Douglas Preston - The Book of the Dead

“Yes?”

“It’s… a difficult question.”

Pendergast paused. “What is it?”

“You realize there’s only one way to take care of Diogenes.”

Pendergast’s silvery eyes hardened.

“You know what I’m talking about, right?”

Still, Pendergast said nothing, but the look in his eyes was so cold that D’Agosta almost had to look away.

“When the moment comes, if you hesitate… he won’t. So I need to know if you’ll be able to…” D’Agosta couldn’t finish the sentence.

“And your question, Vincent?” came the icy reply.

D’Agosta looked back at him, saying nothing. After a beat, Pendergast turned abruptly and disappeared into the terminal.

Diogenes Pendergast strolled around the corner of the Via dello Sprone and back into Via Santo Spirito. Constance Greene was gone, having ducked into the Via dei Coverelli as he’d anticipated. And now she would be waiting for him, in ambush, to round the corner.

To confirm this, he walked briskly down Via Santo Spirito and paused just before the entrance to Coverelli, flattening himself against the ancient sgraffito facade of some long-forgotten palace. With enormous caution, he peered around the corner.

Excellent. She was still not to be seen-she had already turned the first angle of the dogleg and was no doubt waiting for him to come from the opposite direction.

His hand slipped into his pocket and removed a leather case, from which he took an ivory-handled scalpel identical to the one he had left beneath her pillow. The cool weight of it comforted him. Counting out the seconds, he opened his umbrella and made the turn. Then he began walking boldly down Via dei Coverelli, his shoes echoing on the cobblestones in the confined alleyway, his upper body hidden beneath the black umbrella. Disguise was unnecessary: she would not look back around the corner to see who was coming from the other direction. She would not expect his approach from that side.

He strode on boldly, inhaling the scent of urine and dog feces, of vomit and wet stone-the ancient alleyway retained even the smell of medieval Florence. Keeping the scalpel poised in his gloved hand, he approached the first corner of the dogleg. As he did so, he previsualized his strike. She would have her back to him; he would come up from the side, grab her neck with his left arm while aiming the scalpel for that sweet spot just below the right clavicle; the length of the scalpel blade would be sufficient to sever the brachiocephalic artery at the point where it divided into the carotid and subclavian arteries. She would not even have time to cry out. He would then hold her while she died; he would cradle her; he would allow her blood to flow over him as it had done once before… under very different circumstances…

… and then he would leave both her and his raincoat in the alley.

He approached the corner. Fifteen feet, ten, eight, now…

He turned the corner and paused, tense and then astonished. There was no one there. The dogleg was empty.

He quickly looked around, forward and back: no one. And now he was in the dogleg, blind, unable to see who was coming from either direction.

He felt a twinge of panic. Somewhere he had miscalculated. Where had she gone? Had she tricked him in some way? It didn’t seem possible.

He paused, realizing that he was now stuck in the blind spot. If he walked around the corner ahead of him, out into Borgo Tegolaio, a much broader and more visible street, and she was there, she would see him-and all his advantage would be lost. On the other hand, if she was behind him, and he went back, that would also destroy his advantage.

He stood motionless, thinking furiously. The sky continued to darken, and now he realized that it wasn’t merely the rain, but the evening was falling like a dead hand over the city. He couldn’t stay there forever: he would have to move, to turn either one corner or the other.

Despite the chill, he felt himself growing warm under the raincoat. He had to abandon his plan, turn around, and walk back the way he had come-to unwind, so to speak, his flanking maneuver as if it had never happened. That would be best. Something had happened. She had taken another turn somewhere and he had lost her-that was it. He would then have to think of another attack. Perhaps he should go to Rome and allow her to follow him into the Catacombs of St. Callixtus. That popular tourist site, with its anonymous dead ends and doubling-backs, would be an excellent place to kill her.

He turned and walked back along Via dei Coverelli, cautiously rounding the first dogleg. The alleyway was empty. He strode down it-and then suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, he saw a flash of movement from one of the archways above; he instinctively threw himself sideways even as a shadow dropped upon him and he felt the resistless swipe of a scalpel cutting through the layers of his raincoat and suit, followed by the searing burn of cut flesh.

With a cry, he twisted around and-even as he fell-drove his own scalpel in a glittering arc toward her, aiming for the neck. His greater experience with the blade, combined with superior speed, paid off as his scalpel met flesh in a mist of blood; but as he continued to fall, he realized she had twisted her head at the last moment and his blade, instead of cutting her throat, had merely slashed the side of her head.

He fell hard onto the cobblestones, his mind swept clean by astonishment, rolled over, and leaped up, scalpel in hand-but she was already gone, vanished.

In that moment, he understood her plan. Her poor disguise had been no accident. She had been showing herself to him, just as he had been revealing himself to her. She had allowed him to lead her to a point of ambush, and she had then used it against him. She had countered his countermove.

The simple brilliance of it astounded him.

He stood there, looking up at the crowded stone arches above him. He made out the crumbling ledge of pietra serena from which she had no doubt launched her attack. Far above he could see the tiniest sliver of steel-gray sky, out of which were spinning raindrops.

He took a step, staggered.

He felt a wave of faintness as the burning sensation in his side increased. He dared not open his coat and inspect; he could not afford to get blood on the outside of his clothing-it would draw attention. He belted his raincoat as tightly as possible, trying to bind the wound.

Blood would draw attention.

As the feeling of faintness receded and his brain emerged from the shock of the attack, he realized that an opening had presented itself to him. He had cut her head, and no doubt it was bleeding copiously, as all such cuts did. She could not hide such a cut and the blood, not even with a scarf. She could not pursue him around Florence with blood pouring down her face. She would have to retreat somewhere, clean herself up. And that gave him the window of opportunity he needed to escape from her, to shake her off-forever.

Now was the moment. If he could escape from her cleanly, he could assume another identity, and from there proceed to his final destination. She would never find him there-never.

He strolled as casually as possible through the streets toward the taxi stand at the end of Borgo San Jacopo. As he walked, he could feel the blood soaking through his clothes, trickling down his leg. The pain was minor, and he was sure the cut had merely sliced along his rib cage without penetrating his vitals.

He had to do something about the blood, however-and fast.

He turned into a little café at the corner of Tegolaio and Santo Spirito, went up to the bar, and ordered an espresso and a spremuta. He downed both, one after the other, dropped a five-euro bill on the zinc, and went into the bathroom. He locked the door and opened his raincoat. The amount of blood was shocking. He quickly probed the wound, confirming that it hadn’t pierced his peritoneum. Using paper towels, he mopped up as much blood as he could; and then, tearing away the lower half of his blood-soaked shirt, he tied the strips around his torso, closing the wound and stanching the flow of blood. Then he washed his hands and face, put on his raincoat, combed his hair, and left.