The Twelfth Card (Lincoln Rhyme 6)

"That's how I met her. She walked into my office last week and asked if I knew where she could get records of old crimes in the city--back in the eighteen hundreds. I let her look through a few of the old books I have but it's almost impossible to find trial court records going back that far. I couldn't help her." The skinny man raised an eyebrow. "She wanted to pay me for my time. Most of my clients don't even do that."

With another look around the town house, Goades seemed satisfied that the situation was what it seemed to be. "Are you close to catching this guy?"

"We have some leads," Rhyme said noncommittally.

"Well, tell her I came by, would you? And if there's anything she needs, anytime, have her call me." He nodded at his card and then left.

Mel Cooper chuckled. "A hundred bucks he's represented a spotted owl at one point or another in his career."

"No takers on that one," Rhyme muttered. "And what'd we do to deserve all these distractions? Back to work. Let's move!"

Twenty minutes later Bell and Geneva arrived with a box of documents and other material from her great-aunt's apartment, which a patrolman had delivered to them at the precinct house.

Rhyme told her that Wesley Goades had come by.

"To check on me, right? I told you he was good. If I ever sue anybody I'm going to hire him."

Lawyer of Mass Destruction . . .

Amelia Sachs walked inside with the evidence from the scene, nodding a greeting to Geneva and the others.

"Let's see what we've got," Rhyme said eagerly.

The cigarette that Unsub 109 had used as a fuse for the distracting "gunshot" was a Merit brand, common and untraceable. The cigarette had been lit but not smoked--or at least they could detect no teeth marks or saliva on the filter. This meant he was not a habitual smoker, most likely. No fingerprints on the cigarette, of course. Nor was there anything distinctive about the rubber band he'd affixed the cigarette to the bullet with. They found no manufacturer's markers in the cyanide. The acid could be purchased in many locations. The contraption that would mix the acid and poison in Bell's car was made of household objects: a glass jar, foil and a glass candleholder. Nothing had any markings or indications that could be traced to a particular location.

In the abandoned building where the killer had done his surveillance Sachs had found additional traces of the mysterious liquid she'd recovered from the Elizabeth Street safe house (and whose FBI analysis Rhyme was still impatiently awaiting). In addition she'd recovered a few tiny flakes of orange paint the shade of roadside signs or construction or demolition site warnings. Sachs was sure these were from the unsub because she'd located flakes in two different locations, right next to his footprints, and nowhere else in the abandoned store. Rhyme speculated that the unsub might have masqueraded as a highway, construction or utility worker. Or maybe this was his real job.

Meanwhile Sachs and Geneva had been searching through the box of family memorabilia from her aunt's house. It contained dozens of old books and magazines, papers, scraps, notes, recipes, souvenirs and postcards.

And, it turned out, a yellowed letter filled with Charles Singleton's distinctive handwriting. The lettering on this page was, however, far less elegant than in his other correspondence.

Understandable, given the circumstances.

Sachs read it out loud:

" 'July fifteenth, 1868.' "

"The day after the theft at the Freedmen's Trust," Rhyme noted. "Go on."

" 'Violet--What madness this is! As near as I have been able to discern, these events are a plan to discredit me, to shame me in the eyes of my colleagues and of the honorable soldiers in the war for freedom.

" 'Today I learned where I might find justice, and this evening, I went to Potters' Field, armed with my Navy Colt. But my efforts ended in disaster, and the one hope for salvation now lies forever hidden beneath clay and soil.

" 'I will spend the night in hiding from the constables--who now search everywhere for me,--and in the morning, I will steal to New Jersey. You and our son must flee too; I fear they will try to visit their vengeance upon you, as well. Tomorrow at noontime meet me at the John Stevens Pier in New Jersey. Together, we will repair to Pennsylvania, if your sister and her husband will agree to harbor us.

" 'There is a man who lives in the building above the stable where I am now hiding, who seems not unsympathetic to my plight. He has assured me he will get you this message.' "

Sachs looked up. "Something's crossed out here. I can't make it out. Then he goes on: 'It is dark now. I am hungry and tired, as tested as Job. And yet the source of my tears--the stains you see on this paper, my darling,--are not from pain but from regret for the misery I have visited upon us. All because of my d----ed secret! Had I shouted the truth from the top of City Hall, perhaps these sorrowful events would not have transpired. Now it is too late for the truth. Please forgive my selfishness, and the destruction wrought by my deceit.' "

Sachs looked up. "He signs it only 'Charles.' "

The next morning, Rhyme recalled, came the pursuit and arrest described in the magazine Geneva had been reading when she was attacked.

"His one hope? 'Hidden beneath clay and soil.' " Rhyme looked over the letter again, Sachs holding it up for him. "Nothing specific about the secret . . . And what happened in Potters' Field? That's the pauper's graveyard, isn't it?"

Cooper went online and browsed for a few moments. He reported that the city cemetery for indigents was located on Hart's Island, near the Bronx. The island had been a military base, and the graveyard had just opened on it shortly before Charles went there on his mysterious mission, armed with his Colt pistol.

"Military?" Rhyme asked, frowning. Something had clicked in his memory. "Show me the other letters."