“Let me introduce my Lieutenants,” Mephisto said. He waved at the hulking figure that stood behind them. “This is Little Harry. Got into horse pretty young. Took to petty thievery to support the habit. One thing led to another, and he ended up in Attica. They taught him quite a lot there. When he got out, he couldn’t find a job. Luckily, he wandered below and joined our community before he could fall back into bad habits.”
Mephisto pointed at the slow-moving figure by the fire. “That’s Boy Alice. Used to teach English at a Connecticut prep school. Things went sour. He lost his job, got divorced, ran out of money, began hitting the bottle. He gravitated to the shelters and soup kitchens. That’s where he heard about us. As for Tail Gunner, he got back from ‘Nam only to find that the country he’d defended didn’t want anything to do with him.”
Mephisto wiped his mouth on the newspaper. “That’s more than you need to know,” he said. “We’ve left the past behind, as you must have. So you’re here about the killings?”
Pendergast nodded. “Three of our people have been missing since last week, and the rest are getting concerned. We heard your call for alliance against the Wrinklers. The headless killers.”
“Word is getting around. Two days ago I heard from the Philosopher. Know of him?”
Pendergast hesitated for just a second. “No,” he replied.
Mephisto’s eyes narrowed. “Odd,” he said. “He’s my counterpart, leader of the communities beneath Grand Central.”
“Perhaps some day we shall meet,” Pendergast said. “For now, I need to take word back, reassurances for my people. What can you tell me about the killings and the killers?”
“They started almost a year ago,” Mephisto replied in a silky hiss. “First was Joe Atcitty. We found his body dumped outside the Blockhouse, head gone. Next, Dark Annie disappeared. Then Master Sergeant. It went on and on. Some we found. Most we didn’t. Later, we got word from the Manders that deep activity had been detected.”
Pendergast frowned. “Manders?”
Again, Mephisto shot a suspicious glance toward him. “Never heard of the Manders?” He cackled. “You ought to stretch your legs more, get out, see the neighborhood, MayorWhitey. The Manders live below us. Never come up, never use lights. Like salamanders. Versteht?They said there were signs of movement belowthem.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “They said the Devil’s Attic had been colonized.”
D’Agosta looked questioningly at Pendergast. But the FBI agent merely nodded. “The lowest level of the city,” he said, as if to himself.
“The very lowest,” Mephisto replied.
“Have you been down there?” Pendergast asked with deliberate casualness.
Mephisto flashed him a look as if to imply even he wasn’t that crazy.
“But you think these people are behind the killings?”
“I don’t think it. I knowit. They’re beneath us, right now.” Mephisto smiled grimly. “But I’m not sure I’d use the word people.”
“What do you mean?” Pendergast said, the casualness gone from his voice.
“Rumor,” Mephisto said very quietly. “They say they’re called Wrinklers for a reason.”
“Which is—?”
Mephisto did not answer.
Pendergast sat back on his crate. “So what can we do?”
“What can we do?” The smile vanished from Mephisto’s face. “We can wake up this city, that’s what we can do! We can show them that it won’t just be the mole people, the invisible people, who die!”
“And if we do that?” Pendergast asked. “What can the city do about these Wrinklers?”
Mephisto thought a moment. “Like any infestation. Get them where they live.”
“Easier said than done.”
Mephisto’s hard, glittery gaze landed on the FBI agent. “You got a better idea, Whitey?” he hissed.
Pendergast was silent. “Not yet,” he said at last.
= 24 =
ROBERT WILLSON, librarian at the New York Historical Society, looked at the other occupant of the map room with irritation. Odd-looking guy: somber black suit, pale cat’s eyes, blond-white hair combed severely back from a high forehead. Annoying, too. Annoying as hell. He’d been there all afternoon, making demands and throwing the maps askew. Every time Willson turned back to his computer to resume work on his own pet project—the definitive monograph on Zuñi fetishes—the man would be up, asking more questions.
As if on cue, the man got out of his chair and glided over noiselessly. “Pardon?” he said in his polite but insistent mint-julep drawl.
Willson glanced up from the screen. “Yes?” he snapped.
“I hate to trouble you again, but it’s my understanding that the Vaux and Olmstead plans for Central Park called for canals to drain the Central Park swamps. I wonder if I could look at those plans?”
Willson compressed his lips. “Those plans were rejected by the Parks Commission,” he replied. “They’ve been lost. A tragedy.” He turned back to his screen, hoping the man would take the hint. The real tragedy would be if he didn’t get back to his monograph.
“I see,” the visitor said, not taking the hint at all. “Then tell me, how werethe swamps drained?”
Willson sat back in his chair exasperatedly. “I should have thought it was common knowledge. The old Eighty-sixth Street aqueduct was used.”
“And there are plans for the operation?”
“Yes,” said Willson.
“May I see them?”
With a sigh, Willson got up and made his way through the heavy door back into the stacks. It was, of course, in its usual mess. The room managed to be both vast and claustrophobic, metal shelves reaching two stories into the gloom, tottering with rolled maps and moldering blueprints. Willson could almost feel the dust settling on his bald scalp as he scanned the arcane lists of numbers. His nose began to itch. He found the correct location, pulled the ancient maps and carried them back to the cramped reading room. Why do people always request the heaviest maps,he wondered to himself as he emerged from the stacks.
“Here they are,” Willson said, placing them on the mahogany counter. He watched as the man took them over to his desk and began looking them over, jotting notes and making sketches in a small leather-bound notebook. He’s got money,Willson thought sourly. No professor could afford a suit like that.
A heavenly quiet descended on the map room. At last, he could get some work done. Bringing some yellowed reference photographs out of his desk, Willson began making changes to his chapter on clan imagery.
Within minutes, he felt the visitor standing behind him again. Willson looked up again silently.
The man nodded at one of Willson’s photographs. It showed a nondescript stone carved in an abstract representation of an animal, a small piece of sinew holding a flint point to its back. “I think you’ll find that particular fetish, which I see you’ve labeled as a puma, is in fact a grizzly bear,” the man said.
Willson looked at the pale face and the faint smile, wondering if this was some kind of a joke. “Cushing, who collected this fetish in 1883, specifically identified it as puma clan,” he replied. “You can check the reference yourself.” Everybody was an expert these days.
“The grizzly fetish,” the man continued undeterred, “always has a spearpoint strapped to its back, as this one does. The puma fetish has an arrowhead.”
Willson straightened up. “Just what is the difference, may I ask?”
“You kill a puma with a bow and arrow. To kill a grizzly, you must use a spear.”
Willson was silent.
“Cushing was wrong on occasion,” the man added gently.
Willson shuffled his manuscript together and laid it aside. “Frankly, I would prefer to trust Cushing over someone…” He left the sentence unfinished. “The library will be closing in one hour,” he added.