Now she smiled in turn. “But I do leave you with something.”
“And what is that?”
“The arcanum. Take it: and may you live a long, long life.”
A silence ensued as they looked at each other.
“We’re finished here,” said Constance, turning away. “Take me to the boat, if you please.”
“I’ll meet you at the boat,” Diogenes said, in a hoarse voice. “I have something to take care of first. In that—” and he laughed suddenly, giddily— “in that vast perpetual torture-house. Let thine eyes stare… Let thine eyes stare…”
Shutting her ears to this, Constance turned and walked around the edge of the cistern and up the stairs into the dusk.
He did not follow. She had no fear of turning her back on him — despite everything, his love for her was still too great to allow him to do her harm. Besides, her own life held little value for her.
She hoped he was setting the charges. A museum like that, the physical embodiment of mental sickness the likes of which the world had rarely seen, should not be allowed to exist. She had destroyed his future; and now he himself would destroy his past. If in the end he had the intestinal fortitude to do it: that was still an open question.
She walked the trail through the buttonwoods and mangroves to the long beach. At its far end, the pier ran out into evening water, dark blue in the twilight. Now that it was over, she felt a deep catharsis — but at the same time an emptiness. Her burning hatred, her thirst for revenge, was over, and it left behind a yawning hole. What would be her life now? Where would she go? What would she do? She could never return to Riverside Drive; with Aloysius dead, that was out of the question. She was utterly alone in the world.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a sound of crashing vegetation. She turned and out of the mangroves came — inexplicably — the figure of a young woman, small, wiry, with streaming blond hair, coming straight at her, silent and focused, knife in one hand and gun in the other, face swollen with bloodlust.
Taken utterly by surprise, Constance tried to dodge the charge as the woman rushed into her, but it was too late and the knife came flashing through the evening light, catching her dress and cutting across her ribs like the scoring of a hot poker. Constance cried out and pivoted, raking her hand across her assailant’s face as the girl skidded in the sand and came back at her, gun raised.
65
Once the sun dipped below the sea horizon, darkness fell rapidly. A small kayak, in dull olive, slid out from behind Johnston Key and embarked on the half-mile crossing of the shallow channel. A. X. L. Pendergast, paddle in hand, headed for the cluster of mangrove islands that lay off the southeastern end of Halcyon Key. The kayak glided over the water as Pendergast struggled with the paddle, trying to get into the rhythm of it, propelling the kayak forward without splashing or tipping over. It was a quiet November evening, herons flying low over the water, their wings making a sound like rustling silk.
He knew he had very little time; the two SWAT helicopters would be arriving from Key West Naval Station in less than twenty minutes. Pendergast had been unable to persuade Longstreet that his sort of massive response would not be effective against a man like Diogenes, that it would play to his strengths, and that it might well end in the death of Constance — whether she was hostage or participant. Pendergast was painfully unaware of her state of mind, but he felt certain she was — whatever else — unbalanced. For these reasons, during the staging process Pendergast had slipped away and “appropriated” a cigarette boat from the South Beach Harbor Marina. It had a carbon-fiber hull and twin engines that, in quiet water, could put out a thousand horsepower and do close to ninety knots. At Upper Sugarloaf Key, he’d exchanged it for a kayak and tropical wet suit from one of several kayak rental shops, now closed for the day. The problem was, he had never used a kayak before and not only was the bloody thing tippy and hard to control, but he kept catching the feathered paddles in the water as he tried to go forward.
Finally, though, he mastered the basic motion. And it was not much later when the little island cluster loomed into sight ahead. They were not actual islands, per se, but clusters of mangroves rising out of the shallow water, their roots forming a tangled mass. Pendergast drew the kayak into a hidden channel in the mangroves and tied it up. After a brief struggle he managed to extract himself silently and stood up in about two feet of water. He reached into the kayak’s cargo compartment and took out a shoulder holster holding his Les Baer, strapped it on, then shrugged into a small black Osprey backpack.
Light was fading from the sky as he waded around the side of the mangrove island. The charts indicated the water was no more than three feet deep, and that proved to be the case as he moved forward, threading his way among mangrove stands. The lightweight black wet suit made him almost invisible in the gathering dark. Emerging from the cluster of mangroves, he kept low as he waded across an area of open, shallow water toward the main island, Halcyon. He emerged from the water at a small, sandy beach and paused there, listening. All was quiet. A trail wound inland, which he knew from satellite images led to the smaller house on the island; he moved along the trail until it opened up in the sandy area surrounding the house. It revealed itself as a caretaker’s cottage, a light glowing in the living room window. Moving stealthily, he came up to the window, raised himself, and peered in. An elderly black man, seated in a wing chair, was reading a thick copy of Ulysses.
Pendergast considered that the gentleman’s quiet evening was about to be disturbed — but not quite yet.
Moving past the window, he consulted his mental map of the island, and chose the trail that led to the big house. The path carried him through a shadowy buttonwood grove and a pair of old gumbo-limbo trees before the rear of the house came into view. The lights were off; it didn’t appear anyone was at home. A black night was falling; the moon would not be rising for a few hours yet. Keeping to the shadows, he ventured onto the back veranda and tested the door. Unlocked. He let himself inside, made a quick reconnaissance of the first floor, then exited the front door, convinced no one was home but that the house was currently occupied. Diogenes and Constance were on the island somewhere; he was sure of that.
He paused. There was a distant sound: a high-pitched cry, echoing from far down the island. Drawing his weapon, he listened intently. And then he heard three shots fired in quick succession.
Seeing the handgun, Constance dove straight for her assailant’s knees, tackling her as the shots passed overhead with a whiff of air. They both fell and rolled in the sand, Constance grabbing the girl’s forearm in both hands and slamming it repeatedly into the sand, knocking the gun loose. But the woman was amazingly strong for her size and managed to wrench free of Constance’s grip; they both lunged for the weapon, the woman dropping her knife in order to get it. They fell upon it at the same time, clawing and scrabbling in the sand, seizing it with all four hands at once. They rolled over and over in the sand, squirming and writhing, first one on top and then the other. The girl tried to bite Constance but she jerked her head away, then bit back, aiming for her face, her teeth sinking into the woman’s cheek, the woman screeching in pain. They rolled again and Constance ended on top, trying to dislodge the gun, while the other woman keened, blood flowing from the bite on her cheek. Just as Constance began to prize the gun free, she left herself open and the attacker hit her in the solar plexus with one knee, knocking the wind from her, and in the same moment wrenched the gun away.