Blue Labyrinth

by Douglas Preston

  He grabbed his phone, dialed the number on his computer screen. It rang three times before it was answered.

  “Hello?” came a woman’s voice.

  “Is this Marjorie Angler? My name is Vincent D’Agosta. I’m a lieutenant with the NYPD. Is Lieutenant Angler there?”

  “No. He’s not staying with me.”

  “When did you last speak with him?”

  “Let me see—four, five days ago, I think.”

  “May I ask what you talked about?”

  “He said he was coming upstate. Some investigation he was working on. He said he was rushed for time, but that he hoped to stop by to see me on the way back to New York City. But he never did—I imagine he was too busy, as usual.”

  “Did he say where he was going?”

  “Yes. Adirondack. Is there a problem of some sort?”

  “Not that I know of. Listen, Ms. Angler, you’ve been very helpful. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome—” the voice began again, but D’Agosta was already hanging up.

  He was breathing faster now. Adirondack. Home of Red Mountain Industries.

  Several days before, Angler had been on his way to Adirondack. Why hadn’t he returned to the city? He seemed to have disappeared. Why had Slade lied about his whereabouts? Or was Slade merely mistaken? And the hole: it was exactly the kind of hole you would use to plant a miniature microphone.

  Had Slade embedded a wire microphone in the wall of his office? If so, he’d listened in on D’Agosta’s phone calls. And he’d no doubt also listened in on his conversation with Margo and Constance.

  The hole was empty. The mike was gone. That meant the eavesdropper believed he had all the information he needed.

  It seemed too incredible to be true: Slade was dirty. And who was he working for? Only one answer: Barbeaux.

  Now D’Agosta’s vague concern about Barbeaux somehow threatening or intercepting Margo and Constance became suddenly much more specific. Barbeaux would know all that Slade knew, and that was just about everything. Specifically, he would know Margo and Constance were headed to the Museum to steal plant specimens.

  D’Agosta grabbed for the phone again, then hesitated, thinking furiously. This was a tricky situation. Accusing a fellow cop of being dirty—he damn well better be right.

  Was he? Was Slade dirty? Christ, all he had was a candy wrapper and a misfiled document. Not exactly a lot of evidence for destroying a man’s career.

  The fact was, he couldn’t call in the cavalry. They would think he was crazy—he had less on Slade than what the DA had already rejected on Barbeaux. There was nothing else for it—he’d have to go after Margo and Constance in the Museum by himself. He might be right, and he might be wrong—but he had no choice but to act, and act quickly, because if he was right, the consequences were too terrifying to even consider.

  He darted out of the office and made for the elevator as quickly as he could.

  Margo stood there, paralyzed by the blinding light.

  “Well, well, why am I not surprised?”

  It was Frisby’s voice, coming from behind the light.

  “Switch off that damned headlamp. You look like a miner.”

  Margo complied.

  “Here you are, on schedule, caught red-handed stealing one of the most valuable items in our entire herbarium.” The voice was triumphant. “This is no longer an internal Museum matter, Dr. Green. This is a criminal matter for the police. This will put you away for many years—if not for good.”

  The light was lowered and Frisby—now visible behind the brilliance—extended a hand. “Give me your bag.”

  Margo hesitated. What on earth was he doing down here? How had he possibly known?

  “Hand me the bag or I will be forced to take it from you.”

  She looked left and right for an escape route, but Frisby’s bulk blocked the way. She would have to knock him over—and he was more than half a foot taller than she.

  He took a menacing step forward and, realizing she had no choice, she held out her bag. He opened it, slid out one of the glass plates, and read, in a stentorian tone: “Thismia americana.” He carefully replaced it in the bag. “Caught red-handed. You are finished, Dr. Green. Let me tell you what is going to happen now.” He took out his cell phone and held it up. “I’m going to call the police. They will arrest you. Since the value of these specimens is far in excess of five thousand dollars, you will be charged with a Class C felony, burglary in the second degree, which carries a sentence of up to fifteen years in prison.”

  Margo listened, only barely comprehending. She was stupefied, because this meant the end of not just her own life—but Pendergast’s, as well.

  He searched through the rest of the bag, poking around while shining the light inside. “Pity. No weapon.”

  “Dr. Frisby,” Margo said in a wooden tone, “what is it you have against me?”

  “Who, me, have something against you?” His eyes widened in mock satire, and then narrowed. “You’re a hindrance. You’ve been a disruption in my department with your incessant comings and goings. You’ve been meddling in a police investigation, encouraging them to cast suspicion on our staff. And now you’ve rewarded my generosity in giving you access to the collections with outright thievery. Oh, I have nothing against you.” With a frosty smile, he punched in 911 on his cell phone, holding it so she could see what he was doing.

  He waited a moment, then frowned. “Bloody reception.”

  “Listen,” Margo managed to say. “A man’s life—”

  “Oh, for God’s sake, spare me the pathetic excuses. You played a nasty trick on Jörgensen, got him all riled up. He came boiling into my office and I feared he might have a heart attack. When I heard you’d been in his office asking for access to a rare, extinct plant, I figured you were up to something. What were you planning to do—sell it to the highest bidder? So I came down here, placed a chair in the far corner, and waited for you.” His voice swelled with satisfaction. “And here you came, on cue!”

  He grinned triumphantly. “Now I’ll take you to security to await the police.”

  A thousand ideas raced through Margo’s head. She could run; she could snatch the bag; she could knock Frisby down and escape; she could plead with him, try to talk him out of it; she could try to bribe him… But not a single option had the slightest chance of success. She was busted, and that was that. Pendergast would die.

  For a moment the two stared at each other. Margo could see from the expression on Frisby’s face that there would be no mercy from this man.

  And then his look of triumph suddenly changed: first to one of puzzlement, then to shock. His eyes grew wide and bugged out; his lips contracted. He opened his mouth but no sound came out, save for a strange boiling in the back of his throat. He dropped the flashlight, which hit the stone floor and went out, plunging the room into darkness. Instinctively, Margo reached out and snatched back her bag with nerveless fingers. A moment later she heard the sound of his body hitting the floor.

  And then a new light came on, revealing the outline of a man who had been standing behind Frisby. He stepped forward and, in an act of courtesy, shone the light on his own face, revealing a shortish man with a dark face, black eyes, and the very faintest of smiles playing at the corners of his mouth.

  At that same exact time, at precisely nine fifteen, a livery cab turned in at 891 Riverside Drive, then circled around the drive and came to a stop beneath the mansion’s porte cochere, engine idling.

  A minute passed, and then two. The front door opened and Constance Greene stepped out, wearing an ebony-colored pleated dress with ivory accents. A black duffel of ballistic nylon was slung over one shoulder. In the dim glow of moonlight, the formal, even elegant dress acted almost like camouflage.

  She leaned in at the driver’s window, whispered something inaudible, opened the rear passenger door, placed the duffel carefully on the seat, and then slid in beside it. The door closed; the cab moved back down the drive; an
d then it merged with the light evening traffic, heading north.

  Dr. Horace Stone found himself suddenly awake in the room with his patient. He did not care for nursing duties, but his patient was paying him extremely well and the case was most unusual, if not fascinating. There would be an excellent JAMA article in this—of course, not until after the patient’s demise and postmortem, when they might have at least a better chance of diagnosing this most unusual affliction.

  An excellent article indeed.

  Now he saw what had awakened him. Pendergast’s eyes had opened and were drilling into him with intensity.

  “My phone?”

  “Yes, sir.” Stone fetched the phone from the bureau and handed it to him.

  He examined it, his face pale. “Nine twenty. Constance—where is she?”

  “I believe she just left.”

  “You believe?”

  “Well,” said Stone, flustered. “I heard her say good-bye to Mrs. Trask, I heard the door shut, and there was a livery cab outside that took her away.”

  Stone was shocked when Pendergast rose in his bed. He was clearly coming into the remissive phase of the disease.

  “I strongly advise—”

  “Be silent,” said Pendergast, pushing back the covers and, with difficulty, rising to his feet. He pulled the IV from his arm. “Step aside.”

  “Mr. Pendergast, I simply cannot allow you to leave your bed.”

  Pendergast turned his pale, glittering eyes upon Dr. Stone. “If you try to stop me, I will hurt you.”

  This naked threat stopped Stone’s retort. The patient was clearly febrile, delusional, perhaps hallucinating. Stone had asked for a nurse and been denied one. He could not handle this on his own. He retreated from the room as Pendergast began changing out of his bedclothes.

  “Mrs. Trask?” he called. The house was so blasted large. “Mrs. Trask!”

  He heard the housekeeper bustling around downstairs, calling from the bottom of the stairs.

  “Yes, Doctor?”

  Pendergast appeared in the bedroom doorway, slipping into his black suit, stuffing a sheet of paper into one pocket, and sliding his gun into an inside holster. Dr. Stone stepped aside to let him pass.

  “Mr. Pendergast, I repeat, you are in no condition to leave the house!”

  Pendergast ignored him and headed down the stairs, moving slowly, like an old man. Dr. Stone followed in pursuit. A frightened Mrs. Trask hovered at the bottom.

  “Please get me a car,” Pendergast told the housekeeper.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “You can’t get him a car!” Stone expostulated. “Look at his condition!”

  Mrs. Trask turned to him. “When Mr. Pendergast asks for something, we do not say no.”

  Dr. Stone looked from her to Pendergast himself who, despite being obviously debilitated, returned the stare with such an icy look that he was finally silenced. It all happened so quickly. Now Mrs. Trask was hanging up the phone and Pendergast, staggering slightly, made his way to the porte cochere entrance. In a moment he was out the door, and the red taillights of the hired car were turning up the drive.

  Stone sat down, breathing hard. He had never quite seen a patient with such steely resolve in the grip of such a fatal illness.

  As he reclined in the rear of the car, Pendergast took the piece of paper from his pocket and read it over. It was a note, in Constance’s copperplate hand: the list of chemical compounds and other ingredients. Beside some of these ingredients, locales had been listed.

  Pendergast read the list over carefully, first once, then twice. And then he folded the page over on itself, tore it into small pieces, lowered the window of the car, and allowed the pieces to float out into the Manhattan night, one by one.

  The cab turned onto the entrance ramp for the West Side Highway, heading for the Manhattan Bridge and, ultimately, Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn.

  Shaking his head, the man bent down and plucked something from the back of Frisby’s neck.

  “Interesting collection you’ve got down here,” he said, holding up the object, dripping with Frisby’s blood. Margo recognized it as a giant Sumatran buckthorn: six inches long, recurved, razor-sharp—notorious as a weapon in certain parts of Indonesia.

  “I’d better introduce myself,” the man said. “I’m Sergeant Slade of the NYPD.” He reached into the pocket of his suit coat and produced an ID, illuminating it with his flashlight.

  Margo peered at it. The shield and identification looked real enough. But who was this man, and what was he doing down here? And hadn’t he just… stabbed Frisby? She felt a growing sense of confusion and terror.

  “I guess I arrived in the nick of time,” said Slade. “This old curator—you called him Frisby, right?—seemed to be getting off on calling the cops on you. Little did he know the cop was already here. And he was all wrong about the rap they’d have hung on you. Take it from me: you’d have pled down to Class E and received nothing more than community service. In New York City, no jury cares about a few moldy plant specimens stolen from a museum.”

  He bent to examine the body of Frisby, gingerly stepping around the spreading pool of blood under the neck as he did so, and then rose again.

  “Well, we’d better get on with it,” he said. “Now that I’m here, you don’t have much to worry about. Please give me the bag.” And he held out his hand.

  But Margo just stood there, frozen. Frisby was dead. This man had stabbed him—with a buckthorn, no less. This was nothing less than murder. She remembered D’Agosta’s warning and she suddenly understood: cop or no, this man was working for Barbeaux.

  Sergeant Slade took a step forward, buckthorn in hand.

  “Give me the bag, Dr. Green,” he said.

  Margo stepped back.

  “Don’t make things more difficult for yourself than they have to be. Give me the bag and you’ll get no more than a slap on the wrist.”

  Tightening her hand on the bag, Margo took another step back.

  Slade sighed. “You’re forcing my hand,” he said. “If that’s the way you want to play it, I’m afraid what’s in store for you will be far more extreme than community service.” He shifted the thorn into his right hand and gripped it hard, advancing on her. Margo turned and realized she was backed into a cul-de-sac of the botanical collections, with shelving on either side and the vault behind her.

  She stared at Sergeant Slade. He may have been short, but he moved with the grace of a lean and powerful man. In addition to the giant thorn in his hand, Margo could see a service belt beneath his suit jacket that held a gun, pepper spray, and cuffs.

  She took another step backward and felt her spine contact the metal door of the vault.

  “It’ll be quick,” Slade said, with a note in his voice that sounded almost like regret. “I don’t enjoy this—I really don’t.” The hand with the buckthorn rose into striking position and he loomed forward, bracing himself to swipe the weapon across her throat.

  You may pull over here, if you please.”

  The cabbie nosed his vehicle to the curb. Constance Greene pushed some money through the sliding window, collected the bag, and stepped out onto the sidewalk. She stood for a moment, considering. Across Washington Avenue stood a wrought-iron fence, and beyond that the dark trees of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden. Even though it was nine thirty, the traffic on Washington Avenue was steady and there were pedestrians on the move.

  Slinging the bag onto one shoulder by its strap, Constance smoothed down the pleats of her dress and brushed the hair from her face. She walked to the corner, waited at the crosswalk for the light to change, and crossed to the other side.

  Here the wrought-iron fence surrounding the garden stood about waist-high and was topped with dull spikes. Casually strolling along the fence, Constance walked to a spot midway between streetlights: a dark zone where overhanging tree limbs cast additional shadows. Setting down her bag, she took out her cell phone on the pretense of checking it and waited until there was no on
e in view. Then, in one smooth movement, she grasped two of the spikes and swung herself over, dropping down on the far side. Reaching over the fence, she retrieved her bag. A quick jog carried her into the protective darkness of the trees, where she paused to look back to see if her movements had attracted attention.

  All seemed normal.

  Opening the duffel, she removed a small satchel from it and hid it beneath some ground cover. Then she began moving through the darkness. She had not brought a flashlight: the waxing moon was just rising over the trees, and in any case her eyes were unusually well adapted to darkness from the many years of living in the basement corridors and crawl spaces underneath 891 Riverside Drive.

  She had downloaded a map of the Brooklyn Botanic Garden from the institution’s website and carefully memorized it. Ahead of her lay a border of dense shrubbery that formed a natural wall. She eased into the shrubbery and pushed her way through, emerging in an isolated corner of the Shakespeare Garden. Trampling through a dense patch of irises, their crushed scent rising around her, she gained a brick path that wound through the plantings. Here she paused again to listen. All was dark and quiet. She had no idea what kind of security might be present in the garden, and she moved with exquisite care, instinctively employing skills sharpened from roaming the New York docks as a child, stealing food and money.

  Staying off the main paths, Constance continued past a bed of primroses and another course of shrubbery, followed by a low stone wall. Scaling this, she arrived at the edge of the main pathway leading up to the Palm House, a stately Tuscan Revival building of iron and glass. Beyond it were the greenhouse complexes, including the Aquatic House, home to Hodgson’s Sorrow. But the main path was broad and too well lit to make for a good approach. She waited in the shrubbery, watching for security and puzzled to see none. It occurred to her that this might be evidence of Pendergast’s claim that Barbeaux would get there before her; if so, he would have neutralized the security.