crime, though we didn’t speak its name.
I could have used my flashlight, but I might have drawn unwanted
attention. Under the circumstances, any attention would be unwanted.
Besides, the name of the medication wasn’t important.
Sasha led us into the large living room, where the illumination came
from a television screen nested in an ornate French cabinet with
japanned panels. Even in the poor light, I could see that the chamber
was as crowded as an automobile salvage yard, not with junked cars but
with Victorian excess, deeply carved and intricately painted neo-rococo
furniture, richly patterned brocade upholstery, wallpaper with
Gothic-style tracery, heavy velvet drapes with cascades of braided
fringe, capped with solid helmets cut in elaborate Gothic forms, an
Egyptian settee with beaded-wood spindles and damask seat cushions,
Moorish lamps featuring black cherubs in gilded turbans supporting
beaded shades, bibelots densely arranged on every shelf and table.
Amidst the layers on layers of decor, the cadavers almost seemed like
additional decorative items.
Even in the flickery light of the television, we could see a man
stretched out on the Egyptian settee. He was dressed in dark slacks and
a white shirt. Before lying down, he’d taken off his shoes and placed
them on the floor with the laces neatly tucked in, as though concerned
about soiling the upholstery on the seat cushions. Beside the shoes
stood a drinking glass identical to those in the dining roomwaterford
crystal, judging by appearance in which remained an inch of fruit juice.
His left arm trailed off the settee, the back of the hand against the
Persian carpet, palm turned up. His other arm lay across his chest.
His head was propped on two small brocade pillows, and his face was
concealed beneath a square of black silk.
Sasha was covering the room behind us, less interested in the corpse
than in guarding against a surprise assault.
The black veil over the face did not bellow or even flutter. The man
under it was not breathing.
I knew that he was dead, knew what killed him not a contagious disease,
but a phenobarbital fizz or its lethal equivalent yet I was reluctant to
remove the silk mask for the same reason that any child, having pondered
the possibility of a boogeyman, is hesitant to push back the sheets,
rise up on his mattress, lean out, and peek under the bed.
Hesitantly, I pinched a corner of the silk square between thumb and
forefinger, and pulled it off the man’s face.
[ He was alive. That was my first impression. His eyes were open, and I
thought I saw life in them.
After a breathless moment, I realized that his stare was fixed.
His eyes appeared to be moving only because reflections of images on the
TV screen were twitching in them.
The light was just bright enough to allow me to identify the deceased.
His name was Tom Sparkman. He was an associate of Roger Stanwyk’s, a
professor at Ashdon, also a biochemist, and no doubt deeply involved in
Wyvern business.
The body showed no signs of corruption. It couldn’t have been here a
long time.
Reluctantly, I touched the back of my left hand to Sparkman’s brow.
“Still warm, ” I whispered.
We followed Roosevelt to a button-tufted sofa with carved-wood rails at
seat and crest, on which a second man lay, with hands folded across his
abdomen. This one was wearing his shoes, and his drained glass lay on
its side on the carpet, where he’d dropped it.
Roosevelt peeled back the square of black silk that concealed the man’s
face. The light was not as good here, the corpse not as close to the
television as Sparkman, and I wasn’t able to identify the body.
Two seconds after switching on my flashlight, I clicked it off.
Cadaver number two was Lennart To regard, a Swedish mathematician on a
four-year contract to teach one class a semester at Ashdon, which was
surely a front for his real work, at Wyvern. To regard’s eyes were
closed.
His face was relaxed. A faint smile suggested he was having a pleasant
dream or was in the middle of one when death claimed him.
Bobby slipped two fingers under To regard’s wrist, feeling for a pulse.