Nightrise

question.
    "…And in Auburn, California, last-minute preparations for a very special birthday party. John Trelawny, the man most people believe will win the November election, is returning to the hometown where he was born fifty years ago. These are the streets where, in just a few hours' time, five thousand people are expected to gather to welcome the senator…"
    The story they had been waiting for came onto the screen. Glancing at the picture, Jamie froze. It was as if a chasm had opened up underneath him and he had been sucked into it. He found himself grabbing hold of the bed as if to steady himself. His eyes were fixed on the TV.
    He had seen a face he recognized. Not John Trelawny. It was the last face he had expected to see. It wasn't anyone he had met in the real world.
    It wasn't a real person at all.
    It was a statue.
    A gray stone face. Skin like putty. Hollowed-out eyes. The figure was wearing a shirt with the sleeves rolled up and a crumpled hat. It was resting on one knee, holding a bowl. There was some sort of metal bridge in the background and a few pieces of old mine works around.
    "What is it?" Alicia demanded. She had seen the look on Jamie's face.
    The camera had lingered on it only for a moment but Jamie had heard the words of the commentary. "…
    looking for gold, the town was first founded in the nineteenth century…" And suddenly he understood what this man was…the man he had first seen kneeling by the water in his dreams.
    Not a cowboy. A gold prospector.

    Why?
    "Jamie…?" Alicia was becoming alarmed.
    "Did you see? Just now…"
    "What?"
    "On the screen!"
    It was too late. The picture had changed. Now it was showing old footage of John Trelawny waving to the crowd at another rally.
    "There was a man on the screen just now. Not a man. A statue. I've seen it before and…I don't know why, but it means something. It's important."
    "In Auburn?"
    ''Yes. I think so."
    Alicia slid off the bed. She had a laptop with her and opened it, powering it up and connecting it to the Internet. Meanwhile, Jamie was thinking furiously. He knew he had been sent a sign but it was up to him, and him alone, to make sense of it.
    The statue of a gold prospector in Auburn. A gray giant kneeling on a beach. They were one and the same —Jamie was sure of it. He remembered what Matt had told him. The dream world was there to help them. But sometimes it sent them messages in strange ways. What had the gray man told him?
    "He's gonna kill him. And you have to stop him."
    Was Scott going to be killed in Auburn? Was that what he had meant?
    "His name is Claude Chana," Alicia said. She had accessed an Auburn Web site on her computer. She was looking at a picture of the statue now. "He found gold in the Auburn ravine in 1848 and that led to the establishment of a mining camp which later became the town. There's a statue of him down by the old firehouse."
    "He's gonna kill him."
    "You mean…Scott?"

    "No, boy. You don't understand…"
    But suddenly, with horrible clarity, Jamie did understand. There were two men fighting to become president: John Trelawny and Charles Baker. Nightrise supported Baker. But Trelawny was winning.
    So Nightrise was going to assassinate him.
    And they were going to use Scott.
    "He's gonna kill him."
    The "he" was Scott. The "him" was Trelawny. It was as simple as that.
    'You have to call the senator," Jamie said, and it almost sounded to him as if it was someone else who was talking. 'You have to warn him."
    "What?"
    "They're going to try to kill him."
    Alicia stared at him. "What are you saying? How can you know that?"
    "Please, Alicia. Don't argue with me. I can't explain it to you, but they're going to kill Senator Trelawny in Auburn today and you have to get him on the phone and stop him from going there."
    Alicia hesitated only a few seconds more. Then she grabbed her cell phone and speed-dialed a number.
    Jamie waited as the number was connected. He saw her face fall.
    "Senator…" she said, and he could tell she was leaving a message. "This is Alicia McGuire. I've been talking to Jamie and he says you're in danger, that you mustn't go to Auburn. Please call me back."
    She snapped the phone shut.
    "He wasn't there," Jamie said.
    "I only have his personal cell phone number," Alicia explained. "He wanted me to be able to call him directly. But he may have left his own phone behind. He may have switched it off. I don't know how to reach him."
    "How far is it to Auburn?"

    "I don't know.