“I’ve brought a wealth of information.” Pendergast removed a folder from his jacket. “In here you will find DNA data, handwriting samples, medical history, dental X-rays, distinguishing marks, physical characteristics, and more. She’s alive somewhere in the world — please find her for me.”
Galusha reached out to the file, as if it were something loathsome, but he could not quite bring himself to take it. The hand remained poised in midair, trembling.
“I have an incentive for you, as well,” Pendergast went on. “A certain acquaintance of mine possesses unusual computer skills. He will adjust the files at the University of Texas to give you that BA, cum laude, which you would have been awarded had your father not died, forcing you to drop out in your last semester.”
Galusha bowed his head. Finally his veined hand grasped the file.
“How long?” Pendergast said, his voice almost a whisper.
“Four hours, maybe less. Wait here. Speak to no one. I’ll handle this myself.”
Three and a half hours later the general returned. His face was gray, collapsed. He laid the file on the table and took a seat, the chair scraping slowly, moving like an old man. Pendergast remained very still, watching him.
“Your wife is dead,” said Galusha wearily. “She must be. Because all trace of her vanished ten years ago. After…” He raised his tired eyes to Pendergast. “After she was killed by that lion in Africa.”
“It’s not possible.”
“I’m afraid it’s not only possible but almost inevitable. Unless she’s living in North Korea or certain parts of Africa, Papua New Guinea, or one of a very few other highly isolated places in the world. I know all about her now — and about you, Dr. Pendergast. All records pertaining to her, all threads, all lines of evidence, come to an end in Africa. She is dead.”
“You’re mistaken.”
“M-LOGOS doesn’t make mistakes.” Galusha pushed the folder back at Pendergast. “I know you well enough now to be confident you’ll keep your end of the bargain.” He took a deep breath. “So the only thing left to say is good-bye.”
CHAPTER 39
Black Brake swamp, Louisiana
NED BETTERTON TOOK THE HANDKERCHIEF from his pocket and wiped his forehead for what seemed the hundredth time. He was wearing a loose T-shirt and Bermuda shorts, but he hadn’t expected the swamp air to be this suffocating so late in the year. And the tight gauze bandage around his bruised knuckles felt as hot as a damn rotisserie chicken.
Hiram — the old, almost toothless man he’d spoken to on the front stoop of Tiny’s — was at the wheel of the battered airboat, a shapeless cap pulled down around his ears. He leaned over the gunwale, spat a brown rope of tobacco-laced saliva into the water, then straightened again and returned his gaze to the narrow logging channel that led ahead into a green fastness.
An hour of research in the records office at the county seat was all it had taken for Betterton to discover that Spanish Island was a former fishing and hunting camp deep in Black Brake swamp — owned by June Brodie’s family. Upon learning this, he immediately turned his attention to tracking down Hiram. It had taken a great deal of wheedling and cajoling to convince the old geezer to take him out to Spanish Island. Ultimately a hundred-dollar bill and the brandishing of a quart bottle of Old Grand-Dad had done the trick — but even then, Hiram insisted on their meeting up at the far northwestern corner of Lake End, away from the prying eyes of Tiny and the rest of the crowd.
When they first started out, Hiram had been morose, nervous, and uncommunicative. The journalist had known better than to force the man to speak. Instead he’d left the Old Grand-Dad within easy reach, and now — two hours and many pulls later — Hiram’s tongue had begun to loosen.
“How much farther?” Betterton asked, once again plying the handkerchief.
“Fifteen minutes,” Hiram said, sending another thoughtful jet of saliva over the side. “Maybe twenty. We’re getting into the thick stuff now.”
He’s not kidding, Betterton thought. The cypress trees were closing in on either side, and overhead the braided green and brown of jungle-like vegetation blotted out the sun. The air was so thick and humid, it felt as if they were underwater. Birds and insects chattered and droned, and now and then there was a heavy splash as a gator slid into the water.
“You think that FBI man actually made it as far as Spanish Island?” Betterton asked.
“Don’t know,” Hiram replied. “He didn’t say.”
Betterton had spent a most entertaining couple of days looking into Pendergast’s background. It hadn’t been easy, and he could just as well have spent a whole week at it. Maybe even a month. The man was in fact one of the New Orleans Pendergasts, a strange old family of French and English ancestry. The word eccentricdidn’t even begin to describe them — they were scientists, explorers, medical quacks, hucksters, magicians, con men… and killers. Yes, killers. A great-aunt had poisoned her entire family and been shut up in an insane asylum. An uncle several times great had been a famous magician and Houdini’s teacher. Pendergast himself had a brother, who had apparently vanished in Italy, about whom there were many strange rumors but few answers.
But it was the fire that intrigued Betterton most of all. When Pendergast was a child, a mob in New Orleans had burned down the family mansion on Dauphine Street. The ensuing investigation had not been able to clarify exactly why. Although nobody admitted to being part of the mob, various people questioned by police gave different and conflicting reasons as to why the mansion was torched: that the family was practicing voodoo; that the son had been killing local pets; that the family was plotting to poison the water supply. But when Betterton had sorted through all the conflicting information, he sensed something else behind the mob action: a carefully crafted and highly subtle disinformation campaign by a person or persons unknown, aimed at destroying the Pendergast family.
It appeared the family had a powerful, hidden enemy…
The airboat bumped over a particularly shallow mud bank, and Hiram gunned the engine. Ahead, the vegetation-choked channel forked. Hiram slowed to a virtual standstill. To Betterton, the two channels looked identicaclass="underline" dark and gloomy, with vines and cypress branches hanging down like smokehouse sausages. Hiram rubbed his chin quizzically, then glanced upward as if to get a celestial fix from the braided ceiling overhead.
“We’re not lost, are we?” Betterton asked. He realized that trusting himself to this aged rummy might not have been a prudent move. If anything happened way out here, he’d be dead meat. There was not a chance in hell of his finding his way out of this swampy labyrinth.
“Naw,” Hiram said. He took another pull at the bottle and abruptly gunned the airboat into the left-hand passage.
The channel narrowed still further, choked with duckweed and water hyacinth. The hooting and chattering of invisible creatures grew louder. They maneuvered around an ancient cypress stump, sticking up out of the muck like a broken statue. Hiram slowed again to negotiate a sharp bend in the channel, peering through a thick curtain of hanging moss that blocked the view ahead.
“Should be right up yonder,” he said.
Goosing the engine gently, he carefully nosed the airboat through the dark, slime-choked passage. Betterton ducked as they pushed through the curtain of moss, then rose again, peering intently ahead. The ferns and tall grasses appeared to be giving way to a gloomy clearing. Betterton stared — then abruptly drew in his breath.
The swamp opened into a small, roughly circular stand of muddy ground, ringed by ancient cypresses. The entire open region was scorched, as if it had been bombed with napalm. The remains of dozens of fat creosote pilings rose, burnt and blackened, thrusting toward the sky like teeth. Charred pieces of wood lay strewn everywhere, along with twisted bits of metal and debris. A damp, acrid, burnt odor hung over the place like a fog.