Cold Vengeance (25 page)

C
HAPTER 53

D
R.
J
OHN
F
ELDER FELT LIKE A THIRD WHEEL
as Poole led Constance by the arm through the Central Park Zoo. They had visited the sea lions, the polar bears, and now Constance had asked to see the Japanese snow monkeys. She was more demonstrative than he’d ever seen her before—not excited, exactly, he couldn’t imagine someone with such a phlegmatic disposition ever being excited, but she had definitely lowered her guard to a certain degree. Felder wasn’t sure how he felt about the fact that Constance, who had seemed wary of Dr. Poole at first, had warmed to him significantly.

Perhaps a little too significantly, Felder thought sourly as he walked on her other side.

As they neared the outdoor snow monkey enclosure, he could hear the hoots and screams of the animals playing with one another, tumbling about their rock and water enclosure, raising a din.

He glanced at Constance. The wind had blown back her hair and raised a rosy blush on her normally pale cheeks. She watched the monkeys, smiling at the antics of one particular juvenile who, shrieking with delight, leapt off a rock and landed in the water, just as a child might do, then scampered back up to do it again.

“Curious they aren’t cold,” Constance said.

“Hence the name
snow monkeys
,” replied Poole with a laugh. “They live in a snowy clime.”

They watched for a while and Felder surreptitiously checked his watch. They still had half an hour left, but if the truth be told he was rather anxious to return Constance to Mount Mercy. This was proving too uncontrolled an environment, and he felt Dr. Poole was approaching, if not stepping over, the appropriate doctor-patient distance with his laughter, his witticisms, his arm-holding.

Constance murmured something to Poole, and he in turn glanced over at Felder. “I’m afraid we must visit the ladies’ room. I believe it’s over there, in the Tropic Zone building.”

“Very well.”

They made their way down the path and entered the Tropic Zone. The place was constructed like a tropical rain forest, with live animals and birds in their respective habitats. The restrooms were at the far end down a long corridor. Felder waited at the head of the corridor while Poole escorted Constance to the door of the ladies’ room, opening it for her and then taking up a position outside.

A few minutes passed. Felder checked his watch again. Eleven forty. The outing was to end at noon. He glanced down the corridor to see Poole waiting by the door, arms crossed, a pensive look on his face.

A few more minutes went by, and Felder began to feel uneasy. He walked down the corridor. “Shall we check?” he murmured.

“We probably should.” Poole leaned toward the door. “Constance?” he asked. “Are you all right?”

No answer from within.

“Constance!” He rapped on the door.

Still no answer. Poole glanced at Felder with alarm. “I’d better go in.”

Felder, suppressing a sudden panic, nodded, and Poole pushed into the ladies’ room, loudly announcing himself to anyone within. The door swung shut and Felder could hear him calling her name and opening and closing stalls.

He appeared again a moment later, his face ashen. “She’s gone! And the back window’s open!”

“Oh, my God,” Felder said.

“She can’t have gone far,” said Poole, the words tumbling out in a rush. “We’ve got to find her. Let’s go outside—you go left, I’ll go to the right, we’ll circle the building… and for God’s sake, keep your eyes open!”

Felder sprinted toward the exit, burst out the door, and turned left, circling the building at a run and looking in all directions for the figure of Constance. Nothing.

He reached the rear of the building, where the restrooms were located. There was the bathroom window, standing open. But it was barred.

Barred?

He looked wildly around for Poole coming the other way, arriving from the opposite direction. But Poole didn’t come. With a curse, Felder continued on around the building at a run, reaching the entrance sixty seconds later.

No Poole.

Felder forced his brain to slow down, to think through the problem logically. How could she have gotten out a barred window? And where the hell was Poole? Was he in pursuit of her? That must be it. He recalled that the entire zoo was walled. There were only two exits: one at Sixty-Fourth and Fifth, the other at the south end of the zoo. He sprinted toward the southern exit, pushed through the turnstile, and stared out across the park—bare-branched trees, long promenades. There were few people walking around; given the time of day, the park seemed oddly deserted.

The striking figure of Constance was nowhere to be seen. Or that of Dr. Poole, either.

Clearly she was back in the zoo. Or maybe she had left by the other exit. Felder was suddenly seized with the direness of the situation: Constance was a murderer who had been judged insane. He had arranged for this outing himself, through his official position with the city. If she escaped while under his care, his career would be finished.

Should he call the police? Not yet. His head reeled as he imagined the headlines in the
Times…

Get a grip.
Poole must have found Constance. He must have. All Felder had to do was locate Poole.

He jogged around to the Sixty-Fourth Street entrance, reentered the zoo, and made his way back to the Tropic Zone. He searched the area thoroughly, inside and out, looking for Poole or Constance. Poole had her under control, he told himself. He’d caught up to her and was restraining her, somewhere nearby. He might need assistance.

Felder fumbled out his cell phone and dialed Poole’s number, but it immediately rolled over to voice mail.

He went back to the ladies’ room and barged inside. The window was still open, but it was clearly and visibly barred. Felder paused, staring at it, the full implications of that barred window suddenly sinking in.

He could swear he’d heard Poole opening and closing the stalls and calling out her name. But why would he do that if the window was barred, and there was no possibility of escape? He looked around the small, empty bathroom, but there was literally no place to hide.

And then—with a sudden, terrible clarity—Felder realized there could be only one explanation. Poole must have been in on the escape.

C
HAPTER 54

C
ORRIE
S
WANSON HEARD THE FAINT RINGING
of her cell phone, through her earpieces, as she lay on the bed in her dorm room listening to Nine Inch Nails. She scrambled up, plucked out the earbuds, sorted through the two-foot layer of clothes on her floor, and pulled out the phone.

A number she didn’t recognize. “Yeah?”

“Hello?” came a voice. “Is this Corinne Swanson?”

“Corinne?” The man had an accent of the Deep South, not as refined and melodious as Pendergast’s but not all that different, either. It instantly put her on alert. “Yeah, this is
Corinne
.”

“Corinne, my name is Ned Betterton.”

She waited.

“I’m a reporter.”

“For who?”

A hesitation. “The
Ezerville Bee
.”

At this, Corrie had to laugh. “Okay, who is this really and what’s the joke? You a friend of Pendergast’s?”

There was a silence on the other end. “This is no joke, but it happens that he’s the reason I’m calling.”

Corrie waited.

“My apologies for contacting you like this, but I understand you’re the one who maintains the website on Special Agent Pendergast.”

“Right,” said Corrie warily.

“That’s where I got your name,” said the man. “I didn’t realize you were in town until just today. I’m doing a story about a double murder that occurred down in Mississippi. I’d like to talk to you.”

“Talk.”

“Not on the phone. In person.”

Corrie hesitated. Her instincts were to put him off, but she was curious about the Pendergast connection. “Where?”

“I don’t really know New York well. How about, um, the Carnegie Deli?”

“I don’t do pastrami.”

“I heard they’ve got great cheesecake. How about in an hour? I’ll be wearing a red scarf.”

“Whatever.”

There were about ten people in red scarves packing the deli, and by the time Corrie found Betterton she was in a foul mood. He rose as she approached and pulled out a chair for her.

“I can seat myself, thank you, I’m not some fainting southern belle,” she said, pulling the chair from his solicitous grasp and sitting down.

He was in his late twenties, small but tough looking, ripped, old acne scars on an otherwise handsome face. He was dressed in a tacky sports jacket, with a Scotch Pad of brown hair and a nose that looked like it had once been broken. Intriguing.

He ordered a slice of truffle torte cheesecake, and Corrie settled on a BLT. As the waitress walked away, Corrie crossed her arms and stared at Betterton. “Okay, so what’s this all about?”

“Almost two weeks ago a couple, Carlton and June Brodie, were brutally murdered in Malfourche, Mississippi. Tortured and then killed, to be exact.”

He was temporarily drowned out by the clattering of dishes and a waiter shouting an order.

“Go on,” Corrie said.

“The crime’s unsolved. But I’ve stumbled across some information that I’m following up on. Nothing definitive, you understand, but suggestive.”

“Where does Pendergast come in?”

“I’ll get to that in a moment. Here’s the story. About ten years back, the Brodies disappeared. The wife faked suicide, then the husband vanished. A few months ago, they reappeared as if nothing had happened, moved back to Malfourche, and resumed life. She ascribed her fake suicide to marital and job difficulties, and they told everyone they’d been running a B and B in Mexico. Except that they hadn’t been. It was a lie.”

Corrie leaned forward. This was more interesting than she’d expected.

“Not long before their reappearance, Pendergast arrived in Malfourche with an NYPD captain—a woman—in tow.”

Corrie nodded. That would be Hayward.

“No one can tell me what they were doing there, or why. It seems he was curious about a place deep in the adjoining swamp—a place called Spanish Island.” He proceeded to tell Corrie about all he had learned and his suspicions that it involved a major drug refining and smuggling operation.

Corrie nodded. So this was what Pendergast was working on so secretively.

“Just short of two weeks ago, a man with a German accent showed up in Malfourche. The Brodies were brutally murdered. I traced the man back here to New York. He was using a fake address, but I managed to link him to a small brownstone at Four Twenty-eight East End Avenue. I did a little poking around. The building is in the heart of the old German-speaking area of Yorkville, and it’s been owned by the same company since 1940. A real estate holding company. And it appears he’s got a yacht moored at the Boat Basin—a huge one. I followed him from the brownstone to the yacht.”

Another nod from Corrie. She wondered when he was going to want some information from her in return. “So?” she said.

“So I believe this Pendergast, whom you seem to know so much about, is the key to the whole thing.”

“No doubt. This is the big case he’s been working on.”

An awkward pause. “That doesn’t seem likely to me.”

“What do you mean?”

“An FBI agent working a case doesn’t blow up a bar and sink a bunch of boats, not to mention burn down a drug lab in the swamp. No—this is extracurricular.”

“That’s possible. He often investigates on a… freelance basis.”

“This was not an investigation. This was… retribution. Reckoning. This man Pendergast, I believe he’s the mastermind behind the whole operation.”

She stared at him. “Mastermind of what?”

“The Brodie killings. The drug smuggling operation—if that’s what it is. Something big and highly illegal is going on here—that much is obvious.”

“Now, hold on. You’re calling Pendergast a drug lord, or maybe even a
murderer
?”

“Let us say I strongly suspect his involvement. Everything that’s happened looks to me like drugs, and this FBI agent is up to his neck in it—”

Corrie stood up abruptly, her chair clattering to the floor. “Are you some kind of nutcase?” she said in a loud voice.

“Sit down, please—”

“I will
not
sit down! Pendergast, selling
drugs
?” Her tone of disgust and disbelief was turning heads in the crowded restaurant. She didn’t care.

Betterton cringed under this outburst. “Will you be quiet—”

“Pendergast is one of the most honest men you’ll ever meet. You aren’t even fit to lick his shoes!”

She saw Betterton flushing with mortification. Now she had the riveted attention of the entire restaurant. Several waiters and waitresses were hurrying over. There was something almost gratifying about it.

Her long frustration at Pendergast’s disappearance, her anger at being led to believe he was dead, seemed to coalesce and find a target in Betterton. “You call yourself a reporter?” she cried. “You couldn’t report your way out of a douche bag! Pendergast saved my life! He’s been putting me through college, for your information—and don’t think there’s anything between us, either, because he’s the most decent man alive, you asswipe.”

“Excuse me, miss!” A waiter was flapping his hands in a panic as if to wave her away by magic.

“Don’t ‘miss’ me, I’m on my way out.” She turned and looked at the horrified crowd in the restaurant. “What, you don’t like foul language? Go back to Dubuque.”

She flounced out of the restaurant, exited onto Seventh Avenue, and there, amid the lunchtime crowds, managed to regain her breath and her equilibrium.

This was serious. It seemed Pendergast was in some kind of trouble—maybe deep trouble. But he’d always handled trouble before, she knew. She had made him a promise—a promise to leave this alone—and she intended to keep it.