Cemetery Dance

'All right,' said D'Agosta, 'start at the back and work toward the door.'

They walked down the center of the church. The floor was laid in large, square blocks of foot — polished stone, and there were no chairs, no pews. Their ceremonies and rites — and D'Agosta couldn't even begin to imagine what they must be like — must be done standing. Or maybe kneeling. He noticed strange designs painted on the walls: curlicues and eyes and fronded plants, all linked by elaborate series of lines. They reminded him strongly of the priest's garb — and even more of the bloody design that had been painted on the wall of Smithback's apartment.

He motioned to Perez. 'Take a picture of that design.'

'Right.'

The flash caused Pulchinski to jump.

The lamb bleated again. Hundreds of eyes watched them, and now and again D'Agosta was sure he saw the gleam of honed metal tucked into the folds of their robes.

At length the small group reached the rear of the structure. Where the choir would normally be, there was instead an animal pen, surrounded by a wooden fence, with straw matting covering the ground. In the middle stood a post with a chain dangling from it, and attached to the chain was a lamb. Damp straw, splattered with dark stains, covered the floor. The walls were dribbled with hardened blood, gore, and bits of feces. The post had once been carved like a totem pole, but it was so layered in offal and dung that the carvings had become unrecognizable.

Behind stood a brickwork altar, on which were placed pitchers of water, polished stones, fetishes, and bits of food. Above, on a small pedestal, were some implements of a vaguely nautical cast that D'Agosta didn't recognize: coiled, hooked pieces of metal set into wooden bases, almost like oversize corkscrews. They were highly polished, displayed like holy relics. Next to the altar sat a horsehair chest, padlocked.

'Nice,' said D'Agosta, as he played the light over the scene. 'Real nice.'

'I've never seen Vodou like this,' murmured Bertin. 'In fact, I would not call this Vodou. Oh, the foundations are there, certainly, but this has gone in a completely different, more dangerous, direction.'

'This is horrible,' said Pulchinski. He took out a video camera and began taping.

The appearance of the device caused a shuffling sound to rise from the massed people, a collective rustle.

'This is a sacred place,' said the high priest, his voice resonating in the enclosed space. 'You are defiling it. Defiling our faith!'

'Get it all on tape, Mr. Pulchinski,' said D'Agosta.

Moving as swiftly as a bat, his robes suddenly flaring, the high priest swooped in, swung his staff, and knocked the video camera out of Pulchinski's hands, sending it crashing to the floor. Pulchinski stumbled back, neighing in terror.

D'Agosta had his service revolver out in a flash. 'Mr. Charriere, keep your hands in sight and turn around — I said, turn around!'

The high priest did nothing. The gun was trained on him, but the man seemed unfazed.

Pendergast — who had been flitting around, scraping samples off various artifacts and altar items and dropping them into tiny test tubes — swiftly appeared in front of D'Agosta. 'Just a moment, Lieutenant,' he said quietly, then turned. 'Mr. Charriere?'

The high priest's eyes swiveled toward him. 'Befoulers!' he cried.

'Mr. Charriere.' Pendergast spoke the name again with a most peculiar emphasis, and the man fell silent. 'You have just assaulted an officer of the law.' He turned to the animal control officer. 'Are you all right?'

'No problem, fine,' said Pulchinski, putting on a brave front. The man's knees were practically knocking together. D'Agosta glanced around uneasily. It was not his imagination this time: the crowdhad moved in closer.

'That was a very foolish thing to do, Mr. Charriere,' Pendergast continued, his voice not loud yet somehow penetrating. 'You have now put yourself in our power.' He glanced over. 'Isn't that right, Mr. Bossong?'

A smile spread over the priest's features. For most people, smiles lighten their faces; the smile disfigured Charriere, revealing scar tissue that wasn't previously evident. 'The only power comes from the gods of this place, the power of theLoa and theirhungan! ' He pounded his staff on the floor as if to emphasize the point. And then, in the electric silence, a muffled answering sound came from below their feet.

Aaaaaahhuuuu…

D'Agosta jumped in recognition — it was the sound he had heard in the bushes the other night. 'What the hell was that?'

No answer. The crowd seemed to be poised, electric, waiting.

'I want to search below.'

Now Bossong, the community leader, stepped forward. He had been watching the confrontation from one side, an inscrutable look on his face. 'Your warrant doesn't extend there,' he said.

'I have probable cause. There's an animal or something down there.'

Bossong frowned. 'You shall not pass.' 'The fuck I won't.'

Now the priest, Charriere, took up the cry. He turned and spoke to the crowd. 'He shall not pass!'

'He shall not pass!' they called back, in unison. Their sudden, thunderous cry — after such silence — was almost terrifying.

'We will finish our work up here first,' Pendergast continued calmly. 'Any further efforts to impede us will be met with disfavor. Perhaps even unpleasantness.'

Charriere pressed a finger against Pendergast's coat, the grimacing smile frozen on his face. 'You have no power over me.'

Pendergast stepped back from the man's touch. 'Lieutenant? Shall we proceed?'

D'Agosta holstered his weapon. Pendergast had somehow bought them a minute or two more. 'Pulchinski, take the lamb and the post. Perez, cut the lock off that chest.'

Perez cut a padlock off the horsehair chest, lifted the lid. D'Agosta shined the light inside. It was filled with instruments wrapped in pieces of leather. D'Agosta picked up one, unrolled it — a recurved knife.

'Take the chest and everything in it.'

'Yes, sir.'

The crowd was muttering to itself now, the people shuffling closer. The high priest's face, split by a grimace, stared at them as they worked, his lips drawn back and working, as if he was chanting silently to himself.

D'Agosta caught a glimpse of Bertin out of the corner of his eye. He'd almost forgotten about the bizarre little man. He was poking in a transept — like corner, where dozens of leather strips hung from the ceiling, with fetishes pinned to them. Next, he moved to a bizarre construction of sticks, thousands of them, tied up into a crooked three — dimensional quincunx. His face looked drawn and worried.

'Take that, too,' said D'Agosta, pointing to a fetish lying on the ground. 'And that, and that.' He shined the light into the corners, searching for doorways or closets, trying to see behind the masses of people.

'May the Loa rain disaster on the filthybaka who defile the sanctuary!' cried the high priest. He now held a strange charm in his other hand — a small, dark rattle topped by a desiccated knob the size of a golf ball — and he was shaking it at the intruders.

'Take the fetishes off the altar,' said D'Agosta. 'And those instruments, and that other shit over there. All of it.'

Quickly, Perez loaded the stuff into the plastic evidence locker.

'Thief!' thundered Charriere, shaking the charm. The crowd shuffled forward.

'Cool it, you'll get everything back,' D'Agosta said. They'd better finish up — quick — and then check out downstairs.

'Lieutenant, don't forget the objects on thecaye — mystere. ' Pendergast nodded toward another shrine set into a dark alcove, fringed by stripped palm leaves, on which were piled a number of little pots, fetishes, and food offerings.