Bloodless

by Douglas Preston

  The rest of it lay about twenty feet away, connected by a long coil of viscera from which a single french fry—rotten and undigested—could be seen protruding.

  22

  IT WAS QUARTER PAST ten that evening when Constance ascended the wide central staircase of the Chandler House. The hotel’s carpeting was attractive—intertwining gold acanthus on a field of deep scarlet—but even if the stairs had been bare wood, her steps, from long experience, would have made no noise.

  She paused on the fourth-floor landing to glance around. To her right was a short hallway that ended past half a dozen guest rooms. To her left the hall stretched on for a long way before making a jog.

  Although the hotel had a fifth floor, the stairway ended here, on the fourth. She stood motionless, wondering where the fifth-floor staircase might be found.

  Constance had spent the last hour in the suite of rooms she shared with Pendergast—Coldmoon having been banished to the third floor when he refused to stop brewing his rank and no doubt carcinogenic camp coffee. Constance had taken an interest in the Savannah Vampire legend, and so she had gone in search of the hotel’s library. Although small, it had proven to be of interest. After noting the books they had on the subject, she had indulged in a second curiosity and made her way up the floors of the hotel, one by one, until she reached the fourth—and could go no farther.

  As she looked down the hallway, she could not help but admire the care, taste, and expense that had gone into renovating and remodeling the building. The small china chandeliers, the flocked wallpaper, the sporting prints and landscapes combined to create an antebellum charm that was, somehow, also fresh. Constance sensed an obsessively careful hand at work here.

  She began walking silently down the hall.

  Everything she’d learned about Felicity Frost increased her curiosity. Nobody knew Miss Frost’s background, or who her family was, beyond the fact that she must have come from money.

  In her careful inquiries, Constance had learned a few things. When Frost first converted the building into a hotel, back in the nineties, she had run the place almost single-handedly. She affected a pearl-handled cane and wore hats with veils every Sunday, even though she never went to church. In those days she had been anything but a recluse. She had a quick tongue and was not shy in conversation. Whenever anyone inquired about her past, or her “people,” she would happily enlighten them. Every time, however, the story was different, and those stories grew more elaborate and outrageous with each telling. Her great-great-grandfather had made his fortune in the fur trade, and she’d grown up on a réserve indienne in Quebec. She was a descendant of the only child of Bonnie and Clyde, born in secret and, on reaching maturity, invested her parents’ ill-gotten gains in a young company called IBM. In her wayward youth, she had successfully hijacked a plane to Cuba and made off with a suitcase full of smuggled gemstones. She was the granddaughter of Grand Duchess Anastasia of Russia, who, instead of being massacred by Bolsheviks in Yekaterinburg in 1918, escaped to the forests of the Carpathian Mountains, taking with her three Fabergé eggs. Eventually people tired of being made fools of and stopped asking. But the curiosity and speculation never died away.

  Around ten years ago, it seemed, Miss Frost—then well into her seventies—had been struck by some kind of age-related condition. It was generally believed to affect her mind as well as her body, because her behavior, always eccentric, grew markedly more extreme. She withdrew from the day-to-day work of running the hotel and became increasingly dependent on Ellerby, the manager, to attend to details. She spent more and more time in her rooms on the fifth floor, growing increasingly reclusive, until at last she kept to them entirely. She restricted access to the top floor to just a few chosen maids and Ellerby. Now and then, despite slowly increasing enervation, she was subject to fits of sudden anger. Maids could come up twice a week, to clean and to change the linens, but they had to adhere to a strict schedule; and Miss Frost was never in those rooms while the maids were present. The only other people allowed to visit were her private physician, a Dr. Phyrum—and Patrick Ellerby, by this time the hotel’s proprietor in everything but title, who brought her all her meals and visited her in the evenings. Sometimes, late at night, piano music could be heard.

  This was what Constance, in careful and diligent inquiries, had been able to learn. She’d considered asking Aloysius to dig into FBI databases to find out more but found herself hesitating. The story of a woman locking herself away from the world and spending time in private pursuits struck a chord in Constance. And beyond that, the southern gothic trappings, the rumors and whispers, were too delicious to ruin with the winter wind of truth.

  Naturally the talk had included speculation about the nature of the relationship between Miss Frost and Ellerby. One line of gossip was that the old lady wasn’t as feeble as she made out and had killed the younger man in a lover’s quarrel. It certainly seemed that the older she got, the more she disapproved of Ellerby’s side interest in the stock market. But Constance dismissed the more prurient of these speculations as being too obvious to be true. What fascinated her more was the idea of Felicity Winthrop Frost, feeling her strength, health, and mental faculties begin to desert her, boarding herself up—like a modern-day Miss Havisham—in her luxurious apartments.

  She had nearly reached the bend in the hallway when she stopped at a door to her right. Like the others she had passed, it was closed. But something was different—there was no number on it, and the wood seemed to be of a denser, thicker variety than the others. The knob was different as well—old-fashioned, of polished brass, with an ornate lock beneath it. It was set far apart from the normal-looking hotel doors that flanked it. As she stood silently, staring at the featureless door, she thought she detected piano music—beautifully dark and dense, perhaps Brahms—coming from above. Her hand reached for the doorknob.

  “Oh, miss!” came a voice from down the hall.

  Constance, who was rarely startled, was surprised now. Quick as a snake, she turned toward the voice, the hand that had just been reaching for the knob darting into the pocket of her skirt that held an antique Italian stiletto.

  A maid had just come around the jog in the hallway, holding a large silver platter with several steel domes upon it—evidently a room service order. Constance had been so intent on the music that she had not heard the woman approach. The speed with which she’d turned, however, had so startled the maid that she stepped back, almost dropping the tray.

  “You can’t go in there, miss!” the maid said, voice trembling slightly. “That leads to Miss Frost’s apartment.”

  Constance said nothing. She let her hand drop slowly to her side.

  “It’s past ten…she’s likely to be waking up any moment now,” the maid continued. “I’m very sorry, but she can’t be disturbed.”

  “Of course not,” Constance said in a calm voice. “I was merely wandering. Would you mind telling me where the hotel library is located?”

  “On the first floor, room 104.”

  “Thank you.”

  The maid curtsied—a little awkwardly, given the tray she was holding—then walked past Constance. Constance watched as she knocked on a guest’s door; disappeared inside the room for a minute; then came back out again, empty-handed except for the bill. She walked past Constance again with a small, nervous smile, then went out of sight past the jog in the corridor, heading for the service elevator.

  Constance stood where she was for another few minutes, gazing first in the direction the maid had taken, then at the unmarked door. Finally she turned and—silent as a cat—returned along the hallway the way she’d come and disappeared down the stairs.

  23

  AGENT COLDMOON STOOD AT the edge of the clearing, the early-morning sun filtering down through the mist that rose among moss-draped trees. A lot of useless crime scene tape had been strung, he thought: a sign of overzealous police work, unnecessary since the area where the dog had been killed wasn’t accessible to the pu
blic anyway. The local homicide team and a bevy of Georgia crime scene investigators had worked the site under lights over the course of the night. The local PD technicians had made a credible show of investigating the area: taking photos, collecting samples, scouring the ground for every clue. The M.E., McDuffie, and a forensic veterinarian had gone in next and examined the corpse in situ.

  Coldmoon had made sure to position himself upwind from the dead dog. It had been a warm, humid night and he didn’t want to take any chances. Even without the smell it was a pretty horrific sight.

  “Curious,” murmured Pendergast. “Most curious.”

  Coldmoon wasn’t inclined to ask Pendergast what he found curious, even if the agent would have told him—which he probably would not.

  “I believe it is our turn, Agent Coldmoon,” said Pendergast. “Shall we?”

  Pendergast ducked under the tape and Coldmoon followed. There was no need to put on a monkey suit, thank God: it was only eight in the morning but already a scorcher. And here was his partner, wearing a damn linen suit with big green rubber Wellingtons on his feet. Somehow, he’d kept the suit immaculate even as they’d pushed through vegetation and waded through muck along the riverbank to reach this spot.

  Coldmoon hung back a little. Dead dogs weren’t really his area of expertise, and he was happy to let others take the lead. Pendergast, on the other hand, seemed as eager as ever when a dead body—human or otherwise—was in the vicinity. He made a beeline for the severed head and knelt next to it, slipping on a pair of nitrile gloves. He examined it with a magnifying glass.

  “By Jove, Watson,” Coldmoon muttered.

  If Pendergast heard, he made no sign. He lifted the dog’s tongue, turned it over, and swabbed something from it; then swabbed the dog’s canines and put both swabs in a tube. Another tube came out and he took more rapid samples. Meanwhile, the M.E. and vet were examining the rest of the dog, twenty feet distant.

  Now Pendergast was examining the dog’s badly torn neck. “Agent Coldmoon?”

  Coldmoon came over. Pendergast was pointing to vertebrae exposed in the neck. He waved off a few flies as they looked closer at the bloody mess.

  Pendergast handed him the glass. “If you please.”

  It didn’t please, but Coldmoon took a look anyway. He could see that the tip of one vertebra had broken off and the spinal cord was ragged and torn. “Looks like a lot of force was used.”

  “Exactly,” said Pendergast. “One might assume the head was cut off, but when you examine the flesh, here, and here”—he poked at some muscles in the neck with a swab—“and that fractured vertebra, it looks more like it was torn off. Do you see?”

  “Right,” said Coldmoon. “Right.”

  Pendergast rose. “Let us look at the other section of the body.”

  They joined the M.E. and the vet, still crouching over the remains. Pendergast gave the carcass such a thorough examination, once again with his magnifying glass almost pressed against the fast-decaying flesh, spreading open this wound and probing into that cut, that Coldmoon had to avert his eyes. He hoped to God he wouldn’t be asked to examine something.

  “Well,” said Pendergast as he rose, examination complete. “Dr. McDuffie, what do you make of it?”

  The M.E., high-strung to begin with, seemed particularly nervous. Coldmoon understood why when he saw Commander Delaplane come striding out of the swamp, a look of displeasure on her face.

  “I’ll defer to my veterinary colleague, Dr. Suarez.”

  The vet, a young fellow with a lean frame, laid-back in comparison to McDuffie’s fretfulness, said: “Well, if we weren’t out in the middle of a bayou, I’d say this dog had been hit by a truck. You can see evidence of trauma, significant internal injuries, and broken bones.” As he spoke, he gestured with a bloody scalpel, which he had been using to take tissue samples.

  “Curious,” said Pendergast.

  Delaplane was now standing behind them, listening, her arms crossed.

  “So, in the absence of being hit by a Peterbilt, I’d say the dog was beaten badly—perhaps with a baseball bat or crowbar—and cut or slashed. Possibly, both the butt and blade of an ax were used. We’ll know more when we get the remains to the lab.”

  “Dr. Suarez,” said Pendergast, “I fear your conclusions may require some additional thinking.”

  Suarez raised his eyebrows. “And why is that?”

  “The abuse of the dog you just described would have taken a certain amount of time. But this dog was killed instantly.”

  “Agent Pendergast, even without medical training you can see how extensive these injuries are. It simply isn’t possible for them to happen simultaneously—unless, as I said, the dog was hit by a truck.” He spread his hands and smiled. “But…out here, in the woods?”

  “I respect your observations, Dr. Suarez. Nevertheless, according to everyone interviewed, the dog was killed so quickly it made virtually no sound. It was barking hysterically—and then there was sudden silence. The dog had a GPS collar, which was found within minutes of the cessation of barking.”

  “That’s pretty damn mystifying, then,” said Suarez. “Look at the forensic evidence: This dog has numerous broken bones, multiple internal injuries, and it’s been ripped apart with some sort of hook or hatchet. See these ragged cuts in the abdomen, here, and the place where the head was severed? None of that’s clean—just a frenzy of ripping and tearing.”

  “I do see them,” said Pendergast. “The witnesses, however, are quite clear in stating they reached the clearing only moments after the dog stopped barking. There was no one, or no thing, there. The attacker was gone.”

  The vet smiled. “I would like to hear your theory, Agent Pendergast.”

  But Pendergast didn’t answer. Something in the direction of the river had attracted his attention. He rose and wandered off, disappearing into the trees.

  Suarez shook his head. “He’s an odd duck. Never met an FBI agent like him.”

  “And you never will again,” said Coldmoon, irritated. “He’s the very best.”

  After a short silence, Commander Delaplane said: “If you’re asking about theories, I’ve got one. We have a person who kills two people and steals their blood. Then he disembowels a dog. There’s only one explanation for this: we’ve got a maniac on our hands, someone big and powerful enough to tear apart a dog. The question is: why?”

  Delaplane rounded on Coldmoon. “Is there anything in your criminal databases like this?”

  Coldmoon rose and pulled off his gloves. “There was a situation in Russia in the 1990s,” he said, “of a gang who killed homeless people passed out in parks in Moscow, and drained their blood to sell on the black market. But obviously that’s not likely the case here.”

  Delaplane frowned. “We need a break in this case, fast. The senior senator from Georgia is on the warpath, or so I’m told.” She looked around, glaring. “All right,” she said. “Load the remains of the dog into evidence bags and bring them back to the lab for further analysis. We’ve done all we can here.”

  At this juncture, Coldmoon heard his radio crackle. “Agent Coldmoon?” came Pendergast’s voice. “Please come to the shore. And bring the others.”

  Delaplane turned. “Is that your partner?”

  “Yes.”

  “What does he want?”

  “I don’t know.” Coldmoon set off in the direction of the voice, with Delaplane, Sheldrake, the M.E., and the vet following. They left the clearing and headed through the trees, toward the river.

  “This way,” came the faint voice.

  The trees gave way to an embankment covered with marsh grass, leading to a mudflat along the river. Pendergast stood ten yards out in the mud, knee deep. Amazingly, the Wellies had managed to keep his cream-colored suit still immaculate. He was taking photographs.

  “Take care to preserve the marks, there, in front of me,” he said, pointing to a disturbed area in the mud. “I believe they are significant.”

  Cold
moon peered in the indicated direction. There was a large, irregular depression in the mud, as if something had swiped across its surface, leaving an unclear, confused impression.

  “What is it?” Delaplane called out, standing next to Coldmoon and peering at the smear. “Why’s this significant?”

  “Because,” said Pendergast, “when you approach you will see, in the section closest to my left, a small plug of bloody fur—which, unless I’m very much mistaken, came from the back of our unfortunate bloodhound.”

  24

  IT’S VERY STRANGE,” SAID McDuffie breathily as he led the way into a small conference room to one side of the M.E. lab. “Very strange,” he repeated as Coldmoon and the others all took seats around the central table. “Dr. Kumar will explain it.”

  The doctor, a small man with dark skin and a lively face, opened a briefcase and passed out slim folders to everyone. Coldmoon opened his. There was a cover letter, followed by a bunch of incomprehensible lab reports replete with structural formulas. He quickly shut it but noted that Pendergast, next to him, seemed fully absorbed. Was chemistry another of the agent’s unexpected talents? He decided it must be.

  “Well,” said McDuffie, clasping and unclasping his hands, “Dr. Kumar has something to tell us about the, ah, substance recovered from two of the victims.”

  Dr. Kumar nodded and cast his bright eyes around the table. “As George just said, it is most strange. The details are in the folder, but I’ll try to explain in common English.”

  “Thank you, Dr. Kumar,” said Pendergast.

  “The substance we found on both victims is a mixture of organic molecules, all very unusual. One compound, making up over fifty percent of the sample, will serve as an example. It is a very complex and large organic polymer—a long chain molecule with a core of carbon and hydrogen—with side groups of sulfur, nitrogen, iron, and strangely enough, silver. This is not a substance we would find in any living organism.”