“Where the Ark of the Covenant is hidden!”
It still made no sense to Carter. Hadn’t Ezra just explained that all of that religious mumbo-jumbo was useless, that it had all come about long after any of the things they were dealing with?
“It’s supposed to protect us?”
Ezra, looking all around at the flapping acetates, nodded quickly.
“From what?”
As if in answer, Carter heard a sound like nothing else he had ever heard, or hoped to hear again, in his entire life. It started as a low moan, a wind groaning through the ancient eaves of a mighty house, but rose swiftly in pitch and volume. Instinctively he clapped his hands over his ears. But the sound rumbled underfoot and roared inside his head.
He ran to the door and tried to pull it open, but it wouldn’t budge; the hot wind sped up inside the room, ripping the remaining acetates from the wall. The scroll within them unfurled itself and moved like a tornado toward the center of the room. It swirled in an unsteady spiral, its lavender light growing darker, more purple, the wind increasing in speed.
There was only one other way out. Carter ran to the balcony doors.
“No!” Ezra shouted, even his terror overwhelmed by the fear of losing his precious scroll. “Don’t!”
But these wouldn’t open either. Carter rattled the handles and pushed his shoulder against the frame.
Ezra grabbed his arm and tried to stop him. “We can’t!” he screamed.
“We have to!” Carter shook him free, looking desperately around the room.
The noise in his head had become deafening. It was more like a wail now, a rising tide of anguish uttered by a thousand voices in a host of tongues, the sound of all the misery in all the world, for all of time.
It was too much even for Ezra; he dropped to his knees, the mud on his forehead, his hands clamped over his ears, his eyes squeezed shut.
Carter felt as if his head would explode if it didn’t stop. The old toy chest that Ezra placed his tools on—that might work. Carter swept the tools off, then picked up the wooden chest. Holding it in front of himself like a battering ram, he ran at the French doors. The glass cracked and splintered, but the doors held fast.
Carter heard the crying of every baby born, the death rattle of every departing soul, the howl of every living creature slaughtered or maimed.
He backed up, then ran again at the doors. This time the wood gave way and the doors flew back. The chest dropped to the stone floor of the balcony, and he tumbled over it onto his back.
Above him now he could see the night sky, the stars. And then, on a gust of wind, as dry as the desert, the scroll itself, spiraling in the air like a living thing. It hovered above him, a long, glowing, purple serpent, before another gust propelled it out and over the edge of the balcony.
Carter struggled to his feet as Ezra stumbled out through the broken doors.
They watched as the scroll, like a seagull borne aloft by changing currents, swooped and fluttered through the air, into the distance and then out, out, over the East River. Slowly its purple glow faded away, lost in the city lights, swallowed by the night.
Carter, his head still ringing, glanced at Ezra, whose hands were fixed on the balustrade, his eyes still searching for a sign of the scroll. And he heard him mutter something under his breath.
“What did you say?” His own voice sounded muffled and distant to him.
Ezra paused, then repeated, “It was mine.”
Carter looked out at the city below and the night sky above. “I’m not sure it ever was,” he said. He took a deep breath of the cold night air, and as the din in his head gradually diminished, he thought he detected, from the church across the river, the incessant tolling of a bell.
THIRTY-SIX
Beth had spent the whole day doing nothing, it seemed, but putting out fires. Apologizing to Mrs. Winston for her missing invitation, helping the caterer to get his permits in order, clearing a space for the wait staff to change clothes in, squeezing the backup doorman into a uniform two sizes too small.
But the annual holiday party of the Raleigh Gallery was at last in full swing, with enormous sprays of fresh flowers mounted all around the main floor, white-jacketed waiters carrying silver trays of Dom Perignon and Beluga caviar, a string quartet from Juilliard playing Vivaldi from the mezzanine. And once again, everyone who was anyone in the world of New York art collectors was in attendance.
Richard Raleigh himself was in a maroon velvet dinner jacket, with a gold ribbon on the lapel that he passed off as some kind of honor bestowed on him by the French government, but which Beth knew he’d bought at an estate sale in Southampton. He moved gaily among his many clients, making sure their champagne glasses were always full, that they were having fun, and above all that that they were noticing the important new pieces (a Fragonard and a Greuze among them) now adorning the walls.
Beth had been doing her best to put on a good face, but it wasn’t easy. Carter had come home at the break of dawn, and they hadn’t even had a chance to talk before she left for work. And more to the point, her heart was sick with the news of Russo’s death. She tried to tell herself it was for the best, given the extent of the burn injuries he’d already sustained and the agonies of treatment he was sure to go through . . . but it was still so tragic, so awful even to contemplate.
And finally, as if all that weren’t enough, she hadn’t felt physically right for days. To her immense consternation, she’d detected some bleeding when she’d used the bathroom earlier in the day, even though she was nowhere near her period. What, she worried, was that about? All she wanted right now was to get off her feet—she was wearing some shiny black heels, as Raleigh had none too subtly requested—and as far as she was concerned, the sooner the party started to wind down, the better.
“Beth, look who’s here!” she heard Raleigh call to her, and of course she saw Bradley Hoyt, his buzz cut gleaming in the light from the chandelier, making his way toward her. On the one hand, this was the last thing she needed, but on the other, at least he would do his best to monopolize her attention and she wouldn’t have to work so hard to mingle. “You look terrific,” Hoyt said, as he took her hand.
“She’s a vision,” Raleigh piped up over his shoulder, “worthy of a Fragonard.”
That was subtle, Beth thought.
“In fact, don’t you dare leave without letting me show you a couple of new things,” Raleigh said, lifting two full glasses from a passing tray and handing them to Hoyt and Beth.
After he’d moved away, Hoyt leaned in and said, “Does he ever quit?”
“Not to my knowledge.”
For a few minutes, they talked about the plummeting stock market, the latest plan to rejuvenate downtown, the other guests circulating around them. Although Hoyt may have made off with a bundle of money, he knew next to nothing about the other New Yorkers who had their own bundles, and Beth found it mildly diverting to act as his Baedeker. She pointed out who was who, how old the money was, what corrupt enterprise it originated from (over time Beth had seen the wisdom of Balzac’s observation, that behind every great fortune there is a crime), while Hoyt just took it all in . . . and her.
“The woman in the navy blue Chanel, that’s Mrs. Reginald Clark—the money’s from a railroad stock fraud in the days of the robber barons.
“And the woman she’s talking to, with the diamond necklace? Alice Longstreet—a brokerage house that’s currently under indictment.”
Hoyt laughed. “I bet you think I’m a crook, too!” he said.
Beth took a sip of her champagne, then instantly regretted it; her stomach was already feeling unsettled.
“Aren’t you at least going to deny it?” he kidded her.
“I’m sure you’re completely aboveboard,” she said, and was about to go on, when she saw someone at the front door, huddled with Emma, Raleigh’s assistant. He was tall and blond, and was wearing the little round sunglasses he never took off. She glanced across the room, whe
re Raleigh, too, had just noticed Arius’s entrance. Beth knew he wasn’t on the guest list—the gallery didn’t even have an address for him—but somehow he’d known that tonight was the annual party. And he’d guessed correctly about how he’d be received.
Even as Beth watched with rising dread, she saw Raleigh heading for the door, broadly smiling, his hands already extended in greeting. If there was a chance of a future sale . . .
“Something wrong?” Hoyt said, trying to follow her gaze.
“I just thought of something.”
“What?”
“A new drawing I think you should see.”
“Now?” he said. “It’s a party. Aren’t you supposed to be off duty?”
“It’s upstairs, in the private gallery.”
His ears all but visibly pricked up. And she didn’t have time right now to correct his misapprehension.
She slipped her arm through his and moved him quickly toward the private elevator. They’d be less conspicuous this way than mounting the stairs. Once inside, she turned the key to release the car, and was relieved to see no sign of Arius as the doors slowly closed.
Upstairs, she had another problem. She had to find some drawing Hoyt hadn’t already seen. Then it occurred to her that he probably couldn’t remember three-quarters of what he’d been shown, and she slid open the top drawer of the drawings cabinet and, without even looking to see what it was, removed the first drawing that came to hand.
“Your hand’s shaking,” Hoyt said. “This can’t be that big a deal.”
“These are all new acquisitions . . .”
Hoyt put his hand on top of hers, and said, “You get new stuff all the time. You sure that’s all it is?”
“No,” she confessed, “it’s not. It is something else.”
Hoyt’s face broke into a grin; she was about to admit his irresistibility. It was about time.
“There was someone downstairs that I didn’t want to be seen by.”
His face perceptibly fell.
“And that’s why you hustled me up here?”
Beth nodded her head. “I’m afraid so.”
Hoyt appeared to think it over, then said, “No problem. I’ll take it any way I can.”
“In fact,” she admitted, “I have another favor to ask you now.”
Hoyt waited, ever hopeful.
“I need to sneak out of the gallery, but I don’t want Raleigh to see me, and I don’t want that other man to know I’m gone.”
“My car’s outside—we could be out of here in no time.”
“That’s not what I mean. What I need is for you to just stay up here for a few minutes, and cover for me if anyone asks.”
This was not what he’d been hoping for. Still, he thought, anything he did now that put her in his debt could conceivably pay off later. Part of the reason for his success in life was that he knew when to pay a favor, and when to call it in. Doing what Beth asked for now was a small investment to make on a potentially large return.
“Go ahead,” he said. “My car’s outside, the black Bentley—tell Jack that I said he should take you wherever you need to go, and then come back for me here.”
Beth had never liked Hoyt more than she did at this moment. Even though she knew it was probably another bad idea, she impulsively pecked him on the cheek as she turned to leave.
“Before you go, I’ve got just one question for you. Since I’m supposed to be thinking about buying it,” he said, gesturing at the drawing, “what am I looking at?”
Beth had to turn back and then turn the drawing right side up—and it was only then that she saw what she’d pulled from the drawer.
It was a nineteenth-century etching of a doomed angel with black bat wings, plummeting through the night sky down toward a bank of roiling clouds. It had been part of the French consignment, along with the Greuze and the Fragonard.
“It’s a Gustave Doré, from his series of illustrations for Paradise Lost,” she said. “A fallen angel thrown from Heaven.”
Hoyt nodded, seemingly satisfied with this information.
Beth turned again, a chill descending her spine. It was as if the drawing had been there for a reason, waiting for her to open the drawer and acknowledge it. All the more reason to leave the gallery as quickly as possible. She made for the elevator, her high heels clicking on the parquet floor. Hoyt watched her go, then glanced casually at the etching left out on the table.
Even to his unpracticed eye, it was a powerful piece of work. The bat-winged angel was falling headlong, as if unable to regain control of his flight. A shaft of radiant light descended from the upper right corner of the picture, piercing the turbulent clouds, illuminating the curve of the earth that lay so far below. It was a lot better than the stuff he usually saw here, all kinds of studies and sketches that seldom told a coherent story. In fact, if it hadn’t been for his attraction to Beth, he probably would have called it quits on this Old Master stuff weeks ago; maybe his friends were right—buy the big, colorful modern stuff that everybody who saw it would know had cost a lot of money.
Behind him he heard the creak of the floorboards, but there was no accompanying clack of spike heels, and when he looked up, he saw a man with blond hair and shades watching him from the main entry to the room. The guy was tall, about his own height, and wearing a long black coat that looked to Hoyt like it was cashmere. Hoyt was pretty sure he’d never laid eyes on him before, and he was also pretty sure that this was the guy Beth had been trying to avoid at all costs.
“If you’re looking for Beth,” he said, hoping to give her a little more time to make her escape, “she’ll be right back.”
The intruder smiled, and Hoyt couldn’t help but notice that his lips were unusually full and his teeth gleamed almost unnaturally behind them.
“My name’s Bradley Hoyt,” he said, “and you are?”
“Arius,” the man said, coming closer. The overhead lights turned his blond hair a burnished gold, and Hoyt found himself wondering who this guy went to for such amazing highlights.
“She was showing me a couple of new things,” Hoyt went on, indicating the Doré.
Arius came even closer, gliding almost silently across the floor.
And what kind of aftershave, Hoyt thought, was this guy wearing? It reminded Hoyt of his summers in Maine, back when he was a boy.
Without removing his tinted glasses, Arius looked at the etching, appraisingly. Hoyt had the feeling he knew what it was all about without being told. He had the look of someone who’d grown up with all the advantages.
“The wings,” Arius said, pointing at the angel in the picture, “are fuller than that.”
His middle finger, Hoyt noticed, ended bluntly, above the knuckle.
“And she isn’t coming back,” Arius added, raising his gaze now.
Hoyt didn’t know what to say; somehow, he knew that there’d be no point in lying to this guy. And even though Arius’s eyes were shielded by the amber lenses, Hoyt didn’t at all like having them trained on him.
“Maybe we should both go on back to the party,” Hoyt said, but Arius seemed unwilling to go, and Hoyt wasn’t sure if he should leave him unattended with this valuable piece of art left out. If anything happened to it, Beth could be held responsible.
“Why don’t we see if the champagne is still holding out?” Hoyt tried again, but this time Arius simply took a corner of the etching between his fingers and started to rub it. And though Hoyt didn’t profess to be an expert on such things, he was fairly confident that rubbing the old etching was a bad idea.
“I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”
“Why are you troubling Beth?” Arius said in a low voice.
“Me, troubling Beth?” Hoyt said. “I think, my friend, you’ve got that backward.” Now Hoyt could see why Beth had been running from this guy. There was something distinctly creepy about him.
“Keep away from her. She doesn’t belong to you.”
“And what are you all of a sudden?
” Hoyt said, incredulous. “Her marriage counselor?” Hoyt was flabbergasted; this guy wasn’t just creepy, he was totally crazy. Beth should apply for a restraining order.
And now there was suddenly another aroma in the room, something to add to the scent of a forest in the rain . . . and it was the smell of smoke.
Hoyt looked down and a black stain had spread across the corner of the Doré, where the paper was scorched.
“Jesus, what are you doing?” Hoyt said, snatching the drawing away. But suddenly it was more than a scorch mark, it was a bright flame that raced across the picture like a snake darting at its prey . . . before shooting toward Hoyt’s hand and arm. He tried to drop the burning drawing, but it stuck to his hand like flypaper. Arius watched, impassively, as Hoyt staggered backward, wildly struggling to disengage the burning paper.
“Get it off!” Hoyt screamed, as a smoke alarm blared and the sprinklers went off. The flames, as if they had a mind of their own, had coursed up his arm, across his shoulder and were now licking at his face and hair.
Arius turned to leave.
“Get it off!” Hoyt screamed again, as the sound of urgent voices surged from the gallery below, and hurried footsteps echoed from the foot of the staircase.
Arius didn’t turn to see—he hardly needed to—but he could hear Hoyt flailing around the room, banging his burning limbs against the walls, then crumpling to the floor. His thoughts were already elsewhere, with the little journey he would have to take, if he hoped to catch up with Beth that night.
THIRTY-SEVEN
If it had not been for the gravity of the task that lay before them, Carter would have laughed when Ezra arrived. He was dressed all in black, with a black beret pulled low on his brow and a black satchel slung over one shoulder. To Carter, he looked like a member of the French Resistance from some old newsreel.
“Is your wife home?” Ezra asked, peering into the apartment around Carter’s shoulder.
“No, she’s going straight from work to a friend’s house, upstate. I thought it was best to get her out of town.”
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