Mallick drew close enough for Jacob to see the object in his hand.
It was a knife.
“You’re doing the right thing, Jacob Lev,” Mallick said.
“The balance of justice demands it,” Schott said.
“It’ll be quick,” Subach said.
“Merciful.”
“Necessary.”
“Correct.”
They kept coming closer, speaking in turn, mesmerizing him, and Jacob watched the glint of the knife, a brand-new blade fitted onto an old wooden handle. He knew how it would feel when they put it into his hands — how comfortable. He looked at Mai and at the tall men and over the lawn.
Pernath slipped into the trees.
“Jacob Lev,” Mallick said. “Look at me.”
Jacob released Mai’s hands.
The tall men cried out, helpless.
Her smile was a sweet and sour mix of gratitude and disappointment, and she said, “Forever,” and sprang up into the air.
The three tall men howled their displeasure and rushed forth.
It was useless: she had already changed, a black buzzing dot that slipped through their large, clumsy fingers, spiraling up to freedom. Jacob watched her ascend.
Silence.
The three tall men turned on him, showing new and terrifying aspects, and Jacob was afraid, drawing his merits around him like a coat of armor to protect himself from their wrath.
Paul Schott rolled his boulder shoulders contemptuously. Mel Subach pursed his wet thick lips. Mike Mallick snorted gales and said, “You have done a great wrong.”
“We needed you,” Subach said.
“You failed us.”
“A great wrong.”
“He’s like her,” Schott said. “He’s just like her.”
They crowded him, drawing in on him, teeth gnashing, eyes burning like coals as they expanded to a furious chorus: three to forty-five to seventy-one, two hundred thirty-one, six hundred thirteen, eighteen thousand, a thousand by a thousand, swelling to twelve by thirty by thirty by thirty by thirty by thirty by thirty by three hundred sixty-five thousand myriads.
And Jacob seized the halves of his mind and forced them back together, rising up under his own strength.
The hordes shrank back, leaving a trio of middle-aged cops in bad suits and cheap ties.
Mallick’s white hair in frizzy tufts. Subach’s gut straining his shirt. Schott holding his hands up as though Jacob in his righteous indignation would annihilate all of them.
And Jacob spoke, and he said, “Please get the hell out of my way.”
He pushed through their ranks and ran to collect the abandoned shotgun.
“You don’t know what you’ve done,” Mallick called. “You don’t know.”
Jacob picked up the gun and pumped a shell. He said, “I know what I’m doing.”
In the orchard it was windless, gloomy, and still. He could not see well, but his mind spread wide to welcome new sensations: the strivings of insects in the ground below, fearful prey taking refuge in the underbrush, the collective spirit of all living things.
Jacob stalked the soldierly rows, fixed on the sound of labored breathing coming from a stand of fig trees.
A watery gray light in the shape of a man slumped on the ground, propped against a tree trunk.
Jacob raised the gun. “Lie down on the ground and don’t move.”
Pernath didn’t respond. For a moment, Jacob thought he was dead. But as he drew near, he saw the architect’s chest fluttering, the gray outline moving with it.
“Down on the ground,” Jacob said. “Now.”
Pernath’s head rolled toward Jacob and he sighed. His arm whipped over, taking his torso with it, and his body elongated and he sank a shard of glass into Jacob’s thigh.
Jacob stumbled back, a groan swelling in his throat as he tripped over a fig root and the shotgun flew from his hands. He hit the ground and pain ballooned through his lower body and he began kicking at the dirt, scrabbling in the direction of the gun.
He reached it and saw that Pernath was making no effort to come after him.
The architect simply sat there, his head lolling, a contented smile on his lips.
Jacob looked down at the shard. At least eight inches long, half of that buried in his quadriceps. Blood dyeing the fabric of his jeans. Shivering, nauseated, he stripped off his shirt and tied his leg off at the groin. He slid a broken branch between the shirt and his leg, and twisted as hard as he could to cut off the flow of blood. Another wave of nausea coursed through him. He tamped it down and picked up the shotgun, approaching Pernath in a wide circle.
Pernath’s hands were loose and open in his lap. His eyes were half shut.
Jacob said, “Reggie Heap. Terrence Florack. Claire Mason. Anyone else I need to know about?”
Pernath smiled wider, baring blood-rimmed teeth. Blood bubbled from his nostrils. The mucoid gray light surrounding him flickered. He was dying without regrets. Jacob thought about what he could say to take that away from him.
In the end he said nothing. There was nothing to say. His tourniquet had soaked through and he was starting to feel faint again.
He pressed the end of the barrel against Pernath’s throat and leaned down with all his weight. Pernath’s Adam’s apple imploded. It sounded like a wet cardboard box getting stomped on. His eyes bugged and he suffocated and fought.
Jacob counted to ten and released the pressure, allowed Pernath a few thin breaths. Then he bore down again for another ten count.
He repeated the process eleven more times, once for each of the victims he knew about. He could hear the voices of the tall men coming through the trees, calling his name. Jacob. He placed the end of the shotgun on Pernath’s throat. Jacob, where are you. He pressed down one last time for good luck.
Jacob. Jacob.
He pulled the trigger, severing Pernath’s head from his body.
The recoil kicked Jacob back. He was falling as he answered them. Here I am.
Chapter fifty-six
The nurse came into his room to announce a visitor. Assuming it was his father, Jacob waved permission and continued spooning oatmeal. The curtain shuffled aside and Divya Das stepped in.
He sat up, wiping his mouth. “Hey.”
She looked around for a place to sit, did not approach the unmade cot next to Jacob’s bed.
“My dad’s been sleeping here. Go ahead. He won’t mind.”
Sam’s copy of the Zohar lay on the pillow. She moved it to the nightstand and sat down, setting her orange bowling ball bag on her knees.
Jacob said, “I take it we’re going dancing.”
She smiled. “How are you feeling?”
Jacob had no memory of his first night in the hospital. He’d sneaked a look at his chart and learned he’d walked into the emergency room on his own, ranting and raving. He assumed that Mallick, Subach, and Schott had dropped him off and left. The clinical notes said it had taken two doctors and three orderlies to wrestle him down. Now they had him on an array of barbiturates, along with B vitamins to ease his detox and IV fluids to counteract blood loss. The wound in his leg had been sutured neatly.
He was no longer having green dreams, which offered relief but also pangs of melancholy. His world appeared astringent and flat. Institutional linoleum, smudged bumper rails, oppressive overlighting. No matter how much he slept, he felt tired. He was relaxed and bored and doped up, unable to care very much about anything.
He felt better and worse, trapped and free, blessed and punished in equal measure.
He said, “Sore.”
“May I?”
He nodded.
She lifted a corner of the thin hospital blanket, revealing his bandaged thigh.
“Missed the femoral artery by a quarter of an inch,” he said.