and then gone down First, without so much as a sideways glance at Norgan.
Michael went back up the steps. He summoned the guard nearest the door.
“That man over there, keep an eye on him,” said Michael. “Oh, he’s OK. He’s a private detective hired by the family.”
“Are you sure?”
“Absolutely. Showed us his identification earlier.”
“I don’t think so,” said Michael. “Yuri knew him. He’s not a private detective. Did any of the family tell you they had hired him to be here?”
The guard was flustered. “No. He showed me his identification. You’re right. It should have come from Ryan or Pierce Mayfair.”
“You better believe it.”
Michael was about to say, “Call him.” He was about to walk down the steps and go over to the man himself. Then he remembered that strange religious admonition, “Do not engage him in conversation.”
“You know the next shift?” asked Michael. “Their names, their faces?”
“Yes, all of them. And the guys out back. I know who’s coming at three tomorrow afternoon and at midnight tomorrow night. Got all those names. I should have questioned this guy. Look, let me run that bastard out of here. He said he was working for the Mayfair family.”
“No, just watch him. Maybe Ryan did hire him. Maybe Ryan forgot to tell you and me. Just watch him, watch him and anybody like him, and don’t let anyone in without talking to me.”
“Yes, sir.”
Michael went back inside, shutting the big door behind him. For a moment he stood against it, looking down the narrow hallway, at the old familiar sight of the high keyhole door to the dining room, and the bit of colored mural beyond.
“What’s going to happen, Julien? How is it going to work itself out?”
Tomorrow the family would convene in the dining room to discuss this very question. If the man had not surfaced, what should they do? What was their obligation to others? How should it be handled?
“We will deal with the specifics,” Ryan had said, “with what we know, as corporate lawyers are bound to do. This man abducted and abused Rowan. That is all the various law enforcement agencies need to be told.”
Michael smiled. He started the slow climb up the long flight of stairs. Don’t count them, don’t think about it, don’t think about a twinge in your chest, or a swimming feeling in your head.
It was going to be fun working with “law enforcement agencies,” trying to keep all this secret. Ah, Lord, would the papers have a field day. He suspected the simplest angle would be some cheap statement as to the man’s being a “Satanist,” a member of a violent and dangerous “cult.”
And then he thought of that shining spirit, “the man” whom he had once seen behind the crib at Christmas, and staring at him in the garden below. He thought of that radiant countenance.
What’s it like, Lasher, to be lost in the flesh and to have the whole world looking for you? Like being a needle in a hay-stack, instead of such a powerful ghost? In this day and age, they find needles in haystacks. And you are a bit more like the family emerald, lost in a box of jewels. Not so hard to see you, snatch you, snare you, keep you, the way no one could have ever done when you were Julien’s daemon or fiend.
He stopped at the door of the bedroom. All was as he had left it. Hamilton reading. The nurse with her chart. The candles giving off the sweet good odor of expensive wax, and the shadow of the Virgin’s statue dancing behind them, the shiver of the shadow thrown across Rowan’s face and giving it a false life.
He was about to resume his old position when he spied a movement in the bedroom at the end of the hall. Must be the other nurse, he thought, but he didn’t like it, and he went down the hall to check.
For one moment, he couldn’t make out what he was seeing—a tall gray-haired woman in a flannel gown. Sunken cheeks, bright eyes, a high forehead. Her white hair was loose over her shoulders. Her gown hung to her bare feet. The twinge in his chest became a pain.
“It’s Cecilia,” she said mercifully, patiently. “I know. Some of us Mayfairs were born looking like ghosts. I’ll come in and sit with her if you like. I’ve just slept a good eight hours. Why don’t you he down here for a little while?”