The Last Nightingale (13 page)

Then the other day, while he practiced reading out loud, he came across the Sullivan story. Nothing about it seemed strange to him, until he read about the big scale in the house. Instantly,
he could recall Mrs. Nightingale howling in frustration over her body. He couldn't actually remember what she sounded like in front of the mirror, anymore. Now all he recalled was the noises she made as death approached her. But the pain for both women was real. If Mrs. Nightingale had been inclined to sum up the cause of her anguish in the form of her husband, she might have turned on him, too.

Mrs. Sullivan had been taunted into a state of anguish by the damning presence of the heavyweight meat scale. Surely it took days, weeks, perhaps months for the effect to take hold. But like a dull arthritic ache that blossoms into fiery pain, the daily humiliation became unendurable. By the time she pulled the trigger, all she knew was that she had to make it stop.

Over an hour went by while Shane battled with the words to tell his story. The night was shifting into the chill of the deep late hours. The smell of damp bushes and grass drifted over the cemetery. Even when he was reading out loud, he never talked nonstop for that long. Yet to his surprise, throughout his story this Sergeant Bandall Blackburn seemed to be in no hurry at all, as if waiting for five minutes to get a sentence or two was something that he did every day. Shane was finished with his story before he realized that he had gradually grown comfortable enough that his stutter was greatly reduced. Otherwise it might have taken him another half an hour.

Blackburn stood up and stretched, popping his joints, so Shane took the opportunity to do the same.

“All right then, Shane. I appreciate what you tell me about this woman's special sensitivity and all. And I see that you were able to sort of be a fly on the wall around your adopted house. But I have to tell you, this leap you made from one to the other, from your own experience to a murder scene in some stranger's house—I've never
seen it before. Not even among adults, or among other cops. But you used it to solve this case.”

“You sss-solved it. You told her about finger-pri-prints. You did it.”

Blackburn looked at him and smiled. "Not much of a glory hog, are you? You know, Shane, I think you ought to take more satisfaction in this. You did a good thing. Without your help, an innocent woman would have had her life destroyed.”

Shane didn't have an answer for that, since the man had no idea what a foul creature he was.

“So what do you say, then, if I come back sometime soon? Maybe we can talk over another case or two. Just to get your point of view. There's a cafe just reopened, not too far off. I can buy you dinner.”

Shane wondered if he heard right. This police sergeant who did not realize that he and Shane were together in the Nightingale house wanted to come around to discuss police cases? He felt like a pawn in somebody else's chess game.

“I don-don-don't know.”

“Won't trouble you at all. We don't have to go off anywhere, if you're busy and all. I could be here and gone in a few minutes. What do you say?”

Shane made himself smile and nod. Anything to get Blackburn out of there. Things had happened much too fast. When Blackburn turned to go, Shane felt himself speak without even thinking about it. "I'm glad you—glad that you—I'm—”

Blackburn just smiled and waved. In another heartbeat he was gone.

By that time Shane was so exhausted that he couldn't even replay the events of the night. All he knew for sure was that for the first time since the earthquake, he had spoken to someone about his former family, and that person was the man who had led his team into the Nightingale house. Shane had come far too close to revealing his awful secret.

For the rest of the night hours, his body paced quietly while his
thoughts boiled. It was only once the predawn light finally began to rise that he headed over to a spot next to the Mission chapel and lay down on the ground, spent. He did not want to remain in the darkness of the shed. Even though daylight was beginning to spread across the graveyard, sleep rolled over him like a shadow.

T
OMMIE
IGNORED THE KNOCKING
at his front door while he stood up on the top floor of his lovely Victorian home and gazed out over the crumbled and blackened city. The cast-iron door knocker could fairly rattle the entire house, but most people only gave it one or two raps. Tommie had made sure that the heavy swivel was poorly lubricated and uncomfortable to use.

He trusted that whoever was down there would go away soon. No doubt they were strangers. There was no family left, hallelujah, and those who were once friends of his parents had long since gotten the idea that they were not friends of his. No matter how much they admired his inheritance. To safeguard privacy, he always kept his ground floor windows so well covered that there was no way to tell from the outside whether he was home or not. It was a reliable way of getting people to leave him alone without making them too angry. Angry people get suspicious. Suspicious people intrude upon one's various pastimes.

And yet ever since the quake, these pests were often at his door. Religious witnessing teams, people canvassing for volunteers to take in displaced citizens, beggars knocking for food, for medicine, for money.

Naturally, if desperate and foolish enough, somebody could always break in. So far, nobody had been rash enough to dare. Unfor-
tunately. That would be real icing on the cake, Tommie was certain. Still, he reminded himself that he had no need for any discontent. Because ever since the earthquake and the bizarre energies involved in the upheaval of the earth, the messages from each and every moment gave him repeated assurances that he was on the right track. He was doing good work, even though this rotting world was unlikely to ever acknowledge that, or show the slightest appreciation for it. And yet his work was vital. Everywhere he looked, there were more signs to reassure him and to urge him on.

It was a sign that he had made up his mind to elevate his work to an entirely new level only a few minutes before the earth heaved and citywide chaos gave him the power to kill at random, undetected.

It was a sign that on the same morning when he decided to switch to female victims, he should find the family of store owner Nightingale while the bastard was out.

It was a sign that the wall of flame split in two and passed his neighborhood on either side.

And it was a sign that each of his other killings since the morning of the quake was effortless to perform and easy to disguise.

He felt contented, down deep, like a cat that has just polished off a dish of cream. He had actually been able to eat several of Mrs. Allison's meals within the past few days, and even made himself take a few little naps, almost like real sleep.

There was that one thing, though. Shock and death still came too quickly for Tommie's taste. Even when he did not intend to kill right away, sometimes his victims just laid themselves right down. Or dove for the escape of death like swimmers leaping off of an ocean cliff. After a little introductory knife work, most victims became incapable of following his train of thought while he explained things to them.

There!
he thought with relief. The infernal knocking had finally stopped. Another victory for patience. Let the self-righteous sisters of mercy troll for handouts somewhere else. Why should he inter-

fere with the thinning of the herd, the very process to which he was dedicated?

He turned back to the sweeping view, northeast toward the wharves at the tip of the peninsula, and straight west out to the Pacific Ocean. Slowly, he brought his gaze downward, bringing his line of sight away from the horizon and closer to his own neighborhood. Most of the panorama was still a tableau of destruction, even though the broom-and-shovel crews were working around the clock. And then, only seven houses away from his own property, the magical ring of untouched homes began. And Tommie Kimbrough's place stood right in the middle of the safe zone.

His satisfaction was only spoiled by the sight of a giant rat waddling—waddling—along the sidewalk, like somebody's pet. It galled him to see his neighborhood invaded by vermin. Every other living thing in the area seemed to instinctively realize that if you didn't belong in Tommie's untouched neighborhood, you should stay the hell out. These seaport rodents cared nothing for any of that.
Rats may he foul,
Tommie thought with grudging admiration,
hut only a fool thinks that they're stupid. A rat can survive most of the things that will kill a human being.

A cold shiver ran up his spine and rattled his shoulders. It occurred to him that he had something in common with these marauding rats. Like him, a rat was a remarkable killing machine. But by carrying the Black Plague, rats wielded a far more massive power of death. An entire army of human soldiers might lay siege to a powerful city for many months without success, but a few infected rats could take out most of its citizens in a matter of weeks.

He felt a pang of jealousy over such power. What could be greater than the thrill of savoring his time with a victim? Answer: the thrill of truly savoring the power to cause death from a distance. Death for dozens, death for hundreds, death that took days or weeks to arrive. Death that spread like a black fog.

Then Tommie had a realization that struck him like a church bell: When you cannot conquer a source of power,
you harness it\

"Of course," he finally spoke out loud. "Of course!" he said again, louder this time.

Tommie's eyes were wide open now. He could see the next step in his vital work. He saw it as clearly as he saw the red afternoon sun, way out there, dipping into the sea at that fateful moment and bowing to the coming darkness. Just for him.

The entire time that Blackburn sat in the headmaster's office at St. Adrian's, he felt utterly confused as to just what sort of place he was in. The name made it sound like a formal religious institution, but the place did not claim any specific church.

The headmaster droned on, accompanied by a wet swishing sound coming from a corner in the background, where a young girl of perhaps ten years studiously mopped the floor. She had close-cropped flaming red hair and a spray of freckles across her face, and her girlish energy radiated even in the act of pushing a mop.

Blackburn studied the rest of the room again, looking for anything he might have missed. There was a cloistered feel to the grounds and the buildings, but few religious symbols other than plain Christian crosses placed here and there. And yet the man behind the headmaster's desk had been introduced only as "Friar John." He dressed like a monk in spite of his secular job title. Blackburn wondered why men who were not Catholic would call themselves "friars." Or were they some new kind of Catholic? Nobody offered an explanation. He decided not to mention it, rather to wait and see if the topic arose on its own.

He had to admit that Friar John spoke in such measured tones that serenity and gentleness appeared to radiate from him. Nevertheless, Blackburn felt a wave of vaguely unpleasant sensations wash through him. At least the man was cooperative. He expressed no hesitation in telling all about the boy, Shane. Blackburn listened to every detail of the story of how Shane was adopted by the

Nightingale family a little more than a year before. It all matched the few details that the boy gave him.

It seemed clear that the central mystery of Shane's extraordinary ability was not going to be solved in this place. Friar John explained that the records told nothing of Shane's origin or anything at all of his life prior to arrival. He was said to be about four years old when he was admitted, along with a scrap of paper that only gave his first name, age, and birth date. Friar John assured him that Shane was remembered as smart and quiet, and liked well enough by the other children, even though he often seemed to work at being invisible.

Blackburn gave Friar John the sad news that the entire Nightingale family was killed in the earthquake and that now Shane was living on his own. He avoided giving an address to see if the headmaster would press him, but Friar John just nodded and explained that unless Shane got into trouble, he couldn't be forced to return. With the new influx of orphaned children from the quakes and fires, nobody was pressing for more juvenile wards. The boy had no need to fear that anyone from St. Adrian's was going to come looking for him, he said, and smiled.

Blackburn noticed that the swishing sound had stopped. He instinctively glanced over toward the girl. She was staring straight at them.

Friar John spoke in a vaguely annoyed tone, "Sergeant, this is young Mary Kathleen, with us since her crib days. Spends most of her time on punitive work assignments and never seems to learn a thing from them." He raised his voice to make sure she heard him. "I hope you never have cause to give her trouble and take her downtown!”

Mary Kathleen stifled a good-natured laugh, unperturbed.

Blackburn liked her smile, so full of swagger. The kid looked like she could box a kangaroo. "Did you know Shane?" he asked her.

“He's older," she answered. "Was he hurt in the quake?”

“Mary Kathleen," Friar John interrupted, "you are free to go for
now. You can finish this up in the morning." He gave her a wan smile that Blackburn recognized as trouble. It made the girl's expression go dark.

She nodded to herself, then set the mop against the wall and walked out.

“Nice meeting you," Blackburn called after her.

She turned and flashed him a smile for just an instant, and then she was gone.

St. Adrian's policy of not allowing children off of the grounds without supervision was an invisible ball and chain for Mary Kathleen. It could never be tolerable to her. The only meaningful answer to such an awful restriction was to take solo field trips, excursions into the world that was denied to her.

Mary Kathleen knew that if she told Friar John that one of the Helpers was sneaking around to watch her bathing, she could probably get the man in trouble. But this particular Helper would do anything to keep her silent, and that was highly useful in expanding her horizons from time to time. This time the cooperative Helper covered for her while she darted out the back way and scrambled over the fence. She circled the grounds at a dead run, to reach the front entrance before Sergeant Blackburn got too far away. She was determined to follow him all the way back to wherever Shane was staying. It did not matter how long it took.