Circle of Bones (38 page)

“I suggest you try the numbers three-two-two.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

Foggy Bottom

March 28, 2008

11:40 a.m.

Riley was still trying to comprehend what her father had just said. She felt as though she were being carried along by the swift-moving current as she had in that river on Dominca, with the scenery flashing past her before she could even take it all in. What had her father just said?

Diggory stepped through the doorway and Mrs. Wright followed behind him, a smug smile on her face.

“Dig?” Riley said. “What are you talking about? Who’s Yorick?” There were so many other questions she wanted to ask him, like why he had lied to her about her father’s stroke, why he wanted her there in DC. But she couldn’t stop thinking about her father’s words.
I would have stopped it if I could — he had to die.
Was he talking about Michael? No, it couldn’t be true. It was the illness talking, making him say crazy things.

Looking at Dig, she pointed at her father. “Did you hear what he just said?” 

Dig crossed the room and stood behind her father’s wheelchair. He pulled the chair back from the window a little, then walked around in front so her father could see him. “I believe he mentioned something about approving the murder of his own son.”

“That’s crazy. No way that’s true.”

“I’m afraid it is, my dear. There is a lot you don’t know about this man.”

Her father had loosened a piece of yarn from his sweater and he pulled at it, refusing to look at Diggory. 

“Dad?”

He would not look up at either of them.

“Isn’t that right, Yorick?”

“Diggory, leave him alone. And stop calling him that.”

“But that’s his name — his Bones name.”

The current was pulling her under again. She could not breathe. “What?” No. She would have known if her father had been in Skull and Bones. He would have told her. 

“I’ve known your father much longer than I’ve known you, Riley. He was a sort of mentor to me in Skull and Bones, you know. Helped get me on at the Agency.”

Dig appeared to be addressing her, yet his eyes were on her father as though he really intended the words for him. Riley tried to process what he was saying.

“Yes, Yorick used to be a very powerful man, before he became this pathetic, simpering, mindless shell sitting here in his own urine. And to think, he’s a Patriarch.”

“A what? What are you talking about? Dig, I don’t know what you’re playing at with this stroke story and luring me up here.”

“Don’t flatter yourself, Riley. You’re only a pawn in this game. This is between me and Yorick.”

 “Then why did you go to such lengths to get me here?” Riley placed her hands on her hips, trying to appear more in control than she felt. “It’s time for answers and no cock and bull story about Skull and Bones or my brother.” 

His eyes remained on her father. “You’ve been asking me for the truth, darling, so here it is. Fourteen years ago, when I was getting started with the Agency, I got a call from one of the Patriarchs. They had a little problem. The son of one of their own was some sort of math genius.”

She stumbled back a step as though his words had delivered a physical blow. “Stop that. You’re lying,” she said. She wanted to cover his mouth, but she could not move any closer to him.

“The young man had found some documents while skulking about in his father’s study. Not only did he manage to decode them, but he was also able to extrapolate what they meant in the bigger picture.” 

She thrashed her head from side to side saying, “No, no, no.”

Dig continued speaking to her, but staring at her father. “The son told his father that he intended to go public with it. Something had to be done, and the men your father associates with never get their own hands dirty.  They always call in someone else to clean up their messes. Someone like me.”

“No. You’re a goddamn liar,” she said, but she was thinking
I slept with him – I slept with my brother’s murderer.
  And she felt the acid rising in her throat.

He turned away from the old man and smiled at her. “It has to be unanimous, you know. Doesn’t it, Yorick? When the Patriarchs vote to have someone killed, I mean. What’s one life when there are dollars to be made, empires to build? It’s always about the money, the power. And in your father’s case, they rewarded him for his vote.” Dig turned back to her father and moved his face inches from the old man’s nose. “You earned first chair with that vote, didn’t you, Yorick?”

“Dig, shut up and get out of here.” Her voice came out in a whisper.

 “Couldn’t do the dirty work yourself, though, could you, Yorick? You always had me to call on. Well, all that’s finished now. I’m not your janitor anymore. Today, I’m taking your chair.”

Riley turned to the housekeeper. “Mrs. Wright, call the police. Tell them we have an intruder.” 

Dig straightened up. “Silly girl,” he said.

The woman glanced at Dig and a look passed between them. Mrs. Wright came up behind her and clamped a large hand around Riley’s arm.

He laughed. “She works for us. Always has, you know. Someone had to keep an eye on this demented old fool — make sure he wasn’t babbling about former projects or trying to confess his part in his son’s murder.”

Dig clutch ed a handful of her father’s white hair and jerked his head back. “That was a stupid move, Yorick.”

Riley lunged forward, but the housekeeper grabbed her other arm and held her. 

Diggory leaned in close and spoke in a hushed tone. “Death bed confessions won’t do your soul any good, old man. If there is a hell, your reservation is confirmed. And you know what? You’re about to find out —”

Riley struggled to free her arms.

The old man’s good eye stared at Dig. He hissed one word. “Bastard.”

Dig’s open hand smacked across her father’s face so hard the old man’s head bounced off the handle of the wheelchair.

“No! Stop!” Riley broke free and launched herself at him, but Dig was too fast. 

CHAPTER SIXTY

The Library of Congress

March 28, 2008

Earlier that morning

10:55 a.m.

Cole Thatcher climbed out of the cab at the corner of Independence Avenue and First Street, pulled the collar of his yellow rain jacket tight around his neck, and hoisted his small duffel bag onto his shoulder. Even with his old fisherman’s knit wool sweater on, he was freezing in this weather. And though he had relented and put socks on, his boat shoes weren’t working to keep the cold out, either.  

He stepped gingerly onto the icy sidewalk that led over to the foot of the steps and then looked up at the massive edifice: the Library of Congress. He’d told Theo he needed a bigger library, and this was the biggest library in the world. That it happened to be located in the same city where Riley was had not influenced his decision to drive
Shadow Chaser
from the Saintes to Pointe-à-Pitre all night in order to catch a predawn flight to San Juan then on to DC. Not a bit.

He trotted up the steps, eager to get inside out of the cold. Cole knew the library building well. His work on the Ocracoke Shipwreck Survey at East Carolina had brought him here on many occasions to search old maps, ships’ logs, personal accounts, newspaper articles, etc. as they’d worked to identify the thousands of ships that had foundered off Cape Hatteras.

Today was different, though, he thought as he nodded to the librarians behind the counter in the Main Reading Room. He headed for the stairs to the second floor and the Hispanic and Early American collections. Today, he was here to learn what he could about this End of Days business.

An hour later, Cole leaned back in his chair and sighed. This was getting him nowhere. There was far too much information on this Mayan Calendar. Most of what he’d been reading here had little to do with the sky-is-falling-mania he had read about on the Internet. He’d learned that the Mayan Calendar was also sometimes called the Aztec Calendar and it was all based on the Aztec Sun Stone that was discovered in Mexico City in 1790. In fact, though, the Mayan Calendar was really three calendars: the 260-day religious calendar, the solar calendar, which divides the years into 365 days, and the long count calendar. That’s the one, Cole discovered, that is supposed to end on 12/21/12. That calendar started counting off the days on Day One and continued to an end date. The Mayans noted all the important days in their history by that long count calendar. By correlating some long count dates inscribed in stone monuments of known Mayan historical events, archeologists were able to fix the start date for the long count as August 11, 3114 BC. 

But how did that help him? It was all too confusing. He didn’t see how the Mayan long count calendar could relate to the 40-years calendar they had found on Dominica. He rubbed his hand across his forehead. His temples were throbbing and he hadn’t eaten anything since the night time run on
Shadow Chaser
up to Pointe-à-Pitre. They no longer served anything resembling food on airplanes. 

He wanted to talk to Riley about this Mayan Calendar stuff. But more than that, he
needed
to know that she was okay. He reached into the pocket of his rain jacket and fingered the business card he had picked up on her boat. It only had an email address and a cell phone number. He checked his watch and saw that it was almost noon. He wasn’t sure she wanted to see him, so he was reluctant to call. She might be at the hospital. Probably was. But he could find out where she was staying. He knew that her father had worked for the US Foreign Service, and it was a good bet his name was Riley, too. How difficult could it be to locate his address? After all, here he was in the largest repository of information in the world — and there were plenty of computers available.

Twenty minutes later, Cole was riding in another cab, and he asked the driver to let him out a block past the address he had found for Richard Riley. The street was lined with two-story attached houses that looked like they were at least a hundred years old. He wanted to get a good look at their place first, so he would be able to watch it from down the street. He wasn’t sure yet what he intended to do. He wouldn’t be able to stay out here in this cold very long. Should he walk up and knock on the door? What if she answered? What would he say? 

He paid the driver and climbed out onto the sidewalk. Theirs was the brick front with the bay window upstairs and the black iron gate that separated the little front yard from the street. He supposed it was a lovely neighborhood in the summer, but now the trees that lined the street stretched their bare black branches towards the sky like spindly thorns. It had started snowing during the drive, so Cole dropped his duffel and pulled the hood of his rain jacket up over his head. He cinched the string tight under his chin.

He was still standing there staring down the street at the house he presumed belonged to Riley’s father, when he saw a black Lincoln Town Car pull up from the opposite direction. The door to the back seat opened, and he recognized the man who got out. The man walked up to the front porch, and the door opened before he even knocked. It was the same man Theo had photographed on board the Brewsters’ boat, and the man Cole had last seen on Dominica ushering Riley into that taxi van.  

He crossed the street and walked down closer to the two-story house, hoping to see something through the windows. He tried to look nonchalant so the neighbors wouldn’t think he was some kind of peeping tom. Through the upstairs window, he could make out the form of a person, a man he thought, sitting in a chair facing the window. There was another figure behind him. Cole swung open the gate and stepped into the front yard of the house. He could make out the old man clearly now. He was sitting in a wheelchair, and he appeared to be crying.

Then Cole recognized the hair and the profile of the woman standing behind him. Riley.

Her body was turned away from the window as though she were talking to someone else in the room. He saw another woman step up behind her and take her arm, then the man obscured his view.

Cole was trying to decide what he should do, knock on the door or wait and observe — when he heard her voice shout loud enough to penetrate to the cold outside air. Just two words. 

“No! Stop!”

CHAPTER SIXTY-ONE

Washington, DC 

March 28, 2008

12:35 a.m.

Dig caught her arm, twisted her around and with his forearm pressing against her larynx, he held her tight against his body. His other hand was smashed against her cheek, turning her head so she could see his face. The bastard was smiling. 

From downstairs, Riley heard the sound of the front door opening. A voice called out, “Hello?” 

Dig jerked his head toward the stairs, and Mrs. Wright left the room. 

With her one free hand, Riley pulled at the arm across her throat, trying to open up a small airway. The harder she struggled, the tighter his grip. When the black started closing in, she stopped fighting him. He loosened the pressure on her neck. She sucked in air.

“You see, Yorick? Your daughter is here in my arms.” He jerked her around so her father could see her.

 The left side of her father’s face still showed red where Dig’s hand had struck. His good eye glared at Dig.

“Don’t we make a lovely couple? We did once. Down in Lima. She didn’t tell you? Once I realized who she was, it was easy. She wasn’t a bad lay, but knowing I was fucking the great Yorick’s daughter made it all the sweeter.” 

“Kill you,” her father’s words came out in a breathy hiss.

Dig laughed. “Your time is done, old man. With you gone and proof of Operation Magic in my hands, no one will oppose me. I’ll have taken everything that was once yours. Imagine — first your son, then your daughter, and finally, your
bastard protégé
sitting in your chair.”