Angel of Vengeance

32

They arrived at the garish brownstone on the outskirts of the Tenderloin district at different intervals between midnight and one. First came the dandy, an obviously wealthy English fop whose mincing gait and exaggerated Oxbridge accent were reminiscent of so many callow younger sons of the peerage sent on “grand tours” to get them out of the way. Next came the traveling purveyor of dry goods, recently arrived in New York for an annual company meeting, whose very attempts at being inconspicuous in this high-priced house of turpitude were made all the more risible by his hayseed accent and awkward manners. He passed through the gaudy parlor, gaped in astonishment at the ladies lounging about on sofas and ottomans, dropped his hat in an attempt to doff it, then — after getting his bearings — ascended the stairs.

Last came the nightingale: the expensive lady of easy virtue, whose well-appointed charms could be had by the hour. The English dandy had paid the proprietress for the use of a large set of rooms on the third floor, and nothing about these two additional arrivals excited the faintest of curiosity in the parlor. Other groups of various sizes and compositions had already come in that evening, bent on celebrating the New Year, and more would be arriving soon enough.

Closing the door to the third-floor suite, Pendergast took off his ill-fitting hat and shrugged out of the shabby salesman’s overcoat. Diogenes was already seated in a gaudy Louis XV armchair, one that clashed appallingly with the rest of the furniture, a mishmash of faux pieces from other French periods. His back was to the door, but he glanced up briefly into a framed mirror, saw Pendergast, then returned his attention to a notebook balanced on one knee.

Pendergast looked around: at the huge four-poster bed with fringed canopy; the painted dressers and wardrobes; the various basins of fine china, already filled with water for post-laborem washing.

“Aren’t you going to get out of that ridiculous costume?” he asked his brother.

“This ‘ridiculous costume,’ as you call it, is my armor. It protects me from those who might seek out the Right Reverend Considine for assassination. It is also the uniform of the other life I now lead here: a certain Lord Cedric. I rather enjoy that life and the extracurricular opportunities it offers.”

At Diogenes’s mention of his other life, a pained expression crossed Pendergast’s face. “Speaking of Considine, how has Leng reacted? Does he suspect?”

“Not at all. Leng is so annoyed at being deprived of his victims that I suspect he will soon make an attempt on my life. I’ve grown adept at inflicting on him the finer points of Methodism, and in his rage he suspects nothing.”

“I’m glad to hear that.” Pendergast’s eye fell on the notebook Diogenes had just opened. The page consisted of a list of names, of which he could make out only the first few:

“What’s this?” Pendergast asked, as Diogenes finished drawing a line through the first name. “Martha Jane Cannary?”

“Better known as Calamity Jane,” said Diogenes, flashing a grin.

“And Clarissa Barton, no doubt better known in our day as Clara... Precisely what depraved extracurricular opportunities are you availing yourself of?”

“That, Frater, is none of your affair,” Diogenes replied, closing the book at the same moment that Constance opened the door.

The brothers, as one, looked over at her while she silently entered. Her disguise was so effective in its promise of loose sensuality, its disturbing mix of elegance and poor taste, that for a moment neither could say a word.

She took off her hat and hair netting and came over, glancing each of them up and down as if to assure herself neither had suffered serious harm in her absence. From the ease with which she moved, it was equally clear the injuries sustained from her altercation with Munck had healed.

“Let’s proceed with this meeting, shall we?” she said. “The winter wind off the Hudson is positively Siberian tonight.”

Pendergast frowned. “Very well. As agreed, this is the one meeting we dare allow ourselves before we complete our tasks and get in position. And since we last met, you’ve calculated the date by which we must be ready. Correct?”

Constance nodded.

“Then let us go over our individual progress and finalize our strategies. Leaving room for the unexpected — if we can.”

“Unexpected developments are Leng’s stock in trade,” said Diogenes. He slipped the notebook into a pocket of his waistcoat. “Have you arranged for my access to the alleyway?”

“Yes.”

“This fellow Bloom knows all that he needs to know — but no more?”

“He does,” Pendergast said, taking a seat himself, “and I’d suggest you pay him a visit, make his acquaintance, and see what he’s done.” He turned to Constance. “You’re sure that Binky is no longer in the Riverside Drive mansion?”

Constance tugged her white gloves tighter and spread her fingers, like a cat unsheathing its claws. “She is not.”

“Do you have any further suggestions to add?”

“Not particularly. She has left Riverside Drive, so I suggest you get on with your mission, Aloysius — find her.”

Pendergast’s normally unreadable face creased with irritation. “That is my intention,” he said almost coldly. “Let us get down to particulars, shall we?”

Constance seated herself on a chaise lounge. It was clear Pendergast’s mood had darkened since her arrival. Diogenes looked from one to the other. Then he bent forward, elbows upon his knees, and they began a murmured conversation.

33

Constance estimated that the conference between the three of them could not have lasted over twenty minutes. When all the necessary points had been covered, Diogenes rose.

“I believe we’ve talked enough,” he said. “I’ve completed the lion’s share of my assignment already — cutting off Leng’s supply of victims from the workhouse. But just to be sure: Constance, you said that — given Leng’s methods — we have until January ninth to get all the chess pieces in place?”

She nodded. “Within a day or so, yes. After that, Leng will have made ironclad arrangements for my siblings that... effectively, will render everything we’ve done, or tried to do, useless.”

Diogenes thought a moment. “This deadline — unfortunate word, under the circumstances — doesn’t leave us much time. However, since there are no other options, I’ll proceed with arranging an emergency signal, in the manner we’ve just agreed on — with the hope that all goes well for you both in the interim. Yes?”

Constance nodded, and after a moment Pendergast did as well. It was clear to her they all believed that — however necessary — this assignment for Diogenes remained an exercise in wishful thinking.

“Just so the two of you know,” Constance said in a low voice. “Even if we fail, and the deadline comes and goes — there is one thing that I will be certain to accomplish.”

“And what is that?” Pendergast asked, a note of alarm in his voice. “Why spring this melodrama upon us now — once we’ve already gone over our plans?”

Constance did not reply.

“I am allergic to melodrama,” Diogenes said. “And Horace was right when he said: Indignor quandoque bonus dormitat Homerus. Let me deal with this accursed signal, so I can return my full attention to debauchery once again. Can you not hear it, crying out from the haunts of iniquity and demanding my attention? Such a delicious world this is! So for now, adieu.” He walked over to the coatrack, donned his cape with a flourish, gave a low bow, and left the suite.

Pendergast remained silent for a long moment. Then he glanced over at Constance. She could see an unusual flush of anger in his pale face. “Constance, I find your attitude to be, frankly, not only willful, but ungrateful.”

“‘Ungrateful’?” she repeated acerbically as she stood up. “That would be ungenerous of me indeed, given how poorly I was making out before you arrived here... neither invited nor expected.” She held up a fist before his face — aware that her limbs were trembling with repressed emotion — and began raising her fingers, one after another. “What had I accomplished? Oh, yes. First: I had established an identity as a European duchess, with the pedigree, household, and wealth necessary to maintain it. Second: I had rescued both Joe and Binky and brought them safely under my wing. Third: I had contacted Leng directly, put him off balance, and made my demands clear. Had you not blundered into my carefully laid plans, the four of us would already be far away from here: a family once again, sailing for lands where he’d never follow. Never — because as soon as I had made Mary safe, I would have killed him.”

Pendergast stood as well, listening in icy silence. Then he placed his hand over hers, folding her fingers back down into her palm. “Fourth,” he said, “instead of this fantasy you fondly imagine, a more accurate picture would be this: all of you dead by now, tortured at the hands of Leng — or, worse, awaiting the bite of his scalpel into your lower back.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“You blame me for blundering in and confounding your plans. That’s clear enough. But what I ‘blundered’ into — at that ball where you literally danced with the devil; and later, when you flirted with him at lunch — was the spectacle of a woman unknowingly headed for the slaughterhouse door.”

Constance was taken aback. This was Aloysius as she had never heard him before — brusque, lacking the courtesy with which he habitually treated her. From the meeting just concluded, she’d already sensed he was acting with uncharacteristic recklessness — destroying Shottum’s basement, flooding the subterranean tunnels of the Five Points. She realized this impulsiveness stemmed from anger, even fury.

And yet she felt her own anger rise at this presumption — Aloysius, daring to be angry? He had disregarded her express intentions, entered her world, and spoiled her plans. His irritation was as hypocritical as the swordsman who, upon decapitating Marie Antoinette, grew annoyed when her blood stained his shoes. And it was the last straw.

Snatching away the hand he’d just forced closed, she slapped him. His face went pale, with just a blush where her hand had struck him, and his eyes glittered dangerously.

“It was all going perfectly until you came. I had Leng precisely where I wanted him.”

“You had him as a doomed rabbit has a fox when caught in its jaws. Leng, where you wanted him? Quite the reverse. He was simply enjoying the spectacle, toying with you, as you foolishly exulted in your so-called success.”

“Spectacle?” she raged. “This was my home, my world—” Her throat grew tight with emotion, and for a moment she could not speak. “Make all the excuses you want, but your meddling is what ruined everything... and killed Mary.”

He stood his ground. “This is not your home,” he said. “It is not your time. It’s not even your universe. This delusional image you paint of your ‘family,’ sailing happily off to lands unknown... it never would have happened. The decades you spent in his house have left you blind to how consummately clever Leng is, and—”

“This is my home — as much as I can ever have one! You think my home is back on Riverside Drive, with you? I had to escape. You were cold. And what’s worse — indifferent.”

“Cold? Indifferent? I’ve been good to you in every way.”

“Is being good to me sharing only a sliver of your life — denying me the part of you I most wanted?”

“I always treated you with the utmost respect and decency.”

“Decency?” She was almost crying. “If only you’d showed me a little less of your damned decency.”

“What would you have me do?”

“Be human. Give in to impulse. Be indecent for a change, and not such a weak-kneed prude!”

She could see from his expression this had struck home, and she was glad. Before he could respond, she went on. “And then the heartlessness you showed by following me to this place, even as I was trying to put the misery and loneliness behind me. Didn’t the note I left make it clear? Did you even read it?”

She raised her hand to strike him again, but this time he caught her wrist. The ferocity of her intended strike unbalanced her, and she tipped forward against his chest. When she tried to pull back her arm he continued to hold it in a grip of iron.

“Let me go!”

He said nothing, pulling her closer to him, his face inches from hers. She felt the sudden warmth of his breath; she could see his pupils dilate in the ice-chip eyes, see the mark of her slap blossoming on the alabaster of his cheek.

“I read it a thousand times,” he said, his voice low and urgent. “I know it better than you do yourself.”

“Prove it.”

“I see my own lonely, loveless future,” he said, voice lower still. “If I can’t have you on my own terms, I can’t have—”

But he was abruptly silenced as Constance pulled him still closer, joining her mouth with his. There was the briefest of intervals — brief, yet strangely limitless in its counterpoise of anger and hunger — and then they came together in a passionate embrace.

34

Diogenes Pendergast walked along Central Park South, slowly swinging a billy club by its leather strap and whistling “She Was Poor but She Was Honest,” a tune that seemed to be on everyone’s lips that season. He had temporarily exchanged his foppish dress for the uniform of the Metropolitan Police — a disguise that both made him forgettable and ensured he could do almost anything without arousing curiosity.

Not that there would be any witnesses: it was two in the morning, and he had only the gas lamps for company.

Ahead and to the right rose a dark outline that, he thought with distaste, resembled the “Big Ciggy” — the grotesque Skidmore, Owings & Merrill sculpture that, a century in the future, would dominate a section of the Richmond, Virginia, skyline. The half-completed structure thrust up into the sky like a square straw, devoid of decoration. Tiny slots punctuated its flanks, following an invisible spiral, like the arrow slits of Caernarfon Castle. These, Diogenes assumed, were for wind bracing. The full moon threw a spectral illumination over its bulk, and he could see that its surface was covered in brick for perhaps two-thirds of its height: above that rose a wooden skeleton and steel frame. This was the work of Daniel Burnham, architect and developer, and it was awaiting the final delivery of bricks and precut steel.

He moved closer. Peering into one of the lower slits, he could make out a plumb bob, a sort of pendulum made from a string with a piece of chalk fixed to its base and touching a slate board — a rude implement for measuring the sway of the tower in the wind.

Unfinished, its top partially exposed to the elements, it was easy to see why the eccentric-looking thing was already being called “Burnham’s Folly.” It had none of the finishing touches that would make it the observation tower scheduled to open in three months. But Burnham’s intentions were still bigger: in Chicago, bids were currently being taken for the commission to design the Montauk Building. That, Diogenes knew, was where Burnham’s true interest lay: in constructing the tallest building in America — at fourteen stories, taller than either the Equitable Building or the Tribune Building, both erected in Manhattan over the last ten years. And in the future universe of Diogenes, Burnham had succeeded in building the Montauk — one of the most spectacular high-rises built up to that time, even though it enjoyed only a short life, being demolished around 1900. This ugly tower was the one thing that, to him, seemed an anomaly of this place — a construct that never existed in the Central Park of his own world. It was a vulgar and intrusive excrescence.

Stepping smartly up to the barricade erected around the structure, he undid the padlock with a policeman’s skeleton key and slipped inside. The base of the tower was surrounded by construction site detritus: piles of dirt, sawhorses, cut bricks, and pieces of steel. One foundation section was still exposed, and Diogenes noted the massive footings.

He made his way through the clutter and reached the entrance to the tower itself, which he unlocked with the same method. No workmen would be on site, day or night, until the rest of the building materials arrived. No guards were on hand, either, if for no other reason than there was nothing worth stealing.

After closing the door behind him, Diogenes lit a dark lantern. In one corner, surrounded by worktables, stood a small steel room, fashioned out of sheet metal, carefully welded. This functioned as a vault in which tools and other things of value were normally kept. Its door was set in place with a combination lock.

Diogenes approached the lock and twisted the dial right, then left, then right until the tumblers fell into place. The interior of the vault contained an array of equipment and four small, stout wooden boxes, covered with a drop cloth. Aloysius had been as good as his word: his man, Bloom, had contrived to have the fraternity of New York construction workers drop off the boxes earlier in the evening. Setting the lantern on a peg, he stepped in, pulled away the tarp, and — grabbing a nearby claw hammer — pried off their tops. He examined the neatly stacked red tubes of black powder with their coils of fuses, caps, and plaster inside.

He spent the next half hour gingerly carrying the sticks of explosives up the wooden steps and affixing them at various well-hidden spots. He made his way upward until, at last, he placed the final load directly beneath the wooden ceiling.

He paused to catch his breath, sitting on one of the steps and unbuttoning the top of his policeman’s overcoat. The moonlight, which had not deserted him during the last half hour, shone not only through the tall narrow windows, but also faintly through the cracks in a rectangular shape in the heavily braced ceiling. This, he realized, was the opening to the unfinished viewing parapet. Placing his palms against it, he dislodged it, then hoisted himself up onto the surface.

On the roof, there were not yet railings or posts of any kind: each side of the wooden square dropped off into darkness. Diogenes approached the south edge. He did not suffer from vertigo, but he nevertheless braced himself against the wind gusts that came and went at this height, which he estimated to be one hundred and seventy-five feet above ground.

As he raised his glance from the supporting platform and looked out over the city, he forgot all about the wind. There, below him, was the heart of Manhattan. Directly under his feet, where Central Park met a line of new apartment buildings and hotels, was the “Grand Circle” that, in ten more years, would host a statue of Christopher Columbus. Beyond it, Broadway ran crookedly south, breaking the otherwise neat grid of streets until it encountered the maze of alleys and lanes south of Houston. Despite the late hour, and the emptiness of the streets, faint sounds rose up to greet him: the nicker of a horse, a shout of laughter. The city was breathing, but it was a peaceful breathing... nothing like the garish cacophony of twenty-first-century New York. He could see countless twinkling lights, gas lamps illuminating the streets and margins of lower Manhattan with tiny jets of fire — but there were more, many more, that he could see only indirectly, shining within windows and from alleyways, and these gave the city a mysterious lambent glow, only increasing for Diogenes the sensation that he was staring down upon a living thing.

This was his new home — his domain. This was the place upon which he would make his mark. For all its technology, all its advances, the twenty-first century was sterile, insipid, and pitiless. It had been exceptionally cruel to him — and he to it. It was a flabby world, ruled by detumescent Babbitts, where ease had replaced vigor; a world nihilo ac malem.

He took a step back as this sudden, unexpected transport of emotion threatened to carry him over the edge. He stood still a moment, letting the strong wave of feeling pass and his breathing return to normal.

Now that everything was in place, he had only to attach fuses to each charge as he descended, each one of a length he’d already calculated. Not for the first time, he wondered why he was going for such overkill: the load beneath the roof was perfectly sufficient. But no: removing this excrescence in its entirety would be his opening gift — his housewarming present, so to speak — to 1881.

He slipped down into the tower, pulled the ceiling cover back into place, and picking up the dark lantern, descended the stairs one last time, uncoiling and attaching the fuses, ensuring that all his handiwork had been properly secreted away, before returning once again to the city.

His city.

35

Once again, the dinghy passed through the rustling weeds along the banks of the Hudson and into the hidden passageway, Constance silently dipping the oars. The lantern hung in the bow cast a dim light down the stone passageway as the boat eased forward, until finally the landing came into view. She steadied the boat against the stone quay, tied the painter to the bronze ring, and unloaded an oilskin duffel of fresh supplies. She stepped out herself and, slinging the bag over her shoulders, opened the hidden doorway and crept along the tunnel beyond, until she had passed under the Boston Post Road and entered the sub-basement of the Riverside Drive mansion.

Constance made her way to the blind she had chosen as a hiding place and set down her duffel. As she sank onto the crude cot, covered with a mattress of straw and canvas ticking, she had to force herself not to close her eyes. She hadn’t had a moment to think, or muse, since the night before.

She contemplated the small stone chamber that, almost two centuries earlier, had been the treasure room of the privateer king whose stronghold had been replaced, years earlier, by Leng’s mansion. The chamber, and most of the surrounding passages, had been carved out of the natural bedrock. The half dozen gold ducats and scattering of crude gemstones remaining in the cracks and corners led her to assume the pirate had vacated his lair in a hurry.

She’d intended to return here the night before, under cover of darkness, directly after the meeting with Diogenes and Aloysius. But she had been significantly delayed, and dawn was breaking by the time she exited the house in the Tenderloin district. Nevertheless, she’d put the day to good use. First, she’d stopped at a purveyor of gently used women’s clothing — well made, simple, but out of fashion — and used a dressing room there to change into a new outfit, leaving her brothel-style dress behind. She’d walked a mile along back alleyways before hailing a cab, which she directed to her town house on Fifth Avenue. She entered to the amazement of Féline, Gosnold, and the servants. This unexpected arrival, she hoped, would further confuse Leng and his spies regarding her comings and goings.

Once she had settled the household’s nerves with a combination of half-truths and lies, she retired with Féline to her private study. The young Frenchwoman was recovering well from her injuries, but she, like the others, was distressed by the current state of the house. Constance had no time to waste in commiseration; there were vital affairs to settle and little time to do it.

She explained her plans to Féline. The private secretary was aghast and pleaded with Constance to change her mind. Ultimately, however, she was forced to concede the logic behind her mistress’s intentions. Constance then sent her out to summon the lawyer with whom she had already done business. He arrived; Constance explained what she wanted, then overrode his protestations at the legal irregularity with the help of an extra-large fee. She waited while he drew up the paperwork, then reviewed and signed it, with Féline as witness. Lastly, she took Féline aside for a few final words, and they embraced.

By this time, it was dark. Constance donned black, close-fitting clothes, took up a small traveling satchel, and slipped out a basement window into the dim alleyway behind the house as quietly and invisibly as a cat.

She had made a show of her arrival, but she intended for her departure to remain unseen. Flitting westward from alley to alley, she ultimately gained the Hudson River and the shoreline weeds where she had hidden her dinghy. She rowed up the river, once again with the tide, to the pirate’s secret entrance.

Now, in the silent stone chamber, she gazed meditatively at the tallow candle whose guttering light illuminated her washbasin, the unopened satchel, a whetstone, and a dog-eared copy of the poems of Catullus. It was odd: when she’d returned to the past of her childhood, she had expected to be confronted by long-forgotten memories. What she had not anticipated were the specific things that would trigger them. This cheap candle, for instance — its gray-black smoke, coiling toward a small vent in the ceiling, just now resurrected a ghostly image of her mother, sprinkling salt on a candle precisely like this one in order to extend its burn time. It was the most ephemeral of memories, thin as gossamer and just as fragile.

Constance shook it away. Now was not the time to indulge in reminiscence. She rose up and, lighting a taper from the dying flame, moved out of the chamber into a clammy stone tunnel.

Leng had owned the mansion for only five years, but he was already filling the basement with a collection of weapons, torture devices, anatomical relics, poisons, chemical compounds, and other items of interest to his criminally curious mind and dark ambitions. She was in possession of a vital fact: in her world, at least, Leng would not discover the secret entrance to these caverns below the mansion’s basement complex for another thirty years. Constance, however, already knew them well. On her first arrival underneath the mansion, she had searched the basement and sub-basement with methodical precision, comparing this with her own memory of how it looked in her own present day, and within thirty-six hours she had learned, or refreshed her recollection, of all its secrets. Leng was already busy in the basement, setting up his collections and labs, and she had to be exceedingly careful to leave no trace whatsoever in those spaces. But she could spy on him through certain peepholes and masonry cracks, from the spaces between and inside the walls that honeycombed the rambling structure.

Her first effort had been to find Binky, but it quickly became clear (and was no surprise) that she was no longer in the house. Tracing where she had been taken was now Aloysius’s task. Constance was ready to move on to the next stage of her own plan: the one thing, she’d told the two brothers, that she would achieve — no matter what.

Quickly and stealthily, she made her way past false walls and up secret staircases through the basement and to the main floor, then up a narrow flight of disused back stairs and through a doorway whose outlines were hidden in the wallpaper. She tiptoed between beams, joists, and small piles of nogging, until she came to the inside wall of Leng’s library. There was a tiny hole five feet above the ground, hidden by a minuscule flap of loose plaster in the deepest shadows. She lifted the flap and looked through... to see the man himself, enjoying a glass of postprandial port.

She allowed herself only a split-second glimpse; she knew the doctor was not someone to take even the slightest chances with. But it was enough. That hateful image would carry her through the days of work that lay ahead.

“Te post me, satanas,” she whispered as she secured the tiny flap. Then she turned and slipped away, back down into the darkness, ready to prepare a beverage of her own.

36

Cedric Deddington-Bute, Fifth Baron Jayeaux, lay sprawled across the stylized reproduction of an Egyptian sarcophagus, circa 800 BC, carved out of lignum vitae. From the eiderdown bolsters cushioning his limbs, he gazed with satisfaction around his salon.

The real Cedric Deddington-Bute, newly arrived from Southampton, was now decomposing peacefully in the muck of the East River, and Diogenes had smoothly appropriated the man’s identity and worldly goods. To honor his memory, Diogenes had created this opulent nest with an extravagance that would have been impossible in the twenty-first century. The salon itself was decorated in the Etruscan style; the bath, Egyptian; the dining room, Roman Empire; and the bedroom, a mélange from the fevered minds of Huysmans and Baudelaire. Years ago, Diogenes had learned that money — when spent extravagantly — could spin straw into gold. At present, he had an enormous amount of money: with his knowledge of future market movements, he’d acquired an immense fortune on the New York Stock Exchange with astonishing speed and was now deploying it to his own gratification. It had been easy to do in this Gilded Age, when labor laws, OSHA, building codes, UNESCO conventions, and the Lacey Act remained far in the future.

The Etruscans had been famous for their skilled goldsmiths, who could coax gold to granulation and work it into intricate filigree. Nearly every inch of Diogenes’s salon — from the caryatids sculpted to look like living pillars, to the very jointure of the furniture — was covered in such Etruscan gilt. The drapes of the third-floor room were thrown wide, and the winter light that flooded in gave the natural sheen of every surface a brilliance. Thirty-Fourth Street lay outside the five-story town house he’d purchased, and he’d paid a great sum to have it immediately secured with iron bars, special locks, and soundproofing. There were other retrofittings he planned to make himself... when time permitted.

With a sigh of leisurely enjoyment, he looked over at the dish set beside his couch and the various fruits that lay upon it, glistening with tiny droplets of water. He quoted dreamily to no one in particular:

“Livia,” he said in a somewhat louder voice, “would you be an angel and peel me a grape?”

For a moment, all was still. Then one of the caryatids lowered her hands from their mock position in support of the ceiling, stepped down off her plinth, and walked toward him. Unlike the room’s other ornaments, she was flesh and blood; dressed from the waist down in billowy white silk, but also covered from face to navel to toes in fine baker’s sugar, of a golden color.

“Of course, my lord,” she said, approaching him with a sly smile.

She took a seat on the couch beside him, lifted a paring knife from the plate, and began expertly preparing a grape. Diogenes watched, appreciating her artless poise, the lissome manner in which she moved. It was a gift that only nature could confer: dancers might practice for decades and never achieve it.

Diogenes liked Livia very much indeed. She reminded him of another woman with a similar name he had been very close to: Flavia. The women were also similar in their self-assurance, their lusts, and their willingness to experiment. But while Flavia had been obsessed by the art of causing pain, Livia — who had been born into a family of destitute academics — was much more interested in things intellectual. As such, she and Diogenes were twin adventurers in the realms of the mind and senses. Flavia, alas, had died a few years back in the Florida Keys, assisted into the next world by Constance Greene, among others. So many of those in his brother Aloysius’s orbit seemed to suffer a premature demise.

Livia delicately placed first one grape on his tongue, then another. And then — eager to draw off the sugar from her limbs by slow strokes of his tongue — he smiled and beckoned her to lie beside him.

Soon, the sweet taste was flooding his senses even as his mind continued to roam. He reminded himself: Flavia was not dead; she hadn’t yet been born. Neither had he, for that matter. How strange it was, this parallel universe. Diogenes, agent and abettor of chaos, found himself fascinated by it. With his entropic turn of mind, he couldn’t accept that such a precise duplicate of his world should exist. As he’d moved through this mirrored New York of the nineteenth century, he’d been alert for discrepancies. What if Thomas Edison championed AC current, rather than DC? Or John Keats had avoided tuberculosis and gone on to write another dozen famous odes? Yet wherever he looked, he’d detected no departure from history, however minute — aside from the changes he and his compatriots from the twenty-first century had wrought in their arrival.

And that bloody tower. There was no such tower in his New York, and he had never heard of such a one previously existing. This lone discrepancy from his own timeline vexed him.

Meanwhile, the tip of his tongue had traced a line up Livia’s left arm and was now moving in semicircles toward her breast, taking away arcs of golden sugar with each stroke. But as the Egyptian Revival clock struck the hour, he realized he had dallied too long — the workhouse required his presence.

“Livia, my pulchritudinous poppet,” he said, lifting a fingertip to trace one of her eyebrows, then drifting it along the center part of her brunette hair, “would you mind terribly if we pause for just a while?”

“Of course not,” she said. “As long as you promise to finish.”

“I swear to make it a climactic event of the first order.”

“Should I regild—?” She paused, looking down at the streaks on her smooth flesh where the gold was now gone.

“Oh, please don’t bother. I have some additional adornments in mind for tonight.”

“How delicious!” Livia knew better than to spoil things by asking what these might be. “I’ll order up some caviar and read Justine while I wait.”

Of course she meant the novel by the Marquis de Sade, rather than the other, yet unwritten, one by Lawrence Durrell. He kissed her, whispered something in her ear that made her gasp, then rose and left the salon.

In his private dressing chamber, which nobody — including Livia and his manservant — ever entered, he changed clothes and washed, transforming himself into the Right Reverend Considine, the stiff-necked, narrow-minded bane of Leng’s existence. He left the dressing chamber through a hidden panel and passed down a narrow, blind staircase that ended at a door beneath the level of the street.

Beyond was a narrow, low-ceilinged passageway that had once been intended as a crypt for a church, demolished fifty years before. A new, larger church had been built in its place, and its entrance — at the end of this passageway — was as carefully hidden as the one within his own town house. He had no idea which prior owner built the secret staircase to his dressing room, or why; he only knew it had sat unused and forgotten for half a century.

Reaching the far end, he slipped into an unused basement room of the rebuilt church, closed a hidden door behind him, then threaded a circuitous path up into the active area of the building. Although he saw nobody, he had already devised a backstory for his clerical presence in the church at any time of the day or night.

Diogenes went out the front door of the church onto Thirtieth Street and walked in the direction of Broadway, where he planned to hail a cab to the Five Points. According to Royds, Leng was still attempting to gain access to the Mission and the House of Industry. Diogenes was determined to deal definitively with Leng — the only man capable of seriously threatening his own existence in this strange old snow globe of New York.

He soon became aware he’d been observed leaving the church and was now being tailed. It was one of Leng’s Milk Drinker gang, of course. No avoiding that: he realized he cut a conspicuous figure in the getup of Considine.

Diogenes caught a glimpse of the tail as he passed a mirror in a barbershop window. A gangly, unkempt fellow — he felt offended the man hadn’t done him the courtesy of a decent disguise, remaining clad in the unofficial Milk Drinkers uniform. Diogenes slowed a little, smiling as he saw the thug quicken his own walk. Now it became clear: the man wasn’t just following him, but planned to kill him.

How delicious.

Bringing himself into acute awareness of everything going on around him — on the street, the sidewalk, the buildings above — Diogenes waited for the right opportunity. Two coaches were clip-clopping down the cobbled street, and here, in midblock, the pedestrians had thinned out.

He dipped three fingers into the hem of his cassock, withdrew them, and then suddenly turned to face the man, a beatific smile on his face, hands cupped together before him as if preparing to administer the Eucharist.

“Would you care to confess your sins, my son?” he asked.

The man’s grimy face screwed up in confusion — just long enough for Diogenes to sink the short-handled icepick he’d palmed into the man’s solar plexus, the movement hidden by his billowing cassock. As the would-be assailant wheezed in surprise and pain, Diogenes leaned in familiarly, patting the man’s shoulder with one hand while the other — as with Miss Crean — probed the point for the sweet spot.

The man’s eyes widened as Diogenes found the artery and pierced it, neatly stepped back, and then with a sharp nudge tripped the man up, over, and into the street — even as he feigned a gesture to arrest his fall — directly in front of the wheels of the closest cab. The horse neighed; the driver pulled on the reins with a curse; but nevertheless a satisfying thump-thump informed Diogenes it hadn’t stopped in time.

But he was already looking toward the second coach. As the driver slowed instinctively, Diogenes grabbed the door and hoisted himself up and in.

“What in thunder?” the cabbie cried, looking back into the compartment and spying the white dog collar around his customer’s neck. “Begging Your Grace’s pardon, I mean.”

“I believe he was drunk, poor soul. I tried to arrest his fall, but failed — alas. We can only hope the next life is easier for him than this one was, my friend.”

“Aye, true enough.”

Diogenes, glancing out the window, saw the first cabbie was now down on the street and kneeling by the thug lying motionless between the wheels. The icepick guaranteed there would be little external blood. And there was not even the remotest chance Leng, thorough and clever as he was, would note the similarity in wounds between this fellow and the former director of the workhouse — for the simple reason that Ms. Crean’s corpse no longer existed, save at the atomic or subatomic level.

“Well, my man, time waits for no one,” he said gravely. “Canal Street, please.”

With a whistle of the whip cracking the air, they lurched immediately into a trot.

37

“Would you care for some more damson-plum jam, Mr. Cassaway?”

“No thank you, Mrs. Plaice. If the holidays weren’t so close behind us, I’d think you were fattening me up as a Christmas turkey.”

“What sauce!” Mrs. Plaice tittered as she picked up the tea-things and made her way out of the parlor and into the kitchen.

Humblecut watched her disappear. Mrs. Plaice was, indeed, a most excellent cook, but he was strict about his diet.

Mount Desert Island — where his slow, methodical inquiries had ultimately led him — was a curious place indeed. It was quite large — dwarfing Martha’s Vineyard far to the south. And it had recently undergone a transformation. For years, the island had been the haunt of “rusticators” — artists of the Hudson River school searching for remote, rugged landscapes to put on canvas. But over the last decade, these would-be Thoreauvians had been displaced by the wealthiest of the wealthy, eager to build large summer “cottages” far from the city. Various Carnegies, Astors, and Rockefellers arrived on the island by yacht and steamship for summers full of lawn parties, yachting, and croquet. This was good news for provisioners, carpenters, masons, and house staff... but bad news for the cheap boardinghouses patronized by the artists and naturalists. How lucky then for Scots-bred Emmaline Plaice, who ran just such a modest establishment, that Mr. Cassaway — middle-aged, handsome, lean and sinewy, with impeccable manners — had arrived, looking for a place precisely like hers, where he could research his history of the postrevolutionary New England coast. Better still, he seemed to find the tranquility of the winter season inspirational and appreciated being her only boarder. In fact, once he’d chosen her best room — overlooking the main street of Northeast Harbor — and secured it by paying a month in advance, she’d taken the small ROOMS TO LET sign out of the front window.

In his brief stay on the island, Humblecut had already taken long walks along its rocky coastline and meandering carriage rides through the sleepy winter towns, braving the godawful freezing temperatures, to ensure he became a familiar figure to the locals. He was also spending time at the library and chatting with self-professed island historians in the local coffee shop, displaying his bona fides, along with establishing that he was there for private research and minded his own business. This last quality masked the fact he was skilled at coaxing rumors and gossip out of others without their realizing it. That morning, he’d learned from a lobsterman that a man had taken up residence in the Rockefeller estate as a security guard, bringing his young son with him. Another encounter with a housepainter informed him that a boy of twelve years old had begun attending the Seal Harbor school — noteworthy because the painter’s son had teased the boy on account of his peculiar accent, to unfortunate results.

“I think I’ll go out for a stroll, Mrs. P.,” he told the landlady as she bustled back in. “Work up an appetite for supper.”

“What — after tea?” She frowned in concern. “It gets dark so early, these days.”

“I won’t go far — just up the Foster Farm Road.”

“Will you, and all? There’s nothing to see out that way but them dirty great mansions. Not much history thereabouts — some of them are but half-built.”

“What we find contemporary, future generations will call history.”

The woman frowned as if trying to parse this statement. “Future generations aren’t about to walk out that door and catch their death of cold.”

He smiled. “Have you, by chance, ever heard of historiography?”

“Can’t say that I have.” Mrs. Plaice opened the closet door. “Here, take my late husband’s scarf. White cashmere — it’s ever so soft.”

“I’d prefer that other one, if you don’t mind.”

“What... the black? But that’s a lady’s scarf... that’s mine!”

“In that case, I shall be sure to tuck it especially close to my heart.”

“Such a saucebox!” She tittered — then paused. “What was that word again?”

“Historiography. The study of how written history changes with time. I suppose you could call it the history of history. In any case, someday my history book will be studied in such a way... if I’m lucky.”

“The history of history. I never. It’s like... like walking backward on a moving train. What’s the point?”

“That’s a question even historians can’t answer.”

At this, she burst into laughter. “You always give me something to think about, you do! Now remember: supper’s at half past six. We’re having roast hogget.”

“In that case, I’ll come back with an extra-sharp appetite.” Wrapping the scarf tightly around his neck and tucking it into his coat, he opened the front door and — black upon black — strode out into the failing light.

38

The odd figure wobbled down West 137th Street, a man with long black hair, a swollen nose with burst veins, a shabby frock coat and filthy gaiters, and a partially crushed stovepipe hat perched on his head as the final touch. He trailed a distinct smell of whisky behind him. He approached the corner of Riverside Drive, passing by the somber Beaux Arts mansion that dominated the block, turned the corner, and continued north, humming tunelessly. Veering diagonally across the drive, he jauntily staggered down into newly built Riverside Park, converted from a railyard only a few years before and still not finished. Here, he spied two other malingerers sitting on a stack of granite blocks not far from the tracks of the Hudson Railway.

“A good evening to you, fellow bindlestiffs!” he cried, pulling out a quart bottle and waving it like a white flag before taking a good pull. The two tramps, who had been guardedly watching his approach, softened their expressions.

“Come join us, friend,” said one.

The tramp seated himself and offered the two others his bottle. “Old Overholt,” he cried. “Not as aged as one might like — perhaps Young Overholt would be a more appropriate name. Ha ha ha! But never mind: fine stuff, fine stuff!”

One took it, swigged, and passed it on. The newly arrived tramp stuck out his hand, fingers protruding from dirty fingerless gloves. “Stovepipe’s my moniker.”

The two tramps introduced themselves as Galloon and Howitzer.

“Help yourselves to more refreshment,” said Stovepipe, courteously refusing to accept the bottle reluctantly passed back to him. This considerably cheered the tramps, who took several more enthusiastic pulls each.

“Thank you, friend,” said one, wiping his mouth. “That’s some good coffin varnish.”

Stovepipe issued a cracked laugh and gave the man a slap on the back. “Yessir!”

The bottle went around again, the two tramps indulging themselves even more liberally than before.

“Haven’t seen you in these parts,” said Galloon.

“Just arrived,” Stovepipe said. “Looking for work.”

“What kind of work?”

“As little as possible.”

This got a round of laughs, and the newcomer continued. “Stableman, when I have to be. Just got here from old Boston. I’m a little light on the spondulix at the moment, and I heard the city’s a-growing, lots of jobs.”

Galloon spat. “Not for us.”

Stovepipe waved his hand. “With all the rich people around here? Take that mansion up there. They must have at least a coach and four.”

Galloon shook his head, taking another pull. “Skinflints.”

“You seen what kind of coach they drive? Asking for professional reasons, you understand.”

“Oh, a big old varnished thing, four-in-hand, like you said. Comes and goes at all times of the night and day.”

“Anything else?”

“A wagon, pulled by a Belgian.”

“A four-in-hand and a Belgian? My word. Where do they keep the horses?”

“In the mews right around back of the house.”

“Now that’s some useful information!” Stovepipe scratched thoughtfully at his stubbly chin. “What kind of wagon did you say?”

“A farm wagon, just a horse and cart. I saw it not but a few days back, headed out around midnight.”

“A few days back? You mean, Monday?”

The tramp frowned. “Not sure I recollect.” He shrugged. “Monday sounds right. Then again, it might have been Sunday.”

“Which way did it go?”

“North.”

“Who was driving it?”

“He was all mufflered up on account of the cold, black scarf and greatcoat, but I think it was the master of the house himself — he’s a right tall feller.” He hesitated. “Why so interested? You some kind of second-story man?”

“Good gracious, no! My interest, sir, is for the very simple reason that they couldn’t find a better drayman than yours truly! Why would the master be driving some old farm wagon if he had a decent wagoner? Now, if he had a man like me—”

“I wouldn’t knock on that door if my life depended on it — and that’s a bottom fact.”

“What do you mean?”

“Thems are some rum coves lounging around that place, comings and goings at night — all sorts of doings. It’s a strange house with queer folk, and you’d do better to toughen your knuckles on doors farther up.”

“Well, you’ve scoured the place, and I haven’t... but crikey, it’s the biggest mansion on the whole stretch! More horses, more money. And with a separate stables, a man can likely get a fair amount of shut-eye in without being overly troubled.”

Galloon shook his head.

“What was it carrying?”

“A load of hay, I believe.”

“Out of the city? For dunnage?”

Galloon shrugged. “It was dark, and they was moving fast. If I were you I’d pack away that curiosity — it’s like to get you into deep tar.”

“I thankee for the advice, Mr. Galloon, sir, and I leave you with the bottle as a parting gift. Now, good night. I had better freshen up my wind afore I go a-knocking on doors.”

The tramp rose and headed north along Riverside Drive, eyes scanning the ground. In short order, his vigilance was rewarded with two items — crumpled pieces of damp hay and a single round pellet, which he recognized as the dung of a sheep.

39

The flickering light from Constance’s candle gleamed and winked among the hundreds of glass jars, bottles, beakers, and phials that crowded the shelves in the chemical storeroom housed in the basement of 891 Riverside Drive. She moved silently on stockinged feet, holding the candle to the labels in each row of vessels in turn, on which an impeccable hand had written the name of the item or substance within — a venomous insect, snake, or other noxious creature; a swollen poison gland dissected from a toad; a deadly plant, mineral, liquid, powder, crystalline, or colloid.

This was the heart of Leng’s collections — poisons, toxins, banes, and venoms. He had only begun to stock this most valuable and dangerous storeroom; over the years, Constance knew, it would grow to embrace virtually every lethal substance known to exist, as he searched for the ultimate poison capable of driving the human race to extinction. It had been an unpleasant experience for Constance — delving into her memory, back to the time when she was a young girl living in this same mansion, acting as Leng’s assistant in various chemical and toxicological experiments — but necessary, if she were to reacquaint herself with its layout.

She was looking for a certain toxin Leng had been fascinated with, found in the death cap mushroom, Amanita phalloides. The toxins of that infamous species of mushroom were thermostable: they could be cooked yet remain deadly. In addition, the mushroom had a pleasant taste resembling beef broth, allowing food to be heavily laced with it yet take on no bitter or unusual flavor. But what primarily attracted Leng was the fact that the mushroom’s deadly effects took days to appear — much too late to purge the stomach with an emetic. By the time you felt sick enough to realize something was seriously wrong, you were already a dead person. You could ingest a fatal dose and remain unaware of it for as long as two weeks — until your liver began inexorably to fail. For this reason, the death cap had been used as a poison for thousands of years, playing a role in the demise of, among others, the Roman emperor Claudius, Pope Clement VII, and the Austrian emperor Charles VI.

Once the poison finally manifested, it made itself felt in a most unpleasant manner indeed. An antidote was not developed until some time into the twenty-first century. Prior to that, nothing could save the victim except immediate liver transplantation.

In the nineteenth century, there was no cure at all.

She recalled that, during the 1890s, Leng had labored in this laboratory for weeks: preparing a desiccated and powdered form of the death cap, trying to isolate and identify its poison. He had discovered it contained not one, but seven toxins, each biochemically distinct and with different effects. The empress of these toxins, alpha-amanitin, was the deadliest and also had the advantage of taking the longest to manifest itself. The ingestion of as little as ten milligrams was fatal.

Constance had helped Leng isolate the toxin, and she had searched her memory for the exact process. She wanted to make sure to prepare an absolutely fatal dose, and that meant concentrating the poison through biochemical extraction. Although it would be a decade before he turned his attention to studying its properties, even as early as 1881 she knew Leng had kept a cache of powdered Amanita phalloides somewhere in his storeroom.

At last, the candle flame flickered over the label she was searching for:

She could not simply take the jar of white powder — Leng frequently haunted the laboratory, and she planned on leaving nothing to chance, not even the remote possibility he might spy that the level of powder had dropped in a single jar. Removing a small bottle, a piece of paper, an empty phial, and a packet from the pockets of her dress, she placed them on a shelf. Rolling the paper into a funnel, she gently shook out two tablespoons of the amanita powder into the phial; then, transferring the funnel to Leng’s jar, she took the packet — containing confectioners’ sugar — and restored the powder to its former level, stoppering the jar and shaking it to disperse the sugar.

As she slipped the items back into her pockets and returned the jar to its place, she heard a faint noise. Instantly, she extinguished the candle and stopped its smoke with a pinch of her fingers to the wick. Another sound — a door, scraping a sill with a creak of hinges — and then a gleam of light appeared. It was Leng. The man, so regular in his eating habits, otherwise kept the most unpredictable hours. And it could only be him: no one else, not his gang or his servants or even the hated Munck, was allowed in the basement laboratory and storerooms. None of them, Constance believed, even knew of their existence. She had — over time — become the only person Leng allowed to assist him.

She shook away further recollections.

As the light moved into the chamber, Constance shrank back behind a row of shelves and pressed herself against the damp stone wall. The light continued to move down the central aisle, slowly and silently. From the dark of her hiding place she could see the patrician face of Leng, pale and hollow in the light of his lantern, his eyes glistening behind violet-tinted glasses. He was hatless, and his light blond hair, brushed back, gleamed with Macassar oil. At the sight of him, a hatred rose within her so violent that she feared he might detect the angry beat of her heart. But he passed by like a specter, intent on some late-night business of his own. Soon he had left the room and gone into the next — full of weapons, for the most part still boxed from shipping — and she took the opportunity to creep out of her hiding place and move deeper into the basement, away from Leng.

To isolate alpha-amanitin from the powder would be her next step. It would involve another trip to the laboratory, the borrowing of certain reagents along with a titration burette, analytical balance, mixing beakers, and tubes. It would have to be done tonight, and the equipment returned before morning — once again, to its precise position in the lab.

40

Pendergast turned onto 139th street and headed east to Tenth Avenue, where Murphy was waiting with the carriage, along with a riding horse, saddled and bridled, tied up on a lead rope behind. He stepped into the coach, drew the curtains, then swiftly changed out of his disguise, shedding the crushed stovepipe hat and shabby greatcoat for a cloth cap and scarf, leather trimmed breeches and high boots, a musette bag, and a woolen riding coat of fine quality.

“He’s a good gelding, this one,” said Murphy, offering him the reins as he stepped out, completely transformed. “Name’s Napoleon.”

The chestnut beast eyed Pendergast, his ears perked. Pendergast stroked his neck, let the animal smell him a moment, and then took the reins, slipped his boot into the stirrup, and mounted.

“Take care, sir,” said Murphy.

“I will, Murphy, and thank you. He seems a fine horse.”

The two parted, and Pendergast started northward up Tenth Avenue, bent on his last and most important objective — finding Binky. He’d decided to layer his disguise: a farmer, supposedly returning to his farm from a day in the city, who in reality was an insufficiently disguised Pinkerton agent in pursuit of a fugitive.

By ten that evening, with the moon struggling to rise through icy vapor, Pendergast arrived at Kings Bridge, where the Boston Post Road crossed Spuyten Duyvil Creek, the body of water at the very northern tip of Manhattan Island separating it from the Bronx. Kings Bridge was the oldest bridge connecting Manhattan with the mainland, and as he approached he saw a faint light in the wooden tollhouse at its near end.

Pendergast halted, dismounted, and tied his horse at the hitching post. The toll master opened a small window and leaned out. “Greetings, traveler,” he said, in a tired voice.

As he approached, Pendergast took in the cozy hut, warm from a woodstove, with a coffeepot and a pan of corn bread. “Greetings to you,” said Pendergast.

“Ten cents, if you please.”

Pendergast removed a silver dollar and laid it on the sill. “My good man, permit me a question: early this week, did you happen to be on duty at about two or three o’clock in the morning?”

“I did indeed,” the man said, rousing himself at the question and by the sight of the silver coin. “What’s it to you?”

Pendergast assumed an arrogant tone. “I’m a farmer, returning from a day in the city, and I’m wondering if my brother came through here around that time, Monday or perhaps Sunday night. He’s an uncommonly tall fellow, thin, pale, face and neck wrapped up in a dark scarf, driving a cart loaded with hay hitched to a Belgian draft horse.”

“Your brother, you say?”

“Yes.”

There was a pause, and Pendergast ostentatiously laid a second Morgan dollar on top of the first.

The toll master eyed him up and down. “What’s it all about?”

“I’m afraid that’s none of your business,” came the officious reply, pitched in a tone designed to arouse suspicion.

“It is my business if you’re looking for information.” The toll master paused. “And if I may say so, sir: if you’re a farmer, then I’m President Hayes.”

At this, Pendergast paused a beat. Then he broke into a slow, cold smile. “I can see you’re not one to be easily fooled.”

“I am not,” the man said, a touch of pride in his voice.

Pendergast lowered his voice. “Well, then, I’ll be straight with you. Confidentially, of course.”

“That’s more like it.”

“I’m in pursuit of a fugitive from justice.”

The toll master nodded, eager to hear more.

“Let’s just say I’m a private detective from an outfit that isn’t exactly unknown — if you get my meaning.”

“The Pinkertons?”

“I didn’t say that!” Pendergast leaned forward and lowered his voice still further. “The man I just described is a murderer and kidnapper. The fiend was last seen spiriting a young girl out of the city, trussed up in a hay wagon.”

The man’s eyes widened. “No!”

“I fear greatly that it’s a fact. Now: did you see the man I described pass by?”

“Sir, I did in fact see the man you’re describing. It was after midnight, in the wee hours of Monday morning. Not only that, but at the time I thought I heard a sound from the hay. It seemed the mewling of a cat... but I suppose it could just as well have been the muffled crying of a child.”

“Is that so! I commend your abilities of observation. Did you exchange any words with him? Any clue, say, as to where he might be going?”

“He was completely silent. He drew up to the window, paid his dime, and then shook the reins and was gone over the bridge in a flash.”

“He was moving fast, then?”

“Yes.”

“No idea which road he took on the far side, where the toll road branches?”

“No, sir.”

“Had you ever seen him before, coming and going?”

“I can’t say — his face was entirely muffled up, as you noted, and it was a dark night — like tonight.”

“Had you seen the horse before?”

“Can’t say that, either. There are a lot of Belgians come through this way, pulling loads. That’s a popular breed. The wagon looked like any old market wagon. Stank like sheep shite, I recall.”

“You’ve been quite helpful.” He gestured at the two dollars. “You’ve earned them.”

“I’m not one to take money for doing good. I hope you catch the man, sir. I did feel he had an evil air about him.”

Pendergast retrieved the coins, replacing them with a dime. “You are an honest man and a fine citizen to boot. Now: if anyone should inquire about me or this encounter, what might your response be?”

“That I’ve no idea what they’re talking about and never saw the gentleman in question.”

“Excellent. Thank you, toll master.” Pendergast unhitched Napoleon from the post. And then, with a single, agile movement, he leapt into the saddle and pressed the flanks of the horse with his heels; in an instant they were galloping across the bridge and into the deep gloom of night.

41

Around Four PM, Pendergast halted at the second major fork in the Boston Post Road and looked about. It was an even lonelier spot than the first. Here, the Post Road continued northeastward, while another road went off to the left heading due north, in the direction of White Plains. It was rutted and strewn with dead weeds crushed into the frozen mud by wagon wheels.

After he’d passed Kings Bridge the night before, the road had entered a hilly region of farms and small villages, and after half a mile he’d come to the first main fork. The left-hand fork followed the route of the railroad, past the grand estates perched on the bluffs over the Hudson, meandering through such villages as Dobbs Ferry, Tarrytown, and Pocantico Hills. The right-hand fork was the continuation of the Boston Post Road.

At this point, Pendergast had been presented with his first decision. He stopped the horse and took a deep breath of the cold night air. The crossroads was cold and silent. He was on a high point of ground, and from it he surveyed the countryside. It was remarkable how dark the world had been before the advent of electric lights; how starry the night sky, and silent the landscape. He could see to his left a faint illumination of the Hudson Line, and a sprinkle of dim lights he assumed must be the village of Spuyten Duyvil. To the right, the Post Road continued on through Williamsbridge and Pelham, then northeastward along the shores of Long Island Sound and its many seaside villages.

It seemed likely Leng was taking Binky to a working farm, not a nouveau riche mansion set on manicured grounds, where a dirty farm wagon would attract attention and a flock of sheep would not be welcome. But he’d reminded himself that nothing about Leng could be taken for granted — and he’d spent much of the morning and early afternoon examining the least likely routes before returning... and choosing the right-hand fork.

Another few miles had brought him to the second major fork — and another decision. As he sat on Napoleon, looking up the long, desolate lane that again veered off from the Post Road, with mist rising from its half-frozen ground, he felt a strong sense of desuetude. He knew from a recent study of local maps that this road led to the scattered dairy farms and smallholdings of the Van Cortlandt region, initially settled by Dutch farmers in the seventeenth century and still relatively remote. He closed his eyes, calmed his mind, and considered the matter. Within moments, he felt certain no more time was needed investigating probable red herrings — this was the road Leng had taken. The man was going to a place he knew well and had long used. This northern road led into an area that was quiet and isolated, far from the gossipy small towns on Long Island Sound as well as from the conspicuous mansions along the Hudson. Somewhere along this road there would be a prosperous, working farm owned by Leng, no doubt in another guise — one with livestock and, in particular, sheep.

Sheep. That seemed odd. He had learned, firsthand, that the wagon that had spirited away Binky stank of sheep. But the wool trade was no longer practiced in the Hudson River valley, and mutton, being a poor man’s meat, was not a profitable trade. Why sheep? There were many dairy farms in the Van Cortlandt valley — but they were stocked with cows. And as he tried to penetrate the Umwelt of Leng, he suddenly understood: this farm to which the haycart had been headed was not about mutton or wool: it was about cheese.

He opened his eyes and breathed deeply of the cold winter air and then exhaled, staring as his breath took on shape and form as dark once again began to fall. The air smelled of ice. He gave Napoleon a nudge and sent him down the road less traveled.

As Pendergast rode along, he became aware that this might be the most difficult part of his pursuit: finding the right farm in this vast winter nightscape. But he also felt certain there would be evidence of one kind or another to guide his way.

A mile down the road, he halted his horse and dismounted. He lit a small lantern, then crouched to examine the frozen surface of the road. He noted the ground had become rutted during the freeze-thaw cycle of winter; the relative warmth of the day softened the muddy surface of the road, which would then freeze again at night. The previous Sunday, however, there had been an overcast sky; in the city it had not gone below freezing, and he surmised that had been the case out here as well. Leng’s cart would have left tracks. Unfortunately, he could see that too many wagons and carriages had passed in the intervening time, erasing any useful information.

Pendergast remounted Napoleon, loosened the reins to let the horse have his head, and closed his eyes once again. As the horse continued at a rocking pace, Pendergast used a series of mental exercises to clear his mind of stray thoughts, letting it become like a crystal pool of water. Gradually, the image of Binky in the hay wagon formed in his head, like a reflection on the water. The girl lay with her feet shackled, hands bound before her, a gag around her mouth. Blindfolded, as well: Leng would take no chances with a resourceful, energetic guttersnipe who’d learned the arts of survival in the worst slum of New York City. In the reflected image of his mind, it seemed to Pendergast that she was also tied or otherwise bound to the wagon itself, in order to prevent her from wriggling up and over the sideboards.

But as he observed the scene, he grew convinced that Leng, careful as he was, had made a mistake. Binky’s hands were bound in front... but her fingers were free.

Now Pendergast opened his eyes and halted the horse. He dismounted, relit the lantern, and — leading the animal by the reins — walked slowly along the road, head down, lantern held low to illuminate the ground. The road dipped and rose, and the night deepened as he continued on.

He had gone a quarter of a mile when he found what he was looking for: a piece of damp straw folded into a loose, crude knot.

Remounting Napoleon, he continued on. The tranquil crystal pool vanished from his mind, leaving two images behind. One was of Binky, cleverly tying pieces of straw together with her nimble fingers and dropping them over the side to serve as a sort of breadcrumb trail. But that image dissolved into another, very different, one: Leng, seated at the reins, a handful of straw in his lap — now and then tossing out precisely the same thing.

42

The next fifteen minutes, Constance felt sure, would be the most important — and dangerous — of her time in Leng’s mansion.

With infinite care, she had learned the rhythms of the house. Leng’s outstanding characteristic, she had noted, was a strict adherence to dining routine. When he was in, usually three or four nights a week, he had dinner punctually, alone, and ate a limited menu. At eight o’clock promptly he was served le premier plat, usually smoked buffalo tongue, a pâté of snipe in jelly, or jugged hare. This was followed, invariably, by terrapin soup at eight fifteen. Then at eight forty-five came le plat principal, usually beef or lobster, with a glass of claret or white burgundy, which occupied the doctor for half an hour, until he was served pastries and coffee.

Because Leng was fussy to the point of metathesiophobia when it came to food punctuality, the preparation of dinner was always a fraught affair. The doctor would let it be known, before leaving in the morning, whether he’d be in for dinner, and the necessary arrangements would begin around noon, with marketing and the assembling of ingredients. The cook, with his sous chef and two assistants, would begin work at around five. The kitchen and pantry were on the first floor, their rear wall partially below ground due to the slope of the land, while Leng’s private dining room was almost directly above it, on the second floor. A dumbwaiter served both to bring up the various dishes — then served by the butler — and to send down dirty plates. The preparations reached a crescendo around quarter to eight and slacked off at eight thirty, when Leng briefly left the dining room to sharpen his appetite for the main course with a pipe of tobacco. The dinner reached its zenith between eight forty-five and ten. That was when Leng retired to his private salon and the last plates were sent down to the scullery maid.

This unchanging concerto de cuisine, so very surgical in its demanding nature, was a boon to Constance, especially given Leng’s otherwise unpredictable schedule. From her hidden chambers in the sub-basement — two floors below the kitchen, three floors below the dining room — she choreographed her plan of action. She had timed and rehearsed her plan and tried a dry run to ensure it could work. Now it was time for the main event.

Dressed in her black catsuit, she ascended from her hidden quarters to the basement, and from there to the first floor at five minutes after eight, taking up position behind a panel in the passage between the kitchen and the scullery. She had contrived to keep her hands and arms free by employing a crossbody strap, slung over her neck like a leather scarf and containing a pouch on either side. One held the poison she had managed to extract and concentrate with infinite care, along with a small glass beaker of hydrofluoric acid that she intended to fling at any attacker, should she be discovered. The other pouch contained a “top break” Enfield Mk I service revolver with a full complement of .476 cartridges. This was not for defensive purposes — it was to be used on herself as a last resort.

As the minutes stretched on, she remained still as death. Then, from her vantage point behind the panel, she silently withdrew her pocket watch: eight thirty precisely. And, just as precisely, the dumbwaiter descended with a whir; the scullery maid opened its door, removed the dirty plates, and trotted off down the corridor. A moment later, the sous chef returned with the dinner plates, arranged them in the dumbwaiter, and sent them up. The butler waiting above, Constance knew, was ready to deliver the main course to the table — and then discreetly withdraw.

This was Constance’s window of opportunity. She waited one hundred seconds exactly, then slipped across the corridor, freed the mechanism holding the dumbwaiter at the floor above, and manually wheeled it downward. Then she opened it. As expected, it was empty: the dinner had been taken to the table.

She clambered into the cramped space and closed the door behind her. Then she opened the trap in the roof and used the rope-and-pulley mechanism to lift herself up the fifteen feet from the main floor to the dining room. The dumbwaiter was of too primitive a design to have an interlock, so she bolted it in place manually, then paused to listen. The dining room beyond was silent. Once again, she checked her pocket watch: 8:35.

A faint smell of tobacco permeated the interior of the dumbwaiter.

Now Constance opened the door on the back side. Leng’s dining room came into view. The dinner was set, china and sterling glittering, butler gone, and the food in place, waiting for Leng’s return in a minute or two — or even less.

Constance quickly stepped out of the dumbwaiter and up to Leng’s chair, glancing over the meal: filet de bœuf et sa sauce Bordelaise.

That would do nicely.

Keeping alert for the sound of footsteps in the hallway outside, she plucked a wad of cotton wool from the pouch and unwrapped it, revealing a tiny ampoule with a cork stopper. Without hesitation, she opened it and poured the clear liquid contents into the gravy boat holding the rich sauce. She mixed the sauce briefly with an index finger. Unconsciously, she raised the finger to her tongue — then stopped herself with a mordant smile at this almost fatal mistake. Instead, she dipped it into a large finger bowl and rinsed it off, the copper container masking any faint brownish hue that resulted. After a final glance around, she climbed back into the dumbwaiter, lowered it to the first floor, and put the ceiling trap back into place. Once again she looked at her pocket watch: 8:41.

The corridor outside was silent. Constance opened the dumbwaiter, crawled out, closed its door, raised it back to its proper level, and returned to her hidden observation post on the far side of the hallway.

Leng returned to the dining room, and she could hear the faint sounds of his meal for the next half hour. Finally, the dirty plates were loaded on the dumbwaiter and sent down. Looking out from her peephole, Constance saw that the filet had been wholly consumed — and that the gravy boat with the Bordelaise was at least half-empty.

“The condemned man ate a hearty supper,” she murmured to herself as she ducked out of the nook, then through the door leading down to the basement — and beneath.

43

George Harrison — who, despite his name, had no musical gifts whatsoever — closed the servants’ entrance to the Rockefeller “cottage,” helped Joe remove his coat, and then took off his own. He hung them on pegs while Joe ran ahead into the kitchen. Every day, Mrs. Cookson had raisin porridge waiting on the stove for Joe when he got home from school. This morning, however, they’d made the journey to the schoolhouse only to learn that one of the teachers was ill, and that class would not resume until tomorrow — Saturday. Which meant, Mrs. Cookson said, that Joe would get his porridge early... once he’d completed his studies.

Joe was fitting in well at the two-room schoolhouse. On the first day, his accent had attracted the attention of an older bully, but after Joe had used his fists to place the fellow into a recumbent position, the other students quickly came to respect him. The teacher had initially planned on a remedial syllabus for the boy but, on discovering his reading and writing skills were unexpectedly strong, found a place for him in the upper schoolroom. It was, D’Agosta supposed, one of the benefits of a tiny school, where such labels as fifth or sixth grade had little meaning. He was pleased by the way Joe, even though still keeping much to himself, had begun to make progress in his studies and was getting along with his classmates. The only thing the least unusual was the six-day school week: because fathers needed extra hands to help work during the season, there were sixteen weeks off during summer instead of the usual twelve.

D’Agosta moved through the warm kitchen and proceeded on to the back parlor, where a fire was burning and a copy of the Portland newspaper, a week old, was waiting. He picked it up and began leafing through it. He found these 1880s papers pretty thin: six or eight columns of print set off by ornamented headlines. The most interesting stories were buried inside, lurid descriptions of criminal goings-on, reports of strange marvels from “the uttermost corners of the Orient,” or the like. The stories on the front page were more or less incomprehensible to someone who had no background in the politics or controversies of the day.

He put the paper aside and sighed. Life on the island, he had to admit, was dull. He dutifully made uneventful, daily rounds of the common rooms of the freezing mansion. Mrs. Cookson was friendly and eager to minister to their needs, but her conversation was limited and her worldview cramped. He missed his wife, Laura, terribly and felt broken up that they had parted in anger. She had to be freaked out by his sudden disappearance.

Mr. Cookson turned out to be a surprise. He had initially remained taciturn and indisposed to small talk, but that changed when D’Agosta offered to help paint the ten small bedrooms in the servants’ wing. The man made a feeble attempt to rebuff the offer, but it was clear he was no fan of standing on ladders and slopping paint on ceilings. As they worked together, D’Agosta began to like the wizened, mustachioed man, who only spoke when he had something worthwhile to say, and often with a wit so dry it took a moment to realize that it was wit at all.

The island seemed safe enough. Strangers were rare and immediately noted. A few artists and writers arrived from time to time to spend a week or two in the offseason, wandering around the shores and cliffs. D’Agosta himself had decided the less time he spent out of the mansion, the better: he’d been accepted as one of Mr. Rockefeller’s “people” and was happy to leave it at that. His outside excursions mostly consisted of walking Joe to and from school, and he used the opportunity to look for anything out of place. Nothing raised his suspicions. And Joe, thank God, knew how to keep his mouth shut.

Now the boy himself stepped into the back parlor to join D’Agosta. One hand gripped the leather strap that bound his schoolbooks together, the other his prized possession: a metal dip pen. This pen, though it was used like the others in school and even looked rather common, was in fact very special.

Two packages had arrived from Pendergast since they reached the island: both addressed from Mr. Rockefeller to Mrs. Cookson, but holding inside smaller packages with George Harrison’s name on them. The first contained necessaries, including money and instructions he had burnt after reading. The second package contained a present for Joe. Pendergast, who knew Joe had been developing an interest in astronomy before being rushed out of the Fifth Avenue mansion, had given him a dip pen with a metal shaft. D’Agosta, reading from Pendergast’s note, explained to Joe that the pen was exceedingly rare, having been machined from a piece of the Bendegó meteorite, which had impacted in Brazil almost a hundred years before. In the package Pendergast had also included a pamphlet on meteors and meteorites, along with some photographs. It turned out to be the perfect gift. Joe treasured it above all things and kept its origin as secret as if his life depended on it. D’Agosta smiled as he watched the boy unfasten the strap around his schoolbooks. No doubt half the fun of the gift was being the only one to know just how valuable the ordinary-looking item was.

A thump sounded from downstairs. Immediately, Joe’s eyes met D’Agosta’s. A minute later, the basement door opened and Mr. Cookson could be heard emerging, preparing to do the morning chores, speaking briefly to his wife before shuffling away again. D’Agosta could see Joe’s shoulders sag, his eyes wandering. The boy was easily bored — and no wonder, being stuck on a frozen island.

The combination clock — barometer — temperature gauge on the mantel told him it was nine thirty — an entire day ahead, unexpectedly without school.

“You know what?” D’Agosta asked. “I think it’s high time we went looking for that old ghost. You can do your studying afterward. What do you say?”

Joe’s eyes lit up.

D’Agosta leaned forward conspiratorially. “We’ll just have a quick look... for now. If we find anything suspicious, we’ll make preparations and investigate more thoroughly tomorrow. But we’d better put on our winter coats — those closed parts of the house are as cold as Siberia.”

“Jiminy!” Joe half slid, half jumped out of his chair, then followed D’Agosta into the back kitchen to collect their coats and a kerosene lantern.

Almost an hour later, a freezing D’Agosta sat on the top step of the attic staircase, wrapping his scarf more tightly around his neck. He hadn’t considered just what an ordeal a “quick look” through a mansion entailed. While he’d regularly made a circuit of the primary rooms of the house as part of his cover, he’d never penetrated its recesses. He was shocked at the sheer number of storerooms, larders, closets, and shut-up bedrooms the mansion contained, all of which Joe had insisted on exploring. They were now both covered in dust and cobwebs.

When he’d made the suggestion, it had seemed like a way to make good on his promise to entertain Joe, and in the process give the structure a really thorough going-over. And now, he estimated that, in the last sixty minutes, he had walked up and down at least two dozen flights of stairs. They had ended up here in the freezing, sprawling attic, filled with dust and mothballs and rat traps, many already accommodating frozen rats not yet disposed of. Brick chimneys stood here and there like sentinels, rising through the gloom to pierce the gables overhead.

So far their explorations had not revealed any sign of ghosts, and no rattle of chains had greeted their passing. Joe, however, was having a marvelous time. D’Agosta was exhausted.

“Well, if there were any ghosts,” he said, “we scared ’em off for sure. Time to call it a morning.”

“What about back there?” Joe asked, still eager, pointing to the darkest ends of the attic, where the eaves sloped down into a series of crawl spaces.

“No ghosts in there,” D’Agosta said.

“How do you know?”

“Too cold.”

“Ghosts can’t feel cold,” Joe said authoritatively.

D’Agosta shrugged. “I’m cold.”

Joe accepted this explanation. “What about the carriage house?”

“We’ll look there tomorrow,” D’Agosta replied. “Come on: careful with these stairs — they’re steep.” And, rising, he led the way down to the third floor. Joe followed, closing first the attic door, then the door at the bottom of the stairs.

For several minutes, silence returned to the attic. Then, with a brief, almost indetectable scraping noise, a packing crate shifted in the darkness beneath a far gable. A shape emerged. Edwin Humblecut rose and moved to the front of the crate, on which he took a seat, wiping dust from his heavy clothes and setting his homburg beside him. And then — idly fingering his handlebar mustache — he settled down to wait.

44

The sun had already risen in the eastern sky an hour before Pendergast peered down from the top of a hill, surveying the landscape with a pair of binoculars. After spending the night in a meadow some distance away, where he’d made sure Napoleon was fed and watered, he’d left the horse tied up in a copse, well hidden, while he made his way up the hill at dawn, creeping the last few yards. Mists had risen from the fells and dales of the surrounding farms.

The trail of knotted straw — sparse to begin with — seemed to have vanished. Whatever its origin, it seemed likely Leng’s wagon had turned off the road and headed to one of three farms Pendergast could see in the valley. All were isolated, the farmhouses and outbuildings buried in hollows or surrounded by trees, the encircling fields spreading out broadly across the land, separated by hedgerows and windbreaks. This was dairy country, and he saw small herds of dairy cows, released from the barns, make their way to grazing areas that, despite the season, were clear of snow and offered some meager sustenance. He remained in his blind — motionless, watching — until at the farthest farm he saw what he was looking for: a flock of sheep meandering up a hill, driven by a shepherd with a dog.

The sheep’s milk, he felt sure, was for making cheese. If the farthest farm specialized not in dairy per se, but in cheese making, such an establishment would have cellars or natural caves of the kind necessary for aging cheese — and useful for other, more nefarious purposes.

He crept down from the summit of the hill and back to Napoleon. Stroking the horse, he praised him and murmured a soft goodbye in his ear. Then he unbridled and unsaddled the horse, hung the bridle on a tree branch, propped the saddle on a rock, and turned the horse loose. He knew such a beautiful animal would soon find a good home, and the lucky traveler who happened upon the abandoned saddle and bridle would be grateful indeed.

He ventured back to the road, where he could just make out the gables of the target farm’s main house peeking above the protected dell in which it lay. A stream ran past the rambling old structure, deep in shadow, and it was along these wooded banks that Pendergast decided he would make his approach.

He cast a final glance back at Napoleon, who was standing next to the road, ears perked, watching him quizzically. Another murmured goodbye, and then the horse turned and trotted away, tossing his head with newfound freedom, breathing out clouds of condensation as the sun broke over the horizon.

Crossing the road, Pendergast vaulted a split-rail fence, then traversed a field, moving rapidly and keeping to low areas of ground. He had fixed the terrain in his mind during his long vantage from the top of the hill; he had seen no movement except in the immediate vicinity of the barn, and it was a simple matter to work his way to the small stream burbling along a pebbled course edged by ice, overhung on both sides with bare trees.

He moved downstream, following the meandering course of the rivulet and staying under cover. He calculated it was about eight-tenths of a mile to the farmhouse — a distance he could cover in less than fifteen minutes. Keeping rigid track of both time and distance allowed him to follow his progress across the landscape as clearly as if he were viewing his location on a modern GPS. As the sun rose over the bare tops of the trees, the stream brightened and he began moving more cautiously, keeping to areas of heavier vegetation. The farmhouse was now one final turn of the stream away, and as he came around, creeping through the bushes, he could see it clearly across a broad expanse of matted grass. The farm was showing robust signs of life: smoke streaming from the house’s chimneys, a strange-looking man carrying wood inside, another rolling open the door of the adjacent barn — but the shepherd was away with his sheep and, once he’d satisfied himself as to the rest, Pendergast could plan his final approach.

He heard a stealthy sound behind him in the nearby bushes, then another, farther and to his left. He did not turn, did not even move, but merely tensed ever so slightly. The sounds approached from two sides. Still, he did not react... until he felt the icy steel of a muzzle press itself into the back of his neck, while a second individual with scabby lips and a boil on his face emerged from the thicket to his left, rifle leveled.

“Mr. Prendergrast,” came the voice from behind him. “Raise your arms nice and slow, like.”

“That’s Pendergast,” he said coolly as he complied. “Please do get the name right, at least.”

45

Pendergast waited while the man with the boil searched him.

“Got a knife here,” the man said.

“Keep searching. Master De Jong says this one’s slippery.”

They found a second knife in his boot. Further searching turned up nothing beyond what he carried in his musette bag, which they also took away.

“Keep your hands on your head where’s I can see ’em,” Boil said.

Pendergast complied.

“Now move.”

He was shoved forward. The man with the boil walked behind him while the second man fell farther back, covering him from twenty feet with his revolver. As they came out into the field surrounding the farmhouse, Pendergast could now see the second individual who had captured him — a small, bow-legged fireplug of a man with a massive neck, bullet-shaped head, and giant handlebar mustaches. Several other farmhands had now come out of the house, also armed, including one who was clearly in charge.

“Mr. William,” said the man with the boil, “we caught him sneaking up on the house, just like you said we would.”

“Good work, Berty. Put him in the cheese cellar. I’ll get word to Master De Jong that we found his man.”

Mr. William put his fingers to his lips and gave two strident whistles. A moment later, Pendergast saw still more armed people rising from places of concealment along the edges of the property. It seemed not only that Leng had prepared a welcoming party for him — he’d prepared several. He wondered just how long they’d all remained hidden, laying their trap and giving him a false sense of confidence — it had to have been twelve or eighteen hours, at least. Remarkable.

As these people began approaching, Pendergast was shoved again from behind. The sun rose farther in the sky, casting a bright, cold light over the frozen landscape. He allowed himself to be led past the house and barn to a wedge-shaped structure emerging from the ground, dug into the side of a hill and fronted by two metal doors. The man named Berty undid the padlock holding the doors closed, and another man pulled them open, one at a time, with loud creaking sounds. Stone steps descended into a cellar to a long passage with an arched ceiling, the air pungent with the smell of cheese and mold. As they walked along, Pendergast could see rows upon rows of cheeses curing on wooden shelves and marble slabs. At the far end, a low archway led to another set of descending steps and, in turn, to a second locked door. This opened into a small laboratory, which appeared to be mainly for processing and testing the cultures needed to make cheese, along with some other, more unusual items of equipment. In the back was yet another door.

“I’ll open the door,” said Berty. “You, stand back and cover in case there’s trouble.”

Berty spoke to his fellow worker in a clipped, hostile manner. That, along with his obvious flat affect, led Pendergast to believe the man probably suffered from an antisocial personality disorder. It would make sense, of course, for Leng to employ sociopaths to tend his farm — not only would they be completely reliable if handled correctly, but they would have no moral compass or feelings of sympathy for Leng’s victims.

Now the door was unlocked and opened. Pendergast saw, by the light of a kerosene lantern within, a small stone chamber containing two prisoners. One was a girl of about nine, who sprang out of an armchair in surprise as the door swung open. It was Binky, whom he immediately recognized — having seen her from a distance more than once during his initial surveillance of Constance’s Fifth Avenue mansion. The other prisoner sat on a bed — a girl of eighteen or nineteen. Pendergast had never seen her before, but based on her resemblance to Constance, he instantly realized who she was.

Mary. Alive. So she had not been murdered by Leng after all. This was something Pendergast had speculated about but never been certain of — until now.

“Get in there,” said Berty, nudging him with the rifle.

Pendergast stepped inside as Mary rose in apprehension. The door slammed and there was the sound of padlocking on the other side.

The two girls looked at each other. “Who are you?” asked Mary.

“My name is Pendergast. I’m a close friend of... the person Binky knows as Auntie. The duchess.”

“Where is Auntie?” Binky blurted, like Mary keeping back a little guardedly from this stranger.

“She sent me here. It was my task to find Binky — and save her.”

“But you haven’t saved her,” Mary said, matter-of-factly. “You’ve just joined us — in this cell.”

Pendergast gazed at Mary. He could almost see the face of Constance staring back. But whereas Constance’s eyes always seemed to radiate defiance, Mary’s hazel eyes looked sad and resigned.

46

Decla slouched in the shadows of the brownstones lining Twentieth Street just east of Park, keeping an eye on the plain-looking brownstone that stood, windows shuttered against the cold, halfway down the block. It seemed a perfect residence for a clergyman, a dour, ugly structure, shuttered to the street, in a plummy neighborhood miles from the stink of the Mission. Biscuit had sworn this was the reverend’s home, and he was the best tail man she had. Twice, Reverend Considine had, for some unfathomable reason, given him the slip... No, that couldn’t be right; Biscuit must have just been off his game. On the third attempt, he’d followed Considine straight to this residence — and stayed long enough to see the clergyman taking off his outerwear and getting comfortable in a room full of books before the shutters were once again closed to the outside.

She’d arrived early, and she still had a few minutes to wait. Digging into a pocket of her jacket, she pulled out a small, thin chapbook whose cover she had deliberately defaced to be illegible. Angling it toward the light of the nearest gas lamp, she turned the pages, then began to read:

She scoffed, then took out the nub of a pencil, licked the lead, and spat onto the pavement. She crossed out a few words and added others, altering the opening lines of the poem — and in so doing, improving the doggerel significantly.

Seeing movement in the distance, she looked up to see the thin figure of Longshank approaching from the evening gloom. She shoved the book back into her pocket and tucked the pencil stub away.

Decla had spent ten of her first sixteen years alone on the streets of lower Manhattan, begging for food and tagging behind gangs for protection, learning by necessity the cruel street arts of survival. She’d been helped in this by a fearlessness, which the sight of blood encouraged rather than repelled. But then a missionary — at least that was what he’d called himself — had come across her while preaching salvation on a street corner and taken her under his wing. Naturally, she’d been suspicious, but he had been patient and kind and, above all, erudite, and in time she had let her guard down and learned not only to read, but to appreciate the long-dead poets: Andrew Marvell, Robert Herrick, John Keats. But over time, the man’s lessons began to come at the cost of intimacy: first hinted at, then taken. Decla was so attached to this person she saw as her mentor that at first she hadn’t resisted. But then, as his attentions became more frequent, her repulsion and innate violent nature had risen up against this betrayal. Leaving the bloody remains of the man and his life behind, she returned to the streets of the Five Points, fueled by a fatalistic cruelty that allowed her to rise quickly through the ranks of her chosen gang, which in time caught the attention of Enoch Leng. They had become associates of sorts, enriching each other in many ways. While she did not trust him, she respected his cleverness and the way his cruelty was unvarnished by hypocrisy. He also showed a welcome lack of interest in her private life... And, knowing he was a man of many secrets, she returned the favor.

Seeing Biscuit materialize at the corner of Park, she stepped out of the shadows and began moving down the dark street toward the town house. The three met in a small carriageway that ran alongside the residence. Tom Handy arrived next. Last came Woodstock, who more than compensated for his club foot with an uncanny ability for throwing knives.

“You’re sure it’s the reverend, now?” she whispered to Biscuit, gesturing toward the house.

He nodded in his usual phlegmatic fashion.

“Get to it, then. And keep your peckers up — remember what happened to Scrape.” With four of her lieutenants on hand, she’d decided to let them do the actual job, while she kept lookout. Four against one — that smart-arsed preacher wouldn’t stand a chance; and besides, it would be good practice.

Tom Handy, the picklock, disappeared around the front of the building. Five minutes later, he returned. “No go.”

“What do you mean, ‘no go’?”

“Can’t be done. Like no lock I’ve ever tried.”

Decla cursed under her breath. “And the windows?”

“Barred.”

“Fine bunch of night men you lot are.”

“This one ain’t,” said Woodstock, pointing at a window partway down the façade. Decla crept up and examined it. There were, in fact, no bars — just wooden shutters, closed tight.

“Think you can handle this?” she asked Tom, sarcastically indicating the window frame.

The young man grinned. He pulled out a rag, a cobbler’s hammer, a tiny jar of lard, and some strange-looking tools he’d made for himself, and arrayed everything silently along the ledge. Within five minutes he’d cracked the glass, undone the lock strike, unfastened and pushed aside the interior shutters, then greased up the jamb liner and raised the lower sash halfway.

Decla waited a minute, then peered into the room. It was unlit, but from beyond she could hear a woman’s laugh, then the murmur of voices. Enough light came into the dark room to illuminate Considine’s black cassock and distinctive broad-brimmed hat, hanging on hooks by a fireplace.

She stepped back from the window. “Is this good enough, then, or should I rap on the door and have his nibs ask you lot in for tea?”

Nods in the darkness. She’d roused their spirits, given them something to prove.

“Right, then. Sounds like he’s got a filly with him.” What a surprise — hypocritical cleric bastard. “Do him proper — fast, clean, and quiet. I’ll watch the street and whistle up a signal if I see anything.”

She watched as, one after another, the four slipped quietly through the window and into the town house. Then she moved back to where the alley met Twentieth Street, pulled out her knife, and waited.

Woodstock was last inside, but he was used to being last — the other lads didn’t give him extra consideration, but they also knew better than to make any jokes about his being a gimp.

By practice and silent agreement, the four waited in the darkness to make sure their entrance had roused no curiosity and to let their eyes, and their limbs, prepare. They knew what Decla expected of them. Even if they wouldn’t admit it, they were all afraid of her — except perhaps for Longshank, and that was only because he was too stupid.

The voices continued as before. The door of the dark room was partway open, and beyond lay a plain hallway. The voices came from down the hallway, to the right — what Woodstock assumed was a bedroom.

Biscuit, leader in Decla’s absence, looked at each of them in turn to make sure they were ready. Everyone had their blades out; Woodstock had two of his heaviest throwing knives ready, with another in reserve. Quietly, they made their way across the room, through the door, and then — slowly, in single file — out into the hall. Woodstock hadn’t known what to expect, exactly, but the hallway looked as barren as a prison. There was a strange odor in the air: smoke, but sweet smelling.

Out here, the voices were much clearer: they were coming from a room at the end of the hall, from which also came light that, it seemed to Woodstock, must be the result of many candles. He listened to the exchange going on beyond the door.

“Why, Reverend, I don’t think I should.” A giggle, half-awkward, half-coquettish. “I mean, given what we’ve said, what we’ve done—”

“And what we have still to do, Anna. Remember, please call me Percy.”

“It seems sinful to do so. But then everything feels so sinful — I mean, we only met three days ago, and—”

“And that makes me the luckiest man on earth. Imagine, if I hadn’t been there by the train station, and you hadn’t been on your way back to your father’s flax mill in Greenwich, we might never have met.”

“And I would still be a good girl.”

“No, Anna, no — you would have been, pardon my saying so, an ignorant girl, unaware of all the sensations that God in His goodness confers on us... if we only open ourselves to them.”

The four had been creeping toward the door during this exchange, and now they formed a half circle around it: Biscuit, Longshank, Tom, and Woodstock. Through the partially opened door, Woodstock could glimpse only a portion of what was indeed a bedroom, spare and severe, but with a massive church candelabra of brass, with its candles throwing off a mellow, flickering light.

“Is that from one of your sermons?” Another nervous giggle.

“No — although there’s no reason it couldn’t be. God works in mysterious ways, as He is doing here with the two of us — and with your art.”

Biscuit looked at them each in turn, making sure they were ready. He held up three fingers, then lowered one of them, silently counting down.

“What do you mean?” came the female voice.

“I’m showing you how to express yourself in a new medium — oil paints instead of yarn. As for me, I have an excellent exemplar in John Donne. He was dean of St. Paul’s Cathedral in London, and a most excellent cleric. But he also wrote several elegies that would make the saints in that cathedral’s whispering gallery blush despite their marble skins. One in particular, ‘Going to Bed,’ is particularly apropos: ‘To teach thee, I am naked first; why then / What needst thou have more covering than a man?’”

But this quotation was punctuated by the splitting of wood as Biscuit kicked open the door and the four of them poured into the room. The sight that greeted them, however, gave even the unflappable Biscuit pause. A woman of about twenty sat before a painter’s easel, one hand holding a brush up to the canvas, the other holding a palette. She was entirely naked, hair down, a chemise gathered carelessly at her ankles. A somewhat older man — apparently the model, and most certainly the reverend Considine — reclined on a nearby settee, naked as well. Although the man was thin, his body looked surprisingly strong, its chiseled musculature brought into high relief by the candlelight.

Woodstock took all this in during the fragment of a second when everything remained still. And then, instantly, all was sound and motion. The woman screamed, dropping the palette; the man leapt off the settee with remarkable speed, threw the silken coverlet on which he’d lain over Biscuit, then plunged a knife that appeared out of nowhere into the coverlet — once, twice — and yanked the coverlet off again as Biscuit sank toward the floor, blood spurting from his neck. Throwing the easel in the path of the onrushing intruders, the naked man seemed to vanish into the walls. The remaining three halted, frantically casting about, frozen in shock, while Biscuit writhed on the floor. The naked woman fled down a far hall. And then, suddenly, Considine appeared again, now in a billowing silk robe, darting out from, apparently, a hidden entrance. Instinctively, Woodstock whirled and threw a knife; the man dodged it, then yanked the knife from the wall and, with an odd spinning motion that looked almost like ballet, cut Tom’s throat from ear to ear. Woodstock skipped backward, raising the other knife and aiming for a second throw, but with a bound Considine covered the distance, grabbing Woodstock’s wrist with one hand and twisting it with the other, breaking the bone. “Mind if I borrow this?” he whispered as he wrenched away the knife, flipped it round, then thrust it into Woodstock’s eye with the soft pop of a rupturing grape.

Woodstock staggered back with a hideous scream and fell upon the hard floor just in time to hear Longshank’s own gurgling screams begin to rise. In agonizing pain, Woodstock coiled himself into a fetal position, both hands cupping the blade that protruded from his eye, joining in with the other screams, hoping this was just a bad dream and, given all the noise, he would soon wake up.

47

D’Agosta could smell Mrs. Cookson’s heavenly dinner rolls baking in the oven — but he could not find the housekeeper herself. It was his habit to let her know each time he went out to pick up Joe at school, despite the event being as regular as the tides on nearby Godwit’s Beach. He never bothered looking for Mr. Cookson — that scarecrow could be anywhere about the house or the outbuildings. And so he left the mansion through the servants’ main-floor passage as usual, locking the door, ducking his head against the bitter wind, and making for the Seal Harbor schoolhouse a mile and a half away.

When he arrived, he was surprised and alarmed to learn Joe was not there. He had dropped Joe off in the morning as usual, and the teachers confirmed he had been in school until the final bell — but now he was nowhere in the vicinity of the red-painted structure.

D’Agosta paused outside the schoolhouse door to look around. The last thing he wanted was to cause a fuss and draw attention. Scanning the winter landscape revealed nothing. He had not met Joe along the way. Had he gone off with some newfound friends — sledding, perhaps? Or was this some small rebellion of independence? Earlier, Joe had complained about D’Agosta walking him to school, saying it was making him look bad to the other kids.

Or could something worse have happened?

D’Agosta hurried back toward the cottage to see if Joe had turned up, setting off up the frozen lane at a faster pace than he’d come down it. But when he entered through the servants’ entrance, there was no sign of Joe — and the kitchen was full of smoke and the smell of burnt bread.

An icy foreboding gripped his heart.

“Mrs. Cookson!” he called as he walked through the back quarters of the mansion. “Joe? Joe!”

Only echoes returned.

He ran up to Joe’s room; it was as he’d left it when they’d set off for school that morning. The Cooksons’ rooms were also empty. He went back outside, scanning the horizon, now in a full-blown panic. He quickly checked the barn and carriage house — nothing there either. They had all simply disappeared.

Was it possible Leng had tracked them here? His policeman’s training reasserted itself — anything was possible. He next searched the mansion from attic to basement — maybe Joe was ghost hunting again — but the building was empty. He looked outside for fresh tracks in the snow — nothing.

Returning to the first floor, panting for breath, he considered what to do next. God damn this nineteenth century and its lack of communication. There was no way to contact Pendergast, or anyone else for that matter, beyond the slow and truncated telegraph system.

He was turning, ready to head for the back exit again, when he saw something outside the large windows of the parlor. A man, at the reins of an old wagon, its top covered and tied down with canvas, was approaching the mansion up the private lane.

In all the time he’d spent on the island, D’Agosta had never seen a stranger drive up to the cottage. Mrs. Cookson did the marketing herself, and Mr. Cookson took care of the milking and the limited livestock on the property. But nevertheless this alien wagon was coming closer by the minute, the driver holding the reins and sitting back in his seat as casually as if he were going to Sunday-morning service, wearing a well-brushed homburg and covered in a long, tailored trench coat of black leather. He must have caught sight of D’Agosta staring at him out of the window, because now he raised a hand in greeting, then gestured he was going to take the horse around to the servants’ entrance. Without bothering to wave back, D’Agosta left the parlor, checked that the front doors were bolted, took out his revolver, and went back into the heated section of the mansion.

This couldn’t be a coincidence... could it?

When he reached the servants’ entrance, he found the man had already tied his horse to a post and was approaching the door, a small oilcloth bundle draped over one shoulder. Their eyes met through the glass, and he once again raised a hand in greeting. D’Agosta unbolted the door, then stepped back several steps, bringing up his weapon and pointing it at the man. If the man noticed, it didn’t seem to faze him, because he opened the door and came in, stamping his feet against the cold, then doffing his hat.

“You’re Harrison, I presume?” he said in an accentless American voice as he replaced the hat on his head.

D’Agosta was careful not to register any surprise. “Who are you?”

“My name is Humblecut.”

“What do you want?”

“To speak with you for a bit.”

D’Agosta kept his face expressionless. He was just about to order the man to turn around and prepare to be searched when Humblecut spoke again.

“It would probably save us a lot of time if I simply told you that we have Joe. Also the housekeepers. If you cooperate, it would be better for them — and for you.” As his hand came down from arranging his homburg, it had a derringer in it. “And you could start by handing me your revolver.”

D’Agosta stared at the small weapon, astonished and dismayed at the way the man had gotten the drop on him. Here, in this strange place, on this distant island, his twenty-first-century cop instincts were of little use.

“Come now, let’s not waste time.” Humblecut twitched his gun hand slightly. “I’m not going to hurt either you or Joe — unless you force my hand. That’s not why I’m here.”

“You seem to forget I have a gun pointed at you,” D’Agosta replied.

“If you kill me, it would be the same as killing Joe. And I will get a shot into you, besides.” Keeping the derringer pointed, the man reached into his pocket and pulled out Joe’s deck of cards. He tossed them at D’Agosta’s feet. “If you care at all about Joe, put down your revolver... Mr. Harrison.”

D’Agosta hesitated, then placed his revolver on a nearby bench.

“A wise decision. Now, be kind enough to put your hands against that wall while I check you for other weapons. I hope you won’t mind my lack of trust — a necessity in this business, I’m afraid.”

The man frisked D’Agosta quickly and expertly, then pocketed his revolver. “Now,” he said, motioning again with the derringer, “shall we have our little talk?”

Keeping a safe distance to the rear, Humblecut instructed D’Agosta to walk through the scullery and the kitchen and into the rear parlor. Motioning D’Agosta to take a seat in the far corner, the man quickly locked the pocket door leading into the dining room passage, then took a seat of his own near the entrance to the kitchen. The confidence with which he did all this told D’Agosta the man was already acquainted with the interior of the house.

The man took off his homburg and laid it and his bundle on the floor, then opened the top buttons of his overcoat and pulled out a pencil and a leather notebook.

“Shall we begin?” he asked.

D’Agosta took a deep breath. The man had been sent by Leng; that much was clear. What did he want from D’Agosta? Maybe he could smoke the man out.

“I have a better idea,” he said. “Why don’t you kiss my ass?”

This was followed by a disapproving silence. “I can understand you’re annoyed by your own failings,” Humblecut said. “Nevertheless, we can still proceed like gentlemen.”

“Tell you what: I’ll loosen my pants, stand up, and turn around. That will make it easier for you to kiss my lily-white Italian moneymaker.”

Another silence. “Very well,” Humblecut said. “If you won’t act courteously, you don’t deserve courtesy in return. You will answer my questions... one way or the other.” He paused, looking D’Agosta up and down, as if considering. “Perhaps an audience will help.” And with this he reached over to the oilcloth bundle, loosened it, and — with a motion that, for D’Agosta, was ghastly in its similarity to a bocce player aiming for a pallino in Flushing Meadows Park — rolled the severed head of Mrs. Cookson out into the middle of the room. D’Agosta watched as it tumbled over and over, staring eyes glinting sunlight with each rotation, trailing a thin line of fluid, until — with a final bobble — coming to rest a few feet in front of him.

48

“Motherfuck!” D’Agosta said, recoiling.

Humblecut smiled, amused by his reaction. Then, keeping the derringer pointed, he rose, stepped forward, picked up the head by its hair, and planted it upright in such a way that the saucer eyes stared fixedly at D’Agosta.

“Perhaps now we can steer our conversation back onto a more civilized course,” Humblecut said. He readied pencil and notebook. “Shall we begin?”

But D’Agosta was still staring at the decapitated head of Mrs. Cookson. “Jesus,” he gasped.

Then he forced his gaze back to Humblecut. The man took out a pocket watch and glanced at it. “Time is passing. Are you ready to answer my questions? Or shall I go fetch Mr. Cookson and add him to our audience?”

D’Agosta stared at him, trying to recover himself. “You son of a bitch!”

“You’re taxing my patience. You will answer my questions, with none of your own, or perhaps the next head you’ll see will be Joe’s — which, for now, remains where it belongs.”

He was a madman, and D’Agosta believed him. “Don’t hurt Joe, for God’s sake. Please. I’ll answer your questions.”

Humblecut smiled broadly. “Bear in mind, I know the answers to some of them already, so if I find you are lying, Joe will die. Now—” he consulted his notebook — “who won the World’s Championship Series in the year 2000?” He looked up inquiringly.

D’Agosta struggled to focus. What the hell was this about? “World’s Championship... You mean, baseball? The World Series?”

“Yes. Who was the winner?”

It was hard to think, with the dead eyes staring unblinkingly up at him. D’Agosta took a breath, then another. “The Yanks.”

Humblecut consulted his notebook again. “You mean, the Yankees?”

“Right. The New York Yankees.”

Humblecut raised his pencil and made a check mark, apparently satisfied. “What is the greatest invention of the twentieth century?”

Again D’Agosta was overwhelmed with confusion mingled with horror. Why was Humblecut asking these questions, instead of demanding to know where Pendergast was hiding out, or what their plans were — or something? “I don’t know. The computer, maybe?”

“Which is?”

“A device,” D’Agosta stammered. “A machine. Everyone has one. Electronic brains that can do incredible things.”

“For example?”

“Beat any human at chess. Store huge amounts of information. Do difficult mathematical calculations. You can reach anyone in the world, instantly — and see their faces as you talk to them. You use them for banking, making friends that seem like real people...” He raised his hands. “Everything.”

This was followed by much note-taking and more probing questions, one leading to the next. D’Agosta had to explain what the telephone was, radio, television, the internet, cars, airplanes, spaceships, men on the moon.

Humblecut wrote it all down. Then he changed the subject. “What was the worst event of the twentieth century?”

“Christ... 9/11, maybe. No, that was... The Holocaust. World War II. The bomb. Jesus, I don’t know where to begin.”

“Let us go through each one, then.”

Falteringly, D’Agosta explained the Holocaust, World Wars I and II, the atomic bomb, the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. As he spoke, Humblecut occasionally interrupted with shorter, more pointed questions, still writing everything down. What were the principles behind the bomb? How powerful was it? Who had them? Were there other genocides besides the Holocaust? The questions now probed the darkest, most horrific corners of the twentieth century, an area that Humblecut seemed to relish.

“Now,” the man said at last. “What were the greatest medical advances of the twentieth century?”

D’Agosta racked his brains. These questions were so off the wall. “Um, let’s see... penicillin... the heart transplant... DNA... cloning... CRISPR...”

Humblecut held up a hand. “Enough. Let me have an explanation of those items.”

D’Agosta struggled to explain as Humblecut probed into each medical discovery. What was a vaccine? How did it work? What were antibiotics? Did they cure smallpox? Were there still diseases in the twenty-first century? How long did people live?

Yes, there were still famines and epidemics. There were no cities on the moon. The question of life after death had not been answered. Nobody had proved or disproved God’s existence. You could go anywhere in the world in twenty-four hours. Robots were exploring Mars. D’Agosta, nearly certain he was in the hands of a madman, answered each question as truthfully as possible.

An hour passed, then another, before the questions finally ceased. “Thank you,” Humblecut said — and his tone had regained the fake friendliness he’d shown initially. “I believe you’ve answered my questions truthfully.” He put down his pencil and notebook. “Under the circumstances, I think we can reunite you with Joe now.”

Hearing this, D’Agosta silently thanked whatever god was orchestrating this nightmare. But when Humblecut stood up to put away his gun, a blackjack suddenly replaced it in his hand; and when he stroked D’Agosta’s skull with it, the thankfulness was cut off prematurely.

49

Enoch Leng had his medical office and consulting practice in an ornate suite of rooms in Manhattan’s fashionable Murray Hill neighborhood, on Twenty-Eighth Street just off Madison Avenue — New York’s equivalent of Harley Street, housing the city’s best Gilded Age physicians. He practiced no surgery for private clients — confining his surgical experiments to the mental patients at Bellevue and his personal victims. He maintained a lucrative practice instead by treating wealthy women of a certain age who suffered from a host of fashionable nervous ailments — neurasthenia, the vapors, hysteria, and assorted female maladies. He had recently acquired a device, patented by Dr. Granville, that was remarkable in its ability to restore the nervous vigor of women.

In truth, however, Dr. Leng was wealthy and had little need for the fees he charged these blushing matrons; rather, it was necessary for him to have a professional face for the public at large. And so once a week his practice was open, with a secretary, a nurse, and a medical assistant. The other six days, when the elegant rooms were empty, Leng employed them for other projects.

At present, he was seated in his private office: a large space paneled in mahogany, boasting rippled glass display cases, bookshelves full of medical treatises, diplomas and awards framed on the walls, and two tall windows overlooking Madison Avenue. Several members of his private security staff were in the outer offices, and Decla herself was in his office, sitting moodily across from Leng.

Leng knew what was preying on her mind. Decla needed violence like a shark needed motion. There had been some violence of late — but it had concluded in a manner unsatisfactory to both of them.

A knock sounded on the door.

“Enter,” said Leng.

A member of the Milk Drinkers — dressed in the garb of a newsboy, one of the messengers known as “runners” — stepped in. He nodded to Decla and came forward, leaning over the desk, to murmur in Leng’s ear. Then he produced a thick envelope, which he placed on the desk blotter.

“Thank you, you may go.” Leng sat back, waving vaguely in the direction of the door. He waited until the runner had left, then turned to Decla.

“This reverend Considine is a damned enigma,” he said. “First, he does Scrape a fatal mischief. That was a surprise — Scrape was normally good at that kind of work.”

“One of my best,” Decla said.

“And now, even more surprising, this whoreson making short work of your squad. Please give me the details, as you witnessed them.”

“I was keeping watch outside. Four on one — seemed a good chance to sharpen their skills, like.”

Leng knew this failure had left Decla in a dangerous mood. “Quite understandable. I should have done the same.”

“There were two side windows next the alleyway. The first was barred, but the farther was only shutters over glass — Tom got that open and they all slipped in, like Bob’s your uncle. It was dark, but before they closed the shutters, I noticed a little light from the back of the house, and the laugh of a woman.”

Leng raised his eyebrows.

“It wasn’t loud. A minute later, I heard shouts, then screams. At first, I thought that meant all was going aright. But, quick as you like, I realized the voices — some yelling, some begging — as our own boys’. I thought I was hearing things. Then I wondered if we’d walked into a trap somehow — maybe the preacher had hired some other gang for protection. I almost slipped inside myself to take a butcher’s... but I remembered what you said about unexpected outcomes, and I kept my position as lookout — for a time.”

“Undoubtedly the right thing to do.” Leng knew what most upset her was the loss of three Milk Drinkers and the half blinding of another — on her lookout.

“It didn’t take long. Five minutes, and the cleric opened the back door. Then, after taking a gander, he carried out Biscuit, Tom Handy, and Longshank — one at a time, over his shoulder — and dumped them into a cart near the stables.”

“A cart?”

“The kind you use for night soil.”

Leng shook his head.

“Just a few minutes later, now it was the front door what opened, and out pitched our Woodstock. He hit the pavement and rolled into the gutter. Had one of his own blades sticking out of his eye. I thought it might be a trap, so I whistled up a crew as fast as I could; then we brought a dray cart up and hustled him away.”

“You left the other bodies?”

“Had to save Woodstock — and then later, the bodies had disappeared.”

Leng grunted. He had patched the youth up himself. He’d be all right, in time... but his knife-throwing days were over.

He thought a minute. Woodstock had whined and gabbled out fragments of what had taken place within, but he’d wanted to hear Decla’s own story, as well. “So the first of the side windows was barred.”

She nodded.

“But the second one — farther back — was merely a normal window, covered with wooden shutters?”

“Yes.”

“Odd. It does sound like a trap. The fellow claims to have been a missionary in Africa. Perhaps that proved rather more perilous training than I assumed.”

“All I know is, for a preacher, he’s damned handy with a knife.”

“Fancy him for a member of your gang?” Leng asked, trying to cheer her. “He’d be handing out salutary tracts with one hand while administering coups de grâce with the other.”

Despite the light tone, he was troubled. There was something extraordinary about the man. Leng did not doubt he was a cleric sent to do work in the Five Points; he was just too authentic and eccentric to be an impostor. Nevertheless, there was an intangible air about him, something ineffable and dangerous. He would require an entirely unconventional approach — but Leng, with rather a lot on his own plate at present, could not take up the task himself.

He glanced privately at Decla, who was now staring off into space, eyebrows narrowed, running her fingertips over the fresh scar on her palm. His chargée d’affaires was like a thoroughbred: extraordinarily talented, but requiring careful handling.

“What if I gave him to you?” he asked. “As a special gift, so to speak? Now that you know what you’re up against.”

Decla raised her eyes to his, a hungry smile slowly replacing her abstracted look. “I’d have a free hand?” she asked.

“Just as you please. But hold off a week or two — and take your time formulating a plan. That cleric isn’t going anywhere.”

She was, he noticed, still idly stroking the scar. “I’d be happy to give you the woman who gave you that, as well.”

The fingertips froze, and something flickered in her eyes. “The duchess?”

“Yes. She’s highly skilled, but I think she could, if goaded, become rash or even impetuous. It would be lovely if you could arrange to have a mano a mano someplace where I could be a spectator. Just be careful: I should be particularly unhappy if I ended up having to replace you, as well as the others.” He stretched, adjusted his cuffs. “On a related matter: not only was that Pendergast fellow caught yesterday at a property I own up north, but now—” he paused to pat the envelope on the blotter — “given this message that just arrived from Humblecut, we have all of these pestilent nuisances in chains.”

“Except the girl,” Decla said in a low voice.

“Except the girl.” Leng mused in silence for a moment, then reached for the envelope, slicing it open with a scalpel. He drew out a sheet of paper nearly three feet long, folded at least six times and covered with thin ribbons of text pasted into paragraphs.

“Good heavens!” he said, scrolling through it. “It must have taken the telegraph operator hours to convey this.” He put the document on his desk, smoothing it out carefully.

“I’ll be off, then,” Decla said, rising silkily to her feet, energized by the thought of stalking Considine.

“Mind how you go,” Leng told her. But his voice was low and distracted; his attention was now fixed on the telegram, which he had already begun to decipher.

50

The rough burlap sack had been over D’Agosta’s head for so long that when it was finally removed, his eyes were already adjusted to darkness and he had no problem getting his bearings in the moonlight. He looked about, his head still pounding. He was on a commercial wharf, arms bound behind at the wrists, mouth gagged. It appeared to be early evening, but at this time of the year the place was deserted: a stone building that fronted the quayside was empty and dark, and the only noise was the chugging of a vessel. It appeared to be a fishing trawler, with an upthrust bow covered in netting and a small cabin from which rose a smokestack.

He looked around. There was the wagon that had carried him and Joe from the mansion to the dock. Humblecut pulled Joe out from beneath the wagon covering and stood him on his feet next to D’Agosta. He, too, was bound and hooded. He watched Humblecut pull the hood free, exposing Joe’s face, red and defiant, his mouth also gagged. They exchanged a look. D’Agosta tried to communicate with his eyes that everything was going to be okay — even if he felt precisely the opposite. They were clearly about to sail from Mount Desert Island, bound for God knew where.

How much time had passed since he’d been clobbered, D’Agosta wasn’t sure; Humblecut had locked him alone in a basement storage room with stone walls and an iron door, no windows, and only rows of preserved peaches for company. He guessed that a night and a day had passed, and that it was now the following evening. After finishing his questions, Humblecut hadn’t said another word to him — not when he locked him in the storeroom, not when he put the sack over his head and bundled him into the wagon, and not now.

The crew of the boat seemed limited to two: a mate, who was currently unloading half a dozen oilcloth bundles from the wagon and carrying them on board, and the captain: a man with a deeply seamed and scarred visage.

“Put these two in the hold,” Humblecut told the captain as he boarded the boat.

“Aye, aye, Mr. Cassaway,” the man said.

The captain came up, grabbed him and Joe by an arm each, then escorted them roughly along the dock and up the gangplank onto the vessel. As he ushered them toward the bow, D’Agosta caught sight of the mate again. He was in the stern and, having placed the oilcloth bundles in some heavy netting, was now drawing the netting close around and wrapping it with an iron chain. A rough hand between his shoulders pushed him down the hatchway and onto a rank pile of fishnets. A moment later, Joe was shoved down next to him and the hatch banged to, shutting out the moonlight. There were enough open seams in the wall to let in light from the aft cabin. He’d never seen the youth look worried, and he did not look worried now — only angry and defiant. Remarkable how resilient he was.

D’Agosta heard the light rap of mooring lines hitting the deck; then the engine took on a throatier roar. The boat started to vibrate as it pulled away from the dock. As it moved out into the open water, it began to roll in the swell. At a certain point the engine throttled down, and the boat slowed. There was the murmur of voices, the sound of chains being dragged aft across the deck, followed by a loud splash. It seemed that Mr. and Mrs. Cookson, separated on land, were now to be united in death on the seabed. The callous brutality of it enraged D’Agosta.

It was bitterly cold and dim in the hold. Joe wriggled up against him to stay warm, resting his head on his shoulder. D’Agosta was glad of the human contact; it helped him focus his mind. He turned his thoughts to what might happen next. He wondered if he and Joe were going to shortly join the Cooksons in their journey over the transom. It seemed unlikely: if that were the case, they’d already be dead and gone. Leng was keeping them alive for some reason, probably as bargaining chips. They were securely tied up, and even if they could get loose, they were on a boat in the winter Atlantic with no possibility of getting off... unless he could seize control of the vessel, which seemed an impossibility without weapons. Or, if they could get untied, they might wait until docking to fight or make a break for it.

He wriggled his wrists. Humblecut knew how to tie a knot, that was for sure. The rope that bound his hands and encircled his waist was stout hemp, tight and inflexible. There was probably nothing in the hold that could be used to free them, but D’Agosta knew it was better to keep busy — not only for Joe’s sanity, but for his own. He nudged Joe, not sure how to explain that he was going to search the hold. He pointed his chin around, then got up on his knees and began to crawl about, looking around as best he could in the faint light for anything that might help. Joe immediately caught on and — nodding his understanding to D’Agosta — began a search of his own.

51

Edwin Humblecut eased himself into an armchair by the fire, feeling the warmth of the glowing coals. It was quite a handsome library, revealing enormous wealth, quietly displayed.

“Brandy?” asked Leng, standing at a side table with crystal decanters and glasses.

“No, thank you, Doctor. I am a teetotalist.”

“Of course. I, however, shall have a tot to warm myself on this cold evening.”

Leng poured a brandy and settled into the seat opposite. It was a chill winter night, and Humblecut was grateful for the warmth of the fire after his stay on Mount Desert.

It had been a gratifying trip on several levels. He had particularly enjoyed his time with that pair of island rubes — what were their names? Cookson. And he treasured the moment when he revealed to the policeman what he’d done — the look of perfect horror on his face. The sojourn itself, however — especially his attic vigil — had left him chilled to the bone. But the twenty-four-hour sea voyage back to Manhattan was now complete; he had handed off Harrison and the boy to Leng’s lackeys... and all that remained was to collect his reward.

As Leng settled into the seat, Humblecut observed him with keen but covert interest. Humblecut had the uncanny ability to peer into other people’s minds and see their thought processes. But Leng was absolutely opaque. His thinking was hidden and his goals shrouded in mystery. That intrigued Humblecut. This last assignment had been truly inexplicable: questioning a copper who, apparently, had come from the future. Humblecut was a man who believed in rationality and science, and the concept of traveling through time was too much to swallow. Ordinarily he would have discounted it as madness. But what convinced him of its veracity was that Harrison, the policeman, was clearly an ordinary sort of person, without any particular imaginative gifts — and yet he’d painted a picture of the future that was original, unexpected, utterly grotesque... yet entirely believable. If George Harrison was a fantasist, he showed no other signs of madness or even abnormal thinking. It seemed impossible for him to invent, on the fly, all that he had said.

Thus, Humblecut was inclined to believe it was true — that he was indeed a man who had traveled from the future. And what a future he’d depicted! The remarkable inventions, the even more remarkable violence... Humblecut wished he could live long enough to see it.

He knew better than to ask Leng what it was all about — but nevertheless, he had mentally filed away every detail. There had to be value in it; exactly what to exploit, and how, could wait. Humblecut was not only a careful man — he was a patient one.

He’d brought the police officer and the boy back to the mansion, where Leng’s people had taken over and imprisoned them somewhere in the house. And now it was time for Humblecut to be paid a liberal fee — which he felt he richly deserved, after that long perambulation through a frozen hell.

He waited for Leng to initiate the conversation. But Leng seemed content to sit by the fire in silence, sipping his drink.

“I am wondering,” Leng finally began, in a low voice, “what your thoughts are on this most recent assignment?”

“I don’t think about my assignments, sir,” Humblecut replied. “I accomplish them. And then I move on.”

“But surely,” said Leng, “you must have wondered where that fellow Harrison came from? Why I had you ask him all those questions? Above all, you must have wondered how he could possibly know the answers. Not the slightest glimmer of curiosity about that?”

Humblecut felt the conversation moving into hazardous territory. “Dr. Leng, I pride myself on a lack of inquisitiveness when it comes to the dealings of my clients. I’ve never allowed the kind of curiosity another man might find natural to interfere with business. What you intend to do, or not do, with the man — or the telegram — is none of my affair.”

“A very commendable attitude. I hadn’t pegged you as an incurious man. Had I been in your shoes, I would have had many questions about how such a man could possibly exist, and whether his information could be put to some use. I would have retained notes, at the least.”

“I never take notes,” said Humblecut. “I possess an eidetic memory.”

“Ah! An eidetic memory.”

“Very useful in my line of work,” Humblecut said, allowing himself an uncharacteristic measure of pride. Perhaps such an asset could up his bargaining price in future assignments.

“I imagine so,” Leng said, rising. “Cigar?”

He picked up a box of cigars from the mantel, opened it, and held it out to him. Humblecut selected a cigar — a Don José perla — and used the proffered cutter to notch the end. Leng lit it for him with a large, chased silver lighter. Then he took one for himself, and trimmed and lit it.

Humblecut puffed on his cigar — it was, as he anticipated, excellent.

“Eidetic memory, most useful,” said Leng. “Now, is there anything else you’d like to tell me before we settle our accounts?”

“I’ll just leave you with a word of advice: that man may be an ordinary, unimaginative copper, but he’s cleverer than he looks. He almost managed to escape the boat on our way down from Maine. And keep an eye on the boy — he’s a resourceful little squib.” He took a moment to draw smoke into his mouth and expel it in a little stream.

“Thank you, I shall do so. Now, I believe I owe you a tidy sum.”

Humblecut inclined his head.

“Twenty thousand dollars is what we agreed.”

He inclined his head again.

Leng pulled a tapestry cord next to the chair. One of his white-gloved lackeys came in, conferred with Leng, and left. A moment later he returned with a leather satchel, which he handed to Humblecut. He took it by the handle, opened it, and saw it was filled with neatly banded bricks of notes. He quickly riffled through them, pulling out a random few to ensure they were genuine — more from habit than anything else; Leng was not the kind of client to pull a low stunt such as that. He closed the satchel and placed it next to his chair. “Much obliged, Dr. Leng.”

“It’s a funny thing, Humblecut,” said Leng. “I just can’t get over the fact you aren’t more curious. Surely you’ve been wondering what it’s all about... and how you might profit from it.”

“I’ve already answered that question,” Humblecut said sharply. “I do not seek profit from my clients’ business.” Now was the time to get out — he didn’t like the direction in which Leng continued to steer the conversation, and it occurred to him that revealing his eidetic abilities to this man might not have been wise. “And now, Dr. Leng, I thank you for your trust in me. I hope to do business with you again.” He laid his half-smoked cigar down on the ashtray and rose.

“Not quite yet.”

On his feet, Humblecut felt a sudden spell of dizziness, and a strange weakness in his knees that forced him to steady himself against the arm of the chair. He instantly realized he’d somehow been poisoned. The dimness was coming on fast, his mind filling with confusion. He took a step toward Leng, stumbled, and then lunged, in an effort to strangle his client with the last of his fading strength. But despite the will of a lion, he was overwhelmed with weakness and merely collapsed on the floor in front of the dying fire. Staring up at Leng, all he could manage was a gurgle of fury. He had badly misjudged the man.

Leng rose and stood over him, calmly puffing his cigar. Humblecut stared up at him, burning with an internal paroxysm of rage, but — now entirely incapacitated — with no ability to act on it. Worse, he was finding it increasingly difficult to breathe. It must have been the cigar — or something dusted on the money.

“While I appreciate your help,” Leng said, “I know you were already scheming to turn the knowledge you gained to your profit. That cannot be permitted. A man from the future is an inestimable commodity. And, yes: that is indeed what Harrison is. Extraordinary, don’t you think? The value of his knowledge of what is to come is priceless, and I know exactly how to use it. You, on the other hand, would only ruin everything in an effort to capitalize on the information.”

Now all Humblecut could think of was getting more air into his lungs, trying to keep his chest expanding, his breathing going. But the paralysis had now reached his core, and no matter how hard his mind screamed at his lungs to expand, they refused. His eyes danced with points of light, and then fog, and then finally night.

Leng pulled the tapestry cord again, and the white-gloved lackey returned, a second on his heels. He wordlessly gestured at the body and the satchel, and both were quickly removed.

A few minutes later Decla entered. Leng had asked her to wait until Humblecut left — if she was surprised at the way he’d done so, she did not show it.

“Have a seat,” Leng said.

Decla sat. She looked displeased — Leng knew the trappings of wealth made her uneasy: they were to be looted, rather than make oneself comfortable in. Her eyes darted to the fire and back to him.

“Drink?”

She shook her head.

“My dear, I find myself increasingly concerned about a mutual acquaintance of ours.”

“The churchman?” This piqued her interest.

“No — although, as we’ve discussed, you can have his head in a day or two. Now: I’ve accomplished my goal of capturing and imprisoning our main adversaries — all except one. Three more are due to arrive soon — that interfering fellow Pendergast, along with the sisters, Mary and, ah, Binky. There’s just one loose thread — the other person we spoke of at our last meeting. Despite everything I’ve done, despite all the nets I’ve dragged across the city, I can’t find her. I’m sure you know of whom I speak.”

“The duchess,” Decla said in a low, hateful tone.

“Exactly. The Duchess of Ironclaw. Whose real name is Constance — Constance Greene. A meddlesome creature, here to interfere with my — our — plans.”

Decla nodded with increased interest.

“As you know, I only purchased this abode a few years ago and have yet to find time to explore every last corner. Be that as it may, over the past few days I’ve had the sense — only a feeling, mind you — that there’s a foreign presence here; a hostile revenant, if you will. I’ve no solid evidence; it’s mere intuition... but I believe that presence is our mutual friend.”

Decla remained silent, listening.

“I don’t know the details — neither did the source of my information — but it seems that, for at least a few years, she once lived in this house. And my sense, my intuition, wonders if in fact she might be hiding here, in this house, right under my nose. It’s just the sort of thing she’d do. If that’s the case, it’s possible she knows passageways and rooms I have not yet discovered. Your assignment is to take your squadron and search this house, top to bottom. You will be permitted to enter even those areas previously off-limits, such as the cellars. In fact, you should probably concentrate your search there.” He held up a ring, from which dangled an iron key. “Here is the master key to the house: you may go anywhere, search any place. My only exhortation to you is not to touch anything in my storerooms, laboratory, surgery, or collections. I say this out of concern for your own safety — there are poisons that will kill by mere touch, weapons that will discharge at the slightest jostle, gases that will suffocate. Do you understand?” He removed the key from the ring and tossed it to her. “Go find Constance. I’m not interested in her capture, if you understand my meaning. You may have your way with her — as you may also, in the near future, with the reverend. That will be your reward: but I find this business of the Greene girl rather more pressing than even Considine. Please see to it at once.”

Decla’s only response was the wicked gleam that appeared in her eyes, and a smile she could not fully restrain. She nodded, stood, and left the room.

52

Constance peered at the coin in her hand: a gold doubloon struck during the Spanish empire, bearing a date of 1699. She had found it wedged in a crack of her temporary quarters and appropriated it as a sort of good luck piece. She turned it over in her palm. Its cool heaviness was soothing to the touch — but it did little to ease the agitation she felt.

She assumed — hoped — that Aloysius had found Binky, allowed himself to be captured by Leng’s men, and was now headed back to the mansion — as they had planned in their meeting at the Tenderloin bordello. She’d successfully poisoned Leng — a private plan of her own she had told neither Aloysius nor Diogenes about, for obvious reasons. The man was doomed: it gave her immense satisfaction to know that no matter what he did, no matter what happened to her, he would be dying in agony within four to six days. But poisoning him had started a clock ticking, and it meant both she and Pendergast had a limited period to complete their combined assignments: free her siblings and get them to safety before Leng’s initial symptoms kicked in. These symptoms could manifest themselves as early as tomorrow, January 9. As soon as the poison began to work on Leng and he realized what was happening, he would kill them all. But he’d already killed Mary — which, almost subconsciously, had narrowed her own goal to one overriding thing: destroying Leng. Hence the irreversible poison. Aloysius and the others — they must have known when they came through the portal that the chances of survival were slim. Now, with the machine broken, all their fates were even less certain.

She stared at the coin. Her feeling of unease was not going away. She’d lived in this house — or at least its simulacrum — for a hundred years, and she trusted her instincts. She decided a reconnoiter would be in order, to see if conditions had changed.

Grasping a lantern, she rose from the cell and moved out into the corridor leading to the secret staircase that connected this sub-basement lair to the basement proper. She cautiously ascended the stairs and paused at the exit, peering through a pinhole to ensure nobody was there before she opened the door.

She froze. There was someone. She could see a dim lantern moving down the far end of a basement corridor. Soon, two more appeared behind it.

She watched as they approached. Slowly, the face of the leader became visible. It was Decla. She and the others were clearly searching for something: examining the walls, tapping on them, occasionally holding up lighted matches to test the flow of air.

Constance shrank back. The secret door into the sub-basement was well hidden — and securely locked — but would it stand up to such close examination? Despite the thickness of the walls, she could hear the tapping move closer, and closer, until it reached the hidden door. There the tapping hesitated briefly. Then it started again, now going up and down, then sideways. Clearly, they had noted a change of tone.

This was followed a few minutes later by a low scraping: a knife being used to examine the spot for cracks or unnatural edges. Then a sudden, excited murmur of voices, and the tapping immediately accelerated.

They had found the door to the sub-basement caverns.

More scraping and chiseling as they uncovered the hidden seams. They weren’t going to be able to open it right away — the inside of the door was shielded in solid iron plate — but it would be only a matter of time before they broke through and uncovered the sub-basement — and her lair.

She waited, ear pressed to the iron of the door. More chiseling, hammering, chatter — and then all went silent.

They had gone off to fetch heavier tools.

She had to act immediately. When they got the door open, they would eventually find her hiding place, and everything she’d stored within it. This left her with a choice: she could flee the mansion via the watery tunnel, leaving everything behind — or she could flee into the house itself, hoping to remain hidden in its secret passageways and hollow walls long enough to accomplish her objectives.

In reality, this was no choice at all. To follow through on her end of the plan required her presence — here. To run away was to fail herself and the others, and to perish... sooner rather than later.

Extracting a heavy key from her pocket, she unlocked the door and cracked it open, easing her lantern into the now empty hallway. They would be coming back momentarily — she had to move fast.

After shutting the door and locking it again from the other side — given the scrapings and chisel marks, there was no longer any point in trying to disguise it — she crept along the basement corridor. With her lantern partially shuttered, she moved in the direction opposite Decla’s path of return. It would take the gang an hour, perhaps longer, to break through the door and explore the sub-basement, which should give her time to locate a new bolt-hole from which to operate in the time that remained. Of course, the water entrance — the intended escape route — was almost certain to be discovered. They would have to leave the mansion through the main floor — a dangerous complication.

She moved along the maze of corridors into an abandoned and unstable area of the basement, far from Leng’s labs and collections. A small cave-in marked the opening. She made her way over the rubble and continued along in silence, looking for a place to hide. There were rows of ancient storerooms, some with rotting casks that once held amontillado; stacks of old bricks; hardened sacks of cement; shovels and trowels and other rusting tools.

She heard a distant sound and froze, quickly shuttering her lantern. Listening intently, she identified it as a girl weeping.

In utter darkness, she stole toward the sounds, occasionally touching the basement walls for orientation, her progress aided by her preternatural night vision. Slowly, the sounds grew more prominent, and the darkness diminished — she was approaching a section of the vast, never-mapped basement that was reachable from another passage. Someone had been imprisoned down here — and recently. And as the weeping grew nearer, she realized it was Binky. This meant Pendergast had completed his part of the compact; he had located Binky, been captured by Leng, and already been brought back to the house. But as she turned a corner, and the weeping grew louder, she could hear another voice murmuring words of comfort.

In a moment of profound astonishment, followed instantly by joy, Constance recognized the other voice. It was her sister, Mary. Alive. She was whispering words of comfort to Binky. And then another voice chimed in — Joe.

The shock of this discovery, with the simultaneous rush of gladness and fear she felt, was so powerful that she had to steady herself against a nearby wall. Mary wasn’t dead after all. Mary was alive.

But now all her siblings were prisoners.

It had been a cruel deception of Leng’s — and she had to temporarily put aside her emotions to think the consequences through. If Binky and Mary were here, Pendergast had succeeded. And if Joe was here, too, then Leng had discovered D’Agosta’s hideaway. D’Agosta, if still alive, would probably be imprisoned with Pendergast in another section of the mansion.

She forced herself to pause a moment, to refrain from acting on instinct. Her natural impulse was to rush to them, free them, take them to safety. But without more intelligence of the other developments that must also have occurred, that plan would surely fail — especially now, with the basement crawling with Decla’s gang, which meant Leng was on high alert.

Even as she pondered this, she heard other voices coming down the hallway — loud, male — and then saw a dim light, shining from around the corner of the path opposite to the one she’d taken. More of Leng’s confederates. She shrank back into a nearby storeroom, flattening herself against the inside wall.

She heard the men bang on the metal bars of the cell door. One shouted Mary’s name. There was a defiant yell from Joe and what sounded like a tussle; Binky sobbed loudly and Mary began to scream.

“Don’t take me!” she heard Mary cry. “Oh God, don’t take me there!”

Another angry shout from Joe, followed by the sound of a blow, and then the clang of the iron door. Mary’s voice, still crying out, began to fade as she was manhandled down the hall and away.

A new shock flooded over Constance. Mary was alive... She had not factored that into her plans when she vengefully poisoned Leng. But more immediately, she knew from the echoing sounds exactly where Mary was going: Leng’s new operating theater, built in this very basement.

If Leng had not killed Mary for her cauda equina, then what had he done? There was one obvious answer: he’d been using her as one of his guinea pigs, testing an accelerated version of the Arcanum on her. And since she herself had given him the proper formula, it would no doubt work — Mary would be showing no signs of aging.

And Constance recalled something else. When Leng’s guinea pigs began to present like Mary — indicating a successful formula had been reached — Leng had the first of them dissected, looking for internal malfunctions caused by the elixir but not obvious externally.

This meant that Leng was preparing — right now — to autopsy her sister, Mary... alive.

53

Vincent D’Agosta sat on a straw bale in the corner of the room, watching Pendergast examine the walls, door, floor, and ceiling — something he’d been doing for the past hour. D’Agosta had been locked in this cell the night before, but Pendergast had only arrived today. It seemed that — although Pendergast had been caught earlier than D’Agosta — Leng had taken his sweet time arranging transport for him and the others from his farm down to the mansion... no doubt realizing how cautious he’d have to be in doing so. Upon his arrival, Pendergast had closely questioned D’Agosta about his conversation with Humblecut, taking extreme interest in both the questions and the answers.

“We’re fucked six ways to Sunday,” said D’Agosta wearily. “There’s no way out of this iron box.”

“Your curses are as amusing as they are logistically and anatomically impossible,” Pendergast replied. He broke off his investigation and began pacing the room. His outfit — tight riding breeches and shirt, cloak, and high leather boots — made him look like some highwayman of old.

“You don’t seem all that worried.”

“I assure you, my dear Vincent, I would be extremely worried — were I merely pondering our predicament. But worry is a debilitating emotion, and so I suppress it in lieu of other things.” He paused, staring down at D’Agosta’s shoes. “Pity your footwear has been ruined.”

“Who cares?” D’Agosta said. The overwhelming emotion he felt was one of failure — failure to protect Joe and keep him safe, failure to detect Humblecut’s presence on the island, failure to escape from the boat. That last had been an interminable voyage, the two of them stuffed in the freezing, foul-smelling, almost lightless bilge. At least Joe hadn’t been affected by the seasickness that plagued D’Agosta. They had almost escaped when Joe managed to loosen some rivets in a bulkhead, but their efforts were discovered by that bastard Humblecut. As soon as they docked, a carriage with guards took them to Leng’s mansion; there, Joe had been led off elsewhere, and he, D’Agosta, had been locked in this cell under the eaves of the building. Earlier that day, Pendergast had been thrust in as well. A single candle illuminated the grim, windowless room, its floor covered in straw, a tiny, barred slot in the door presumably for meals — although they had been given only water. The four walls, ceiling, and floor were all riveted iron. Not even Pendergast, it seemed, could find a way out.

When Pendergast spoke, it was as if he’d read D’Agosta’s thoughts. “If you’re blaming yourself for getting caught, please don’t. That was part of our plan all along.”

“Our plan? What are you talking about?”

“Constance, Diogenes, and mine. You see, under the circumstances it was virtually impossible to hide you somewhere you would not be found, while still being able to reach you. No: the trick was to delay Leng’s finding you until his plans and schemes began to focus more and more on the future — and the portal we used to get here. That is why the first thing I did after you left the city was seal off all access to the portal. Whatever Ferenc told him, Leng does not know for certain whether or not we have control over it. I was confident he wouldn’t kill either Joe or Binky, because he could use them for leverage. My assignment was to find Binky — which I did — and then arrange to be captured. I felt certain Leng would return all of us here, under this roof... and as you see, he has done exactly that — including, as it turns out, Mary.”

D’Agosta looked up at him in surprise. “Mary?”

“Yes. Those ashes in the urn were just a cruel deception.”

“Christ.” D’Agosta shook his head. “So now that your plans have succeeded and we’re all under one roof, what next?”

“Now we are tortured in an attempt to force us to give up the secret — not that there’s any to give — of accessing the portal.”

D’Agosta grimaced. “In other words, we have him just where he wants us.”

“You’re forgetting that three of us put this plan together, not just me. One person’s job includes watching our alley, just in case... Well, I need not spell it out. More to the point is the third person’s assignment, which, now that we are all here, is to get Binky and Joe free.”

“You mean, Constance?”

“She knows the house better than anyone — including me and Leng. And she is extremely capable and stealthy, as you know. Although certain variables I did not consider have been introduced to the equation.”

“Such as Mary?”

“That — and precisely how clever and intuitive Leng is. I fear he may have guessed, or will guess shortly, that he has an uninvited guest.”

D’Agosta could imagine this all too well. “How nice for Binky. How nice for Joe. What about us?”

“Constance has a devilishly difficult task merely freeing her siblings.”

“I see. So it’s up to us to free ourselves.”

“Speaking of that — may I see your left shoe?”

“What?”

“Indulge me.”

D’Agosta, still struggling to absorb what he’d just heard, and in any case no longer surprised at any of Pendergast’s enigmatic demands, took off his shoe and handed it over. Pendergast turned it around in his hands, examining it. He then flipped it over and, with a jerk, removed the heel, exposing a pattern of small tacks. Another series of yanks peeled back the sole. He managed to pull out one of the tacks, which he examined with a frown.

“This won’t do,” he said.

He reseated the tack, pressed the sole back on, and reattached the heel. He stared at the shoe a bit longer. Then he unlaced it, extracting the lace and testing its strength with a few jerks.

“Better,” he murmured, weaving it inside his waistband. He handed D’Agosta back his ruined shoe. “Try not to draw attention to its condition.”

“Planning on strangling someone?”

“I fear the lace is too short for that purpose.”

“What’s it for, then?”

“Better you should not know. I’ll gladly replace the shoes with another pair when we get back.”

“If we get back,” D’Agosta said, putting the shoe back on.

“I feel, Vincent, that I owe you a rather profound apology for dragging you here.”

D’Agosta waved his hand. “Why, exactly, is Leng keeping us alive — even just for the time being? I mean, he could kill us and be rid of the problem permanently.”

“Because we’re invaluable to him. As I said, he doesn’t know the time machine might be ruined for good. He anticipates needing our help.”

“Why does he care so much about the machine?”

“Think of the questions he asked you. His goal has moved beyond the Arcanum, although that is still of intense interest. Extending his life is only a proximate goal. His ultimate ambition is to—”

D’Agosta heard the sound of a heavy tread in the corridor. They immediately fell silent.

“We’re going to open the door,” said a loud voice. “Stand in the back of the cell. We’re well armed. Don’t be stupid.”

Pendergast and D’Agosta moved back against the far wall. The door swung open and two men stepped in with rifles, taking positions on either side of the door, while a third came in bearing wrist and ankle cuffs, linked by iron chains. He tossed them across the room, where they landed with a clang at Pendergast’s feet.

“Put those on.”

D’Agosta watched as Pendergast did as ordered, latching each cuff.

“Turn around and lie facedown on the floor.”

Pendergast complied. One of the guards now walked over and tested each cuff, pulling on it to make sure it was latched. They patted him down, finding nothing.

“Stand up.”

Pendergast rose awkwardly, chains clanking. “May I ask where I’m going, all dressed up like this?”

“To the boss.”

“Will there be tea and cakes?”

“Shut your mouth, numpty.”

D’Agosta watched as Pendergast was ushered, unresisting, out the door, which was slammed shut and locked behind him. He sat down on the hay bale, putting his head in his hands, wondering if there was even the slightest chance that he’d ever see Laura again.

54

The guards began escorting Pendergast down from the attic room. He shuffled along clumsily, hindered by the chains binding his legs and arms.

“Hurry up,” one guard said, poking him in the back with his rifle.

“My dear fellow, I would like to see you move nimbly while shackled like an ape,” Pendergast responded, slowing even further.

One of the guards snickered and imitated his upper-crust New Orleans drawl — “My dear fellow” — before giving him another push. “You can move faster than that.”

Pendergast, who knew the mansion well, guessed he was being taken to the library, where no doubt Leng would join him. The house was laid out almost exactly as it would be in his day — but the fixtures, decoration, and wallpaper were, of course, very different. The most striking change was the lack of electricity: the house was lit with glowing gas mantles in frosted glass globes, which cast a mellower light than the electric bulbs of the future.

The shortest route from the attic to the library would involve descending three floors, and along the way it would go past a small, windowless room on the third level that served as a music chamber, where musicians could practice or tune up without bothering people on the lower floors. As they passed by the door to that room, Pendergast abruptly veered into it, opening it with his shackled hands and then pivoting to slam the door shut and wedge it in place with his foot.

There was a moment of consternation as the guards pounded on the door, at last forcing it open. They rushed in, shouting and waving their weapons and surrounding him — Pendergast had barely had time to reach the far side of the darkened room — one smacking him across the face.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” the lead guard asked, seizing Pendergast by the shackled hands and dragging him back out into the hall, shutting the door behind him.

“You can’t fault a man for trying to escape,” Pendergast said meekly.

This brought a round of laughter. “Some escape!”

“My dear fellow,” another mimicked again.

More laughter. He was manhandled down the rest of the stairs, through the drawing room and salon, then past the archway leading to the library.

“Bind him,” the lead guard said.

They hauled Pendergast over to a freshly installed iron post inside the library, locking his feet to its base and his hands to loops welded higher up. Then the two stepped back, rifles trained on him.

“Tell the boss he’s here,” said the lead guard, who had been supervising.

One of the guards left while the other took up a position by the door. A moment later, the first guard returned with Leng.

Now Pendergast looked on as Leng sauntered into the room and took a seat in a wing chair. He adjusted himself, took out a cigar, trimmed and lit it, then settled back, turning intently toward Pendergast. The guards backed off, rifles leveled.

“I’m sorry,” Leng said. “I’d offer you a seat — but you’re a slippery devil, and I can’t feel easy unless you’re chained to that post. Now, we are going to have a rather important conversation. Are you ready?”

While Leng was speaking, Pendergast noticed in his peripheral vision the flash of a single violet eye. It was shrouded in darkness, peering out for a brief moment from a tiny hole formed in the library’s intricate wallpaper. Then it vanished — and where it had been, only wallpaper remained.

55

Enoch Leng set down his cigar and removed a notebook from his pocket, into which Humblecut’s long telegram, cut into leaves, had been bound. He opened it and began perusing it, turning pages covered with his own extensive notations in a tiny, perfect hand.

“Well, well, Aloysius,” he said. Then he added: “May I call you Aloysius? You may call me Enoch. That is the name I prefer now. We are, after all, blood relatives.” He smiled at Pendergast. “But I’m not quite clear how we’re related. My father was Hezekiah Pendergast... who must have been, let’s see, your great-great-grandfather?”

Pendergast said nothing.

Leng took a long moment to examine Pendergast. It was the first time he’d really had a chance to examine the man at leisure, and he was somewhat unsettled by the resemblance to himself, and by the keen intelligence evident in those silver eyes; the lean physique; the patrician visage. He was indeed a Pendergast, through and through. All the more reason to take the most extreme care.

“Since I have no children,” Leng continued, “and have no intention of fathering any, you must be descended from one of my brothers. Comstock? Maurice? Or... Boethius?” He leaned forward, gazing into those silvery eyes, but could not interpret the expression. “I would guess Boethius. He’s the only one who has married so far. Atia is the name of his wife, and they just had a strange little child named Cornelia. Atia must be your great-grandmother. Which makes you my great-grandnephew. And I, your great-granduncle.” He smiled. “So glad that’s settled.”

Pendergast remained silent.

“Amazing how the Pendergast likeness follows the generations.”

Sitting back, he took a long, slow puff on his cigar, laid it down in the ashtray, and crossed his legs. “Now, Aloysius, are you in the frame of mind for this important — indeed, for you, decisive — conversation? How it goes will determine whether you and your associates live or die. If you plan on remaining silent, I shall have you taken back to your cell immediately, so no more of my time will be wasted — and you will all be disposed of accordingly.”

“I do not object to a conversation,” said Pendergast coolly.

“A wise decision. Have you guessed my plans?”

“You wish to extinct the human race.”

At this, Leng gave a little laugh. “Wrong. The word isn’t ‘extinct.’ The word is ‘cleanse.’”

“What do you mean by that?”

“The idea is to eliminate the vast bulk of humanity, leaving behind a small group to continue the species in a superior way. Purified. Decontaminated. Perfected.”

“And you, naturally, are to be part of this small group.”

“Naturally. Do you think my plan is evil?”

“Is the mass murder of innocents evil?”

Leng smiled broadly. “Human beings — innocents? I think not.” He licked his finger, turned another page in the notebook. “Let us review the century to come, the twentieth, and what will happen. It featured two so-called world wars, correct?”

“Yes.”

“In the first, forty million people died. In the second, eighty million. Correct?”

“Approximately.”

“Among the dead were six million Jews, murdered in a coldly systematic and scientific way by Germany under a man named Hitler, in an attempt to eradicate an entire people. Men, women, children, helpless old people, babies — everyone. And it went beyond Jews: Romani, homosexuals, the retarded... Anyone considered genetically or intellectually inferior was liquidated. Correct?”

“Unfortunately, yes.”

“The second war was ended by the use of a new weapon called an atomic bomb, which killed two hundred thousand people in just two explosions. After that, an even more devastating weapon called the hydrogen bomb was developed, which in your current day a dozen or so countries possess. Correct?”

“Where are you going with this inquisition?”

“You know perfectly well where I’m going. Also in that century of yours, there was a man named Stalin, who killed nine million of his countrymen. Another named Pol Pot, who killed a third of the entire population of his country, and a man named Mao, who killed forty to eighty million in China — through mass starvation, prison camps, and executions. A truly staggering figure. Again, correct me if I’m wrong.”

“You are not wrong.”

“Let us return to the case of Germany. I am particularly interested in this, because I spent many good years there studying medicine. It is a country I know well — and when I learned from your associate about Germany’s conduct in the mid-twentieth century, I could scarcely comprehend it. Germany today — I mean, in 1881 — is the most advanced country on earth. It produced Bach and Beethoven, Goethe and Gauss. It fathered some of the greatest advancements in medicine, science, and mathematics the world has ever seen. And yet this country, at the very apex of so-called civilization, made this man, Hitler — and through him, perpetrated the most profound evil in all recorded history.”

“Yes.”

“Staggering. And appalling. But I’ve learned a lot more about the twentieth century, and quite frankly this summary has barely scratched the surface.” He paused. “Which leads me to an overwhelming question.”

“Which is?”

“You know very well what it is. How can you believe the human race is worth preserving?”

He waited, and after a slight but meaningful hesitation, Pendergast said, in a low voice: “I concede that, as a species, we are anything but exemplary. I assume that’s why we blame the serpent in the garden for all our faults. But we have also produced good things, beautiful things — even magnificent things.”

Leng looked at him, then flipped another page in his notebook. “I also understand from your colleague that the sole thing humans of the twenty-first century are united in doing — humans who otherwise are more divided than ever before, having learned nothing in the intervening century — is destroying the earth. All eight billion of you. Polluting the oceans, heating the planet, burning the rainforests, exhausting the mineral wealth. Your own scientists are now calling your age the Sixth Extinction.”

He stared at Pendergast, the man’s pale face now tinged by a slight flush. He might be breaking through. “You admit these things occurred and are occurring — do you not?”

“I admit it.”

“You admit the technological advances of the twentieth century pale in comparison to your descent into barbarism?”

“There is nothing exceptional about the evils of the twentieth century.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“As a species, we have always been bloodthirsty. The twentieth century merely gave us the technology to conduct killing on a mass scale.”

Leng clapped his hands. “You are only reinforcing my argument: this godlike technology will eventually lead the species to self-destruction. Do you agree?”

A hesitation. “It seems likely.”

“Then, if we are to destroy ourselves: shouldn’t it be done in a logical, controlled way, with the idea of starting afresh?”

“You’re speaking of the massacre of billions of people.”

“Irredeemable people.”

“There are many bad people. There are also good and even great people.”

“But most are brutal, stupid, and selfish.”

“I might point out that you, while not stupid, are one of the brutal and selfish ones.”

“I beg to disagree. What I’m doing is nothing less than providing a path to salvation for our species. I’ve always had a low opinion of humankind — but when I learned of the evils of the twentieth century, I could scarcely believe it. Good God! Now I’m certain our species — if unchecked — will not see the twenty-second century. So: instead of destroying ourselves completely, or leaving behind naked savages fighting rats and cockroaches for sustenance, I would rather see a carefully conducted cleansing that will preserve the species, which, when combined with a longer life expectancy, will yield marvelous benefits. My methods are lethal — yes. But they are necessary. I am an agent of good.”

“Good?”

“My dear nephew, how can you possibly support the status quo — the continuation of this madness? Especially given the fact that we have a chance to wipe the slate clean, start afresh.”

“We?”

“You, me...” Leng halted.

“Is this an invitation?” Pendergast asked.

“Of course. But not one issued lightly. You have proven yourself a most superior man. You are just the kind we need to rise from the ashes, phoenixlike.”

Pendergast said nothing.

Leng added, in a significant tone: “The invitation is extended to Constance Greene, if she will lay aside her vengeful mission. The children will come, too — Joe and Binky; that is, young Constance. They are highly intelligent. Even Mary, whom I am on the verge of vivisecting to ensure the Arcanum does its work without damage to the internal organs — I’ll spare her, as well.”

“A family affair. I see.”

“I’ll even throw in your friend D’Agosta as a sweetener, although he is hardly suitable material for our new world. Together, Nephew, we can create a just society, a logical society, one rooted in respect, stability, and obedience to rational principles of good order.”

“And how will you accomplish this?”

“Through use of your portal. Our small band will travel to your century. Science in your time is superhuman in its power. From what I understand, a biologically engineered pestilence — like the Black Plague, but far more virulent — combined with a special vaccine for our select few will do the trick. As I’ve said, humanity is going to destroy itself regardless. I have no doubt bad actors in your century are already working on doomsday weapons.”

“No doubt.”

“But we,” Leng said triumphantly, “will beat them to it!” He paused, finding his heart rate elevated. He took a deep breath and looked at Pendergast, trying again to see into his mind. He thought, not for the first time, that he spied glimmers of curiosity, if not actual interest.

“Just so we’re clear: your ‘wiping the slate clean’ means, at its core, ridding the world of ninety-nine percent or more of its inhabitants — and beginning again with a handpicked few. Not unlike Dr. Strangelove.”

“I’m unfamiliar with this doctor you speak of, so I imagine his brilliant work lies in the future. But that’s beside the point. Will you join me?”

A long silence ensued. “It is worth considering,” Pendergast finally said, slowly and deliberately.

“My dear nephew, the time has come for you to make a decision. I will not wait. What is it to be? Will you join my endeavor: yes or no?”

A long silence. And then: “Yes.”

56

Sitting on a fly-blown couch in an otherwise barren second-floor room, Otto Bloom had just finished rolling a cigarette and was about to light it when he heard a commotion among the sandhogs milling about on the floor below.

“Look — it’s his nibs!”

“So it is. And he’s got his muffin with him, looks like.”

“Between the two of them, I don’t know which one’s the more barmy.”

Dropping the cigarette, Bloom jumped to his feet and raced downstairs to the small group clustered about the sole entrance that remained open to Forty-Second, sniggering and chortling.

“Shut your pieholes!” he said, pulling the men bodily back from the doorway, leaving only the two guards in place. “Back to your posts!”

As the bricklayers, carpenters, and other construction workers scattered into the dim fastness of the empty tenement, Bloom stepped out onto the street to watch the glittering cab pull up. There was a brief pause, then the door opened and a resplendently dressed man descended, pausing on the lowest step to glance right and then left through his monocle, grimacing as if the street were made of cowshit and he were searching for the spot most thinly daubed. At last he condescended to tread the pavement, where he paused to snatch a silk handkerchief from a vest pocket and polish the handle of his snakewood walking stick. Giving the enameled surface a final stroke, he tossed the kerchief into the gutter, shot his cuffs to a precise amount of Mechlin lace, then turned to assist his companion out of the carriage. This was a young woman — young and, Bloom had to admit, very beautiful — whose shoulders were wrapped in sable and whose sweeping silk gown exposed — given the cold January air — an unhealthy amount of décolletage. The dandified gent gave her his arm and then guided her to a cart where a woman was selling apples to select one for his companion and another for himself. Reaching into a pocket of his satin waistcoat, he extracted a coin and tossed it to the vendor, a glint of gold flashing end over end. He looked up at the building before him, his gaze moving languorously east to west across the heavily scaffolded façade. He patted his companion’s hand with satisfaction and proceeded toward the guards framing the doorway, their expressions carefully stolid. As he did so, Bloom moved back a few steps into the maze of carpentry, preparing himself for another meeting with Lord Cedric.

When Mr. Billington had employed Bloom and his gang to contrive a small collapse in Smee’s Alley, then fill the alley and its surrounding buildings with enough obstacles — in the form of structural girders and buttresses — to keep out a small army, Bloom hadn’t asked many questions. The pale-looking man had paid handsomely indeed. It was only once the site was fully secured that he was let in on the secret. And it was bizarre indeed.

Billington said his family had an estate in Surrey, where he had an older brother — Cedric, Lord Jayeaux, fifth baron in his line. Thanks to the English system of primogeniture, Lord Cedric got all the money, and Billington’s allowance was dictated by his brother’s whims.

One of these whims, Billington explained, was Lord Cedric’s study of the occult. His Lordship was a member of various mystical orders and secret societies devoted to alchemy, divination, necromancy, and other occult sciences. Billington described to him Cedric’s interest in mummy “unwrapping parties” and “spirit boards” and his devotion to the charismatic Helena Blavatsky, a Russian spiritualist who had arrived in New York a few years earlier and founded the Theosophical Society.

Bloom’s recollections were interrupted by the high, nasal tones of Lord Cedric, searching for him.

“Stab me if I’ve ever seen such a beastly mess in all my life! Bloom!”

Summoning patience, Bloom stepped out into the corridor.

“Odd’s fish, where is that layabout? Bloom, I say! Come out of your hole and face me!”

Turning a corner, Bloom reached the spot where Lord Cedric currently stood, spreading his costume out to full glory, like a peacock fanning his feathers.

“There you are!” cried Lord Cedric. “Bloom, have you been introduced to this, my trembling hyacinth of the Dartmoor bogs, my hothouse Brixton orchid — the Lady Livia?”

“We’ve met,” Bloom said, putting a hand to his cap. Lord Cedric had, in fact, brought the woman here only once before, to the great entertainment of the sandhogs. He fell in behind Lord Cedric, who was now continuing on through the dust and intervening joists, making for a shaft of light that marked the interior entrance to Smee’s Alley.

Years earlier, Billington had told Bloom, his brother Cedric and Madame Blavatsky had joined forces to establish the precise point on earth where unearthly forces could manifest themselves to worldly beings. Billington had referred to this mysterious spot as the “nexus of ectoplasmic energy” or some such thing. The baron and Madame Blavatsky had determined it was located somewhere in New York City — but then they’d had a falling-out. Not long afterward, Lord Cedric had narrowed down the location of the nexus — the middle of Smee’s Alley. Blavatsky and her henchmen had learned about the discovery and were moving in to take it over.

When Bloom heard this and realized all their work in the alleyway was merely to indulge the ridiculous whims of a batty English lord, he’d come close to quitting. He had, however, noticed a variety of shady characters loitering here and there, evidently acolytes of Blavatsky. Billington had warned him they were serious people — and would not hesitate to murder anyone who might stand in their way of gaining access to the nexus.

Bloom, of course, didn’t tell his men anything about the occult tommyrot. Lord Cedric was paying them lavish amounts of money to keep the alley and its surrounding buildings secured, in addition to providing unlimited food and small beer. With three hots and a cot, and the spondulix literally pouring in, the men were happy to shore up the works and keep watch without asking questions. In fact for them, the occasional visits by Lord Cedric were moments of comic relief. Not so for Bloom, who had to keep his men in line while at the same time humoring the dandified Brit.

The three of them stepped into the empty alley, and Bloom watched as the baron took a moment to peer around with his monocle, satisfying himself that everything was in good order. Bloom had to admit that the man — once he’d allowed his monocle to drop — had a keen, observant eye — at least one eye, the green one. The other was a deadish white-blue, perhaps blind.

There was a rustling from one of the few open windows looking over the alley, and then a rough voice sounded, scornfully feigning a cough. “Kaf-kaf-kaf... PONCE!! Kaf-kaf!”

Lord Cedric looked up indignantly. “Who said that?”

Silence from above.

“Insolent puppy! Show yourself!”

Another rustling, then the grimy, indistinct visage of a workman peered out a second-floor window, grinning. Immediately, Livia took aim and let fly her half-eaten apple, the overhand heater — despite the dim light — hitting the man’s face squarely above one eye with a spray of pulp and juice. The figure disappeared from view with a stream of invective.

“Why, Livia!” Lord Cedric turned toward her, delighted. “How reassuring to see you haven’t lost your slum pitching arm.”

Livia — who, it seemed, didn’t appreciate being reminded of her pedigree — sulkily turned her back on them and began to stroll toward the guardhouse sealing off Smee’s Alley.

“Don’t mind ’em, milord,” Bloom said, making a mental notation of the heckler’s name in order to dock his wages. “Just blowing off steam, you know — making a little harmless fun of their betters at the end of the day.”

“Blowing off steam, you say? Well, you can tell him for me — in the words of Mozart — Leck mir den Arsch fein recht schön sauber.” The baron looked around once again. “All quiet? All remains as it was? No sign of the nexus coming to life?”

“No, milord. And my two brothers arrived just yesterday from Virginia. They’ve been working the mines there. Brought three of their sons with them, too: big, strapping boys they are — to keep out them spies.”

“Stab me, that’s capital! Bolstering the ranks is a bully idea, especially—”

“Cedric?” Livia’s voice came floating over, interrupting the conversation.

“Yes, my dove?” the baron said without looking over.

“Whatever on earth is that?”

Bloom watched as the other man spun around. Halfway down the alley — hovering directly in front of a set of old dancing-hall posters plastered to the brickwork — strange sparks were appearing in the air, hovering a moment like fireflies, and then disintegrating in odd rainbow curlicues.

Bloom was struck dumb. He had never seen anything like it. Good God, could the hocus-pocus actually be true? Even more remarkable was the transformation of the baron’s face, the silly expression vanishing into one of surprise, then concentration. “Bloom,” the man said in an entirely new voice, “have someone get that woman into a carriage and send her home. Not in my own conveyance — that is to stay. Hurry, now.”

As Bloom led the protesting woman away, he could see Lord Cedric approaching the sparkling lights. By the time Bloom returned, the baron was standing — warily — in front of the multicolored flashes, which now were vibrating the very air of the alley. As he watched, the vibration turned to a shimmer, then began to take on an ovoid shape. Bloom stared, mesmerized and astounded.

“Bloom,” Lord Cedric said, turning to him.

But Bloom found himself unable to move.

“Bloom!” came the low, urgent voice. “We must hurry and cover this thing up. Let us drop the cloths now — as discussed. And, for God’s sake, keep everyone away.”

Spell broken, Bloom — who had more than once been instructed on what to do in this situation, however unlikely — began issuing orders to his men. In quick succession, they tugged a series of guide ropes that loosed heavy black tarps — each suspended from scaffolding above, five feet on either side of the shimmering thing — and let gravity roll them to the ground. The baron meantime scrambled up a ladder and, running along a catwalk, kicked free another tarp, mounted horizontally, that unrolled along a frame, covering the open space above the thing. Descending the ladder again, he helped Bloom fix the tarp panels in place with hooks. In minutes they had, in effect, produced a twelve-foot cube, the thick black material of which enclosed and obscured from all eyes the brilliant light of the thing within.

“You remember what to do next?” Lord Cedric asked him.

They were currently standing inside of the enclosure, and Bloom, having fixed the last tarp into place, was again staring, mesmerized, at the... thing.

“Yes, sir. Triple the guard.”

“Exactly. Your best men. And for the love of Christ, keep everyone away. You understand? It won’t be long now. Twelve, maybe twenty-four hours, and either Billington or I will see that you and all your men get a thousand dollars each. Now, hop it!”

“A thousand—?” Seeing the look in Lord Cedric’s eye, Bloom nodded. The baron, for his part suddenly a different man, ducked out of the canvas cube and began running — actually running, having lost all his mincing affectations — for the alley exit, then disappeared.