TWENTY-FIVE
Friday, 5:35 p.m.
When they arrived back at Temple University Hospital, they found that Doctor Berman was still in theater, finishing up his treatment of an auto mechanic who had been splashed in the face with car-battery acid. They waited in the beige-painted visitors’ lounge at the end of the corridor, under framed prints of lakes and forests. Kavita closed her eyes and tilted her head back and attempted to rest, while Aarif lay back on one of the couches, keeping the folded white compress pressed to his nose. Nathan sat next to the tropical fish tank, trying to read National Geographic, but he couldn’t stop picturing the way that Torchy had blazed through the bars of his cage, flown at Ron Kasabian and set him on fire. After a while he tossed the magazine back on to the table.
Twenty minutes passed and then Braydon Harris came into the lounge, carrying a cup of coffee. His eyes were swollen and his hair was sticking up at the back like a bedraggled cockatoo. He was wearing a light green zip-up windbreaker with a pattern of brown stains down the front, and grubby gray Nike sneakers.
He sat down opposite Nathan and nodded, ‘Hi, Professor.’
Nathan said, ‘Hi there. How’s it going?’
Braydon sipped his coffee. It was still scalding hot, and he said, ‘Ouch. Shit. No wonder they call it the burns unit.’ He put down his cup and then he said, ‘Taking a break?’
‘I’m waiting for Doctor Berman,’ said Nathan. ‘How’s your daughter doing?’
‘I haven’t seen her yet. They’re changing the dressings or something like that.’
‘I don’t think you should worry about her too much. The surgeons here can practically work miracles.’
‘I hope to God. As if she hasn’t been through enough already, what with her mom and me separating. Kids always have to bear the brunt of it, don’t they?’
‘Sure. But they’re pretty resilient. Tougher than adults, sometimes.’
‘I’m not so sure about my Sukie. She’s kind of sensitive, you know. One of those real shy kids who wouldn’t say boo to a goose. And she’s always having those nightmares.’
‘Come on . . . nightmares are not necessarily bad. Having nightmares is how kids deal with things that frighten them, and things they don’t understand. Don’t tell me you never had nightmares, when you were young? I always thought that the robe that was hanging on the back of my bedroom door was going to jump down and strangle me. Then I used to have nightmares about getting lost in the woods, and there were wolves coming after me.’
‘Yeah, but my daughter has that same nightmare about the Spooglies, over and over, and always has.’
‘Have you ever taken her for counseling?’
Braydon shook his head. ‘Her mom – my gorgeous ex-wife – she doesn’t believe in shrinks. She thinks that Sukie has some kind of psychic gift, like my ex-mom-in-law. They’ve always been into that stuff, the two of them. Seances, Ouija boards, all that crap. She thinks that Sukie’s nightmares are some kind of message from beyond, you know, like w-o-ooo-ooo-ooh!’
He paused, and tried sipping his coffee again, but it was still too hot. ‘I talked to the psychiatrist here, Doctor Mahmood, and he said pretty much the same as you, that her nightmares were caused by stress. You know, her mother and me always yelling at each other. But I still don’t understand why she should always have nightmares about these goddamned Spooglies. She even drew me a picture of one.’
Nathan took out his iPhone and Googled Doré’s engraving of Malacoda, the leader of the Malebranche. When he had located it, he passed his iPhone over to Braydon, and said, ‘Sukie’s drawing . . . did it look anything at all like this?’
Braydon peered at it. ‘Jesus. That’s exactly what it looked like. Exactly. What the hell is this?’
‘It’s a gargoyle – a flying creature that was supposed to have plagued the whole of Europe in the Middle Ages. According to the myths about them, they came out at night in their hundreds, whole flocks of them, and swooped down on cattle and sheep, and carried them off. People, too, apparently. Men, women and kids.’
Braydon blinked and passed Nathan’s iPhone back. ‘I thought gargoyles were those ugly statues you see on the tops of churches.’
‘They are. But the myths suggest that they were alive, once, and it was only because they were hunted down by exorcists and turned to stone that they became extinct.’
‘Yeah, but like you say, they’re only a myth, right? Why should Sukie have nightmares about a myth?’
‘I don’t have any idea, to be frank with you. But I would be very interested to find out.’
At that moment, Doctor Berman came in, still wearing his green theater scrubs.
‘Ah . . . Professor Underhill. We’re ready for you now.’
‘How’s Sukie?’ asked Braydon. ‘Can I see her now?’
Doctor Berman smiled and held up his right hand with his fingers spread. ‘If you could just give us five minutes, Mr Harris?’
‘Sure. But she’s OK, isn’t she?’
‘In five minutes, I promise you, you can see for yourself.’
Doctor Berman led Nathan and Aarif and Kavita along the corridor to Susan Harris’ room.
‘Is she making any progress?’ asked Nathan.
Doctor Berman looked back over his shoulder. ‘You could say that,’ he replied, evasively.
They went into Susan Harris’ room, where a nurse was plumping up Sukie’s pillows and making her comfortable.
Nathan slowly approached her bed and said, ‘My God.’
Sukie was no longer wearing the shiny Jaloskin covering that had been protecting her burns while they healed. She was no longer wearing an oxygen mask, either. She was still connected to a saline drip, and her vital signs were still being monitored, but she was sitting up in bed with a crooked smile on her face.
Her mousy-colored hair was still burned on one side like stubble in a cornfield, and she still had no eyebrows, but the only signs that her face had been seared so severely were a pinkish patch on her forehead and a pattern of pinkish spots on her cheeks. Her lips were redder than they should have been, with two or three black crusty scabs, but Nathan could see that they were healing fast.
She wasn’t a particularly pretty little girl. In fact she was rather plain, with an overbite and a weak chin. But she had huge brown eyes that were immediately appealing, and what Nathan warmed to, most of all, was the way in which her face had regenerated so quickly, in less than a day.
‘I never saw anything like it,’ said Doctor Berman. ‘If she continues to improve at this rate, she should be ready for discharge in a day or two. Best of all, I don’t think she’ll have any visible scars on her face at all.’
He took a deep breath, and then he said, ‘When they took the Jaloskin off, and I saw Sukie’s face, I have to admit that I had tears in my eyes – and, believe me, I’ve been treating burns victims for twenty-six years, and I’m not the sentimental type.’
Nathan took hold of Sukie’s hand. ‘How are you feeling, Sukie?’
‘Much better, thank you.’
‘Does your face hurt at all?’
‘No, but it feels stretchy.’
‘Stretchy, that’s OK. Stretchy is good. Stretchy means that it’s getting better.’
‘I am hungry, though.’
‘You’re hungry? Haven’t they been feeding you in here? What would you like to eat?’
‘A Twinkie,’ said Sukie.
Nathan turned to Doctor Berman. ‘Is that OK? A Twinkie?’
‘It’s not on the usual dietary sheet for burns patients, but I guess it wouldn’t hurt. So long as it’s not deep-fried.’
Aarif opened his medical bag one-handed and Kavita took out a hypodermic with the stem cell sample. Nathan said, ‘I just have to give you two injections, Sukie. One in each side of your face. You’ll feel a little scratch, but that’s all. Once I’ve done that, you can have as many Twinkies as you like.’
He injected Sukie, once in each jaw-muscle. She said, ‘Ouch!’ w
ith each injection, and gave him an exaggerated frown, but then she smiled again, and Nathan could tell that she was already feeling better. As for himself, he felt almost like God.
TWENTY-SIX
Friday, 9:23 p.m.
That evening, Grace was too tired after her day’s rounds to think about cooking, so Nathan called Cosimo’s and ordered pepperoni pizzas. When the pizzas arrived, Denver and his friend Stu took theirs up to his bedroom so that they could listen to death/grind CDs, while Nathan and Grace ate theirs sprawled on the living room couch, in front of the television.
‘What’s going to happen to your phoenix project now that Ron’s dead?’ asked Grace.
Nathan chewed and swallowed. ‘I’m not sure. For the moment, I’m going to try to carry on as normal. I’ll probably have to produce a new budget presentation for the board, but once they see evidence of what the phoenix stem cells can do, I don’t think I’ll have any trouble at all in getting them to approve more funding. Doctor Berman says that he’ll give me his unqualified endorsement.’
‘But what about the phoenix attacking Ron like that? I mean, that could happen again, and somebody else could get burned.’
‘Torchy was being protective, that’s all. He saw Ron going for Kavita, and he wanted to stop him from hurting her. I don’t think that kind of situation is ever likely to arise again.’
Grace finished her pizza and wiped her mouth on a paper napkin. ‘All the same, darling, you don’t know how Torchy turned himself into pure flame like that, and until you do—’
Nathan said, ‘Don’t worry. I’m determined to find out how he does it, and what it is that triggers him off. It’s crucial that we know. After all, it could be the key to how he can recreate himself, and how his stem cells can regenerate people’s burns. Kavita went back to the lab tonight to take more readings, and I’ll be running some more comprehensive tests tomorrow.’
He had told Grace that he had been interviewed by the police after Ron Kasabian’s death, but he had not yet told her that he had been also been interviewed by the same detectives after the death of Eduardo Delgado at Temple University Hospital, and why. He didn’t want to frighten her by telling her what had happened when Theodor Zauber had visited him at the hospital, and the threats that Zauber had made against him and his family.
‘The gargoyle is now a living creature, ja? And like all living creatures, it will do anything to survive. Just as you will. Just as your wife and your son will.’
He hoped that Theodor Zauber had been bluffing, but if he was anything like his father, Nathan knew that his threat was serious. He had urged one of his gargoyles to smash an innocent man to pieces, after all, just to prove what they were capable of, and to prove that he had no conscience about ordering them to do it.
‘How about a nightcap?’ he suggested, picking up their pizza plates.
‘A glass of that Merlot would be good,’ said Grace.
Nathan went through to the kitchen and took two glasses out of the hutch. He was just about to pour them two glasses of red wine when he heard a thunderous crash from upstairs, and the explosive sound of a window breaking. The impact was so violent that the entire house shook, and a row of side plates rolled off the shelf on top of the hutch, one after the other, and shattered on the floor.
The crash was immediately followed by a hideous screeching sound, like a train jamming its emergency brakes on, only shriller and louder.
Nathan hurtled out of the kitchen and collided with Grace, who was coming into the kitchen to find him.
‘What was that?’ she gasped. ‘Something’s hit the house!’
‘Dad!’ screamed Denver, from his bedroom. ‘Dad, come quick!’
‘Stay here!’ Nathan told Grace, and bounded up the staircase. He was only halfway up when there was another crash, even louder than the first, and the house jolted so much that he had to grip the banister rail to stop himself from losing his footing.
‘Dad!’ Denver called out, and this time his voice was shrill with panic. ‘Dad! There’s something trying to get in here! Stu’s been hurt real bad!’
Nathan ran across the landing and along the corridor to Denver’s bedroom. When he threw open the door he could hardly believe his eyes. The entire window had been smashed in, including the frame, and the carpet and bed were strewn with sparkling fragments of glass and broken pieces of glazing bars. Part of the wall on the left-hand side of the window had been ripped away, too, and the torn wallpaper was flapping in the wind.
Outside, the trees were thrashing as if they were trying to uproot themselves in terror. The street lights were flickering through the leaves so that everything in Denver’s bedroom seemed to jump and jerk like a scene from an old Charlie Chaplin movie.
Denver was crouched down behind his bed, while Stu was lying on his back with a large triangle of glass sticking out of his right thigh. His jeans were flooded in bright red blood, and he was shivering with shock.
‘What the hell happened?’ asked Nathan, kneeling down beside him.
‘Something crashed in through the window!’ Denver told him, so frightened that he was almost screaming. ‘It was like a monster or something! It crashed in through the window and there was glass flying everywhere! Then it came crashing in again, and I thought it was going to bite me!’
Nathan said, ‘Go downstairs, call nine-one-one for an ambulance, right now.’
Stu groaned, and tried to sit up, but Nathan pushed him gently back down again and took off his thick-lensed eyeglasses. ‘Just lie still, Stu. I’m going to take out this piece of glass and see how bad you’re bleeding. I won’t hurt you, I promise.’
Denver hesitated at the door, but Nathan told him, ‘Go! Call nine-one-one!’ and he went.
Nathan took hold of the thick brown woolen throw from Denver’s bed and used it as an impromptu glove. He gripped the triangular piece of glass in Stu’s thigh and carefully drew it out. Then he unfastened Stu’s belt and tugged his jeans down to his knees. There was a diagonal slit high up in the inside of Stu’s skinny white thigh, about seven inches long, which was pumping out blood like the mouth of a harpooned fish. Nathan guessed that the glass had cut his femoral artery, and that he was in imminent danger of bleeding out.
Grace appeared in the doorway. ‘Denver just told me that Stu’s been hurt. He’s called for an ambulance.’
‘A damn great piece of glass went into his leg,’ said Nathan. ‘Quick – hand me that towel.’
Grace took the white hand-towel from the ring beside Denver’s washbasin, and folded it up. ‘Here,’ she said, ‘I’ll do this. Press the heel of your hand into the crease of his groin – that’s it, just there – as hard as you can.’
She wrestled Stu’s jeans right off, and then she held the towel firmly against his wound. Meanwhile, Nathan knelt down next to him, positioned the heel of his hand over the pressure point at the top of his leg, and leaned forward with all of his weight, so that he would restrict the pumping of blood through his femoral artery. Stu said, ‘Ow!’ and tried to struggle out from under him, but he was already growing weaker, and Nathan held him firmly against the floor.
‘God, I hope those paramedics get here soon,’ said Grace. The hand towel she was using as a pressure bandage was already soaked bright red, and she tugged the bottom sheet from Denver’s bed and bundled it up so that she could press it down on top of the towel.
‘What the hell happened here?’ she asked Nathan, looking across at the shattered bedroom window. ‘It looks like a bomb went off.’
‘I have a pretty good idea,’ Nathan told her. ‘But first let’s make sure this kid doesn’t die on us.’
Denver came to the bedroom door and stood watching them for a while. ‘He’s going to be OK, isn’t he?’
‘Sure,’ said Nathan, even though Stu’s face was white now and his lips were pale blue. The blood from his femoral artery was creeping inexorably into the sheet and by the look on Grace’s face Nathan could tell that she was beginning to think that the
y had lost him.
‘He can’t die,’ said Denver.
Nathan heard the scribbling of an ambulance siren. ‘Go down and let the paramedics in, OK? Tell them what’s happened. Tell them that Stu has a severed artery in his right leg and that he’s bleeding bad.’
‘Should I tell them about the monster?’
Grace looked up sharply and said, ‘What monster?’
‘The monster that bust in through the window,’ said Denver. ‘It was like some kind of dragon or something.’
‘Don’t say anything about the monster,’ Nathan told him. ‘It’ll only confuse them. Just tell them about Stu, OK?’
‘OK,’ said Denver, doubtfully, and disappeared downstairs again.
‘What monster?’ Grace demanded. ‘What is he talking about, for Christ’s sake?’
Nathan said, ‘I’ll tell you later, I promise. All I care about right now is saving Stu.’
A few seconds later, two paramedics came running up the stairs, a thin blonde woman and a young Korean. The woman took over from Grace, applying a fresh dressing to Stu’s thigh, while the young man fitted an oxygen mask over Stu’s face and then ran down again to fetch a stretcher. Nathan stayed where he was, keeping up the pressure on Stu’s artery. The pale blue carpet all around was soggy with blood.
It took another ten minutes before the bleeding appeared to slow down. The woman paramedic wrapped Stu’s thigh in another dressing, and then she and her companion lifted Stu on to the stretcher and carried him downstairs.
‘Which ER are you taking him to?’ asked Nathan, as the young man closed the ambulance doors.
‘Albert Einstein Medical Center. You know how to get there?’
‘Sure. Yes. We’ll see you there. Please – take care of him.’
TWENTY-SEVEN
Friday, 10:33 p.m.
Asmall crowd of neighbors had gathered in his front yard. His next-door neighbor Jim Lightly came up to him with his wife Jean. Jim was a lawyer for Philadelphia City Council, serious and bespectacled with a shiny bald head even though he was only thirty-nine.
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