Текст книги "Reliquary"

Автор книги: Lincoln Child

Соавторы: Douglas Preston
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Текущая страница: 12 (всего у книги 30 страниц)

Pendergast frowned. “Manders?”

Again, Mephisto shot a suspicious glance toward him. “Never heard of the Manders?” He cackled. “You ought to stretch your legs more, get out, see the neighborhood, MayorWhitey. The Manders live below us. Never come up, never use lights. Like salamanders. Versteht?They said there were signs of movement belowthem.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “They said the Devil’s Attic had been colonized.”

D’Agosta looked questioningly at Pendergast. But the FBI agent merely nodded. “The lowest level of the city,” he said, as if to himself.

“The very lowest,” Mephisto replied.

“Have you been down there?” Pendergast asked with deliberate casualness.

Mephisto flashed him a look as if to imply even he wasn’t that crazy.

“But you think these people are behind the killings?”

“I don’t think it. I knowit. They’re beneath us, right now.” Mephisto smiled grimly. “But I’m not sure I’d use the word people.”

“What do you mean?” Pendergast said, the casualness gone from his voice.

“Rumor,” Mephisto said very quietly. “They say they’re called Wrinklers for a reason.”

“Which is—?”

Mephisto did not answer.

Pendergast sat back on his crate. “So what can we do?”

“What can we do?” The smile vanished from Mephisto’s face. “We can wake up this city, that’s what we can do! We can show them that it won’t just be the mole people, the invisible people, who die!”

“And if we do that?” Pendergast asked. “What can the city do about these Wrinklers?”

Mephisto thought a moment. “Like any infestation. Get them where they live.”

“Easier said than done.”

Mephisto’s hard, glittery gaze landed on the FBI agent. “You got a better idea, Whitey?” he hissed.

Pendergast was silent. “Not yet,” he said at last.

= 24 =

ROBERT WILLSON, librarian at the New York Historical Society, looked at the other occupant of the map room with irritation. Odd-looking guy: somber black suit, pale cat’s eyes, blond-white hair combed severely back from a high forehead. Annoying, too. Annoying as hell. He’d been there all afternoon, making demands and throwing the maps askew. Every time Willson turned back to his computer to resume work on his own pet project—the definitive monograph on Zuñi fetishes—the man would be up, asking more questions.

As if on cue, the man got out of his chair and glided over noiselessly. “Pardon?” he said in his polite but insistent mint-julep drawl.

Willson glanced up from the screen. “Yes?” he snapped.

“I hate to trouble you again, but it’s my understanding that the Vaux and Olmstead plans for Central Park called for canals to drain the Central Park swamps. I wonder if I could look at those plans?”

Willson compressed his lips. “Those plans were rejected by the Parks Commission,” he replied. “They’ve been lost. A tragedy.” He turned back to his screen, hoping the man would take the hint. The real tragedy would be if he didn’t get back to his monograph.

“I see,” the visitor said, not taking the hint at all. “Then tell me, how werethe swamps drained?”

Willson sat back in his chair exasperatedly. “I should have thought it was common knowledge. The old Eighty-sixth Street aqueduct was used.”

“And there are plans for the operation?”

“Yes,” said Willson.

“May I see them?”

With a sigh, Willson got up and made his way through the heavy door back into the stacks. It was, of course, in its usual mess. The room managed to be both vast and claustrophobic, metal shelves reaching two stories into the gloom, tottering with rolled maps and moldering blueprints. Willson could almost feel the dust settling on his bald scalp as he scanned the arcane lists of numbers. His nose began to itch. He found the correct location, pulled the ancient maps and carried them back to the cramped reading room. Why do people always request the heaviest maps,he wondered to himself as he emerged from the stacks.

“Here they are,” Willson said, placing them on the mahogany counter. He watched as the man took them over to his desk and began looking them over, jotting notes and making sketches in a small leather-bound notebook. He’s got money,Willson thought sourly. No professor could afford a suit like that.

A heavenly quiet descended on the map room. At last, he could get some work done. Bringing some yellowed reference photographs out of his desk, Willson began making changes to his chapter on clan imagery.

Within minutes, he felt the visitor standing behind him again. Willson looked up again silently.

The man nodded at one of Willson’s photographs. It showed a nondescript stone carved in an abstract representation of an animal, a small piece of sinew holding a flint point to its back. “I think you’ll find that particular fetish, which I see you’ve labeled as a puma, is in fact a grizzly bear,” the man said.

Willson looked at the pale face and the faint smile, wondering if this was some kind of a joke. “Cushing, who collected this fetish in 1883, specifically identified it as puma clan,” he replied. “You can check the reference yourself.” Everybody was an expert these days.

“The grizzly fetish,” the man continued undeterred, “always has a spearpoint strapped to its back, as this one does. The puma fetish has an arrowhead.”

Willson straightened up. “Just what is the difference, may I ask?”

“You kill a puma with a bow and arrow. To kill a grizzly, you must use a spear.”

Willson was silent.

“Cushing was wrong on occasion,” the man added gently.

Willson shuffled his manuscript together and laid it aside. “Frankly, I would prefer to trust Cushing over someone…” He left the sentence unfinished. “The library will be closing in one hour,” he added.

“In that case,” the man said, “I wonder if I could see the plates from the 1956 Upper West Side Natural Gas Pipeline Survey.”

Willson compressed his lips. “Which ones?”

“All of them, if you please.”

This was too much. “I’m sorry,” Willson said crisply. “It’s against the rules. Patrons are allowed only ten maps at a time from the same series.” He glared at the visitor triumphantly.

But the man seemed oblivious, lost in thought. Suddenly, he looked back at the librarian.

“Robert Willson,” he said, pointing at the nameplate. “Now I remember why your name is familiar.”

“You do?” Willson asked uncertainly.

“Indeed. Aren’t you the one who gave the excellent paper on mirage stones at the Navajo Studies Conference in Window Rock last year?”

“Why, yes, I did,” Willson said.

“I thought so. I wasn’t able to be there myself, but I read the proceedings. I’ve made something of a private study of southwestern religious imagery.” The visitor paused. “Nothing as serious as yours, of course.”

Willson cleared his throat. “I suppose one cannot spend thirty years in such study,” he said as modestly as possible, “without one’s name becoming known.”

The visitor smiled. “It’s an honor to make your acquaintance. My name is Pendergast.”

Willson extended his hand and encountered an unpleasantly limp handshake. He prided himself on the firmness of his own.

“It’s gratifying to see you continuing your studies,” the man named Pendergast said. “Ignorance of southwestern culture is so profound.”

“It is,” Willson agreed wholeheartedly. He felt a peculiar sense of pride. Nobody had taken the least interest in his work before, let alone been able to talk about it intelligibly. Of course, this Pendergast was obviously misinformed about Indian fetishes, but…

“I’d love to discuss this further,” Pendergast said, “but I fear I’ve taken up enough of your time.”

“Not at all,” Willson replied. “What was that you’d asked to see? The ’56 Survey?”

Pendergast nodded. “There was one other item, if I may. I understand there was a survey of existing tunnels done in the 1920s for the proposed Interborough Rapid Transit system. Is that correct?”

Willson’s face fell. “But there are sixty maps in that series…” His voice trailed off.

“I see,” Pendergast said. “It’s against the rules, then.” He looked crestfallen.

Suddenly, Willson smiled. “I won’t tell if you won’t,” he said, pleased at his own recklessness. “And don’t worry about closing time. I’ll be here late, working on my monograph. Rules were made to be broken, right?”

Ten minutes later, he emerged from the gloom of the storage room, pushing an overloaded cart across the worn floorboards.

= 25 =

SMITHBACK WALKED INTO the cavernous entryway of the Four Seasons, eager to leave the heat and stench and noise of Park Avenue behind. He approached the four-square bar with measured step. He’d sat here many times before, looking enviously across the room, past the Picasso hanging, toward the unattainable paradise beyond. This time, however, he did not dally at the bar, but continued toward the maître d’. A quickly mentioned name was all it took, and now he, Smithback, was himself walking down that corridor of dreams toward the exclusive restaurant beyond.

Every table in the Pool Room was filled, yet the space seemed quiet and calm somehow, muted by its own vastness. He threaded his way past captains of industry, publishing moguls, and robber barons to one of the prized tables near the fountain. There, already seated, was Mrs. Wisher.

“Mr. Smithback,” she said. “Thank you for coming. Please sit down.”

Smithback took the indicated chair across the table, glancing about as he did so. This promised to be an interesting lunch, and he hoped he had time to enjoy it fully. He’d barely started to write up his big story, and press time was 6:00 P.M.

“Would you care for a glass of Amarone?” Mrs. Wisher asked, indicating the bottle beside the table. She was crisply dressed in a saffron-colored blouse and pleated skirt.

“Please,” Smith replied, meeting her gaze. He felt much more at ease than the last time he’d spoken to her: sitting primly in her darkened apartment, a copy of the Postlying beside her like a silent accusation. His “Angel of Central Park South” obituary, the Post’sreward offer, and his favorable coverage on the Grand Army Plaza rally made him feel confident of a warmer reception.

Mrs. Wisher nodded to the wine steward, waited until the man had poured a glass for the journalist and departed, then leaned almost imperceptibly forward.

“Mr. Smithback, you’re undoubtedly wondering why I asked you to join me for lunch.”

“It had occurred to me.” Smithback tasted the wine, found it excellent.

“I won’t waste any time sporting with your intelligence, then. Certain events are about to happen in this city. And I’d like you to document them.”

Smithback put his wine glass down. “Me?”

The corners of Mrs. Wisher’s mouth turned up slightly in what might have been a smile. “Ah. I thought you would be surprised. But you see, Mr. Smithback, I’ve done some research on you since our last meeting. And I read your book on the Museum murders.”

“You bought a copy?” Smithback asked hopefully.

“The Amsterdam Avenue branch of the public library had one. It made very interesting reading. I had no idea you were so directly involved with almost every aspect of that event.”

Smithback’s eyes darted quickly toward her face, but he could detect no trace of sarcasm in her expression.

“I also read your article on our rally,” Mrs. Wisher continued. “It had a positive tone that I found lacking in some of the other press coverage.” She waved her hand. “Besides, I really have you to thank for what’s happened.”

“You do?” Smithback asked a little nervously.

Mrs. Wisher nodded. “It was you who convinced me that the only way to get the city’s attention was to dig a spur into its flank. Remember your comment? ‘People in this town don’t pay attention to something unless you slap them in the face with it.’ Had it not been for you, I might still be in my drawing room, writing letters to the mayor, instead of putting my sorrow to good use.”

Smithback nodded. The not-so-merry widow had a point.

“Since that rally, our movement has spread dramatically,” Mrs. Wisher said. “We’ve hit a common nerve. People are coming together—people of power and influence. But our message belongs just as much to the common man, the man on the street. And that’s the person you can reach with your paper.”

Although Smithback did not like to be reminded that he wrote for the common man, he kept his expression even. Besides, he’d seen it for himself: By the time the rally had ended, there’d been plenty of them around, drinking, heckling, hoping for action.

“And so this is what I propose.” Mrs. Wisher placed her small, neatly manicured fingernails on the linen tablecloth. “I will give you privileged access to every event planned by Take Back Our City. Many of these actions will be intentionally unannounced; the press, like the police, will learn of them too late to make any real difference. You, however, will be brought into my circle. You will know what to expect, and when to expect it. You can accompany me directly, if you like. And then you can slap your readers in the face with it.”

Smithback struggled to keep from betraying his excitement. This is too good to be true,he thought.

“I imagine you’d like to publish another book,” Mrs. Wisher went on. “Once the Take Back Our City campaign reaches a successful conclusion, you’d have my blessing on such a project. I’ll make myself available for interviews. And Hiram Bennett, editor-in-chief of Cygnus House, is one of my closest friends. I think he’d be very interested in seeing such a manuscript.”

Jesus,Smithback thought. Hiram Bennett, Mister Publishing himself.He could imagine the bidding war between Cygnus House and Stockbridge, the publishers of his Museum book. He’d get his agent to set up an auction, specify a floor of two hundred grand, no, make that two fifty, with ten percent topping privileges and—

“I ask one thing in return,” Mrs. Wisher coolly interrupted his thoughts. “That from now on, you devote yourself to covering Take Back Our City. I want your newspaper articles, when they appear, to focus exclusively on our cause.”

“What?” Smithback said abruptly. “Mrs. Wisher, I’m a crime reporter. I’m hired to turn in product on a regular basis.” His visions of publishing fame quickly faded, replaced with the angry face of his editor, Arnold Murray, demanding copy.

Mrs. Wisher nodded. “I understand. And I think I can deliver you all the ‘product’ you could wish for within a few days. I’ll give you details as soon as we’ve finalized our plans. Trust me, I think that you will find this relationship to be beneficial to us both.”

Smithback thought quickly. In a couple of hours, he was due to file his story covering what he’d learned eavesdropping on the Museum conference. He’d delayed it already, hoping in vain to gain additional information. This was to be the story that got him his raise, the story to set that prick Bryce Harriman back on his heels.

But would it? The reward was getting a little stale, and no leads had panned out. His report on Mephisto hadn’t excited the interest he’d thought it would. There was no clear proof that the death of the Medical Examiner, though suspiciously coincidental, was connected. And then, there were always the unpleasant consequences of Museum trespass to be considered.

But this Wisher story, on the other hand, could be just the dynamite he was looking for. His journalist’s instincts told him it had the feel of a winner. He could call in sick, stall Murray for a day or two. When he got the final results, all would be forgiven.

He looked up. “Mrs. Wisher, you’ve got yourself a deal.”

“Call me Anette,” she said, her gaze drifting over his face for a moment before falling toward the menu at her elbow. “And now let’s order, shall we? I’d suggest the coldwater scallops wrapped in lemon phyllo and caviar. The chef here does them excellently.”

= 26 =

HAYWARD ROUNDED THE corner onto 72nd Street, then stopped, frowning in disbelief at the sand-colored building that loomed up in front of her. She checked her pocket for the scribbled address, then stared up again. There was no mistake. But the place looked more like a mansion out of a Charles Addams cartoon—magnified perhaps twenty times—than a Manhattan apartment building. The structure rose, stone upon layer of stone, nine generous stories into the air. Near its top, huge two-story gables hung like eyebrows over the facade. The copper-trimmed slate roof above was encrusted with chimneys, spires, turrets, finials—everything but a widow’s walk. Or maybe arrow slits would be more appropriate,Hayward thought. The Dakota, it was called. Strange name for a strange-looking place. She’d heard of the place, but had never seen it. Then again, she didn’t get many excuses to visit the Upper West Side.

She walked toward the arched carriageway that bored into the southern flank of the building. The guard inside the adjoining sentry box took her name, then made a brief call.

“Southwest lobby,” he said, hanging up and directing her through. She stepped past him toward the dark tunnel.

On the far side, the archway opened into a large interior courtyard. Hayward stopped for a moment, staring at the bronze fountains, thinking that the genteel, almost secretive hush seemed absurdly out of place on the west side of Manhattan. Then she turned right and headed for the nearest corner of the courtyard. She stepped through the narrow lobby and into the elevator, stabbing the button with a slender finger.

The elevator rose slowly, opening at last into a small rectangular space. Stepping out, she saw that on the far side a single door had been set into the dark polished wood. The elevator whispered shut and began to descend, leaving Hayward in blackness. For a moment, she wondered if she was on the wrong floor. There was a slight rustle, and her right hand moved instinctively toward her service piece.

“Sergeant Hayward. Excellent. Please come in.” Even in the dark, Hayward would have recognized the accent, the bourbon-and-buttermilk voice. But the far door had opened and Agent Pendergast was standing just within, his slim, unmistakable figure silhouetted by the soft light of the room beyond.

Hayward stepped inside and Pendergast shut the door behind her. Though the room was not especially large, its high ceiling gave it a sense of formal grandeur. Hayward looked around curiously. Three of the walls were painted a deep rose, edged above and below in black molding. Light came from behind what appeared to be wafer-thin pieces of agate, framed in scallop-shaped bronze fixtures set well above eye level. The fourth wall was covered in black marble. Across the entire face of the marble, a thin sheet of water fell like a stream of glass from ceiling to floor, gurgling silently into the grill that ran along its base. A few small leather sofas were placed about the room, their bases hidden by the thick nap of the carpet. The only decoration consisted of a few paintings and several twisted plants, scattered here and there on lacquer tables. The room was fastidiously clean, without a smudge or a particle of dust. Though she knew there must be other doors leading into the interior of the apartment, their outlines were too well concealed for her to make them out.

“Sit anywhere, Sergeant Hayward,” Pendergast said. “May I offer you refreshment of some kind?”

“No thanks,” Hayward replied, selecting the seat closest to the door and letting the soft black leather creep luxuriously up around her. She stared at the painting on the nearest wall, an impressionist landscape of haystacks and pink-tinged sunlight that seemed somehow familiar. “Nice place. Though the building’s kind of weird.”

“We tenants would prefer to call it eccentric,” Pendergast said. “But many would have agreed with you over the years, I suppose. The Dakota, so named because when it was built in 1884, this part of town seemed as remote as Indian Territory. Still, it has a solidity, a kind of permanence, that I like. Built on bedrock, walls almost thirty inches thick at ground level. But you didn’t come here to listen to a lecture on architecture. Actually, I’m grateful you came at all.”

“You kidding?” Hayward asked. “And pass up a chance to tour Agent Pendergast’s crib? You’re kind of a legend among the rank and file these days. As if you didn’t know.”

“How reassuring,” Pendergast replied, slipping into a chair. “But this is the extent of the tour, I’m afraid. I rarely entertain visitors. Still, it seemed the best place for our chat.”

“And why’s that?” Hayward asked as she looked around. Then her eyes lighted on the closest of the lacquered tables. “Hey!” she pointed. “That’s a bonsai plant. A miniature tree. My senseiat the karate dojohas a couple of them.”

“ Ginkgo biloba,”Pendergast said. “The Maidenhair. It’s the only remaining member of a tree family common in prehistory. And to your right is a group planting of dwarf trident maples. I’m especially proud of their natural look. The trees in that planting all change color at different times in the fall. From the first tree to the last, that construction took me nine years. Your senseicould no doubt tell you that the secret to group plantings is to add bonsai in odd numbers at a time, up to a point where counting the trunks demands concentration Then you’re done.”

“Nine years?” Hayward repeated. “Guess you got a lot of free time on your hands.”

“Not really. Bonsai is one of my passions. It is an art that is never finished. And I find its blend of natural and artificial aesthetics intoxicating.” He crossed one leg over the other, his black-suited form almost invisible against the dark leather, and waved one hand dismissively. “But stop encouraging me. A moment ago, you asked why I thought this the best place to talk. It’s because I wish to learn more about the underground homeless.”

Hayward was silent.

“You’ve worked with them,” Pendergast continued. “You’ve studiedthem. You are an expert on the subject.”

“Nobody else thinks so.”

“If they gave the matter any thought, they would. In any case, I can understand why you’re sensitive about your thesis. And it seemed to me you might be more comfortable discussing it off duty, someplace far away from headquarters or the station house.”

The man had a point, Hayward thought. This strange, soothing room, with its quiet waterfall and stark beauty, seemed about as far from headquarters as the moon. Sitting back in the intoxicating softness of the chair, she felt her natural wariness draining away. She thought about taking off her bulky gun belt but decided she was too comfortable to move.

“I’ve been down twice,” Pendergast said. “The first time merely to test my disguise and do some simple reconnaissance, and the second time to find Mephisto, the homeless leader. But when I found him, I discovered I’d underestimated a couple of things. The depth of his convictions. And the size of his following.”

“Nobody knows, exactly, how many live below ground,” Hayward said. “The only thing you can be sure of is the number’s bigger than you expect. As for Mephisto, he’s probably the most famous mayor down there. His community’s the biggest. Actually, I heard it’s several communities: a core community of troubled Vietnam vets and sixties relics, with others joining after the headless murders started. The deeper tunnels below Central Park are crawling with him and his pals.”

“What surprised me was the variety I encountered,” Pendergast went on. “I expected to find one flawed personality type predominating, perhaps two. But instead I found an entire cross section of humanity.”

“Not all homeless go below,” Hayward said. “But the ones afraid of the shelters, the ones that hate the soup kitchens and subway gratings, the loners, the cult freaks—they tend to go down. First to the subway tunnels. Then farther. Believe me, there’re lots of places to hide.”

Pendergast nodded. “Even on my first trip, I was astonished at the vastness. I felt like Lewis and Clark, setting out to explore unmapped territory.”

“You don’t know the half of it. There’s two thousand miles of abandoned or half-dug tunnels, and another five thousand miles still in use. Underground chambers, sealed up and forgotten.” Hayward shrugged. “And you hear stories. Like about bomb shelters, secretly built by the Pentagon in the fifties to protect Wall Street types. Some of them are still stocked with running water, electricity, canned food. Engine rooms filled with abandoned machinery, ancient sewers made from wooden pipes. An entire freakin’ lost world.”

Pendergast sat forward in his chair. “Sergeant Hayward,” he said quietly. “Have you heard of the Devil’s Attic?”

Hayward nodded. “Yeah. I’ve heard of it.”

“Can you tell me where it is, or how I can locate it?”

There was a long silence while she thought. “No. One or two of the homeless mentioned it during rousts. But you hear so much crap down there, you tune most of it out. I always thought it was bullshit.”

“Is there anybody I can talk to who might know more?”

Hayward shifted slightly. “You might talk to Al Diamond,” she said, her eyes drifting again toward the picture of the haystacks. Amazing, she thought, how a couple of thick dabs of paint could capture an image so clearly. “He’s an engineer for the PA, a real authority on underground structures. They always call him in when a deep main breaks, or when a new gas tunnel has to be bored.” She paused. “Haven’t seen him around for a while, though. Maybe he bought the farm.”

“Excuse me?”

“Died, I mean.”

There was a silence, broken only by the soft hush of the waterfall. “If the killers have colonized some secret space underground, the sheer number of homeless will make our own job extremely difficult,” Pendergast said at last.

Hayward took her eyes from the picture of the haystack and fastened them on the FBI agent. “It gets worse,” she said.

“What do you mean?”

“Autumn’s only a few weeks away. That’s when the homeless really start streaming underground, anticipating winter. If you’re right about these killers, you know what that means.”

“No, I don’t,” Pendergast said. “Why don’t you tell me?”

“Hunting season,” Hayward said, and shifted her gaze back to the painting.