His northbound train was approaching. He could hear it in the tunnel. He could see the light growing larger. There was a little moment of terror before the train pulled in and blocked her from sight. The woman’s mouth opened wide and round. The brakes of the approaching train screamed. Her arm shot up like a referee of the game. And then she was lost from sight again, the entire platform blotted out by the tons of screaming, steaming metal.
He boarded his train, tired and shaken sober. He never looked back through the windows of the car, but as the train picked up speed, he wondered if she looked for him in these quick squares of light.
The cellular telephone rang. Andrew opened his eyes to the dark canopy of raincoats. When at last he had the phone in his hand, he said, “Hello?”
“This mass is for a woman who was brutally murdered,” said a man’s voice. In the litany that followed, Andrew realized it was a priest saying mass for the dead dancer.
Mozart and a ghost choir spilled out of the magical telephone and filled his senses. Moving along on his knees, he crawled out from the cover of his canopy and looked up to the ceiling of the sky with its faint sprinkling of stars. Mozart’s Requiem filled a cathedral of his mind’s making. Hooded monks paraded past his eyes, candles became torches, and there was blood on the altar and blood on the floor, a river of it winding and washing through the belly of the church, churning beneath his feet.
Aubry crawled down the aisle under the falling axe. Her heart still beating with seconds of life. Everything was pulsating red. The exposed organs beat out their independent lives and deaths as they failed her, each one in turn.
He reached out his hand to her too late. Her face was gone to dark sockets and a death’s-head grin. He knelt on broken glass in shock beyond pain. And there was a new fear in his eyes, which were blurring with tears, as he stared up at the final horror of the night-the stars. In a suicide of heaven, the stars were going out.
And now, all the brighter lights of New York City also failed him as he pitched forward in a faint.
CHAPTER 9
It was past two in the afternoon when Rlker walked in the door, his eyes closing to narrow slits. He set his small bag of belongings on the coffee table, and sank down on the couch in the front room. He laid the assault rifle on the floor and slid it underneath the skirt of the slipcover and away from his host’s sight.
“Thanks, Charles. I really appreciate this.”
“My pleasure.” Charles was standing at the hall closet, pulling blankets and sheets from the top shelf. He was also making rapid calculations on the toll of sleep deprivation upon a man of Riker’s age, who drank too much and smoked too much. There were slowed reflexes to consider, and then-
“Mallory’s holed up at my place,” said Riker. “I’m looking at maybe six hours of sleep before I take the night shift with Andrew.”
“Couldn’t someone else do it?”
“It’s not a problem.”
Charles wondered if he had offended Riker, for it suddenly occurred to him-he would never have made that suggestion to Mallory. Oh, and there was one more thing to worry about. He tucked the bedding under one arm and searched the mantelpiece until he found the detective’s card. He handed it to Riker. “About an hour ago, this man came by with two officers in uniform. They were looking for Mallory.”
Riker held the card out at arm’s length. “Kinkaid? You didn’t tell this cop anything useful, did you?”
“Certainly not,” said Charles, as though cooperating with the authorities were something a gentleman would never consider. “But why does she have to hide? You don’t think Blakely would really harm her, do you?”
“No, not now he wouldn’t. He might want to kill her, but when he resigned this afternoon, they made him turn in his gun. And Robin Duffy didn’t leave him with enough money to hire a shooter.”
“So it’s over?”
“The business with Blakely? Yeah. Now she’s only in trouble with the commissioner.” Riker held up the business card. “This cop, Kinkaid? He’s attached to the commissioner’s office. Beale wants to have a little chat with her about the proper form for arresting suspects while cameras are rolling. She made the evening news last night.”
“But the worst is over, and Mallory is all right?”
“She’s fine. She called Coffey this morning. He got on her case right away. Told her it was her lucky day that Oren Watt wasn’t pressing charges for abuse of power, and if she ever pulled a stunt like that again, he’d suspend her in a heartbeat.”
“But under the circumstances-”
“He had to rag her. If he didn’t, she’d walk all over him. I taught him that.” Riker obviously took some pride in this. “Coffey still has a lot to learn, but he does learn fast. So then Coffey tells her, real sarcastic, it might be nice if she showed up for a meeting once in a while. And the kid says, ‘Why should I? All the important meetings are in the men’s room.’ Coffey told me that in the men’s room of Peggy’s Bar.”
Charles carried his bundle of sheets and blankets to the spare bedroom. When he returned to the front room, his houseguest was sitting up straight enough, but the man was fast asleep.
Charles gently lowered Riker’s body down, and then lifted his feet to the cushion and began to untie the shoelaces. When he was done with the pillows and quilts, one would have to admit that Riker’s own mother could not have done a better job of tucking him in.
Quinn stood by the large window in the dining room, watching the river rolling by, no longer aware of the Chopin etude in the background. In a polite ripple of baroque chimes, an antique mantel clock consulted with him about the passing time. His first appointment of the evening was with Gregor Gilette.
There was nothing he could do to ease the pain which Emma Sue Hollaran had caused, but he could do something to Emma Sue. He had tried to stop her, even threatened her, and the woman’s own stupidity had foiled him. She truly did believe she was invincible, and she would continue to believe that until she lay crushed beneath the wheels of the machinery he had put into motion. Too late for Gregor, however. The damage could not be undone. Revenge was only the next best thing, but he found it a necessary thing.
Quinn packed his sword and his mask in preparation to meet with Mallory later in the evening. As he packed the formal white fencer’s uniform, he planned out Mallory’s future as he would a military campaign. It was a strange warfare, this, for all his strategy was toward embracing the enemy, and preventing her from ever leaving him.
He avoided his reflection in the mirror above the mantelpiece as he zipped up his fencing bag.
Other women had come to him, not believing that he could care for them. Nothing in his eyes ever led them on, ever promised them anything. They had come to him without expectations; they left him without rancor. And it was always they who left him. For even when he did care for a woman, even when she moved him, his eyes were disbelieved. The woman would put all her faith in the unintended counterfeit contempt of his expression, and having a better opinion of herself, she would leave him.
It would be different with Mallory. She would never look outside herself for affirmation of her worth. She was made for the battle between man and woman. She promised an exciting tension that would last, always challenging, never abating, for she was young and had little need for rest. Tonight, he would beat her in the fencing match, and she would make him pay for that.
He smiled, or thought he did. The expression never made the translation to his eyes, and so it was unrealistic, unbelievable.
He wanted Mallory more than he had ever wanted anyone. He wondered if she knew that. No, of course she didn’t. He could depend on his cold eyes to never give away an honest emotion. But if he told her what she was to him, would he be believed? No. His eyes would always foil him. Perhaps one day he would tell her in the dark.