The Cabinet of Curiosities (Pendergast #3)(78)

Lee signed his name in Chinese; emboldened, it seemed, by the opposition of his wife.

“Now give me the keys and we’re done.”

“Have to make copy of keys.”

“You give me those keys. It’s my apartment now. I’ll make the copies for you at my own expense. I need to start moving in right away.”

Lee reluctantly handed her the keys. Nora took them, folded one of the leases into her pocket, and stood up. “Thank you very much,” she said cheerfully, holding out her hand.

Lee shook it limply. As the door closed, Nora heard another sharp irruption of displeasure from the wife. This one sounded as if it might go on for a long time.





THREE




NORA IMMEDIATELY RETURNED TO THE APARTMENT BELOW. O’SHAUGHNESSY appeared by her side as she unlocked the door. Together, they slipped into the living room, and Nora secured the door with deadbolts and chains. Then she moved to the barred window. Two nails stuck out from either side of the lintel, on which someone had once hung a makeshift curtain. She removed her coat and hung it across the nails, blocking the view from outside.

“Cozy place,” O’Shaughnessy said, sniffing. “Smells like a crime scene.”

Nora didn’t answer. She was staring at the floor, already working out the dig in her mind.

While O’Shaughnessy cased the apartment, Nora made a circuit of the living room, examining the floor, gridding it off, plotting her lines of attack. Then she knelt and, taking a penknife from her pocket—a knife her brother, Skip, had given her for her sixteenth birthday and which she never traveled without—eased it between the edges of two bricks. Slowly, deliberately, she cut her way through the crust of grime and old floor wax. She rocked the knife back and forth between the bricks, gently loosening the stonework. Then, bit by bit, she began to work the closest brick from its socket. In a moment it was free. She pulled it out.

Earth. The damp smell rose toward her nostrils. She poked her finger into it: cool, moist, a little slimy. She probed with the penknife, found it compact but yielding, with little gravel or rocks. Perfect.

She straightened up, looked around. O’Shaughnessy was standing behind her, looking down curiously.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Checking the subflooring.”

“And?”

“It’s old fill, not cement.”

“Is that good?”

“It’s outstanding.”

“If you say so.”

She tapped the brick back into place, then stood. She checked her watch. Three o’clock, Friday afternoon. The Museum would close in two hours.

She turned to O’Shaughnessy. “Look, Patrick, I need you to get up to my office at the Museum, plunder my field locker for some tools and equipment I’ll need.”

O’Shaughnessy shook his head. “Nothing doing. Pendergast said I was to stay with you.”

“I remember. But I’m here now, safe. There must be five locks on that door, I won’t be going anywhere. I’ll be a lot safer here than walking the streets. Besides, the killer knows where I work. Would you rather I went uptown and you waited here?”

“Why go anywhere? What’s the hurry? Can’t we wait until Pendergast is out of the hospital?”

She stared at him. “The clock’s ticking, Patrick. There’s a killer out there.”

O’Shaughnessy looked at her. Hesitated.

“We can’t afford to just sit around. I hope you’re not going to give me a hard time. I need those tools, and I need them now.”

Still, hesitation.

Nora felt her anger rise. “Just do it. Okay?”

O’Shaughnessy sighed. “Double-lock the door behind me, and don’t open it for anybody. Not the landlord, not the fire department, not Santa Claus. Only me. Promise?”

Nora nodded. “I promise.”

“Good, I’ll be back ASAP.”

She drew up a quick list of items, gave O’Shaughnessy directions, and locked the door carefully behind him, shutting out the sound of the growing storm. Slowly, she stepped away from the door, her eyes swiveling around the room, coming to rest at last on the brickwork beneath her feet. One hundred years before, Leng, for all his genius, could not have anticipated the reach of modern archaeology. She would excavate this site with the greatest care, sifting through his old laboratory layer by layer, bringing all her skills to bear in order to capture even the smallest piece of evidence. And there would be evidence, she knew that. There was no such thing as a barren archaeological site. People—wherever they went, whatever they did—always left a record.

Taking out her penknife, she knelt and, once again, began easing the blade between the old bricks. There was a sudden peal of thunder, louder than any that had come before; she paused, heart beating wildly with terror. She forced her feelings back under control, shaking her head ruefully. No killer was going to stop her from finding out what was beneath this floor. She wondered briefly what Brisbane would say to this work. The hell with him, she thought.

She turned the penknife over in her hands, closed it with a sigh. All her professional life, she had unearthed and catalogued human bones without emotion—with no connection to the ancient skeletons beyond a shared humanity. But Mary Greene had proven utterly different. There, outside the girl’s house, Pendergast had thrown Mary Greene’s short life and awful death into sharp relief. For the first time, Nora realized she had excavated, handled, the bones of someone that she could understand, grieve for. More and more, Pendergast’s tale of Mary Greene was sinking in, despite her attempts to keep a professional distance. And now, she had almost become another Mary Greene.