The Codex (49 page)

And yet Skiba was a happy man. No one could understand this happiness. They thought he had lost his mind, that he was having some kind of breakdown. They did not know what it was like to be pulled out of the very flames of hell.

What was it that had stayed his hand, three months ago, in that dark office? Or in the three months that followed? Those three months of silence from Hauser had been the darkest months of Skiba’s life. Just when it seemed the nightmare would never end, suddenly there was news. The New York Times had run a little article, buried in the B section, which announced the creation of the Alfonso Boswas Foundation, a nonprofit organization devoted to translating and publishing a certain ninth-century Mayan codex found in the collections of the late Maxwell Broadbent. According to the foundation’s president, Dr. Sally Colorado, the Codex was a Mayan book of healing that would prove tremendously useful in the search for new drugs. The foundation had been established and funded by the four sons of the late Maxwell Broadbent. The article noted that he had passed away unexpectedly while on a family holiday in Central America.

That was all. There was no mention of Hauser, the White City, the lost tomb, the crazy father burying himself with his money—nothing.

Skiba had felt as if the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders. The Broadbents were alive. They had not been murdered. Hauser had failed to get the Codex and, most important, had failed to kill them. Skiba would never know what happened, and it would be too dangerous to inquire. The only thing he knew was that he was not guilty of murder. Yes, he was guilty of terrible crimes and he had much to atone for, but the irrevocable taking of a human life—even his own—wasn’t among them.

There was one other thing. By being stripped of everything—money, possessions, reputation—he could finally see again. The scales had fallen. He could see as clearly as if he were a child once more: all the bad things he had done, the crimes he had committed, the selfishness and greed. He could trace in perfect clarity now the spiraling ethical descent he had made in his successful career in business. It was so easy to become confused, to conflate prestige with honesty, power with responsibility, sycophancy with loyalty, profit with merit. You had to be an exceptionally clear-minded human being to keep your integrity in such a system.

Skiba smiled as he gazed out over the mirrored surface of the lake, watching it all disappear in the evening twilight, everything he had worked for, everything that had once been so important to him. In the end, even the battenboard cabin would have to go, and he would never gaze on this lake again.

It didn’t matter. He had died and been reborn. Now he could begin his new life.

87

Officer Jimmy Martinez of the Santa Fe Police Department settled back in his chair. He had just laid down the telephone. The leaves on the cottonwood tree outside the window had turned a rich, golden yellow, and a cold wind swept down from the mountains. He glanced at his partner, Willson.

“The Broadbent place again?” Willson asked.

Martinez nodded. “Yeah. You’d think those neighbors would’ve gotten used to it by now.”

“These rich people—who can figure ’em out?”

Martinez snorted his agreement.

“Who do you think that character up there really is? Have you ever seen anything like it? A tattooed Indian from Central America, going around in the old man’s suits, smoking his pipe, riding his horses around that thousand-acre ranch, bossing the servants, playing the country gentleman, insisting everyone call him sir?”

“He owns the place,” said Martinez. “It checks out, all legal.”

“Sure he owns the place! But my question is: How the hell did he get his hands on it? That estate’s worth twenty, thirty million. And then to run it, shit, must be a couple of mil a year. Do you really think a guy like that has money?”

Martinez smiled. “Yeah.”

“Whaddya mean, yeah? Jimmy, the guy has filed teeth. He’s a frigging savage.”

“No, he isn’t. He’s a Broadbent.”

“Are you nuts? You think that Indian with earlobes dragging on the ground is a Broadbent? Get out, Jimmy, what’ve you been smoking?”

“He looks just like them.”

“You ever met them?”

“I met two of the sons. I’m telling you, he’s another one of the old man’s sons.”

Willson stared at him, astonished.

“The man had a reputation in that way. The other sons got the art, he got the house and a shitload of money. Simple.”

“An Indian son of Broadbent?”

“Sure. I bet the old man boned some woman in Central America on one of his expeditions.”

Willson sat back in his chair, deeply impressed. “You’re gonna make detective lieutenant someday, you know that, Jimmy?”

Martinez nodded modestly. “I know.”