He heard another sound then, from behind. He didn't look up immediately. Ginny was enough. He was already trying to work out whether he had to shoot her, to put her out of her misery — or out of his misery, perhaps — or whether she would survive the journey back to civilization, and what would be left to save if she did. He didn't think he could face another such decision.
He took too long working it out. It wasn't another child behind him. It was Harold Davids, and he shot Bobby in the back of the head.
Ginny Wilkins's legs were still moving, still slowly thrashing and turning a thousand miles from her home and those who missed her, for several minutes after Robert Nygard was dead.
Zandt was now oblivious to the rain, and had run through the last house without looking in any of the rooms. He was now just following the trail of bones, and he hadn't said anything to me for five minutes.
I hurried after him. The trail was no longer playing with us, proudly showing us what we were amidst, but merely leading us up the centre of the path. A small square, marked out in metacarpals, a patella in its centre. A long snakelike line of vertebrae, laid out at two-foot intervals, in the right order, for all I knew. The Upright Man must have set most of the trail well in advance, only adding the first pile of ribs at the last minute, when he knew we were here to be led. The rest of it had taken time, had been done with care. The killer hadn't gotten us out of Davids's house for our sakes, but for his: he'd already prepared a meeting, and he didn't want his work going to waste. He had, in one way or another, been directing our behaviour for far longer than that.
Finally a pair of clavicles, arranged in an inverted V, with the second femur used to turn it into an arrow. An arrow that pointed up the last fork of the path, to a house thirty yards away.
I caught up with Zandt and grabbed him by the shoulder.
'We're not going in there,' I said.
He ignored me, shrugging off my hand and striding up the path to the steps that led up to the house's terrace.
I grabbed his arm. 'He's going to be waiting for us, John — you know that. He's already killed the girl and he's going to kill us, and then he'll go find the others and kill them too. I know you cared about this girl but I'm not going to let you
Zandt swung round and smacked me in the face.
I fell heavily backward onto the wet path, more shocked than hurt, and began to wonder if I was
missing something. Zandt hadn't even seemed to see me, hadn't looked as if he had any idea who I was.
I slipped and struggled to my feet, and ran after him.
Zandt walked heavily up the steps. Unlike the other houses, this had a door right in the centre of the front elevation. The steps of the terrace led straight to it, as if pouring him down a long, dark funnel. His jaw seemed to want to retreat back into his neck, as if it was only the spasming of his face and skin that was keeping it in place.
There was something lying at the top of the steps.
This time I didn't try to grab hold of him, but walked beside, accompanying him. I was only a step away when Zandt reached the final piece of the trail.
A girl's sweater, now sodden with rain. But neatly folded, and with a name stitched into the front. The sweater was a peach colour. The name was Karen Zandt.
35
Something told Nina not to say anything. Not to make a sound when she heard the door to the lobby softly open. Her chest hurt, and the pain was spreading through her body, grinding and clawing through her stomach, down her right arm to where she held the gun. She didn't want to think about what it would have been like had the bullet hit her lower down.
The door swished shut. A couple of footsteps and still nobody said her name. She knew then that Bobby was dead. She couldn't see that part of the room without shoving herself up and turning her head, a movement that would have been both painful and fatally revealing. She tried to sink into the big soft chair. The footsteps continued, along with another sound. A rolling sound. Then something was put on the floor. It was quiet for a moment.
'I know you're here,' somebody said.
Nina's stomach lurched, and she almost said something. Almost confessed. Almost admitted that yes, here she was, as for a while she had been made to do as a child. But that was a long time ago, and now her lips clamped shut and she gripped the gun as tightly as she could. Her hand felt like it wasn't working
as well as it should.
'They wouldn't have left Bobby here,' the voice said, 'unless there was someone to look after.'
Footsteps. Exploratory. He didn't know where she was. But she'd be in here, and he'd do what he had been told. He usually had. Though on the outside he looked strong, capable, a leader, in reality he had always followed. He had been guilty and trapped for so long, little else seemed to make sense. Hopkins's father had done that to him. Taken a quiet, reasonable life and turned it into a mess. You couldn't help liking Don, in the old days. You were pulled in the slipstream. You met at his house, drank his beer, wound up with his ideas in your head. Wound up with a life you didn't recognize, and too old to do much about it. Wound up hating the follower in yourself, and knowing who to blame.
'Maybe you're already dead,' he said, 'but I don't think so. Anyway, I have to make sure.'
Nina tried to slip lower, but it hurt. And any move big enough to make a difference would make a noise on the leather.
'Bobby's dead,' the man said. His voice was old, but confident. It left no room for doubt. 'And soon the others will be. We could leave you. But loose ends will be securely tied, and that is my job.'
The footsteps were now replaced by a sliding sound, as the man carefully progressed a few inches at a time, masking the direction of his approach. Nina was so frightened she started to cry, an involuntary response from deep inside and long ago, a response she wasn't even aware of.
She slowly pushed her left arm behind her, bracing it against the side of the seat. She pulled her feet inward, a millimetre at a time. Her hand was shaking, and the nerves within her arm felt as if they were on fire.' An auspicious night to die,' the man said quietly. His voice was a little closer now. 'This is not the end. Not at all. This is a new beginning. A clean new world that starts with a bang.' He laughed briefly.
'Actually, that's pretty good.'
The sliding sound stopped.
Nina pushed with everything she had. Her body slumped forward out of the chair. She was awkward, locked up, and toppled forward, crashing down onto the glass table in front of her. She knew she'd screwed it up, but she now could see the shadow over to her right.
Davids nodded. 'Ah. There you are.'
She hauled her hand up and pulled the trigger. Once, twice, three times.
There was only one shot in return, and it didn't hit her.
She waited a moment that lasted for ever, waited for the second shot. It didn't come. She pulled a
knee forward, pushed herself up, turned. On the floor six feet away was a body. Now that she was moving, the prospect of further movement
seemed almost credible, albeit bathed in a stunning white light of pain.