Pend00 - Extraction Page 3
“And there, arrayed with military precision on the tray, we saw something else. Teeth. Thirty-two of them. But these were not baby teeth—oh, no. They were all adult. And they were damp, their roots bloody, some pulled out so violently that sections of the surrounding bone were still attached. They had all been freshly extracted.”
“Freshly extracted,” Constance repeated in a dull voice, and then quoted: “ ‘I appeased him.’ ”
“Everett was always so precise in his speech. Indeed he did appease Old Dufour. And what a ghastly exchange it must have been.”
“And what happened to him?”
“We never saw Uncle Everett again. The police searched the place, and searched again. Both Dufour and my uncle had disappeared, as if into thin air. There were those who spoke of hearing cries in the night; of seeing a dark figure lugging a trunk down by the abandoned Saint Peter Street Piers—but, of course, such stories remained rumors.”
“And the, ah, leaving of teeth at the Dufour house? Has the tooth fairy tradition continued?”
“You know how children are, my dear Constance. Childish rituals do not die; they are passed along more tenaciously than any adult tradition. The tradition continued even as the Dufour house fell further into rack and ruin. And then, one dark night, it burned down. That was about three years after the events I’ve described. No one was particularly surprised by it; abandoned houses did have a tendency to burn. But I, for one, long wondered if my brother Diogenes was somehow responsible. Later, it came to my attention that he enjoyed fires very much; the larger the better.”
The plump figure of Mrs. Trask appeared in the library doorway. Cook, she was pleased to announce, had prepared a new dish of tagliatelle pasta; dinner was ready; and the tartufo bianco was no less than heavenly. Indeed, the wonderful aroma of it had filled the kitchen and was now drifting into the library.
“And is the pasta al dente?” Constance asked.
“Perfectly so,” replied Mrs. Trask.
Bertin came up behind the housekeeper. As Pendergast had predicted, the old man’s mood was restored. “Marvelous, I simply cannot wait!” he said, rubbing his hands. “Have you ever scented such exquisite truffes? Please, let us go in without delay.”
Pendergast rose and glanced at Constance. “Shall we?”
“Al dente,” Constance repeated to herself. “Yes, one must eat one’s pasta al dente. Somehow, Aloysius, I find that your story has sharpened my appetite to a most excellent degree.”
And with that observation, the three went in to dinner.
All of Special Agent Pendergast’s questions will finally be answered…
See the next page for a preview of Preston & Child’s new thriller:
Two Graves
Coming in December 2012
+ Forty Hours
FOR THE PAST FORTY HOURS, SHE HAD BEEN BLINDFOLDED and kept constantly on the move. She had been bundled into the trunk of a car, the back of a truck, and—she guessed—the hold of a boat. In all the furtive shuttling from place to place, she had grown disoriented and lost track of time. She felt cold, hungry, and thirsty, and her head still ached from the savage blow she’d received in the taxi. She had been given no food, and the only liquid offered her had been a plastic bottle of water, thrust into her hand some time back.
Now she was once again in the trunk of a car. For several hours they had been driving at high speed, apparently on a freeway. But now the car slowed; the vehicle made several turns; and the sudden roughness of the ride led her to believe they were on a dirt road or track.
Whenever she had been transferred from one makeshift prison to another, her captors had been silent. But now, with the road noise reduced, she could hear the murmur of their voices through the vehicle. They were speaking a mixture of Portuguese and German, both of which she understood perfectly, having learned them before either English or her father’s native Hungarian. The talk was faint, however, and she could make out very little beyond the tones, which seemed angry, urgent. There seemed to be four of them now.
After several minutes of rough travel, the car eased to a halt. She heard doors opening and closing, feet crunching on gravel. Then the trunk was opened and she felt chill air on her face. A hand grabbed her by the elbow, raised her to a sitting position, then pulled her out. She staggered, knees buckling; the pressure of the hand increased, raising her and steadying her. Then—without a word—she was shoved forward.
Strange how she felt nothing, no emotion, not even grief or fear. After so many years of hiding, of fear and uncertainty, her brother had appeared with the news she had long dreamed of hearing but had resigned herself would never come. For one brief day she had been afire with the hope of seeing Aloysius again, of restarting their lives, of finally living once more like a normal human being. Then in a moment it was snatched away, her brother murdered, her husband shot and perhaps dead as well.
And now she felt like an empty vessel. Better to have never hoped at all.
She heard the creak of an opening door, and she was guided over a sill and into a room. The air smelled musty and close. The hand led her across the room, apparently through a second door and into an even mustier space. A deserted old house in the country, perhaps. The hand released its grip on her arm, and she felt the pressure of a chair seat against the back of her knees. She sat down, placing her remaining hand in her lap.
“Remove it,” said a voice in German—a voice she instantly recognized. There was a fumbling at her head, and the blindfold was pulled away.
She blinked once, twice. The room was dark, but her long-blindfolded eyes needed no period of adjustment. She heard footsteps recede behind her, heard the door close. Then, licking dry lips, she raised her eyes and met the gaze of Wulf Konrad Fischer. He was older, of course, but still as powerful looking and as heavily muscled as ever. He was seated in a chair facing her, his legs apart and his hands clasped between them. He shifted slightly, and the chair groaned under his massive build. With his penetrating pale eyes, his dark tan, and his closely trimmed thatch of thick, snow-white hair, he exuded Teutonic perfection. He looked at her, a cold smile distorting his lips. It was a smile Helen remembered all too well. Her apathy and emptiness were replaced by a spike of fear.
“I never expected to receive a visit from the dead,” Fischer said in his clipped, precise German. “And yet here you are. Fräulein Esterhazy—forgive me, Frau Pendergast—who departed this earth more than twelve years ago.” He looked at her, hard eyes glinting with some combination of amusement, anger, and curiosity.
Helen said nothing.
“Natürlich, in retrospect I can see how it was done. Your twin sister—der Schwächling—was the sacrificial pawn. After all your protests, your sanctimonious outrage, I see how well you have learned from us, after all! I almost feel honored.”
Helen remained silent. The apathy was returning. She would be better off dead than living with this pain.
Fischer peered at her intently, as if to gauge the effect of his words. He took a pack of Dunhills from his pocket, plucked one from the box, lit it with a gold lighter. “You wouldn’t care to tell us where you’ve been all this time, would you? Or whether you’ve had any other accomplices in this little deception—beyond your brother, I mean? Or whether you’ve spoken to anyone about our organization?”
When there was no response, Fischer took a deep drag on the cigarette. His smile broadened. “No matter. There will be plenty of time for that—once we get you back home. I’m sure you’ll be happy to tell the doctors everything… that is, before the experiments begin.”
Helen went still. Fischer had used the word Versuchsreihe—but that word meant more to her than simply “experiments.” At the thought of what it meant—at the memory—she felt a sudden panic. She leapt to her feet and ran headlong toward the door. It was a mindless, instinctive act, born of the atavistic need for self-preservation. But even as she charged the door, it was opened, her captors standing just beyond. Helen did not slow, and the
force of the impact knocked two of them back, but the others seized her and gripped her hard. It took all four to restrain her and drag her back into the room.
Fischer stood up. Taking another deep drag on the cigarette, he regarded Helen as she struggled silently, fiercely. Then he looked at his watch.
“It’s time to go,” he said. He glanced again at Helen. “I think we had better prepare the hypodermic.”
Pendergast’s latest adventure!
For more information about Preston & Child’s new hardcover Two Graves, available in December 2012, you can visit their Facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/PrestonandChild/app_116692181738298
Learn more about Pendergast’s mysterious brother Diogenes…
Now, available for the first time together in a single digital volume:
The Diogenes Trilogy
Brimstone
Dance of Death
The Book of the Dead
About the Authors
The thrillers of Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child “stand head and shoulders above their rivals” (Publishers Weekly). Preston and Child’s Relic and The Cabinet of Curiosities were chosen by readers in a National Public Radio poll as being among the one hundred greatest thrillers ever written, and Relic was made into a number-one box office hit movie. Coauthors of the famed Pendergast series, Preston and Child are also the authors of Fever Dream, Cold Vengeance, and Gideon’s Sword. Preston’s acclaimed nonfiction book, The Monster of Florence, is being made into a movie starring George Clooney. His interests include horses, scuba diving, skiing, mountain climbing, and exploring the Maine coast in an old lobster boat. Lincoln Child is a former book editor who has published five novels of his own, including the huge bestseller Deep Storm. He is passionate about motorcycles, sports cars, exotic parrots, and nineteenth-century English literature.
Readers can sign up for The Pendergast File, a monthly “strangely entertaining note” from the authors, at their website, www.prestonchild.com. The authors welcome visitors to their alarmingly active Facebook page, where they post regularly.
By Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child
Gideon’s Corpse
Cold Vengeance
Gideon’s Sword
Fever Dream
Cemetery Dance
The Wheel of Darkness
The Book of the Dead
Dance of Death
Brimstone
Still Life with Crows
The Cabinet of Curiosities
The Ice Limit
Thunderhead
Riptide
Reliquary
Mount Dragon
Relic
In answer to a frequently asked reader question:
The above titles are listed in descending order of publication, though almost all of them are stand-alone novels that need not be read in order. However, the pairs Relic/Reliquary and Dance of Death/The Book of the Dead and the trilogy Fever Dream/Cold Vengeance/Two Graves should ideally be read in sequence.
By Douglas Preston
Impact
The Monster of Florence (with Mario Spezi)
Blasphemy
Tyrannosaur Canyon
The Codex
Ribbons of Time
The Royal Road
Talking to the Ground
Jennie
Cities of Gold
Dinosaurs in the Attic
By Lincoln Child
The Third Gate
Terminal Freeze
Deep Storm
Death Match
Utopia
Tales of the Dark 1–3
Dark Banquet
Dark Company
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Contents
Welcome
Extraction
A Preview of Two Graves
About the Authors
Also by Douglas Preston & Lincoln Child
Newsletters
Copyright
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the authors’ imaginations or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Copyright © 2012 by Splendide Mendax, Inc., and Lincoln Child
Excerpt from Two Graves copyright © 2012 by Splendide Mendax, Inc., and Lincoln Child
Image of pliers on cover © Alexander Potapov/Shutterstock. Cover Art Direction and Design by Elizabeth Connor. Cover copyright © 2012 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.
All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher constitute unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
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First e-book edition: October 2012
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ISBN 978-1-4555-2808-0