“Is it bolted down?”
“It’s a door. I see hinges and a handle, but something solid has been placed on top of it outside. I can move it, but I can’t open it more than a crack.”
My eyes were still glued to the opening as I clutched the weapon in one hand and the flashlight in the other. For a moment I could have sworn—
There it was! That stealthy shuffle, as though someone was inching his way along the tunnel, skulking through the darkness so as not to give away his position.
“He’s coming,” I whispered.
My voice carried all the way to the top. The stairs clanged as Devlin quickly descended. He took the gun and the flashlight and swept the beam up the ladder.
“Get to the top. I’ve managed to pry the door open a few inches. See if you can squeeze through.”
“What about you?”
“Just go. I’ll be right behind you.”
But as I started up the ladder, I glanced over my shoulder and saw the light disappear through the hole.
“Devlin?”
No answer.
I was torn between going up and coming back down. The torturous indecision was like my nightmare all over again. I was still hanging there a moment later when Devlin crawled back though the opening.
He didn’t say a word, just waited at the bottom until I’d climbed to the top and then he followed me up.
I shimmied through the opening, scraping elbows and knees against the rough brick, and then once through, I used all my strength to heave a boulder aside and open the door.
Devlin crawled up out of the well and we both turned to survey our surroundings. We were somewhere in the woods outside the cemetery gates.
It was not yet dark. The horizon still glowed in the west. To the east, the moon rose over the treetops. A breeze whispered through the leaves and I could smell jasmine in the twilight.
Devlin took my hand and we walked through the cooling air as his ghosts slipped through the veil behind us.
TWENTY-NINE
B
y the time I left the cemetery, the place was swarming with cops. Crime scene techs had descended upon the chamber and a small army of policemen was combing through the tunnels. I assumed Devlin would be occupied for hours so I was completely shocked when he showed up at my door later that night.
I’d been home long enough to shower and fix myself a light dinner, though I couldn’t bring myself to do much more than pick at the salad. What had been seen in that chamber could not be unseen, and I had a bad feeling it would be days, if not weeks, before I managed a full night’s sleep.
Devlin had brought a laptop with him so that we could go through the Oak Grove images together. I assumed he’d come to the same conclusion I had earlier—Hannah Fischer had been in that chamber either dead or alive while I’d been aboveground photographing headstones. The theft of my briefcase solidified my suspicion that the killer believed I’d captured something incriminating in one or more of those shots.
But how had he known those pictures were in my briefcase…unless he’d seen them?
On the day the body had been discovered, I’d spent the afternoon at Emerson, both upstairs in the main library and in the basement archives area. The briefcase had been left unattended for long periods of time while I combed through boxes of records and scrolled through the database. If the case had been open, anyone passing by could have glimpsed the pictures. Which would mean that at some point during the day, I had been in proximity to the killer. We might have brushed shoulders or exchanged pleasantries. The thought of that now in the aftermath of our discovery—with the purpose of those chains and pulleys so gruesomely apparent—made me ill.
Before Devlin arrived, I’d put together a chart of everything we knew about the burial site of each victim, starting with Hannah Fischer.
Along with a floral design, the headstone had been engraved with a floating feather and this poetic epitaph:
The midnight stars weep upon her silent grave,
Dead but dreaming, this child we could not save.
The headstone on the grave where the unidentified remains had been excavated contained a single full-blown rose, a winged soul effigy and the inscription:
How soon fades this gentle rose,
Freed from earthly woes,
She lies in eternal repose.
Since Afton Delacourt’s body had been left on the floor of the mausoleum rather than buried, I had no headstone art or epitaph with which to compare, but I thought the art and inscription on the vault that had led us to the hidden chamber might be significant clues. The broken chain deviated from the soul-in-flight motif on the two headstones, but the verse intrigued me:
The day breaks…
The shadows flee…
The shackles open…
And now blessed sleep.
As I looked down through my chart, underlining “feather,” “soul effigy,” “broken chain” and “shackles,” I felt a stirring of excitement. Maybe Tom Gerrity was right. The answer was there, staring me right in the face, if only I could interpret the killer’s message.
How much time did we have, I wondered, before he claimed his next victim?
“What is it?” Devlin asked.
His voice startled me in the quiet. I’d almost forgotten he was there, which also surprised me. “I was just sitting here going over all the epitaphs and symbols and thinking that Tom Gerrity was right. There is a message in all of this, but I don’t know how to read it.” I paused. “Have you found anything?”
“No, unfortunately.” He sounded as frustrated as I felt.
“You know what’s still bothering me? How the killer knew about those tunnels.”
“Like I said earlier, old records, deeds. By accident.” He glanced up. “I’ll tell you what’s bothering me. The way the skeleton was shackled.”
“Because it breaks the pattern?”
“Yes, exactly.”
“When will you hear from Ethan?”
“Soon. He’ll make it a priority. At least now he can compare any anomalies or details he finds in this skeleton with the remains we exhumed from the grave.”
We both fell silent for a moment as we concentrated on the Oak Grove images.
Then I thought of something else I wanted to tell him. “Remember I mentioned earlier about seeing Daniel Meakin in the archives room at Emerson? I asked him that day about the possibility of a missing register from an old church that was once connected to Oak Grove. He said a lot of records were destroyed during and after the Civil War, but he also mentioned that some of them might have merely been misplaced because everything is such a mess down there. And he’s right about that. Someone could have easily removed any record or book that cited those tunnels and no one would have missed them.”
“Did he mention anything other than a church in connection to that property?”
“No. And we talked about it, too. He did tell me that he has some old books in his office that reference Oak Grove. He was going to look up some information for me, but I haven’t seen him since that day.”
Devlin nodded. “I’ll go talk to him.”
“I think that’s a good idea. If anyone would know whether something had been there before the church, it would be him.” I hesitated as something else occurred to me. “This probably has nothing to do with anything, but Temple told me that Meakin once tried to commit suicide.”
Devlin glanced up.
“I know it’s just gossip, but apparently she saw a nasty-looking scar on his wrist. And he does tend to favor his left hand. You’ll see what I mean when you talk to him. He holds it at an odd angle as if he’s constantly bothered by that scar or overly aware of what he tried to do to himself.”
“He’s always been a little strange,” Devlin said.
I cocked my head in surprise. “You know him? When you said you knew of him, I assumed you were familiar with his work.”
“He was a few years ahead of me in school.”
“What school? Emerson?
You
went to Emerson?”
He frowned at the accusatory note in my tone. “Is that a problem?”
“No…it’s not a problem, but why didn’t you mention it before?”
He shrugged. “I don’t talk about my personal life unless it’s relevant.”
I stared down at my chart, wondering if he would consider my next question relevant or just plain nosy. “Did you meet your wife at Emerson?” I almost said “Mariama,” but caught myself because Devlin had never once called her by name. Another odd thing.
He hesitated. “Yes.”
“Did you know Dr. Shaw?”
“Everyone on campus knew Shaw. He was an enigmatic presence, to say the least.”
“Did you ever go to one of his séances?”
“I can’t think of a bigger waste of time.”
So much scorn from someone so haunted.
“Did you know any of the Claws?”
He closed his laptop. “You sure have a lot of questions tonight.”
“Sorry.”
“I’d say you’ve taken to detective work like a duck to water.”
I wasn’t sure he meant that as a compliment, but I decided to take it as such. “In some ways, it’s not so different from my job. And I like mysteries. Which is why I’m so intrigued with the Order of the Coffin and the Claw. Have you noticed that no one wants to talk about them?”
He made a noncommittal sound I couldn’t interpret.
I gave him a surreptitious appraisal out of the corner of my eye. “You said earlier that people in high places were starting to pull some strings. Do you think that has something to do with the Order? They have generations of influence behind them and apparently no one wants to take them on. Are they closing rank to protect one of their own?”
Devlin scrubbed a hand down his face, looking bone-deep weary when only moments ago he’d seemed relaxed. “I don’t know. I’ve seen signs of manipulation, but I don’t know where it’s coming from.”
“They can’t cover it up, can they?”
“No. Not after what we found today. But they can control it by bringing in their own investigators.”
“But it’s your case.”
“You’re right. And I don’t intend to give it up without a fight.”
The look in his eyes scared me a little. “What can they do to you if you don’t cooperate?”
“Nothing,” he said. “They can’t touch me.”
With Devlin’s confident assertion still ringing in my ears, I rose and went into the kitchen to make tea. I took my time boiling the water and setting out cups because I wanted a chance to think back over our discussion. I felt that I’d learned some important things about Devlin. The revelation that he’d attended Emerson was of particular interest, and I still found it curious that he hadn’t mentioned it on the many occasions we’d discussed Afton Delacourt’s murder. But maybe he really was just that discreet about his personal life.
I carried the tea out to the office only to find Devlin stretched out on the chaise, fast asleep.
Sitting down behind my desk, I returned to the images, but the longer I sifted through the now-familiar symbols and epitaphs, the less enthusiasm I had for the task. I was beginning to feel a little off—weakness in my knees, an uncomfortable hollowness in my stomach. The same symptoms I’d experienced the last time Devlin had fallen asleep in my office.
I told myself I wouldn’t go to him this time. I would just let him sleep, and when he woke up, we would resume talking about the case or he would leave. And that would be that.
I wouldn’t go to him.
But, of course, I did go to him because I couldn’t stay away. I stood over him, bracing myself for the jolt, for that breathless pressure in my chest, and when it came, it still took me by storm. My legs buckled and I sat down heavily on the chaise beside him.
Devlin’s eyes flew open. He stared at me intently, but I had the strange notion that he wasn’t really seeing me. That he might not even be fully awake yet.
Something fleeted across his face, an unbearable sadness that came and went so fast I wasn’t even sure that I’d seen it. But I was reminded of what he’d told me that afternoon about his nightmares.
And then I wake up and remember that it’s real.
He sat up and glanced around. “What happened?”
“Nothing happened. We were going through the Oak Grove images and you fell asleep.”
He sat back against the chaise and rubbed a hand over his eyes. “What is it about this place?” he muttered
“It’s not this place. It’s you,” I told him. “You’ve had a long day. We both have. I feel a little drained myself.”
He frowned at that. “How long was I out?”
“A half hour. Forty-five minutes, maybe.” It occurred to me then that he might be wondering why I was sitting beside him. Quickly, I grabbed the afghan from the back of the chaise. “I thought you might be cold.”
As I pulled the cover over him, his hand closed on mine. I knew that I should pull away from him. The ebb and flow of energy between us made me light-headed, but I didn’t move.
“I feel like I’ve been asleep for hours.” His head rested against the back of the chaise, but his eyes were still on me. We spent a few moments of uneasy silence and I did contemplate getting up and returning to my desk. But his hand was still on mine. I couldn’t extract myself without some awkwardness.
“Who are you named after?” he asked unexpectedly.