Fever Dream (26 page)

He glanced toward the phone, saw the empty cradle.
Damn these cordless phones
. Where had he left the handset? Of course—it was in the den, on the table by the laptop.

He walked quickly back into the room, plucked the telephone from the wooden surface. Then he froze. Somebody was in the hall
just beyond. A tall man in a long trench coat stepped forward from the darkness.

“What are you doing in my house?” he demanded. “What do you want?”

The intruder did not speak. Instead, he pulled back his coat, revealing the twin barrels of a sawed-off shotgun. The butt-stock
was of a heavy black wood, carved in paisley rosettes, and the bluing of the barrels gleamed faintly in the light of the den.

Blackletter found that he was unable to take his eyes from the weapon. He took a step back. “Wait,” he began. “Don’t. You’re
making a mistake… we can talk…”

The weapon swiveled upward. There was a tremendous boom-
boom
as both barrels fired almost simultaneously. Blackletter was flung backward, impacting the far wall with a shattering crash,
then slumping to the ground. Framed pictures and knickknacks rained down around him from little wooden shelves.

The front door was already closing.

The robot, its audio sensors alerted, swiveled toward the motionless form of its builder. “Robo want a cracker,” it said,
the tinny voice muffled by the blood now coating its miniature speaker. “Robo want a cracker.”

Port Allen, Louisiana

T
HE FOLLOWING DAY WAS AS DARK AND RAINY
as the previous day had been pleasant. That was just fine with D’Agosta—there would be fewer customers to deal with at the
doughnut shop. He had deep misgivings about this whole scheme of Pendergast’s.

Pendergast, behind the wheel of the Rolls, took the Port Allen exit from I-10, the wheels hissing on the wet asphalt. D’Agosta
sat beside him, turning the pages of the
New Orleans Star-Picayune
. “I don’t see why we couldn’t do this at night,” he said.

“The establishment has a burglar alarm. And the noise would be more apparent.”

“You better do the talking. I have a feeling my Queens accent wouldn’t go down well in these parts.”

“An excellent point, Vincent.”

D’Agosta noticed Pendergast glancing once again in the rearview mirror. “We got company?” he asked.

Pendergast merely smiled in return. Rather than his habitual black suit, he was wearing a plaid work shirt and denims. Instead
of resembling an undertaker, he now looked like a gravedigger.

D’Agosta turned another page, paused at an article headlined
Retired Scientist Murdered in Home
. “Hey, Pendergast,” he said after
scanning the opening paragraphs. “Look at this: that guy you wanted to talk to, Morris
Blackletter, Helen’s old boss, was just found murdered in his house.”

“Murdered? How?”

“Shotgunned.”

“Do the police suspect a robbery gone wrong?”

“The article doesn’t say.”

“He must have just returned from his vacation. A great pity we didn’t get to him earlier—he could have been rather useful.”

“Somebody else got to him first. And I can guess who that somebody was.” D’Agosta shook his head. “Maybe we should go back
to Florida and sweat Blast.”

Pendergast turned onto Court Street, heading for downtown and the river. “Perhaps. But I find Blast’s motive to be obscure.”

“Not at all. Helen might have told Blackletter about Blast threatening her.” D’Agosta folded the paper, shoved it between
the seat and the center pedestal. “We talk to Blast, and the following night Blackletter is killed. You’re the one who doesn’t
buy coincidences.”

Pendergast looked thoughtful. But instead of replying, he turned off Court Street and nosed the Rolls into a parking lot a
block short of their destination. They stepped out into the drizzle, and Pendergast opened the trunk. He passed D’Agosta a
yellow construction helmet and a large canvas workbag. He took out another helmet, which he fitted onto his head. Lastly,
he pulled out a heavy tool belt—from which dangled an assortment of flashlights, measuring tapes, wire cutters, and other
equipment—and buckled it around his waist.

“Shall we?” he said.

Pappy’s Donette Hole was quiet: two plump girls stood behind the counter while a lone customer ordered a dozen double-chocolate
FatOnes. Pendergast waited until the customer paid and left, then stepped forward, construction belt jangling.

“Manager around?” he said in a demanding voice, his southern accent sinking about five notches in refinement.

One of the girls wordlessly turned and went into the back. A minute later, she returned with a middle-aged man. His thick
forearms were coated in blond hair, and he was sweating despite the cool of the day.

“Yeah?” he said, wiping flour onto an apron already heavy with grease and doughnut batter.

“You’re the manager?”

“Yeah.”

Pendergast reached into the back pocket of his denims, brought out an ID billfold. “We’re from the Buildings Department, Code
Enforcement Division. My name’s Addison and my partner here is Steele.”

The man scrutinized the ID Pendergast had doctored up the night before, then grunted. “So what do you want?”

Pendergast put away the billfold and pulled out a few stapled sheets of official-looking paper. “Our office has been conducting
an audit of the construction and permits records of buildings in the general vicinity, and we’ve found several of them—including
yours—that have problems.
Big
problems.”

The man looked at the outstretched sheets, frowning. “What kind of problems?”

“Irregularities in the permitting process. Structural issues.”

“That can’t be,” he said. “We get our inspections regular, just like the food and sanitation—”

“We’re not
food inspectors
,” Pendergast interrupted sarcastically. “The records show this structure was built without the proper permits.”

“Hold on, now. We been here a dozen years—”

“Just why do you think the audit was ordered?” Pendergast said, still waving the sheets of paper in the man’s sweaty face.
“There’ve been irregularities. Allegations of
corruption
.”

“Hey, I’m not the guy you need to talk to about that. The franchise office handles—”

“You’re the guy who’s here now.” Pendergast leaned forward. “We need to get down into that basement and see just how bad the
situation is.” Pendergast stuffed the papers back into the pocket of his shirt. “And I mean
now
.”

“You want to see the basement? Be my guest,” the manager said, sweating profusely. “It ain’t my fault if there’s a problem.
I just work here.”

“Very well. Let’s get going.”

“Joanie here will take you down while Mary Kate attends to the customers—”

“Oh, no,” Pendergast interrupted again. “Oh, no, no, no. No customers. Not until we’re done.”

“No customers?” the man repeated. “I’m trying to run a doughnut shop here.”

Pendergast bent closer now. “This is a dangerous, maybe life-threatening situation. Our analysis shows the building is
unsound
. You are
required
to close your doors to the public until we have completed our check of the foundation and the load-bearing members.”

“I don’t know,” the manager said, his frown deepening. “I’m gonna have to call the main office. We’ve never closed during
business hours before, and my franchise contract states—”

“You don’t
know
? We aren’t going to waste time while you call up every Tom, Dick, and Harry you’ve a mind to.” Pendergast leaned in even
closer. “Why, exactly, are you stalling? Do you know what would happen if the floor collapsed under a customer while he was
eating a box of—” here Pendergast paused to glance at the menu posted above the counter, “—chocolate-banana double-cream glazed
FatOnes?”

Silently, the man shook his head.

“You’d be charged. Personally. Criminal negligence. Manslaughter in the second degree. Maybe even… in the
first
degree.”

The manager took a step backward. He gulped for air, fresh sweat popping on his brow.

Pendergast let a strained silence build. “Tell you what I’ll do,” he said with sudden magnanimity. “While you put up the
CLOSED
sign, Mr. Steele and I will make a quick visual inspection downstairs. If the situation is less grave than we’ve been led
to believe, business can resume while we complete our site report.”

The man’s face broke out in unexpected relief. He turned to his employees. “Mary Kate, we’re closing up for a few minutes.
Joanie, show these men to the basement.”

Pendergast and D’Agosta followed Joanie through the kitchen, past a pantry and restroom, to an unmarked door. Beyond, a steep
concrete stairway led down into darkness. The girl switched on the light, revealing a graveyard of old equipment—professional
stand mixers and industrial-strength deep-fat fryers, apparently all awaiting
repair. The basement itself was clearly very
old, with facing walls of undressed stone, roughly mortared. The other two walls were made of brick. These, though apparently
even older, were much more carefully fitted together. A number of plastic garbage bins lined the floor by the stairway, and
untidy heaps of tarps and plastic sheeting lay, apparently forgotten, in a corner.

Pendergast turned. “Thank you, Joanie. We’ll work alone. Please shut the door on your way out.”

The girl nodded and retreated up the stairs.

Pendergast walked over to one of the brick walls. “Vincent,” he said, resuming his usual voice, “unless I am much mistaken,
about twelve feet beyond this lies another wall: that of Arne Torgensson’s basement. And in between we should find a section
of the old aqueduct, in which, perhaps, the good doctor has hidden something.”

D’Agosta dropped the tool sack on the ground with a thump. “I figure we got two minutes, tops, before that jackass upstairs
calls his boss and the shit hits the fan.”

“You employ such colorful expressions,” Pendergast murmured, examining the brick wall with his loupe and rapping on it with
a ball-peen hammer. “However, I think I can buy us some more time.”

“Oh, yeah? How?”

“I’m afraid I must inform our managerial friend that the situation is even more dire than we first thought. Not only must
the shop be closed to customers—the workers themselves must vacate the premises until we complete our inspection.”

Pendergast’s light tread up the stairs receded quickly into silence. D’Agosta waited in the cool, dry darkness. After a moment
an irruption of noise sounded from above: a protest, raised voices. Almost as quickly as it started, the noise ceased. Pendergast
reappeared on the landing. Carefully closing and locking the door behind him, he descended the stairs and walked over to the
bag of tools. Reaching into it, he pulled out a short-handled sledgehammer and handed it to D’Agosta.

“Vincent,” he said with a ghost of a smile, “I yield the floor to you.”

A
S D’AGOSTA HEFTED THE SLEDGEHAMMER, PENDERGAST
bent close to the ancient wall, rapping first on one stone, then another, all the while listening intently. The light
was dim, and D’Agosta had to squint to see. After a few moments, the FBI agent gave a low grunt of satisfaction and straightened
up.

“Here,” he said, pointing to a brick near the middle of the wall.

D’Agosta came over, gave the sledgehammer a practice swing like a batter on deck.

“I’ve bought us five minutes,” Pendergast said. “Ten at most. By then our managerial friend will undoubtedly be back. And
this time he may bring company.”

D’Agosta swung the sledgehammer at the wall. Though he missed the indicated spot by a few bricks, the iron impacted the wall
with a blow that shivered its way through his hands and up his arms. A second blow struck truer, and a third. He set down
the sledgehammer, wiped his hands on the back of his pants, got a better grip, and returned to work. Another dozen or so heavy
blows and Pendergast gestured for him to stop. D’Agosta stepped back, panting.