"Why the machine and the theatrics?" Pendergast asked quietly. "Why not put a bullet in him? The need to terrify your victim had passed."
"That was for your benefit, my dear fellow! It was a way to stir up the police, keep you in Italy a while longer. Where you would be easier to dispose of."
"Whether we will be easy to dispose of remains to be seen."
Fosco chuckled with great good humor. "You evidently think you have something to bargain with, otherwise you wouldn't have accepted my invitation."
"That is correct."
"Whatever you think you have, it won't be good enough. You are already as good as dead. I know you better than you realize. I know you because you are like me. You are very like me."
"You could not be more wrong, Count. I am not a murderer."
D'Agosta was surprised to see a faint blush of color in Pendergast's face.
"No, but you could be. You have it in you. I can see it."
"You see nothing."
Fosco had finished his steak and now he rose. "You think me an evil man. You call this whole affair sordid. But consider what I've done. I've saved the world's greatest violin from destruction. I've prevented the Chinese from penetrating the planned U.S. antimissile shield, removing a threat to millions of your fellow citizens. And at what cost? The lives of a pederast, a traitor, a producer of popular music who was filling the world with his filth, and a godless soul who destroyed everyone he touched."
"You haven't included our lives in this calculation."
Fosco nodded. "Yes. You and the unfortunate priest. Regrettable indeed. But if the truth be known, I'd waste a hundred lives for that instrument. There are five billion people. There is only one Stormcloud."
"It isn't worth even one human life," D'Agosta heard himself say.
Fosco turned, his eyebrows raised in surprise. "No?"
He turned and clapped his hands. Pinketts appeared at the door.
"Get me the violin."
The man disappeared and returned a moment later with an old wooden case, shaped like a small dark coffin, covered with the patina of ages. Pinketts placed it on a table next to the wall and withdrew to a far corner.
Fosco rose and strolled over to the case. He took out the bow, tightened it, ran a rosin up and down a few times, and then-slowly, lovingly-withdrew the violin. To D'Agosta, it didn't look at all extraordinary: just a violin, older than most. Hard to believe it had led them on this long journey, cost so many lives.
Fosco placed it under his chin, stood tall and straight. A moment of silence passed while he sighed, half closing his eyes. And then the bow began moving slowly over the strings, the notes flowing clearly. It was one of the few classical tunes D'Agosta recognized, one that his grandfather used to sing to him as a child: Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring. The melody was simple, the measured notes rising, one after another, in a dignified cadence, filling the air with beautiful sound.
The room seemed to change. It became suffused with a kind of transcendent brightness. The tremulous purity of the sound took D'Agosta's breath away. The melody filled him like a presence, sweet and clean, speaking in a language beyond words. A language of pure beauty.
And then the melody was over. It was like being yanked from a dream. D'Agosta realized that, for a moment, he'd lost track of everything: Fosco, the killings, their perilous situation. Now it all came back with redoubled vengeance, all the worse for having been temporarily forgotten.
There was a silence while Fosco lowered the violin. Then he spoke in a whisper, his voice trembling. "You see now? This is not just a violin. It is alive . Do you understand, Mr. D'Agosta, why the sound of the Stradivarius is so beautiful? Because it is mortal. Because it is like the beating heart of a bird in flight. It reminds us that all beautiful things must die. The profound beauty of music lies somehow in its very transience and fragility. It breathes for a shining moment-and then it expires. That was the genius of Stradivari: he captured that moment in wood and varnish. He immortalized mortality."
He looked back at Pendergast, eyes still haunted. "Yes, the music always dies. But this "-he held up the violin-"will never die. It will outlive us all a hundred times over. Tell me now, Mr. Pendergast, that I have done wrong to save this violin. Please, say that I have committed a crime."
Pendergast said nothing.
"I'll say it," said D'Agosta. "You're a cold-blooded murderer."
"Ah, yes," Fosco murmured. "One can always count on a philistine to lay down absolute morality." He carefully wiped down the violin with a soft cloth and put it away. "Beautiful as it is, it isn't at its best. It needs more playing. I've been exercising it every day, fifteen minutes at first, now up to half an hour. It's healing already. In another six months, it will be back to its perfect self. I will loan it to Renata Lichtenstein. Do you know her? The first woman to win the Tchaikovsky Competition, a girl of only eighteen but already a transcendental genius. Yes, Renata will play it and go on to glory and renown. And then, when she can no longer play, my heir will loan it to someone else, and his heir to someone else, and so it will go down the centuries."
"Do you have an heir?" Pendergast asked.
D'Agosta was surprised by the question. But Fosco was not; he seemed to welcome it.
"Not a direct heir, no. But I shall not wait long to furnish myself with a son. I have just met the most charming woman. The only drawback is that she is English, but at least she can boast an Italian great-grandfather." His smile broadened.
As D'Agosta watched, Pendergast grew pale. "You are grotesquely deluded if you think she will marry you."
"I know, I know. Count Fosco is fat, revoltingly fat. But do not underestimate the power of a charming tongue to capture a woman's heart. Lady Maskelene and I had a marvelous afternoon on the island. We are both of the noble classes. We understand each other." He dusted his waistcoat. "I might even go on a diet."
This was greeted by a short silence. Then Pendergast spoke again. "You've showed us the violin. May we now see this little device that you spoke of? The device that killed at least four men?"
"With greatest pleasure. I'm very proud of it. Not only will I show it to you, I'll give you a demonstration."
D'Agosta felt a chill. Demonstration?
Fosco nodded to Pinketts, who took the violin and left the room. Within moments he returned with a large aluminum suitcase. Fosco unlatched the case and raised the lid, exposing half a dozen pieces of metal nestled in gray foam rubber. He began removing them, screwing them together. Then he turned and nodded to D'Agosta.
"Will you please stand over there, Sergeant?" he asked quietly.
{ 78 }
"Buck!" Hayward screamed again, fighting against an almost overwhelming panic. "Don't let them do this!" But it was hopeless; the roar of the crowd drowned out her voice, and Buck was in his tent, flaps closed, out of sight behind a wall of people.
The crowd was closing in now, the noose tightening fast. The ringleader-Buck's aide-de-camp, bolstered by increasingly frenzied followers-raised the hand with the rock. Watching him, Hayward saw his eyes widen, his nostrils flare. She'd seen that look before: it was the look of someone about to strike.
"Don't!" she shouted. "This isn't what you're about! It's against everything you stand for!"
"Shut up, centurion!" Todd cried.