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Dance of Death
Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
9/17/2005

DANCE OF DEATH

Douglas Preston

and

Lincoln Child

WARNER BOOKS

NEW YORK BOSTON

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and
incidents are the product of the authors' imagination or are used
fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or
persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Original poetry on page 406 is from "Piano" by D. H. Lawrence
© 1918.

Copyright © 2005 by Lincoln Child and Splendide Mendax,
Inc.

All rights reserved.

Warner Books

Time Warner Book Group

1271 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020

Visit our Web site at www.twbookmark.com.

Printed in the United States of America

First Printing: June 2005

10 987654321

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication
Data

Preston, Douglas J.

Dance of death / Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child.- 1st
ed.

p. cm.

Summary: "FBI Special Agent Pendergast is pitted against his
most personal foe: His

brother, Diogenes, has planned a horrendous crime and is
framing Pendergast for a series of terrible murders."-Provided by
the publisher.

ISBN 0-446-57697-2 (regular hardcover ed.) - ISBN
0-446-57830-4 (large print ed.)

1. Government investigators-Fiction. 2. False
testimony-Fiction. 3. Sibling rivalry-

Fiction. 4. Serial murders-Fiction. 5. Brothers-Fiction. I.
Child, Lincoln. II. Title.

PS3566.R3982D36 2005

813'.54 -dc22 2005003933

Book design by Giorgetta Bell McRee

Lincoln Child

dedicates this book to his daughter,
Veronica

Douglas Preston

dedicates this book to his daughter,
Aletheia

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

At Warner Books, we would like to thank the following: Jamie
Raab, Larry Kirshbaum, Maureen Egen, Devi Pillai, Christine Barba
and the Sales Team, Karen Torres and Marketing, Martha Otis and
the Advertising and Promotions Department, Jennifer Romanello,
Dan Rosen, Maja Thomas, Flag Tonuzi, Bob Castillo, Penina Sacks,
Jim Spivey, Miriam Parker, Beth de Guzman, and Les
Pockell.

A special thanks to our editor, Jaime Levine, for being a
tireless champion of the Preston-Child novels. We owe much of our
success to her fine editing, enthusiasm, and
advocacy.

Thanks also to our agents, Eric Simonoff at Janklow
Nesbit, and Matthew Snyder of Creative Artists Agency. Garlands
of laurel leaves to Special Agent Douglas Margini, Jon Couch,
John Rogan, and Jill Nowak, for their diverse and sundry
ministrations.

And, as always, we want to thank our wives and children for
their love and support.

It goes without saying that the characters, corporations,
events, locales, police precincts, periodicals, museums, and
governmental bodies described on these pages are all fictitious,
or are used fictiously.

ONE

Dewayne Michaels sat in the second row of the lecture hall,
staring at the professor with what he hoped passed for interest.
His eyelids were so heavy they felt as if lead sinkers had been
sewn to them. His head pounded in rhythm with his heart and his
tongue tasted like something had curled up and died on it. He'd
arrived late, only to find the huge hall packed and just one seat
available: second row center, smack-dab in front of the lectern.
Just great.

Dewayne was majoring in electrical engineering. He'd elected
this class for the same reason engineering students had done so
for three decades-it was a gimme. "English Literature-A Humanist
Perspective" had always been a course you could breeze through
and barely crack a book. The usual professor, a fossilized old
turd named Mayhew, droned on like a hypnotist, hardly ever
looking up from his forty-year-old lecture notes, his voice
perfectly pitched for sleeping. The old fart never even changed
his exams, and copies were all over Dewayne's dorm. Just his
luck, then, that-for this one semester- a certain renowned
Dr. Torrance Hamilton was teaching the course. It was as if Eric
Clapton had agreed to play the junior prom, the way they fawned
over Hamilton.

Dewayne shifted disconsolately. His butt had already fallen
asleep in the cold plastic seat. He glanced to his left, to his
right. All around, students-upperclassmen, mostly-were typing
notes, running microcassette recorders, hanging on the
professor's every word. It was the first time ever the course had
been filled to capacity. Not an engineering student in
sight.

What a crock.

Dewayne reminded himself he still had a week to drop the
course. But he needed this credit and it was still possible
Professor Hamilton was an easy grader. Hell, all these students
wouldn't have shown up on a Saturday morning if they thought they
were going to get reamed out... would they?

In the meantime, front and center, Dewayne figured he'd better
make an effort to look awake.

Hamilton walked back and forth on the podium, his deep voice
ringing. He was like a gray lion, his hair swept back in a mane,
dressed in a snazzy charcoal suit instead of the usual threadbare
set of tweeds. He had an unusual accent, not local to New
Orleans, certainly not Yankee. Didn't exactly sound English,
either. A teaching assistant sat in a chair behind the professor,
assiduously taking notes.

"And so," Dr. Hamilton was saying, "today we're looking at
Eliot's The Waste Land-the poem that packaged the
twentieth century in all its alienation and emptiness. One of the
greatest poems ever written."

The Waste Land. Dewayne remembered now. What a title.
He hadn't bothered to read it, of course. Why should he? It was a
poem, not a damn novel: he could read it right now, in
class.

He picked up the book of T. S. Eliot's poems-he'd borrowed it
from a friend, no use wasting good money on something he'd never
look at again-and opened it. There, next to the title page, was a
photo of the man himself: a real weenie, tiny little granny
glasses, lips pursed like he had two feet of broomstick shoved up
his ass. Dewayne snorted and began turning pages. Waste Land,
Waste Land... here it was.

Oh, shit. This was no limerick. The son of a bitch went
on for page after page.

"The first lines are by now so well known that it's hard for
us to imagine the sensation-the shock-that people felt
upon first reading it in The Dial in 1922. This was not
what people considered poetry. It was, rather, a kind of
anti-poem. The persona of the poet was obliterated. To whom
belong these grim and disturbing thoughts? There is, of course,
the famously bitter allusion to Chaucer in the opening line. But
there is much more going on here. Reflect on the opening images:
'lilacs out of the dead land,' 'dull roots,' 'forgetful snow.' No
other poet in the history of the world, my friends, ever wrote
about spring in quite this way before."

Dewayne flipped to the end of the poem, found it contained
over four hundred lines. Oh, no. No...

"It's intriguing that Eliot chose lilacs in the second line,
rather than poppies, which would have been a more traditional
choice at the time. Poppies were then growing in an abundance
Europe hadn't seen for centuries, due to the numberless
putrefying corpses from the Great War. But more important, the
poppy-with its connotations of narcotic sleep-seems the better
fit to Eliot's imagery. So why did Eliot choose lilacs? Let's
take a look at Eliot's use of allusion, here most likely
involving Whitman's 'When Lilacs Last in the Door-yard
Bloom'd.'"

Oh, my God, it was like a nightmare: here he was in the front
of the class and not understanding a word the professor was
saying. Who'd have thought you could write four hundred lines of
poetry on a freaking waste land? Speaking of wasted, his
head felt like it was packed full of ball bearings. Served him
right for hanging out until four last night, doing shots of
citron Grey Goose.

He realized the class around him had gone still, and that the
voice from behind the lectern had fallen silent. Glancing up at
Dr. Hamilton, he noticed the professor was standing motionless, a
strange expression on his face. Elegant or not, the old fellow
looked as if he'd just dropped a steaming loaf in his drawers.
His face had gone strangely slack. As Dewayne watched, Hamilton
slowly withdrew a handkerchief, carefully patted his forehead,
then folded the handkerchief neatly and returned it to his
pocket. He cleared his throat.

"Pardon me," he said as he reached for a glass of water on the
lectern, took a small sip. "As I was saying, let's look at the
meter Eliot employs in this first section of the poem. His free
verse is aggressively enjambed: the only stopped lines are those
that finish his sentences. Note also the heavy stressing of
verbs: breeding, mixing, stirring. It's like the ominous,
isolated beat of a drum; it's ugly; it shatters the meaning of
the phrase; it creates a sense of disquietude. It announces to us
that something's going to happen in this poem, and that it won't
be pretty."

The curiosity that had stirred in Dewayne during the
unexpected pause faded away. The oddly stricken look had left the
professor's face as quickly as it came, and his features-though
still pale-had lost their ashen quality.

Dewayne returned his attention to the book. He could quickly
scan the poem, figure out what the damn thing meant. He glanced
at the title, then moved his eye down to the epigram, or
epigraph, or whatever you called it.

He stopped. What the hell was this? Nam Sibyllam
quidem... Whatever it was, it wasn't English. And there,
buried in the middle of it, some weird-ass squiggles that weren't
even part of the normal alphabet. He glanced at the explanatory
notes at the bottom of the page and found the first bit was
Latin, the second Greek. Next came the dedication: For Ezra
Pound, il miglior fabbro. The notes said that last bit was
Italian.

Latin, Greek, Italian. And the frigging poem hadn't even
started yet. What next, hieroglyphics?

It was a nightmare.

He scanned the first page, then the second. Gibberish, plain
and simple. "I will show you fear in a handful of dust." What was
that supposed to mean? His eye fell on the next line. Frisch
weht der Wind...

Abruptly, Dewayne closed the book, feeling sick. That did it.
Only thirty lines into the poem and already five damn languages.
First thing tomorrow morning, he'd go down to the registrar and
drop this turkey.

He sat back, head pounding. Now that the decision was made, he
wondered how he was going to make it through the next forty
minutes without climbing the walls. If only there'd been a seat
up in the back, where he could slip out unseen...

Up at the podium, the professor was droning on. "All that
being said, then, let's move on to an examination
of-"

Suddenly, Hamilton stopped once again.

"Excuse me." His face went slack again. He looked-what?
Confused? Flustered? No: he looked scared.

Dewayne sat up, suddenly interested.

The professor's hand fluttered up to his handkerchief, fumbled
it out, then dropped it as he tried to bring it to his forehead.
He looked around vaguely, hand still fluttering about, as if to
ward off a fly. The hand sought out his face, began touching it
lightly, like a blind person. The trembling fingers palpated his
lips, eyes, nose, hair, then swatted the air
again.

The lecture hall had gone still. The teaching assistant in the
seat behind the professor put down his pen, a concerned look on
his face. What's going on? Dewayne wondered. Heart
attack?

The professor took a small, lurching step forward, bumping
into the podium. And now his other hand flew to his face, feeling
it all over, only harder now, pushing, stretching the skin,
pulling down the lower lip, giving himself a few light
slaps.

The professor suddenly stopped and scanned the room. "Is there
something wrong with my face?"

Dead silence.

Slowly, very slowly, Dr. Hamilton relaxed. He took a shaky
breath, then another, and gradually his features relaxed. He
cleared his throat.

"As I was saying-"

Dewayne saw the fingers of one hand come back to life again,
twitching, trembling. The hand returned to his face, the fingers
plucking, plucking the skin.

This was too weird.

"I-" the professor began, but the hand interfered with his
speech. His mouth opened and closed, emitting nothing more than a
wheeze. Another shuffled step, like a robot, bumping into the
podium.

"What are these things?" he asked, his voice
cracking.

God, now he was pulling at his skin, eyelids stretched
grotesquely, both hands scrabbling-then a long, uneven scratch
from a fingernail, and a line of blood appeared on one
cheek.

A ripple coursed through the classroom, like an uneasy
sigh.

"Is there something wrong, Professor?" the T.A.
said.

"I... asked ... a question." The professor growled it out,
almost against his will, his voice muffled and distorted by the
hands pulling at his face.

Another lurching step, and then he let out a sudden scream:
"My face! Why will no one tell me what's wrong with my
face!"

More deathly silence.

The fingers were digging in, the fist now pounding at the
nose, which cracked faintly.

"Get them off me! They're eating into my
face!"

Oh, shit: blood was now gushing from the nostrils,
splashing down on the white shirt and charcoal suit. The fingers
were like claws on the face, ripping, tearing; and now one finger
hooked up and-Dewayne saw with utter horror-worked itself into
one eye socket.

"Out! Get them out!"

There was a sharp, rotating motion that reminded Dewayne of
the scooping of ice cream, and suddenly the globe of the eye
bulged out, grotesquely large, jittering, staring directly at
Dewayne from an impossible angle.

Screams echoed across the lecture hall. Students in the front
row recoiled. The T.A. jumped from his seat and ran up to
Hamilton, who violently shrugged him off.

Dewayne found himself rooted to his seat, his mind a blank,
his limbs paralyzed.

Professor Hamilton now took a mechanical step, and another,
ripping at his face, tearing out clumps of hair, staggering as if
he might fall directly on top of Dewayne.

"A doctor!" the T.A. screamed. "Get a doctor!"

The spell was broken. There was a sudden commotion, everyone
rising at once, the sound of falling books, a loud hubbub of
panicked voices.

"My face!" the professor shrieked over the din. "Where is
it?"

Chaos took over, students running for the door, some crying.
Others rushed forward, toward the stricken professor, jumping
onto the podium, trying to stop his murderous self-assault. The
professor lashed out at them blindly, making a high-pitched,
keening sound, his face a mask of red. Someone forcing his way
down the row trod hard on Dewayne's foot. Drops of flying blood
had spattered Dewayne's face: he could feel their warmth on his
skin. Yet still he did not move. He found himself unable to take
his eyes off the professor, unable to escape this
nightmare.

The students had wrestled the professor to the surface of the
podium and were now sliding about in his blood, trying to hold
down his thrashing arms and bucking body. As Dewayne watched, the
professor threw them off with demonic strength, grabbed the cup
of water, smashed it against the podium, and-screaming- began to
work the shards into his own neck, twisting and scooping, as if
trying to dig something out.

And then, quite suddenly, Dewayne found he could move. He
scrambled to his feet, skidded, ran along the row of seats to the
aisle, and began sprinting up the stairs toward the back exit of
the lecture hall. All he could think about was getting away from
the unexplainable horror of what he'd just witnessed. As he shot
out the door and dashed full speed down the corridor beyond, one
phrase kept echoing in his mind, over and over and
over:

I will show you fear in a handful of
dust.

TWO

"Dinnie? Vin? Sure you don't want any help in
there?"

"No!" Lieutenant Vincent D'Agosta tried to keep his voice cool
and even. "No. It's all right. Just a couple more
minutes."

He glanced up at the clock: almost nine. A couple more
minutes. Yeah, right. He'd be lucky if he had dinner on the
table by ten.

Laura Hayward's kitchen-he still thought of it as hers; he'd
only moved in six weeks before-was usually an oasis of order, as
calm and immaculate as Hayward herself. Now the place looked like
a war zone. The sink was overflowing with soiled pots. Half a
dozen empty cans lay in and around the wastebasket, dribbling out
remnants of tomato sauce and olive oil. Almost as many cookbooks
lay open on the counter, their pages obscured by bread crusts and
blizzards of flour. The lone window looking down on the snowy
intersection of 77th and First was speckled with grease from
frying sausages. Although the vent fan was going full blast, the
odor of burned meat lingered stubbornly in the
air.

For weeks now, whenever their schedules allowed time with each
other, Laura had thrown together-almost effortlessly, it seemed-
meal after delicious meal. D'Agosta had been astonished. For his
soon-to-be-ex-wife, now up in Canada, cooking had always been
anordeal accompanied by histrionic sighs, clanging of pans, and-
more often than not-disagreeable results. It was like night and
day with Laura.

But along with his astonishment, D'Agosta also felt a bit
threatened. As a detective captain in the NYPD, not only did
Laura Hayward outrank him, but she outcooked him as well.
Everybody knew men made the best chefs, especially Italians. They
blew the French out of the water. And so he'd kept promising to
cook her a real Italian dinner, just like his grandmother used to
make. Each time he repeated the promise, the meal seemed to grow
in complexity and spectacle. And at last, tonight was the night
he would cook his grandmother's lasagna
napoletana.

Except that once he got in the kitchen, he realized he didn't
remember exactly how his grandmother cooked lasagna
napoletana. Oh, he'd watched dozens of times. He'd often
helped out. But what precisely went into that ragù
she spooned over the layers of pasta? And what was it she'd added
to those tiny meatballs that-along with the sausage and various
cheeses-made up the filling? He had turned in his desperation to
Laura's cookbooks, but each one had offered conflicting
suggestions. And so now here he was, hours later, everything at
varying stages of completion, frustration mounting by the
second.

He heard Laura say something from her banishment in the living
room. He took a deep breath.

"What was that, babe?"

"I said I'll be home late tomorrow. Rocker's having a
state-of-the-force meeting with all the captains on January 22.
That leaves me only Monday evening to get status reports and
personnel records up to date."

"Rocker and his paperwork. How is your pal the
commissioner, by the way?"

"He's not my pal."

D'Agosta turned back to the ragù, boiling away on
the stove. He remained convinced that he'd gotten his old job on
the force back, his seniority restored, only because Laura had
put a word in Rocker's ear. He didn't like it, but there it
was.

A huge bubble of ragù rose from the pot, burst
like a volcanic eruption, and spewed sauce over his hand. "Ouch!"
he cried, dousing the hand in dishwater while turning down the
flame.

"What's up?"

"Nothing. Everything's just fine." He stirred the sauce with a
wooden spoon, realized the bottom had burned, moved it hastily
onto a back burner. He raised the spoon to his lips a little
gingerly. Not bad, not bad at all. Decent texture, nice mouth
feel, only a slight burned taste. Not like his grandmother's,
though.

"What else goes in the ragù, Nonna?" he
murmured.

If there was any response from the choir invisible, D'Agosta
couldn't hear it.

Suddenly, there was a loud hissing from the stove. The giant
pot of salted water was bubbling over. Swallowing a curse,
D'Agosta turned down the heat on that as well, tore open a box of
pasta, dumped in a pound of lasagna.

The sound of music filtered in from the living room: Laura had
put on a Steely Dan CD. "I swear I'm going to speak to the
landlord about that doorman," she said through the
door.

"Which doorman?"

"That new one who came on a few weeks ago. He's the surliest
guy I've ever met. What kind of a doorman doesn't even open the
door for you? And this morning he wouldn't call me a cab. Just
shook his head and walked away. I don't think he speaks English.
At least, he pretends he doesn't."

What do you expect for twenty-five hundred a month?
D'Agosta thought to himself. But it was her apartment, so he kept
his mouth shut. And it was her money that paid the rent-at least
for now. He was determined to change that as soon as
possible.

When he'd moved in, he hadn't brought any expectations with
him. He'd just gone through one of the worst times in his life,
and he refused to let himself think more than a day ahead. Also,
he was still in the early stages of what promised to be an
unpleasant divorce: a new romantic entanglement probably wasn't
the smartest thing for him right now. But this had turned out far
better than he could ever have hoped. Laura Hayward was more than
a girlfriend or lover-she'd become a soulmate. He'd thought that
their both being on the job, her ranking him, would be a problem.
It was just the opposite: it gave them common ground, a chance to
help each other, to talk about their cases without worrying about
confidentiality or second-guessers.

"Any new leads on the Dangler?" he heard Laura ask from the
living room.

The Dangler was the NYPD's pet name for a perp who'd recently
been stealing money from ATMs with a hacked bank card, then
exposing his johnson to the security camera. Most of the
incidents had been in D'Agosta's precinct.

"Got a possible eyewitness to yesterday's job."

"Eyewitness to what?" Laura asked suggestively.

"To the face, of course." D'Agosta gave the pasta a
stir, regulated the boil. He glanced at the oven, made sure it
was up to temperature. Then he turned back to the messy counter,
mentally going over everything. Sausage: check. Meatballs: check.
Ricotta, Parmesan, and mozzarella fiordilatte: all check.
Looks like I might pull this one out of a hat, after
all...

Hell. He still had to grate the
Parmesan.

He threw open a drawer, began rummaging frantically. As he did
so, he thought he heard the doorbell ring.

Maybe it was his imagination: Laura didn't get all that many
callers, and he sure as hell didn't get any. Especially this time
of night. It was probably a delivery from the Vietnamese
restaurant downstairs, knocking at the wrong door.

His hand closed over the box grater. He yanked it out, set it
on the counter, grabbed the brick of Parmesan. He chose the face
with the finest grate, raised the Parmesan to the
steel.

"Vinnie?" Laura said. "You'd better come out
here."

D'Agosta hesitated only a moment. Something in her tone made
him drop everything on the counter and walk out of the
kitchen.

She was standing in the front doorway of the apartment,
speaking to a stranger. The man's face was in shadow, and he was
dressed in an expensive trench coat. Something about him seemed
familiar.

Then the man took a step forward, into the light. D'Agosta
caught his breath.

"You!" he said.

The man bowed. "And you are Vincent D'Agosta."

Laura glanced back at him. Who's he? her expression
read.

Slowly, D'Agosta released the breath. "Laura," he said, "I'd
like you to meet Proctor. Agent Pendergast's
chauffeur."

Her eyes widened in surprise.

Proctor bowed. "Delighted to make your acquaintance,
ma'am."

She simply nodded in reply.

Proctor turned back to D'Agosta. "Now, sir, if you'd kindly
come with me?"

"Where?" But already D'Agosta knew the answer.

"Eight ninety-one Riverside Drive."

D'Agosta licked his lips. "Why?"

"Because someone is waiting for you there. Someone who has
requested your presence."

"Now?"

Proctor simply bowed again in reply.

THREE

D'Agosta sat in the backseat of the vintage '59 Rolls-Royce
Silver Wraith, looking out the window but not really seeing
anything. Proctor had taken him west through the park, and the
big car was now rocketing up Broadway.

D'Agosta shifted in the white leather interior, barely able to
contain his curiosity and impatience. He was tempted to pepper
Proctor with questions, but he felt sure the chauffeur would not
respond.

Eight ninety-one Riverside Drive. The home-one of the
homes- of Special Agent Aloysius Pendergast, D'Agosta's friend
and partner in several unusual cases. The mysterious FBI agent
whom D'Agosta knew, and yet did not know, who seemed to have as
many lives as a cat...

Until that day not two months ago, when he'd seen Pendergast
for the last time.

It had been on the steep flank of a hill south of Florence,
Italy. The special agent had been below him, surrounded by a
ravening pack of boar-hunting dogs, backed up by a dozen armed
men. Pendergast had sacrificed himself so D'Agosta could get
away.

And D'Agosta had let him do it.

D'Agosta stirred restlessly at the memory. Someone who has
requested your presence, Proctor had said. Was it possible
that, despite everything, Pendergast had somehow managed
to escape? It wouldn't be the first time. He suppressed a surge
of hope...

But no, it was not possible. He knew in his heart that
Pendergast was dead.

Now the Rolls was cruising up Riverside Drive. D'Agosta
shifted again, glancing out at the passing street signs: 125th
Street, 130th. Very quickly, the well-tended neighborhood
surrounding Columbia University gave way to dilapidated
brownstones and decaying hulks. The usual loiterers had been
chased indoors by the January chill, and in the dim light of
evening the street looked deserted.

Up ahead now, just past 137th Street, D'Agosta could make out
the boarded-up facade and widow's walk of Pendergast's mansion.
The dark lines of the vast structure sent a chill through
him.

The Rolls pulled past the gates of the spiked iron fence and
stopped beneath the porte-cochere. Without waiting for Proctor,
D'Agosta let himself out and stared up at the familiar lines of
the rambling mansion, windows covered with tin, looking for all
the world like the other abandoned mansions along the drive.
Inside, it was home to wonders and secrets almost beyond belief.
He felt his heart begin to race. Maybe Pendergast was inside,
after all, in his usual black suit, sitting in the library before
a blazing fire, the dancing flames casting strange shadows over
his pale face. "My dear Vincent," he would say, "thank you for
coming. May I interest you in a glass of
Armagnac?"

D'Agosta waited as Proctor unlocked, then opened, the heavy
door. Pale yellow light streamed out onto the worn brickwork. He
stepped forward while Proctor carefully relocked the door behind
him. He felt his heart beat still faster. Just being back inside
the mansion sent a strange mix of emotions coursing through him:
excitement, anxiety, regret.

Proctor turned toward him. "This way, sir, if you
please."

The chauffeur led the way down the length of the gallery and
into the blue-domed reception hall. Here, dozens of rippled-glass
cabinets displayed an array of fabulous specimens: meteorites,
gems, fossils, butterflies. D'Agosta's eyes stole across the
parquet floor to the far side, where the double doors of the
library lay open. If Pendergastwas waiting for him, that's where
he'd be: sitting in a wing chair, a half-smile playing across his
lips, enjoying the effect of this little drama on his
friend.

Proctor ushered D'Agosta toward the library. Heart pounding,
he stepped through the doors and into the sumptuous
room.

The smell of the place was as he remembered it: leather,
buckram, a faint hint of woodsmoke. But today there was no fire
crackling merrily on the hearth. The room was cold. The inlaid
bookshelves, full of leather-bound volumes tooled in gold, were
dim and indistinct. Only a single lamp glowed-a Tiffany piece
standing on a side table-casting a small pool of light in a vast
lake of darkness.

After a moment, D'Agosta made out a form standing beside the
table, just outside the circle of light. As he watched, the form
advanced toward him across the carpeting. He recognized
immediately the young girl as Constance Greene, Pendergast's ward
and assistant. She was perhaps twenty, wearing a long,
old-fashioned velvet dress that snugged her slender waist and
fell in lines almost to the floor. Despite her obvious youth, her
bearing had the poise of a much older woman. And her eyes,
too-D'Agosta remembered her strange eyes, full of experience and
learning, her speech old-fashioned, even quaint. And then there
was that something else, something just the other side of normal,
that seemed to cling to her like the antique air that exhaled
from her dresses.

Those eyes seemed different today. They looked haunted, dark,
heavy with loss ... and fear?

Constance held out her right hand. "Lieutenant D'Agosta," she
said in a measured tone.

D'Agosta took the hand, uncertain as always whether to shake
it or kiss it. He did neither, and after a moment the hand was
withdrawn.

Normally, Constance was polite to a fault. But today she
simply stood before D'Agosta, without offering him a chair or
inquiring after his health. She seemed uncertain. And D'Agosta
could guess why. The hope that had been stirring within him began
to fade.

"Have you heard anything?" she asked, her voice almost too low
to make out. "Anything at all?"

D'Agosta shook his head, the flame of hope dashed
out.

Constance held his glance a moment longer. Then she nodded her
understanding, her gaze dropping to the floor, her hands
fluttering at her sides like confused white moths.

They stood there together in silence for a minute, perhaps
two.

Constance raised her eyes again. "It's foolish for me to
continue to hope. More than six weeks have passed without a
word."

"I know."

"He is dead," she said, voice even lower.

D'Agosta said nothing.

She roused herself. "That means it is time for me to give you
this." She went to the mantelpiece, took down a small
sandalwood box inlaid with mother-of-pearl. A tiny key already in
her hand, she unlocked it and, without opening it, held it out
toward D'Agosta.

"I have delayed this moment too long already. I felt that
there was still a chance he might appear."

D'Agosta stared at the box. It looked familiar, but for a
moment he could not place where he'd seen it before. Then it came
to him: it had been in this house, this very room, the previous
October. He'd entered the library and disturbed Pendergast in the
act of writing a note. The agent had slipped it into this same
box. That had been the night before they left on their fateful
trip to Italy-the night Pendergast told him about his brother,
Diogenes.

"Take it, Lieutenant," Constance said, her voice breaking.
"Please don't draw this out."

"Sorry." D'Agosta gently took the box, opened it. Inside lay a
single sheet of heavy cream-colored paper, folded
once.

Suddenly, the very last thing D'Agosta wanted to do was to
take out that piece of paper. With deep misgivings, he reached
for it, opened it, and began to read.

My dear Vincent,

If you are reading this letter, it means that I am dead. It
also means I died before I could accomplish a task that,
rightfully, belongs to me and no other. That task is preventing
my brother, Diogenes, from committing what he once boasted would
be the "perfect" crime.

I wish I could tell you more about this crime, but all I know
of it is that he has been planning it for many years and that he
intends it to be his apotheosis. Whatever this "perfect" crime
is, it will be infamous. It will make the world a darker place.
Diogenes is a man with exceptional standards. He would not settle
for less.

I'm afraid, Vincent, that the task of stopping Diogenes must
now fall to you. I cannot tell you how much I regret this. It is
something I would not wish on my worst enemy, and especially not
on somebody I've come to regard as a trusted friend. But it is
something I believe you are best equipped to handle. Diogenes's
threat is too amorphous for me to take to the FBI or other law
enforcement agency, since he contrived his own false death some
years ago. A single, dedicated individual has the best chance of
preventing my brother from carrying out this crime. That
individual is you.

Diogenes has sent me a letter consisting of only one thing: a
date, January 28. In all likelihood, the crime will be committed
on that date. I would not, however, make any assumptions-the date
could mean nothing at all. Diogenes is, if anything,
unpredictable.

You will need to take a leave of absence from the Southampton
P.D. or wherever you are currently employed. This cannot be
avoided. Get all the information you can from Detective Captain
Laura Hayward, but for her own sake minimize her involvement.
Diogenes is an expert on forensics and police procedure, and any
information left at the scene of the crime-assuming, God forbid,
you are not in time to stop said crime-will no doubt be cleverly
contrived to mislead the police. Hayward, as fine an officer as
she is, is no match for my brother.

I've left a separate note for Constance, who will at this
point know all the particulars of this matter. She will make my
house, my finances, and all my resources available to you. She
will immediately put at your disposal a bank account containing
$500,000 in your name, to use as you see fit. I recommend that
you use her invaluable research skills, though I ask that you
keep her out of your direct investigation for obvious reasons.
She must never leave the mansion-ever. And you must watch her
very, very carefully. She is still fragile, both mentally and
physically.

As a first step, you should pay a visit to my Great-Aunt
Cornelia, who is confined to a hospital on Little Governors
Island. She knew Diogenes as a boy, and she will provide you with
the personal and family information you will undoubtedly need.
Treat this information-and her-with great care.

One final word. Diogenes is consummately dangerous. He is my
intellectual equal, but he was somehow formed without the
slightest shred of moral conscience. In addition, a severe
childhood illness left him damaged. He is motivated by an undying
hatred of myself and an utter contempt for humanity. Do not gain
his attention any earlier than you have to. Be vigilant at all
times.

Goodbye, my friend-and good luck.

Aloysius Pendergast

D'Agosta looked up. "January 28? My God, that's just one
week away."

Constance only bowed her head.

FOUR

IT was the smell of the place, she thought, that really
brought home the fact she was back in the museum: that mixture of
mothballs, dust, old varnish, and a whiff of decay. She walked
down the great fifth-floor corridor, past the oaken office doors,
each sporting the name of a curator in black-edged gold leaf. She
was surprised at how few new names there were. A lot of things
had changed in six years, but here, in the museum, time seemed to
run at a different pace.

She had been worried-more worried than she cared to admit-
about how it would feel to be back in the museum several years
after the most frightening experience of her life. In fact, that
worry had delayed her decision to return. But she had to admit,
after a slightly rough first couple of days, that little of the
old terror still clung to the place. Her nightmares, the
lingering sense of vulnerability, had faded with the years. The
old events, the bad events, were now ancient history. And the
museum was still a wonderful old pile, a Gothic castle of
Brobdingnagian proportions, full of wonderful, eccentric
people-and bursting with strange and fascinating specimens. The
most extensive collection of trilobites in the world. Lucifer's
Heart, the most precious diamond ever found. "Snaggletooth," the
largest and best-preserved T. rex fossil known.

Nevertheless, she had been careful not to stray into the
museum's sub-basement. And it was not laziness that made her
limit the number of nights she worked much past
closing.

She remembered the time when she had walked down this august
corridor for the first time as a graduate student of no account.
Graduate students were so low on the museum's totem pole they
were not even despised-they were simply invisible. Not that she'd
been resentful: it was a rite of passage everyone had to go
through. Back then she was a nobody-a "you," or, at best, a
"Miss."

How things had changed. Now she was "Doctor," sometimes even
"Professor," and her name appeared in print with a string of
titles after it: Pierpont Research Fellow (the "fellow" part
always made her smile); adjunct professor of ethnopharmacology;
and her most recent title, only three weeks old: editor in chief
of Museology. While she'd always told herself that titles
meant nothing, she was surprised to discover that, once she'd
acquired them, they were most gratifying. Professor ...
that had a nice round sound to it, especially on the lips of
those crusty old curators who, six years ago, wouldn't even give
her the time of day. Now they went out of their way to ask her
opinion or press their monographs on her. Just that morning, no
less a personage than the head of anthropology and her titular
boss, Hugo Menzies, had asked solicitously after the subject of
her panel discussion for the forthcoming Society of American
Anthropologists meeting.

Yes: a refreshing change, indeed.

The office of the director lay at the end of the hall, in one
of the coveted tower offices. She paused before the great oaken
door, darkened with the patina of a century. She raised her hand,
then lowered it, suddenly feeling nervous. She took a deep
breath. She felt happy to be back in the museum, and she wondered
yet again if the sudden controversy she was about to launch
herself into wasn't a serious mistake. She reminded herself that
this controversy had been forced on her and that as editor of
Museology she had to take a stand. If she ducked this one,
she would immediately lose her credibility as an arbiter of
ethics and free expression. Worse, she wouldn't be able to live
with herself.

Her hand fell firmly upon the oaken door, once, twice, three
times, each knock firmer than the last.

A moment of silence. Then the door was opened by Mrs. Surd,
the dry and efficient secretary to the museum's director. The
sharp blue eyes gave her a rapid once-over as she stepped
aside.

"Dr. Green? Dr. Collopy is expecting you. You may go straight
in."

Margo approached the inner door, if anything darker and more
massive than the other, grasped the ice-cold brass knob, turned
it, and pushed it open on well-oiled hinges.

There, behind the great nineteenth-century desk, under a vast
painting by De Clefisse of Victoria Falls, sat Frederick Watson
Collopy, director of the New York Museum of Natural History. He
rose graciously, a smile creasing his handsome face. He was
dressed in a somber gray suit of old-fashioned cut, the starched
white shirtfront enlivened only by a bright red silk bow
tie.

"Ah, Margo. How good of you to come. Please take a
seat."

How good of you to come. The note she had received had
more the flavor of a summons than an invitation.

Collopy came around his desk and indicated a plush leather
armchair which formed part of a group arrayed before a pink
marble fireplace. Margo sat down and Collopy followed, taking a
seat opposite her.

"Care for anything? Coffee, tea, mineral
water?"

"Nothing, thank you, Dr. Collopy."

He leaned back, threw one leg casually over the
other.

"We're so pleased to have you back at the museum, Margo," he
said in his old New York society drawl. "I was delighted when you
agreed to accept the editorship of Museology. We felt so
lucky to lure you away from GeneDyne. Those research papers you
published really impressed us, and your background here in
ethnopharmacology made you the perfect candidate."

"Thank you, Dr. Collopy."

"And how do you find it? Everything to your satisfaction?" His
voice was genteel, even kind.

"Everything is well, thank you."

"I am glad to hear it. Museology is the oldest journal
in its field, publishing continuously since 1892, and still the
most respected. It is a great responsibility and challenge you've
taken on, Margo."

"I hope to carry on the tradition."

"And so do we." He stroked his closely trimmed iron-gray beard
meditatively. "One of the things we are proud of is the strongly
independent editorial voice of Museology."

"Yes," said Margo. She knew where this was going, and she was
ready.

"The museum has never interfered with the editorial opinions
expressed in Museology, and we never will. We consider the
editorial independence of the journal to be well-nigh
sacred."

"I'm glad to hear that."

"On the other hand, we would not like to see Museology
devolve into a ... what should one call it? An op-ed
organ." The way he said it made it sound like another kind of
organ entirely. "With independence comes responsibility. After
all, Museology bears the name of the New York Museum of
Natural History."

The voice remained soft-spoken, and yet it had taken on an
edge. Margo waited. She would remain cool and professional. In
fact, she had already prepared her response-even written it out
and memorized it so she could express herself more eloquently-but
it was important to let Collopy have his say.

"That is why the previous editors of Museology have
always been exceedingly careful about how they exercised their
editorial freedom." He let the words hang in the
air.

"I assume you're referring to the editorial I am about to
publish on the repatriation request of the Tano
Indians."

"Exactly. The letter from the tribe, asking for the return of
the Great Kiva masks, arrived only last week. The board of
trustees has not yet discussed it. The museum hasn't even had
time to consult its lawyers. Isn't it a bit premature to be
editorializing on something that hasn't even begun to be
evaluated? Especially when you're so new to the
position?"

"It seems to me a straightforward issue," she said
quietly.

At this, Collopy leaned back in his chair, a patronizing smile
on his face. "It is anything but straightforward, Margo.
Those masks have been in the museum's collections for one hundred
and thirty-five years. And they're to be the centerpiece of the
Sacred Images show, the biggest exhibition in the museum since
Superstition, six years ago."

Another heavy silence.

"Naturally," Collopy went on, "I'm not going to ask you to
alter your editorial stand. I will merely point out that there
may be a few facts you are unaware of." He pressed an almost
invisible button on his desk and said into an equally invisible
speaker: "The file, Mrs. Surd?"

A moment later, the secretary appeared with an ancient file in
her hand. He thanked her, glanced at it, then handed it to
Margo.

Margo took the file. It was very old and brittle and gave off
a fearful smell of dust and dry rot. She opened it carefully.
Inside were some handwritten papers in spidery
mid-nineteenth-century script, a contract, some
drawings.

"That is the original accession file of the Great Kiva masks
you seem so anxious to return to the Tano Indians. Have you seen
it?"

"No, but-"

"Perhaps you should have before you drafted your editorial.
That first document is a bill of sale, itemizing two hundred
dollars for the masks: a lot of money back in 1870. The museum
didn't pay for those Great Kiva masks in trinkets and beads. The
second document is the contract. That X is the signature
of the chief of the Great Kiva Society-the man who sold the masks
to Kendall Swope, the museum's anthropologist. The third
document, there, is the letter of thanks the museum wrote to the
chief, in care of the Indian agent, which was read to him by the
agent, promising the chief that the masks would be well taken
care of."

Margo stared at the ancient papers. It continually amazed her
how tenacious the museum was with everything, especially
documents.

"The point is, Margo, the museum bought those masks in good
faith. We paid an excellent price for them. We've now owned them
for almost one and a half centuries. We've taken beautiful care
of them. On top of that, they're among the most important objects
in our entire Native American collection. Many thousands of
people view them-are educated by them, make career choices
in anthropology or archaeology because of them-every week. Not
once in a hundred and thirty-five years did any member of the
Tano tribe complain or accuse the museum of acquiring them
illegally. Now, doesn't it seem just a tad unfair for them to
suddenly be demanding them back? And right before a blockbuster
exhibition in which they are the featured
attraction?"

Silence fell in the grand tower office, with its tall windows
overlooking Museum Drive, its dark-paneled walls graced with
Audubon paintings.

"It does seem a bit unfair," Margo said evenly.

A broad smile creased Collopy's face. "I knew you would
understand."

"But it won't change my editorial position."

A gradual freezing of the air. "Excuse me?"

It was time for her speech. "Nothing in that accession file
changes the facts. It's quite simple. The chief of the Great Kiva
Society didn't own the masks to begin with. They weren't his.
They belonged to the entire tribe. It would be like a priest
selling off church relics. By law, you can't sell something you
don't own. That bill of sale and contract in that folder are not
legally valid. What's more, when he bought the masks, Kendall
Swope knew that, and that is clear from the book he wrote,
Tano Ceremonials. He knew the chief didn't have the right
to sell them. He knew the masks were a sacred part of the Great
Kiva ceremony and must never leave the kiva. He even admits the
chief was a crook. It's all right there in Tano
Ceremonials."

"Margo-"

"Please let me finish, Dr. Collopy. There's an even more
important principle at stake here. Those masks are sacred
to the Tano Indians. Everyone recognizes that. They can't be
replaced or remade. The Tanos believe each mask has a spirit and
is alive. These aren't conveniently made-up beliefs; they're
sincere and deeply held religious convictions."

"But after one hundred and thirty-five years? Come, now. Why
hadn't we heard a peep from those people all this
time?"

"The Tano had no idea where the masks had gone until they read
about the upcoming exhibition."

"I simply cannot believe they were mourning the loss of those
masks for all this time. They were long forgotten. This is all
too convenient, Margo. Those masks are worth five, maybe ten
million dollars. It's about money, not about
religion."

"No, it isn't. I've spoken to them."

"You've spoken to them?"

"Of course. I called and spoke to the governor of Tano
Pueblo."

For a moment, Collopy's mask of implacability fell away. "The
legal implications of this are staggering."

"I was simply fulfilling my responsibility as editor of
Museology to learn the facts. The Tanos do
remember, they remembered all along-those masks, as your own
carbon dating proved, were almost seven hundred years old when
they were collected. Believe me, the Tanos remember their
loss."

"They won't be properly curated-the Tanos don't have the
proper facilities to take care of them!"

"They should never have left the kiva to begin with. They
aren't 'museum specimens'-they're a living part of Tano religion.
Do you think the bones of St. Peter under the Vatican are being
'properly curated'? The masks belong in that kiva, whether it's
climate-controlled or not."

"If we give these masks back, it would set a terrible
precedent. We'll be inundated with demands from every tribe in
America."

"Perhaps. But that's not a valid argument. Giving back those
masks is the right thing to do. You know it, and I'm going
to publish an editorial saying so!"

She stopped, swallowed, realizing she had violated all her
resolutions by raising her voice.

"And that is my final, and independent, editorial
judgment," she added more quietly.

FIVE

There were no secretaries, receptionists, or low-echelon
flunkies seated outside the entrance to Glen Singleton's office.
The room itself was no larger than any of the other few dozen
offices scattered around the cramped and dusty confines of the
precinct house. There was no sign on the door announcing the
exalted status of its tenant. Unless you were a cop yourself,
there would be no way of knowing this was the office of the head
honcho.

But that, D'Agosta reflected as he approached, was the
captain's style. Captain Singleton was that rarest of police
brass, a guy who'd worked his way up honorably through the ranks,
built a reputation not from kissing ass, but by solving tough
cases with solid police work. He lived and breathed for one
reason: to get criminals off the streets. He was perhaps the
hardest-working cop D'Agosta had ever known, save Laura Hayward.
D'Agosta had worked for more than his fair share of incompetent
desk jockeys, and that made him respect Singleton's
professionalism all the more. He sensed that Singleton respected
him, too, and to D'Agosta that meant a great deal.

All this made what he was about to do even
harder.

Singleton's door was wide open, as usual. It wasn't his style
to limit access-any cop who wanted to see him could do so at any
time. D'Agosta knocked, half leaning into the doorway. Singleton
was there, standing behind the desk, talking into the phone. Even
at his desk, the man never seemed to sit down. He was in his late
forties, tall and lean, with a swimmer's physique-he swam laps
every morning at six, without fail. He had a long face and an
aquiline profile. Every other week he had his salt-and-pepper
hair cut by the ridiculously expensive barber in the basement of
the Carlyle, and he always looked as well groomed as a
presidential candidate.

Singleton flashed a smile at D'Agosta and gestured for him to
come in.

D'Agosta stepped inside. Singleton pointed to a seat, but
D'Agosta shook his head: something about the captain's restless
energy made him feel more comfortable on his feet.

Singleton was clearly talking to somebody in NYPD public
relations. His voice was polite, but D'Agosta knew that, inside,
Singleton was doing a slow boil: his interest lay in police work,
not P.R. He hated the very concept, telling D'Agosta, "Either you
catch the perp or you don't. So what's there to
spin?"

D'Agosta glanced around. The office was decorated so minimally
it was almost anonymous. No photos of family; no obligatory
picture of the captain shaking hands with the mayor or
commissioner. Singleton was one of the most decorated cops on
active duty, but there were no commendations for bravery, no
plaques or citations framed on the walls. Instead, there was just
some paperwork sitting on a corner of his desk, fifteen or twenty
manila folders on a nearby shelf. On a second shelf, D'Agosta
could see handbooks on forensic technique and crime scene
investigation, half a dozen well-thumbed books on
jurisprudence.

Singleton hung up the phone with a sigh of relief. "Hell," he
said. "I feel like I spend more time juggling community action
groups than I do catching bad guys. It's enough to make me wish I
was on foot patrol again." He turned toward D'Agosta with another
short smile. "Vinnie, how's it going?"

"Okay," D'Agosta replied, not feeling okay at all. Singleton's
friendliness and approachability made this little visit all the
more difficult.

The captain hadn't requested D'Agosta: he'd been assigned to
the division by the commissioner's office. This would have
guaranteed D'Agosta a suspicious, hostile reception from other
brass he'd known-Jack Waxie, for instance. Waxie would have felt
threatened, kept D'Agosta at arm's length, made sure he got the
low-profile cases. But Singleton was just the opposite. He'd
welcomed D'Agosta, personally brought him up to speed on the
details and procedures unique to his office, even put him in
charge of the Dangler investigation-and, at the moment, cases
didn't get any higher-profile than that.

The Dangler hadn't killed anybody. He hadn't even used a gun.
But he'd done something almost as bad: he'd subjected the NYPD to
public ridicule. A thief who emptied ATMs of cash, then whipped
out his dong for the benefit of their security cameras, was
perfect fodder for the daily tabloids. So far, the Dangler had
paid visits to eleven ATMs. Each new robbery meant more
front-page headlines, smirking, full of innuendo. Each time, the
NYPD had its face rubbed in it afresh. Dangler's streak grows
longer, the Post had trumpeted after the last robbery,
three days before. Police find themselves
short.

"How's our witness?" Singleton asked. "She panning out?" He
stood behind his desk, looking at D'Agosta. The captain had
piercing blue eyes, and when they looked at you, it was like you
were the center of the universe: for that brief moment, at least,
you had his complete and undivided attention. It was
unnerving.

"Her story checks out against the security
cam."

"Good, good. Hell, you'd think in this digital age the banks
would be able to manage better coverage with their security cams.
The guy seems to know their sweep, their range-you think he
worked in security once?"

"We're looking into that."

"Eleven hits and all we still know for sure is he's
Caucasian."

And circumcised, D'Agosta thought mirthlessly. "I had
our detectives call all the branch managers on the hot list.
They're installing additional hidden cameras."

"The perp might be working for the security firm that provides
the cameras."

"Looking into that, too."

"One step ahead of me. That's what I like to hear." Singleton
moved toward the pile of paperwork, began riffling through it.
"This guy's pretty territorial. All his jobs have been within a
twenty-square-block area. So the next step is to stake out the
choicest machines he hasn't hit yet. Unless we can narrow down
the list of potentials, we'll be spread too thin. Thank God we
aren't working any active homicides at the moment. Vinnie, I'll
leave it to you to interface with the task force, draw up a list
of most likely ATMs based on the earlier hits, and allocate
manpower for the stakeouts. Who knows? We might just get
lucky."

Here it comes, D'Agosta thought. He licked his lips.
"Actually, that's what I came in to talk to you
about."

Singleton stopped, fixed him once again with his intense gaze.
Wrapped up in his work the way he was, it hadn't occurred to the
captain that D'Agosta might have come in about anything else.
"What's on your mind?"

"I don't really know how to say this, but... sir, I wish to
request a leave of absence."

Singleton's eyebrows shot up in surprise. "A leave of
absence?"

"Yes, sir." D'Agosta knew how it sounded. But no matter how
he'd rehearsed in his mind, it never seemed to come out
right.

Singleton held his gaze a moment longer. He didn't say
anything; he didn't need to. A leave of absence. You've been
here six weeks, and you want a leave of
absence?

"Anything I should know, Vinnie?" he asked in a low
voice.

"It's a family matter," D'Agosta replied after a brief pause.
He hated himself for stammering under Singleton's gaze, and hated
himself even more for lying. But just what the hell was he
supposed to say? Sorry, Cap, but I'm taking unlimited time off
to go chase a man who's officially dead, whose whereabouts are
unknown, for a crime that hasn't yet been committed? There
was no question in his mind, no question at all, this was
something he had to do. It was so important to Pendergast that
he'd left instructions from beyond the grave. That was more than
enough. But that didn't make this any easier or feel any more
right.

Singleton held him in a look that was both concerned and
speculative.

"Vinnie, you know I can't do that."

With a sinking sensation, D'Agosta realized it was going to be
even harder than he anticipated. Even if he had to quit, he
would- but that would be the end of his career. A cop could quit
once, but not twice.

"It's my mother," he said. "She's got cancer. They think it's
terminal."

Singleton stood quite still for a moment, taking this in. Then
he rocked slightly on his heels. "I'm very, very sorry to hear
that."

There was another silence. D'Agosta wished somebody would
knock on the door, or the phone would ring, or a meteor would
strike the precinct house-anything to deflect Singleton's
attention.

"We just found out," he went on. "It was a shock, a real
shock." He paused, sick at heart. He'd just blurted out the first
excuse he could think of, but already it seemed an appalling
choice. His own mother, cancer... shit, he'd have to go to
confession after this, big-time. And call his mom in Vero Beach,
send her two dozen roses.

Singleton was nodding slowly. "How much time do you
need?"

"The doctors don't know. A week, maybe two."

Singleton nodded again, even more slowly. D'Agosta felt
himself flushing all over. He wondered what the captain was
thinking.

"She doesn't have much time left," he went on. "You know how
it is. I haven't exactly been a model son. I just feel I need to
be with her, right now, through this ... Just like any son
would," he concluded lamely. "You could rack it up against future
vacation and sick leave."

Singleton listened closely, but this time he didn't nod. "Of
course," he said.

He gazed at D'Agosta a long time. His look seemed to say: A
lot of people have sick parents, personal tragedies. But they're
professionals. What's so different about you? Breaking eye
contact at last, he turned away, picking up the sheaf of papers
that lay on his desk.

"I'll have Mercer and Sabriskie coordinate the stakeouts," he
said crisply over his shoulder. "Take whatever time you need,
Lieutenant."

SIX

A dense FOG lay over the stagnant marshlands of Little
Governors Island. From out of the murk came the mournful blast of
a tugboat drifting down the East River. Manhattan was less than a
mile across the icy black waters, but no lights from the
cityscape pierced the veil of mist.

D'Agosta sat in the front passenger seat, holding grimly to
the door handle as Laura Hayward's unmarked pool car bounced and
swayed over the rough one-lane road. The headlights stabbed into
the gloom, twin shafts of yellow that caromed wildly up and down,
briefly illuminating the rutted drive and the skeletal chestnut
trees that lined it.

"I think you missed one pothole back there," he
said.

"Never mind about that. Let me get this straight. You told
Singleton your mom has cancer?"

D'Agosta sighed. "It was the first thing that came into my
head."

"Jeez, Vinnie. Singleton's own mother died of cancer. And
guess what? He never missed a day of work. Had the funeral on a
Sunday. Everybody knows that story."

"I didn't." D'Agosta winced, thinking back over what he'd said
to his captain that morning. You know how it is. I just feel I
need to be with her, right now, through this. Just like any son
would. Nice going, Vinnie.

"And I still can't believe you're taking a leave of absence to
hunt for this brother of Pendergast's, based on a letter and a
hunch. Don't get me wrong: nobody respected Pendergast more than
me, he was the most brilliant law enforcement officer I ever met.
But he had a fatal weakness, Vinnie, and you know what it was. He
didn't respect the rules. He thought he was above the rest of us
schmucks who are bound by the regulations. And I hate to see you
picking up that attitude."

"I'm not picking up that attitude."

"This search for Pendergast's brother is so far beyond the
rule book it isn't even funny. I mean what, exactly, are you
planning to do if you find this Diogenes?"

D'Agosta didn't answer. He hadn't gotten that far
yet.

The car shuddered as the front left tire sank into a rut. "Are
you sure this is the right way?" she asked. "I can't believe
there's a hospital out here."

"It's the right way."

Ahead, vague shapes were gradually becoming visible through
the fog. As the car approached, the shapes resolved themselves
into the pointed bars of a wrought-iron gate, set in a
ten-foot-high wall of moss-covered bricks. The sedan pulled up
before the closed gate, an ancient guardhouse beside it. A plaque
on the gate read Mount Mercy Hospital for the Criminally
Insane.

A guard appeared, flashlight in hand. D'Agosta leaned across
Hayward, displaying his badge. "Lieutenant D'Agosta. I have an
appointment to see Dr. Ostrom."

The man retreated into the guardhouse, checked a printed list.
A moment later, the gate creaked slowly open. Hayward drove past
and up a cobbled drive to a rambling structure, its battlements
and towers half obscured by drifting mist. Along its upper edge,
D'Agosta could see rows of crenellated stone, like broken teeth
against the blackness.

"My God," Hayward said, peering through the windshield.
"Pendergast's great-aunt is in there!"

D'Agosta nodded. "Apparently, this place used to be an
expensive sanatorium for tubercular millionaires. Now it's a
loony bin for murderers found not guilty by reason of
insanity."

"What did she do, exactly?"

"Constance tells me she poisoned her whole
family."

Hayward glanced at him. "Her whole family?"

"Mother, father, husband, brother, and two children. She
thought they'd been possessed by devils. Or maybe the souls of
Yankee soldiers shot dead by her father. Nobody seems to be quite
sure. Whatever the case, be sure to keep your distance. She's
apparently skilled at acquiring razor blades and concealing them
on her person. Put two orderlies in the emergency room in the
last twelve months."

"No kidding."

Inside, Mount Mercy Hospital smelled of rubbing alcohol and
damp stone. Beneath the drab institutional paint, D'Agosta could
still glimpse the remains of an elegant building, with
hand-carved wood ceilings and paneled walls, the hallway floors
of well-worn marble.

Dr. Ostrom was waiting for them in a "quiet room" on the
second floor. He was a tall man in a spotless medical coat who,
even without speaking, managed to convey the air of having
several more important things to do. Glancing around the sparsely
appointed space, D'Agosta noticed that everything-table, plastic
chairs, light fixture-was either bolted to the floor or hidden
behind steel mesh.

D'Agosta introduced himself and Hayward to Ostrom, who nodded
politely in return but did not offer to shake hands. "You're here
to see Cornelia Pendergast," he said.

"At her grandnephew's request."

"And you're familiar with the, ah, special requirements
necessary for such a visit?"

"Yes."

"Keep well back at all times. Make no sudden movements. Do
not, at any time, touch her or allow her to touch you. You'll
only be able to spend a few minutes with her; any longer and
she's likely to become excited. And it's of paramount importance
she not become excited. When I see any such indications, I'll be
forced to conclude the interview immediately."

"I understand."

"She doesn't like receiving strangers and may not see you, and
there's nothing I can do to force the issue. Even if you had a
warrant..."

"Tell her I'm Ambergris Pendergast. Her brother." This was the
name Constance Greene had suggested.

Dr. Ostrom frowned. "I don't approve of deception,
Lieutenant."

"Then don't call it deception. Call it a white lie. It's
important, Doctor. Lives may be at stake."

Dr. Ostrom seemed to consider this. Then he nodded brusquely,
turned, and left the room through a heavy steel door set in the
back wall.

All was silent for several minutes. Then-at what seemed a
great distance-the voice of an elderly lady could be heard raised
in querulous complaint. D'Agosta and Hayward exchanged
glances.

The raillery grew louder. Then the steel door opened again and
Cornelia Pendergast was wheeled into view.

She was sitting in a wheelchair whose every surface was
encased in thick black rubber. A small needlepoint pillow sat in
her lap, on which rested her two withered hands. Ostrom himself
pushed the wheelchair, and behind him came two orderlies wearing
padded protective garments. She was wearing a long, old-fashioned
dress of black taffeta. She looked tiny, with sticklike arms and
a narrow frame, her face obscured by a mourning veil. It seemed
impossible to D'Agosta that this frail-looking creature had
recently slashed two orderlies. As she came into view and the
wheelchair stopped, the string of invectives
ceased.

"Raise my veil," she commanded. Her southern accent was
cultivated, almost British, in its modulations.

One of the orderlies approached and-standing at arm's length-
lifted the veil with a gloved hand. Unconsciously, D'Agosta
leaned forward, staring curiously.

Cornelia Pendergast stared back. She had a sharp, catlike face
and pale blue eyes. Despite her advancing years, her
liver-spotted skin had a strangely youthful glow. As he looked at
her, D'Agosta's heart accelerated. He could see-in her intent
gaze, in the lines of her cheekbones and jaw-faint outlines of
his vanished friend. The resemblance would have been stronger but
for the gleam of madness in her eyes.

For a moment, the room fell utterly silent. As Great-Aunt
Cornelia held his gaze, D'Agosta became afraid she would erupt
with anger at his lie.

But then she smiled. "Dear brother. So good of you to come all
this way to visit me. You've kept away so very long, you
bad creature. Not that I blame you, of course-it's almost more
than I can bear, living in the North with all these barbarous
Yankees." She gave a little laugh.

Okay, D'Agosta thought to himself. Constance had told
him Great-Aunt Cornelia lived in a fantasy world and would
believe herself to be in one of two places: Ravenscry, her
husband's estate north of New York City, or in the old Pendergast
family mansion in New Orleans. Obviously, today she was in the
former.

"Nice to see you, Cornelia," D'Agosta replied
guardedly.

"And who is this lovely young lady at your
side?"

"This is Laura, my ... my wife."

Hayward shot him a glance.

"How delightful! I always wondered when you'd take a bride.
High time the Pendergast line was invigorated by new blood. May I
offer you some refreshment? Tea, perhaps? Or better still, your
favorite, a mint julep?"

She glanced at the orderlies, who had taken up positions as
far away from the woman as possible. They remained
motionless.

"We're fine, thank you," D'Agosta said.

"I suppose it's just as well. We have such dreadful
help these days." She flapped a hand toward the two orderlies
behind her, who fairly jumped. Then she leaned forward, as if to
impart a confidence across the room. "I envy you. Life is so much
more gracious in the South. People up here take no pride in being
members of the servile class."

As D'Agosta nodded in sympathy, a strange, dreamlike unreality
began to settle over him. Here was this elegant old woman
chatting amiably to a brother she'd poisoned almost forty years
before. He wondered just how he was going to go about this.
Ostrom had said to keep the meeting short. He'd better get to the
point.

"How, ah, how is the family?" he asked.

"I'll never forgive my husband for bringing us up to this
drafty pile. Not only is the climate dreary, but the lack of
culture is shocking. My dear children are my
comfort."

The fond smile that accompanied this observation chilled
D'Agosta. He wondered if she'd watched them die.

"Of course, there are no neighbors fit for company. As a
result, my days are my own. I try to walk for the sake of my
health, but the air is so raw I'm frequently driven inside. I've
gone as pale as a ghost. See for yourself." And from the pillow,
she lifted up a thin, palsied hand for his
inspection.

Automatically, D'Agosta stepped forward. Ostrom frowned and
nodded for him to stay back.

"How about the rest of the family?" D'Agosta asked. "I haven't
heard from-from our nephews in a long time."

"Aloysius comes to visit me here every now and then. When he
needs advice." She smiled again, and her eyes flashed. "He's such
a good boy. Attentive to his elders. Not like the other
one."

"Diogenes," D'Agosta said.

Great-Aunt Cornelia nodded. "Diogenes." She gave a shudder.
"From the day he was born, he was different. And then there was
his illness ... and those peculiar eyes of his." She paused.
"You know what they said about him."

"Tell me."

"Dear me, Ambergris, have you forgotten?"

For an uncomfortable moment, D'Agosta thought a look of
skepticism passed over the old woman's face. But it soon vanished
as her expression turned inward. "The Pendergast bloodline has
been tainted for centuries. There but for the grace of God go you
and I, Ambergris."

A suitably pious pause followed this statement. "Young
Diogenes was touched even from the beginning. A bad seed
indeed. After his sudden illness, the darker side of our lineage
reached full flower in him."

D'Agosta remained silent, not daring to say more. After a
moment, Great-Aunt Cornelia stirred and began
again.

"He was a misanthrope from the beginning. Both boys were
loners, of course-they were Pendergasts-but with Diogenes it was
different. Young Aloysius had one close friend his age, I
recall-he became quite a famous painter. And, dear me, Aloysius
would spend a lot of time in the bayou among the Cajuns
and others of that sort, to which I naturally objected. But
Diogenes had no friends at all. Not a one. You remember how none
of the other children would go near him. They were all scared to
death of him. The illness made it so much worse."

"Illness?"

"Very sudden-scarlet fever, they said. That's when his eye
changed color, went milky. He's blind in that eye, you know." She
shuddered.

"Now, Aloysius, he was just the opposite. The poor boy was
bullied. You know how we Pendergasts are frequent objects of
scorn among the common folk. Aloysius was ten, I believe, when he
began visiting that queer old Tibetan man down on Bourbon
Street-he always had the most uncommon acquaintances. The man
taught him all that Tibetan nonsense, you know, with the
unpronounceable name, chang or choong something or
other. He also taught Aloysius that peculiar way of fighting
which guaranteed he was never bothered by bullies
again."

"But the bullies never picked on Diogenes."

"Children have a sixth sense about that kind of thing. And to
think Diogenes was younger and smaller than
Aloysius."

"How did the two brothers get along?" D'Agosta
asked.

"Ambergris, you're not getting forgetful in your old age, are
you, dear? You know Diogenes hated his older brother.
Diogenes never cared for anyone but his mother, of course, but he
seemed to put Aloysius in a special category altogether. After
the illness particularly."

She paused, and for a moment her mad eyes seemed to dim, as if
she was peering far into the past. "Surely, you remember
Aloysius's pet mouse."

"Oh, sure. Of course."

"Incitatus he called it, after the emperor Caligula's favorite
horse.

He was reading Suetonius at the time, and he used to walk
around with the tiny beast on his shoulder, chanting: 'All hail
Caesar's beautiful mouse, Incitatus!' I have a perfect horror of
mice, you know, but the little white thing was so friendly and
calm I found myself able to bear it. Aloysius was so patient with
the creature, he loved it so. Oh, the tricks he taught it!
Incitatus could walk upright on his hind legs. He must have
responded to a dozen different commands. He could fetch a
Ping-Pong ball for you and balance it on his nose like a seal. I
remember you laughing so, dear, I feared your sides would
split."

"I remember."

Great-Aunt Cornelia paused. Even the impassive guards seemed
to be listening.

"And then one morning young Aloysius woke to find a wooden
cross planted at the foot of his bed. A little cross, no more
than six inches high, beautifully and lovingly made. Incitatus
had been crucified upon it."

D'Agosta heard Laura Hayward inhale sharply.

"Nobody had to ask. Everyone knew who'd done it. It changed
Aloysius. He never had another pet after Incitatus. As for
Diogenes, that was just the beginning of his, ah,
experiments on animals. Cats, dogs, even poultry and
livestock began to disappear. I recall one particularly
unpleasant incident with a neighbor's goat..."

At this, Great-Aunt Cornelia stopped speaking and began to
laugh, quite softly, under her breath. It went on for a long
time. Dr. Ostrom, growing alarmed, frowned at D'Agosta and
pointed to his watch.

"When did you last see Diogenes?" D'Agosta asked
quickly.

"Two days after the fire," the old woman
replied.

"The fire," D'Agosta repeated, trying not to make it sound
like a question.

"Of course, the fire," Great-Aunt Cornelia said, her
voice suddenly agitated. "When else? The dreadful, dreadful fire
that destroyed the family and convinced my husband to bring me
and the children up to this drafty mansion. Away from New
Orleans, away from all that."

"I think we're done here," Dr. Ostrom said. He nodded to the
guards.

"Tell me about the fire," D'Agosta pressed.

The old woman's face, which had gone almost fierce, now took
on a look of great sorrow. Her lower lip trembled, and her hands
twitched beneath the restraints. Despite himself, D'Agosta
couldn't help but marvel at the suddenness with which these
changes overtook her.

"Now, listen," Dr. Ostrom began.

D'Agosta held up his hand. "One minute more. Please." When he
looked back at Great-Aunt Cornelia, he found she was staring
directly at him.

"That superstitious, hateful, ignorant mob. They burned our
ancestral home, may the curse of Lucifer be on them and their
children for all eternity. By that time, Aloysius was twenty and
away at Oxford. But Diogenes was home that night. He saw his own
mother and father burned alive. The look on his face when the
authorities pulled him from the basement, where he'd gone to
hide..." She shuddered. "Two days later, Aloysius returned. We
were staying with relatives by then, in Baton Rouge. I recall
Diogenes taking his older brother into another room and closing
the door. They were only inside for five minutes. When Aloysius
came out, his face was dead white. And Diogenes immediately
walked out the front door and disappeared. He didn't take
anything, not even a change of clothing. I never saw him again.
The few times we heard from him, it was either by letter or
through family bankers or solicitors, and then nothing. Until, of
course, the news of his death."

There was a moment of tense silence. The sorrow had left the
old woman's face, leaving it calm, composed.

"I do believe it's time for that mint julep, Ambergris." She
turned sharply. "John! Three mint juleps, well chilled, if
you please. Use the icehouse ice, it's so much
sweeter."

Ostrom spoke sharply. "I'm sorry, your guests have to
go."

"A pity."

An orderly arrived with a plastic cup of water. He handed it
gingerly to the old woman, who took it in her withered hand.
"That's enough, John. You are dismissed."

She turned to D'Agosta. "Dear Ambergris, you're leaving an old
woman to drink alone, shame on you."

"It was nice seeing you," D'Agosta said.

"I do hope you and your lovely bride will come again. It's
always a pleasure to see you ... brother." Then she
abruptly bared her teeth in what seemed half-smile, half-snarl;
raised a spotted hand; and drew the black veil down over her face
once again.

SEVEN

Somewhere, a clock chimed midnight, its deep, bell-like tones
muted by the plush drapes and hanging tapestries of the library
in the old mansion at 891 Riverside Drive.

D'Agosta sat back from the table and stretched in the leather
armchair, fingertips working the kinks out of the small of his
back. This time the library felt a lot more cheery: a fire was
crackling atop wrought-iron firedogs, and light from half a dozen
lamps threw a mellow glow into the remotest corners. Constance
was sitting beside the fire, sipping tisane from a china cup and
reading Spenser's Faerie Queene. Proctor, who had not
forgotten D'Agosta's own taste in beverages, had drifted in a few
times, replacing warm, half-finished glasses of Budweiser with
chilled ones.

Constance had produced all the materials Pendergast saved
concerning his brother, and D'Agosta had spent the evening poring
over them. Here, in this familiar room, with its walls of books
and its scent of leather and woodsmoke, D'Agosta could almost
imagine Pendergast at his side, helping him take up the long-cold
trail, pale eyes glittering with curiosity at the onset of the
chase.

Except there was precious little here to chase. D'Agosta
glanced over the documents, clippings, letters, photographs, and
old reports that littered the table. Pendergast had clearly taken
his brother's threat seriously: the collection was beautifully
organized and annotated. It was almost as if Pendergast knew
that, when the time ultimately came, he might not be around to
face the challenge; that the task might be left to others. He'd
saved every scrap of information, it seemed, that he had been
able to obtain.

Over the last several hours, D'Agosta had read everything on
the table two and, in some cases, three times. After Diogenes had
severed his connection with the Pendergast clan following the
death of his mother and father, he had gone largely into hiding.
For almost a year, there was no word at all. Then a letter
arrived from a family lawyer, asking that a sum of $100,000 be
wired to a Zurich bank for Diogenes's benefit. This was followed
a year later by another, similar letter, demanding that $250,000
be wired to a bank in Heidelberg. The family rejected this second
request, and it prompted a response from Diogenes. That letter
now sat on the table, sealed between two panels of clear Lucite.
D'Agosta glanced once again at the spidery, meticulous script, so
curiously inappropriate for a boy of seventeen. There was no date
or location, and it was addressed to Pendergast:

Ave, frater-

I find it disagreeable to write you on this subject, or any
other for that matter. But you force my hand. For I have no doubt
you are the one behind the denial of my request for
funds.

I need not remind you I will come into my inheritance in a few
years. Until that time I shall now and then require certain
trifling sums such as I requested last month. You will find it in
your best interests, and in the best interests of others you may
or may not know, to honor such requests. I should have thought
our final discussion in Baton Rouge would have made that clear. I
am very much preoccupied at present with various lines of
research and study and have no time to earn money in the
conventional manner. If forced to do so, I will obtain the
funds I need-in a manner amusing to myself. If you do not wish to
see my attentions diverted in this way, you will honor my request
with all haste.

The next time I write you, it shall be on a matter of my own
choosing, not yours. I will not bring this up again. Good-bye,
brother. And bonne chance.

D'Agosta put the letter aside. Records showed that the money
was promptly sent. The following year, a similar sum was wired to
a bank in Threadneedle Street, London. A year later, another sum
was sent to a bank in Kent. Diogenes surfaced briefly on his
twenty-first birthday to claim his inheritance-eighty-seven
million dollars. Two months later, he was reported to have been
killed in an automobile accident in Canterbury High Street.
Burned beyond recognition. The inheritance was never
found.

D'Agosta turned the bogus death certificate over in his
hands.

I am very much preoccupied at present with various lines of
research and study. But what, exactly? Diogenes certainly
didn't say, and his brother was silent on the matter. Or almost
silent. D'Agosta let his eye fall on a pile of news clippings.
They had been taken from a variety of foreign magazines and
newspapers. Each had been labeled with an attribution and a date,
and those in foreign languages had translations attached-once
again, Pendergast thinking ahead.

Most of these clippings dealt with unsolved crimes. There was
an entire family in Lisbon, killed by botulism, yet without any
trace of food found in their stomachs. A chemist at the
University of Paris, Sorbonne, was discovered with radial
arteries of both wrists severed and the body carefully
exsanguinated. Yet there was no blood at the murder scene. Files
on several of the chemist's experiments were found to be missing.
Additional clippings described still other deaths, more grisly,
in which the corpses seemed to have been victims of various
tortures or experimentation-the bodies were too badly damaged to
be certain. And yet other clippings were mere obituaries. There
seemed to be no logic or pattern to the deaths, and Pendergast
did not leave any commentary on what it was that he had found
interesting.

D'Agosta picked up the pile, riffled through it. There was a
variety of thefts, too. A pharmaceutical manufacturing company,
reporting the robbery of a freezer full of experimental drugs. A
collection of diamonds mysteriously vanished from a vault in
Israel. A rare, fist-sized piece of amber containing a leaf from
a long-extinct plant, lifted from a wealthy couple's apartment in
Paris. A unique, polished T. rex coprolite, dating precisely from
the K-T boundary.

He replaced the clippings on the table with a
sigh.

Next his eye fell on a small sheaf of papers from Sandringham,
a private school in the south of England that Diogenes
attended-unknown to his family-to finish out his last year of
upper school. He had managed to get himself accepted on the
strength of several forged documents and a phony set of parents
hired for the occasion. Despite a first- semester report card
putting him in the first of every form, he was expelled a few
months later. Judging from the paperwork, the school gave no
reason for the expulsion and responded to Pendergast's queries
with evasion, even agitation. Other papers showed that Pendergast
had contacted a certain Brian Cooper on several occasions-Cooper
had briefly been the roommate of Diogenes at Sandringham-but it
seemed the boy refused to respond. A final letter from the
youth's parents said Brian had been placed in an institution,
where he was being treated for acute catatonia.

Following the expulsion, Diogenes slipped completely out of
view for more than two years. And then he had surfaced to claim
his inheritance. Four months later, he staged his own death in
Canterbury.

After that, silence.

No-that wasn't quite true. There was one final communication.
D'Agosta turned toward a folded sheet of heavy linen paper,
sitting alone at one corner of the table. He reached for it,
opened it thoughtfully. At the top was an embossed coat of arms,
a lidless eye over two moons, a lion crouched beneath. And at the
very center of the sheet was a date, written in violet ink with
what D'Agosta now recognized as Diogenes's handwriting:
January 28.

Inexorably, D'Agosta's mind returned once again to the October
day when he'd first held the letter-here, in this room, on the
eve of their departure to Italy. Pendergast had shown it to him
and spoken briefly of Diogenes's plan to commit the perfect
crime.

But D'Agosta had returned from Italy alone. And now it was up
to him-and nobody else-to follow through for his dead partner, to
stop the crime that presumably would occur on January
28.

Less than a week away.

He felt a rising panic; there was so little time left. The
roommate at Sandringham: now, there was a lead. He'd call the
parents tomorrow, see if the boy was talking. Even if he struck
out there, undoubtedly there were other boys at the school who
had known Diogenes.

D'Agosta folded the paper carefully and returned it to the
table. Beside it lay a single black-and-white photograph, scuffed
and creased with age. He picked it up, held it to the light. A
man, a woman, and two young boys, standing before an elaborate
wrought-iron railing. An imposing mansion could be seen in the
middle distance. It was a warm day: the boys were in shorts, and
the woman wore a summer dress. The man stared at the camera with
a patrician face. The woman was beautiful, with light hair and a
mysterious smile. The boys were perhaps eight and five. The elder
stood straight, arms behind his back, looking gravely into the
lens. His light blond hair was carefully parted, his clothes
pressed. Something about the shape of the cheekbones, the
aquiline features, told D'Agosta this was Agent
Pendergast.

Beside him was a younger boy with ginger hair, hands pressed
together, fingers pointed skyward, as if in prayer. Unlike his
older sibling, Diogenes seemed faintly disheveled. But there was
nothing in his dress or his grooming to account for this. Maybe
it was something in the relaxed, almost languid draping of his
limbs, so out of context with the chastely positioned hands.
Maybe it was the parted lips, too full and sensual for a person
so young. Both eyes looked the same- this must have been before
the illness.

Still, D'Agosta was drawn to the eyes. They weren't looking at
the camera, but at some point past it if they were looking at
anything at all. They seemed dull, almost dead, out of place in
that childish little face. D'Agosta felt an uncomfortable
sensation in the pit of his stomach.

There was a rustle beside him and D'Agosta jumped. Constance
Greene had suddenly materialized at his side. She seemed to have
Pendergast's ability to approach with almost total
silence.

"I'm sorry," Constance said. "I didn't mean to startle
you."

"No problem. Looking at all this stuff is enough to creep
anyone out."

"Excuse me. Creep out?"

"It's just an expression."

"Have you found anything interesting? Anything at
all?"

D'Agosta shook his head. "Nothing we didn't talk about
earlier." He paused. "The only thing is, I didn't see anything in
here about Diogenes's illness. Scarlet fever, according to Aunt
Cornelia. She said it changed him."

"I wish there was more information I could give you. I've
searched the collections and the family papers, just in case
there was something Aloysius overlooked. But he was very
thorough. There's nothing else."

Nothing else. Diogenes's whereabouts, his appearance,
his activities, even the crime he planned to commit: everything
was a blank.

There was only a date-January 28. Next Monday.

"Maybe Pendergast was wrong," D'Agosta said, trying to sound
hopeful. "About the date, I mean. Maybe it's not for another
year. Or maybe it's something else entirely." He gestured at the
documents strewn across the table. "All this seems so far away
and long ago. It's hard to believe something big's about to
happen."

The only response from Constance was a faint, and fleeting,
smile.

EIGHT

Lorace Sawtelle passed the oversize vellum menu back to the
waiter with relief. He wished that once-just once-a client would
come to him. He hated the sprawling concrete jungles they
all worked in: Chicago, Detroit, and now New York. Once you got
to know it, Keokuk wasn't so bad. He knew all the best watering
holes and titty bars. Some of his clients might even develop a
deep admiration for certain Iowan charms.

Across the table, his client was ordering something that
sounded like cough-up of veal. Horace Sawtelle wondered if the
man really knew what the hell he was asking for. He himself had
scanned the menu, first one side and then the other, with deep
misgivings. Handwritten French script, and unpronounceable at
that. He'd settled on something called steak tartare. Hell, how
bad could it be? Even the French couldn't ruin steak. And he
liked tartar sauce on fish sticks.

"You don't mind if I glance through them once more before
signing?" the client asked, holding up the sheaf of
contracts.

Sawtelle nodded. "You go right ahead." Never mind that they'd
spent the last two hours going over them with a damn magnifying
glass. You'd think the guy was buying a million dollars' worth of
Palm Beach real estate instead of fifty grand in machine
parts.

The client buried his nose in the paperwork and Sawtelle
looked around, idly crunching on a breadstick. They were sitting
in what looked to him like a glassed-in sidewalk cafe, protruding
out into the sidewalk from the main restaurant. Every table was
full: these pasty-faced New Yorkers needed all the sunlight they
could get. Three women sat at the next table, black-haired and
gaunt, picking at huge fruit salads. On the far side, a fat
businessman was digging into a plate of something yellow and
slippery.

A truck passed in a shriek of grinding gears, seemingly inches
away from the glass wall, and Sawtelle's hand closed reflexively,
breaking the breadstick. He wiped his hand on the tablecloth in
disgust. Why the hell had the client insisted on eating out here,
in the January chill? He glanced up through the glass ceiling at
the pink awning, La Vielle Ville stitched on it in white.
Above towered one of the huge cliff dwellings that passed for
apartments in New York City. Sawtelle eyed the rows of identical
windows rising toward the sooty sky. Like a damn high-rise
prison. Probably held a thousand people. How could they stand
it?

There was a flurry of activity near the entrance to the
kitchen and Sawtelle glanced over disinterestedly. Maybe it was
his lunch. Prepared tableside, the menu had said. And just how
the hell were they going to do that: wheel a Weber grill over and
fire up the charcoal? But sure enough, here they came, a whole
damn procession of men in white smocks, pushing what looked like
a small gurney in front of them.

The chef parked the rolling table at Sawtelle's elbow with a
proud flourish. He barked a few orders in rapid-fire French and
several underlings began to scurry around, one chopping onions,
another frenziedly beating a raw egg. Sawtelle scanned the
rolling table. There were little white toast points, a pile of
round green things he guessed were capers, spices and dishes of
unknown liquids, and a cupful of minced garlic. In the center, a
fist-sized wad of raw hamburger. No steak or tartar sauce to be
had for love or money.

With great ceremony, the chef dropped the hamburger into a
stainless bowl, poured in the raw egg, the garlic, and onions,
then began mashing everything together. In a few moments, he
removed the sticky mass and dropped it back onto the rolling
table, working it slowly between his fingers. Sawtelle glanced
away, making a mental note to ask that the hamburger be cooked
extra-well-done. You never know what kinds of diseases these
New Yorkers carry around. And where was the damn grill,
anyway?

At that moment, a waiter appeared at the client's side and
slipped a plate onto the table. Sawtelle looked over in surprise
just as another waiter darted in and slid something in between
his own knife and fork. Looking down, Sawtelle saw with
incredulity that the glistening patty of raw beef-now tamped down
into a neat little mound-sat in front of him, surrounded by
wedges of toast, chopped eggs, and capers.

Sawtelle looked up again quickly, uncomprehending. Across the
table, the client was nodding approvingly.

The chef beamed at them briefly from the far side of the
table, then stepped back as his flunkies began wheeling the
apparatus away.

"Excuse me," Sawtelle said in a low voice. "You haven't cooked
it."

The chef stopped. "Pourquoi?"

Sawtelle jerked a finger in the direction of his plate. "I
said, you haven't cooked it. You know, heat. Fire.
Flambé."

The chef shook his head vigorously. "No, monsieur. Is
no cook."

"You don't cook steak tartare," the client said, pausing as he
was about to sign the contracts. "It's served raw. You didn't
know?" A superior smile came briefly to his lips, then
vanished.

Sawtelle sat back, rolling his eyes heavenward, struggling to
keep his temper. Only in New York. Twenty-five bucks for a
mound of raw hamburger.

Suddenly, he stiffened. "Sweet Caesar, what the hell is
that?"

Far above him, a man dangled in the sky: limbs flung wide and
flailing silently in the chill air. For a moment, it seemed to
Sawtelle that the man was just hovering there, as if by magic.
But then he made out the thin taut line of rope that arrowed
upward from the man's neck. It disappeared into a window above,
black and broken. Sawtelle stared openmouthed, thunderstruck by
the sight.

Others in the restaurant had followed his gaze. There were
sharp intakes of breath, a sudden gasp.

The figure jerked and shuddered, its back arching in agony
until the victim seemed almost bent double. Sawtelle watched,
transfixed with horror.

Then, suddenly, the rope parted. The man, flapping his arms
and churning his legs, dropped directly toward
him.

Just as suddenly, Sawtelle found he could move again. With an
inarticulate cry, he threw himself backward in his chair. A split
second later, there came an explosion of glass, and a shape
hurtled past in a shower of glass and landed with a deafening
crash on the women and their fruit salads, which disintegrated
into a strange pastel eruption of reds and yellows and greens.
From his position on his back on the floor, Sawtelle felt
something warm and wet slap him hard across the side of the face,
followed almost immediately by a shower of broken glass, dishes,
cups, forks, spoons, and flowers, all raining down from the
impact.

A strange silence. And then the cries began, the screams of
pain, horror, and fear, but they seemed strangely soft and far
away. Then he realized that his right ear was full of an unknown
substance.

As he lay on his back, the full impact of what had just
happened finally registered. Disbelief and horror washed over him
once again. For a minute, maybe two, he found himself unable to
move. The cries and shrieks grew steadily louder.

At last, with a heroic effort, he forced his unwilling limbs
to respond. He rose to his knees, then staggered to his feet.
Other people were now climbing to their feet, the room filling
with the muffled shrieks and moans of the damned. Glass lay
everywhere. The table at his right had turned into a crumpled
mound of food, gore, flowers, tablecloth, napkins, and splintered
wood. His own table was covered with glass. The
twenty-five-dollar mound of raw hamburger was the only thing that
had been spared, and it sat in solitary splendor, fresh and
gleaming, all by itself.

His eyes moved to his client, who was still sitting,
motionless, his suit splattered with something
indescribable.

Abruptly, involuntarily, Sawtelle's limbs went into action. He
swiveled about, found the door, took a step, lost his balance,
recovered, took another.

The client voice followed him. "Are-are you
going?"

The question was so inane, so inappropriate, that Sawtelle
broke into a choking, hoarse laugh. "Going?" he repeated,
clearing his ear with a tug. "Yeah. I'm going." He lurched
toward the door, coughing with laughter, his feet crunching
across glass and ruin, anything to get away from this terrible
place. He hit the sidewalk and turned south, his walk breaking
into a run, scattering pedestrians in his wake.

From now on, people would just have to come to
Keokuk.

NINE

William Smithback Jr. got out of the cab, tossed a crumpled
twenty through the front passenger window, and looked up Broadway
toward Lincoln Center. A few blocks uptown he could make out a
vast throng of people. They'd spilled out into Columbus and
across 65th Street, creating one mother of a traffic jam. He
could hear people leaning on their horns, the shriek of sirens,
the occasional earth-shuddering blaaaat of a truck's air
horn.

Smithback threaded his way through the sea of motionless
vehicles, then turned north and began jogging up Broadway, his
breath misting in the cold January air. It seemed he ran just
about everywhere these days. Gone was the dignified, measured
step of the ace New York Times reporter. Now he rushed to
get his copy in on time, dashed to each new assignment, and
sometimes filed two stories a day. His wife of two months, Nora
Kelly, was not happy. She'd had expectations of unhurried
dinners, sharing with each other the events of the day, before
retiring to a night of lingering pleasure. But Smithback found he
had little time for either eating or lingering. Yes, he was on
the run these days: and for good reason. Bryce Harriman was
running, too, and he was hard on Smithback's
heels.

It had been one of the worst shocks of Smithback's life to
return from his honeymoon and find Bryce Harriman lounging in his
office doorway, grinning smugly, wearing the usual insufferably
preppie clothes, welcoming him back to "our
paper."

Our paper. Oh, God.

Everything had been going his way. He was a rising star at the
Times, had nailed half a dozen great scoops in as many
months. Fen-ton Davies, his editor, had started turning
automatically to Smithback when it came time to hand out the big
assignments. He'd finally convinced his girlfriend Nora to stop
chasing old bones and digging up pots long enough to get hitched.
And their honeymoon at Angkor Wat had been a dream-especially the
week they'd spent at the lost temple of Banteay Chhmar, hacking
through the jungle, braving snakes, malaria, and stinging ants
while exploring the vast ruins. He remembered thinking, on the
plane ride home, that life couldn't possibly get any
better.

And he'd been right.

Despite Harriman's smarmy collegiality, it was clear from day
one that he was gunning for Smithback. It wasn't the first time
they'd crossed swords, but never before at the same paper. How
had he managed to get rehired by the Times while Smithback
was halfway around the world? The way Harriman sucked up to
Davies, bringing the editor lattes every morning, hanging on his
every word like he was the Oracle of Delphi, made Smithback's
gorge rise. But it seemed to be working: just last week, Harriman
had bagged the Dangler story, which by rights belonged to
Smithback.

Smithback quickened his jog. Sixty-fifth and Broadway-the spot
where some guy had reportedly fallen right into the midst of
dozens of people eating lunch-was just ahead now. He could see
the cluster of television cameras, reporters checking their
cassette recorders, soundmen setting up boom microphones. This
was his chance to outshine Harriman, seize the
momentum.

No briefing under way yet, thank God.

He shook his head, muttering under his breath as he elbowed
his way through the crowd.

Up ahead, he could see the glassed-in cafe of La Vielle Ville.
Inside, police were still working the scene: the periodic flash
of the police photographer lit up the glass restaurant. Crime
scene tape was draped everywhere like yellow bunting. His eye
rose to the glass roof of the cafe and the huge, jagged hole
where the victim had fallen through, and still farther, up the
broad facade of Lincoln Towers, until it reached the broken
window from which the victim had precipitated. He could see cops
there, too, and the bright bursts of a flash unit.

He pushed forward, looking around for witnesses. "I'm a
reporter," he said loudly. "Bill Smithback, New York
Times. Anybody see what happened?"

Several faces turned to regard him silently. Smithback took
them in: a West Side matron carrying a microscopic Pomeranian; a
bicycle messenger; a man balancing a large box filled with
Chinese takeout on one shoulder; half a dozen
others.

"I'm looking for a witness. Anybody see
anything?"

Silence. Most of them probably don't even speak
English, he thought.

"Anybody know anything?"

At this, a man wearing earmuffs and a heavy coat nodded
vigorously. "A man," he said in a thick Indian accent. "He
fall."

This was useless. Smithback pushed himself deeper into the
crowd. Up ahead, he spotted a policeman, shooing people onto the
sidewalk, trying to clear the cross street.

"Hey, Officer!" Smithback called out, using his elbows to dig
through the gawking herd. "I'm from the Times. What
happened here?"

The officer stopped barking orders long enough to glance his
way. Then he went back to his work.

"Any ID on the victim?"

But the cop ignored him completely.

Smithback watched his retreating back. Typical. A lesser
reporter might be content to wait for the official briefing, but
not him. He'd get the inside scoop, and he wouldn't even break a
sweat trying.

As he looked around again, his eye stopped at the main
entrance to the apartment tower. The building was huge, probably
sported a thousand apartments at least. There'd be people inside
who knew the victim, could provide some color, maybe even
speculate on what happened. He craned his neck, counting floors,
until he again reached the open window. Twenty-fourth
floor.

He began pushing his way through the crowd again, avoiding the
megaphone-wielding cops, tacking as directly as he could toward
the building's entrance. It was guarded by three large policemen
who looked like they meant business. How on earth was he going to
get in? Claim to be a tenant? That wasn't likely to
work.

As he paused to survey the milling throng of press outside,
his equanimity quickly returned. They were all waiting, like
restless sheep, for some police brass to come out and begin the
briefing. Smithback looked on pityingly. He didn't want the same
story everybody else got: spoon-fed by the authorities, telling
only what they wanted to tell with the requisite spin attached.
He wanted the real story: the story that lay on the
twenty-fourth floor of Lincoln Towers.

He turned away from the crowd and headed in the opposite
direction. All big apartment buildings like this had a service
entrance.

He followed the facade of the building up Broadway until he
finally reached its end, where a narrow alley separated it from
the next building. Thrusting his hands back into his pockets, he
turned down the alley, whistling jauntily.

A moment later, his whistling stopped. Up ahead lay a large
metal door marked Service Entrance-Deliveries.
Standing beside the door was another cop. He was staring at
Smithback and speaking into a small radio clipped to his
collar.

Damn. Well, he couldn't just stop dead in his tracks
and turn around-that would look suspicious. He'd just walk right
past the cop like he was taking a shortcut behind the
building.

"Morning, Officer," he said as he came abreast of the
policeman.

"Afternoon, Mr. Smithback," the cop replied.

Smithback felt his jaw tighten.

Whoever was in charge of this homicide investigation was a
pro, did things by the book. But Smithback was not some
third-rate line stringer. If there was another way in, he'd find
it. He followed the alley around the back of the building until
it turned a right angle, heading once again toward
65th.

Yes. There, not thirty yards in front of him, was the
staff entrance to La Vielle Ville. Deserted, with no cop
loitering around outside. If he couldn't get to the twenty-fourth
floor, at least he could check out the place where the man had
landed.

He moved forward quickly, excitement adding spring to his
step. Once he'd checked out the restaurant, there might even be a
way to get into the high-rise. There had to be connecting
passages, perhaps through the basement.

Smithback reached the battered metal door, pulled it ajar,
began to step in.

Then he froze. There, beside a brace of massive stoves,
several policemen were taking statements from cooks and
waiters.

Everybody slowly turned to look at him.

He put a tentative foot in, like he was going
somewhere.

"No press," barked one of the cops.

"Sorry," he said, flashing what he feared was a ghastly smile.
"Wrong way."

And, very gently, he closed the door and stepped back, walking
back around to the front of the building, where he was once more
repelled by the sight of the vast herd of reporters, all waiting
like sheep to the slaughter.

No way, not him, not Bill Smithback of the Times. His
eye cast around for some angle of attack, some idea that hadn't
occurred to the others-and then he saw it: a pizza delivery man
on a motorbike, hopelessly trying to work his way through the
crowd. He was a skinny man with no chin wearing a silly hat that
said Romeo's Pizzeria, and his face was splotched and red
with frustration.

Smithback approached him, nodded toward the carrier mounted on
the back. "Got a pizza in there?"

"Two," the man said. "Look at this shit. They're gonna be
stone-cold, and there goes my tip. On top of that, if I don't get
it there in twenty minutes, they don't have to
pay-"

Smithback cut him off. "Fifty bucks for your two pizzas
and the hat."

The man looked at him blankly, like a complete
idiot.

Smithback pulled out a fifty. "Here. Take it."

"But what about-"

"Tell them you got robbed."

The man couldn't help but take the money. Smithback swiped the
hat off the man's head, stuck it on his own, opened the rear
carrier on the motorbike, and hauled out the pizza boxes. He
moved through the crowd toward the door, carrying the
pizzas in one hand and jerking off his tie with the other,
stuffing it in his pocket.

"Pizza delivery, coming through!" He elbowed his way to
the front, came up against the blue barricades draped in crime
scene tape.

"Pizza delivery, SOC team, twenty-fourth
floor."

It worked like a dream. The fat cop manning the barricade
shoved it aside and Smithback hiked through.

Now for the triumvirate at the door.

He strode confidently forward as the three cops turned to face
him.

"Pizza delivery, twenty-fourth floor."

They moved to block his way.

"I'll take the pizzas up," one said.

"Sorry. Against company rules. I got to deliver directly to
the customer."

"Nobody's allowed in."

"Yeah, but this is for the SOC team. And if you take it up,
how am I going to collect my money?"

The cops exchanged an uncertain glance. One shrugged.
Smithback felt a glow. It was going to work. He was as good as
in.

"They're getting cold, come on." Smithback pressed
forward.

"How much?"

"Like I said, I have to deliver directly to the
customer. May I?" He made one more tentative step, almost
bumped into the large gut of the lead cop.

"No one's allowed up."

"Yes, but it's just for a-"

"Give me the pizzas."

"Like I said-"

The cop reached out. "I said, give me the damn
pizzas."

And just like that, Smithback realized he was defeated. He
docilely held them out and the cop took them.

"How much?" the cop asked.

"Ten bucks."

The cop gave him ten, no tip. "Who's it for?"

"The SOC team."

"Your customer got a name? There're a dozen SOC up
there."

"Ah, I think it was Miller."

The cop grunted, disappeared in the dim lobby carrying the
pizzas, while the other two closed rank, blocking the
door. The one who had shrugged turned back. "Sorry, pal, but
could you bring me a fifteen-inch pie, pepperoni, garlic, and
onions with extra cheese?"

"Up yours," Smithback said, turning and walking back to the
barriers. As he squeezed through the press of reporters, he heard
some snickers and someone called out, "Nice try, Bill." And
another shrilled out in an effeminate voice, "Why, Billy darling,
that hat looks dreamy on you."

Smithback pulled the hat off in disgust and tossed it. For
once, his reportorial genius had failed. He was already getting a
bad feeling about this assignment. It had barely started and
already it was smelling rotten. Despite the January frost in the
air, he could almost feel Harriman's hot breath on the back of
his neck.

He turned and-with heavy heart-took his place in the crowd to
wait for the official briefing.

TEN

Lieutenant Vincent D'Agosta pushed open the door of McFeeley's
Ale House, feeling bone-tired. McFeeley's was about as cozy an
Irish bar as you could still find in New York, and D'Agosta
needed a little comfort right about now. The place was dark,
long, and narrow, with a thickly varnished wooden bar on one
side, booths along the other. Ancient sporting prints hung from
the walls, indistinguishable underneath a heavy mantle of dust.
Behind the bar, bottles stood six rows deep in front of the
mirrored wall. An old jukebox sat near the door, the kind where
the Irish selections were printed in green ink. On tap were
Guinness, Harp, and Bass. The place smelled of greasy cooking and
spilled beer. Just about the only nostalgic touch missing, in
fact, was tobacco smoke, and D'Agosta didn't miss that at all:
he'd given up cigars years before, when he quit the force and
moved to Canada to write.

McFeeley's was half empty, the way D'Agosta liked it. He chose
a stool, pulled it up to the bar.

Patrick, the bartender, caught sight of him and came over.
"Hey, Lieutenant," he said, sliding a coaster in front of him.
"How's it going?"

"It's going."

"The usual?"

"No, Paddy, a black and tan, please. And a cheeseburger,
rare.'

A pint appeared a moment later and D'Agosta sank his upper lip
meditatively into the mocha-colored foam. He almost never allowed
himself this kind of indulgence anymore-he had lost twenty pounds
in the last few months and didn't intend to gain them back- but
tonight he'd make an exception. Laura Hayward wouldn't be home
until late: she was working the bizarre hanging that had taken
place on the Upper West Side at lunchtime.

He'd spent a fruitless morning chasing leads. There was
nothing in the public records office on Ravenscry, Great-Aunt
Cornelia's estate in Dutchess County. He'd made inquiries with
the NOPD about the long-burned Pendergast residence in New
Orleans, with similar results. In both cases, there was nothing
about Diogenes Pendergast.

From headquarters, he'd journeyed back to 891 Riverside to
reexamine Pendergast's scanty collection of evidence. He'd called
the London bank to which, according to Pendergast's records,
Diogenes had requested money be deposited years before. The
account had been closed for twenty years, no forwarding
information available. Inquiries at the banks in Heidelberg and
Zurich brought the same answer. He spoke with the family in
England whose son had briefly been Diogenes's roommate at
Sandringham, only to learn the youth had killed himself one day
after being removed from protective restraints.

Next, he called the firm of lawyers that had acted as
intermediaries in the correspondence between Diogenes and his
family. This time the red tape was almost interminable: he was
transferred from one legal secretary to another, each requiring a
repetition of his request. At long last, an attorney who would
not identify himself came on the line and informed D'Agosta that
Diogenes Pendergast was no longer a client; that attorney-client
privilege forbade giving out further information; and that,
besides, all relevant files had long been destroyed at said
person's request.

Five hours and at least thirty phone calls later, D'Agosta had
learned precisely zip.

Next, he turned to the newspaper clippings Pendergast had
collected of various odd crimes. He'd considered calling the case
officers involved but decided against it. Pendergast had no doubt
done this already; if there had been any information worth
sharing, he would have put it in the files. Anyway, D'Agosta
still had no clue what Pendergast thought important about these
clippings, scattered as they were across the globe, the crimes
they reported bizarre yet seemingly unconnected.

It was now past two o'clock. D'Agosta knew his boss, Captain
Singleton, would be out: he invariably spent his afternoons in
the field, following up personally on the important cases. So
D'Agosta left 891 Riverside and made his way down to the precinct
house, where he slunk to his desk, turned on his computer
terminal, and punched in his password. For the rest of the
afternoon, he had moused his way through every law enforcement
and governmental database he could access: NYPD, state, federal,
WICAPS, Interpol, even the Social Security Administration.
Nothing. Despite all the crushing, endless documentation
generated by the interlocking tangle of government bureaucracies,
Diogenes walked through it all like a wraith, leaving no
impression behind him. It was almost as if the guy were really
dead, after all.

That was when he gave up and went to
McFeeley's.

His cheeseburger arrived and he began to eat, barely tasting
it. His investigation wasn't even forty-eight hours old, and
already he'd just about run out of leads. Pendergast's vast
resources seemed of little use against a ghost.

He took a few more halfhearted bites from his burger, finished
his drink, dropped some bills on the bar, nodded to Patrick, and
left. Get all the information you can from Detective Captain
Laura Hayward, but for her own sake minimize her involvement.
D'Agosta had, in fact, told her little of his investigations
since their visit to Great-Aunt Cornelia. In a perverse way, it
seemed best.

Why?

He thrust his hands into his pockets, bent into the chill
January wind. Was it because of the levelheaded things he was
certain she'd say? Vinnie, this is crazy. A letter containing
nothing but a date. Some half-baked threats made twenty,
thirty years ago. I can't believe you're wasting your
time.

And maybe-just maybe-he was afraid she'd convince him it was
crazy, too.

Strolling along, he approached the intersection of 77th and
First Avenue. The ugly white brick apartment building he shared
with Laura Hayward rose at the corner. Shivering, he glanced at
his watch. Eight o'clock. Laura wouldn't be home yet. He'd set
the table for her, put what was left of the lasagna
napoletana in the microwave. He was curious to hear more
about this new murder case she was working. Anything to keep his
mind from running in circles.

The doorman made a belated, insolent attempt to open the door
for him. D'Agosta walked past into the narrow lobby, sounding his
pocket for the key. Ahead, one of the elevators stood open
invitingly. D'Agosta stepped in, pressing the button for the
fifteenth floor.

Just as the elevator doors were closing, a gloved hand shot
in, forcing them open. It was the obnoxious doorman. He stepped
in, then turned to face forward, crossing his arms before him and
ignoring D'Agosta. The unpleasant smell of body odor filled the
small space.

D'Agosta glanced at him with irritation. He was a
swarthy-looking fellow with a fleshy face, brown eyes,
overweight. Strange: he hadn't pressed a floor button of his own.
D'Agosta looked away, losing interest, directing his gaze to the
floor indicator as the elevator rose. Five, six,
seven...

The doorman leaned forward, pressed the stop button. The
elevator came to an abrupt halt.

D'Agosta glanced over. "What's your problem?"

The doorman didn't bother looking at him. Instead, he pulled
an override key from his pocket, inserted it into the control
panel, turned it, and withdrew it. With a jerk, the elevator
began descending again.

Laura's right, D'Agosta thought. This jerk's got a
serious attitude problem. "Look, I don't know where the hell
you think you're going, but you can wait until I've reached my
floor." D'Agosta pressed the button marked 15
again.

The elevator didn't respond. It was still descending, past the
lobby now and heading for the basement.

In a heartbeat, D'Agosta's irritation turned to alarm. His cop
radar went off full blast. The cautionary words of Pendergast's
note suddenly flashed through his mind: Diogenes is
consummately dangerous. Do not gain his attention any earlier
than you have to. Almost without thinking, he reached into
his coat and yanked out his service piece.

But even as he did so, the doorman spun toward him and, with
an amazing, lightninglike move, thrust him up against the
elevator wall, pinning his arms behind his back in a viselike
grip. D'Agosta struggled, only to find he had been expertly
restrained. He drew breath to yell for help, but-almost as if by
telepathy-a gloved hand clamped down hard over his
mouth.

D'Agosta struggled briefly again, hardly believing how swiftly
and totally he had been disarmed and immobilized.

And then the doorman did a strange thing. He leaned forward,
brought his lips directly to D'Agosta's ear. When he spoke, it
was in the faintest of whispers.

"My sincerest apologies, Vincent..."

ELEVEN

Detective Captain Laura Hayward walked across the living room
and glanced out the window, careful not to brush against the
table that had been placed beneath it. Through the shattered
hole, she could see that, far below, Broadway was finally quiet.
She'd given her men strict orders to seal off the scene, and
they'd done a good job: the injured had been quickly removed by
ambulance, the gawkers and rubberneckers had eventually grown
tired and cold and had drifted away. The press had been more
tenacious, but they, too, had eventually settled for the terse
statement she'd given late in the afternoon. It had proved a
complicated, messy crime scene, involving the apartment and the
restaurant below, but she'd coordinated all the investigative
teams personally and now-at last-the on-site forensic work was
wrapping up. The fingerprint examiners, photo technicians, and
crime scene analysts had already left. Only the evidence
custodian remained, and she would be gone within the
hour.

Laura Hayward derived immense satisfaction from a well-worked
homicide. Violent death was a disorderly affair. But as a scene
was analyzed-as wave after wave of forensic investigators,
medical examiners, technicians, and criminalists went about their
jobs in the scripted fashion-the chaos and horror were
compartmentalized, ordered, and labeled. It was as if the
investigation itself restored some of the natural order that the
act of murder had overturned.

And yet, as she looked over this scene, Hayward felt no
satisfaction. She felt instead an inexplicable sense of
unease.

She shivered, blew on her hands, buttoned the top button of
her coat. What with the broken window, and her instructions to
touch nothing (not even the heat), the room was only a few
degrees warmer than outside. For a moment, she found herself
wishing D'Agosta were there. No matter: she'd tell him about the
case when she got home. He'd be interested, she knew, and he
often surprised her with practical, creative suggestions. Maybe
it would get his mind off his unhealthy obsession with
Pendergast's brother. Just when he'd gotten over Pendergast's
death, just when his sense of guilt had seemed to ease, he'd been
summoned by that damned chauffeur...

"Ma'am?" a sergeant said, popping his head into the living
room. "Captain Singleton is here."

"Show him in, please." Singleton was the local precinct
captain, and Hayward expected he would show up personally. He was
one of those old-fashioned captains who felt their place was with
their men, working cases, on the street or at the scene of a
crime. Hayward had worked with Singleton before and found him one
of the best captains in the city when it came to working with
Homicide-cooperative, deferring when it came to forensics, but
involving himself usefully in every step of the
investigation.

And now in the doorway the man himself appeared, natty in a
long camel's-hair coat, his carefully trimmed hair impeccable as
always. He paused, eyes moving about restlessly, taking in the
scene. Then he smiled, stepped forward, and offered his hand.
"Laura."

"Glen. Nice to see you." The handshake was brief and
businesslike. She wondered if Singleton knew about her and
D'Agosta, decided immediately that he didn't: they had both been
careful to keep their relationship out of the NYPD rumor
mill.

Singleton waved his hand around the room. "Beautiful work, as
usual. Hope you don't mind my sticking my nose
in."

"Not at all. We're just about squared away."

"How's it going?"

"Just fine." She hesitated. No reason not to tell Singleton:
unlike most police brass, he got no joy out of backstabbing
potential rivals for advancement-nor was he threatened by being
upstaged by Homicide. Besides, he was a captain, too-she could
rely on his discretion.

"Actually, I'm not so sure," she said in a quieter
tone.

Singleton glanced over at the evidence custodian, who was
standing in a far corner of the room jotting some notations on a
clipboard. "Want to tell me about it?"

"The lock on the front door was expertly picked. It's a small
apartment, just two bedrooms, one converted into an artist's
studio. The perpetrator entered the apartment undetected and
apparently hid here-" She pointed to a dark corner near the
doorway. "He jumped the victim as he entered the living room,
probably hit him over the head. Unfortunately, the body was so
badly damaged by the fall that it might be difficult to determine
the weapon the attacker used." She pointed to the adjoining wall,
where a spray of blood defaced a painting of Central Park's boat
pond. "Take a look at that impact splatter."

Singleton examined. "Fairly small, medium-velocity drops. A
blunt instrument of some kind?"

"That's our take. The cast-off patterns, here and here, back
up the assumption. And the height of the spray relative to the
wall is what indicates a blow to the head. Judging by the pattern
of travel-note the crown droplets moving across the rug-the
victim staggered a few feet, then collapsed where that ponding
stain has been marked. The amount of blood is also suggestive of
a head wound-you know how much they bleed."

"I take it no weapon was recovered?"

"None. Whatever was used, the perp took it with
him."

Singleton nodded slowly. "Go on."

"It appears that the attacker then dragged the stunned victim
to the sofa, where-and this is strange-he tended the wound he'd
just inflicted."

"Tended?"

"Dabbed at it with gauze pads from the medicine cabinet in the
bathroom. Several empty packages were found next to the sofa,
some bloody pads tossed in the trash."

"Any prints?"

"The guys from Latents lifted about fifty from all over the
apartment. Even took a few from the blood of the victim, Duchamp,
with an amido black methanol solution. All the prints matched
Duchamp, his help, or known acquaintances. There were no others:
not on the medicine cabinet, not on the doorknob, not on the
packets of gauze."

"The murderer wore gloves."

"Surgical rubber, based on trace residues. The lab will be
able to confirm by morning." Hayward gestured at the sofa. "Next
the victim was bound, arms tied behind his back in a series of
elaborate knots. The same heavy cordage was used to fashion the
hangman's noose. I had forensics remove the ropes from the body
and bag them. The knots are like nothing I've ever seen before."
She nodded to a series of oversize plastic bags which lay, tagged
and sealed, atop a blue evidence locker.

"Strange-looking ropes, too."

"It's about the only evidence the perp left behind. That, and
a few fibers from his clothing." It's the only bit of good
news in the whole case, Hayward thought to herself. Rope had
almost as many characteristics as fingerprints: type of twist,
turns per inch, number of plies, filament attributes. That, along
with the particular type and style of knot, could speak
volumes.

"By the time Duchamp came to again, he was probably already
bound. The murderer shoved that long desk into position there
beneath the window. Then-somehow-he forced Duchamp to climb onto
the desk and, in effect, walk the plank. Or, I should say,
run the plank. The man basically leaped out through the
window, hanging himself."

Singleton frowned. "You sure about that?"

"Take a look at the desk." Hayward showed him a series of
bloody footprints across the desktop, each flagged and
labeled.

"Duchamp walked through his own blood on the way to the desk.
See how, in the first set of prints, he's standing at rest? As
the others lead toward the window, the distance between them
grows larger. And look how, in this last print before the window,
only the ball of the shoe hit the desk. These are
acceleration marks."

Singleton stared at the desk for at least a minute. Then he
glanced over at Hayward. "They couldn't have been faked? The
murderer couldn't, say, have taken off Duchamp's shoes, made the
marks, then replaced them on his feet?"

"I wondered about that, too. But the forensics boys said that
would have been impossible. You can't fake prints like that.
Besides, the pattern of breakage of the window frame is
consistent with somebody leaping through it, rather than somebody
being manhandled, or pushed, out of it."

"Holy crap." Singleton stepped forward. The shattered window
was like a jagged eye staring out into the Manhattan night.
"Imagine Duchamp standing there, arms tied behind his back, a
hangman's noose hanging from his neck. What could somebody say
that would induce him to take a running leap out his own
window?"

He turned back again. "Unless it was voluntary. Assisted
suicide. After all, there was no sign of struggle-was
there?"

"None. But then, what are we to make of the perp picking the
lock? Wearing gloves? Assaulting Duchamp before tying him up? The
footprints on the desk show none of the false starts, the
hesitation, you usually see in suicide attempts. Besides, we've
done preliminary interviews of Duchamp's neighbors, some friends,
a few clients. Everybody said he was the sweetest, gentlest man
they'd ever met. Always a kind word for everyone, always smiling.
His doctor backed that up as well. No psychological troubles.
Unmarried, but no signs of any recent breakup. Financially
stable. Made plenty of money from his paintings." Hayward
shrugged. "No stressors of any kind that we know
about."

"Any of the neighbors see anything?"

"Nobody. We've impounded the videotapes from building
security. They're being gone over now."

Singleton pursed his lips, nodding. Then, putting his hands
behind his back, he strolled slowly around the room, looking
carefully at the traces of fingerprint powder, the labeled pins,
and the evidence markers. At last, he stopped beside the locker.
Hayward came over and together they stared at the heavy length of
rope within the sealed bag. It was a very unusual material,
glossy rather than rough, and the color was equally strange: dark
purple verging on black, the color of eggplant. The hangman's
noose was wrapped in the requisite thirteen loops, but they were
the strangest loops Hayward had ever seen: thick and complex,
like a mass of knotted intestine. In another, smaller bag lay the
cord used to bind Duchamp's wrists. Hayward had instructed the
workers to cut the cord, not the knot, which was almost as exotic
and serpentine as the hangman's noose.

"Look at those," Singleton said, whistling. "Big, fat idiot
knots."

"I'm not sure about that," Hayward replied. "I'll have the
ligature specialist run them through the FBI's knot database."
She hesitated. "Here's something unusual. The rope he was hung
from was cut partway through with a sharp knife, maybe a razor,
at the center of its length."

"You mean-" Singleton stopped.

"Right. The rope was supposed to break the way it
did."

They stared a moment longer at the strange coils of rope,
shimmering faintly in the incandescent light.

From behind, the evidence custodian cleared her throat.
"Excuse me, Captain," she said. "Can I remove that
now?"

"Sure." Hayward stepped back as the woman carefully placed the
bags into the evidence locker, sealed it, then began wheeling the
locker toward the front door.

Singleton watched her go. "Anything taken? Valuables, money,
paintings?"

"Not a thing. Duchamp had close to three hundred dollars in
his wallet and some really valuable old jewelry on his dresser.
Not to mention a studio full of expensive paintings. Nothing was
touched."

Singleton's eyes were on her. "And this feeling of uneasiness
you spoke about?"

She turned to face him. "I can't really put a finger on it. On
the one hand, the whole scene feels a little too clear and
cold-almost like it's a setup. This was certainly a carefully,
almost masterfully executed crime. And yet nothing makes any
sense. Why knock the guy over the head, then doctor the wound?
Why tie him up, put a noose around his neck, force him to jump
out a window, but then deliberately weaken the rope so he falls
to his death after a brief struggle? What could Duchamp possibly
have been told that would make him leap to his own death like
that? And above all: why go to all this trouble to kill a
harmless watercolor artist who never hurt a fly? I get the sense
that there's a deep and subtle motive for this crime, and so far
we haven't even begun to guess at it. I've already got Psych
working on a profile. I can only hope we'll learn what makes him
tick. Because unless we find the motive, how the hell are we
supposed to find the killer?"

TWELVE

FOR A moment, D'Agosta went rigid in shock and disbelief. The
voice was familiar and yet strange. Instinctively, he tried to
speak again, but the gloved hand clamped down still harder over
his mouth.

"Shhhh."

The elevator doors rolled open with a faint chime. Still
holding D'Agosta in a tight restraint, the man peered cautiously
out into the dark basement corridor, looking carefully in both
directions. Then he gave D'Agosta a gentle shove out into the
dingy hall, steering him through a series of narrow,
high-ceilinged passages of yellow cinder block. At last, he
brought D'Agosta up short before a scuffed metal door, unlabeled
and painted the same color as the walls. They were near the
building's power plant: the low rumble of furnaces was clearly
audible. The man glanced around once again, then stopped to
examine a small cobweb that stretched across one edge of the door
frame. Only then did he withdraw a key from his pocket, unlock
the door, and usher D'Agosta quickly inside, closing the door and
carefully locking it.

"Glad to see you looking so well, Vincent."

D'Agosta could not summon a word.

"My sincerest apologies for the brusque behavior," the man
said, crossing the room with swift steps and checking the lone
basement window. "We may speak freely here."

D'Agosta remained astounded by the disconnect between the
man's voice-those unmistakable, mellifluous southern tones with
the lazy consistency of molasses-and the man himself: a total
stranger in a spotty doorman's uniform, stocky, dark-complected,
with brown hair and eyes and a round face. Even his bearing, his
manner of walking, was unfamiliar.

"Pendergast?" D'Agosta asked, finally finding his
voice.

The man bowed. "The very same, Vincent."

"Pendergast!" And before he realized what he was doing,
D'Agosta had crushed the FBI agent in a bear hug.

Pendergast went rigid for a few seconds. Then, gently but
firmly, he disengaged himself from the embrace and took a step
back. "Vincent, I can't tell you how delighted I am to see you
again. I have missed you."

D'Agosta seized his hand and shook it, embarrassment mingling
with the surprise, relief, and joy. "I thought you were dead.
How-?"

"I must apologize for the deception. I'd intended to remain
'dead' even longer. But circumstances have forced my hand." He
turned his back. "Now, if you don't mind..." He slipped out of
the doorman's coat, which D'Agosta could now see was cleverly
padded around the shoulders and midriff, and hung it on the back
of the door.

"What happened to you?" D'Agosta asked. "How did you escape? I
turned Fosco's castle upside down looking for you. Where the hell
have you been?" As the initial shock began to recede, he felt
himself filling with a thousand questions.

Pendergast smiled faintly under this barrage. "You shall know
all, I promise. But first, make yourself comfortable-I'll only be
a moment." And with that, he turned and vanished into a back
room.

For the first time, D'Agosta examined his surroundings. He was
in the living room of a small, dingy apartment. A threadbare sofa
was shoved against one wall, flanked by two wing chairs, their
arms spotted with stains. A cheap coffee table held a stack of
Popular Mechanics magazines. A battered rolltop desk sat
against one wall, its writing surface bare save for a sleek Apple
PowerBook: the only thing out of place in the monochromatic room.
Some faded Hummel pictures of big-eyed children hung on the
nondescript walls. A bookshelf was stuffed with paperbacks,
mostly popular novels and cheesy best sellers. D'Agosta was
amused to find a personal favorite, Ice Limit III: Return to
Cape Horn, among the well-thumbed reads. Beyond the living
room, an open door led to a kitchen, small but tidy. The place
was about as far removed from Pendergast's digs at the Dakota or
his Riverside Drive mansion as you could get.

There was a faint rustle and D'Agosta jumped to find
Pendergast-the real Pendergast-standing in the doorway: tall,
slender, his silver eyes glittering. His hair was still brown,
his skin swarthy, but his face had morphed back into the fine,
aquiline features D'Agosta knew so well.

Pendergast smiled again, as if reading D'Agosta's mind. "Cheek
pads," he said. "Remarkable how effectively they can change one's
appearance. I've removed them for the present, however, since I
find them rather uncomfortable. Along with the brown contact
lenses."

"I'm floored. I knew you were a master of disguises, but this
beats all... I mean, even the room..." D'Agosta jerked a thumb in
the direction of the bookcase.

Pendergast looked pained. "Even here, alas, nothing can appear
out of place. I must keep up the image of
doorman."

"And a surly one at that."

"I find that exhibiting unpleasant personality traits helps
one evade deeper scrutiny. Once people typecast me as a peevish
doorman with a chip on his shoulder, they look no farther. May I
offer you a beverage?"

"Bud?"

Pendergast shuddered involuntarily. "My dissembling has its
limits. Perhaps a Pernod or Campari?"

"No, thanks." D'Agosta grinned.

"I take it you received my letter."

"That's right. And I've been on the case ever
since."

"Progress?"

"Precious little. I paid a visit to your great-aunt. But that
can wait a bit. Right now, my friend, you have some serious
explaining to do."

"Naturally." Pendergast motioned him to a seat and took a
chair opposite. "I recall we parted in haste on a mountainside in
Tuscany."

"You could say that. I'll never forget the last time I saw
you, surrounded by a pack of boar-hunting dogs, every one eager
to take a chunk out of you."

Pendergast nodded slowly, and his eyes seemed to go far away.
"I was captured, bound, sedated, and carried back to the castle.
Our corpulent friend had me transported deep into the tunnels
beneath. There he chained me in a tomb whose former occupant had
been unceremoniously swept out. He proceeded-in the most genteel
way, of course-to wall me in."

"Good God." D'Agosta shuddered. "I brought the Italian police
in to search for you the next morning, but it was no use. Fosco
had removed all traces of our stay. The Italians thought I was a
lunatic."

"I learned later of the count's curious death. Was that
you?"

"Sure was."

Pendergast nodded approvingly. "What happened to the
violin?"

"I couldn't leave it lying around the castle, so I took it
and..." He paused, feeling uncertain how Pendergast would feel
about what he had done.

Pendergast raised his eyebrows in query.

"I brought it to Viola Maskelene. I told her you were
dead."

"I see. How did she react?"

"She was very shocked, very upset. Although she tried to cover
that up. I think..." D'Agosta hesitated. "I think she cares for
you."

Pendergast was silent, his face a mask.

D'Agosta and Pendergast had first met Viola Maskelene the
prior November, while working on a case in Italy. It had been
obvious to D'Agosta that, from the moment the two saw each other,
something ineffable had passed between Pendergast and the young
Englishwoman. He could only guess what Pendergast was now
thinking.

Pendergast suddenly roused himself. "You did the correct
thing, and now we can consider the case of the Stormcloud violin
definitively closed."

"But look," D'Agosta said, "how did you escape the castle? How
long were you walled up down there?"

"I was chained in the tomb for almost forty-eight
hours."

"In the dark?"

Pendergast nodded. "Slowly suffocating, I might add. I found a
certain specialized form of meditation to be most
useful."

"And then?"

"I was rescued."

"By who?"

"My brother."

D'Agosta, still reeling from Pendergast's near-miraculous
reappearance, felt himself go numb with shock. "Your
brother? Diogenes?"

"Yes."

"But I thought he hated you."

"Yes. And because he hates me, he needs me."

"For what?"

"For at least the past six months, Diogenes had made it his
business to monitor my movements, as part of his preparation for
the crime. I regret to say I was completely unaware of it. I had
always believed myself the biggest impediment to his success and
that someday he would attempt to kill me. But I was
wrong-foolishly wrong. The opposite was true. When
Diogenes learned of my peril, he launched a daring rescue. He
entered the castle, disguised as a local-he is more the master of
disguise than I am-and freed me from the tomb."

D'Agosta was seized by a sudden thought. "Wait. His eyes are
two different colors, right?"

Pendergast nodded again. "One is hazel, the other a milky
blue."

"I saw him. On the hillside there, above Fosco's
castle. Just after we were separated. He was standing in the
shadow of a rock ledge, watching the proceedings, as calm as if
it was the first race at Aqueduct."

"That was him. After freeing me from my imprisonment, he
transported me to a private clinic outside Pisa, where I
recuperated from dehydration, exposure, and the wounds inflicted
by Fosco's dogs."

"I still don't get it. If he hated you-if he planned to commit
this so-called perfect crime-why not just leave you walled
up?"

Pendergast smiled again, but this time the smile held no
mirth. "You must always remember, Vincent, that we are dealing
with a uniquely deviant criminal mind. How little I understood
his real plans."

At this, Pendergast abruptly rose and went to the kitchen. A
moment later, D'Agosta heard the clink of ice in a glass. When
the agent returned, he held a bottle of Lillet in one hand and a
tumbler in the other.

"Are you sure I can't interest you in a drink?"

"No. Now tell me, for God's sake, what you
mean."

Pendergast splashed a few fingers of Lillet into the glass.
"If I had died, I would have ruined everything for Diogenes. You
see, Vincent, I am the primary object of his
crime."

"You? You're going to be the victim? Then
why-?"

"I am not going to be the victim. I already am
the victim."

"What?"

"The crime has commenced. It is being successfully executed as
we speak."

"You're not serious."

"I have never been more serious in my life." Pendergast took a
long gulp of Lillet, refilled the glass. "Diogenes disappeared
during my recovery at the private clinic in Pisa. As soon as I
recovered, I returned to New York, incognito. I knew his plans
were almost mature, and New York seemed the best place to mount
the effort to stop him. I had little doubt the crime would take
place here. This city offers the greatest anonymity, the best
opportunities to hide, adopt an alter ego, develop his plan of
attack. And so now-aware that my brother had been keeping tabs on
my movements-I remained 'dead' as a way to move about unseen. It
meant keeping all of you in the dark. Even Constance." At this, a
stab of pain crossed Pendergast's face. "I regret that more than
I can say. Still, it seemed the most prudent way to
proceed."

"And so you became a doorman."

"The position allowed me to keep an eye on you and, through
you, others important to me. I have a better chance of hunting
Diogenes from the shadows. And I would not have revealed myself
had certain events not forced my hand
prematurely."

"What events?"

"The hanging of Charles Duchamp."

"That bizarre murder over by Lincoln Center?"

"Correct. That, and another murder in New Orleans three days
ago. Torrance Hamilton, professor emeritus. Poisoned in front of
a crowded lecture hall."

"What's the connection?"

"Hamilton was one of my tutors in high school, the man who
taught me French, Italian, and Mandarin. We were very close.
Duchamp was my dearest-in fact, my only-childhood friend.
He's the only person from my youth I've remained in touch with.
Both murdered by Diogenes."

"It couldn't be a coincidence?"

"Impossible. Hamilton was poisoned by a rare nerve toxin,
placed in his water glass. It's a synthetic toxin, very similar
to that produced by a certain spider native to Goa. An ancestor
of my father's died of a bite from that same spider when he was a
minor functionary in India during the Raj." Pendergast took
another sip. "Duchamp was hung from a noose, which then parted,
plunging him twenty stories to his death. My Great-Great-Uncle
Maurice died in precisely the same manner. He was hanged in New
Orleans in 1871 for murdering his wife and her lover. Because the
gibbet had been badly damaged in recent riots, they hung him
instead from one of the upper courthouse windows on Decatur
Street. But Maurice's violent struggles, combined with a
defective rope, caused it to part, sending him plummeting to his
death."

D'Agosta stared at his friend in horror.

"These deaths, and the manner in which they were staged, were
Diogenes's way of attracting my attention. Perhaps now, Vincent,
you can understand why Diogenes needs me
alive."

"You can't mean that he's-"

"Precisely. I had always assumed his crime would be against
humanity. But now I know I am his target. My brother's
so-called perfect crime is to murder everyone close to me.
That's the real reason he rescued me from Fosco's castle. He
doesn't want me dead, he wants me alive-alive so he can destroy
me in a far more exquisite way, leaving me filled with misery and
self-reproach, torturing myself with the knowledge that I was
unable to save those few people on earth..." Pendergast paused,
took a steadying breath. "Those few people on earth I truly care
about."

D'Agosta swallowed. "I can't believe this monster's related to
you."

"Now that I know the true nature of his crime, I've been
forced to abandon my initial plan and develop a new one. It's not
an ideal plan, but it is the best possible under the
circumstances."

"Tell me."

"We must prevent Diogenes from killing again. That
means locating him. And here's where I'll need your help,
Vincent. You must use your access as a law enforcement officer to
glean as much as you can from the crime scene
evidence."

He handed a cell phone to D'Agosta. "Here's a phone I'll use
to keep in contact with you. Because time is of the essence,
we'll need to start locally, with Charles Duchamp. Dig up
whatever evidence you can find and bring it to me. No crumb is
too small. Find out everything you can from Laura Hayward-but for
God's sake don't tell her what you're up to. Not even Diogenes
can leave a totally clean crime scene."

"Good as done." D'Agosta paused. "So what's with the date on
the letter? January 28?"

"I no longer have any doubt that is the day he plans to
complete his crime. But it is vital you keep in mind that the
crime has already begun. Today is the twenty-second. My
brother has been planning this infamy for years, maybe decades.
All his preparations are in place. I shudder to think who he
might kill in the next six days." And at this, Pendergast sat
forward and stared at D'Agosta, his eyes glittering in the dim
room. "Unless Diogenes can be stopped, everyone close to me-and
that would certainly include you, Vincent-may
die."

THIRTEEN

Smithback took his usual place in the darkest corner of the
Bones, the dingy restaurant behind the museum favored as an
after-hours hangout by museum employees who-it seemed-never tired
of the sight of bones. The official name of the place was the
Blarney Stone Tavern; it had acquired its nickname from the
owner's penchant for hammering bones of all shapes, sizes, and
sources onto the walls and ceiling.

Smithback looked at his watch. Miracle of miracles, he was ten
minutes early. Maybe Nora would be early, too, and they could
have a few extra minutes to talk. He felt like he hadn't seen his
new wife in ages. She had promised to meet him here for a burger
and beer before she returned to the museum to work late on the
big upcoming show. And he himself had a story of sorts to write
up and file before the 2 a.m. deadline.

He shook his head. What a life: two months married and he
hadn't been laid in a week. But it wasn't so much making love he
missed as Nora's companionship. Talk. Friendship. The truth was,
Nora was Smithback's best friend, and right now he needed his
best friend. The Duchamp murder story was going badly: he'd
gotten nothing more than the same crap as the other papers. The
cops were keeping a tight lid on information, and his usual
sources could offer nothing. Here he was, Smithback of the
Times, and his latest stories were nothing more than the
reheated leftovers of a few briefings. Meanwhile, he could almost
smell Bryce Harriman's ambition to muscle in on the story, take
it away from him, leave him with the damn Dangler assignment he'd
managed to slough off so adroitly when the Duchamp case first
broke.

"Whence the dark look?"

Smithback looked up, and there was Nora. Nora, her
bronze-colored hair spilling over her shoulders, her freckled
nose wrinkled by a smile, her green eyes sparkling with
life.

"This seat taken?" she asked.

"Are you kidding? Jesus, woman, you're a sight for sore
eyes."

She slid her bag to the floor and sat down. The obligatory
droopy-eared, hangdog-faced waiter appeared, like a pallbearer at
a funeral, and stood silently awaiting their
order.

"Bangers and mash, fries, glass of milk," said
Nora.

"Nothing stronger?" Smithback asked.

"I'm going back to work."

"So am I, but that never stopped me. I'll take a shot of that
fifty-year-old Glen Grant, backed up by a steak and kidney
pie."

The waiter gave a mournful dip of his head and was
gone.

Smithback took her hand. "Nora, I miss you."

"Likewise. What a crazy life we lead."

"What are we doing here in New York City? We should go
back to Angkor Wat and live in some Buddhist temple in the jungle
for the rest of our lives."

"And take a vow of celibacy?"

Smithback waved his hand. "Celibacy? We'll be like Tristan and
Isolde in our own jeweled cave, making love all day
long."

Nora blushed. "It was quite a shock, coming back to reality
after that honeymoon."

"Yeah. Especially to find that circus ape Harriman, grinning
and bobbing in my doorway."

"Bill, you're too obsessed with Harriman. The world's full of
people like that. Ignore him and move on. You should see the
people I have to work with at the museum. Some of them should be
numbered and put in a glass case."

Their food arrived within minutes, along with Smithback's
drink. He picked it up, clinked Nora's glass of milk.
"Slainte."

"Chin-chin."

Smithback took a sip. Thirty-six dollars a shot and worth
every penny. He watched Nora tuck into her meal. Now, there was a
woman with healthy appetites-no fussy little salads for her. He
recalled a certain moment that illustrated his point, back in the
ruins of Banteay Chhmar, and felt an amorous stirring in his
loins.

"So how are things at the museum?" he asked. "You whipping
them into shape over that new show?"

"I'm only the junior curator, which means I'm mostly a
whippee."

"Ouch."

"Here we are, six days from opening, and a quarter of the
artifacts haven't even been mounted yet. It's a zoo. I've got
only one more day to write label copy for thirty objects, and
then I have to curate and organize an entire exhibit on Anasazi
burial practices. And just today they said they want me to give a
lecture on southwestern prehistory for the lecture series. Can
you believe it? Thirteen thousand years of southwestern
prehistory in ninety minutes, complete with slides." She took
another bite.

"They're asking too much of you, Nora."

"Everybody's in the same boat. Sacred Images is the biggest
thing to hit the museum in years. And on top of that, the
geniuses that run the place have decided to upgrade the museum's
security system. You remember what happened with the security
system the last time they had a blockbuster exhibition? You know,
Superstition?"

"Oh, God. Don't remind me."

"They don't want even the possibility of a repetition. Except
that every time they upgrade the security for a new hall, they
have to shut and lock the damn place down. It's impossible to get
around-you never know what's going to be closed off. The bright
side is that in six days it'll be over."

"Yeah, and then we'll be ready for another
vacation."

"Or a stretch in a padded cell."

"We'll always have Angkor," Smithback intoned
dramatically.

Nora laughed, squeezed his hand. "And how's the Duchamp story
going?"

"Terrible. The homicide captain in charge is a woman named
Hayward, a real ballbuster. Runs a tight ship. No leaks anywhere.
I can't get a scoop to save my life."

"I'm sorry, Bill."

"Nora Kelly?"

A voice broke in, vaguely familiar. Smithback looked up to see
a woman approaching their table-small, intense, brown hair,
glasses. He froze in astonishment, and so did she. They stared at
each other in silence.

Suddenly, she smiled. "Bill?"

Smithback grinned. "Margo Green! I thought you were living up
in Boston, working for that company, what's its
name?"

"GeneDyne. I was, but corporate life wasn't for me. Great
money, but no fulfillment. So now I'm back at the
museum."

"I had no idea."

"Just started six weeks ago. And you?"

"Wrote a few more books, as you probably know. I'm now at the
Times. Got back from my honeymoon just a few weeks
ago."

"Congratulations. Guess that means you won't be calling me
Lotus Blossom anymore. I assume this is the lucky
woman?"

"She sure is. Nora, meet an old friend of mine, Margo Green.
Nora works at the museum, too."

"I know." Margo turned. "In fact, Bill, no offense, but I was
actually looking for her, not you." She stretched out her hand.
"Perhaps you don't remember, Dr. Kelly, but I'm the new editor of
Museology. We met at the last departmental
meeting."

Nora returned the handshake. "Of course. I read all about you
in Bill's book Relic. How are things?"

"May I sit down?"

"To tell you the truth, we..." Nora's voice trailed off as
Margo took a seat.

"I'll only be here for a moment."

Smithback stared. Margo Green. It seemed like another
lifetime, it was so long ago. She hadn't changed much, except
that maybe she seemed more relaxed, more confident. Still trim
and athletic. She was wearing an expensive tailored suit, a far
cry from the baggy L. L. Bean shirts and Levi's of her graduate
student days. He glanced down at his own Hugo Boss suit. They had
all grown up a little.

"I can't believe it," he said. "Two heroines from my books,
together for the first time."

Margo cocked her head questioningly. "Oh, really? How's
that?"

"Nora was the heroine of my book
Thunderhead."

"Oh. Sorry. Haven't read it."

Smithback kept smiling gamely. "What's it like to be back at
the museum?"

"It's changed a lot since we were first there."

Smithback felt Nora's gaze upon him. He wondered if she
assumed Margo was an old girlfriend and that perhaps there were
certain salty things he'd left out of his memoirs.

"Seems like ages ago," Margo went on.

"It was ages ago."

"I often wonder what happened to Lavinia Rickman and Dr.
Cuthbert."

"No doubt there's a special circle of hell reserved for those
two."

Margo chuckled. "What about that cop D'Agosta? And Agent
Pendergast?"

"Don't know about D'Agosta," Smithback said. "But the word
around the Times foreign desk is that Pendergast went
missing under mysterious circumstances a few months ago. Flew to
Italy on assignment and never came back."

A shocked look came over Margo's face. "Really? How
strange."

A brief silence settled over the table.

"Anyway," Margo resumed, turning once again to Nora, "I wanted
to ask your help."

"Sure," Nora said. "What is it?"

"I'm about to publish an editorial on the importance of
repatriating Great Kiva masks to the Tano tribe. You know about
their request?"

"I do. I've also read the editorial. It's circulating the
department in draft."

"Naturally, I've run into opposition from the museum
administration, Collopy in particular. I've started contacting
all the members of the Anthropology Department to see if I can
build a united front. The independence of Museology must
be maintained, and those masks must be returned. We've got to be
together on this as a department."

"What is it you want me to do?" asked Nora.

"I'm not circulating a petition or anything quite so overt.
I'm just asking for informal support from members of the
department if it comes to a showdown. A verbal assurance. That's
all."

Smithback grinned. "Sure, no problem, you can always count on
Nora-"

"Just a minute," Nora said.

Smithback fell silent, surprised at the sharp
tone.

"Margo was speaking to me," Nora said dryly.

"Right." Smithback hastily smoothed down an unrepentant
cowlick and retreated to his drink.

Nora turned to Margo with a rather chilly smile. "I'm sorry, I
won't be able to help."

Smithback stared from Nora to Margo in
surprise.

"May I ask why not?" Margo asked calmly.

"Because I don't agree with you."

"But it's obvious that those Great Kiva masks belong to the
Tanos-"

Nora held up a hand. "Margo, I am thoroughly familiar with
them and with your arguments. In one sense, you're right. They
belonged to the Tano and they shouldn't have been collected. But
now they belong to all of humanity-they've become a part of the
human record. What's more, taking those masks out of the Sacred
Images exhibition would be devastating this late in the game-and
I'm one of the curators of the show. Finally, I'm a southwestern
archaeologist by training. If we started giving back every sacred
item in the museum, there'd be nothing left. Everything is
sacred to Native Americans-that's one of the beautiful things
about Native American culture." She paused. "Look, what's done is
done, the world is the way it is, and not all wrongs can be
righted. I'm sorry I can't give you a better answer, but there it
is. I have to be honest."

"But the issue of editorial freedom..."

"I'm with you one hundred percent on that one. Publish your
editorial. But don't ask me to back your arguments. And don't ask
the department to endorse your private opinions."

With that, Margo stared first at Nora, then at
Smithback.

Smithback grinned nervously, took another sip of his
drink.

Margo rose. "Thank you for your directness."

"You're welcome."

She turned to Smithback. "It's great to see you again,
Bill."

"Sure thing," he mumbled.

He watched Margo walk away. Then he realized Nora's gaze was
on him.

" 'Lotus Blossom'?" she said tartly.

"It was just a joke."

"Former girlfriend of yours?"

"No, never," he replied hastily.

"You're sure about that?"

"Not even a kiss."

"I'm glad to hear it. I can't stand that woman." She turned to
stare at Margo's departing figure. Then she looked back. "And to
think she hasn't read Thunderhead. I mean, that's much
better than some of the earlier stuff you wrote. I'm sorry, Bill,
but that book Relic-well, let's just say you've matured a
lot as a writer."

"Hey, what was wrong with Relic?"

She picked up her fork and finished her meal in
silence.

FOURTEEN

When D'Agosta arrived at the Omeleteria, Hayward had already
taken their usual booth by the window. He hadn't seen her for
twenty-four hours-she'd pulled an all-nighter at the office. He
paused in the doorway of the restaurant, looking at her. The
morning sunlight had turned her glossy black hair almost blue,
given her pale skin the sheen of fine marble. She was
industriously making notes on a Pocket PC, chewing her lower lip,
brow knitted in concentration. Just seeing her sent a throb of
affection through him so sharp it was almost
painful.

He didn't know if he was going to be able to do
this.

She looked up suddenly, as if aware of his gaze. The look of
concentration vanished and a smile broke over her beautiful
features.

"Vinnie," she said as he approached. "Sorry I missed your
lasagna napoletana."

He kissed her, then took a seat opposite. "It's okay.
Lasagna's lasagna. I'm worried you're working too
hard."

"Nature of the business."

Just then a skinny waitress came up, placed an egg white
omelette before Hayward, started to refill her coffee
cup.

"Just leave the pot, please," Hayward said.

The waitress nodded, turned to D'Agosta. "Need a menu,
hon?"

"No. Give me two fried eggs, over well, with rye
toast."

"I went ahead and ordered," Hayward said, taking a gulp of her
coffee. "Hope you don't mind. I've got to get back to the office
and-"

"You're going back?"

Hayward frowned, gave her head a single vigorous shake. "I'll
rest tonight."

"Pressure from on high?"

"There's always pressure from on high. No, it's the case
itself. I just can't get a handle on it."

D'Agosta watched as she tucked into her omelet, feeling the
dismay grow inside him. Unless Diogenes can be stopped,
everyone close to me may die, Pendergast had told him the
night before. Find out everything you can from Laura
Hayward. He glanced around the coffee shop, looking at the
faces, looking for one bluish-white, one hazel eye. But, of
course, Diogenes would be wearing contacts, disguising his most
striking characteristic.

"Why don't you tell me about the case?" he asked as easily as
he could.

She took another bite, dabbed at her mouth. "The autopsy
results came back. No surprise there. Duchamp died of massive
internal injuries resulting from his fall. Several pharyngeal
bones were fractured, but the hanging itself didn't cause death:
the spinal cord had not been severed and asphyxiation hadn't yet
occurred. And here's the first of many weird things. The rope had
been cut almost through beforehand with a very sharp blade. The
killer wanted it to part during the
hanging."

D'Agosta felt himself go cold. My Great-Great-Uncle Maurice
died in precisely the same manner...

"Duchamp was initially subdued in his apartment, then tied up.
There was a contusion on the left temple, but the head itself was
so badly crushed in the fall we can't be certain that's what
caused all the blood in the apartment. But get this: the
contusion had been doctored and bandaged, apparently by
the killer."

"I see." The case made sense to D'Agosta ... too much sense.
And he could say nothing to Hayward.

"Then the perp pushed a long desk up against the window,
convinced Duchamp to climb on it, and take a running jump out the
window."

"Unassisted?"

Hayward nodded. "With his hands bound behind him and a noose
around his neck."

"Anyone see the perp?" D'Agosta felt a constriction in his
chest; he knew who the perp was, yet he couldn't tell her
directly. It was an unexpectedly difficult
feeling.

"Nobody in the apartment building remembers seeing anybody
unusual. There's only one possible sighting, by a basement
security camera. Just a rear view of a man in a trench coat.
Tall, thin. Light hair. We're having the image digitally
enhanced, but the techs aren't hopeful we'll get enough to be
useful. He knew the camera was there and took care passing
through its field of view." She finished her coffee and poured
herself another.

"We went through the victim's papers, his studio, looking for
any motive," she went on. "None. Then we used his Rolodex to call
up friends and acquaintances. Nobody we spoke with could believe
it. A real Mister Rogers, this guy Duchamp. Oh, and here's a
bizarre coincidence. Duchamp knew Agent
Pendergast."

D'Agosta froze. He didn't know what to say, how to act.
Somehow, he just couldn't be phony with Laura Hayward. He felt a
flush spread across his face.

"Seems they were friends. Pendergast's Dakota address was on
the Rolodex. According to Duchamp's appointment book, the two had
lunch three times last year, always at '21.' Too bad we can't get
Pendergast's take on this from beyond the grave. Right about now
I think I'd welcome even his help."

Suddenly, she stopped, catching sight of D'Agosta's
expression. "Oh, Vinnie," she said, sliding a hand across the
table and grasping his. "I'm sorry. That was a thoughtless thing
to say."

This made D'Agosta feel ten times worse. "Maybe this is the
crime Pendergast warned me about in his note."

Slowly, Hayward withdrew her hand. "I'm sorry?"

"Well..." D'Agosta stammered. "Diogenes hated his
brother.

Maybe he plans to revenge himself on Pendergast by killing off
Pendergast's friends."

Hayward looked at him, her eyes narrowing.

"I heard there was another friend of Pendergast's killed
recently. A professor in New Orleans."

"But, Vinnie, Pendergast is dead. Why kill his brother's
friends now?"

"Who knows how crazy people think? All I'm saying is that, if
it were my case, I'd consider it a suspicious
coincidence."

"How'd you hear about this New Orleans murder?"

D'Agosta looked down, arranged his napkin on his lap. "I can't
recall. I think maybe his-his secretary, Constance, mentioned it
to me."

"Well, there are lots of strange aspects to the case, I'll
give you that." Hayward sighed. "It's far-fetched, but I'll look
into it."

The waitress reappeared with his breakfast
order.

D'Agosta hardly dared meet Laura's eyes. Instead, he lifted
his fork and knife and sliced into the glistening egg. A jet of
yellow spurted across the plate.

D'Agosta jerked back. "Waitress!"

The woman, half a dozen booths away already, turned and walked
slowly back.

D'Agosta handed her the plate. "These eggs are runny. I said
over well. I didn't say over easy."

"All right, hon, hold your water." The woman took the plate
and walked away.

"Ouch," Hayward said in a low voice. "Don't you think you were
hard on the poor woman?"

"I hate runny eggs," D'Agosta said, staring into his
coffee once again. "I can't stand looking at
them."

There was a brief silence. "What's wrong, Vinnie?" she
asked.

"This Diogenes business."

"Don't take this the wrong way, but it's time you dropped this
wild-goose chase and got back on the job. It's not going to bring
Pendergast back. Singleton's not going to let this go on forever.
On top of that, you're not acting like yourself. Nothing like
getting back to work as a way of curing the
blues."

You're right, he thought. He wasn't acting like himself
because he wasn't feeling like himself. It felt bad enough, not
telling Hayward the truth. But it went even beyond that: here he
was, pumping her for information while withholding the fact
Pendergast was still alive.

He arranged his lips into what he hoped was a sheepish
smile.

"I'm sorry, Laura. You're right: it's time I got back on the
job. And here I am, acting cranky, when you're the one who's had
no sleep. What else about the case kept you up all
night?"

She glanced at him searchingly for a moment. Then she took
another bite of her omelet, pushed it away. "I've never seen such
a careful murder. It's not just the fact there are so few clues,
but the ones we have are so damn puzzling. The only evidence left
behind by the perp, other than the ropes, was some clothing
fibers."

"Well, that gives you three clues to work, at
least."

"That's right. The fibers, the rope, and the structure of the
knots. And so far, we've come up blank on all three.
That's what kept me away all night: that, and the usual
paperwork. The fibers are of some kind of exotic wool that
forensics hasn't seen before. It's in none of the local or
federal databases. We've got a textile expert working on it. Same
with the ropes. The material is nothing manufactured in America,
Europe, Australia, the Middle East."

"And the knots?"

"They're even more bizarre. The ligature specialist-who we
dragged out of bed at three, by the way-was fascinated. At first
glance, they look random, massive, like some bondage fetishist
gone crazy. But they're not that at all. Turns out they're
expertly fashioned. Very intricate. The specialist was staggered:
he said he'd never seen the knot before, that it seemed to be of
a new type entirely. He went into a whole riff on mathematics and
knot theory that I couldn't even begin to follow."

"I'd like to see a photograph of the knots, if I
could."

She flashed him another questioning gaze.

"Hey, I was in the Boy Scouts," he said with a levity he
didn't feel.

She nodded slowly. "I had this instructor at the Academy,
Rider-back. Remember him?"

"Nope."

"He was fascinated by knots. He used to say they were a
three-dimensional manifestation of a fourth-dimensional problem.
Whatever that means." She took another sip of coffee. "Sooner or
later, those knots are going to help us crack this
case."

The waitress came back, placing D'Agosta's eggs before him
with a look of triumph. Now they were wizened-looking, almost
desiccated, crisp around the edges.

Hayward glanced at the plate, a smile returning to her lips.
"Enjoy," she said with a giggle.

Suddenly, his coat began to vibrate. For a moment, D'Agosta
went rigid in surprise. Then, remembering the cell phone
Pendergast had given him, he dug a hand into his pocket and
pulled it out.

"New phone?" Hayward asked. "When'd you pick that
up?"

D'Agosta hesitated. Then, rather abruptly, he decided that he
just couldn't tell her one more lie.

"Sorry," he said, standing up. "Gotta go. I'll explain
later."

Hayward half rose as well, a look of surprise on her face.
"But, Vin-"

"Will you get breakfast?" he asked, putting his hands on her
shoulders and kissing her. "I'll get the next."

"But-"

"See you tonight, sweetheart. Good luck with the case." And-
holding her questioning stare with his own for a brief moment-he
gave her shoulders a parting squeeze, turned, and hurriedly left
the restaurant.

He glanced once more at the message displayed on the tiny cell
screen:

SW Corner 77 and York. NOW.

FIFTEEN

The big black limo, tearing southward on York Avenue, appeared
seconds after D'Agosta reached the corner. It slewed to a stop;
the door flew open. Even before D'Agosta shut the door, the limo
was accelerating from the curb, driver leaning on the horn, cars
behind them screeching to a halt to let the big car
pass.

D'Agosta turned in astonishment. A stranger sat in the seat
beside him: tall, slender, well tanned, dressed in an impeccable
gray suit, slim black attaché case across his
knees.

"Don't be alarmed, Vincent," said the familiar voice of
Pendergast. "An emergency has forced me to change my spots again.
Today I am an investment banker."

"Emergency?"

Pendergast handed D'Agosta a sheet of paper, carefully sealed
within layers of glassine. It read:

Nine of Swords: Torrance Hamilton

Ten of Swords: Charles Duchamp

King of Swords, Reversed: Michael Decker

The Five of Swords-?

"Diogenes is telegraphing his move in advance. Baiting me."
Disguise or no disguise, Pendergast's face was as grim as
D'Agosta had ever seen it.

"What are those-tarot cards?"

"Diogenes always had an interest in tarot. As you may have
guessed, those cards involve death and betrayal."

"Who's Michael Decker?"

"He was my mentor when I first moved to the FBI. Before, I'd
been in more, ah, exotic forms of government service, and
he helped me make a rather difficult transition. Mike's highly
placed in Quantico these days, and he's been invaluable in
clearing the way for my somewhat unorthodox methods. It was
thanks to Mike that I was able to get the FBI involved so quickly
on the Jeremy Grove murder last fall, and he helped smooth some
ruffled feathers after a small case I handled in the Midwest
prior to that."

"So Diogenes is threatening another one of your
friends."

"Yes. I can't raise Mike on his cell or at home. His secretary
tells me he's on elevated assignment, which means they won't
release any details about it-even if I were to reveal myself as a
colleague. I must warn him in person, if I can find
him."

"As an FBI agent, though, he must be pretty hard to get the
jump on."

"He's one of the best field agents in the Bureau. I fear that
would deter Diogenes not at all."

D'Agosta glanced back at the letter. "Your brother wrote
this?"

"Yes. Curious: it doesn't look like his handwriting-more like
a crude attempt to disguise his handwriting, rather. Far too
crude, in fact, for him. And yet there's something strangely
familiar about it..." Pendergast's voice trailed
off.

"How'd you get it?"

"It arrived at my Dakota apartment early this morning. I
employ a doorman there, Martyn, to take care of special things
for me. He got it to Proctor, and Proctor got it to me through a
prior arrangement."

"Proctor knows you're alive?"

"Yes. Constance Greene does, too, as of last
night."

"What about her? Does she still think you're
dead?"

D'Agosta didn't say the name-he didn't need to. Pendergast
would know he was referring to Viola Maskelene.

"I haven't communicated with her. It would put her in grave
danger. Ignorance, as painful as it is, will keep her
safe."

There was a brief, awkward silence.

D'Agosta changed direction. "So your brother took this letter
to the Dakota? Aren't you having the place
watched?"

"Of course. Very carefully. It was delivered by a derelict.
When we caught him and questioned him, he said he was paid to
deliver it by a man on Broadway. His description was too vague to
be of use."

The limo sheared toward the on-ramp for the FDR Drive, leaning
into the turn, wheels smoking.

"You think your FBI friend will listen?"

"Mike Decker knows me."

"It seems to me that you rushing down to warn Decker is
exactly what Diogenes expects."

"Correct. It is like a forced move in chess: I'm falling into
a trap and there's not a thing I can do about it." Pendergast
looked at D'Agosta, eyes bright even behind brown contact lenses.
"We must find some way to reverse the pattern, get on the
offensive. Have you learned anything more from Captain
Hayward?"

"They recovered some fibers from the site. That and the ropes
are the only hard evidence they've got so far. There are some
other weird things about the murder, too. For example, it seems
Diogenes stunned Duchamp with a blow to the head, then doctored
and bandaged the injury before killing him."

Pendergast shook his head. "Vincent, I must know more. I
must. Even the smallest, least significant detail could be
critical. I have, shall we say, a connection in New Orleans who
is getting me the police dossier on the Hamilton poisoning. But I
have no such connection here, for the Duchamp
case."

D'Agosta nodded. "Understood."

"There's another thing. Diogenes seems to be working forward,
choosing his victims chronologically. That means you might soon
be at risk. We worked together on my first really large-scale
case on the FBI-the museum murders."

D'Agosta swallowed. "Don't worry about me."

"It seems Diogenes has begun to take pleasure in giving me
advance warning. We might assume you and other potential targets
are temporarily safe-at least until I receive the next message.
Even so, Vincent, you must take every precaution possible. The
safest thing is to go back to work immediately. Surround yourself
with police, remain in the precinct house when not on call. Most
important, alter all your habits-every single one. Temporarily
move your residence. Take cabs instead of walking or riding the
subway. Go to bed and rise at different hours. Change everything
in your life that might cause you danger-or danger to those you
care about. An attempt on your life could easily result in
collateral damage to others, in particular Captain Hayward.
Vincent, you're a good officer-I don't need to tell you what to
do."

The limo came screeching to a stop. The blacktopped expanse of
the East 34th Street Heliport lay directly ahead, its stubby,
three-hundred-foot runway gleaming dully in the morning sun. A
red Bell 206 Jet Ranger was waiting on the tarmac, rotors
turning. Pendergast abruptly slipped into investment banker mode,
his face relaxing, the glittering hatred and determination
vanishing from his eyes, leaving behind a pleasant
blandness.

"One other thing," D'Agosta said.

Pendergast turned back.

D'Agosta reached into his jacket pocket, retrieved something,
held it out in a closed fist. Pendergast reached out and D'Agosta
dropped into his palm a platinum medallion, slightly melted along
one edge, on a chain. On one side of the medallion was the image
of a lidless eye hovering over a phoenix, rising from the ashes
of a fire. A crest of some sort had been stamped into the other
side.

Pendergast stared at it, a strange expression passing over his
face.

"Count Fosco was wearing this when I went back to his castle
with the Italian police. He showed it to me, privately, as proof
you were dead. You'll see the bastard engraved his own crest on
the back-his final trick against me. I thought you'd want
it."

Pendergast turned it over, peered at it, turned it over
again.

"I took it from him the night I ... paid him a final visit.
Maybe it'll bring you good luck."

"Normally I despise luck, but at the moment I find myself in
singular need of it. Thank you, Vincent." Pendergast's voice was
almost too low to be heard above the revving of the rotors. He
placed the medallion around his neck, tucked it into his shirt,
and grasped D'Agosta's hand.

And then, without another word, he strode across the tarmac
toward the waiting chopper.

SIXTEEN

The chopper landed at a corporate heliport in Chevy Chase,
Maryland, where a car without a driver awaited. By nine o'clock,
Pendergast was crossing into D.C. It was a cold, sunny January
day, with a weak yellow sun filtering through the bare branches
of the trees, leaving frost in the shadows.

In a few minutes, he was driving along Oregon Avenue, lined
with stately mansions-one of Washington's most exclusive suburbs.
He slowed as he passed Mike Decker's house. The tidy,
brick-fronted Georgian seemed as somnolent as the rest of the
neighborhood. No car was parked outside, but that in itself meant
nothing: Decker ranked a car and driver when he wanted
one.

Pendergast drove a block farther, then pulled over to the
curb. Taking out a cell phone, he once again tried Decker's home
and mobile. No answer.

Behind the row of mansions lay the wooded fastness of Rock
Creek Park. Pendergast got out of the car with his attaché
case and walked thoughtfully into the park. Diogenes, he felt
sure, would be watching the scene and would recognize him despite
his disguise- just as he felt sure he would recognize his
brother, no matter what.

But he saw no one and heard nothing but the faint rush of
water from Rock Creek.

He walked briskly along the fringe of the park, then darted
across a driveway, crossed a garden, and came up through a hedge
into Decker's backyard. The yard was deep and well tended,
falling away at the rear into the dense woods of the park. There,
hidden from the neighbors by thick shrubbery, he glanced up at
the windows. They were closed, white curtains pulled shut.
Glancing at the adjoining houses, he proceeded, with practiced
casualness, across the yard and to the back door, pulling on a
pair of gloves as he did so and leaving his attaché on the
stoop.

Pendergast paused again, his alert eyes taking in every
detail. Then, without knocking, he peered through the small
window.

Decker's kitchen was modern and almost spartan in its bachelor
emptiness. A folded newspaper lay on a counter beside the phone;
a suit jacket had been draped over the back of a chair. On one
side of the room, a door-shut-opened no doubt onto the basement
stairway; on the other side, a dark corridor led into the front
rooms of the house.

A shape lay on the floor of the corridor, vague in the dim
light. It moved feebly, once, twice.

In an instant, Pendergast moved to pick the lock, only to find
that the knob-broken-turned easily in his hand. There was a
telltale cut wire: a security system had been bypassed. Nearby,
the phone wire had also been snipped. He swept inside, darting
toward the shape in the hall and kneeling on the broad
floorboards.

A male Weimaraner lay there, eyes glassy, rear legs still
twitching in slowing spasms. Pendergast ran his gloved fingers
quickly over the dog's frame. Its neck had been broken in two
places.

Now, rising, Pendergast reached into his pocket. When his hand
appeared again, it was holding a gleaming Wilson Combat TSGC .45.
Moving quickly and with utter silence, Pendergast searched the
first floor of the house: wheeling around corners, gun extended,
eyes darting over every surface and place of concealment. Living
room, dining room, front hall, bath: all empty and
still.

Next, Pendergast flew up the stairs, pausing to glance around
at the upper landing. Four rooms gave onto a central hallway.
Sunlight lanced in through the open doors, illuminating a few
dust motes dancing lazily in the sluggish air.

Gun at the ready, he spun around the first doorway, which led
into a back bedroom. Inside, the guest beds were made with almost
military perfection, bedspreads tight across the mattresses and
over the pillows. Beyond, the gaunt trees of Rock Creek Park were
visible through the window. Everything was wrapped in a deep
silence.

A faint sound came from nearby.

Pendergast froze, his hyperacute senses strained to the
maximum. There had been one sound, only one: the slow outrush of
air, like a languorous sigh.

He exited the back bedroom, darted across the hall, paused
outside the entrance to the room opposite. Tall bookshelves and
the edge of a table could be seen through the open door: a study.
Here, closer, another sound could just be discerned-a fast,
running patter as of a faucet improperly closed.

Tensing, gun forward, Pendergast wheeled around the door
frame.

Mike Decker sat in a leather chair, facing his desk. He was
ex-military and had always endowed his movements with economy and
precision, yet it was not preciseness that kept him so erect in
the chair. A heavy steel bayonet had been driven into his mouth,
angling down through his neck and pinning him to the headrest.
The point of the old bayonet pierced all the way through the
chair back, sticking out the back side, its rough edge heavy with
blood. Drops fell from its tip onto the sodden
carpet.

Another low sigh sounded in Decker's ruined throat, like the
collapsing of a bellows. It died into a faint, bloody gargle. The
man stared sightlessly at Pendergast, white shirt stained a
uniform red. Streams of blood still flowed across the table,
running in slow meanders and draining, with a pattering sound, to
the floor.

For a moment, Pendergast remained still, as if thunderstruck.
Then he removed one glove and-leaning forward, careful not to
step in the blood that had ponded beneath the chair-placed the
back of his hand against Decker's forehead. The man's skin felt
supple, elastic, and its surface temperature was no cooler than
Pendergast's own.

Abruptly, Pendergast drew back. The house was silent-except
for the steady dripping.

The sighs, Pendergast knew, were postmortem: air bleeding from
the lungs as the body relaxed against the bayonet. Even so, Mike
Decker had been dead less than five minutes. Probably less than
three.

Yet again, he hesitated. The precise time of death was
irrelevant. What was far more important was Pendergast's
realization that Diogenes had waited until Pendergast entered the
house before killing Decker.

And that meant his brother might still be here, in this
house.

In the distance, at the threshold of hearing, came the wail of
police sirens.

Pendergast swept the room, eyes glittering, searching for the
slightest clue that might help him track down his brother. His
eye finally rested on the bayonet-and, abruptly, he recognized
it.

A moment later, his gaze fell to Decker's hands. One lay
slack; the other was clenched in a ball.

Ignoring the approaching sirens, Pendergast withdrew a gold
pen from his pocket and carefully teased the clenched hand open.
Inside lay three strands of blond hair.

Retrieving a jeweler's loupe from his pocket, he bent forward
and examined the hairs. Returning his hand back into his pocket,
he exchanged the loupe for a pair of tweezers. Very carefully, he
plucked every strand from the motionless hand.

The sirens were louder now.

By now, Diogenes was certainly gone. He had choreographed the
scene, managed its many variables, with perfection. He had
entered the house, no doubt immobilized Decker with some kind of
drug, then waited for Pendergast to arrive before killing him.
Chances were that Diogenes had deliberately tripped the burglar
alarm while leaving the house.

A senior FBI agent lay dead, and the house would be picked
apart in the search for clues. Diogenes would not risk sticking
around- and neither could he.

He heard a screeching of tires, a confusion of sirens, as a
phalanx of police cars barreled down Oregon Avenue, now just
seconds from the house. Pendergast glanced back at his friend one
last time, briskly wiped a trace of excess moisture from one eye,
then dashed down the stairs.

The front door was now wide open, a security panel beside it
blinking red. He leaped over the inert form of the Weimaraner,
exited through the back door, snagged his attaché case,
sprinted across the yard, and-tossing the strands of hair into a
pile of dead leaves- vanished like a ghost into the shadowy
depths of Rock Creek Park.

SEVENTEEN

Margo Green was the first to arrive at the museum's grand old
Murchison Conference Room. As she settled into one of the old
leather chairs flanking the massive nineteenth-century oak table,
she took in the marvelous-but somewhat disconcerting-details: the
trophy heads of now endangered species gracing the walls; the
brace of elephant tusks flanking the door; the African masks,
leopard, zebra, and lion skins. Murchison had done his fieldwork
in Africa over a century before, and had enjoyed a career as a
great white hunter alongside his more serious profession of
anthropology. There was even a pair of elephant's-foot
wastebaskets at opposite ends of the room. But this was a museum,
and a museum must not throw anything away, no matter how
politically incorrect it may have become.

Margo used the few moments of quiet before the rest of the
department arrived to look through her notes and organize her
thoughts. She felt a rising nervousness she seemed unable to
quell. Was she doing the right thing? She'd been here all of six
weeks, and now, with her very first issue of Museology,
she was injecting herself into the midst of controversy. Why was
it so important to her?

But she already knew the answer. Personally, she had to make a
stand on something she believed in. And professionally, as editor
of Museology, it was the right thing to do. People would
expect the journal to comment on the issue. Silence, or a weak,
waffling editorial, would be noted by all. It would set the tone
of her editorship. No- it was important to show that
Museology would continue to be relevant and topical while
not fearing the controversial. This was her opportunity to show
the profession that she meant business.

She went back to her notes. Because the item in question was
owned by the Anthropology Department, it was the anthro curators
who were most concerned. She would not get a second chance to
make her case to the whole department, and she wanted to get it
right.

Other curators were now drifting in, nodding to her, chatting
among themselves, rattling the almost empty coffee urn, which was
boiling into tar the remains of the coffee prepared that morning.
Someone poured a cup, then replaced it with a clatter and a
suppressed expression of disgust. Nora Kelly arrived, greeted
Margo cordially, and took her seat on the opposite side of the
table. Margo looked around the room.

All ten curators were now here.

The last to arrive was Hugo Menzies, chairman of the
Anthropology Department since the untimely death of Dr. Frock six
years before. Menzies gave Margo a special smile and nod, then
took his seat at the head of the vast table. Because the bulk of
Museology articles were on anthropological subjects, he
had been appointed as her supervisor. And-she suspected-he had
also been instrumental in her hiring. Unlike everybody else on
staff-who favored lawyerly briefcases-Menzies carried around a
classy canvas shoulder bag by John Chapman Company, a top
manufacturer of English fishing and shooting gear. At the moment,
he was taking some papers out of the bag, squaring and organizing
them. Next, he put on his reading glasses, adjusted his tie, and
smoothed down his untidy thatch of white hair. Finally, he
checked his watch, raised his lively blue eyes to the waiting
group, cleared his throat.

"Glad to see you all here," he said, his voice reedy and
old-fashioned. "Shall we commence?"

There was a general shuffling of papers.

"Rather than go through the usual business," he said, glancing
at Margo, "let's go straight to a subject I know is on all your
minds: the problem of the Great Kiva masks."

More shuffling of papers, glances at Margo. She straightened
her back, kept her face neutral and composed. Deep in her heart,
she believed she was right, and that helped give her the strength
and conviction she needed.

"Margo Green, the new editor of Museology, has asked to
speak to you all. As you know, the Tano Indians are requesting
the return of the Great Kiva masks, a centerpiece of our upcoming
show. As chairman of the department, it's my job to make a
recommendation to the director on this matter: whether we give up
the masks, keep them, or seek some compromise. We are not a
democracy, but I can promise you your opinions will carry great
weight with me. I might add that the director himself will also
be seeking the advice of the board and the museum's attorneys
before he makes his final decision, so mine is not the last
word." He smiled, turned to Margo. "And now, Margo, would you
like to take the floor?"

Margo rose, looked around the room.

"Most of you probably know I'm planning to run an editorial in
the next issue of Museology, calling for the return of the
Great Kiva masks to the Tanos. A draft of the editorial has
circulated, and it's caused some consternation in the
administration." She swallowed, trying to conceal the nervous
flutter she could hear in her voice.

She went on to speak about the history of the masks and how
they were collected, gaining confidence and poise.

"For those of you who aren't familiar with the Tano Indians,"
she said, "they live on a remote reservation on the New
Mexico-Arizona border. Because of their isolation, they still
retain their original language, religion, and customs, while
living with one foot in the modern world. Less than twenty
percent of the tribe identify themselves as Christian.
Anthropologists believe they settled in their present area along
the Tano River almost a thousand years ago. They speak a unique
language, apparently unrelated to any other. I'm telling you
these things because it's important to emphasize that these are
not Native Americans in genotype alone, trying belatedly to
recapture long-lost traditions. The Tano are one of the few
tribes who have never lost their traditions."

She paused. People were listening attentively, and while she
knew not all agreed with her, at least they were giving her a
respectful hearing.

"The tribe is divided into moieties-that is, two religious
groups. The Great Kiva Society masks are used only when
these moieties come together for religious ceremonies in the
Great Kiva-the kiva being the circular underground chamber that
serves as their place of worship. They hold these great
ceremonies only once every four years. They believe these
ceremonies maintain balance and harmony in the tribe, in all
people of the earth, and in the natural world. They believe-and
I'm not exaggerating here-that the terrible wars and natural
disasters of the last hundred years are due to the fact that they
don't have the Great Kiva masks and have been unable to perform
properly the ceremony restoring balance and beauty to the
world."

She went on for another five minutes and then wrapped it up,
glad that she'd been able to keep it relatively
short.

Menzies thanked her, glanced around the table. "And now, let
the debate begin."

There was a shuffling. Then a thin voice piped up, carrying a
slightly aggrieved tone. It was Dr. Prine. The slope-shouldered
curator rose to his feet. "Being a specialist in Etruscan
archaeology, I don't know much about the Tano Indians, but I
think the whole business has a bad odor to it. Why are the Tano
suddenly so interested in these masks? How do we know the Tano
won't just turn around and sell them? They must be worth
millions. I'm very suspicious about their
motives."

Margo bit her lip. She remembered Prine from her graduate
student days: a dim bulb that had only grown dimmer with the
passage of years. His life's research, she recalled, was a study
of Etruscan liver divination.

"For these reasons and many others," Prine went on, "I'm
strongly in favor of keeping the masks. In fact, I can't believe
we're seriously considering returning them. We bought them, we
own them, and we should keep them." He sat down
abruptly.

A short chubby man with a furze of red hair encircling a large
bald spot rose next. Margo recognized him as George Ashton, chief
curator of the Sacred Images exhibition. Ashton was a capable
anthropologist, if temperamental and easily riled. And he looked
riled now.

"I agree with Dr. Prine, and I take strong objection to this
editorial." He turned to Margo, his eyes almost popping from his
round red face, chin doubling and tripling in his excitement. "I
consider it highly inappropriate that Dr. Green raised this
question at this time. We're less than a week from the opening of
the biggest show at the museum in years, costing almost five
million dollars. The Great Kiva masks are the centerpiece of the
show. If we pull those masks, there's no way the show will open
on time. Really, Dr. Green, I find your timing on this matter to
be truly unfortunate." He paused long enough to give Margo
a fiery stare, then turned to Menzies. "Hugo, I propose we table
this question until after the show has closed. Then we can debate
it at leisure. Of course, giving back the masks is unthinkable,
but for heaven's sake let's make that decision after the
show."

Margo waited. She would respond at the end-if Menzies gave her
the opportunity.

Menzies smiled placidly at the indignant curator. "For the
record, George, I would note that the timing has nothing to do
with Dr. Green-it's in response to the receipt of a letter from
the Tano Indians, which was triggered by your own pre-publicity
campaign for the show."

"Yes, but does she have to publish this editorial?" Ashton
slashed the air with a piece of paper. "She could at least wait
until after the show closes. This is going to create a
public relations nightmare!"

"We are not in the business of public relations," said Menzies
mildly.

Margo cast him a grateful look. She had expected his support,
but this was more than just support.

"Public relations are a reality! We can't just sit in our
ivory tower and ignore public opinion, can we? I'm trying to open
a show under the most trying conditions, and I do not appreciate
being undercut like this-not by Dr. Green and certainly not by
you, Hugo!"

He sat down, breathing hard.

Menzies said quietly, "Thank you for your opinion,
George."

Ashton nodded curtly.

Patricia Wong, a research associate in the Textile Department,
stood up. "The issue, it seems to me, is simple. The museum
acquired the masks unethically, perhaps even illegally. Margo
demonstrates that clearly in her editorial. The Tano asked for
them back. If we as a museum have any pretense to ethics, we
should return them right away. I respectfully disagree with Dr.
Ashton. To keep the masks for the show and display them to all
the world and then return them admitting we were wrong to have
them-that would look hypocritical, or at best
opportunistic."

"Hear, hear," said another curator.

"Thank you, Dr. Wong," said Menzies as the woman sat back
down.

And now Nora Kelly was standing up, sweeping cinnamon hair
from her face, slender and tall. She looked around, poised and
confident. Margo felt a swelling of irritation.

"There are two questions before us," she began, her voice low
and reasonable. "The first is whether Margo has the right to
publish the editorial. I think we all agree that the editorial
independence of Museology must be preserved, even if some
of us don't like the opinions expressed."

There was a general murmuring of agreement, except from
Ashton, who crossed his arms and snorted audibly.

"And I am one of those who does not agree with this
editorial."

Here it comes, thought Margo.

"It's more than a question of mere ownership. I mean, who owns
Michelangelo's David? If the Italians wanted to break it
up to make marble bathroom tiles, would that be acceptable? If
the Egyptians decided to level the Great Pyramid for a parking
lot, would that be okay? Do they own it? If the Greeks wanted to
sell the Parthenon to a Las Vegas casino, would that be their
right?"

She paused.

"The answer to these questions must be no. These things are
owned by all of humanity. They are the highest expressions of the
human spirit, and their value transcends all questions of
ownership. So it is with the Great Kiva masks. Yes, the museum
acquired them unethically. But they are so extraordinary, so
important, and so magnificent that they cannot be returned to the
Tano to disappear forever into a dark kiva. So I say: publish the
editorial. Let's have the debate. But for God's sake, don't give
back the masks." She paused again, thanked them for listening,
and sat down.

Margo felt a redness creeping into her face. As much as she
hated to admit it, Nora Kelly was formidable.

Menzies looked around, but it appeared that no one had any
more comments. He turned to Margo. "Anything further to add? Now
is the time to speak."

She sprang to her feet. "Yes. I'd like to rebut Dr.
Kelly."

"Please."

"Dr. Kelly has conveniently overlooked one critical point: the
masks are religious objects, unlike everything else she
cited."

Nora was immediately on her feet. "The Parthenon isn't a
temple? The David isn't a figure from the Bible? The Great
Pyramid isn't a sacred tomb?"

"For heaven's sakes, they're not religious objects now. No one
goes to the Parthenon to sacrifice rams anymore!"

"Exactly my point. Those objects have transcended their
original limited religious function. Now they belong to all of
us, regardless of religion. Just so with the Great Kiva masks.
The Tano may have created them for religious purposes, but now
they belong to the world."

Margo felt the flush spread through her body. "Dr. Kelly, may
I suggest that your logic is better suited to an undergraduate
classroom in philosophy than a meeting of anthropologists in the
greatest natural history museum in the world?"

A silence followed. Menzies slowly turned toward Margo, fixed
her with his blue eyes, over which his eyebrows were drawn down
in displeasure. "Dr. Green, passion in science is a marvelous
quality. But we must insist upon civility as
well."

Margo swallowed. "Yes, Dr. Menzies." Her face flamed. How had
she allowed herself to lose her temper? She didn't even dare
glance over at Nora Kelly. Here she was, not only creating
controversy but making enemies in her own
department.

There was a general nervous clearing of throats, a few
whispers.

"Very well," Menzies said, his voice back to its soothing
note. "I've gotten the drift of opinion from both sides, and it
appears we are more or less evenly divided. At least among those
with opinions. I have made my decision."

He paused, casting his eye around the group.

"I will be bringing two recommendations to the director. The
first is that the editorial be published. Margo is to be
commended for initiating the debate with a well-reasoned
editorial, which upholds the best traditions of Museology
journal."

He took a breath. "My second recommendation is that the masks
be returned to the Tano. Forthwith."

There was a stunned silence. Margo could hardly believe it-
Menzies had come down one hundred percent on her side. She had
won. She sneaked a glance at Nora, saw the woman's face now
reddening as well.

"The ethics of our profession are clear," Menzies went on.
"Those ethics state, and I quote: 'The first responsibility of an
anthropologist is to the people under study.' It pains me more
than I can say to see the museum lose those masks. But I have to
agree with Drs. Green and Wong: if we are to set an ethical
example, we must return them. Yes, the timing is certainly
awkward, and it creates an enormous problem with the exhibition.
I'm sorry, George. It can't be helped."

"But the loss to anthropology, to the world-" Nora
began.

"I have said what I have to say," said Menzies, just a shade
of tartness entering his voice. "This meeting is
adjourned."

EIGHTEEN

Bill Smithback rounded a corner, stopped, then breathed a sigh
of relief. There, at the far end of the corridor, lay the door to
Fenton Davies's office, open and unvexed by the lingering shade
of Bryce Harriman. In fact, come to think of it, Smithback hadn't
seen much of Harriman at all today. As he walked toward Davies's
office, a fresh spring in his step, he rubbed his hands together,
feeling a delicious shudder of schadenfreude at Harriman's bad
luck. To think Harriman had been so eager to get his mitts on the
Dangler story. Well, he was welcome to it. In retrospect, it
wasn't really much of a Times story, anyway: far too
undignified, tending toward the burlesque. Still, Harriman-what
with his recent stint at the Post-would probably find it
right up his alley.

Smithback chuckled as he walked.

He, on the other hand, had scored a major coup by landing the
Duchamp murder. It was everything a big story should be: unusual,
compelling, galvanic. It was the number one topic of conversation
around watercoolers all over the city: the gentle, kindly artist
who- for no apparent reason-had been bound, a hangman's noose
fitted around his neck, then forced out of a twenty-fourth-story
window and sent crashing through the roof of one of Manhattan's
fancy French restaurants. All this in broad daylight in front of
hundreds of witnesses.

Smithback slowed a little as he approached Davies's office.
True, those many witnesses were proving hard as hell to track
down. And so far, he'd had to content himself with the police
department's official line and what discreet conjectures he'd
drummed out of those usually in the know, who were proving
disconcertingly out of the know in this case. But the story would
break open. Nora was right when she said he always came through
in the end. How well she understood him. It was just a matter of
working every angle, maintaining traction.

No doubt that was why Davies had summoned him: the editor was
eager for more. No sweat, he'd tell Davies he was chasing down
some choice leads from his confidential sources. He'd get his ass
back up to Broadway and 65th. Today there wouldn't be any cops
around to cramp his style. Then he'd go haunt the precinct house,
talk to an old pal there, see what crumbs he could pick up. No,
he corrected himself: crumbs wasn't the right word. Other
reporters picked up crumbs, while Smithback found the cake-and
ate it, too.

Chuckling at his own metaphorical wit, he paused at the
secretarial station outside Davies's office. Vacant. Late
lunch, Smithback thought. Striding forward, feeling and
looking every inch the ace reporter, he breezed up, raising his
hand to knock on the open door.

Davies was sitting, Buddha-like, behind his cluttered desk. He
was short and perfectly bald, with fastidious little hands that
always seemed to be doing something: smoothing his tie or playing
with a pencil or tracing the lines of his eyebrows. He favored
blue shirts with white collars and tightly knotted paisley ties.
With his high, soft voice and effeminate mannerisms, Davies might
look to the uninitiated like a pushover. But Smithback had
learned that this was not the case. You didn't get to be an
editor at the Times without at least a few pints of
barracuda blood coursing through your veins. But his delivery was
so mild it sometimes took a moment to realize you'd just been
disemboweled. He played his cards close to his vest, listened
more than he spoke, and one rarely knew what he was really
thinking. He didn't fraternize with his reporters, didn't hang
out with theother editors, and seemed to prefer his own company.
There was only one extra chair in his office, and it was never
occupied.

Except that today it was occupied by Bryce
Harriman.

Smithback froze in the doorway, hand still raised in
midknock.

"Ah, Bill." Davies nodded. "Good timing. Please come
in."

Smithback took a step forward, then another. He struggled to
keep his eyes from meeting Harriman's.

"Planning to file a follow-up on the Duchamp murder?" Davies
asked.

Smithback nodded. He felt dazed, as if somebody had just
sucker-punched him in the gut. He hoped to hell it didn't
show.

Davies ran his fingertips along the edge of his desk. "What's
the angle going to be?"

Smithback was ready with his answer. This was Davies's
favorite question, and it was a rhetorical one: his way of
letting reporters know he didn't want any grass growing under
their feet.

"I was planning a local-interest angle," he said. "You know,
the effect of the killing on the building, the neighborhood,
friends and family of the victim. And, of course, I was planning
a follow-up story on the progress of the investigation. The
detective in charge, Hayward, is the youngest homicide captain in
the force and a woman to boot."

Davies nodded slowly, allowing a meditative hmmmm to
escape his lips. As usual, the response communicated nothing
about what he was really thinking.

Smithback, his nervousness heightened, elaborated. "You know
the drill: unnatural death comes to the Upper West Side, matrons
afraid to walk their poodles at night. I'll weave in a sketch of
the victim, his work, that sort of thing. Might even do a sidebar
on Captain Hayward."

Davies nodded again, picked up a pen, rolled it slowly between
his palms.

"You know, something that could run on the first page of the
Metro Section," Smithback said gamely, still
pitching.

Davies put down the pen. "Bill, this is bigger than a Metro
story, the biggest homicide in Manhattan since the Cutforth
murder, which Bryce here covered when he was at the
Post."

Bryce here. Smithback kept his face
pleasant.

"It's a story with a lot of angles. Not only do we have the
sensational manner of death, but we also have-as you point
out-the posh location. Then we have the man himself. An artist.
And the female homicide detective." He paused. "Aren't you biting
off a little more than you can chew-for a single story, that
is?"

"I could make it two, even three. No problem."

"No doubt you could, but then the stretched-out time frame
becomes problematic."

Smithback licked his lips. He was acutely aware of the fact
that he was standing and Harriman was sitting.

Davies went on. "I personally had no idea that Duchamp was, in
his own quiet way, a painter of some renown. He wasn't trendy or
popular with the SoHo crowd. More of a Sutton Place style of
artist, a Fairfield Porter. Bryce and I were just talking about
it last night."

"Bryce," Smithback repeated. The name tasted like bile in his
mouth. "Last night?"

Davies waved his hand with studied nonchalance. "Over drinks
at the Metropolitan Club."

Smithback felt himself stiffen. So that was how the smarmy
prick had managed it. He'd taken Davies for drinks at his
father's fancy club. And Davies, it seemed, like any number of
editors Smithback had known, was a sucker for that kind of thing.
Editors were the worst social climbers, always hanging around the
fringes of the rich and famous, hoping to catch a few scraps that
dropped from the table. Smithback could just imagine Davies being
ushered into the cloistered fastness of the Metropolitan Club;
shown to a luxurious chair in some gilded salon; served drinks by
deferential men in uniform; all the while exchanging hushed
greetings with various Rockefellers, De Menils, Vanderbilts-that
was just the thing to turn Davies's Maplewood, New Jersey, head
all the way around.

Now, at last, he glanced again in Harriman's direction. The
scumbag was sitting there, one leg tucked primly over the other,
looking as nonchalant as if he did this every day. He didn't
bother returning Smithback's look. He didn't need
to.

"We haven't just lost a citizen here," Davies went on. "We've
lost an artist. And New York is a poorer place for his loss. See,
Bill, you just never know who lives in that apartment next door.
It could be a hot dog vendor or a sanitation worker. Or it could
be a fine artist whose paintings hang in half the apartments in
River House."

Smithback nodded again, frozen smile on his
lips.

Davies smoothed his tie. "It's a great angle. My friend Bryce
here will handle it."

Oh, God. For a bleak and terrible moment, Smithback
thought he was about to be reassigned to the
Dangler.

"He'll cover the society aspect of the story. He knows several
of Duchamp's important former clients, he's got the family
connections. They'll talk to him, whereas..."

His voice trailed off, but Smithback got the message:
whereas they won't talk to you.

"In short, Bryce can give us the silk-stocking view that
Times readers appreciate. I'm glad to see you have a
handle on the cop and street angle. You keep that
up."

The cop and street angle. Smithback felt his jaw
muscles flex involuntarily.

"It goes without saying that you'll both share information and
leads. I'd suggest regular meetings, keeping in touch. This story
is certainly big enough for the both of you, and it doesn't look
like it's going away any time soon."

Silence descended briefly over the office.

"Was there anything else, Bill?" Davies asked
mildly.

"What? Oh, no. Nothing."

"Then don't let me keep you."

"No, of course not," Smithback said. He was practically
stammering now with shock, mortification, and fury. "Thanks." And
as he turned to leave the office, Harriman finally glanced in his
direction. There was a smug half-smile on his shit-eating face.
It was a smile that seemed to say: See you around,
partner.

And watch your back.

NINETEEN

"SO how was your first day back?" Hayward asked, gamely sawing
away at a chicken breast.

"Fine," D'Agosta replied.

"Singleton didn't give you a hard time?"

"Nope."

"Well, you were just out two days, which probably helped
matters. He's intense-sometimes too intense-but he's a hell of a
cop. So are you. That's why I know you two will get
along."

D'Agosta nodded, pushed a piece of plum tomato around his
plate, then lifted it to his mouth. Chicken cacciatore was the
one recipe he could pull off without
thinking-barely.

"This is pretty good, Vinnie. Really. I'll have to let you
into the kitchen more often." And she smiled across the
table.

D'Agosta smiled back. He put down his fork for a moment and
just watched her eat.

She'd made a special effort to get home on time. She praised
his cooking even though he'd overcooked the chicken. She hadn't
even asked about his hasty departure from breakfast that morning.
She was clearly making a special effort to give him some space
and let him work out whatever he was working out. He realized,
with a sudden upwelling of affection, that he really loved this
woman.

That made what he was about to do all the
harder.

"Sorry I can't do your dinner justice," she said. "It deserves
to be lingered over. But I've got to rush out
again."

"New developments?"

"Not really. The ligature specialist wants to brief us on the
knots. Probably just a way of covering his ass-he hasn't been
much help."

"No?"

"He thinks the knots are Asiatic, maybe Chinese, but that
isn't narrowing it down very much."

D'Agosta took a deep breath. "Have you looked into the
possibility I mentioned at the diner? That Pendergast's brother
might be behind these murders?"

Hayward paused, fork halfway to her mouth. "There's so little
evidence to support that theory that it verges on crank. You know
I'm a professional. You have to trust me to conduct this case in
the best way possible. I'll look into it when I have
time."

There was nothing D'Agosta could say to this. They ate for a
moment in silence.

"Vinnie," she said, and something in her tone made him look up
at her again. "Sorry. I didn't mean to snap at
you."

"It's all right."

She was smiling again, and her dark eyes shone in the
artificial light. "Because the fact is, I'm really happy you're
back on the job."

D'Agosta swallowed. "Thanks."

"This crazy posthumous case of Pendergast's has just been a
distraction for you at the worst possible time. He may have been
a productive agent, but he wasn't-well, normal. I know you
were a friend of his, but I think-" She paused. "I think he had
an unhealthy influence on you. And then, this request from beyond
the grave, all this stuff about his brother ... I have to tell
you, I resent that."

Despite everything, D'Agosta felt a stab of irritation. "I
know you never liked the guy. But he got results."

"I know, I know. I shouldn't criticize the dead.
Sorry."

The irritation was swept away by a sudden flood of guilt.
D'Agosta said nothing.

"Anyway, all that's past. The Dangler case is high-profile, a
great starter case. You're going to shine, Vinnie, I know you
are. It'll be just like old times."

D'Agosta cut into a chicken thigh, then dropped his knife on
the plate with a clatter. This was agony. He couldn't put it off
any longer.

"Laura," he began. "There's no easy way to say
this."

"Say what?"

He took a deep breath. "I'm moving out."

She froze, as if uncomprehending. Then a look slowly crept
over her face: a look of disbelief and pain, like a child who had
just been unexpectedly struck by a beloved parent. Seeing that
expression, D'Agosta felt just about as bad as he'd ever felt in
his life.

"Vinnie?" she asked, dazed.

D'Agosta lowered his eyes. There was a long, excruciating
silence.

"Why?"

He didn't know what to say. He knew only that the one thing he
could not do was tell her the truth. Laura, honey, I may be in
danger. You're not a target, but I definitely am. And by staying
here, I could put you in danger, as well.

"Is it something I've done? Something I haven't
done?"

"No," he said immediately. He had to make up something, and
with Laura Hayward, that something had better be
good.

"No," he said again, more slowly. "You've been great. It has
nothing to do with you. I really care about you. It has to do
with me. Our relationship ... maybe we started off just a little
too fast."

Hayward did not reply.

D'Agosta felt like he was walking himself off a cliff. There
was nothing he wanted more right now than to stay with this
woman- this beautiful, caring, supportive woman. He'd rather hurt
himself than her. And yet he was hurting her, hurting her
deeply, with every word. It was an awful thing to do, but he had
no choice. Vincent, you must take every precaution
possible. D'Agosta knew that the only way to save this
relationship-and, perhaps, Laura Hayward's life-was by
interrupting it.

"I just need a little space, that's all," he went on. "To
think things through. Get some perspective on my life." The
platitudes sounded hollow, and rather than continue, he stopped
short.

He sat there, waiting for Hayward to blow up, curse him out,
order him to leave. Yet there was only another long, awful
silence. Finally, he looked up. Laura was sitting there, hands in
her lap, dinner growing cold, her face pale and her eyes cast
downward. Her beautiful blue-black hair had fallen forward,
covering one eye. This wasn't the reaction he'd expected. This
surprise, this hurt, was even worse than anger.

At last, she sniffed, rubbed a finger beneath her nose, pushed
away her plate. Then she rose.

"I've got to get back to work," she said, so quietly D'Agosta
barely heard her. He sat motionless as she brushed her hair away
from her face. Then she turned and walked quickly toward the
door. It wasn't until her hand was on the doorknob that she
stopped, realizing she'd forgotten her coat and her briefcase.
She turned, walked slowly to the closet, shrugged into her coat,
picked up the case. And then she left, closing the door quietly
behind her.

She did not look back.

D'Agosta sat at the dinner table for a long time, listening to
the tick of the clock, to the faint street noises filtering up
from below. Finally, he stood, brought the dishes into the little
kitchen, threw the half-eaten dinners into the garbage, and
washed up.

Then he turned and-feeling very old-headed for the bedroom to
pack.

TWENTY

AT three o'clock in the morning, the boarded-up Beaux Arts
mansion at 891 Riverside Drive looked asleep, perhaps even dead.
But deep below the shuttered windows and double-locked doors,
activity flickered in one of the basement tunnels cut into the
Manhattan bedrock beneath the old house. The longest
tunnel-actually a series of connected basement rooms-lay in a
line due west, drilling beneath Riverside Drive and Riverside
Park toward the Hudson River. At the end, a crude staircase
spiraled down a natural cavity to a stone quay, where a watery
tunnel led out past a small, weed-draped opening onto the river
itself. More than two centuries before, the river pirate who
owned the mansion's earlier incarnation had used this secret
passage on nocturnal errands of mischief. Today, only a handful
of people knew of the hidden entrance.

In this isolated spot, the soft lapping of oars could be
heard. There was a faint plash as the green veil of weeds was
lifted aside, exposing an underwater passage. It was a foggy,
moonless night, and only the palest glint of light outlined a
skiff as it entered the tunnel. Noiselessly, it slid forward
beneath a low, rocky ceiling, easing up at last to the stone
quay.

Pendergast stepped out of the skiff, tethered it to a cleat,
and looked around, eyes glinting in the darkness. He remained
still for several minutes, listening. Then he pulled a flashlight
from his pocket, snapped it on, and headed up the staircase. At
the top, he stepped out into a large room filled with wooden
cases displaying weapons and armor, some modern, others dating
back two thousand years. He passed through the room and into an
old laboratory, beakers and retorts gleaming on long black-topped
tables.

In one corner of the laboratory stood a silent, shadowy
figure.

Pendergast came forward cautiously, one hand stealing toward
his weapon. "Proctor?"

"Sir?"

Pendergast relaxed. "I got the signal from
Constance."

"And I, in turn, got your message to meet here. But I must say
I'm surprised to see you in person, sir."

"I had hoped it wouldn't be necessary. But as it happens,
there's a message that I, in turn, must deliver to Constance, and
it's one I felt had to be delivered in person."

Proctor nodded. "I understand, sir."

"From now on, it is vital that you keep a close eye on
her. You know Constance, how fragile her mental condition is. How
she appears on the surface is no indication at all of her true
emotional state. You also know that she's been through what no
other human being has. I fear that, if she is not treated with
exceptional care and caution..."

His voice trailed off. After a moment, Proctor nodded
again.

"This all couldn't have come at a worse time. I'm going to
tell her that she needs to be ready at all times to return to
that place ... where she first hid from us. Where nobody,
nobody, could ever find her."

"Yes, sir."

"You found the breach?"

"It has been found and sealed."

"Where was it?"

"It seems that a nineteenth-century sewer tunnel runs under
Broadway, just beyond the basement fruit cellars. It has not been
used for fifty years. He was able to penetrate the fruit cellars
from that tunnel, knocking a hole in the pipe."

Pendergast looked at him sharply. "He didn't find the
staircase leading to this sub-basement?"

"No. It seems he was in the house for only a few moments. He
was there just long enough to take the item from a first-floor
cabinet and leave."

Pendergast continued to look fixedly at Proctor. "You must
make sure the mansion is perfectly sealed. This cannot be
allowed to happen again. Is that clear?"

"Perfectly, sir."

"Good. Then let's go speak with her."

They passed out of the laboratory and through a series of
chambers filled with glass-fronted cabinets and tall cases full
of seemingly endless and impossibly eclectic collections: stuffed
migratory birds, Amazonian insects, rare minerals, bottled
chemicals.

At last, in a room full of butterflies, they stopped.
Pendergast licked the flashlight over the ranks of display cases.
Then he spoke quietly into the darkness.

"Constance?"

Only silence answered.

"Constance?" he said again, just a trifle
louder.

There was a faint rustle of linen; then a woman of about
twenty appeared seemingly out of nowhere. She wore a long,
old-fashioned white dress with lace ruffling around the throat.
Her delicate skin was very pale in the light of the
flashlight.

"Aloysius," she said, embracing him. "Thank
God."

For a moment, Pendergast simply held her close. Then he gently
detached himself and turned away for a minute, twisting a small
brass knob set into one wall. The chamber filled with faint
light.

"Aloysius, what's the matter?" Her eyes-strangely wise for a
face so young-grew anxious.

"I'll tell you in a moment." Pendergast placed a reassuring
hand on her shoulder. "Tell me about the message."

"It arrived late this evening."

"Method of delivery?"

"It was slipped into a crack beneath the front
door."

"You took the necessary precautions?"

Constance nodded. Then she reached into one of her sleeves and
drew out a small ivory business card, carefully sealed inside a
glassine envelope.

Pendergast took the card, turned it over. Diogenes
Pendergast was engraved in fine copperplate on the card's
face: below that, in rose-colored ink, had been written: The
Five of Swords is Smithback.

He stared at the card for a long moment. Then he slipped it
into his coat pocket.

"What does it mean?" Constance asked.

"I hesitate to tell you more. Your nerves have been strained
enough already."

Constance smiled faintly. "I must say, when you walked into
the library, I was sure I was seeing a-a
revenant."

"You know my brother's plans, how he intends to destroy
me."

"Yes." Constance went even paler and for a moment seemed to
stagger slightly. Pendergast placed his hand on her
shoulder.

She mastered herself with effort. "I'm fine, thank you. Do go
on."

"He has already begun. Over the last several days, three of my
closest friends have been killed." Pendergast touched his jacket
pocket. "This note from Diogenes puts me on notice that William
Smithback is the next target."

"William Smithback?"

"He's a reporter for the New York Times." Pendergast
hesitated again.

"And?" Constance asked. "There's something else troubling you-
I can see it in your face."

"Yes. The first three who died were all very close to me. But
that isn't the case with Bill Smithback. I've known him for
several years. He was involved in three cases of mine, a very
effective journalist. And despite an impulsive and somewhat
careerist exterior, he is a good man. What troubles me, however,
is that he's more an acquaintance than a friend. Diogenes is
casting his net wider than I thought. It isn't just close friends
who are at risk. And that makes the situation even more difficult
than I thought."

"How can I help?" Constance asked in a low
tone.

"By keeping yourself absolutely safe."

"You think-?"

"That you're a possible target? Yes. And there's something
more. The third man to die was Michael Decker, an old FBI
associate of mine. I found Mike's body yesterday, in his
Washington house. He had been killed with an old bayonet. The
modus operandi was a nod to a distant ancestor of mine, who died
in a very similar fashion as an officer in Napoleon's army,
during the Russian campaign of 1812."

Constance shivered.

"What concerned me was the weapon itself. Constance, that
bayonet came from the collections of this very
house."

She froze for a moment as the implications of this sank home.
"The chasepot or the lebel?" she asked faintly, almost
robotically.

"The chasepot. It had the initials P.S.P. engraved onto
the quillon. Quite unmistakable."

But Constance did not reply. Her alert, intelligent eyes had
sharpened, deepened, with fear.

"Diogenes has found entrance to this house. No doubt that was
the message he intended to deliver to me with that particular
bayonet."

"I understand."

"You're still safer within this house than without, and for
now you are not in Diogenes's sights. Proctor here has found and
sealed the weak point through which Diogenes entered, and as you
know, this mansion has been hardened against intruders in many
ways. Proctor will be ceaselessly vigilant, and he is more
formidable than he looks. Still, you must be on constant guard.
This is a very old and vast house. It has a great many secrets.
You know those secrets better than anyone. Follow your instincts.
If they tell you something is not right, melt into those recesses
of the house that only you know. Be ready at a moment's notice.
And until we can once again feel safe from this threat, I want
you to sleep in that secret space where you first hid from me and
from Wren."

At this, Constance's eyes went wide and wild. She clutched at
Pendergast. "No!" she cried passionately. "No, I don't
ever want to go back there again!"

Pendergast immediately put his arms around her.
"Constance-"

"You know how it reminds me of that time! The dark
spaces, the terrible things ... I don't wish to be reminded, ever
again!"

"Constance, listen to me. You'll be safe there. And I can't do
what needs to be done without knowing you're
safe."

Constance did not respond, and Pendergast pressed her more
tightly. "Will you promise me that?"

She laid her forehead against his chest.

"Aloysius," she said, her voice breaking. "It was just a few
months ago we sat in the library, upstairs. You read to me from
the newspapers. Do you remember?"

Pendergast nodded.

"I was beginning to comprehend. I felt like a swimmer,
coming to the surface after being so long underwater. I want that
again. I don't want to go ... to go down again. You do
understand, don't you, Aloysius?"

Pendergast caressed her brown hair gently. "Yes, I understand.
And everything will be as you want it, Constance. You will get
better, I promise. But we must get through this first. Will you
help me do that?"

She nodded.

Slowly, Pendergast lowered his arms. Then he took her forehead
between his hands and, bringing her close, kissed it gently. "I
must go."

And he turned, darted back into the waiting darkness, and was
gone.

TWENTY-ONE

IT was quarter to eight when Smithback emerged from his
apartment building, glanced up West End Avenue, and stretched out
his hand for a taxi. A beat-up yellow cab that had been idling at
the far end of the block pulled forward obediently, and Smithback
got in with a sigh of regret.

"Forty-fourth and Seventh," he said. The driver-a thin,
olive-skinned man with black hair and a bad complexion-muttered a
few words in some unknown tongue and screeched away from the
curb.

Smithback settled back, glancing out at the passing cityscape.
By rights, he should still be in bed, arms around his new wife,
deliriously asleep. But the image of Harriman, sitting in their
editor's office with that insufferably smug look on his face, had
spurred him into rising early to flog the story some
more.

You'll both share information and leads, Davies had
said. Hell with that. Smithback knew Harriman wasn't planning to
share jack shit, and for that matter neither was he. He'd check
in at the office, make sure nothing disagreeable had happened
overnight, and then hit the pavement. The article he'd turned in
the night before had been weak, and he had to get something
better. He had to, even if it meant buying a damn
apartment in Duchamp's building. Now, there was an idea: calling
a real estate agent and posing as a prospective buyer
….

The driver turned sharply left onto 72nd. "Hey, watch it,"
Smithback said. "I'm nursing a war wound back here." For once,
the driver had closed the shield of Plexiglas that separated the
front from the back. The cab stank of garlic, onions, and cumin,
and Smithback opened the rear window. As usual, the damn thing
only went down about a third of the way. Smithback's mood,
already low, fell lower.

It was probably just as well he'd left the apartment ninety
minutes early. Nora had been in a foul mood for several days now,
getting hardly any sleep and working at the museum until well
past midnight. That, plus the frosty exchange between her and
Margo Green the other night at the Bones, was weighing on him
heavily. Margo was an old friend and it pained him the two didn't
get along. They're too much alike, he thought.
Strong-willed and smart.

Ahead lay the West Side Highway and the Hudson River. Instead
of turning south onto the highway and heading toward Midtown, the
driver gunned the cab up the merge ramp onto the northbound
lanes.

"What the hell?" Smithback said. "Hey, you're going the wrong
way!"

In response, the driver jammed down harder on the accelerator,
veering past blaring horns and into the far left
lane.

Shit, the guy's English is worse than I thought.
Smithback pounded on the heavy shield of scratched Plexiglas.
"You're going the wrong way. Okay?
The-wrong-way. I said 44th Street. Get off
at 95th and turn around!"

The driver didn't respond. Instead, he continued to
accelerate, weaving in and out of lanes as he passed car after
car. The 95th Street exit came and went in a
flash.

Smithback's mouth went dry. Jesus, am I being kidnapped or
something? He grabbed for the door lock, but as with most
cabs the outer knob had been removed and the pull itself was
engaged, sunk beneath the level of the window
frame.

He renewed his frantic tattoo against the Plexiglas shield.
"Stop the car!" he yelled as the cab squealed around a bend. "Let
me out!"

When there was no answer, Smithback reached into his pocket
and plucked out his cell phone to dial 911.

"Put that thing away, Mr. Smithback," came the voice from the
front seat. "You're in good hands, I assure you."

Smithback froze in the act of dialing. He knew that voice:
knew it well. But it certainly didn't belong to the
Mediterranean-looking man in the front seat.

"Pendergast?" he said incredulously.

The man nodded. He was looking in the rearview mirror,
scanning the cars behind them.

The fear abated-slowly, slowly-to be replaced by surprise.
Pendergast, Smithback thought. Oh, God. Why do I get a
sinking feeling every lime I run into him?

"So the rumors were wrong," he said.

"Of my death? Most certainly."

Smithback guessed they were going at least a hundred miles an
hour. Cars were flashing past, vague shapes and blurs of
color.

"You mind telling me what's going on? Or why you're in
disguise? You look like a fugitive from a Turkish prison-if you
don't mind my saying so," he added hastily.

Pendergast glanced again in the rearview mirror. "I'm taking
you to a place of safety."

This didn't immediately register. "You're taking me
where?"

"You're a marked man. There's a dangerous killer after you.
The nature of the threat forces me to take unusual
measures."

Smithback opened his mouth to protest, then stopped. Alarm,
incredulity, astonishment, mingled in equal measures within him.
The 125th Street exit passed in a heartbeat.

Smithback found his voice. "A killer after me? What
for?"

"The more you know, the more dangerous it will be for
you."

"How do you know I'm in danger? I haven't pissed off anybody-
not lately, anyway."

To the left, the North River Control Plant shot by. Glancing
uneasily to his right, Smithback thought he caught the briefest
glimpse of 891 Riverside Drive-ancient, shadow-haunted-rising
above the greenery of Riverside Park.

The car was moving so fast now the tires barely seemed to
touch the road. Smithback looked around for a seat belt, but the
cab had none. Cars flashed past as if stationary. What the hell
kind of an engine does this thing have? He swallowed. "I'm
not going anywhere until I know what's going on. I'm a married
man now."

"Nora will be fine. She'll be told you're on assignment for
the Times and will be incommunicado for a while. I'll see
to that myself."

"Yeah, and what about the Times? I'm in the middle of
an important assignment."

"They will hear from a doctor of your sudden, serious
illness."

"Oh, no. No way. The Times is a dog-eat-dog place. It
doesn't matter if I'm sick or dying, I'll lose the
assignment."

"There will be other assignments."

"Not like this one. Look, Mr. Pendergast, the answer
is-shit!"

Smithback braced himself as the cab whipped around a cluster
of cars, weaving across three lanes, swerving at the last moment
to avoid rear-ending a lumbering truck and shooting back into the
fast lane. Smithback gripped the seat, silenced by
terror.

Pendergast glanced once again in the rearview mirror. Looking
around, Smithback could see-four or five cars back-a black
Mercedes, weaving in and out of the traffic, pacing
them.

Smithback faced forward again, feeling a rush of panic. Ahead
on the shoulder, an NYPD cruiser had pulled over a van and the
officer was out writing a ticket. As they flew past, Smithback
saw the cop whirl around in disbelief, then run back to his
cruiser.

"For God's sake, slow down," he choked out, but if
Pendergast heard him, he gave no response.

Smithback glanced back again. Despite the awful speed, the
black Mercedes wasn't falling behind. If anything, it seemed to
be gaining. It had heavily tinted windows, and he could not make
out the driver.

Ahead were signs for Interstate 95 and the George Washington
Bridge. "Brace yourself, Mr. Smithback," Pendergast said over the
roar of the engine and the screaming of wind.

Smithback seized a door handle, planted his feet on the
plastic floor mats. He was so frightened he could hardly
think.

Traffic had begun to thicken as the two-lane exit approached,
one stream of cars heading for the bridge and New Jersey, the
other heading eastward toward the Bronx. Pendergast slowed,
alternatelywatching the traffic ahead and the Mercedes in the
rearview mirror. Then, seizing an opportunity, he sheared across
all four lanes of traffic onto the right shoulder. A squeal of
brakes and a torrent of angry horns erupted, Doppler-shifting
lower as Pendergast jammed on the accelerator again, blasting up
the narrow shoulder, sending loose trash and hubcaps flying
behind them.

"Holy shit!" Smithback yelled.

Ahead, the shoulder narrowed, the curb of the median angling
in from the right. But instead of slowing, Pendergast pushed the
car relentlessly forward. The tires on the passenger side reared
up onto the curb and the vehicle charged ahead at an unwieldy
angle, rocking crazily back and forth, tires squealing, the stone
wall of the exit perilously close at hand.

From behind came the faint wail of a siren.

Pendergast braked abruptly, then turned into a brutal,
four-wheel power slide, just merging into a hole in the traffic
converging on the Trans-Manhattan Expressway. He changed lanes
once-so fast Smithback was thrown sideways on the seat-twice, a
third time, darting back and forth, all the while accelerating.
The car blasted along beneath the hulking apartments like a
bullet through the barrel of a gun.

A quarter mile ahead, a sea of red lights winked back out of
the gloom as traffic bunched up in the inevitable gridlock of the
Cross Bronx Expressway. The right-hand lane was blocked off by
orange cones, signs announcing a highway repair project
that-typically- was empty and unmanned. Pendergast veered into
the lane, scattering cones left and right.

Smithback glanced back. The black Mercedes was still there, no
more than six cars back, pacing them despite all Pendergast could
do. Much farther behind now were two police cars, lights flashing
and sirens wailing.

Suddenly, Smithback was thrown to one side. Pendergast had
abruptly veered onto the off-ramp for the Harlem River Drive.
Instead of slowing, he maintained a speed close to a hundred
miles an hour. With a shriek of stressed rubber, the car drifted
sideways, its flank contacting the stone retaining wall that
encircled the ramp.

There was a scream of ripping steel, and an explosion of
sparks flew backward.

"Son of a bitch! You're going to kill-!"

Smithback's voice was cut off as Pendergast braked violently
once again. With a bucking motion, the car shot over a
divider onto the opposing entrance helix to a small bridge
spanning the Harlem River. The vehicle fishtailed wildly before
Pendergast regained control. Then he accelerated yet again as
they shot over the river and into a tangle of narrow streets
leading toward the South Bronx.

Heart in mouth, Smithback glanced once again over his
shoulder. Impossibly, the Mercedes was still there, farther back
now but gaining once again. Even as he watched, the driver's
window of the Mercedes opened and there was a sudden puff of
smoke, followed by the crack of a gunshot.

With a thunk!, the passenger side mirror vanished in a
spray of glass and plastic, annihilated by a high-caliber
bullet.

"Shit!" Smithback screamed.

"Get down," Pendergast said, but Smithback was already on the
floor, hands over his head.

From this position, the nightmare was even worse: unable to
see anything, Smithback could only imagine the chaos of the
chase, the violent changes of direction, the screeching of tires,
the roar of the engine, the blaring of horns, snatches of cursing
in English and Spanish. And above it all, the ever-growing wail
of police sirens. Again and again, he was thrown forward against
the undersupports of the front seat as Pendergast braked
violently; again and again, he was thrown back as the agent
accelerated.

After a few endless minutes, Pendergast spoke again. "I need
you to get up, Mr. Smithback. Do so carefully."

Smithback rose, gripping the seat. The car was racing along a
wide avenue through an impoverished barrio of the Bronx, darting
from left to right. Instinctively, he glanced over his shoulder.
In the distance, he could see the Mercedes still pacing them,
swerving back and forth among slow-moving delivery vans and
lowriders. Farther back were strung out at least half a dozen
police cars.

"We're going to be stopping in a moment," Pendergast said. "It
is imperative that you follow me out of the car as quickly as
possible."

"Follow-?" Smithback was so terrorized his mind had stopped
working.

"Just do as I say, please. Stay right behind me. Right
behind me. Is that clear?"

"Yes," Smithback croaked.

Ahead, the road ended in a vast fence of barbed wire and metal
pipe, interrupted only by a heavy gate directly before them. The
fence enclosed at least five acres of cars, SUVs, and vans,
squeezed impossibly close to one another, extending from one end
of the fence to the other, a sea of vehicles, all makes and
models and vintages. They were all packed so tightly not even a
scooter could get between them. Atop the gate was a battered sign
that read Division of Motor Vehicles-Mott Haven Impound
Facility.

Pendergast plucked a small remote control from one pocket and
punched a code onto its keypad. Slowly, the gate began to open.
When Pendergast did not reduce speed, Smithback clasped the door
handle again and clenched his teeth.

The car blew past the gate with an inch to spare and, with a
shuddering squeal of brakes, spun sideways and stopped at the
wall of cars. Without bothering to turn off the engine,
Pendergast leaped out and took off, with a brusque wave for
Smithback to follow. The reporter tumbled out of the backseat and
dashed after Pendergast, who was already running through the maze
of cars. They made directly for the rear of the facility, running
and dodging through the sea of parked vehicles. Smithback could
barely keep up with the agent flying along in front of
him.

It was close to a half-mile sprint to the rear wall of the
impound facility. At last, Pendergast stopped at the final row of
vehicles, which were parked a few dozen yards in from the rear of
the yard, blocked by the same heavy steel pipe fence. Taking a
key from his pocket, he unlocked a battered Chevy van parked in
the last row and gestured for Smithback to get in the back.
Pendergast leaped behind the wheel, turned the key, and the van
roared to life.

"Hold on," he said. Then he put the van in gear and shot
forward, accelerating directly toward the pipe
fence.

"Wait," Smithback said. "You'll never bash through that fence.
We'll be-oh, shit!" He turned away, shielding his face
from the inevitable catastrophic impact.

There was a loud clang; a brief jolt; but the van was still
accelerating forward. Smithback raised his head and lowered his
arms, heart pounding, and looked back. He saw that a section of
the fence had been knocked away, leaving a clean rectangular hole
in its place.

"The metal pipes had already been cut, then spot-welded back
into place," Pendergast said by way of explanation, driving more
slowly now, making a number of turns through a warren of side
streets while removing his wig and wiping the stage makeup from
his face with a silk handkerchief. The black Mercedes and the
police cars were gone. "Help me with this."

Smithback climbed into the front seat and helped Pendergast
pull off the cheap, stained brown polyester top, revealing a
dress shirt and tie underneath.

"Hand me my jacket back there, if you'd be so
kind."

Smithback pulled a beautifully pressed suit coat off a rack
hanging behind the front seat. Pendergast slid into it
quickly.

"You planned this whole thing, didn't you?" Smithback
said.

Pendergast turned onto East 138th Street. "This is a case
where advance preparation meant the difference between life and
death."

All at once, Smithback understood the plan. "That guy who was
after us-you lured him into the one place he couldn't follow.
There's no way around that impound facility."

"There is a way around, yes, involving three miles of driving
through congested side streets." Pendergast turned north, heading
for the Sheridan Expressway.

"So who the hell was that? The man you say is trying to kill
me?"

"As I said, the less you know, the better. Although I must say
that the high-speed chase and the use of firearms were
uncharacteristically crude of him. Perhaps he saw his opportunity
evaporating and became desperate." He looked over at Smithback
with a laconic expression. "Well, Mr. Smithback?
Convinced?"

Smithback nodded slowly. "But why me? What'd I
do?"

"That is, unfortunately, the very question I can't
answer."

Smithback's heart was only now slowing down, and he felt as
wrung out and limp as a dishrag. He'd been in tight spots with
Pendergast before. Deep down, he knew the man wouldn't do
something like this unless it was absolutely necessary. All of a
sudden, his career at the Times seemed a lot less
important.

"Hand me your cell phone and wallet, please."

Smithback did as requested. Pendergast shoved them in the
glove compartment and handed him an expensive leather
billfold.

"What's this?"

"Your new identity."

Smithback opened it. There was no money, only a Social
Security card and a New York driver's license.

"Edward Murdhouse Jones?" he read off.

"Correct."

"Yes, but Jones? Come on, what a cliché."

"That's precisely why you'll have no trouble remembering it...
Edward."

Smithback shoved the wallet in his back pocket. "How long is
this going to last?"

"Not long, I hope."

"What do you mean not long? A day or two?"

No answer.

"Where the hell are you taking me, anyway?"

"River Oaks."

"River Oaks? The millionaire funny farm?"

"You are now the troubled son of a Wall Street investment
banker, in need of rest, relaxation, a bit of undemanding
therapy, and isolation from the hectic world."

"Hold on, I'm not checking into any mental
hospital-"

"You'll find River Oaks to be quite luxurious. You'll have a
private room, gourmet food, and elegant surroundings. The grounds
are beautiful-pity they are buried in two feet of snow at the
moment. There's a spa, library, game room, and every imaginable
comfort. It's housed in a former Vanderbilt mansion in Ulster
County. The director is a very sympathetic man. He'll be most
solicitous, I assure you. Most important, it is utterly
secure from the killer who is determined to end your life. I
am sorry I can't tell you more, I really am."

Smithback sighed. "This director, he'll know all about me,
right?"

"He's got all the information he could possibly need. You will
be well treated. Indeed, you are guaranteed special
treatment."

"No force-fed meds? Straitjackets? Shock
therapy?"

Pendergast smiled faintly. "Nothing like that, trust me.
You'll be waited on hand and foot. An hour of counseling a day,
that's all. The director is fully informed, he has all the
necessary documents. I've purchased some clothes that I think
will fit you."

Smithback was silent a moment. "Gourmet food, you
say?"

"As much as you could wish."

Smithback sat forward. "But Nora. She'll worry about
me."

"As I mentioned, she'll be led to understand you are on a
special assignment for the Times. Given the work she's
doing for the opening, she'll hardly have time to think about you
at all."

"If they're after me, she'll be in danger. I need to be there
to protect her."

"I can tell you that Nora is in absolutely no danger at
present. However, she will be in danger if you remain near
her. Because you are the target. It is for her sake
as much as yours that you must go into hiding. The farther away
you are, the safer she'll be."

Smithback groaned. "This is going to be a disaster for my
career."

"Your career will suffer more from your untimely
death."

Smithback could feel the lump of the wallet in his back
pocket. Edward Murdhouse Jones. "I'm sorry, but I don't
like this at all."

"Like it or not, I'm saving your life."

Smithback did not reply.

"Are we clear on that, Mr. Smithback?"

"Yes," Smithback said, with a dreadful sinking
feeling.

TWENTY-TWO

Nora Kelly tried to shut out the din of the exhibition hall
and focus her attention on the box of sand in front of her. On
one side, she had laid out the objects to be arranged: a skeleton
in plasticine, along with a suite of grave goods-priceless
objects in gold, jade, polychrome ceramics, bone, and carved
shell. On the other side of the large box, she had set up a
photograph of a real tomb, a photo taken only moments after its
astonishing discovery. It was the grave of a ninth-century Mayan
princess named Chac Xel, and Nora's job was to re-create it-in
painstaking detail-for the Sacred Images
exhibition.

As she contemplated the work, she could hear, over her
shoulder, the heavy breathing from one very annoyed guard, upset
at being pulled from his usual duty manning the sleepy Hall of
Pelagic Birds and thrust into a manic hive of activity at the
very center of the Sacred Images show. She heard the guard shift
his enormous bulk and sigh theatrically as if to hurry her
along.

But Nora wouldn't allow herself to be rushed. This was one of
the most important exhibits in the entire exhibition. The
artifacts to be arranged were extraordinarily delicate and
demanded the utmost attention and care. Once again, she tried to
shut out the uproar of construction, the growl of drills and the
whine of Skilsaws, the shoutings back and forth, the furious
comings and goings of curators, designers, and assistants. And on
top of that, with the museum's security system being beefed up
for the umpteenth time in preparation for the new opening, they
had to drop everything and leave the exhibition now and then as
sensors were installed and software tested. It was pure
bedlam.

Nora refocused her attention on the sandbox in front of her.
She began by arranging the bones, laying them in the sand after
their original placement in the photograph. The princess had not
been laid out flat, Western style; rather, her body had been
bound into a mummy bundle, knees drawn up to the face, arms
folded in front, the whole wrapped up like a package in beautiful
woven blankets. The rotting of the bundle had caused the skeleton
to fall open, spilling the bones in a crazy pattern on the floor
of the tomb, which Nora carefully replicated.

Next came the placement of the objects found in the tomb.
Unlike the bones, these were the real thing-and virtually
priceless. She slipped on a pair of cotton gloves and lifted the
largest object, a heavy pectoral in beaten electrum depicting a
jaguar surrounded by glyphs. She held it up, momentarily
spellbound by the dazzle of light off its golden curves.
She laid it with care on the skeleton's chest. Next came a gold
necklace, which she placed around the cervical vertebrae. Half a
dozen gold rings were slipped onto the bony fingers. A solid-gold
tiara set with jades and turquoises went atop the skull. She
carefully arranged pots in a semicircle, filled with offerings of
polished jade, turquoises, and glossy pieces of black obsidian.
Next came a ceremonial obsidian knife, almost a foot long with
many barbs, still sharp enough to make a nasty cut if not handled
just so.

She paused. The last thing was the jade mask, worth millions,
carved from a single flawless block of deep green nephrite jade,
with rubies and white quartz set in the eyes, and turquoise
teeth.

"Lady," said the guard, interrupting her reverie, "I've got a
break in fifteen."

"I'm aware of that," said Nora dryly.

She was about to reach for the mask when she heard the voice
of Hugo Menzies at some distance, not loud but somehow riding
above the din. "Wonderful work!" he was saying.
"Marvelous!"

Nora looked up to see the bushy-haired figure picking his way
down the hall, stepping fastidiously across a floor strewn with
electrical cables, sawdust, pieces of Bubble Wrap, and other
construction detritus. The omnipresent canvas fishing bag he used
instead of a briefcase was slung over one shoulder. He was
shaking hands, nodding in approval, encouraging as he went along,
knowing everyone's name, from the carpenters to the curators.
Everyone got a nod, a smile, a word of encouragement. How
different from Ashton, chief curator of this exhibition, who felt
it beneath him to talk to anybody lacking a doctoral
degree.

After the meeting, Nora had been furious with Menzies for
coming down on Margo Green's side. But it was impossible to stay
angry with a man like Menzies: he so clearly believed in what he
was doing, and she'd personally witnessed so many other ways,
large and small, in which he'd supported the department. No, you
couldn't stay mad at Hugo Menzies.

It was a different story, though, with Margo
Green.

Menzies approached. "Hello, Frank," he said to the guard,
laying a hand on his shoulder. "Nice to see you
here."

"You, too, sir," the guard said, straightening up and wiping
the scowl off his face.

"Ahh," said Menzies, turning to Nora. "That High Classic jade
mask is one of my favorite objects in the entire museum. You know
how they made it so thin? Polished it down by hand with blades of
grass. But I expect you already knew that."

"As a matter of fact, I did."

Menzies laughed. "Of course. What am I thinking? Excellent
work, Nora. This is going to be a highlight of the show. May I
watch while you place the mask?"

"Of course."

She reached down and picked it up with her white-gloved hands,
not without trepidation. Carefully, she placed it in the sand
above the head of the body, where it had been found, adjusting it
and making sure it was secure.

"A trifle to the left, Nora."

She moved it slightly.

"Perfect. I'm glad I was in time to see that." He smiled,
winked, and moved on through the chaos, leaving in his wake
people who were working all the harder, if such a thing were
possible. Nora had to admire his people skills.

The case was complete, but she wanted to check it one more
time. She ran through the list of items, matching them to the
photograph. She had only one shot to get this right: once the
case was sealed under bulletproof, shatterproof glass, it
wouldn't be opened until the end of the show, four months
later.

As she ran the final check, for some reason her mind wandered
to Bill. He'd run off to Atlantic City covering some casino story
and wouldn't be back for-she realized she wasn't sure when
he'd be back. He'd been so vague. And it had all happened so
suddenly. Was this what it was like to be married to a reporter?
What had happened to the murder he was covering? And wasn't he on
the city desk? She supposed that a casino story in New Jersey
might qualify for the city desk, but still... He'd sounded so
strange on the telephone, so breathless, so tense.

She sighed, shook her head. It was probably for the better,
given that she'd hardly been able to see him with all the
craziness surrounding the opening. Everything was, as usual,
behind schedule, and Ash-ton was on the warpath. She could hear
the chief curator's voice, pitched high in querulous complaint in
some far corner of the hall.

The guard issued another ostentatious sigh behind her,
breaking her reverie.

"Just a minute," she said over her shoulder. "As soon as we
get this sealed." She glanced at her watch. Three-thirty already.
And she'd been going since six. She was going to be working at
least until midnight, and every minute she wasted now was a
minute of sleep lost at the end of the day.

Nora turned to the foreman, who had been nearby, waiting for
this moment. "Ready to seal the case."

Soon a group of exhibition assistants, under the foreman's
direction, began fitting the monstrously heavy sheet of glass
over the tomb, accompanied by grunts and curses.

"Nora?"

She turned. It was Margo Green. Bad timing, as
usual.

"Hello, Margo," she said.

"Wow. Beautiful exhibit."

Nora saw out of the corner of her eye the scowling face of the
guard, the gaggle of laborers sealing up the tomb.

"Thanks. We're really under the gun here, as you can
see."

"I can." She hesitated. "I don't want to take up any more of
your time than I have to."

Then don't, thought Nora, trying to maintain her fake
smile. She had four other cases to mount and seal. She couldn't
help but watch as the workers struggled to seat the glass. If
they dropped it...

Margo stepped closer, lowered her voice. "I wanted to
apologize for my snarky comment in the meeting."

Nora straightened. This was unexpected.

"It was uncalled-for. Your points were all well taken and
totally within professional bounds. I was the one who acted
unprofessionally. It's just..." Margo hesitated.

"Just what?"

"You're so damned... competent. And articulate. I was
intimidated."

Nora didn't quite know how to answer this. She looked closely
at Margo, who was reddening from the effort to apologize. "You're
not exactly a pushover yourself," she finally
said.

"I know. We're both kind of stubborn. But stubborn is
good-especially if you're a woman."

Nora couldn't help but smile, this time for real. "Let's not
call it stubbornness. Let's call it the courage of our
convictions."

Margo smiled in turn. "That sounds better. Although a lot of
people might call it plain old bitchiness."

"Hey," said Nora. "Bitchy is good, too."

Margo laughed. "Anyway, Nora, I just wanted to say I was
sorry."

"I appreciate the apology. I really do. Thank you,
Margo."

"See you around."

Nora paused, the case temporarily forgotten in her surprise,
as she watched Margo's slender form make its way back through the
barely controlled chaos of the exhibition.

TWENTY-THREE

Captain Laura Hayward sat in a plastic chair in the trace
evidence lab on the twelfth floor of One Police Plaza, making a
conscious effort not to glance at her watch. Archibald Quince,
chief scientist of the fiber analysis unit, was holding forth:
walking back and forth before a crowded evidence table, hands
clasped behind the white lab coat one minute, then gesticulating
the next. It was a rambling, repetitious tale, full of sound and
fury, and yet it all came down to one easily grasped point: the
man didn't have shit.

Quince paused in midstep, then turned toward her, his tall,
bony frame all angles and elbows. "Allow me to
summarize."

Thank God, Hayward thought. At least there was light at
the end of the tunnel.

"Only a handful of fibers were recovered that were foreign to
the site. A few were stuck to the ropes used to bind the victim;
another was found on the couch where the victim was placed,
peri-mortem. We can thus reasonably assume a fiber exchange
between the murderer and the murder scene.
Correct?"

"Correct."

"Since all fibers were the same-length, composition, spinning
method, and so forth-we can also assume they are primary rather
than secondary fiber transfers. In other words, they're fibers
from the killer's clothes rather than fibers that happened to be
on the killer's clothes."

Hayward nodded, forcing herself to pay attention. All day, as
she'd gone about her work, she'd felt the strangest sensation: as
if she were floating, detached, just outside her own body. She
didn't know if it was due to weariness or to the shock of Vincent
D'Agosta's abrupt, unexpected departure. She wished she could get
mad about it, but somehow anger wouldn't come-just grief. She
wondered where he was, what he was doing now. And, more urgently,
she wondered how in his mind such a good thing could have
suddenly gone so wrong.

"Captain?"

Hayward realized there was a question hanging in the air,
unanswered. She looked up quickly. "Excuse me?"

"I said would you like to see a sample?"

Hayward rose. "Sure."

"It's an extremely fine animal fiber, one I've never seen
before. We've identified it as an exceptionally rare kind of
cashmere, blended with a small percentage of merino. Very, very
expensive. As you'll notice, both fiber types were dyed black
prior to being spun together. But take a look for yourself."
Stepping back, Quince gestured toward the stereoscopic microscope
that stood beside the lab table.

Hayward came forward and glanced through the oculars. Half a
dozen slender black threads were displayed against a light
background, sleek and glossy and very even.

Very, very expensive. Though she was still waiting for
Psych to deliver the profile, a few things about the perp were
already obvious. He-or perhaps she-was very sophisticated, highly
intelligent, and had access to funds.

"The dye has also proven elusive to identification. It's made
from a natural vegetative pigmentation, not synthetic chemicals,
but we haven't yet been able to track down the coloring agent.
It's not in any database we've checked. The closest we've come is
a certain rare berry grown on the mountain slopes of Tibet, used
by local tribesmen and Sherpas."

Hayward stepped back from the scope. As she listened, she felt
afaint frisson of recognition. She had excellent instincts, and
normally that little tingle meant two pieces of a puzzle coming
together. But at the moment, she couldn't imagine what those
pieces might be. She was probably even more tired than she
thought. She would go home, have an early dinner, then try to get
some sleep.

"Despite their fineness, the fibers are very tightly woven,"
Quince said. "Do you know what that means?"

"An extremely soft and comfy garment?"

"Yes. But that's not the point. Such a garment doesn't shed
easily. It isn't usually a donor garment. Hence the small number
of fibers."

"And, perhaps, evidence of a struggle."

"My thought as well." Quince frowned. "Normally, the fact that
the fabric is uncommon is important to a fiber examiner. It's
helpful in identifying the suspect. But here the fabric is so
uncommon it's actually proving to be the opposite. There's
nothing exactly like it in any of the textile fiber databases.
Then there's another odd thing: the age of the
fiber."

"Which is?"

"Our tests have indicated the fabric was spun at least twenty
years ago. Yet there is no evidence the clothing itself is
old. The fibers aren't worn. There isn't the kind of fading or
damage you'd expect from years of usage and dry cleaning. It's as
if the fabric came off the store rack yesterday."

At last, Quince shut up. He stretched out his arms, palms up,
as if in supplication.

"And?" Hayward asked.

"That's it. As I said, all our searches have come up empty.
We've checked with textile mills, clothing manufacturers,
everything. Foreign and domestic. It's the same as with
the rope. This fabric seems to have been made on the moon, for
all we can learn."

For all we can learn? "I'm sorry, but that's just not
good enough." Fatigue and impatience gave her tone a sudden edge.
"We have only a handful of evidence in this case, Dr. Quince, and
these fibers are some of the most important of that evidence. You
said yourself the fabric is extremely rare. If you've already
checked with the mills and the manufacturers, then you should be
checking with individual tailors."

Quince shrank back at this scolding. His large, moist,
houndlike eyes blinked back at her, full of hurt. "But, Captain
Hayward, with all the tailors in the world, that would be like
looking for a needle in-"

"If the fabric's as fine as you say it is, then you'd need to
contact only the most exclusive and expensive tailors. And in
only three cities: New York, London, and Hong
Kong."

Hayward realized she was breathing heavily and that her voice
had risen. Calm down, she told herself.

In the uncomfortable silence that settled over the lab,
Hayward heard a throat being tactfully cleared. She glanced over
her shoulder and saw Captain Singleton standing in the
doorway.

"Glen," she said, wondering how long he'd been standing
there.

"Laura." Singleton nodded. "Mind if we have a
word?"

"Of course." Hayward turned back to Quince. "Give me a
follow-up report tomorrow, please." Then she followed Singleton
out into the corridor.

"What's up?" she asked as they paused in the bustling hallway.
"It's almost time for Rocker's state-of-the-force
meeting."

Singleton waited a moment before answering. He was dressed in
a dapper chalk-stripe suit, and despite its being late afternoon,
his white shirt was still as crisp as if he'd just put it
on.

"I got a call from Special Agent in Charge Carlton of the New
York field office," he said, motioning her to step to one side,
out of the traffic. "He was following up on a request from
Quantico."

"What request is that?"

"Have you heard the name Michael Decker?"

Hayward thought a moment, shook her head.

"He was a top FBI honcho, lived in a classy D.C. neighborhood.
The man was murdered yesterday. Speared through the mouth with a
bayonet. Nasty piece of business, and, as you can imagine, the
FBI are on the case hammer and tongs. They're following up with
Decker's colleagues, trying to find out if there might be any bad
guys in the man's past who had a score to settle." Singleton
shrugged. "It seems one of Decker's colleagues, and closest
friends, was a man named Pendergast."

Hayward glanced at him abruptly. "Agent
Pendergast?"

"That's right. You worked with him on the Cutforth murder,
right?"

"He's been involved in a few priors of mine."

Singleton nodded. "Since Agent Pendergast is missing and
presumed dead, Carlton asked me to check with any associates of
his in the NYPD. See if he ever talked about Decker, maybe
mentioned enemies the man might have had. I figured you might
know something."

Hayward thought a moment. "No, Pendergast never spoke of
Decker to me." She hesitated. "You might talk to Lieutenant
D'Agosta, who worked with him on at least three cases going back
seven years."

"That so?"

Hayward nodded, hoping that her expression remained
professionally neutral.

Singleton shook his head. "The thing is, I can't find
D'Agosta. He hasn't reported in since lunch, and nobody else
working his case has seen him. And for some reason, we can't
raise him on his radio. You wouldn't happen to know where he is,
would you?" As Singleton spoke, he kept his voice studiously
neutral, his eyes fixed on the people walking past
them.

In that moment, Hayward realized he knew about her and
D'Agosta. She felt a sudden, consuming embarrassment. So it's
not the big secret we thought it was. She wondered how soon
Singleton would learn D'Agosta had moved out.

She licked her lips. "Sorry. I've no idea where Lieutenant
D'Agosta might be."

He hesitated. "Pendergast never mentioned Decker to
you?"

"Never. He was the kind of guy who really kept his cards
close, never talked about anyone, least of all himself. Sorry I
can't be of more help."

"Like I said, it was a long shot. Let the FBI take care of
their own."

Now, at last, he looked directly at her. "Can I buy you a cup
of coffee? We've got a few minutes before that
meeting."

"No, thanks. I need to make a couple of quick phone calls
first."

Singleton nodded, shook her hand, then turned
away.

Hayward watched his receding form, thinking. Then, slowly, she
turned the other way, preparing to head back to her office. As
she did so, everything else suddenly fell away: the murmur of
conversations, the people walking past; even the fresh and
painful ache in her heart.

She had made the connection.

TWENTY-FOUR

William Smithback Jr. paced around his sumptuous third-floor
room at River Oaks. He had to admit that Pendergast was right:
the place was gorgeous. His room was luxuriously furnished,
albeit in a style that went out with the Victorians: dark
crushed-velvet wallpaper, oversize bed with canopy, hulking
mahogany furniture. Paintings in gilt frames hung on all four
walls: a still life of fruit in a bowl; sunset over the ocean; a
pastoral countryside of cows and hayricks. They were real oils,
too, not reproductions. While nothing had been actually screwed
to the floors or walls, Smithback had noticed an absence of sharp
implements, and he'd had the indignity of having his belt and tie
taken away upon entrance. There was also a marked absence of
telephones.

He strolled thoughtfully over to the large window and stared
out. It was snowing, the fat flakes ticking against the glass.
Outside, in the dying light, he could see a vast lawn deep in
snow, bordered with hedges and gardens-all lumps and mounds of
white-and dotted with icicled statuary. The garden was surrounded
by a high stone wall, beyond which stood forest and a winding
road that led down the mountain to the nearest town, six miles
away. There were no bars on the window, but the small, thick
leaded panes looked like they'd be very difficult to
break.

Just for the hell of it, he tried to push the window open.
Although there was no visible lock, it refused to budge.
Smithback tried a little harder. Nothing. He turned away with a
shrug.

River Oaks was a huge and rambling structure, perched atop one
of the lower peaks of the Catskills: the country retreat of
Commodore Cornelius Vanderbilt in the days before Newport, now
converted to a mental hospital for the ultra-privileged. The
orderlies and nurses wore discreet black uniforms instead of the
usual white, and were ready to attend to every need of the
"guests." Aside from light work duty and the daily hour of
therapy, he had no set schedule. And the food was fantastic:
Smithback, whose work duty was in the kitchen, had learned the
head chef was a Cordon Bleu graduate.

But still, Smithback felt miserable. In the few hours he'd
been here, he had tried to convince himself to take it easy, that
this was for his own good, that he should wallow in luxury. It
was a kind of lifestyle that, under other circumstances, he'd
almost welcome. He'd told himself to treat it as drama, one he
could maybe turn into a book someday. It seemed incredible
someone was out to kill him.

But already this personal pep talk was growing stale. At the
time of his admittance, he'd still been dazed from the high-speed
chase, struck dumb by the suddenness with which his life had been
turned around. But now he'd had time to think. Plenty of time.
And the questions-and dark speculations -just kept
coming.

He told himself that at least there was no need to worry about
Nora. On the drive up the New York Thruway, he'd called her
himself using Pendergast's phone, making up a story about how the
Times was sending him on an undercover assignment to
Atlantic City to cover a casino scandal, rendering him
incommunicado for a while. He had Pendergast's assurance Nora
would be safe, and he had never known Pendergast to be wrong. He
felt guilty about lying to her, but, after all, he had done it
for her sake, and he could explain it all later.

It was his job that preyed most on his mind. Sure, they'd
accept he was sick, and no doubt Pendergast would make it
convincing. But in the meantime, Harriman would have free reign.
Smithback knew that, when he finally got back after his
"convalescence," he'd be lucky to get assigned even the Dangler
story.

The worst of it was, he didn't even know how long he'd have to
stay here.

He turned, pacing again, half mad with worry.

There came a soft knock at the door.

"What is it?" Smithback said irritably.

An elderly nurse stuck her gaunt head inside the room, raven
hair pulled back in a severe bun. "Dinner is served, Mr.
Jones."

"I'll be right down, thanks."

Edward Jones, troubled son of a Wall Street investment
banker, in need of rest, relaxation, and a bit of isolation from
the hectic world. It seemed very strange indeed to be playing
Edward Jones, to be living in a place where everybody thought you
were somebody else. Especially somebody not quite right in
the head. Only Pendergast's acquaintance, the director of River
Oaks-a Dr. Tisander-knew the truth. And Smithback had seen him
only in passing while Pendergast was dealing with the admittance
paperwork; they hadn't yet had a chance to speak
privately.

Exiting his room and closing the door behind him-there were no
locks on any of the guests' doors, it seemed-Smithback walked
down the long hallway. His footfalls made no noise on the thick
rose-colored carpeting. The corridor was of polished, figured
mahogany, dark with carved moldings. More oils lined the walls.
The only sound was the faint moan of the wind outside. The huge
mansion seemed cloaked in a preternatural silence.

Ahead, the corridor opened onto a large landing, framing a
grand staircase. From around the corner, he heard low voices.
Immediately, with a reporter's instinctive curiosity, he slowed
his walk.

"...don't know how much longer I can take working in this
loony bin," came a gruff male voice.

"Ah, quit complaining," came a second, higher voice. "The
work's easy, the pay's good. The food's great. The crazies are
nice and quiet. What the hell's wrong with that?"

It was two orderlies. Smithback, unable to help himself,
stopped short, listening.

"It's being stuck out here in the middle of frigging nowhere.
On top of a mountain in the dead of winter, nothing around except
miles of woods. It messes with your mind."

"Maybe you should come back as a guest." The second orderly
guffawed loudly.

"This is serious," came the aggrieved reply. "You know Miss
Havisham?"

"Nutcase Nellie? What about her?"

"How she always claims to be seeing people who aren't
there?"

"Everyone in this joint sees people who aren't
there."

"Well, she's got me seeing things, too. It was early
this afternoon. I was heading back up to the fifth floor when I
happened to look out the staircase window. There was someone out
there, I could swear it. Out there in the snow."

"Yeah, right."

"I'm telling you, I saw it. A dark form, moving fast in
the trees. But when I looked back, it was gone."

"Yeah. And how much J.D. had you had before
this?"

"None. It's like I told you, this place is-"

Smithback, who'd been edging closer and closer to the edge of
the corridor, overbalanced and stumbled forward into the landing.
The two men-orderlies in somber black uniforms-abruptly drew
apart, their expressions dissolving into emotionless
masks.

"May we help you, Mr.-Mr. Jones?" one of them
said.

"No, thanks. Just on my way down to the dining room."
Smithback made his way down the broad staircase with as much
dignity as he could muster.

The dining room was a grand space on the second floor that
reminded Smithback of a Park Avenue men's club. There were at
least thirty tables within, but the room was so big it could have
held dozens more comfortably. Each was covered with a crisp linen
tablecloth and arrayed with gleaming-and extremely
dull-silverware. Brilliant chandeliers hung from a Wedgwood-blue
ceiling. Despite the elegant room, it seemed barbaric to eat
dinner at 5 p.m. Guests were already seated at some of the
tables, eating methodically, chatting quietly, or staring moodily
at nothing. Others were shuffling slowly to their
seats.

Oh, God, Smithback thought. The dinner of the living
dead. He looked around.

"Mr. Jones?" An orderly came over, as obsequious as any
maître d', with the same smirk of superiority behind the
mask of servility. "Where would you care to sit?"

"I'll try that table," he said, pointing to one currently
occupied by only one young man, who was buttering a dinner roll.
He was flawlessly attired-expensive suit, snowy white shirt,
gleaming shoes- and he looked the most normal of the bunch. He
nodded to Smithback as the journalist sat down.

"Roger Throckmorton," the man said, rising. "Delighted to meet
you."

"Edward Jones," Smithback replied, gratified at the cordial
reception. He accepted the menu from the waiter and, despite
himself, grew quickly absorbed in the long list of offerings. He
finally settled on not one, but two main courses-plaice à
la Mornay and rack of spring lamb-along with an arugula salad
and plover eggs in aspic. He marked his choices on the card
beside his place setting, handed the card and the menu to the
waiter, then turned once again toward Mr. Throckmorton. He was
about Smithback's age, strikingly good-looking, with blond hair
carefully parted, and smelling faintly of expensive aftershave.
Something about him reminded Smithback of Bryce Harriman; he had
that same air of old money and entitlement.

Bryce Harriman...

With a mighty effort, Smithback drove the image from his mind.
He caught the eye of the man across the table. "So," he said,
"what brings you here?" He realized only after asking the
question how inappropriate it was.

But the man didn't seem to take it amiss. "Probably the same
as you. I'm crazy." And then he chuckled to show he was kidding.
"Seriously, I got in a bit of a scrape, and my father sent me up
here for a short, ah, rest. Nothing serious."

"How long have you been here?"

"Couple of months. And what brings you here?"

"Same. Rest." Smithback cast around for a way to redirect the
conversation. What do lunatics talk about, anyway?
He reminded himself the extreme nutcases were kept in the quiet
ward, located in another wing. Guests here, in the main section
of the mansion, were simply "troubled."

Throckmorton placed his dinner roll on a plate, dabbed primly
at his mouth with a napkin. "You just arrived today, didn't
you?"

"That's right."

The waiter brought their drinks-tea for Throckmorton, a tomato
juice for Smithback, who was annoyed he couldn't get his usual
single-malt Scotch. His eye stole once again around the room.
Everybody in the place moved so sluggishly, spoke so softly: it
all seemed like a banquet in slow motion. Jesus, I don't think
I can take much more of this. He tried to remind himself of
what Pendergast had said-how he was the target of a murderer, how
being here not only kept him safe, but Nora as well-yet already,
even after a single day, it was getting hard to bear. Why would a
dangerous killer be after him? It made no sense. For all he knew,
that Mercedes, that bullet, had been meant for Pendergast, not
him. Besides, Smithback knew how to handle himself. He'd been in
rough situations before-some of them really
rough...

Once again, he forced his thoughts back to his dinner
companion.

"So what do you ... think of the place?" he asked a little
lamely.

"Oh, not a bad old pile, actually." There was an amused gleam
in the man's eye as he spoke that made Smithback think he might
have found an ally.

"You don't get tired of all this? Of not getting
out?"

"It was much nicer in the fall, of course. The grounds are
spectacular. The snow is a bit confining, I'll admit, but what's
there to 'get out' to, anyway?"

Smithback digested this a moment.

"So what do you do, Edward?" Throckmorton asked. "For a
living."

Smithback mentally reviewed Pendergast's briefing. "My
father's an investment banker. Wall Street. I work for his
firm."

"My family's on Wall Street, too."

A lightbulb went on in Smithback's head. "You're not
that Throckmorton, are you?"

The man across the table smiled. "I'm afraid so. At least, one
of them. We're a rather large family."

The waiter returned with their entrées-brook trout for
Throckmorton, the twin dishes of plaice and lamb for Smithback.
Throckmorton looked over at Smithback's heaping portions. "I hate
to see a man with no appetite," he said.

Smithback laughed. This fellow wasn't crazy at all. "I never
pass up a free meal."

He raised his knife and fork and tucked into the plaice. He
began to feel ever so slightly better. The food was superb. And
this Roger Throckmorton seemed a decent enough guy. River Oaks
might just be bearable for another day or two if he had somebody
to talk to. Of course, he'd have to be careful not to blow his
cover.

"What do people here do all day?" he mumbled through a
mouthful of fish.

"I'm sorry?"

Smithback swallowed. "How do you pass the
time?"

Throckmorton chuckled. "I keep a journal and write poetry. I
try to keep up with the market, in a desultory kind of way. In
good weather, I like to stroll the grounds."

Smithback nodded, speared another piece of fish. "And the
evenings?"

"Well, they have billiard tables in the first-floor salon, and
games of bridge and whist in the library. And there's
chess-that's fun when I can find a partner. But a lot of the time
I just read. Recently, I've been reading a lot of poetry. Last
night, for example, I began The Canterbury
Tales."

Smithback nodded his approval. "My favorite bit is 'The
Miller's Tale.' "

"I think mine is the General Prologue. It's full of so much
hope for renewal, for rebirth." Throckmorton sat back in his
chair and quoted the opening lines. "Whan that April with his
showres soote / The droughte of March hath perced to the
roote."

Smithback cast his memory back over the prologue, managed to
dredge up a few lines. "Or how about this: Bifel that in that
seson on a day, / In Southwerk at the Tabard as I
lay-"

"Fishing, with the arid plain behind me."

It took Smithback, who had turned his attention to the lamb, a
moment to register this change. "Wait a minute. That's not
Chaucer, that's-"

"Out, out, brief candle!" Throckmorton sat up very stiff,
almost as if at attention.

Smithback paused in the midst of forking up a piece of lamb,
the smile freezing on his face. "I'm sorry?"

"Did you hear something just now?" Throckmorton had paused as
if listening, head cocked to one side.

"Ah ... no."

Throckmorton cocked his head again. "Yes, I'll take care of it
right away."

"Take care of what?"

Throckmorton fixed him with an annoyed eye. "I wasn't speaking
to you."

"Oh. Sorry."

Throckmorton rose from the table, dabbed primly at his lips,
carefully folded his napkin. "I hope you'll forgive me, Edward,
but I have a business appointment."

"Right," said Smithback, aware that the smile was still frozen
on his lips.

"Yes." Throckmorton leaned over and said, in a conspiratorial
whisper: "And it's a dreadful responsibility, I don't mind
telling you. But when He comes calling, who are we to
refuse?"

"He?"

"The Lord our God." Throckmorton straightened up, shook
Smithback's hand. "It's been a pleasure. I hope we'll meet again
soon."

And he walked with a jaunty step out of the
room.

TWENTY-FIVE

D'Agosta walked slowly through the cavernous open space of the
Homicide Division, feeling self-conscious. Even though he was a
lieutenant in the NYPD, and had more or less carte blanche to
wander the halls of One Police Plaza as he chose, he nonetheless
felt as if he were a spy within enemy territory.

I must know more, Pendergast had said. Even the
smallest, least significant detail could be critical. It was
crystal clear what he meant: he needed the file on Charles
Duchamp. And it was just as clear he expected D'Agosta to get it
for him.

Only it hadn't been as easy as D'Agosta initially anticipated.
He'd been back on the job just two days, and he'd been forced to
spend more time than expected catching up on the Dangler case.
The wack-job seemed to be getting more brazen with each crime:
already he'd robbed three more ATMs in the two days D'Agosta was
away. And now, with the Duchamp murder, there was less manpower
available for stakeouts. Coordinating the two-man teams, talking
with the branch managers at the affected banks, had eaten up a
lot of time. The fact was, he'd been allocating more of the work
than he should have, and he was way behind on interviewing
potential eyewitnesses. But always, he remembered the urgency in
Pendergast's voice. Therewas a message in that urgency: We
have to work fast, Vincent. Before he kills
again.

And yet, though he'd wasted precious work hours poring through
online records of the Duchamp murder, there was little in the
wide-access database he didn't already know-or that Pendergast
himself didn't have access to with his laptop. There was nothing
else for it: he'd have to go get the case file.

In his left hand, he carried a small sheaf of papers:
yesterday's interviews with a possible Dangler eyewitness,
brought along merely as camouflage, something to hold. He glanced
at his watch as he walked. Ten minutes to six. The huge room was
still buzzing with activity-police officers talking together in
small groups, on the phone, or, more commonly, typing at
computers. Divisional offices always had 24/7 coverage, and in
any precinct house, you were guaranteed to find-at any hour of
the day or night-somebody at their desk, doing paperwork. Most of
a cop's life was spent doing paperwork, it seemed, and nowhere
was there more paperwork than in Homicide.

But D'Agosta didn't mind all the activity. In fact, he
welcomed it. If anything, it helped him blend in. The important
thing was that Laura Hayward would be away from her
office. It was Thursday, and Commissioner Rocker would be holding
one of his state-of-the-force meetings. Thanks to the Duchamp
case, she was sure to be there.

He glanced a little guiltily toward the far end of the room.
Her office was there, door wide open, desk covered with
paperwork. At the sight of the desk, an electric current ran
briefly through his loins. It wasn't many months ago that Laura's
desk had been used for something quite different from paperwork.
He sighed. But, of course, her office then had been on the floor
above. And a hell of a lot had happened since-most of it
bad.

He pulled his gaze away and glanced around. To his right was a
series of empty desks, nameplates at their fronts and computer
terminals to one side. Ahead and along the left wall were at
least a dozen horizontal file cabinets, stacked from floor to
ceiling. These held the files of all active homicide
cases.

The good news was that Duchamp was an active case. All closed
cases were kept in storage, which meant signing in and out and a
host of related security problems. The bad news was that, because
it was an active case, he had to examine the evidence
right here, in front of the entire Homicide
Division.

He glanced around again, still feeling ridiculously exposed.
Hesitation is what's going to do you in here, pal, he told
himself. Forcing himself to move as slowly and casually as
possible, he approached the cabinets. Unlike other divisions,
which sorted their cases by case number, Homicide sorted active
files by victim's last name. He slowed further, eyeing the labels
covertly: DA-DE. DE-DO. DO-EB.

Here we go. D'Agosta stopped at the appropriate
cabinet, pulled out the drawer. Dozens of green hanging folders
met his eye. My God, how many active homicides are they
investigating here?

Now was the time to move quickly. Turning away from the rows
of desks, he began flipping the files from left to right, pushing
the name tabs with an index finger. Donatelli, Donato, Donazzi...
what, was it Mafia Week here in Homicide? Dowson.
Dubliawitz.

Duggins.

Oh, shit.

D'Agosta paused, finger on the case file of a Randall Duggins.
The one thing he hadn't wanted to consider was the possibility
that the Duchamp case file wouldn't be in the
cabinet.

Could Laura have it? Would she have left it on her desk when
she went to meet with Rocker? Or was it perhaps with one of her
detectives?

Whatever the case, he was screwed. He'd have to come back
again, some other time-some other shift, so as not to arouse
suspicion with the same group. But when else could he come back
and still be sure Laura wouldn't be here? She was a workaholic;
she could be here at almost any hour. Especially now, when she
didn't have a reason to be home.

D'Agosta felt his shoulders sag. He fetched a sigh, then
dropped his hand from the file to the cabinet, preparing to close
it.

As he did so, he got a glimpse of the file behind Randall
Duggins's. It was labeled Charles Duchamp.

Now, there's a break. Somebody in a hurry must have
misfiled it.

D'Agosta plucked it from the cabinet and began leafing through
it. The case file was much heavier than he expected. Laura had
complained about the paucity of evidence. But there had to be a
dozen thick documents here: fingerprint analyses and comparisons,
reports of investigation, debriefing reports, interview
summaries, evidence acquisition reports, toxicology and lab
reports. Leave it to Hayward to somehow document even a shitty
case well.

He'd been hoping to give everything a quick once-over, return
the case file, then find Pendergast and give him an oral report.
But there was way too much here for that. No choice: he'd have to
photocopy everything, and fast.

Once again moving as casually as possible, he slid the cabinet
closed, looking left and right as he did so. A large photocopier
stood in the middle of the room, but it was surrounded by desks,
and, as he watched, an officer went over to use it. Taking the
case file off the floor and copying it elsewhere was out of the
question: too risky. But large divisions like Homicide usually
had several copiers. There had to be another one close by. Where
the hell was it?

There. On the far wall, close to Hayward's office, a
copier sat between a bulletin board and a
watercooler.

Quickly, D'Agosta approached. It was working, and it didn't
require an access code to use: his luck, such as it was, still
held. But he'd have to hurry: it was getting close to six, and
Rocker's meeting wouldn't last much longer.

He dumped the case file on the edge of the copier, placed the
Dangler paperwork on top. Just in case he was interrupted, he
decided to start with the most important-the case officer's
report- and work his way from there. He pulled the report from
the folder and started copying.

The minutes crawled slowly by. Maybe it was the fact he had a
tall stack of papers, or maybe it was because this machine was
far from the desks of the homicide squad, but nobody else came up
to use the machine. He made his way through the lab results,
toxicology reports, fingerprint analyses, and interviews, working
as fast as he could, stuffing each completed sheet beneath the
Dangler paperwork.

He glanced again at his watch. It was past 6:15 now, almost
6:20. He had to get the hell out: Laura could come back at any
time...

At that moment, a homicide lieutenant-somebody D'Agosta
recognized as one of Hayward's most trusted associates-appeared
at the far end of the division. That was it: his cue to leave.
Finishing up the last interview report, he rearranged the files,
stacked the photocopies into a crisp pile, and returned the
hanging folder to the file cabinet. He hadn't copied everything,
but he'd gotten the most important documents. This, along with
what evidence Pendergast had obtained from New Orleans, should be
a huge help. Closing the cabinet, he began making his way to the
exit, once again careful to maintain an air of
casualness.

The walk seemed to take forever, and at any moment he expected
to see Laura appear in the doorway ahead. But at last, he gained
the relative safety of the central corridor. Now it was just a
question of gaining the elevator that lay directly
ahead.

The corridor was relatively empty, and nobody was waiting at
the elevator bank. He stepped forward, pressed the down button.
Within moments, a descending elevator chimed, and he walked
toward it just as the doors opened.

The elevator compartment beyond was empty except for one
person: Glen Singleton.

For a moment, D'Agosta stood motionless, rooted in place with
surprise. This had to be a nightmare, he decided: this kind of
thing just didn't happen in real life.

Singleton gazed back at him, cool and level. "You're holding
up the elevator, Vincent," he said.

Quickly, D'Agosta stepped in. Singleton punched a button and
the doors whispered closed.

Singleton waited until the elevator was descending again
before speaking. "I'm just coming from Rocker's
state-of-the-force meeting," he said.

D'Agosta silently cursed himself. He should have known
Singleton might have attended the meeting; he wasn't thinking
straight.

Singleton glanced toward D'Agosta again. He didn't say
anything further; he didn't need to. And just what are you
doing here yourself? the gaze clearly said.

D'Agosta thought fast. He'd spent the last two days doing his
best to avoid Singleton and this very question. Whatever he said,
it had to sound believable.

"I'd heard a homicide detective might have been an inadvertent
witness, post-fact, to the most recent Dangler job," he said. "I
thought I'd take a minute to check it out." And he raised his
sheaf of Dangler paperwork as if to underscore the
point.

Singleton nodded slowly. It sounded credible, yet was just
amorphous enough to allow D'Agosta some wiggle
room.

"What was the detective's name again?" Singleton asked in his
mild voice.

D'Agosta held his expression, careful not to betray any
surprise or doubt. He thought back to the rows of empty desks
he'd just passed, tried to recall the names on the nameplates.
"Detective Conte," he said. "Michael Conte."

Singleton nodded again.

"He wasn't around," D'Agosta said. "Next time I'll just
call."

There was a moment of silence as the elevator
descended.

"You haven't heard of an FBI agent named Decker, have you?"
Singleton asked.

Once again, D'Agosta had to work to keep the surprise from
showing on his face. "Decker? I don't think so.
Why?"

"The man was killed in his house in D.C. the other day. Seems
he was good friends with Special Agent Pendergast, who I know you
worked with before his disappearance. Did Pendergast ever mention
Decker-any enemies he might have had, for
example?"

D'Agosta pretended to think. "No, I don't think he ever
did."

Another brief silence.

"I'm glad to see you're at work," Singleton went on. "Because
I've been getting a few reports of items left unattended these
last two days. Tasks half done, or not done at all. Jobs
delegated unnecessarily."

"Sir," D'Agosta said. This was all true, but he tried to let a
little righteous indignation trickle into his voice. "I'm playing
catch-up as quickly as I can. There's a lot to
do."

"I've also heard that, instead of working the angles on the
Dangler case, you've been asking a lot of questions about the
Duchamp murder."

"Duchamp?" D'Agosta repeated. "It's an unusual case, Captain.
I guess I'm as curious as the next man."

Singleton nodded again, more slowly. He had a unique way of
letting his expression telegraph his thoughts for him, and right
now that expression was saying, You mean a lot more curious
than the next man. But once again, he changed tack.
"Something wrong with your radio, Lieutenant?"

Hell. D'Agosta had intentionally left it off that
afternoon, in hopes of avoiding just such a cross-examination. He
should have known this would excite even more
suspicion.

"As a matter of fact, it seems to be acting kind of wonky
today," he said, patting his jacket pocket.

"Better have it checked out. Or get yourself issued a new
one."

"Right away."

"Is there something the matter, Lieutenant?"

The question was asked so quickly on the heels of the last one
that D'Agosta was momentarily taken aback. "Sir?"

"I mean, with your mother. Is everything all
right?"

"Oh. Oh, yes. The prognosis is better than I'd hoped. Thank
you for asking."

"And you're okay with being back on the job?"

"Completely okay, Captain."

The elevator slowed, but Singleton still held D'Agosta's gaze.
"That's good," he said. "That's good to hear. Because the truth
is, Vincent, I'd rather have somebody not here at all than have
him only half here. You know what I mean?"

D'Agosta nodded. "Yes, I do."

Singleton smiled faintly as the doors opened. Then he extended
one hand. "After you, Lieutenant."

TWENTY-SIX

Margo hesitated at the door to Menzies's office, took a deep
breath, and knocked. The door was answered by Menzies himself;
he'd done away with the prerogative of a secretary years before,
complaining it distracted him. He smiled, nodded, and stepped
aside, gesturing for her to enter.

She knew the office well. During her first stint at the museum
as a graduate student, it had been the office of Menzies's
predecessor, her old thesis adviser, Dr. Frock. Back then it had
been stuffed with Victorian furniture, fossils, and curiosities.
With Menzies, it seemed more spacious and pleasant, the dusty
fossil plaques replaced by tasteful prints, the heavy old
furniture retired in favor of comfortable leather chairs. A new
flat-panel iMac sat in a corner. The last rays of the setting sun
came through one of the west-facing windows, cutting a
parallelogram of red across the wall behind Menzies's mahogany
desk.

Menzies steered Margo to an armchair, then took his own seat
behind the desk. He clasped his hands together and leaned
forward. "Thank you for coming at such short notice,
Margo."

"No problem."

"Working late, I see?"

"I've got to put Museology to bed this
evening."

"Of course." He unclasped his hands and leaned back into the
sun, his unruly white hair suddenly haloed in gold. "As you may
have guessed, I asked you here because I received an answer from
the board of trustees in relation to the Tano
masks."

Margo adjusted herself in the armchair, tried to look
confident and assertive.

He issued a long sigh. "I won't beat around the bush. We lost.
The board voted to keep the masks."

Margo felt herself go rigid. "I can't tell you how sorry I am
to hear that."

"I'm sorry, too. Lord knows I gave it my best shot. Collopy
was not unsympathetic, but the issue hit a wall with the
trustees. Most of them are lawyers and bankers who have as much
knowledge of anthropology as I have of writs or currency futures.
Unfortunately, the world is such that they can presume to tell us
what to do, and not vice versa. Frankly, I don't find the outcome
surprising in the least."

Margo could see that the usually even-tempered curator was
nettled. She had been hoping that the trustees, despite all
indications to the contrary, would do the right thing. It seemed
so obvious to her. But then again, it wasn't even obvious to
other members of her department, so how could she expect a bunch
of Wall Street lawyers to understand?

Menzies leaned on the table, looking at her intently. "This
puts you rather more in the hot seat than before."

"I realize that."

"There's going to be a lot of pressure on you not to publish
this editorial. They'll say the decision's been made, it's
done-why stir up trouble?"

"I'm publishing, anyway."

"That's what I thought you'd say. Margo, I want you to know
that I'm behind you one hundred percent. But you must be
realistic and expect some fallout."

"I'm ready. Museology's been an independent voice in
museum affairs for more than a century, and I'm not about to
knuckle under- not with my first issue."

Menzies smiled. "I admire your spirit. But there's another
complication I must share with you."

"And what's that?"

"The Tanos are planning a cross-country protest caravan, due
to arrive at the museum the night of the opening. It isn't just
to call attention to their demands, but ostensibly to 'call back
the lost souls of the masks' or something along those lines.
They're going to stage an all-night religious ceremony and dances
on Museum Drive, directly outside the museum. The trustees
received notice earlier today."

Margo frowned. "The press is going to eat it
up."

"Indeed."

"The administration's going to be embarrassed."

"Undoubtably."

"The opening's going to be total chaos."

"Without question."

"God, what a mess."

"My sentiments exactly."

There was a long pause. Finally, Menzies spoke. "You do what
you have to do. Academic freedom is a critical issue in these
parlous times. May I venture a piece of advice?"

"Please."

"Don't speak to the press-at all. When they come
calling, politely refer them to the editorial you wrote and tell
them that's all you have to say on the matter. The museum can't
fire you over the editorial, but you can bet they'll be looking
for another reason. Lie low, keep your mouth shut, and don't give
it to them."

Margo rose. "Dr. Menzies, I thank you more than I can
say."

The man smoothed down his unruly mane and rose as well, taking
Margo's hand. "You're a brave woman," he said with a smile of
admiration.

TWENTY-SEVEN

A light rap sounded on the glass of the office door. Laura
Hayward, who'd been peering intently at her computer screen, sat
up in surprise. For a ridiculous moment, she thought it might be
D'Agosta, suitcase in hand, offering to take her home. But it was
just the Guatemalan cleaning lady, armed with mop and pail,
smiling and nodding her head.

"Is okay I clean?" she asked.

"Sure." Hayward wheeled away from her desk to allow the woman
access to her wastebasket. She glanced up at the clock: almost
2:30 in the morning. So much for getting to bed early. But all of
a sudden, she found she had a lot to do-anything to avoid going
back to her empty apartment.

She waited until the woman had gone, then wheeled back to the
terminal, scrolling through the federal database once again. But
it was really just a perfunctory check: she had what she needed,
for now.

After a few more moments, she turned to her desk. Messy on the
best of days, it was now awash in computer printouts, manila
folders, SOC photographs, CD-ROMs, faxes, and index cards-the
results of her search of recent unsolved homicides meeting
certain criteria. The papers formed a vague sort of pile. On a
far corner of the desk, neater and very much smaller, sat another
pile containing only three folders. Each had been labeled with a
name: Duchamp. Decker. Hamilton. All acquaintances of
Pendergast. And now all dead.

Duchamp and Decker: one a friend of Pendergast, the other a
colleague. Was it really a coincidence they were murdered within
days of each other?

Pendergast had disappeared in Italy-under strange and almost
unbelievable circumstances, as related by D'Agosta. There were no
witnesses to his death, no body, no proof. Seven weeks later,
three acquaintances of his were brutally murdered, one after the
other. She glanced at the pile. For all she knew, there might be
other victims whose connections to Pendergast she had not yet
uncovered. Three was troubling enough.

What the hell was going on here?

She sat for a moment, tapping the small pile of folders
restlessly. Then she pulled out the one marked Hamilton,
opened it, reached for her phone, and dialed a long-distance
number.

The phone rang seven, eight, nine times. At last, someone
picked up. There was a silence so long Hayward thought she'd been
disconnected. Then, heavy breathing and a slurred, sleep-heavy
voice came on.

"Somebody'd better be dying."

"Lieutenant Casson? I'm Captain Hayward of the
NYPD."

"I don't care if you're Captain Kangaroo. You know what time
it is in New Orleans?"

"It's an hour later in New York, sir. I apologize for the late
call, but it's important. I need to ask you a few questions about
one of your cases."

"Damn it all, can't it wait until morning?"

"It's the Hamilton murder. Torrance Hamilton, the
professor."

There was a long, exasperated sigh. "What about
it?"

"Do you have any suspects?"

"No."

"Any leads?"

"No."

"Evidence?"

"Precious little."

"What, exactly?"

"We have the poison that killed him."

Hayward sat up. "Tell me about it."

"It's as nasty as they come-a neurotoxin similar to what you
find in certain spiders. Only this stuff was synthetic and highly
concentrated. A designer poison. It gave our chemists quite a
thrill."

Hayward tucked the phone under her chin and began to type.
"And the effects?"

"Leads to brain hemorrhaging, encephalitic shock, sudden
dementia, psychosis, grand mal seizures, and death. I've had a
medical education from this case you wouldn't believe. Happened
right in front of his class at Louisiana State
University."

"Must've been quite a scene."

"You're not kidding."

"How'd you isolate the poison?"

"We didn't need to. The killer thoughtfully left us a sample.
On Hamilton's desk."

Hayward stopped typing. "What?"

"Seems he walked, bold as brass, into Hamilton's temporary
office and left it on the desk. Right while the old guy was
delivering the last lecture of his life. He'd spiked Hamilton's
coffee with it half an hour earlier, which means he'd been on the
premises for a while. The perp left it there in plain sight, like
he was sending some kind of message. Or maybe it was just a taunt
to the police."

"Any suspects?"

"None. Nobody noticed anybody going in or out of Hamilton's
office that morning."

"Is this information public? About the poison, I
mean."

"That it was poison, yes. As to what kind, no."

"Any other evidence? Latents, footprints,
anything?"

"You know how it is, the SOC team picks up a shitload of crap
that has to be analyzed, hardly any of it relevant. With one
possible exception: a recently shed human hair with root, enough
to get a DNA reading. Doesn't match Hamilton's DNA, or his
secretary's, or anyone else's who frequented the office. Kind of
an unusual color-secretary said she couldn't recall any recent
visitors with that hair color."

"Which was?"

"Light blond. Ultra-light blond."

Hayward felt her heart suddenly pounding in her
chest.

"Hello? Are you still there?"

"I'm here," said Hayward. "Can you fax me the evidence list
and the DNA data?"

"Sure can."

"I'll call your office first thing, leave my fax
number."

"No problem."

"One other thing. I assume you're investigating Hamilton's
past, his acquaintances, that sort of business."

"Naturally."

"Run across the name Pendergast?"

"Can't say I have. Is this a lead?"

"Take it for what you will."

"All right, then. But do me a favor-next time, call me during
the day. I'm a lot more charming awake."

"You were charming enough, Lieutenant."

"I'm from the South-I suppose it's genetic."

Hayward replaced the phone in its cradle. For a long time,
perhaps ten minutes, she remained motionless, staring at it.
Then, slowly and deliberately, she replaced the file marked
Hamilton, picked up the one marked Decker, lifted
the phone again, and began to dial.

TWENTY-EIGHT

a nurse-tall, slender, wizened, dressed in black with white
shoes and stockings, a real Addams Family creation-stuck her head
out from behind a mahogany door. "The director will see you now,
Mr. Jones."

Smithback, who'd been cooling his heels in a long hallway on
the second floor of River Oaks, jumped so fast he sent the
antimacassar flying. "Thanks," he said hastily as he patted it
back on the chair.

"This way." And ushering Smithback through the doorway, she
began leading him down another one of the mansion's dim, ornate,
and seemingly endless corridors.

It had been surprisingly difficult to secure an audience with
the director. It seemed "guests" often demanded to see Dr.
Tisander, usually to announce that the walls were whispering to
them in French or to demand that he stop beaming commands into
their heads. The fact that Smithback had been unwilling to
divulge the matter he wished to see the director about had made
things even more difficult. But Smithback had insisted. Last
night's dinner with Throckmorton, and the stroll around the manor
house that had followed-with sidelong glances at the shuffling,
empty-eyed waxworks and glum-looking fossils inhabiting the
library and the various parlors-had been the final straw.
Pendergast's concern was all very well, but he simply couldn't
face the thought of another day-or another night-in this creepy
mausoleum.

Smithback had worked it all out. He'd get a hotel room in
Jersey City, take the PATH train to work, stay well away from
Nora until all this blew over. He could take care of himself.
He'd explain it all to the director. They couldn't very well keep
him here against his will.

He followed the tiny figure of the nurse down the endless
corridor, passing rows of closed doors bearing gold-leaf numbers.
At some point, two burly orderlies had slipped into step behind
him. At last, the corridor ended in a particularly grand door
bearing the single word Director. The nurse knocked on it,
then stepped aside, gesturing for Smithback to
enter.

Smithback thanked her and stepped through. Beyond lay an
elegant suite of rooms dressed in dark wood, illuminated by
sconces. A fire flickered in an ornate marble fireplace. Sporting
prints decorated the walls. The rear wall of the main room was
dominated by a bow window, which afforded a view of the wintry
landscape beyond. There were no bookshelves or anything else to
suggest this was the office of a hospital director, although
through one of the two side doors of the suite, Smithback made
out what looked like a medical library.

In the center of the room was a huge desk, surfaced in glass,
with heavy, eagle-claw feet. Behind the desk sat Dr. Tisander,
writing busily with a fountain pen. He looked up briefly, gave
Smithback a warm smile.

"How nice to see you, Edward. Have a seat."

Smithback seated himself. For a minute or so, the only sound
in the room was the crackle of the fire, the scratch of the pen.
Then Tisander placed the pen back into its desk set, blotted the
paper, and set it aside. He leaned back in his heavy leather
chair and smiled confidentially, giving Smithback his utmost
attention.

"There, that's finished. Tell me what's on your mind, Edward.
How's the adjustment to life at River Oaks?" His voice was low
and mellifluous, and the kindly lines of his face were smoothed
by age. He had a domed forehead, from which white hair arose in a
gravity-defying leonine shock not unlike
Einstein's.

Smithback noticed that the two orderlies were standing against
the wall behind him.

"Can I offer you any refreshment? Seltzer? Diet
soda?"

"Nothing, thanks." Smithback gestured at the orderlies. "Do
they have to be here?"

Tisander gave a sympathetic smile. "One of the house rules,
alas. Just because I'm the director of River Oaks doesn't mean
I'm above its rules."

"Well, if you're sure they can be trusted to keep
quiet."

"I have absolute confidence in them." Tisander nodded
encouragingly, gestured for Smithback to proceed.

Smithback leaned forward. "You know all about me, why I'm
here, I assume."

"Naturally." A warm, concerned smile lit up the director's
wise features.

"I agreed to come here for protection, for my own safety. But
I have to tell you, Dr. Tisander, that I've changed my mind. I
don't know how much you know about this killer who's supposedly
after me, but bottom line, I can take care of myself. I don't
need to be here any longer."

"I see."

"I've got to get back to my job in New York at the
Times."

"And why is that?"

Smithback was encouraged by Dr. Tisander's receptiveness. "I
was working on a very important story, and if I don't get back
there, I'll lose it to another reporter. I can't afford that.
This is my career. A lot's at stake here."

"Tell me about this story you're working on."

"It's about the Duchamp murder-you know it?"

"Tell me about it."

"A killer hung an artist named Duchamp out of a
high-rise window, dropped him through the glass roof of a
restaurant. This is one of those sensational stories that don't
come along every day."

"Why do you say that?"

"The bizarre mode of death, the prominence of the victim, the
fact that the killer seems to have escaped all detection-it's a
super story. I can't let it go."

"Can you be more specific?"

"The details aren't important. I need to get out of
here."

"The details are always important."

Smithback's feeling of encouragement began to evaporate. "It
isn't just my job. There's my wife. Nora. She thinks I'm in
Atlantic City undercover, working another story, but I'm sure
she's worried about me. If I could just get out and call her, let
her know I'm all right. We've only been married a few months.
Surely, you understand."

"I certainly do." The director was listening with utmost
sympathy and attention.

Smithback, encouraged anew, went on. "This supposed killer
who's after me, I'm not concerned about him. I can look out for
myself. I don't need to hide up here any longer, pretending to be
some nutcase."

Dr. Tisander nodded again.

"So, anyway, that's it. Even though I was placed in here with
the best of intentions, the fact is, I can't stay a moment
longer." He rose. "Now, if you'd be so kind as to call for a car?
I'm sure that Agent Pendergast will cover the cost. Or I'll be
happy to send you a check once I get back to New York. He took
away my wallet and credit cards on the way up here." He remained
standing.

For a moment, the room was silent. Then the director sat
forward slowly, leaned his arms on the desk, and interlaced his
fingers. "Now, Edward," he began in his calm, kindly voice, "as
you know-"

"And no more of this Edward business," Smithback interrupted
with a flare of irritation. "The name's Smithback. William
Smithback Jr."

"Please allow me to continue." A pause, another sympathetic
smile. "I'm afraid I cannot accede to your
request."

"This isn't a request: it's a demand. I'm telling you, I'm
leaving. You can't keep me here against my will."

Tisander cleared his throat patiently. "Your care has been
entrusted to us. Your family has signed papers to that effect.
You've been committed here for a period of observation and
treatment. We're here to help you, and to do that, we need
time."

Smithback stared incredulously. "Excuse me, Dr. Tisander, but
do you think we could dispense with the cover?"

"What cover might that be, Edward?"

"I'm not Edward! Jesus. I know what you've been told,
and there's no need for this pretense any longer. I need to get
back to my job, to my wife, to my life. I tell you, I'm
not worried about any killer. I'm leaving here.
Now."

Dr. Tisander's face retained its kindly, patient smile. "You
are here, Edward, because you are ill. All this talk of a job
with the New York Times, about a cover story, about being
hunted by a killer-that's what we're here to help you
with."

"What?" Smithback spluttered again.

"As I said, we know a great deal about you. I have a file two
feet thick. The only way for you to get better is to face the
truth, to abandon these delusions and fantasies, this dreamworld
you inhabit. You've never had a job at the Times or
anyplace else. You're not married. There's no killer after
you."

Smithback slowly sank back into his chair, holding on to the
arms for support. A terrible chill came over him. Pendergast's
words on the drive up from New York City returned to him,
pregnant with ominous new meaning: The director knows all
about you. He's fully informed, he has all the necessary
documents. Smithback realized that, despite what he'd
assumed-despite what Pendergast implied-the director was
not in on the deception. The "necessary documents" were
probably legal papers of commitment. The full scope of
Pendergast's plan to protect him lay suddenly revealed. He
couldn't leave even if he wanted to. And everything he said-all
his protestations and denials and talk of a killer-only confirmed
what the director had learned from reading his case files: that
he was delusional. He swallowed, tried to sound as reasonable and
sane as possible.

"Dr. Tisander, let me explain. The man who brought me up here,
Special Agent Pendergast? He gave me a false identity, put me
here in order to protect me from a killer. All those papers you
have are forged. It's all a ruse. If you don't believe me, call
the New York Times.

Ask them to fax up a picture of me, a description. You'll see
that I'm William Smithback. Edward Jones doesn't
exist."

He stopped, realizing how crazy it must all sound. Dr.
Tisander was still listening to him, smiling, giving him his full
attention-but now Smithback recognized the nuances of that
expression. It was pity, mixed perhaps with a faint expression of
that relief with which the sane view the insane. That same
expression had no doubt been on his own face at dinner last night
as he listened to Throckmorton talk about a business meeting with
God.

"Look," he began again. "Surely, you've heard of me, read my
books. I've written three best-selling novels: Relic,
Reliquary, and Thunderhead. If you have them in your
library, you can see for yourself. My picture's on the back of
all three."

"So now you're a best-selling author as well?" Dr. Tisander
allowed his smile to widen slightly. "We don't stock our library
with best sellers. They pander to the lowest common denominator
of reader and-worse-tend to overexcite our
guests."

Smithback swallowed, tried to make himself sound the soul of
sanity and reason. "Dr. Tisander, I understand that I must sound
crazy to you. If you would please allow me to make one call with
that phone on your desk-just one-I'll show you otherwise. I'll
talk to my wife or my editor at the Times. Either one will
immediately confirm I'm Bill Smithback. Just one call-that's all
I ask."

"Thank you, Edward," said Tisander, rising. "I can see you'll
have a lot to discuss with your therapist at your next session. I
have to get back to work."

"Damn you, make the call!" Smithback exploded, leaping
to his feet and lunging for the phone. Tisander jumped back with
amazing quickness, and Smithback felt his arms seized from behind
by the two orderlies.

He struggled. "I'm not crazy! You cretin, can't you tell I'm
as sane as you are? Make the frigging call!"

"You'll feel better once you're back in your room, Edward,"
the director said, settling back in his chair, composure
returning. "We will speak again soon. Please don't be
discouraged; it's often difficult to transition to a new
situation. I want you to know that we're here to
help."

"No!" Smithback cried. "This is ridiculous! This is a
travesty! You can't do this to me-"

Howling in protest, Smithback was gently-but firmly-escorted
from the office.

TWENTY-NINE

while Margo was in the kitchen preparing dinner, Nora took a
moment to look around the woman's unexpectedly large and elegant
apartment. An upright piano stood against one wall, with some
Broadway show tunes propped up on the music stand; next to it
hung a number of nineteenth-century zoological engravings of odd
animals. A set of shelves against one wall was packed with books,
and a second set of shelves contained an assortment of
interesting objects: Roman coins, an Egyptian glass perfume
bottle, a small collection of bird's eggs, arrowheads, an Indian
pot, a piece of gnarled driftwood, a fossilized crab, seashells,
a couple of bird skulls, some mineral specimens, and a gold
nugget-a miniature cabinet of curiosities. Hanging on the far
wall was what Nora recognized as an exceptionally fine Eyedazzler
Navajo rug.

It said something about Margo, Nora thought-that she was a
more interesting person than she first appeared. And she had a
lot more money than Nora had expected. This was no cheap
apartment, and in a co-op building, no less.

Margo's voice echoed out of the kitchen. "Sorry to abandon
you, Nora. I'll just be another minute."

"Can't I help?"

"No way, you relax. Red or white?"

"I'll drink whatever you're drinking."

"White, then. We're having fish."

Nora had already been savoring the smell of salmon poaching in
a delicate court bouillon wafting from the kitchen. A moment
later, Margo came in carrying a platter with a beautiful piece of
fish, garnished with dill and slices of lemon. She set it down,
returned to the kitchen, and came back with a cool bottle of
wine. She filled Nora's glass and then her own, then sat
down.

"This is quite a dinner," said Nora, impressed not only with
the cooking but with the trouble Margo had gone
to.

"I just thought, with Bill away on assignment and the show
coming up, maybe you needed a break."

"I do, but I didn't expect anything quite this
nice."

"I like to cook, but I rarely have the opportunity-just like I
never seem to have time to meet guys." She sat down with a wry
smile, brushing her short brown hair from her face with a quick
gesture. "So how's the show going?"

"This is the first night in a week that I've gotten out of
there before midnight."

"Ouch."

"We're down to the wire. I don't see how they're going to make
it, but everyone who's been through this before swears they
always pull through in the end."

"I know how that goes. I have to get back to the museum
tonight as it is."

"Really?"

Margo nodded. "To put the next issue of Museology to
bed."

"My God, Margo. Then you shouldn't be wasting time making me
supper."

"Are you kidding? I had to get out of that dusty old heap,
even if only for a few hours. Believe me, this is a treat for me
as well." She cut a piece of salmon and served Nora, then served
herself, adding some spears of perfectly cooked asparagus and
some wild rice.

Nora watched her arrange the food, wondering how she could
have been so wrong about a person. It was true Margo had come on
rather strong in their first few encounters, brittle and
defensive, but outside of the museum she seemed a different
person, with a largeness of spirit that surprised Nora. Margo was
trying hard to make up for her nasty comment in the staff
meeting, going beyond the generous apology she had already made
to treat Nora to a home-cooked dinner.

"By the way, I just wanted you to know that I'm going ahead
with that editorial. It may be a lost cause, but it's just
something I feel I have to do."

Nora felt a sense of admiration. Even with Menzies's support,
it was a gutsy move. She herself had gone up against the museum
administration, and it was no cakewalk-some of them could be
extremely vindictive.

"That's awfully brave of you."

"Well, I don't know about bravery. It's sheer stupidity,
really, I said I was going to do it, and now I feel like I
have to, even though the trustees have already ruled
against me."

"And your first issue, too."

"First and perhaps last."

"I meant what I said earlier. Even though I don't agree with
you, I support your right to publish. You can count on me. I
think everyone in the department would agree, except maybe
Ashton."

Margo smiled. "I know. And I really appreciate that,
Nora."

Nora sipped the wine. She glanced at the label: a Vermentino,
and a very good one. Bill, an inveterate wine snob, had taught
her a lot over the last year or two.

"It's tough being a woman in the museum," she said. "While
things are a lot better than they used to be, you still don't see
a lot of female deans or departmental heads. And if you look at
the board of trustees, well, it's basically made up of socially
ambitious lawyers and investment bankers, two-thirds of them
male, with little real interest in science or public
education."

"It's discouraging that a top museum like this can't do
better."

"It's the way of the world." Nora took a bite of the salmon.
It was good, just about the best she'd tasted.

"So tell me, Nora, how did you and Bill meet? I knew him at
the museum back when I was still a student. He didn't seem like
the marrying sort. I was fond of him, despite everything-though
I'd never let him know that. He was quite a
character."

"Fond of him? When I first saw him, I thought he was
the biggest jerk I'd ever met." She smiled at the memory. "He was
in a limo, signing books in the god-awful town of Page,
Arizona."

Margo laughed. "I can just see it. Funny, he tends to make a
bad first impression, until you realize he's got a heart of gold
... and the courage of a lion to match."

Nora nodded slowly, a little surprised at this insight. "It
took me a while to figure that out, though, to cut through his
'intrepid reporter' pose. We're very different, Bill and I, but I
think that helps in a marriage. I couldn't stand being married to
someone like me-I'm way too bossy."

"Me, too," said Margo. "What were you doing in Page,
Arizona?"

"That's a story. I was leading an archaeological expedition
into the canyon country of Utah, and Page was our rendezvous
point."

"Sounds fascinating."

"It was. Too fascinating, as it turned out. Afterwards I took
a job at the Lloyd Museum."

"No kidding! So you were there when it folded?"

"It more or less folded even before it opened. Palmer Lloyd
supposedly went off the deep end. But by that point I'd burned my
bridges, and the upshot was I was out of work again. So I landed
a job here."

"Well, the Lloyd Museum's loss is our gain."

"You mean, the diamond hall," Nora said jokingly. When the
plans to open the Lloyd Museum fell apart, the New York Museum of
Natural History had swooped down and-with the help of a huge
donation by a wealthy patron-purchased Palmer Lloyd's
world-renowned diamond collection for their own gem
halls.

Margo laughed. "Don't be silly. I'm talking about
you."

Nora took another sip of wine. "How about you, Margo? What's
your background?"

"I worked here as a graduate student in ethnopharmacology.
That was during the time of the museum murders-the ones Bill
wrote up in that first book of his. Did you read
it?"

"Are you kidding? One of the prerequisites of dating Bill was
reading all his books. He didn't actually insist on it, but the
hints came thick and fast."

Margo laughed.

"From what I read," Nora said, "you've had some pretty amazing
adventures."

"Yeah. Who says science is boring?"

"What brought you back to the museum?"

"After getting my doctorate, I went to work for the
pharmaceutical conglomerate GeneDyne. I did it to please my
mother, really: she'd desperately wanted me to go into the family
business, which I absolutely refused to do. Working for GeneDyne,
making lots of money in a corporate environment, was like
throwing her a bone. Poor Mom. She liked to say she couldn't
fathom why I wanted to spend my life studying people with bones
through their noses. Anyway, the money was great, but the
corporate world just wasn't to my liking. I guess I'm not a team
player-or an ass-kisser. Then one day Hugo Menzies called. He
knew of my earlier work at the museum, and he'd come across some
of my GeneDyne research papers on traditional Khoisan medicine.
He wondered if I'd ever consider coming back to the museum. The
position at Museology had just opened up and he wanted me
to apply. So I did, and here I am." She pointed to Nora's plate.
"Seconds?"

"Don't mind if I do."

Margo placed another piece of salmon on her plate, took a
little more for herself. "I don't suppose you've heard about the
Tano crosscountry march," she said, eyes on her
plate.

Nora looked up sharply. "No. Nothing."

"The museum is trying to keep it under wraps, hoping it won't
come off. But I think that since you're one of the curators of
the show, you should know about it. The Tanos have begun a sort
of protest caravan from New Mexico to New York to ask for the
return of those masks. They plan to set up in front of the museum
the night of the opening, perform dances, sing songs, and hand
out leaflets."

"Oh, no," Nora groaned.

"I managed to speak to the leader of the group, a religious
elder. He was a very nice man, but he was also extremely firm
about what they were doing and why. They believe there's a spirit
inside each mask, and the Tanos want to placate them-to let them
know they haven't been forgotten."

"But on opening night? It'll be a disaster."

"They're sincere," Margo said gently.

Nora glanced at her, a retort already on her lips. Then she
softened. "I suppose you're right."

"I really did try to talk them out of it. Anyway, I only
mention this because I figured you might appreciate a
heads-up."

"Thanks." Nora thought for a moment. "Ashton's going to have a
shit-fit."

"How can you stand working with that man? What a
dork."

Nora burst out laughing, amazed at Margo's directness. It was,
of course, true. "You should see him these days, running around
the exhibition, yelling at everyone, waving his hands, the wattle
on his forearms flapping back and forth."

"Stop! I don't want to picture it."

"And then Menzies comes through, and with a quiet word here
and a nod there, he gets more accomplished in five minutes than
Ash-ton does in a whole morning."

"Now, there's a lesson in management." Margo pointed at Nora's
glass. "Another?"

"Please."

She filled up both their glasses, then raised hers. "Too bad
Menzies's soft-spoken approach doesn't yet work for us women. So
here's to you and me, Nora, kicking ass in that fossilized
pile."

Nora laughed. "I'll drink to that."

And they clinked glasses.

THIRTY

IT was exactly two in the morning when Smithback cracked open
the door of his room. Holding his breath, he glanced out through
the narrow gap. The third-floor corridor was deserted and dark.
Easing the door open still farther, he ventured a look in the
other direction.

Deserted, as well.

Smithback closed the door again, leaned against it. His heart
pounded in his chest, and he told himself it was because he'd
been waiting so long for this moment. He had lain in bed for
hours, feigning sleep, all the while putting the finishing
touches on his plan. Earlier in the evening, there had been the
occasional hushed footfall outside; around eleven, a nurse had
looked in on him and-seeing him motionless in bed-left him to
sleep. Since midnight, there had been no sound at all outside the
door.

Smithback grasped the door handle again. It was time to put
his plan into action.

After his outburst with the director, Smithback had been
summoned to dinner that evening as usual. He was shown to a seat
and given a menu as if nothing had happened-it seemed that
delusional outbursts were par for the course at River Oaks. After
dinner, he'd put in his requisite hour of work detail in the
kitchen, returning perishable goods to the walk-in refrigerators
of the rambling kitchen complex on the mansion's first
floor.

It was while on duty Smithback had managed to purloin a key to
the basement.

Though he'd worked only two shifts, Smithback already had a
pretty good sense of how the kitchen operated. Deliveries came in
through a loading dock in the back of the mansion, and were then
brought through the basement and up into the kitchen. Security at
River Oaks was a joke: half the kitchen staff seemed to have keys
to the basement, from the head chef on down to the dishwashers,
and the door was always being unlocked, opened, and relocked
during working hours. When the sous chef had gone down to get a
piece of equipment, Smithback seized his chance and-when nobody
was looking-pocketed the key that had been left in the lock. The
chef had come back up, grunting under the weight of a vertical
broiler, the key completely forgotten.

It had been that easy.

Now Smithback tensed, preparing to open his door again. He was
wearing three shirts, a sweater, and two pairs of pants, and was
sweating profusely. It was a necessary precaution: if everything
went according to plan, he had a long, cold ride ahead of
him.

While on duty in the kitchen, he'd learned that the first food
service truck arrived at the loading dock at 5:30 a.m. If he
could make his way through the basement, wait until the truck
arrived, and then sneak into its rear compartment just before it
departed, nobody would be the wiser. Two hours or more would pass
until his absence was discovered-and by then he'd be well on his
way back to New York, beyond the grasp of Dr. Tisander and his
legion of creepy, black-uniformed nurses.

He cracked the door open again. Deathly silence. He opened it
wider, then slipped out into the corridor and closed it
noiselessly behind him.

He glanced over his shoulder, then began making his way
cautiously down the corridor toward the landing, keeping close to
the walls. He stood little chance of being spotted: the
chandeliers were dimmed and their amber pools of light faint. The
landscapes and portraits hanging on the walls were dark,
indistinguishable rectangles. The soft carpeting was a river of
maroon so deep it looked almost black.

It was the work of five minutes to reach the landing. Here the
light was a little brighter and he hung back, listening for the
sound of footsteps on the stairway. He took a step, then another,
listening intently.

Nothing.

Gliding forward, hand on the banister, Smithback made his way
down, ready to dart back up the stairs at the first sign of an
encounter. Reaching the second-floor landing, he retreated to a
dark corner, crouching behind a sideboard. Here he paused to
reconnoiter. The landing widened into four corridors: one leading
to the dining room, another to the library and west parlor, the
others to treatment areas and administrative offices. This floor
seemed as silent and deserted as the first, and Smithback,
encouraged, began creeping out.

From down the administrative hallway came the sound of a
closing door.

Quickly, he darted back to his hiding place, crouched down,
and waited.

He heard a key turning in a lock. Then, for perhaps a minute,
nothing more. Had somebody been locking himself inside an
office? Or out?

He waited another minute. Still nothing.

Just as he was gathering himself to rise again, someone came
into view from the darkness of the administrative corridor: an
orderly, walking slowly, hands clasped behind him. The man was
looking from left to right as he strolled, as if checking that
all doors were properly closed.

Smithback shrank back farther into the darkness behind the
sideboard, not moving, not even breathing, as the man walked
across the far side of the landing and vanished down the corridor
leading to the library.

Smithback waited, motionless, another five minutes. Then,
keeping low, he made his way down the staircase to the first
floor.

Here it seemed even gloomier. After making sure nobody was in
sight, Smithback darted down the wide corridor that led to the
kitchen.

It was the work of thirty seconds to reach the heavy double
doors. Taking one last look over his shoulder, he pushed against
the door, preparing to back into the kitchen.

The door didn't budge.

Smithback turned to face it, pressed harder.

Locked.

Shit. This was something he hadn't anticipated: a door
that was never locked during the day.

He sounded his pocket for the basement key, hoping against
hope it would open the kitchen door as well. No
luck.

He glanced over his shoulder again, disappointment and a
rising despair flooding over him. It had been such a good plan.
And he'd been so close to getting out. To be thwarted like
this...

Then he paused. There might-just might-still be a
chance.

Cautiously, he made his way back to the landing. He peered up,
straining for any sound, but the velvety darkness remained
silent. Noiselessly, he crept up the stairway to the second
floor, flitted across the landing, and entered the dining
room.

The vast, ghostly space seemed sepulchral in its stillness. A
few bars of pale moonlight slanted in through tall windows,
bathing the room in an eerie, almost phosphorescent illumination.
Smithback threaded his way quickly between the tables-already
laid for breakfast-until he reached the rear. Here, a decorative
partition ran parallel to the wall, concealing the service ports
and waiters' stations behind. Smithback ducked behind the
partition and-now in deeper darkness-moved carefully toward his
destination: the dumbwaiter, covered by a four-by-three-foot
metal panel set into the back wall.

Slowly, careful to make no noise, Smithback grasped the metal
panel and pulled it open. Inside was an empty shaft. A heavy
rope, mounted to a pulley mechanism on the chute's ceiling,
vanished in inky depths below.

Smithback couldn't help but smile.

During his kitchen duty, he'd seen gray tubs of silverware and
dirty dishes come down from the dining room via this same
dumbwaiter. Now, with any luck, it would carry a very different
cargo.

There were a series of buttons beside the access panel, used
to raise and lower the dumbwaiter. Smithback peered at them in
the faint illumination, then reached out to press the up button.
He'd bring the thing up from the kitchen, clamber in, and
descend...

Then he froze. The motor would make a lot of noise in the
stillness. And there was the faintest chance somebody might still
be inside the kitchen: the last thing he wanted was to betray his
presence.

Leaning forward, he grasped the heavy rope, gave one or two
exploratory tugs, and then-with a grunt-began to haul upward with
all his might.

It took ages to hoist the dumbwaiter from the kitchen below.
By the time he was done, Smithback was gasping and puffing, his
triple layer of shirts soaked in sweat. He paused to rest a
moment and look around. Still nobody.

Returning his attention to the dumbwaiter, he clambered
inside, squeezing his long limbs into its narrow confines. He
pulled the access panel closed behind him.

Utter darkness.

Sitting inside the dumbwaiter, knees up around his ears,
Smithback realized there was no easy way to lower the device.
Then he discovered that, by placing his hands against the front
wall of the chute and exerting upward pressure, he could force
the dumbwaiter down, inch by inch. It was blind, sweaty,
exhausting work, but in a few minutes he felt his hands brushing
against the steel frame of another access panel. He'd reached the
first floor-and the kitchen.

He paused a moment, despite the stifling, claustrophobic
space, to listen. Hearing nothing, he pushed open the
panel.

The kitchen was empty. The only light came from the emergency
exit signs, which threw a faint crimson light over the sprawling
space.

Smithback climbed out, worked the kinks out of his limbs, and
looked around. There, set into a far wall, was the door to the
basement.

He stiffened with excitement. Almost there. Nothing
could stop him now. River Oaks might be able to incarcerate
slack-jawed wackos like Roger Throckmorton, but it couldn't hold
the likes of William Smithback.

The kitchen was a strange melange of old and new. The
soot-blackened walk-in fireplace was flanked by professional
stainless-steel mixers large enough to hold a family. Long
bunches of braided garlic cloves, peppers, and fines herbes hung
from the ceiling: the head chef was a native of Brittany. The
granite countertops gleamed with ranks of cookware. Dozens of
top-quality German carving knives sat behind locked frames of
steel and meshed glass.

But Smithback had eyes for only one thing: the heavy wooden
door set in the far wall. He quickly walked over to it, unlocked
it. A stone stairway led down into a well of
darkness.

Gingerly, Smithback stepped down, careful not to slip on the
clammy stone. He closed and locked the door behind him, shutting
out the pale red glow of the exit signs and plunging the
stairwell into utter darkness. He made his way downward with
exquisite care, counting steps as he went.

At the twenty-fourth step he reached bottom.

He stopped to look around. But there was nothing to see: the
surrounding blackness was, if anything, even more complete. The
air smelled of mold and damp. For the first time, it occurred to
him that he should have nicked a flashlight, made some discreet
inquiries about the layout of the basement and the route to the
loading dock. Maybe he should put this escape attempt off for a
day or two, go back to his room, and try again another
night...

He pushed these thoughts away. It was too late to go back: he
could never force the dumbwaiter back up to the dining room.
Besides, his job was at stake. And he wanted, needed, to
talk to Nora. He had three hours until the first delivery of the
morning: that was more than enough time to find his
way.

He took a deep, steadying breath, then another, suppressing a
faint susurrus of fear. Then, arms stretched out before him, he
began to move slowly forward, sliding one foot ahead, then the
other. After about a dozen steps, he made contact with a brick
wall running perpendicular to his position. He turned right and
began moving again, a little more quickly now, one hand brushing
the wall.

There was another sound, Smithback realized, in addition to
his steps: the low pattering and squeaking of
rats.

His foot came in sudden contact with something on the floor,
squat and heavy and immovable. He pitched forward, saving himself
at the last minute from sprawling. He rose, rubbed his shin with
a curse, then felt forward with his hands. Some kind of a slop
sink, bolted to the brick face, barred his way. He moved
carefully around it, then continued forward. The squeaking of
rats died away, as if the rodents were fleeing at his
approach.

The wall to his left ended abruptly, leaving him once again
marooned in the black.

This was crazy. He needed to think this out.

Mentally, he went over what he knew of the layout of the
mansion. As he reviewed his twistings and turnings from the base
of the stairs, it seemed to him the rear must lie to the
left.

The moment he turned, he saw it: a pinpoint glimmer in the
distance. It was the faintest smudge of light, a mere attenuation
of black, but he made for it with the greediness of a drowning
man for terra firma. As he walked, it seemed to recede before
him, miragelike. The floor level rose, then fell again. At last,
as he drew close, he could see that the illumination was set at
eye level: a set of small green display panels fastened to an
automatic thermostat of some kind. They threw a faint glow over a
strange room: groined and vaulted in dressed limestone, it
contained a half dozen steam boilers of polished brass and
copper. They dated back to the mid-nineteenth century, at least,
and had been retrofitted to the thermostat controls by bundles of
colored wires. The giant boilers hissed and rumbled softly,
almost as if snoring in rhythm to the sleeping mansion they
warmed.

Over the sound of the boilers came again the scampering and
squeaking of rats.

And then, quite distinctly, the clump of a boot on
stone.

Smithback whirled around. "Who is it?" he blurted out, his
voice echoing among the vaults and boilers.

No answer.

"Who's there?" Smithback said a little louder. And, as he took
a slow step backward, the only response was the thudding of his
heart.

THIRTY-ONE

margo made the final correction to the last page of the
bluelines for Museology and laid the proof aside. I'm
probably the only editor in the country who still works with hard
copy, she thought to herself. She settled back into her chair
with a sigh and glanced at the clock: 2 a.m. exactly. She yawned,
stretched, the old oaken chair creaking in protest, and
rose.

The offices of Museology were located in a stuffy set
of rooms half a flight up from the fifth floor, jammed under the
eaves of the museum's west wing. A dirty skylight provided
illumination during the day, but now the skylight was a rectangle
of black, and the only light came from a feeble Victorian lamp
that sprouted from the ancient desk like an iron
mushroom.

Margo slipped the corrected bluelines into a manila envelope
and wrote a quick note to the journal's production manager. She
would drop them off at the museum's printing office on her way
out. The journal would be printed first thing in the morning, and
by noon proof copies would be going out by hand to the museum's
president, the dean of science, Menzies, and the other department
heads.

She shivered involuntarily, experiencing a moment of
self-doubt. Was it really her duty to mount this crusade? She
loved working again at the museum-she could see herself working
here happily for the rest of her life. Why mess it
up?

She shook her head. It was too late now, and besides, it was
something she had to do. With Menzies behind her, it was doubtful
they'd fire her.

She climbed down the metal stairs and entered the enormous
fifth-floor corridor, stretching four city blocks, said to be the
longest horizontal corridor in all of New York City. She walked
along its length, heels clicking on the marble floor. At last,
she stopped at the elevator, pressed the down button. A rumble
sounded in the bowels of the building as the elevator rose. After
about a minute, the doors opened.

She stepped in and pressed the button for the second floor,
admiring as she did so the once-elegant elevator, with its
nineteenth-century brass grille and fittings and its ancient
bird's-eye-maple paneling, much scarred by time and use. It
creaked and groaned its way back down, then stopped with a jolt,
the doors rumbling open again. She made her way through a
succession of old, familiar museum halls- Africa, Asian Birds,
Shells, the Trilobite Alcove. The lights in the cases had been
turned off, which gave them a creepy aspect, the objects inside
sunken in shadow.

She paused in the gloom. For a moment, memories of a terrible
night seven years earlier threatened to return. She pushed them
aside and quickened her step, arriving at the unmarked door to
the printing division. She slipped the bluelines into the slot,
turned, then made her way back through the echoing, deserted
galleries.

At the top of the second-floor stairs, she paused. When she
spoke to the Tano elder, he'd told her that, if the masks
had to be displayed, they must be placed facing in the
proper directions. Each of the four masks embodied the spirit of
a cardinal direction: as a consequence, it was critical that each
faced its respective direction. Any other arrangement would
threaten the world with chaos-or so the Tanos believed. More
likely, it would threaten the museum with even more controversy,
and that was something Margo was most anxious to avoid. She had
forwarded the information to Ashton, but Ashton was overworked
and snappish, and she had little faith he'd carried it
out.

Instead of descending the stairs to the employee security
entrance, Margo turned left, heading for the Sacred Images
entrance. In a few moments, she arrived. The door to the
exhibition had been designed to look like the portal to an
ancient Hindu tomb of the Khmer style, the carved stone lintels
depicting gods and demons engaged in a titanic struggle. The
figures were in violent motion: flying apsaras, dancing Shivas,
gods with thirty-two arms, along with demons vomiting fire and
cobras with human heads. It was unsettling enough that Margo
stopped, wondering if it wouldn't be better to call it a night
and do this errand in the morning. But tomorrow the hall would be
a madhouse again, and Ashton would be there, impeding her and- in
the wake of her editorial-perhaps even denying her
access.

She shook her head ruefully. She couldn't just give in to the
demons of the past. If she walked away now, her fears would have
won.

She stepped forward and slid her magnetic card through the
reader beside the entrance door; there was a soft click of
well-oiled steel disengaging, and the security light went green.
She pushed the door open and entered, carefully closing it behind
her and making sure the security LED returned to
red.

The hall was silent and empty, lit softly by exterior spots,
the cases dark. Two o'clock was too late for even the most
dedicated curator. The air smelled of fresh lumber, sawdust, and
glue. Most of the exhibits were in place, with only a few
remaining unmounted. Here and there a curatorial cart stood
loaded with objects not yet in place. The floor was strewn with
sawdust, lumber, pieces of Plexiglas, and electrical wires. Margo
looked around, wondering how they could possibly open in three
days. She shrugged, glad the opening was Ash-ton's problem and
not hers.

As she walked through the initial room of the exhibition, her
curiosity rose despite the sense of unease. Last time, she'd been
looking for Nora and hadn't bothered to pay much attention to the
surroundings. Even in its unfinished state, it was clear this was
going to be an exceptionally dramatic exhibit. The room was a
replica of the burial chamber of the ancient Egyptian queen
Nefertari, located in the Valley of the Queens in Luxor. Instead
of depicting the unlooted tomb, the designers had reconstructed
what the tomb might have looked like just after being
looted. The enormous granite sarcophagus had been broken into
several pieces, the inner coffins all stolen. The mummy lay to
one side, a gaping hole in its chest where the looters had cut it
open to steal the gold and lapis scarab that lay next to the
heart as a promise of eternal life. She paused to examine the
mummy, carefully protected by glass: it was the real McCoy, the
label identifying it as belonging to the actual queen herself, on
loan from the Cairo Museum in Egypt.

She continued to read the label, her mission temporarily
forgotten. It explained that the tomb had been robbed not long
after the queen's burial by the very priests who had been
assigned to guard it. The thieves had been in mortal dread of the
power of the dead queen and had tried to destroy that power by
smashing all her grave goods in order to purge the objects of
their sacred power. As a result, everything not stolen had been
smashed and was lying about helter-skelter.

She ducked under a low stone archway, its dark surfaces busy
with graven images, and found herself suddenly plunged
underground into the early Christian catacombs beneath Rome. She
was in a narrow passageway cut into the bedrock. Loculi and
arcosolia radiated outward in several directions, niches in their
sides packed with bones. Crude inscriptions in Latin graced some
of the niches, along with carved crosses and other sacred
Christian imagery. It was disturbingly naturalistic, down to the
models of rats scampering around the bones.

Ashton had gone for the sensational, but Margo had to admit it
was effective. This would definitely pack in the
crowds.

She hastened on into a completely different space that
depicted the Japanese tea ceremony. There was an orderly garden,
the plantings and pebbled walkway in meticulous order. Beyond lay
the sukiya, the tea room itself. It was a relief to enter
this open, orderly space after the claustrophobia of the
catacombs. The tea room was the living embodiment of purity and
tranquillity, with its polished wood, paper screens,
mother-of-pearl inlays, and tatamis, along with the simple
accouterments of the ceremony: the iron kettle, the bamboo
dipper, the linen napkin. Even so, the emptiness of it, the deep
shadows and dark spaces, started to unnerve Margo
again.

Time to wrap up this errand and get out.

She walked briskly through the tea room and wound her way
deeper into the exhibition, passing an eclectic parade of
exhibits including a dark Indian funerary lodge, a hogan filled
with Navajo sand paintings, and a violent Chukchi shamanistic
rite in which the shaman had to be physically chained to the
ground to keep his soul from being stolen by
demons.

She finally arrived at the four Kiva Society masks. They stood
in a glass case in the center of the room, mounted on slender
rods, each facing in a different direction. Around the circular
walls had been painted a magnificent depiction of the New Mexico
landscape, and each mask faced one of the four sacred mountains
that surrounded Tanoland.

Margo gazed at them, awestruck anew by their power. They were
amazingly evocative masks, severe, fierce, and yet at the same
time overflowing with human expression. Although they were close
to eight hundred years old, they looked modern in their formal
abstraction. They were true masterpieces.

She glanced at her notes, then walked to the nearest wall map
to orient herself. Then she moved around the central display,
checking each mask-and was surprised to find that they were, in
fact, facing the correct directions. Ashton, for all his bluster,
had gotten it right. In fact, she grudgingly had to admit he'd
put together an outstanding exhibition.

She stuffed the notes back in her purse. The silence, the
dimness, was starting to get to her. She'd take in the rest of
the show some other time, in broad daylight, when the halls were
bustling with people.

She had just turned to retrace her steps when she heard a loud
clatter, like a board falling, in the next room.

She jumped, heart suddenly pounding in her ears. A minute
passed with no further sound.

Her heart slowing again, Margo advanced to the archway and
peered into the dimness of the exhibit beyond. It was a depiction
of the interior of Arizona's haunting House of Hands Cave,
painted by the Anasazi a thousand years ago. But the room was
empty, and the quantity of cut lumber still lying around
indicated that what she'd heard was just a propped-up board which
had finally gotten around to falling.

She took a deep breath. The watchful stillness, the spookiness
of the exhibition, had finally gotten to her. That was all.
Don't think about what happened before. The museum's changed
since then, changed utterly She was probably in the safest
place in New York City. The security had been upgraded half a
dozen times since the debacle seven years ago. This latest
system-still being finalized-was the best money could buy. Nobody
could get into this hall without a magnetic key card, and the
card reader recorded the identity of each person who passed
through, as well as the time.

She turned again, preparing to walk back out of the
exhibition, humming to herself as a defense against the silence.
But before she had even crossed the exhibit, she was stopped
again by the clatter of lumber-this time from the room ahead of
her.

"Hello?" she called out, her voice unnaturally loud in the
quiet hall. "Somebody there?"

There was no answer.

She decided it must be the guard making his rounds, tripping
over loose boards. In the old days, the guards, having discovered
the tanks of grain alcohol preservative stored in the Entomology
Department, were sometimes found drunk at night. I guess some
things never change.

Once again, she headed back in the direction of the entrance,
wending her way through the dark exhibits, walking briskly, her
heels making a reassuring click-click on the tiled
floor.

With a sudden snap!, the exhibition was plunged into
blackness.

An instant later, the emergency lights came to life, rows of
fluorescent tubes set in the ceiling, popping and humming as they
winked on, one by one.

Once again, she tried to calm her wildly beating heart. This
was silly. It wasn't the first time she'd been in the museum
during a power failure; they happened all the time in the old
building. There was nothing, absolutely nothing, to worry
about.

She had barely taken another step when she heard yet another
clatter of lumber, this time from the room she had just passed
through. It sounded almost deliberate-as if someone were
deliberately trying to spook her.

"Who's there?" she asked, whirling around, suddenly
angry.

But the hall behind her-a crimson-painted crypt arrayed with
the cruel trappings of a black mass-was empty.

"If this is some kind of joke, I don't appreciate
it."

She waited, tense as a spring, but there was no
sound.

She wondered if it was just a coincidence: another board
falling on its own, the exhibition settling down after a hectic
day. She reached into her handbag, feeling around for something
she might use as a weapon. There was nothing. In years past,
following the trauma of the museum killings and their aftermath,
she had taken to keeping a pistol in her bag. But this was a
habit she'd dropped when she left the museum and went to work for
GeneDyne. Now she cursed herself for letting down her
guard.

Then she spied a box cutter, sitting on a worktable on the far
side of the exhibit. She ran to it, snatched it up, and-holding
it out aggressively before her-resumed her walk toward the
entrance.

Another clatter, this one louder than the others, as if
someone had tossed something.

Now Margo was sure there was someone else with her in the
exhibition: someone deliberately trying to scare her. Was it
possible it was somebody who objected to her editorial and was
now trying to intimidate her? She'd find out from security who
else had been in the hall and report them
immediately.

She broke into a trot. She passed through the Japanese tea
room and had just entered the looted Egyptian tomb when there was
another sharp snap! This time the emergency lights went
out and the windowless hall was plunged into total
blackness.

She halted, almost paralyzed by sudden fear and a chilling
sense of déjà vu as she recalled a similar moment in
another exhibition, years earlier, in this same
museum.

"Who is it?" she cried.

"It's just me," a voice said.

THIRTY-TWO

Smithback froze, all senses on high alert. He looked left and
right, eyes straining in the greenish dark. But there was no
sound; no figure rushing toward him, black upon
black.

Must be my imagination, he thought. The creepy place
was enough to give anybody the heebie-jeebies.

Much as he hated to leave the faint light of the boiler room,
he knew he had to move on. He needed to find the loading dock
and- just as important-a good hiding place nearby. If the last
ten minutes were any indication, it might take him a
while.

He waited a good five minutes, listening, making sure the
coast was clear. Then he crept back out of the vast room and,
turning, began making his way toward what he thought must be the
back of the mansion. The pale light faded away and he once again
slowed his pace, putting his arms out in front of him, shuffling
his feet gingerly so as not to bark his shins a second
time.

He paused. Was that another sound? Was somebody down here with
him?

Heart still hammering uncomfortably in his chest, he stopped
to wait again. But he heard nothing but the faint squeak of mice
and, after another minute, resumed his slow
progress.

Suddenly, his hands encountered another wall: rough stone,
slick with moisture. Following it to the right, he encountered a
perpendicular wall, with what felt like a steel door bolted into
it. His fingers probed along the jamb until they found the
handle. He seized it, turned.

The handle refused to move.

Taking a deep breath, he yanked with all his might. No good:
the thing wouldn't budge.

With a curse, he went back along the wall in the other
direction. After about twenty paces, the wall ended and his hands
groped once again on open space. He turned the corner, then
stopped, his heart in his throat.

There was a sudden glow of light ahead, framing a turn in the
corridor. Someone had just turned on the lights up ahead. Or had
they been on all this time?

Smithback paused, frozen with indecision. That was the way he
had to go, he was sure of it, and the light was welcoming. But
was anyone waiting up there for him?

He crept forward, keeping close to the wall, and peered around
the corner.

The corridor ahead was lit by a string of dim bulbs hanging
from the ceiling. They were few and far between, and the light
they shed was feeble, but at least he'd be able to see where he
was going. Best of all, the corridor was empty. Nobody had turned
on the lights, Smithback decided-they'd been on all along. He
just hadn't noticed them at first. Or maybe he'd been too far
away to catch their light.

He walked slowly down the stone corridor. On both sides,
ancient doors lay open, yawning gulfs of barely penetrable murk.
He paused to look into a few. A wine cellar, rows of bottles and
heavy oaken kegs covered in dense cobwebs. An old storage room,
wooden file cabinets bursting with yellowing documents. A
billiard room, the felt of its table torn and curled. Just what
you'd expect in a manor house that had been converted into an
insane asylum for the rich.

Smithback walked on, confidence returning. It was a good
plan.

The basement couldn't go on forever. He had to be getting near
the loading dock. He had to...

There it was again: that nagging sensation he was being
stalked; that someone was deliberately trying to conceal the
sound of their footsteps with his own.

He stopped abruptly. He couldn't be certain, but he thought
he'd heard the sound of an interrupted tread, as if someone in
the darkness behind had frozen in the act of taking a step. He
wheeled. The corridor, at least the lighted part, stretched empty
behind him.

Smithback licked his lips. "Pendergast?" he tried to say, but
his throat was thick and dry and his tongue didn't want to work.
Just as well, because he knew in his gut there was
somebody back there, and it wasn't Pendergast; oh, God, no, it
wasn't Pendergast...

He began walking forward again, heart pounding furiously.
Suddenly, the pools of faint light were no longer a godsend. They
were treacherous, revealing... And he was suddenly terribly
certain somebody had turned on the lights, the better to
see him with.

There is a killer after you. A supremely dangerous killer
of almost supernatural ability...

He fought against the instinct to run. Panic wasn't the answer
here. He needed to think this through. He needed to find a dark
corner, a place where he could hide. But first he had to be sure.
Absolutely sure.

He passed quickly beneath another bulb and into the interval
of darkness beyond. He slowed his pace, trying to get the timing
right. Then, tensing, he turned abruptly.

Behind, a dark form-cloaked, strangely muffled-shrank back
from the light into the dark oblivion of the
basement.

At this sight, expected yet unutterably awful, Smithback's
failing nerves deserted him. He turned and ran like a frightened
rabbit, tearing down the corridor, heedless of any hidden
obstacles to his escape.

The sound of heavy boots closing in from behind spurred him
on.

Lungs burning, Smithback tore down the corridor, beyond the
last of the hanging bulbs and back into absolute, endless,
protective darkness...

And then something cold and unyielding slammed up against him,
stopping him dead. A savage pain tore through his head and chest;
white light exploded in his skull; and, as consciousness fled
away and he sank to the ground, his last impression was of a
claw-like grasp, hard as steel, fastening onto his
shoulder.

THIRTY-THREE

"who?" Margo almost shrieked, holding the box cutter toward
the sound, swinging it back and forth. "Who is
it?"

"Me."

"Who is 'me' and what the hell do you want?"

"I'm looking for an honest man ... or woman, as the case may
be." The voice was small and almost effeminate in its
exactitude.

"Don't you come near me," she cried, brandishing the box
cutter in the blackness. She tried to calm her pounding heart and
focus. This was no joker: she sensed instinctively that this man
was dangerous. The emergency lights would come back on shortly;
they must-it was automatic. But as the seconds ticked by, she
felt her terror continue to escalate. Had the man himself cut the
emergency backup? It didn't seem possible. What was going
on?

Struggling to master herself, she inched forward as silently
as possible, sliding her feet along the floor, stepping carefully
over objects as she encountered them, poking the box cutter out
in different directions. She had a vague idea of where the
entrance was, and for now the man seemed to have shut up-perhaps
as confounded by the darkness as she was. She reached the far
wall and began feeling her way along it. Then her hands
encountered the cool steel of the security door. With a flood of
relief, she felt for the handle, found the card reader, pulled
her card from her bag, and swiped it through.

Nothing.

As quickly as it had come, the relief ebbed away, replaced by
a dull, pounding fear. Of course: the magnetic lock was
electric and the power was off. She tried opening the door,
rattling the knob and throwing her weight against it, but it
didn't budge.

"When the power goes off," came the thin voice, "the security
system locks everything down. You can't get out."

"Get close to me and I'll cut you!" she cried, spinning around
and putting her back to the door, brandishing the box cutter at
the darkness.

"You wouldn't want to do that. The sight of blood leaves me
faint... faint with pleasure."

In the clarity of her fear, Margo realized that she had to
stop responding. She had to go on the offensive. She fought to
control her breathing, control her fear. She had to do something
unpredictable, surprise him, turn the tables. She took a
noiseless step forward.

"What does the sight of blood do to you, Margo?" came the
gentle whisper.

She inched toward the voice.

"Blood is such a strange substance, isn't it? Such a perfect,
exquisite color, and so teeming with life, packed with all those
red and white cells and antibodies and hormones. It's a living
liquid. Even spilled on a dirty museum floor, it lives on-at
least for a time."

She took another step toward the voice. She was very close
now. She braced herself. Then, in one desperate motion, she
sprang forward and brought the box cutter around in a slashing
arc; it contacted something and ripped through it. As she jumped
back, she heard a stumbling noise, a muffled sound of
surprise.

She waited, tensing in the blackness, hoping she'd opened up
an artery.

"Brava, Margo," came the whispery voice. "I'm impressed. Why,
you've ruined my greatcoat."

She began circling the voice again, intending to strike a
second time. She had him on the defensive now. If she
could wound him, preoccupy him, she'd buy herself enough time to
run back into the exhibition. If she could do that, put half a
dozen rooms between herself and this evil, disembodied voice,
he'd never find her in the blackness. She could wait for the
guards to make their next set of rounds.

There was a low, breathy chuckle. The person seemed to be
circling her at the same time. "Margo, Margo, Margo. You didn't
really think you'd cut me?"

She lunged again, her arm sweeping only air.

"Good, good," came the voice with another dry chuckle. The
chuckle went on and on, hanging in the blackness, circling
slowly.

"Leave me alone or I'll kill you," said Margo, surprised at
how calm her voice sounded.

"What spunk!"

Instantly, Margo tossed her purse toward his voice, heard it
strike, and followed up with a lightning-fast slash that met with
just enough resistance to let her know she'd struck
home.

"My, my, another good trick. You are far more formidable than
I had supposed. And now you have cut me."

As she turned to run, she felt, rather than heard, a sudden
movement; she threw herself sideways, but the man seized her
wrist and-with one terrible twist that cracked her bones-sent the
box cutter flying. She cried out, struggling despite the
unbearable pain shooting up her arm. He twisted again and she
screamed, lashing out with her foot, landing a punch with her
free hand, but the man pulled her up against him in a brusque,
horrid movement that almost caused her to faint from the pain to
her broken wrist. His hand was like a steel manacle around her
arm, and his hot breath, smelling faintly of damp earth, washed
over her.

"You cut me," he whispered.

With a hard shove, he released her, stepping back. Margo fell
to her knees, close to blacking out from shock and pain, holding
her shattered wrist close against herself, trying to gather her
wits, to determine where in the darkness the box cutter had
fallen.

"Although I am a cruel man," came the voice, "I will not let
you suffer."

There was another swift movement, like the rush of a giant bat
above her. And then she felt a stunning, searing blow from behind
that dropped her to the ground. And as she lay there, she
realized, with a sense of strange disbelief, that he had driven a
knife into her back; that she'd been given a mortal blow. Yet
still she clawed the floor, trying to rise, the sheer force of
her will bringing her to her knees. It was no use. Something warm
was running down her arm now, running onto the floor, as a
different kind of blackness rushed in on her from all sides. The
last thing she heard, coming from a great distance as if in a
dream, was a final astringent chuckle...

THIRTY-FOUR

Laura Hayward walked quickly through the museum's Great Hall,
the early morning light casting parallel banners through its tall
bronze windows. She strode through the bands of light with
purpose, as if the physical act of walking would somehow prepare
her for what was to come. Beside her, almost skipping to keep up,
was Jack Manetti, head of museum security. Behind them followed a
silent but swift phalanx of NYPD homicide detectives and museum
personnel.

"Mr. Manetti, I'm assuming the exhibition has a security
system. Correct?"

"State-of-the-art. We're just completing a full
overhaul."

"Overhaul? Wasn't the exhibit alarmed?"

"It was. We've got redundancies built into each zone. Strange
thing is, no alarm went off."

"Then how'd the perp get in?"

"At this point, we have no idea. We've compiled a list of
everyone who had access to the exhibition space."

"I'll want to talk to them all."

"Here's the list." Manetti pulled a printout from his jacket
pocket.

"Good man." Hayward took it, scanned it, handed it to one of
the detectives behind her. "Tell me about the
system."

"It's based on magnetic keys. The system keeps track of
everyone coming and going after hours. I have a register of that,
as well." He handed her another document.

They rounded the corner of the Hall of Ocean Life. Hayward
walked past the great blue whale, hanging ominously from the
ceiling, without even a glance.

"Any key cards reported missing?"

"No."

"Can they be duplicated?"

"I'm told it's impossible."

"Someone could have borrowed a card, perhaps?"

"That's possible, although as of now all cards except the
victim's are accounted for. I'll be looking into that specific
question."

"So will we. Of course, the perp might be a museum employee
with prior access."

"I doubt it."

Hayward grunted. She doubted it herself, but you never knew-
she'd seen more than her share of certifiable lunatics wandering
around this old pile. As soon as she'd heard about this case,
she'd asked to be assigned, despite still being busy with the
Duchamp murder. She had a theory-no, call it more of a
premonition-that the two were connected. And if she was right, it
was going to be big. Very big.

They passed through the Hall of Northwest Coast Indians, then
stopped before the oversize portal leading to the Sacred Images
exhibition. The door itself was open but taped off, and beyond,
Hayward could hear the murmurings of the SOC team working the
scene. "You, you, and you"-she jabbed her finger at detectives in
turn- "pass the tape with me. The rest wait here and keep back
the curious. Mr. Manetti? You come, too."

"When Dr. Collopy arrives-?"

"This is a crime scene. Keep him out. I'm
sorry."

Manetti didn't even argue. His face was the color of putty and
it was pretty clear he hadn't even had time for his morning cup
of coffee.

She ducked under the police tape, nodded to the waiting
sergeant, signed his clipboard. Then she entered the foyer of the
exhibition, moving slower now, far more deliberate. SOC and
forensics would have already gone over ingress and egress, but it
was always good to keep an eye open.

The truncated group wound its way through the first room, past
almost completed exhibits, stepping over the odd piece of lumber,
and then into the exhibition's second room: the scene of the
crime itself. Here a chalk outline delineated where the victim
had fallen. There was quite a lot of blood. The SOC photographer
had already documented the scene and was awaiting any special
requests Hayward, as the investigating officer, might have. Two
members of the SOC team were still on their hands and knees with
tweezers.

She eyed the scene almost fiercely, her eye roving over the
central pool of blood, across various splatters, bloody
footprints, smears. She gestured to Hank Barris, the senior SOC
officer. He rose, put away his tweezers, came
over.

"What a damn mess," she said.

"The paramedics worked on the victim for a
while."

"The murder weapon?"

"A knife. It went with the victim to the hospital. You know,
you can't pull it out-"

"I'm aware of that," snapped Hayward. "Did you see the
original scene?"

"No. The EMTs had already messed it up by the time I
arrived."

"ID on the victim?"

"Not that I know of, at least not yet. I could call the
hospital."

"Any witnesses to the original scene?"

Barris nodded. "One. A technician named Enderby. Larry
Enderby."

Hayward turned. "Bring him in."

"In here?"

"That's what I said."

A silence ensued while Hayward looked around, body completely
still, her dark eyes the only thing moving. She scrutinized the
blood splatters, making rough estimates of trajectories, speed,
and origin.

Slowly, a general picture of the crime began to come together
in her mind.

"Captain? Mr. Enderby is ready."

Hayward turned to see a surprisingly young, pimply man with
black hair and a ninety-eight-pound-weakling physique. A T-shirt,
a Mets cap worn backward, and a pair of ratty jeans completed the
picture.

At first, she thought his high-tops were dyed red, until she
saw them closer.

A policeman ushered him forward.

"You were the first to find the victim?"

"Yes, ma'am ... I mean ... Officer." He was already
flustered.

"You may call me Captain," she said gently. "What's your
position at the museum, Mr. Enderby?"

"I'm a systems technician, grade one."

"What were you doing in the hall at three
a.m.?"

The voice was high and quavery, ready to break. Always the
timidest who find the deadest, Hayward remembered her former
professor of forensic psychology at NYU joking. Hayward
swallowed, tried to make her voice sympathetic. It wouldn't do to
have Enderby crack up.

"Checking the install of the new security
system."

"I see. Was security up and running in the
hall?"

"Mostly. We're running some updated software routines, and
there was a glitch. My boss-"

"His name?"

"Walt Smith."

"Proceed."

"My boss sent me down to see if the power had been
cut."

"Was it?"

"Yeah. It was. Someone had cut a power cable."

Hayward glanced at Barris.

"We know about it, Captain. It appears the perp cut the cable
to kill the emergency lights, the better to ambush the
victim."

"So what is this new security system?" she asked, turning back
to Enderby.

"Well, it's multilayered and redundant. There are motion
sensors, live video feeds, crisscrossing infrared laser beams,
vibration sensors, and air pressure sensors."

"Sounds impressive."

"It is. For the past six months, the museum's been upgrading
the security in each hall, one after another, to the latest
version of the system."

"What does that involve?"

Enderby took a deep breath. "Interfacing with the security
contractors, reconfiguring the monitoring software, running a
test bed, that sort of thing. All on a rigid schedule calibrated
to an atomic satellite clock. And it has to happen at night, when
the museum's closed,"

"I see. So you came down here to check the power failure and
found the body."

"That's right."

"If you can manage it, Mr. Enderby, could you look at the
scene here and describe for me exactly how the victim was
lying?"

"Well... the body ... the body was lying just as it's
outlined, one arm thrown out like you see. There was an
ivory-handled knife sticking out of the small of the back, buried
to the hilt."

"Did you touch or try to remove the knife?"

"No."

Hayward nodded. "The victim's right hand, was it open or
closed?"

"Ah, it seems to me it was open." Enderby swallowed
painfully.

"Bear with me, Mr. Enderby. The victim was moved before the
photographer arrived, so all we have is your
memory."

He wiped his brow with the back of his hand.

"The left foot: turned in or out?"

"Out."

"And the right?"

"In."

"Are you sure?"

"I don't think I'll ever forget. The body was kind of twisted
a little."

"How so?"

"Kind of lying facedown, but with the legs almost
crossed."

The act of talking seemed to be helping Enderby get a grip on
himself. He was turning out to be a good witness.

"And the blood on your shoes? How'd that
happen?"

Enderby stared at his shoes, eyes widening. "Oh. I... I rushed
over and tried to help."

Hayward's respect for the young man went up a notch. "Describe
your movements."

"Let's see ... I was standing there when I saw the body. I
stopped, ran over. I knelt, felt for a pulse, and I guess that's
when I... stepped in the blood. I got blood on my hands, too, but
I washed that off."

Hayward nodded, adding those facts to her mental
reconstruction.

"Any pulse?"

"I don't think so. I was hyperventilating, it was hard to
tell. I don't really know how to read a pulse too well. First I
rang security-"

"On a house phone?"

"Yes, around the corner. Then I tried mouth-to-mouth, but
within a minute, a guard arrived."

"The guard's name?"

"Roscoe Wall."

Hayward nodded to one of the detectives to note
this.

"Then the paramedics came. They basically pushed me
away."

Hayward nodded. "Mr. Enderby, if you could just step aside
with Detective Hardcastle for a few minutes, I might have more
questions."

She returned to the first room of the exhibition, looked
around, then walked slowly back. A thin scattering of sawdust on
the floor, despite having been stirred up, retained traces of the
struggle. She bent to examine the small sprays of blood. A mental
splatter analysis helped finalize her general understanding of
what had happened. The victim had been ambushed in the first
exhibit room of the hall. Perhaps he'd even been followed from
the opposite end of the exhibition-there was a rear door, she'd
been told, although it had been found secured and locked. It
looked like they had circled each other for a moment. Then the
killer grabbed the victim, twisted him sideways; struck him with
the knife while moving fast in a lateral motion...

She closed her eyes a moment, visualizing the choreography of
murder.

Then she reopened them, zeroing in at a tiny spot, off to one
side, that she'd noticed in passing on her initial circuit of the
room. She walked over and stood looking down at it: a drop of
blood about the size of a dime, a quiet little drop that appeared
to have fallen vertically, from a stationary subject, from a
height of about five feet.

She pointed at it. "Hank, I want this entire drop taken out,
floorboard and all. Photograph it in situ first. I want DNA on
it, yesterday. Run it against all the
databases."

"Sure thing, Captain."

She looked around, her eyes traveling on a tangent from the
chalk outline, through the lone drop of blood, to the far wall.
There she saw a large dent in the new wooden floor molding. Her
eyes sharply narrowed. "And Hank?"

He looked up.

"I think you might find the victim's own weapon behind that
exhibit case."

The man rose, walked over, peered behind.

"I'll be damned."

"What is it?" Hayward asked.

"A box cutter."

"Blood?"

"Not that I can see."

"Bag it and run every test in the book. And run it against
that spot you just took out. You'll find a match, I'll bet my
last dollar."

As she stood there, somehow unwilling to take her eyes off the
scene, another thought occurred to her. "Bring Enderby
back."

A moment later, Detective Hardcastle returned, Enderby in
tow.

"You said you gave the victim mouth-to-mouth?"

"Yes, Captain."

"You recognized him, I assume."

"Her, not him. Yes, I did."

"Who was it?"

"Margo Green."

Hayward stiffened, as if coming to attention. "Margo
Green?"

"Yes. I understand she used to be a graduate student here.
Anyway, she'd returned to be editor of..."

His voice faded into the background. Hayward was no longer
listening. She was thinking back half a dozen years to the subway
murders and the famous Central Park riot, when she was a lowly
T.A. cop, and to the Margo Green she had met back then-the young,
feisty, and deeply courageous woman who'd risked her life and
helped crack open the case.

What a shitty world it was.

THIRTY-FIVE

Smithback SAT glumly in the same chair he had occupied the day
before, feeling an unpleasant sense of déjà vu. The
same fire seemed to be flickering in the ornate marble fireplace,
lending a faint perfume of burning birchwood to the air; the same
sporting prints decorated the walls; and the same snowy landscape
presented itself through the bow windows.

Worse, the same director sat behind his gigantic desk with the
same pitying, condescending smile on his well-shaven face. He was
giving Smithback the reproachful-stare treatment. Smithback's
head still throbbed painfully from running full tilt into a
cement wall in the dark, and he felt deeply humiliated for
panicking at the footsteps of a mere orderly. And he also felt
like a real jerk for thinking he could beat the security system
in such a ham-handed way. All he had accomplished was to confirm
the director's opinion that he was a nutcase.

"Well, well, Edward," said Dr. Tisander, clasping his veined
hands together. "That was quite an escapade you had last night. I
do apologize if orderly Montaney gave you a start. I trust you
found the medical care at our infirmary
satisfactory?"

Smithback ignored the patronizing question. "What I want to
know is, why was he sneaking around after me like that in the
first place? I could've been killed!"

"Running into a wall? I hardly think so." Another
genial smile. "Although you were lucky to avoid a
concussion."

Smithback didn't respond. The dressing on the side of his
head" tightened uncomfortably whenever he moved his
jaw.

"I am surprised at you, Edward. I thought I'd already
explained it to you: just because we don't appear to have
security doesn't mean we don't have security. That's the
whole purpose of our facility. The security is unobtrusive, so
that our guests don't feel uncomfortable."

Smithback felt irritated by the word guest. They were
inmates, pure and simple.

"We followed your nocturnal perambulations via the infrared
beams you interrupted and the motion sensors you moved past. It
wasn't until you actually penetrated the basement that orderly
Montaney was dispatched to tail you unobtrusively. He followed
protocol to the letter. I imagine you thought you'd escape on one
of the food service trucks; that's usually what they try
first."

Smithback felt like leaping up and wrapping his hands around
the good doctor's neck. They? I'm not crazy, you idiot!
But he didn't. He realized now what an exquisite catch-22 he was
in: the more he insisted he was sane, the more excited he became,
the more he validated the doctor's opinion to the
contrary.

"I just want to know how much longer I'm going to be here," he
said.

"That remains to be seen. I must say, this escape attempt does
not lead me to think your departure will be any time soon. It
shows resistance on your part to being helped. We can't help you
until we have your cooperation, Mr. Jones. And we can't release
you until we've helped you. As I am fond of saying, you
are the most important person in your cure."

Smithback balled his fists, making a supreme effort not to
respond.

"I have to tell you, Edward, that another escape attempt will
result in certain changes to your domestic arrangements that
might not be to your liking. My advice is, accept your situation
and work with us.

Right from the beginning, I have sensed an unusual amount of
passive-aggressive resistance on your part."

That's because I'm as sane as you are. Smithback
swallowed, tried to muster an obsequious smile. He needed to be a
lot more clever if he was going to escape, that much was
clear.

"Yes, Dr. Tisander. I understand."

"Good, good! Now we're making progress."

There had to be a way out. If the Count of Monte Cristo
could escape the Château d'If, William Smithback could
escape from River Oaks.

"Dr. Tisander, what do I have to do to get out of
here?"

"Cooperate. Let us help you. Go to your sessions, devote all
your energies to getting better, make a personal commitment to
cooperate with the staff and orderlies. The only way anyone
leaves here is carrying a document with my signature release on
it."

"The only way?"

"That's correct. I make the final decision-based, of course,
on expert medical and, if necessary, legal
advice."

Smithback looked at him. "Legal?"

"Psychiatry has two masters: medicine and law."

"I don't understand."

Tisander was clearly getting into his favorite subject. His
voice took on a pontifical ring. "Yes, Edward, we must deal with
legal as well as medical issues. Take yourself, for instance.
Your family, who love you and are concerned for your welfare,
have committed you here. That's a legal as well as a medical
process. It is a grave step to deprive a person of his freedom,
and due process must be followed with utter
scrupulousness."

"I'm sorry ... did you say my family?"

"That's right. Who else would commit you,
Edward?"

"You know my family?"

"I've met your father, Jack Jones. A fine man indeed. We all
want to do what's right for you, Edward."

"What'd he look like?"

A puzzled expression crossed Tisander's face, and Smithback
cursed himself for asking such an obviously crazy question. "I
mean, when did you see him?"

"When you were brought here. He signed all the requisite
papers."

Pendergast, Smithback thought. Damn
him.

Tisander rose, held out his hand. "And now, Edward, is there
anything else?"

Smithback took it. The germ of an idea had seeded itself in
his mind. "Yes, one thing."

Tisander raised his eyebrows, the same condescending smile on
his face.

"There's a library here, isn't there?"

"Of course. Beyond the billiard room."

"Thank you."

As he exited, Smithback caught a glimpse of Tisander settling
back down at his enormous claw-footed desk, smoothing his tie,
his face still wearing a self-satisfied smile.

THIRTY-SIX

A watery winter light was fading over the river as D'Agosta
reached the old door on Hudson Street. He paused for a moment,
taking a few deep breaths, trying to get himself under control.
He'd followed Pendergast's complicated instructions to the
letter. The agent had moved yet again-he seemed determined to
keep one step ahead of Diogenes-and D'Agosta wondered, with a
dull curiosity, what disguise he had assumed now.

Finally, having composed himself and taken one last look
around to make sure there was no one near, he tapped on the door
seven times and waited. A moment later, it was opened by a man
who, from all appearances, was a derelict in the last stages of
addiction. Even though D'Agosta knew this was Pendergast, he was
startled- once again-by the effectiveness of his
appearance.

Without a word, Pendergast ushered him in, padlocked the door
behind him, and led him down a dank stairwell to a noisome
basement room filled by a large boiler and heating pipes. An
oversize cardboard carton piled with soiled blankets, a plastic
milk crate with a candle and some dishware, and a neat stack of
tinned food completed the picture.

Pendergast swiped a rag from the floor, exposing an iMac G5
with a Bluetooth wireless Internet connection. Beside it lay a
well-thumbed stack of papers: the photocopied case file that
D'Agosta had purloined from headquarters, along with other
reports that, D'Agosta assumed, were from the police dossier on
the Hamilton poisoning. Clearly, Pendergast had been studying
everything with great care.

"I..." D'Agosta didn't quite know how to begin. He felt rage
take hold once again. "That bastard. That son of a bitch.
My God, to murder Margo-"

He fell silent. Words just couldn't convey the shaking fury,
turmoil, and disbelief he felt inside. He hadn't known Margo was
back in New York, let alone working at the museum, but he'd known
her well in years past. They'd worked together on the museum and
subway murders. She'd been a brave, resourceful, intelligent
woman. She hadn't deserved to go out like this: stalked and
killed in a darkened exhibition hall.

Pendergast was silent as he rapped at the computer keyboard.
But his face was bathed in sweat, and D'Agosta could see that was
not part of the act. He was feeling it, too.

"Diogenes lied when he said Smithback would be the next
victim," D'Agosta said.

Without looking up, Pendergast reached into the crate and
pulled out a ziplock bag with a tarot card and a note inside,
handing it to D'Agosta.

He glanced at the tarot card. It depicted a tall, orange brick
tower, being struck by multiple bolts of lightning. It was afire,
and tiny figures were falling from its turrets toward the grass
far beneath. He turned his attention to the note.

Ave, frater!

Since when did I ever tell you the truth? One would think
after all these years you'd have learned by now I am a skillful
liar. While you were busy hiding the braggart Smithback-and I
commend you for your cleverness there, for I haven't yet found
him-I was free to plot the death of Margo Green. Who, by the way,
put up a most spirited struggle.

Wasn't it all so very clever of me?

I'll tell you a secret, brother: I'm in a confessional mood.
And so I will name my next victim: Lieutenant Vincent
D'Agosta.

Amusing, what? Am I telling the truth? Am I lying again? What
a delicious conundrum for you, dear brother.

I bid you, not adieu, but au
revoir.

Diogenes

D'Agosta handed the note back to Pendergast. He felt a strange
sensation in his gut. It wasn't fear-no, not fear at all-but a
fresh groundswell of hatred. He was shaking with
it.

"Bring the motherfucker on," he said.

"Have a seat, Vincent. We have very little
time."

It was the first thing Pendergast had said, and D'Agosta was
silenced by the deep seriousness in his voice. He eased himself
down onto a crate.

"What's with the tarot card?" he asked.

"It's the Tower, from El Gran Tarot Esotérico
variant of the deck. The card is said to indicate destruction, a
time of sudden change."

"No kidding."

"I've spent all day compiling a list of potential victims and
making arrangements for their protection. I've had to call in
virtually every favor I'm owed, which will have the unfortunate
collateral effect of blowing my cover. Those I have dealt with
have promised to keep things to themselves, but it's only a
matter of time before the news will come out that I'm alive.
Vincent, take a look at this list."

D'Agosta leaned over and looked at the document on the screen.
On it were a lot of names he recognized, along with many others
he didn't know.

"Is there anyone else you feel should be on
here?"

D'Agosta stared at the list. "Hayward." The thought of her
sent a twinge through his gut.

"Hayward is the one person I know whom Diogenes will certainly
not target. There are reasons for this that I cannot yet
explain to you."

"And what about..." D'Agosta hesitated. Pendergast was an
extremely private person and he wondered how he would react to
him mentioning her name. "Viola Maskelene?"

"I have thought a great deal about her," he said in a low
tone. He looked down at his white hands. "She's still on the
island of Capraia, which in many ways is a perfect fortress for
her. It's almost impossible to get to, involving several days'
travel. There's only one small harbor, and a stranger-no matter
how disguised-would be instantly noted. Diogenes is here in New
York. He can't reach her quickly, nor would he ever operate with
a proxy. And finally"-his voice dropped-"Diogenes can know
nothing of my-my interest in her. No one else in the world
but you are aware of that. As far as Diogenes is concerned, she's
simply a person I interviewed once with regard to a violin. On
the other hand, if I were to take steps to protect her, it might
actually alert Diogenes to her existence."

"I can see that."

"So in her case I have opted to leave things as
is."

He unclasped his hands. "I have taken steps to protect the
others, whether they like it or not. Which brings us to the most
difficult question: what about you, Vincent?"

"I'm not going into hiding. As I said, bring him on. I'll be
the bait. I'd rather die than run like a dog from Margo's
killer."

"I'm not going to argue with you. The risk you're taking is
enormous-you know that."

"I certainly do. And I'm prepared for it."

"I believe you are. Margo's attack was patterned after the
murder of a spinster aunt of mine, who was stabbed in the back
with a pearl-handled letter opener by a disgruntled servant. It's
still possible that there's evidence from the scene of the attack
that can help lead us to Diogenes-I'll need your help there. When
word of my continuing existence reaches the police, there is
going to be a serious problem."

"How so?"

Pendergast shook his head. "When the time comes, you'll
understand. How long you choose to stay with me is, of course, up
to you. At a certain point, I intend to take the law into my own
hands. I would never entrust Diogenes to the criminal justice
system."

D'Agosta nodded brusquely. "I'm with you all the
way."

"The worst is yet to come. For me, and especially for
you."

"That bastard killed Margo. End of discussion."

Pendergast placed a hand on his shoulder. "You're a good man,
Vincent. One of the best."

D'Agosta did not respond. He was wondering at Pendergast's
enigmatic words.

"I've arranged for all who might be likely targets of Diogenes
to go to ground. That is phase one. And this brings us to phase
two: stopping Diogenes. My initial plan failed utterly. It has
been said: 'When you lose, don't lose the lesson.' The lesson
here is that I cannot defeat my brother alone. I assumed that I
knew him best, that I could predict his next move, that with
enough evidence I could stop him myself. I've been proven
wrong-devastatingly so. I need help."

"You've got me."

"Yes, and I'm grateful. But I was referring to another kind of
help. Professional help."

"Like what?"

"I'm too close to Diogenes. I'm not objective, and I'm not
calm-especially now. I have learned the hard way that I don't
understand my brother and never have. What I need is an expert
psychological profiler to create a forensic model of my brother.
It will be an extraordinarily difficult task, as he is a
psychologically unique individual."

"I know of several excellent forensic
profilers."

"Not just any will do. I need one who is truly
exceptional." He turned and began scribbling a note. "Go to
the Riverside Drive house and give this to my man Proctor, who
will pass it on to Constance. If this individual exists,
Constance will find him."

D'Agosta took the note, folded it into his
pocket.

"We're almost out of time: two days until January
28."

"Any idea yet what the date could mean?"

"None, except that it will be the climax of my brother's
crime."

"How do you know he isn't lying about the date,
too?"

Pendergast paused. "I don't. But instinct tells me it's real.
And at the moment, that's all I have left:
instinct."

THIRTY-SEVEN

Whit DeWinter III hunched over his fifteen-pound calculus
textbook in the bowels of the Class of 1945 Library at Phillips
Exeter Academy. He was staring at a formula made entirely of
Greek letters, trying to pound it into his muddy brain. The
midterm was in less than an hour and he hadn't even memorized
half the formulas he'd need. He wished to hell he'd studied the
night before instead of staying up so late, smoking weed with his
girlfriend Jennifer. It had seemed like a good idea at the time
... Stupid, so stupid. If he failed this test, his B in calculus
would drop to a C, he'd have to go to UMass instead of Yale, and
that would be it. He'd never get into medical school, he'd never
have a decent job, he'd end up living out his miserable life in a
split-level in Medford with some cow of a wife and a houseful of
squalling brats...

He took a deep breath and dived once again into the tome, only
to have his concentration broken by a raised voice from one of
the nearby carrels. Whit straightened up. He recognized the
voice: it was that sarcastic girl in his English lit class, the
Goth with retro purple hair ... Corrie. Corrie
Swanson.

"What's your problem? Can't you see I'm studying here?" the
voice echoed loudly across the sleek atrium of Academy
Library.

Whit strained and failed to catch the calm, murmured
answer.

"Australia? Are you nuts'?" came the raised reply. "I'm
in the middle of midterms! What're you, some kind of
pervert?"

A couple of shushes came from students studying nearby. Whit
peered above the edge of his carrel, glad for the diversion. He
could see a man in a dark suit leaning over a carrel a few dozen
yards away.

"He told you that? Yeah, right, let's see some
ID."

More murmuring.

"All right, hey, I believe you, and I'm all for a beach
vacation. But right now? You've got to be
kidding."

More talk. More shushes.

"Okay, okay. All I can say is, if I fail biology, it'll
be Pendergast's fault."

He heard a chair scraping and saw Corrie Swanson rise from the
carrel and follow the man in the suit. He looked like Secret
Service, all buttoned down, square jaw, dark glasses. He wondered
what kind of trouble Corrie was in now.

Whit watched her pass, her trim behind twitching invitingly in
a slinky black dress with pieces of metal jingling from it, her
purple hair falling in a thick cascade down her back, grading
almost to black at the ends. Damn, she was cute, just as long as
he didn't try to take her home to Father. The old man would kill
him for dating a girl like that.

Whit turned his throbbing eyeballs back to the formula for
finding the radius of curvature for a function of two variables,
but it remained all Greek to him. Literally. The damn formula had
so many squiggly letters it could be the first line of the
Iliad, for all he knew.

He groaned again. His life was about to end. And all because
of Jennifer and her magic bong...

A light snow had fallen on the white clapboard house that
stood on the corner of Church Street and Sycamore Terrace in the
quiet Cleveland suburb of River Pointe. The whitened streets were
broad and silent, the streetlights casting pools of yellow light
across thenocturnal landscape. The distant whistle of a train
added a melancholy note to the silent
neighborhood.

A shadow moved behind a shuttered window in a second-story
gable-a figure in a wheelchair-barely outlined in the soft blue
light that emanated from the depths of the room. Back and forth
the figure went in silent pantomime, busy at some unknown task.
Inside the room, metal racks stood from floor to ceiling, packed
with electronic equipment: monitors, CPUs, printers, terabytes of
hard drives, units for the remote seizure of computer screen
images, cellular telephone scanner-interceptors, wireless
routers, NAS devices, and Internet port sniffers. The room
smelled of hot electronics and menthol.

The figure rolled this way and that, a single withered hand
tapping keyboards, pressing buttons, turning dials, and punching
keypads. Slowly, one by one, the units were being powered down,
shut off, closed out. One by one, the lights went off, LAN and
broadband connections were cut, screens went dark, hard drives
spun down, LEDs winked out. The man known in the underground
hacking community by the single name of Mime was shutting himself
off from the world.

The last light to go off-a large blue flat-panel LCD-plunged
the room into darkness.

Mime rested when he was finished, breathing in the
unaccustomed darkness. He was now completely cut off from the
outside world. He knew that, blacked out like this, he could not
be found. Still, the information that had reached him from the
man known as Pendergast, one of only two people in the world he
trusted implicitly, made him uneasy.

Mime had not been cut off in many years from the vast torrents
of data that washed over his house like an invisible ocean. It
was a cold, lonely feeling.

He sat brooding. In a minute, he would turn to an entirely new
set of controls, and new lights would come on in the room: the
lights from a battery of video camera monitors and security
readouts from a surveillance system set up around and within his
house. It was a protective measure that had been installed years
before, but that had never been needed. Until now.

Mime breathed in the darkness, and-for the first time in his
life-he was afraid.

Proctor carefully locked the door to the great shuttered
mansion at 891 Riverside Drive, looked around, then slipped into
the waiting Hummer. The building was shut up tightly, every
potential breach or entry point carefully sealed. Constance was
still within, hiding in the secret spaces that had shielded her
in the past, spaces that not even he-not even Pendergast-knew
about. She had supplies, an emergency cell phone, medication:
everything she needed.

Proctor accelerated from the curb, easing the enormous armored
vehicle around the corner, moving south on Riverside Drive. Out
of habit, he glanced in his rearview mirror to see if he was
being followed. There was no evidence of it, but-as Proctor well
knew- the lack of evidence of being followed was not evidence of
a lack of being followed.

At the corner of 95th and Riverside, he slowed as he
approached an overflowing public trash receptacle; as he passed,
he tossed into it a sack of greasy, congealed McDonald's french
fries almost completely coated with solidified ketchup. Then he
accelerated onto the on-ramp to the West Side Highway, where he
headed north, keeping to the speed limit and checking his mirrors
frequently. He continued up through Riverdale and Yonkers to the
Saw Mill River Parkway, then the Taconic, then I-90, and then
I-87 and the Northway. He would drive all night and much of the
next morning, until he reached a certain small cabin on a certain
small lake twenty-odd miles north of St. Amand l'Eglise,
Quebec.

He glanced to his right, where an AR-15 lay on the seat, fully
loaded with 5.56mm NATO rounds. Proctor almost hoped he was being
followed. He'd like nothing more than to teach the fellow a
lesson he'd never forget as long as he lived-which in any case
would not be long, not long at all.

As the sky paled and a dirty dawn broke across the Hudson
River, and a freezing wind whipped scraps of newspaper down the
empty streets, a lone derelict, shuffling along Riverside Drive,
paused at an overflowing garbage can and began rummaging about.
With a grunt of satisfaction, he extracted a bag of half-frozen
McDonald's french fries. As he stuffed them greedily into his
mouth, his left hand deftly pocketed a small piece of paper
hidden in the bottom of the bag, a paper with a few lines written
in a beautiful, old-fashioned script:

There is only one man in the world who meets your particular
requirements:

Eli Glinn of Effective Engineering Solutions

Little West 12th Street, Greenwich Village, New
York

THIRTY-EIGHT

A brilliant moon, huge and intensely white, seemed to gild the
vast expanse of sea far, far below. Looking out her window, Viola
Maskelene could see a long white wake like a pencil laid across
the burnished water, at the head of which was an enormous ocean
liner, looking like a toy boat from 33,000 feet. It was the
Queen Mary, she thought, on its way to New York from
Southampton.

She gazed at it, feeling the enchantment of it, imagining the
thousands of people below on that great ship in the middle of the
ocean, eating, drinking, dancing, making love-an entire world on
a ship so small it seemed she could hold it in her hand. She
watched until it vanished on the far horizon. Funny how she'd
flown at least a thousand times and still it was such an exciting
experience for her. She glanced at the man across the aisle,
dozing over his copy of the Financial Times, having never
once looked out the window. That was something she couldn't
understand.

She settled back in her seat, wondering how to amuse herself
next. This was the second leg of her journey from Italy, having
changed planes in London, and she'd already read her book and
flipped through the trashy in-flight magazine. The first-class
cabin was almost empty, and as it was almost 2 A.M. London time,
what few passengers shared the cabin were asleep. She had the
flight attendant to herself. She caught the woman's
eye.

"Can I be of assistance, Lady Maskelene?"

She winced at the use of her title. How in the world did they
all seem to know? "Champagne. And if you don't mind, please don't
call me Lady Maskelene. It makes me feel like an old bag. Call me
Viola instead."

"My apologies. I'll bring the champagne right
away."

"Thanks ever so."

While Viola waited, she rummaged in her purse and withdrew the
letter she had received at her house on the Italian island of
Capraia three days before. It already showed signs of being
opened and closed one too many times, but she read it again,
anyway.

My dear Viola,

This letter will no doubt come as a shock to you, and for that
I'm sorry. I find myself in the same position as Mark Twain in
having to announce that the reports of my death are much
exaggerated. I am alive and well, but I was forced to go
underground due to an exceptionally delicate case I have been
working on. That, combined with certain recent events in Tuscany
with which you are no doubt acquainted, created the unfortunate
impression among my friends and colleagues that I was dead. For a
time, it was useful for me not to correct that impression. But I
am alive, Viola-though I experienced a situation that put
me as close to death as a human being can get.

That terrible experience is the reason for this letter. I
realized during those dreadful hours of near-death how short life
is, how fragile, and how we must none of us let slip those rare
opportunities for happiness. When we met by chance on Capraia
scant hours before that experience began, I was taken by
surprise-and so, if you'll pardon my saying so, were you.
Something happened between us. You made an indelible impression
on me, and I entertain hopes that I made a not dissimilar
impression on you. I would therefore like to invite you to stay
with me in New York forten days, so that we may get to know each
other better. To see, in effect, if indeed that impression is as
indelible, and as favorable, as I strongly believe it to
be.

At this, Viola had to smile; the old-fashioned, somewhat
awkward wording was so like Pendergast that she could almost hear
his voice. But the fact was, this was an extraordinary
letter, unlike any she had ever received. Viola had been
approached by many different men in many different ways, but
never quite like this. Something happened between us. It
was true. Even so, most women would be surprised and even shocked
to receive an invitation like this. Somehow, even on one meeting,
Aloysius already knew her well enough to understand that such a
letter would not displease her. On the contrary...

She returned her attention to the letter.

If you accept this admittedly unconventional invitation,
please arrange to be on the January 27 British Airways Flight 822
from Gatwick to Kennedy. Do not tell anyone why you are
coming. I will explain when you get here; suffice to say
that, if word of your visit got out, it could even now endanger
my life.

When you arrive at Kennedy, my dear brother, Diogenes, will
meet you at the luggage carousel.

Diogenes. She found herself smiling, remembering how
Aloysius had said on Capraia that eccentric names ran in his
family. He wasn't kidding-who would ever name their child
Diogenes?

You will recognize him instantly because of his strong
resemblance to me-except that he sports a neatly trimmed beard.
What is most striking about him is that, due to a childhood
accident, he has eyes of two different colors: one hazel, the
other a milky blue. He will carry no sign and he, of course, does
not know what you look like, so you will have to find him
yourself. I wouldn't trust you with anyone less than my brother,
who is utterly discreet.

Diogenes will escort you to my cottage out on Long Island, in
a little town on Gardiners Bay, where I will be waiting for you.
This will allow us several days in each other's company. The
cottage is well equipped but rustic, with a splendid view of
Shelter Island across the bay. You will naturally have your own
chambers, and we will comport ourselves with propriety-unless, of
course, circumstances dictate otherwise.

At this, Viola giggled out loud. He was so old-fashioned, and
yet here he was, basically propositioning her in a way that
wasn't even subtle-but managing to do it tastefully, with the
driest sense of humor.

In three days following your arrival, the case I've been
involved in will conclude. We will then emerge and I will once
again show myself to the living, with (I trust) you on my arm. We
will proceed to enjoy a splendid week of theater, music, art, and
culinary exploration in New York City before your return to
Capraia.

Viola, I beg you again, tell no one of this. Please give me
your answer by old-fashioned telegram to the following
address:

A. Pendleton

15 Glover's Box Road

The Springs, NY 10511

and sign it, "Anna Livia Plurabelle."

You will make me very happy if you accept my invitation. I
know I am not very clever with sentiment and flowery
phraseology-that is not my way. I will save further
demonstrations of affection for when we meet in
person.

Sincerely,

Aloysius

Again, Viola had to smile. She could almost hear Pendergast,
with his elegant but rather severe air, speaking the sentences.
Anna Livia Plurabelle, indeed; nice to know that Pendergast
wasn't above tossing in a witty literary allusion, and an
esoteric, highbrow one at that. How appealing he was; she fairly
tingled with the thought of seeing him again. And the faint whiff
of danger he alluded to in the letter simply added spice to the
adventure. Once again, she couldn't help but reflect on how odd
it was she seemed to know him so well after spending only that
one afternoon together. She had never before believed in that
nonsense about soulmates, about love at first sight, about
matches made in heaven. But somehow...

She folded up the letter and took out the second one. It was a
telegram, and it read simply:

Delighted you are coining! Confirmed my brother will meet you.
I know I can trust you to be discreet. Fondly,
A.X.L.P.

She carefully put both letters back into her handbag and
sipped the champagne, her mind drifting back to that meeting on
Capraia. She remembered how she had been digging manure into her
vineyard when she saw a man in a black suit approaching, picking
his way gingerly among the clods, accompanied by an American
policeman in mufti. It was such an odd sight it had almost made
her laugh. They had called out to her, thinking she was a peasant
laborer. And then they'd drawn closer and she had looked at
Pendergast's strange and beautiful face for the first time.
Nothing like that sudden, queer feeling had happened to her
before. She could read the same experience in his face, despite
his efforts to conceal it. It had been a short visit- an hour's
talk over glasses of white wine on her terrace overlooking the
sea-and yet her mind had returned again and again to that
afternoon, as if something momentous had happened.

Then there was that second visit-by D'Agosta alone, his face
wan and troubled, and his terrible news of Pendergast's death. It
wasn't until that awful moment that she had realized just how
much she'd looked forward to seeing Agent Pendergast again-and
how certain she had somehow been that he would figure in the rest
of her life.

How dreadful that day had been. And how joyful things had
become, now that she'd received his letter.

She smiled, thinking about seeing him again. She loved
intrigue. She had never shied away from anything life had thrown
at her. Her impulsiveness had gotten her into trouble on
occasion, but it had also given her a colorful and fascinating
life she wouldn't trade for anything. This mysterious invitation
was like something out of the romance novels she used to devour
in her early teen years. A weekend in a cottage hidden away on
Long Island, with a man who fascinated her like no other,
followed by a whirlwind week in New York City. How could she
refuse? She certainly didn't have to sleep with him- he was the
very soul of a gentleman-although just the thought brought an
electric tingle that caused her to blush...

She finished off the champagne, which was excellent, as it
always was in first class. She sometimes felt guilty about flying
first class- it seemed elitist-but on a transatlantic flight, it
was so much more comfortable. Viola was used to discomfort from
her many years digging up tombs in Egypt, but she had never seen
any sense in being uncomfortable for its own sake.

She checked her watch. She'd be landing at Kennedy in just
over four hours.

It would certainly be interesting to meet this brother of
Pendergast's-this Diogenes. You could tell a lot about a person
by meeting his brother.

THIRTY-NINE

D'Agosta followed Pendergast's downtrodden form as the agent
shambled around the corner of Ninth Avenue onto Little West 12th
Street. It was nine o'clock in the evening and a bitter wind was
blowing hard off the Hudson River. The old meatpacking
district-sandwiched into a narrow corridor south of Chelsea and
north of Greenwich Village-had changed in the years D'Agosta was
away. Now hip restaurants, boutiques, and technology start-ups
were sprinkled among the wholesale meat distributors and
commercial butcheries. It seemed like a hell of a place for a
forensic profiler to hang up his shingle.

Halfway down the block, Pendergast halted before a large
twelve-story warehouse that had seen better days. The steel-mesh
windows were opaque with age, and the lower stories were caked
with soot. There was no sign of any kind, no name, nothing to
announce the existence of any firm within beyond a weathered sign
painted directly onto the old brick which read Price
Price Pork Packing Inc. Below that was an oversize entrance
for truck deliveries, closed and barred, and a smaller door
beside it with an unlabeled buzzer. Pendergast's finger went up
to it and gave it a jab.

"Yes?" a voice asked immediately from the adjoining speaker
grille.

Pendergast murmured something and there was the sound of an
electronic lock disengaging. The door opened into a small white
space, empty save for a tiny camera mounted high on the rear
wall. The door closed behind them with a faint click. They stood
there, facing the camera, for thirty seconds. Then an almost
invisible door in the rear wall slid back. Pendergast and
D'Agosta walked down a white corridor, then stepped into a dim
room-an amazing room.

The lower floors of the warehouse had been gutted, leaving a
large, six-story shell. Ahead, the sprawling main floor was a
maze of display tables, hulking scientific equipment, computer
workstations, and intricate models and dioramas, all cloaked in
shadow. D'Agosta's attention was drawn to a gigantic table
displaying what appeared to be a model of the ocean floor
somewhere around Antarctica, cut away to show sub-seafloor
geology, along with what looked like a strange volcano of some
kind. There were other intricate models, including one of a ship
packed with mysterious-looking ROVs, scientific equipment, and
military hardware.

A voice sounded from the shadows. "Welcome."

D'Agosta turned into the dimness and saw a figure in a
wheelchair approaching between two rows of long tables: a man
with closely cropped brown hair and thin lips set above a square
jaw. He wore an unassuming but well-cut suit and controlled the
wheelchair with a small joystick operated by a black-gloved hand.
D'Agosta realized that one of the man's eyes must be glass,
because it conveyed none of the fierce gleam of its mate. A
purple scar ran down the right side of his face, from hairline to
jaw, giving the illusion of a dueling wound.

"I am Eli Glinn," he said, his voice low, mild, and neutral.
"You must be Lieutenant D'Agosta and Special Agent Pendergast."
He stopped the wheelchair and extended his hand. "Welcome to
Effective Engineering Solutions."

They followed him back between the tables and past a small
greenhouse, its grow-lamps flickering eerily, then got into an
elevator cage that took them up to a fourth-floor catwalk. As he
followed the wheelchair down the catwalk, D'Agosta felt a twinge
of doubt. Effective Engineering Solutions? Mr.-not Dr.-Eli Glinn?
He wondered if, despite her vaunted research skills, Constance
Greene had made a mistake. This didn't look like any forensic
profiling consultant he had ever seen before-and he had dealt
with quite a few.

Glinn glanced back, ran his good eye over D'Agosta's uniform.
"You might as well turn off your radio and cell phone,
Lieutenant. We block all wireless signals and radio frequencies
in this building."

He led the way into a small conference room decorated in
polished wood, dosed the door, then gestured for them to be
seated. He wheeled himself to the far side of the lone table,
where a gap between the charcoal-colored Herman Miller chairs was
clearly reserved for him. A thin envelope lay on the table before
him; otherwise, the spotless table was empty. Leaning back in the
wheelchair, he fixed them both with a penetrating
gaze.

"Yours is an unusual request," he said.

"Mine is an unusual problem," Pendergast
replied.

Glinn eyed him up and down. "That is a rather effective
disguise, Mr. Pendergast."

"Indeed."

Glinn folded his hands. "Tell me the nature of your
problem."

Pendergast glanced around. "Tell me the nature of your
company. I ask because all this"-he gestured-"does not look like
the office of a forensic profiler."

A slow, mirthless smile stretched the features of the man's
face, distorting and inflaming the scar. "A fair question.
Effective Engineering Solutions is in the business of solving
unique engineering problems and performing failure
analysis."

"What kind of engineering problems?" Pendergast
asked.

"How to neutralize an underground nuclear reactor in a certain
rogue Middle Eastern state being used to produce weapons-grade
fuel. The analysis of the mysterious and sudden loss of a
billion-dollar classified satellite." He twitched a finger, a
small gesture that carried surprising weight, so motionless had
the man been up to that point. "You'll understand if I don't go
into details. You see, Mr. Pendergast, 'failure analysis' is the
other side of the engineering coin: it is the art of
understanding how things fail, and thus preventing failure before
it happens. Or finding out why failure occurred after it
happens. Sadly, the latter is more common than the
former."

D'Agosta spoke. "I still don't get it. What does failure
analysis have to do with forensic profiling?"

"I'm getting to that, Lieutenant. Failure analysis begins and
ends with psychological profiling. EES realized long ago that the
key to understanding failure was understanding exactly how human
beings make mistakes. Which is the same as understanding how
human beings make decisions in general. We needed predictive
power-a way to predict how a given person would act in a
given situation. We therefore developed a muscular proprietary
system for psychological profiling. It currently runs on a
grid-powered supercomputer of IBM eServer nodes. We do
psychological profiling better than anyone else in the world. And
I do not tell you this by way of salesmanship. It's a simple
fact."

Pendergast inclined his head. "Most interesting. How is it I
have never heard of you?"

"We do not generally wish to be known-beyond, that is, a small
circle of clients."

"Before we begin, I must be assured of
discretion."

"Mr. Pendergast, EES makes two guarantees. First, utter
discretion. Second, guaranteed success. Now, please tell me your
problem."

"The target is a man named Diogenes Pendergast-my brother. He
disappeared over two decades ago, after contriving to stage his
own false death. He seems to have vanished off the face of the
earth-at least officially. He's not in any government databases,
beyond a death certificate which I know to be forged. There are
no adult records of him at all. No address, no photos, nothing."
He removed a thick manila folder from his coat and placed it on
the table. "Everything I know is in here."

"How do you know he's still alive?"

"We had a curious encounter last summer. It's in the report.
That, and the fact he has turned into a serial
killer."

Glinn gave a slow nod.

"From a young age, Diogenes hated me, and he's made it his
life's work to destroy me. On January 19 of this year, he finally
put his plan into action. He has begun murdering my friends and
associates, one by one, and taunting me with my inability to save
them. He's killed four so far. For the last two, he's mocked me
with notes ahead of time, naming the victim-the first time
correctly, and the second time as a ruse to make me protect the
wrong person. In short, I have utterly failed to stop him. He
claims to be targeting Lieutenant D'Agosta here next. Again, the
summaries of the homicides are in that folder."

D'Agosta saw Glinn's good eye gleam with new interest. "How
intelligent is this Diogenes?"

"As a child, his I.Q. was tested at 210. That was,
incidentally, after he had scarlet fever, which altered him
permanently."

Glinn raised an eyebrow. "Are we dealing with organic brain
damage?"

"Not likely. He was strange before the fever. The illness
seems to have focused it, brought it to the fore."

"And this is why you need me. You need a complete
psychological, criminal, and behavioral analysis of this man.
Naturally, because you are his brother, you are too close to
him-you cannot do it yourself."

"Correct. Diogenes has had years to plan this. He's been three
steps ahead of me all the way. He leaves no clues at his crime
scenes-none that are unintentional at least. The only way to stop
him is to anticipate what he'll do next. I must stress this is an
emergency situation. Diogenes has threatened to complete his
crime tomorrow, January 28. He named this day as the culmination
of all his planning. There is no telling how many more lives are
in jeopardy."

Glinn opened the folder with his good hand and began leafing
through it, scanning the pages. "I cannot produce a profile in
twenty-four hours."

"You must."

"It's impossible. The earliest I can do it-assuming I drop all
other work and focus solely on this-is seventy-two hours from
now. You have come to me too late, Mr. Pendergast. At least too
late for the date your brother named. Not too late, perhaps, to
take effective action afterwards." He gave his head a curious
tilt as he eyed Pendergast.

The agent was very still for a moment. "So be it, then," he
said in a low voice.

"Let's not waste any more time." Glinn put a hand on the
folder before him and slid it across the table. "Here is our
standard contract. My fee is one million dollars."

D'Agosta rose from his chair. "A million bucks? Are you
crazy!"

Pendergast stilled him with a wave of his hand. "Accepted." He
took the folder, opened it, scanned the contract
rapidly.

"At the back," said Glinn, "you'll find our standard
disclaimers and warranties. We offer an absolute, unconditional
guarantee of success."

"This is the second time you've mentioned that curious
guarantee. How do you define 'success,' Mr.
Glinn?"

Another ghostly smile lingered on Glinn's face. "Naturally, we
cannot guarantee that you will apprehend Diogenes. Nor can we
guarantee to stop him from killing. That lies in your hands.
Here's what we do guarantee. First: we will give you a forensic
profile of Diogenes Pendergast that will accurately elucidate his
motive."

"I already know his motive."

Glinn ignored this. "Second: our forensic profile will have
predictive power. It will tell you, within a limited range
of options, what Diogenes Pendergast's next actions will be. We
offer follow-up services- if you have specific questions about
the target's future actions, we will run them through our system
and provide you with reliable answers."

"I question whether that's possible with any human being, let
alone someone like Diogenes."

"I do not wish to bandy philosophical questions with you, Mr.
Pendergast. Human beings are disgustingly predictable, and this
is as true of psychopaths as it is of grandmothers. We shall do
what we say."

"Have you ever failed?"

"Never. There is one assignment that remains-shall we say-
open."

"The one involving the thermonuclear device?"

If Glinn was surprised by this question, he did not show it.
"What thermonuclear device is that?"

"The one you are designing downstairs. I saw several equations
on a whiteboard relating to the curve of binding energy. On a
nearby table lay a paper with the design for machining a piece of
H.E. that could only be used to compress a core."

"I shall have to speak to my chief engineer about his
carelessness with regard to our other project."

"I also see you're developing a genetically engineered plant
mosaic virus. Does that also relate to that other
project?"

"We offer the same guarantee of confidentiality to our other
clients that we offer you. Shall we return to the subject of
Diogenes? In particular, the question of his
motive."

"Not quite yet," said Pendergast. "I do not speak frivolously.
Your entire manner-your speech, your movements, your very
intensity, Mr. Glinn-speaks of someone with an overriding
obsession. I have also noted that, at least if the scar on your
face is an indication, your injuries are recent. When I weigh
that with what I saw downstairs, I find myself growing
concerned."

Glinn raised his eyebrows. "Concerned?"

"Concerned that a man such as you, wrestling with a problem
far greater than my own, wouldn't be able to devote his full
attention to mine."

Glinn remained very still, not answering. Pendergast looked
across the table at him, equally motionless.

A minute went by, then two, without either man speaking.
Watching, waiting, D'Agosta grew increasingly alarmed. It was as
if the two men were fighting a duel, waging a battle of turn and
counterturn, all without speaking or even moving.

Suddenly, without preamble, Glinn began to speak again in the
same calm, neutral voice. "If you ever decide to leave the FBI,
Mr. Pendergast, I believe I could find a place for you here.
There is no obsession on my part, however-only the simple
fulfillment of our guarantee of success. You see, we don't make
that guarantee just for our clients: we make it for ourselves. I
intend to complete that other project successfully, although the
original client is no longer in a condition to appreciate it.
That project involves a severe seismic dislocation at a certain
site in the South Atlantic that requires a, ah, nuclear
adjustment. And that is more than you need to know. It is true
that I am taking on your little problem chiefly because I find
myself embarrassed for funds. However, I will devote all my
energy to seeing your project through, because to fail would
mean having to return your money and to suffer personal
humiliation. And, as I said, EES does not fail. Clear
enough?"

Pendergast nodded.

"And now, let us return to your brother's motive-the
fountain-head of his hatred. Something happened between you and
him, and I must know what it is."

"It's all described in that folder. He always hated me. The
final straw was when I burned my brother's
journals."

"Tell me about it."

"I was fourteen, and he was twelve. We had never gotten along.
He was always cruel and strange-much more so after the scarlet
fever."

"When was that?"

"When he was seven."

"Are there any medical records?"

"None. He was treated by the private family
physician."

"Proceed."

"One day I came across his journals, which were filled with
the most vile things ever put on paper-abominations beyond the
reach of any normal mind. He'd been keeping them for years. I
burned them-and that was the precipitant. Some years later, our
home burned, and our parents died in the fire. I was away at
school, but Diogenes saw it all, heard their cries for help. That
drove him over the edge."

A cold smile played at the corners of Glinn's lips. "I think
not."

"You think not?"

"I have no doubt that he was jealous of you and that the
destruction of his journals infuriated him. But that happened far
too late to produce such a deep, pathological, obsessive hatred.
Nor can a mere bout with scarlet fever create hatred out of thin
air. No, Mr. Pendergast: this hatred stems from something
else that happened between you and your brother at a much
earlier age. That is the information we lack. And you are
the only person who can supply it."

"Everything of relevance that happened between me and my
brother is in that file, including our recent encounter in Italy.
I can assure you there is no single incident, no smoking gun,
which explains his hatred."

Glinn picked up the file, leafed through it. Three minutes
passed, then five. Then Glinn put the folder down. "You're right.
There is no smoking gun here."

"Just as I said."

"It's quite possible you've repressed it."

"I repress nothing. I have an exceptional memory going back to
before my first birthday."

"Then you are deliberately withholding
something."

Pendergast went very still. D'Agosta watched the two men,
surprised. He had never seen anyone challenge Pendergast in quite
this way before.

As he eyed Pendergast, Glinn had become, if possible, even
more expressionless. "We can't proceed without this information.
I need it, and I need it now." He glanced at his watch. "I'm
going to call in several of my trusted associates. They'll be
here within the hour. Mr. Pendergast, there's a small room with a
bed behind that door in the back; please make yourself
comfortable and await further instructions. Lieutenant, your
presence here is no longer required."

D'Agosta looked at Pendergast. For the first time in his
memory, the agent's face wore a look of something like
apprehension.

"I'm not going anywhere," D'Agosta said immediately, irritated
at Glinn's arrogance.

Pendergast smiled thinly, shook his head. "It's all right,
Vincent- much as I loathe the idea of rummaging around in my past
for something that probably doesn't exist, I see the necessity
for doing so. I will meet you back at our prearranged
place."

"Are you sure?"

Pendergast nodded. "And never forget: you are the one named
next by Diogenes. January 28 is less than three hours away.
Vincent: be transcendentally cautious."

FORTY

Laura Hayward paced the small room like a caged lioness,
glancing frequently at the ugly clock behind her desk. She felt
that, if she didn't work off her nervous energy, she would
explode. And since she couldn't leave her office, she
paced.

She had spent almost the entire evening organizing the
evidence from the Duchamp and Green killings, and cross-comparing
it to evidence she had cajoled, pried, and bludgeoned out of the
New Orleans and D.C. police departments. She had cleared her cork
wall of all other cases and had divided it into four cantons, one
for each homicide: Professor Torrance Hamilton on January 19;
Charles Duchamp on January 22; Special Agent Michael Decker on
January 23; and Dr. Margo Green on January 26. There were
micrographs of fibers and hair, photographs of knots and
footprints, abstracts of the M.E. reports, blood splatter
analyses, photographs of the murder scenes and weapons,
fingerprint reports, diagrams showing ingress and egress where
determined, along with an embarrassment of other evidence,
relevant or not. Pushpins with colored strings drew red, yellow,
green, and blue connections among the evidence. And there were a
surprising number of connections: while the M.O.'s were all quite
different, there was no doubt in Hayward's mind the same person
had committed all four homicides.

No doubt.

Sitting on the middle of her desk was a thin report, just in,
from the top guy in the forensic profiling division. He had
confirmed that the homicides were psychologically consistent and
could have been committed by the same perp. What's more, he had
prepared a profile of the killer. It was startling, to say the
least.

D.C. and New Orleans didn't know it yet; the FBI didn't know
it yet; not even Singleton or Rocker knew it yet: but they were
dealing with a serial killer. A meticulous, intelligent,
methodical, cool, and utterly insane serial
killer.

She spun, strode, spun again. As soon as she showed Rocker
that she'd connected the cases, the shit would hit the fan. The
FBI, already involved because of Decker's murder, would descend
like a ton of bricks. There would be an earthquake of
publicity-serial killers always garnered big headlines. But a
serial killer like this was totally unheard of. She could
almost see the screaming 72-point headline in the Post.
The mayor would get involved, maybe even the governor. It was
going to be a mess. A god-awful mess.

But she couldn't call Rocker until she had the last piece of
evidence, the last piece of the puzzle. The smoking gun. She was
going to get raked over the coals, no matter what. The political
fallout would be terrible. It was important she had all her ducks
in a row- that was the only thing that could save her
ass.

A timid rap came on the door, and she halted midstride. "Come
in," she said.

A man holding a manila envelope poked his head
in.

"Where've you been? I was supposed to have this report two
hours ago!"

"I'm sorry," the man stammered, taking a few tentative steps
inside the office. "As I explained on the phone, we had to run
the match three times because-"

"Never mind. Just give me the report, please."

He held it out from a distance, almost as if fearful of being
bitten.

"You got a DNA match?" she asked, taking the
report.

"Yes. A pair of beautiful matches, blood from the box cutter
and the spot on the floor. Both from the same individual, not the
victim. But here's the problem: the DNA wasn't in any of the FBI
criminal or juvenile databases, so we did like you asked and ran
it against all the DNA databases. When we finally did get a
match, it was in a federal database, and we had a major problem
because of confidentiality issues and ... well..." He
hesitated.

"Go on," Hayward said as gently as she could.

"The reason I had to run the program three times was to be
absolutely sure about this match. This is explosive stuff,
Captain. We can't afford to be wrong."

"And?" Hayward could hardly breathe.

"You aren't going to believe this. The DNA matched one of the
Bureau's top agents."

Hayward breathed out. "I believe it. God help us, I believe
it."

FORTY-ONE

ELI Glinn waited in his small private office on the fourth
floor of the Effective Engineering Solutions building. It was a
sober room, containing only a table, several computers, a small
bookshelf, and a clock. The walls were painted gray, and there
was nothing of a personal nature in the office, save for a small
photograph of a stately blonde woman wearing the uniform of a
ship's captain, waving from what appeared to be the bridge of a
tanker. A line from a W. H. Auden poem was handwritten
beneath.

The office lights had been turned off, and the only
illumination came from a large flat-panel monitor, which carried
a high-definition digital feed from an office in the basement of
the EES building. The video feed showed two people: the subject,
Pendergast, with EES's psychological specialist, Rolf Krasner,
who was preparing the subject for questioning.

Glinn observed the slender figure of Pendergast with interest.
The man's insight into Glinn's own psychology, his extraordinary
ability to pick out and interpret a few details scattered about a
room which itself was a very morass of detail, had nearly
unnerved Glinn-and, in a curious way, deeply impressed
him.

While still watching the proceedings on the monitor, the audio
turned off, he turned again to the folder Pendergast had given
him.

Although unimportant in the larger scheme of things,
Pendergast's case was not without its points. For example, there
was the near mythical Cain and Abel relationship between these
two extraordinary brothers. For Pendergast was
extraordinary-Glinn had never before met a man whose intellect he
could respect as equal to his own. Glinn had always felt somewhat
alienated from the mass of humanity-and yet here was a man he
could, in the revolting parlance of the present age,
identify with. That Pendergast's brother appeared to be
even more intelligent, and yet utterly malevolent, Glinn found
even more intriguing. This was a man so consumed by hatred that
he had devoted his life to the object of his hatred, not unlike a
man under the spell of obsessive love. Whatever lay at the bottom
of that hatred was something perhaps unique in human
experience.

Glinn glanced back at the monitor. The chitchat was over and
Rolf Krasner was getting down to business. The EES psychologist
combined a disarmingly friendly air with consummate
professionalism. You could hardly believe that this cheerful,
round-faced, unassuming man with the Viennese accent could be
considered a threat. Indeed, at first glance, he seemed about the
most unthreatening personality imaginable-until you saw him in
action. Glinn knew just how effective that Jekyll and Hyde
strategy could be with an unsuspecting subject.

On the other hand, Krasner had never had a subject like this
one.

Glinn leaned over and switched on the audio
feed.

"Mr. Pendergast," Krasner was saying cheerily, "is there
anything I can get you before we begin? Water? A soft drink? A
double martini?" A chuckle.

"Nothing, thank you."

Pendergast appeared ill at ease, as well he should. EES had
developed three different modes of interrogation, each for a
particular personality type, along with an experimental fourth
mode to be used only on the most difficult, resistant-and
intelligent-subjects. After they had read through Pendergast's
folder and discussed the situation, there was no argument over
which mode would be used. Pendergast would be only the sixth
person to undergo this fourth type of interrogation. It had never
failed.

"We use some of the techniques of good, old-fashioned
psychoanalysis," Krasner said. "And one of them is that we ask
you to lie down on a couch, out of view of the questioner. Would
you please make yourself comfortable?"

The figure lay down on the richly brocaded couch and folded
his white hands on his chest. Except for the ragged clothes, he
looked alarmingly like the corpse at a wake. What a
fascinating creature this man is, Glinn thought as he moved
his wheelchair closer to the monitor.

"Perhaps you recognize the office we're in, Mr. Pendergast?"
Krasner said, bustling about, getting ready.

"I do. Number 19 Berggasse."

"Exactly! Modeled after Freud's own office in Vienna. We even
managed to acquire some of his African carvings. And that Persian
carpet in the center also belonged to him. Freud called his
office gemütlich, which is an almost untranslatable
German word meaning agreeable, comfortable, cozy, friendly-and
that is the atmosphere we have strived to create. Do you speak
German, Mr. Pendergast?"

"German is not one of my languages, much to my regret. I
should have liked to read Goethe's Faust in the
original."

"A marvelous work, vigorous and yet poetic." Krasner took a
seat on a wooden stool out of Pendergast's view.

"Do you employ the free-association methods of
psychoanalysis?" Pendergast asked dryly.

"Oh, no! We've developed a technique all our own. It's very
straightforward, actually-no tricks, no dream interpretations.
The only thing Freudian about our technique is the office decor."
He chuckled again.

Glinn found himself smiling. The fourth interrogation mode
used tricks-they all did-but, of course, the subject wasn't
supposed to see them. Indeed, this fourth mode seemed like pure
simplicity itself ... on the surface. Highly intelligent people
could be fooled, but only with the greatest of care and
subtlety.

"I'm going to help you through some simple visualization
techniques, which will also involve questioning. It's simple and
there is no hypnosis involved. It's just a way to induce a calm
and focused mind, receptive to questioning. Does that suit you,
Aloysius? May I call you by your first name?"

"You may, and I am at your disposal, Dr. Krasner. I am only
concerned that I may not be able to give you the information you
desire, because I do not believe it exists."

"Do not concern yourself with that. Simply relax, follow my
instructions, and answer the questions as best you
can."

Relax. Glinn knew this was about the last thing
Pendergast would be able to do, once Krasner got
started.

"Wonderful. Now I'm going to turn down the lights. I will also
ask you to close your eyes."

"As you wish."

The lights dimmed to a faint diffuse glow.

"Now we will allow three minutes to pass in silence," said
Krasner.

The minutes crawled by.

"Let us begin." Krasner's voice had taken on a hushed, velvety
tone. Another long silence, and then he resumed.

"Breathe in slowly. Hold it. Now let it out even more slowly.
Again. Breathe in, hold, breathe out. Relax. Very good. Now, I
want you to imagine you are at your favorite place in all the
world. The place where you feel most at home, most comfortable.
Take a minute to place yourself there. Now turn around, examine
your surroundings. Sample the air. Take in the scents, the
sounds. Now, tell me: What do you see?"

A momentary silence. Glinn leaned still closer to the
monitor.

"I am on a vast green lawn at the edge of an ancient beechwood
forest. There is a summerhouse at the far end of the lawn. There
are gardens and a millhouse to the west, where a brook flows. The
lawn sweeps up to a stone mansion, shaded by
elms."

"What is this place?"

"Ravenscry. The estate of my Great-Aunt
Cornelia."

"And what is the year and season?"

"It is 1972, the ides of August."

"How old are you?"

"Twelve."

"Inhale the air again. What scents can you
smell?"

"Freshly cut grass, with a faint overlay of peonies from the
garden."

"What are the sounds?"

"A whip-poor-will. The rustle of beech leaves. The distant
murmur of water."

"Good. Very good. Now I want you to rise. Rise off the ground,
let yourself float... Look down as you rise. Do you see the lawn,
the house, from above?"

"Yes."

"Now rise further. One hundred feet. Two hundred. Look down
again. What do you see?"

"The great sprawling house, the carriage house, the gardens,
lawns, millhouse, trout hatchery, arboretum, greenhouses, the
beechwood forest, and the drive winding to the stone gates. The
encircling wall."

"And beyond that?"

"The road to Haddam."

"Now. Make it night."

"It is night."

"Make it day."

"It is day."

"Do you understand that you are in control, that all this is
in your head, that none of this is real?"

"Yes."

"During this process, you must always keep that in mind. You
are in control, and none of what is happening is real. It is all
in your mind."

"I understand that."

"Below, on the lawn, put the members of your family. Who are
they? Name them, please."

"My father, Linnaeus. My mother, Isabella. My Great-Aunt
Cornelia. Cyril, the gardener, working to one
side..."

There was a long pause.

"Anyone else?"

"And my brother. Diogenes."

"His age?"

"Ten."

"What are they doing?"

"Standing around just where I put them." The voice sounded dry
and ironic. Glinn could see very well that Pendergast was
maintaining an ironic detachment and would attempt to do so as
long as possible.

"Put them in some kind of typical activity," Krasner went on
smoothly. "What are they doing now?"

"Finishing tea on a blanket spread out on the
lawn."

"Now I want you to drift down. Slowly. Join
them."

"I am there."

"What are you doing, exactly?"

"Tea is over and Great-Aunt Cornelia is passing a plate of
petits fours. She has them brought up from New
Orleans."

"Are they good?"

"Naturally. Great-Aunt Cornelia has the highest standards."
The tone of Pendergast's voice was laden with irony, and Glinn
wondered just who this Great-Aunt Cornelia was. He glanced down
at an abstract attached to Pendergast's file, flipped through it,
and came to the answer of his question. A chill crept up his
spine. He quickly shut the file-right now that was a
distraction.

"What kind of tea did you take?" asked Krasner.

"Great-Aunt Cornelia will only drink T. G. Tips, which she has
sent over from England."

"Now look around the blanket. Look at everyone. Gaze around
until your eyes come to rest on Diogenes."

A long silence.

"What does Diogenes look like?"

"Tall for his age, pale, with very short hair, eyes of two
different colors. He is very thin and his lips are overly
red."

"Those eyes, look into them. Is he looking at
you?"

"No. He has turned his head away. He does not like to be
stared at."

"Keep staring at him. Stare hard."

A longer silence. "I have averted my eyes."

"No. Remember, you control the scene. Keep
staring."

"I don't choose to."

"Speak to your brother. Tell him to rise, that you wish to
speak to him in private."

Another, longer silence. "Done."

"Tell him to come with you to the summerhouse."

"He refuses."

"He cannot refuse. You control him."

Even through the monitor, Glinn could see that a small sheen
of sweat had appeared on Pendergast's brow. It's
beginning, he thought.

"Tell Diogenes that there is a man waiting for him in the
summerhouse who wants to ask you both some questions. A Dr.
Krasner. Tell him that."

"Yes. He will come to see the doctor. He is curious that
way."

"Excuse yourselves and walk to the summerhouse. Where I am
waiting."

"All right."

A brief silence. "Are you there?"

"Yes."

"Good. Now, what do you see?"

"We're inside. My brother is standing here, you're here, I'm
here."

"Good. We shall remain standing. Now, I will ask you and your
brother some questions. You will relay your brother's answers to
my questions, since he cannot speak to me
directly."

"If you insist," said Pendergast, a touch of irony returning
to his voice.

"You control the situation, Aloysius. Diogenes cannot
evade answering, because it is you who is really answering for
him. Are you ready?"

"Yes."

"Tell Diogenes to look at you. To stare at
you."

"He won't."

"Make him. With your mind, make him do
it."

A silence. "All right."

"Diogenes, I am now speaking to you. What is your first memory
of your older brother, Aloysius?"

"He said he remembers me drawing a picture."

"What is the picture?"

"Scribbles."

"How old are you, Diogenes?"

"He says six months."

"Ask Diogenes what he thinks of you."

"He thinks of me as the next Jackson Pollock."

That ironic tone again, thought Glinn. This was one
very resistant client.

"That would not normally be the thought of a six-month-old
baby."

"Diogenes is answering as a ten-year-old, Dr.
Krasner."

"Fine. Ask Diogenes to keep looking at you. What does he
see?"

"He says nothing."

"What do you mean, nothing? He isn't speaking?"

"He spoke. He said the word nothing."

"What do you mean by the word nothing!"

"He says, 'I see nothing that is not there and the nothing
that is.'"

"Excuse me?"

"It's a quotation from Wallace Stevens," said Pendergast
dryly. "Even at ten, Diogenes was partial to
Stevens."

"Diogenes, when you say 'nothing,' does that mean you feel
your brother, Aloysius, is a nonentity?"

"He laughs and says the words are yours, not
his."

"Why?"

"He is laughing harder."

"How long will you be at Ravenscry, Diogenes?"

"He says until he goes back to school."

"And where is that?"

"St. Ignatius Loyola on Lafayette Street, New
Orleans."

"How do you like school, Diogenes?"

"He says he likes it as much as you would like being shut up
in a room with twenty-five mental defectives and a middle-aged
hysteric."

"What is your favorite subject?"

"He says experimental biology ... on the
playground."

"Now I want you, Aloysius, to ask Diogenes three questions,
which he must answer. You must make him answer them. Remember,
you are in control. Are you ready?"

"Yes."

"What is your favorite food, Diogenes?"

"Wormwood and gall."

"I want a straight answer."

"That, Dr. Krasner, is the one thing you will never get from
Diogenes," said Pendergast.

"Remember, Aloysius, that it is you who are actually
answering the questions."

"And with great forbearance, I might add," said Pendergast. "I
am doing all I can to suspend my disbelief."

Glinn leaned back in his wheelchair. This wasn't quite
working. Clients resisted, some with every fiber of their being,
but not quite like this. Irony was the ultimate resistance-he had
never before seen it so skillfully employed. And yet Glinn felt a
shiver of self-recognition: Pendergast was a man who was
hyperaware of himself, unable ever to step outside of himself, to
let go, to lower, even for an instant, the elaborate defensive
mask he had created to place between himself and the
world.

Glinn could understand a man like that.

"All right. Aloysius, you are still in the summerhouse with
Diogenes. Imagine you have a loaded pistol in your
hand."

"Fine."

Glinn sat up, a little startled. Krasner was already moving to
what they termed phase two-and very abruptly. Clearly, he, too,
realized this session needed to be jump-started.

"What kind of pistol is it?"

"It's a gun from my collection, a Signature Grade 1911 .45 ACP
by Hilton Yam."

"Give it to him."

"It would be most unwise to give a pistol to a ten-year-old,
don't you think?" Again, that ironic, amused tone.

"Nevertheless, do it."

"Done."

"Tell him to point the gun at you and pull the
trigger."

"Done."

"What happened?"

"He's laughing uproariously. He didn't pull the
trigger."

"Why not?"

"He says it's too soon."

"Does he intend to kill you?"

"Naturally. But he wants..." His voice trailed
off.

Krasner pounced. "What does he want?"

"To play with me for a while."

"What kind of play?"

"He says he wants to pull off my wings and watch what happens.
I am his ultimate insect."

"Why?"

"I don't know."

"Ask him."

"He's laughing."

"Grab him and demand an answer."

"I would prefer not to touch him."

"Grab him. Get physical. Force him to
answer."

"He's still laughing."

"Hit him."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"Hit him."

"I won't carry on with this charade."

"Take the gun away from him."

"He's dropped the gun, but-"

"Pick it up."

"All right."

"Shoot him. Kill him."

"This is utterly absurd-"

"Kill him. Do it. You've killed before; you know how to do it.
You can and you must do it."

A long silence.

"Did you do it?"

"This is an asinine exercise, Dr. Krasner."

"But you did imagine it. Didn't you? You imagined
killing him."

"I imagined no such thing."

"Yes, you did. You killed him. You imagined it. And now you
are imagining his dead body on the ground. You see it because you
cannot help but see it."

"This is..." Pendergast's voice trailed of.

"You see it, you can't help but see it. Because I am
telling you to, you are seeing it... But wait-he's not yet dead
... He moves, he still lives ... He wants to say something. With
his last dying strength, he beckons you closer, says something to
you. What did he just say?"

A long silence. Then Pendergast answered dryly, "Qualis
artifex pereo."

Glinn winced. He recognized the quotation but could see that
Krasner did not. What should have been a breaking point for
Pendergast had suddenly turned into an intellectual
game.

"What does that mean?"

"It's Latin."

"I repeat: what does it mean?"

"It means 'O, what an artist dies with me!'"

"Why did he say that?"

"Those were Nero's last words. I believe Diogenes was speaking
facetiously."

"You have killed your brother, Aloysius, and now look on his
body."

An irritated sigh.

"This is the second time you have done it."

"The second time?"

"You killed him once before, years ago."

"Pardon me?"

"Yes, you did. You killed whatever goodness was in him; you
left him a hollow shell filled with malice and hatred. You did
something to him that murdered his very soul!"

Despite himself, Glinn found he was holding his breath. The
gentle, soothing tones were long gone: Dr. Krasner had slipped
into phase three, once again with unusual
swiftness.

"I did no such thing. He was born that way, empty and
cruel."

"No. You. killed his goodness! There is no other
possible answer.

Don't you see, Aloysius? The hatred Diogenes feels for you is
mythological in its immensity. It cannot have sprung from
nothing; energy can neither be created nor destroyed. You
created that hatred, you did something to him that struck
out his heart. All these years, you have repressed this terrible
deed. And now you have killed him again, literally as well
as figuratively. What you must face, Aloysius, is that you
are the author of your own fate. You are at fault. You
did it."

Another long silence. Pendergast lay on the couch, unmoving,
his skin gray, waxlike.

"Now Diogenes is rising. He is looking at you again. I want
you to ask him something."

"What?"

"Ask Diogenes what you did to him to make him hate you
so."

"Done."

"His answer?"

"Another laugh. He said, 'I hate you because you are
you.'"

"Ask again."

"He says that is reason enough, that his hatred has nothing to
do with anything I did, it simply exists, like the sun, moon, and
stars."

"No, no, no. What is it that you did, Aloysius?"
Krasner's voice was once again gentle, but it had great urgency.
"Unburden yourself of it. How terrible it must be to carry that
weight on your shoulders. Unburden yourself."

Slowly, Pendergast arose from the couch, swinging his legs
over the side. For a moment, he sat motionless. Then he passed a
hand across his forehead, looked at his watch. "It is midnight.
It is now January 28, and I am out of time. I can't be bothered
with this exercise anymore."

He stood and turned to Dr. Krasner. "I commend you on your
valiant effort, Doctor. Trust me, there's nothing in my past that
would justify Diogenes's conduct. In the course of my career
studying the criminal mind, I have come to realize a simple
truth: some people are born monsters. You can elucidate their
motives and reconstruct their crimes-but you cannot explain the
evil within them."

Krasner looked at him, great sadness in his face. "There's
where you're wrong, my friend. Nobody is born
evil."

Pendergast held out his hand. "We shall differ, then." Then
his eyes turned directly toward the hidden camera, startling
Glinn. How could Pendergast know where it was?

"Mr. Glinn? I thank you, too, for your effort. You should have
plenty in that folder to complete the job at hand. I can help you
no further. Something terrible will happen today, and I must do
everything in my power to stop it."

And he turned and walked briskly from the room.

FORTY-TWO

The mansion at 891 Riverside Drive lay above one of the most
complex geological areas of Manhattan. Here, beneath the
litter-strewn streets, the bedrock of Hartland schist yielded to
a different formation, the Cambrian Manhattan. The gneiss of the
Manhattan Formation was particularly faulted and contorted, and
riddled with weak areas, cracks, and natural tunnels. One such
weak area, several centuries ago, had been enlarged to form the
passage from the mansion's sub-basement to the weed-choked shore
of the Hudson River. But there were other tunnels, older and more
secret, that burrowed beneath the mansion into dark and unknown
depths.

Unknown to all, that is, but one.

Constance Greene moved slowly through one of these tunnels,
descending with practiced ease into the blackness. Though she
held a torch in one slim hand, it was not lit: she knew these
deep and hidden spaces so well that light was not necessary. The
passage was frequently narrow enough to allow her to follow both
walls with her outstretched hands. Though the tunnel was of
natural rock, the ceiling was tall and quite regular, and the
floor was even enough to appear almost like steps fashioned by
man.

But only Constance had ever walked this way
before.

Until a few days ago, she had hoped never to come here again.
It was a reminder of the old times-the bad times-when she had
seen things no living being should ever have to witness. When
he had come, with violence and murder, and had taken from
her the only human being she had known, a man who was like a
father to her. The murderer had upended the ordered world
she had grown so used to. She had fled here then, into the chill
recesses of the earth. For a time, it seemed, sanity itself also
fled, under the shock.

But her mind had been too carefully trained, over too many
years, to ever become fully lost. Slowly, slowly, she came back.
Once again, she grew interested in the ways of the waking, the
living; once again, she began creeping back up to her old home,
her world, the mansion at 891 Riverside. That was when she began
watching the man named Wren and-finally-revealed herself to the
kindly old gentleman.

Who, in turn, had brought her to Pendergast.

Pendergast. He had reintroduced her to the world,
helped her move out of a shadowy past into a brighter
present.

But the work was not yet done. All too well, she was aware of
that tenuous line still separating her from instability. And now
this had happened...

As she walked, Constance bit her lip to keep back a
sob.

But it shall be all right, she tried to tell herself.
It shall be all right. Aloysius had promised her so. And
he could do anything, it seemed; even rise from the
dead.

She had made a promise to him as well, and she would keep it:
to spend her nights here, where not even Diogenes Pendergast
could ever find her. She would keep her promise, despite the
dreadful weight this place, and its memories, placed on her
heart.

Ahead, the passage narrowed, then split into two. To the
right, the tunnel kept corkscrewing down into darkness. To the
left, a narrower way led off horizontally. Constance chose this
passage, following its twists and turns for a hundred yards. Then
she stopped and, at last, turned on the lamp.

Its yellow light revealed that the passage widened abruptly,
dead-ending in a small, snug chamber, perhaps ten feet by six.
Its floor was covered by an expensive Persian carpet, taken from
one of the basement storage rooms of the mansion above. The lines
of the bare rock walls were softened by reproductions of
Renaissance paintings: Parmigianino's Madonna with the Long
Neck, Giorgione's Tempest, half a dozen others. A cot
was set into the rear of the niche, and a small table lay at one
side. Works by Thackeray, Trollope, and George Eliot were stacked
neatly beside Plato's Republic and St. Augustine's
Confessions.

It was much warmer here, belowground. The air smelled, not
unpleasantly, of rock and earth. Yet the relative warmth, the
small attempts at domesticity, afforded Constance little
comfort.

She set the lamp upon the table, sat down before it, and
glanced to one side. There was a recess in the rock face here,
perhaps three feet above the level of the floor. She pulled a
leather-bound book from it: the most recent volume of a diary she
had kept in the old days, when she had been the ward of
Pendergast's ancestor.

She opened the diary and turned its pages over slowly,
thoughtfully, until she reached the final entry. It was dated
July of the previous year.

Constance read the entry once, then again, brushing away a
stray tear as she did so. Then, with a quiet sigh, she replaced
the diary into the recess, beside its mates.

Forty-two other volumes, identical in size and shape, stood
there. While the closer volumes looked quite new, the ones
farther along the recess grew increasingly cracked and worn with
age.

Constance sat there, looking at them, her hand resting
pensively on the edge of the niche. The movement had pulled back
the material of her sleeve, exposing a long row of small, healed
scars on her forearm: twenty or thirty identical marks, lined up
precisely in parallel with one another.

With another sigh, she turned away. Then she extinguished the
light and-saying a brief prayer to the close and watchful
darkness-she stole toward the cot, turned her face to the wall,
and lay down, eyes open, preparing herself as best she could for
the nightmares that would inevitably come.

FORTY-THREE

viola Maskelene picked up her luggage at the international
arrivals carousel at Kennedy Airport, engaged a luggage porter to
load it onto a cart, and followed it through customs. It was
after midnight, and the wait was brief; the bored official asked
her a few desultory questions, stamped her U.K. passport, and
ushered her through.

A small crowd of people was waiting at the arrivals area. She
paused, scanning the crowd, until she noticed a tall man in a
gray flannel suit standing at the fringe. She recognized him
instantly, so uncanny was the resemblance to his brother, with
his high smooth forehead, aquiline nose, and aristocratic
bearing. Just seeing a person with such a close resemblance to
Pendergast made her heart accelerate. But there were differences,
too. He was taller and less wiry, a little more heavily built
perhaps; but his face was sharper, the cheekbones and bony ridges
around the eyes more pronounced, all of which, taken together,
gave his face a curiously asymmetrical feeling. His hair was
ginger-colored and he sported a thick, neatly trimmed beard. But
the most startling difference was in his eyes: one was a rich
hazel green, the other a glaucous blue. She wondered if he was
blind in the pale eye-it looked dead.

She smiled, gave him a quick wave.

He, too, broke into a smile and came walking over with a
languid step, his hands outstretched. He grasped her hand in both
of his, hands cool and soft. "Lady Maskelene?"

"Call me Viola."

"Viola. I'm charmed." His voice had much of his brother's
buttery southern tones, yet although his manner of speech was
almost as languorous as his walk, his words were very precisely
enunciated, as if bitten off at the ends. It was an unusual,
almost strange combination.

"A pleasure to meet you, Diogenes."

"My brother has been quite mysterious about you, but I know
he's anxious to see you. Is this your luggage?" He snapped his
fingers and a porter came rushing over. "See that this lady's
luggage is brought to the black Lincoln parked just outside,"
Diogenes told him. "The trunk is open." A twenty appeared in his
hand as if by magic, but the man was so captivated by Viola that
he barely saw it.

Diogenes turned back to Viola. "And how was your
trip?"

"Bloody awful."

"I'm sorry I couldn't suggest a more convenient flight. It's
been rather a hectic time for my brother, as you know, and the
logistics of arranging the meeting were a bit
daunting."

"No matter. The important thing is that I'm
here."

"Indeed it is. Shall we go?" He offered her his arm and she
took it. It was surprisingly strong, the muscles hard as steel
cables, very different from the soft, languid impression his
movements gave.

"There'd be no mistaking you for anyone but Aloysius's
brother," she said as they walked out of the baggage claim
area.

"I'll take that as a compliment."

They went through the revolving doors into a blast of cold
air. A dusting of fresh snow glittered on the sidewalks beyond
the covered walkway.

"Brrr!" Viola said, recoiling. "When I left Capraia, it was a
balmy twenty degrees. This is barbaric!"

"That would be twenty degrees Celsius, of course," said
Diogenes with a wink. "How I envy you, able to live there
year-round. My car." He opened the door for her, then went
around, waited for the skycap to dose the trunk, then slipped in
the other side.

"I don't actually live there year-round. Normally at this time
of year, I'm in Luxor, working on a dig in the Valley of the
Nobles. But this year, with the blasted state of the Middle East,
I ran into some permit problems."

Diogenes accelerated smoothly from the curb and merged into
the traffic headed for the airport exit. "An Egyptologist," he
said. "How fascinating. I myself spent some time in Egypt, a
junior member of the von Hertsgaard expedition."

"Not the one that went into Somalia looking for the diamond
mines of Queen Hatshepsut? The one where Hertsgaard was found
decapitated?"

"The very one."

"How exciting! I'd love to hear about it."

" 'Exciting' is certainly one way to describe
it."

"Is it true that Hertsgaard may have found the Hatshepsut
mines just before he was murdered?"

Diogenes laughed quietly. "I sincerely doubt it. You know how
these rumors get started. What I find more interesting than those
mythical mines is the very real Queen Hatshepsut herself-the only
female pharaoh-but, of course, you know all about her, I'm
sure."

"Fascinating woman."

"She claimed legitimacy by saying that her mother slept with
the god Amon and that she was the issue. How does that famous
inscription go? Amon found the queen sleeping in her room.
When the pleasant odors that proceeded from him announced his
presence she awoke. He showed himself in his godlike splendor,
and when he approached the queen she wept for joy at his strength
and beauty and gave herself to him."

Viola was intrigued: Diogenes seemed to be as much of a
polymath as his brother.

"So tell me, Viola. What kind of work are you doing in the
Valley of the Nobles?"

"We've been excavating the tombs of several royal
scribes."

"Find any treasures-gold or, even better,
jewels?"

"Nothing like that. They were all robbed in antiquity. We're
after inscriptions."

"What a marvelous profession, Egyptology. It seems my brother
appreciates interesting women."

"I hardly know your brother, to tell you the
truth."

"That will change this week, I have little
doubt."

"I'm looking forward to it." She laughed a little
self-consciously. "Actually, I still can't believe I'm here. This
whole trip is such a ... a caprice. So mysterious. I love
mysteries."

"So does Aloysius. It seems you two are made for each
other."

Viola felt herself coloring. She quickly changed the subject.
"Do you know anything about this case he's been working
on?"

"It's been one of the most difficult of his career.
Fortunately, it's almost over. Today, in fact, will come the
denouement-and then he'll be free. The case involves a serial
killer, a truly insane individual, who for various obscure
reasons has conceived a deep hatred for Aloysius. He's been
killing people and taunting my brother with his inability to
catch him."

"How terrible."

"Yes. My brother was forced to go underground so abruptly in
order to conduct his investigation that it gave everyone the
impression he'd been killed."

"I thought he was dead. Lieutenant D'Agosta told me as
much."

"Only I knew the truth. I helped him after that Italian
ordeal, nursed him back to health. I saved his life, if I may be
allowed a moment of self-congratulation."

"I'm so glad he has a brother like you."

"Aloysius has few real friends. He's very old-fashioned,
somewhat forbidding, a bit standoffish. And so I've tried to be
his friend as well as his brother. I'm so glad he found you. I
was so worried about him after that dreadful accident with his
wife in Tanzania."

Wife? Tanzania? Suddenly, Viola found herself wanting
very much to ask what had happened. She resisted: Aloysius would
tell her in good time, and she had always had the English
abhorrence of prying into someone else's personal
life.

"He hasn't really found me yet. We're just the most casual of
new friends, you know."

Diogenes turned his strange, bicolored eyes to her and smiled.
"I believe my brother is already in love with
you."

This time Viola colored violently, feeling a sudden mixture of
excitement, embarrassment, and foolishness. Stuff, she
thought. How could he be in love with me after one
meeting?

"And I have reason to believe you are in love with
him."

Viola managed a careless laugh, but she was tingling all over
with the strangest sensation. The car hurtled through the frosty
night. "This is all far too premature," she finally
managed to say.

"While Aloysius and I are much alike, I do differ from him in
terms of directness. Forgive me if I've embarrassed
you."

"Think nothing of it."

The Long Island Expressway stretched ahead, a snowy alley of
darkness. It was almost one o'clock in the morning and there were
few cars on the road. Flakes of snow were drifting down, whipping
up and over the windshield of the car as they hurtled
along.

"Aloysius was always the indirect one. I could never tell what
he was thinking, even when he was a boy."

"He does seem a bit inscrutable, I suppose."

"Very inscrutable. Rarely does he ever reveal his real
motivations for doing things. For example, I've always believed
he devoted himself to public service to make up for some of the
black sheep in the Pendergast line."

"Really?" Viola's curiosity was piqued again.

An easy laugh. "Yes. Take Great-Aunt Cornelia, for example.
Lives not far from here, at the Mount Mercy Hospital for the
Criminally Insane."

Curiosity was replaced by surprise. "Criminally
insane?"

"That's right. Every family has its black sheep, I
suppose."

Viola thought of her own great-grandfather. "Yes, that's
true."

"Some families more than others."

She nodded, glanced over, found Diogenes looking at her,
quickly lowered her eyes.

"I think it adds interest, spice, to a family lineage.
Much better to have a murderer for a great-grandfather than a
shopkeeper."

"A rather unique point of view." Diogenes might be a little
odder than first impressions indicated, but he was certainly
amusing.

"Any interesting criminals in your ancestry?" Diogenes asked.
"If you don't mind me prying."

"Not at all. No criminals, exactly, but I did have an ancestor
who was one of the great violin virtuosi of the nineteenth
century. He went insane, froze to death in a shepherd's hut in
the Dolomites."

"Exactly my point! I felt sure you would have some interesting
ancestors. No dull accountants or traveling salesmen in your
lineage, eh?"

"Not that I know of."

"Actually, we did have a traveling salesman in our own
ancestry- contributed greatly to the Pendergast fortune, in
fact."

"Really?"

"Indeed. He concocted a quack medicine by the name of
Hezekiah's Compound Elixir and Glandular Restorative. Started by
selling it from the back of a wagon."

Viola laughed. "What a funny name for a
medicine."

"Hilarious. Except it consisted of a deadly combination of
cocaine, acetanilid, and some rather nasty alkaloid botanicals.
It caused uncounted numbers of addictions and thousands of
deaths, including that of his own wife."

The laughter died in Viola's throat. She felt a twinge of
uneasiness. "I see."

"Of course, nobody knew back then of the dangers of drugs like
cocaine. You can't fault Great-Great-Grandfather Hezekiah for
that."

"No, of course not."

They fell silent. The light snow continued to fall, the flakes
drifting out of the dark sky, a glitter flashing through the
headlights-and then were gone.

"Do you think there's such a thing as a criminal gene?" asked
Diogenes.

"No," said Viola. "I think that's rubbish."

"Sometimes I wonder. There have been so many in our own
family. There was Uncle Antoine, for example, one of the truly
great mass murderers of the nineteenth century. Killed and
mutilated almost a hundred workhouse girls and
boys."

"How awful," murmured Viola.

The feeling of uneasiness grew stronger.

Diogenes gave an easy laugh. "The English transported their
criminals to the colonies-Georgia and then Australia. They
figured it would purge the Anglo-Saxon race of the criminal
classes, but the more criminals they transported, the higher the
crime rate became."

"Crime obviously had a lot more to do with economic conditions
than genetics," said Viola.

"You think so? True: I would not have wanted to be poor in
nineteenth-century England. In my view, the real criminals back
then were the titled classes. Less than one percent of the people
owned more than ninety-five percent of the land. And with the
enclosure laws, the English lords could evict their tenant
farmers, who flocked to the cities and either starved or turned
to crime."

"True," Viola murmured. It seemed Diogenes had forgotten that
she came from those titled classes.

"But here in America, it was different. How would you explain
the fact that criminals run in some families like blue eyes or
blond hair? In every generation, the Pendergast family seems to
have produced a killer. After Antoine, let's see ... There was
Comstock Pendergast, famed mesmerist, magician, and mentor of
Harry Houdini. He killed his business partner and the man's poor
family, and then committed suicide. Cut his own throat twice.
Then..."

"Pardon?" Viola realized that she was unconsciously gripping
the door handle.

"Oh, yes. Twice. The first time he didn't quite get it deep
enough, you see. I guess he didn't relish the thought of bleeding
slowly to death. Myself, I wouldn't mind dying a slow death by
exsanguination-I hear it's rather like going to sleep. I would
have plenty of time to admire the blood, which has such an
exquisite color. Do you like the color of blood,
Viola?"

"Excuse me?" Viola felt panic well up within
her.

"Blood. The color of a fine ruby. Or vice versa. I personally
find it to be the most compelling color there is. Some might call
me eccentric, but there it is."

Viola tried to quell her feelings of fear and uncertainty.
They were now far from the city, and the dark night rushed by,
only a few lights on in the darkened neighborhoods they passed,
barely visible from the highway.

"Where are we going?" she asked.

"To a little place called the Springs. A charming cottage on
the shore. It's about two more hours."

"And Aloysius is there?"

"Of course. Dying to see you."

This whole trip was a colossal mistake, she could see that
now. Another foolish, impulsive decision. She'd been caught up in
the heady romance of it, in the relief of learning Pendergast was
still alive. But the truth was, she hardly knew the man. And this
brother of his...

Suddenly, the thought of spending two more hours in a car with
him was unthinkable.

"Viola," came the soft voice, "I'm sorry. Are you all
right?"

"Fine. Just fine."

"You look worried."

She took a deep breath. "To tell you the truth, Diogenes, I'd
prefer to stay in New York tonight. I'm more tired than I
realized. I'll see Aloysius when he comes to
town."

"Oh, no! He'll be crushed."

"I can't help that. If you would, please turn the car around?
Really, I'm terribly sorry for the sudden change of mind, but
this will be best. You've been very kind. Please take me back to
New York."

"If that's what you want. I'll have to get off at the next
exit to reverse direction."

She felt a wave of relief. "Thank you. I'm really awfully
sorry for putting you to all this trouble."

The exit soon came: Hempstead. The car slowed, exited. It
approached the stop sign at the top of the exit ramp and cruised
to a stop. There were no cars in sight and Viola sat back, hand
still unconsciously clutching the door handle, and waited for
Diogenes to proceed.

But he didn't proceed. And then, suddenly, she smelled the
queerest chemical odor.

She turned quickly. "What is-?"

A hand holding a bunched cloth clamped itself over her mouth
while an arm lashed around her neck with lightning speed and
wrenched her brutally down to the seat. She was pinned, the
stinking cloth jammed mercilessly over her nose and mouth. She
struggled, trying to breathe, but it was as if a door of darkness
had just opened before her: against her will, she leaned forward,
falling and falling into darkness, and then the world went
blank.

FORTY-FOUR

The wintry scene could not have been more bleak: a thin snow
had fallen on the cemetery the night before, and now a bitter
wind blew through the bare trees, rattling the branches and
sending wisps of snow whipping across the frozen ground. The
grave itself looked like a black wound in the earth, surrounded
by bright green Astroturf laid on the snow, with a second
Astroturf carpet laid over the pile of dirt. The coffin rested
beside the hideous hole, strapped to a machine that would lower
it into the grave. Huge bouquets of fresh flowers stood about,
jittering in the wind, adding a surreal fecundity to the frozen
scene.

Nora could not take her gaze from the coffin. Wherever she
turned, she always seemed drawn back to it. It was a highly
polished affair, with brass handles and trim. Nora couldn't
accept that her friend, her new friend, lay inside. Dead. How
terrible to think that, just a few days before, she and Margo had
been enjoying dinner together in Margo's apartment, chatting
about the museum.

That same night she had been murdered.

And then, yesterday, the very disturbing, very urgent call
from Pendergast...

She shivered uncontrollably, took a few deep breaths. Her
fingers were freezing even through her gloves, and her nose felt
like it had lost all sensation. She was so cold that she thought
the tears might freeze on her face.

The minister, dressed in a long black down coat, was reading
Rite One of the Burial of the Dead from the Book of Common
Prayer, his voice sonorous in the freezing air. A large crowd had
turned out- amazingly large when you considered the weather. An
enormous quantity of people had come from the museum. Margo had
clearly made a large impression even during her short tenure
there: but then, she had also been a graduate student there years
before. Standing near the front was the museum's director,
Collopy, with a stunningly beautiful wife even younger than Nora.
Most of the Anthropology Department had showed up, except for
those who were supervising the desperate last-minute work on the
Sacred Images show: the opening gala was this evening. She
herself should have stayed at the show, but she would never have
forgiven herself if she'd missed Margo's funeral. There was
Prine, bundled up like an Eskimo and dabbing at his bright red
nose with a cotton handkerchief; the security director, Manetti,
looking genuinely stricken, probably feeling that Margo's death
had been a personal failure. Her eye roamed the crowd. A quietly
weeping woman stood at the front, supported on either side by
ushers: no doubt Margo's mother. She had Margo's light brown
hair, her same fine features and slim build. She seemed to be the
only member of Margo's family-and Nora remembered Margo saying at
dinner that she was an only child.

A particularly strong gust of wind rattled through the
cemetery, temporarily overwhelming the minister's voice. Then it
returned: "Into thy hands, O Lord, we commend thy servant Margo,
our dear sister, as into the hands of a faithful Creator and most
merciful Savior, beseeching thee that she may be precious in thy
sight..."

Nora bent against the bitter wind and drew her coat tighter as
she listened to the sad, soothing words. She wished with all her
heart that Bill was there with her. The bizarre telephone call
from Pendergast-and it was Pendergast, she had no
doubt-had left her shaken. Bill's life threatened, and he in
hiding? And now her own life in danger? It all seemed incredible,
frightening, as if a dark cloud had descended on her world. And
yet the evidence was directly in front of her. Margo was
dead.

A humming noise broke her black reverie. The machine was
lowering Margo's coffin into the grave with a grinding of gears
and the whirring of a motor. The minister's voice raised slightly
as the coffin descended. Making the sign of the cross with an
upraised hand, he read the last words of the service. With a
faint thump, the coffin came to rest, and then the minister
invited Margo's mother to throw in a clod of dirt. She did so,
and some others followed, the frozen clods making a disturbingly
hollow sound as they struck the coffin lid.

Nora felt as if her heart would break. Her friendship with
Margo, which had gotten off to such a bad start, had just begun
to blossom. Her death was a tragedy in the truest sense of the
word-she was so brave, so full of conviction.

The service over, the crowd began to drift back toward the
narrow cemetery lane where their cars waited, frosty breath
rising in the air. Nora checked her watch: ten o'clock. She had
to get back to the museum immediately, to work on the final
preparations for the opening.

As she turned to leave, she saw a man dressed in black
approach obliquely; a few more moments and he had fallen into
step beside her. He looked haggard with grief, and she wondered
if Margo didn't have other close relatives, after
all.

"Nora?" came the low voice.

Nora was startled. She paused.

"Keep walking, please."

She kept walking, feeling mounting alarm. "Who are
you?"

"Agent Pendergast. Why are you out in the open after my
warning?"

"I have to live my life."

"You can't live a life if you've lost it."

Nora sighed. "I want to know what's happened to
Bill."

"Bill is safe, as I explained. It is you I'm worried about.
You're a prime target."

"Target of what?"

"I can't tell you that. What I can tell you is that you must
take steps to protect yourself. You should be
afraid."

"Agent Pendergast, I am afraid. Your call scared me
half to death. But you can't expect me to drop everything. As I
told you, I've got an opening I've got to prepare for
tonight."

A sharp, exasperated exhalation. "He's killing everyone around
me. He will kill you, too. And then you'll miss not only your
opening but the rest of your life."

The voice, far from the honeyed drawl she remembered, was
tense and urgent.

"I have to take the risk. I'll be in the museum the
rest of the day, under high security in the exhibit. And then
I'll be at the opening tonight, surrounded by
thousands."

"High security did not stop him before."

"Who is this him?"

"As I've said, to tell you more would only put you at greater
risk. Oh, Nora, what must I do to protect
you?"

She faltered, shocked at the near despair in his voice. "I'm
sorry. Look, it's just not in my nature to run and hide. I've
worked too long for this opening. People are counting on me.
Okay? Tomorrow- let's take this up again tomorrow. Just not
today."

"So be it." The anonymous figure turned away-strange how
little he looked like the Pendergast Nora remembered-melted into
the dark dusters of people walking toward their cars, and was
gone.

FORTY-FIVE

D'Agosta paused at the door of Hayward's office, feeling
almost afraid to knock. The painful memory of their first
encounter in her office came into his mind unbidden, and he
forced it away with great effort, rapping more loudly than he
intended.

"Come in." The very sound of her voice caused his heart to
pause. He grasped the handle, pushed open the
door.

The office looked very different. Gone were the various piles
of paper, the pleasant, controlled untidiness. Now it was severe
in its organization-and it was clear Hayward was working, living,
and breathing a single case.

And there she was, standing behind her desk, her short, slim
figure in a neat gray suit with captain's bars on the shoulder,
looking directly at him. The look was so intense D'Agosta found
himself almost pushed back by it.

"Have a seat." The voice was coldly neutral.

"Listen, Laura, before we begin, I just want to
say-"

"Lieutenant," came the crisp response. "You've been summoned
here on police business, and anything you might have to say of a
personal nature is inappropriate."

D'Agosta looked at her. This was unfair. "Laura,
please..."

Her face softened, but only for a moment, and she spoke in a
low vice. "Vincent, don't do this to me or to yourself.
Especially not now. I have something very, very difficult to show
you."

This stopped D'Agosta.

"Please take a seat."

"I'll stand."

Brief silence while she stared at him. Then she spoke again.
"Pendergast is alive."

D'Agosta felt himself go cold. He hadn't known why she'd
summoned him, hadn't even dared to guess-but this was the last
thing he'd expected. "How did you find out?" he
blurted.

Her face tightened with anger. "So you did
know."

Another tense silence. Then she reached down and picked up a
piece of paper, drew it in front of her. D'Agosta could see it
was a list of handwritten notes. What was this about? He had
never seen Laura so wound up.

"On January 19, Professor Torrance Hamilton was poisoned in
front of a lecture hall of two hundred students in his class at
Louisiana State University and died about an hour later. The only
useful evidence uncovered from the crime scene, some black fibers
found in his office, is analyzed in this report." She dropped a
slim folder on her desk.

D'Agosta glanced at it but did not pick it up.

"The report states that the fibers were from a very costly
cashmere-merino blended-wool fabric made for only a few years in
the 1950s in a factory outside Prato, Italy. The only place it
was sold in America- the only place-was a small shop on
Rue Lespinard in New Orleans. A shop patronized by the Pendergast
family."

D'Agosta felt a sudden hope. Was it possible, after all, that
she believed him? That she'd checked into Diogenes? "Laura,
I-"

"Lieutenant, let me finish. My forensic team searched
Pendergast's apartment in the Dakota-at least the rooms we could
get into- and took fiber samples. In addition, we found two dozen
identical black suits in a closet. The suits and the fibers all
came from the same source: those bolts of cashmere-merino wool,
dyed black. This is a virtually unique fiber. There can be no
mistake."

D'Agosta felt a very strange sensation crawl up his spine. He
suddenly had a premonition of where this might be
going.

"On January 22, Charles Duchamp was hung from his apartment
building on 65th and Broadway. Again, the crime scene was
unusually clean. However, our forensic team did recover a few
more of the same black fibers that were found at the Torrance
homicide. In addition, the rope used to hang Duchamp was woven of
a rare type of gray silk. We ultimately learned it is a special
type of rope used in Buddhist religious ceremonies in Bhutan. The
monks tie these silk ropes into incredibly complex knots for
meditative and contemplative purposes. These are unique knots,
found nowhere else in the world."

She paused, laid down a photograph of the rope that hung
Duchamp, showing the knot, smeared with blood. "That particular
knot is known as Ran t'ankha durdag, 'the tangled path to
hell.' It has come to my attention that Special Agent Pendergast
spent time in Bhutan studying with the very monks who make these
knots."

"There's a simple answer-"

"Vincent, if you interrupt me one more time, I'll have you
muzzled."

D'Agosta fell silent.

"The next day, on January 23, FBI Special Agent Michael Decker
was murdered in his house in Washington, D.C., stabbed through
the mouth with an antique Civil War bayonet. This crime scene was
equally clean. The forensic team recovered fibers from the same
bolt of cashmere-merino wool found at the Hamilton poisoning."
She laid another report before D'Agosta.

"At around two o'clock in the morning of January 26, Margo
Green was fatally stabbed in the New York Museum of Natural
History. I've gone over the museum's personnel lists, and she was
the last person to enter the exhibition hall. But she also
checked out of the hall-the murderer must have used her card to
leave. This crime scene wasn't nearly as clean as the others.
Green was a formidable opponent, and she put up a struggle. She
defended herself with a box cutter and wounded her assailant.
Blood not belonging to the victim was recovered from the scene,
both on the box cutter-which had been imperfectly wiped clean-and
from a single spot on the floor." She paused. "The DNA tests came
back late last night."

She picked up a piece of paper and, with a snap, dropped it,
too, in front of D'Agosta. "Those are the
results."

D'Agosta couldn't bring himself to look. He knew the answer
already.

"That's right. Special Agent Pendergast."

D'Agosta knew better than to say anything.

"Which brings me to motive. All these people had something in
common-they were close acquaintances of Pendergast. Hamilton was
Pendergast's language tutor in high school. Duchamp was
Pendergast's closest-and perhaps only-childhood friend. Michael
Decker was Pendergast's mentor at the FBI. He's one of the main
reasons Pendergast has even survived in the FBI, after all
the trouble his unorthodox methods got him into. And finally-as
you well know-Margo Green was a close friend of Pendergast's from
two cases dating back several years, the museum murders and the
subway killings.

"All this evidence, all these tests, have been checked and
rechecked. There can be no mistake. Special Agent Pendergast is a
psychopathic killer."

D'Agosta had gone cold. He realized now why Diogenes had saved
Pendergast the way he did, why he'd helped nurse him back to life
after what had happened in the Castel Fosco. It wasn't enough
just to murder his brother's friends. No-he would also frame him
for the crimes.

"And now this," Hayward said. She showed him another
report. It was bound in plastic, and the title was
visible:

Psychological Profile

Hamilton/Duchamp/Decker/Green Killer

Behavioral Science Unit

Federal Bureau of Investigation, Quantico

"I didn't tell them that I suspected one of their own. I just
told them we thought the crimes might be connected and asked them
to draw up a profile. Because of the Decker killing, I got it
back in twenty-four. Go ahead and read it if you want, but here's
the short version. The killer is a highly educated male with at
least four years of postgraduate education. He's an expert
chemist. He's thoroughly familiar with forensic and police
procedure and he probably once worked, or still works, in law
enforcement. He has a broad knowledge across a range of subjects
in science, literature, math, history, music, and art-in short,
he is a Renaissance man. His I.Q. lies in the 180 to 200 range.
His age is probably between thirty and fifty. He is well traveled
and probably multilingual. He is likely ex-military. He is a
person of considerable financial means. He is very adept at
disguises."

She looked D'Agosta in the eye. "This remind you of anyone,
Vincent?"

D'Agosta didn't reply.

"Those are the outward details. Now comes the psych analysis."
She paused, finding the place in the report. "The killer is a
self-controlled and controlling person. He's extremely well
organized, neat, and places a high premium on logic. He represses
any outward show of emotion and rarely, if ever, confides in
anyone. He has few, if any, real friends and has difficulty
forming relationships with the opposite sex. This individual
probably suffered a difficult childhood, with a cold, controlling
mother and a distant or absent father. His family relationships
were not close. There will probably be a history of mental
illness or crime in the family. As a young boy, he suffered a
crippling emotional trauma involving a close family member-
mother, father, or sibling-that he has spent the rest of his life
compensating for. He is deeply suspicious of authority, considers
himself intellectually and morally superior to
others-"

"What a load of psychobabble!" D'Agosta exploded. "It's all
twisted up. This isn't the way he is at all!"

He stopped abruptly. Hayward was looking at him with raised
eyebrows.

"So you do recognize this person."

"Of course I recognize him! But this is a twisting of who he
really is. Pendergast didn't murder those people. He was framed.
The evidence, the blood, was planted. His brother, Diogenes, is
the killer."

Another long silence. "Go on," she said, her tone
neutral.

"After Pendergast's ordeal in Italy, when we all thought he
was dead, Diogenes took him to a clinic to recover. He was sick,
drugged. It must have allowed Diogenes plenty of opportunity to
harvest all the forensic evidence he needed to frame
Pendergast-hair, fibers, blood. It's Diogenes. Don't you
see? He's hated Pendergast all his life, he's been planning this
for years. He sent Pendergast a taunting letter saying he was
going to commit the perfect crime and naming the
date-today."

"You're not going to lay this crazy theory on me again,
Vincent-"

"It's my turn to talk. Diogenes wanted to commit a crime even
more horrible than killing his brother. He wanted to kill
everyone his brother loves but leave his brother alive. Now it
seems he's also framing his brother for those same
crimes-"

D'Agosta stopped. She was looking at him with an expression of
pity bordering almost on pain.

"Vinnie, you remember how you told me to look into Diogenes?
Well, I did. I had a hell of a time tracing him, but here's what
I found." She opened a folder, took out yet another document, and
slid it in front of him. It was stamped and embossed and
notarized.

"What is it?"

"A death certificate. Of Diogenes Dagrepont Bernoulli
Pendergast. He was killed twenty years ago in a car accident in
the U.K."

"A forgery. I saw a letter from him. I know he's
alive."

"What makes you think Pendergast didn't write the
letter?"

D'Agosta stared at her. "Because I saw Diogenes. With
my own eyes."

"Is that so? Where?"

"Outside Fosco's castle. When we were being chased. He had
eyes of two different colors, just like Cornelia Pendergast told
us."

"And how do you know it was Diogenes?"

D'Agosta hesitated. "Pendergast told me."

"Did you speak to him?"

"No. But I saw a picture of him as a child, just recently. It
was the same face."

A long silence followed. Hayward reached down and picked up
the forensic profile again. "There's something else in here. Read
it." She pushed a piece of paper over to him.

The target subject may manifest symptoms of a rare form of
multiple personality disorder, a variant of Munchausen syndrome
by proxy, in which the subject acts out two separate,
diametrically opposite roles: that of killer and of investigator.
In this unusual condition, the killer may also be a law
enforcement officer assigned to the case or an investigator
connected to the case. In another variant of this pathology, the
killer is a private citizen who initiates his own investigation
into the killings, often making apparently brilliant discoveries
of evidence that law enforcement has overlooked. In both
variants, the killer personality leaves minute clues for the
investigator personality to discover, such discoveries often made
apparently through extraordinary powers of observation and/or
deduction. The killer personality and investigator personality
are not aware of each other's existence on a conscious level,
although much cooperation is noted on the subconscious,
pathological level.

"Bullshit. Munchausen by proxy is about somebody wanting
attention. Pendergast goes out of his way to avoid the
limelight. This doesn't describe Pendergast. You know the guy,
you've worked with him. What does your gut tell
you?"

"You don't want to know what my gut tells me." Her dark eyes
were scrutinizing him. "Vinnie, you know why I'm sharing this
information with you?"

"Why?"

"For one thing, because I think you're in terrible danger.
Pendergast is a crazy son of a bitch and he's going to kill you
next. I know he will."

"He won't kill me because he isn't the killer."

"The Pendergast you know isn't even aware he's the
killer. He believes in this Diogenes. He genuinely thinks his
brother is still alive and that you two are going to find him.
It's all part of the pathology mentioned here." She slapped the
report. "There's the other personality of his ... Diogenes. Who
exists within the same body. That personality you haven't met
yet. But you will... when he kills you."

D'Agosta couldn't even find the words to
respond.

"I don't know. Maybe I shouldn't have told you all this." Her
voice hardened. "You don't have a right to know any of this after
how royally you've screwed up. I went out on a ten-mile limb for
you, got you a great position on the force-and you betrayed my
trust, you rejected my..." She paused, breathing hard, recovering
her composure.

Now D'Agosta felt a flash of real anger. "I betrayed
you? Listen, Laura: I tried to talk with you about
this. I tried to explain. But you pushed me away, saying I was
obsessing over someone's death. How do you think that felt? Or
how do you think I feel now, listening to you say how naive I am,
how gullible, trusting Pendergast like this? You've seen my
casework in the past, you know what I'm capable of. Why do you
think I'm so wrong now?"

The question hung in the air.

"This isn't the time or place for that discussion," Hayward
replied after a moment. Her tone had grown quiet and
businesslike. "And we're straying from the point."

"And what, exactly, is the point?"

"I want you to bring Pendergast in."

D'Agosta stood rooted in place, thunderstruck. He should have
seen it coming.

"Bring him in. Save yourself. Save your career. If he's
innocent, let him have his day in court."

"But the evidence against him is overwhelming-"

"That's right. It's damning as hell. And you didn't even see
the half of it. But that's the way our system works: bring him in
and let him face a jury of his peers."

"Bring him in? How?"

"I've got it all worked out. You're the only man he
trusts."

"You're asking me to betray him?"

"Betray? My God, Vinnie, the man's a serial
killer. Four innocent people are dead. And there's another
thing you seem to be overlooking. Your actions to date-keeping
Pendergast's existence secret, lying to me, lying to Captain
Singleton-border on obstruction of justice. Now that you know
Pendergast is a fugitive-that's right, a warrant for his arrest
has already been sworn out-any further actions on your part to
protect him will amount to criminal obstruction and accessory
after the fact. You're already in deep shit, and this is the only
way you're going to get out of it. You bring him in, or you go to
jail. It's that simple."

For a long moment, D'Agosta said nothing. When he spoke, his
voice sounded dead, wooden, even in his own ears. "Give me a day
to think it over."

"A day?" She looked at him incredulously. "You've got ten
minutes."

FORTY-SIX

Viola woke with a splitting headache. For a moment, she stared
blankly, uncomprehendingly, at the frilled top of a canopied bed
rising above her. And then it all came back: the drive along the
dark highway, the increasingly bizarre comments by Pendergast's
brother, the sudden attack...

She fought down a rising wave of panic, lying still,
concentrating only on her breathing, trying not to think of
anything at all.

Finally-when she felt she was master of herself-she sat up
slowly. Her head reeled, and dark spots danced across her vision.
She closed her eyes. When at last the throbbing had subsided a
little, she opened her eyes once again and looked around the
room.

It was a small bedroom with rose-patterned wallpaper, some old
Victorian furniture, and a single barred window. Moving
carefully- for the sake of both her headache and silence-she
swung her legs over the bed and stood unsteadily on the floor.
Quietly, she reached for the door handle and gave it a turn, but,
as she expected, it was locked. A second twinge of panic was
suppressed more quickly than the first.

She went to the window and looked out. The house was set a few
hundred yards back from a marshy bay. Beyond a line of scraggly
dunes, she could see a pounding line of surf and a dark ocean
fleckedwith whitecaps. The sky was a metal gray and, with the
instinct of somebody who had spent many nights under the open
sky, she sensed it was morning. On both the right and the left,
she could just make out a pair of ramshackle beach houses, their
windows boarded up for the season. The beach was
empty.

She reached through the bars and tapped on the glass. It
seemed to be unusually blue and thick-perhaps unbreakable. And
soundproofed, too-at least, she could not hear the
surf.

Still moving slowly, and making every effort to be silent, she
walked into a small adjoining bathroom. Like the bedroom, it was
old-fashioned and neat, with a sink, a claw-footed tub, and
another small window, also barred and paned in the same oddly
thick glass. She turned on the tap and out came a gush of water,
which quickly went from cold to piping hot. Shutting it off, she
returned to the bedroom.

She sat back down on the bed, thinking. It was all so unreal,
so utterly bizarre, it was impossible to comprehend. That the
person who had picked her up was Pendergast's brother, she had
absolutely no doubt-in many ways, he was practically a twin of
the man. But why had he kidnapped her like this? What were his
intentions? And, most important: what on earth was Pendergast's
role in it? How could she have been so wrong about
him?

But then, when she thought back to their brief meeting on the
island of Capraia last fall, she realized how strange it all was.
Perhaps word of his tragic death that made her romanticize their
lone encounter and made it seem more than it really was. And then
that letter, with its news that Pendergast was still alive, and
its romantic, impulsive request...

Impulsive. That was the word. Once, again she had
allowed her impulsiveness to get her into trouble-and this time
it looked like deadly serious trouble.

Was it possible that D'Agosta was in on it, too? That the
entire story of Pendergast's death had been a sham, part of some
complex plot to lure her here? Was this some kind of
sophisticated kidnapping network? Or were they holding her for
ransom? The more she thought about this complete and utter dog's
breakfast, the more she felt fear giving way to anger and
outrage. But even that emotion she repressed. Better to direct
her energies toward escape.

She went back into the bathroom and made a quick inventory:
plastic comb, toothbrush, toothpaste, water glass, clean towels,
washcloth, shampoo. She reached down and picked up the glass. It
was heavy and cold, real glass.

She turned it over thoughtfully in her hands. A sharp piece
would make a weapon, but it could also double as a tool. Escape
through the windows was out of the question, and no doubt the
door would be reinforced and secure. But this was an old house,
and the walls would probably be plaster and lath beneath the
wallpaper.

She took a towel, wrapped it tightly around the glass, and
gave it several sharp taps on the edge of the sink until it
broke. She unwrapped the towel: as she'd hoped, the glass had
broken into several large pieces. She took the sharpest, walked
back into the bedroom, and approached the opposite wall. Careful
to minimize noise, she stuck the pointed edge into the wallpaper
and gave an exploratory thrust.

It immediately slipped, taking with it a piece of the
wallpaper. She saw, to her dismay, the glint of metal underneath.
With her fingernails, she caught the cut edge of wallpaper and
peeled it back, revealing a smooth, cold expanse of
steel.

A chill went up her spine. And in that moment, a knock came at
the door.

She started, then quickly climbed back into the bed,
pretending to be asleep.

The knock came again, and a third time, and then she heard the
scrape of a key in the lock. The door creaked open. She lay
there, eyes closed, shard of glass concealed beside her
body.

"Dear Viola. I know you have been up and
about."

Still she lay there.

"I see you have already discovered I've decorated your room in
metal. Now, please sit up and stop this tiresome charade. I have
something important to tell you."

Viola sat up, anger returning. A man stood in the doorway whom
she did not recognize, although the voice was unmistakably that
of Diogenes.

"Forgive my unusual appearance; I am dressed for the city. To
which I am headed in a few minutes."

"In disguise, it seems. You fancy yourself a right Sherlock
Holmes."

The man bowed his head.

"What do you want, Diogenes?"

"I have what I want-you."

"Whatever for?"

The strange man gave a broad smile. "What do I want with you?
Frankly, I could care less about you, except for one thing: you
aroused the interest of my brother. I heard your name pass his
lips just once, no more. It piqued my curiosity. Luckily, your
name is unique, your family is prominent, and I was able to find
out a great deal-a great deal-about you. I suspected
tender feelings on your part for my brother. When you responded
to my letter, I knew my hunch was right, and that I had landed a
prize beyond compare."

"You're an ass. You don't know anything about
me."

"My dear Viola, rather than worrying about what I know, you
should be worrying about two things you don't know-and
should. First, you need to know that you cannot get out of this
room. The walls, floor, ceiling, and door are made of riveted
ship's hull steel. The windows are two layers of unbreakable,
soundproof, bulletproof glass. The glass is one-way, which means
that you can see out but those outside-and there will not be
any-cannot see in. I tell you this only to save you trouble.
There are books in the bookcase, drinking water from the tap, and
some hard candies in the bottom drawer of the bureau for you to
suck on."

"My, you've gone to a lot of trouble and expense. Boiled
sweets, even."

"Indeed."

"Indeed." She mocked his courtly drawl. "You said you
had two things to tell me. What's the second?"

"That you must die. If you believe in a supreme being, be sure
to resolve any unfinished business you have with Him. Your death
will take place tomorrow morning, at the traditional time:
dawn."

Almost without intent, Viola laughed: an angry, bitter laugh.
"If you could only hear what a pompous ass you sound! You will
die at dawn. How histrionic."

Diogenes took a step back, a frown passing fleetingly over his
face before neutrality returned. "What a sprightly vixen you
are."

"What have I done to you, you bloody nutter?"

"Nothing. It is what you did to my brother."

"I did nothing to your brother! Is this some kind of
sick joke?"

A dry chuckle. "It is indeed a sick joke, a very sick
joke."

Anger and frustration burned away her fear. Viola slowly
tightened her grip on the shard of glass. "For such a revolting
man, you seem insufferably pleased with yourself."

The dry chuckle died off. "My, my. We certainly have a sharp
tongue this morning."

"You're crazy."

"I have no doubt that, by the standards of society, I am
clinically insane."

Viola's eyes narrowed. "So you're a follower of the Scottish
psychiatrist R. D. Laing."

"I follow nobody."

"So you believe, in your ignorance. Laing said, 'Mental
illness is the sane response to an insane world.'"

"I commend the gentleman-whoever he is-for his insight. But my
dear Viola, I don't have all day to exchange
pleasantries-"

"My dear Diogenes-if only you knew just how boorish you
sound." She put on a deadly accurate imitation of his languid
accent. "How dreadfully sorry I am that we can't continue
this charming conversation. You and your feeble attempts
at breeding."

There was a silence. Diogenes had lost his smile, but if other
thoughts were going through his head, they did not express
themselves on his face. Viola was amazed at the depth and clarity
of her own anger. She was breathing fast, and her heart was going
like mad in her chest.

Diogenes finally sighed. "You are as chattery as a monkey and
almost as smart. If I were you, I'd be a little less garrulous
and face your end with dignity, as befits your
station."

"My station? Oh my God, don't tell me you're another of those
American poons who get their willy up meeting some red-nosed
baronet or doddering old viscount. I should have
known."

"Viola, please. You're getting
overexcited."

"Wouldn't you be a little overexcited if you had been lured
overseas, drugged and kidnapped, locked in a room, and
threatened-"

"Viola, ça suffit! I will be back in the wee hours
of the morning to carry out my promise. Specifically, I will cut
your throat. Twice. In honor of our Uncle
Comstock."

She suddenly stopped. The fear had come back in full force.
"Why?"

"Finally, a sensible question. I am an existentialist. I carve
my own meaning out of the suppurating carcass of this rotting
universe. Through no fault of your own, you have become part of
that meaning. But I do not feel sorry for you. The world is abrim
with pain and suffering. I simply choose to direct the
festivities instead of offering myself up as another witless
victim. I take no pleasure in the suffering of others-except one.
That is my meaning. I live for my brother, Viola; he gives
me strength, he gives me purpose, he gives me life. He is my
salvation."

"You and your brother can go to hell!"

"Ah, dear Viola. Didn't you know? This is hell. Except
that you are about to gain your release."

Viola leaped off the bed and rushed at him, shard raised, but
in the blur of an instant she found herself pinned to the floor.
Somehow Diogenes now lay on top of her, his face inches from
hers, his breath, sweetly smelling of cloves, in her
face.

"Good-bye, my lively little monkey," he murmured, and kissed
her tenderly on the lips.

And then, in one swift, batlike movement, he rose and was
gone, the door slamming behind him. She flung herself on it but
it was too late: there was the sound of oiled steel sliding into
steel, and the door felt as cold and unyielding as a bank
vault.

FORTY-SEVEN

D'Agosta didn't need a day to consider Hayward's offer; he
didn't even need ten minutes. He walked straight out of the
building, pulled out the cell phone Pendergast had given him, and
asked for an emergency meeting.

A quarter of an hour later, as he stepped out of a cab at the
corner of Broadway and 72nd, the memory of his encounter with
Laura was still raw. But he told himself he couldn't think about
that right now. He had to bury his personal feelings until the
crisis was over- assuming, that is, it would ever be
over.

He walked east down 72nd. Ahead, in the distance, he could see
Central Park, the brown trees skeletal in the January chill. At
the next intersection, he stopped and pulled out the cell phone
again. Call me again once you reach Columbus and 72nd,
Pendergast had said. D'Agosta was only a block away from
Pendergast's apartment at the Dakota. Could he possibly be at
home? It seemed outrageous, given the
circumstances.

He flipped open the phone, dialed the number.

"Yes?" came the voice of Pendergast. In the background,
D'Agosta could hear the tapping of keys.

"I'm at the corner," he replied.

"Very good. Make your way unobserved to 24 West 72nd. The
building is mixed residential and commercial. The entrance is
locked during working hours, but the receptionist habitually
buzzes in anyone who looks normal. Take the stairs to the
basement and locate the door marked B-14. Make sure you
are alone. Then knock slowly, seven times. Have you got
that?"

"Got it."

The line went dead.

Putting the phone away, D'Agosta crossed the street and
continued toward the park. Up ahead, at the far corner, he could
see the crenellated, sand-colored bulk of the Dakota. It looked
like something out of a Charles Addams cartoon. At its base,
beside a huge Gothic entrance, was a doorman's sentry box. Two
cops in uniform loitered nearby, and three squad cars were parked
along Central Park West.

It seemed the cavalry was already in place.

D'Agosta slowed his pace, keeping as near as he could to the
building fronts, a wary eye on the police.

Twenty-four West 72nd Street was a large brownstone structure
halfway down the block. He glanced around again, saw nobody
suspicious, rang the buzzer, gained admittance, and quickly
ducked inside.

The lobby was small and dark, the walls covered with
dingy-looking gray marble. D'Agosta nodded to the receptionist,
then made his way down the staircase at the rear of the lobby.
There was a single basement hallway, with metal doors set into
the cinder-block walls at regular intervals. It was the work of
sixty seconds to find the door marked B-14. He glanced
around once again, then rapped on the door seven times, as
instructed.

For a moment, silence. Then, from within, the sound of a bolt
being slid back. The door opened and a man wearing the black and
white uniform of a doorman appeared. He glanced up and down the
hall, then nodded to D'Agosta and ushered him
inside.

To his surprise, D'Agosta found himself, not in a room, but in
a very narrow hallway-barely more than a crawl space-that ran on
ahead into darkness. The doorman switched on a flashlight, then
led the way along the corridor.

It seemed to go on forever. The walls changed from cinder
block, to brick, to plaster, then back to brick again. At times,
the corridor widened; at others, it grew so narrow it almost
brushed against D'Agosta's shoulders. It jogged left a few times,
then right. At one point, they emerged into a tiny courtyard,
little more than an air shaft, and D'Agosta could see a small
patch of blue sky far above. It felt like being at the base of a
chimney. Then they climbed a short stairway, the doorman opened
another door with a large, old-fashioned key, and they entered
yet another narrow corridor.

At length, the corridor dead-ended at a small service
elevator. The doorman pulled back the brass grillwork, unlocked
the elevator door with a different key, and motioned for D'Agosta
to step in. The man stepped in behind D'Agosta, closed the grille
and the elevator door, then grasped a large, circular handle in
one wall. With a protesting chuff, the elevator creaked
upward.

The ancient door was windowless, and D'Agosta had no idea how
many floors they ascended: he guessed four or five. The elevator
stopped of its own accord and the doorman opened its door. As the
bronze grille was pulled back, D'Agosta saw a short passageway
beyond, leading to a single door. The door was open, and
Pendergast stood within it, once again clad in his habitual black
suit.

D'Agosta paused, staring at him. Ever since his surprise
reappearance, the man had appeared in some disguise or other-his
face or clothing, or more usually both, dramatically altered-and
it gave D'Agosta a strange chill to see his old friend as he
really was.

"Vincent," Pendergast said. "Do come in." And he led the way
into a small, almost featureless room. There was an oaken dresser
and a leather sofa along one wall, and a worktable along another.
Four iMac laptops were lined up on the worktable, along with some
NAS devices and what looked to D'Agosta like a network hub. There
were two doors in the rear of the room; one was closed, and the
other opened onto a small bathroom.

"This is your Dakota apartment?" D'Agosta asked in
disbelief.

A wan smile appeared on Pendergast's face, then disappeared
again. "Hardly," he said, closing the door. "My apartment is on
the floor above this one."

"Then what's this place?"

"Think of it as a bolt-hole. A rather high-tech bolt-hole. It
was set up last year on the advice of an Ohio acquaintance of
mine, in case his services were temporarily
unavailable."

"Well, you can't stay here. The cops are crawling all over the
entrance to the Dakota. I've just come from Laura Hayward's
office, and she's got a red-hot suspect."

"Me."

"And how in hell did you learn that?"

"I've known it for some time." Pendergast's eyes darted from
monitor to monitor as his hands flew over the keys. "When I came
upon the murder scene of my friend Michael Decker, I found
several strands of hair clutched in his hand. Blond hair. My
brother's hair is not blond: it's a gingery red. Immediately, I
realized that Diogenes's plan was even more 'interesting' than
I'd suspected. Not only did he plan to kill everyone close to
me-he planned to frame me for their murders."

"But what about the notes Diogenes wrote you? Don't they
indicate he's alive?"

"No. Recall the odd handwriting, the handwriting I said was
strangely familiar? That was my handwriting, but altered just
enough so it would appear-to a handwriting expert, anyway-that I
was trying to disguise it."

D'Agosta took a moment to digest this. "Why didn't you tell
me?"

"I saw no reason to burden you with all this before it was
necessary. When I saw those hairs, it was perfectly clear to me
that Diogenes would have salted the other crime scenes with false
evidence as well. I'm sure, during my convalescence in Italy, he
stocked up on all the physical evidence he needed, taken from my
person, including my blood. It was only a matter of time before
they connected me to the killings. I had hoped I'd have a little
more time than this. Hayward did a commendable
job."

"That's not all. Laura asked me to set you up. I walked out on
that one. They've sworn out a warrant on you. You can't stay
here."

"On the contrary, Vincent, I must stay here. It's the only
place with the resources I need on short notice. And it is a bit
like Poe's purloined letter-the last place they expect to find me
is at home. The police presence is a mere
formality."

D'Agosta stared at him. "So that's how you knew
Diogenes wouldn't target Laura. She's the one investigating
Duchamp's murder. He was banking on her suspecting
you."

"Precisely. Now, pull up a chair and let me show you what I'm
doing." Pendergast waved his hands toward the four
laptops.

"These computers are tapped in parasitically to the city's web
of street corner surveillance cameras, along with a couple of
major private systems-ATMs and banks, for example." He pointed at
one of the screens, which was currently subdivided into a dozen
small windows: in each window, black-and-white video feeds of
sidewalks, street intersections, and toll plazas were zipping by
in accelerated reverse motion.

"Why?"

"I'm convinced Diogenes's final crime is going to take place
in or around Manhattan. And you cannot move around a city like
New York these days without being photographed, taped, or
otherwise surveyed dozens of times every hour."

"But Diogenes is disguised."

"To most, yes. Not to me. You can disguise your appearance,
but you can't disguise everything-your mannerisms, the way you
walk, even the way you blink your eyes. Diogenes and I are very
alike physically. I've videotaped myself, and now I'm running
image-recognition and pattern-recognition algorithms against
these video-in-various-states-of-motion feeds." He waved at
another of the laptops. "As you can see, I'm concentrating
particularly on feeds near the Dakota and the intersections
around the Riverside Drive mansion. We know Diogenes has been to
the mansion, and he has probably been here as well. If I can
locate him, acquire an image print, I can track him backwards and
forwards visually from that point, try to find a pattern in his
movements."

"Wouldn't that need more computing horsepower than you'd find
at a small university?"

"Hence the wiring closet." And Pendergast reached over and
opened the closed door. Inside, stacked from floor to ceiling,
were rack-mounted blade servers and RAID arrays.

D'Agosta whistled. "You understand all this
shit?"

"No. But I know how to use it."

Pendergast swiveled to look at him. Although his skin was
paler than D'Agosta had ever seen it, the agent's eyes glittered
with a dangerous brightness. He had the manic energy, the
deceptive second wind, of somebody who had not slept in several
days.

"Diogenes is out there, Vincent. He's lurking somewhere
in this myriad of data streams. To commit his ultimate crime,
he's going to have to surface. And that's my chance-my last, my
only chance- to stop him. This room is the only place
anymore where I have access to the technology that can accomplish
that." More clattering of keys. "The acquaintance I spoke of just
now, the one in Ohio? He would be far better suited to this job
than I. But he has been forced to make himself invisible for ...
for reasons of his own protection."

"Laura isn't the type to wait around. They're probably already
coming after you."

"And no doubt you, too."

D'Agosta said nothing.

"They've searched my apartment, they've probably searched the
Riverside Drive house. As for this little warren ... well, you
saw yourself that I have a private exit from the Dakota. Even the
doormen here don't know about it. Only Martyn, who you just
met."

He paused in his typing. "Vincent, there is something you must
do."

"What's that?"

"You'll go straight to Laura Hayward, say that you'll
cooperate in every way, but that I seem to have disappeared and
that you've no idea where I am. There's no need for you to damage
your career any further over this."

"I already told you, I'm with you all the way."

"Vincent, I am demanding that you
leave."

"Hey, Aloysius?"

Pendergast looked at him.

"Up yours."

He saw Pendergast's eyes were upon him. "I won't forget
this,

Vincent."

"Never mind."

The agent went back to his work. Ten minutes passed, twenty-
and then Pendergast suddenly stiffened.

"A hit?"

"I believe so," Pendergast said. He was staring intently at
one of the computers, playing a grainy image over and over,
forward and backward.

D'Agosta looked over his shoulder. "Is that
him?"

"The computer believes so. And I do, as well. It's odd,
though- the image isn't taken from outside the Dakota, as I'd
expected. It's about six blocks north, outside
of-"

At that moment, a low chime sounded from a box on the table.
Pendergast turned toward it quickly.

"What's that?" D'Agosta asked.

"It's Martyn. It seems there's somebody to see
me."

D'Agosta tensed. "Police?"

Pendergast shook his head. He leaned toward the box, depressed
a switch.

"A bicycle messenger, sir," came the voice. "He has an
envelope for you."

"You've asked him to wait?"

"Yes."

"And the police are unaware of his presence?"

"Yes, sir."

"Bring him up. Take the usual precautions." Pendergast took
his finger from the switch and straightened. "Let's see what this
is about." His tone was casual, but his face looked
drawn.

They walked down the short hallway to the elevator. A minute
passed without a word being exchanged. Then, from below, the
elevator gave a clank and began to rise. Shortly, the brass
grille was drawn back and two figures emerged: the doorman
D'Agosta had met earlier and the bicycle messenger, a slim
Hispanic youth wearing a scarf and a heavy jacket. He held an
oversize envelope in one hand.

Looking at the package, Pendergast's pale face went gray.
Wordlessly, he reached into a pocket of his black jacket,
withdrew a pair of medical gloves, and drew them on. Then he took
a twenty-dollar bill from his wallet and gave it to the
messenger.

"Would you mind waiting here a few moments, please?" he
asked.

"I guess," the messenger said, looking suspiciously at the
gloves.

Pendergast took the envelope, exchanged a private look with
the doorman. Then, nodding to D'Agosta, he strode quickly back
into the room.

"Is it from Diogenes?" D'Agosta asked, closing the door behind
them.

Pendergast didn't respond. Instead, he spread a sheet of white
paper on the desk, laid the envelope on top of it, and examined
it carefully. It was unsealed, the rear flap loosely fastened by
twisted red thread. Pendergast gave the thread a brief, close
scrutiny. Then he unwound it and carefully upended the
envelope.

A small sheet of folded paper fell out, followed by a lock of
glossy dark hair.

Pendergast drew in his breath sharply. In the room, it sounded
explosively loud. Quickly, he knelt and opened the folded
sheet.

The paper was a beautiful, hand-pressed linen, with an
embossed coat of arms at its top: a lidless eye over two moons,
with a lion couchant. Beneath, written in tobacco-colored ink
with a fountain pen or quill, was a date: January
28.

D'Agosta realized it was identical to the note Pendergast had
received a few months earlier, at the mansion on Riverside Drive.
Unlike that note, however, this one had more written upon it than
just a date. His eye fell to the words below:

She's very spirited, brother. I can see why you like
her.

Savor this token as earnest of my claim: a lock of her lovely
hair. Savor it also as a memento of her passing. If you caress it
you can almost smell the sweet air of Capraia.

Of course, I could be lying about everything. This lock could
belong to someone else. Search your heart for the
truth.

Frater, ave atque vale.

"Oh, my..." D'Agosta said. The words were cut off as his
throat closed up involuntarily. He glanced over at the agent. He
was sitting on the floor, gently stroking the lock of hair. The
look on his face was so terrible D'Agosta had to turn
away.

"It could be a lie," he said. "Your brother's lied
before."

Pendergast did not answer. There was a brief and awful
silence.

"I'll go question the messenger," D'Agosta said, not daring to
look back.

Exiting the room, he walked down the corridor to the elevator.
The messenger was there, waiting, watched over by
Martyn.

"NYPD," he said, briefly showing his badge. Everything had
slowed down, as in a nightmare. He felt curiously heavy, as if he
could barely move his limbs. He wondered if this was what it was
like to be in shock.

The youth nodded.

"Who gave you the package to deliver?"

"Somebody in a cab dropped it off at our
service."

"What did the passenger look like?"

"It was just the cabbie. There was no
passenger."

"What kind of vehicle, exactly?"

"Typical yellow cab. From the city."

"Did you get a name or medallion number?" Even as he asked the
question, D'Agosta knew it wouldn't matter whether the kid had
gotten one or not; no doubt Diogenes had covered his
trail.

The messenger shook his head.

"How were you paid?"

"The driver paid fifty bucks. Said his instructions were to
get a messenger to deliver the package to a Dr. Pendergast, 1
West 72nd Street. In person, if possible. And not to talk to
anybody but Dr. Pendergast or the doorman."

"Very well." D'Agosta got the youth's name and employer. Then
he took Martyn aside, asking him to make sure the cops didn't
stop the messenger as he left the building. The strange feeling
of heaviness had not left him. He walked back down the corridor
to the small room.

Pendergast did not look up at his entrance. He was still
sitting on the floor, hunched forward, the lock of hair placed
before him. One hand rested on each knee, palm inward, each thumb
forming a small circle with the middle finger. The bereft,
grief-stricken expression on his face had disappeared, and in its
place was utter impassivity. He did not move, did not blink,
didn't even seem to breathe. He looked to D'Agosta as if he were
a million miles away.

Maybe he is, D'Agosta thought. Maybe he's meditating
or something. Or maybe he's just trying to keep himself
sane.

"The messenger knew nothing," he said as gently as he could.
"The trail's too well covered."

Pendergast did not acknowledge this. He remained motionless.
His face had lost none of its pallor.

"How the hell did Diogenes find out about Viola?" D'Agosta
burst out.

Pendergast spoke almost robotically. "For the first week,
while in Diogenes's care, I was raving. Delirious. It's possible
I mentioned her name. Nothing escapes
Diogenes-nothing."

D'Agosta sank into a nearby chair. Right now, he didn't think
he cared if Laura Hayward, a dozen FBI agents, and an army corps
came storming into the apartment. They could lock him up and
throw away the key. It wouldn't make any difference. Life was
shit.

The two sat in the room, motionless, silent, as half an hour
ticked by.

Then, without warning, Pendergast leaped to his feet, so
suddenly that D'Agosta's heart turned over in his
chest.

"She would have traveled under her own name!" he said, eyes
glittering intently.

"What?" D'Agosta said, rising himself.

"She wouldn't have come if he'd asked her to use a pseudonym
or arranged for a false passport. And she must have just arrived;
he wouldn't delay the note-he wouldn't have had
time!"

He raced toward the nearest laptop and began typing furiously.
Within twenty seconds, the typing stopped.

"Here she is!" he cried.

D'Agosta raced to look at Pendergast's screen:

Folkestone DataCentre PROPRIETARY

SQL Engine 4.041.a CONFIDENTIAL

Passenger Manifest Lookup

Results of inquiry follow

One record(s) found:

BA-0002359148

Maskelene, Lady Viola

British Airways Flight 822

Departed: London Gatwick LGW, 27 January, 11:54 P.M.
GMT

Arrived: Kennedy Intl JFK, 28 January, 12:10 A.M.
EST

End of Inquiry

Pendergast turned away from the screen. His entire being
seemed to crackle with energy, and his eyes-before so empty and
distant- were on fire.

"Come, Vincent-we're off to JFK. Every minute we waste, the
trail grows colder." And without another word, he dashed out of
the room and down the hall.

FORTY-EIGHT

It was like the old days, D'Agosta thought grimly: Pendergast
in his black suit, racing along the streets of New York City in
his Rolls. Except that, really, it wasn't like the old days at
all. Pendergast was a hunted man, and D'Agosta himself was in
such deep shit he'd need a decompression chamber when he
surfaced- assuming he ever surfaced at all.

The Rolls pulled up to the curb at Terminal 7 Arrivals.
Pendergast leaped out, leaving the vehicle running. A Port
Authority policeman was strolling along the curb, and Pendergast
swooped down on him.

"Federal Bureau of Investigation." He passed his gold shield
in front of the officer briefly, then closed it up and slid it
back into his suit.

"What can I do for you, sir?" the officer responded, instantly
intimidated.

"We're here on an investigation of the utmost importance. Can
I ask you to watch my vehicle, Officer?"

"Yes, sir." The man practically saluted.

Pendergast strode into the terminal, black coat flapping
behind him. D'Agosta followed him to baggage claim security.
Within, a heavyset guard was listening patiently to a man in a
suit shouting angrily about a stolen bag.

Again, Pendergast opened his badge, "Special Agent Pendergast,
Federal Bureau of Investigation. My associate, Vincent D'Agosta,
NYPD."

"Well, it's about time!" the man cried angrily. "My wife's
extremely valuable jewelry-"

"Never put valuable jewelry in check-in luggage," said
Pendergast smoothly, linking his arm in the man's and propelling
him to the door and out, then stepping quickly back and shutting
and locking it.

"You make it look so easy," said the guard with a
grin.

"Is there an Officer Carter on duty?" said Pendergast, his eye
just flitting over the man's identification badge.

"That's me. Randall Carter. What can I do for
you?"

"I was told you were the best man to handle my
problem."

"Really?" The man's face lit up. "Who-?"

"We need to review some security videotapes from last night.
Just after midnight. It's a matter of great
urgency."

"Yes, sir, let me just call the director of
security."

Pendergast shook his head wonderingly. "Didn't they tell you
this was already cleared?"

"It is? I didn't know. Funny they didn't send down an S.C...
."

"Well," Pendergast interrupted briskly, "I'm glad they at
least had the sense to send me to you. You think for yourself;
you're not one of those bureaucratic types." He suddenly leaned
into the man's face and grasped his shoulder. "Are you wearing
body armor, Officer?"

"Body armor? We're not required ... Hey, but
why-?"

"We'd better get going."

"Yes, sir." The officer needed no more persuasion. He hustled
to the back of his office and unlocked a security
door.

Down a beige corridor, past another locked door, and D'Agosta
found himself in a large computer room festooned with monitors
playing back live video feeds from all over the terminal. A few
security guards were sitting around a cafeteria-style table
drinking coffee, while a thin, irritated technician rapped away
on a keyboard in one corner.

"These gentlemen need to see some video," Carter said to the
technician.

"Moment," said the technician.

"No, now. This man's FBI and it's a matter of grave
importance."

The technician got up, expelling an irritated hiss. "Right.
Let's see the S.C." He held out his hand.

"It's been cleared. You got my okay on that."

A roll of the eyes. "So what do you want?"

Pendergast stepped up. "British Airways Flight 822 arrived
here from Gatwick just after midnight. I want the security
videotapes of the carousel where that flight's luggage arrived
and, most important, I need to review the feed from the
greeting area just beyond customs clearance."

"Have a seat. This might take a while."

"I'm afraid I don't have a while."

"Give me a break. I'll do what I can, but don't hold your
breath."

Pendergast broke into a gentle smile. Seeing that smile,
D'Agosta felt himself tense up instinctively.

"You're Jonathan Murphy, are you not?" Pendergast asked in his
honeyed voice.

"So you can read an ID card. Bravo."

"I believe in the carrot-and-stick method of doing things,
Jonathan," Pendergast said, still pleasantly. "Get me those
videotapes in five minutes and you will receive a
ten-thousand-dollar reward from the FBI's Public Incentive and
Reward Program, also known as PIRP. No doubt you've heard of it.
On the other hand, fail to get me that videotape and I'll put a
red security flag in your file, which will mean that you'll never
work at another airport, or any other secured site, in the
country again. Now, which is it to be: carrot or
stick?"

A silence. The security guards were nudging each other and
grinning. Clearly, the technician wasn't popular.

Murphy smirked. "I'll take the ten grand."

"Excellent."

The technician sat down again and went to work with a
vengeance, fingers hammering at the keys. D'Agosta watched as
numbers scrolled frantically across the CRT.

"We don't use videotapes anymore," he said. "We have
everything stored digitally, on-site. The ganged feeds use up an
entire terabyte of our RAID-1 array every..."

Suddenly, he stopped bashing at the keyboard. "Okay. The
flight arrived at ten minutes after midnight, gate 34. Let's see
... It takes about fifteen minutes, on average, to go through
pre-customs and walk to the carousel... I'll cue up to
twelve-twenty, just to be safe."

A video sprang to life on Murphy's screen. Pendergast bent
forward, scrutinizing it intently. D'Agosta peered over his
shoulder. He could see the international baggage area, an empty
carousel turning.

"I'll nudge up the speed until people start arriving," Murphy
said.

Now the carousel turned much faster. The seconds spun by, in
fast motion, at the bottom of the screen. Shortly, people began
arriving at the carousel, looking for their luggage. Murphy
tapped a set of keys, slowing the video down to normal
speed.

"That's her!" Pendergast whispered urgently, pointing at the
screen.

D'Agosta made out the slender form of Viola Maskelene,
carrying a small bag. She approached the carousel, pulled her
ticket out of the bag, examined the baggage claim checks, then
crossed her arms to wait.

For a minute, Pendergast just stared at the image. Then he
spoke again. "Switch to the greeting area, please. Same time
frame."

The technician typed in some more commands. The image of the
baggage area disappeared, replaced by the waiting area outside
customs. It was sparsely populated, a few knots of people
standing around restlessly, waiting to meet
arrivals.

"There," said Pendergast.

A man stood off to one side, tall, slender, dressed in a dark
overcoat. He had gingery hair, and he was looking around the room
rather languidly, peering into various corners. His eye turned
and stopped, fixed on the security camera.

D'Agosta had to stop himself from taking an instinctual step
back. The man was staring right at them. His face was tan and
angular and he had a closely trimmed beard, one eye milky blue,
the other hazel. D'Agosta recognized him instantly as the man he
had seen on theslopes above Castel Fosco in Italy that fateful
day not two months earlier.

The man nodded formally at the camera, raised his hand just a
little, and tipped a wave. His lips moved as if in
speech.

D'Agosta glanced at Pendergast. His face was white-with
rage.

Pendergast turned to the technician. "Back that up and print
it out, there-when the man waves."

"Yes, sir."

A moment later and the computer printer was humming.
Pendergast ripped the color image out and stuffed it in his
pocket.

"Fast-forward, please, until a lady conies out and greets
him."

Once again, the images on the screen scurried briefly in
accelerated motion, slowing again when Viola emerged. Diogenes
approached with two outstretched hands and a large smile.
D'Agosta watched breathlessly as the two exchanged what appeared
to be pleasantries; then Diogenes waved a bill and a skycap came
rushing over. They turned and headed toward the door, the skycap
following with Viola's bags.

Pendergast pointed at the screen. "Who's that
skycap?"

Carter, the security officer, squinted at the screen. "Looks
like Norm. Norman Saunders."

"Is he still on?"

Carter shook his head. "Couldn't say."

"He goes off at eight," one of the other guards said. "But
sometimes he works overtime."

The figures disappeared out the glass doors.

"Go to the curbside camera."

"Right."

More rapping of keys. The scene abruptly changed again. There
was Diogenes striding toward a dark Lincoln. He grasped the door
handle, opened the door for Viola, helped her in. He waited for
the skycap to close the trunk; then he walked around the car and
got into the driver's seat.

The car pulled away, accelerating into the darkness beyond,
and was gone.

"Back up," said Pendergast, "and get me a print of the car.
When the door is open, please: I want to see the interior. And
another print when the car's pulling away, so we can get a make
on the plate."

A moment later, the computer was spitting out the images,
which Pendergast immediately thrust into his jacket. "Good. Now
we're going to find Saunders."

"If he's here, he'll be at the east carousels," Carter
said.

"Thank you." Pendergast turned to go.

"So," said the technician, "how do I collect my ten
grand?"

Pendergast paused. "Ten thousand dollars? Just for doing your
job? A ridiculous idea."

To much muffled laughter and shaking of heads, they left the
room. "If Saunders is on, he'll be over by baggage," said Carter.
"I'll show you."

Several flights had recently arrived, and streams of travelers
were crowding into baggage claim. All carousels were running
full-bore, packed with luggage, and skycaps were coming and going
busily.

Carter stopped one of them. "Saunders take an extra
shift?"

The man shook his head. "He's off until
midnight."

Looking past the skycap, D'Agosta noticed four Port Authority
cops on the landing above the baggage claim concourse, scanning
the crowd. Immediately, he nudged Pendergast. "I don't like
that."

"Neither do I."

Carter's radio went off and he grabbed it.

"We better get the hell out of here," murmured
D'Agosta.

They began walking briskly toward the exit.

"Hey!" came a distant shout. "Wait!"

D'Agosta glanced back to see the officers spilling into the
crowd, pushing their way through. "You two! Wait!"

Pendergast broke into a run, darting through the throngs of
people and heading back out to the curb. The P.A. cop was still
beside the idling Rolls, talking on his radio. Pendergast shot
past him, and D'Agosta half jumped, half tumbled into the
passenger seat. The man's protest was lost in the roar of the big
engine and the tremendous screech of rubber as the Rolls shot
away from the pickup area at high speed.

As they accelerated onto the JFK Expressway, Pendergast pulled
the printouts from his suit coat.

"Boot up my laptop, there in the carrier, and do a make on a
Lincoln Town Car, New York license 453A WQ6. Radio the milepost
11 toll plaza on the Van Wyck Expressway and talk someone into
reviewing the security tapes for between twelve-thirty and one
a.m., going both east and west."

"What about us?"

"We're going east."

"East? You don't think he took her into the
city?"

"That's exactly what I do think he did. But given that
Diogenes seems to be able to anticipate what I think, I'm going
east-to the far end of the island."

"Right."

"Another thing: we're going to need to trade down." And
Pendergast abruptly pulled off the airport expressway into the
returns lot of a Hertz office, steered the big car into an empty
spot, and killed the engine.

D'Agosta looked up from the laptop. "What, rent
something?"

"No. Steal something."

FORTY-NINE

Once again, Smithback entered the gracious confines of Dr.
Tisander's office, a load of textbooks under one arm. It was
eight o'clock, well past the barbaric 5:30 p.m. dinner hour of
River Oaks. He found the psychiatrist seated behind his desk, but
this evening the usual look of genteel condescension was marred
by an irritated flash in the eyes.

"Edward," Dr. Tisander said. "Although I am extremely busy, I
am happy to give you five minutes of my undivided
attention."

Smithback seated himself without an invitation and thumped the
load of books onto the man's desk.

"I've been thinking about something you said in our
conversation the day before yesterday," he began. "You told me:
'It is a grave step to deprive a person of his freedom, and due
process must be followed with total scrupulosity'"

"I may have said something like that, yes."

"You said exactly that. It made me curious to know just what
that process is."

Tisander nodded condescendingly. "You seem to have found our
library to your satisfaction."

"Very much so. In fact, I found exactly what I was looking
for."

"How nice," said Tisander, feigning interest while taking a
surreptitious glance at his watch.

Smithback patted the top book. "The laws of New York State
regarding the involuntary commitment of the mentally ill are
among the strictest in the nation."

"I am well aware of that. It's one reason why we have so many
homeless people on the street."

"It isn't enough for a family to sign the documents in order
to commit someone against his will. There's a whole process
involved."

Another sage nod from Tisander.

"Isn't it true, for example, that a judge has to declare the
person non compos mentis?"

"Yes."

"And even a judge cannot make that declaration unless two
conditions are met. Do you recall those two conditions, Dr.
Tisander?"

This time the psychiatrist gave a genuine smile, delighted to
show off his erudition. "I certainly do. The person is either a
danger to himself-mentally or physically-or a danger to
society."

"Right. In the first case, suicide ideation or an actual
attempt must usually be present, which must be attested to by a
signed letter from a doctor. In the case of a person being a
danger to society, it's usually necessary for the person to have
been arrested."

"You have been busy, Edward," said
Tisander.

"And then, after the declaration of non compos mentis,
there must be a psychiatric evaluation recommending involuntary
commitment."

"All standard procedure. Now, Edward, it's after eight, and it
isn't long until lights-out, so if you'd-"

Smithback pulled one of the books from the pile. "I'll be done
in a minute."

Tisander rose, squaring papers on his desk. "If you make it
quick." He nodded imperceptibly, and an orderly emerged from the
shadows near the door.

Smithback hastily pulled a sheet of paper from the book and
handed it over the desk. "I drew up a list of documents that
must, by law, be in my file."

Tisander took the list, scanned it with a frown. "A judge's
declaration. A suicide-attempt report-signed by a doctor-or an
arrest record. A psychiatric evaluation." He read them off. "I've
no doubt they're all there. Now, Edward, it's
time."

The orderly advanced.

"One other thing," Smithback said.

"Thank you, Edward." A note of exasperation had crept
into Tisander's orotund voice.

"A question. That psychiatric evaluation that must be in the
file- who administers it?"

"We do. Always. Surely, Edward, you remember the interview and
tests you took on admittance."

"There's where you blew it, Tisander." Smithback dropped the
heavy tome back on the desk, for effect. "It says right in
here-"

"Jonathan?"

The orderly appeared at Smithback's elbow, a hulking presence.
"This way, Mr. Jones."

"-by law," Smithback went on loudly, "the psychiatric
evaluation can't be done by anyone on the staff of the admitting
institution."

"Rubbish. Show Mr. Jones to his room,
Jonathan."

"It's true!" Smithback cried as the orderly took his
arm. "Back in the fifties, a young man was committed by his
family in collusion with the asylum. They stole his inheritance.
In the aftermath, a law was passed stating the evaluation had to
be done by an independent psychiatrist. Check it out. Page 337,
Romanski v. Reynauld State Hospital!"

"This way, Mr. Jones," said the orderly, propelling him firmly
across the Persian carpet.

Smithback dug in his heels. "Tisander, when I get out, I'm
going to sue River Oaks and you personally. If you can't produce
that independent evaluation, you'll lose the suit-and it'll cost
you dearly."

"Good night, Edward."

"I'll make it my mission in life! I'll dog you like the Furies
dogged Orestes. I'll take away everything you have, your job,
your reputation, this whole pile. As you know, I'm as rich as
Croesus. Check my file. I know for a fact you cut that
corner! There's no independent evaluation, and you know
it!"

Smithback felt himself being dragged bodily toward the
door.

"Shut the door on your way out, will you, Jonathan?" Dr.
Tisander said.

"Tisander?" Smithback raised his voice. "Can you afford to
make this mistake? You'll lose the whole enchilada, you son of
a-!"

Jonathan shut the door to the office. "Come on, Jones," he
said, giving Smithback a gentle push down the hall. "Give it a
rest."

"Get your hands off me!" Smithback cried,
struggling.

"Hey, man, I'm just doing my job," said the orderly
calmly.

Smithback relaxed. "Right. Sorry. I imagine it's about as much
fun working here as it is being a 'guest.'"

The orderly released him and Smithback dusted off his jacket.
"All right, Jonathan," he said, mustering a feeble smile. "Escort
me back to my cage. I'll work up a new angle
tomorrow."

Just as they were turning the corner, Tisander's voice came
echoing down the hall. "Jonathan? Bring Mr. Jones
back."

Jonathan paused. "Looks like you get another
hearing."

"Yeah, right."

As they turned back toward Tisander's office, Smithback heard
the low voice of the orderly behind him. "Good
luck."

Smithback entered the office. Tisander was standing behind the
desk, his figure rigid. Smithback saw his own file open on the
director's desk. Next to it was the book he'd indicated-opened to
page 337.

"Sit down," Tisander said tersely. He nodded at the orderly.
"You can wait outside."

Smithback took a seat.

"You think you're a clever fellow," Tisander said. All the
phony good humor and condescension was gone. His face was now as
hard and gray as a boiled potato.

"I was right," Smithback murmured, more to himself than to
Tisander.

"A sheer technicality. There isn't a psychiatric hospital in
the state that does independent evaluations. I don't think
anyone's even aware of this ridiculous law. But under the
circumstances, I can't afford to keep you here."

"You're damn right you can't afford it. I'll sue your ass from
here to Albany-"

Tisander closed his eyes and held up a hand. "Mr. Jones,
please. Our intention was to help you, but I'll be damned
if I'll let some spoiled brat undo all the good I've built up
over the years. Frankly, you're not worth it."

"So I'm free?"

"As soon as I write up the decommitment papers. Unfortunately,
it's almost lockdown. You won't be able to leave until six a.m.
tomorrow."

"Tomorrow?" Smithback echoed, almost afraid to believe his
ears.

"Believe me, I'd love to get rid of you now.
Jonathan?"

The orderly came back in.

"Mr. Jones is to be discharged in the morning. See to it he's
given every consideration until then."

They exited the office, and as soon as the door closed,
Smithback grinned. "Jonathan, I'm outta here."

Jonathan high-fived him with a big smile. "Man, how'd you do
it?"

Smithback shrugged. "Sheer brilliance."

FIFTY

Nora Kelly paused on the corner of 77th Street and Museum
Drive, looking northward. The great Romanesque entrance to the
museum was lit up with spotlights, a five-story banner touting
the opening hung on the facade. Below, the drive was packed with
the usual New York chaos of limos and black Mercedes, disgorging
patrons and celebrities in furs and black tie to successive waves
of flashes. The inevitable red carpet had been rolled down the
granite steps, which were roped off as if at a movie premiere, to
keep back the press and the uninvited. The whole spectacle made
her sick.

Margo Green had been brutally murdered just two days ago and
buried this very morning-yet it was as if the museum had already
dismissed and forgotten her. Nora wondered what would happen if
she just turned around and went back to her apartment; but she
already knew the answer: she might as well kiss her career
good-bye. She was supposedly one of the stars of this show, as
George Ashton had made all too clear to her. The show must go
on.

Taking a deep breath, and pulling her woolen coat more tightly
about her shoulders, she started forward. As she drew closer, she
noticed a commotion off to one side. A group of short, heavyset
men dressed in buckskins and wrapped in decorated blankets was
standing in a circle, beating drums and chanting-some waving
bundles of smoking sagebrush. After a moment of incomprehension,
she suddenly realized what it was all about: the Tano protesters
had arrived. She could see Manetti, the security director,
talking with them and gesturing, flanked by a couple of NYPD cops
and some museum guards. It seemed the commotion had begun to
attract the attention of the guests, and some of them were coming
over to see what was happening.

"Excuse me!" Nora pushed her way through some gawkers, ducked
under the velvet rope, stuck her museum badge in the face of a
protesting guard, and approached the group of Indians. At that
very moment, a beautiful young woman came sweeping up: a star or
starlet of some kind, judging by the trail of paparazzi that
followed in her wake.

"This is private property," Manetti was saying to what Nora
assumed was the leader of the Tanos. "We don't object to your
protesting, but you have to do it down there, on the
sidewalk-"

"Sir," the leader began in a quiet voice, "we are not
protesting, we are praying-"

"Whatever. This is private property."

The celebrity waded in. With a jolt, Nora recognized her as
movie star Wanda Meursault, tall, exotic, and vaguely foreign,
rumored to be in line for best actress at the upcoming Academy
Awards.

"Hold on! Why shouldn't these people have a right to pray?"
she demanded to a dozen simultaneous flashes. A thicket of boomed
mikes came swinging around to capture every deathless word that
might drop from her lips, and TV lights fired up.

Instantly, Nora saw a P.R. disaster in the
making.

"I'm not saying they can't pray," Manetti said, exasperation
strong in his voice. "All I'm saying is that this is private
property-"

"These Native Americans are praying." Meursault turned
and asked, as an afterthought: "Why are you
praying?"

"We're praying for our sacred masks, locked in a case in the
museum," the leader said.

"They've locked up your sacred masks?" The
actress's face bloomed in mock horror.

The cameras zeroed in.

Something had to be done-and fast. Nora shoved forward,
pushing aside a policeman and jostling Manetti to one
side.

"Hey, just a minute," the security director
began.

"Nora Kelly, assistant curator of the exhibition," Nora
explained to the cop, dangling her badge before every official
face within reach. She turned to the security director. "I'll
handle this, Mr. Manetti."

"Dr. Kelly, these people are trespassing on museum
property-"

"I know that. I'll handle it."

Manetti fell silent. Amazing, Nora thought, how quickly a
sharp tone and an air of authority-an authority she didn't
have-could turn the tables.

She turned to the Tano leader, startled to see he was old, at
least seventy. The calmness and dignity in his face was
remarkable. This wasn't the young, angry activist she had
imagined. The other men were equally aged, all somewhat rotund,
wrapped in Pendleton wool blankets. The old VW bus they'd arrived
in, a real junker, was parked illegally on Museum Drive and would
no doubt soon be towed.

"Y'aah shas slit dz'in nitsa," she said to the
man.

The leader stared at her dumbfounded. "Y'aah shas," he
said hastily, as if remembering himself. "How-?"

"I spent some time at Tano Pueblo," said Nora. "That's all I
know of your language, so please don't try to reply!" She smiled
and held out her hand. "Nora Kelly, one of the curators of the
show. I believe I spoke to one of your
colleagues."

"You spoke to me."

"Then you must be Mr. Wametowa."

The old man nodded.

"How can I help you?" Nora asked.

"They want to pray!" Meursault shouted from the
sidelines.

Nora ignored her, keeping her attention on
Wametowa.

"We're praying to the masks," he said. "That's all we're
asking, to speak to our masks."

"Speak to the masks?"

"Yes. To reassure them that we're here, that we care about
them, that they haven't been forgotten."

Nora could see Manetti rolling his eyes.

"That's so beautiful," said Meursault, turning her head
to better expose her profile to the cameras. Another dozen
flashes went off.

"We believe the masks are alive, that they have a spirit.
They've been alone and away from us for a long time. We've come
to bless them, comfort them."

Suddenly, Nora realized just what the solution
was.

She pretended to think for a moment. She knew, from her brief
week at Tano Pueblo back in her graduate student days, that they
viewed any decision arrived at quickly as a poor decision. "This
doesn't seem like a good place to do that," she said at
last.

"That's just what I was saying-" Manetti began.

Nora paid no attention. "I wonder if there might be a better
place..."

"There is," Manetti said. "Down there on the
sidewalk."

Nora flashed a look at Manetti.

"We would like to be closer to our masks, not further," said
Wametowa.

"Why don't you come in, then?" Nora asked.

"They won't let us."

"Come in as my guests. I'll take you to the masks right now,
so you can speak to them in private-before the unveiling
of the hall."

"Dr. Kelly, are you crazy?" Manetti protested.

The Tano elder stared at her a minute. Then his broad, ancient
face broke into a radiant smile. He gave a dignified bow.
"Eesha łat dził. You are a human being, Miss
Nora."

"Bravo!" cried Meursault.

"I won't permit this," the security director
said.

"Mr. Manetti, I'll take full responsibility."

"You can't just bring these people into the hall before the
ribbon cutting-that's impossible!"

"Nothing's impossible. In fact, this is the way it
should be." She turned to the Indians. "Would you
gentlemen like to follow me?"

"We'd be happy to," said the Tano.

Meursault linked her arm with the startled old Indian's and
they marched forward behind Nora, the crowd of press and
onlookers surging behind. "Make way for the Tano elders!"
Meursault cried. "Make way!" Her sequined dress shimmered under
the lights, her face radiant at seizing so brilliantly the center
of attention.

Like magic, the crowd parted as they mounted the red-carpeted
steps. The Tanos began softly chanting and beating their drums
again as they passed through the Rotunda and entered the Hall of
the Heavens, and Nora found herself facing a line of gala
partygoers who had fallen rapt at the sight of Native Americans
marching toward the hall. No doubt they all thought the
procession was part of the program. The mayor came forward,
sensing, like Meursault, an opportunity.

Manetti followed behind, his face red but his mouth shut,
obviously realizing it would be counterproductive to continue the
argument in front of the whole city.

Now Collopy came rushing forward from the greeting line.
"Nora! What in the world?"

She bent toward him and whispered quickly. "The Tanos would
like to have a private moment with the masks alone, before the
ribbon cutting."

"Whatever for?"

"To pray for and bless the masks. That's all."

Collopy frowned. "Nora, this is not the time. Surely,
this can wait!"

Nora looked straight into his eyes. "Dr. Collopy. Please trust
me on this. I know the Indians of the Southwest well, I've lived
and worked among them for years. They're not here to cause you
trouble or public embarrassment. They just want a little private
time with their masks. By the time the ceremony's over, they'll
be gone. And the whole situation will be defused. This is the
very best way to handle things, and I know if you give it
careful consideration, you'll agree." She dropped her
voice even further. "It also happens to be a great public
relations opportunity."

Collopy looked at Nora, his patrician face wide with
astonishment. Then he looked at Manetti. Finally, he turned
toward the waiting Tanos. He cleared his throat and smoothed his
hair, his brow wrinkled in thought.

And then suddenly, his face broke into a welcoming smile. He
reached out his hand toward the Tano leader. "Welcome! Mr... .
?"

"Wametowa."

"Of course! Welcome! The museum is delighted to receive you
and your group as representatives of the Tano people. I
understand you've come a long way to see the Great Kiva
masks."

"Two thousand miles."

A murmur went up in the crowd. The cameras were
whirring.

"We are so glad you could make it. This is a special honor for
the museum and for me personally."

The press was eating it up. Nora felt a huge relief: it was
going to turn out all right.

"Our security director, Mr. Manetti, will take you into the
hall to, ah, visit with the masks in private. Mr. Manetti? You
can handle the security zones a tad ahead of schedule, I'm sure.
And leave them alone while they pray."

"Yes, sir."

"Will half an hour suffice?" Collopy asked the
leader.

"Yes, thank you," replied the Tano elder.

"Splendid! Afterwards, you're all invited to join the
festivities, Mr. Wem, ah, Wem..."

"Wametowa."

"Excellent! Is there anything else we can do?"

"For now, this will suffice." The Tanos nodded, looking around
and nodding to one another. "To tell you the truth, we didn't
expect to be treated with this kind of respect."

"Nonsense! We're delighted to have you!" Collopy turned toward
the cameras, having fully recovered his composure. "The museum
thanks the Tano people for the privilege of being allowed to
share these remarkable masks with the rest of the
world."

Meursault began the clapping and soon the hall was thundering
with applause, the television cameras capturing every
detail.

Nora watched Manetti lead the group of Indians down the
corridor, speaking into a two-way radio as he did so. Then she
turned, walked to the nearest chair she could find, and collapsed
in it. She couldn't believe she'd spoken to the museum director
like that. Her knees felt like rubber.

In a detached, almost weary way, it occurred to her how
fitting an elegy this was for Margo. It had been so important to
her, this issue of the masks and the Tanos' sovereignty over
them. Seeing these Indians ushered into the exhibition with
solicitousness and respect would have made her very
happy.

Suddenly, a cold glass of champagne appeared before her. She
looked up in surprise to see Hugo Menzies standing behind her,
resplendent in a magnificent shawl-collared tuxedo, his flowing
white hair combed back, face beaming.

He took Nora's hand, placed the cold glass into it, patted her
on the back, and sat down. "Did anyone ever tell you what a
genius you are?" He chuckled. "That was the most dashing
publicity coup it has been my privilege to
witness."

Nora shook her head. "It could have been a publicity
disaster."

"It would have been a disaster if you hadn't been on
the scene. But not only did you handle the Tanos, but you made
the museum look downright benevolent. Brilliant, just brilliant."
He practically chortled with pleasure, his eyes sparkling. Nora
had never seen him so animated.

She took a slug of champagne. It had been the week from hell,
with Bill threatened and in hiding, Margo's murder, the stress of
the opening, the warnings from Pendergast... But right now she
was too tired and exhausted to feel any fear. All she wanted to
do was go home, double-lock the door, and crawl into bed.
Instead, she had to endure hours of speechifying, mingling, and
forced gaiety.

Menzies placed a gentle hand on her shoulder. "When this is
all over, I'd like you to take a week's vacation. You deserve
it."

"Thanks. I wish I could begin now."

"Three more hours."

Nora held up her glass. "Three more hours," she said, and took
another gulp of champagne.

A string ensemble struck up Haydn's Emperor Quartet as
the crowd began to move toward the food tables. They were loaded
with blini au caviar, prosciutto, rare French and Italian
cheeses, mounds of crusty baguettes, crudites, fresh oysters on
beds of crushed ice, cold lobster tails, smoked sturgeon-the
works. Other tables groaned with wines and champagne, and every
third person seemed to be a waiter rushing about with a silver
tray loaded with drinks and food.

"Nora," said Menzies, "you must circulate."

She groaned. "God help me."

"Come on. We'll face the ravening hordes together." He took
her arm and they began making their way slowly through the crowd.
Nora found that she was greeted at every turn by congratulators,
peppered with questions from the press. Her stunt with the Tanos
had apparently gone down exceptionally well, everyone assuming it
had been long planned.

When at length she returned to their assigned table, she found
that several other members of the department were there,
including Ashton, the show's chief curator. As the serious eating
got under way, Collopy, flanked by his young wife, mounted the
podium and gave a short, witty speech.

Then it was time for the cutting of the ribbon. Nora, Menzies,
Ashton, and a few other curators lined up at the podium while
Collopy, wielding the gigantic pair of scissors used for such
occasions, went to the ribbon and made a hash of trying to cut
it. When it was finally accomplished, a cheer went up and the
huge doors leading to the Sacred Images exhibition swung open.
Smiling and nodding, Menzies, Nora, and the rest of the
Anthropology Department led the way, the partygoers following in
an excited crush behind.

It took about half an hour to reach the far end of the hall,
propelled along by the mass of people behind them. Nora felt a
shudder as she passed through the room Margo had been murdered
in, but, of course, all trace of the crime scene had been removed
and nobody but her even seemed aware of it. As she moved farther
and farther beyond the scene of the murder, Nora felt the horror
replaced by a quiet sense of pride. She could hardly believe
they'd managed to pull it off.

Menzies stayed close beside her, occasionally murmuring
compliments on the cases she had curated or arranged. The Tanos
had come and gone, leaving some bits of turquoise, pollen, and
cornmeal on the top of the mask case, which everybody took care
to leave in place. At last, when they reached the final hall,
Menzies turned to Nora and bowed.

"I do believe we have done our duty." He smiled, face
twinkling. "And now you may beat a discreet retreat home. I,
unfortunately, have some work to do upstairs in my office. Let's
talk next week about that vacation I owe you."

He bowed again and Nora, with relief, turned to make her way
to the nearest exit-and home.

FIFTY-ONE

For perhaps the fiftieth time in the last two days, Larry En
derby had made up his mind to quit, get the hell out of the
museum.

It wasn't enough that he worked in a windowless basement room
in the Museum of Natural History, the spookiest damn place in all
of New York City. He couldn't get the horror of what he'd found
two days ago out of his head. They hadn't even given him a
frigging day off, offered him counseling, or even thanked him. It
was like he didn't count. It was like she didn't count,
the way they just moved right ahead with the exhibition as if
nothing had happened.

Margo Green. He didn't know her well, but she'd gone out of
her way to be nice to him the few times they'd met. Which was
more than he could say for most of the curators and all the
administrators. It was just the way the museum treated everybody
below a certain level: hired help.

But, if he could admit it to himself, Enderby was mainly
disgruntled because the museum had chosen this exact time-during
the biggest party in five years-to switch over yet another
museum hall to the new security system. So, instead of scarfing
down caviar and champagne with the beautiful people two flights
up, they were down there in the basement once again, toiling over
software subroutines.

Sure, they'd been invited to the party, like everyone else in
the museum. That just added insult to injury.

He rolled back from the computer console with an exaggerated
sigh.

"Holding up?" Walt Smith, project manager for the museum's
security upgrade, asked from behind a nearby monitoring
screen.

Smitty had been unusually gentle since Enderby's discovery,
two days before. Everyone was tiptoeing around him, like somebody
had died in his family.

"How about a short break to check out the party?" Enderby
asked him. "I wouldn't mind a few of those cocktail
shrimp."

Smitty shook his head. He held a BlackBerry in one hand and a
cell phone in the other. "I don't think that's going to be
possible, Larry. Sorry."

"Come on, Smitty," Jim Choi, the software engineer, said from
the far side of the diagnostic display unit. "Just give us half
an hour. You'd be surprised how many shrimp I can ingest in half
an hour. The party's almost over, they'll run out of food
soon."

"You know we can't alter the schedule. The Astor Hall's just
like any other, one more on the list. What, we're going to sneak
the hands of the atomic clock back five minutes, maybe nobody
will notice?" Smitty laughed at his own miserable
joke.

Choi rolled his eyes. Smitty was not known for his rapier-like
wit.

Enderby watched the goatee on Smith's chin waggle up and down
as he laughed. It was a straggly little thing, seemingly attached
by only a few hairs, and Enderby half hoped it might fall off one
of these days. Despite Enderby's general irritation, he had to
admit Smitty wasn't a bad guy to work for. He'd worked his way up
through the ranks and, despite being only thirty-five, was as Old
Museum as they came. A real stickler, relatively humorless, but
as long as you were a conscientious worker and did your job, he
looked out for you. It wasn't Smitty's fault the museum bigwigs
were demanding that the new security system be fully installed
and operational, yesterday.

Smitty stood up and walked across the room, past racks of
computer workstations and servers, to a bank of six dozen small
CCTV monitors mounted in the far wall. Most of the monitors
showed black-and-white still lifes of empty museum hallways and
display cases. Half a dozen in the lower right corner,
however-the video feeds from the Hall of the Heavens, where the
opening party was going on-were a riot of movement. From his
terminal, Enderby watched the little images dance and jitter
their way across the screen with a heavy heart. Upstairs, the
museum's slope-shouldered, mouth-breathing curators were rubbing
elbows with starlets and nymphets; and here he was, toiling in
this cave like some troglodyte. True, it could be worse-he could
be working in the "Pit," the museum's Central Security Office,
which was twice as large but unpleasantly hot and crammed full of
even more screens and keyboards than this Advanced Technology
Center. Worse, but not much worse.

Smitty was squinting at his BlackBerry. "Okay, set to
initialize the final test?"

Nobody replied.

"I'll take that as a yes." He turned back to his console,
tapped briefly on the keyboard. "Astor Hall," he intoned, "final
fail-safe test of the security upgrade, January 28, 8:28
p.m."

Jeez, he always makes it sound like it's Mission Control in
here, Enderby thought. He glanced over at Jim Choi, who once
again rolled his eyes.

"Larry, what's the status of the legacy system?" Smitty
asked.

"Looks good."

"Jim, give me an update on the laser grid in the Astor
Hall."

A brief tapping of keys. "Ready to go," Choi
said.

"Then let's run the low-level diagnostics."

There was a brief silence as both Smitty and Choi ran
independent tests. Enderby, whose job was to monitor the behavior
of the preexisting security system as the updated laser security
system was brought online, stared at his monitor. This was
probably the fortieth hall they'd converted to the new system.
And for each conversion, there were a hundred steps to perform:
on-site analysis, system architecture, coding, installation ...
He could be making three times his salary in some slick start-up
in Palo Alto, with stock options to boot. And he probably
wouldn't stumble over any bodies in the middle of the night,
either.

Smitty looked up from his keyboard. "Jim, what's your
checksum?"

"It's 780E4F3 hex."

"I concur. Let's proceed." Smitty picked up a phone,
dialed.

Enderby watched without interest. He knew Smitty was calling
the boys in the Pit, giving them a heads-up that the switchover
was about to happen, just a reminder in case some newbie went
apeshit when he saw the hiccup on their screens. It was always
the same. The old system would be disabled; there would be a
ninety-second period in which the new system was initialized and
the "handshake" performed; then a final twenty-minute test of the
new system would follow, to ensure the installation was correct
and that it had been brought online successfully. Twenty minutes
in which they had nothing to do but twiddle their thumbs. Then,
at last, the new system would become fully operational and the
old system put in backup mode. He fetched a huge yawn. As he did
so, his stomach grumbled unhappily.

"Central Security?" Smitty was saying into the phone. "Who is
this, Carlos? Hey, it's Walt Smith in ATC. We're activating the
lasers in the Astor Hall. We'll be initializing in about five
minutes. Right. I'll call back once the handshake's
complete."

He put the phone down, then looked back at Enderby. "Hey,
Larry," he said gently.

"What?"

"Just how much time did Choi there say he needed to consume
that trawler-load of shrimp?"

"I told you," Choi piped up. "Thirty minutes."

Smitty leaned forward, resting his arm on the console. "Tell
you what. If we can get this initialization done and the
twenty-minute test phase started, I'll give you fifteen.
Including the time it'll take us to get there and back
again."

Enderby sat up. "On the level?"

Smitty nodded.

Choi grinned widely. "You just purchased yourself a
boy."

"Good. Then let's see how fast we can get through this
checklist." And Smitty turned back to his
terminal.

FIFTY-TWO

Hugo Menzies inserted his key into the staff elevator and rode
it from the second to the fifth floor. Exiting the elevator, he
strolled meditatively down the long, polished corridor. The
curatorial offices lay on either side: old oaken doors with
panels of frosted glass, each bearing the name of a curator in
old-fashioned gold-leaf lettering, even those most recently
appointed. Menzies smiled, already feeling a nostalgia for the
old pile and its quaint traditions.

He paused before his own office door, opened it, and entered
just long enough to pick up the canvas satchel that accompanied
him almost everywhere. Then he closed and locked the door and
continued his stroll to the farthest end of the hall, where there
was an unmarked door. He unlocked it, stepped into the stairwell
beyond, descended two flights, and exited into a dark, deserted
hall-the Hall of Northwest Coast Indians. It was one of the
oldest halls in the museum, a true gem of late-nineteenth-century
museology, and it smelled of old cedar and smoke. Transformation
masks, totem poles, slate bowls gleamed in the dark recesses.
Menzies paused to inhale the air with delight. Then he walked
briskly through the deserted hall and several others, finally
arriving at a large metal door bearing the legend The Astor
Hall of Diamonds.

His eye dwelled lovingly on the door in all its brushed-steel
splendor, taking special note of the two video cameras on either
side, staring down at him like beady black eyes-except, as he
knew, they were currently not functioning. He smiled again, then
removed a large round watch from his vest pocket and gazed at it.
Although in shape it resembled a pocket watch, it was, in fact, a
modern digital stopwatch. On its face, numbers were counting down
with enormous rapidity, at an accuracy to the thousandths of a
second.

The watch was reading time signals from the same satellite
that the museum's security system used.

He waited until the watch signaled a certain point in time
with a soft beep. Menzies immediately put the watch away, stepped
rapidly to the door, placed his ear against it, and then quickly
swiped a magnetic card through the reader. The door did not open;
instead, a small eye-level window shot open, revealing a retinal
optical scanner.

Menzies bowed his head, popped two soft contact lenses out
from his eyes and into a waiting plastic container, then stepped
up to the optical reader. A quick bar of light passed across his
face; there was a moment's stillness, and then a soft click
announced the disengagement of the lock. He stepped through the
door into the hall beyond, the door automatically closing behind
him.

With a rapidity of movement marvelous for his advanced age,
Menzies knelt, opened his satchel, and got to work. First he
reached up and, with a sharp tug, removed his leonine thatch of
white hair, shoved the wig into the satchel, then reached into
his mouth and pulled out five molded rubber cheek and chin
pieces. This act alone caused an astonishing transformation in
the shape and apparent age of his face. Another pair of quick
tugs took off the bushy eyebrows and a few small blemishes, liver
spots, a mole.

Next, still kneeling, the man removed more than a dozen small
dental mirrors from the satchel, mounted on bizarre little stands
in a variety of odd shapes and sizes, all made of beautifully
hand-machined brass. Next came an array of black objects wired
together, a stack of thin Mylar sheets, several small cutting
tools, exotic-looking metal instruments, and a flat of sticky
pads, each the size and shape of a lentil.

When these had been arranged on the floor with military
precision, the man waited, still crouching, unmoving, stopwatch
again in his hands. He raised his head once to look at the hall
in front of him. It was dark-utterly dark-without even the
slightest gleam announcing its extraordinary contents. The
darkness was part of the security, because the only
electromagnetic radiation in the hall after closing was invisible
infrared and far-infrared wavelengths. Even the myriad laser
beams crisscrossing the hall were infrared, undetectable to the
naked eye. But he did not need light: he had rehearsed this many
hundreds of times, in an exact duplicate of this room which he
had constructed himself.

The watch gave another soft beep, and the man exploded into
movement. With the speed of a ferret, he darted about the room,
placing the dental mirrors in precisely fixed and calibrated
locations, each mirror turned to the precise
angle.

In two minutes, he was done and back in his place by the door,
breathing slowly and regularly, watch in hand.

Another soft beep indicated the laser beams had gone back on-
each one now redirected to a different path, running around the
outer walls instead of crisscrossing the hall itself. This
rotating series of laser grids was one of the features of the new
security system. No doubt the technicians in the basement were
congratulating themselves on another successful
test.

Again, the man waited, looking at his watch. Another soft beep
and he was up again, this time carrying the Mylar sheets, which
he stuck over the video camera lenses which had been placed in
numerous strategic locations. The Mylar sheets, clear to the
naked eye, were actually etched with holographs which responded
strongly to infrared light, and which reproduced the precise
scene that the infrared video cameras were pointed at-minus, of
course, the man. When the video cameras came back on, they would
see the same boring scene they had seen before. Only it would not
be real.

Again, like a cat, the man retreated to his safe corner.
Again, he waited until the stopwatch beeped another soft
warning.

This time he scurried around the perimeter of the hall,
setting a sleek black box in each corner, connected by wires to a
small power pack. These were powerful radar guns of the type used
by state police, modified to jam the museum's new infrared
Doppler radar system, said to be so sensitive it could detect the
motion of a cockroach across the carpeting.

Once the radar jammers were in place and active, the man
straightened up, dusted his knees, and gave a low, dry chuckle.
Movements now almost languid, he removed a flashlight from the
satchel, turned it on, and played the dull green beam about the
hall- a precise wavelength of green light chosen because none of
the sophisticated electromagnetic sensors in the hall could see
it.

The man strolled casually to the center of the hall where a
square, four-foot pillar had been constructed, on top of which
was set a thick Plexiglas box. He bent down and looked in the
box. Resting inside on thick satin was the dark form of a
heart-cut diamond of extraordinary, almost incredible size:
Lucifer's Heart, the museum's prize gem, which had been called
the most valuable diamond in the world. It was certainly the most
beautiful.

A fine place to start.

With a small cutting tool, the man opened a hole in the
Plexiglas. Then, with a series of slender tools machined
precisely for this purpose and some of the tiny, sticky pads, he
reached in and removed the diamond, being careful to prevent the
trigger pin under the diamond from rising. Another deft movement
placed a large glass marble on the same stand, which would keep
the pin depressed.

The man held the diamond in his hand, shining the flashlight
up through it for a moment. In the green light it looked black
and dead, without color, almost like a piece of coal. But the man
was not perturbed: he knew that a red diamond under green light
always looked black. And this diamond was red-or more precisely,
a rich cinnamon, but without a trace of brown. It was the only
diamond of its color in the world. Blue diamonds were created by
boron or hydrogen trapped in the crystal matrix, green diamonds
by natural radiation, yellow and brown diamonds by nitrogen, and
pink diamonds by the presence of microscopic lamellae. But this
color? Nobody knew.

He held it up and peered through it to the flashlight below.
He could see his own eyes reflected and multiplied by the
diamond's facets, creating a surreal kaleidoscope of eyes and
more eyes, hundreds of them, staring every which way inside the
gem. He moved the gem back and forth, from eye to eye, enjoying
the spectacle.

And the strangest thing of all was that the eyes were of
different colors: one hazel, the other a milky, whitish
blue.

FIFTY-THREE

Larry Enderby sat at his console in the Advanced Technology
Center, puffing slightly. The hollowness in his stomach had gone,
replaced with an uncomfortable bloated feeling. He felt like a
frigging suckling pig, to tell the truth. He belched, let out his
belt a notch. All that was missing was the shiny red apple for
his mouth.

He glanced over at his co-workers, Walt Smith and Jim Choi.
Smitty-who, true to his nature, had acted with restraint-was
staring at a bank of monitors, no worse for wear. The same
couldn't be said for Choi, who was slumped at his terminal, a
glazed expression on his face. During the fifteen minutes Smitty
had allotted, Choi had indeed shown a remarkable ability to bolt
down jumbo shrimp and glasses of champagne. Enderby had given up
counting shrimp at sixty-two.

He eased up another bolus of air, then patted his stomach
gingerly. They'd gotten to the food table just in time: the
feeding frenzy was almost over. There was a dribble of caviar on
his shirtfront, and he flicked it away with a fingernail. But
that fourth glass of champagne he'd chugged at the last moment
had probably been a mistake. He just hoped he could keep it
together for the rest of his shift. He glanced up at the clock:
only another hour. They'd verify that the Astor Hall's upgraded
security system was fully operational, then go through the
procedure of mothballing the old system. No sweat: he'd done it
dozens of times before, he could probably do it in his
sleep.

A low chime sounded. "That's it," Smitty said. "Twenty
minutes." He glanced over at Choi. "What's the status of the
Astor Hall system?"

Choi blinked a little blearily at his screen. "Test completed
without incident." His eye swept the cluster of video feeds.
"Hall looks fine."

"Error logs?"

"None. The system's nominal."

"And the beam modulation?"

"Every five minutes, as programmed. No
deviation."

Smitty walked over to the wall of monitors. Enderby watched as
he peered at the video feeds devoted to the Astor Hall of
Diamonds. He could see case after case of the precious gems,
gleaming faintly in the infrared light. There was no movement, of
course: once the laser beams were activated after lockdown, not
even guards were permitted in the high-security exhibition
halls.

Smitty grunted his approval, then walked over to his
monitoring station and picked up the internal phone. "Carlos?
It's Walt in the ATC. We've completed the twenty-minute shakedown
of the Astor Hall laser grid. How'd it look from Central
Security?" A pause. "Okay, good. We'll get the standard
scheduling online and mothball the prior."

He hung up the phone and glanced over at Enderby. "The Pit
says that everything's five by five. Larry, put it to bed. I'll
help Jim finalize the automation routines for the laser
grid."

Larry nodded and pulled his chair closer to the console. Time
to put the old security system in backup mode. He blinked, wiped
the back of a hand across his mouth, then began typing in a
series of commands.

Almost immediately, he sat back. "That's
strange."

Smitty looked over. "What is?"

Enderby pointed at an LED screen sitting on the side of his
work-station. A single red dot glowed in its upper left corner.
"When I rolled back the first zone into standby mode, the system
gave me a code red."

Smitty frowned. A "code red" was the legacy system's alarm
setting. In the Astor Hall, this would have been activated only
when a diamond was removed from its setting. "What zone was
that?"

"Zone 1."

"What's it contain?"

Enderby turned to a separate console, accessed the accession
and inventory database, typed in a SQL query. "Just a single
diamond. Lucifer's Heart."

"That's right in the center of the room." Smitty walked over
to the bank of video monitors, peered at one closely "Looks fine
to me. We're dealing with some kind of software glitch
here."

He glanced back toward Enderby. "Roll back zone
2."

Enderby typed a few more commands into his primary terminal.
Immediately, a second red dot glowed into view on the LED screen.
"That's giving me a code red, too."

Smitty walked over, a worried look coming onto his
face.

Enderby stared at the screen. His mouth was dry, and the
alcohol haze was dissipating fast.

"Do a global rollback," Smitty said. "All zones in the
hall."

Enderby took a deep breath, then typed a short sequence on his
keyboard. Immediately, he was flooded with dismay.

"Oh, no," he breathed. "No."

The little LED screen on Enderby's desk had just blossomed
into a Christmas tree of red.

For a moment, there was a shocked silence. Then Smitty waved
his hand dismissively.

"Let's not have a cow here. What we've got is a software
glitch. Incompatibility between the new system and the old
probably crashed the legacy system. Must've happened when we
pulled it off-line. Nothing to get excited about. Larry, shut
down the old system, one module at a time. Then reboot from the
backup master."

"Shouldn't we report to Central?"

"What, and make ourselves look like idiots? We'll report
after we've solved the problem."

"Okay. You're the boss." And Enderby began to
type.

Smitty mustered a weak grin and gestured at the video screens
of the empty hall, the diamonds glittering within their cases. "I
mean, hey-take a look. Does the hall look robbed to
you?"

Enderby had to chuckle. Maybe Smitty was acquiring a sense of
humor, after all.

FIFTY-FOUR

D'Agosta moved through the channels on the portable
police-band radio he'd pulled from the Rolls, searching for more
official chatter about him and Pendergast. Their appearance at
Kennedy had set off an APB across the entire length of Long
Island, from Queens to Bridgehampton. The Rolls had been
impounded at the rental lot, and in time the authorities had
identified the Toyota Camry they'd stolen, and put out an
advisory on that, as well. They'd managed to evade several
roadblocks established on the Long Island Expressway by keeping
to back roads and taking their cues from the radio
advisories.

They were in a net, and the net was drawing
tighter.

Still, Pendergast searched, stopping at one all-night service
area after another, refusing to give up-and yet to D'Agosta it
seemed a hopeless task, the kind of last-resort, brute-force
police work that soaked up man-hours and rarely yielded results.
It was a numbers game in which the numbers were just too damn
big.

Pendergast screeched into an all-night service area at
Yaphank, which looked just like the two dozen others they had
already visited: glassed-in front, sickly green fluorescent
lights beating back the bitter darkness. At some point, D'Agosta
mused, they were going to get an attendant who had heard about
the APB. And that would be it.

Yet again, Pendergast leaped out of the Camry like a cat. The
man seemed to burn with a fierce, inextinguishable flame. They'd
been at it more than twelve hours straight, and during all that
time spent alternately searching and evading, he'd said few words
not directly related to the game at hand. D'Agosta wondered how
long the agent could keep it up.

Pendergast was into the little store and in the sleepy
attendant's face before the man could even rouse himself from his
cozy chair behind the counter, where he'd apparently been
watching a martial arts movie.

"Special Agent Pendergast, FBI," he said in his usual cool
voice, which somehow managed to convey menace without being
offensive, as he passed his shield across the man's field of
view. At the same time, D'Agosta reached over and snapped off the
television, creating a sudden, unnerving silence.

The man's chair legs clunked down on the floor as he hastily
righted himself. "FBI? Sure, yeah, right. What can I do for
you?"

"When do you go on shift?" Pendergast asked.

"At midnight."

"I want you to look at these." He removed the prints he had
collected at Kennedy, held one in front of the attendant. "Have
you seen this man? He would have come in last night, sometime
between one and three."

The attendant took the photo, screwing up his face. D'Agosta
watched carefully, relaxing slightly. Clearly, the guy knew
nothing of the APB. He glanced out toward the dark highway. It
was almost four in the morning. It was only a matter of time.
They weren't ever going to get a lead, this was
needle-and-haystack stuff. The police would find them,
and...

"Yeah," the guy said. "I saw him."

The air in the tiny store went electric.

"Look at this photo as well, please." Pendergast passed the
man a second image. "I want you to be sure." He spoke quietly,
but his body was tense as a coiled spring.

"That's him again," the man murmured. "I remember those funny
eyes, kind of freaked me out."

"Did you see this car?" Pendergast murmured, showing him a
third image.

"Well, I can't say I remember that. He did the self-serve, you
know?"

Pendergast took back the photographs. "And your name
is-?"

"Art Malek."

"Mr. Malek, can you tell us if anyone was with
him?"

"He came into the store alone. And like I said, I didn't go
out, so I really can't say if there was anybody in the car.
Sorry."

"That's all right." Pendergast returned the photos to his
jacket and drew still closer. "Now, tell me exactly what you
remember from the time this man arrived to the time he
left."

"Well... it was last night, like you said, must have been
close to three in the morning. There wasn't anything unusual
about it-he pulled up, filled the car himself, came in to
pay."

"Cash."

"Right."

"Did you notice anything else about him?"

"Not really. Had a funny accent, kind of like yours. No
offense," Malek added hastily. "In fact, he looked kind of like
you."

"What was he wearing?"

A labored effort to remember. "All I can remember is a dark
overcoat. Long."

"Did he do anything else but pay?"

"Seems to me he wandered about the aisles a bit. Didn't buy
anything, though."

At this, Pendergast stiffened. "I assume you have security
cameras in the back aisles?"

"Sure do."

"I'd like to see the tapes from last night."

The man hesitated. "The system recycles them on a thirty-hour
loop, and it gets erased as-"

"Then please stop the security system now. I must see
the tape."

The man almost jumped to comply, hastening into a back
office.

"Looks like we've finally got a lead," said
D'Agosta.

The pair of eyes Pendergast turned on him seemed almost dead.
"On the contrary. Diogenes hoped we would find this
place."

"How do you know?"

Pendergast didn't answer.

The man came huffing out of the back room with a videotape.
Pendergast ejected the movie from the VCR and shoved in the
security tape. A ceiling-level shot of the tiny store came into
view, a time and date stamp in the bottom left corner. Pendergast
punched the rewind button, stopped, rewound again. Within a
minute, he'd located the 3 a.m. time stamp for January 28. Next,
he cued it back another half hour to allow for a margin of error.
Then they began watching the tape at accelerated
speed.

The black-and-white picture quality was poor. The aisles of
the convenience store glowed and flickered on the screen. Now and
then a huddled shape raced through on fast-forward, like a
pinball, bounced around grabbing things off shelves, then
disappeared again.

Suddenly, Pendergast jabbed the play button, slowing it to a
normal pace as yet another dark figure entered the screen. The
figure strolled down the aisle, its eyes-differing shades of
gray-seeking out and fixing on the security
camera.

It was Diogenes. A smile spread over his face as he casually
reached into his pocket and withdrew a piece of paper. He
unfolded it and nonchalantly held it up to the
camera.

BRAVO, FRATER!

TOMORROW, CALL AT 466 AND

ASK FOR VIOLA.

THIS WILL BE OUR

LAST COMMUNICATION.

MAY OUR NEW LIVES BEGIN!

VALEAS.

"Four six six?" said D'Agosta. "That's not a legit emergency
number..."

Then he stopped. It was not a telephone number, he realized,
but an address. Four sixty-six First Avenue was the underground
entrance at Bellevue that led to the New York City
Morgue.

Pendergast rose, ejected the tape, and put it in his
pocket.

"You can keep that," said the attendant helpfully as they
left.

Pendergast slipped behind the wheel, started the Camry, but
did not move. His face was gray, his eyes half
lidded.

There was a terrible silence. D'Agosta could think of nothing
to say. He felt almost physically ill. This was even worse than
at the Dakota-worse because, for the last twelve hours, they'd
had hope. Slender, but hope nevertheless.

"I'll check the police band," he said stiffly. It was a
pointless gesture, just something to keep himself busy. And even
police chatter about the APB was preferable to the dreadful
silence.

Pendergast didn't respond as D'Agosta turned on the
radio.

A burst of frantic, overlapping voices poured from the
speaker.

Instinctively, D'Agosta glanced out the window. Had they been
spotted? But the roads around the service area were
deserted.

He leaned forward and changed the frequency. More frantic
voices.

"What the hell?" D'Agosta punched the button, changed the
frequency again and again. Almost half the available channels
were taken up, and the talk wasn't about them. Something big, it
seemed, was going down in the city. As he listened, trying to
figure out what it was, he became aware that Pendergast was
listening, too, suddenly totally alert.

The talk on the current channel was about the Museum of
Natural History, a theft of some kind. It seemed the Astor Hall
of Diamonds had been hit.

"Go to the command-and-control channel," Pendergast
said.

D'Agosta dialed it in.

"Rocker wants you to sweat the techies," a voice was
saying. "This was an inside job, that much is
clear."

D'Agosta listened in disbelief. Rocker at four in the morning?
This must be gigantic.

"They got 'em all? Including Lucifer's
Heart?"

"Yup. And see who knew the specs on the security system,
get a list, move through it fast. Museum security,
too."

"Got that. Who's the insurer?"

"Affiliated Transglobal."

"Jeez, they're going to shit bricks when they learn about
this."

D'Agosta, glancing at Pendergast, was shocked at the rapt
expression on his face. Strange how, at this moment of ultimate
crisis, he could become so fixated on something that had no
bearing or the problem at hand.

"The museum's president is on his way. And they've gotten
the mayor out of bed. You know how he'll crucify anybody who lets
him get behind the curve on a major-"

"Someone knocked off the diamond hall," said D'Agosta. "I
guess that's why we've been temporarily upstaged."

Pendergast said nothing. D'Agosta was taken aback by the look
on his face.

"Hey, Pendergast," he said. "You okay?"

Pendergast turned his pale eyes toward him. "No," he
whispered.

"I don't get it. What's this got to do with anything? It's a
diamond heist-"

"Everything." And then the FBI agent looked away, out
into the winter darkness. "All these brutal killings, all these
mocking notes and messages ... nothing more than a smoke screen.
A cruel, coldblooded, sadistic smoke screen."

He tore away from the curb and headed back into the
neighborhood they had just passed through.

"Where are we going?"

Instead of answering, Pendergast jammed on the brakes, pulling
up in front of a split-level house. He pointed to an F150 pickup
parked in the driveway. For Sale was written on the
windshield in soap.

"We need a new vehicle," he said. "Get ready to move the radio
and laptop into that truck."

"Buy a car at four a.m.?"

"A stolen car is reported too quickly. We need more
time."

Pendergast got out of the car and strode up the short concrete
walk. He rang the bell, rang it again. After a minute, the lights
on the second floor came on. A window scraped open, and a voice
shouted down: "What do you want?"

"The pickup-it's operational?"

"Hell, pal, it's four in the morning!"

"Will hard cash help get you out of bed?"

With a muttered curse, the window shut. A moment later, the
porch light came on and a corpulent man in a bathrobe appeared at
the door. "It's three thousand. And it works good. Got a full
tank of gas, too."

Pendergast reached into his suit, removed a book of cash,
peeled off thirty hundreds.

"What's going on?" the man asked a little
blearily.

Pendergast pulled out his badge. "I'm with the FBI." He nodded
at D'Agosta. "He's NYPD."

Balancing the radio and laptop under one arm, D'Agosta removed
his shield.

"We're working an undercover narcotics job. Be a good citizen
and keep this to yourself, all right?"

"Sure thing." The man accepted the cash.

"The keys?"

The man disappeared, came back a moment later with an
envelope. "The title's in there, too."

Pendergast took the envelope. "An officer will be by shortly
to take care of our previous vehicle. But don't say anything
about the car or about us, not even to another police officer.
You know how it is with undercover cases."

The man nodded vigorously. "Sure do. Hell, the only books I
read are true crime."

Pendergast thanked the man and turned away. A minute later,
they were inside the truck, accelerating from the
curb.

"That should buy us a few hours," Pendergast said as he raced
back in the direction of the Montauk Highway.

FIFTY-FIVE

Diogenes Pendergast drove slowly, without hurry, through the
bleak winter townscapes along the Old Stone Highway: Barnes Hole,
Eastside, Springs. Ahead, a traffic light turned red, and he
coasted to a stop at the intersection.

He eased his large head to the left, to the right. A wintry
potato field stretched to one side, frozen and dusted with snow.
At its edge stood a dark wood of bare trees, branches etched in
white. The world was black and white and it had no depth: it was
flat, like a nightmare confection of Edwin A. Abbott. Fie, fie
how franticly I square my talk...

The light moved down, indicating it had turned green, and
Diogenes slowly depressed the accelerator. The car nosed forward
and swung right onto Springs Road as he turned the wheel, letting
it slide through his hands as the car straightened out. He
increased the pressure on the accelerator, easing off as the
vehicle approached the speed limit. More gray potato fields
passed on his right, beyond which stood several rows of gray
houses, and beyond that, the Acabonack Marshes.

All gray, exquisite gray.

Diogenes reached to the dash and turned the heater vent
several clicks to the right, increasing the flow of warmth into
the glass, steel, and plastic compartment that enclosed his body.
He felt neither triumph nor vindication, only a curious kind of
emptiness: the sort that came with the achievement of a great
thing, the completion of a long-planned work.

Diogenes lived in a world of gray. Color did not enter his
world, except fleetingly, when he least expected it, coming in
from the corner of his eye like a Zen koan. Koan. Ko. Koan ko.
Ko ko rico, ko ko rico...

Long ago, his world had attenuated to shades of gray, a
monochromatic universe of shape and shadow, where true color had
vanished even from his waking dreams. No, not quite. Such a
statement would be dissembling, melodrama. There was a
final repository of color in his world, and it was there, in the
leather satchel beside him.

The car moved down the empty road. No one was
out.

He could tell, from a shifting of the monochromatic landscape
around him, that night was relinquishing its hold on the world.
Dawn was not far away. But Diogenes had little use for sunlight,
just as he had little use for warmth or love or friendship or any
of the countless things that nourished the rest of
humanity.

As he drove, he played back, in meticulous detail, the events
of the night before. He went over every last action, motion,
statement, taking pleasure in satisfying himself that he had made
no errors. At the same time, he thought of the days ahead,
mentally ticking off the preparations he would have to make, the
tasks he'd need to perform, the great journey he would make-and,
aber natürlich, the journey's end. He thought of
Viola, of his brother, of his childhood, multithreaded
multiplexing waking daydreams that seemed more real than the
present. Unlike the other bags of meat and blood that made up his
species, Diogenes mused, he could process several disparate
trains of thought simultaneously in his head.

The Event which had robbed Diogenes of color had also stolen
his ability to sleep. Full oblivion was denied him. Instead, he
drifted, he lay on his bed in a world of waking dreams: memories
of the past, conflagrations, conversations, conflations, certain
animals poisoned and dying with exquisite restraint, racked
bodies on splintered roods, a hair shirt fashioned from nerve
ganglia, a mason jar of freshblood-the disconnected images from
his past played on the screen of his mind like a magic-lantern
show. Diogenes never resisted them. Resistance would be futile,
and futility itself was, of course, to be resisted. He let the
scenes drift in and out as they would.

All this would change. The great wheel would come around,
because he-after all-was about to break a butterfly upon a wheel.
The thing that had preyed upon his mind would at long last be
exorcised. His revenge on his brother was all but
complete.

As he drove, Diogenes let his thoughts drift back almost
thirty years. At first-after it had happened-he had lost himself
in the inner maze of his mind, wandering as far from reality and
sanity as it was possible to go, while even a small part of him
remained prosaic, quotidian, able to interact with the outside
world, whose true nature now-thanks to the Event-stood revealed
to him.

But then-slowly, very slowly-insanity alone lost its power to
shelter. It was no longer a comfort, even a bitter one. So he
came back, but he was like a diver who had gone too deep, run out
of air, and rushed to the surface only to be racked by the
bends.

That was the worst moment of all.

And yet it was at this very moment, as he balanced on the
cruel knife-edge of reality, that he comprehended there
was a purpose waiting for him back in the real world. A
double purpose: a reckoning and a reclamation. It would take
decades of planning. It would be, in his own self-referential
world, a work of art: the masterpiece of a
lifetime.

Why then Ile fit you.

And so Diogenes did return to the world.

He knew now what kind of place it really was and what kind of
creatures inhabited it. It was not a lovely world, no, not a
lovely world at all. It was a world of pain and evil and cruelty,
walked on by vile creatures of piss and excrement and bile. But
his newfound purpose, the end toward which he had bent all his
intellect, made such a world just bearable. He became a
chameleon par excellence, hiding everything, everything,
behind a fast-changing skin of disguise, prevarication,
misdirection, irony, cool detachment.

At times, when his will threatened to crumble, he found that
certain temporary pastimes were enough to divert him, to haul him
up from the deeps. The emotion that sustained him some might call
hatred, but for him it was the mead that nourished him, that gave
him superhuman patience and a fanatic's attention to detail. He
found he could live not merely a double life or a triple life,
but in fact could assume the very personalities and lives of half
a dozen invented people, in several different countries, as the
needs of his work of art required.

Some of the personalities he had assumed years, even decades
before, as he laid the complex groundwork of his master
plan.

Ahead, an intersection. Diogenes slowed, turned
right.

Night was relinquishing its hold on the world, but Suffolk
County still slept. It gave Diogenes comfort to know that his
brother, Aloysius, was not one of those sunken in voluptuous or
erotic stupefaction. Nor would Aloysius sleep well again: ever.
Just now he would be growing fully conscious of the dimensions of
what he, Diogenes, had done to him.

His plan had the power and functional perfection of a
well-oiled bear trap. And now Aloysius was caught in its jaws,
awaiting the arrival of the hunter and the merciful bullet to the
brain. Only, Diogenes would show no such mercy.

His eyes strayed back to the satchel on the passenger seat. He
had not opened it since filling it hours before. The
transcendental moment, when he looked at-or rather
into-the diamonds at leisure had almost arrived. The
moment of freedom, of release, he had so long yearned
for.

For only through the intense, brilliant, refracted light
issued by a deeply colored diamond could Diogenes escape, if only
for a moment, his black-and-white prison. Only then could he
recapture that faintest and most sought-after of his memories-the
essence of color. And of all the colors he most longed for, red
was his overriding passion. Red in all its myriad
manifestations.

Lucifer's Heart. That was where he would begin and where he
would end. The alpha and the omega of color.

Then there would be Viola to take care of.

The instruments had all been cleaned, polished, honed, and
stropped to their sharpest edges. Viola would take some time. She
was a grand cru wine that merited being taken up from the
cellar, brought to room temperature, uncorked, and allowed to
breathe- before being enjoyed, one exquisite sip after another,
until nothing was left. She had to suffer-not for her sake, but
for the marks it would leave on her body. And no one would be
better able to interpret those marks than Aloysius. They would
induce a suffering in him equal to, if not exceeding, the pain
they caused the body's owner.

Perhaps he would start with a re-creation, in the cottage's
damp stone basement, of the scene depicted in Judith and
Holofernes. That had always been his favorite painting of
Caravaggio's. He'd stood in front of it for hours, at the
Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica in Rome, rapt in admiration: the
lovely little furrow of determination on Judith's brow as she did
the knifework; the way she kept every part of her body, save her
bare hands and arms, away from the messy work in progress; the
bright strong cords of blood that slashed diagonally across the
bedsheets. Yes, that would make a fine start. Perhaps he and
Viola could even study the painting together, before he got to
work. Judith and Holofernes. With the roles reversed, of course,
and the addition of a pewter bleeding bowl so that none of the
precious nectar would be lost...

Diogenes passed through the empty village of Gerard Park.
Gar-diners Bay appeared ahead of him, a dull cold sheet of zinc
broken by the dark outlines of distant islands. The car eased
right onto Gerard Drive, Acabonack Harbor on one side, the bay on
his left. Less than a mile more now. As he drove, he smiled
faintly.

"Vale, frater," he murmured in Latin.
"Vale."

Viola had pulled the chair up to the barred window, and she
watched the first streak of light creep over the black Atlantic-a
smudge of dirty chalk-with a sense of surreal detachment. It was
like a nightmare she couldn't wake from, a dream as real and
vivid as it was senseless. What scared her most of all was the
realization of just how much trouble and expense Diogenes had
gone to in creating this prison cell-riveted steel walls, floor,
and ceiling, a steel door with a tumbler lock from a safe, not to
mention the unbreakable windows, the special plumbing and wiring.
It was as secure as a cell in the highest security prison-maybe
more so.

Why? Was it really possible that, with dawn
approaching, she had mere minutes to live?

Yet again, she forced this useless speculation from her
mind.

She had long since concluded that escape was impossible. A
great deal of thought had gone into constructing her prison, and
her every effort to seek a way out had been anticipated and
blocked. He had been gone all night-at least that's what the
utter silence seemed to tell her. From time to time, she had
banged and screamed on the door, at one point striking a chair
against it again and again until the chair had come apart in her
hands. No one had come.

The smear of chalk took on a faintly bloody tinge: a lurid
glow over the heaving Atlantic. A ferocious wind dotted the dark
ocean with dim flecks of whitecaps. Wisps of frozen snow-or was
it sand?-whipped along the ground.

Suddenly, she sat up, abruptly alert. She had heard the faint
muffled sound of a door opening. She rushed to her own door,
pressed an ear against it. The very faintest of sounds came from
below: a footfall, the closing of a door.

He was back.

She felt a sudden surge of fear and glanced across the room
toward the window. The limb of the sun was just now climbing
above the gray Atlantic, and just as quickly rising into a black
bar of storm cloud. He had made it a point to arrive just at
dawn. In time for the execution.

Viola curled her lip. If he thought he was going to kill her
without a struggle, he was sorely mistaken. She would fight him
to the death...

She swallowed, realizing how foolish her bravado was, aimed
against a man who would surely have a gun and know exactly how to
use it.

She fought against a sudden, panicky hyperventilation. A
strange set of conflicting feelings rose within her: on the one
hand, an urgent, instinctive desire for survival at whatever the
cost; on the other, an ingrained need to die-if death, in fact,
was near-with dignity, not with screaming and
struggling.

There were more sounds and, without thinking, she immediately
lay down on the floor to listen at the tiny space between the
door and the threshold. The sounds were still faint and
muffled.

She rose and ran into the bathroom, tore the toilet paper from
its receptacle, unraveled it with a fierce shake of her hand, and
pulled the cardboard tube free. Then she ran back to the door
frame, pressing one end of the tube to her ear and squeezing the
other end up against the long crack of the jamb.

Now she could hear much better: the rustle of clothing, the
setting down of several things, the sound of a latch being
undone.

There was a sudden, sharp intake of breath. Next, a long, long
silence. Five minutes passed.

Then came a strange and terrible sound: a low, agonized
keening, almost like the warning moan of a cat. It rose and fell
in singsong fashion before suddenly ascending in volume to become
a shriek of pure, undistilled, absolute anguish. It was inhuman,
it was the shriek of the living dead, it was the most horrifying
sound she had ever heard-and it came from
him.

FIFTY-SIX

The cab pulled up in front of the Times Building. Smithback
impatiently signed the credit card receipt-the fare was
$425-paying with the card he'd picked up at his apartment. He
handed the slip back to the cabbie, who took it with a
frown.

"Where's the tip?" the driver said.

"Are you kidding? I could've flown to Aruba for what I just
paid you."

"Look, pal, I got gas, insurance, expenses up the
wazoo-"

Smithback slammed the door and ran into the building,
sprinting for the elevator. He would just touch base with Davies,
let his boss know he was back in town, make sure his job wasn't
on the line- and then head straight to the museum and Nora. It
was quarter after nine: she hadn't been at the apartment, and he
assumed she'd already left for work.

He punched the button for the thirty-third floor and waited
while the elevator rose with maddening slowness. At last, it
arrived, and he exited the car and jogged down the hall, pausing
outside Davies's door just long enough to catch his breath and
smooth down the unruly cowlick that always seemed to pop up at
the worst possible time.

He took a deep breath, gave the door a polite
rap.

"It's open," came the voice.

Smithback stepped forward into the doorway. Thank God:
Harriman wasn't anywhere in sight.

Davies glanced up from his desk. "Bill! They told me you were
at St. Luke's, practically at death's door."

"I made a quick recovery."

Davies looked him over, his eyes veiled. "Glad to see you
looking so fat and happy." He paused. "I take it you'll be
providing us with a note from your doctor?"

"Of course, of course," Smithback stammered. He assumed
Pendergast could fix that, as he seemed able to fix everything
else.

"You picked a convenient time to disappear." Davies's voice
was laced with irony.

"I didn't pick it. It picked me."

"Have a seat."

"Well, I was just on my way-"

"Oh, I beg your pardon-I didn't realize you had a pressing
engagement."

On hearing the icy tone in the voice, Smithback decided to sit
down. He was dying to see Nora, but it wouldn't pay to piss off
Davies any more than he already had.

"Bryce Harriman was able to take up the slack during your
recent indisposition, both on the Duchamp killing and that other
one up at the museum, since the police are now saying they're
linked-"

Smithback sat forward in the chair. "Excuse me. Did you say a
murder up at the museum? What museum?"

"You really have been out of it. The New York Museum of
Natural History. A curator was murdered there three days
ago-"

"Who?"

"Nobody I'd heard of. Don't worry about it, you're long off
that story-Harriman's taken it over." He snapped up a manila
envelope. "Here's what I've got for you, instead. It's a big
story, and I'll be frank with you, Bill: I feel a certain
trepidation entrusting it to someone in shaky health. I'd have
considered passing it on to Harriman, too, only he's got a lot on
his plate as it is and he was already in the field when the news
broke twenty minutes ago. There was a big robbery at the museum
last night. Seems it's a busy place these days. You're the one
with contacts there, you wrote that book on the place-so it's
your story, despite my feelings of concern."

"But who-?"

He shoved the envelope at Smithback. "Somebody cleaned out the
diamond hall last night while a big function was under way.
There's going to be a press conference at ten. Your credentials
are in there." He glanced at his watch. "That's half an hour, you
better get moving."

"About the killing at the museum," Smithback said again. "Who
was it?"

"Like I said, nobody important. A new hire named Green. Margo
Green."

"What?" Smithback found himself gripping the seat,
reeling. It was impossible. Impossible.

Davies gazed at Smithback with alarm. "Are you all
right?"

Smithback rose on shaking legs. "Margo Green ...
murdered?"

"Do you know her?"

"Yes." Smithback barely got the word out.

"Well, better that you're not handling the story, then," said
Davies briskly. "Reporting on a subject too close to you, my old
editor used to say, is like trying to be your own lawyer: you've
got a fool for a lawyer and a fool for a-hey! Where're you
going?"

FIFTY-SEVEN

AS Nora turned the corner from Columbus Avenue onto West 77th
Street, she immediately realized something big had happened at
the museum. Museum Drive was packed with police vehicles,
unmarked cars, and scene-of-crime vans, these in turn surrounded
by television vans and a seething crowd of
reporters.

She checked her watch-it was quarter to ten, usually a time
when the museum was still waking up. Her heart quickened: had
there been another killing?

She walked briskly down the service drive to the employee
entrance. The police had already cleared a path for arriving
museum employees and were pushing back an increasingly unruly
crowd of rubberneckers. Apparently, whatever happened had already
been reported on the morning news, as the crowds were swelling
even as she watched. But because of the opening the night before,
she'd overslept and hadn't had time to listen to the
radio.

"Museum employee?" one cop asked.

She nodded, pulling out her badge. "What's going
on?"

"Museum's closed. Go over there."

"But what-?"

The cop was already shouting at someone else, and she found
herself propelled toward the security entrance, which seemed to
be mobbed with museum security. Manetti, the security director,
was there, gesturing frantically at a pair of hapless
guards.

"All arriving staff to the roped area on the right!" one of
the guards shouted. "Have your badges ready!"

Nora saw George Ashton in the milling crowd of arriving
employees and grabbed his arm. "What's happened?"

He stared at her. "You must be the only one in the city who
doesn't know."

"I overslept," she said testily.

"This way!" a policeman bawled. "Museum employees this
way!"

The velvet ropes that had blocked off the gawkers and press
from the gala the night before were now being put to a second
use, this time to funnel museum staff to a holding area near the
security entrance, where guards were checking IDs and calming
irate employees.

"Someone hit the Astor Hall last night," said Ashton
breathlessly. "Cleaned it out. Right in the middle of the
party."

"Cleaned it out? Even Lucifer's Heart?"

"Especially Lucifer's Heart."

"How?"

"Nobody knows."

"I thought the Astor Hall was impregnable."

"So they said."

"Move back and stay to the right!" a cop yelled. "We'll have
you inside in a moment!"

Ashton grimaced. "Just what I need the morning after five
glasses of champagne."

More like ten, Nora thought wryly as she recalled
Ashton's slurred ramblings of the previous
evening.

Police and museum guards were checking IDs, questioning each
employee, then moving them to a second penned area just before
the security entrance.

"Any suspects?" Nora asked.

"None. Except that they're convinced the burglars had inside
help."

"IDs!" a cop bawled in her ear.

She fished in her purse again and showed her ID. Ashton did
the same.

"Dr. Kelly?" The cop had a clipboard. Another pulled Ashton
aside.

"May I ask a few quick questions?"

"Fire away," Nora said.

"Were you at the museum last night?"

"Yes."

He marked something down.

"What time did you leave?"

"About midnight."

"That's all. Step over there and, as soon as we can, we'll
open the museum and you can go to work. We'll be in touch with
you later to schedule an interview."

Nora was shunted to the second holding area. She could hear
Ash-ton's raised voice behind her, demanding to know why he
hadn't been read his rights. The curators and staff waiting
around her beat their hands in the cold, their breath filling the
air. It was a gray day and the temperature hovered just below
freezing. Voices were raised in complaint all
around.

Nora heard a commotion from the street and looked. The press
had suddenly surged forward, cameras juggling on shoulders, boom
mikes swinging. Then she saw the reason: the museum doors had
swung open. The museum's director, Frederick Watson Collopy,
appeared, flanked by Rocker, the police commissioner. A phalanx
of uniformed policemen stood behind them.

Immediately, the press erupted in a clamor of shouted
questions and waved hands. It was the start, it seemed, of a
press conference.

At that same moment, she saw a frantic movement off to one
side. She turned toward it. It was her husband, fighting through
the crowd, shouting frantically and trying to reach
her.

"Bill!" She rushed forward.

"Nora!" Smithback plowed through a milling crowd of
hangers-on, sent a beefy museum security guard sprawling, hopped
the velvet ropes, and muscled his way through the museum
employees. "Nora!"

"Hey, where's that guy going?" A policeman struggled to
intercept him.

Smithback cut through the last of the crowd and almost ran
into Nora, enveloping her in a bear hug and lifting her bodily
off the ground.

"Nora! God, did I miss you!"

They hugged, kissed, hugged again.

"Bill, what happened to you? What's that bruise on the side of
your head?"

"Never mind about that," Smithback replied. "I just heard
about Margo. Was she really killed?"

Nora nodded. "I went to her funeral yesterday."

"Oh my God. I can't believe it's true." He wiped savagely at
his face, and Nora saw that his eyes were leaking tears. "I can't
believe it."

"Where were you, Bill? I was so worried!"

"It's a long story. I was locked in an insane
asylum."

"What?"

"I'll tell you about it later. I've been worried about you,
too. Pendergast thinks there's a maniac killer wandering around,
knocking off all his friends."

"I know. He warned me. But it was right before the opening-
there was nothing I could-"

"This man's not supposed to be here," a museum guard
interrupted, stepping between them. "This is for museum employees
only-"

Smithback swung around to respond, but they were interrupted
by the shriek of feedback on an improvised P.A. system. A moment
later, Commissioner Rocker stepped up to the mike and asked for
silence-and, miraculously, got it.

"I'm with the Times," said Smithback, scrounging some
paper out of his pocket and fumbling for a pen.

"Here, use mine," Nora said, her arm still around his
waist.

The crowd was silent as the police commissioner began to
speak.

"Last night," Rocker began, "the Astor Hall of Diamonds was
burglarized. At this point, the scene-of-crime teams are still on
the site, along with some of the best forensic experts in the
world. Everything that can be done is being done. It's too early
for leads or suspects, but I promise you, as new developments
arise, we will keep the press informed. I'm sorry I can't give
you more, but it's still very early in the investigation. I will
say this: it was an extremely professional job, obviously planned
long in advance, by technologically sophisticated thieves who
appear to have been intimately familiar with the museum's
security system, and who used the distraction of last night's
opening gala to their advantage. It will take a while to analyze
and understand how they penetrated the museum's security. That's
about all I have to say for the present. Dr.
Collopy?"

The museum's director stepped forward, standing straight,
trying to put the best face on things-and failing. When he spoke,
a tremor underlay his words.

"I want to reiterate what Commissioner Rocker just said: all
that can possibly be done is being done. The truth is, most of
the diamonds stolen are unique and would be instantly
recognizable to any gem dealer in the world. They cannot be
fenced in their present form."

A murmur of unease went up at the implication they might be
recut.

"My fellow New Yorkers, I know what a great loss this is to
the museum and to the city. Unfortunately, we just don't know
enough yet to be able to say who might have done it, or why, or
what their intentions are."

"What about Lucifer's Heart?" someone shouted from among the
press.

Collopy seemed to stagger. "We're doing all we can, I promise
you."

"Was Lucifer's Heart stolen?" another shouted.

"I'd like to turn the floor over to the museum's public
affairs director, Carla Rocco-"

A barrage of shouted questions followed and a woman stepped
forward, holding up her hands. "I'll take the questions when
there's silence," she said.

The clamor subsided and she pointed. "Ms. Lilienthal of ABC,
your question?"

"What about Lucifer's Heart? Is it gone?"

"Yes, it was among the diamonds taken."

A turbulent murmur followed this unsurprising revelation.
Rocco held up her hands again. "Please!"

"The museum claimed their security was the best in the world!"
a reporter shouted. "How did the thieves get
through?"

"We're analyzing it as we speak. Security is multilayered and
redundant. The hall was under constant video surveillance. The
thieves left behind a mass of technical
equipment."

"What kind of technical equipment?"

"It'll take days, maybe weeks, to analyze."

More shouted questions. Rocco pointed to another reporter.
"Roger?"

"How much is the collection insured for?"

"One hundred million dollars."

A murmur of awe.

"What's it actually worth?" the reporter named Roger
persisted.

"The museum never put a value on it. Next question to Mr.
Werth from NBC."

"What's Lucifer's Heart worth?"

"Again, you can't put a value on it. But let me please
emphasize that we expect to recover the gems, one way or
another."

Collopy stepped forward abruptly. "The museum's collection
consists mostly of 'fancy' diamonds-that is, colored ones-and
most are unusual enough to be recognizable from color and grade
alone. That's especially true of a diamond like Lucifer's Heart.
There's no other diamond in the world with its deep cinnamon
color."

Nora watched as Smithback stepped over the velvet cord and
into the group of press, waving his hand.

Rocco pointed to him, squinted. "Smithback, from the
Times?"

"Isn't Lucifer's Heart considered the finest diamond in the
world?"

"The finest fancy diamond, yes. At least that's what
I've been told."

"So how are you going to explain this to the people of New
York? How are you going to explain the loss of this unique
gemstone?" His voice was suddenly shaking with emotion. It seemed
to Nora that all the anger Smithback felt at Margo's death, and
at his enforced separation from her, was being channeled into his
question. "How could the museum have allowed this to
happen!"

"No one allowed this to happen," said Rocco
defensively. "The security in the Astor Hall is the most
sophisticated in the world."

"Apparently, not sophisticated enough."

More chaos and shouting erupted. Rocco waved her hands.
"Please! Let me speak!"

The roar died to an uneasy rumble.

"The museum deeply regrets the loss of Lucifer's Heart.
We understand its importance to the city and, indeed, to the
country. We're doing all we can to recover it. Please be patient
and give the police time to do their work. Ms. Carlson of the
Post?"

"This is for Dr. Collopy. Not to put too fine a point on it,
but you were holding that diamond in trust for the people of New
York, to whom it really belongs. How do you, personally, as the
head of the museum, intend to bear responsibility for
this?"

The rumble was rising again. But it suddenly died away as
Collopy held up his hands. "The fact is," he said, "any security
system devised by man can be defeated by man."

"That's a rather fatalistic view," Carlson continued. "In
other words, you're admitting the museum can't ever guarantee the
security of its collections."

"We certainly do guarantee the security of our
collections," Collopy thundered.

"Next question!" Rocco called. But the reporters had latched
onto something and weren't going to let go.

"Can you explain what you mean by 'guarantee'? The greatest
diamond in the world has just been stolen and you tell us its
security was guaranteed?"

"I can explain." Collopy's face swelled with
anger.

"There's a bit of cognitive dissonance floating around here!"
Smithback shouted.

"I make that statement because Lucifer's Heart was not
among the diamonds stolen!" Collopy
cried.

There was an astonished silence. Rocco turned and looked at
Collopy in amazement, as did Rocker himself.

"Excuse me, sir," Rocco began.

"Silence! I'm the only person in the museum privy to this
information, but under the circumstances I don't see any point in
keeping the information back any longer. The stone on display was
a replica, a real diamond artificially colored by radiation
treatments. The true Lucifer's Heart has always
been safely locked in a vault at the museum's insurance company.
The gem was too valuable to put on display-our insurance company
wouldn't allow it."

He raised his head, a glitter of triumph in his eyes. "The
thieves, whoever they are, stole a fake."

A roar of questions followed. But Collopy simply mopped his
brow and retreated.

"This press conference is over!" shouted Rocco, to no effect.
"No more questions!"

But it was clear, from the frantic hands and the shouts, that
it was not over, and that there were many, many more questions to
come.

FIFTY-EIGHT

Hours passed as they drove through one deserted beach town
after another. Dawn had swelled into a dismal day, bitterly cold,
with a knife-edged wind whipping out of a pewter sky. D'Agosta
was still listening, moodily, to the police radio. He was growing
increasingly concerned: the police chatter concerning them had
abruptly dropped off-not just because of the gem heist, although
that filled most of the channels, but because they'd probably
switched to more secure channels that couldn't be monitored from
their portable police-band radio.

It was becoming obvious to him they had reached the end of the
line. Hitting more convenience stores was hopeless-with a full
tank of gas, Diogenes would have no further reason to stop. Their
previous score in Yaphank had only confirmed what Diogenes wanted
them to know-that he had gone east and that Viola would shortly
be dead. Beyond that, nothing. D'Agosta felt sick for Pendergast:
it was hopeless, and he knew it.

Still, they soldiered on, stopping at motels, marts, all-night
diners, each time exposing themselves to the possibility of being
spotted and arrested.

What few scraps D'Agosta had managed to glean from the radio
had been disheartening. Bolstered by a new and strong federal
presence, the police were rapidly closing in. New roadblocks had
been erected, and local authorities were on full alert.
Inevitably, they'd learn about the purchase of the pickup truck.
Unless Pendergast had something truly clever up his sleeve, their
free-range hours were numbered.

The pickup swerved abruptly and D'Agosta clutched the roof
handle as Pendergast screeched into a small parking lot, coming
to a halt in front of a twenty-four-hour Starbucks. Beyond lay a
public parking lot and, beyond that, the gray, rolling
Atlantic.

They sat for a moment while the police radio, still tuned to
the museum theft, droned on. Some kind of press conference was in
session, being broadcast over one of the public
channels.

"No way they stopped here," said D'Agosta.

"What I'm after is a wireless hot spot." Pendergast opened the
laptop, booted it up. "No doubt there's one inside. I'll use a
sniffer to find an open port, tap into the Net that way. I left
my pattern-recognition software running at the Dakota. Perhaps it
has something more to tell us."

D'Agosta watched morosely as Pendergast tapped on the
keyboard. "Would you be so kind as to order us some coffee,
Vincent?" he asked without looking up.

D'Agosta got out of the truck and entered the Starbucks. When
he returned a few minutes later with a couple of lattes,
Pendergast had moved into the passenger seat and was no longer
typing.

"Anything?"

Pendergast shook his head. Slowly, he sat back, closed his
eyes.

D'Agosta eased himself into the driver's seat with a sigh. As
he did so, he noticed a police cruiser turning into the parking
lot. It slowed as it passed them, then halted at the far end of
the lot.

"Shit. That cop's running our plates."

Pendergast didn't respond. He sat motionless, eyes
closed.

"That's it. We're screwed."

Now the cruiser eased into a three-point turn at the end of
the lot and headed back toward them.

Pendergast opened his eyes. "I'll hold the drinks. See what
you can do about getting him off our tail."

Instantly, D'Agosta slammed the truck into drive and peeled
out, fishtailing past the cruiser and onto the road paralleling
the boardwalk. The cruiser snapped on its lights and siren,
accelerating behind them.

They tore along the dune road. Moments later, D'Agosta heard
another siren, this one coming from somewhere
ahead.

"The beach," said Pendergast, gingerly balancing the
lattes.

"Right." D'Agosta shifted into 4WD, spun the wheel, and bashed
through the railing onto the boardwalk. The truck rumbled across
the uneven wooden planks, hit the railing on the far side, and
was briefly airborne as it made the two-foot drop to the
sand.

In a moment, they were racing along the beach, just beyond the
surf. D'Agosta glanced back to see the squad cars in the sand,
still following.

They were going to have to do better.

He accelerated further, tires spinning up jets of damp sand.
Ahead, he could see an area of dunes, one of the many preserves
along the South Shore. He swerved into it, broke down another
wooden fence, and hit the scrubby dunes at forty. It was clearly
a large preserve, and he had no idea where he was going, so he
angled the truck into the roughest-looking section, where the
brush was heaviest and the dunes highest, covered with a
scattering of scrubby pines. No way the cruisers could follow
them in here.

Suddenly, Pendergast sat up, like the snapping of a steel
spring.

D'Agosta bashed through some more heavy brush, then glanced
into the rearview mirror. Nothing. The cruisers had been stopped,
but D'Agosta knew their respite was only temporary. All the
police stations along the South Shore had beach patrol buggies-he
knew, he used to drive one, in another life just a few months
back. They were still in deep shit and he'd have to find some
other way to-

"Stop the truck!" Pendergast said abruptly.

"No way, I've got to-"

"Stop!"

Something in the tone caused D'Agosta to jam on the brakes.
They swerved wildly, stopping beneath the shadow of an
overhanging dune. He killed the lights and the engine at the same
time. This was crazy. They'd left a set of tracks any idiot could
follow.

The radio was still on the press conference, and Pendergast
was listening intently.

"... always been safely locked in a vault at the museum's
insurance company. The gem was too valuable to put on
display-our insurance company wouldn't allow
it."

Pendergast turned to D'Agosta, a look of astonishment and
sudden, fierce hope lighting up his face.

"That's it!"

"What?"

"Diogenes finally made a mistake. This is the opening we
need." He had his cell phone out.

"I wish to hell I knew what you were talking
about."

"I'm going to make some calls. As of now, you have but one
vital task, Vincent: get us back to
Manhattan."

The faint sound of a siren came up from behind the screen of
dunes.

FIFTY-NINE

Smithback slowly SHUT his cell phone, stunned by the bizarre
call he had just received. He found Nora looking at him
curiously. They had finally opened the museum's staff entrance
and employees were streaming past them, rushing to gain the
warmth of indoors.

"What is it, Bill?" she asked. "Who was that?"

"Special Agent Pendergast. He managed to track me down on this
loaner cell phone I picked up at the
Times."

"What'd he want?"

"I'm sorry?" He felt dazed.

"I said, what did he want? You look
shell-shocked."

"I've just had a most, um, extraordinary proposal put to
me."

"Proposal? What are you talking about?"

Smithback roused himself and grasped Nora's shoulder. "I'll
tell you about it later. Look, are you going to be okay here? I'm
worried about your safety, with Margo dead and all these warnings
of Pendergast's."

"The safest place in New York City is inside that museum right
now. There must be a thousand cops in there."

Smithback nodded slowly, thinking. "True."

"Listen, I do have to go to work."

"I'm coming in with you. I've got to talk to Dr.
Collopy."

"Collopy? Good luck."

Smithback could already see a large, angry crowd of reporters
being kept from the museum by a string of policemen and guards.
No one was getting in but employees. And Smithback was well
known-all too well known-to the guards.

He felt Nora put an arm around his shoulder. "What are you
going to do?"

"I've got to get inside."

Nora frowned. "Does this have to do with that call of
Pendergast's?"

"It sure does." He looked into her green eyes, his gaze
wandering over her copper hair and freckled nose. "You know what
I'd really like to do..."

"Don't tempt me. I have a ton of work to do. Today's the
public opening of the exhibition-assuming we ever open
again."

Smithback gave her a kiss and a hug. He started to break away
but found that Nora wouldn't release him.

"Bill," she murmured in his ear, "thank God you're
back."

They held each other a few moments more, then Nora slowly let
her arms fall away. She smiled, winked, then turned and walked
into the museum.

Smithback watched her disappearing form. Then he shouldered
his way into the crowd of employees lined up outside the door,
bypassing the thicket of reporters who had been shunted off to
one side. All the employees had their IDs out, and the crowd was
thick. Police and museum guards were checking everybody's
identification: it was going to be a bitch getting in. Smithback
thought a moment, then pulled out his business card and scribbled
a short note on the back.

When his turn came to pass through the security barrier, a
guard barred his way. "ID?"

"I'm Smithback of the Times."

"You're in the wrong place, pal. Press is over
there."

"Listen to me. I have a very urgent and private message
for Dr. Collopy. It must be delivered to him immediately, or
heads will roll. I'm not kidding. Yours, too"-Smithback glanced
at the guard's name-plate- "Mr. Primus, if you don't deliver
it."

The guard wavered, a look of fear in his eyes. The museum
administration had not made life easy in recent years for those
on the bottom, fostering a climate of fear more than family.
Smithback had used this fact before, to good effect, and he hoped
it would work again.

"What's it about?" the guard named Primus
asked.

"The diamond theft. I have private
information."

The guard seemed to waver. "I don't know..."

"I'm not asking you to let me in. I'm asking you to deliver
this note directly to the director. Not to his secretary, not to
anyone else-just to him. Look, I'm not some schmuck, okay? Here
are my credentials."

The guard took the press pass, looking at it
doubtfully.

Smithback pressed the message into his hand. "Don't read it.
Put it in an envelope and deliver it personally. Trust me, you'll
be glad you did."

The guard hesitated a moment. Then he took the card and
retreated to the security office, reappearing a few moments later
with an envelope. "I sealed it in here, never looked at
it."

"Good man." Smithback scribbled on the envelope: "For Dr.
Collopy, extremely important, to be opened immediately. From
William Smithback Jr. of the New York
Times."

The guard nodded. "I'll see it's delivered."

Smithback leaned forward. "You don't understand. I want
you to deliver it personally." He glanced around. "I don't
trust any of these other bozos."

The guard flushed, nodded. "All right." Envelope in hand, he
disappeared down the hall.

Smithback waited, cell phone in hand. Five minutes passed.
Ten.

Fifteen.

Smithback paced in frustration. This was not looking
good.

Then his phone gave a shrill ring. He opened it
quickly.

"This is Collopy," came the patrician voice. "Is this
Smithback?"

"Yes, it is."

"One of the guards will escort you to my office
immediately."

A scene of controlled chaos greeted Smithback as he approached
the grand, carved oaken doors of the director's office. Outside
was a confabulation of New York City police, detectives, and
museum officials. The door was shut, but as soon as Smithback's
escort announced him, he was shown inside.

Collopy stood pacing before a great row of curved windows,
hands clasped behind his back. Beyond the windows lay the wintry
fastness of Central Park. Smithback recognized the security
director, Manetti, along with several other museum officials
standing before Collopy's desk.

The museum director noticed him, stopped pacing. "Mr.
Smithback?"

"That's me."

Collopy turned to Manetti and the other officials. "Five
minutes."

He watched them leave, then turned to Smithback. He was
gripping the card in one hand, his face slightly flushed. "Who's
behind this outrageous rumor, Mr.
Smithback?"

Smithback swallowed. He had to make this sound good. "It's not
exactly a rumor, sir. It came from a confidential source which I
can't reveal. But I made a few calls, checked it out. It seems
there might be something to it."

"This is intolerable. I've got enough to worry about without
this. It's just some crank speculation, best
ignored."

"I'm not sure that would be wise."

"Why? You're not going to publish unsubstantiated calumnies
like this in the Times, are you? My assertion that the
diamond is safe at our insurance company ought to be
enough."

"It's true the Times doesn't publish rumors. But as I
said, I've got a reliable source that claims it's true. I can't
ignore that."

"Bloody hell."

"Let me pose a question to you," Smithback said, keeping his
voice the soul of reasonableness. "When was the last time you
personally saw Lucifer's Heart?"

Collopy shot him a glance. "It would have been four years ago,
when we renewed the policy."

"Did a certified gemologist examine it at the
time?"

"No. Why, it's an unmistakable gemstone..." Collopy's voice
trailed off as he realized the weakness of his
remark.

"How do you know it was the genuine article, Dr.
Collopy?"

"I made a perfectly reasonable assumption."

"That's the crux of it, isn't it, Dr. Collopy? The truth is,"
Smithback continued gently, "you don't know for a fact that
Lucifer's Heart is still in the insurance company vault. Or, if a
gemstone is there, whether it's the real one."

"This is an absurd spinning of a conspiracy theory!" The
director set off pacing again, hands balled up behind his back.
"I don't have time for this!"

"You wouldn't want to let a story like this get out of
control. You know how these things tend to assume a life of their
own. And I do have to file my article by this
evening."

"Your article? What article?"

"About the allegations."

"You publish that and my lawyers will eat you for
breakfast!"

"Take on the Times? I don't think so." Smithback spoke
mildly and waited, giving Collopy plenty of time to think things
out to the inevitable, preordained conclusion.

"Damn it!" Collopy said, spinning on his heel. "I
suppose we'll just have to bring it out and have it
certified."

"An interesting suggestion," said Smithback.

Collopy paced. "It'll need to be done publicly, but under
tight security, of course. We can't just invite every Tom, Dick,
and Harry in to watch."

"May I suggest that all you really need is the Times'?
The others will follow our lead. They always do. We're the paper
of record."

Another turn. "Perhaps you're right."

Another pace across the room, another turn. "Here's what I'm
going to do. I'm going to get a gemologist to certify that the
stone held by our insurance company is, in fact, Lucifer's Heart.
We'll do it right there, at Affiliated Transglobal Insurance
headquarters, under the tightest security. You'll be the only
journalist there and, damn it, you'd better write an article that
will scotch those rumors once and for all."

"If it's genuine."

"It'll be genuine or the museum will end up owning Affiliated
Transglobal Insurance, so help me God."

"What about the gemologist? He'd have to be independent, for
credibility."

Collopy paused. "It's true we can't use one of our own
curators."

"And his reputation will obviously need to be
unimpeachable."

"I'll contact the American Council of Gemologists. They could
send one of their experts." Collopy walked to the desk, picked up
the phone, and made several calls in rapid succession. Then he
turned back to Smithback.

"It's all arranged. We'll meet at the Affiliated Transglobal
headquarters, 1271 Avenue of the Americas, forty-second floor, at
one o'clock precisely."

"And the gemologist?"

"A fellow named George Kaplan. Said to be one of the best." He
glanced at Smithback. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got a lot
to do. See you at one." He hesitated. "And thank you for your
discretion."

"Thank you, Dr. Collopy."

SIXTY

D'Agosta listened to the sirens coming across the dunes. They
grew louder, receded, then grew louder again. From his days with
the Southampton P.D., he recognized the tinny sound as coming
from the cheap units mounted on the dune patrol
buggies.

They'd sat here in the shadow of a sand dune, hiding,
assessing the situation, at least five minutes. If he remained on
the beach, there was no way their truck was going to escape dune
buggies. And yet if he went back on the street, he'd be nabbed
immediately, now that they knew his approximate location,
vehicle, and license plate.

They were now near Southampton, D'Agosta's old stomping
ground, and he knew the lay of the land, at least in general
terms. There had to be a way out. He would just have to find
it.

He started the truck, popped the emergency
brake.

"Hold on to your seat," he said.

Pendergast, who had apparently finished making a string of
cell phone calls, glanced over. "I am in your
hands."

D'Agosta took a deep breath. Then he gunned the engine, the
pickup digging out of the hollow and climbing the side of a dune,
shooting huge jets of sand behind them. They plunged into another
depression, wound around several dunes, then climbed diagonally
up the flank of an especially large one that separated them from
the mainland. As they topped it, D'Agosta got a backward glimpse
of several patrol buggies scooting along the hard sand a quarter
mile back, with at least two others in the dunes themselves, no
doubt following their tracks.

Shit. They were closer than he'd
expected.

D'Agosta jammed the pedal to the floor as the pickup topped
the dune. For a moment, they were airborne. Then they landed on
the far side, bottoming out in the loose sand, churning and
grinding their way through a patch of dense brush. The preserve
ended, and the path ahead was blocked by several grand Hampton
estates. As he fought with the wheel, D'Agosta quickly arranged
the local topography in his head. If they could just get past the
estates, he knew, Scuttlehole marsh lay beyond.

The dunes leveled out and he bashed the truck through a slat
fence, emerging onto a narrow road. On the far side was a high
boxwood hedge, surrounding one of the great estates. He tore
alongside the hedge, and where the road curved up ahead, he saw
what he was looking for-a sclerotic patch in the foliage-and he
veered off, aiming directly for it. The pickup truck hit it at
forty, bashed through the hedge, tearing off both mirrors in the
process, and then they were accelerating across a ten-acre lawn,
a huge Georgian mansion on the left, a gazebo and covered pool on
the right, the way beyond blocked by an Italian rose
garden.

He flashed past the pool at speed, ripped through the rose
garden, nicked the arm off a sculpture of some naked woman, and
crashed through a raised vegetable bed that lay beyond. Up ahead,
like a green wall, stood another unbroken line of
hedge.

Pendergast looked back through the rear window of the pickup
truck, a pained expression on his face. "Vincent, you're cutting
quite a swath," he said.

"They can add nude statue molestation to my growing list of
crimes. For now, though, you'd better brace yourself." And he
accelerated toward the hedge.

They hit it with a shuddering crash that nearly stopped the
vehicle dead. The engine coughed and sputtered, and for a moment
D'Agosta feared it would die. But they fought their way out the
far side of the hedge, still running. Across another narrow road,
he could see a split-rail fence and, beyond that, the marshes
surrounding Scuttlehole Pond.

For the past couple of weeks it had been cold-very cold. Now
D'Agosta was going to find out if it had been cold
enough.

He tore along the road until he found a break in the fence,
then pointed the truck through it and went off-road again. He was
forced to slow down as he wound through the sparse jack-pine
forest that surrounded the marsh. He could still hear the sirens
coming faintly from behind. If he had gained ground cutting
through the estate, it was precious little.

The stunted pines gradually gave way to marsh grass and sandy
flats. Ahead, he could see the dead stalks of cattail and yellow
marsh grass. The pond itself seemed lost in the gray
light.

"Vincent?" Pendergast said calmly. "You're aware there's a
body of water ahead?"

"I know."

The pickup accelerated over the frozen verge of the marsh, the
wheels sending shards of crackling ice skittering away on either
side like a wake. The speedometer edged back up to thirty, then
thirty-five, then forty. For what he was about to do, he was
going to need all the speed he could get.

With a final slapping sound, the cattails scattering in their
wake, the pickup truck was on the ice.

Pendergast gripped the door handle, the lattes forgotten.
"Vincent-?"

The truck was moving fast across the ice, breaking it as they
went with a machine-gun chatter. D'Agosta could see in his
rearview mirror that the ice was cracking and shattering behind
them, some pieces even flung up and skittering away, black water
slopping up. The sound of fracturing ice boomed across the lake
like the reports of cannon.

"The idea is they won't be able to follow us," said D'Agosta
through clenched teeth.

Pendergast didn't answer.

The far shore, lined with stately homes, steadily approached.
The truck felt almost like it was floating now, rising up and
down like a powerboat on the continuously breaking crust of
ice.

D'Agosta could feel he was losing momentum. He applied just a
little more gas, being careful to ease down slowly on the
accelerator. The truck roared, wheels spinning, the crackle and
snap of ice growing louder.

Two hundred yards. He gave it more gas, but it just
spun the wheels faster.

The amount of power being transferred from the wheels to the
slick surface was steadily decreasing. The truck jerked, bounced,
slowed, and began to slew sideways as the craquelure of failing
ice spread out from them in all directions.

This is no time for half measures. D'Agosta jammed the
pedal to the floor once again as he spun the wheel. The engine
screamed, the truck accelerating, but not quite enough to stay
ahead of the horrible disintegration of ice.

One hundred yards.

The engine was now screaming like a turbine, the truck still
yawing sideways, moving now on inertia alone.

The far shore was close, but the truck was slowing with every
passing second. Pendergast had scooped up the laptop and police
radio under his arm, and seemed to be preparing to open his
door.

"Not yet!" D'Agosta gave the wheel a sharp check, just enough
to straighten out the truck. The nose, the heavier part, was
still up, and as long as it stayed that way...

With a horrible sinking sensation, the front of the truck
began to settle. There was a moment of breathless suspension. And
then it nosed down sharply and slammed into the forward edge of
ice, stopping the truck cold.

D'Agosta flung open the door and launched himself into the
freezing water, clutching at the breaking edge of ice, gripping
it, hauling himself up onto a jagged floe. He scrambled away
crablike onto solid ice as the bed of the pickup truck swung
upward vertically, the back wheels still spinning off watery
slush-and then as he watched, the truck plunged straight down
with a rush of forced air, slopping him with a wave of icy water,
cakes of broken ice dancing and churning in its
wake.

After the truck had vanished, there, on the far side of the
gaping hole, stood Pendergast, standing on the ice as if he'd
merely stepped out of the truck, computer and radio tucked under
one arm, black coat dry and unruffled.

D'Agosta rose unsteadily to his feet on the groaning ice. They
were a mere dozen yards from shore. He glanced back but the dune
buggies had not yet appeared on the shore of the
pond.

"Let's go."

In a moment, they reached the shore and hid themselves behind
a raised dock. The buggies were just arriving, their yellow
headlights piercing the bitter gray air. The story that met their
eyes was evident enough: a long, broken path of heaving ice that
led most of the way across the lake to a gaping hole, littered
with broken chunks of ice. A slick of gasoline was slowly rising
and spreading in rainbow patterns.

Pendergast peered across the lake from between the slats of
the dock. "That, Vincent, was a most ingenious
maneuver."

"Thanks," D'Agosta said through chattering
teeth.

"It will take them a while to determine that we're still
alive. Meanwhile, shall we see what the neighborhood has to offer
in the way of transportation?"

D'Agosta nodded. He had never been so cold in his life. His
hair and clothes were freezing, and his hands burned with the
cold.

They crept up along the hedges of one of the great houses-all
summer "cottages," currently shut up for the winter. The driveway
was empty, and they moved around the side of the house and looked
in the garage window.

There sat a vintage Jaguar on blocks, the wheels stacked in
the gloom of one corner.

"That should do," Pendergast murmured.

"Garage's alarmed," D'Agosta managed to say.

"Naturally." Pendergast glanced around, found a wire tucked
behind a drainpipe, followed it to the garage door, and in a few
minutes had found the alarm plate coupling.

"Very crude," he said, jamming a stray nail behind the plate
and prying it loose, being careful not to cut the connection.
Then he picked the lock on the garage door, raised it a foot, and
they slid underneath.

The garage was heated.

"Warm yourself, Vincent, while I get to work."

"How in hell did you avoid going in the water?" D'Agosta said,
standing directly on top of the heating vent.

"Perhaps my timing was better." Taking off his coat and jacket
and rolling up his crisp white sleeves, Pendergast set the four
tires in place, jacked up one end of the car, slipped the tire on
and bolted it, then followed the same procedure for the other
three wheels.

"Feeling warmer?" he asked as he worked.

"Sort of."

"Then if you don't mind, Vincent, open the hood and connect
the battery." Pendergast nodded toward a toolbox that sat in one
corner.

D'Agosta pulled out a wrench, opened the hood, connected the
battery, checked the fluid levels, and examined the engine.
"Looks good."

Pendergast kicked away the final block and jacked down the
last wheel. "Excellent."

"No one to call the cops about a stolen car."

"We shall see. Although the area seems deserted for the
winter, there's always the danger of a nosy neighbor. This 1954
Mark VII saloon is not an inconspicuous vehicle. Now for the
moment of truth. Please get in and help me start
her."

D'Agosta clambered into the driver's seat and waited for
instructions.

"Foot on the accelerator. Choke out. Gear in
neutral."

"Check," D'Agosta said.

"When you hear the engine turn, give it a bit of
gas."

D'Agosta complied. A moment later, the car roared to
life.

"Ease off the choke," Pendergast said. He walked over to the
alarm box, glanced around, picked up a long wire, attached it to
both metal plates in the alarm, then opened the door. "Take her
out."

D'Agosta eased the Jag out. Pendergast shut the garage door
and got into the rear of the vehicle.

"Let's get the heat on in this baby," said D'Agosta, fiddling
with the unfamiliar controls as he drove onto the
street.

"You do that. Pull over and let it run for a few minutes. I am
going to lie down, and ... ho, what's this?" He held up a loud
sports jacket checkered in various shades of light green. "A
stroke of luck, Vincent! Now you look the part."

D'Agosta drew off his sodden coat and tossed it on the floor,
putting on the sports jacket instead.

"How becoming."

"Yeah, right."

At that moment, Pendergast's cell phone rang. D'Agosta watched
as the agent plucked it from his pocket.

"Yes," Pendergast said. "I understand. Yes, excellent. Thank
you." And he hung up.

"We have three hours to get to Manhattan," he said, checking
his watch. "Do you think you can manage it?"

"You bet." D'Agosta hesitated. "Now, you want to tell me who
that was and what the heck you've been up to?"

"That was William Smithback."

"The journalist?"

"Yes. You see, Vincent, at last-at long, long last-we might
have been given a break."

"How do you figure that?"

"Diogenes was the person who robbed the Astor Hall last
night."

D'Agosta turned to stare at him. "Diogenes? You
sure?"

"Undoubtedly. He's always had an obsession with diamonds. All
these murders were just a horrible distraction to keep me busy
while he planned his real crime: the robbing of the
diamond hall. And he chose to take Viola last, to ensure my
maximal distraction during the robbery itself. Vincent, it
was a 'perfect' crime, after all, in a spectacular, public
sense-not one aimed simply at myself."

"So what makes this a break for us?"

"What Diogenes didn't know-couldn't know-was that the finest
gem of all, no doubt the one he most wanted, wasn't on display.
He didn't steal Lucifer's Heart: he stole a fake."

"So?"

"So I'm going to steal the real Lucifer's Heart for him and
make a trade. Is the motor warmed up? Let's get back to New
York-there's no time to waste."

D'Agosta eased the car away from the curb. "I've seen you pull
a few rabbits out of your hat, but how in the hell are you going
to steal the world's greatest diamond on the spur of the moment?
You don't know where it is, you don't know anything about its
security."

"Perhaps. But as it happens, Vincent, my plans are already in
motion." And Pendergast patted the pocket where his cell phone
was.

D'Agosta kept his eyes on the road. "There's a problem," he
said in a quiet voice.

"What's that?"

"We're assuming that Diogenes still has something to
trade."

There was a brief silence before Pendergast spoke. "We can
only pray that he does."

SIXTY-ONE

Laura Hayward walked briskly up the steps of the Lower
Manhattan Federal Building, Captain Singleton at her heels.
Singleton was, as usual, dressed nattily: camel's-hair topcoat,
Burberry scarf, thin black leather gloves. He hadn't said much on
the ride downtown, but that was okay: Hayward hadn't felt much
like talking.

It had been barely twenty-four hours since D'Agosta walked out
of her office and away from her ultimatum, but it might as well
have been a year. Hayward had always been an exceptionally
levelheaded person, but as she walked into the Federal Building,
she had an almost overpowering sense of unreality. Maybe none of
this was happening, maybe she wasn't on her way to an urgent FBI
briefing, maybe Pendergast wasn't the most wanted criminal in New
York and D'Agosta his accomplice. Maybe she'd just wake up and it
would be January 21 again, and her apartment would still smell of
Vinnie's overcooked lasagna.

At the security checkpoint, Hayward showed her shield, checked
her weapon, signed the clipboard. There wasn't going to be a
happy ending. Because if D'Agosta wasn't Pendergast's accomplice,
he would be Pendergast's victim.

The conference room was large, paneled in dark wood. Flags of
New York and the United States drooped from brass flagpoles on
both sides of the entryway, and color photos of various
government types lined the walls. A huge oval table dominated the
room, surrounded with leather chairs. The coffee urn and the
table heaped with donuts and crullers, a staple of NYPD
departmental meetings, was absent. Instead, a pint bottle of
spring water had been placed before each chair.

Unfamiliar men and women in dark suits were standing around in
knots, talking quietly among themselves. As Hayward and Singleton
entered, the groups began making their way quickly toward the
chairs. Hayward chose the nearest seat and Singleton sat down
beside her, removing his gloves and scarf. There was no place to
hang their stuff, and as a result they were the only two people
in the room wearing coats.

At that moment, a tall, stocky man walked into the conference
room. Two shorter men followed on his heels, like obedient
hounds. Each of the two carried a brick of red folders under his
arm. The tall man stopped for a moment, glancing around the
table. Unlike the rest of the faces in the room, pallid from the
New York winter, his was sunburned. It wasn't the even,
artificial tan you got from a salon: this man had spent long
hours working someplace sunny and hot. His eyes were small,
narrow, and pissed-off.

He walked to the head of the table, where three seats had been
left empty, and took the middle one. His two retainers sat to his
right and his left.

"Good morning," the man said in an abrasive Long Island accent
at odds with the sunburn. "I'm Special Agent in Charge Spencer
Coffey, and with me are Special Agents Brooks and Rabiner. With
their assistance, I'll be leading the search for Special Agent
Pendergast."

The man seemed to spit out the final word, and as he said it,
the anger spread from his eyes to his entire face.

"The facts as we know them so far are these: Pendergast is a
primary suspect in four homicides, one in New Orleans, one in
D.C., and two here in New York. We have DNA and fiber evidence
from all four sites, and we're cooperating with local authorities
in an effort to gather more."

Singleton shot Hayward a meaningful look. Coffey's idea of
"cooperation" had been a phalanx of FBI agents swooping down on
her office, grilling her men, and taking whatever evidence struck
their fancy. Ironic how her own request for the Quantico profile
had aroused Coffey's interest in the first place.

"Clearly, we're dealing with a mentally unbalanced individual-
the psych profile confirms it. There is a high probability he is
planning additional homicides. He was last spotted yesterday
afternoon at Kennedy Airport, where he eluded security guards and
police officers, stole a rental car, and drove away. He abandoned
his own vehicle at the rental lot-a Rolls-Royce."

A low murmur went around the room at this, punctuated by
several scoffs and dark looks. Pendergast must have made more
than his share of enemies during his tenure with the
FBI.

"There have been unconfirmed sightings of Pendergast at
several convenience stores and gas stations in Nassau and Suffolk
counties, last night and this morning. We're following up on
those now. Pendergast is traveling with another man, believed to
be NYPD lieutenant Vincent D'Agosta. And I've just had news of a
high-speed chase in the vicinity of Southampton. Preliminary
eyewitness accounts from the officers involved would seem to ID
Pendergast and D'Agosta."

Hayward shifted uncomfortably in her chair. Singleton stared
straight ahead.

"We have teams searching Pendergast's 72nd Street apartment
and his New Orleans town house as we speak. Any information we
discover that might shed light on his future movements will be
passed down the line to you. We're setting up a
command-and-control structure that will allow for quick
dissemination of new information. This is going to be a very
fluid situation, and we have to be ready to revise our strategy
accordingly."

Coffey nodded to his retainers, and they stood up and began
walking around the table, passing out the red folders. Hayward
noticed that neither she nor Singleton received one. She'd
assumed this was to be a working meeting, but it appeared that
Special Agent inCharge Coffey already had his own ideas about how
to handle the case and neither needed nor wanted input from
anybody else.

"You'll find your initial instructions and assignments in
these folders. You will be working in teams, and each team will
be assigned six field agents. Our immediate priority is to
determine Pendergast's movements over the last twenty-four hours,
look for patterns, set up checkpoints, and draw in the net until
we have him. We don't know why he's running around Long Island,
stopping at convenience stores and gas stations: those we've
interviewed indicate he's been looking for someone. I'll be
expecting hourly verbal reports from each team, made either to me
directly or to Special Agents Brooks and Rabiner."

Coffey stood up heavily, sweeping the table with his angry
gaze. "I'm not going to sugarcoat this. Pendergast is one of our
own. He knows all the tricks of the trade. Even though it seems
we've got him pinned down on eastern Long Island, he could still
elude us. That's why we're throwing the entire resources of the
Bureau into this. We need to nail this bastard, and quickly. The
reputation of the Bureau's at stake."

He surveyed the table again. "Any questions?"

"Yes," Hayward said.

All eyes turned toward her. She hadn't intended to speak, but
the word had just tumbled out involuntarily.

Coffey glanced at her, small eyes narrowing to pinpricks of
white. "Captain, ah, Hayward, isn't it?"

She nodded.

"Go ahead, please."

"You haven't mentioned the role of the NYPD in the
search."

Coffey's eyebrows shot up. "Role?"

"That's right. I've heard a lot about what the FBI's going to
do, but nothing about the cooperation with the NYPD you mentioned
earlier."

"Lieutenant Hayward, our latest information, if you've been
listening, has Pendergast in Suffolk County. There's not a great
deal you can do for us out there."

"True. But we've got dozens of detectives here in Manhattan
who are familiar with the case, we've developed virtually all the
evidence-"

"Lieutenant," Coffey interrupted, "no one is more
grateful for the NYPD's assistance in furthering this
investigation than I am." But he didn't look grateful-if
anything, he looked more pissed-off than before. "At the moment,
however, the matter is outside your jurisdiction."

"Our immediate jurisdiction, yes. But he could always return
to the city. And given that Agent Pendergast is wanted in two
murders I'm in charge of investigating, I want to make sure that,
once he's apprehended, we've got access for
interrogation-"

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves," Coffey snapped. "The man's
still at large. Any other questions?"

The room was silent.

"Good. There's just one last thing." Coffey's voice went down
a few notches. "I don't want anybody taking any chances.
Pendergast is armed, desperate, and extremely dangerous. In the
event of a confrontation, a maximal armed response will be
appropriate. In other words, shoot the son of a bitch. Shoot to
kill."

SIXTY-TWO

George Kaplan exited his Gramercy Park brownstone, paused for
a moment at the top of the steps to check his cashmere coat,
flicked off a speck of dust, pinched his perfectly knotted
cravat, patted his pockets, inhaled the crisp January air, and
descended. His was a quiet, tree-lined neighborhood, his
brownstone facing the park itself, and even in the cold winter
weather there were mothers with their children walking the
winding lanes, their cheerful voices rising among the bare
branches.

Kaplan fairly tingled with anticipation. The call he had
received was as unexpected as it was welcome. Most gemologists
lived their entire lives without ever having the opportunity to
gaze into the depths of a gemstone one-millionth as rare or
famous as Lucifer's Heart. He had, of course, seen it at the
museum behind a thick piece of glass, under execrable lighting,
but until now he hadn't known just why the lighting was so bad:
had it been lit properly, at least a few gemologists-himself
included-would have recognized it as a fake. A very good fake, to
be sure: a real diamond, irradiated to give it that incredible
cinnamon color, no doubt enhanced by colored fiber-optic light
skillfully delivered from beneath the gem. Kaplan had seen it all
in his forty years as a gemologist, every rip-off, cheat, and con
game in the business. He chided himself for not realizingthat a
diamond like Lucifer's Heart couldn't be put on display.
No company would insure a stone which was always in full public
view, its location known to the world.

Lucifer's Heart. And what was it worth? The last red
diamond of any quality that had come up for sale was the Red
Dragon, a five-carat stone that had gone for sixteen million
dollars. And this one was nine times as large, a better grade and
color, without a doubt the finest fancy color diamond in
existence.

Value? Name your price.

After receiving the call, Kaplan had spent a few moments in
his library, refreshing himself on the history of the diamond.
With diamonds, it was usually the case that the less color the
better, but that was true only up to a point. When a diamond had
a deep, intense color, it suddenly leaped in value; it became the
rarest of the rare- and of all the colors a diamond could
possess, red was by far the rarest. He knew that, in all the
crude production from all the De Beers mines, a red diamond of
quality surfaced only about once every two years. Lucifer's Heart
made the word unique sound hackneyed. At forty-five
carats, it was huge, a heart-cut stone with a GIA grade of VVS1
Fancy Vivid. No other stone in the world even came close. And
then there was the color: it wasn't ruby red or garnet-colored,
either of which was exceedingly rare in its own right. Rather, it
was an intensely rich reddish orange, a color so unusual that it
defied naming. Some called it cinnamon, and while Kaplan thought
it more reddish than true cinnamon, he himself could not find a
better word to describe it. The closest analogy he could think of
was blood in bright sunlight, but if anything, it was even richer
than blood. No other object in the wide world possessed its
color-nothing. Its color was a scientific mystery. To find out
what gave Lucifer's Heart its unique color, scientists would have
to destroy a piece of the diamond-and that, of course, would
never happen.

The diamond had a short, bloody history. The raw stone, a
monster of some 104 carats, had been found by an alluvial digger
in the Congo in the early 1930s. Not realizing, because of its
color, that it was even a diamond, he used it to pay a
long-running bar tab. When the man later learned what it was, he
tried to get it back from the barman, only to be rebuffed. So one
night he broke into the barman's home, killed the man, his wife,
and their three children, and then spent the rest of the night
trying to hide his crime by cutting up the corpses and throwing
them off the back porch to the crocodiles in the Buyimai River.
He was caught, and during the gathering of evidence for the
murder trial, part of which involved killing and examining the
stomach contents of a dozen river crocodiles, a police inspector
was killed by an enraged reptile and a second drowned trying to
save him.

The gemstone, still uncut, made its way through the black
market (and several other rumored killings) before it resurfaced
in Belgium as the property of a notorious black market dealer.
The man badly botched the cleaving of the stone, leaving a nasty
crack in it, and subsequently committed suicide. The now damaged
rough stone bounced around the diamond demimonde for a while,
ultimately ending up in the hands of an Israeli diamond cutter
named Arens, one of the best in the world. In what was later
called the most brilliant cutting ever done, Arens was able to
produce a heart-shaped gem from the cracked rock in just such a
way as to remove the flaw without fracturing the stone or losing
too much material. It took Arens eight years to complete the cut.
The process had since passed into legend. He spent three years
looking at the stone; then another three practicing the cutting
and polishing on no fewer than two hundred plastic models of the
original, experimenting in ways to optimize the size, cut, and
design while removing the exceedingly dangerous flaw. He
succeeded, in much the same way Michelangelo was able to sculpt
the David out of a badly cracked block of marble other
sculptors had rejected as unworkable.

When Arens was done, he had produced an extraordinary,
heart-cut stone along with another dozen or so smaller stones,
all from the same rough. He named the biggest stone Lucifer's
Heart after its grim history, commenting to the press that it was
"the very devil to cut."

And then, in an act of extraordinary generosity, Arens willed
the stone to the New York Museum of Natural History, which he had
visited as a child and whose Hall of Diamonds had determined
whathis life's work would be. He sold the dozen or so much
smaller stones cut from the same rough for what was rumored to be
an astonishing sum, but, strangely enough, none of the stones had
ever resurfaced on the market. Kaplan assumed they had been made
into a single, spectacular piece of jewelry, which remained with
the original owner, who wished to keep her identity
secret.

Kaplan swung around the corner of Gramercy Park and walked
west, toward Park Avenue, where he had the best shot of catching
a cab headed uptown. He had half an hour, but you could never
predict midtown traffic at lunchtime, and this was one
appointment he did not want to be late to.

As he stopped at the corner of Lex to wait for the light to
change, he was startled to see a black car roll up beside him,
window down. Inside sat a man in a green sports
jacket.

"Mr. George Kaplan?"

"Yes?"

The man leaned over, presented the badge of a New York City
police lieutenant, and opened the door. "Get in,
please."

"I have an important appointment, Officer. What's this all
about?"

"I know. Affiliated Transglobal Insurance. I'm your
escort."

Kaplan peered closely at the badge: Lieutenant Vincent
D'Agosta. It was a genuine shield-Kaplan was well versed in such
things- and the man behind the wheel really couldn't be anything
other than a cop, despite the unusual choice of apparel. Who else
would know about his appointment?

"That's kind of you." Kaplan climbed in, the door shut, the
locks shot down, and the car eased away from the
curb.

"Security's going to be high," said the policeman. Then he
nodded at a gray plastic box on the seat between them. "I'll have
to ask you to surrender your cell phone, your wallet with all
your identification, any weapons you might have, and all your
tools. Put them in that box next to you. I'll pass them to my
colleague, and they'll all be returned to you at the vault after
they've been thoroughly vetted."

"Is this really necessary?"

"Absolutely. And I'm sure you can understand
why."

Kaplan, not very surprised under the circumstances, removed
the requested items and placed them in the box. At the next
light, at Park Avenue, a vintage Jaguar that had been following
them pulled up alongside; the windows of both vehicles went down;
and the policeman handed the box through the window. Glancing
into the other car, Kaplan saw that the driver had carefully
groomed pale blond hair and was wearing a nicely tailored black
suit.

"Your colleague drives a most unusual car for a
policeman."

"He's a most unusual man."

When the light changed to green, the Jaguar turned right and
headed for Midtown, while the policeman driving Kaplan turned
south.

"I beg your pardon, Officer, but we should be heading north,"
Kaplan said. "Affiliated Transglobal Insurance is headquartered
at 1271 Avenue of the Americas."

The car accelerated southward and the policeman looked over
unsmilingly. "Sorry to inform you, Mr. Kaplan, but this is one
appointment you won't be keeping."

SIXTY-THREE

They gathered in the sitting room of Harrison Grainger, CEO
of Affiliated Transglobal Insurance. The executive suite was
perched high in the Affiliated Transglobal Tower, looking north
up the great canyon of Avenue of the Americas to its terminus, a
half dozen blocks north, at the dark rectangle of Central Park.
At one o'clock precisely, Grainger himself emerged from his
office, a florid man with cauliflower ears and a narrow head,
expansive, balding, and cheerful.

"Well, are we all here?" He looked around.

Smithback glanced about. His mouth felt like paste and he was
sweating. He wondered why in the world he had agreed to this
insane scheme. What had sounded like a fabulous escapade earlier
that day, a chance at a one-of-a-kind scoop, now appeared mad in
the harsh light of reality: Smithback was about to participate in
a very serious crime-not to mention compromising all his ethics
as a journalist.

Grainger looked around, smiling. "Sam, you make the
introductions."

Samuel Beck, the security chief, stepped forward with a nod.
Despite his nervousness, Smithback couldn't help noticing the man
had feet as small as a ballerina's.

"Mr. George Kaplan," the security chief began. "Senior
associate of the American Council of Gemologists."

Kaplan, a neat man dressed in black, sporting a trimmed goatee
and rimless glasses, had the elegant look of a man of the last
century. He gave a short, sharp bow.

"Frederick Watson Collopy, director of the New York Museum of
Natural History."

Collopy shook hands all around. He didn't look especially
pleased to be here.

"William Smithback of the New York
Times."

Smithback managed a round of handshakes, his hand as damp as a
dishrag.

"Harrison Grainger, chief executive officer, Affiliated
Transglobal Insurance Group Holding."

This set off another series of murmured
greetings.

"Rand Marconi, CFO, Affiliated Transglobal
Group."

Oh, God, thought Smithback. Were all these people
coming?

"Foster Lord, secretary, Affiliated Transglobal
Group."

More handshakes, nods.

"Skip McGuigan, treasurer, Affiliated Transglobal
Group."

Yet again, Smithback plucked weakly at his
collar.

"Jason McTeague, security officer, Affiliated Transglobal
Group."

It was like announcing the nobility arriving at a formal ball.
A heavily armed security guard shifted on his feet, nodded,
didn't offer his hand.

"And I am Samuel Beck, director of security, Affiliated
Transglobal Group. Suffice to say, we've all been checked,
vetted, and cleared." He gave a quick smile at his own witticism,
which was reinforced by a hearty laugh from
Grainger.

"All right, then, let's proceed," said the CEO, holding out
his hand toward the elevators.

They headed deep into the bowels of the building, descending
first one elevator, then a second, then a third, at last winding
through long and unnamed cinder-block corridors before arriving
at the largest, most polished, most gleaming vault door Smithback
had ever seen. Staring at the door, his heart sank still
further.

Beck busied himself with a keypad, a series of locks, and a
retinal scanner while they all waited.

At last, Beck turned. "Gentlemen, we now have to wait five
minutes for the timed locks to disengage. This vault," he
continued proudly, "contains all our original, executed policies:
every single one. An insurance policy is a contract, and the only
valid copies of our contracts are here-representing almost half a
trillion dollars of coverage. It's protected by the latest
security systems devised by man. This vault is designed to
withstand an earthquake of 9 on the Richter scale, an F-5
tornado, and the detonation of a hundred-kiloton nuclear
bomb."

Smithback tried to take notes, but he was still sweating
heavily, the pen slippery in his hands. Think of the story.
Think of the story.

There was a soft chiming sound.

"And that, gentlemen, is the signal that the vault's locks
have disengaged." Beck pulled a lever and the faint humming of a
motor sounded, the door slowly swinging outward. It was
staggeringly massive, six feet of solid stainless
steel.

They moved forward, the well-armed security guard bringing up
the rear, and passed through two other massive doors before
entering what was evidently the main vault, a huge steel space
with metal cages enclosing drawer upon metal drawer, rising from
floor to ceiling.

Now the CEO stepped forward, clearly relishing his role. "The
inner vault, gentlemen. But even here the diamond is not kept
unprotected, where it might tempt one of our trusted employees.
It is kept in a special vault-within-a-vault, and no fewer than
four Affiliated Transglobal executives are needed to open this
vault: myself, Rand Marconi, Skip McGuigan, and Foster
Lord."

The three men, dressed in identical gray suits, bald, and
looking enough alike as to be mistaken for brothers, all smiled
at this. Clearly, they didn't get many chances to strut their
stuff.

The interior vault stood at the far end of the chamber,
another steel door in the wall. Four keyholes were arrayed in a
line across its face. Above them, a small light glowed
red.

"And now we wait for the outer vault doors to be locked before
we open the inner vault."

Smithback waited, listening to the series of motorized
hummings, clickings, and deep rumbles.

"Now we are locked in. And as long as the inner safe is
unlocked, the outer vault doors will remain locked.
Even if one of us wanted to steal the diamond, we couldn't leave
with it!" Grainger chuckled. "Gentlemen, take out your
keys."

The men all removed small keys from their
pockets.

"We've set up a small table for Mr. Kaplan," said the CEO,
indicating an elegant table nearby.

Kaplan eyed it narrowly, pursing his lips with tight
disapproval.

"Is everything in order?" the CEO asked.

"Bring out the diamond," Kaplan said tersely.

Grainger nodded. "Gentlemen?"

Each of the men inserted his key into one of the four
keyholes. Glances were exchanged; then the keys were turned
simultaneously. The small red light turned green and the safe
clicked open. Inside was a simple metal cabinet with eight
drawers. Each one was labeled with a number.

"Drawer number 2," said the CEO.

The drawer was opened; Grainger leaned in and removed a small
gray metal box, which he carried over to the table and placed
before Kaplan with reverence. The gemologist sat down and began
fussily laying out a small collection of tools and lenses,
adjusting them with precision on the tabletop. He took out a
rolled pad of plush black velvet and laid it out, forming a neat
square in the middle of the table. Everyone watched him work, the
people forming a semicircle around the table-with the exception
of the security guard, who stood slightly back, arms
crossed.

As a last step, Kaplan pulled on a pair of surgical gloves. "I
am ready. Hand me the key."

"I'm sorry, Mr. Kaplan, but rules require me to open the box,"
said the security director.

Kaplan waved a hand irritably. "So be it. Don't drop it, sir.
Diamonds may be hard but they shatter as easily as
glass."

Beck leaned over the box, inserted the key, and raised the
lid. All eyes were riveted on the box.

"Don't touch it with your naked, sweaty hands," said Kaplan
sharply.

The security director withdrew. Kaplan reached into the box
and plucked out the gem as nonchalantly as if it were a golf
ball, laying it on the velvet in front of him. He opened a loupe
and leaned over the stone.

Suddenly, he straightened up and spoke in a sharp, high,
querulous voice. "I beg your pardon, but really, I can't work
being crowded around like this, especially from behind. I beg
you, please!"

"Of course, of course," said Grainger. "Let's all step back
and give Mr. Kaplan some room."

They shuffled back. Once again, Kaplan bent to examine the
gem. He picked it up with a four-pronged holder, turned it over.
He laid down the loupe.

"Hand me my Chealsea filter," he said sharply, to no one in
particular.

"Ah, which is that?" Beck asked.

"The white oblong object, over there."

The security director picked it up and handed it over. Kaplan
took it, opened it, and examined the gem again, muttering
something unintelligible.

"Is everything to your satisfaction, Mr. Kaplan?" asked
Grainger solicitously.

"No," he said simply.

The tension in the vault went up a notch.

"Do you have enough light?" the CEO asked.

A freezing silence.

"Hand me the DiamondNite. No, not that.
That."

Beck handed him a strange device with a pointed end. Ever so
gently, Kaplan touched the stone with it. There was a small beep
and a green light.

"Hmph. At least we know it's not moissanite," the gemologist
said crisply, handing the device back to Beck, who did not look
pleased to be cast in the role of assistant.

More mutterings. "The polariscope, if you
please."

After a few false starts, Beck handed it to
him.

A long look, a snort.

Kaplan stood up and looked around, eyeing everyone in the
room. "As far as I can tell, which isn't much, given the
horrendous lighting in here, it's probably a fake. A superb fake,
but a fake nonetheless."

A shocked silence. Smithback stole a glance at Collopy. The
museum director's face had gone deathly white.

"You're not sure?" the CEO asked.

"How can I possibly be sure? How can you expect an expert like
me to examine a fancy color diamond under fluorescent
lighting?"

A silence. "But shouldn't you have brought your own light?"
ventured Grainger.

"My own light?" Kaplan cried. "Sir, forgive me, but
your ignorance is shocking. This is a fancy color diamond,
graded Vivid, and you cannot simply bring in any old light
to look at it with. I need real light to be sure. Natural
light. Nothing else will do. No one said anything about having to
examine the finest diamond in the world under fluorescent
lighting. This is an insult to my profession."

"You should have mentioned this when we made the
arrangements," said Beck.

"I assumed I was dealing with a sophisticated insurance
company, knowledgeable on the subject of gemstones! I had no idea
I would be forced to examine a diamond in a stuffy basement
vault. Not to mention with half a dozen people breathing down my
neck as if I'm some kind of zoo monkey. My report will be that it
is a possible fake, but that final determination will await
reexamination under natural light." Kaplan crossed his arms and
stared fiercely at the CEO.

Smithback swallowed painfully. "Well," he said, taking what he
hoped were intelligible notes, "I guess that's it. There's my
story."

"What's your story?" Collopy said, turning on him. "There's no
story. This is inconclusive."

"I should certainly say so," said Grainger, his voice shaky.
"Let's not jump to conclusions."

Smithback shrugged. "My original source tells me that
diamond's a fake. Now Mr. Kaplan says it may be a
fake."

"The operative word here is may," Grainger
said.

"Just a moment!" Collopy turned to Kaplan. "You need natural
light to tell for sure?"

"Isn't that what I just said?"

Collopy turned to the CEO. "Isn't there someplace he can view
the stone under natural light?"

There was a moment of silence.

Collopy drew himself up. "Grainger," he said in a sharp voice,
"the safekeeping of this stone was your
responsibility."

"We can bring the stone up to the executive boardroom,"
Grainger said. "On the eighth floor. There's plenty of light up
there."

"Excuse me, Mr. Grainger," said Beck, "but the policy is quite
firm: the diamond can't leave the vault."

"You heard what the man said. He needs better
light."

"With all due respect, sir, I have my instructions, and not
even you can alter them."

The CEO waved his hand. "Nonsense! This is a matter of
critical importance. Surely we can get a waiver."

"Only with the written, notarized permission of the
insured."

"Well, then! We've got the museum's director right here. And
Lord's a notary public, aren't you, Foster?"

Lord nodded.

"Dr. Collopy, you'll give the necessary written
permission?"

"Absolutely. This has got to be resolved now." His face was
gray, almost cadaverous.

"Foster, draw up the document."

"As director of security, I strongly recommend against this,"
said Beck quietly.

"Mr. Beck," said Grainger, "I appreciate your concern. But I
don't think you fully comprehend the situation. We have a
hundred-million-dollar limit on our policy at the museum, but
Lucifer's Heart is covered in a special rider, and one of the
conditions of the stone being kept here for safekeeping is that
there's no limitation of liability. Whatever the GIA
independently determines the stone's value to be, we must pay.
We've got to have an answer to the question of whether
this stone is real, and we've got to have it now."

"Nevertheless," said Beck, "for the record, I still oppose
taking the gem out of the vault."

"Duly noted. Foster? Draw up the document and Dr. Collopy will
sign it."

The secretary took a piece of blank paper from his suit
jacket, wrote some lines. Collopy, Grainger, and McGuigan signed
it, then Lord notarized it with his signature.

"Let's go," said the CEO.

"I'm calling a security escort," said Beck darkly. At the same
time, Smithback watched as the security chief slid a gun out of
his waistband, checked it, flicked off the safety, and slid it
back.

Kaplan picked up the stone with the four-prong.

"I'll do that, Mr. Kaplan," said Beck quietly. He took the
handle of the four-prong and gently laid the stone in its velvet
box. Then he shut the lid and locked it, pocketing the key and
placing the box under his arm.

They waited while Kaplan packed up his supplies; then they
shut the inner door and waited for the outer one to open. They
proceeded back through the succession of massive doors, where
they were met by a brace of security guards. The guards escorted
them to a waiting elevator bank, and within five minutes
Smithback found himself being ushered into a small but extremely
elegant boardroom, done up in exotic wood. Light flooded in
through a dozen broad windows.

Beck stationed the two extra security guards outside the
doors, then shut and locked them.

"Everyone please stand back," he said. "Mr. Kaplan, will this
do?"

"Splendid," said Kaplan with a broad smile, his whole mood
seeming to change.

"Where do you want to sit?"

Kaplan pointed to a seat in a corner, between two windows.
"That would be perfect."

"Set yourself up."

The jeweler busied himself laying out all his tools again,
spreading the velvet. Then he looked up. "The stone,
please?"

Beck laid the box next to him, unlocked it with the key, and
raised the lid. The gemstone lay inside, nestled in its
velvet.

Kaplan reached in, plucked it out with the four-prong, and
called for a Grobet double lens. Using this device, he peered at
the diamond, first looking at it through one lens, then the
other, then both at once. As he held it, light struck the
gemstone, and the walls of the room were suddenly freckled with
dots of intense cinnamon color.

Several minutes passed in absolute silence. Smithback realized
he was holding his breath. At length, Kaplan slowly laid the
diamond down on the velvet, swiveled the Grobet lenses from his
eyes, and bestowed a beaming smile on the waiting
audience.

"Ah, yes," he said, "how wonderful it is. Natural light makes
all the difference in the world. This is it, gentlemen. Without
the slightest doubt, this is Lucifer's Heart." He placed it back
down on the velvet pad.

There was a relieved exhalation, as if everybody else in the
room had been holding their breaths along with
Smithback.

Kaplan waved his hand. "Mr. Beck? You may put it away. With
the four-prong, if you please."

"Thank the Lord," said the CEO, turning to Collopy and
grasping his hand.

"Thank the Lord is right," Collopy replied, shaking the hand
while dabbing at his forehead with a handkerchief. "I had a bad
moment back there."

Meanwhile, Beck, his face unreadable but still dark, had
reached over with the four-prong to pick up the gem. At the same
time, Kaplan rose from his chair and bumped into him. "I beg your
pardon!"

It happened so fast that Smithback realized what he'd seen
only after the fact. Suddenly, Kaplan had the gem in one hand and
Beck's gun in the other, pointed at Beck. He fired it almost in
Beck's face, just turning the barrel enough so the bullets went
past and buried themselves in the wall. He fired three times in
rapid succession, the incredibly loud reports plunging the room
into terror and confusion as everyone dropped to the floor, Beck
included.

And then he was gone, out the supposedly locked
door.

Beck was up in a flash. "Get him! Stop
him!"

As he picked himself up from the floor, ears ringing,
Smithback could see through the double doors the two security
guards sprawled on the floor scrambling back to their feet and
taking off down the hall, fumbling with their
guns.

"He's got the gem!" Collopy cried, struggling to his feet.
"He's got Lucifer's Heart! My God, get him! Do
something!"

Beck had his radio out. "Security Command? This is Samuel
Beck. Lock down the building! Lock it down! I don't want anyone
going out-anything going out-no garbage, no mail, no people,
nothing! You hear me? Shut off the elevators, lock the
stairwells. I want a full security alert and all security
personnel to search for a George Kaplan. Get an image of his face
from the security checkpoint video cam. Nobody leaves the
building until we've got a security cordon in place. No, to hell
with fire regulations! That's a direct order! And I want an X-ray
machine suitable for detecting a swallowed or concealed gemstone,
along with a fully staffed technical team to man it, at the Sixth
Avenue entrance, on the double."

He turned to the rest of them. "And none of you, none
of you, are to leave this room without my
permission."

Two exhausting and trying hours later, Smithback found himself
in a line with what seemed like a thousand employees of
Affiliated Transglobal Insurance. The line snaked interminably
around the interior lobby of the building, coiling three times
about the elevator banks. On the far side of the lobby, he could
see employees trundling carts piled with mail and packages,
running them all through X-ray machines of the kind found in
airports. Kaplan had not been found-and, privately, Smithback
knew he wouldn't be.

As Smithback approached the head of the line, he could hear a
hubbub of voices raised in argument, from a large group of people
shunted to one side who had refused to allow themselves to be
X-rayed. Outside were fire trucks, their lights flashing; police
cars; and the inevitable gaggle of press. As each person in line
was thoroughly searched and then put through the X-ray machine,
finally emerging into the gray January afternoon, there would be
scattered applause and a burst of camera flashes.

Smithback tried to control his sweating. As the minutes
crawled by, his nervousness had only grown worse. For the
thousandth time, he cursed himself for agreeing to this. He had
already been searched twice, including a revolting body-cavity
search. At least the others in the executive boardroom had been
subjected to the same kind of search, Collopy insisting on it for
himself and the rest, including the officers of Affiliated
Transglobal Insurance and even Beck. Meanwhile, Collopy-almost
beside himself with agitation-had been doing all he could to
convince Smithback to keep mum, not to publish anything. Oh, God,
if they only knew...

Why, oh why, had he ever agreed to this?

Only ten more people in line ahead of him now. They were
putting the people, one at a time, into what looked like a narrow
telephone booth, with no fewer than four technicians examining
various CRT screens affixed to it. Someone in front of him was
listening to a transistor radio with everyone else crowding
around-amazing how news got out-and it appeared the real Kaplan
had been released unharmed in front of his brownstone a half hour
ago and was now being questioned by the police. Nobody yet knew
who the fake Kaplan was.

Just two more people to go. Smithback tried to swallow
but found that he couldn't. His stomach churned with fear. This
was the worst part. The very worst of all.

And now it was his turn. Two technicians stood him on a mat
with the usual yellow footprints and searched him yet again, just
a little too thoroughly for comfort. They examined his temporary
building pass and his press credentials. They had him open his
mouth and searched it with a tongue depressor. Then they opened
the door of the booth and put him inside.

"Don't move. Keep your arms at your side. Look at the target
on the wall..." The directions rolled out with rapid
efficiency.

There was a short hum. Through the safety glass, Smithback
could see the technicians poring over the results. Finally, one
nodded.

A technician on the other side opened the door, placed a firm
hand on Smithback's arm, and drew him out. "You're free to go,"
he said, pointing to the building exit.

As he gestured, the technician brushed briefly against
Smithback's side.

Smithback turned and walked the ten feet to the revolving
door- the longest ten feet of his life.

Outside, he zipped up his coat, ran the gauntlet of
flashbulbs, ignored the shouted questions, pushed through the
crowd, and walked stiffly up Avenue of the Americas. At 56th
Street, he hailed a cab, slid into the back. He gave the driver
the address of his apartment, waited until the cab had moved out
into traffic, turned and glanced searchingly out the rear window
for a full five minutes.

Only then did he dare settle into his seat, reach into his
coat pocket. There, nestled safely in the bottom, he could feel
the hard, cold outline of Lucifer's Heart.

SIXTY-FOUR

D'Agosta and Pendergast sat, without speaking, inside the Mark
VII on a bleak stretch of Vermilyea Avenue in the Inwood section
of Upper Manhattan. The sun was dropping slowly through layers of
gray, setting with a final slash of blood-red light, which cast a
momentary glow over the dusky tenements and bleak warehouses
before it was extinguished in bitter night.

They were listening to 1010 WINS, New York's all-news radio
station. The station repeated its top stories on a
twenty-two-minute cycle, and it had been continuously
broadcasting news of the museum diamond heist, the announcer's
excited voice in contrast to the somber mood inside the vehicle.
Just ten minutes earlier, a new story had broken, a related but
even more spectacular item: the theft of the real Lucifer's Heart
from Affiliated Transglobal Insurance headquarters. D'Agosta had
no doubt the police had tried desperately to keep a lid on that
one, but there was no way something that explosive could be kept
under wraps.

"...the most brazen diamond theft in history, taking place
right under the noses of museum and insurance company executives,
and following hard on the heels of the diamond heist at the
museum. Sources close to the investigation say the same thief is
suspected of both crimes..."

Pendergast was listening intently, his face as hard and pale
as marble, his body motionless. His cell phone sat on the seat
between them.

"Police are questioning George Kaplan, a well-known
gemologist, who was on his way to identify Lucifer's Heart for
Affiliated Transglobal Insurance when he was abducted near his
Manhattan town house. Sources close to the investigation say that
the thief then assumed his identity in order to gain access to
the diamond. Police believe he may still be hiding in the
Affiliated Transglobal building, where a massive manhunt is still
under way..."

Pendergast leaned over and shut off the radio.

"How do you know Diogenes will hear the news?" D'Agosta
asked.

"He'll hear it. For once, he's at a loss. He didn't get the
diamond. He'll be in agony, on edge-listening, waiting, thinking.
And once he learns what's happened, there will be only one course
of action available to him."

"You mean, he'll know it was you who stole it."

"Absolutely. What other conclusion could he come to?"
Pendergast smiled mirthlessly. "He'll know. And with no other way
to send me a message, he'll call."

Sodium lights had come up, burning pale yellow along the
length of the empty avenue. The temperature had dropped into
single digits and a brutal wind swept up from the Hudson, blowing
before it a few glittering flakes of snow.

The cell phone rang.

Pendergast hesitated just a second. Then he turned it over,
punching the tiny speaker on the back into life. He said
nothing.

"Ave, frater" came the voice from the
speaker.

A silence. D'Agosta glanced at Pendergast. In the reflected
glow of the streetlights, his face was the color of alabaster.
His lips moved, but no sound came.

"Is that any way to greet a long-lost brother? With
disapproving silence?"

"I am here," Pendergast said in a strained
voice.

"You're there! And how honored I am to be graced with
your presence. It almost makes up for the vile experience of
being forced to call you. But leave us not bandy civilities. I
have but one question: did you steal Lucifer's
Heart?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"You know why."

There was a silence at the other end of the phone, then a slow
exhalation of breath. "Brother, brother,
brother..."

"I am no brother of yours."

"Ah, but that's where you're wrong. We are brothers,
whether we like it or not. And that relationship defines who we
are. You know that, don't you, Aloysius?"

"I know that you're a sick man desperately in need of
help."

"True: I am sick. No one recovers from the disease of being
born. There is no cure to that sickness, short of death.
But when you get down to it, we're all sick, you more than
most. Yes, we are brothers- in sickness as well as in
evil."

Again, Pendergast had no response.

"But here we are, bandying civilities again! Shall we get down
to business?"

No answer.

"Then I will lead the discussion. First, a big, fat bravo for
pulling off in one afternoon what I took years to plan-and,
ultimately, failed to accomplish." D'Agosta could hear a slow
patting of hands over the phone. "I assume this is all about
making a little trade. A certain personage in exchange for the
gemstone. Why else would you have gone to what was undoubtedly a
bit of trouble?"

"You assume correctly. But first..." Pendergast's voice
faltered.

"You want to know if she's still alive!"

This time it was Diogenes who let the silence draw out.
D'Agosta stole a glance at Pendergast. He was motionless, save
for the twitch of a small muscle below the right
eye.

"Yes, she's still alive-at present."

"You hurt her in any way and I'll hunt you to the ends of the
earth."

"Tut-tut. But while we're on the subject of women, let's talk
a little bit about this young thing you've kept cloistered in the
mansion of our late lamented ancestor. If indeed she is 'young,'
which I'm beginning to doubt. I find myself most curious about
her. Her in particular, in fact. I sense that what one
sees on the surface is what one sees of an iceberg: the merest
fraction. There are hidden facets to her, mirrors within mirrors.
And at a fundamental level, I sense that something in her is
broken."

During this speech, Pendergast had stiffened visibly. "Listen
to me, Diogenes. Keep away from her. You come close to her again,
approach her in any way, and I'll-"

"Do what? Kill me? Then my blood would be on your hands- more
than it already is-as well as that of your four dear friends.
Because you, frater, are responsible for all this. You
know it. You made me what I am."

"I made you nothing."

"Well said! Well said!" A dry, almost desiccated laugh
came over the tiny speaker. Listening, D'Agosta felt a chill of
repulsion.

"Let's get to it," Pendergast managed to say.

"Get to it? Just when the conversation was becoming
interesting? Don't you want to talk about how utterly and
completely responsible you are for all this? Ask any
family shrink: they'll tell you how important it is that we talk
it out. Frater."

Suddenly, D'Agosta could take it no longer. "Diogenes! Listen
to me, you sick fuck: you want the diamond? Then you cut with the
bullshit."

"No diamond, no Viola."

"If you hurt Viola, I'll take a sledgehammer to the diamond
and mail you the dust. If you think I'm kidding, keep
talking."

"Empty threats."

D'Agosta brought his fist down on the dashboard, making a
resounding crash.

"Careful! Easy!" The voice was suddenly high and
panicked.

"So shut the hell up."

"Stupidity is an elemental force, and I respect
it."

"You're still talking."

"We'll do this on my terms," said Diogenes briskly. "Do you
hear me? My terms!"

"With two conditions," Pendergast said quietly. "One: the
exchange must take place on the island of Manhattan, and within
six hours. Two: it must be set up in such a way that you can't
renege. You tell me your plan and I'll be the judge. You have one
chance to get it right."

"That sounds like five conditions, not two. But of course,
brother-of course! I have to say, though, this is a knotty little
problem. I'll call you back in ten minutes."

"Make it five."

"More conditions?" And the phone went dead.

There was a long silence. A sheen of moisture had appeared on
Pendergast's brow. He plucked a silk handkerchief from his suit
jacket, dabbed his forehead, replaced it.

"Can we trust him?" D'Agosta asked.

"No. Never. But I don't think he'll have enough time to
arrange an effective double cross within six hours. And he wants
Lucifer's Heart-wants it with a passion you and I cannot
comprehend. I think we can trust that passion, if we can trust
nothing else."

The phone rang again, and Pendergast pressed the speaker
button.

"Yes?"

"Okay, frater. Time for a pop quiz in urban geography.
You know of a place called the Iron Clock?"

"The railroad turntable?"

"Excellent! And you know its location?"

"Yes."

"Good. We'll do it there. You'll no doubt want to bring your
trusty sidekick, Vinnie."

"I intend to."

"Listen to me carefully. I'll meet you there at... six minutes
to midnight. Enter through tunnel VI and step slowly out into the
light. Vinnie can hang back in the dark and cover you, if you
wish. Have him bring his weapon of choice. That will keep me
honest. Feel free to bring your own Les Baer or whatever fashion
accessory you're carrying these days. There'll be no gunplay
unless something goes wrong. And nothing's going to go wrong. I
want my diamond, and you want your Viola da Gamba. If you know
the layout of the Iron Clock, you'll realize it is the perfect
venue for our, shall we say, transaction."

"I understand."

"So. Do I have your approval, brother? Satisfied that I can't
cheat you?"

Pendergast was silent for a moment. "Yes."

"Then a presto."

And the phone went dead.

"That bastard gives me the creeps," said
D'Agosta.

Pendergast sat in silence for a long time. Then he removed the
handkerchief again, wiped his forehead, refolded the
handkerchief.

D'Agosta noticed Pendergast's hands were trembling
slightly.

"You all right?" he asked.

Pendergast shook his head. "Let's get this over with." But
rather than move, he remained still, as if in deep thought.
Abruptly, he seemed to come to some decision. And then he turned
and-to D'Agosta's surprise-took his hand.

"There's something I'm going to ask you to do," Pendergast
said. "I warn you in advance: it will go against all your
instincts as a partner and as a friend. But you must believe me
when I say it is the only way. There is no other solution.
Will you do it?"

"Depends on what it is."

"Unacceptable. I want your promise first."

D'Agosta hesitated.

A look of concern settled over Pendergast's face. "Vincent,
please. It's absolutely critical that I can rely on you in this
moment of extremity."

D'Agosta sighed. "Okay. I promise."

Pendergast's tired frame relaxed in obvious relief. "Good.
Now, please listen carefully."

SIXTY-FIVE

Diogenes Pendergast stared at the cell phone, lying on the
pine table, for a long time. The only indication of the strong
emotion running through him was a faint twitching of his left
little finger. A mottled patch of gray had appeared on his left
cheek, and-were he to look in a mirror, which he did only when
applying a disguise-he knew he'd find his ojo sarco
looking deader than usual.

Finally, his gaze strayed from the telephone to a small bottle
topped by a rubber membrane and, lying next to it, a
glass-and-steel hypodermic needle. He picked up the bottle, held
it upside down while inserting the needle, drew out a small
quantity, thought a moment, drew out more, then capped the needle
with a plastic protector and placed it in his suit
pocket.

His gaze then went to a deck of tarot cards, sitting on the
edge of the table. It was the Albano-Waite deck-the one he
preferred. Picking it up, he gave the deck an overhand shuffle,
then laid three cards facedown before him in the spread known as
the gypsy draw.

Putting the rest of the deck to one side, he turned over the
first card: the High Priestess.
Interesting.

He moved his hand to the second card, turned it over. It
showed a tall, thin man in a black cloak, turned away, head
bowed. At his feet were overturned golden goblets, spilling red
liquid. In the background was a river, and beyond that, a
forbidding-looking castle. The Five of Cups.

At this, Diogenes drew in his breath sharply.

More slowly now, his hand moved to the third and final card.
He hesitated a moment, then turned it over.

This card was upside down. It portrayed a hand above a barren
landscape, thrusting out of a dark cloud of smoke. It held a
massive sword with a jeweled hilt. A golden crown was impaled on
the end of its blade.

The Ace of Swords. Reversed.

Diogenes stared at the card for a moment, then slowly exhaled.
He raised it in a shaking hand, then with one violent motion tore
it in half, then in half again, and scattered the
pieces.

Now his restless gaze moved to the black velvet cloth, laid
out and rolled up at the edges, on which lay 488 diamonds, almost
all of them deeply colored, scintillating underneath the bright
gem light clamped to the table's edge.

As he stared at the diamonds, his agitation began to
ease.

Restraining an exquisite eagerness, his hand roved over the
ocean of glittering trapped light before plucking one of the
largest diamonds, a vivid blue stone of thirty-three carats,
called the Queen of Narnia. He held it in his palm, observing the
light catch and refract within its saturated deeps, and then with
infinite care raised it to his good eye.

He stared at the world through the fractured depths of the
stone. It was like kicking open a door just a crack and catching
a glimpse of a magic world beyond, a world of color and life, a
real world-so different from this false, flat world of
gray mundanity.

His breathing became deeper and more even, and the trembling
in his hand subsided as his mind loosened in its prison and began
to ramble down long-forgotten alleys of memory.

Diamonds. It always started with diamonds. He was in his
mother's arms, diamonds glittering at her throat, dangling from
her ears, winking from her fingers. Her voice was like a diamond,
pure and cool, and she was singing a song to him in French. He
was no more than two years old but nevertheless was crying, not
from sorrow, but from the aching beauty of his mother's voice.
In spite of myself, the insidious mastery of song / betrays me
back, till the heart of me weeps to belong...

The scene faded.

Now he was wandering through the great house on Dauphine
Street, down long corridors and past mysterious rooms, many of
them, even then, having been shut up for ages. But when you
opened a door, you would always find something exciting,
something wondrous and strange: a huge draped bed, dark paintings
of women in white and men with dead eyes; you would see exotic
objects brought from faraway places-panpipes made of bone, a
monkey's paw edged in silver, a brass Spanish stirrup, a snarling
jaguar head, the wrapped foot of an Egyptian
mummy.

There was always his mother to flee to, with her warmth and
her soft voice and her diamonds that glittered as she moved,
catching the light in sudden bursts of rainbow. The diamonds were
here, they were alive, they never changed, never faded, never
died. They would remain, beautiful and immutable, for all
time.

How different from the fickle vicissitudes of the
flesh.

Diogenes understood the image of Nero watching Rome burn while
gazing at the conflagration through a gemstone. Nero understood
the transformative power of gems. He understood that to gaze at
the world through such a stone was to transform both the world
and oneself. Light was vibration; and there were special
vibrations from a diamond that reached the deepest levels of his
spirit. Most people couldn't hear them; perhaps nobody else on
earth could hear them. But he could. The gemstones spoke
to him, they whispered to him, they gave him strength and
wisdom.

Today the diamonds, not the cards, would provide
divination.

Diogenes continued to gaze deeply into the blue diamond. Each
gemstone had a different voice, and he had picked this stone for
its particular wisdom. He waited, murmuring to the gemstone,
beseeching it to speak.

And after a moment, it did. In response to his murmured
question, a whispery answer came back like an echo of an echo,
half heard in a waking dream.

It was a good answer.

Viola Maskelene listened to the strange murmuring, almost like
a prayer or a chant, that came from below. The sound was so low
she could make out nothing. This was followed by an unnerving
half-hour silence. Then, at last, came the sound she'd been
dreading: the scrape of a chair, the slow, careful footfall of
the man climbing the staircase. All her senses went on high
alert, her muscles trembling, ready to act.

A polite rap on the door.

She waited.

"Viola? I should like to come in. Please step round the bed to
the far side of the room."

She hesitated, then did as he requested.

He had said he was going to kill her at dawn. But he hadn't.
The sun had set already, night was coming on. Something had
happened. His plans had changed. Or, more likely, had been
changed, against his will.

The door opened and she saw Diogenes standing in it. He looked
different-slightly disheveled. His face was mottled, his cravat
askew, his ginger hair a little ruffled.

"What do you want?" she asked huskily.

Still, he gazed at her. "I'm beginning to see what my brother
found so fascinating in you. You are, of course, beautiful and
intelligent, as well as spirited. But there is one quality you
possess that truly astonishes me. You have no
fear."

She did not dignify this with an answer.

"You should be afraid."

"You're mad."

"Then I am like God, because if there is a God, He is Himself
mad. I wonder why it is that you have no fear. Are you brave or
stupid-or do you merely lack the imagination to picture your own
death? You see, I can imagine it, have imagined it, so
very clearly.

When I look at you, I see a bag filled with blood, bones,
viscera, and meat, held in by the most fragile and vulnerable
covering, so easily punctured, so facilely ripped or torn. I have
to admit, I was looking forward to it."

He peered at her closely. "Ah! Do I finally detect a note of
fear?"

"What do you want?" she repeated.

He raised his hand, opening it with a twist and displaying a
dazzling gemstone between thumb and forefinger. The ceiling light
struck it, casting glittering shards about the
room.

"Ultima Thule."

"Excuse me?"

"This is a diamond known as the Ultima Thule, named after a
line in one of Virgil's Georgics. That's Latin for the
'Uttermost Thule,' the land of perpetual ice."

"I read Latin in school, too," said Viola
sarcastically.

"Then you'll understand why this diamond reminded me of
you."

With another flick of the wrist, he tossed it to her.
Instinctively, she caught it.

"A little going-away gift."

Something about the way he said "going away" gave her an ugly
feeling. "I don't want any gift from you."

"Oh, but it's so apt. Twenty-two carats, princess-cut, rated
IF Flawless, with a color grading of D. Are you familiar with the
grading of diamonds?"

"What rot you talk!"

"D is given to a diamond utterly without color. It is also
called white. It is considered by those with no imagination to be
a desirable trait. I look at you, Viola, and what do I see? A
wealthy, titled, beautiful, brilliant, and successful woman. You
have a splendid career as an Egyptologist, you have a charming
house on the island of Capraia, you have a grand old family
estate in England. No doubt you consider you are living life to
the fullest. Not only that, but you've had relationships with a
variety of interesting men, from an Oxford professor to a
Hollywood actor to a famous pianist-even an Italian soccer
player. How others must envy you!"

Shock burned through Viola at this invasion of her privacy.
"You bloody-"

"And yet, not all is what it seems. None of your relationships
have worked out. No doubt you're telling yourself the fault lies
with the men. When will it occur to you, Viola, that the fault
lies in yourself? You are just like that diamond-flawless,
brilliant, perfect, and utterly without color. All your sad
attempts to appear exciting, unconventional, are just that-sad
attempts." He laughed harshly. "As if digging up mummies, rooting
in your little plot of dirt by the Mediterranean, could confer
character! That diamond, which all the world considers so
perfect, is in reality dead common. Like you. You're thirty-five
years old and you're unloved and unloving. Why, you're so
desperate for love that you fly halfway around the world in
response to a letter from a man you met only once! Ultima Thule
is yours, Viola. You've earned it."

Viola staggered. His words felt like one physical blow after
another, each one finding its mark. This time she had no
answer.

"That's right. No matter where you go, you'll live in Ultima
Thule, the land of perpetual ice. As someone once said: Wherever
you go, there you are. There's no love within you, and there'll
be no love for you. Barrenness is your fate."

"You and your bit of glass can get knotted!" she cried,
violently throwing the stone back at him.

He deftly caught it. "Glass, you say? Do you know what I did
yesterday while you were here all alone?"

"My interest in your life would be undetectable even to the
most powerful microscope."

Diogenes removed a square of newsprint from his pocket and
unfolded it, revealing the front page of that day's New York
Times.

She stared at it from across the room, squinting to make out
the headlines.

"I robbed the Astor Hall of Diamonds at the Museum of Natural
History. It is a crime I've been planning for many years. I
created a new identity to pull it off. And you helped me do it.
That's why I wanted to give you that stone. But if you don't want
it..." He shrugged, slipped it into his pocket.

"My God." Viola stared at him. And now, for the first time,
she was truly afraid.

"You played an important role. The pivotal role. You see, your
disappearance kept my brother racing all over Long Island,
searching frantically for you, desperately worried about your
safety, while I robbed the museum and transported the gems out
here."

Viola swallowed, feeling a lump in her throat. The fact she
was still alive was nothing but a temporary reprieve. He wouldn't
tell her all this if he meant to let her live.

He really was going to kill her.

"I was giving you that as a little keepsake, a memento, since
we shall part, never to see each other in this world
again."

"I'm going somewhere?" she said, voice quavering now despite
her best efforts.

"Oh, yes."

"Where?"

"You shall find out."

She could see he had his hand in his jacket pocket, fingering
something. He took a step into the room. The door remained open
behind him.

"Come here, Ice Princess."

She didn't move.

He took a second step forward, and a third. At that moment,
she broke for the door. But somehow he had anticipated it,
whirling and leaping toward her with the speed of a cat. She felt
a shockingly powerful arm, tight as a steel cable, whip around
her neck; the other hand slipped out of his pocket now, and in it
was the sudden flash of a needle, and then she felt a burning
sting in her upper thigh; there was the sensation of heat and an
overpowering roar; and then the world abruptly shut
down.

SIXTY-SIX

"Any idea what this is about?" Singleton said as they rode an
express elevator to the rarefied upper floors of One Police
Plaza.

Laura Hayward shook her head. If Commissioner Rocker had asked
to see her alone, she might have expected it was more fallout
over her fingering Pendergast for the murders. But she and
Singleton had been asked to meet with the commissioner together.
Besides, Rocker had always been a straight shooter. He wasn't
political.

They emerged on the forty-sixth floor and walked down the
plushly carpeted corridor to the commissioner's corner suite. A
uniformed secretary in the large outer office took their names,
dialed her phone, had a brief, hushed conversation, and waved
them through.

Rocker's office was expansive but not ostentatious. Instead of
the shooting awards and grinning photo ops that covered the
office walls of most police brass, these walls sported watercolor
landscapes and a couple of diplomas. Rocker was seated behind a
large but utilitarian desk. Three couches were arrayed in a rough
semicircle around it. Special Agent in Charge Coffey sat in the
middle couch, flanked by Agents Brooks and
Rabiner.

"Ah, Captain Hayward," Rocker said, rising. "Captain
Singleton.

Thanks for coming." There was an unusual, strained quality to
his voice she hadn't heard before, and his jaw was set in a tight
line.

Agent Brooks and Agent Rabiner rose as well, leaping to their
feet as if tickled by live wires. Only Coffey remained seated. He
nodded coolly at them, small pale eyes in the big sunburned face
moving from Hayward to Singleton and back to Hayward
again.

Rocker waved vaguely at the sofas. "Please have a
seat."

Hayward seated herself beside the window. So at last Coffey
was deigning to bring them into his investigation. They hadn't
heard a word from him or anybody else in the FBI since the
meeting that morning. Instead, she'd kept herself and her
detectives busy questioning additional museum employees and
further developing the evidence. At least it had helped keep her
mind off the manhunt going on sixty miles to the east, at what
D'Agosta was doing-committing- on Long Island. Thinking
about him, about the whole situation, gave her nothing but pain.
She could never understand why he'd done it, why he'd made the
decision he did. She'd given him an ultimatum, and under the
circumstances an incredibly fair one. Do the right thing, come in
out of the cold. And not just the right thing as a cop, but as a
human being and a friend. She hadn't actually said it, but it had
been clear enough: It's either me or
Pendergast.

D'Agosta had made his choice.

Rocker cleared his throat. "Special Agent in Charge Coffey has
asked me to convene this meeting to discuss the Duchamp and Green
murders. I've asked Captain Singleton to be here as well, since
both homicides took place in his precinct."

Hayward nodded. "I'm glad to hear that, sir. We've had
precious little information from the Bureau about the progress of
the manhunt, and-"

"I'm sorry, Captain," Rocker interrupted quietly. "Special
Agent Coffey wishes to discuss transfer of evidence on the
Duchamp and Green murders."

This stopped Hayward dead in her tracks. "Transfer of
evidence? We've made all our evidence freely
available."

Coffey crossed one trunklike leg over the other. "We're
assuming control of the investigation, Captain."

There was a moment of stunned silence.

"You don't have the power to do that," Hayward
said.

"This is Captain Hayward's case," Singleton said, turning to
Rocker, his voice quiet but strong. "She's been living it night
and day. She's the one who found the connection between the D.C.
and New Orleans homicides. She developed the evidence, she ID'd
Pendergast. Besides, murder isn't a federal
crime."

Rocker sighed. "I'm aware of all that. But-"

"Let me explain," Coffey said with a wave of the hand at
Rocker. "The perp is FBI, one of the victims is FBI, the case
crosses state boundaries, and the suspect's fled your
jurisdiction. End of discussion."

"Agent Coffey is right," said Rocker. "It's their case. We'll
naturally be on hand to assist-"

"We don't have a lot of time to jawbone," said Rabiner. "Let's
get on with the particulars of evidence transfer."

Hayward glanced at Singleton. His face was flushed. "If it
wasn't for Captain Hayward," he said, "there wouldn't be any
manhunt."

"We're all just as pleased as punch at Captain Hayward's
police work," said Coffey. "But the bottom line is, this is no
longer an NYPD matter."

"Just give them what they need, please, Captain," Commissioner
Rocker said, a note of exasperation in his voice.

Hayward glanced at him and realized he was pissed as hell at
this development, but could do nothing about it.

She should have seen it coming. The federal boys were going
for the gold, and on top of that, this Coffey seemed to have a
personal animosity toward Pendergast. God help him and D'Agosta
when the feds finally caught up with them.

Hayward knew she ought to feel outraged at all this. But
through the numbness, all she could bring herself to feel was an
upwelling of weariness. That, and a feeling of revulsion so
strong that she simply could not bear to spend another moment in
the same room with Coffey. And so, abruptly, she stood
up.

"Fine," she said briskly. "I'll initiate the paperwork. You'll
get your evidence as soon as the chain-of-evidence transfers are
signed. Anything else?"

"Captain?" said Rocker. "I'm very grateful to you for your
fine work."

She nodded, turned, and left the room.

She walked quickly toward the elevator, head lowered,
breathing fast. As she did so, her cell phone
rang.

She waited, getting her breathing under control. After a
minute or two, the cell phone rang again.

This time she answered. "Hayward."

"Laura?" came the voice. "It's me. Vinnie."

Despite herself, she felt her heart rise into her throat.
"Vincent, for God's sake. What the hell are you-?"

"Just listen, please. I have something very important to tell
you."

Hayward took a deep breath. "I'm listening."

SIXTY-SEVEN

D'Agosta followed Pendergast into Penn Station,
which-disgracefully-consisted of little more than an escalator
entrance in the shadow of Madison Square Garden. It was a quiet
evening, a Tuesday of no consequence, and at such a late hour,
the area was almost deserted, save for a few homeless people and
a man passing out sheets of his poetry. The two rode the
escalator down to the waiting area, then took another that
descended still farther, to the track level.

They were headed, D'Agosta noted with a certain grimness, for
track 13.

Pendergast had barely spoken a word in the last half hour. As
the appointed time drew nearer-as they came closer to seeing
Viola and, inevitably, Diogenes-the agent had grown more and more
tight-lipped and withdrawn.

The tracks were almost deserted, just a few maintenance men
sweeping up trash and two uniformed cops at a security station,
chatting and blowing on cups of coffee. Pendergast led the way to
the far end of the platform, where the tracks disappeared into a
dark tunnel.

"Be ready," Pendergast murmured as his pale eyes roved the
tracks.

They waited for a moment. The two cops turned and walked into
the security station.

"Now!" Pendergast said under his breath.

They jumped lightly off the platform onto the tracks and
jogged away into the dimness. D'Agosta glanced back at the
receding platform, ensuring nobody had noticed.

It was warmer belowground, hovering just around freezing, but
it was a much damper cold, and it seemed to cut effortlessly
through D'Agosta's purloined sports jacket. After another minute
of jogging, Pendergast stopped, fished in his pocket, and pulled
out a flashlight.

"We have some way to go," he said, shining the light down the
long, dark tunnel. Several pairs of eyes-rat's eyes-gleamed out
of the darkness ahead.

The agent set off again at a fast walk, his long legs striding
down the middle of the tracks. D'Agosta followed, listening a
little nervously for any sound of an approaching train. But all
he could hear were their hollow footsteps, his own breathing, and
the sound of water dripping from icicles in the ancient brick
roof.

"So the Iron Clock is a railroad turntable?" he asked after a
moment. He spoke more to break the strained silence than anything
else.

"Yes. A very old one."

"I didn't know there were any turntables under
Manhattan."

"It was built to manage the flow of train traffic in and out
of the old Pennsylvania Station. In fact, it's the only remaining
artifact from the original architecture."

"And you know how to find it?"

"Remember the subway murders we worked on some years back? I
spent quite a bit of time then, studying the underground
landscape of New York City. I still recall much of the layout
beneath Manhattan, at least the more common
routes."

"How do you think Diogenes knows about it?"

"That is an interesting fact, Vincent, and it has not escaped
my attention."

They came to a metal door, set into an alcove in the tunnel
wall, fastened with a rust-covered padlock. Pendergast stooped to
examine the lock, tracing the heavy lines of rust with his
finger. Then he stepped back, nodding to D'Agosta to do the same.
Pulling his Wilson Combat 1911 from its holster, Pendergast fired
it into the lock. A deafening roar cracked down the tunnel, and
the broken lock fell to the ground in a cloud of rust. He leaned
to the side and kicked open the door.

A stone staircase led down, exhaling a smell of mold and
rot.

"How far down is it?"

"Actually, we're already at the grade of the Iron Clock. This
is merely a shortcut."

The staircase was slippery, and as they descended, the air
grew warmer still. After a long descent, the steps leveled out,
broadening into an old brick tunnel with Gothic arches. Locked
work sheds lined the tunnel.

D'Agosta paused. "Lights ahead. And voices."

"Homeless," Pendergast replied.

As they continued, D'Agosta began to smell woodsmoke. Shortly,
they came across a group of ragged men and women sitting around a
rudely built fire, passing around a bottle of
wine.

"What's this?" one of them called out. "You fellows miss your
train?"

The laughter subsided as they passed. From the darkness behind
the group came the sudden crying of a baby.

"Jeez," D'Agosta muttered. "You hear that?"

Pendergast merely nodded.

They came to another metal door, from which someone had
already cut away the lock. Opening the door, they climbed back up
a long, wet staircase, dodging streams of water, and emerged onto
a new set of tracks.

Pendergast paused, checking his watch.
"Eleven-thirty."

More rats scurried away as they walked wordlessly down the
tunnel for what seemed miles. No amount of walking seemed to warm
D'Agosta against the damp chill. At one point, they passed a
siding holding several wrecked train cars. Later, passing a
series of stone alcoves, D'Agosta saw an ancient metal gear more
than eight feet in diameter. Once in a while, he heard the
distant rumble of trains, but nothing seemed to be running on the
tracks they were walking on.

At last, Pendergast halted, switched off his flashlight, and
nodded ahead. Peering into the darkness, D'Agosta saw that the
tunnel ended in an archway of dim yellow light.

"That's the Iron Clock up ahead," Pendergast said in a low
voice.

D'Agosta removed his Glock 29, slid open the magazine, checked
it, and slipped it back into place.

"You know what to do?"

D'Agosta nodded.

They moved forward slowly and silently, Pendergast in front,
D'Agosta close behind. He checked his watch, holding it mere
inches from his nose: twelve minutes to midnight.

"Remember," Pendergast whispered. "Cover me from
here."

D'Agosta flattened himself against the wall. From this vantage
point, he had a good view into the enormous space ahead. What he
saw almost took his breath away. It was a huge circular vault
built of granite blocks streaked with limestone and grime, an
incredible Romanesque underground massing. The floor of the vault
was spanned by a railroad turntable: a single length of track
stretching from one wall to another, set into a vast iron circle.
Twelve arched tunnels, spaced equally apart, entered the vault.
Each bore a small, grime-covered light above its mouth, along
with a carved Roman numeral, I through XII.

So that's the Iron Clock, he thought.

His dad had been a railroad buff, and D'Agosta knew something
about railroad turntables. The revolving carousels were usually
found at a railroad's terminus: a single track led into the
turntable, and lying beyond would be a semicircular roundhouse
with bays for locomotive storage. Here, however, hard by Penn
Station and within one of the world's busiest networks of
railroad tracks, the turntable clearly had a different purpose:
it was simply a nexus, a way to allow trains to go from one
series of tracks and tunnels to another.

The sound of dripping water echoed in the vast space, and he
could see, far above, icicles on the upper vaulting. The drops
came spinning down through a dirty circle of lights to land in
black puddles below.

He wondered if-out there somewhere, in the darkness of one of
the other eleven railroad tunnels-Diogenes was
waiting.

Just then he heard a faint rumble, followed by a growing rush
of air. Pendergast retreated back into the tunnel, motioning
D'Agosta to do the same. A moment later, a commuter train burst
out of one of the tunnel mouths and went thundering over the
turntable, windows flashing by as it shot through the space, then
rocketed back into darkness. The roar died to a rumble, then a
murmur. And then, with a loud clanking noise, the single section
of track in the center of the Iron Clock began to rotate, halting
with a clang as it connected two other tunnels, preparing for the
next train.

The tunnels it now connected were tunnel XII and the tunnel
they themselves were in: tunnel VI.

All fell silent again. D'Agosta saw the dark shapes of
rats-some the size of small dogs-scurrying along the shadows at
the far edge of the roundhouse. Water dripped steadily. The place
smelled of rot and decay.

Pendergast stirred, gestured toward his watch. Six minutes to
midnight. Time to act. He grasped D'Agosta's hand.

"You know what to do?" he repeated.

D'Agosta nodded.

"Thank you, Vincent," he said. "Thank you for
everything."

Then Pendergast turned and stepped out of the tunnel, into the
dim light. Two steps. Three.

D'Agosta remained in the shadows, Glock in hand. The great
vault of the roundhouse remained empty and silent, the dark
tunnels like so many open mouths, icicles gleaming like
teeth.

Pendergast took another step, then stopped.

"Ave, frater!"

The voice boomed out into the dank, dark space, echoing from
all quarters, so that it was impossible to tell its source.
D'Agosta stiffened, straining to see into the black openings of
the other tunnels visible from his own, but he could see no sign
of Diogenes.

"Don't be shy, brother. Let's have a look at that pretty face
of yours. Step a little farther into the light."

Pendergast took a few more steps into the open area. D'Agosta
waited, gun in hand, covering him.

"Did you bring it?" came the echoing voice. The tone was
leering, almost a snarl; yet there was a curious hunger in
it.

In reply, Pendergast raised one hand, twisting his wrist as he
did so. The diamond suddenly appeared, dull in the dim
light.

D'Agosta heard a sharp intake of breath, like the crack of a
whip, come out of the darkness.

"Bring me Viola," Pendergast said.

"Easy, now, brother. All in good time. Step onto the
turntable."

Pendergast stepped over the iron circle and onto the track
bed.

"Now walk forward, to the center of the track. You'll find an
old hole cut in the iron plate. Inside that is a small velvet
box. Put the stone in there. And do hurry-we wouldn't want
another passing train to end all this
prematurely."

Again, D'Agosta strained to locate the voice, but it was
impossible to know in which tunnel Diogenes might be hiding.
Given the peculiar acoustics of the vaulted space, he could be
anywhere.

Pendergast walked forward guardedly. Reaching the center of
the roundhouse, he knelt, picked up the velvet box, placed the
diamond inside it, replaced it by the track.

Then, abruptly, he rose, pulling out his Wilson Combat and
aiming it at the diamond. "Bring me Viola," he
repeated.

"Whoa! Brother! This rashness is unlike you. We go by the
book. Now step back while my man takes a look to make sure it's
real."

"It is real."

"I trusted you once, long ago. Remember? Look where it got
me." A strange sigh, almost like a moan, came out of the
darkness. "Forgive me if I don't trust you again. Mr. Kaplan? Do
your stuff, if you please."

A terrified, disheveled man stumbled out of tunnel XI into the
faint light. He blinked, looking around in bewilderment. He was
wearing a dark suit and black cashmere coat, muddied and torn. On
his bald head was a headband loupe, and he held a light in one
hand.

D'Agosta immediately recognized him as the man they'd abducted
earlier.

He looked like he'd had an unusually bad day.

Kaplan took a tottering step forward, then stopped again. He
stared about, uncomprehending. "Who...? What...?"

"The diamond is in a box at the center. Go examine it. Tell me
if it's Lucifer's Heart."

The man looked around. "Who's speaking? Where am
I?"

"Frater, show Kaplan the diamond."

Kaplan stumbled forward. Pendergast waved his gun in the
direction of the box.

The sight of the gun seemed to wake Kaplan from his stupor.
"I'll do what you say, but please don't kill me!" he cried. "I
have children."

"And you shall see your dimpled lunatics again-if you
do as I say," came the disembodied voice of
Diogenes.

The man stumbled again, recovered, knelt over the diamond, and
picked it up. He lowered the loupe over his eye, switched on the
small light, and examined the stone.

"Well?" came Diogenes's voice, high and
strained.

"A moment!" the man almost sobbed. "Give me a moment,
please."

He peered at it, the light blossoming inside the diamond,
turning it into a glowing orb of cinnamon. "It looks like
Lucifer's Heart, all right," he said, his voice
hushed.

" 'Looks like' won't do, Mr. Kaplan."

The man continued to peer into the diamond, his hands shaking.
Then he straightened. "I'm sure it is," he said.

"Be sure, now. Your life, and the lives of your family, depend
on your accurate appraisal."

"I'm sure. There's no other diamond like it."

"The diamond has one microscopic flaw. Tell me where it
is."

Kaplan returned to his examination. A minute passed, then
two.

"There's a faint inclusion about two millimeters from the
center of the stone, in the one o'clock
direction."

A hiss-perhaps of triumph, perhaps something else-came from
the darkness. "Kaplan, you may go. Tunnel VI is your exit.
Frater, remain where you are."

With a grateful sob, the man hurried toward tunnel VI and the
waiting D'Agosta, stumbling, half sprawling in his zeal to get
away. A moment later, he arrived in the darkness of the tunnel
mouth, panting heavily.

"Thank God," he sobbed. "Thank God."

"Get behind me," said D'Agosta.

Kaplan peered at D'Agosta, fear replacing relief as he
recognized the face. "Wait a minute. You're the cop
who-"

"Let's worry about that later," D'Agosta said, pushing him
farther into the protective darkness. "We'll have you out of here
soon."

"And now, the moment you've been waiting for." Diogenes's
voice echoed around the vaulted space. "I present you-Lady Viola
Maskelene!"

As D'Agosta peered out, Viola Maskelene suddenly stepped out
of the darkness of tunnel IX. She paused in the light, blinking
uncertainly.

Pendergast took an involuntary step forward.

"Don't move, brother! Let her come to
you."

She turned and looked at Pendergast, took a step forward, not
quite steadily.

"Viola!" Pendergast took another step forward.

There was a sudden gunshot, deafening in the enclosed space. A
puff of dirt sprang up near Pendergast's outstretched shoe.
Instantly, the agent dropped into a crouch, gun in hand, moving
its barrel from tunnel mouth to tunnel mouth.

"Go ahead, brother. Return fire. Pity if a stray round takes
down your Lady Eve."

Pendergast turned. Viola had frozen at the sound of the
gunshot.

"Come to me, Viola," he said.

She stared at him. "Aloysius?" she asked
weakly.

"I'm right here. Just come to me, slow and
steady."

"But you ... you..."

"It's all right now. You're safe. Come to me." He held out his
arms.

"What a touching scene!" said Diogenes. This was followed by
mocking, cynical laughter.

She took a shaky step, another, another-and collapsed in
Pendergast's arms.

Pendergast cradled her protectively, lifting her chin with a
gentle hand and looking at her face. "You drugged her!" he
said.

"Pooh. Nothing more than a few milligrams of Versed to keep
her quiet. Don't be concerned-she's
intact."

D'Agosta could now hear Pendergast murmuring into Viola's ear,
but he couldn't catch the words. She shook her head, pulled away,
swayed. He grasped her again, steadying her. Then he helped her
toward the tunnel opening.

"Bravo, gentlemen, I do believe we're done!" came Diogenes's
triumphant voice. "Now you may all leave by tunnel VI. In fact,
you must leave by tunnel VI. I would insist upon it. And
you had better hurry-the midnight Acela will be coming down track
VI in five minutes, bound for Washington. It accelerates quickly
out of the station and will already be going close to eighty. If
you don't reach the first alcove, three hundred yards down the
tracks, you'll be so much paste on the tunnel walls. I'll shoot
any stragglers. So get moving!"

Pendergast helped Viola back into the darkness, passed her to
D'Agosta.

"Get her and Kaplan out of here," he murmured, placing his
flashlight in D'Agosta's hand.

"And you?"

"I have unfinished business."

This was the answer D'Agosta had feared. He put out a
restraining hand. "He'll kill you."

Pendergast gently shook himself free.

"You can't!" D'Agosta whispered urgently. "They'll
be-"

"Did you hear me?" Diogenes's voice rang out. "You've now got
four minutes!"

"Go!" said Pendergast fiercely.

D'Agosta shot him a final glance. Then he wrapped his arm
around Viola, turned toward Kaplan, gave him a gentle nudge.
"Come on, Mr. Kaplan. Let's go."

He switched on the flashlight and, turning away from the Iron
Clock, led the way quickly down the tracks.

SIXTY-EIGHT

Pendergast remained in the darkness of the tunnel, gun drawn,
waiting. All was silent. A minute went by, then two, then three,
then four.

Five minutes passed. No train came.

Six minutes. Seven.

Still Pendergast waited in the dark. He realized his brother,
always cautious, would not show himself until the train had
passed. Slowly, he stepped back out into the
light.

"Aloysius! What are you still doing here?" The voice
was suddenly panicked. "I said I'd kill anyone who showed
themselves again!"

"Then do it."

Once again, a gun fired, kicking up gravel inches from his
toe.

"Your aim is off."

A second round ricocheted off the stone arch above
Pendergast's head, spraying him with chips.

"You missed again."

"The train's coming through at any moment," came the urgent
voice. "I won't have to kill you-the train will do it for
me."

Pendergast shook his head. Then he began strolling leisurely
along the railroad turntable, heading toward the center of the
vault.

"Get back!" Another shot.

"Your aim is poor today, Diogenes."

He stopped at the center of the turntable.

"No!" came the voice. "Get away!"

Pendergast reached down and picked up the box, took out the
diamond, weighed it in his palm.

"The train, you fool! Put the diamond down! It's safe in that
hole!"

"There is no train."

"Yes, there is. It's late, that's all."

"It's not coming."

"What are you talking about?"

"The midnight Acela was canceled. I called in a bomb threat at
the Back Bay station."

"You're bluffing! How could you have called in such a threat?
You couldn't have known my plan."

"No? Why meet us at six minutes to midnight, rather than
midnight? And why here? There could be only one reason: it had to
do with the railroad timetable. From there it was elementary." He
slipped the diamond into his pocket.

"Put that back-it's mine! You liar! You lied to
me!"

"I never lied to you. I merely followed your instructions.
You, on the other hand, lied to me. Many times. You said you
would kill Smithback. Instead, you targeted Margo
Green."

"I killed your friends. You know I won't hesitate to kill
you."

"And that's precisely what you're going to have to do. You
want to stop me? Then kill me."

"Bastard! Mon semblable, mon frère-now, you
die!"

Pendergast waited, motionless. A minute passed, then
another.

"You see, you can't kill me," Pendergast said. "That's why you
did not properly aim your shots. You need me alive. You proved
that when you rescued me from Castel Fosco. You need me, because
without me-without your hatred of me-you would have
nothing left."

Diogenes did not respond. And yet a new sound had been
introduced to the vault: the sound of running feet, barked
commands, crackling radios.

The sounds were coming closer.

"What is it?" came Diogenes's urgent voice.

"The police," said Pendergast calmly.

"You called the police'? You fool, they'll get you, not
me!"

"That's the whole point. And your gunshots will bring them
here all the faster."

"What are you talking about? Idiot, you're what-using yourself
as bait? Sacrificing yourself?"

"Precisely. I'm exchanging my freedom for the safety of Viola,
and for the recovery of Lucifer's Heart. Self-sacrifice,
Diogenes: the one end result you could not have predicted.
Because it's the one thing you would never, ever think to do
yourself."

"You-! Give me my diamond!"

"Come and get it. You might even have a minute to enjoy it
before we're both captured. Or you can run now, and maybe-just
maybe- escape."

"You can't do this, you're utterly mad!" The disembodied voice
fell in another choking moan, so penetrating and inhuman that it
sounded feral. And then it cut off abruptly, leaving only an
echo.

A moment later, Hayward burst out of tunnel IV, a phalanx of
cops behind her. Singleton followed, speaking excitedly into his
radio. The officers quickly surrounded Pendergast, dropping to
their knees in the three-point stance, weapons aimed at
him.

"Police! Freeze! Raise your hands!"

Slowly, Pendergast raised his hands.

Hayward came forward, stepping through the ring of blue. "Are
you armed, Agent Pendergast?"

Pendergast nodded. "And you will find Lucifer's Heart in the
left pocket of my jacket. Please treat it with great care. Hold
it yourself, don't entrust it to anyone."

Hayward glanced back, motioned for one of the officers to
frisk him. Another agent came up behind, grabbing Pendergast's
hands, pulling them behind his back and cuffing
them.

"I suggest we move away from the railroad track," Pendergast
said. "For the sake of safety."

"All in good time," Hayward said. She reached cautiously into
his jacket pocket, withdrew the diamond, glanced at it, tucked it
into her own breast pocket. "Aloysius Pendergast, you have the
right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used
against you in a court of law..."

But Pendergast was not listening. He was looking over
Hayward's shoulder, into the darkness of tunnel III. Two small
points of light were barely visible there, seemingly mere
reflections of the faint light of the vault. As he watched, the
lights faded out a moment, then returned-as eyes would do when
blinked. Then they dimmed, turned away, and vanished, leaving
only blackness in their wake.

SIXTY-NINE

THE ambulance crew had already taken away Kaplan and Viola.
D'Agosta remained behind, cuffed to a chair in the holding area
of the NYPD's Madison Square Garden substation, guarded by six
cops. His head was down, eyes on the floor, trying to avoid eye
contact with his former peers and subordinates as they stood
around, making forced small talk. It turned out to be easy:
everybody was assiduously avoiding looking at him. It was as if
he no longer existed, as if he'd turned into some kind of vermin
that didn't even merit a glance.

He heard a burst of radio talk and saw, through the
substation's glassed-in partition, a large group of cops moving
through the ticketing area of Penn Station. In the middle, still
walking tall, was the slender, black-suited figure of Pendergast,
hands cuffed behind his back, two burly cops on either side.
Pendergast glanced neither to the left nor to the right, and his
back was straight, his face untroubled. For the first time in
many days, he looked-if it was possible, under the
circumstances-almost like his old self. No doubt they were
leading him to a waiting paddy wagon at the station's Eighth
Avenue entrance. As Pendergast passed, he glanced in D'Agosta's
direction. Even though the partition was made of mirrored glass,
it seemed that Pendergast nevertheless looked directly at him,
with what seemed to be a quick, grateful nod.

D'Agosta turned away. His whole world, everything he cared
about, had been destroyed. Because of Pendergast's insistence
that he inform Hayward of their whereabouts, his friend was on
his way to prison, probably for life. There was only one thing
that could make him feel worse, and that would be if Hayward
herself made an appearance.

As if on cue, there she was: walking with Singleton,
approaching from the far side of the substation.

He dropped his head and waited. He heard footsteps approach.
His face burned.

"Lieutenant?"

He looked up. It wasn't Hayward, just Singleton. Laura had
simply passed him by.

Singleton glanced around, exchanged greetings with the cops
guarding D'Agosta. "Uncuff him, please."

One of the cops uncuffed him from the chair.

"I'd like to have a private word with the lieutenant, if you
fellows don't mind."

The cops evacuated the holding area with visible relief. When
they were gone, Singleton put a hand on his shoulder. "You're in
deep shit, Vinnie," he said, not unkindly.

D'Agosta nodded.

"Needless to say, they'll be convening a board of inquiry, and
a preliminary internal affairs hearing will be held as soon as
possible, probably the day after tomorrow. Your future in law
enforcement is a big question mark at this point, but, frankly,
that's the least of your worries. It looks like we're dealing
with four felony charges: kidnapping two, grand auto, reckless
endangerment, accessory after."

D'Agosta put his head in his hands.

Singleton squeezed his shoulder. "The thing is, Vinnie,
despite all this, in the end you came through. You dropped a dime
on Pendergast, and we nailed him. A few cars were wrecked, but
nobody got hurt. We might even be able to argue that this was the
plan allalong-you know, you were working undercover, setting
Pendergast up."

D'Agosta didn't respond. The sight of Pendergast being led off
in cuffs was still working its way into his head. Pendergast, the
untouchable.

"The point is, I'm going to see what I can do about these
charges, maybe knock some of them down to misdemeanors before
they get written up and filed, if you know what I mean. No
promises."

D'Agosta swallowed and managed to say,
"Thanks."

"There's a bit of a twist here. The kidnap victim's
preliminary statement seems to indicate that this Diogenes
Pendergast is alive- and maybe even responsible for the diamond
heist at the museum. Seems we just missed him down there in the
railroad tunnels. The fact that Pendergast had Lucifer's Heart in
his pocket is also damned puzzling. This sort of... well, opens
up the case. We're going to have to take a second look at some of
our assumptions."

D'Agosta looked up sharply. "I can explain
everything."

"Save it for the interrogation. Hayward already told me about
your theory that Diogenes framed his brother for those killings.
The fact is, we now know that Pendergast impersonated Kaplan and
stole the diamond. Whatever the precise details are, he's going
to do hard time, no question about it. If I were you-and I'm
speaking to you now as a friend, not as a supervisor-I'd worry
about your own skin and quit interesting yourself in his. That
FBI bastard's caused you enough trouble."

"Captain, I would appreciate it if you wouldn't speak of Agent
Pendergast in that way."

"Loyal to the end, eh?" Singleton shook his
head.

The sound of a loud, angry voice came echoing down the
substation. A solid mass of federal agents, led by a tall,
glowering, sunburned man, came into view outside the holding
area. D'Agosta stared hard: the man at the front looked familiar,
very familiar. He tried to clear his mind, cut through the fog.
Coffey. Special Agent Coffey.

Spying Singleton, Coffey veered in the direction of the
holding area.

"Captain Singleton?" His fleshy face was red even through the
tan.

Captain Singleton looked up, his expression mild. "Yes, Agent
Coffey?"

"What the hell's gone down here? You made the collar without
us?"

"That's right."

"You know this is our case."

Singleton waited a minute before responding. When he did, his
voice was calm and low, almost as if he were talking to a child.
"The information came in fast and we had to act on it
immediately. The perp slipped your Suffolk County dragnet and
made his way back into the city. We couldn't wait. I'm sure
you'll understand, given the circumstances, why we had to move
without you."

"You didn't contact the Southern District of Manhattan Field
Office at all. There were agents standing by in the city, ready
to move at a moment's notice."

Another pause. "That was certainly an oversight, for which I
take full responsibility. You know how easy it is, in the heat of
action, to neglect to dot an i somewhere along the way. My
apologies."

Coffey stood in front of Singleton, breathing hard. A few NYPD
officers snickered in the background.

"There was an unexpected bonus in collaring Pendergast,"
Singleton added.

"And what the hell was that?"

"He had the diamond, Lucifer's Heart, in his
pocket."

Singleton took advantage of Coffey's momentary speechlessness
to glance at his men. "We're done here. Let's head
downtown."

And, propelling D'Agosta gently to his feet, he turned on his
heel and walked away.

SEVENTY

Wednesday dawned brilliant and dear, the morning sun blazing
in through the single window of the dining nook of the small
apartment on West End Avenue. Nora Kelly heard the door to the
bathroom slam. A few minutes later, Bill Smithback emerged in the
hallway, dressed for work, his tie unknotted and his jacket slung
over one shoulder. The expression on his face was
dark.

"Come and have some breakfast," she said.

His face brightened slightly as he saw her, and he came over
and sat down at the table.

"What time did you get in last night?"

"Four." He leaned over and gave her a kiss.

"You look like hell."

"It isn't for lack of sleep."

Nora pushed the paper over to him. "Page one.
Congratulations."

Smithback glanced at it. His story of the theft of Lucifer's
Heart by an unknown assailant was front page, above the fold: the
dream of every journalist. It was a stupendous scoop, and along
with the arrest of Pendergast, it had pushed Harriman's story of
the Dangler capture to B3 of the Metro Section-an old woman had
seen the Dangler exposing himself in front of an ATM and,
righteously indignant, had whacked him into semiconsciousness
with her cane. For the first time, Nora thought, Bill didn't seem
interested in Harriman's misfortune.

He pushed the paper away. "Not going to work?"

"The museum's told us all to stay home for the rest of this
week- a kind of forced vacation. The place is in lockdown mode
until they find out how the security system was breached." She
shook her head. "On top of that, Hugo Menzies seems to have
disappeared. It seems they caught him on a security camera not
far from the Astor Hall at the time of the heist. They're worried
he might have stumbled on the robbery and gotten himself
killed."

"Maybe he's the thief."

"Diogenes Pendergast is the thief. You of all people should
know that."

"Maybe Menzies is Diogenes." Bill forced a brittle
laugh.

"That's not even funny."

Smithback shrugged. "Sorry. Poor taste on my
part."

Nora filled his coffee cup, refilled her own. "There's one
thing I still don't get from reading your story. How did
Pendergast get Lucifer's Heart out of the Affiliated Transglobal
building? I mean, they immediately sealed the building, they
X-rayed everyone leaving, they did a count of every single person
who had come in and left. And they never found Pendergast. What'd
he do, climb down the outside of the building? How'd he get the
gem out?"

Smithback smoothed down an unruly cowlick, which popped back
up as soon as his hand was gone. "That's the best part of the
story-if only I could write it."

"Why can't you?"

Smithback turned toward her and smiled a little grimly.
"Because I was the one who walked the diamond out of the
building."

"You?" Nora stared at him, incredulous.

Smithback nodded.

"Oh, Bill!"

"Nora, I had to. It was the only way. And don't
worry-it'll never be traced back to me. The diamond is back where
it belongs. It was truly a brilliant plan."

"Tell me about it."

"You sure you want to know? That makes you an accessory after
the fact."

"I'm your wife, silly. Of course I want to
know."

Smithback sighed. "Pendergast worked it all out. He knew
they'd seal the building and search everyone on their way out. So
he posed as a technician manning the X-ray
machine."

"But if security was as tight as you say, wouldn't they X-ray
the security technicians, too? I mean, when they left the
building?"

"Pendergast figured that out, too. After sending me through
the X-ray machine, he pointed me toward the building exit. That's
when he slipped the diamond into my pocket. I walked it right out
of the building."

Nora could hardly believe it. "If you'd been caught, they
would have put you away for twenty years."

"Don't think that wasn't on my mind." Smithback shrugged. "But
a life depended on it. And I have faith in Pendergast-sometimes I
feel like I'm the only one left in the world who
does."

At this, he rose, walked to the window, and stared out
restlessly, hands on his hips.

"It's not over, Nora," he muttered. "Not by a long
shot."

He turned swiftly, eyes flashing with anger. "It's a travesty
of justice. An innocent man's been framed as a horrendous serial
killer. The real killer's still loose. I'm a journalist. It's my
job to report the truth. There's a hell of a lot of truth still
missing in this story. I'm going to find out what it
is."

"Bill-for God's sake, don't go after Diogenes."

"What about Margo? Are we going to let her killer go free?
With Pendergast in jail and D'Agosta on modified duty or worse,
there's no one left who can do it but me."

"Don't. Please don't. This is just another one of your
impulsive- and stupid-decisions."

He turned back to the window. "I concede that it's impulsive.
Maybe even stupid. So be it."

Nora rose from her chair, feeling a surge of anger herself.
"What about us? Our future? If you go after Diogenes, he'll kill
you. You're no match for him!"

Smithback looked out the window, not answering immediately.
Then he stirred. "Pendergast saved my life," he said quietly. He
turned again and looked at Nora. "Yours, too."

She wheeled away, exasperated.

He came over and took her in his arms. "I won't do it... if
you tell me not to."

"And that's the one thing I'm not going to tell you.
It's your decision."

Smithback stepped back, knotted his tie, drew on his jacket.
"I'd better get to work."

He kissed her. "I love you, Nora."

She shook her head. "Be very, very careful."

"I will, I promise. Have faith in me."

And he vanished out the door.

SEVENTY-ONE

One day later, and fifty miles to the north, the sun shone
dimly through the shuttered window of a small room in the
intensive-care unit of a private clinic. A single patient lay
under a sheet, hooked up to several large machines that beeped
softly, almost comfortingly. Her eyes were closed.

A nurse came in, checked the machines, jotted down some of the
vitals, and then paused to look at the patient.

"Good morning, Theresa," she said brightly.

The patient's eyes remained closed, and she did not answer.
They'd removed the feeding tube, and she was out of immediate
danger, but she was still one very sick woman.

"It's a beautiful morning," the nurse went on, opening the
shutters and allowing a ray of sun to fall across the covers.
Outside the window of the rambling Queen Anne mansion, the Hudson
River sparkled amidst the winter landscape of Putnam
County.

The woman's pale face lay against the pillow, her short brown
hair spreading slightly across the cotton fabric.

The nurse continued to work, changing the IV bag, smoothing
the covers. Finally, she leaned over the girl and brushed a
strand of hair out of her face.

The girl's eyes slowly opened.

The nurse paused, then took her hand. "Good morning," she said
again, holding the hand lightly.

The eyes flicked to the left and right. The lips moved, but no
sound came.

"Don't you try to talk just yet," the nurse said, moving to
the intercom. "Everything will be all right. You've had a tough
time of it, but now everything's fine."

She pressed the intercom lever and leaned toward it, speaking
in a low voice.

"The patient in ICU-6 is waking up," she murmured. "Get word
to Dr. Winokur."

She went and sat by the bed, taking the woman's hand
again.

"Where...?"

"You're at the Feversham Clinic, Theresa dear. A few miles
north of Cold Spring. It's January 31, and you've been
unconscious for six days, but we've got you on the mend.
Everything's just fine. You're a strong, healthy woman and you're
going to get better."

The eyes widened slightly. "What... ?" the weak voice managed
to say.

"What happened? Never you mind about that now. You had a very
close call, but it's all over and done with. You're safe
here."

The figure in the bed struggled to speak, her lips
moving.

"Don't try to talk just yet. Save your strength for the
doctor."

"... tried to kill..." The phrase came out
disconnected.

"Like I said, never you mind. You concentrate on getting
better."

"...awful..."

The nurse stroked her hand kindly. "I'm sure it was, but let's
not dwell on that now. Dr. Winokur will be here at any moment and
he might have some questions for you. You should rest,
dear."

"Tired ... Tired..."

"Certainly, you are. You're very tired. But you can't go back
to sleep quite yet, Theresa. Stay awake for me and the doctor.
Just for now. Okay? That's a good girl."

"I'm not... Theresa."

The nurse smiled indulgently, patting her hand. "Don't worry
about a thing. A little confusion on awakening is perfectly
normal. While waiting for the doctor, let's look out the window.
Isn't it a lovely day?"

SEVENTY-TWO

Hayward had never before visited the legendary high-security
lockup within Bellevue Hospital, and she walked toward the unit
with a rising sense of curiosity. The long, brightly lit hallways
stank of rubbing alcohol and bleach, and along the way they
passed through almost half a dozen locked doors: Adult Emergency
Services, Psychiatric Emergency, Psychiatric Inpatient, finally
ending up at the most intimidating door of all: a windowless
double set of dented stainless steel, flanked by two orderlies in
white suits and an NYPD police sergeant sitting at a desk. The
door sported a small, scratched label: Secure
Area.

Hayward flashed her badge. "Captain Laura Hayward and guest.
We're expected in D-11."

"Morning, Captain," said the sergeant in a leisurely tone, who
took her shield, jotted down some information on the sign-in
sheet, and handed it to her to sign.

"My guest will wait here while I visit the inmate
first."

"Sure, sure," said the sergeant. "Joe will escort
you."

The beefier of the two orderlies nodded,
unsmiling.

The sergeant turned to a nearby phone and made a call. A
moment later, there came the sound of heavy automatic locks being
released. The orderly named Joe pulled the door open. "D-11, you
said?"

"That's correct."

"This way, Captain."

Beyond lay a narrow corridor, the floors and walls of
linoleum. Long rows of doors lined both walls. These were metal,
with tiny observation ports set at eye level. A strange, muted
chorus of voices met Hayward's ears: frenzied cursing, crying, a
dreadful half-human gibbering, all filtering out from behind the
doors. The smell was different here; underlying the stench of
alcohol and cleaning fluids was a faint waft of vomit, excrement,
and something else which Hayward recognized from her visits to
maximum security prisons: the smell of fear.

The door clanged shut behind her. A moment later, the
automatic locks reengaged with a crack like a pistol
shot.

She followed the orderly down the long corridor, around a
corner, and down a similar corridor. There, toward the end, she
could easily identify the room they were headed for: it could
only be the one with four men in suits standing guard outside.
Coffey had missed out on the actual collar, but he sure as hell
wasn't going to miss anything else.

The agents turned as she approached. Hayward recognized one of
them as Coffey's personal flunky, Agent Rabiner. He didn't seem
happy to see her.

"Put your weapons in the lockbox, Captain," he said by way of
greeting.

Captain Hayward removed her service piece and pepper spray and
placed them in the lockbox.

"Looks like we're keeping him," Rabiner said with an unctuous
smile. "We've got him nailed on Decker, and it fits the federal
death penalty statute to a T. Right now it's just a question of
getting the psych evaluation over with. By the end of the week,
he'll be in the isolation unit at Herkmoor. We're taking this
sucker to trial, like, tomorrow."

"You're rather garrulous this morning, Agent Rabiner," Hayward
said.

That shut him up.

"I'd like to see him now. First myself, then I will bring back
a guest."

"You going in alone or want protection?"

Hayward didn't bother answering. She simply stood back and
waited while one of the agents peered through the glass, then
unbolted the door, weapon at the ready.

"Sing out if he gets physical," Rabiner said.

Captain Hayward stepped into the garishly lit
cell.

Pendergast, in an orange prison jumpsuit, sat quietly on the
narrow cot. The walls of the cell were thickly padded and there
were no other furnishings.

For a moment, Hayward said nothing. She had grown so used to
seeing him in a well-tailored black suit that the outfit looked
incomprehensibly out of place. His face was pale and drawn, but
still composed.

"Captain Hayward." He stood and motioned her toward the cot.
"Please have a seat."

"That's all right. I prefer to stand."

"Very well." Pendergast, too, remained standing, as a
courtesy.

A silence settled over the small cell. Hayward was not one to
find herself at a loss for words, but the fact was, she still
didn't quite know what impulse had prompted her to make this
visit. After a moment, she cleared her throat.

"What did you do to piss off Special Agent Coffey?" she
asked.

Pendergast smiled a little wanly. "Agent Coffey has an
inordinately high opinion of himself. It's a viewpoint I've never
quite been able to bring myself to share. We worked on a case
together some years ago, which did not end well for
him."

"I ask because we tried to get jurisdiction over the case, but
I've never seen the FBI stomp down so hard on the NYPD. And it
wasn't done in the usual semi-cordial way."

"I am not surprised."

"Thing is, there've been a couple of bizarre developments in
the case, not yet official, which I wanted to ask you
about."

"Please do."

"Turns out Margo Green is alive. Someone pulled a fast one at
the hospital, arranging for her to be medevaced upstate under a
phony name, while substituting the corpse of a homeless drug
addict about to be sent to potter's field in her place. The M.E.
says it was an honest mistake, the medical director claims it was
a 'regrettable bureaucratic mix-up.' Funny that both of them
happen to be old acquaintances of yours. Green's mother just
about had a heart attack when she learned the daughter she had
just buried was alive."

She paused, her eyes narrowed, then burst out: "Damn it,
Pendergast! Can't you do anything by the book? And how
could you put a mother through that?"

Pendergast was silent a moment before answering. "Because her
grief had to be real. Diogenes would have seen through any
dissembling. As cruel as it was, it was necessary in order to
save Margo Green's life-and her life is, ultimately, more
important than a mother's temporary grief. It was this same need
for utmost secrecy that kept me from telling even
Lieutenant D'Agosta."

Hayward sighed. "Anyway, I just spoke to Green on the phone.
She's incredibly weak, had the closest of calls, but she was very
lucid. And what she had to say surprised the hell out of me.
She's absolutely insistent that you weren't her attacker, and her
description fits the other description we have of your brother
quite well. Problem is, it was your blood at the crime
scene and on the weapon Green defended herself with, along with
fiber, hair, and other physical evidence. So we've got a major
evidence conundrum on our hands."

"You certainly do."

"Our interviews with Viola Maskelene corroborate your story
about Diogenes, at least what I understand of it. She's insistent
it was he who did the kidnapping, not you. She says he basically
confessed to the killings and showed her one of the stolen
diamonds from the Astor Hall. No proof, of course, just her word,
but she helped lead us to the safe house where she was held. We
found quite a setup there, including some pretty conclusive
evidence linking Diogenes to the Astor Hall theft-evidence he
clearly didn't intend to give up."

"Interesting."

"We almost caught someone in the tunnels who Lieutenant
D'Agosta swears was Diogenes. The gemologist, Kaplan, backs this
up, as does Maskelene. Their preliminary stories are all
consistent, and we know it couldn't have been you. We've asked
our British counterparts to open an investigation into Diogenes's
death in England, but that'll take time. Anyway, the evidence
does seem to indicate your brother may be alive, after all. We
have three people who certainly believe it."

Pendergast nodded. "And what do you believe,
Captain?"

Hayward hesitated. "That the case merits further
investigation. Trouble is, the FBI are moving full speed ahead
bringing capital charges on the murder of a federal agent, and it
seems they could care less at present about any inconsistencies
in the other three. Or rather, two, since the Green killing
wasn't a killing, after all. Which makes my continued
investigation of those other homicides somewhat
moot."

Pendergast nodded. "I see your problem."

Hayward peered at him curiously. "I was just wondering-do you
have anything to say about the matter to me?"

"That I have faith in your abilities as a police officer to
find the truth."

"Nothing more?"

"That's a great deal, Captain."

She paused. "Help me, Pendergast."

"The person to help you is Lieutenant D'Agosta. He knows all
there is to know about the case, and you could do no better than
use his expertise."

"You know that's impossible. Lieutenant D'Agosta's on modified
duty. He can't help anyone at the moment."

"Nothing is impossible. You just need to learn how to bend the
rules."

Hayward sighed irritatedly.

"I have a question for you," Pendergast said. "Does Agent
Coffey know about the reappearance of Margo
Green?"

"No, but I doubt he'd care much. As I said, they're one
hundred percent focused on Decker."

"Good. I would ask you to keep that information quiet as long
as possible. I believe Margo Green is safe from Diogenes, at
least in the short term. My brother has gone to ground and will
be licking his wounds for a while, but when he emerges, he will
be more dangerous than ever. I ask that you keep a protective eye
over Dr. Green during the rest of her convalescence. The same
goes for William Smithback and his wife, Nora. And yourself.
You're all potential targets, I'm afraid."

Hayward gave a shudder. What had seemed like an insane fantasy
just two days ago now was beginning to look chillingly
real.

"I'll do that," she said.

"Thank you."

Another silence settled over the cell. After a moment, Hayward
roused herself.

"Well, I'd better be going. I really just came as an escort
for someone else who wants to see you."

"Captain?" Pendergast said. "A final word."

She turned to face him again. He stood there, pale in the
artificial light, his cool gaze resting upon her.

"Please don't be too hard on Vincent."

Despite herself, Hayward looked away quickly.

"What he did, he did at my request. The reason he told you so
little, the reason he moved out-those actions were to keep you
safe from my brother. In order to help me, to protect lives, he
made a grave professional sacrifice-I hope and pray the sacrifice
won't be a personal one, as well."

Hayward did not reply.

"That's all. Good-bye, Captain."

Hayward found her voice. "Good-bye, Agent
Pendergast."

Then, still without making eye contact, she turned away once
more and rapped on the safety glass of the observation
port.

Pendergast watched the door close behind Hayward. He stood
motionless, in the ill-fitting orange jumpsuit, listening. He
heard a few muffled voices outside the padded door, and then
focused on the light but determined stride of Hayward as she made
for the ward'sexit. He heard the security locks disengage, heard
the heavy door boom open. It remained so for almost thirty
seconds before closing and locking again.

Still, Pendergast listened, even more intently. Because now
another, different set of footsteps was sounding in the corridor
outside: slower, tentative. They were growing closer. As he
listened, his frame tensed. A moment later, there was a rude
banging on his door again.

"Visitor!"

Then Viola Maskelene appeared in the doorway.

She had a scratch over one eye, and beneath her Mediterranean
tan she seemed pale, but otherwise she appeared
unhurt.

Pendergast found he could not move. He simply stood and looked
at her.

She stepped forward, stopped awkwardly in the middle of the
room. The door closed behind her.

Still, Pendergast did not move.

Viola's eyes fell from his face to his prison
garb.

"I wish, for your sake, that you'd never met me," he said
almost coldly.

"What about for your sake?"

He looked at her a long time, and then said, more quietly:
"I'll never regret meeting you. But as long as you have feelings
for me- if that is indeed the case-then you'll be in grave
danger. You must go away and never see or think of me
again."

He paused, then cast his eyes to the floor. "I'm deeply,
deeply sorry for everything."

There was a long silence.

"Is that it?" Viola finally asked in a low voice. "We'll never
know, never have the chance to find out?"

"Never. Diogenes is still out there. If he thinks there's any
connection remaining between us, anything at all, he'll
kill you. You must leave immediately, go back to Capraia, get on
with your life, tell everyone-including your own heart-how
utterly indifferent you are to me."

"And what about you?"

"I'll know you're alive. That's enough."

She took a fierce step forward. "I don't want to "get on' with
my life. Not anymore." She hesitated, then raised her arms and
rested her hands on his shoulders. "Not after meeting
you."

Pendergast remained as still as a statue.

"You must leave me behind," he said quietly. "Diogenes will be
back. And I won't be able to protect you."

"He ... said terrible things to me," she said, her voice
faltering. "It's been thirty-six hours since I walked out of that
railroad tunnel, and in all those hours I haven't been able to
think of anything else. I've led a stupid, wasted, loveless life.
And now you're telling me to walk away from the only thing that
means anything to me."

Pendergast put his arms gently around her waist, looked
searchingly into her eyes.

"Diogenes makes it a game to find out a person's deepest
fears. Then he strikes a deadly, well-aimed blow. He's driven
people to suicide that way. But his words are hollow. Don't let
those words stalk you. To know Diogenes is to walk in darkness.
You must walk out of that darkness, Viola. Back into the light.
And that also means away from me."

"No," she murmured.

"Go back to your island and forget about me. If not for your
own sake, Viola, then for mine."

They looked into each other's eyes for a moment. Then, in the
harsh light of the squalid cell, they kissed.

After a moment, Pendergast disengaged himself and stepped
back. His face was uncharacteristically flushed; his pale eyes
glittered.

"Good-bye, Viola," he said.

Viola stood as if rooted to the ground. A minute passed. Then,
with infinite reluctance, she turned and walked slowly to the
door.

At the door, she hesitated and, without turning, began to
speak in a low voice.

"I'll do as you say. I'll go back to my island. I'll tell
everyone I could not care less about you. I'll live my life. And
when you're finally free, you'll know where to find
me."

She gave a quick rap on the observation port, the door opened-
and she was gone.

epilogue

The fire died on the grate, leaving a crumbling stack of
coals. The light in the library was dim, and the usual cloak of
silence lay over all: the baize-covered reading tables neatly
stacked with books, the walls of slumbering volumes, the shaded
lamps and leather chairs. Outside, it was a bright winter day,
the last day of January, but within 891 Riverside it seemed to be
perpetual night.

Constance sat in one chair, wearing a black petticoat with
white lace trimming, legs tucked up beneath her, reading an
eighteenth-century treatise on the benefits of bloodletting.
D'Agosta sat in a wing chair nearby. A can of Budweiser sat on a
silver tray on a table beside him, unconsumed, in a puddle of its
own condensation.

D'Agosta glanced over at Constance, at her perfect profile,
her straight brown hair. That she was a beautiful young woman,
there was no doubt; that she was unusually, even uncannily,
intelligent and well read for someone her age went without
saying. But there was something strange about her-very, very
strange. She'd had no emotional reaction at all to the news of
Pendergast's arrest and incarceration. None.

In D'Agosta's experience, that kind of nonreaction was often
the strongest reaction of all. It worried him. Pendergast had
warned him of Constance's current fragility and had hinted of
dark things in her past. D'Agosta had long had his own doubts
about Constance's stability, and this inexplicable lack of
reaction only made him wonder the more. It was partly to watch
over her, now that Pendergast was gone, that had brought him and
his few belongings back to 891 the day before-that and the fact
he had no place else to go.

And then there was the problem of Diogenes. It was true he had
been crossed, his plans for Viola and Lucifer's Heart had been
thwarted, he himself forced back into hiding. The NYPD now
believed in his existence and were pursuing him with a vengeance.
The recent developments seemed to have dented, but not completely
shaken, their certainty that Pendergast was a serial killer-the
problem was still the overwhelming physical evidence. The NYPD
was at least now certain, however, that Diogenes was behind the
Astor Hall theft and had kidnapped Viola. They'd found the safe
house and were in the process of taking it apart. The case was by
no means closed.

In a way, Diogenes's failure and flight only made him more
dangerous. He recalled Diogenes's curiosity about Constance,
during the phone conversation in the vintage Jaguar, and he
shivered. The one thing he could count on was that Diogenes was a
meticulous planner. His response-and there would be one, of that
D'Agosta was sure- would not come for a while. He would have a
little time to prepare for it.

Constance looked up from her book. "Did you know, Lieutenant,
that even into the early 1800s, leeches were often a preferred
alternative to the scarificator when performing
bloodletting?"

D'Agosta glanced at her. "Can't say that I
did."

"The colonial doctors frequently imported the European leech,
Hirudinea annelida, because it was able to take in much
more blood than Macrobetta decora."

"Macrobetta decora?"

"The American leech, Lieutenant." And Constance returned to
her book.

Call me Vincent, D'Agosta thought as he looked
reflectively at her.

He wasn't all that sure how much longer he was going to be a
lieutenant, anyway.

His mind wandered to the previous afternoon, and the
humiliating internal affairs hearing. On the one hand, it had
been a huge relief: Singleton had been good to his word and the
whole misadventure had been chalked up to an undercover operation
gone awry, in which D'Agosta had displayed poor judgment, made
errors-one of the board had termed him "maybe the stupidest cop
on the force" -but in the end they found he had not willfully
committed any felonies. The list of misdemeanors was ugly
enough.

Stupidity was better than felony, Singleton had told him
afterward. There would be more hearings, but his future as an
NYPD cop-as any kind of cop-was very much in
question.

Hayward, of course, had testified. Her testimony had been
delivered in a resolutely neutral voice, employing the usual
police jargon, and not once-not once-had she glanced in
his direction. But in its own way, the testimony had been
effective in helping him escape some of the heavier
charges.

Once again, he dragged the Diogenes file into his lap, feeling
a sudden stab of futility. Ten days before, he had been in this
same room, looking at this same file, again without Pendergast
there to guide him. Only now, four people had been murdered, and
Pendergast, instead of being "dead," was in Bellevue, undergoing
some kind of psych evaluation. D'Agosta had learned nothing
helpful then- what could he possibly learn now?

But he had to keep plugging. They'd taken everything away from
him: his career, his relationship with Hayward, his closest
friend- everything. There was only one thing left for him to do:
prove Pendergast's innocence. And to do that, he needed to find
Diogenes.

A faint buzzer sounded in the depths of the house. Someone was
at the door.

Constance looked up. For the briefest of moments, naked fear-
and something else, something ineffable-showed in her face before
a veil of blankness came down.

D'Agosta stood up. "It's okay. Probably just neighborhood
kids, playing around. I'll check it out."

He put the file aside, stood up, surreptitiously checked his
weapon, then began walking toward the library door. But even as
he did, he saw Proctor approaching from across the reception
hall.

"A gentleman here to see you, sir," Proctor
said.

"You took the necessary precautions?" D'Agosta
asked.

"Yes, sir, I-"

But just then, a man in a wheelchair came into view in the
gallery behind Proctor. D'Agosta stared in astonishment as he
recognized Eli Glinn, the head of Effective Engineering
Solutions.

The man brushed past both Proctor and D'Agosta and wheeled
himself toward one of the library tables. With a brusque motion
of his arm, he shoved aside several stacks of books, clearing off
a space. Then he deposited a load of papers on the table:
blueprints, plats, building plans, mechanical and electrical
diagrams.

Constance had risen and was standing, book in hand, looking
on.

"What are you doing here?" D'Agosta asked. "How did you find
this place?"

"Never mind that," said the man, turning to D'Agosta with a
gleam in his good eye. "Last Sunday, I made a
promise."

He raised his black-gloved hand, and in it was a slender
manila folder. He laid it on the table.

"And there you have it: a preliminary psychological profile of
Diogenes Dagrepont Bernoulli Pendergast. Updated, I might add, to
reflect these most recent events-at least what I could glean of
them from the news reports and my sources. I'm counting on you to
tell me more."

"There's a lot more."

Glinn glanced over. "And you must be
Constance."

She nodded in a way that was almost a curtsy.

"I'll need your help, too."

"I shall be glad."

"Why this sudden interest?" D'Agosta asked. "I had the
impression-"

"The impression that I wasn't giving it a high priority? I
wasn't. At the time, it seemed a relatively unimportant problem,
a way to earn an easy fee. But then, this happened." And
he tapped the manila folder. "There may not be a more dangerous
man in the world."

"I don't get it."

A grim smile gathered on Glinn's lips. "You will when you read
the profile."

D'Agosta nodded toward the table. "And what are all these
other papers?"

"Blueprints and mechanical plans for the maximum security wing
of the Herkmoor Correctional Facility in upstate New
York."

"Why?"

"I should think the 'why' would be obvious. My client, Agent
Pendergast."

"But Pendergast is in Bellevue, not Herkmoor."

"He'll be in Herkmoor soon enough."

D'Agosta glanced at Glinn in astonishment. "You don't mean
we're going to ... to bust him out?"

"I do."

Constance drew in a sharp breath.

"That's one of the worst pens in the country. No one's ever
escaped from Herkmoor."

Glinn continued to stare at D'Agosta. "I'm aware of
that."

"You think it's even possible?"

"Anything's possible. But I must have your
help."

D'Agosta looked down at the papers and blueprints thrown
across the table. Everything conceivable was there-diagrams and
drawings of every technical, structural, electrical, and
mechanical system in the building. Then he glanced at Constance.
She nodded almost imperceptibly.

Finally, he looked back at Glinn's one glittering eye. For the
first time in a long while, he felt a fierce, sudden rush of
hope.

"I'm in," he said. "So help me God, I'm
in."

Another smile spread across Glinn's scarred face. He gave the
pile of papers a light slap with his gloved hand. "Come on, my
friends- we've got work to do."

eBook Info

Identifier:

SLQHKXWWCW

Title:

Dance of Death

Creator:

Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child

Date:

9/17/2005