He'd been careful, so very careful. How could this be happening to him now? That pale death's-head of an avenging angel, appearing on his doorstep so unexpectedly... He had always played a conservative game, never taking risks. And it had worked, until now...
The stillness of the room was broken by the ring of a telephone. Blast jumped at the sudden sound. He strode over to it, plucked the handset from the cradle. From the ottoman, the two Pomeranians watched his every move.
"It's Victor. What's up?"
"Christ, Victor, it's about time you called back. Where the hell have you been?"
"Out," a rough, gravelly voice replied. "Is there a problem?"
"You bet there's a problem. A monstrous big fucking problem. An FBI agent came sniffing around last night."
"Anybody we know?"
"Name of Pendergast. Had an NYPD cop with him, too."
"What did they want?"
"What do you think they wanted? He knows too much, Victor--way too much. We're going to have to take care of this, and right away."
"You mean..." The gravelly voice hesitated.
"That's right. It's time to roll everything up."
"Everything?"
"Everything. You know what to do, Victor. See that it gets done. See that it gets done right away." Blast slammed down the phone and stared out the window at the endless blue horizon.
32
THE DIRT TRACK WOUND THROUGH THE PINEY forest and came out in a big meadow at the edge of a mangrove swamp. The shooter parked the Range Rover in the meadow and removed the gun case, portfolio, and backpack from the rear. He carried them to a small hillock in the center of the field, setting them down in the matted grass. He took a paper target from the portfolio and walked down the field to the swamp, counting his strides. The noonday sun pierced through the cypress trees, casting flecks of light across the green-brown water.
Selecting a smooth, broad trunk, the shooter pinned a target to the wood, tacking it down with an upholstery hammer. It was a warmish day for winter, in the low sixties, the smell of water and rotting wood drifting in from the swamp, a flock of noisy crows croaking and screeching in the branches. The nearest house was ten miles away. There wasn't a breath of wind.
He walked back up to where he had left his gear, counting his steps again, satisfied that the target was about a hundred yards away.
He opened the hard Pelican case and removed the rifle from it: a Remington 40-XS tactical. At fifteen pounds, it was a heavy son of a bitch, but the trade-off was a better-than-0.75 MOA accuracy. The shooter hadn't fired the weapon in quite some time, but it was now cleaned and oiled and ready to go.
He knelt, laying it over his knee, and flipped down the bipod, adjusting and locking it in place. Then he lay down in the matted grass, set the rifle in front of him, moving it around until it was stable and solid. He closed one eye and peered through the Leupold scope at the target affixed to the tree. So far, so good. Reaching into his back pocket, he removed a box of .308 Winchester rounds and placed it in the grass to his right. Plucking out a round, he pushed it into the chamber, then another, until the four-round internal magazine was full. He closed the bolt and looked again through the scope.
He aimed at the target, breathing slowly, letting his heart rate subside. The faint trembling and movement of the weapon, as evident from the motion of the target in the crosshairs, subsided as he allowed his entire body to relax. He placed his finger on the trigger and tightened slightly, let his breath run out, counted the heartbeats, and then squeezed between them. A crack, a small kick. He ejected the shell, resumed breathing, relaxed again, and gave the trigger another slow squeeze. Another crack and kick, the sound rolling away quickly over the swampy flatlands. Two more shots finished the magazine. He rose to his feet, gathered the four shells, put them in his pocket, and walked down to inspect the target.
It was a fairly tight grouping, the rounds close enough to have cut an irregular hole to the left and slightly below the center of the target. Removing a plastic ruler from his pocket, he measured the offset, turned and walked back across the meadow, moving slowly to keep his exertion down. He lay down again, gathered the rifle into his hands, and adjusted the elevation and windage knobs on the scope to take his measurements into account.
Once again, with great deliberation, he fired four rounds at the target. This time the grouping lay dead center, all four rounds more or less placed in the same hole. Satisfied, he pulled the target off the tree trunk, balled it up, and stuffed it in his pocket.
He walked back to the center of the field and resumed firing position. It was now time for a little fun. When he first began firing, the flock of crows had risen in noisy flight and settled about three hundred yards away at the far edge of the field. Now he could see them on the ground under a tall yellow pine, strutting about in the needle duff and picking out seeds from a scattering of cones.
Peering through the scope, the man selected a crow and followed it in the crosshairs as it pecked and jabbed at a cone, shaking it with its beak. His forefinger tightened on the curved steel; the shot rang out; and the bird disappeared in a spray of black feathers, splattering the nearby tree trunk with bits of red flesh. The rest of the flock rose in an uproar, bursting into the blue and winging away across the treetops.
The man looked about for another target, this time aiming the scope down toward the swamp. Slowly, he swept the edge of the swamp until he found it: a massive bullfrog about 150 yards off, resting on a lily pad in a little patch of sun. Once again he aimed, relaxed, and fired; a pink cloud flew up, mingled with green water and bits of lily pad, arcing through the sunlight and gracefully falling back into the water. His third round clipped the head off a water moccasin, thrashing through the water in a frightened effort to get away.
One more round. He needed something really challenging. He cast about, looking around the swamp with a bare eye, but the shooting had disturbed the wildlife and there was nothing to be seen. He would have to wait.
He went back to the Range Rover and removed a soft-canvas shotgun case from the rear, unzipped it, and took out a CZ Bobwhite side-by-side 12-gauge with a custom-carved stock. It was the cheapest shotgun he owned, but it was still an excellent weapon and he hated what he was now about to do. He rummaged around in the Rover, removing a portable vise and a hacksaw with a brand-new blade.
He laid the shotgun over his knees and stroked the barrels, rubbed them down with a little gun oil, and laid a paper tape measure alongside. Marking off a spot with a nail, he put the hacksaw to it and went to work.
It was a long, tedious, exhausting business. When he was finished, he filed the burr off the end with a rattail, gave it a quick bevel, brushed it with steel wool, and then oiled it again. He broke the action and carefully cleaned out loose filings, then dunked in two shotgun shells. He strolled down to the swamp with the gun and the sawed-off barrels, flung the barrels as far out into the water as he could, braced the gun at his waist, and pulled the front trigger.
The blast was deafening and it kicked like a mule. Crude, vile--and devastatingly effective. The second barrel discharged perfectly as well. He broke the action again, put the shells in his pocket, wiped it clean, and reloaded. It worked smoothly a second time around. He was pained, but satisfied.
Back at the car, he slid the shotgun back in its case, put the case away, and removed a sandwich and thermos from his pack. He ate slowly, savoring the truffled fois gras sandwich while sipping a cup of hot tea with milk and sugar from the thermos. He made an effort to enjoy the fresh air and sun and not think about the problem at hand. As he was finishing, a female red-tailed hawk rose up from the swamp, no doubt from a nest, and began tracing lazy circles above the treetops. He estimated her distance at about two hundred fifty yards.
Now this, finally, was a challenge worthy of his skill.
He once more assumed a shooting position with the sniper rifle, aiming at the bird, but the scope's field of view was too narrow and he couldn't keep her i
n it. He would have to use his iron sights instead. He now peered at the hawk using those fixed sights, trying to follow her as she moved. Still no go: the rifle was too heavy and the bird too fast. She was tracing an ellipsis, and the way to hit her, he decided, was to pre-aim for a point on that ellipsis, wait until the hawk circled around toward it, and time the shot.
A moment later the hawk tumbled from the sky, a few feathers drifting along after her, carried off on the wind.
The shooter folded away the bipod, picked up and re-counted all the shells, put the gun back in its case, packed away his lunch and thermos, and hefted his pack. He gave the area one last look-over, but the only sign of his presence was a patch of matted grass.
He turned back toward the Range Rover with a deep feeling of satisfaction. Now, at least for a while, he could give free vent to his feelings, allow them to flow through his body, spiking his adrenaline, preparing him for the killing to come.
33
Port Allen, Louisiana
D'AGOSTA STOOD OUTSIDE THE VISITOR'S CENTER in brilliant afternoon sunlight, looking down Court Street toward the river. Besides the center itself--a fine old brick building, spotlessly renovated and updated--everything seemed brand new: the shops, the civic buildings, the scattering of homes along the riverbank. It was hard to believe that, somewhere in the immediate vicinity, John James Audubon's doctor had lived and died nearly 150 years before.
"Originally, this was known as St. Michel," Pendergast said at his side. "Port Allen was first laid out in 1809, but within fifty years more than half of it had been eaten away by the Mississippi. Shall we walk down to the riverfront promenade?"
He set off at a brisk pace, and D'Agosta followed in his wake, trying to keep up. He was exhausted and wondered how Pendergast maintained his energy after a week of nonstop traveling by car and plane, charging from one place to the next, rolling into bed at midnight and waking at dawn. Port Allen felt like one place too many.
First they had gone to see Dr. Torgensson's penultimate dwelling: an attractive old brick residence west of town, now a funeral home. They had rushed to the town hall where Pendergast had charmed a secretary, who allowed him to paw through some old plans and books. And now they were here, on the banks of the Mississippi itself, where Blast claimed Dr. Torgensson had spent his final unpleasant months in a shotgun shack, ruined, in a syphilitic and alcoholic stupor.
The riverfront promenade was broad and grand, and the view from the levee was spectacular: Baton Rouge spread out across the far bank, barges and tugs working their way up the wide flow of chocolate-colored water.
"That's the Port Allen Lock," Pendergast said, waving his hand toward a large break in the levee, ending in two huge yellow gates. "Largest free-floating structure of its kind. It connects the river to the Intracoastal Waterway."
They walked a few blocks along the promenade. D'Agosta felt himself reviving under the influence of the fresh breeze coming off the river. They stopped at an information booth, where Pendergast scanned the advertisements and notice boards. "How tragic--we've missed the Lagniappe Dulcimer Fete," he said.
D'Agosta shot a private glance toward Pendergast. Given how hard he'd taken the shock of his wife's murder, the agent had taken the news about Constance Greene--which Hayward had given them yesterday--with remarkably little emotion. No matter how long D'Agosta knew Pendergast, it seemed he never really knew him. The man obviously cared for Constance--and yet he seemed almost indifferent to the fact that she was now in custody, charged with infanticide.
Pendergast strolled back out of the booth and walked across the greensward toward the river itself, pausing at the remains of a ruined sluice gate, now half underwater. "In the early nineteenth century, the business district would have been two or three blocks out there," he said, pointing into the roiling mass of water. "Now it belongs to the river."
He led the way back across the promenade and Commerce Avenue, made a left on Court Street and a right on Atchafalaya. "By the time Dr. Torgensson was forced to move into his final dwelling," he said, "St. Michel had become West Baton Rouge. At the time, this neighborhood was a seedy, working-class community between the railroad depot and the ferry landing."
He turned down another street; consulted the map again; walked a little farther and halted. "I do believe," he drawled, "that we have arrived."
They had arrived at a small commercial mini-mall. Three buildings sat side by side: a McDonald's; a mobile phone store; and a squat, garishly colored structure named Pappy's Donette Hole--a crusty local chain D'Agosta had seen elsewhere. Two cars were parked in front of Pappy's, and the McDonald's drive-through was doing a brisk business.
"This is it?" he exclaimed.
Pendergast nodded, pointing at the cell phone store. "That is the precise location of Torgensson's shotgun shack."
D'Agosta looked at each of the buildings in turn. His spirits, which had begun to rise during the brief walk, fell again. "It's like Blast said," he muttered. "Totally hopeless."
Pendergast put his hands in his pockets and strolled up to the mini-mall. He ducked into each of the buildings in turn. D'Agosta, who could not summon the energy to follow, merely stood in the adjoining parking lot and watched. Within five minutes the agent had returned. Saying nothing, he did a slow scan of the horizon, turning almost imperceptibly, until he had carefully scrutinized everything within a three-hundred-sixty-degree radius. Then he did it again, this time stopping about halfway through his scan.
"Take a look at that building, Vincent," he said.
D'Agosta followed the gesture with his eyes toward the visitor's center they had passed at the beginning of their loop.
"What about it?" D'Agosta asked.
"That was clearly once a water-pumping station. The Gothic Revival style indicates it probably dates back to the original town of St. Michel." He paused. "Yes," he murmured after a moment. "I'm sure it does."
D'Agosta waited.
Pendergast turned and pointed in the opposite direction. From this vantage point they had an unobstructed view down to the promenade, the ruined sluice gate, and the wide Mississippi beyond.
"How curious," Pendergast said. "This little mini-mall falls on a direct line between that old pumping station and the sluice gate at the river."
Pendergast broke into a swift walk toward the river again. D'Agosta swung in behind.
Stopping almost at the water's edge, Pendergast bent forward to examine the sluice gate. D'Agosta could see it led to a large stone pipe that was sealed with cement and partially backfilled.
Pendergast straightened up. "Just as I thought. There was an old aqueduct here."
"Yeah? So what's it mean?"
"That aqueduct was no doubt abandoned and sealed up when the eastern half of St. Michel crumbled into the river. Remarkable!"
D'Agosta did not share his friend's enthusiasm for historical detail.
"Surely you see it now, Vincent? Torgensson's shack must have been built after this aqueduct was sealed up."
D'Agosta shrugged. For the life of him, he didn't see where Pendergast was going.
"In this part of the world it was common--for buildings constructed over the line of an old water pipe or aqueduct, anyway--to cut into an old aqueduct and use it as a basement. It saved a great deal of labor when basements were dug by hand."
"You think the pipe is still down there--?"
"Exactly. When the shack was built in 1855, they probably used a section of the capped and abandoned tunnel--now quite dry, of course--as the basement. Those old aqueducts were square, not round, and made of mortared stone. The builders merely had to shore up the foundations, construct two brick walls on the sides perpendicular to the existing aqueduct walls, and--voila! Instant basement."
"And you think that's where we'll find the Black Frame?" D'Agosta asked a little breathlessly. "In Torgensson's basement?"
"No. Not in the basement. Remember the creditor's note Blast showed us? 'We've searched the shack from basement to eaves. It h
as proven empty, nothing left of value, certainly no painting.' "
"If it's not in the basement, then what's all the excitement about?" Pendergast's coyness could be so maddening sometimes.
"Think: a series of row houses, situated in a line above a preexisting tunnel, each with a basement fashioned from a segment of that tunnel. But, Vincent--think also of the spaces between the houses. Remember, the basements would be roughly the size of the houses above them."
"So... so you're saying there would be old spaces between the basements."
"Precisely. Sections of the old aqueduct between each basement, bricked off and unused. And that's where Torgensson might have hidden the Black Frame."
"Why hide it so well?"
"We can assume that if the painting was so precious to the doctor that he could not part with it even in the greatest penury, then it would be precious enough that he would not want to ever be far from it. And yet he had to hide it well from his creditors."
"But the house was struck by lightning. It burned to the ground."
"True. But if our logic is correct, the painting would likely have been safe in its niche, secure in the aqueduct tunnel between his basement and the next."
"So all we have to do is get into the basement of the wireless store."
Pendergast put a restraining hand on his arm. "Alas, that wireless store has no basement. I checked when I went inside. The basement of the structure that predated it must have been filled in after the fire."
Once again, D'Agosta felt a huge deflation. "Then what the hell are we going to do? We can't just get a bulldozer, raze the store, and dig a new basement."
"No. But we just might be able to make our way into the tunnel space from one of the adjacent basements, which I confirmed still exist. The question is: which one to try first?" Once again, that gleam that had been so often absent in recent days returned to Pendergast's eyes: the gleam of the hunt. "I'm in the mood for doughnuts," he said. "How about you?"
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