Douglas Preston - Brimstone

"Nice neighborhood," said D'Agosta, looking around at the six-story brick tenements festooned with rusting fire escapes. Threadbare laundry hung from dozens of clotheslines strung between the buildings.

"Indeed."

D'Agosta nodded in the direction of the three rummies, who had gone back to passing around a bottle of Night Train. "Wonder if those three know anything."

Pendergast gestured for him to proceed.

"What? Me?"

"Of course. You are a man of the street, you speak their language."

"If you say so." D'Agosta glanced around again, then headed into the package store. He returned a few minutes later with a bottle in a brown paper bag.

"A gift for the natives, I see."

"I'm just taking a page from your book."

Pendergast raised his eyebrows.

"Remember our little journey underground during the subway massacre case? You brought a bottle along as currency."

"Ah, yes. Our tea party with Mephisto."

Bottle in hand, D'Agosta ambled up to the stoop, pausing before the men. "How are you boys today?"

Silence.

"I'm Sergeant D'Agosta, and this is my associate, Special Agent Pendergast. FBI."

Silence.

"We're not here to bust anyone's balls, gentlemen. I'm not even going to ask your names. We're just looking for any information on one Ranier Beckmann, who lived here several years back."

Three pairs of rheumy eyes continued staring at him. One of the men hawked up a gobbet of phlegm and deposited it gently between his badly scuffed shoes.

With a rustle, D'Agosta removed the bottle from the paper bag. He held it up. The light shone through it, illuminating pieces of fruit floating in an amber-colored liquid.

The oldest wino turned to the others. "Rock 'n' Rye. The cop has class."

"Beware of cops bearing gifts."

D'Agosta glanced at Pendergast, who was looking on from a few paces back, hands in his pockets. He turned back. "Look, guys, don't make a fool out of me in front of the feds, okay? Please."

The oldest man shifted. "Now that you've said the magic word, have a seat."

D'Agosta perched gingerly on the sticky steps. The man reached out a hand for the bottle, took a swig, spat out a piece of fruit, passed it on. "You too, friend," he said to Pendergast.

"I would prefer to stand, thank you."

There were some chuckles.

"My name's Jedediah," said the oldest drunk. "Call me Jed. You're looking for who again?"

"Ranier Beckmann," said Pendergast.

Two of the drunks shrugged, but after a moment, Jed nodded slowly. "Beckmann. Name rings a bell."

"He lived in room 4C. Died of cancer almost ten years ago."

Jed thought another moment, took a swig of the Rock 'n' Rye to lubricate the brain cells. "I remember now. He's the guy who used to play gin rummy with Willie. Willie's gone, too. Man, did they argue. Cancer, you say?" He shook his head.

"Did you know anything about his life? Marriage, former addresses, that sort of thing?"

"He was a college-educated fellow. Smart. Nobody ever came to visit him, didn't seem to have any kids or family. He might have been married, I suppose. For a while, I thought he had a girl named Kay."

"Kay?"

"Yeah. He'd say her name now and then, usually when he was mad at himself. Like when he lost at rummy. 'Kay Biskerow!' he'd say. As if he wouldn't have been in such a fix if she were there to look after him."

Pendergast nodded. "Any friends of his still here we could talk to?"

"Can't think of anybody. Beckmann mostly kept to himself. He was sort of depressed."

"I see."

D'Agosta shifted on the uncomfortable stoop. "When someone dies here, what usually happens to his stuff?"

"They clean out his room and throw it away. Except that John sometimes saves a few things."

"John?"

"Yeah. He saves dead people's shit. He's a little strange."

"Did John save any of Beckmann's possessions?" Pendergast asked.

"Maybe. His room's full of junk. Why don't you go on up there and ask? It's 6A. Top floor, head of the stairs."

Pendergast thanked the man, then led the way into the dim lobby and up the wooden staircase. The treads creaked alarmingly under their feet. As they reached the sixth floor, Pendergast laid a hand on D'Agosta's arm.

"I compliment you on your adroitness back there," he said. "Thinking to ask about his belongings was a clever move. Care to handle John, too?"

"Sure thing."

D'Agosta rapped on the door marked6A , but it was already ajar and creaked inward at his knock. It opened a little, then stopped, blocked by a mountain of cardboard boxes. The room was almost completely filled with vermin-gnawed cartons, stacks of books, all manner of memorabilia. D'Agosta stepped in, threading a narrow path between walls of assorted junk: old pictures, photo albums, a tricycle, a signed baseball bat.

In the far corner, beneath a grimy window, a space just big enough for a bed had been cleared. A white-haired man lay on the filthy bed, fully clothed. He looked at them but did not rise or move.

"John?" D'Agosta asked.

He gave a faint nod.

D'Agosta went over to the bed, showed his badge. The man's face was creased and sunken, and his eyes were yellow. "We just want a little bit of information, and then we'll be gone."

"Yes," the man said. His voice was quiet, slow, and sad.

"Jed, downstairs, said you might have saved some personal effects belonging to Ranier Beckmann, who lived here several years back."

There was a long pause. The yellowed eyes glanced over toward one of the piles. "In the corner. Second box from the bottom. Beck written on it."

D'Agosta laboriously made his way to the tottering stack and found the box in question: stained, moldy, and half flattened from the weight of the boxes on top.

"May I take a look?"

The man nodded.

D'Agosta shifted the boxes and retrieved Beckmann's. It was small; inside were a few books and an old cigar box wrapped in rubber bands. Pendergast came up and looked over his shoulder.

"James, Letters from Florence ," he murmured, glancing at the spines of the books. "Berenson, Italian Painters of the Renaissance. Vasari, Lives of the Painters. Cellini, Autobiography . I see our Mr. Beckmann was interested in Renaissance art history."

D'Agosta picked up the cigar box and began to remove the rubber bands, which were so old and rotten they snapped at his touch. He opened the lid. The box exuded a perfume of dust, old cigars, and paper. Inside, he could see a moth-eaten rabbit's foot, a gold cross, a picture of Padre Pio, an old postcard of Moosehead Lake in Maine, a greasy pack of cards, a toy Corgi car, some coins, a couple of matchbooks, and a few other mementos. "Looks like we found Beckmann's little chest of treasures," he said.

Pendergast nodded. He reached over and picked up the matchbook. "Trattoria del Carmine," he read aloud. His slender white fingers drifted over the coins and other mementos. Next he reached for the books, plucking the Vasari from the box and leafing through it. "Required reading for anyone wishing to understand the Renaissance," he said. "And look at this."

He handed the book to D'Agosta. Scrawled on the flyleaf was a dedication:

To Ranier, my favorite student,

Charles F. Ponsonby Jr.

D'Agosta took out a book himself. There was no inscription in this one, but as he rifled through it, a photograph dropped from between the pages. He picked it off the floor. It was a faded color snapshot of four youths, all male, arms draped around each other's necks, before what looked like a blurry marble fountain.

D'Agosta heard a sharp intake of breath from Pendergast. "May I?" the agent asked.

D'Agosta handed him the photograph. He stared at it intently, then handed it back.

"The one on the far right, I believe, is Beckmann. And do you recognize his friends?"