Two Graves

by Douglas Preston

  All these thoughts occurred in a split second.

  Eyeing the ground, Proctor looked for traces of Alban’s passing, but was unable to tease out the youth’s marks from the welter of fresh footprints in the dust. He took a deep breath and, after a moment, spun around the corner and covered the room with his weapon. A single, naked lightbulb, hanging from a wire that ran the length of the sub-basement, illuminated the room, casting deep shadows. Cases along the walls displayed a motley collection of stuffed reptiles.

  The room appeared to be empty.

  With a quick movement he darted across the floor and took cover behind an old case that lay on its side, rusting halberds spilling out. From that vantage point he scoured the room as best he could. He did not need to hurry. The killer wasn’t trying to escape—the killer was stalking him just as surely as he was stalking the killer.

  After ascertaining that the room was empty, Proctor darted to the far end and flattened himself against the archway that led into the next chamber, back in the direction of the staircase leading upward. This was filled with shelving, not just along the wall but also running across the middle, loaded with glass bottles in different colors, filled with strange and bizarre objects, dried insects, lizards, seeds, liquids and powders. There were many places to hide among those complicated rows of shelves, many places in which to set up an ambush.

  A pity, what he would have to do.

  Proctor carried a Beretta Px4 Storm with a 9 + 1 magazine, but he always carried two extra twenty-round magazines on his person: fifty rounds in all. He had a phobia of running out of ammunition. It had never happened to him, and it never would.

  He slipped out the ten-round magazine, inserted one of the twenties. It significantly increased the weight of the weapon, but it was necessary for what he was about to do.

  Unpredictable…

  Suddenly Proctor surged under the archway, firing repeatedly into the rows of shelves as he sprinted down the length of the room, shooting ahead first to one side and then to the other. The result was a roar of sound and a chaotic storm of glass as the expanding rounds tore through multiple rows of shelves, fragmenting as they went, blowing the shelving to smithereens. The noise in the confined space was deafening. Anyone hiding among the shelves would be, at the very least, blinded by flying glass and quite possibly struck by fragmenting bullets. Such a person would be unable to return fire accurately.

  Proctor continued running into the next chamber, maintaining a withering fire, blowing hundreds of glass bottles into glittering showers as he ran.

  The twenty rounds carried him through to a third chamber, a smaller space filled with cases of stuffed birds. Here, the magazine empty, he took cover behind a heavy oaken case that projected from one wall. Crouching, he held his breath and listened with great intensity.

  The residual sounds from the shoot-up echoed through the sub-basement: liquids draining, glass falling, an occasional crash. The stone floor behind him was now covered with thousands of glass shards. Nobody could walk over it—nobody—without making a sound. If the killer were behind him, he would not be able to follow without making his presence known.

  Still he waited. Gradually the after-sounds of destruction died away, leaving the monotonous drip, drip of liquids and a foul compound odor of alcohol, formaldehyde, dead animals, and dried insects.

  He knew that the next room was also stuffed with display cases, offering many hiding areas. The cases, he recalled, were loaded with ancient tools and antique devices. Proctor had no idea why Enoch Leng had assembled these bizarre collections, nor did he care. All he knew was that—most likely in one of the ancient rooms ahead—his adversary was also waiting.

  Proctor waited a very long time. Often success came from simply outwaiting one’s adversary. Eventually they would move. And then, bang.

  But this time, silence reigned. The adversary did not show himself.

  While it was possible the killer was in one of the rooms he’d already passed through, dead or gravely wounded, Proctor somehow doubted it. His gut told him that Alban was in one of the rooms that lay ahead.

  Waiting.

  Proctor removed the empty magazine and inserted the second twenty-round box. In that moment he heard the crunch of a footfall on glass.

  Spinning, astonished the killer was behind him, he quickly moved to a more defensible position in an alcove against the mortared wall.

  He waited again, listening intently. The entire floor of the previous room was covered with shattered glass. It was not possible to move without making noise—or was it?

  Ever so slowly, he crept up to the edge of the stone arch, listening. But there was no more sound. Could it have been something falling onto the glass?

  The uncertainty began to eat away at Proctor. He had to see, to find out. In a burst of speed, he launched himself back through the archway, racing down the center of the room, again firing to the left and right. He saw a flash of movement to his far right, behind a row of shattered bottles, and he fired at it repeatedly through the shelves before taking cover in an alcove along the far wall.

  Pressing himself into the space, he listened again. He must have hit the killer, or at least sprayed him with flying glass. He would be injured, perhaps blinded, frightened, disoriented.

  … Or was this just wishful thinking?

  Another loud crunch of glass, an unmistakable footfall.

  Bursting from the alcove, Proctor ran, firing again in the direction of the sound, through the already-broken bottles, sending up a kaleidoscopic spray of glittering shards, additional shelves crashing down, beakers spraying their contents. But as he raked the area from where the sound had come, he realized there was nobody. Nothing. He kept running until he reached the far end of the chamber, taking cover in a corner, staring wildly about.

  Abruptly, a pebble arced through the air, hit the lightbulb, and the room was plunged into darkness. Proctor immediately fired in the direction from which the pebble had been launched, the light from the adjacent room streaming in and providing a little illumination.

  He lowered the gun, breathing hard. How many rounds did he have left? He normally kept count, but this time he had lost track. He’d fired twenty, plus at least fifteen more. Which left perhaps five in this magazine and ten in the final magazine.

  His nightmare—running out of ammo—was starting to come true.

  As he crouched in the black corner, he realized his strategy had been a failure. He was dealing with an adversary of tremendous foresight and skill.

  He would need a new strategy. The killer probably expected him to continue on, to keep probing, searching, as he had been doing. So instead he would now turn around and retrace his steps. He would force the killer to come to him.

  Creeping along the wall, he reached the doorway to the next room. Light streamed through from its single bulb. This room, too, had been full of bottles, and the floor was covered with glass. He now faced the same problem he had posed his adversary. He could not move without making noise.

  Maybe. Crouching, he slipped off his shoes. Keeping low, he inched around the archway into the next room in his stockinged feet, keeping to the deep shadows behind the shattered cases. Slowly, slowly he moved, in complete silence, ignoring the broken glass that cut into the soles of his feet. Between each step he paused, listening.

  He heard a brief intake of breath, to his right, behind a massive row of broken shelves. Unmistakable. The killer must also be moving in stockinged feet.

  Did the killer see him? Impossible to know.

  Unpredictable—that’s what he had to keep in mind.

  He erupted into sudden, furious motion, running straight at the long, tall row of shelves, slamming into them and heaving them over, the shelving falling against the next row and the next, like dominoes, the already-broken and shot-up frames crashing down like a house of cards, trapping the person within in a storm of broken glass, chemicals, specimens, and twisted shelving.

  As he stepped back, he felt a
sudden blow to his arm and his .45 went flying. He spun, swinging his fist around, but the black figure had already flitted aside, slamming him in the ribs and sending him sprawling onto the glass.

  Proctor rolled and was up in one swift motion, the jagged neck of a broken beaker in his hand. The killer jumped back, picking up his own piece of jagged glass. They circled each other warily.

  Proctor, an expert with a knife, lunged, but the killer skipped aside and slashed at him, cutting his forearm. Proctor swept back and managed to rip the killer’s shirt, but the killer once again—with supernatural speed—turned and avoided the main thrust.

  Never in his life had Proctor seen anyone move so fast or anticipate so well. He advanced on the killer, slashing again and again, forcing him to retreat but scoring no hits. The killer backed against a table, dropped his shard of glass, and picked up a heavy retort. Proctor pressed his advantage, advancing and slashing. But then suddenly, as if from nowhere, the killer—who feinted back again as if once again in retreat—twisted around in the most extraordinary movement and slammed the retort against the side of Proctor’s head, the heavy glass shattering and sending Proctor to the floor, dazed.

  In a flash the killer was on top of Proctor, pinning him, the jagged glass of the retort pressed into his throat, right up against his carotid artery, with just enough pressure to cut the skin but go no deeper.

  Proctor, dazed, stupefied in shock and pain, could not believe he had been bested. It did not seem possible. And yet he had been defeated—at the very thing he was most skilled in.

  “Go ahead,” he said hoarsely. “Finish it.”

  The killer laughed, exposing gleaming white teeth. “You know perfectly well that if I wanted to kill you, you’d already be dead. Oh, no. You have a message to deliver to your master. And I have a brother who needs… attending to.”

  As he spoke, a long arm snaked out and removed the key to Tristram’s room from Proctor’s pocket.

  “And now, good night.”

  A sudden, stunning blow to the side of Proctor’s head caused the world to shut down in darkness.

  44

  IN THE APARTMENT OVERLOOKING FIRST AVENUE, LIEUTENANT Vincent D’Agosta paced restlessly. He threw himself down on the living room couch, turned on the television, ran aimlessly through the channels, then turned it off again. He got up, walked to the sliding door, and looked out over the darkened balcony. He went to the kitchen, opened the refrigerator door, took out a beer, thought better of it, replaced it and closed the door.

  Every few minutes he glanced toward the phone, then glanced away again.

  He knew he should join Laura in bed, get some sleep, but he also knew sleep just wouldn’t come. In the fallout that followed his meeting with Singleton, he’d been given a so-called command discipline and relieved of the squad commander post on the hotel killings—as Singleton had pointed out, he was damn lucky not to have fared worse, no thanks to Pendergast. The thought of getting up in the morning and going back to his desk and picking up the pieces of half a dozen piece-of-shit crimes was almost more than he could stand.

  He looked over at the phone again. He might as well get it over with—he’d never feel easy until he got it off his chest.

  He sighed, then picked up the phone and dialed Pendergast’s cell.

  It was answered on the third ring. “Yes?” came the cool southern drawl.

  “Pendergast? It’s me. Vinnie.”

  There was a pause. When the voice sounded again, it had dropped several dozen degrees in temperature. “Yes?”

  “Where are you?”

  “In my car. Driving home.”

  “Good. I thought you’d still be awake. Listen, I just wanted to say… well, how sorry I am about what happened.”

  When there was no answer, D’Agosta struggled on. “I didn’t know what to do. I mean, I was squad commander, it was my duty to report any and all possible evidence. Singleton was coming down hard on me—I was backed into a corner.”

  Still no reply. D’Agosta licked his lips. “Look, I know you’ve gone through a lot these past several weeks. I’m your friend, I want to help any way I can. But this… this is my job. I had no choice. You’ve got to understand.”

  When it came, Pendergast’s voice was as brittle, yet as steely, as he’d ever heard it. “Even one with the meanest comprehension would understand. You betrayed a confidence.”

  D’Agosta took a deep breath. “You can’t take it like that. I mean, we’re not talking about the sanctity of the confessional here. Withholding the identity of a serial killer, even if it is your own flesh and blood—that’s illegal. Trust me, better it came out now than later.”

  No response.

  “They took me off the case. And you—let’s face it—you were never on it to begin with. Let’s put that all behind us now.”

  “My son—as you so kindly pointed out—is a serial killer. How, precisely, am I supposed to put that behind me?”

  “Then let me help you. On the side. I’ll still have access and I can pass developments on to you. We’ve worked that way before—we can do it again.”

  Once again, Pendergast was silent.

  “Well? What do you say?”

  “What do I say? What I say is this: exactly how much longer am I to be burdened with self-serving justifications and unwanted offers of assistance?”

  D’Agosta felt the full force of this, and the unfairness of it all, coming suddenly to a boil. “You know what I say?” he shouted. “Fuck you!” And he slammed down the phone.

  45

  AS SOON AS PENDERGAST ENTERED THE MANSION HE sensed something was wrong. There was a watchful silence in the air, an unnatural stasis—and a faint, strange odor. A quick check showed that all the alarms were on and green, the locks un-tampered-with, everything in its place.

  Nevertheless, Pendergast moved fast through the echoing corridors to the library. It was cold, dark, and silent, the fireplace dead, no sign of Proctor.

  Swinging open the bookcases, he took the elevator to the basement, raced along the subterranean passageway to the secret door, opened it. Now the smell hit him like a wall—the commingled stench of formaldehyde, ethanol, and myriad other liquids, powders, and unguessable concoctions. He drew his .45 as he raced down the curve of the staircase.

  He emerged through the archway into the long string of underground chambers that made up the sub-basement, ran through the first half dozen, then stopped abruptly. The rooms ahead—stretching off one after another, connected by stone arches, illuminated by a string of lightbulbs—presented a scene of destruction. Everywhere glittered shards of colored glass and shattered bottles lay amid puddles of smoking liquids. Specimens were strewn everywhere, shelving lay upended and shattered upon the stone floor, and the cases along the walls were peppered with large-caliber bullet holes.

  “Tristram!” he cried as he began to run.

  He flew through the vaults, his shoes crunching on a carpet of glass, turned a corner halfway down the series of chambers, came to his son’s room, jammed his key in the lock, then turned it and wrenched open the door.

  A body lay on the floor, covered with a sheet. Stifling a gasp, Pendergast rushed to it and pulled the sheet back—to uncover Proctor, his face covered with blood. He quickly felt the pulse in his neck: strong. The chauffeur was alive but unconscious. Pendergast made an examination of Proctor’s body, determining he was merely battered, with a nasty gash on his head that had bled copiously and was clearly evidence of a concussion.

  Going to the connecting bathroom, he rinsed a cloth in warm water and returned, gently cleaning Proctor’s face and the cut on his head. The effort began to revive the man, and he tried to sit up, almost fainting as a result. Pendergast eased him back down.

  “What happened?” Pendergast asked, quietly but urgently.

  Proctor shook his head to clear it, then groaned at the resulting pain. “Alban… took Tristram.”

  “How in God’s name did he get in?”

&nbs
p; Another shake of the head. “No idea. Thought I heard… a noise.”

  “When did this happen?”

  “About a quarter… to ten.”

  It was now past eleven. Pendergast leapt up. There was no indication Alban and his victim had left the house—the alarms had been green. And yet more than an hour had passed since the attack.

  “I’m going to leave you here while I track them,” he said.

  Proctor waved a dismissive hand as if to say, Don’t worry about me.

  Sidearm at the ready, Pendergast performed a quick search of the room. Going through the mess of papers on Tristram’s desk, his attempts to write in English, he found a striking drawing of a mountain, with a note indicating it was a gift to his father. This discovery caused a painful twinge. But he pushed the feeling away as best he could, took the drawing, and left the room, locking the door behind him.

  He examined intently the marks in the dust of the side passage, but this close to Tristram’s room there were too many confusing footprints to bring any order to. He returned to the main corridor, continuing on as swiftly as he could while still maintaining vigilance, examining the riot of ruin that covered the floor. Passing through several more chambers, he came to the old laboratory of Professor Leng. The confrontation had not extended this far—the lab was relatively in order. Old soapstone tabletops were covered with beakers, retorts, titration apparatuses. He looked around carefully, then made his way noiselessly along the walls to the open door leading to the next and final room. It was full of weapons, both ancient and relatively modern: swords, maces, rifles, blackjacks, grenades, flails, tridents.

  Here Pendergast paused, fishing a small LED light from his pocket and exploring the room with it. Nothing appeared to be missing. At the far end, he stopped. There were fresh marks before an unobtrusive door in the wall.

  The security alarms had been green. The motion sensors had not been triggered. The mansion was exceedingly well wired against intruders—except for the basement and sub-basements, accessible only through the hidden elevator and secret door, which because of their bizarre layout and almost limitless extent could not be properly wired for security. Indeed, attempting to have done so might actually have compromised that secret section of the mansion. But this was all speculation, because no intruder could find his way into them.