Verses for the Dead

by Douglas Preston

The cab veered onto the shoulder, avoiding the stalled traffic, then swerved sharply left at Ninth Street.

  “Mind explaining what went on back there?” Coldmoon asked as he woke up his phone and dialed in the Miami City Cemetery.

  “Just a moment.” Pendergast leaned forward. “What route are you taking?” he asked the driver.

  The man braked violently at the intersection of Collins Avenue, forcing Coldmoon to grab the oh-shit handle above his window. “The causeway, then Biscayne.”

  Pendergast looked inquiringly at Coldmoon, who looked in turn at his phone. MacArthur Causeway was a solid red line of traffic, stretching all the way from Miami Beach to the mainland. He shook his head.

  “No,” said Pendergast.

  “What do you mean, no?” came the reply from the front seat. “You want to get there or not?”

  “Venetian Way looks like a better bet,” said Coldmoon, jumping back and forth between traffic apps.

  “Over the islands? You crazy, man, or—”

  “I’ll make you a deal,” Pendergast interrupted. “My friend here will provide the directions; you will follow them, breaking any and all traffic laws necessary to keep us moving; and I’ll keep handing you money. What do you say?” And he peeled off another fifty and tossed it into the front seat.

  The driver, Axel, glanced at it, then—jamming his foot on the gas again—shot across Collins Avenue to the screaming protest of oncoming horns. For a busted-up old taxi, Axel’s ride had plenty of juice.

  “Flashers on, please, and take the median strip to the light,” said Pendergast.

  “Whatever.” The cab mounted the curb and tore along the grass, fishtailing slightly.

  “Right on Meridian, left on Seventeenth,” Coldmoon told the cabbie.

  Pendergast settled back as the cab swerved back onto the roadway and shot along Meridian to a symphony of blaring horns.

  “So what happened back there?” Coldmoon asked.

  Pendergast settled into the seat. “A charming couple from Brisbane, on their way to Orlando. I advised against it and pointed out the wisdom of staying another day at their hotel—in an upgraded room, of course, at no charge to them.”

  “Why not just flash your gold and take the damn cab away from them?”

  “To such a lovely elderly couple? How uncouth.”

  “So you conned them out of their taxi.”

  “I did them a favor. No civilized person should have to set foot willingly in Orlando. I suggested the World Erotic Art Museum would be a better choice, just around the corner from the hotel.”

  The cab turned onto Seventeenth, then accelerated dramatically, pinning the two agents to their seats. The driver threaded his way expertly between cars, honking and swerving, finally driving over the edge of a sidewalk.

  “Run the light, please.” With this comment, another fifty landed in the front seat.

  The cabbie ran the light and continued on. Coldmoon checked the apps again. No route was traffic-free, but this one was the least of many evils.

  Ahead of them, a vista of intense blue suddenly appeared—Biscayne Bay. Thirty seconds later the road became a bridge, bisecting a parallel series of lozenge-shaped isles, glittering green and white in the cerulean, like jewels set into a Fabergé egg. Coldmoon stared at the gleaming high-rise condos and marinas before him, fringed by countless palm trees and seeming to rise out of the tropical water like dream castles. It occurred to him that had he been shown a picture of such a place during his childhood on the Pine Ridge Reservation, he would have assumed it was something out of a fairy tale.

  His thoughts were interrupted by a violent screech of brakes that threw him against the driver’s headrest. Recovering, he saw a long line of brake lights ahead and what appeared to be an accident. He realized that Pendergast—and the driver, via the rearview mirror—was looking at him expectantly.

  “Well?” Axel asked. “What now, Davy Crockett?”

  Coldmoon glanced at his phone. They were on the eastern edge of Rivo Alto Island. “Make a left, two rights, then back onto Venetian Way.”

  Without another word, the driver twisted the steering wheel, gunned into the oncoming lane, drove along it for a hundred yards, then made a left, the rear end fishtailing. Pendergast let another fifty-dollar bill drop gently into the front seat.

  “You know, it would probably have been easier to just rent a chopper,” Coldmoon said.

  To his surprise, Pendergast took the suggestion seriously. “Anything would be an improvement on this abominable traffic.” He was silent a moment. “This is the second time I’ve been late to a crime scene. I won’t be late to a third.”

  The taxi, once again weaving in and out across both directions of traffic, now veered over the final island in the chain and approached the breastwork of hotels lining the mainland shore. “Right on Second Avenue,” Coldmoon said, observing that Route 1, too, was little better than a parking lot, thanks to construction ahead.

  By way of answer, the cab shot across one intersection, then another, narrowly missing being T-boned by a moving van, then made a harrowing right onto Second, the rear tires smoking, again using the median strip, weaving among palm trees as if on a slalom course. And then the car lurched once again to a stop. This time, it looked more or less final: all lanes ahead were at a standstill, apparently blocked by the construction and spillover from Route 1.

  “Damn,” he muttered.

  But even as he spoke he saw Pendergast throw another bill into the front seat and get out. Coldmoon followed suit. Three blocks ahead, he could make out a patch of green: the cemetery.

  “Eleven minutes,” Pendergast said. “Excellent. Perhaps we’ll even beat our friend the lieutenant.” And threading his way between the cars to the sidewalk, he began moving north at a smooth but rapid walk.

  14

  SPECIAL AGENT COLDMOON nodded to the two cops manning the gate as he passed into the City of Miami Cemetery. More cop cars were arriving, and activity was ramping up. He paused to cast a cold eye over the scene even as Pendergast skipped lightly ahead. An asphalt lane bisected the cemetery: a large grassy area surrounded by a green-painted fence and shaded by gnarled oaks. Lining the central lane were tombstones and mausoleums of various styles and shapes, some decrepit, others well kept. The cemetery looked venerable, and—judging by the vaults—was home to some pretty wealthy corpses. Strange place for a burial ground, though: almost in the shadow of downtown Miami.

  When he had taken in the spirit of the place, he strode toward the mausoleum where the heart had apparently been found, a grim temple of granite roped off with crime scene tape, surrounded by a growing crowd of police and forensic teams. Pendergast was nowhere to be seen. He spoke to one of the local cops and learned the interior would be cleared and ready for their entry in about thirty minutes.

  Coldmoon took a leisurely stroll beyond the crime scene tape, committing to memory all he could of the scene. This particular mausoleum was built from massive blocks, with two stone urns flanking the entrance and a heavy copper door covered with verdigris. The name carved above the lintel was FLAYLEY. As he passed the open front doors, he could see the shabby interior, brilliantly lit, where two CSU investigators in white suits moved about. They reminded Coldmoon of ancestral spirits, confused and wandering, seeking release from their earthly shackles.

  On the far side, a distant figure caught his eye: a mourner in black, kneeling, head bowed in sorrow. Then he realized it was Pendergast. He ambled over to find his partner examining the grass, nose practically buried in the ground. A pair of tweezers was in his hand.

  “Find anything?”

  “Not yet.” Still, he slipped a test tube out of somewhere, put something invisible into it with the tweezers, and stood up. He continued to work his way in a circle around the mausoleum, as if, Coldmoon thought, “cutting for sign”—a tracking trick he had learned during his childhood.

  “I would appreciate a second pair of eyes on the ground,” Pendergast said. “I’m lo
oking for ingress and egress.”

  “Since last night was a full moon, with a cloudless sky, you’re assuming he didn’t walk in by the service road.”

  “Precisely.”

  They made an excruciatingly slow loop, picking up every trace they could. Finally, when they got back to where they had started—with no success, it seemed—Pendergast squinted toward the mausoleum. “Ah. The chamber of the dead is now ready.”

  Members of the Crime Scene Unit—under the watchful gaze of Lieutenant Sandoval—were packing up their gear and taking off their suits. Following Pendergast, Coldmoon ducked under the tape and entered the mausoleum.

  Both right and left walls were lined with niches, three rows of five, making thirty crypts total, all sealed over save for one at the far left. A plaque of marble covered each crypt, carved with a name and dates, but some of the coverings had cracked and fallen to the floor, revealing the rotten coffins within. The floor was thick with dust and evidence of rat activity, while the walls were massively stained from roof leaks.

  While Pendergast prowled around silently, Coldmoon focused his gaze on the niche in question. It was one of the newest.

  AGATHA BRODEUR FLAYLEY

  September 3, 1975

  March 12, 2007

  Its marble plaque had been removed and set aside. Hanging before the coffin on a string, like a Christmas ornament, was a human heart, swinging ever so slightly, cradled in a crude net made of roasting twine. A single drop of clotted blood hung from the bottom like an icicle. A sticky pool had formed on the floor below it.

  Fastened to the heart with a large diaper pin was a note. Coldmoon approached it with caution, photographed it with his cell phone, and then stepped back to read it.

  My lovely Agatha,

  Your end was the most horrifying of all and for that I am so very sorry. Death lies on you like an untimely frost. Because I am a man of Action and not just words, I have brought you a gift by way of atonement.

  With fond wishes,

  Mister Brokenhearts

  “Brokenhearts fancies himself a man of literary parts,” said Pendergast, coming up behind him.

  “You mean the quote from Romeo and Juliet?”

  To Coldmoon’s gratification, Pendergast’s brows rose slightly in surprise. “Indeed. We can add that to the line from T. S. Eliot in the previous note.”

  “‘Let us go then, you and I, when the evening is spread out against the sky,’” Coldmoon intoned. “I took a bunch of English lit classes my freshman year,” he said by way of explanation.

  “Indeed. Although I can’t imagine what J. Alfred Prufrock has to do with this—” Pendergast gestured at the oversize diaper pin, its lime-green plastic head molded in the shape of a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle— “except to indicate our killer might have a droll sense of humor.”

  While Coldmoon took photographs, Pendergast went down again on his hands and knees to examine the floor, plucking more invisible items here and there with the tweezers. As he worked, Coldmoon heard an excited voice in a thick Florida drawl outside, along with the more measured tones of Lieutenant Sandoval.

  “Ah, the man who found the heart,” said Pendergast as he rose. “Shall we have a word?”

  The man was retelling the story of his discovery to Sandoval. Coldmoon turned on his recorder and slipped it into his front pocket.

  “My good man,” said Pendergast, “we haven’t heard your story yet. May we listen in?”

  “You bet. I was just telling the policeman here—”

  “Your name?” Coldmoon interrupted.

  “Joe Marty. I’m the day caretaker. So anyway, after I arrive, I’m doing my rounds and I see them copper doors open. I think to myself, it wasn’t like that yesterday. Nossir. I keep a close eye, gentlemen, on these tombs. A lot of famous people are interred here, and we don’t want anyone messing with them, or taking souvenirs. So I see them doors open and I poke my head in. Don’t see nothing. So I push the door open a little more and go inside. Still nothing.”

  His voice was rising in pitch, building to a climax.

  “But there’s this funny smell. Off, you know. So I turn around and bump this thing with my head, setting it swinging back and forth, you know? And I says to myself, there shouldn’t be anything hanging in here like that. So I reach out to grab it and it’s all wet and sticky, and there’s this piece of paper pinned to it, and I let go real fast. And I see my hand is all covered with something, so I hold it out into the daylight and it looks like blood and that’s when I start yelling. Yessir, I yelled like you wouldn’t believe. Then I call the manager and he calls the police, and here we are! Let me tell you—”

  Pendergast adroitly inserted a question into this torrent of words. “What time did you arrive at work?”

  “Seven. That’s when I start. Nothing like this ever happened here—”

  “When you touched the heart,” Pendergast asked, “did you notice if it was still warm?”

  “Why, shoot, I never thought of that. But now that you mention it, it was a bit on the warmish side.” He shuddered.

  “Any ideas how the killer might have entered and left the cemetery?”

  “Hell, that fence ain’t tall enough to keep anybody out. We get kids coming in here, drinking beer, urinating—very disrespectful.”

  “Often?”

  “Damned often enough.”

  “Thank you. Agent Coldmoon, any questions?”

  Coldmoon saw Marty turn his small, wet eyes to him. “Do people ever come to visit this tomb? Lay flowers?”

  “No, this is one of them that don’t seem to have nobody.”

  “Who’s responsible for upkeep?”

  “We do the grounds. But the plots themselves belong to each family, and they’re supposed to do it. Lot of them don’t, and it’s a goddamned shame—”

  “Are you familiar with the Flayley family?”

  “Never heard of them. Not famous like some in here. Maybe they’ve died off, or live far away. It happens. I don’t mind telling you, when I saw that heart swinging back and forth, it just about froze my blood.”

  “I’m sure it did,” said Coldmoon. “Thank you.”

  Joe Marty walked off, casting about, looking for someone else to tell his story to. Coldmoon could see that at the cemetery entrance the press was starting to arrive in force, kept back by the police.

  A homicide detective approached, wearing a seersucker suit and brandishing a pair of files. He handed them to Sandoval, who flipped through one quickly, then passed it to Pendergast. “Here’s the initial backgrounder on Agatha Flayley. Another suicide. Found hanging from a bridge in Ithaca, New York.”

  “Thank you.” As Pendergast took the file, Coldmoon caught a quick movement out of the corner of his eye: a tall, lanky man in a Hawaiian shirt and skinny jeans, a hipster porkpie on his head, was approaching swiftly. When he saw them turn toward him, he called out: “Could I have just a brief word with you gentlemen—?”

  A reporter. Sandoval’s face blossomed with annoyance. “Jesus, look who’s here. Don’t you know this is off limits?”

  The lanky man waved some sort of card. “Come on, Lieutenant, think of all the favors I’ve done you guys! Please: one question, two, that’s all.”

  “Get back behind the perimeter.”

  “Wait, just a—” The reporter suddenly froze, staring at Pendergast. “You!”

  Coldmoon looked at his partner. The agent’s face, usually expressionless, showed a rare surprise.

  “What are you doing here?” the reporter asked.

  Sandoval sighed in exasperation. “Smithback, get behind the perimeter before I have my men escort you out. You know this is a restricted area.”

  “Hold on, please.” The reporter took a step toward Pendergast and stuck out his hand. “Agent Pendergast. How are you?”

  Pendergast was still for a moment. “Fine. Thank you.” He reluctantly took the hand, and Smithback gave his a vigorous shake.

  “You know this guy?”
Sandoval asked Pendergast.

  But Smithback swung around and answered the question. “Of course he knows me.”

  “All right, you’ve said hello. Now back behind the perimeter.” Sandoval beckoned to some uniforms. “Sergeant Morrell,” he called out. “Will you and Gomez show this guy out?”

  “Pendergast, please!”

  Pendergast seemed to recover himself. “Mr. Smithback, I’m surprised to see you. I hope you are well?”

  “Great, thanks.” The reporter glanced toward the swiftly approaching officers and lowered his voice. “Um, why is the FBI involved?”

  “Two reasons. The case presents unusual psychological aspects that have interested our Behavioral Analysis Unit. And the targeted graves are out-of-state suicides, triggering federal involvement.”

  “Targeted how?”

  “I regret we can’t get into details.”

  “Okay, but—” By now the two cops had hooked the man by the arms and were leading him away. “Is this a serial killer?”

  Instead of replying, Pendergast turned to Coldmoon, who was looking at him questioningly. Sandoval was doing the same.

  “In case you are wondering,” Pendergast said, “I knew his brother well. A tragic story. Someday I shall tell you about it.”

  Coldmoon nodded. He doubted he would ever hear the story, but then again, he wasn’t sure he particularly wanted to.

  15

  THE MIAMI FIELD Office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation was one of the more prominent in the country, given its role in covering not just nine counties of Florida, but also Mexico, the Caribbean, and all of Central and South America. It was housed in a new, high-tech building of bluish glass that soared above the streets of Miramar, northwest of Miami, and it was the most spectacular field office Coldmoon had ever seen: more like a postmodernist sculpture than a federal building. He tried to tell himself he wasn’t the least intimidated.

  He followed Pendergast into a second-floor conference room dominated by a mahogany table and leather chairs, interactive whiteboards and 5K flatscreens—the very latest in technology. Coldmoon wished he had his comforting thermos of camp coffee at hand. The image of the hanging heart, with its icicle of blood, had unexpectedly stayed with him since that morning.