Cold Vengeance p-11

by Douglas Preston

  CHAPTER 82

  AT FIVE MINUTES BEFORE SIX IN THE EVENING, Central Park lay under the drowsy enchantment of a Magritte painting: the sky above in vivid light, the trees and pathways below swathed in heavy dusk. The pulse of the city had slowed with the coming of evening; the cabs hushed by on Fifth Avenue, too lazy even to honk their horns.

  The Kerbs Memorial Boathouse rose like a confection of brick and verdigrised copper beside the mirrored surface of Conservatory Water. Beyond it, past a fringe of trees dressed in autumn colors, rose the monolithic expanse of Fifth Avenue, the ramparts of stone blushing pink in the reflected glow of the dying sun.

  Special Agent Pendergast made his way through the cherry trees of Pilgrim Hill and paused in the long shadows to scan the boathouse and its surroundings. It was an unusually warm fall evening. The oval pond was utterly calm, its mirror-like surface ablaze with the carmine and vermilion of the sky. The café adjoining the boathouse was closed for the day, and there were only a handful of would-be yachtsmen at the water’s edge plying their model yachts. A few children sat or lay beside them, hands idly stirring the water, staring out at the little vessels.

  Slowly, Pendergast circled the pond, passing the Alice in Wonderland statue as he approached the boathouse. A violinist stood on the stone parapet that rose before the lake, case open at his feet, playing “Tales from the Vienna Woods” with almost more rubato than the music could stand. A young couple sat on one of the benches before the boathouse, holding hands, whispering and nuzzling, identical backpacks beside them. On the next bench over sat Proctor, dressed in a suit of dark serge, apparently intent on reading The Wall Street Journal. A vendor of chestnuts and hot pretzels was closing up his cart for the day, and in the deep shadow behind the boathouse, in a cluster of rhododendrons, a homeless man was preparing his cardboard-box bed for the evening. A sprinkling of pedestrian commuters strode past on the various walkways leading to Fifth Avenue.

  Pendergast touched his earpiece. “Proctor?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Anything amiss?”

  “No, sir. Everything’s quiet. A couple of lovebirds who can’t seem to get enough of each other. A vagrant who’s just finished scrounging a meal from the trash. Now he’s settling down for the night with what looks like a bottle of Night Train. An art class was painting the lake, but they left about fifteen minutes ago. The last model yachtsmen are packing up their boats. Looks like a go.”

  “Very well.”

  While they spoke, Pendergast’s hands had clenched unconsciously. Now he opened them quite deliberately, flexed his fingers. He made a successful effort to slow his heart to a normal level. Taking a long, deep breath, he emerged into the open, strolling to the short parapet surrounding Conservatory Water.

  He checked his watch again: six o’clock exactly. He looked around — and then went quite still.

  Two new figures were approaching from the direction of Bethesda Fountain, indistinct beneath the dark canopy of trees. As he stared, they crossed the East Drive and continued to draw closer, past Trefoil Arch, past the statue of Hans Christian Andersen. He waited, hands at his sides, keeping his movements slow and casual. Beside him, a young boy laughed joyously as two of the toy yachts collided while coming into port.

  The figures, silhouetted by the evening sky, paused on the far side of Conservatory Water, looking in his direction. One was a man; the other, a woman. As they moved again, circling the lake toward him, he saw something about the woman — the poise of her bearing, the way her limbs moved as she walked — that momentarily stopped the beating of his heart. Everything around him — the yachtsmen, the lovers, the violinist, all the rest — vanished as he stared at her. As they rounded the edge of the lake they moved into a bar of evening light — and the woman’s features came clearly into view.

  Time itself seemed abruptly suspended. Pendergast could not move. She, after a moment’s pause, separated from the man and came toward him with hesitant steps.

  Was it really Helen? The thick auburn hair was the same — shorter, but just as lustrous as he remembered. She was as slender as she’d been when he first met her, perhaps even more so, and she carried her long limbs with the easy grace he recalled so well. But as she drew close he noted changes: crow’s-feet at the corners of her blue-and-violet eyes; those eyes that had stared sightlessly up at him on that terrible day among the fever trees. Her skin, always tawny and lightly freckled, had grown pale, even wan. Instead of the habitual self-confidence that had radiated from her like light from the sun, she had the diffident quality of someone who had been beaten down by the vicissitudes of life.

  She stopped a few feet from him and they looked at each other.

  “Is it really you?” he said, his voice little more than a croak.

  The woman tried to smile, but it was a wistful smile, almost forlorn. “I’m sorry, Aloysius. So very sorry.”

  Upon hearing her speak — a voice he now heard only in dreams — another shock rippled through Pendergast. For the first time in his life, he felt his self-possession gone; he found himself utterly unable to think, completely at a loss for words.

  She stepped up to him and, with the tip of one finger, touched the cut on his cheek. Then she looked beyond him, to the east, and pointed.

  He followed her gesture, gazing through the trees of the park and toward Fifth Avenue. There, framed by the stately buildings, rose a swollen, buttery moon.

  “Look,” she whispered. “After all these years, we still have the moonrise.”

  It had always been their secret: they had first met under the full moon, and in the brief years that followed they had made it an almost religious duty to be together and alone once a month, to watch the rise of the full moon.

  This convinced Pendergast of what he already felt in his heart: this was indeed Helen.

  CHAPTER 83

  JUDSON ESTERHAZY HAD KEPT A DISCREET DISTANCE from the couple and now took up a position in the eaves of the boathouse. He waited, hands in the pockets of his jacket, observing the peaceful scene. The violinist finished the waltz and segued smoothly into a sentimental rendition of “Moon River.”

  His fears of the Covenant receded somewhat. They knew Helen was alive now, and they were very powerful, but in Pendergast he had found his own powerful ally. Now all would be well.

  A dozen yards off, the last yachtsman had removed his model boat from the water and was taking it apart and putting the pieces into an aluminum case lined with foam cutouts. Esterhazy watched as Pendergast and Helen strolled along the verge of the pond. He felt, for the first time in his entire life, an immeasurable sense of relief — that finally he was finding his way out of the maze of evil in which he had been entangled since his earliest childhood memories. It had all happened so suddenly he could barely believe it. He almost felt reborn.

  And yet, despite the bucolic scene, Esterhazy still couldn’t rid himself of that old, eternal sense of apprehension. He couldn’t say why — there was absolutely no cause for concern. There was no way the Covenant could have learned of their meeting spot. No doubt his unease was merely habit.

  Now he began strolling behind the two, hanging back, allowing them a few moments of privacy. The Dakota was a short walk across the park, along well-frequented paths. But for now… Their murmured voices drifted back to him as they slowly made a circuit around the small pond.

  As they approached the boathouse again, Pendergast reached into the pocket of his jacket. He drew a ring from his pocket: a gold ring, set with a large star sapphire. “Do you recognize this?” he asked.

  A flush came over her features. “I never thought I’d see it again.”

  “And I never thought I’d get the chance to replace it on your finger. Until Judson told me you were still alive. I knew, I knew, he was telling the truth — even when nobody else believed me.” He reached for her left hand, his limbs still trembling slightly, preparing to place it on her ring finger.

  But as he lifted her arm, he paused. The ha
nd was gone. Only a stump remained, a jagged scar running across its end.

  “But why your hand? I thought your sister…”

  “The whole thing went awry. It was a horrific disaster, too complicated to explain now.”

  He looked back up at her. “Helen,” he said. “Why did you go along with this murderous scheme? Why did you conceal things from me — the Black Frame, Audubon, the Doane family, everything else? Why haven’t you—”

  She lowered her arm. “Let’s please not talk about that. Not now. Later — we’ll have plenty of time later.”

  “But Emma, your twin sister — did you know she’d be sacrificed?”

  Her face turned very pale. “I only learned… afterward.”

  “But you never contacted me, ever. How can I—”

  She stayed him with her good hand. “Aloysius, stop. There were reasons for everything. It’s a terrible story, a terrible story. I will tell it to you, all of it. But this is not the time or place. Now, please — let’s leave.” She tried to smile, but her face was white.

  She raised her other hand and wordlessly he slipped the ring onto the ring finger. As he did so, he glanced past her at the sylvan scene. Nothing had changed. Two distant joggers were approaching from the direction of the reservoir. A small child was crying, having gotten entangled in the leash of an excited Yorkshire terrier. The violinist was still sawing away industriously.

  His glance fell on the last remaining yachtsman, packing up his boat, still clumsily trying to fit the pieces into his case. His hands were shaking, and despite the chill air Pendergast noticed a sheen of perspiration on his forehead.

  A split second elapsed in which a dozen thoughts passed through Pendergast’s brain — speculation, realization, decision.

  Keeping his movements unhurried and calm, he turned toward Esterhazy and made a casual gesture for him to join them.

  “Judson,” he murmured. “Take Helen and get her away from here. Do it calmly but quickly.”

  Helen looked at him in confusion. “Aloysius, what—”

  Pendergast silenced her with a little shake of his head. “Take her to the Dakota — I’ll meet up with you there. Please go. Now.”

  As they began to move away, Pendergast glanced toward Proctor, sitting on the bench a hundred yards off. “We’ve got a problem,” he murmured into the headset. Then he continued strolling along the edge of the pond, toward the yachtsman, still struggling with his case. As he passed, he paused, keeping one eye on Esterhazy and Helen, moving along the path ahead of him.

  “Lovely boat,” he said, pausing. “Sloop or ketch?”

  “Well,” said the man with a sheepish look, “I’m rather new to this, couldn’t tell you the difference.”

  With a fast, easy movement Pendergast pulled his.45 and drew down on the man. “Stand up,” he said, “slowly. Keep your hands where I can see them.”

  The man looked up at him with a curiously blank expression. “Are you crazy?”

  “Do it.”

  The yachtsman started to rise. Then, with a lightning movement, he yanked a gun from beneath his jacket. Pendergast dropped him with a single shot, the roar of the.45 ripping across the silence of the evening.

  “Run!” he cried to Esterhazy and Helen.

  Instantly, all hell broke loose. The two lovers on the bench leapt to their feet, pulling TEC-9s from their backpacks and firing at Esterhazy, who had taken off at a run, pulling Helen along by the hand. The automatic fire cut him down, Esterhazy clawing the air with a scream as he fell.

  Helen stopped and turned. “Judson!” she cried over the commotion.

  “Keep running!” Esterhazy half choked, half coughed, writhing in the grass. “Keep—”

  Another clatter of gunfire raked Esterhazy, flipping him over onto his back.

  People were running everywhere, crying and screaming. Pendergast dropped one of the lovers with a shot from his.45 as he raced toward Helen; Proctor had leapt to his feet and, with a Beretta 93R that suddenly appeared in his hand, fired at the other lover, who had dropped down behind the bench, using her fallen companion as cover. As Pendergast tried to get a bead on her as well, out of the corner of his eye he saw the bum rise from his cardboard bed, extracting a shotgun from the bushes as he did so.

  “Proctor!” Pendergast cried, “the homeless man—!”

  But even as he spoke, the shotgun roared. Proctor, in the act of pivoting, was physically lifted off his feet by the impact and slammed backward, his Beretta clattering to the ground; he fell heavily, twitched, then went still.

  As the homeless man turned to fire at Pendergast, the agent brought him down with a round to the chest, punching the man backward into the bushes.

  Pendergast turned to see Helen, a hundred yards off, a low figure surrounded by fleeing people. She was still bending over her fallen brother, crying out in despair, cradling his head in her good hand.

  “Helen!” he shouted, sprinting toward her once again. “Fifth Avenue! Head for Fifth Avenue—!”

  The sound of a gunshot came from behind the bench and Pendergast felt a terrible blow to his back. The heavy-caliber round punched him to the ground, stunning him with its impact; his bulletproof vest stopped it but the wind had been knocked from him. He rolled over, coughing, and from a prone position returned fire at the shooter behind the bench. Helen had finally risen and was running toward the avenue. If he could cover her, suppress fire, she might just make it.

  The bench shooter fired and a bullet kicked up a clout of dirt inches from Pendergast’s face. He returned fire, heard the shot ricochet off the metal frame of the bench. Another shot came from between the slats; he felt a puff of air on his cheek as the bullet whined past his head and buried itself in his calf. Ignoring the fiery pain, Pendergast collected himself, emptied his lungs of air, and squeezed off another round; it passed between the slats this time, striking the shooter full in the face; she jerked backward, arms flinging out in surprise, and fell.

  The shooting stopped.

  Pendergast swept the scene of carnage with his eyes. Six bodies lay motionless around him: the two lovers, the would-be yachtsman, the homeless man, Proctor, Esterhazy. Everyone else had fled the vicinity, shrieking and crying. In the distance, he could make out Helen, still running, heading for a stone entrance leading to the Fifth Avenue sidewalk. Already he could hear distant sirens. He rose to follow, limping on his injured leg.

  Then he saw something else: the two joggers — who had paused, then altered course away when the gunfire erupted — were now making directly for Helen. And they were no longer jogging. They were sprinting.

  “Helen!” he cried, hobbling past the boathouse as quickly as he could, blood streaming from his leg. “Look out! To your left!”

  In the darkness beneath the trees, still at a run, Helen turned, seeing immediately that the joggers were going to cut her off at the gate. She swerved away, heading for a grove of trees off the path.

  The joggers veered in pursuit. Pendergast, realizing he could not catch up, dropped on his good leg and aimed the.45, squeezing off a round. But the target was more than two hundred feet away and moving fast, an almost impossible shot. He fired again, and then in desperation fired the final round from his magazine, missing again. Helen was sprinting toward a grove of sycamores alongside the Central Park boundary wall. In a furious movement, Pendergast ejected the empty magazine, slammed a fresh one home.

  A scream resounded as the two joggers caught Helen, one tackling her, the two of them wrestling her back to her feet.

  “Aloysius!” he heard her cry floating back toward him. “Help! I know these people! Der Bund—the Covenant! They’ll kill me! Help me, please—!”

  They dragged her back toward the gate to Fifth Avenue. With a groan of fury Pendergast staggered to his feet, stumbling forward, summoning the last of his ebbing strength, willing himself to stay on his feet. His wound was bleeding profusely but he ignored it, moving forward at a shambling lope.

  He saw where the
joggers were headed: a taxi, waiting at the Fifth Avenue curb. He would never make it — but the car at least was a good target. Sinking back down, head spinning, he fired at it, the round striking the side window with a dull thud, ricocheting off. Armored. He aimed lower, at the tires, squeezed off two more rounds, but the bullets ricocheted harmlessly off armored hubcaps.

  “Aloysius!” Helen screamed as the joggers reached the taxi and flung open the rear door. They threw her inside and climbed in after her.

  “Los, verschwinden wir hier!” he heard one of the joggers shout. “Gib Gas!”

  The passenger door slammed shut. Pendergast stopped, took careful aim, preparing to shoot at the tires again — but the car screeched from the curb and the final round zinged harmlessly off the lower body.

  “Helen!” he cried. “No!”

  The last thing he saw, as a black mist rose before his eyes, was the taxi disappearing into a sea of identical cabs moving south on Fifth Avenue. As darkness rushed in, amid the sounds of rising sirens, he whispered once again: Helen.

  He had found Helen Esterhazy Pendergast — only to lose her again.

  Authors’ Note

  While most towns and other locations in Cold Vengeance are imaginary, we have in a few instances employed our own version of existing places such as Scotland, New York City, New Orleans, and Baton Rouge. In such cases, we have not hesitated to alter geography, topology, history, and other details to suit the needs of the story.

  All persons, locales, police departments, corporations, institutions, museums, and governmental agencies mentioned in this novel are either fictions or used fictitiously.

  Dear Reader,

  Earlier this year, we launched a new series of thrillers featuring an uncommon investigator by the name of Gideon Crew. The first book in this series, Gideon’s Sword, was published in February. We’re now hard at work on the second in the series, titled Gideon’s Corpse, due to be published in the winter of 2012.