Gideon’s Sword gc-1

by Douglas Preston

  The smell was overpowering.

  With his left hand he pulled the box cutter from his pocket, wiped it dry, thumbed open the blade. It was time. With a final jerk he pulled the zipper all the way down — and stared. Shocked. Speechless.

  “The legs!” he cried. “What the hell? What happened to the legs?”

  55

  A few blocks north of the Port Authority Bus Terminal and hard by the Hudson River stood a massive, nearly windowless ten-story structure of brown limestone, covering an entire city block. It had originally been the mill and headquarters of the New Amsterdam Blanket and Woolen Goods Corporation. Later, when the company went out of business, an enterprising firm purchased the building and retrofitted it into self-storage facilities. When this failed and was seized for nonpayment of taxes, the city converted the storage units, with few modifications, into “temporary” shelters for homeless persons. Known officially as the Abram S. Hewitt Transitional Housing Facility, unofficially as the Ant Farm, it was a vast cliff dwelling for thousands of the disillusioned and disenfranchised.

  Nodding Crane’s own storage-unit-cum-studio was on the seventh floor of the Ant Farm. It suited him perfectly. In his grimy coat and hat, head hanging low, he was almost indistinguishable from the other inmates, the battered guitar case being the only thing that gave him a certain distinction in this shabby and miserable environment.

  At two forty-five AM, he walked along the narrow corridor of the seventh floor, past unit after unit, each just a closed roll-down door with a stenciled number, his guitar case knocking gently against his legs. From behind the metal doors, he could hear coughing; snores; other, less identifiable noises. Reaching his own at last, he opened its padlock with a key, raised the curtain wall, ducked in, lowered it again, and barred it shut with a police brace. He reached up, pulled the cord to turn on the bare bulb, then glanced around. The slit of a window peeped into the blackness of an airshaft.

  He knew the tiny room had not been burgled: he had replaced the supplied padlock with a much better one he’d purchased, with a five-pin tumbler and a stainless-steel shackle, and it had not been disturbed. And yet with him such an examination was as instinctive as breathing. There was little to take in: a futon, neatly made; a battered leather suitcase; a rice-paper mat; a case of liter-size bottles of springwater; a few rolls of paper towels. In one corner was a portable music player and a stack of well-used Blues CDs; in another, a small neat row of popular paperback books. Nodding Crane favored Hemingway, Twain, and the martial arts literature of the Tang dynasty: Fengshen Yanyi; Outlaws of the Marsh.

  There was only one item in the little space that could be considered decorative: a photograph, badly creased and faded, of a brown and desolate-looking mountain range — the Pamir Plateau in the Xinjiang Autonomous Region. Putting his guitar carefully aside and hanging his coat and hat on a metal hook, Nodding Crane sat on the rice-paper mat and gazed at the photograph with an intense concentration, for five minutes exactly.

  He had been born on that plateau, in the shadow of those mountains, far from any village. His father had been a poor herder and smallhold farmer who died when Nodding Crane was less than a year old. His mother had tried to carry on with the farm. One day, when Nodding Crane was six, a man stopped by. He looked very different from any man Nodding Crane had ever seen, and he spoke Mongolian haltingly, with a strange accent. The man said he was from America—​Nodding Crane had vaguely heard of that place. He said he was a missionary, traveling from village to village, but to Nodding Crane he looked more like a beggar than a holy man. In exchange for a meal, he would pray with them and teach the word of God.

  His mother invited the man in to share their supper. The man accepted. While they ate, he talked of faraway places, of his strange religion. He was a little clumsy with chopsticks and wiped his mouth on his sleeve, and he kept taking quick drinks from a flask. Nodding Crane did not like the way he kept staring at his mother with wet eyes. Now and again he broke into song: a dolorous, mournful kind of music that was new to Nodding Crane. After dinner, as they were drinking tea, the man began pawing at Nodding Crane’s mother. When she pulled away, he knocked her to the floor. Nodding Crane threw himself on the man and was shoved violently away. When the man began to rape his mother, again he tried to defend her. But the man was powerful and beat him senseless with a brick. When he woke, he found his mother strangled.

  A few days later, Shaolin monks took him away to live in their temple. Other than the kung fu training, however, monastic life ultimately proved not to his liking, and when he had mastered all they could teach he ran away, traveling first to Hohhot and then to Changchun, where he lived on the street and became a master thief. That was before the state police picked him up and, seeing his talent, sent him to the 810 Office for special training.

  Every day, without fail, Nodding Crane performed this bitter reflection while gazing upon the faded photograph of his distant home. It was his meditation. He stood up, went through a lengthy series of breathing exercises and limbering drills. Then — in perfect silence — he performed the twenty-nine ritual steps of the “flying guillotine” kata. Breathing a little harder, he sat down again on the rice-paper mat.

  Gideon Crew had almost reached his goal. Nodding Crane was now certain he would lead him to what he sought. As Crew closed in on his goal, he would be excited, rushed. It was the correct time for the feint, the unexpected jab at the flank. The girl would serve that purpose well.

  Give your enemy no rest, Sun Tzu had written. Attack where he is unprepared, appear where you are unexpected.

  Since that night on the Pamir Plateau many years ago, Nodding Crane had never smiled. Nevertheless he felt a warm glow inside himself now: a satisfied glow of violence performed, an expectant glow of more violence to follow.

  Slipping his hand into a tear in the seam of the futon, he pulled out a small carrying case made of hard, ballistic plastic, hidden in a cavity excavated from the stuffing. He disarmed the explosive device protecting the case, then unlatched it. Inside were six cell phones; Chinese, Swiss, British, and American passports; many thousands of dollars in a variety of currencies; a Glock 19 with a silencer; and a single handkerchief, pale silk with complex embroidery.

  Carefully, lovingly, he drew out the handkerchief. It had been his mother’s. Draping it over his knees, he reached his other hand into the pocket of his overcoat and pulled out his set of picks: four fingerpicks and a thumbpick. They were coated with blood and matter and had lost their characteristic gleam.

  He took one of the bottles of springwater, cracked it open, and dampened a paper towel with it. Then he arranged the picks before him, one by one. Long ago he had given them names, calling them after mythological deities, and now as he cleaned each one in turn he pondered its name and the individual personality of that pick. Pinkie: Ao Guang, dragon king of the east sea, who had once unleashed chaos onto the sinful world. Ring: Fei Lian, Flying Curtain, god of the wind. Middle: Zhu Rong, god of fire. Index: Ji Yushyu Xuan, god of the endless outer darkness. And master of them all, the thumbpick, Lei Gong, “duke of thunder,” tasked with punishing mortals who strayed from the true path.

  Nodding Crane used the thumbpick to anchor the windpipe of his victims as the others did their slicing work; this last pick was particularly dirty and required a second application of water to clean satisfactorily.

  At last the picks shone brilliantly again, their peace and equilibrium restored through loving attention. They would rest now, in preparation for fresh exercise to come. And Nodding Crane would follow their lead.

  He carefully wrapped the picks in his mother’s handkerchief and placed them in a small wooden box. Then, stretching out on the futon, he quickly fell asleep amid the fitful night sounds of the Ant Farm.

  56

  Where are the legs?” Gideon rarely lost it, but he lost it now. He was beside himself, absolutely furious.

  The aide came running in. “Hey, man, take it easy—”

  “No o
ne told me! No one asked my permission!”

  “Look, stop shouting—”

  “Fuck you! I won’t stop shouting!” His voice echoed and re-echoed down the stark corridors. There was the sound of running feet.

  “You can’t shout in here,” said the aide. “I’m going to call security if you don’t calm down.”

  “Go ahead! Call security! Ask them who stole the — my lover’s legs!” Even in his fury, he had to remain in character.

  Another aide burst through the double doors, followed by a security guard. Gideon turned on them. “I want to know where Mark’s legs are!”

  “Excuse me,” said a man, pushing his way in through the stupefied group. He had the air of authority, of calmness in the face of panic. “I’m a med tech. Sir, you’ve got to calm down.” He turned to the aide. “Go get the deceased’s medical records.”

  “I don’t need the medical records, I need the legs!”

  “The medical records will tell what happened to the legs,” the man said. He laid a steadying hand on Gideon’s arm. “You understand? We’re going to find out what happened to them. I suspect—” He hesitated, then went on. “—they may have been amputated.”

  The word amputated hung in the air like a bad smell.

  “But…” Gideon stopped. He realized immediately this was what must have happened. The legs had been crushed, ruined, beyond medical repair. They would have been amputated as part of the effort to save Wu’s life. He should’ve realized it the moment he first saw the X-rays.

  The aide returned, followed by the blond receptionist, holding a freshly printed sheet of paper. The med tech took it, scanned it, handed it to Gideon.

  It confirmed that the legs had been amputated a few hours after the accident, no doubt shortly after the X-rays were taken. Gideon scanned the sheet again. That had been almost a week ago. Now they were gone forever. He swallowed. The disappointment was so crushing that he was temporarily unable to speak.

  “I think we’ve got everything under control here,” said the med tech. The others began to disperse.

  Gideon recovered his voice. “What…what happened to them?”

  The med tech continued to steady Gideon with a kindly arm. “They would have entered the medical-waste stream. Been disposed of.”

  “Medical-waste stream? And what happens to that, goes into a landfill or something?”

  “No. Medical waste is disposed of by burning.”

  “Oh.” Gideon swallowed. “And…and how long does it take for it to be burned?”

  “They don’t let it sit around, obviously. Look, I’m really sorry, but the legs are gone. I know it must’ve been a shock, but…well, your friend is dead.” He waved down at the body. “What you see here is just a discarded shell. Your friend has gone somewhere else, and where he is now he won’t be missing his legs. At least that’s what I believe, if you don’t mind my saying so.”

  “No. No, I don’t mind. It’s just that…” Gideon fell silent. He couldn’t believe it was over. He had failed.

  “I’m very sorry,” the man said.

  Gideon nodded.

  “Can I help you with anything else?”

  “No,” said Gideon wearily. “I’m done here.” He zipped up the bag, slid the drawer shut. He wondered what Eli Glinn would have to say.

  As they turned away, he noticed, for the first time, a very large and imposing African American woman standing in the doorway, wearing surgical scrubs, her mask pulled down. She cleared her throat. “I couldn’t help but overhear,” she said. “I’m Dr. Brown, one of the MEs around here.”

  The med tech greeted her, and there was a silence.

  Dr. Brown began to speak, very gently. “What was your name again, sir?”

  “Gideon Crew.”

  “I have some information, Mr. Crew, that might give you some small comfort.”

  Gideon waited for another exposition of religious views.

  “Mr. Correlli here is correct that it is standard procedure in this country for body parts from surgery to enter the medical-waste stream. But in this case, that would not have happened.”

  “Why not?”

  “Here in New York City we have an unusual system, perhaps even unique. When a limb is removed in surgery, if the patient doesn’t have specific directions for its disposal, that limb, after it leaves pathology, is placed in a box and delivered to New York’s potter’s field for burial.”

  Gideon stared at her. “Potter’s field?”

  “That’s right. It’s the place where the indigent are buried. The name comes from the Bible, the field where Judas was buried.”

  “New York City has a potter’s field?”

  “Correct. When a person dies and the body isn’t claimed, or if the family can’t afford a burial, the city buries the remains in their potter’s field. Same thing for, ah, unclaimed limbs. That’s where your friend’s legs would be buried.”

  “And just where is this…potter’s field?”

  “On Hart Island.”

  “Hart Island?” Gideon repeated. “Where’s that?”

  “As I understand, it’s an uninhabited island in Long Island Sound.”

  “And the legs were buried there?”

  “Undoubtedly.”

  “Is there a way to…relocate them?”

  “Yes,” the ME said. “After going through pathology, all the bodies, limbs, and so forth are placed in numbered, labeled boxes and buried in such a way that they can be retrieved for pathological or forensic reasons. So you needn’t worry. Your friend’s legs received a decent burial.”

  “I’m so relieved.” Gideon made an effort to cover up his racing pulse. This was incredible, unbelievable news.

  The med tech gave Gideon a kindly pat on the shoulder. “Well, I hope that gives you some small comfort.”

  “Yes,” Gideon said. “Yes, it does. Although—” Here Gideon turned a pair of soulful, pleading eyes toward the ME. “—I’d like the opportunity to visit them. Mourn them. Surely you understand?”

  For all her self-possession, Dr. Brown seemed disconcerted. “Well, I would think the remains here would be sufficient for mourning purposes.”

  “But this is only part of him.” Gideon let his voice quaver a little, as if he might break down at any moment.

  Brown considered this, and then spoke. “On a few rare occasions, an ME has had to retrieve human remains. It’s always a huge ordeal, lots of paperwork, taking weeks. A court order is required. You’ve got to understand, Hart Island is completely off-limits to all visitors, period. The burial work is done by prisoners from Rikers Island.”

  “But if they can retrieve a limb, how do they know where it’s buried? Do they keep track?”

  “I believe the numbered boxes are stacked in their trenches in order. When they fill a trench, they place a cement marker at the end and start a new one.”

  “How would I find out the number and location? Do you have that information?”

  Brown took the printout from the med tech and consulted it, her brow wrinkling. “The files, here, have the number.”

  Gideon extended a hand. “May I?”

  She handed Gideon the printout and, fumbling a pen out of his pocket, he wrote down the indicated number: 695–998 MSH.

  “Thank you. Thank you so much.”

  “Is there anything else I can help you with?” the ME asked. “I’m overdue in the autopsy room, if you don’t mind. We’re a little short-staffed at the moment.”

  “No, this is all I need. Thank you, Dr. Brown. I can find my way out.”

  “I'll have to escort you as far as the waiting room.”

  Gideon followed her solid and reassuring form into the corridor and past the autopsy room, which was still filled with activity. At least a dozen homicide detectives and police officers remained in the room; others had moved out into the corridor, almost blocking it. Even as they pushed through, Gideon could see that members of the press had now gathered outside the double doors, shouting and pushi
ng.

  “Must be a big deal, that homicide,” said Gideon.

  “It was particularly brutal,” said Brown, tersely. “Excuse me,” she said, pushing through the doors and trying to get past an especially aggressive camera crew. As soon as the press saw her doctor’s scrubs, they surged forward with a chorus of shouted questions.

  “Good luck.” She retreated behind the doors as the crowd peppered her with questions.

  “Suspects,” someone shouted. “Are there any suspects?”

  “Where in the church was the body hidden?”

  Gideon tried pushing through the crowd as they continued to yell questions at the closed doors.

  “…any witnesses or leads?”

  He elbowed a burly soundman aside and made for the exit.

  “…true that the throat was ripped out again, like the last one in Chinatown?”

  Gideon halted abruptly, turned. Who had said that? He looked about the seething crowd and grabbed a reporter, hanging at the fringes of the crowd, tape recorder in hand.

  “This murder — what was that I heard about the throat ripped out?”

  “You’re a witness?” the man asked, suddenly eager, sticking out his hand. “Bronwick of the Post.”

  Gideon stared at the man, his yellow ferret-teeth pushing out his lower lip. He had an incongruous Cockney accent.