Hayes knew this. He heard what they thought of him. And he knew then that this moment would echo through time for him. This one would be different. In some way he knew that even though he had been whole and painless and powerful for only a short time, he had been what he was always supposed to be, and would be for the rest of his days.
He was watching the firemen tend to the wounded when it left him entirely. The world fell silent around him, dead of all the thoughts and hopes he’d heard so clearly. Now he heard only the indistinct mutters he’d heard all his life. It was like being struck blind.
Hayes sat down on the hood of the fire truck. He huddled in his coat and wiped tears from his eyes and fought to hold on to that feeling, that feeling of being whole, of being unbroken and able.
“Are you all right?” asked one fireman.
“Yes,” said Hayes hoarsely. He stood up. “What else is there to do?”
CHAPTER FORTY
It took a long while for Samantha to get to Garvey’s apartment. In the past few hours the city had come under siege, practically. As Samantha hurried through the gloomy streets she held the pistol Hayes had given her at her side, glad it was there but hoping she would not have to use it. You could hear the din of the crowds and fires far away to the southeast, as if through a radio, and all the sky was smoke. The few cabs that were still out would not stop for anyone and trolleys sat abandoned in their tunnels and stations. Some of the eastern portions of the city had lost power, and there the windows and stoops were lit up with candlelight, little flickering stars spackling the building fronts. It seemed medieval.
When she finally came to Garvey’s apartment she found it deserted. At first she was frightened for him, but then she saw it had not been ransacked. Everything was clean and ordered, as usual. Even the bed had been made. Then she opened the drawer to his desk and found his gun was missing.
“Oh, Donald,” she said sadly.
She thought for a moment, then went east to where the Wering Canal began. She followed the paths down into the canal to where they ran just above the water. As she moved she could hear people running around among the bridges and sidewalks above her, sometimes cackling or shouting threats. She was glad of the solitary darkness down here, underneath the bridges and forgotten piping.
Soon the paths rose up and she was met with a string of small apartments, the first one being Hayes’s safe house. She went to the door and found it unlocked, then thought hard and pushed it open to reveal darkness. She kept the gun pointed down as it swung. There was a sharp click, the sound of a pistol cocking from somewhere back in the room. She shut her eyes, waiting for the bang, yet it never came.
“Goddamn,” said a hoarse voice. “Samantha?”
She cracked one eye and saw a gray electric light fluttering on far back in the room. A figure was hunched on the bed with a pistol pointed to the floor. The light grew to show Garvey staring at her, breathing hard. “What the hell are you doing with a gun?” he asked.
“I could ask the same of you,” she said faintly, pointing at his own weapon.
He looked down at the revolver in his hand as though confused about what it was, then hastily put it on the table. As he stood she ran to him and he caught her in his arms.
“Jesus Christ, Sam,” he said. “Thank God you’re all right.”
“What are you doing here?” she asked. “I went to your apartment, but you weren’t there. What happened?”
“I didn’t think it was safe,” he said. “I waited a while and then I snuck out the window. I think maybe Hayes’s paranoia is catching.”
“I don’t think it’s paranoia if it’s justified,” she said. She let go of him. “Listen, Donald. We found that friend of his. And he told us what Tazz has been doing.”
She went over what she had heard and seen out in the woods. Garvey listened carefully, his body seeming to tighten with each word.
“So Tazz arranged this?” he said softly at the end. “Bringing in these guns and holding hostages?”
“It would seem so. I’m not sure.”
“And then starting this. This fire.”
“I don’t know.”
“Jesus,” he said, and shook his head. “This just got a whole lot nastier. What about that thing you found? Down underground?”
“I don’t know much about that. Hayes seemed to recognize it. It seemed to speak to him. About what, I don’t know. I think he’s handling that. He said he was going up to Kulahee Cave.”
“What the hell? Kulahee Cave? What for?”
“To look for something, he said. I don’t know what.” She glanced around the apartment. “Where are the files?”
“Under the bed. Half of them, at least. I took half in to Collins to show him I meant business.”
“And what did he say?”
“He said to come in. Tomorrow. Or today, depending on whatever the hell time it is. I just hope there’s still a city in the morning.”
“And you still plan to? To go?”
“Yes,” he said. His face seemed starved and thin, like too little skin stretched over too much bone. “Especially now, Sam. I mean… someone has to be accountable. We just need to wait now. Wait until it’s safe to go out.”
Samantha looked out the window at the sheet of smoke pouring off the horizon. “Yes,” she said. “Safe.”
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
Once the fires had died out Hayes crept away and stole a car at the edge of Lynn and drove south and west. He passed out of the city and roved through the dark woodland roads until he came into the hills and the little towns there. He could not remember exactly where it was, so he drove for two more hours until his headlights fell upon an enormous blue-and-gold sign that read: SEE KULAHEE CAVE, BIRTHPLACE OF GENIUS. He stopped the car and stared at the sign, then looked off down the road in the direction the big yellow arrow pointed. He primed the engine and continued.
He kept rising. The car strained on the little dirt roads, but he followed the signs until he came to a small home with a large sign proclaiming it to be the visitor’s center for Kulahee Cave. He got out and walked to the little building, then peered into the dusty windows and tried the knob. There was nothing of interest there save an electric torch on the back stoop.
He took the torch and walked down the path into the pines. He wandered until he came to a small, neat little entrance into the side of a hill. Two wet, mossy stones made the doorway, leaning against each other. He touched them and shone the torch inside. It was empty. Nothing but small signs educating the visitor about the life of Kulahee and his great contributions to society. Whatever he was looking for, it was not here.
He walked out of the cave and looked up into the hillside. He shone the torch up and the beam of light bobbed around the rocks and the brush and the sparse grass.
There was something else. Something else farther up. Buried just under the skin of the earth. He felt it, though he could not understand how.
He began climbing up the hillside. A few hundred feet up he turned and looked out. He saw the smoking remains of Evesden far away, lining the shore. Then he turned and looked at the hills around him.
From this angle it appeared that there had once been some work done here. There was a road on the north face, he saw, but it had long been out of use and was now overgrown. It led to some large basin, unnaturally made, which had been somewhat filled in. As he rose farther he saw there were divots and carvings in the very hills, as if they had been torn apart, clay and stone rivulets running through the earth. A scarred countryside, moonwrought and alien in this strange night.