Douglas Preston - The Book of the Dead

As fast as a striking snake, the man’s arm shot out and deftly caught the cup just before it hit the ground. He replaced it on its silver salver, sat back again. Not a drop had spilled. It had happened so fast that Constance was hardly sure it had happened at all. She remained standing, unable to move. Despite her profound shock, one thing was clear: the man was seated between her and the room’s only exit.

The man spoke softly, as if sensing her thoughts. “There is no need for alarm, Constance. I mean you no harm.”

She remained where she was, standing motionless before the chair. Her eyes flickered about the room and returned to the seated man.

“You know who I am, don’t you, child?” he asked. Even the buttery New Orleans tones were familiar.

“Yes. I know who you are.” She choked on the uncanny resemblance to the man she knew so well, all except his hair-and his eyes.

The man nodded. “I am gratified.”

“How did you get in here?”

“How I got in is unimportant. Why I am here is the true question, don’t you think?”

Constance seemed to consider this for a moment. “Yes. Perhaps you are right.” She took a step forward, letting the fingers of one hand drift from her wing chair and slide along the side table. “Very well, then: why are you here?”

“Because it’s time we spoke, you and I. It’s the least courtesy you could pay me, after all.”

Constance took another step, her fingers trailing along the polished wood. Then she paused. “Courtesy?”

“Yes. After all, I-”

With a sudden motion, Constance snatched a letter opener from the side table and leaped at the man. The attack was remarkable not only for its swiftness, but for its silence. She had done nothing, said nothing, to warn the man of her strike.

To no avail. The man twitched aside at the last instant and the letter opener sank to its hilt in the worn leather of the wing chair. Constance jerked it free and-still without uttering a sound-whirled to face the man, raising the weapon above her head.

As she lunged, the man coolly dodged the stroke and with a flick of his arm seized her wrist; she thrashed and struggled, and they fell to the floor, the man pinning her body under his, the letter opener skidding across the rug.

The man’s lips moved to within an inch of her ear. “Constance,” he said in a quiet voice. “Du calme. Du calme.”

“Courtesy!” she cried once again. “How dare you speak of courtesy! You murder my guardian’s friends, disgrace him, tear him from his house!” She stopped abruptly and struggled. A soft groan rose in her throat: a groan of frustration, mingled with another, more complex emotion.

The man continued to speak in a smooth undertone. “Please understand, Constance, I’m not here to hurt you. I’m restraining you simply to prevent harm to myself.”

She struggled again. “Hateful man!”

“Constance, please. I have something to say to you.”

“I’ll never listen to you!” she gasped.

But he continued to pin her to the floor, gently yet firmly. Slowly her struggling ceased. She lay there, heart racing painfully. She became aware of the beating of his own heart-much slower-against her breasts. He was still whispering calming, soothing words into her ear that she tried to ignore.

He pulled away slightly. “If I release you, will you promise not to attack me again? To stay and hear me out?”

Constance did not reply.

“Even a condemned man has the right to be heard. And you may learn that everything is not as it seems.”

Still, Constance said nothing. After a long moment, the man raised himself from the floor, then-slowly-released his grip on her wrists.

She stood at once. Breathing heavily, she smoothed down her pinafore. Her eyes darted around the library again. The man was still positioned strategically between her and the door. He raised a hand toward her wing chair.

“Please, Constance,” he said. “Sit down.”

Warily, she seated herself.

“May we speak now, like civilized people, without further outbursts?”

“You dare speak of yourself as civilized? You? A serial killer and thief.” She laughed scornfully.

The man nodded slowly, as if ingesting this. “Naturally, my brother has taken a certain line with you. After all, it’s worked so well for him in the past. He’s an extraordinarily persuasive and charismatic individual.”

“You can’t presume to imagine I’d believe anything you say. You’re insane-or worse, you do these things as a sane man.” She again glanced past him, toward the library exit and the reception hall beyond.

The man gazed back at her. “No, Constance. I am not insane-on the contrary, like you, I greatly fear insanity. You see, the sad fact is, we have a great deal in common-and not just that which we fear.”

“We haven’t the slightest in common.”

“No doubt this is what my brother would like you to believe.”

It seemed to Constance that the man’s expression had become one of infinite sadness. “It’s true that I am far from perfect and cannot yet expect your trust,” he went on. “But I hope you understand that I intend you no hurt.”

“What you intend means nothing. You’re like a child who befriends a butterfly one day to pull off its wings the next.”

“What do you know of children, Constance? Your eyes are so wise and so old. Even from here, I can see the vast experience written there. What strange and terrible things they must have seen! How very penetrating your gaze! It fills me with sadness. No, Constance: I sense-I know-that childhood was a luxury you were denied. Just as I myself was denied it.”

Constance went rigid.

“Earlier, I said I was here because it’s time we spoke. It is time that you learned the truth. The real truth.”

His voice had sunk so low that the words were only just audible. Against her will, she asked, “The truth?”

“About the relationship between me and my brother.”

In the soft light of the dying fire, Diogenes Pendergast’s peculiar eyes looked vulnerable, almost lost. Gazing back at her, they brightened slightly.

“Ah! Constance, it must sound impossibly strange to you. But gazing on you like this, I feel I would do anything in my power to lift from you that burden of pain and fear and carry it myself. And do you know why? Because when I look at you, I see myself.”

Constance did not reply. She merely sat, motionless.

“I see a person who longs to fit in, to be merely human, and yet who is destined always to remain apart. I see a person who feels the world more deeply, more intensely, than she is willing to admit… even to herself.”

Listening, Constance began to tremble.

“I sense both pain and anger in you. Pain at being abandoned-not once, but several times. And anger at the sheer capriciousness of the gods. Why me? Why again? For it’s true: you’ve been abandoned once again. Though not, perhaps, in exactly the way you imagined it. Here, too, we are the same. I was abandoned when my parents were burned to death by an ignorant mob. I escaped the flames. They did not. I’ve always felt that I should have died, not them; that it was my fault. You feel the same way about the death of your own sister, Mary-that it was you, instead of she, who should have died. Later, I was abandoned by my brother. Ah: I see the disbelief in your face. But then again, you know so little about my brother. All I ask is that you hear me with an open mind.”

He rose. Constance took in a sharp breath, half rising herself.

“No,” Diogenes said, and once again Constance stopped. There was nothing in his tone but weariness now. “There’s no need to run. I’ll take my leave of you. In the future, we’ll speak again, and I’ll tell you more about the childhood I was denied. About the older brother who took the love I offered and flung back scorn and hatred. Who took pleasure in destroying everything I created-my journals of childish poetry, my translations of Virgil and Tacitus. Who tortured and killed my favorite pet in a way that, even today, I can barely bring myself to think about. Who made it his mission in life to turn everyone against me, with lies and insinuations, to paint me as his evil twin. And when in the end none of this could break my spirit, he did something so awful… so, so awful…” But at this, his voice threatened to break. “Look at my dead eye, Constance: that was the least of what he did…”