Eric felt his heart sink as the surgeon working on Wheeler shrugged, stepped back from the table, and flicked off the police captain's monitor. The lone spark of hope he had nurtured was gone.
At a loss for what he could possibly do next, Eric wandered down the hall to Haven Darden's room. The medical chief, alone save for a nurse, was sitting up on his stretcher, an IV draining into his wrist.
Heavy bandages swathed his wounded shoulder.
"Is he dead?" he asked.
"He is."
Darden motioned Eric inside, and then asked the nurse to leave.
"Rebecca was always too beautiful for her own good," he said.
"She is that, sir. I'm sorry for what you're going through."
"And I for what you are going through. Obviously, as far as my daughter is concerned, things are going to get much worse. She has a great deal to answer for."I hope she can shed some light on what's happened to Laura."
"I hope so too," Darden said. His voice was husky and distant.
"You know, my wife and I began worrying about Rebecca when she was still in grade school, when we found she was getting other children-boys mostly-to do things for her or give her things in exchange for kissing her or touching her or just being her friend. We… we brought her to Haiti with us any number of times in hopes of breaking through her narcissism, and insdmng in her some sort of social conscience. She seemed like a different person there-so interested in everything, so anxious to know the country. There was no way to know that she would just take what we were giving her and…
He began to weep. Eric took his hand and held it.
"You're a good man and a great doctor," he said.
"I don't know what to say except that you deserved better.
"Thank you. Is there any more you can tell me about what Rebecca was involved in? What those people were doing?"
"Not precisely. But when I amp; know, I promise you and I will sit and talk about it "
"I would be grateful. I'm very sorry about your friend. I hope Captain Wheeler was mistaken about her."
"I hope so, too, Dr. Darden, but I fear he wasn't Do you think Rebecca might be home now? I'd like to call her."
"She might She doesn't have a job, you see. Never seemed to need one. I should have asked her about the sports car and the furs and all the other things, but…"
"Please, sir, try to get some rest. You've lost a fair amount of blood."
Eric left the emergency room and headed through the crowded corridors to the Proctor Building and Dave Subarsky's lab. Remarkably, the hospital seemed perfectly normal, as if the violence he'd witnessed had never happened.
It was unlikely that Dave had heard anything at all from Laura, but there was always the chance. If there had been no word from her, at least his friend could help him decide whether it was better to call Rebecca Darden immediately or try to confront her at the Cambridge address Haven Darden had given him.
The research floor was largely deserted, and the door to Subarsky's lab locked. Eric found one researcher-a young biochqkist named Jessica Marshlocking up for the evening, "Excuse me," he asked, "have you seen David?"
"He left a while ago," the woman said.
"Do you have a key to his lab? Dave must have assumed I had mine', but I left them at home."
"I have keys to all the labs on the floor," she said.
"But I'm not allowed to-"
"Please, Jessica," Eric implored. "Dave was supposed to meet me here..
I'm sure he's left a — note for me inside. There's a call that might have come in on his phone that I've got to know about."
The woman hesitated.
"Please, it's very important," Eric urged. "Listen, you've seen me working here alone dozens of nights.
You know Dave and I are friends."
Reluctantly, she pulled her keys from her purse and opened the door.
"I shouldn't be doing this- " she said.
"Thank you, Jess. You won't regret it."
As she was turning the key, the phone inside began ringing. Eric raced inside, slamming his thigh against the corner of a lab bench as he rounded it to the inner office. He snatched up the receiver.
"Hello?"
"Yes, I'm trying to reach Dr. Dave Subarsky."
Eric felt his pulse leap.
"Laura?"
"Eric, yes, it's me! Oh, God, I've been worried about you."
"You've been worried-I thought you were dead."
"I almost was. Eric, it's Captain Wheeler, the policeman I told you about. He's behind everything."
"I know. I know. Laura, Wheeler shot himself here in the hospital.
He's dead. You don't have anything to worry about anymore.
Where are you?"
"I'm at a house in East Boston. Eric, I found Scott. He…
Wheeler killed him."
"Jesus. Oh, Laura, I'm so sorry. Listen, just tell me where you are.
I'll come and get you. You can tell me all about everything then."
"I'm at this couple's place not far from the docks.
They picked me up by the road. I spent some time in the water, and I was chilled to the bone, but I'm okay now.
"Tell me the address," he said, feeling through the top desk drawer until he found a pen. "I'll be right over."
"You don't have to. I spoke with your friend Dave an hour or so ago. I thought he would be here by now.
I was just calling to make sure he had left."
"well, he's not here."
"That's strange. Maybe the traffic was-Wait a minute. The doorbell just rang. He might be here now… Yes, yes, it's him.
Eric, listen, I know where that tape is. Scott remembered before he died be right down, Mrs. Pbletti. just tell him to wait a minute. You still there?"
"Oh, I'm here. I'm here. I can't believe you're all right."
"I'm fine. Eric, get this. The tape is in an old tractor trailer right in the lot where we parked that day we went to the docks. We were right next to it!"
"Amazing."
"We're going to stop by and get it on the way back to Boston, Where will you be?"
"I don't know… How about Bernard's apartment?"
"Perfect I'll see you there in an hour or less. And Eric?"
"Yes."
"Eric, I love you."
"I love you, too, kiddo."
Eric hung up and leaned back in his chair, his fists clenched, his arms stretched upward. The nightmare was over.
A few moments of quiet and absolute exultation, and then he pushed back from the desk and stood up.
Below him, in the partially open desk drawer, something caught his eye-Wmething that he must have pulled forward in his search for a pen.
He picked it up and halted it in his hand for a moment, his mind I unwilling to accept what it was and what it meant.
But he knew.
What seemed a lifetime ago, he had stood beside the occupational therapist as she demonstrated an electrolarynx for him.
His heart pounding, Eric pulled on the other desk drawers. Both were locked. Using a letter opener, he forced the first of them open and spilled its contents onto the desk. Tucked among the computer printouts and lab reports was a five-by-seven color photo, clearly taken in a tropical setting. Dave Subarsky, wearing a baggy surfer's bathing suit, stood leaning against a palm tree. Nearly dwarfed inside his arm, her perfect body glistening in the sun, was Rebecca Darden.
Barely able to breathe, Eric forced open the bottom drawer and withdrew something enclosed in a brown paper bag. His hands were shaking as he set the bag on the desk and ripped it open. Lying there, glowering eerily up at him in the dim light of the desk lamp, was the death's-head mask.
With a cry of pain, Eric snatched up a phone book. Paolini?
Paretti? What in the hell did she say their name was? Did she even say the name of their street?
He spent half a minute staring at the columns of names before shoving the book aside. Then he grabbed the hideous mask and bolted from the lab.