Gupta stared. "You are sure?" He looked down at the chart cover and checked through the list. "Yes, I believe you are right! Oh, this is marvelous, simply marvelous!"
He turned and hurried from the room, leaving Jack and Abe staring at each other.
"All prime numbers?"
Abe nodded. "And all multiplied by another prime."
The creep factor had just doubled.
They stood and watched the prof stare adoringly at the Kicker Man. His eyes shone like Gawain contemplating the Holy Grail.
5
Jack pulled his big black Crown Victoria out of the Upper West Side garage where he kept it for a monthly fee that equaled a mortgage payment in some states. He headed east through the fading light.
Three messages left with Michael Gerhard's office voice mail had sparked no callback. Haifa dozen calls to his house had gone unanswered as well. Add to that the stuffed mailbox and maybe Mr. Gerhard was on vacation.
And maybe not.
Whatever the reason, a knock on his door was called for, which meant a trek out to Flatlands.
Swell.
The Flatlands section lay on the far side of Brooklyn. Not even a subway stop out there. He had to drive. And driving anywhere in the city lately made him crazy.
Ten miles and forty minutes later he was driving past Gerhard's house on Avenue M. It stood midway along a line of detached, two-story, cookie-cutter houses that must have been depressingly identical when built half a century before, but changes in siding and different plantings over the years afforded them a modicum of individuality. The area had been farmland in the old-old days but was purely residential now.
Jack slowed as he passed…
The place looked dark and empty except for one lighted upstairs window. Maybe a security light, but Jack would have expected one downstairs as well.
He found a parking space two blocks past and walked back. He'd dressed in construction-worker casual for the trip: flannel shirt, jeans, and six-inch, steel-toed Thorogrip Commando Deuces.
He skirted a puddle on the front walk and stopped on the steps before the door. The place looked like it once had sported a front porch, but that had been enclosed for extra living space. He was raising his hand to knock when he noticed the steps were wet. Hadn't rained in days. He bent and touched the weather stripping along the bottom of the door… worn… with water leaking through from inside.
Something wrong here.
Ya think?
His instincts urged him to turn and run—not walk, run—back to his car and get the hell out of here. But a need to know made him stay. He promised himself if he could find an easy way in, he'd take a quick look and then be on his way. If a break-in was necessary, he'd skip it and go home.
He pressed the doorbell button and heard it ring inside. He didn't expect an answer but you never knew. As he rang it again he turned the doorknob and gave a push.
Locked.
He looked around. Nobody about, and he was pretty well hidden in the shadow of the door's overhang.
He slipped around the side and found a basement window behind some bushes. He pulled out his little key-chain penlight and briefly flashed it a few times through the dirty window. The beam reflected off a pool of water within.
Whatever was leaking had been doing so for a while.
Jack saw no sign that the window was wired, so he tested it—not that he wanted to wade through that water, but he felt obliged to check.
No luck.
He could have taken off his jacket, wrapped it around his fist, and broken the window, but he'd promised himself no break-in. So he rose and walked around to the back door. No water leaking out here. He turned the knob and pushed.
It swung inward with a melodramatic creak.
Jack pulled his Glock from the nylon holster at the small of his back and stepped inside.
"Hello? Mister Gerhard? This is Jack Prince. I've been trying to reach you all day. Anybody home?"
No answer.
He closed the door behind him and started through the kitchen toward the front. The inside of the house was a moonless night. The floor stayed dry until he reached the living room. There the carpet began to squish under his boots. When he reached the stairs he risked a quick flash of the penlight. The runner was saturated. Water dripped off the uncarpeted edges of the treads. He touched it—cold.
From somewhere above, the light he'd seen from outside threw just enough illumination to silhouette the banister and newel post on the upper floor.
He called out again but received no answer.
Okay. Time to go see what's what.
Keeping the Clock ahead of him and pointed up, he took the steps two at a time, squishing and creaking all the way. So much for stealth. When he reached the top he stopped and listened.
There… to his right… light and water running under a closed door, the faint splash and gurgle of running water within. Three strides took him to the threshold where he pushed the door open.
Jack's stomach lurched at the sight of a fully dressed man crouched facedown in an old-fashioned pawfoot tub. Underwater. The bloated condition of the corpse and the attendant stink said he'd been there awhile. Probably be stinking worse if not for the continuous flow of cold water.
Mr. Gerhard, I presume.
Jack stepped into the tiny room and did a quick check to make sure he was alone. Then, keeping his pistol trained toward the door, he squatted next to the tub for a closer look.
The back of the guy's head and a stretch of his lower back were the only parts above water. Jack was glad he couldn't see the face. He didn't know what Gerhard looked like and probably wouldn't recognize him if he did. The cold tap was running at maybe half speed, keeping the tub overflowing.
He groaned aloud when he spotted the bungee cord knotted around the corpse's swollen neck.
Swell. A murder. How much trace evidence had he left already?
Another look revealed handcuffs around the wrists; the cord from the neck fed through the eye of a bolt fastened to the bottom of the tub. No, not fastened—drilled through a hole in the bottom of the tub and screwed into the flooring beneath. Another look at the corpse showed the legs bound together at the thighs, knees, and ankles.
Not just murder… some form of ritual. Or torture.
This was no place to be hanging out. Past time to get out. But as long as he was here… why not see if Gerhard had any notes on Jerry Bethlehem?
Toward the front he found a bedroom with an unmade bed, clothes on the floor, and open dresser drawers. Tossed or just a sloppy guy? Jack checked the closet and under the bed, then grabbed a T-shirt from the floor and headed rearward.
There he found a guest bedroom. He made sure it was empty and moved on to another bedroom Gerhard had converted into an office.
After pulling the shades on the two windows, Jack flashed his light around and found the usuaclass="underline" desk, filing cabinets, and a computer with a dark screen but a glowing power light.
He turned off the flash and stood listening. He was ninety-nine percent sure he was alone in the house and one hundred percent sure he had the second floor to himself. As for anyone sneaking up those noisy stairs—no way.
He stowed the Glock and began searching the office.
The filing cabinets came first. A quick search showed no Bethlehem or Pickering file. He wiped down the drawer handles with the T-shirt and moved to the desk. No help there. He sat before the monitor and wiggled the mouse with a T-shirt-wrapped hand. The computer awoke and the screen came to life with Explorer up and running.
The current page was an article on the assassination of abortion doctors in Atlanta. Jack frowned. When was this? The story was dated nearly twenty years ago. It came back to him. Big deal at the time. Someone had shot down a couple of abortionists within a week of each other. The whole country had been buzzing, cops posted at all the clinics and outside doctors' homes. They'd finally caught the guy and put him away, but it had been all anyone had talked about at the time.