Reliquary

= 30 =

HAYWARD PUSHED THE door open brusquely, her cheeks still full of lunch.

“Captain Waxie just called,” she said, swallowing the tuna fish. “Wants you down in the IU right away. They got him.”

D’Agosta looked up from placing the final pins in a missing-persons map that replaced the one taken by Waxie. “Got who?”

“Him. The copycat killer, of course.” She raised her eyebrows.

“No shit.” D’Agosta was at the door in a second, pulling his suit jacket off the hanger and shrugging into it.

“Caught him in the Ramble,” Hayward said as they walked through the office pool toward the elevator bank. “Somebody on stakeout heard a commotion, went to check it out. The guy had just knifed a vagrant and was preparing to cut off his head.”

“How’d they know that?”

Hayward shrugged. “Ask Captain Waxie.”

“And the knife?”

“Homemade job. Real rough. Just what they were looking for.” She didn’t sound convinced.

The elevator doors opened to reveal Pendergast. Seeing D’Agosta and Hayward about to step in, he raised his eyebrows quizzically.

“The killer’s in the IU,” D’Agosta said. “Waxie wants me down there.”

“Indeed?” The FBI agent stepped back and pressed the button for the second floor. “Well, let’s head down there by all means. I’m curious to see exactly what kind of fish angler Waxie has landed.”

The Interrogation Unit of One Police Plaza was a grim series of gray-colored rooms with cinder-block walls and heavy metal doors. The cop on desk duty buzzed them through, directing them to the observation area of room nine. Inside, Waxie was lounging in a chair, looking through the one-way glass into the interrogation cell. He glanced up when he heard them enter, frowned when he saw Pendergast, grunted at D’Agosta, and ignored Hayward.

“Is he talking?” D’Agosta said.

Waxie grunted again. “Oh, yeah. Talking is all he’s doing. But so far we’ve only heard a load of shit. Calls himself Jeffrey; won’t give anything else. We’ll get the real story out of him soon, though. Meanwhile, thought you might like to ask him a few questions.” In his triumph, Waxie was generous, brimming with smug self-confidence.

Looking through the glass, D’Agosta could see an unkempt, wild-eyed man. The rapid, silent movements of the suspect’s mouth were in almost humorous contrast with his stiff, unmoving body.

“This is the guy?” D’Agosta said in disbelief.

“That’s him.”

D’Agosta kept looking through the glass. “Looks kind of small to have done so much damage.”

Waxie’s mouth set in a defensive frown. “Maybe he got sand kicked in his face one too many times.”

D’Agosta leaned forward and pressed the mike button. Instantly, a torrent of curses spewed from the speaker above the one-way window. D’Agosta listened for a moment, then snapped the mike button off.

“What about the murder weapon?” he asked.

Waxie shrugged. “It’s a handmade thing, a piece of steel sunk into a wooden shank. The handle’s been wrapped in cloth, gauze, something like that. Too bloody to tell; we’ll have to wait until forensics gets done with it.”

“Steel,” Pendergast said.

“Steel,” Waxie replied.

“Not stone.”

“I said, it was steel. Take a look for yourself.”

“We will,” D’Agosta said, stepping away from the window. “But for now, let’s see what this guy has to say.” He headed for the door, Pendergast gliding behind him like a silent spirit.

Number nine looked like countless interrogation rooms in countless police stations across the country. A scarred wooden table sat in the middle of the stark space. On the far side of the table, the prisoner sat in a straight-backed chair, arms cuffed behind his back. A single detective sat in one of several chairs on the table’s near side, enduring the verbal abuse with complete disinterest as he manned the tape recorder. Police officers, armed and in uniform, faced each other from across the room. Two huge black-and-white blowups hung on the side walls. One showed the torn and broken body of Nicholas Bitterman, lying on the men’s room floor inside Belvedere Castle. The other was the now-famous Post photo of Pamela Wisher. A video camera was fixed in one corner of the ceiling, dispassionately recording the proceedings.

D’Agosta took a seat at the table, inhaling the familiar blend of sweat, damp socks, and fear. Waxie followed him in, settling his bulk carefully into an adjoining chair. Hayward stood next to the closest uniformed officer. Pendergast closed the door, then leaned against it, the crisp black arms of his suit folded casually, one over the other.

The prisoner had stopped shouting when the door opened. Now he glared at the new arrivals through a greasy lock of hair. His eyes lighted on Hayward, lingered for a moment, then moved on.

“What the hell you looking at?” he said at last to D’Agosta.

“Don’t know,” D’Agosta replied. “You want to tell me about it?”

“Piss off.”

D’Agosta sighed. “You understand your rights?”

The prisoner grinned, exposing small, filthy teeth. “That fat mother next to you read them to me. I don’t need no lawyer to hold my hand.”

“You watch your mouth,” Waxie snapped, flushing an angry crimson.

“No, fat boy, you watch yours. And your fat ass.” He cackled with laughter. Hayward didn’t bother to suppress a smirk.

D’Agosta wondered if this was how they had been carrying on before he got there. “So what happened in the park?” he asked.

“You want a list? For firstly, he was in my sleeping spot. For secondly, he hissed at me, like a snake out of Egypt. For thirdly, he lacked the blessings of God. For fourthly, he—”

Waxie waved his hand. “We get the picture. Tell us about the others.”

Jeffrey said nothing.

“Come on,” Waxie pushed. “Who else?”

“Plenty,” came the reply at last. “Nobody disses me and gets away with it.” He leaned forward. “Better watch out, fat boy, case I carve a piece of blubber off you.”

D’Agosta placed a restraining hand on Waxie. “So who else you done?” he asked quickly.

“Oh, they know me. They know Jeffrey, the cherub cat. I’m on my way.”

“What about Pamela Wisher?” Waxie broke in. “Don’t deny it, Jeffrey.”

The seams at the corners of the prisoner’s muddy eyes thickened. “I don’t deny it. The scumbags disrespected me, all of them. They deserved it.”

“And what’d you do with the heads?” Waxie asked breathlessly.

“Heads?” Jeffrey asked. To D’Agosta, he seemed to falter slightly.

“You’re in too deep now; don’t start denying.”

“Heads? I ate their heads is what I did.”

Waxie cast a triumphant gaze toward D’Agosta. “What about the guy at Belvedere Castle, Nick Bitterman? Tell me about him.”

“That was a good one. That mother had no respect. Hypocrite, miser. He was the adversary.” He rocked back and forth.

“Adversary?” D’Agosta asked, frowning.

“The prince of adversaries.”

“Yes,” said Pendergast sympathetically. “You must counteract the powers of darkness.” They were the first words he’d spoken since entering.

The prisoner rocked more vigorously. “Yes, yes.”

“With your electrical skin.”

Suddenly, the rocking stopped.

“And your glaring eyes,” Pendergast continued. Then he pushed himself away from the door and came forward slowly, looking directly at the suspect.

Jeffrey stared hard at Pendergast. “Who are you?” he breathed.

Pendergast was silent for a moment. “Kit Smart,” he said at last, without removing his eyes from Jeffrey.

To D’Agosta, the change that came over the prisoner was shocking. The color seemed to drain from his face in an instant. He looked at Pendergast, mouth working silently. Then, with a shriek, he forced himself backwards with such force that the chair tipped over and crashed to the floor. Hayward and the two police guards sprang to subdue the struggling figure.

“Jesus, Pendergast, what the hell did you say to him?” Waxie said over the screams, hoisting himself to his feet.

“The right thing, apparently.” Pendergast glanced at Hayward. “Please give this fellow every comfort. I think we can let Captain Waxie take over from here.”

“So who is that guy?” D’Agosta asked as the elevator carried them back up toward the Homicide Division.

“I’m not sure what his real name is,” Pendergast replied, smoothing his tie. “But it isn’t Jeoffry. And he’s not the person we’re looking for.”

“Tell Waxie that.”

Pendergast glanced mildly at D’Agosta. “What we saw, Lieutenant, was a classic case of paranoid schizophrenia, aggravated by multiple personality disorder. You noticed how the man seemed to weave in and out of two personas? There was the blustering tough guy, no doubt as unconvincing to you as to me. Then there was the killer visionary—infinitely more dangerous. Did you hear? ‘For secondly, he hissed at me, like a snake out of Egypt.’ Or ‘Jeoffry, the cherub cat.’ ”

“Of course I heard it. The guy was talking like somebody just handed him the Ten Commandments or something.”

“Or something. You’re right, his ravings had the structure and cadence of written speech. This occurred to me, also. At that point, I recognized he was quoting from the old poem Jublilate Agno, by Christopher Smart.”

“Never heard of it.”

Pendergast smile faintly. “It’s a fairly obscure work by a fairly obscure writer. It is undeniably powerful in its strange vision, however; you should read it. The author, Smart, wrote it while he himself was half-insane in a debtor’s prison. In any case, there’s a long passage in the poem in which Smart describes his cat, Jeoffry, whom Smart believed to be some kind of chrysalis creature undergoing a physical conversion.”

“If you say so. But what does all this have to do with our vocal friend back there?”

“Obviously, the poor fellow identifies himself with the cat in the poem.”

“The cat?” D’Agosta asked incredulously.

“Why not? Kit Smart—the real Kit Smart—certainly did. It’s an extremely powerful image of metamorphosis. I feel sure this poor fellow was once an academician, or a failed poet, before the creeping descent into madness began. He killed one man, true enough—but only when his path was crossed at the wrong time. As for the rest…” Pendergast waved his hand. “There are many indications this man is not our true target.”

“Like the photographs,” D’Agosta said. All good interrogators knew that no killer could keep his eyes from photographs of his victims or artifacts from the crime scene. Yet, as far as D’Agosta could tell, Jeffrey had never moved his eyes to either picture.

“Exactly.” The elevator doors whispered open, and the two made their way through the hubbub toward D’Agosta’s office. “Or the fact that this murder, as Waxie describes it, has none of the elements of the blitzkrieg attacks suffered by the other victims. In any case, once I recognized his neurotic identification with the poem, it was easy enough to goad his madness to the surface.”

Pendergast closed the office door and waited until D’Agosta was seated before continuing. “But let’s put this irritating business behind us. Have you had any luck on that cross-correlation I requested?”

“DP just delivered it this morning.” D’Agosta thumbed through a tall sheaf of miniprinter output. “Let’s see. Eighty-five percent of the victims were male. And ninety-two percent were residents of Manhattan, including transients.”

“I’m primarily interested in things that all the victims had in common.”

“Gotcha.” There was a pause. “All had last names beginning with letters other than I, S, U, V, X, and Z.”

Pendergast’s mouth twitched in what might have been a faint smile.

“All were older than twelve and younger than fifty-six. None of the victims were born in November.”

“Go on.”

“I think that’s it.” D’Agosta flipped some more pages. “Oh, here’s something else. We ran the data through SMUD, checking for various traits associated with serial murderers. The only common thread it found was that none of the murders were committed during a full moon.”

Pendergast sat up. “Indeed? That’s worth remembering. Anything else?”

“No, that’s it.”

“Thank you.” He sank back in the chair. “Still, it’s precious little. Information is what we need, Vincent, hard facts. And that’s why I can’t wait any longer.”

D’Agosta looked at him, uncomprehending. Then he frowned. “You’re not going down again.”

“Indeed I am. If Captain Waxie continues to insist this man is the killer, then the extra patrols will be called off. Vigilance will fade. Creating an atmosphere that can only make additional killings easier.”

“Where will you go?” D’Agosta asked.

“To the Devil’s Attic.”

D’Agosta snorted. “Come on, Pendergast. You don’t even know if such a place exists, let alone how to get there. You’ve got nothing but the word of that hobo.”

“I believe Mephisto’s word to be reliable,” Pendergast replied. “And in any case, I have considerably more than just his word. I’ve spoken with a city engineer named Al Diamond. He explained that the so-called Devil’s Attic is in reality a series of tunnels, constructed by New York’s wealthiest families before the turn of the century. They were intended as a private rail line, but abandoned after only a few years. And I’ve been able to reconstruct a rough approximation of the route of these tunnels.” Taking a marker from the desk, Pendergast moved the missing person’s map. He set the point of the marker down at the intersection of Park and 45th, drew a line over to Fifth, up to Grand Army Plaza, then diagonally across Central Park and north up Central Park West. Then he stepped back, looking at D’Agosta bemusedly.

D’Agosta stared at the map. Except for a few locations in the Park, almost all the white and red pins were clustered along the lines Pendergast had drawn.

“Holy shit,” he breathed.

“You could say that,” Pendergast said. “Diamond also pointed out that the sections of tunnels to the south and north of the Park have been sealed off. So it’s beneath the Park that I go.”

D’Agosta reached into his desk for a cigar. “I’m coming along.”

“Sorry, Vincent. You’re essential up here, now that the rest of the force is about to let down its guard. And I need you to work with Margo Green to determine the precise nature of Kawakita’s movements. We haven’t yet heard the last of his involvement in all this. In any case, this time around my goal will be stealth. It’s an extremely dangerous trip. Two of us would double the chances of our being discovered.” He replaced the marker cap with a snap of his finger. “However, if you could spare Sergeant Hayward’s expertise for a few hours, I could use some help in my preparations.”

Scowling, D’Agosta put the cigar down. “Christ, Pendergast—that’s a long trip down. You’ll be gone overnight.”

“More than that, I’m afraid.” The FBI agent put the marker back on the desk. “If you don’t hear from me within seventy-two hours…” He paused. Then, suddenly, he smiled and grasped D’Agosta’s hand. “A rescue mission would be foolish.”

“What about food?”

Pendergast feigned surprise. “Have you forgotten the delicacy of track rabbit au vin, spit-roasted over an open fire?”

D’Agosta grimaced, and Pendergast smiled reassuringly. “Fear not, Lieutenant. I’ll be well provisioned. Food, maps, all I need.”

“It’s like the journey to the center of the earth,” D’Agosta said, shaking his head.

“Indeed. I do feel a bit like an explorer setting out into parts unknown, peopled by unknown tribes. Odd to think it exists directly beneath our feet. Cui ci sono del mostri, my friend. Let us hope I avoid i mostri. Friend Hayward will see me off.”

Pendergast stood motionless a moment, apparently lost in thought. Then, with a final nod at D’Agosta, he swept out of the office and into the corridor beyond, the silk nap of his black suit shining dully under the fluorescent lights, the last of the great explorers.