worktable and took a few steps toward the Hall of Truth and the burial chamber beyond. He could see that it was quite dark-still at level 1 lighting, like the rest of the tomb. He couldn’t see a damn thing, to tell the truth.
He went back to the worktable, looked at the computer. It was fully booted, the software loaded and waiting in standby mode. He moused over to the lighting icon, trying to remember how to raise the light levels. Lipper had done it a hundred times, but he’d never paid much attention. There were some software sliders visible in an open window and he clicked the one labeled Hall of the Chariots.
Christ! The lights dimmed, sending the disquieting Egyptian carvings and stone statuary even further into gloom. He quickly moused the slider in the other direction, and the lights intensified. Then he began brightening the lights in the rest of the tomb.
He heard a thump and turned with a jerk. “Jayce?”
It had definitely come from the burial chamber.
DeMeo laughed. “Hey, Jayce, c’mere. I got the pizzas.”
There was that strange noise again: Draaaag-thump. Draaaag-thump. As if somebody, or some thing, was dragging one limb.
“It sounds just like The Mummy’s Curse. Ha, ha, Jayce-good one!”
No answer.
DeMeo, still chuckling, turned from the computer and strode through the Hall of Truth. He turned his eyes away from the squatting form of Ammut-something about the Egyptian god, the eater of hearts with a crocodile head and lion’s mane, creeped him out even worse than the rest of the tomb.
He paused beyond the door to the burial chamber. “You’re a funny guy, Jayce.”
He waited for Lipper’s laugh, for the sight of his skinny form emerging from behind a pilaster. But there was nothing. The silence was absolute. With a nervous swallow, he ducked inside, peered about the tomb.
Nothing. The other doors leading away from the burial chamber were dark-they weren’t part of the computer lighting scheme. Lipper must be hiding in one of those rooms, preparing to jump out and scare him half to death.
“Hey, Jayce, come on. The pizzas are cold and getting colder.”
The lights suddenly went out.
“Hey!”
DeMeo spun around, but the tomb doglegged at the Hall of Truth and he could not see back into the Hall of the Chariots-nor could he see the comforting blue glow of the LCD screen.
He spun again, hearing the strange, dragging footfalls behind him, moving closer now.
“This isn’t funny, Jay.”
He felt for his flashlight-but of course he wasn’t carrying it; it was back in the chariots hall, on the table. Why couldn’t he see the indirect glow of the LCD? Had the power been cut as well? The darkness was total.
“Look, Jay, cut the crap. I’m serious.”
He shuffled backward in the dark, came up against one of the pillars, began feeling his way around it. The steps drew still closer.
Draaaag-thump. Draaaag-thump.
“Jay, come on. Cut the bullshit.”
Suddenly, from closer than he ever expected, he heard the raspy sound of air escaping from a dry throat. A rattle that was almost a hiss, full of something like hatred.
“Jesus!” DeMeo took a step forward and swiped his heavy fist through the air, striking something that shuffled back with another snakelike hiss.
“Stop it! Stop it!”
He both heard and felt the thing rush at him with a high keening sound. He tried to twist aside but felt, with astonishment, a terrible blow. Searing heat knifed through his chest. With a shriek, he fell backward, clawing at the darkness, and as he hit the ground, he felt something heavy and cold stamp on his throat and bear down with shocking weight. He lashed about with his hands as he heard the bones crackling in his neck and a sudden, dazzling explosion of urine-colored light flashed in his eyes-and then nothing.
Chapter 19
The large, elegant library in Agent Pendergast’s mansion on Riverside Drive was the last room one would expect to call crowded. And yet-D’Agosta reflected moodily-there was no other word for it this evening. Tables, chairs, and much of the floor were covered with plats and diagrams. Half a dozen easels and whiteboards had been erected, showing schematics, maps, routes of ingress and egress. The low-tech reconnaissance they had conducted of Herkmoor a few nights earlier had now been enhanced by high-tech remote surveillance, including false-color satellite images in radar and infrared wavelengths. Boxes lay shoved against one wall, overflowing with printouts, data dumps from computer probes of the Herkmoor network, and aerial photographs of the prison complex.
In the middle of the controlled chaos sat Glinn, nearly motionless in his wheelchair, speaking quietly in his usual monotone. He had begun the meeting with a crushingly detailed analysis of Herkmoor’s physical plant and security measures. D’Agosta needed no convincing there: if any prison was escape-proof, it was Herkmoor. The old- fashioned defenses like redundant guard posts and triple fencing had been bolstered by cutting-edge instrumentation, including laser-beam “lattices” at every exit, hundreds of digital videocams, and a network of passive listening devices set into the walls and ground, ready to pick up anything from digging to stealthy footsteps. Every prisoner was required to wear an ankle bracelet with an embedded GPS device, which broadcast the prisoner’s location to a central command unit. If the bracelet were cut, an alarm would immediately sound and an automatic lockdown sequence would begin.
As far as D’Agosta was concerned, Herkmoor was invincible.
From there, Glinn had segued to the next step in the escape plan. And this was where D’Agosta’s simmering unease had boiled over. Not only did the idea seem simplistic and inept, but, even worse, it turned out that he, D’Agosta-and he alone-was the man assigned to carry it out.
He glanced around the library, waiting impatiently for Glinn to finish. Wren had arrived earlier that evening with a set of architectural plans of the prison, “borrowed” from the private records section of the New York Public Library, and now he hovered around Constance Greene. With his luminous eyes and almost translucent skin, the man looked like a cave creature, paler even than Pendergast… if that were possible.
Next, D’Agosta’s gaze fell on Constance. She sat at a side table opposite Wren, a stack of books before her, listening to Glinn and taking notes. She was wearing a severe black dress with a row of tiny pearl buttons in the back, running from the base of her spine up to the nape of her neck. D’Agosta found himself wondering who had buttoned them up for her. More than once, he had caught her privately stroking one hand over the other, or gazing into the fire that crackled on the huge grate, lost in thought.
She’s probably as skeptical about all this as I am, he thought. Because as he looked around at their little foursome-Proctor, the chauffeur, was unaccountably absent-he couldn’t imagine a group less suited for such a daunting task. He had never really liked Glinn and his smooth arrogance, and he wondered if the man had finally met his match with the Herkmoor penitentiary.
There came a pause in Glinn’s drone, and he turned toward D’Agosta.
“Do you have any questions or comments so far, Lieutenant?”
“Yeah. A comment: the scheme is crazy.”
“Perhaps I should have phrased the question differently. Do you have any comments of substance to make?”
“You think I can just waltz in, make a spectacle of myself, and get out scot-free? This is Herkmoor we’re talking about. I’ll be lucky not to end up in the cell next to Pendergast.”
