William Bernhardt - Dark Eye

“I don’t want any part of your plan!”

He took her chin-upside down before him-and held it in his palm. “Would you prefer to be like the other heathens, those who remain on this plane and melt into nothingness? Or would you be translated into a Golden Age?”

“I would rather be at home in clean clothes.”

“Don’t be petty. Why can’t you see what I can see?”

“Because I’m not insane.”

He clamped the chloroform-soaked cloth over her nose and mouth, his hands shaking with rage. She was unworthy, but that spirit would soon be gone, replaced with that of his lost Virginia, and once he and she were reunited, nothing else would matter.

I was practically out of my mind when I finally heard the doorknob click. It was barely half an hour before midnight. Did they not understand? Midnight was the dreamtime, according to Poe. Later would be too late. Especially for Rachel.

Bloomfeld had two men trailing behind him whom I immediately recognized from their file photos. Two suspects. Two Edgar possibles.

But only two.

“Apologies,” Bloomfeld said. He could be quite polite, once you put the fear of death into him. “Couldn’t find the third officer.”

“We need him,” I said.

“We’ll find him in time, I’m sure. He’s supposed to be working in the ballroom, but no one could locate him. It’s already packed in there-hundreds of Halloween revelers. Ran into your partner, though, that FBI man. Sent him into the crowd to find the guy while I brought you these two.”

I stared at the photo of the missing security guard, Ernest Lee Abbott. I mentally added a mustache, changed the hair, put dark glasses on him.

“He’s normally very reliable. That’s why we asked him to help with the crowd control. Everyone is doing the work of three.”

I could imagine the man’s lips moving, his face. His eyes taking that somewhat menacing, somewhat sorrowful expression that told so much about him.

“If you want, I’ll go back to the ballroom and look some more. He’s probably behind the cathedral, helping with some last-minute crisis. Whose idea was it to do the Hunchback, anyway? I always thought it was too literary. Kids today, they don’t know anything about French literature. They probably think-”

“Hunchback?” I closed my eyes and let my mind wander again, but this time, it went straight to the source. The key clue. The one that hadn’t fallen into place before.

I haven’t been this scared since the day we rented a video just after my parents- That was what Rachel had said, during that brief phone call. Everyone thought she was terrified, babbling, me included. But we were wrong. Rachel is a tough girl, a smart one.

She was trying to give me a clue.

What was the movie? What was the damn movie?

Of course.

We’d rented The Hunchback of Notre Dame. The Disney version. The first day I brought her home. After her parents were killed.

“Take me to this ballroom,” I said, rising out of my chair. “Now.”

Bloomfeld stuttered, “B-B-But I rounded up your suspects-don’t you want to interrogate them?”

I shook my head. “It’s the other one. Abbott. He’s Edgar.”

By the time I made it to the ballroom, I still hadn’t found Patrick, Darcy hadn’t returned, and it was barely ten minutes until midnight. Ten minutes.

Rachel! I wanted to scream out her name, but I knew that wouldn’t help, not in this earsplitting chaos. Please, God, don’t let me be too late. Don’t let me be too late.

Even though the Halloween party had not officially started, the ballroom was packed. I could see where Bloomfeld might’ve had difficulty finding one security cop in this swarm. I might have trouble finding myself in here. At least half the partygoers were in costume, many of them masked. If Edgar was one of them, how would I ever find him?

Think, Susan. Think!

He wouldn’t be out here mingling, would he? He has some tremendous master plan in the works, something wonderful, something terrible. Something involving Rachel. He couldn’t have her out here, whether she was costumed, dead or alive. Could he?

While I was trying to crawl into Edgar’s brain, I saw Chief O’Bannon enter the ballroom. I showed him the photo of Abbott.

“You’re sure it’s him?”

“Damn straight.”

He smiled a little. “Good girl. Knew you could do it.”

He took the left side of the room and I surged into the right. I saw the great façade of the cathedral of Notre Dame at the far end of the ballroom, a focal point for all the festivities. I moved toward it. I’ve never been to Paris, but it looked pretty damn real to me, except that it wasn’t quite finished. There was still some scaffolding, several raised platforms on wheels, off to the side. The ballroom was festooned with confetti and orange and black ribbons and banners. And where was the hunchback? He would emerge later, I guessed, probably from the top of the cathedral, ringing those four huge bells, two on each side of the central spire.

I moved toward the cathedral. It seemed like the place Edgar-Abbott-was most likely to be. And I knew Rachel had seen it before, right? That was the whole point of the clue.

Someone dressed in a jester costume fell into me, tumbling backward. I went for my gun. Jesus, was I on edge. I shoved him out of the way and tried to plow a trail through the dense horde. They were getting increasingly crazed, ebullient, nutty, which I suppose was to be expected as the clock approached midnight. I could smell alcohol breath every which way I turned. It made me sick.

Which was certainly a good sign.

Eventually I forced my way to the back of the room. It was a high-quality cathedral, made of some kind of molded fiberglass, stained to the proper shade of gray. Someone had spent some real money on this. After trying several false apertures, I found a door on the far side that worked.

I stepped into the cathedral, such as it was. It was dark back here, darker than I liked. The cathedral touched the ceiling and, despite the openings for the bells, little light crept through.

This was his place. I knew it, as sure as I’d ever known anything in my life. I could feel it.

I drew my weapon. I’d let IA argue later about whether I had cause or not. Right now, I wanted a gun between me and him.

I stepped into the darkness, marking a path I thought was parallel to the front of the cathedral. The entire area was small, close, silent. And dark. Did I mention that it was dark?

I took baby steps, inching forward, fighting the desire to rush ahead. I wanted to find Rachel. I had to find her before it was too late. But Edgar had proven how dangerous he could be, how smart. I had to be careful. I couldn’t save her if I were dead.

I kept moving forward, one dark step at a time.

Till I saw someone.

At first, I couldn’t make out who it was. His face was masked by shadows. He was sitting on the floor, looking up at me.

“Patrick!”

He was staring with a strange, vacant expression on his face. I holstered my gun and ran toward him. “Patrick!” I said, grabbing his arm. “Patrick! What are you-”

I gasped.

His head fell forward into my lap. Just his head.

I screamed like a siren, like a child at a horror movie, like the weakest sister who ever lived. Blood spilled all over my turtleneck, my pants. The head fell to the floor but didn’t roll. It just impacted with a sickening splat and lay there, staring up at me. It had been sliced clean-by a pendulum? I wondered-at the base of the neck.

My God, my God, Abbott killed Patrick, he killed him, and if he killed Patrick-

An even deeper horror clutched at the base of my spine.

It was so unlike him to be gone so long…