Redemption Road: A Novel Read Online Free Page B

and the purpose, the determination every day to make the world better. Life with your father was like standing next to an open fire, just raw force and heat and purpose. He got out of bed driven and ended every day the same. He made me very happy for a lot of years.”
    “And now?”
    She smiled wistfully. “Let’s just say that as rigid as he may have grown, my home will always be between your father’s walls.”
    Elizabeth appreciated the simple elegance of such commitment. The preacher. The preacher’s wife. She let a moment pass, thinking how it must have been for them: the passion and the cause, the early days and the great, stone church. “It’s not like the old place, is it?” She turned back to the window and stared out at rock-lined gardens and brown grass, at the poor, narrow church wrapped in sunbaked clapboards. “I think about it sometimes: the cool and the quiet, the long view from the front steps.”
    “I thought you hated the old church.”
    “Not always. And not with such passion.”
    “Why are you here, sweetheart?” Her mother’s reflection appeared in the same pane of glass. “Really?”
    Elizabeth sighed, knowing this was the reason she’d come. “Am I a good person?” Her mother started to smile, but Elizabeth stopped her. “I’m serious, Mom. It’s like now. It’s the middle of the night. Things in my life are troubled and uncertain, and here I am.”
    “Don’t be silly.”
    “Am I a taker?”
    “Elizabeth Frances Black, you’ve never taken anything in your whole life. Since you were a child I’ve watched you give, first to your father and the congregation, now to the whole city. How many medals have you won? How many lives have you saved? What’s this really about?”
    Elizabeth sat again and stared into her drink, both shoulders lifting. “You know how well I shoot.”
    “Ah. Now, I understand.” She took her daughter’s hand, and creases gathered at her eyes as she squeezed it once and took the seat across the table. “If you shot those men eighteen times, then you had good reason. Nothing anybody ever says will make me feel different about that.”
    “You’ve read the papers?”
    “Generalities.” She made a dismissive sound. “Distortion.”
    “Two men are dead. What else is there to say?”
    “Baby girl.” She refilled Elizabeth’s glass and poured more in hers. “That’s like using white to describe a full moon rising, or wet to capture the glory of the oceans. You saved an innocent girl. Everything else pales.”
    “You know the state police are investigating?”
    “I know only that you did what you felt was right, and that if you shot those men eighteen times, there was a good reason for doing so.”
    “And if the state police disagree?”
    “My goodness.” Her mother laughed again. “You can’t possibly doubt yourself that much. They’ll have their little investigation, and they’ll clear your name. Surely you see that.”
    “Nothing seems clear right now. What happened. Why it happened. I haven’t really slept.”
    Her mother sipped, then pointed with a finger. “Are you familiar with the word inspiration ? The meaning of it? Where it comes from?”
    Elizabeth shook her head.
    “In the Dark Ages, no one understood the things that made some people special, things like imagination or creativity or vision. People lived and died in the same small village. They had no idea why the sun rose or set or why winter came. They grubbed in the dirt and died young of disease. Every soul in that dark, difficult time faced the same limitations, every soul except a precious few who came rarely to the world and saw things differently, the poets and inventors, the artists and stonemasons. Regular folks didn’t understand people like that; they didn’t understand how a person could wake up one day and see the world differently. They thought it was a gift from God. Thus, the word inspiration . It means ‘breathed upon.’”
    “I’m no artist. No