Dark Rivers of the Heart

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        Interstate 15 was a quarter mile ahead. Spencer was stunned that the truck had been carried so far in so little time. The currents were even faster than they seemed.
        The highway spanned the arroyo-usually a dry wash-on massive concrete columns. Through the smeary windshield and heavy rain, the bridge supports appeared to be absurdly numerous, as if government engineers had designed the structure primarily to funnel millions of dollars to a senator's nephew in the concrete business.
        The central passage between the bridge supports was broad enough to let five trucks pass abreast. But half the flood churned through the harrower races between the closely ranked columns on each side of the middle channel. Impact with the bridge supports would be deadly.
        Swoo in lun in the rode a series of raids. Water s lashed against the windows. The river picked up speed. A lot of speed.
        Rocky was shaking more violently than ever and panting raggedly.
        "Easy, pal, easy. You better not pee on the seat. You hear?"
        On I-50, the headlights of big rigs and cars moved through the stormdarkened day. Emergency flashers threw red light into the rain where motorists had stopped on the shoulder to wait out the downpour.
        The bridge loomed. Exploding ceaselessly against the concrete columns, the river threw sheets of spray into the rain-choked air.
        The truck had attained a fearful velocity, shooting downstream.
        It rolled violently, and waves of nausea swelled through Spencer.
        "Better not pee on the seat," he repeated, no longer speaking only to the dog.
        He reached under his fleece-lined denim jacket, under his soaked shirt, and withdrew the 'made-green soapstone medallion that hung on a gold chain around his neck. On one side was the carved head of a dragon. On the other side was an equally stylized pheasant.
        Spencer vividly recalled the elegant, windowless office beneath China Dream. Louis Lee's smile. The bow tie, suspenders. The gentle voice:
        I sometimes give one of these to people who seem to need it.
        Without slipping the chain over his head, he held the medallion in one hand. He felt childish, but he held it tightly nonetheless.
        The bridge was fifty yards ahead. The Explorer was going to pass dangerously close to the forest of columns on the right.
        Pheasants and dragons. Prosperity and long life.
        He remembered the statue of Quan Yin by the front door of the restaurant. Serene but vigilant. Guarding against envious people.
        After a life like yours, you can believe in this?
        We must believe in something, Mr. Grant.
        Ten yards from the bridge, ferocious currents caught the truck, lifted it, dropped it, tipped it half onto its right side, rolled it back to the left, and slapped loudly against the doors.
        Sailing out of the storm into the eclipsing shadow of the highway above, they passed the first of the bridge columns in the row immediately to the right. Passed the second. At horrendous speed.
        The river was so high that the solid underside of the bridge was only a foot above the truck.
        They surged nearer to the columns, bulleting past the third, the fourth, nearer still.
        Pheasants and dragons. Pheasants and dragons.
        'The currents pulled the truck away from the concrete supports and dropped it into a sudden swale in the turbulent surface, where it wallowed with filthy water to its windowsills. The river teased Spencer with the posibility in them along as if they were 1 of safe assa e in that troll hush' on a bobsled in a luge chute-but then it mocked his brief flicker of hope by lifting the truck again and tossing it passenger-side-first into the next column. The crash was as loud as a bomb blast, metal shrieked, and Rocky howled.
        The impact pitched Spencer to his left, a move that the safety harness couldn't check. The side of his head slammed into the window.
        In spite of all the other clamor, he heard the tempered glass webbing with a million hairline cracks, a sound like a crisp slice of toast being crushed with a sudden clench of a fist.
        Cursing, he put his left hand to the side of his head. No blood.
        Only a rapid throbbing that was in time with his heartbeat.
        The window was a mosaic of thousands of tiny chips of glass, held together by the gummy film in the center of