By The Sword Part 16

The facial recognition software had done its job half well. In the NYPD database it had found mug shots of a brown-haired man named Hugh Gerrish, arrested for breaking and entering two years ago. They matched perfectly the face on the security cam. Gerrish had pleaded out to an illegal-trespa.s.s charge and been given probation with no jail time. The file listed this apartment in Brooklyn's Greenpoint area as his address.

The software had not, however, found the ronin ronin. Rather, it had found too many of them. One hundred twenty-seven hits, each of them resembling the ronin ronin. Either his features were very common, or the only existing photo was not detailed enough for an accurate search. Perhaps both. Hideo would have to work on a way to narrow the selection.

"I'm coming, I'm coming," said an old woman's voice from within. Her accent was Spanish. A few seconds later the peephole darkened and he heard: "Who are you?"

Gerrish's mother, perhaps? Hideo was prepared for this.

"Police, ma'am," he said, holding a gold NYPD detective's badge up to the peephole. "We need to speak to you about your son."

"Madre de Dios!"

A chain rattled, the k.n.o.b turned, and the door opened. A wizened, gray-haired old woman in a stained housedress looked up at him with frightened eyes.

"Mi Julio! What has happened?" What has happened?"

Hideo had a sudden bad feeling about this. Hugh Gerrish hadn't looked the least bit Hispanic. He pushed open the door and motioned the yakuza inside. The old woman backed up a step and opened her mouth to scream but Hideo pressed a finger firmly against her lips.

"Silence, please. We mean you no harm." When she took a breath as if to scream anyway, he held up his other hand in a stop sign. "Please."

She stayed silent.

Beyond, in the tiny apartment, Hideo heard a cacophony of doors and drawers opening and closing. It lasted less than a minute, and then Kenji was beside him.

"Empty, Takita-san," he said in j.a.panese. "And no katana."

"How many bedrooms?"

"One."

Hideo nodded as a sinking feeling dragged on his gut.

"The closets-any men's clothes?"

He shook his head. "Only woman's. And not much of that."

Goro and Ryo appeared, the latter holding up a framed photograph. Hideo took it and saw the old woman with her cheek pressed against that of a dark-haired, dark-skinned young man who looked nothing like Hugh Gerrish. He showed it to her.

"Who is this?"

She s.n.a.t.c.hed it from him. "Mi Julio." "Mi Julio." Tears rimmed her eyes. "What has happened to him?" Tears rimmed her eyes. "What has happened to him?"

"Nothing. He is fine. We have made a mistake."

"Mistake?" she said, her tone and expression growing indignant. "You break into my home and frighten-"

"How long have you lived here?"

"Since September."

Eight months. Gerrish must have moved out last summer. Hideo suppressed a curse and masked his frustration as he pulled a wad of bills from his pocket.

"We have disturbed you and wasted five minutes of your time." He peeled off five hundred-dollar bills and pressed them into her hands. "I trust this will help you forgive us."

She gazed at the bills as if he'd given her a fortune. Perhaps to her it was. To him it was merely an expense he would charge to Kaze.

What had seemed so straightforward and easy yesterday was proving digressive and difficult. He had run into obstacles, but none he could not surmount.

As Americans liked to say: Back to the drawing board.

10.

Shouldn't be too hard to spot, Jack thought, studying the face in the photo as he walked west along East 96th Street.

He'd just left Russ Tuit, his go-to guy for all things computer. Russ had downloaded the photo, cropped out Bobblehead and the inebriated-looking Laurie, sharpened and enlarged the guy behind them, and printed it out. Still kind of blurry, but serviceable.

Hugh Gerrish had a round, florid face topped by wavy brown hair that scooped down into a sharp widow's peak. The outstanding feature was a big diamond stud stuck in his left earlobe. Jack wished he had more of a view of his body to help spot him from a distance, but this would work.

He'd checked the post time at Belmont: first race one o'clock except Fridays when it moved to three P.M. The track was closed today so he'd have to wait till tomorrow.

"Jack?"

A woman's voice. He looked around and saw a slim blonde in her mid-twenties, looking much younger because of her pigtails and her getup. She wore a white oxford s.h.i.+rt with a loose, askew tie, a plaid pleated miniskirt, white knee socks, and high-heel Mary Janes. Only a few of the s.h.i.+rt b.u.t.tons were fastened, exposing her diamond-studded navel.

Jack stared, dumbfounded. "Do I-?"

She smiled and batted her heavily mascaraed, blue-shadowed eyes. "It's me. Junie. Junie Moon. We met-"

"Right-right. Gia's friend. How are you?"

They'd met last summer when Junie had been a guest at a Brooklyn party celebrating a big sale of one of her paintings. But she hadn't looked like jailbait then.

"Fine. Things have cooled down a little, but still better than I'd ever dreamed."

Nathan Lane had bought one of her paintings and publicly raved about it and suddenly her canvases were going for twenty K apiece. Jack had never seen any of her work but Gia said she was good.

"You're looking... different."

"Like it?" She struck a pose. "Marketing. All marketing." She stepped closer. "I saw Gia last week."

"You did?"

"She didn't tell you?"

"No."

Jack wondered why not.

"Must've forgot. I finally got the nerve to stop by. I'm such a s.l.u.t of a friend. I mean, here she's been like my big sister for years, but I couldn't bring myself to stop by after the accident. I just couldn't stand seeing her hurt."

"She's pretty much back to normal now."

Junie shook her head. "Not really."

Jack felt a sinking sensation. "What do you mean?"

"Her art, my brotha. Her paintings. They're..."

"She showed you?"

"Well, ya-ah. We're both artists, you know. Why wouldn't she?"

It stung knowing Gia would share them with someone else but not him. Maybe the artist connection explained it, but still...

"I haven't seen them."

"Oh, s.h.i.+t. You two aren't on the outs, are you? Because if you've hurt her-"

"Never in a million years. She just doesn't want me to see them."

"Yeah, well, maybe I can see why."

"Want to give me a hint?"

"They're not her."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"They're not like anything she's ever painted. They're... dark. You know how Gia's stuff has always been sunny, with all that Hopperesque bright light and shadow. Now it's mostly shadow. I think that accident changed her, Jack. I mean, you talk to her, she seems the same, but those paintings..." She looked uncomfortable. "They aren't from the Gia I knew."

They chatted awhile longer, with Junie monologuing and Jack monosyllabling, barely hearing what she said.

Those paintings... he had to get a look at Gia's paintings.

11.

"Glenn! Glenn!"

Glaeken stood at the living room window, watching the stretched shadow of his building inch across Central Park's Sheep Meadow.

Glenn... he was glad Magda had forgotten his real name. Wouldn't do to have her calling "Glaeken!" a thousand times a day. Glenn, Glaeken, Veilleur, and all the other names he'd adopted down through the ages. Sometimes he lost track of who he was supposed to be.

Used to be he could always return to "Glaeken," but no longer. In his mind these days he'd become simply Veilleur Veilleur.

"Coming, my dear."

The voice had come from the kitchen, as were sounds of rattling cookware now. He headed that way and found Magda standing by the granite-topped island, staring at the open cabinets in confusion.

Her white hair was neatly combed, thanks to the visiting homemaker who had just left. Her weight loss over the past few years or so accentuated the stoop of her shoulders. She wore a sweater as usual, because she was always cold.

"My kitchen!" she cried, her Hungarian accent thicker than before the decline had begun. "Glenn, what's happened to my kitchen?"

"Nothing, Magda. It's just as it always is."

A vision of a younger Magda took shape before him. Soft, smooth skin; long, chestnut hair; dark, gleaming eyes so full of wit and intelligence. That Magda was gone, but his love for her remained. He heard echoes of her voice as she sang, of her mandolin as she played, the sight of her bent over her typewriter as she wrote.

Another vision... Magda facing down the greatest evil... defying everything Rasalom could throw at her... terrified, horrified, repulsed, yet holding out, blocking his way until Glaeken could gather strength enough to take her place.

The memory of her courage and her unyielding trust that he would not let her down constricted his throat-now as much as then.

But two years ago her memory began to fail. She noticed it first. Then he noticed her making notes about the simplest things. He knew what it meant. And it crushed him.

The one woman across his eons with whom he could grow old was failing, becoming less and less the woman he'd fallen in love with. He refused to allow the splendid life they'd lived, the glowing love they'd shared to be tainted by her decline. He would never leave her, never give up on her. He would be with her until the end.

And perhaps that end was not too far off.

For both of them.

For everyone.

"But how can I cook dinner?"

He stepped to her side. "We've already had dinner."

She looked at him. "No! We couldn't. I'm still hungry."

"We had lamb chops, roasted red potatoes, and string beans. You cleaned your plate."

"No, I-"

"I cut your meat for you, remember?"

She closed her eyes and took a deep, shuddering breath. They were moist when she opened them.