Dr. Joshua Randall stood in the large round den, the back half of which held floor to ceiling windows overlooking a deck and the narrow, creek-sized river beyond that served as the far boundary of his property. He saw the eleven people seated on chairs or pillows on the floor around the room. He looked into the eyes of each, holding the gaze for a long time, knowing that the eyes are like a modem transferring vast amounts of information, experiences and history from one person to the next at the same speed information is conveyed from one computer to the next, data so complex and detailed the conscious mind can not comprehend. His face was relaxed and he was unable to suppress a smile.

"It is now seven o'clock and we will officially begin this workshop. Everybody has met everyone else and you all have gotten settled in. I will begin by telling you my experience. I'm excited about, no, let me be totally accurate; I'm filled with joy almost beyond my capacity to contain by the trust and courage all of you have shown in accepting my invitation to come here. My joy also comes from knowing how profound this weekend will be. I already know some of the exercises we'll be doing in our work as couples and how they will affect us, and yet there are so many things that are still a mystery to me and I do not know where they will take us. But I can promise this to you," he paused and let his eyes sweep across the room. "You will likely encounter thoughts, feelings, sensations and intuition beyond anything you've ever conceptualized or heard about, and you will travel further than your most secret wish, beyond thought and previously known experiences. But first I want to put this work, or play if you will, in a context, and indicate why I believe we must proceed with all due haste."

The listeners' initial squirming and glancing around the room had stopped, and all eyes were on Joshua Randall.

"It is now the first Friday after the equinox of spring, two weeks before Good Friday, thirteen days before Passover and sixteen days before Easter," Dr. Randall continued. "According to my calculations, we are in either the last few days of the old millennium or the first few days of the new millennium. Everyone thinks the new millennium is five years away when the year 2001 arrives, but that assumption is based on the Roman calendar which, in turn, is based on Christianity and the birth of Jesus. Most scholars agree, however, that Jesus was not born on December 25th, and not in the year we base our calendars upon. The Gospels were written decades after his death, and only two describe his birth, so arriving at a specific date was not likely. What is known from Biblical scholars, astronomers and historians is that the birth date was probably five years earlier, and in the spring. There were shepherds in the fields, according to the Bible, watching their flocks at night, most likely during lambing season which called for the shepherds' presence, and this would have been in the spring, our present time of year. We also know from Luke that the journey to Bethlehem occurred as a result of the Roman census when Quirinius was the governor of Syria, in about 5 BC. In that same year Chinese astronomers recorded an exploding star, in the constellation Capricorn, that shined for 70 days and is a good candidate for the star that 'lit the way'. It's my belief," Dr. Randall said as he looked into the distance beyond the small river behind the house, "that a more accurate calendar based on Jesus' birth puts us now at the year 2001."

The eleven people around the room looked at Joshua intently through unblinking eyes. Half of their attention was upon him, and the other half was on an internal search to find some reference for what he was talking about, to figure out why he was taking them in this direction. All except Jeanne Randall, his wife, were surprised by the swiftness with which Joshua had framed the weekend in mystery. They were intrigued, excited and yet slightly apprehensive. In response to the sudden deviation from the expected into unknown territory, their bodies remained motionless.

"So what difference does that make, you might ask." Dr. Randall paused, and brought his gaze back to the people in the room. The smile was gone. "You have heard many speak of the new millennium. Collectively, we all sense great changes coming even though we have no sensible data to rely upon. But when we look at evidence that doesn't come from science, we see predictions from long ago about forthcoming shifts in the world. Did you know we're already in the last 25 year segment of the Mayan calendar? Think of the implications of that; after 5000 years, the last delineated time span! Here was a civilization that not only knew of the planets, they also knew where these planets were located in the heavens, and they didn't have telescopes. What advanced knowledge did they have? The Mayans have predicted a shift of major proportion in the world at the end of their calendar. Likewise we are at the end of the Hopi calendar. And America's only recognized prophet and seer, Edgar Cayce, has predicted that at the end of this century there will be a discovery at the anterior part of the Sphinx so profound it will be beyond all known things. Nostradamus's prophecies indicate global war which will destroy civilization as we know it in the next few years, which will in turn lead to a new era on earth that will last a thousand years."

Dr. Randall paused again, looked deeply into the eyes of several of the listeners, then returned his gaze to the outside. "It has been prophesized that preceding this shift will be major changes in the atmospheric conditions, with chaotic weather producing catastrophic results; and, you have seen the flooding, droughts, excessive tornadoes, hurricanes hitting the northeastern United States, and blizzards in the springtime. I think the shift is very close at hand, closer than anyone thinks, so there is no time to waste in preparing at all levels for that transition if we are to survive. As in nature, the species that can adapt survives; all else perish."

"I believe this work is about just that, of evolving to another level. It is not perfected yet. I asked you here, in part, to test out some of the work, and also to experiment. You might think of this as your own Kittyhawk. We're going to see if this plane flies."

"Josh," Bill McNair from North Carolina said. "Everyone here is part of a couple. There's the five of us and you and Jeanne. Is this a coincidence, or does that have something to do with it, I mean getting to that next level you're talking about?"

"It has everything to do with it." Joshua looked at his wife and the corners of her mouth turned upward in a knowing smile. His eyes returned the smile as he spoke. "At least right now it does, and maybe always. We'll get into the specifics shortly, but I just wanted everyone to know how seriously I take what we are doing." He scanned the room to make his point, then smiled broadly.

"On Sunday evening before we part, I have a special guest who'll be joining us for supper. I think you'll be pleased."

"I don't know, Josh," said Mike Thomas from Baton Rouge. Don't you think that might be a bit risky? You know, having thirteen people at a supper this close to Easter?"

Everyone laughed.

CHAPTER 1

All of the material for what was likely to be a long night's vigil was either on his person or in a pile on the desk. There were a camera, video camera, night vision goggles, small tape recorder, extra tapes, note pads, pens and pencils, badges and various forms of identification, a duffel bag with a coffee-filled Thermos bottle, audiotapes, brass knuckles, urine collection bottle, a five-inch knife, mace, a billy, and a holstered .38 police revolver. Surveillance was not John Hilliard's favorite activity.

The long hours of waiting, the boredom, the fear that he might nod off in those few moments when he needed to be recording and photographing some incriminating activity, were always present during surveillance. He once tailed a wife for weeks after her husband suspected her cheating on him and hired John to "find the truth." When Hilliard finally spotted her engaging in unusual activity on a rainy and cold November New Orleans night, he was ready to gather the data with his camera and long distance lens after only a few hours' wait by the motel. But his head throbbed that night, probably from sinus problems caused by the south Louisiana humidity and an erratic sleeping pattern that made him more vulnerable to minor illnesses. To ease his pain during the wait John swallowed two Tylenol in the dark. He didn't see that they were blue, not white, and he couldn't have known that his receptionist inadvertently purchased Tylenol PM for him the week before. By the time he pulled himself from the drugged sleep, he was sitting with a stiff neck behind the wheel of his van in full daylight, the opportunity for gathering evidence long passed. John wanted to continue the hunt and knew he'd catch the woman in time, but her urges were apparently intermittent and before she ever presented another opportunity the husband got tired of paying for the meter to run, half- convinced by then that his imagination was just overactive anyway. John heard years later they were divorced, and she had gotten a huge settlement. He was determined never to let another client down again.

Tonight he felt good. At 45, John Hilliard was in decent shape. He had an athletic frame and even though he was not muscular, he was very strong. His strength came as much from his determination and will as from physical prowess. With brown hair, slightly over six feet and no distinguishing features, he could easily be mistaken for a lawyer, banker, high school coach or member of many other professions. He had stopped smoking three years earlier, and rather than gain weight he actually lost sixteen pounds because of the excessive and compulsive exercise he used to take his mind off the constant craving for cigarettes during those first three months. After that, the craving stopped for no apparent reason but he was already hooked on exercise, including the early morning runs, occasional biking, pick-up basketball games at the health club, and lifting the free weights he preferred over the club's cushiony machines that didn't quite produce enough pain for him.

Tonight seemed to be routine surveillance. He was to watch a large office supply company whose owners turned up missing items in their last inventory--mostly printers, fax machines, hand held calculators, and parts for a variety of office machines. The company president who contacted him didn't want to bring in the police because he suspected an inside job, and he didn't want their presence to scare off the thief. He suspected several people, the prime one an assistant supervisor who recently seemed stressed and tense, and who had access to keys to the warehouse. A set of keys was missing and there was no evidence of forced entry, or stock in disarray at the warehouse. Except for the inventory, no one would have known anything was wrong.

John pulled a navy fleece sweatshirt over his head. He often wore a jogging suit on surveillance because if he got out of his van for a closer look, the suit made him seem less suspicious. People associated health consciousness with jogging and, therefore, they relaxed and were less vigilant.

Just as he reached for his cell phone it rang; he answered it before it had a chance to ring twice.

"John?" It was a man's voice. "John Hilliard?"

"Yes."

"John," he said again, this time sounding like a friend. "This is Tom Randall. How have you been? Long time, no see."

Tom Randall. Maybe they weren't the best of friends back at Brother Martin High School--those New Orleans all-male Catholic high school days--but they were always friendly to each other. It was Tom who coached him, helping him pass an American history test after he'd stayed too long at the arcade the night before. They played sports together, competing with and against each other in intramural football, soccer, basketball. Both lettered three straight years in varsity football.

"Tom!" They hadn't seen each other since their tenth-year class reunion, sixteen years ago. A lot had happened. "I'm doing well, thanks," he lied. His life wasn't going the way he wanted it to. He had plenty of work, his vehicles ran well, and there were only seven years left on his mortgage but something was missing. He wasn't depressed, but then again he was losing his capacity to care. Yeah, that was it--but he certainly wasn't going to tell Tom. As a private investigator he learned years ago not to expose his weaknesses. Always protect the underbelly, he thought. And the jugular. "It's good to hear from you. It's really been a long time...what's been going on in your life?"

"I don't know if you remember back in 1980 at the reunion but I had just married about two years earlier. The family's grown since then. Got three kids now; the oldest is fourteen and the youngest, six. Like a lot of other folks, I've got myself saddled with a mortgage, car notes, a job that drains me, and school tuition. I can barely make enough money to keep up with all the things TV ads entice us to think we can't do without. At this point I don't know if I own all that stuff or it owns me."

His voice suddenly deepened. "I'd love to meet with you some time and catch up on old times but right now I've got a problem, I think, and I need your help. Actually, I don't know if we have a problem or not, and that's part of the problem, the not knowing. It's about my brother, Josh. I don't know if you ever met him. Well, anyway, my sister Allison and I are really concerned. Did you ever meet her? No, of course not," he answered, before John could respond. "Josh is two-and-a-half years younger than me, and Allison was born one-and-a-half years after him. She's the baby."

John recognized the signs of nervousness--the repetition of words, hesitation, and focus upon irrelevant details, but he said nothing.

"As usual, as the older brother I have to try and take care of things. Don't get me wrong, though, I really don't mind, it's just that now I don't know what to do so I'm turning to you for help. I heard you did private investigations, and I checked with some of my lawyer friends who they tell me you have a good reputation for staying on something until it's done. Even heard it was you who got the initial photos of that preacher in the Airline Highway motel with the hooker."

"What's the situation with your brother?" John asked, diverting attention away from himself. He could hear the edginess in Tom's voice. Despite's Tom's friendliness and his attempts to present information in an unemotional fashion, his use of language and his frequent inhalations told John just how anxious he was.

At first there was silence. "I'm trying to collect my thoughts as much as possible," Tom said, "but I'm not really sure. Josh and his wife Jeanne are missing though. We haven't heard from them for at least a week, and it's not like them to just disappear like that. We got a call from Josh's secretary on Friday when he didn't show up to see his patients. He had some type of workshop over the weekend, and took off from work from Monday to Wednesday, but he was due back at his office Thursday afternoon. He consults at a hospital on Thursday mornings, and had scheduled conference calls and catch-up work in the afternoon at his office. Brenda, his secretary, thought it was odd when he didn't come in, and she called his house and got no answer. She was really alarmed Friday morning when he didn't show up and all his patients started coming in. Didn't know what to tell them. She was finally able to get in touch with me about noon on Friday."

Tom sounded out of breath. Having interrogated many people over the years, John always looked for physiological signs that might signal fear, anger or truthfulness, and he knew Tom was probably mouth breathing high up in the chest, and was close to hyperventilating. John waited.

"They live across the lake," Tom continued, his voice a little stronger, "and Allison and I drove over Friday afternoon. When we got over there the house was locked, but we have keys. One of their cars was gone and there was a lot of mail stacked in the mailbox. Six days' worth! Everything was in place, and nothing seemed to be missing. There were some large and unusual drawings on the table though, and I don't know what they mean. One was an infinity symbol with energy representations within each loop. Another looked like a four leaf clover, or a propeller. The other was a star." Tom paused as though going off on a new thought. "We called several of their friends but no one has seem them for a week. We keep calling the house, but there is no answer."

"I suppose you've already contacted the sheriff's office over in St. Tammany Parish about this?"

"Yep, soon as we left Josh's place. But you already know how they treat missing persons' reports, especially for adults. They'd act more interested if I'd said my prize cat was missing. We called them again yesterday and today and they say they're looking into it, but so far they don't have anything to report. One of the reasons I'm calling you is that you might be able to find out if they are really looking into this situation."

A former deputy sheriff, John believed the police were probably taking it more seriously than they let on. Cops just weren't that good at showing empathy or patience, he thought. He was also aware that a woman from Slidell had disappeared from her home in mid-day last month and was still missing, and he assumed law enforcement officers were studying data from both cases to see if there was any similarity.

Someone missing. Usually it was a one-shot deviation from the norm. An executive, fed up with workday demands, reaches the end of his rope and escapes to Aruba with a plane ticket and a dream of the good life. A few days or weeks later reality sets in, he's bored, and he decides to return, only the life he comes back to is now more complicated by an angry and hurt family and distrustful co-workers. Or the eighteen-year-old girls who disappear with their latest "soulmates," convinced they've found their one true love even though Mom and Dad disapprove. Sometimes, if the girl is lucky, she and the guy have an illusion-shattering fight before their vows, and she comes back home in tears.

Sometimes, though, the outcomes were different. A missing child, later found under a bridge near the Bonnet Carre Spillway, who had been abused and strangled. A clerk who was later discovered to have embezzled tens of thousands of dollars from a retirement fund, and only returned through extradition. John learned to trust his intuition over the years, and he thought there was reason in this case to worry. But he asked the standard questions anyway, just to make sure.

"Is it possible he and Jeanne just needed to get away by themselves for a while?"

"They were already by themselves," said Tom. "They have only one kid, Christopher, a freshman up at Georgetown. And they say so often how much they love their house in Covington. Besides, every time they go away for more than a couple of days they call and let either me or Allison know. Ever since Mom and Dad died, we've all been closer. We keep in touch. It's just not like them."

Although he already knew the answer John said, "Could there have been some kind of emergency that came up and they didn't have time to call?"

"No," Tom replied. "There have been dire emergencies in the past, like when Chris was in a car accident, and they always called. I guess it's conceivable but highly unlikely."

"Do they carry a beeper or cell phone?"

"No. Josh says he hates phones and the last thing in the world he wants is for everyone to be able to contact him whenever they want. Says he'd just as soon have a bell around his neck and a ball and chain around his ankle. He's always been an independent sort. He follows the rules but he also likes to follow his own path. He is always on the look for something. I'm not sure what it is but he gets involved in all kinds of things to learn new ideas, new therapies, new 'ways of being' as he calls it. Don't know what in the hell he means by that, but that's just him. He keeps saying he's on the trail of truth. I keep reminding him that the one truth is the golden rule, you know, where the one with the gold makes the rules. He just laughs and says that's true too, and he likes gold as much as the next person."

John took everything in when he listened. Finally he said, "You said he learned therapies. Is he a shrink?"

"He's a psychologist. Got his degree from Duke University about fifteen years ago. He was in private practice in Metairie with a psychiatrist and a couple of social workers, but about five years ago he went into solo practice in Covington."

"What kind of people does he see? Does he specialize in treating certain types of problems?"

"He sees a variety of patients with the usual type of problems like anxiety and depression. People with work-related problems, stress. In recent years he has gotten heavily involved in working with couples, you know, marriage therapy, helping people decide if they want to stay married or not."

For a second John's thoughts flashed back to Rachel, and one of their sessions with a marriage therapist. He could still see her melancholy face in detail. He forced his attention back to what Tom was saying.

"Sometimes he helps them decide whether or not to get married. He really likes doing that type work. Says he's making discoveries that pull all his previous learning together. He says he thinks he's discovered the key we've all been looking for."

"What does he mean by that? Key to what?"

"Damned if I know. Sometimes he says it might be the key to paradise. At other times it's the 'code to the next realm,' whatever that means. I don't really get it."

Although curious about what Josh meant by the key, John directed the conversation back to the more serious matter. "I would imagine he has dealt with some pretty irate spouses at times. Has he ever mentioned any particular individuals who might have blamed him for their relationship not making it?"

"Josh never talks much about any particular patients. He might make a general comment now and then, but never connected to a name. I don't recall him having any problems with a couple, but he did mention a situation recently that concerned him--something about a woman with multiple personalities. One of the personalities identified herself as the 'daughter of Satan,' and another personality said she was an angel. Josh told me he hadn't treated patients with this problem before, and in fact thinks people either make it up or else it is caused by the therapist. He seemed a bit worried about her, and said he might be getting in over his head. Now that he's missing, that comment is beginning to take on a different meaning for me."

"I imagine therapists see some people who are crazy or paranoid or off-balance in some way. Have any of them ever threaten him?"

"I'm not aware of it if they did. Like I said, Josh doesn't say very much about the people he works with."

John looked at his watch. He knew he had to hurry because he needed to set up for tonight's surveillance. At the same time he wanted to help Tom, to let him know he understood his concerns and took them seriously. "Tom, do you know of any difficulties he or his wife might have had? Like financial problems? Personal problems? Any legal difficulties? Or anyone who might have had something against them, or might have wanted to harm them?" John's voice dropped. It was never easy asking relatives questions like these.

"Not that I know of," Tom responded. "If they have any of those problems, they haven't mentioned them to me. Financially, they are doing well. Josh's practice is doing well and Jeanne's shop always has customers. I don't know of any legal problems. I certainly don't know of any one who'd want to hurt them. I think both of them get along with everyone else better than most people do."

"How do Josh and Jeanne get along?" John asked. "Any troubles in the marriage?"

"No, they get along great. Looks to me like they really care about each other." There was a pause. "I think they may have had some rough spots five or six years ago, but nothing like that since."

"What kind of rough spots?"

"I don't know. Neither ever said and I never asked. I actually don't even know if they had problems. All I know is they didn't seem happy back then, and they just didn't talk to each other much when they were in my presence."

"Could either be romantically involved with someone else at the present time?"

"Highly unlikely. Like I said, they just seem to be really happy with each other."

John glanced at the gear on the table. "Tom, is there anything you can think of that is related to their disappearance?"

There was a long pause, then Tom replied, "Like I said, Josh was an adventurer. Always looking for something. He always said he'd wallow in a pig sty if he knew he'd find a diamond. I think he meant that in his search for this ideal life he talks about, he sometimes goes to extreme lengths to get it. He told me about workshops and seminars and training programs he attended or participated in, and I have to tell you, John, sometimes they sound far out. I wonder at times if there aren't a lot of kooks at those things. When I ask, Josh just laughs and says he's going to hire me out as a worrier for some of his anxious patients. Says that as long as he 'stays on the path' he is safe. So I'd ask him what damn path he's talking about, and he just says 'THE path, you know, the path to heaven.'" Tom's voice ended abruptly.

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