Circle of Bones - Kling Christine (полная версия книги txt) 📗

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-a-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-a-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.”