Fever Dream

Despite her skepticism, Hayward felt herself intrigued. "Perhaps you're wrong. Maybe the virus lay dormant all this time. The parrot caught it naturally."

"Unlikely. Recall the parrot had been banded. No: the viral genome would have been painstakingly sequenced and rebuilt in a laboratory--using viral material from the stolen Carolina Parakeets. And then live birds were inoculated with it."

"So the bird escaped from a lab."

"Precisely." Pendergast stood up. "The biggest question of all remains: what does this have to do with Helen's murder and the recent killings and attacks on us--if anything?"

"Isn't there another question you're forgetting?" Hayward asked.

Pendergast looked at her.

"You say Helen stole the parrots Audubon studied--the ones that supposedly sickened him. Helen also visited the Doane family and stole their parrot--because, as you also say, she knew it was infected. By inference, Helen is the common thread that binds the two events. So aren't you curious what role she might have had in the sequencing and inoculation?"

Pendergast turned away, but not before a look of pain lanced across his face. Hayward almost regretted asking the question.

A long pause settled over the library. At last, Pendergast turned toward her again. "We must pick up where Vincent and I left off."

" 'We'?"

"You're going to grant Vincent's request, I assume. I need a competent partner. And as I recall, you're from this region originally. You'll do well, I assure you."

His assumptions, his patronizing attitude, were irritating in the extreme. She knew all too well of Pendergast's unorthodox investigative techniques, his breezy neglect for rules and procedures, his skirtings of the law. She would find that a

At the same time... Vi

She realized she had already made the decision.

"All right. I'll help you see this thing through. For Vi

"Of course, Captain."

"When--if--we find the person responsible for your wife's death, you must promise me not to kill him."

Pendergast went very still. "You realize this is the cold-blooded murderer of my wife we're discussing."

"I don't believe in vigilante justice. Too many of your perps end up dead before they even reach a courtroom. This time, we're going to let justice take its course."

There was a pause. "What you are asking--is difficult."

"It's the price of the dance," Hayward said simply.

Pendergast held her gaze for a long moment. And then--almost imperceptibly--he nodded.

48

IN THE DIM GARAGE, A MAN CROUCHED BEHIND a vehicle draped in a white canvas shroud. The time was seven in the evening, and the sun had set. The air smelled of car wax, motor oil, and mold. Sliding a 9mm Beretta semi-automatic pistol out of his belt, the man eased open the magazine, checked again that it was full. After snugging the gun back into his waistband, he opened and closed his hands three times, alternately stretching and clenching the fingers. The target would be arriving at any moment. The sweat crept down the nape of the man's neck and a tendon began to jump in his thigh, but he was unaware of either distraction, so concentrated was he on what was to come.

Frank Hudson had been scouting the grounds of Penumbra Plantation for the past two days, learning the movements and habits of the place. He had been surprised at how lax the security was: a single dotty, half-blind servant opening the house in the morning and shutting it up again at night on a schedule so regular you could set your watch by it. The entrance gates were left closed but unlocked during the day, and they were apparently unwatched. A diligent search had turned up no sign of security cameras, alarm systems, motion sensors, or infrared beams. The decrepit old plantation was so far off the beaten track that Hudson had little to fear from regular police patrols. There were few people at the plantation house besides the target and the servant: only a rather attractive woman with a great figure he'd seen a few times.

Hudson's target, the man named Pendergast, was the only irregularity in the timeless cycle of Penumbra Plantation. He came and went at the most unpredictable hours. But Hudson had observed long enough to see the begi

This evening an uncorked bottle of wine stood on the sideboard, clearly visible through the dining room windows.

Hudson checked his watch. He rehearsed in his mind how it would go, what he would do. And then he froze: outside, he heard the sound of wheels crunching on gravel. This was it. Hudson waited, his breathing shallow. The car came to a halt outside the garage, the engine idling. A car door opened, followed by the sound of feet. The garage doors swung open, first one, then the other--they were not automatic--and the footsteps went back to the car. The engine revved slightly. The nose of the Rolls eased into the garage, the lights momentarily filling the space, blinding him. A moment later the lights went out, the engine died, and the garage was dark again.

He blinked, waiting for his eyes to readjust. His hand closed on the pistol grips and he eased the weapon from his belt, carefully thumbing off the safety.

He waited for the sound of the opening door, for his target to turn on the lights in the garage, but nothing happened. Pendergast seemed to be waiting in the car. What for? Feeling his heart accelerate in his chest, Hudson tried to control his breathing, maintain his lucidity. He knew he was well hidden, having adjusted the shroud on the vehicle so that it reached all the way to the ground, ensuring that even his feet were invisible.

Perhaps Pendergast was on his cell phone, finishing up a call. Or he was taking a rare opportunity to sit quietly, as people sometimes did, before getting out of the vehicle.

With infinite caution, Hudson raised his head ever so slightly to peer over the edge of the shroud; the dim form of the Rolls rested quietly in the dark, the only sound the ticking of the cooling engine. It was impossible to see inside the smoked windows.

He waited.

"Lose a button?" came a voice from right behind him.

With a grunt of surprise Hudson leapt up, his hand jerking instinctively, the gun going off with a loud crash in the enclosed space. As he tried to pivot he felt the gun wrenched from his hand and a wiry arm wrap around his neck. His body was spun around, then shoved up hard against the sheeted vehicle.

"In the great game of human life," the voice said, "one begins by being a dupe and ends up by being a rogue."

Hudson struggled ineffectually.

"Where are you, my friend, on that happy spectrum?"

"I don't know what the hell you're talking about," Hudson finally managed to gasp out.