“Officer, I swear it! It was dark and full of rocks, and we walked down this ledge and there was a cliff on one side that went down to God-knows-where. I never knew there was stuff like that under the city …”
“Either did I. So what happened?”
“Ralphie found this … thing, this guy, I guess. He was chained to a rock and a bird was picking at him, biting him in the stomach … it was horrible! It was like a monster movie. I got so scared that I couldn’t stay there any longer. I guess I figured that anything outside couldn’t be any worse than what we were looking at down there.”
“And so you left? You left Ralphie down there with this thing on the rock?” John was writing everything down quickly, trying not to let the absurdity of it all interfere with getting it all down. Try not to think about how nutty this is, he told himself; just listen to her story.
“You bet I did. He wouldn’t come, so I ran back through the fog and found the platform. Then I jumped down to the tracks and ran back to the Houston Street station. There was an old man down there waiting for the next train, and he helped me up. I was so scared—I didn’t know what to do. I was afraid a train was going to come while I was still on the tracks, you know? I called my friend down at Christopher Street, and he came up and got me. I didn’t say nothing to anybody about it till now. And when Ralphie didn’t come to work, I was afraid he was still down there, that something had happened to him … I just thought I should tell you about it.” She opened her clutch bag, pulled out a pack of Marlboros, and lit one.
John leaned back in his chair when he finished writing. Looking at Constance Starkey, he could see that she was getting freaked out just from remembering what she had seen. He wondered whether it would do any good to question her further. “What did this thing look like—this thing you both saw on the rock?”
“It was big, but I can’t remember what it really looked like, you know. Its shape kind of oozed around, like it was changing all the time. All I can remember is that it had big eyes—real big eyes that were scary like a monster’s, you know?”
“Yeah, right,” said John. “And there was a bird, you said.” Constance shuddered as though seeing it again in her mind’s eye. “Yeah, and it was eating him. Tearing big pieces out of his middle. It’s down there, I swear it is, and I’m afraid it might get Ralphie.”
“All right, Miss Starkey. I’m going to have to check this out. I appreciate you coming forward with this information. I’ll get back to you on it, if you’d like.”
“You mean, that’s all?”
“That’s all for now. I’ll be contacting you if we need more information.”
“Are you going to look for Ralphie? Are you going to find him?” She puffed on the cigarette nervously.
“I’m going to try.” John stood up and walked around the desk. “Thank you again, Miss Starkey.”
“All right. Thank you, Officer. You’ve been very nice.” She looked at him with her big eyes, so huge in her tiny face. “You believe me, don’t you? You don’t think I’m making all this up, do you?”
“I believe you. Why would you make it up?”
“Oh, man, I wouldn’t, you know? I’ve always been afraid of the police and all. I wouldn’t have come here if I didn’t think I had to.”
John nodded and escorted her out of the bull pen and downstairs to the lobby, then watched her walk out into the night. He didn’t know what to make of the whole story. It was crazy, that was for sure, but there was a lot of crazy shit in this city. He didn’t know what the hell was going on, but he had the uncomfortable feeling that the girl’s story was true—as nutty as it sounded—and he felt compelled to check it out. As he walked back upstairs, he had a fleeting image of that dark shape he had seen jumping under the train, and the thought struck him that maybe he was really hoping that the girl’s story was bullshit. He didn’t want to find any empty little station, any big cavern under the streets. Jesus, it was crazy.
The captain issued him a car and he drove down toward the Village, south of Washington Square, hanging a right on Houston Street and pulling up at the IRT entrance. The streets were not crowded and there was the usual mixture of types to be seen. Some of the surrounding doorways were already decorated with sleeping bums; there were a few packs of kids walking with that typical macho swaying of the shoulders; a guy and his girl were heading up to one of the restaurants on Mott Street.
Provenza trotted down the steps, flashed his gold at the large black woman in the token booth, and vaulted the turnstiles. He walked down to the platform and saw that there were a half dozen people waiting for the downtown local. He had better wait until it came through before climbing down to the roadbed. There were places where he could dodge it, those little alcoves, and of course there was always the trough between the rails, but John had no desire to see if that worked.
As he stood there in silence, leaning against one of the support girders, he recalled some of the things that Melvin Peake had said during the interrogations and some of the stuff he’d read in the psychiatric reports. All that business about there being creatures living down here, those things that looked like blobs that hitched rides on the trains … bunch of crazy bullshit, everybody thought, but you never knew. He remembered walking through that gangway and having that monster cat jump out at him. Scraggly and wiry, all matted fur, and not like any cat he’d ever seen before, but it was a cat just the same. If cats could make it down here, who knew what else was skulking around.
A rumbling in the tunnel was joined by the single white beam of the train’s headlight. The train was a square of darkness filling the dark tunnel, rushing toward him with a thunderous roar, and suddenly it was upon the platform, jerking to a stop and flinging open its spray-painted doors.
When the train pulled out, John was alone on the platform. He jumped down to the tracks and started running at a light jog along the tracks toward uptown. The tunnel curved to the left and there was a semaphore light in the distance. He kept moving, watching the darkest point ahead and listening for any telltale vibrations that might mean a grisly death was bearing down on him. It was darker in the tunnel than he had imagined it would be and he cursed himself for not bringing a flashlight.
He wasn’t sure how long he had trotted along before he saw the empty platform. His eyes had gradually adjusted to the darkness and now everything was in various reliefs of shadow and lighter and darker blacks. It was a small station platform, just as the girl had said, almost invisible in the blackness of the tunnel. He climbed out of the tunnel and saw the vague outline of a single light bulb hanging down in the center, but it was dark. You’d never notice this unused station if you were in the train rushing past. He felt his way around the walls, and couldn’t find an exit. No doors, no stairs, nothing. Everything must have been walled up when the place was abandoned.
He was getting a funny feeling the longer he stayed on the platform. It was so damned quiet down here. He could hear his own breathing, feel the beating of his heart. And the longer he stood there, staring at the far wall, the more he thought he could see something light, something starting to glow. The hairs on the back of his neck were getting stiff. It was a sensation he’d never had before, and it bothered him. It was as if his body knew what was happening before his mind did. Some kind of primitive reaction, like his body was telling him to get the fuck out of here, Jack, now.
But his mind still had control over his body, and he knew that he had to—Jesus Christ, what the hell was that?!
At the opposite end of the platform, the mosaic tiles of the walls were rippling as if they were a mirage. Standing in the almost total darkness, he could detect an undefined light source. It did look like a wall of fog, a fog that was illuminated from within itself, a glowing mist. It was just as the dancer had described it. He had been certain she was telling the truth, but seeing his beliefs vindicated was another story. No choice but to check it out now.
John withdrew his .38 snub-nose from the holster, checked the chambe
r and the safety, and held it in front of him as he walked forward. The light from the mist grew slightly brighter with each step until he was entering it, feeling its coldness touch his flesh and seep through his clothing like a living thing. John could feel the hair on his arms standing up as a chill shot through him. He gripped the service revolver tightly, keeping his hand steady as he moved forward. The platform was quickly lost behind him in the mist.
What he saw stopped him in his tracks despite what he had been expecting.
She had said a cave, a cavern, but Provenza abruptly found himself standing on a ledge that overlooked a bottomless canyon. His left shoulder grazed a sheer rock face, which jutted upward as far as the eye could follow into darkness. The walls of the place were deeply veined with glowing deposits of phosphorescent minerals and niter, which cast an eerie, neonlike frost of light over everything. He had the sensation of standing inside a vast cathedral. His mind kept objecting that there could not be any such place beneath the streets of the city; yet he was standing here, trying to take it in, trying to make it real.
He had a sudden impulse to turn and run from the place as fast as he could. He had experienced that feeling before when he knew he was putting his neck on a chopping block, but never had he felt it so overpoweringly. His stomach felt like it was dropping out of sight, and his mouth was as dry as a dustpan.
Get moving. Check it out and then get the hell out, he told himself. No sounds came to him, and he found that disquieting instead of a comfort. Hearing something would have warned him to expect something, but the silence was worse. He started walking along the ledge, refusing to look off into the emptiness below the narrow ledge of rock. He had never been crazy about heights and had never seen any lure or thrill in mountain climbing, and here he was, inching along above an abyss where one missed step or the loss of balance meant a drop into nothingness.
But as he walked farther along the path, he noticed that it was widening, becoming flatter and more open. In the distance he could see a shadowed mass of rock rising up toward the vault of the ceiling, and—just as the girl had said—there was something lumpy attached to the rock.
John stopped, drew a deep breath. Check it out. Now. And then get out of here. He moved forward again. With each step, the image on the rock became more defined. It was a man, that much was clear, but he made no sound and no movement. The light from the phosphorescent minerals was weak and the shadows were deep and utterly black. He could see, yet he could not see until he was almost upon the place.
That was when he knew the man was dead.
Suspended by four heavy chains, the body hung limply, its arms grossly distended, the knees buckling. The entire torso looked like somebody had taken to it with a pickax. It was simply gone. This guy was an autopsy by a coroner gone around the bend, everything yanked out and tossed, leaving nothing but a dark, stained, empty hole. The guy’s eyes were still open and his jaw gaped, the lips curled back away from the teeth.
Staring at what was left of Ralphie Loggins, Provenza realized that he had gone beyond shock or fear or revulsion. The impossibility of what he was seeing had pushed him over into some new realm. It was as if somebody had opened up the door into the world the nightmares come from and waved a friendly hand: come on in, take a look around. He had done it, and now he felt irretrievably lost. Where do you go after you’ve been to hell?
That’s when he heard something approaching out of the darkness.
It was a rough, flapping sound, something beating the air like the slow-motion rotors of a copter coming in. And he remembered what the girl had said about a bird.
Looking up, he saw it wheeling above him, tilting in a glide to make a cursory pass over the place where he stood. John trained his 38 on the creature as it swooped closer through the shadows, trying to see what it was.
For openers, it was goddamned big—wingspan like a condor, body the size of a small man. Its flesh looked almost shiny and its head was big and ugly. It looked almost like a lizard, but it was flying and it was smooth and confident. As it passed within twenty feet of him, it tilted its head and regarded him with one big, yellow eye, its curved, open beak looking like a pair of linoleum knives.
Provenza backed up, making sure that he stayed in the center of the path, watching the flying thing arch upward and begin a new flight path that would bring it down on a collision with him.
There was a leathery beating of the air and the bird-thing increased its speed, its beak open. It bore down on him like a Stuka in one of the old newsreel clips, and he tracked it along the end of the short barrel, waiting until there was no chance that he could miss. Closer it came, bridging the distance with unbelievable speed. He fired two shots wildly; the third one exploded its skull like a piece of ripe fruit. A piercing scream echoed after the report of the gunshots, and the big wings folded up like old newspaper tossed in the wind. The thing fell into the rock before him with a dull, wet thud.
John lowered the handgun slowly. Now he could let his hands shake, could let the adrenaline jump through his veins, let his balls drop slowly back into their sack. Despite the cold, damp air of the place, there was a rime of sweat on his face and he could feel it cooling off like a wet rag. Now get out of here. Get the fuck out of here and get somebody back here to take some pictures. Make it real so I know I haven’t made loony tunes.
He backed off slowly, warily. He had the impression that he had violated some holy place, like going into church and tearing up the altar or something like that. He didn’t belong here, and he knew he’d left his mark. If there were any more of those birds around, he didn’t want to trust his aim on a whole squadron.
Retracing his steps along the ledge, he kept listening to the silence, waiting to hear something coming after him. He was so convinced that it would happen that he was actually surprised when he safely reached the foggy entrance. The hard, even surface of the platform was very dark and very cold; he felt like he was waking up from a dream.
As he stood there in the dark, breathing hard and still shaking, there was a sound from the tunnel—a reassuring sound from the real world, a clatter of steel upon steel. It was a good sound, a comforting sound. He stood on the platform and watched the blur of lighted windows whip past the abandoned platform.
Then he jumped down on the tracks and ran in the wake of the train. As he moved through the tunnel toward the Houston Street station, he knew that he hadn’t solved anything, that it was only the beginning of something far worse than a missing person.
CHAPTER 23
CORVINO
Michael felt no morning-after regrets when he and Lya awoke. With the sunlight pouring through the open window-wall and the skylight, they made love once again, then showered and breakfasted.
When she had finished curling her hair in the bathroom, he borrowed one of her Bic razors to shave, and struggled the dulling blade across his jaw. His face was going to look like a pizza pie, but it was better than nothing. Long live Norelco.
“Do you have to leave so soon?” she asked as he fumbled his tie into a knot before leaving the bathroom.
“Roll call’s at eight for the detectives. It’s usually a bunch of bullshit, but they like you to be there. I’ll call you this evening, either at the studio or here, okay?” He was feeling high and happy, and he wasn’t prepared for her serious expression, the hint of a frown he encountered when he stepped out of the bathroom. “Hey, what’s the matter, sweetheart?”
“Is it okay, Michael?” She was looking at him with a troubled directness. He knew what she meant.
Smiling, he touched her cheek, then kissed her. “Believe me … trust me. We’re both okay. I think it’s safe to assume that we’re very much attracted to each other, right?”
She nodded and smiled. “You’re so at ease. So confident.”
“It’s my nature, I guess. Can’t help it. Let’s just let it play. If everything’s right, it will stay right. If it isn’t, well, it wouldn’t be the first time, right? We’re both grownup
people, aren’t we?”
She nodded again, kissed him.
“So stop worrying about it, try not to analyze everything. Just enjoy it until things become clearer. They always do, you know.”
“I do believe you’re right, Detective Corvino,” said Lya. “It just seems like there’s so much happening all at once.”
“Well, whatever happens, we can handle it. Gotta go. I’ll call you tonight.” She walked him to the door and thanked him for a beautiful evening.
“You were beautiful,” he said. “The evening took care of itself. Bye, sweetheart.”
He took the subway downtown to the station nearest the precinct, fighting the morning crowds and the tensions and forced anonymity of the commuters. They didn’t have a chance of winning, though, because he was feeling so good. Man, he hadn’t felt like this since he was back in college. It was like he had been idling in neutral for a long time, and had finally gotten things into gear.
But all that changed when he reached the station.
John was sitting by their desk, looking as if he had been awake all night. His lean face was darkened by a rough beard, his hair only vaguely combed. He ignored Michael’s cheery greeting and looked straight into his eyes. “Partner, we’ve got to talk. I think I’m going bonkers, no shit.”
Corvino pulled up a chair. “What’s the matter, man? You look terrible!”
“If I tell you something, and I swear on my mother’s grave that it’s the goddamned truth, you’d believe me, wouldn’t you?”
“You wouldn’t have to go that far, you know that.”
“The captain would like to see me go a little further, I think.”
“You want to tell me what’s going down?”
Provenza rubbed his eyes. “This is so crazy, gumba, I’m telling you ahead of time that it’s crazy …”
Corvino slapped him on the shoulder. “Hey, listen, I could tell you a few crazy things, too. Go on, let it go.”
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