“So what does this mean?”
“It’s the name.”
“No, I mean what’s the significance of this particular shell?”
“Is it supposed to mean something? You’re Homo sapiens sapiens, this is Pisania maculosa. That’s just the way it is.”
“This shell, is it rare?”
“Not at all. You can easily buy them over the Internet, from any number of dealers.”
Which made the shell little more than useless as a way to track a killer. With a sigh, she put away her notebook.
“They’re quite common in the Mediterranean,” he said.
She looked up. “The Mediterranean?”
“And the Azores.”
“I’m sorry. I’m not really clear exactly where the Azores are.”
He gave her a sour look of disbelief. Then he waved her over to one of the cases, where dozens of shells were displayed, along with a faded map of the Mediterranean. “There,” he said, pointing. “It’s these islands here, to the west of Spain. Pisania maculosa ranges throughout this area, from the Azores to the Mediterranean.”
“And nowhere else? The Americas?”
“I’ve just told you its range. Those shells I brought out to show you-they were all collected in Italy.”
She was silent a moment, her gaze still on the case. She could not remember the last time she’d really studied a map of the Mediterranean. Her world, after all, was Boston; crossing the state line was the equivalent of a foreign trip. Why a seashell? Why this particular seashell?
Her eyes then focused on the eastern corner of the Mediterranean. On the island of Cyprus.
Red ocher. Seashells. What is the killer trying to tell us?
“Oh,” said Von Schiller. “I didn’t know anyone else was here.”
Jane had not heard any footsteps, even on the creaking wood floors. She turned to see a young man looming right behind her. Most likely a graduate student, judging by his rumpled shirt and blue jeans. He certainly looked like a scholar, with heavy black-framed glasses, his face washed out to a wintry pallor. He stood so silent that Jane wondered if the man could speak.
Then the words came out, his stuttering so tortured that it was painful to hear. “P-p-professor Von Schiller. It’s t-t-time to c-c-close.”
“We’re just finishing up here, Malcolm. I wanted to show Detective Rizzoli some examples of Pisania.” Von Schiller placed the shells back in their box. “I’ll lock up.”
“B-b-but it’s my-”
“I know, I know. Just because I’ve gotten on in years, no one trusts me to turn one stupid key anymore. Look, I’ve still got papers on my desk that I need to sort through. Why don’t you show the detective out? I promise I’ll lock the door when I leave.”
The young man hesitated, as though trying to come up with the words to protest. Then he simply sighed and nodded.
Jane slipped the evidence bag containing the shell back into her pocket. “Thank you for your help, Dr. Von Schiller,” she said. But the old man was already shuffling away to return the box of shells to its drawer.
The young man said nothing as he led Jane through the gloomy exhibit halls, past animals trapped behind glass, his sneakers setting off barely a creak on the wood floors. This was hardly the place a young man should be spending a Sunday evening, she thought. Keeping company with fossils and pierced butterflies.
Outside, through the gloom of early evening, Jane trudged back toward the parking lot, her shoes crunching across gritty snow. Halfway there she slowed, stopped. Turning, she scanned the darkened buildings, the pools of light cast by streetlamps. No one, nothing, moved.
On the night she died, did Eve Kassovitz see her killer coming?
She quickened her pace, her keys already in hand, and crossed to her car, which now sat alone in the lot. Only after she’d slid inside and locked the door did she let down her guard. This case is freaking me out, she thought. I can’t even walk across a parking lot without feeling like the Devil’s at my back.
And closing in.
August 1. Phase of the moon: Full.
Last night my mother spoke to me in my dreams. A scolding. A reminder that I have been undisciplined. “I have taught you all the ancient rituals, and for what?” she asked. “So that you will ignore them? Remember who you are. You are the chosen one.”
I have not forgotten. How could I? Since my earliest years, she has recited the tales of our ancestors, about whom Manetho of Sebennytos, in the age of Ptolemy the Second, wrote, “They set our towns on fire. They caused the people to suffer every brutality. They waged war, desiring to exterminate the race.”
In my veins runs the sacred blood of hunters.
These are secrets that even my distracted and oblivious father did not know. Between my parents, the ties were merely practical. But between my mother and me, the bonds reach across time, across continents, into my very dreams. She is displeased with me.
And so tonight, I lead a goat into the woods.
It comes willingly, because it has never felt the sting of human cruelty. The moon is so bright I need no flashlight to show me the way. Behind me I hear the confused bleating of the other goats that I’ve just released from the farmer’s barn, but they don’t follow me. Their calls recede as I walk deeper into the woods, and now all I hear is the sound of my footfalls and the goat’s hooves on the forest floor.
When we have walked far enough, I tie the goat to a tree. The animal senses what is to come and gives an anxious bleat as I take off my clothes, stripping down to naked skin. I kneel on the moss. The night is cool, but my shivering is from anticipation. I raise the knife, and the ritual words flow from my lips as easily as they always have before. Praise to our lord Seth, to the god of my ancestors. The god of death and destruction. Through countless millennia, he has guided our hands, has led us from the Levant to the lands of Phoenicia and Rome, to every corner of the earth. We are everywhere.
The blood spurts in a hot fountain.
When it is over, I walk naked, except for my shoes, to the lake. Under the moon’s glow I wade into the water and wash away the goat’s blood. I emerge cleansed and exhilarated. Only as I pull on my clothes does my heartbeat finally slow, and exhaustion suddenly drapes its heavy arm around my shoulders. I could almost fall asleep on the grass, but I don’t dare lie down; I am so tired, I might not awaken until daylight.
I trudge back toward the house. As I reach the top of the hill, I see her. Lily stands on the edge of the lawn, a slender silhouette with hair gleaming in the moonlight. She is looking at me.
“Where have you been?” she asks.
“I went for a swim.”
“In the dark?”
“It’s the best time.” Slowly I walk toward her. She stands perfectly still, even as I move close enough to touch her. “The water’s warm. No one can see you swimming naked.” My hand is cool from the lake, and she shivers as I caress her cheek. Is it from fear or fascination? I don’t know. What I do know is that she has been watching me these past weeks, just as I’ve been watching her, and something is happening between us. They say that Hell calls to Hell. Somewhere inside her, the darkness has heard my call and is stirring to life.
I move even closer. Though she’s older than I am, I’m taller, and my arm slips easily around her
