She gave a short, sharp scream.
Tom was across the room in an instant. She pointed into the freezer, the cold air swirling inside it like fog on a wet winter's morning. Tom could just about make out what she was pointing at.
An arm. A human arm. And it was holding a rolled-up canvas.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The large H-shaped farmhouse and its rambling assortment of outbuildings nestled in a wide clearing in the middle of the forest. A single dirt track, wide enough for one car, snaked its way over three miles back to the nearest blacktop. Here and there animal tracks materialized and then faded away again, hinting at life without ever fully confirming it, the forest's muffled silence broken only by the call of an occasional eagle knifing through the air far overhead before vanishing into the sun.
Bailey lay in the snow, hidden among the trees, the crisp blue vault of the sky just about visible through their dark, oily branches. He was already cold, and now he could feel the moisture seeping in through the knees of his supposedly waterproof trousers. Viggiano was lying on one side of him, a pair of binoculars glued to his face, with Sheriff Hennessy on the other.
"How many people did you say were in there?" asked Viggiano.
"Twenty to twenty-five," Bailey replied, shifting position to relieve the stiffness in his arms. "Each family's got their own bedroom in the side extensions. They all eat and hang out together in the main building."
"Goddamned cousin-fuckers," Viggiano muttered. Bailey sensed Hennessy shifting uneasily beside him.
Viggiano picked up his radio. "Okay, Vasquez — move in."
Two teams of seven men rose from their hiding places along Phase Line Yellow, their final position for cover and concealment, and emerged running in single file from the trees at opposite ends of the outer perimeter. Still in formation, they vaulted over the low wooden fence and passed Phase Line Green, the point of no return, rapidly moving in on the front and rear entrances to the main building. Once there, they crouched along the side walls to the left of each door.
Using his own set of binoculars, Bailey checked the farmhouse for signs of life from inside — a shadow or a twitching curtain or a hurriedly extinguished light — but detected nothing apart from a few flakes of white paint peeling from the window frames and fluttering in the wind.
Then he ran his binoculars along the two SWAT teams in their helmets, gas masks, and bulletproof vests. Against the whiteness of the snow they looked like large black beetles, the visors on their helmets winking in the afternoon sun. In addition to submachine guns and pistols, one man in each unit was also equipped with a large metal battering ram.
"Okay," came Vasquez's voice over the radio. "Still no sign of activity inside. Alpha team, stand by."
A voice amplified through a bullhorn rang out. "This is the FBI. You are surrounded. Come out with your hands up."
"I said to keep it low-key, Vasquez, you macho idiot," Viggiano muttered under his breath.
Silence from the farmstead.
Again the amplified voice blared out. "I repeat, this is the FBI. You have ten seconds to show yourselves." Still nothing.
Viggiano's radio crackled. "Nothing doing, sir. It's your call."
"Make the breach," Viggiano ordered. "Now." At each entrance the man with the battering ram stepped forward and slammed it into the lock. Both doors splintered on impact and flew open. A second man then lobbed a tear-gas canister through each open doorway. A few seconds later, the canisters exploded, sending dense, choking clouds of gas billowing out of the front and rear of the building.
"GO, GO, GO!" yelled Vasquez as the men disappeared into the house.
From their vantage point, Bailey could hear muffled shouting and the regular pop and fizz of further tear-gas grenades being let off, but nothing else. No screams. No crying children. Certainly not a gunshot. The seconds ticked by, then turned into minutes. This was going better than any of them had expected.
The radio crackled into life. "Sir, this is Vasquez… There's nobody here."
Viggiano pulled himself up into a crouching position and grabbed the radio. "Say again?"
"I said there's nobody here. The place is empty. We searched every room, including the attic. It's deserted and it looks like they left in a hurry. There's half-eaten food on the table. The whole fucking place stinks."
Bailey swapped a confused look with Viggiano and then with Hennessy, who looked genuinely concerned.
"There must be someone there, Vasquez. I'm coming down," Viggiano said.
"Negative, sir. Not until we've secured the whole area."
"I said, I'm coming down. You and your men stay put till I arrive. I want to see this for myself."
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
"Coffee?"
"I need a drink." Tom went to the decanter on the table and poured himself a large glass of cognac. He took a mouthful, swilling it around before swallowing it, and then sat down heavily in one of the armchairs and glanced around him.
This was only the second time he'd been to Archie's place. It was a realization that brought home to Tom how little he knew about his partner — who he was, what his passions were, where his secrets lay — although he now saw that, after the evening's revelations, he could say the same of Dominique. Perhaps that said more about him than either of them.
Despite this, he was able to detect in the room itself some hints of Archie's character. Immediately apparent, for example, was his love of Art Deco, as evidenced by the Emile-Jacques Ruhlmann furniture and the various pieces of Marinot glassware that adorned the mantelpiece. And a collection of Edwardian gaming chips displayed in two framed cases on either side of the door betrayed his fascination with gambling.
More intriguing was the teak coffee table, which Tom immediately identified as a late nineteenth-century Chinese opium bed. The brass fittings around its edge would once have housed bamboo poles to support a silk canopy that preserved its occupant's anonymity.
"Sorry about your game," Tom said, his gaze returning to Archie as he settled into the chair opposite him.
"Don't worry." Archie dismissed the apology with a wave of his hand. "I was losing anyway. Is she all right?" He tilted his head in the direction of the closed bathroom door in the hallway.
"She'll be fine," Tom said. If what he had learned about Dominique's past had confirmed anything, it was her ability to tough it out.
"What the hell happened?"
Tom handed him the rolled-up canvas.
"What's this?"
"Take a look."
Archie unscrolled the painting on the coffee table. He looked up in surprise. "It's the Bellak from Prague." Tom nodded. "Where did you find it?" Archie ran his hands gently over the painting's cracked surface, his fingers brushing against the ridges in the oil paint, pausing over a series of small holes that punctured its surface.
"It was a gift. Somebody kindly left it in my freezer."
"In your what?" Archie wrinkled his forehead as if he hadn't heard properly.
"In my freezer. And it wasn't the only thing they left."
Archie shook his head. "I'm not sure I even want to know."
"There was a human arm in there too. In fact, come to think of it, it's still in there."
For once, Archie was speechless, his eyes bulging in disbelief. When he did manage to get a word out, it was in a strangled, almost angry voice.
"Turnbull."
"What?"
"It's that two-faced bastard Turnbull." Tom laughed. "Come on, Archie. You said he checked out."