The Cabinet of Curiosities

mean, go nowhere.

“And you’ve caught nothing since but a series of questionable assignments and gray-area errands. Of which you no doubt consider this one more.”

O’Shaughnessy spoke to the window, his voice deliberately tired. “Pendergast, I don’t know what your game is, but I don’t need to listen to this. I really don’t.”

“I saw that tape,” said Pendergast.

“Good for you.”

“I heard, for example, the prostitute pleading with you to let her go, saying that her pimp would beat her up if you didn’t. Then I heard her insisting you take the two hundred dollars, because if you didn’t, her pimp would assume she had betrayed him. But if you took the money, he would only think she’d bribed her way out of custody and spare her. Am I right? So you took the money.”

O’Shaughnessy had been through this in his own mind a thousand times. What difference did it make? He didn’t have to take the money. He hadn’t given it to charity, either. Pimps were beating up prostitutes every day. He should’ve left her to her fate.

“So now you’re cynical, you’re tired, you’ve come to realize that the whole idea of protect and serve is farcical, especially out there on the streets, where there doesn’t even seem to be right or wrong, nobody worth protecting, and nobody worth serving.”

There was a silence.

“Are we through with the character analysis?” O’Shaughnessy asked.

“For the moment. Except to say that, yes, this is a questionable assignment. But not in the way you’re thinking.”

The next silence stretched into minutes.

They stopped at a light, and O’Shaughnessy took an opportunity to cast a covert glance toward Pendergast. The man, as if knowing the glance was coming, caught his eye and pinned it. O’Shaughnessy almost jumped, he looked away so fast.

“Did you, by any chance, catch the show last year, Costuming History?” Pendergast asked, his voice now light and pleasant.

“What?”

“I’ll take that as a no. You missed a splendid exhibition. The Met has a fine collection of historical clothing dating back to the early Middle Ages. Most of it was in storage. But last year, they mounted an exhibition showing how clothing evolved over the last six centuries. Absolutely fascinating. Did you know that all ladies at Louis XIV’s court at Versailles were required to have a thirteen-inch waist or less? And that their dresses weighed between thirty and forty pounds?”

O’Shaughnessy realized he didn’t know how to answer. The conversation had taken such a strange and sudden tack that he found himself momentarily stunned.

“I was also interested to learn that in the fifteenth century, a man’s codpiece—”

This tidbit was mercifully interrupted by a screech of brakes as the Rolls swerved to avoid a cab cutting across three lanes of traffic.

“Yankee barbarians,” said Pendergast mildly. “Now, where was I? Ah yes, the codpiece . . .”

The Rolls was caught in Midtown traffic now, and O’Shaughnessy began to wonder just how much longer this ride was going to take.

The Great Hall of the Metropolitan Museum was sheeted in Beaux Arts marble, decorated with vast sprays of flowers, and almost unbearably crowded. O’Shaughnessy hung back while the strange FBI agent talked to one of the harried volunteers at the information desk. She picked up a phone, called someone, then put it down again, looking highly irritated. O’Shaughnessy began to wonder what this Pendergast was up to. Throughout the extended trip uptown he’d said nothing about his intended plan of action.

He glanced around. It was an Upper East Side crowd, for sure: ladies dressed to the nines clicking here and there in high heels, uniformed schoolchildren lined up and well behaved, a few tweedy-looking academics wandering about with thoughtful faces. Several people were staring at him disapprovingly, as if it was in bad taste to be in the Met wearing a police officer’s uniform. He felt a rush of misanthropy. Hypocrites.

Pendergast motioned him over, and they passed into the museum, running a gauntlet of ticket takers in the process, past a case full of Roman gold, plunging at last into a confusing sequence of rooms crowded with statues, vases, paintings, mummies, and all manner of art. Pendergast talked the whole time, but the crowds were so dense and the noise so deafening, O’Shaughnessy caught only a few words.

They passed through a quieter suite of rooms full of Asian art, finally arriving in front of a door of shiny gray metal. Pendergast opened it without knocking, revealing a small reception area. A strikingly good-looking receptionist sat behind a desk of blond wood. Her eyes widened slightly at the sight of his uniform. O’Shaughnessy gave her a menacing look.

“May I help you?” She addressed Pendergast, but her eyes continued to flicker anxiously toward O’Shaughnessy.

“Sergeant O’Shaughnessy and Special Agent Pendergast are here to see Dr. Wellesley.”

“Do you have an appointment?”

“Alas, no.”

The receptionist hesitated. “I’m sorry. Special Agent—?”

“Pendergast. Federal Bureau of Investigation.”

At this she flushed deeply. “Just a moment.” She picked up her phone. O’Shaughnessy could hear it ringing in an office just off the reception area.