The Dead of Night

by Peter Lerangis

A metallic sound echoed sharply. Nellie set her jaw and looked up.

  One of the guards was holding up a cell phone camera. “Say cheese,” he said.

  “What the — ?” Reagan sputtered.

  “Is this some sort of joke?” Fiske demanded.

  “I don’t think so,” Alistair replied, lifting the cardboard sheet.

  Nellie’s pulse quickened. A digital photo. Which meant someone was going to see it. Which meant a possible connection to the outer world.

  Make it count.

  With a sudden, crazy idea, she raised the reptile toward the camera.

  And she smiled.

  “Cheese.”

  They looked terrible.

  Staring at the image of the hostages on her phone, Amy could barely hold back tears. Vesper One had sent it just as they’d walked back into their hotel room.

  On the laptop screen, Sinead and Evan huddled around the image, which Dan had patched through to Sinead’s phone.

  “Wow,” said Sinead on Dan’s laptop. “They sure look . . .”

  “Battered,” Jake said.

  “Desperate,” Atticus added.

  “Alive,” Dan interjected.

  All seven hostages were accounted for. That was the good part. The bad part was everything else. They stood against a flaking hole in the wall. Phoenix Wizard had a bloody gash on his forehead. Reagan Holt’s wrist was bandaged and Natalie looked shrunken. Nellie seemed half-crazed, thrusting forward a lizard as if it were a sword.

  But what had scared Amy the most was the sight of Uncle Alistair. He was glaring at the camera, defiant. He clutched a handmade sign:

  “That handwriting is familiar,” Amy said.

  On the screen, Evan nodded. “It’s Alistair’s. Vesper One made him draw his own sign. I’m figuring he didn’t want anyone in the Vesper organization to do it. That would give us a handwriting sample to analyze. Pretty shrewd.”

  “Pretty paranoid,” Dan said.

  “Props to Dan for his quick thinking,” Sinead said. “He forced Vesper One to take the photo. It may not look it, but the tide is turning, guys. Hostages alive, Atticus outwitting the Wyomings in Göreme — and we just heard from Jonah and Hamilton. They’ve arrived in Pompeii. Any progress on the stale orb?”

  “It’s not Estelle Urb,” Jake said bitterly, touching a bandaged arm. “That was a wild-goose chase — just like I predicted.”

  “What happened to your arm?” Sinead asked. “It looks all scratched up.”

  “The old lady told us ‘Do not wake Ruhan,’” Jake replied, “but who knew Ruhan was a chimpanzee? Apparently I said something that sounded like ‘I ate your bananas’ in Estonian. Then I was rewarded for my pains by learning that Atticus had gone rogue.”

  “In actuality, Dan and I were just getting some plov,” Atticus said, “but Dad had been trying to track us by calling cab companies. It must have been the call our driver took — and the guy ratted us out. So Dad contacted an old student who’d moved here to get a PhD. He was also making some money as a musician — and he found me. Oh, by the way, Jake, Dad wants us home.”

  “I’ll talk to him,” Jake said.

  Amy was zoning out of the conversation. She stared at the image of the hostages. A pair of eyes seemed to be reaching out at her.

  Nellie’s.

  The au pair seemed manic. Borderline deranged.

  I know that expression.

  It was exactly the way Nellie looked when she would thrust out her iPod. Amy, you just HAVE to listen to this!

  “What’s with the lizard?” Atticus asked, looking over her shoulder. “That girl looks possessed.”

  “Maybe she was bitten,” Jake chimed in. “Reptile venom can cause hallucinations. Which you would know if you had watched the recent National Geographic special on South Africa.”

  Amy’s breath caught.

  She’s not asking us to listen. She’s asking us to see.

  “Do you know that the lizard is South African, Jake?” Amy asked.

  “I was being illustrative,” Jake said. “I don’t really know where it comes from.”

  Amy grinned.

  Nellie’s not crazy. She’s the only one in this photo who’s still thinking.

  “Jake, thank you!” she exclaimed, grabbing him by the shoulders and planting a kiss on his cheek.

  Jake’s eyes widened. He touched the side of his face. “Wore yelcome. I mean —”

  On the screen, Evan’s jaw hung open in shock. “Amy?”

  “Evan, Sinead — look at Nellie in that photo!” Amy said. “She’s trying to tell us something. What do we know about that lizard? The size, the pattern of its skin — they’ll indicate what part of the world it’s from. We’ll know where the hostages are being held!”

  “Sister, you are the best!” Sinead exclaimed. “We’ll get to work on it, stat.”

  Amy smiled. Sister. She liked the sound of that. Sinead’s expression warmed her. It was the only glimmer of happiness she’d had all day.

  “Um, Ames?” Evan said, his voice a little unsteady. “That was brilliant. Really. I, uh, I just wanted to weigh in on how . . . brilliant you are. ’Cause, yeah. I’ve been thinking about that. And, um, you.”

  “Thanks, Evan,” Amy said. “And Sinead. Oh, and thank Ian, too!”

  Sinead and Evan shot each other a glance. Their smiles vanished.

  “Um, that was the other thing we need to tell you,” Sinead said softly. “Ian is gone. He left a note saying he was going to New York. He didn’t say why, but we know Isabel is there.”

  “Isabel?” The name was like a sharp slap. Amy’s exhilaration drained instantly. “But why?”

  “We don’t know, and his phone is not working,” Sinead said. “I’d like to say he misses his mom. But I don’t think Isabel is missable.”

  “He should have contacted us by now,” Evan said.

  “Do you think he’s been kidnapped?”

  “Don’t know.” Sinead shrugged sadly. “We’ll find out.”

  Amy exhaled hard.

  Don’t think about Ian.

  There had to be an explanation for his absence. Ian had changed. He’d proven that. Attleboro would take care of this misunderstanding. Right now there were way more important things on hand.

  Uncle Alistair’s words seemed to jump out of the image — One and a half days left. It wasn’t much time to solve a mystery locked up for six hundred years. And she had only a thin pile of papers from an egghead museum guide to unlock it.

  Or they would all have blood on their hands.

  “Gooooood afternoon, this is meteorologist Sandy ‘the Breeze’ Bancroft, with Disaster Watch! We’re reporting live from the ultimate death-doom-and-destruction destination — that’s right . . . Pompeii!”

  With a frown of deep concern, a bronze-faced weather forecaster gestured to Mount Vesuvius behind him. His hair flew straight backward, courtesy of a gigantic offscreen fan.

  Hamilton Holt stopped and turned to look, stepping on Jonah Wizard’s shoes. “Whoa — it’s the Breeze! The Disaster Forecaster, the Sultan of Storms! I can’t believe this!”

  “I can’t believe you just scuffed my custom four-hundred-fifty-dollar Nikes,” Jonah said. But already Hamilton was charging the set, like a running back on fourth and goal.

  Erasmus checked his watch. “The museum will close soon. We’ll be late.”

  “We gotta extract Ham from Mr. Tan-from-a-Can.” Jonah pulled his hood tight to obscure the Face That Launched a Million Downloads. “Keep with me, be cool, go with the flow. Anyone asks, my name is Clarence, yo. I just happen to resemble the international artist Jonah Wizard. Got that?”

  Erasmus nodded. “Clarence Yo.”

  “What kind of crew are you guys?” Jonah m
uttered, heading into the crowd.

  Bancroft dropped his head portentously at the camera. “We’ll be back after a commercial break, with more —”

  “Daily doom in your living room!” Hamilton recited aloud.

  The camera light went out, and Bancroft narrowed his eyes at Hamilton. “An American fan. Sweet! Hey, fella, how’d you like a coupon for one dollar off a box of Sandy’s Volcano-Hot Bancroft Breezcuits?”

  As Jonah pushed through the crowd, he felt the love all around. Crowds were like oxygen to him. Only a thin piece of fabric separated his peeps from the gangsta di tutti gangstas. He could remove the hood and give them what they hungered for. The face.

  But he wasn’t going to do that. He was all about the plan. And the plan was Pompeii. Getting the 411 on Astrid Rosenbloom’s list. Rescuing Phoenix.

  But first, the extraction of Hamilton.

  The Breeze was signing Ham’s coupon. “Write ‘To my biggest — and I mean biggest — fan,’” Hamilton said.

  Jonah pulled on his arm. “Yo, Human Action Figure. We gotta keep the focus.”

  Sandy Bancroft looked up. “Why does that sound familiar?”

  I gotta stop dropping lyrics from real songs! Jonah scolded himself. “Uh, just sayin’.”

  Bancroft cocked his head. “‘Just Sayin’ — my kids love that song!”

  Jonah cringed at his own carelessness. “Yo, you talk to him, Erasmus,” he whispered over his shoulder.

  Erasmus yanked Hamilton by the arm. “Got to run. Thanks, Mr. Breeze.”

  As they turned to go, Jonah nearly rammed into a girl wearing an I WENT TO POMPEII AND MET THE LAVA MY LIFE T-shirt. “Yo, don’t touch the merch,” he said.

  The girl’s jaw dropped open.

  Oops.

  “Let’s roll!” Jonah shouted, breaking into a sprint. “We got about three seconds! Where to?”

  “The Antiquarium!” Erasmus said, struggling to keep pace. “Pompeii’s museum. The biggest resource about the explosion. Why are we running?”

  “Just do it!” Jonah said.

  Clutching his coupon, Hamilton grinned. “You have no idea how much this means to me.”

  “It’s about to mean a whole lot more!” said Jonah, as a gust of wind blew the hood off his face.

  A bloodcurdling shriek rang out behind him. “JO-O-O-O-NAH!”

  Jonah could feel the pavement shaking under his feet.

  He wasn’t sure if it was the mob or the volcano.

  Sometimes, Ian Kabra thought, it paid to be devastatingly handsome.

  With a big smile, he strode up to the United Nations security guard. She looked exactly like her photo in the Cahill database.

  Reina Mendez. Age 37. 144-36 Steinway Place, Astoria. Daughter, Pilar. Fifth grade, PS 151Q, gifted in math and chemistry, scheduled for accelerated math on New York State standardized test.

  “Good morning, Reina,” he said, holding out his fake ID to the guard. He had created it in a hurry and the resolution was off. “How did your daughter’s math exam go?”

  The guard looked momentarily bewildered.

  Ian boosted his smile to level five: irresistible. Reina glanced briefly at the faked ID card. “Ninety-seven out of a hundred,” she said with pride. “Thank you for asking, Mr. . . . um, Kabra.”

  “Bravo, a budding genius,” Ian said. “Education begins in the home, I always say. As does personal attractiveness.”

  “You should know, sir,” the guard replied.

  I know more than you imagine, Ian thought as he breezed into the main lobby. Access to the Cahill database had its advantages. Like private surveillance records of every UN employee. Ian could have told Reina the date of her appendix operation, every item in her last grocery purchase, and the fact that she had a medical history of intense foot odor.

  But achieving entry into the building was enough.

  He rode to the second floor. From there, the crowd noise guided him. It was an unmistakable din of excitement, an electricity he could feel even before leaving the elevator. To his right, a throng spilled out the door of a vast auditorium. People of all ages and nationalities jockeyed for position, straining to see the lecture inside.

  “Pardon me . . . clear, please. . . .” Ian said, sliding through the crowd.

  Although her face loomed overhead on two enormous screens, Ian almost didn’t recognize his own mother.

  It was the smile.

  It dazzled. It beamed. It bathed the room in warmth. And it shocked Ian to the core. She had only rarely displayed that much brightness to her children. Usually after a successful poisoning or international art theft.

  She was standing behind a lectern, center stage, before a bank of press microphones. Behind her, an image flashed onto another screen, drawing gasps and applause. Ian recognized it from the home page of the website of Mother’s organization. The lush South American jungle outpost. A happy, banana-eating child surrounded by young workers of many ethnicities.

  “Meet dear, precious Carlos,” Isabel said, her voice sweet and melodious. “He weighed a mere thirty pounds when he came to our station in Sierra de Córdoba, Argentina. Dressed in rags, mewling softly. He appeared more animal than human. But look at him now! In a few short months, a thriving young man. A boy who can read Dr. Seuss in two languages and navigate the web. Whose final words before going to sleep at night are . . .”

  Her voice faded away, and a video faded in — there was Carlos in pajamas, with a gap-toothed smile, holding Isabel’s hand. “. . . THANK YOU, AY DOUBLE-U DOUBLE-U!” he shouted.

  A woman sitting next to Ian burst into tears. The audience rose to its feet, exploding with applause. Someone began shouting “Ka-BRA . . . Ka-BRA!” and soon the entire audience had joined him.

  “Please . . . please, no, the credit does not belong to me. . . .” Isabel shook her head modestly, as if embarrassed beyond her wildest dreams. “It is the work, not I. It is the mission of a hundred souls . . . to help a million!”

  The few remaining sitters stood, pounding their palms together. If the UN could adopt a resolution of sainthood, Isabel Kabra would be top of the list.

  Ian jammed his hands in his pockets. He bit his tongue to keep from screaming.

  As the presentation wound down, people lined the aisle to see Isabel. Several mothers had brought children. Almost everyone was carrying a copy of her recent book, Listening to the Banana Leaf: Saving the World, One Soul at a Time.

  Ian took a place in line. He waited for what seemed like hours, and then there they were. Eye to eye for the first time since the gauntlet.

  “Ian, darling,” she said, “I was expecting you.”

  Ian sputtered. In his head, anger and shock and longing all collided, canceling one another out and leaving him nearly speechless. “Expecting me?”

  “It was only a matter of time before you left those . . . people,” Isabel said, avoiding the word Cahills as if pronouncing it would be like sipping a beaker of smallpox. “So, Ian, do you have a question? Or are you here to volunteer and do something useful with your life for a change?”

  “I want to chat, Mother,” Ian said with forced cheer. “About your vacation plans. Just an FYI, in case you were considering another jaunt to that delightful little backwater in upstate New York. You won’t be able to tour the DeOssie factory anymore. Although the crater that remains is bound to attract a lively crowd.”

  “Ian, dear, you speak in riddles,” Isabel replied.

  “Riddle me this, Mother,” Ian said. “What does Aid Works Wonders have to do with the Vespers?”

  Ian watched her carefully. Mother was the master of the impassive expression. She often bragged that she had total control over each of her facial muscles. But he knew better than that. Even after not seeing her for two years, he could detect a tiny tightening
of the left side of her lip.

  Ian reached out and brushed his finger against his mother’s forehead. “Odd — you’re sweating, Mother. Yet the room is awfully well air-conditioned. Oh, by the way, your daughter is still alive for now, thanks for asking. Although she appears to be starving. Since you care so much about little Carlos, surely you want to know about your own blood —”

  “Carlos is my blood,” Isabel snapped, lowering her voice to a focused whisper. “When my children left me, my world ended. I was thrown in prison, no different from your sister. I learned there. I discovered the meaning of compassion for others. Giving of oneself. Loyalty.”

  “Loyalty to what, Mother?” Ian asked. “What do you believe in?”

  Isabel cupped Ian’s face gently in her hand. “Ask yourself that question, my handsome son. Why are you here? Why did you leave your new family?”

  “I didn’t leave them!” Ian retorted.

  “Do they see that? Face it, Ian, they tolerate you, that’s all. In their minds, you’ll always be an outsider. And now you’re gone. Snap — there goes that fragile bond. Do you believe they’ll let you back?” Isabel threw her head back in mocking laughter. “People trust me, Ian. Who trusts you?”

  “I — I —” Ian stammered.

  “Next, please?” Isabel was already gesturing to the person behind him.

  Ian turned. He elbowed his way through the adoring mass. No one seemed to pay him the slightest attention.

  Outside the auditorium, a table with Aid Works Wonders merchandise was six deep. People were buying buttons and bumper stickers for fifteen dollars. “Each purchase will feed an entire family for a month!” a worker chirped loudly, displaying a sticker that said: MAKE A FAMILY HAPPY — CHANGE THE WORLD!

  An entire family.

  The notion was staggering. Fifteen dollars was the dry-cleaning bill for Ian’s hand-painted Italian silk tie. Since his fall from Kabra wealth, he knew the prices of things. For that to be the price of a family’s happiness? Unimaginable. In fact, he couldn’t imagine a happy family at all.

  Waiting for the elevator, Ian gazed out the window. He watched an airliner swoop low overhead on its way to LaGuardia Airport. From here, the airport was a short cab ride away.