The Woman in the Woods

by John Connolly

  “Yes?”

  “I think Louis has always been looking for someone to put him out of his pain, just as you once did.”

  “But you stopped him. He’s different now.”

  “No, he’s not. It’s still sleeping inside him, that desire for an ending. Don’t ever let him use me as an excuse.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “He listens to you.”

  “I don’t think he does. You’re mistaking silence for listening.”

  “Maybe. And you can let go of my hand now.”

  “Sorry.”

  “Don’t be.”

  They were quiet for a time.

  “If you die—” said Parker.

  “Yeah?”

  “I’m not going to date Louis just to make him feel better. That hand-holding, it was only me being comforting.”

  “Don’t make me laugh. It hurts.”

  “I’m just saying.”

  “Get out of here.”

  Parker stood. He paused at the door.

  “Angel?”

  “Uh-huh?”

  “No dying, you hear?”

  “Yes,” said Angel, “I hear.”

  CHAPTER

  XLVI

  Louis sat by Angel’s bedside. Some ruddiness had returned to Angel’s cheeks, or perhaps this was simply wishful thinking on the part of his partner: Angel was still pumped full of the kind of medication that left the world a blur, and made arduous all but the simplest and shortest of endeavors. Now he was sleeping while the night laid claim to the world beyond his window.

  Two hours went by, during which Louis read. Reading had not previously consumed much of his time, but here in this hospital room he had begun to find in books both an escape from his cares and a source of solace when their avoidance proved impossible. Uncertain of where to start, he had sourced a number of lists of the hundred greatest novels ever written, which he combined to create his own guide. So far in the course of Angel’s illness, Louis had read The Call of the Wild, Lord of the Flies, and Invisible Man—both the Ellison and Wells titles, due to a mix-up at the bookstore, but Louis didn’t mind as both were interesting in their different ways. He was currently on The Wind in the Willows, the inclusion of which had initially appeared to represent some form of cataloging error, but the book had grown pleasantly strange as his exploration of it progressed.

  “Why are you still here?” asked a voice from the bed.

  “I’m trying to finish a chapter.”

  Angel sounded hoarse. Louis put down the novel and fetched the no-spill water cup with its flexible straw. He held it until Angel waved a hand to signal he was done. His eyes seemed clearer than they had been since before the operation, like those of a man who has woken after a long, undisturbed rest.

  “What are you reading now?” Angel asked.

  “The Wind in the Willows.”

  “Isn’t that for kids?”

  “Maybe. Who cares?”

  “And after that?”

  Louis reached for his coat and removed a folded sheet of paper. He examined the contents of the list.

  “I might try something older. You ever read Dickens?”

  “Yeah, I read Dickens.”

  “Which one?”

  “All of them.”

  “Seriously? I never knew that about you.”

  “I read a lot when I was younger, and when I was in jail. Big books. I even read Ulysses.”

  “Nobody’s read Ulysses, or nobody we know.”

  “I have.”

  “Did you understand it?”

  “I don’t think so. Finished it, though, which counts for something.”

  “You still read now. You always have a book by the bed.”

  “I don’t read the way I used to. Not like that.”

  “You ought to start again.” Louis waved his paper. “I got a list you can use.”

  “The Wind in the Willows, huh?”

  “That’s right.”

  “So read me something from it.”

  “You mean out loud?”

  “You think I’m psychic, I’m gonna guess the words?”

  Louis glanced at the half-open door. He had never read aloud to anyone in his life, nor had he been read aloud to. He could recall his mother singing to him as a child, but never reading stories, not unless they were from the Bible. He thought of Angel’s bodyguards. He didn’t want them to return and find him voicing rats and toads.

  “You’re too embarrassed to read to me?” asked Angel. “If I die, you’ll be—”

  “Okay!” said Louis. “Not the dying again. You want me to go back to the beginning?”

  “No, just from where you’re at.”

  With one final check of the door, Louis began.

  “ ‘The line of the horizon was clear and hard against the sky,’ ” he read, “ ‘and in one particular quarter it showed black against a silvery climbing phosphorescence that grew and grew. At last, over the rim of the waiting earth the moon lifted with slow majesty till it swung clear of the horizon and rode off, free of moorings; and once more they began to see surfaces—meadows wide-spread, and quiet gardens, and the river itself from bank to bank, all softly disclosed, all washed clean of mystery and terror, all radiant again as by day, but with a difference that was tremendous. Their old haunts greeted them again in other raiment, as if they had slipped away and put on this pure new apparel and come quietly back, smiling as they shyly waited to see if they would be recognized again under it. . . .’ ”

  * * *

  ALL WAS STILL.

  Angel was once again asleep. Louis stopped reading.

  “That,” said Tony Fulci, from his seat on the floor, “was fucking beautiful.”

  Beside him, his brother Paulie—fellow bodyguard and now, it appeared, literary critic—nodded in agreement.

  “Yeah, fucking beautiful . . .”

  CHAPTER

  XLVII

  Quayle and Mors headed northwest, taking rooms at the Mill Inn in Dover-Foxcroft. The town lay near the edge of Piscataquis County, about twenty miles southeast of where the remains of Jane Doe had been discovered.

  While Mors was resting, Quayle was thinking of Maela Lombardi. He regretted her death, for both practical and personal reasons: practical because her disappearance would eventually attract attention, and it would be best if he and Mors were long gone from this place when it did; and personal because Lombardi had at least been a woman of principle and courage, and Quayle still retained the capacity to admire such qualities.

  And for all the risks he and Mors had taken in interrogating Lombardi before killing her and disposing of the body, they had emerged only with confirmation that Karis Lamb had made it as far as Maine, and Lombardi’s opinion that the remains found in Piscataquis were hers. But this was lent further credence by the press conference held earlier that day, an adjunct to the ongoing hunt for the killers of the state trooper, Jasper Allen. Before taking questions from the media, a female lieutenant had gone into greater detail than before about the age and approximate build of the woman, both of which matched descriptions of Karis. She had also informed the media that a Star of David carved on a nearby tree might have some connection to the body. Quayle knew from the late Vernay that Karis habitually wore a small Star of David on a chain around her neck. Vernay had found her attachment to this symbol of her mother’s faith amusing. Quayle suspected it added to the pleasure Vernay took in Lamb’s defilement.

  Unbeknownst to Quayle, he was operating on a similar set of assumptions to Charlie Parker: that Karis’s child was still alive, and very possibly living in some proximity to the grave. Quayle had sent Mors to scout the site—although she only narrowly avoided apprehension by the police officer assigned to guard it—and her view was that it had been chosen specifically for its remoteness, which suggested local knowledge.

  But Quayle possessed an advantage over any other parties, including the police, who might now be looking for Karis Lamb’s missing ch
ild.

  Quayle knew about the book.

  * * *

  THAT EVENING, PARKER CALLED the Upper West Side apartment shared by Louis and Angel. When Louis answered, Parker inquired after Angel’s health before progressing to the other reason for the call.

  “I had a face-to-face conversation with Bobby Ocean a few days ago.”

  “Uh-huh,” said Louis. “And how was that?”

  “Like soaking my brain in bile. He stopped just short of presenting me with a bill for his son’s truck.”

  “Does the boy usually let his father do his dirty work?”

  “I don’t think Billy knew about the visit.”

  “Why not?”

  “Bobby Ocean shares some of his son’s moral failings, but the stupidity gene may have skipped a generation. If Billy were to find out who was responsible for blowing up his pride and joy, he might take it into his head to seek some retribution. Bobby’s guess is that this wouldn’t end well for anyone, but particularly not for his son, and possibly not for him either.”

  “So he came to you to let off a little steam? Sorry for the inconvenience.”

  “I’ve had worse.”

  “This Billy doesn’t sound like an honor roll kid.”

  “You remember our friend Philip from Providence?”

  Philip was the unacknowledged offspring of a liaison between a deceased New England criminal named Caspar Webb and the woman who would eventually inherit, and dismantle, Webb’s empire, a figure known only as Mother. Philip had objected strenuously to Mother’s disposal of the family franchise, believing himself a worthy heir to his father’s fortune, and was now rumored to be taking an extended vacation. If so, it was the kind conducted horizontally, and under a weight of dirt.

  “Hard to forget him,” said Louis. “But I am trying.”

  “Well, I think Billy has similar paternal issues, minus the outright criminality, but with prejudice to compensate.”

  “Maybe I shouldn’t have blown up the truck.”

  “We live and learn.”

  They talked some more, and Parker told Louis about the body of the woman, and the search for her child.

  “If the kid is alive,” said Louis, “then someone is probably starting to panic right about now. You think it could be in danger?”

  “No.”

  “You sure about that?”

  “The mother died from severe hemorrhaging very soon after giving birth. It’s likely that someone buried her with enough care and respect to carve the symbol of her religion on a nearby tree. That doesn’t strike me as the act of a person who’d harm a child.”

  “Just the act of a person who wanted a child badly enough to bury its mother in a shallow grave.”

  “When you put it that way.”

  They returned to the subject of the truck. Parker wasn’t sure how much Bobby Ocean actually knew about Louis beyond rumor and reputation, but if he expended enough time and effort, he might be able to find out more. It would be better for all concerned if Louis were absent from Portland for a while, although given Louis’s current mood, Parker guessed that the city would soon be graced once again by his presence.

  “The hospital will get Angel walking in a day or two, encourage him to eat and drink, then send him home,” said Louis. “Or that’s the plan.”

  Parker knew that Louis would be engaging nurses to assist Angel during the early stages of his recovery. The internist felt it wasn’t strictly necessary, but Louis would have been the first to admit that he wasn’t one of nature’s caregivers. Parker said that he’d come visit once Angel was settled back in the apartment. They agreed to speak again in a few days.

  And Death circled.

  CHAPTER

  XLVIII

  They called themselves the Backers: individuals who had attained positions of considerable wealth, power, and influence, in part through their own energy and acumen, but mostly by aligning themselves with forces older and more arcane than any religion. In doing so they had damned themselves, and were therefore content to see all others damned in turn.

  Now five of them—three men and two women—were seated at a table in the Oak Room at the Fairmont Copley Plaza in Boston, the grande dame of the city’s hotel bars. In recent years it had been rebranded as the OAK Long Bar + Kitchen, but this quintet, like many of the city’s blue bloods, chose to ignore the change. To them, it was the Oak Room, and always would be.

  They attracted no particular attention, apart from the solicitous but not overbearing service of their waiter. On this particular evening, the bar was entertaining half a dozen not dissimilar parties of senior patrons, all casually attired—or casually for them, which meant jackets and ties for the gentlemen, and dresses for the women. Their coterie eschewed cocktails for gins and white wine, and declined offers of food since they had a reservation at L’Espalier for eight p.m. Like their meeting, the reservation had been arranged at short notice, but with no great difficulty.

  “Well?” said one of the women, once the drinks were served, and they could speak without being overheard. She looked over at the Principal Backer, he who had called them together. “One imagines this is not principally a social gathering.”

  The Principal Backer raised his glass in a silent toast, and took a sip before replying.

  “Quayle is in New England.”

  The woman who had spoken grimaced, as though the wine were not quite to her taste.

  “Where?”

  “Maine.”

  “Why?”

  “Have you been following the story of the woman’s body found in the northern woods?”

  “I think I read something about it. Wasn’t she pregnant?”

  “Not quite; she gave birth shortly before she died. Quayle thinks he knows who she is. Apparently he’s been looking for her for some time.”

  “So now he can return home,” said a thin, dark man with the aspect of a sad, emaciated crow. “His search, it would appear, is at an end.”

  The others nodded their agreement. One of the men even laughed.

  Bluster, thought the Principal Backer. None was willing to look the others in the face. All feared seeing their own disquietude reflected.

  “Unfortunately,” he said, “his efforts have not yet concluded. He’s now seeking the missing child.”

  “You’ve spoken with him?” asked the crow-man.

  “Not directly, but he has made contact. He has requested our assistance—‘request,’ in this case, being something of a euphemism.”

  Quayle operated largely in seclusion and solitude, a succession of female partners excepted. In times past he had enjoyed a more public profile, but no longer. Nevertheless he was a figure of influence, and one not to be denied.

  “What use would a man like Quayle have for a child?” asked the other woman present. The Principal Backer thought he detected what might almost have been concern in her tone. She sat on the boards of a number of charities, including at least two that specialized in seeking cures for pediatric illnesses. Perhaps, he considered, her hypocrisy had become so ingrained that she was no longer even capable of perceiving it as such.

  “I don’t think he’s especially interested in the child itself,” said the Principal Backer. “Although if he did want it, would you really care to know his reasons?”

  The woman did not reply. Her silence was sufficient response.

  “Then why persist?” asked the man who had laughed, his expression restored to its default smirk. The Principal Backer distrusted those who laughed too easily, perceiving in it a deeper inability to find anything funny at all.

  “The mother possessed something Quayle wants. He believes that this object now resides with whomever has the child.”

  No one needed to ask why this asset was of interest to Quayle. The lawyer had only one purpose to his existence: the reconstruction of the Fractured Atlas, which would reorder the world in its image.

  “What kind of assistance does he require from us?” asked the second woman.
/>
  “Contacts: police, municipal government, whatever else may strike him.”

  “And we’re obliging?”

  “Naturally.”

  “While ensuring that we’re kept apprised of any developments?”

  “Where possible.”

  The Principal Backer waited for their approval to subside. They were coming to the meat of it now.

  “Quayle believes he’s close,” he said, “closer than he has ever yet been.”

  “But how close?” said the crow-man. “We’ve heard all this before. My father listened to the same claims coming from Quayle’s mouth.”

  Another bark of laughter: “Your grandfather, too. And mine.”

  The Principal Backer waited for them to stop. They were of old blood, and old blood grew torpid.

  “The last of the missing pages,” he said, “if Quayle is to be believed.”

  The other four absorbed this information.

  “And then?” asked the woman of charitable disposition.

  “If Quayle is right, the world will become a reflection of the Atlas. The Not-Gods will return, and the Old God will pass into nonbeing. All will be fed to the flames.”

  No laughter now. These Backers, like those long gone before them, had predicated their existence on the belief that they could pass on the cost of their bargain to future generations. They would be dead before the consequences of their actions were made manifest; or perhaps this pact with an evil that had come into being with the birth of the universe, this covenant agreed centuries earlier, might ultimately be revealed as mere myth, so much sophistry to explain away good fortune. Their success would not come at a price. The Not-Gods did not exist. There was no Buried God lost deep beneath the dirt and rock of this world, waiting to be discovered, just as there was no Old God seeking adoration and remembrance. There was only this life, and then nothingness.

  But no: they knew the truth. They had only hoped to be gone before it was revealed.

  “So,” said the crow-man, “we must collude with Quayle in our own destruction, and the extinction of those we love?”