"Is this where you see the Virgin in the Clouds?" the older man asked.

Dee felt her heart soar. The Lord had brought these seekers to her. The miracle would return and she would guide them. "This is the place. If you have faith and a willing heart, G.o.d will speak to you."

The young man checked the sky and smirked. "There aren't any clouds."

"There will be."

"We don't have time for this!" said the older lady.

"What about the trees in the park?" asked the young lady. "Somebody saw Jesus and Mary there yesterday."

"Let's go!" said the older man.

Dee called after them, "But this is the place!"

"You can have it!" the young man mocked.

And just that quick, they were gone.

Dee's heart sank, but she remained there, sitting on the hood of her car. The clouds would return. She had faith.

"HOW MUCH do we really know about this guy?" asked Richard, the real estate broker from Wisconsin.

"Everything we need to know," replied Andy Parmenter, the retired California executive. "He's a messenger of G.o.d-"

"No, no, now come on, that's a cop-out and you know it!" said Weaver, the CPA from Chicago.

"There's something he's not telling!" warned Richard.

"Like everything, maybe?" said Weaver.

They were gathered around the front of Andy Parmenter's big motor home, all three of them in sour moods they'd been working on for days.

"It hit me this morning," said Real Estate Richard. "Here we are in this RV park with-what?-three hundred other people?"

"Four hundred, I think," Weaver the CPA offered.

"I'm still waiting to have my water turned on, I'm smelling the sewage from sixty other vehicles in my row that isn't going anywhere, it's just sitting in the sewer lines-"

"The whole system's backed up."

"And we've got kids crying and couples fighting and radios blaring while I'm trying to sleep-"

"And who's that loud-mouthed prophet lady over in Row Four?" "Which one, Moses' sister, Miriam, or Isaac's wife, Rebecca?"

"She doesn't know when to shut up, does she? Who's listening to her?"

"Your point, Richard!" Andy demanded. "Get to your point!" Richard leaned forward and gestured like an angry Italian. "My point is, this morning it hit me: I am not better off than I was back in Wisconsin. Back there I had a house and a job and people who looked up to me. I didn't like it, it didn't feel like it was about anything, but-" He looked around the RV park hastily laid out on George Harding's property. "What's so great about this? I may as well be back in Wisconsin!"

Andy shook his head impatiently. "Richard, you have to be willing to sacrifice."

"What sacrifice? I didn't come here to sacrifice! I came here because you told me Nichols could produce."

"He can't produce!" said Weaver.

"Wait a minute, Weaver!" said Andy. "He healed your bald spot, didn't he?"

"My bald spot? My bald spot? Winnie and I came all the way out here and she still has her hay fever and she still bugs the heck out of me and now my motor home's in mud up to the axles! And you want me to be happy about a freakin' bald spot?"

"So leave!" Andy snapped.

"Uh-uh!" said Richard. "I'm coming to my point here: You're the one who talked us into this!"

"I sold my house, remember?" said Weaver, who started poking Andy in the chest. "You told me to sell my house, so now I'm sitting in the mud with that stupid motor home in a wheat field with a wife I can't stand who has hay fever!"

Andy grabbed the poking finger and pushed it away. "Don't touch me again, Weaver!"

"Why? You gonna do something about it?" This time Weaver shoved him.

Andy outweighed him. His shove put Weaver on his back in the stubble. Richard got into the fight, then Weaver again. Andy's neighbor sided with Andy and threw his weight into it. Weaver resorted to straw and mud, Richard to lots of high kicking, Andy to more shoving and a little biting.

A bigger crowd would have gathered to watch, but theirs was not the only fight worth watching. Over on Row Four, Dorothy who once had arthritis and Alice who once had a bad hip were in the middle of a face-scratching, hair-pulling catfight over whose grandkid broke out a window, and Row Two had two fights involving six people and plenty of black, sticky mud to make it interesting.

"AND WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN?" Brandon Nichols growled as Michael came in the back door to the house dripping wet. Nichols was standing on a chair while Melody Blair worked hurriedly, pinning the hem of his new white robe.

"I'm afraid I've taken a swim."

Nichols's fiery eyes glared at him through his disheveled hair. "You went swimming when I need you?" He snapped at Melody, "Are you through?"

"Just a few more pins and-"

"The people need some enlightenment! They need their eyes opened! Who put their bodies together? Who put bread in their stomachs and hope in their hearts? TELL ME!"

Michael jumped a little at Nichols's outburst but answered loyally, "You did, my Lord! You and only you!"

Nichols gave a slight nod of approval though the anger did not leave his face. "Then we'll have to go over it again for the sake of those who've forgotten! Did you hear there's another messiah in town? There's somebody else telling people he's the christ! In my town!"

Michael was quite dismayed. "How can this be, when you are the Christ?"

Nichols glared at nothing, half in a world of his own. "Sally Fordyce is a poison to us. She's lying. We'll have to take care of that. And Mrs. Macon . . ." He cursed. "I fault myself for hiring Gildy Holliday." Nervously, he swept his hair from his face with his fingers. "We've got a lot to do and not a lot of time. Michael, who is the Christ?"

"You are, my Lord."

"Who, Michael? Who is the Christ?"

"You and only you."

Nichols leaned, pointing his finger, his eyes like cold, white marbles. "WHO IS THE CHRIST, MICHAEL?"

Michael shouted back, "You are!"

Nichols nodded approvingly. "Simple. It's as plain as anything can be. We just need to tell them, Michael, and keep telling them until they get it. We're going into town today. We're going to make it abundantly clear!"

"You-you're going into Antioch?"

Nichols screamed toward the hall. "Mary!"

The voice of the Virgin Mary Donovan came from a distant room in the house. "Yea, my son?"

"Be ready in ten minutes!" Then he glared at Michael. "Put on some dry clothes and then go out and help Matt prepare the truck.

You're my prophet, Michael. You're going to prophesy." He reached down and swatted Melody on the head. She cowered, fearing another blow. "Hurry it up!"

AT OUR LADY ' S , Arnold Kowalski brought in the ladder. The pilgrims wanted it in place, ready for the next miracle. His feet hurt, his hands hurt, and carrying that ladder up the platform steps was no easy task, but no one in the crowd offered to help. This was his penance, he figured, the price to pay for a refreshing of his own private blessing.

His personal crucifix was still around his neck, and judging from the recurrence of his pain, it must need recharging. He didn't think anyone would get upset if he went up the ladder to, uh, dust off the crucifix. He was, after all, the church maintenance man. He'd brought the ladder, hadn't he? For all his trouble and pain he deserved access to the wonderful wooden image.

Setting the ladder carefully in place, he started climbing, one painful step at a time. He could hear the people beginning to stir behind him. He looked over his shoulder and produced his dust rag. "Church maintenance. Just gonna dust things off."

They didn't seem too sure about that.

He reached the top of the ladder, face to face with the image, and began to feign dusting as he carefully, stealthily pulled his crucifix from under his shirt. Leaning awkwardly-he still had the chain around his neck-he managed to touch the big crucifix with his own.

"Hey!" a man yelled. "What are you doing?"

"Uh . . . just dusting."

"Whatcha got in your hand?"

And then it started. "What's in his hand? What is he doing?" People got out of their seats, ran for a better viewing angle. "He's trying to steal the blessing! Look! He's got another crucifix!"

People were running onto the platform for a better look-and they were mad!

"Get down from there!"

"You think I came all this way-"

"How dare you!"

The ladder started shaking.

"Oh no, no, please!" Arnold cried. A hand grabbed his ankle. "OHH!"

The ladder shook again. Another hand grabbed Arnold's other ankle. "Get down from there!"

"Well if he's gonna get some, I'm gonna get some!"

"You'll have to wait your turn!"

The lady who once had leukemia slapped the fat lady, who slapped her back, the procrastinator shoved them both, and Penny squirmed through the opening in the crowd trying to get to the ladder. A mob was forming on the platform and the ladder was beginning to teeter away from the wall.

Arnold was sure he was going to die.

There was a crash. A candle stand had fallen over.

"Now look what you did!"

"Look what I got!"

"Give me that!"

Slaps. Punches. Screams.

Arnold tried to climb down. Hands yanked him and he fell into the crowd. Now there was a free-for-all for the ladder. OOF! They were walking right on his back!

Father Vendetti came racing in, yelled something, waved his hands, yelled again. n.o.body listened.

A burly character who'd been sitting in the front row reached the top of the ladder and grabbed the crucifix with both hands, making it wiggle on its wall mountings.

"Is it loose?" someone asked.

"Loose enough."

"Yeah," said the fat lady, "why does it have to be up there where we can't reach it?"

A riotous yell went up from the crowd and the burly man started heaving and yanking.

Father Vendetti ran for his office and the telephone.

"GUESS WE'RE GONNA have ourselves a little parade," said Matt Kiley, strapping down some loudspeakers in the back of the ranch's big flatbed. "The Boss likes attention, ever notice that?"

Michael was yanking the starter rope of a small Honda gas generator anch.o.r.ed between some hay bales. It wouldn't start.

"Choke it."

"Where's that?"

Matt flipped the choke up. "Try it."

Michael yanked again, and the generator came to life.

Matt opened the choke and then switched on the PA. He spoke into the wireless microphone. "h.e.l.lo, testing, testing." His voice boomed out of the speakers, echoing off the ranch house and barn.

"Brandon Nichols, you are ready to greet your public!" He handed the microphone to Michael. "Go on, get out in front and try it out."

Michael took the microphone and hopped down from the flatbed. For the first time since he'd knocked on the door of the Macon ranch house, he felt a little foolish.

"Come on," said Matt, "let's hear something prophetic!"