Precious Blood

by Jonathan Hayes

  “I knew my work wasn’t good for me, and I wasn’t good for my work. So I went to the meeting, and I resigned.”

  “And that was that?”

  “Some people tried to get me to stay, but they didn’t understand where I was. I just couldn’t be there anymore, couldn’t do it anymore.”

  They lay there quiet for a long while. And finally he realized she was right: it was different now.

  In the ruined factory on the river, the man was trying to get warm. The blankets hanging over the main window, sodden from the rain, kept pulling out their moorings, the brick so rotten it shattered when he tried to drive a nail with his nail gun.

  He gave up and huddled in the corner, clutching his knees Precious Blood

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  to his chest, all of his bedding wrapped around him as he tried to fight off the damp. He looked around the room. It was pathetic.

  He’d been someone once, someone important. He had created FMedbase, an innovative database program, and for a while, his name appeared frequently in tech-sector newslet-ters and trade magazines. But just as quickly as he had risen, he had foundered, overtaken by younger, better companies with younger, better programmers.

  In an instant it seemed as if all his success had just been illusion, his company just another entrepreneurial blip. After the long summer where his failure became too obvious for him to deny, he had given up. Early that September, he made his way to the same big glass building in downtown Manhattan where just three years earlier he’d signed his incorporation papers. The appointment was early, a quick mercy killing before his lawyer got on with making real money from real entrepreneurs.

  The lawyer, impatient with his client’s slow reading of routine documents, pushed his fountain pen into the man’s hand and began to read aloud his own copy. The man sat silent at the conference table as his attorney went down the bankruptcy form, nodding his head slowly as he initialed each line, then signing and dating the bottom. The ink gleamed on the white paper, the bright morning sun gilding the final proof of his failure.

  “You understand that with Chapter Eleven . . . ,” the lawyer said, and then his voice was drowned out by the roar of engines and the clatter of the shuddering windows. He turned, confused, to the window just in time to see the impact. The man was falling to the ground when the blast hit, spraying the room with shards of tinted glass.

  When he pulled himself to his feet, the lawyer was sitting against a partition, mouth gaping and shutting, blood pouring from his scalp. The man bent stiffly, picked up the bankruptcy papers, and went into the hall. At first he was 146

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  deaf, but the roaring sound soon gave way to pandemonium, the sound of screams and car alarms. The stairwells were packed with panicked secretaries and lawyers.

  On the street, traffic had instantly become snarled. He saw flames rolling up the sides of the tower. It was obviously impossible, some kind of illusion—special effects from a Hollywood B movie.

  He stood at the corner for a while, leaning on a lamppost, his hearing fading out and coming back as he worked his jaw. He decided to walk home. He had just started east when the roar of the second plane flooded the area, followed by the explosion of its impact.

  All the buildings in the area were emptying. Police and fire department and EMS vehicles were fighting their way through the gridlock. He reached the park in front of City Hall and realized he had to sit. He rested for a little, but the hysteria of the crowds upset him, so he stood again and moved toward the Brooklyn Bridge, dazed, his movements treacle-slow and painful.

  He was on the bridge when the first of the towers went down. He didn’t look, just saw the faces, heard the screaming, and knew.

  When he reached the Brooklyn side, a Hasidic man told him he was bleeding, and wiped his wounds with a dishcloth wet with bottled water; it was nothing, scratches from the shower of glass. He blotted his injuries with the bankruptcy paperwork, then threw all the soiled papers into the garbage. He made to leave, but concerned people made him sit. He waited in the shade of the off-ramp for an hour, then continued on through the lazy flurry of paper and ash now floating down from the sky, walking toward the factory in Williamsburg that had housed his dead business, walking on toward home.

  sunday,

  december 8

  Jenner winced as he poured the champagne into the orange juice—a waste of a good bottle—but she wanted a mimosa, and so he’d made her a mimosa. And another.

  And was now working on a third. He misjudged, swearing as he lifted the dripping champagne flute up.

  Alcohol or not, she seemed to be doing better. Lying in bed that morning, she’d talked about her future for the first time. She did want to go back to school, eventually. She’d take some time off, maybe travel, get it all out of her system.

  Maybe she could work for Uncle Douggie for a while; she was actually a pretty good photographer.

  He wiped the counter, then put the glass down. He tipped a scoop of coffee beans into the mill and listened to her sing in the shower, a shifting, grisly medley of Coldplay and Brit-ney Spears.

  He pulsed the coffee, stopping when he heard a knock.

  Jun with more fucking bad news, no doubt. He opened the door to find Douggie Pyke, deep tan and weary, red-rimmed eyes. Jenner stepped back in surprise.

  He walked past Jenner into the loft, sniffing. “Afternoon, Jenner. Am I in time for coffee?”

  “Hey, Douggie. Just about.” The shower was still on full blast.

  “Can you believe this rain? I had to take the train up from D.C. They closed LaGuardia early this morning.” His eyes scanned the loft. “Where’s Ana?”

  “She’s just washing up, I think. How was your trip?”

  Jenner heard her shut off the shower.

  “How’s she doing?”

  “Good days and bad days. Pretty much how you’d expect.

  How was the trip?”

  “Rough—D.C. to New York was actually the easiest part.

  It took forever to get back to Yaoundé. On the trek back, we 150

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  came across a poacher camp. I got some incredible shots of butchered gorillas, saddest thing I’ve ever seen.”

  Pyke walked over to the counter and peered into the mill.

  He popped the cover and sniffed it. “What is this? Kenyan?

  It’s still way too coarse.” He pressed on the cap, and the loud rattle of the grinding chamber filled the room again.

  Ana walked into the room, naked except for a towel tied into a turban on her head. “Jenner, do you have any moistur-izer? My face is dry as—”

  Then she saw Douggie, pivoted and ran back into the bathroom, her arms across her breasts.

  Douggie took his hand off the coffee mill. He looked at Jenner, then walked over to the couch and sat.

  He didn’t speak for a minute or so.

  “So this is your idea of looking after her?”

  Jenner said nothing.

  “She’s half your age.”

  “Douggie, I’m sorry, but you don’t know what it’s been like. You have no idea what’s been going on.”

  “Oh, I think I have a pretty good idea.” He stood and called toward the bathroom, “Ana? Can you get your things?

  I’ll wait for you in my studio.”

  He walked over to the bathroom, tapped on the door, and repeated himself.

  “I can’t come out,” she said. “I don’t have anything to put on.”

  Pyke turned to Jenner.

  “Get her some clothes. Tell her to get her things and come downstairs. She can stay with me now.”

  “Douggie, she’s—”

  Pyke cut him off. “I don’t want to hear anything from you right now.”

  Jenner said, “Jesus, Douggie.”

  Pyke turned and walked over to him. “What? Go ahead, say something—I’m this fucking close to punching you in the fucking mouth.”

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  Jenner winced. The notion was ridiculous—Jenner was more than a head taller—but Pyke was his best friend. And he was right.

  He stayed silent as Pyke walked out of the room.

  “Is he gone yet?”

  Jenner slumped down onto the couch.

  “Yep.”

  She came out of the bathroom, this time without even the turban. She took two steps toward him, then bent over double with laughter.

  “Oh, my God! That was so great!” She couldn’t catch her breath, holding on to the countertop with one hand, trying to straighten up, gasping. “You should have seen your face!”

  She slipped onto his lap and put an arm about his neck.

  “You didn’t think it was funny?”

  She looked at his face and saw that he didn’t, which set her off into fresh gales of laughter.

  Jenner just sat there, mystified.

  “Between you and Uncle Douggie, I feel like a Victorian orphan. Damn! I wish I’d thought of that bit in Blue Velvet, you know, when she walks across the lawn naked to him in front of all of those people?”

  She put on a voice. “Edward . . . Edward, my secret lover

  . . .” And then, prodding him with her finger, “He put his disease in me . . .”

  That set her off again, and soon Jenner was laughing, too.

  “Seriously, though,” she said, “I should stay with him.

  He’ll get over it—he’s just tired. He feels like he’s let my parents down, what with you molesting me and all. I can tell.

  I promise I’ll sneak up so we can hang out. And when we’re fooling around, I’ll be shouting out, ‘ But . . . but . . . I’m half your age! ’ ”

  And she collapsed laughing again.

  The phone rang.

  “Father Patrick Sheehan for Dr. Jenner, please.”

  Jenner sat up guiltily, Ana sliding off his lap with a protest-152

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  ing squeak. “Good afternoon, Father. This is Dr. Jenner.”

  “Pat, Dr. Jenner. Unless you’re about to ask me to hear your confession!”

  It seemed Father Sheehan was the jovial type. “Hah. Nothing to confess, thanks. Simon Lescure told me you’d be back today. I’m sorry to interrupt your homecoming.”

  “Not at all, not at all! Simon tells me that you are involved in a most intriguing situation concerning some form of Coptic text. Very exciting indeed! I keep telling my students that the ancient languages live on among us, but they never seem to take it in. Nor any of the other pearls I lob at them, I fear!”

  The priest insisted they meet the next day. Jenner thanked him, took his address, and hung up.

  Ana sat by, smirking and sipping her drink.

  “Oh, I think it’s a little soon to be talking with a priest, don’t you? I mean, I know I rocked your tiny world, but it was just one night . . .”

  Jenner frowned up at her. “I liked you better depressed.”

  She smiled a little smile. “Oh, I’ve kept a little of that aside, just for you.”

  She stood, then paused to lean over him and kiss his cheek softly. She whispered, “Thank you,” into his ear, then padded back to the bathroom, mimosa in hand.

  monday,

  december 9

  They met in the stairwell at 10:00 a.m., before Jenner headed out to Yardley to visit Father Pat. She stood on the landing between his floor and Douggie’s, in jeans and a baseball cap, hair gathered into a ponytail tugged through the cap’s backstrap. She asked him how he was. He was fine, she was too.

  He had to go: Roggetti was waiting downstairs. Rad had called the night before to tell Jenner that their Columbia guy hadn’t panned out. Apparently, Whittaker had brought him to the morgue to read the text directly from the victim’s back; the professor had barely crossed the threshold of the autopsy room before turning white and having to be helped out onto the street.

  Roggetti would drive Jenner to meet Sheehan; he also had pulled Jenner’s tracings from the earlier killings from the Evidence Unit. All of which was fine by Jenner—the tracings were better quality than the photocopies he’d kept, plus he’d save the money on the car rental.

  Ana turned to go. Jenner said, “Wait! I have something for you . . .”

  He sheepishly handed her the oblong box wrapped in sky blue tissue paper.

  “What is it?” she asked, genuinely excited.

  She tore off the wrapping and dropped it onto the stairs.

  She unrolled the tissue paper, and tipped its contents into her palm. It was a handsome Laguiole pocketknife—authentic, not a cheap copy—with a three-inch blade, a stubby smaller blade for scoring the caps of wine bottles, and a corkscrew.

  The handle was rosewood with ebony inlay, and it had the traditional Napoleonic bee at the base of the blade; he’d spotted it in the window of an antique store after leaving Lescure’s apartment.

  She looked at it, beaming. “You know the Chinese say, 156

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  ‘Never give a friend a knife’?” She curled her fingers around the elegant handle, then kissed his cheek. “Thanks, Jenner.

  It’s beautiful.”

  Joey Roggetti was leaning against the car out by the back loading bay, whistling either Nirvana’s “Come As You Are”

  or “Hava Nagilah,” Jenner couldn’t tell. Joey insisted on taking the Holland Tunnel; as they neared the entrance, the tuneless whistling turned into tuneless humming.

  On the Jersey side, Jenner looked back at the city. He didn’t often take this route, and wasn’t used to the Manhattan skyline without the Twin Towers, like a face without a mouth.

  Roggetti had tuned in WDHA, a classic-rock station, that day broadcasting live all day from Asbury Park. Spring-steen’s “State Trooper” came on, and Roggetti sang along, beating the rhythm on the steering wheel.

  Old metal bridges carried them high over the barren marshes and derelict factories below, the blighted swamp between Kearney and Secaucus, New Jersey, the saddest place on earth.

  Roggetti fell quiet until they reached Pennsylvania, his mood brightening after they stopped for coffee. Ten minutes from Wilkes-Barre, he found a station playing the Stones; he kicked the car up to seventy-five and hit the cruise control.

  He hummed the verses to Tom Petty’s “Free Falling,” and sang along with the choruses. Jenner watched the countryside: empty snowy fields, low gray fencing, small industrial buildings and warehouses.

  Yardley had the cheery air of a college that had long ago embraced its mid-level status, contenting itself with the ambience, if not the academic achievement, of the Ivy League.

  The buildings were brick, solid and handsome, set around Precious Blood

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  large, snowy lawns with a central gazebo and beautiful oaks and elms, an elegant, winter-bare forest.

  The holiday break was approaching, and the air was festive. From the gazebo, a choir sang carols, and there was a long table where three young women dressed as elves sold mulled apple cider and baked goods for charity. In front of every dorm, groups of students were building large, complex snow sculptures—a Golden Gate Bridge, an airport with planes taxiing on the runway, a model of the United Nations, and the like.

  “They take their Christmas pretty seriously here, don’t they, Doc?”

  Jenner nodded.

  Roggetti shrugged. “You want some cider?”

  They walked down toward the table of elves, conspicuous in their dark overcoats and slightly wary expressions.

  The cider wasn’t bad. Hot and thick and sweet, heady with cinnamon and clove, the paper cup warm in Jenner’s bare hands.

  A snowball fight broke out near the UN; it looked like something out of a J. Crew catalogue.

  “Dr. Jenner?”

  They turned to see a spry older man with white hair, flushed cheeks, and bright blue eyes standing under the arches. He wore a dark brown hat tilted back on his head, Bing Crosby style, a clerical collar peeking throu
gh his un-zipped green parka.

  Jenner nodded. “Father Sheehan?”

  “Yes. Kind of horrifying to watch, isn’t it?” He gave a crooked grin.

  Jenner shook his outstreched hand and introduced Roggetti.

  The priest led them back to his rooms, on the ground floor of the dorm with the Golden Gate sculpture. As he closed the door to his bedroom, Jenner caught a glimpse of stacks and stacks of books, overflow from the book-lined study 158

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  where they sat. The room had a warm, dry smell of pipe to-bacco and firewood; it was almost uncomfortably cozy, with deep leather armchairs arranged by the fireplace, where the mantel held a collection of small carved owls in wood and stone.

  Jenner and Roggetti sat. They had a perfect view of the quadrangle lawn. The sound of “Deck the Halls” rose from the gazebo.

  “There’s no escaping it, is there?” said Sheehan, wryly gesturing to the window. “At Christmas, the whole world turns into some gigantic, awful mall.”

  He set a tray of glasses with a decanter on a side table. “I stay sane by telling myself that at least it isn’t ‘It’s a Small World After All.’ Sherry, gentlemen?” He was already pouring.

  The priest took a poker and nudged the logs in his fireplace, then sat opposite them. He waited until they had sipped before he drank.

  “Now. Your problem, Dr. Jenner. . . . ”

  Jenner set the large manila envelope of photos on the desk.

  Looking at Sheehan sitting in his chair, expectant, anxious to help, at the man’s books and owls around the room, at the snowy lawns and trees through the windows behind him, Jenner felt like a vector of disease, carrying sickness and decay into the heart of the priest’s idyllic little world.

  He opened the fastening on the envelope, then hesitated.

  “Father. I’m afraid you’ll find these photographs very upset-ting; I’ve been doing this for some time now, and even I find them disturbing.”

  The priest smiled softly. “Ah, Dr. Jenner. I did two tours as an army chaplain on the USS Repose during the Vietnam War; I assure you, a hospital ship at war quickly hardens the fainthearted. I appreciate your sensitivity, indeed I do; if I have some problems with the material, I’ll speak up.”