couldn’t help but think of her now as a different person. She wondered what the PTSD meant and how it might manifest itself. And then there was the odd fact that Stacy had arrived in town several days before revealing herself to anyone. What had she been doing during that time? Had she really just been “getting a feel” for the place?
Corrie got into her car and started the engine. There was still some residual heat so it warmed up fast, which made her grateful. She drove out of town and headed up Ravens Ravine Road, taking the switchbacks very slow, the snow building up on her wipers. It was falling so thickly now that anyone waiting with a gun wouldn’t even see her car on the road, let alone have a shot. So much the better. She thought ahead to her crappy meal of beans and rice — all she could afford — and another evening of freezing her ass in the house. The hell with it, she was going to pick the thermostat lock, turn up the heat, and let the owner howl. Ridiculous that a multimillionaire was so concerned about a few extra dollars.
The mansion emerged from the falling snow, dark and gloomy. Stacy’s car was gone, as expected. Corrie hoped she wouldn’t drink in the restaurant and try to drive home in this weather afterward.
She parked in the driveway. Her car would be plowed in the next morning, as it had been several times before, requiring her to shovel it out. All because the owner wouldn’t let her use the garage. No wonder he was locked in a horrible divorce.
As she got out of the car, freezing already, it abruptly occurred to her that Pendergast was right. It was time to get out of Roaring Fork. Her basic research was complete, and it was all too clear she wasn’t going to solve the hundred-fifty-year-old serial killings. She’d exhausted all avenues without coming up with so much as a clue. As soon as the highway was opened, she’d split.
Decision made.
She stuck her key into the door of the house and opened it, expecting the usual flurry of barks and yips to greet her — only to be met with silence.
She felt a welling of apprehension. It was like last night all over again. “Jack?” she called out.
No answer. Had Stacy brought the dog into town with her, in case he was lonely? But she hadn’t shown much interest in Jack and professed to prefer cats.
“Jack? Here,
Not even a whimper. Corrie tried once again to control her pounding heart. She flicked on all the lights — screw the electric bill — and called again and again. Making her way down the hall to her wing of the house, she found her bedroom door shut but unlocked. She pushed it open. “Jack?”
The room was dark. There was a form at the foot of the bed, and a very dark area around it. She turned on the lights, and saw Jack’s body — minus the head — lying on top of the rug, surrounded by a huge crimson stain.
She didn’t scream. She couldn’t scream. She simply stared.
And then she saw the head, propped up on the dresser, eyes open and staring, a cascade of congealing blood dripping down the fake wood front. Stuck between the jaws was a piece of paper. In an almost dream-like state, disconnected, as if it was happening to someone else, Corrie managed to pick up a letter opener, pry open the jaws, take out the paper, and read the message.
Swanson: Get out of town today or you’re dead. A bullet through that sweet little head of yours.
Corrie stared. It was like some sick take on
The note snapped her out of her fog. Amid a sick wash of fear and disgust, she also felt a groundswell of rage so powerful it frightened her: fury at the crude attempt at intimidation, fury for what had been done to poor, innocent Jack.
Leave? No way. She was staying right here.
44
Hampstead Heath, Roger Kleefisch remarked to himself, had changed sadly since the days when Keats used to traverse it on his way from Clerkenwell to the cottage of Cowden Clarke, there to read his poetry and chat about literature; or since Walter Hartright, drawing teacher, had crossed it late at night, deep in thought, only to encounter the ghostly Woman in White on a distant byroad. These days it was hemmed in on all sides by Greater London, NW3, with bus stops and Underground stations dotted along its borders where once only groves of trees had stood.
Now, however, it was almost midnight; the weather had turned chilly, and the heath was relatively deserted. They had already left Parliament Hill and its marvelous panorama of the City and Canary Wharf behind and were making their way northwest. Hills, ponds, and clumps of woodlands were visible as mere shadows beneath the pale moon.
“I brought a dark lantern along,” Kleefisch said, more to keep up his spirits than to be informative. He brandished the device, which he’d kept hidden beneath his heavy ulster. “It seemed appropriate to the occasion, somehow.”
Pendergast glanced toward it. “Anachronistic, but potentially useful.”
Earlier, from the comfort of his lodgings, planning this little escapade had filled Kleefisch with excitement. When Pendergast had been unable to secure permission to enter Covington Grange, he had declared he would do so anyway, extralegally. Kleefisch had enthusiastically volunteered to help. But now that they were actually executing the plan, he felt more than a little trepidation. It was one thing to write scholarly essays on Professor Moriarty, the “Napoleon of crime,” or on Colonel Sebastian Moran, the “second most dangerous man in London.” It was quite another thing, he realized, to be actually out on the heath, with breaking and entering on the agenda.
“There’s the Hampstead Heath constabulary, you know,” he said.
“Indeed,” came the response. “What’s their complement?”
“Maybe a dozen or so. Some use police dogs.”
To this there was no response.
They skirted South Meadow and passed into the heavy woods of the Dueling Ground. To the north, Kleefisch could make out the lights of Highgate.
“Then there’s the National Trust groundskeepers to consider,” he added. “There’s always the chance one of them might be loitering about.”
“In that case, I would suggest keeping that lantern well concealed.”
They slowed as their objective came into sight over the lip of a small hill. Covington Grange was sited just at the far edge of the Dueling Ground, surrounded on three sides by woods. Stone Bridge and Wood Pond lay to the right. To the north, a green lawn ran away in the direction of sprawling Kenwood House. Beyond, late-night traffic hushed along Hampstead Lane.
Pendergast looked about him, then nodded to Kleefisch and made his way forward, keeping to the edge of the wood.
The Grange itself was an archaeological enigma, as if its builder could not decide which school, or even which era, he wished it to belong to. The low facade was half-timbered and Tudor, but a small addition to one side was a bizarre bit of neo-Romanesque. The long sloping wooden roof, bristling with exposed eaves, presaged the Craftsman era by a good half century. A greenhouse clung to the far side, its glass panels now cracked and covered with vines. The entire structure was enclosed by a hurricane fence, sagging and weathered, which appeared to have been erected as a security measure decades ago and long since forgotten.
Following Pendergast’s lead, Kleefisch crept up to the front of the building, where a narrow gate in the fencing was held in place with a padlock. Beside it, a weather-beaten sign read: PROPERTY OF H. M. GOV’T. NO TRESPASSING.
“Shall we, Roger?” Pendergast asked, as calmly as if he were inviting Kleefisch in for cucumber sandwiches at the Ritz.
Kleefisch glanced uneasily around, clutched the dark lantern more closely to him. “But the lock—” he began. Even as he spoke, there was a faint clicking noise and the padlock sprang open in Pendergast’s hand.
