Cemetery Dance

After about twenty yards, the passage split in two directions. Hayward went right, in what she believed to be the direction of the central church. The air was slightly less noisome here, the walls constructed of primitively dressed stone. She peered closely at the stonework, examining it with her flashlight. This was clearly not the wall in the video of Nora Kelly.

Suddenly, she straightened up. Was that a cry?

She stood motionless in the dark, listening intently. But whatever she had heard — if indeed she'd heard anything at all — did not sound again.

She moved forward. The stone passage ended in a massive, vaulted archway. Ducking underneath, she found herself in a crudely constructed mausoleum, supported by rotting timbers, a set of a dozen burial niches carved into the clay walls, each one with a rotting coffin. Charms and fetishes were everywhere: bags of leather and sequins; grotesque dolls with leering, oversize heads; maddeningly complex designs of spirals and crosshatches, painted onto boards and stretched hides. It was a subterranean temple to the dead leaders of the Ville, it seemed — or, perhaps, the undead. The coffins themselves were strange, banded with iron and padlocked, as if to keep the dead inside, some with massive spikes driven through them and into the clay below. Hayward shuddered, recalling some of the more colorful stories of her old cohorts on the New Orleans PD.

… Now it came again, and this time there was no question: a female voice, sobbing quietly — and coming out of the darkness directly ahead.

Nora Kelly? She moved forward as silently as she could through the voodoo — laden chamber, gun ready, keeping her flashlight shielded. The voice was muffled but it sounded close, perhaps only two or three chambers away. The niche — filled room ended in a passage that forked again; the sounds were coming from the left, and Hayward headed toward them. If it was Nora, she would probably be guarded — the Ville would have sent somebody down at the first sign of trouble.

The passage doglegged, then suddenly gave onto a vast crypt, its vaulted ceiling supported by heavy columns. In the dust — fragrant darkness, Hayward could make out row after row of wooden sarcophagi stretching ahead to the rear wall. There in the distance she could make out three figures, backlit by the intermittent flicker of what appeared to be a cigarette lighter. Two were women, one of whom was weeping quietly. The other, a man, was speaking to them in a low voice. His back was to Hayward, but by his tone and gesture he seemed to be reassuring them about something.

She felt her heart quicken. She took a step closer, then another. And then she was certain: the man across the room was Vincent D'Agosta.

"Vi

He turned. For a moment, he looked confused. Then a relieved smile broke over his face. "Laura! What are you doing here?"

She came forward quickly, no longer bothering to conceal her light. The women looked toward her as she approached, their faces pinched with fear.

D'Agosta's right arm was in an improvised sling; his face was scratched and dirty; his suit was torn and badly rumpled. But she was so relieved to see him she barely noticed.

She gave him a hasty embrace, awkward because of the sling. Then she paused to look at him. "Vi

"I feel like it. Got a couple of people here who need help. They were with the protesters, got set on by some of the residents of the Ville and got lost trying to flee." He paused. "Are you down here looking for Nora, too?"

"No. I came for you."

"Me? What for?" He seemed almost offended.

"Pendergast told me you were down here, might be in danger."

"I was looking for Nora. You said Pendergast?"

"On his way out, he said he was going to get Nora. He told me she isn't here."

"What? Where is she?"

"He didn't say. But he said that something attacked you both. Something strange."

"That's right. Laura, if it's true Nora's not down here, we've got to get out of here. Now."

Abruptly, he fell silent. A moment later Hayward heard it as well: a fleshy pattering out of the darkness, like broad hands drumming a tattoo against the cold stonework. It was distant, but coming closer. A moment later, the skittering sound was overlaid by a wet smacking and a low groan like the gasp of a punctured bellows: aaaahuuuuuu …

One of the women gasped, took an instinctive stumbling step back. D'Agosta started. "Too late," he said. "It's back."

Chapter 81

In the mildewed dark, Nora waited. Her head throbbed fiercely; just moving it sent a lance of pain searing from temple to temple. Her jailer had aggravated her concussion with that blow to the head. Despite the pain, she had to fight against a heavy torpor that threatened to overwhelm her. How many hours had passed? Twenty — four? Thirty — six? Strange how the dark preyed on one's perception of time.

She lay propped up against the wall, on one side of the door, awaiting her jailer's return, wondering if she would have the energy to attack him when he did. She had to admit to herself it was hopeless — the trick hadn't worked the first time and it would hardly work a second. But what other course was there? If she remained anywhere else in the room, he could shoot her through the window. She knew her jailer wasn't going to release her. He was keeping her alive for some obscure purpose, and when that purpose was complete, he would kill her.

In the black silence, her thoughts wandered. Into her mind came the image of a black limo at the marina in the tiny town of Page, Arizona, the red bluffs of Lake Powell rising in the background and the sky overhead a cloudless bowl of perfect blue. Heat rose from the parking lot in shimmering waves. The door of the limo opened and a lanky man climbed awkwardly out of it, dusted himself off, and straightened up. He looked silly in his Ray — Bans, his brown hair sticking out in multiple directions. He stooped slightly, as if embarrassed by his tallness; she recalled his aquiline nose, his long and lean face, and the squinting, perplexed, yet confident way he took in his surroundings. It was her first glimpse of the man who would become her husband, who had joined her archaeological expedition to the canyon country of Utah as the resident journalist. Right away she had thought him an ass. Only later did she learn he kept his better qualities, his wonderful qualities, deeply buried, as if mildly ashamed of them.

Other random memories drifted through her mind from those first days in Utah: Bill, calling her Madam Chairman. Bill, climbing on his horse, Hurricane Deck, cursing and swearing as the horse danced around. These recollections segued into memories of their early life together in New York: Bill, spilling brandy sauce on his new suit at Café des Artistes. Bill, decked out as a bum in order to sneak into a building site at night where thirty — six bodies had been found. Bill, lying in the hospital bed after being rescued from Leng… The images came unbidden, unwelcome and yet strangely comforting. No longer having the energy to resist, she let them pass through her memory as she drifted into a state midway between sleep and wakefulness. Now, at this extremity, her own life destined to end at any moment, she seemed somehow finally able to come to terms with her loss.

She was torn back to the present by a muffled rumble, a deep vibration both in the air and through the walls. She sat up, suddenly alert, headache temporarily forgotten. The rumble went on and on before dying away into silence. Minutes later, it was followed with the loudboom! boom! of two gunshots in rapid succession, followed by a pause, and then a third.