Dance Of Death

D'Agosta swallowed. "Don't worry about me."

"It seems Diogenes has begun to take pleasure in giving me advance warning. We might assume you and other potential targets are temporarily safe-at least until I receive the next message. Even so, Vincent, you must take every precaution possible. The safest thing is to go back to work immediately. Surround yourself with police, remain in the precinct house when not on call. Most important, alter all your habits-every single one. Temporarily move your residence. Take cabs instead of walking or riding the subway. Go to bed and rise at different hours. Change everything in your life that might cause you danger-or danger to those you care about. An attempt on your life could easily result in collateral damage to others, in particular Captain Hayward. Vincent, you're a good officer-I don't need to tell you what to do."

The limo came screeching to a stop. The blacktopped expanse of the East 34th Street Heliport lay directly ahead, its stubby, three-hundred-foot runway gleaming dully in the morning sun. A red Bell 206 Jet Ranger was waiting on the tarmac, rotors turning. Pendergast abruptly slipped into investment banker mode, his face relaxing, the glittering hatred and determination vanishing from his eyes, leaving behind a pleasant blandness.

"One other thing," D'Agosta said.

Pendergast turned back.

D'Agosta reached into his jacket pocket, retrieved something, held it out in a closed fist. Pendergast reached out and D'Agosta dropped into his palm a platinum medallion, slightly melted along one edge, on a chain. On one side of the medallion was the image of a lidless eye hovering over a phoenix, rising from the ashes of a fire. A crest of some sort had been stamped into the other side.

Pendergast stared at it, a strange expression passing over his face.

"Count Fosco was wearing this when I went back to his castle with the Italian police. He showed it to me, privately, as proof you were dead. You'll see the bastard engraved his own crest on the back-his final trick against me. I thought you'd want it."

Pendergast turned it over, peered at it, turned it over again.

"I took it from him the night I… paid him a final visit. Maybe it'll bring you good luck."

"Normally I despise luck, but at the moment I find myself in singular need of it. Thank you, Vincent." Pendergast's voice was almost too low to be heard above the revving of the rotors. He placed the medallion around his neck, tucked it into his shirt, and grasped D'Agosta's hand.

And then, without another word, he strode across the tarmac toward the waiting chopper.

SIXTEEN

The chopper landed at a corporate heliport in Chevy Chase, Maryland, where a car without a driver awaited. By nine o'clock, Pendergast was crossing into D.C. It was a cold, su

In a few minutes, he was driving along Oregon Avenue, lined with stately mansions-one of Washington's most exclusive suburbs. He slowed as he passed Mike Decker's house. The tidy, brick-fronted Georgian seemed as somnolent as the rest of the neighborhood. No car was parked outside, but that in itself meant nothing: Decker ranked a car and driver when he wanted one.

Pendergast drove a block farther, then pulled over to the curb. Taking out a cell phone, he once again tried Decker's home and mobile. No answer.

Behind the row of mansions lay the wooded fastness of Rock Creek Park. Pendergast got out of the car with his attaché case and walked thoughtfully into the park. Diogenes, he felt sure, would be watching the scene and would recognize him despite his disguise- just as he felt sure he would recognize his brother, no matter what.

But he saw no one and heard nothing but the faint rush of water from Rock Creek.

He walked briskly along the fringe of the park, then darted across a driveway, crossed a garden, and came up through a hedge into Decker's backyard. The yard was deep and well tended, falling away at the rear into the dense woods of the park. There, hidden from the neighbors by thick shrubbery, he glanced up at the windows. They were closed, white curtains pulled shut. Glancing at the adjoining houses, he proceeded, with practiced casualness, across the yard and to the back door, pulling on a pair of gloves as he did so and leaving his attaché on the stoop.

Pendergast paused again, his alert eyes taking in every detail. Then, without knocking, he peered through the small window.

Decker's kitchen was modern and almost spartan in its bachelor emptiness. A folded newspaper lay on a counter beside the phone; a suit jacket had been draped over the back of a chair. On one side of the room, a door-shut-opened no doubt onto the basement stairway; on the other side, a dark corridor led into the front rooms of the house.

A shape lay on the floor of the corridor, vague in the dim light. It moved feebly, once, twice.

In an instant, Pendergast moved to pick the lock, only to find that the knob-broken-turned easily in his hand. There was a telltale cut wire: a security system had been bypassed. Nearby, the phone wire had also been snipped. He swept inside, darting toward the shape in the hall and kneeling on the broad floorboards.

A male Weimaraner lay there, eyes glassy, rear legs still twitching in slowing spasms. Pendergast ran his gloved fingers quickly over the dog's frame. Its neck had been broken in two places.

Now, rising, Pendergast reached into his pocket. When his hand appeared again, it was holding a gleaming Wilson Combat TSGC.45. Moving quickly and with utter silence, Pendergast searched the first floor of the house: wheeling around corners, gun extended, eyes darting over every surface and place of concealment. Living room, dining room, front hall, bath: all empty and still.

Next, Pendergast flew up the stairs, pausing to glance around at the upper landing. Four rooms gave onto a central hallway. Sunlight lanced in through the open doors, illuminating a few dust motes dancing lazily in the sluggish air.

Gun at the ready, he spun around the first doorway, which led into a back bedroom. Inside, the guest beds were made with almost military perfection, bedspreads tight across the mattresses and over the pillows. Beyond, the gaunt trees of Rock Creek Park were visible through the window. Everything was wrapped in a deep silence.

A faint sound came from nearby.

Pendergast froze, his hyperacute senses strained to the maximum. There had been one sound, only one: the slow outrush of air, like a languorous sigh.

He exited the back bedroom, darted across the hall, paused outside the entrance to the room opposite. Tall bookshelves and the edge of a table could be seen through the open door: a study. Here, closer, another sound could just be discerned-a fast, ru

Tensing, gun forward, Pendergast wheeled around the door frame.

Mike Decker sat in a leather chair, facing his desk. He was ex-military and had always endowed his movements with economy and precision, yet it was not preciseness that kept him so erect in the chair. A heavy steel bayonet had been driven into his mouth, angling down through his neck and pi

Another low sigh sounded in Decker's ruined throat, like the collapsing of a bellows. It died into a faint, bloody gargle. The man stared sightlessly at Pendergast, white shirt stained a uniform red. Streams of blood still flowed across the table, ru