She remembered this magical place like yesterday. Here, on the expedition to Quivira almost five years earlier, their boat had passed this same waterfall. Bill Smithback, whom she had met only the day before, had stood at the boat railing and waved her over.
“See that, Nora?” he had said, nudging her and smiling. “That’s where the fairies wash their gossamer wings. It’s the fairy shower.”
It was the first time he had surprised her with his poetry, his insight, his humor and love of beauty. It caused her to look at him more closely, not to trust her original impression. It might also have marked the moment when she began to fall in love with him.
Two weeks ago she had returned to New Mexico, after having been offered a job as curator at the Santa Fe Archaeological Institute. Staying with her brother Skip, she had spent the last week learning more about the job and discussing the position with the museum’s president and board. If she took the job, it would be contingent on working out details for funding her already planned expedition to Utah the upcoming summer. Skip had been a tremendous help and support, glad to return the favor from the time, years before, when she had helped him pick up the pieces of his own life.
But there had been another, more private, reason for the journey. She was, for the most part, coming to terms with the horror of Bill’s death. New York City—their favorite restaurants and parks, even the apartment itself—held no more terrors for her. And yet the past was a different story. She had no idea how the canyon country of the Southwest would affect her. Places like Page, Arizona, where they first met, or Lake Powell itself, or the wild country beyond where they had searched for the half-mythical city of Quivira. She felt a need to explore these places again, perhaps as part of laying the ghosts to rest. As the boat drifted down the canyon, memories—shrouded in a wistful veil of time that made them bittersweet rather than painful—began to surface. Bill, complaining loudly after being bitten by his horse, Hurricane Deck. Bill, shielding her from a flash flood with his own body. Bill, his form outlined in brilliant starlight, reaching for her hand. This magical land had brought such memories back to her, and for that she was grateful.
The boat came to rest, drifting ever so slightly in the mirror-like water. Nora reached down and picked up a small bronze urn, pulled away the paper seal on its rim, and removed the lid. She held it over the side of the boat and shook a few handfuls of ashes out into the water. They splashed down, sinking slowly into the jade-colored depths. She watched them dissolve in a turbulent plume that dimmed as it sank. And then they were gone.
“Good-bye, dear friend,” she said softly.
A Word from the Authors
THE PRESTON-CHILD NOVELS
We are very frequently asked in what order, if any, our books should be read.
The question is most applicable to the novels that feature Special Agent Pendergast. Although most of our novels are written to be stand-alone stories, very few have turned out to be set in discrete worlds. Quite the opposite: it seems the more novels we write together, the more “bleed-through” occurs between the characters and events that comprise them all. Characters from one book will appear in a later one, for example, or events in one novel could spill into a subsequent one. In short, we have slowly been building up a universe in which all the characters in our novels, and the experiences they have, take place and overlap.
Reading the novels in a particular order, however, is rarely necessary. We have worked hard to make almost all of our books into stories that can be enjoyed without reading any of the others, with a few exceptions.
Here, then, is our own breakdown of our books.
THE PENDERGAST NOVELS
Relic was our first novel, and the first to feature Agent Pendergast, and as such has no antecedents.
Reliquary is the sequel to Relic.
The Cabinet of Curiosities is our next Pendergast novel, and it stands completely on its own.
Still Life with Crows is next. It is also a self-contained story (although people curious about Constance Greene will find a little more information here, as well as in The Cabinet of Curiosities).
Brimstone is next, and it is the first novel in what we informally call the Diogenes trilogy. Although it is also self-contained, it does pick up some threads begun in The Cabinet of Curiosities.
Dance of Death is the middle novel of the Diogenes trilogy. While it can be read as a stand-alone book, readers may wish to read Brimstone before Dance of Death.
The Book of the Dead is the culminating novel in the Diogenes trilogy. For greatest enjoyment, the reader should read at least Dance of Death first.
The Wheel of Darkness follows next. It is a stand-alone novel that takes place after the events in The Book of the Dead.
Cemetery Dance, which you presently hold in your hands, is our most recent Pendergast novel. It is self-contained but, as is our custom, does at times reference or build upon what has come before.
THE NON-PENDERGAST NOVELS
We have also written a number of self-contained tales of adventure that do not feature Special Agent Pendergast. They are, by date of publication, Mount Dragon, Riptide, Thunderhead, and The Ice Limit.
Thunderhead introduces the archaeologist Nora Kelly, who appears in most of the later Pendergast novels. The Ice Limit introduces Eli Glinn, who appears in Dance of Death and The Book of the Dead.
In closing, we want to assure our readers that this note is not intended as some kind of onerous syllabus, but rather as an answer to the question In what order should I read your novels? We feel extraordinarily fortunate that there are people like you who enjoy reading our novels as much as we enjoy writing them.
With our best wishes,
Cemetery Dance Page 39
