Cold Vengeance

by Douglas Preston

Betterton rose abruptly and used his upward momentum to propel an uppercut directly into Tiny’s jaw. The man went down like a hopper of soft butter dropped on cement.

  The lesson Ned learned as a high-school freshman was that, whoever it was, no matter how big, you responded. Or it would just happen again, and worse. Tiny rolled in the dirt, cursing, but he was too stunned to get up and pursue. Betterton walked quickly to his car, passing the men who were still standing around, their mouths agape.

  “Enjoy the rest of the beer, gents.”

  As he drove off, his hand throbbing, he remembered he was supposed to be covering the Women’s Auxiliary Bake-Off in half an hour. Hell with it. No more bake-offs for him.

  CHAPTER 32

  St. Charles Parish, Louisiana

  DR. PETER LEE BEAUFORT FOLLOWED THE MOBILE forensic lab—painted a discreet gray—as it turned in at the side gate of Saint-Savin Cemetery. A groundskeeper swung the gate shut behind them, locking it securely. The two vehicles, his own station wagon and the mobile lab, moved slowly down the narrow graveled lane, flanked by graceful dogwoods and magnolia trees. Saint-Savin was one of the oldest incorporated cemeteries in Louisiana, its plots and glades impeccably manicured. Over the last two hundred years, some of New Orleans’s most illustrious names had been buried here.

  They would be most surprised, Beaufort mused, if they knew the nature of the procedure the cemetery was about to host.

  The lane forked, then forked again. Now, ahead of the mobile lab, Beaufort could see a small cluster of cars: official vehicles, a vintage Rolls-Royce, a Saint-Savin van. The lab pulled into a narrow shoulder behind them and Beaufort followed suit, glancing at his watch as he did so.

  It was ten minutes after six and the sun was just climbing the horizon, casting a golden hue over the greensward and marble. To ensure maximum privacy, exhumations were always done as early in the morning as possible.

  Beaufort got out of the car. As he approached the family plot, he could see workers in protective clothing erecting screens around one of the graves. It was an unusually cool day, even for early November, and for that he was profoundly thankful. Hot-day exhumations were invariably unpleasant.

  Considering the wealth and long history of the Pendergast family, the actual plot had very few graves. Beaufort, who had known the family for decades, was well aware that most members had preferred to be buried in the family plot at Penumbra Plantation. But some had a curious aversion to that mist-shrouded, overgrown burial ground—or the vaults beneath—and preferred a more traditional interment.

  He stepped around the privacy screens and over the low cast-iron fencing surrounding the plot. Besides the technicians, he saw the gravediggers, Saint-Savin’s funeral director, the manager of Saint-Savin, and a portly, nervous-looking fellow whom Beaufort assumed was Jennings, the health officer. At the far end stood Aloysius Pendergast himself, unmoving and silent, black and white, a monochromatic specter. Beaufort looked at him with curiosity. He had not seen the FBI agent since he was a young man. Although his face had changed little, he was gaunter than ever. Over his black suit he wore a long, cream-colored coat that looked like camel’s hair, but—given its silky sheen—Beaufort decided was more likely vicuña.

  Beaufort had first encountered the Pendergast family as a young pathologist in St. Charles Parish, when he was called to Penumbra Plantation after a serial poisoning by the mad old aunt—what was her name, Cordelia? No, Cornelia. He shuddered at the memory. Aloysius had been a boy then, spending his summers at Penumbra. Despite the awful circumstances of Beaufort’s visit, the young Aloysius had latched onto him like a limpet, following him around, fascinated with forensic pathology. For several summers after, he haunted Beaufort’s laboratory in the basement of the hospital. The boy was an exceptionally quick study and possessed of a rare and powerful curiosity. Too powerful, and disturbingly morbid. Of course, the boy’s morbidity had paled in comparison with his brother’s… But this reflection was too distressing and Beaufort forced it away.

  On cue, Pendergast looked up, caught his eye. He came gliding over and took Beaufort’s hand. “My dear Beaufort,” he said. “Thank you for coming.” Pendergast had always had—even as a boy—the habit of calling him by his last name only.

  “My pleasure, Aloysius. How good to see you again after all these years—but I’m sorry it had to be under these particular circumstances.”

  “Yet if it hadn’t been for death, we should never have known each other—would we?”

  Those penetrating silver eyes turned on him and Beaufort, as he parsed the thought, felt a small shiver travel down his spine. He had never before known Aloysius Pendergast to be tense or agitated. Nevertheless, despite a veneer of calm, the man seemed so today.

  The privacy screens were pulled into place around the plot, and Beaufort turned his attention to the goings-on. Jennings had been glancing at his watch and plucking at his collar. “Let us begin,” he said in a high, nervous voice. “May I have the exhumation license, please?”

  Pendergast pulled it from inside his coat and handed it over. The health official glanced at it, nodded, handed it back. “Recall that at all times, our primary responsibility is to protect the public health and to ensure the dignity and respect of the deceased.”

  He glanced down at the gravestone, which read, simply:

  HELEN ESTERHAZY PENDERGAST

  “Are we all in agreement on the correctness of the grave?”

  There was a general nodding of heads.

  Jennings stepped back. “Very well. The exhumation may proceed.”

  Two gravediggers, wearing gloves and respiratory face masks in addition to their protective clothing, began by cutting a rectangle in the thick green sod and, with expert finesse, neatly detaching and rolling it up in strips, setting them carefully aside. An operator stood by with a tiny cemetery backhoe.

  The sod up, the two gravediggers set to work with square-bladed shovels, aiming sharp alternating blows into the black earth, piling it neatly on a plastic sheet laid to one side. The hole took shape, the diggers blading the walls to crisp angles and planes. And then they stepped back while the backhoe inched forward, its miniature bucket plunging into the dark ground.

  The backhoe and the two diggers alternated work, the diggers trimming the hole while the bucket took out the dirt. The assembled group watched in almost liturgical silence. As the hole deepened, the air became charged with its scent; loamy and oddly fragrant, like the smell of the deep woods. The open grave smoked faintly in the early-morning air. Jennings, the health officer, dipped a hand into his coat, pulled out a face mask, and put it on.

  Beaufort shot a private glance at the FBI agent. He was staring at the deepening hole as if transfixed, an intense expression on his face that was, at least to Beaufort, unreadable. Pendergast had been evasive about why he wanted his wife’s body dug up—only that he wanted the mobile forensic van to be prepared for any and all tests of identity. Even for a family as notably eccentric as the Pendergasts, it seemed disturbing and inexplicable.

  The digging continued for fifteen minutes, then thirty. The two men in masks and protective clothing stopped for a brief rest, then returned to work. A few minutes later, one of the shovels hit a heavy object with a loud, hollow thunk.

  The men surrounding the open grave glanced at one another. All except Pendergast, whose eyes remained riveted on the yawning hole at his feet.

  More carefully now, the diggers evened out the walls of the grave, then continued down, slowly exposing the standard cement container in which the coffin rested. The backhoe, fitted with straps, lifted the concrete lid, exposing the coffin inside. It was made of mahogany, even blacker than the surrounding soil, trimmed with brass handles, corners, and rails. A new scent was introduced to the already charged atmosphere: a faint odor of decomposition.

  Four more men now appeared at the graveside, carrying the “shell”—a new casket to hold both the old casket and its exhumed remains. Placing it on the ground, they stepped f
orward to help the diggers. As the group watched silently, new webbing was lowered into the grave and slid beneath the coffin. Together—slowly, carefully, by hand—the six men strained to lift the coffin from its resting place.

  Beaufort watched. At first, the coffin seemed to resist being disturbed. And then, with a faint groan, it came free and began to rise.

  As the witnesses stepped back to give them room, the Saint-Savin workers lifted the coffin out of the grave and placed it on the ground beside the shell. Jennings came forward, pulling on latex gloves. Kneeling at the head of the coffin, he bent forward to inspect the nameplate.

  “Helen Esterhazy Pendergast,” he read through the mask. “Let the record show the name on the casket conforms with the name on the exhumation license.”

  Now the shell was opened. Beaufort saw that its interior consisted of a tarred zinc liner, covered with a plastic membrane and sealed with isopon. All standard. At a nod from Jennings—who had backed quickly away—the cemetery workers once again lifted Helen Pendergast’s coffin by the webbing, carried it to the open shell, and placed it inside. Pendergast watched as if frozen, his face pale, his eyes hooded. He had not moved a muscle, save to blink, since the exhumation process started.

  With the coffin safely inside the shell, the lid was closed and fastened. The cemetery manager came forward with a small brass nameplate. As the workers removed the disposable protective clothing and washed their hands with disinfectant, he hammered the nameplate into the surface of the shell.

  Beaufort stirred. It was almost time for his own work to begin. The workers lifted the shell by its railings and he led them to the rear of the mobile forensic lab, parked on the gravel nearby. It sat in the shade of the magnolias, generator rumbling quietly. His assistant opened the rear doors and helped the cemetery workers lift the shell up and slide it inside.

  Beaufort waited until the doors were shut again, then he followed the workers back to the screened-off plot. The group was still assembled, and would remain there until the procedure was complete. Some of the workers began filling in the old grave, while others, with the help of the backhoe, began opening a fresh one beside it: when his work on the remains was complete, they would be re-interred in the new grave. Beaufort knew that moving her body—even so slight a distance as this—was the only way Pendergast had been able to get the exhumation approved. And even then he wondered what pressure had been brought to bear on the nervous, sweating Jennings.

  At last Pendergast stirred, glancing his way. The anticipation, the tense watchfulness, had deepened in his pale features.

  Beaufort came up to him and spoke in a low voice. “We’re ready. Now, exactly what tests would you like done?”

  The FBI agent looked at him. “DNA, hair samples, fingerprints if possible, dental X-rays. Everything.”

  Beaufort tried to think of the most tactful way to say it. “It would help if I knew what the purpose of all this was.”

  A long moment passed before Pendergast replied. “The body in the coffin is not that of my wife.”

  Beaufort absorbed this. “What leads you to believe there’s been a… a mistake?”

  “Just perform the tests, if you please,” said Pendergast quietly. His white hand emerged from under his suit; in it was a hairbrush in a ziplock bag. “You’ll need a sample of her DNA.”

  Beaufort took the bag, wondering at a man who would keep his wife’s hairbrush untouched for more than ten years after her death. He cleared his throat. “And if the body is hers?”

  When there was no reply to this question, Beaufort asked another. “Would you, ah, care to be present when we open the coffin?”

  The agent’s haunted eyes seemed to freeze Beaufort. “It’s a matter of indifference to me.”

  He turned back to the grave and said no more.

  CHAPTER 33

  New York City

  THE FOOD LINE AT THE BOWERY STREET MISSION snaked slowly past the front row of refectory-style tables toward the steam trays.

  “Shit,” said the man directly ahead. “Not chicken and dumplings again.”

  Distractedly, Esterhazy picked up a tray, helped himself to corn bread, shuffled forward in the line.

  He had been staying below the radar. Way below. He’d taken a bus down from Boston and stopped using credit cards and withdrawing cash from ATMs. He went by the name on the false passport and bought a new cell phone under that assumed name. His lodgings were a cheap SRO on Second Street that preferred dealing in cash. Whenever possible he was subsisting on handouts such as this. He had a goodly supply of cash left over from his trip to Scotland, so for the time being money wasn’t a concern, but he would need to make it last. Pendergast’s resources were frighteningly exhaustive—he wasn’t about to take any chances. Besides, he knew they would always give him more.

  “Goddamn green Jell-O,” the man in front of him continued to complain. He was perhaps forty years old, sported a wispy goatee, and wore a faded lumberjack shirt. His grimy, pale face was seamed with every manner of vice, self-gratification, and corruption. “Why can’t we ever get red Jell-O?”

  The banality of evil, thought Esterhazy as he slid an entrée onto his plastic tray without even looking at it. This was no way to live. He had to stop running and get back on the offensive. Pendergast had to die. He’d tried to kill Pendergast twice. Third time’s the charm, as the saying went.

  Everyone has a weak spot. Find his and attack it.

  Carrying the tray, he walked over to a nearby table and sat down at the only empty place, next to the goateed man. He lifted his fork, picked absently at the food, put the fork down again.

  Now that he thought about it, Esterhazy realized how little he really knew about Pendergast. The man had been married to his sister. And yet, though they’d been on friendly terms, he’d always remained distant, cool, a cipher. He had failed to kill Pendergast partly because he hadn’t really understood him. He needed to learn more about the man: his movements, his likes, his dislikes, his attachments. What made him tick, what he cared about.

  We’ll take good care of you. Just as we always have.

  Esterhazy could hardly swallow his food with that phrase echoing in his mind. He put down his fork and turned to the goateed vagrant sitting next to him. He stared at the man until he stopped eating and looked up.

  “Got a problem?”

  “As a matter of fact, yes.” Esterhazy bestowed a friendly smile on the man. “May I ask you a question?”

  “What about?” The man was instantly suspicious.

  “Someone’s pursuing me,” said Esterhazy. “Threatening my life. I can’t shake him.”

  “Kill the mother,” said the man, resuming slurping up his Jell-O.

  “That’s just it. I can’t get near enough to kill him. What would you do?”

  The man’s deep-set eyes glittered with malice, and he put down his spoon. This was a problem he understood. “You get to someone close to him. Someone weak. Helpless. A bitch.”

  “A bitch,” Esterhazy repeated.

  “Not just any bitch, his bitch. You get to a man through his bitch.”

  “That makes sense.”

  “No shit it makes sense. I had a beef with this dealer, man, wanted to bust a cap in his ass, but he always had his crew around him. Well, he had this little sister, real juicy…”

  The story went on for a long time. But Esterhazy wasn’t listening. He had fallen into pensive thought.

  His bitch…

  CHAPTER 34

  Savannah, Georgia

  THE ELEGANT TOWN HOUSE DOZED IN THE FRAGRANT cool of a fall evening. Outside, in Habersham Street, and beyond in Whitfield Square, passersby chatted animatedly and tourists snapped pictures of the park’s gingerbread cupola and the historic brick structures surrounding it. But within the town house, all was still.

  Until, with a faint rustle of metal against metal, the lock turned and the back door was teased open.

  Special Agent Pendergast slipped into the kitchen, barely a
shadow in the fading light. He closed and locked the door behind him, then turned and leaned against it, listening. The house was vacant, but he paused in the silence anyway. The air smelled stale and the blinds were all drawn. This was a building that had not been entered in some time.

  He recalled the last time he had been in this house, several months before, under very different circumstances. Esterhazy had since gone to ground, and done it very well. But there would be traces. Clues. And of any place, this house was the most likely to contain that information—because nobody could disappear without a trace.

  Except perhaps Helen.

  Pendergast raked the kitchen with his pale eyes. It was almost obsessively neat and, like the rest of the house, decidedly masculine in its choice of furnishings: the heavy oak breakfast table, the oversize slab of butcher block studded with massive knives, the dark cherry cabinets and black granite countertops.

  He made his way out of the kitchen, through the hall, and up the stairs to the second floor. The doors off the landing were closed, and he opened each one in turn. One led to an attic staircase, which he climbed to an unfinished, peaked-ceilinged space smelling of mothballs and dust. He pulled a string hanging beside a bare bulb, bathing the room in harsh light. There were a number of boxes and trunks here, neatly arranged against the walls, all locked. In one corner stood a full-length mirror, dull and cobwebbed.

  Pendergast withdrew a pearl-handled switchblade from his jacket pocket and flicked it open. Methodically, without hurry, he slit open the boxes and sorted through them, resealing them with fresh packing tape when he was done. The steamer trunks came next: locks picked, searched, and relocked, everything left as before.

  As he moved toward the stairs, he paused before the mirror, and then, with the sleeve of his black suit, polished the mirror clean in one area and gazed into it. The face that looked back at him seemed almost alien; he turned away.