Cold Vengeance - Lincoln Child [48]
“And did he say anything?”
“Well, yes. But I can’t really talk about that, you understand. A man’s confessions to God are a sacred secret.”
The priest was speaking so slowly, so deliberately, that Esterhazy felt he might go mad. “What a fascinating story. Is there anything else you can tell me?”
“He asked me the way around the marshes. I told him it was several miles.” The priest puckered his lips. “But he insisted, so I drew him a little map.”
“A map?”
“Well, yes, it was the least I could do. I had to draw him the route. It’s terribly treacherous, bogs everywhere.”
“But you’re up from Anglesey. How do you know this area?”
The priest chuckled. “I’ve been coming here for years. Decades! I’ve wandered all over these moors. I’ve visited every kirkyard between here and Loch Linnhe! This is a very historic area, you see. I’ve rubbed hundreds of tombstones, including those of the lairds of—”
“Yes, yes. But tell me about the map you drew. Can you draw the same map for me?”
“Of course! Delighted! You see, I sent him around the marshes because the way by Kilchurn Lodge is even more dangerous. I honestly don’t know how he got out there in the first place.” He clucked again as he drew a crude map, with atrocious draftsmanship, cramped and small. “Here is where we were,” he said, poking at an X.
Esterhazy was forced to bend down to see better. “Where?”
“Here.”
Even before Esterhazy could comprehend what was happening, he felt a ferocious jerk. Then he was forced to the ground and pinned, his arm twisted behind his back, his face pressed into the turf—and the cold barrel of a pistol was jammed so hard into his ear canal that it cut his flesh, drawing blood.
“Talk,” said the clergyman.
The voice was that of Pendergast.
Esterhazy struggled, his mind wild, but the barrel jammed in relentlessly. He felt a wave of horror and terror. Just when he was sure the devil was dead and gone, he reappeared. This was the end. Pendergast had finally won. The enormity of it sank in like poison.
“You said Helen was alive,” came the voice, almost a whisper. “Now tell me the rest. All of it.”
Esterhazy struggled to bring his mind into order, to overcome his shock, to consider what he would say and how he would say it. The smell of turf filled his nostrils, gagging him. “Just a moment,” he gasped. “Let me explain from the beginning. Please, let me up.”
“No. Stay down. We have plenty of time. And I have no compunctions about forcing you to talk. You will talk. But if you lie to me, even once, I’ll kill you. No warning.”
Esterhazy grappled with an almost overwhelming fear. “But then… then you’ll never know.”
“Wrong. Now that I know she’s alive, I’ll find her regardless. But you could spare me a lot of time and trouble. I repeat: truth or die.”
Esterhazy heard the soft click of the safety being thumbed off.
“Yes, I understand…” He tried once again to collect his thoughts, calm himself down. “You have no idea,” he gasped, “no idea what’s involved here. It goes back, before Longitude.” He heaved, struggling for air in the dew-laden grass. “It goes back even before we were born.”
“I’m listening.”
Esterhazy took a heaving breath. This was harder than he ever imagined. The truth was so very, very awful…
“Start at the beginning.”
“That would be April 1945…”
The pressure of the gun abruptly vanished. “My dear fellow, that was a nasty fall! Let me help you up.” Pendergast’s voice had changed, and the Welsh accent was back in force.
For a moment Esterhazy was utterly confused.
“You’ve cut your ear! Oh, dear!” Pendergast dabbed at the ear and Esterhazy felt the gun, now in Pendergast’s pocket, pressing into his side. At the same time he heard a car door slam, then voices—a chorus of voices. He looked up from the earth, blinking. A jolly group of men and women approached, with walking sticks, waterproofs, notebooks, cameras, and pens. The van in which they had arrived was parked just beyond the old stone wall enclosing the kirkyard.