The Coffin Dancer

chapter forty-one

A LITTLE THUNDER, A SPRINKLING of spring rain late at night.

The window was open wide – not the falcon window, of course; Rhyme didn’t like them disturbed – and the room was filled with cool evening air.

Amelia Sachs popped the cork and poured Cake-bread chardo

She looked down and gave a faint laugh.

“I don’t believe it.”

On the computer beside the Clinitron was a chess program.

“You don’t play games,” she said. “I mean, I’ve never seen you play games.”

“Hold on,” he said to her.

On the screen: I did not understand what you just said. Please try again.

In a clear voice he said, “Rook to queen’s bishop four. Checkmate.”

A pause. The computer said, Congratulations, followed by a digitized version of Sousa’s “Washington Post” march.

“It’s not for entertainment,” he said churlishly. “Keeps the mind sharp. It’s my Nautilus machine. You want to play sometime, Sachs?”

“I don’t play chess,” she said after a swallow of the fine wine. “Some damn knight goes for my king, I’d rather blow him away than figure out how to outsmart him. How much did they find?”

“Money? That Talbot had hidden? Over five million.”

After the auditors had gone through the second set of books, the real books, they found that Hudson Air was an extremely profitable company. Losing the aircraft and the U.S. Medical contract would sting, but there was plenty of cash to keep the company, as Percey told him, “aloft.”

“Where’s the Dancer?”

“In SD.”

Special Detention was a little-known facility in the Criminal Courts Building. Rhyme had never seen the place – few cops had – but in thirty-five years no one had ever broken out of it.

“Coped his talons pretty good,” Percey Clay had said when Rhyme told her this. Which means, she explained, the filing down of a hunting falcon’s claws.

Rhyme – given his special interest in the case – insisted on being informed about the Dancer’s tenure in SD. He’d heard from the guards that he’d been asking about windows in the facility, what floor they were on, what part of town the facility was located in.

“Do I smell a service station nearby?” he’d asked cryptically.

When he’d heard this, Rhyme had immediately called Lon Sellitto and asked him to call the head of the detention center and double the guard.

Amelia Sachs took another fortifying sip of wine, and whatever was coming was coming now.

She inhaled deeply then blurted, “Rhyme, you should go for it.” Another sip. “I wasn’t sure I was going to say that.”

“Beg pardon?”

“She’s right for you. It could be real good.”

They rarely had trouble looking at each other’s eyes. But, rough water ahead, Sachs looked down at the floor.

What was this all about?

When she glanced up and saw her words weren’t registering, she said, “I know how you feel about her. And she doesn’t admit it, but I know how she feels about you.”

“Who?”

“You know who. Percey Clay. You’re thinking she’s a widow, she’s not going to want someone in her life right now. But… You heard what Talbot said – Carney had a girlfriend. A woman in the office. Percey knew about it. They stayed together because they were friends. And because of the Company.”

“I never -”

“Go for it, Rhyme. Come on. I really mean that. You think it’d never work. But she doesn’t care about your situation. Hell, look at what she said the other day. She was right – you’re both real similar.”

There are times when you just need to lift your hands and let them flop into your lap in frustration. Rhyme settled for nestling his head in his luxurious down pillow. “Sachs, where on earth did you get this idea?”

“Oh, please. It’s so obvious. I’ve seen how you’ve been since she showed up. How you look at her. How obsessed you’ve been to save her. I know what’s going on.”

“What is going on?”

“She’s like Claire Trilling, the woman who left you a few years ago. That’s who you want.”

Oh… He nodded. So that’s it.

He smiled. Said, “Sure, Sachs, I have been thinking about Claire a lot the past few days. I lied when I said I hadn’t been.”

“Whenever you mentioned her I could tell you were still in love with her. I know that after the accident she never saw you again. I figured it was still an open book for you. Like me and Nick after he left me. You met Percey and she reminded you of Claire all over again. You realized that you could be with someone again. With her, I mean. Not… not with me. Hey, that’s life.”

“Sachs,” he began, “it’s not Percey you should’ve been jealous of. She’s not the one that booted you out of bed the other night.”

“No?”

“It was the Dancer.”

Another splash of wine in her glass. She swirled it and looked down at the pale liquid. “I don’t understand.”

“The other night?” He sighed. “I had to draw the line between us, Sachs. I’m already too close to you for my own good. If we’re going to keep working together, I had to keep that barrier up. Don’t you see? I can’t be close to you, not that close, and still send you in harm’s way. I can’t let it happen again.”

“Again?” She was frowning, then her face flooded with understanding.

Ah, that’s my Amelia, he thought. A fine criminalist. A good shot. And she’s quick as a fox.

“Oh no, Lincoln, Claire was…”

He was nodding. “She was the tech I assigned to search the crime scene in Wall Street after the Dancer’s hit five years ago. She was the one who reached into the wastebasket and pulled out the paper that set off the bomb.”

Which is why he’d been so obsessed with the man. Why he’d wanted, so uncharacteristically, to debrief the killer. He wanted to catch the man who’d killed his lover. Wanted to know all about him.

It was revenge, undiluted revenge. When Lon Sellitto – who’d known about Claire – had wondered if it might not be better for Percey and Hale to leave town, he was asking if Rhyme’s personal feelings weren’t intruding into the case.

Well, yes, they were. But Lincoln Rhyme, for all the overwhelming stasis of his present life, was as much a hunter as the falcons on his window ledge. Every criminalist is. And when he scented his prey he wouldn’t be stopped.

“So, that’s it, Sachs. It has nothing to do with Percey. And as much as I wanted you to spend the night – to spend every night – I can’t risk loving you any more than I do.”

It was so astonishing – bewildering – to Lincoln Rhyme to be having this conversation. After the accident he’d come to believe that the oak beam that had snapped his spine actually did its worst damage to his heart, killing all sensation within it. And his ability to love and be loved were as crushed as the thin fiber of his spinal cord. But the other night, Sachs close to him, he’d realized how wrong he was.

“You understand, don’t you, Amelia?” Rhyme whispered.

“Last names only,” she said, smiling, walking close to the bed.

She bent down and kissed him on the mouth. He pressed back into his pillow for a moment then returned the kiss.

“No, no,” he persisted. But he kissed her hard once again.

Her purse dropped to the floor. Her jacket and watch went on the bedside table, followed by the last of the fashion accessories to come off – her Glock 9.

They kissed again.

But he pulled away. “Sachs… It’s too risky!”

“God don’t give out certain,” she said, their eyes locked on each other’s. Then she stood and walked across the room to the light switch.

“Wait,” he said.

She paused, looked back. Her red hair fell over her face, obscuring one eye.

Into the microphone hanging on the bed frame Rhyme commanded, “Lights out.”

The room went dark.