Part 28 (1/2)

I handed the large vase carefully to Brother Mike when I was outside. It was beautiful, I decided. I was not normally one for precious objects, but this warped clay, formed by fire, moved me.

Brother Mike took it from my hands and tossed it away. It landed with a heavy thud on the hard ground.

”What are you doing?” I asked.

”It's ruined,” he said. ”I should have retrieved them at most two days after the firing. It's been six weeks. The humidity got to them.”

He picked up the hammer and swung it down, obliterating the vase with one smash.

I did not pa.s.s over the other vase.

”But it's beautiful,” I said. It was slightly shrunken perhaps, but exquisite. ”Didn't you tell me that the unpredictable results of the firing were all part of the process?”

”Kali,” he said patiently. ”I have pieces in collections all over the world. Trust me. I know what needs to be done.”

He took the vase from my grip and tossed it down. ”And besides, it's therapeutic.”

I did not share his view, but despite my reluctance, I went back for more. With each trip I handed him another couple of precious items, and he tossed, swung, and smashed. I gave up on the niceties and began rolling them down the tunnel ahead of me, until I could no longer stand the bad air and needed a break. I felt like a coal miner working a seam.

Outside, sweating from the latent heat and the exertion, I ran my hand across my forehead. Brother Mike started to laugh.

”What is it?” I asked, self-conscious.

”If you could see yourself covered in soot and sweat. You finally look like your namesake. Kali, the destroyer of worlds.”

”I've been waiting for the right moment to reveal myself.”

It was good to see his smile.

By the late afternoon we were inside again and drinking that tea I'd wanted.

”I'm sorry you were left down there,” he said.

I did not want to think about that place and those things, and I did not blame him for them. I only wished there were pockets of time that could be utterly forgotten.

”Was it Hammond,” I asked, ”in the infirmary?”

He did not answer for a minute. I knew that Fenton and Roy had led Brother Mike back to DI-6 and that Fenton had butchered the man within. But there was no official confirmation about the ident.i.ty, no trail to anyone named Hammond, only my insistence, and no one had paid my claims any attention.

”I don't know,” Brother Mike said finally. ”Jon Crowley had convinced me that it was Hammond. I'm sorry I lied to you about that, but I couldn't tell you the truth. I feared what would happen to Hammond if anyone learned he was there. I was only able to visit the infirmary once, and I didn't recognize anything about him. It was awful what Fenton did to him. Like a cow being slaughtered.”

I wanted to ask if they'd found an answer on the man, a tattoo or some indication of the bank account number they were looking for, but I didn't have the heart to press for details.

”I suppose it was the comic book Roy wanted all along,” I said. ”If they ever catch him, that's the one thing I'd like to ask.”

He had escaped from the window of the examination room of a city hospital, a place they'd sent the inmates with the worst injuries. I was still struck by the absurdity of a one-legged man climbing a drainpipe from four stories up, catching a taxi, and getting away.

Brother Mike did not seem to hear me.

”I think I feel most betrayed by Jon,” he said. ”To know that the comic book wasn't an artistic retelling of Hammond's life. To find out there were symbols and messages encoded in the drawings. And to realize that he'd used me to get the details, that he'd gone through my files for those reasons and not the reasons I thought. I was a fool to believe him.”

I stopped him.