Cemetery Dance

starting with the feet and working upward, handing them to D'Agosta for stowing in the evidence box. When he reached the chest, he slowly worked the knife out of the soil and handed it over.

'Do you see that, Vincent?' he asked, pointing. D'Agosta shined his light over a piece of wrought iron, like a long spike or rod, with an end that curved over the bones of the victim's upper arm. The long end of the spike was buried deep in the ground. 'Pinned into the grave.'

Pendergast pulled the spikes out and set them with the rest of the remains. 'Curious. And do you see this?'

Now D'Agosta shined the light on the victim's neck. The remains of a thin, twisted hemp cord could still be seen, horribly constrictive around the neck bone.

'Strangled so hard,' said D'Agosta, 'it must have half decapitated him.'

'Indeed. The hyoid bone is nearly crushed.' Pendergast continued with his grisly task.

Soon all that was left to be exposed was the skull, which remained facedown in the dirt. Pendergast undermined it and the jaw with a small penknife, wiggling them loose, then freeing them as a single unit. He turned them over with the blade of his pen — knife.

'Oh, shit.' D'Agosta took a step back. The skull's mouth was closed, but the space behind the teeth, where the tongue had been, was packed with a chalky, greenish white substance. A curled — up thread lay in a tangle in front, one end clamped between the teeth.

Pendergast picked out the thread and looked at it, then carefully placed it in a test tube. He then leaned in gingerly, sniffed the skull, pinched up a minuscule amount of the powder, and rubbed it between thumb and forefinger. 'Arsenic. The mouth was filled with it and the lips sewn shut.'

'Jesus. So what's a suicide doing strangled, with a knife in his back and a mouth sewn full of arsenic? You'd think the people who buried him would have noticed.'

'The body wasn't originally buried like this. Nobody buries their kin facedown. After the relations buried the body, someone else — those who had presumably, ah, 'reanimated' it — came back, dug it up, and prepared it in this special manner.'

'Why?'

'A common enough Obeah ceremony. To kill him a second time.'

'What the hell for?'

'To make sure he was very, very dead.' Pendergast stood up. 'As you've already noticed, Vincent, this was no suicide. Or victim. In fact, since he was killed twice, the second time with arsenic and a knife in the back, there can be no doubt at all. After his initial burial, this man was dug up — dug upfor a purpose — and, when that purpose was accomplished, buried again, facedown. This is the perpetrator — the 'reanimated corpse' of theNew York Sun — of the Inwood Hill murders of 1901.'

'You're saying the Ville kidnapped or recruited him, turned him into a zombii, made him kill that landscape architect and parks commissioner — all to keep their church from being razed?' Pendergast waved at the corpse. 'Ecce signum.'

Chapter 44

D'Agosta took a swig of coffee and shuddered. It was his fifth cup of the day and it wasn't even noon. The expense of drinking Starbucks was becoming ruinous, and so he'd switched back to the black tar produced by the ancient coffee machine in the break room down the hall. As he sipped, he gazed at Pendergast, sitting in the corner, lost in thought, his fingers tented — apparently no worse the wear for the previous night's gravedigging antics.

Suddenly, he heard a querulous voice raised in the hallway — someone demanding to see him. It sounded familiar, but D'Agosta couldn't immediately place it. He rose and poked his head out the door. A man in a corduroy jacket was arguing with one of the secretaries.

The secretary glanced up and saw him. 'Lieutenant, I keep telling this man he needs to make his report to the sergeant.'

The man turned. 'There you are!'

It was that movie — producer — with — a — cause, Esteban. With a fresh bandage on his forehead.

'Sir,' the secretary said, 'you must make an appointment to see the lieutenant —'

D'Agosta waved him over. 'Shelley, I'll go ahead and see him. Thanks.'

D'Agosta stepped back into his office, and Esteban followed. When he caught sight of Pendergast, sitting silently in the corner, he frowned; the two hadn't exactly become best buddies during their first encounter, out at Esteban's Long Island estate.

D'Agosta sat down wearily behind his desk, and the man took a chair in front. There was something about Esteban that D'Agosta didn't like. Basically, the man was a self — righteous prig.

'What is it?' D'Agosta asked.

'I was attacked,' said Esteban. 'Look at me! Attacked with a knife!'

'Did you report it to the police?'

'What the hell do you think I'm doing now?'

'Mr. Esteban, I'm a lieutenant in the homicide division. I'll be happy to refer you to an investigating officer —'

'It's an attempted homicide, isn't it? I was attacked by a zombii.'

D'Agosta halted. Pendergast slowly raised his head.

'Excuse me… a zombii?' D'Agosta said.

'That's what I said. Or someone acting like a zombii.'

D'Agosta held up a hand and pressed down his intercom. 'Shelley? I need an investigating officer in here right away, ready to take a statement.'

'Sure thing, Lieutenant.'

The man tried to speak again but D'Agosta held up his hand. In a minute an officer came in with a digital recorder, and D'Agosta nodded him toward the lone remaining empty chair.

The officer snapped on the recorder and D'Agosta lowered his hand. 'All right, Mr. Esteban. Let's hear your story.'

'I stayed late in my office working last night.'

'Address?'

'Five thirty — three West Thirty — fifth Street, near the Javits Convention Center. I left about one am. That area of town is pretty dead at night, and I was walking east on Thirty — fifth when I realized someone was behind me. I turned and he looked like some kind of bum, drunk or maybe high, dressed in rags, lurching along. He looked out of it, so I didn't pay much attention. Just before I reached the corner of Tenth Avenue, I heard this rush behind me; I spun around and was struck in the head with a knife. It was just a glancing blow, thank God. The man — or man — thing — tried to stab me again with the knife. But I keep myself in good shape and I was a boxer in college, so I parried the strike and hit him back. Hard. He made another swipe at me but by that time I was ready and knocked him down. He got up, grabbed the knife, and went lurching away into the night.'

'Can you describe the assailant?' Pendergast asked.

'All too well. His face was all puffy and swollen. His clothes were ragged and covered with splotches, maybe blood. His hair was brown, all matted and sticking up from his head, and he made this sound, like…' Esteban paused, thinking. 'Almost like water being sucked down a drain. Tall, angular, thin, gawky. Around thirty — five. His hands were spotted, streaked with what looked like old blood.'

Colin Fearing, thought D'Agosta. Or Smithback.

'Can you give a precise time?'

'I checked my watch. It was one eleven A.M.'

'Any witnesses?'

'No. Look, Lieutenant, I know who's behind this.'

D'Agosta waited.

'The Ville has been out to get me ever since I raised the issue of animal sacrifice. I was interviewed by that