Douglas Preston - Reliquary

“Shit,” Hayward breathed with fervent conviction. “What a balls-up.”

Carlin turned toward her in surprise, then coughed disapprovingly into his hand.

There was a sudden flurry of movement behind them, and Hayward turned to see Mrs. Wisher moving gracefully away, head held high, leading a small knot of retainers and bodyguards. In her wake, Horlocker looked like a fighter who’d finished a bad twelve rounds. He leaned against the sand-colored stone of the Castle wall as if seeking its support.

“Have they finished dosing the Reservoir with—well, with whatever it’s called?” he asked at last, fetching a ragged breath.

“Thyoxin,” said a well-dressed man standing by a battery-powered radio. “Yes, they finished fifteen minutes ago.”

Horlocker looked around with sunken eyes. “Why the hell haven’t we heard anything?” His eyes landed on Hayward. “You, there!” he barked. “What’s your name, Harris?”

Hayward stepped forward. “It’s Hayward, sir.”

“Whatever.” Horlocker pushed himself away from the wall. “Heard anything from D’Agosta?”

“No, sir.”

“Captain Waxie?”

“No, sir.”

Abruptly, Horlocker sank back again. “Jesus Christ,” he muttered. Then he looked at his watch. “Ten minutes to midnight.”

He turned to an officer at his right. “Why the hell are they still at it?” he said, pointing out toward the Great Lawn.

“When we try to round them up, they just break and reform somewhere else. And more seem to be joining, leaking through the perimeter at the south end of the Park. It’s hard without tear gas.”

“Well, why the hell don’t you use it, then?” Horlocker demanded.

“Your orders, sir.”

“ My order? Wisher’s people are gone now, you idiot. Gas them. Now.”

“Yes, sir.”

There was a deep booming sound, strangely muffled, seemingly from the center of the earth itself. Suddenly, life returned once again to Horlocker’s limbs. He sprang forward. “Hear that?” he demanded. “Those were the charges! The goddamn charges!”

A scattering of applause rang out from the cops manning the various communications devices. Carlin turned toward Hayward, a puzzled look on his face. “Charges?” he asked.

Hayward shrugged. “Beats me. What are they so happy about, with all hell breaking loose down there?”

As if on an unspoken signal, they both turned back toward the Great Lawn. The spectacle below was perversely fascinating. Cries and shouts rushed up toward them, a sonic wave almost physical in its force. Every few moments, a single sound would separate itself from the roar: a curse, a scream, the smack of fist on flesh.

Suddenly, from beyond the Great Lawn, Hayward heard a strange sighing sound, as if the very foundation of Manhattan had decided to give way. At first she was unable to pinpoint its location. Then she noticed that the surface of the Central Park Reservoir, normally as calm as a mill pond, was suddenly in motion. Little wavelets broke the surface like whitecaps, and a series of bubbles began to roil its center.

A silence fell in the Command Center as all eyes turned to the Reservoir.

“Breakers,” Carlin whispered. “In the Central Park Reservoir. I’ll be goddamned.”

There was a deep-throated belching sound, followed by the awesome rumbling of millions of cubic feet of water pouring with incredible force into underground Manhattan. On the plain of the Great Lawn, out of sight of the Reservoir, the rioting continued. But beneath the sounds of conflict, Hayward heard, or rather felt, a great hollow rushing, as of vast underground galleries and long-forgotten tunnels filling with the onslaught of water.

“It’s too early!” Horlocker cried.

As Hayward watched, the surface of the Reservoir began visibly dropping, first slowly, then more rapidly. In the reflected glow of the spotlights and the innumerable fires, she could see the exposed crescent of Reservoir wall, its banks boiling and frothing from the force of a great central whirlpool.

“Stop,” Horlocker whispered.

The level continued to drop inexorably.

“Please stop,” Horlocker whispered, staring fixedly northward.

The Reservoir was draining faster now, and Hayward could see the surface of the water surging downward by the moment, exposing more and more of the cracked far wall abutting the East Meadow and the Ball Field. Suddenly, the rumbling sound seemed to falter, and the turbulence lessened. The water grew calmer, slowing in its rapid descent. The silence in the Command Center was absolute.

Hayward stared as a narrow band of bubbles flowed into the Reservoir from its northward end; first a fine jet, then more and more until it had expanded into a heavy roar.

“Son of a bitch,” Horlocker whispered. “They did it.”

With the exits below sealed off, the Reservoir ceased draining. However, water continued to pour into the Reservoir from the upstate aquifers. With great sizzles and pops, the level of the water began to rise again. The churning at the northward end of the Reservoir grew until the entire mass of water seemed to tremble from some kind of subterranean pressure. With a steady surge of thunder, the water rose, and rose, until at last it trembled on the edge of the embankment. Then, suddenly, it crested.

“Jesus,” Carlin said. “I guess they’re going swimming.”

A massive flood of water spilled over the top of the Reservoir and hurried away into the lambent darkness of the Park, drowning the sound of fighting with its splashing, hissing, tumbling roar. Frozen in place, staring at the awe-inspiring sight, Hayward was reminded of a vast bathtub that had been allowed to overflow. She watched as the onrush of water leveled mounds of earth and worried away the ground among small trees and copses. It was like a huge river, she thought: gentle, shallow, but irresistible. And there was no mistake about where it was headed—the low ground of the Great Lawn.

There was a moment of unbearable suspense as the onrushing water was hidden from the rioting plain that stretched beneath the Castle ramparts. Then it appeared between the trees at the northern end of the Lawn, a glistening swath of black, churning sticks and weeds and garbage before it. As it struck the edges of the crowd, Hayward could hear the noise of the fighting shift in tone and volume. A sudden uncertainty rippled through the rioters. Hayward watched as knots of people dispersed, reformed, dispersed again. Then the water was rushing over the length of the Great Lawn, and the shrieking mob was breaking for the high ground of the trees, slipping and stumbling over each other as they struggled toward the Park exits and safety.

And still the water advanced, licking around the baseball diamonds, swallowing up countless fires, knocking over trash cans. It swept into the Delacorte Theater with an immense gurgling sound, surrounded and then swallowed up Turtle Pond, and swirled around the base of Belvedere Castle itself, breaking against the stones in dark rivulets of foam. Then at last the sound of rushing water began to die away. As the newly made lake grew still, bright points of reflected light appeared on its surface, more and still more as the water grew quieter, looking at last like a vast mirror of stars.

For another long moment, the entire Command Center remained still, awed by the spectacle. Then a spontaneous cheering burst out, filling the chambers and turrets of the Castle and swirling upward into the crisp summer night air.

“I wish my old daddy could’ve seen that,” Hayward said over the noise, turning to Carlin with a grin. “He would have-said it was just like water on a dogfight. I’ll bet money he would.”

= 64 =

THE EARLY MORNING sun snuck in low over the Atlantic, kissing the sandy fork of Long Island, gliding over coves and harbors, villages and resorts, bringing a cool summer sweat to asphalt and pavement. Farther west, the brilliant arc illuminated the nearest reaches of New York City, briefly turning the gray welter of buildings a pale shade of rose. Following the ecliptic, the rays hit the East River, then burnished the windows of ten thousand buildings to a temporary sparkle, as if washing the city new in heat and light.