Nevermore

by Keith R. A. DeCandido

  Dean frowned. “Okay.”

  That seemed to be all she wanted to say on the subject. When they got to the corner, McBain walked up to the front door—well, one of them. The church actually had three front doors, and any number of side doors. Wisely, she chose the one in the middle of the front, which was diagonally on the corner of Fordham and MLK, facing the middle of the intersection.

  The detective pounded on the ornate wooden door, which was about ten feet high.

  “So,” Dean said, “the direct approach?”

  “I ain’t sneakin’ into no church, brushy-top. I sinned enough for one life, thanks. Now botha you keep your yaps shut and let me handle this.”

  Dean looked over at Sam. Sam just shrugged with a “what do you want from me?” look. It wasn’t like they hadn’t snuck into churches before…

  After several agonizing seconds, which to Dean felt like several days, the door slid open slowly with a creek. A bleary-eyed man stood on the other side. “Yes?”

  McBain held up her badge. “NYPD, Father.”

  “I’m a deacon, actually,” he muttered. “The priests are on retreat for the week.”

  Lucky bastard, Dean thought. Gets the place to himself. He wondered what kind of trouble a deacon could get into while the priests were all away. Probably not much, he thought, disappointed.

  “I’m sorry, but we have reason to believe that your bell tower has been compromised. May we come in?”

  “Compromised?”

  “Yes, sir. We need to investigate it.”

  The deacon seemed to be working the conversation through his brain very slowly. “I don’t understand.”

  Fed up, Dean stepped forward. “Look, Deacon, we think somebody’s up there. We need to check it out. Will you let us in?”

  “Well…” He shook his head. “I suppose. I mean, as long as you’re police.” He gave a ragged smile. “Besides, all are welcome in the Lord’s house.”

  Dean smiled. “Amen.”

  As they entered, McBain whispered, “What’d I tell you about lettin’ me handle this, brushy-top?”

  “I got us in, didn’t I?”

  McBain just glared at him as they came into the church.

  Pointing to a spiral staircase to the left, the deacon said, “The bell towers are that way.”

  Nodding, McBain said, “Stay down here, please, sir, while we look into it.”

  “Er, okay.” The deacon didn’t sound happy, but he didn’t argue, either, for which Dean was grateful.

  Dean looked around and was surprised to see very little. He could only make out vague shapes inside. He never thought of a church as closing down, but this late at night, with no light coming through the stained glass, and both the electric lights and the candles out, there was nothing to see.

  Sam and McBain had already started up the staircase, and Dean followed quickly.

  The trio moved up the spiral, McBain in the lead and Sam and Dean close behind. Dean wasn’t comfortable with that, but if nothing else, it probably put the deacon at ease, since she was the only one who’d shown a badge.

  After climbing up the narrow, winding stairs for about ten days, they finally got past the main part of the church’s high ceiling. Dean was never particularly agoraphobic, but being this high up in the open space of the church with only a twisting metal banister between him and plunging to the floor didn’t exactly thrill him. He was grateful when the staircase came to an end at a landing. There was a hallway that led down the length of the church, and another staircase that continued upward.

  Indicating the staircase with her head, McBain continued up. Dean reached behind his back and took out his pistol, and McBain and Sammy both did likewise at the same time. Again, they didn’t want to alarm the deacon, but now that they were out of sight…

  This was a curvy staircase, but one actually built into the stonework, surrounded by walls on either side with no sheer drops.

  Unfortunately, as dark as it was in the church, there had been some light, and the hallway at the top of the spiral staircase had some electric lights. This second staircase wasn’t illuminated at all.

  “Brushy-top,” McBain whispered.

  I really wish she’d stop calling me that. Dean whispered back, “Yeah?”

  “You go first.”

  Not that he objected, but he had to ask: “Why?”

  “’Cause my night vision sucks ass.”

  Muttering, “Now she tells us,” Dean moved ahead of both Sam and McBain, Sam taking up the rear.

  Dean moved slowly, letting his eyes adjust to the growing darkness, weapon at the ready.

  As they approached the top, he noticed a trip wire running across the bottom. He might not have seen it in the dim light, but this loser had used that trick once before, so Dean figured he’d go for it again.

  “Trip wire,” he whispered, pointing at it with his left hand, gun still raised in the right.

  Sam and the detective both nodded. Dean stepped over it and moved into a small alcove. There were two more staircases on either side of the alcove, both leading up to the bells themselves, and a small doorway between them. Dean guessed that was where they rang the bells from. Everything was dark stone, giving the place a medieval feel—except for the shiny red fire extinguisher that was on a small shelf next to that small doorway. Gotta love them fire codes.

  Without even thinking about it, Sam and Dean moved to either side of the door. McBain just stared at them for a second, shook her head, then went straight for the door, yanking it open and jumping back into a kneeling position. At the same time, Dean and Sam leaned in. All three were pointing their weapons.

  The room was empty.

  Dean shook his head. “The crazy son of a bitch may be up in the bells themselves.”

  “Or he may not be here at all,” Sam said. “This was just a guess.”

  Suddenly, Dean winced from the echoing report of a pistol being fired, followed by the pinging sound of a bullet ricocheting off stone.

  Sam also winced. “Or not.”

  McBain ran to the bottom of the stairs, but stayed to the side, out of the line of fire—not that there was a line of fire with the curved stairs—and said, “NYPD—come down with your hands up.”

  Dean looked at Sam, and Sam immediately ran to the other staircase.

  “No chance of that, I’m afraid. You’ll have to come up.”

  “Don’t think I won’t,” McBain said.

  I know that voice, Dean thought. Where do I know that voice from? It wasn’t Mackey, but it was one he’d heard recently. Not one of Scottso—they couldn’t have gotten here that fast, and this was too well spoken a tone for any of them.

  Oh, man. He finally placed it. Shoulda freakin’ known.

  Aloud, he said, “The jig’s up, Vincent!”

  McBain whirled around and looked up at him, mouthing the words, Say what?

  After a pause, the voice of Dr. Ross Vincent asked, “Who is that?”

  “Doesn’t matter, Professor, it’s over. I know you kept trying to convince everyone on that message board that there wasn’t a connection between the murders. Makes sense for you to do that if you were trying to keep people away from your bogus ritual.”

  “It isn’t ‘bogus’!” Vincent screamed, his voice getting closer. “Percival Samuels was a genius, and his methods will provide the answer at last!”

  “To what?” Dean asked.

  Two figures came into view. One was Vincent—he had looked slightly manic in his office on Fordham’s campus, but now he was out-and-out crazed. Dean couldn’t see his eyes in the dim light, but his body language was completely messed up.

  The other figure was Mackey, at whose head Vincent was pointing the muzzle of a .44 caliber pistol.

  I just love Mexican standoffs, Dean thought.

  “The truth! Don’t you see? No one knows how Poe died! Now we can learn that, and so much more! So much of his life was a mystery, and we scholars waste so much limited time and useless effort to s
olve it, but we cannot—not without the original! So I am using Samuels’s genius to—”

  “It’s a fake, you dork!” Dean said. “The ritual’s a dud. Samuels was just using it to con the rubes out of their dough.”

  “You’re lying!”

  McBain said, “You ain’t never findin’ out. Drop your weapon.”

  “No. No, you can’t! I’m so close! On Tuesday, everything will come together, you’ll see! You’ll see! Poe will return and then everyone will know the truth!”

  Vincent whirled around and said, “Don’t move!” Only then did Dean see Sam approaching from the other side.

  “Don’t worry about me,” Mackey said in a strained voice, “just please shoot this imbecile!”

  “Fine by me,” Dean muttered.

  McBain said, “Don’t even think it, brushy-top.”

  Dean wouldn’t endanger Mackey’s life, of course, but damn was it tempting.

  Although Sam hadn’t moved, Vincent cried, “I said, don’t move, damn you!” He then shot toward the ground.

  Dean could hear the bullet ricochet off the stone, then hit something metal. Probably one of the bells, he thought.

  “That was a warning shot. I don’t wish to hurt anyone beyond the confines of the ritual, but I will kill you before I let you stop me.”

  “Ain’t nowhere you can go, Professor,” McBain said. “We can stand here all night, but sooner or later—”

  “Scholarship is at stake, madam,” Vincent said, his .44 now again pointed at Mackey. “I assure you, I can stand here with my gun at Mr. Pym’s throat until Tuesday, if necessary. I’ve come this far, I will not be stopped!”

  Dean heard dripping. What the hell? Figuring that McBain and Sam both had Vincent covered, he was willing to take his eyes off the bastard long enough to look down at the stairs. Something was running down the staircase in rivulets, each one caused by the three sets of feet on the staircase.

  A second later he smelled gas.

  Sonofabitch. That wasn’t a bell he hit, that was a gas can. Vincent was probably gonna use it for the fire Sammy was talking about.

  Holding up his pistol, Dean said, “I’m holstering my weapon, okay, Professor?”

  Angrily, McBain said, “Brushy-top, what the hell you doin’?”

  “Trust me,” Dean said as he put the gun in the back of his waistband. He looked up at Vincent. “Listen to me, Professor, I got something I wanna show you, okay?”

  “Do not try anything, Mr. Morrison.”

  McBain gave Dean a quick sidelong glance of confusion, but kept her focus on Vincent.

  Dean reached into his jacket pocket slowly, not taking his eye off Vincent, feeling around for the item he needed. He put his thumb in the right position and hoped this would work.

  Sam suddenly said, “Professor, look out!”

  “What?”

  Thank you, Sammy! Vincent turned his head, giving Dean the precious second he needed to pull out his lighter, flick it on, and toss it at the dripping gas.

  Within seconds the entire staircase was on fire. Dean felt it at his back as he ran to the fire extinguisher. Turning, he saw that Sam had grabbed Mackey, and that Vincent himself was on fire and screaming.

  Dean immediately hit him with the fire extinguisher. White foam sprayed out, smothering the flames. He turned the hose on the stairs, and within seconds everything was fine.

  McBain was staring at Dean with an incredulous expression. “What the hell was that, brushy-top?”

  “Stoppin’ the bad guy,” Dean said.

  “By startin’ a fire?”

  Dean shrugged. “Hey, he’s the one who shot the gas can. It woulda gone off if anyone fired. At least this way we had some control over it.”

  The detective looked like she wanted to argue, but instead she just shook her head, holstered her pistol, and took out her handcuffs. “What’s this asshole’s name?” she asked Dean.

  “Ross Vincent. He’s the Poe expert Mackey sent us to.”

  McBain put the handcuffs on the burned form of their perp. “Ross Vincent, you are under arrest on suspicion of the murders of Marc Reyes, Sarah Lowrance, John Soeder, and Kevin Bayer, the kidnapping of Arthur Mackey, resisting arrest, and whatever the hell else I feel like charging you with. You have the right to remain silent…”

  “Thank you, gentlemen,” Mackey said as Sam led him down the stairs. “That was quite unpleasant.”

  “Yeah, well, it would’ve been worse come Tuesday,” Sam said.

  “Indeed. ‘In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire.’ I feared I would never see my wife and children again.” Mackey’s beady eyes went wide once again. “Oh dear, I must call them. Do either of you have a phone I may borrow?”

  Sam handed over his Treo, which proved once again that he was more generous than Dean, as Dean didn’t want this guy touching his stuff. Okay, so Mackey wasn’t the bad guy, something he hadn’t been a hundred percent sold on until he saw Vincent holding a .44 to his head, but still…

  McBain had finished reading Vincent his Miranda nights and asked, “You okay, Arthur?”

  Into Sam’s Treo, he said, “One moment, love.” He looked up. “A bit worse for the wear, Detective, but I’ll live—probably.” Back to the phone: “I must go, my dear, but I promise to be home as soon as I can. I’ll probably have to give a statement to the police. Yes, all right. Kiss the kids for me. I love you all. Good night.” He handed Sam the phone back and said, “Thank you.”

  “No problem,” Sam said with a friendly smile.

  Meanwhile, McBain was on her own cell phone calling for backup and an ambulance for Vincent.

  Dean thought back to what Vincent had said in his office about wasting time arguing over things they couldn’t know and the importance of truth, and he was kicking himself for not figuring out he was the guy sooner. Too focused on Mackey, I guess. Aloud, he said, “I can’t believe he did all this just to find out how Poe died.”

  Mackey laughed. “Really? Obviously, you haven’t met very many academics. I can think of several dozen who would think nothing of committing four murders if it meant furthering the cause of scholarship.”

  Staring at Sam, Dean said, “And you wanted to go to grad school.”

  “Well,” Sam said defensively, “law school.”

  “Yeah,” McBain said, having finished her phone call, “’cause what we really need is more lawyers. Hell, this guy prob’ly has some suit on retainer that’ll get his ass off with insanity.” Staring intently at Dean, McBain then said, “Why don’t you guys go wait for the backup to show up?”

  “Good idea,” Dean said emphatically, getting the hint that they should vamoose before that backup arrived.

  “Definitely,” Sam said with a nod.

  Dean just hoped the cops were done at Manfred’s place.

  “Uh, hello?” came a voice from the spiral staircase. It sounded like the deacon.

  Sighing, McBain said to Dean and Sam, “Send his holiness up here on your way out. I’ll fill him in. Oh, and don’t forget, we got that meeting tomorrow morning at six at the parking area just off the 97th Street exit on the West Side Highway.”

  Confused, Dean asked, “We do?”

  “Yeah, brushy-top, we do.”

  Dean let out a long sigh. He assumed this was the other thing she had said she wanted to share with them. “Fine. Let’s go, Sammy.”

  Grinning, Sam said, “After you, brushy-top.”

  Only the fact that he was in a church kept Dean from beating the crap out of his brother.

  EPILOGUE

  97th Street exit, West Side Highway

  New York, New York

  Friday 24 November 2006

  McBain was waiting for them when the Impala veered off the West Side Highway and then veered again when the road split. The left fork continued under the highway to Ninety-seventh Street; the right fork, which the brothers took, went to a small parking lot that overlooked the Hudson River.

  Sam took a moment to a
dmire the view. It was a windy morning, and the Hudson was full of small whitecaps. A large boat was sailing up toward them, which soon became visible as the Circle Line, a boat that went around the island of Manhattan. There were only a few people on it, and they were bundled against the frigidity—it had to feel ten degrees colder on the water, Sam thought as he pulled his coat tight to his chest—but they seemed to be enjoying themselves.

  On the other side of the river was New Jersey, including the lengthy strip along the river that, according to what he’d read on the web, had been built up over the last ten years or so as a major shopping area.

  McBain was leaning against her Saturn and holding a folder, which she handed to Dean.

  “What’s this?” he asked as he took it.

  “I ain’t the first NYPD cop to walk the spook beat. Guy before me was a cranky old bastard named Landesberg. He used to keep an eye on the crazy-ass stuff back in the seventies. He left me a box full of folders, and I dig through it every once in a while. Found this, and figured you guys might be able to do something about it.”

  Dean stared at the contents of the folder, then closed it and handed it to Sam.

  Sam saw several yellowing newspaper clippings from a Cedar Wells, Arizona, newspaper in 1966, with notes made in simply awful handwriting, as well as several 81/2-by-11-inch sheets of paper.

  “It’s down near the Grand Canyon,” McBain said. “There were a series of unexplained killings in early December 1926 and then again at the same time in 1966.”

  “Every forty years,” Sam said, looking at the pages, which turned out to be photocopies of clippings from 1926.

  “Yeah, and we’re comin’ up on the anniversary.” She indicated the Impala with her head. “I figure that tank oughtta get you cross-country in time.”

  “Definitely,” Dean said with pride. Sam tried not to roll his eyes.

  “It’s worth checking out, certainly,” Sam said. “Can we keep this?”

  McBain snorted. “It’s way outta my jurisdiction, so sure. Just try to keep people alive, okay?”

  “That’s what we do,” Dean said. “And if we can’t, we make sure it doesn’t happen again.”