Perfect Grave

Chapter Forty-Two

“ A n e-ticket will be waiting for you at the Air Canada counter. Take your passport, it’ll make things easier,” Maggie in travel told Jason over his cell.

He was driving to his apartment, eye on his rearview mirror because he was speeding. Before he’d left the Mirror, Maggie had given him four hundred Canadian dollars and a company credit card.

“You’ve got over two hours to make your flight,” she said. “I’ll get a cab rolling to your place to take you to the airport.”

At his apartment, Jason packed fast.

He grabbed his laptop, extra batteries, files, and enough clothes for two nights. Traffic was choked due to a wreck on I-5. By the time he arrived at Sea-Tac International, got his ticket, got wanded through security, and cleared Canadian Immigration, preboarding was commencing.

As the queue formed, Jason called Grace Garner. He had to smooth things over, he thought, as her line rang. If something broke on the story while he was away, he’d need help. And if he uncovered critical information on this trip, he might need to broker a deal. He got her voice mail. The sound of her voice resurrected memories of them together. He pushed them aside and he left her a message.

“Grace, it’s Jason. I know things have been tense lately, but call me.”

The jet to Vancouver was three-quarters full.

Jason had a window seat with no one beside him for the forty-minute flight. In the air, his stomach tightened over the story. What if he struck out and something broke back home while he was away? Not much he could do about that. Chewing gum did not ease his tension.

Things looked gray outside.

A gentle rain was falling when he landed in Vancouver, British Columbia. Before connecting to Calgary, he checked his phone to see if Grace had returned his call.

Nothing.

He tried calling his old man. Maybe his dad had something. More important, Jason was concerned about how his father was holding up.

No answer.

His jet to Calgary departed on time. When the plane leveled off over the mountains, he put his files, recorder, and laptop on the tray table and began working. He scoured the photocopied pages of Sister Anne’s journal, studied her graceful handwriting. The bulk of her entries were mundane notes or reflection on experiences of delivering hope in Third World countries. But scores of excerpts hinted cryptically at her past. Jason captured them into a story file, highlighting those that leapt from the page, such as: Oh heavenly Father, can I ever be forgiven for what I did, for the pain I caused? Although I am not worthy, please forgive me.

Regret and remorse were the underlying tones, he thought, as he read an excerpt written near the last days of her life: I deeply regret the mistakes I have made and will accept your judgment of me.

What the hell happened? What could a nun have done that would compel such tortured soul-searching? It wasn’t clear. She doesn’t spell it out here. And he considered what Sister Denise told him about Sister Anne’s odd revelation about “destroying lives.”

What does it all mean?

Jason gazed out his window for the answer. Was it out there among the Rockies, reaching up from the earth below? All he could see was an ocean of snowcapped peaks that stretched to the edge of the world.

The key had to be in her past life.

And his best shot at finding it would be with the hermit nun, he thought, closing his laptop and his tray as the plane made its descent.

As the jet banked, its wing tipped. Suburbs wheeled by, along with a web of expressways and buildings. When the plane lined up for its final approach, Jason’s stomach quaked in time with the hydraulic groan of the landing gear coming down.

Man, he could fail on an epic scale.

Or break this story wide open.