Margo stared at the shadowed figure in the chair, his features invisible in the darkness, the only observable movement the slight flexing of thick fingers. The chanting ebbed, then swelled again, taking on an unmistakable undertone of anticipation. The figure raised his hand suddenly, and the chanting ceased in an instant. Then, as he leaned forward, the flickering firelight slanted across his face.
For Margo, it was as if time itself were suspended for a brief, terrible instant. She forgot the fear, the aching knees, the detonation timers relentlessly ticking in the dark corridors above her head. The man who sat on the litter made of lashed human bone—dressed in the familiar gabardine pants and paisley tie—was Whitney Frock.
She opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came.
“Oh, my God,” Smithback said behind her.
Frock gazed across the assembled throng, his expression impassive, devoid of emotion. The huge hall was deathly silent.
Slowly, Frock’s eyes swept forward to the prisoners before him. He looked at D’Agosta, then Smithback, then Pendergast. When his gaze reached Margo, he started suddenly. Something kindled in his eyes.
“My dear,” he said. “How truly unfortunate. Frankly, I didn’t expect to see you as science advisor for this little outing, and I am indeed sorry. No—it’s true, and you needn’t look at me like that. Remember how, when it came time to get rid of that meddlesome Irishman, I spared yourlife. Against my own better judgment, I might add.”
Margo, reeling in shock and disbelief, could not speak.
“However, it can’t be helped.” The flicker in Frock’s eyes died away. “As for the rest of you, welcome. I think some introductions are in order. For example, who is this hirsute gentleman with the ragged clothes?” He turned to Mephisto. “He has the face of a wild animal caught in a trap, which I suppose is exactly what he is. One of the natives, I imagine, brought along as a guide. I will ask you again, what is your name?”
There was a silence.
He turned to one of his lieutenants. “Cut his throat if he doesn’t answer. We can’t tolerate rudeness, now, can we?”
“Mephisto,” came the sullen reply.
“Mephisto, indeed! A little learning is a dangerous thing. Especially in a derelict. But ‘Mephisto.’ Really, how banal. No doubt meant to strike fear into the hearts of your scabby little followers. You don’t look like much of a devil to me, just a pathetic, drug-addled bum. I should not complain, however: you and your likes have been exceedingly useful, I will admit. Perhaps you will find an erstwhile friend amongst my children…” He swept his hand across the gathered ranks of Wrinklers. Mephisto drew himself up, saying nothing.
Margo stared at her former professor. This was like no Frock she had ever seen before. He had always been diplomatic and soft-spoken. Now there was an arrogance, a cold lack of emotion, that chilled her even beyond the fear and confusion she felt.
“And Smithback, the journalist!” Frock sneered. “Were you brought along to document this intended victory over my children? Pity you won’t be able to tell the real outcome in that scandal sheet you write for.”
“The jury’s still out on that,” Smithback said defiantly.
Frock chuckled.
“Frock, what the hell is all this?” D’Agosta said as he struggled. “You’d better explain, or—”
“Or what?” Frock turned toward the police officer. “I always thought you a crude, ill-bred fellow. But I’m surprised it’s necessary to point out you are in no position to make demands of me.Are they disarmed?” he asked one of the hooded figures closest to him, who nodded slowly in reply.
“Check that one again,” Frock said, pointing to Pendergast. “He’s a tricky devil.”
Pendergast was hauled roughly to his feet, searched, then shoved back to his knees. Frock slowly scanned them with his eyes, smiling coldly.
“That was your wheelchair, wasn’t it?” Pendergast asked quietly, indicating the platform.
Frock nodded. “My bestwheelchair.”
Pendergast said nothing. Margo turned to Frock, finding her voice at last. “Why?” she asked simply. Frock looked at Margo for a moment, then signaled his lieutenants. The cloaked forms moved into position behind the huge cauldrons. Frock stood up, jumped down from the sedan chair, and approached the FBI agent on foot.
“ Thisis why,” he replied.
Then he stood proudly, lifting his arms high above his head.
“ As I am cured, so shall you be cured!” he cried in a clear, ringing voice. “ As I am made whole, so shall you be made whole!”
A loud answering cry came from the assembly. The cry went on and on, and Margo realized it was not an inarticulate cry, but a kind of programmed guttural response. The creatures are speaking,she thought. Or trying to.
Slowly, the cry died away and the chanting resumed. The deep, monotonous beat of the drums began again, and the lines of Wrinklers came shuffling forward toward the semicircle of cauldrons. The lieutenants brought delicate clay goblets out from within the hut. Margo stared, her mind unable to connect the beautifully formed implements with the hideous ceremony. One by one, the creatures came forward, accepting the steaming cups in horny-nailed hands, drawing them up into their hoods. She turned away, repelled by the thick slurping sounds that followed.
“ Thisis why,” Frock repeated, turning toward Margo. “Don’t you see? Don’t you see how thiswould be worth anything, anything in the world?” There seemed to be something almost imploring in his tone.
For a minute, Margo didn’t understand. Then it hit her: the ceremony, the drug, the wheelchair pieces, Pendergast’s reference to the Lourdes shrine with its miraculous healing powers.
“So you could walk,” she said quietly. “All this, just so you could walk again.”
Instantly, Frock’s face hardened. “How easy for you to judge,” he said. “You, who have walked all your life and nevergiven it a second thought. How can you begin to know what it is like not to walk? Bad enough to be crippled from birth, but to know the gift and to have it snatched away, when the greatest achievements of your life still lie before you?” He looked at her. “Of course, to you I was always just Dr. Frock. Dear old Dr. Frock, how unpleasantfor him to contract polio in that African bush village in the Ituri Forest. How unfortunatehe had to give up his field work.”
He brought his face closer to hers. “Field work was my life,” he hissed.
“So you built upon Dr. Kawakita’s work,” Pendergast said. “You finished what he started.”
Frock snorted. “Poor Gregory. He came to me in desperation. As you surely know, he’d started taking the drug prematurely.” Frock waggled his finger in an uncharacteristically cynical gesture. “Tut, tut. And to think I’d always taught him to follow strict laboratory procedure. But the boy was simply too eager. He was arrogant and had visions of immortality. He took the drug before all the unpleasant side effects of the reovirus had been negated. Due to the rather, ah, extremephysical changes that resulted, he needed help. A surgical procedure had left him with a plate in his back. It was beginning to cause him acute pain. He was hurt, lonely, and scared. Who could he turn to but me, in my stifling, wasting retirement? And, naturally, I was able to help him. Not only in removing the plate, but in further purifying the drug. But of course, his cruelexperimentation”—here Frock spread his hands at the multitude—“his selling of the drug—was his demise. When his subjects realized what he had done to them, they killed him.”
“So you purified the drug,” Pendergast said, “and took it yourself.”