Douglas Preston - Two Graves

The room fell into silence. At last, Joyce shifted in his chair. “Is there anything you’d like to add?”

Pendergast shook his head almost imperceptibly. “I would say you’ve articulated the situation admirably, Supervisory Special Agent Joyce.”

“In that case—take your thirty days. And stay far, far away from this case.” Turning away from Pendergast, Joyce plucked Cruising Boats Within Your Budget from a shelf behind him, placed it on his desk, and began to read.

43

PROCTOR WHEELED BACK TO TRISTRAM, WHO WAS SITTING on his bed, white-faced. “Stay here,” he said. “I’ll lock you in. You’ll be safe in this room.” He stepped out, locked the door securely, and then raced down the stone corridor, flattening himself against the wall just before the hallway opened on to the nearest sub-basement room.

He took out his .45, racked a round into the chamber, flicked on the laser sights. Then he took a moment to clear his head, get a feel for the tactical situation. He pushed away all surprise, all pain from his bruised ribs, all speculation about how the youth could have gotten in—and focused on the problem at hand.

The killer meant to lure him out into the sub-basement proper. Alban wanted him to follow. Just as clearly, that was the course of action he must take. There was no other. He could not allow the young man—now inside the security of the house—any freedom of action. He had to track him down. Alban meant to ambush him—he was sure of that. So he had to be unpredictable. He had to develop a strategy.

And he had to understand why Alban hadn’t killed him outright, when he’d clearly had the chance.

All these thoughts occurred in a split second.

Eyeing the ground, Proctor looked for traces of Alban’s passing, but was unable to tease out the youth’s marks from the welter of fresh footprints in the dust. He took a deep breath and, after a moment, spun around the corner and covered the room with his weapon. A single, naked lightbulb, hanging from a wire that ran the length of the sub-basement, illuminated the room, casting deep shadows. Cases along the walls displayed a motley collection of stuffed reptiles.

The room appeared to be empty.

With a quick movement he darted across the floor and took cover behind an old case that lay on its side, rusting halberds spilling out. From that vantage point he scoured the room as best he could. He did not need to hurry. The killer wasn’t trying to escape—the killer was stalking him just as surely as he was stalking the killer.

After ascertaining that the room was empty, Proctor darted to the far end and flattened himself against the archway that led into the next chamber, back in the direction of the staircase leading upward. This was filled with shelving, not just along the wall but also running across the middle, loaded with glass bottles in different colors, filled with strange and bizarre objects, dried insects, lizards, seeds, liquids and powders. There were many places to hide among those complicated rows of shelves, many places in which to set up an ambush.

A pity, what he would have to do.

Proctor carried a Beretta Px4 Storm with a 9 + 1 magazine, but he always carried two extra twenty-round magazines on his person: fifty rounds in all. He had a phobia of running out of ammunition. It had never happened to him, and it never would.

He slipped out the ten-round magazine, inserted one of the twenties. It significantly increased the weight of the weapon, but it was necessary for what he was about to do.

Unpredictable…

Suddenly Proctor surged under the archway, firing repeatedly into the rows of shelves as he sprinted down the length of the room, shooting ahead first to one side and then to the other. The result was a roar of sound and a chaotic storm of glass as the expanding rounds tore through multiple rows of shelves, fragmenting as they went, blowing the shelving to smithereens. The noise in the confined space was deafening. Anyone hiding among the shelves would be, at the very least, blinded by flying glass and quite possibly struck by fragmenting bullets. Such a person would be unable to return fire accurately.

Proctor continued running into the next chamber, maintaining a withering fire, blowing hundreds of glass bottles into glittering showers as he ran.

The twenty rounds carried him through to a third chamber, a smaller space filled with cases of stuffed birds. Here, the magazine empty, he took cover behind a heavy oaken case that projected from one wall. Crouching, he held his breath and listened with great intensity.

The residual sounds from the shoot-up echoed through the sub-basement: liquids draining, glass falling, an occasional crash. The stone floor behind him was now covered with thousands of glass shards. Nobody could walk over it—nobody—without making a sound. If the killer were behind him, he would not be able to follow without making his presence known.

Still he waited. Gradually the after-sounds of destruction died away, leaving the monotonous drip, drip of liquids and a foul compound odor of alcohol, formaldehyde, dead animals, and dried insects.

He knew that the next room was also stuffed with display cases, offering many hiding areas. The cases, he recalled, were loaded with ancient tools and antique devices. Proctor had no idea why Enoch Leng had assembled these bizarre collections, nor did he care. All he knew was that—most likely in one of the ancient rooms ahead—his adversary was also waiting.

Proctor waited a very long time. Often success came from simply outwaiting one’s adversary. Eventually they would move. And then, bang .

But this time, silence reigned. The adversary did not show himself.

While it was possible the killer was in one of the rooms he’d already passed through, dead or gravely wounded, Proctor somehow doubted it. His gut told him that Alban was in one of the rooms that lay ahead.

Waiting.

Proctor removed the empty magazine and inserted the second twenty-round box. In that moment he heard the crunch of a footfall on glass.

Spinning, astonished the killer was behind him, he quickly moved to a more defensible position in an alcove against the mortared wall.

He waited again, listening intently. The entire floor of the previous room was covered with shattered glass. It was not possible to move without making noise—or was it?

Ever so slowly, he crept up to the edge of the stone arch, listening. But there was no more sound. Could it have been something falling onto the glass?

The uncertainty began to eat away at Proctor. He had to see, to find out. In a burst of speed, he launched himself back through the archway, racing down the center of the room, again firing to the left and right. He saw a flash of movement to his far right, behind a row of shattered bottles, and he fired at it repeatedly through the shelves before taking cover in an alcove along the far wall.

Pressing himself into the space, he listened again. He must have hit the killer, or at least sprayed him with flying glass. He would be injured, perhaps blinded, frightened, disoriented.

… Or was this just wishful thinking?

Another loud crunch of glass, an unmistakable footfall.

Bursting from the alcove, Proctor ran, firing again in the direction of the sound, through the already-broken bottles, sending up a kaleidoscopic spray of glittering shards, additional shelves crashing down, beakers spraying their contents. But as he raked the area from where the sound had come, he realized there was nobody. Nothing. He kept running until he reached the far end of the chamber, taking cover in a corner, staring wildly about.