The Cabinet of Curiosities

by Preston; Child

  She crept forward between the shelves, strained to catch a glimpse of them, but she could see nothing but the beam of a flashlight stabbing through the dark piles of bone.

  There was no more time: she had to get out.

  She listened closely to the footsteps of the cops. Good: they seemed to still be together. In their joint eagerness to take credit for the collar, they’d been too stupid to leave one to guard the door.

  “All right!” she called. “I give up! Sorry, I guess I just lost my head.”

  There was a brief flurry of whispers.

  “We’re coming!” O’Grady shouted. “Don’t go anywhere!”

  She heard them moving in her direction, more quickly now, the flashlight beam wobbling and weaving as they ran. Watching the direction of the beam, she scooted away, keeping low, angling back toward the front of the storage room, moving as quickly and silently as she could.

  “Where are you?” she heard a voice cry, fainter now, several aisles away. “Dr. Kelly?”

  “She was over there, O’Grady.”

  “Damn it, Finester, you know she was much farther—”

  In a flash Nora was out the door. She turned, slammed it shut, turned her key in the lock. In another five minutes she was out on Museum Drive.

  Panting hard, she slipped her cell phone out of her purse again and dialed.

  SEVEN

  THE SILVER WRAITH glided noiselessly up to the Seventy-second Street curb. Pendergast slid out and stood for a moment in the shadow of the Dakota, deep in thought, while the car idled.

  The interview with his great-aunt had left him with an unfamiliar feeling of dread. Yet it was a dread that had been growing within him since he first heard of the discovery of the charnel pit beneath Catherine Street.

  For many years he had kept a silent vigil, scanning the FBI and Interpol services, on the lookout for a specific modus operandi. He’d hoped it would never surface—but always, in the back of his mind, had feared it would.

  “Good evening, Mr. Pendergast,” the guard said at his approach, stepping out of the sentry box. An envelope lay in his white-gloved hand. The sight of the envelope sent Pendergast’s dread soaring.

  “Thank you, Johnson,” Pendergast replied, without taking the envelope. “Did Sergeant O’Shaughnessy come by, as I mentioned he would?”

  “No sir. He hasn’t been by all evening.”

  Pendergast grew more pensive, and there was a long moment of silence. “I see. Did you take delivery of this envelope?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “From whom, may I ask?”

  “A nice, old-fashioned sort of gent, sir.”

  “In a derby hat?”

  “Precisely, sir.”

  Pendergast scanned the crisp copperplate on the front of the envelope: For A. X. L. Pendergast, Esq., D. Phil., The Dakota. Personal and Confidential. The envelope was handmade from a heavy, old-fashioned laid paper, with a deckle edge. It was precisely the sort of paper made by the Pendergast family’s private stationer. Although the envelope was yellow with age, the writing on it was fresh.

  Pendergast turned to the guard. “Johnson, may I borrow your gloves?”

  The doorman was too well trained to show surprise. Donning the gloves, Pendergast slipped into the halo of light around the sentry box and broke the envelope’s seal with the back of his hand. Very gingerly, he bowed it open, looking inside. There was a single sheet of paper, folded once. In the crease lay a single small, grayish fiber. To the untrained eye, it looked like a bit of fishing line. Pendergast recognized it as a human nerve strand, undoubtedly from the cauda equina at the base of the spinal cord.

  There was no writing on the folded sheet. He angled it toward the light, but there was nothing else at all, not even a watermark.

  At that moment, his cell phone rang.

  Putting the envelope carefully aside, Pendergast plucked his phone from his suit pocket and raised it to his ear.

  “Yes?” He spoke in a calm, neutral voice.

  “It’s Nora. Listen, Smithback figured out where Leng lives.”

  “And?”

  “I think he went up there. I think he went into the house.”

  The Search

  ONE

  NORA WATCHED THE silver wraith approach her at an alarming speed, weaving through the Central Park West traffic, red light flashing incongruously on its dashboard. The car screeched to a stop alongside her as the rear door flew open.

  “Get in!” called Pendergast.

  She jumped inside, the sudden acceleration throwing her back against the white leather of the seat.

  Pendergast had lowered the center armrest. He looked straight ahead, his face grimmer than Nora had ever seen it. He seemed to see nothing, notice nothing, as the car tore northward, rocking slightly, bounding over potholes and gaping cracks in the asphalt. To Nora’s right, Central Park raced by, the trees a blur.

  “I tried reaching Smithback on his cell phone,” Nora said. “He isn’t answering.”

  Pendergast did not reply.

  “You really believe Leng’s still alive?”

  “I know so.”

  Nora was silent a moment. Then she had to ask. “Do you think—Do you think he’s got Smithback?”

  Pendergast did not answer immediately. “The expense voucher Smithback filled out stated he would return the car by five this evening.”

  By five this evening… Nora felt herself consumed by agitation and panic. Already, Smithback was over six hours overdue.

  “If he’s parked near Leng’s house, we might just be able to find him.” Pendergast leaned forward, sliding open the glass panel that isolated the rear compartment. “Proctor, when we reach 131st Street, we’ll be looking for a silver Ford Taurus, New York license ELI-7734, with rental car decals.”

  He closed the panel, leaned back against the seat. Another silence fell as the car shot left onto Cathedral Parkway and sped toward the river.

  “We would have known Leng’s address in forty-eight hours,” he said, almost to himself. “We were very close. A little more care, a little more method, was all it would have taken. Now, we don’t have forty-eight hours.”

  “How much time do we have?”

  “I’m afraid we don’t have any,” Pendergast murmured.

  TWO

  CUSTER WATCHED BRISBANE unlock his office door, open it, then step irritably aside to allow them to enter. Custer stepped through the doorway, the flush of returning confidence adding gravity to his stride. There was no need to hurry; not anymore. He turned, looked around: very clean and modern, lots of chrome and glass. Two large windows looked over Central Park and, beyond, at the twinkling wall of lights that made up Fifth Avenue. His eyes fell to the desk that dominated the center of the room. Antique inkwell, silver clock, expensive knickknacks. And a glass box full of gemstones. Cushy, cushy.

  “Nice office,” he said.

  Shrugging the compliment aside, Brisbane draped his tuxedo jacket over his chair, then sat down behind the desk. “I don’t have a lot of time,” he said truculently. “It’s eleven o’clock. I expect you to say what you have to say, then have your men vacate the premises until we can determine a mutually agreeable course of action.”

  “Of course, of course.” Custer moved about the office, hefting a paperweight here, admiring a picture there. He could see Brisbane growing increasingly irritated. Good. Let the man stew. Eventually, he’d say something.

  “Shall we get on with it, Captain?” Brisbane pointedly gestured for Custer to take a seat.

  Just as pointedly, Custer continued circling the large office. Except for the knickknacks and the case of gems on the desk and the paintings on the walls, the office looked bare, save for one wall that contained shelving and a closet.

  “Mr. Brisbane, I understand you’re the Museum’s general counsel?”

  “That’s right.”

  “An important position.”

  “As a matter of fact, it is.”

  Custer moved
toward the shelves, examined a mother-of-pearl fountain pen displayed on one of them. “I understand your feelings of invasion here, Mr. Brisbane.”

  “That’s reassuring.”

  “To a certain extent, you feel it’s your place. You feel protective of the Museum.”

  “I do.”

  Custer nodded, his gaze moving along the shelf to an antique Chinese snuffbox set with stones. He picked it up. “Naturally, you don’t like a bunch of policemen barging in here.”

  “Frankly, I don’t. I’ve told you as much several times already. That’s a very valuable snuffbox, Captain.”

  Custer returned it, picked up something else. “I imagine this whole thing’s been rather hard on you. First, there was the discovery of the skeletons left by that nineteenth-century serial killer. Then there was that letter discovered in the Museum’s collections. Very unpleasant.”

  “The adverse publicity could have easily harmed the Museum.”

  “Then there was that curator—?”

  “Nora Kelly.”

  Custer noted a new tone creeping into Brisbane’s voice: dislike, disapproval, perhaps a sense of injury.

  “The same one who found the skeletons—and the hidden letter, correct? You didn’t like her working on this case. Worried about adverse publicity, I suppose.”

  “I thought she should be doing her research. That’s what she was being paid to do.”

  “You didn’t want her helping the police?”

  “Naturally, I wanted her to do what she could to help the police. I just didn’t want her neglecting her museum duties.”

  Custer nodded sagely. “Of course. And then she was chased in the Archives, almost killed. By the Surgeon.” He moved to a nearby bookshelf. The only books it contained were half a dozen fat legal tomes. Even their bindings managed to look stultifyingly dull. He tapped his finger on a spine. “You’re a lawyer?”

  “General counsel usually means lawyer.”

  This bounced off Custer without leaving a dent. “I see. Been here how long?”

  “A little over two years.”

  “Like it?”

  “It’s a very interesting place to work. Now look, I thought we were going to talk about getting your men out of here.”

  “Soon.” Custer turned. “Visit the Archives much?”

  “Not so much. More, lately, of course, with all the activity.”

  “I see. Interesting place, the Archives.” He turned briefly to see the effect of this observation on Brisbane. The eyes. Watch the eyes.

  “I suppose some find it so.”

  “But not you.”

  “Boxes of paper and moldy specimens don’t interest me.”

  “And yet you visited there”—Custer consulted his notebook—”let’s see, no less than eight times in the last ten days.”

  “I doubt it was that often. On Museum business, in any case.”

  “In any case.” He looked shrewdly back at Brisbane. “The Archives. Where the body of Puck was found. Where Nora Kelly was chased.”

  “You mentioned her already.”

  “And then there’s Smithback, that annoying reporter?”

  “Annoying is an understatement.”

  “Didn’t want him around, did you? Well, who would?”

  “My thinking exactly. You’ve heard, of course, how he impersonated a security officer? Stole Museum files?”

  “I’ve heard, I’ve heard. Fact is, we’re looking for the man, but he seems to have disappeared. You wouldn’t know where he was, by any chance, would you?” He added a faint emphasis to this last phrase.

  “Of course not.”

  “Of course not.” Custer returned his attention to the gems. He stroked the glass case with a fat finger. “And then there’s that FBI agent, Pendergast. The one who was attacked. Also very annoying.”

  Brisbane remained silent.

  “Didn’t much lik—eh, Mr. Brisbane?”

  “We had enough policemen crawling over the place. Why compound it with the FBI? And speaking of policemen crawling around—”

  “It’s just that I find it very curious, Mr. Brisbane…” Custer let the sentence trail off.

  “What do you find curious, Captain?”

  There was a commotion in the hallway outside, then the door opened abruptly. A police sergeant entered, dusty, wide-eyed, sweating.

  “Captain!” he gasped. “We were interviewing this woman just now, a curator, and she locked—”

  Custer looked at the man—O’Grady, his name was—reprovingly. “Not now, Sergeant. Can’t you see I’m conducting a conversation here?”

  “But—”

  “You heard the captain,” Noyes interjected, propelling the protesting sergeant toward the door.

  Custer waited until the door closed again, then turned back to Brisbane. “I find it curious how very interested you’ve been in this case,” he said.

  “It’s my job.”

  “I know that. You’re a very dedicated man. I’ve also noticed your dedication in human resources matters. Hiring, firing…”

  “That’s correct.”

  “Reinhart Puck, for example.”

  “What about him?”

  Custer consulted his notebook again. “Why exactly did you try to fire Mr. Puck, just two days before his murder?”

  Brisbane started to say something, then hesitated. A new thought seemed to have occurred to him.

  “Strange timing there, wouldn’t you agree, Mr. Brisbane?”

  The man smiled thinly. “Captain, I felt the position was extraneous. The Museum is having financial difficulties. And Mr. Puck had been… well, he had not been cooperative. Of course, it had nothing to do with the murder.”

  “But they wouldn’t let you fire him, would they?”

  “He’d been with the Museum over twenty-five years. They felt it might affect morale.”

  “Must’ve made you angry, being shot down like that.”

  Brisbane’s smile froze in place. “Captain, I hope you’re not suggesting I had anything to do with the murder.”

  Custer raised his eyebrows in mock astonishment. “Am I?”

  “Since I assume you’re asking a rhetorical question, I won’t bother to answer it.”

  Custer smiled. He didn’t know what a rhetorical question was, but he could see that his questions were finding their mark. He gave the gem case another stroke, then glanced around. He’d covered the office; all that remained was the closet. He strolled over, put his hand on the handle, paused.

  “But it did make you angry? Being contradicted like that, I mean.”

  “No one is pleased to be countermanded,” Brisbane replied icily. “The man was an anachronism, his work habits clearly inefficient. Look at that typewriter he insisted on using for all his correspondence.”

  “Yes. The typewriter. The one the murderer used to write one—make that two—notes. You knew about that typewriter, I take it?”

  “Everybody did. The man was infamous for refusing to allow a computer terminal on his desk, refusing to use e-mail.”

  “I see.” Custer nodded, opened the closet.

  As if on cue, an old-fashioned black derby hat fell out, bounced across the floor, and rolled in circles until it finally came to rest at Custer’s feet.

  Custer looked down at it in astonishment. It couldn’t have happened more perfectly if this had been an Agatha Christie murder mystery. This kind of thing just didn’t happen in real policework. He could hardly believe it.

  He looked up at Brisbane, his eyebrows arching quizzically.

  Brisbane looked first confounded, then flustered, then angry.

  “It was for a costume party at the Museum,” the lawyer said. “You can check for yourself. Everyone saw me in it. I’ve had it for years.”

  Custer poked his head into the closet, rummaged around, and removed a black umbrella, tightly furled. He brought it out, stood it up on its point, then released it. The umbrella toppled over beside the hat. He looked up again at Bris
bane. The seconds ticked on.

  “This is absurd!” exploded Brisbane.

  “I haven’t said anything,” said Custer. He looked at Noyes. “Did you say anything?”

  “No, sir, I didn’t say anything.”

  “So what exactly, Mr. Brisbane, is absurd?”

  “What you’re thinking—” The man could hardly get out the words. “That I’m… that, you know… Oh, this is perfectly ridiculous!”

  Custer placed his hands behind his back. He came forward slowly, one step after another, until he reached the desk. And then, very deliberately, he leaned over it.

  “What am I thinking, Mr. Brisbane?” he asked quietly.

  THREE

  THE ROLLS ROCKETED up riverside, its driver weaving expertly through the lines of traffic, threading the big vehicle through impossibly narrow gaps, sometimes forcing opposing cars onto the curb. It was after eleven P.M., and the traffic was beginning to thin out. But the curbs of Riverside and the side streets that led away from it remained completely jammed with parked cars.

  The car swerved onto 131st Street, slowing abruptly. And almost immediately—no more than half a dozen cars in from Riverside—Nora spotted it: a silver Ford Taurus, New York plate ELI-7734.

  Pendergast got out, walked over to the parked car, leaned toward the dashboard to verify the VIN. Then he moved around to the passenger door and broke the glass with an almost invisible jab. The alarm shrieked in protest while he searched the glove compartment and the rest of the interior. In a moment he returned.

  “The car’s empty,” he told Nora. “He must have taken the address with him. We’ll have to hope Leng’s house is close by.”

  Telling Proctor to park at Grant’s Tomb and wait for their call, Pendergast led the way down 131st in long, sweeping strides. Within moments they reached the Drive itself. Riverside Park stretched away across the street, its trees like gaunt sentinels at the edge of a vast, unknown tract of darkness. Beyond the park was the Hudson, glimmering in the vague moonlight.

  Nora looked left and right, at the countless blocks of decrepit apartment buildings, old abandoned mansions, and squalid welfare hotels that stretched in both directions. “How are we going to find it?” she asked.