ARKANE Thrillers Books 7-9

Chapter 10

10

JAKE OPENED HIS EYES to a hazy view of the stacks, illuminated by a nimbus around the light next to them. His head pounded and nausea rose within him, but as he came fully alert, he realized that the gas had been merely to knock them out. The Mother Superior's diary was gone, as were both his and Naomi's guns, but it looked like nothing else had been touched. Maybe whoever did this didn't want to leave bodies as evidence that would point to the stolen diary.

This way, no one would be any the wiser about the incursion.

Naomi's head rested on Jake's shoulder and he was acutely aware of her soft body against his. Her breathing was natural and she stirred a little. Her dark hair smelled of coconut shampoo and he closed his eyes for a moment, inhaling her scent. Regina's head still lay in Naomi's lap and she looked like she was breathing more easily, her skin a normal color. Jake reached down to check her pulse, relieved to find it steady and strong.

He shook Naomi's shoulder gently.

"Hey … wake up," he said, softly. "You OK?"

She sighed and lifted her head, taking a deep breath as she focused on the vault and rubbed her eyes.

"Regina," she said, bending to the young woman in concern.

"She'll be alright in a minute," Jake said. "It looks like we were only drugged for the short term while they took the diary. We'll make sure she gets some help when we get out of here."

Naomi looked up at him with a dawning smile.

"That must mean that the book really does hold the location of the relic, and I think I read about it before the gas attack. I know where we need to go next."

"You can take the boat out into the Sound but just don't land on any of the islands," the skipper said as Jake signed the paperwork. "It's illegal and they're really strict about it. You do not want to cross the Corrections Department, believe me."

"We just want to do a little sightseeing," Jake said. "Maybe some night fishing later on."

The skipper frowned.

"Not really the weather for it but hey, it's your call. The insurance is all in order." He stamped the documents and filed them quickly, locking away the cash Jake had provided. There were a couple of extra hundred-dollar notes in the pile after his questioning glances at their dusty and dirty clothes, evidence of the underground excursion.

After Regina had roused from the drugged sleep, they'd traced their way back through the tunnels and left her at the ER, where she assured them she would be fine. Then, Jake and Naomi continued the hunt alone.

They had two backpacks now, delivered at short notice by an ARKANE agent from the central office. Their weapons and torches had been replaced, just in case, but they still wore the clothes from the day's adventure.

Together, they headed out for the dock, the skipper leading the way. He showed Jake the controls of the boat, explained the safety features and wished them a good evening.

Naomi helped cast off and they set out north from City Island towards Chimney Sweeps and the Blauzes, where there was apparently some good fishing.

As soon as they were far enough away, Jake turned the boat east towards Hart Island. The throb of the engine through his feet and the movement of the ocean made him smile. Being out here in the wind was far preferable to the dark tunnels beneath the city. He took a deep breath of the salty air. Naomi sat at the bow, her dark hair tied back with a few strands caught by the breeze.

"Some call it the island of the outcasts," she said, her voice wistful as they caught sight of the shoreline ahead. "It was originally a prisoner of war camp for Confederate soldiers – it's functioned as a juvenile prison workhouse, a quarantine camp for yellow fever, a missile base, a hospital for tuberculosis patients, and of course, a lunatic asylum."

"And now?" Jake asked, steering the boat across the bay, his hand steady on the wheel.

"It's a mass burial ground for those unclaimed and unknown. Those without a name, or those with a name but no one to bury them. Those too poor to afford a proper grave. Babies who died in hospital or were abandoned. There are over 800,000 people buried here. The graves are dug by the inmates of Rikers Island who come by ferry every day."

Jake thought of Morgan and their visit to the mummy crypt of Palermo, where the baby room had been the most disturbing place. He shook his head with a sigh.

"Mass graves aren't exactly my idea of a fun tourist day out, you know."

"Sorry." Naomi smiled. "But the Mother Superior's diary specifically mentioned this place. She used to minister to the women here at the asylum. Her words were something like, the relic will protect those who suffer here. They deserve it more than the rich languishing in the towers built from the bodies of those they exploit."

"Ouch," Jake said. "She sounds like a firebrand."

"Just the type to buck tradition and bring the relic here perhaps. The diary must be important or it wouldn't have been taken."

Jake scanned the waters around them.

"Indeed, but it does mean that we might have some company soon."

"It's near impossible to get permission to come onto the island," Naomi said. "Even those who find relatives buried here have to go through the prison administration system. Then if you get permission, you're restricted to the ferry dock gazebo where the burial records are held."

"So we have no choice but to trespass, right?"

"Absolutely none." Naomi turned and her eyes were bright, her smile alive with enthusiasm. "Besides, where would the fun be in going through the usual channels? I'm having a pretty exciting time with you, Jake Timber. Trespassing twice in one day. I really have to get out of the office more often."

As they neared the shore, they looked for a place to land the boat, avoiding the official pier where there would likely be cameras. The island was low with sparse cover. Just a few trees, scrub and patches of dust. It was unkempt, as if those who came here couldn't leave fast enough. Buildings dotted the landscape but all were rundown, used as storehouses while they still stood, but they looked as if they would be left to crumble or soon be leveled to make room for new graves.

There was a sense of abandonment, a place only inhabited by ghosts and the dead.

Jake slowed the engine as they scanned the shoreline, avoiding the treacherous reefs. Signs dotted the perimeter on the rocks above the shallow beaches. New York City Corrections Department. Restricted area. No trespassing. No docking. No anchoring. Violators will be prosecuted.

"I'm not intending to violate anything," Jake said. "How 'bout you?"

"Certainly not," Naomi said. "How about landing over there?"

She pointed out a cobbled beach under the shadow of an imposing building with a tall chimney, the ruins of the island's power plant. Jake steered the boat in, revving slightly before pulling up the motor so they could coast up the stones a little. Naomi jumped gracefully out onto the shore, holding the boat steady so Jake could disembark. They dragged the boat further away from the water line, the sound of metal on stone loud in the still air.

"No point in trying to hide the boat," Jake said. "If we get caught, it's better to be clueless tourists than clandestine operatives."

Naomi pulled a map from her backpack and peered closely at it, turning it around until she got her bearings.

"OK, the asylum isn't too far. This way."

They walked up from the beach through the trees, stepping quietly with an instinctive respect. It was a place that demanded silence, as if to wake what slumbered here would be abomination. The ground was covered in patchy mist and Jake fancied that the souls of the unloved clung to the earth, seeking solace. What is heaven if you have no hope of seeing those who made life on earth so happy?

He thought of his parents, his sisters, murdered too young. He didn't really believe in an afterlife, but in quiet moments, he could sense their presence and there was still hope that he might be together with them in the end.

A red brick building loomed from the trees, with tall window spaces that gaped black inside. The map named it as the Pavilion Building, which had once housed the Hart Island Lunatic Asylum, a women-only residence that held the overflow from Blackwell Island Insane Asylum.

"They only brought chronic cases here," Naomi said. "Perhaps the ones who couldn't be treated, so they kept them somewhere their screams wouldn't disturb the public."

"And where the so-called civilized didn't have to deal with them," Jake said.

The forest floor grew right to the doorstep of the building, green shoots withering as they touched the brick as if afraid to cross the threshold. It was quiet and still, with no sound of birdsong or rustle of animals in the overgrown foliage. The ambient noise was only the far-off city and the ocean waves that washed all the way to the Atlantic. The air was damp, clinging to their skin, and the smell of the forest had crept in here, nature slowly reclaiming that which man had left behind.

Jake willed the encroachment on faster, for perhaps only when this place was a crumble of ruins would the shades of these women be at peace.

He stepped inside with Naomi following close behind. The structure was falling apart, the inner layers of the original building showing through. The years of weathering had stripped the paint and paper from the walls, revealing the struts and planks. The floor was cracked through repeated floods and winter cold. Piles of dead leaves had blown in through glassless windows. The place was clad in decaying shades of brown and green, natural colors that dominated as the traces of human touch were slowly, but inevitably, erased.

They walked onwards.

In one room, four metal beds stood against a wall regulation-distance apart, rusted and surrounded by fallen masonry. In another, three plain wooden caskets sat next to planks and plastic gloves, waiting for the bodies that would be laid inside. What kind of a life would it have been, incarcerated here and then buried in these crowded graves? Jake shivered and turned away.

"Maybe there are some records upstairs?" he said.

They walked up to the second floor, their footsteps eerie in the quiet place, and turned into the first room on the left.

"Oh." Naomi let out a soft gasp at what she saw.