"It seemed appropriate." Galen put a knee on the man's chest. "Eve doesn't like second-story men." He opened the man's wallet and checked the driver's license. "Bill Nathan, age forty-seven. Eye color is right, but the weight's wrong. He's a good fifteen pounds heavier than it says here."
"So I gained a little weight when I quit smoking." Nathan's glance shifted to Eve. "Will you call this ... bastard off me so that I can talk to you?"
"My name is Sean Galen, and you're in no position to call me anything but sir." Galen finished searching him. "He's clean." He handed her a card. "Press ID. He's with the Times Picayune ... maybe."
Nathan scowled. "Are you going to let me up?"
Galen glanced inquiringly at Eve.
She nodded.
"Maybe I shouldn't—" Galen shrugged. "Oh, well, he's not much threat either way." He stood, pulled Nathan to his feet, and then pushed him into the chair beside the bed. "Talk to me. What are you doing here?"
"I'm on a rescue mission, dammit. And I don't like being tossed around like this."
"Why the balcony?"
"I wasn't sure whether the front door was being watched. Do you think I like crawling up the side of a house like some nutty superhero comic-book character?"
"It's definitely not your area of expertise," Galen said.
"Let him talk, Galen," Eve said. "What do you want from us, Nathan?"
"In the short term, I want to save your necks. In the long term, I'm hoping for a Pulitzer."
"Save us from what?"
"From finishing your reconstruction." Nathan gingerly touched his bruised cheek. "God, I need a cigarette."
"You're saying that finishing the reconstruction is dangerous."
"I think so. If you finish, they don't need you anymore, and you may know too much."
Galen lifted his brows. "You think so?"
"That's what I said," he said sourly. "I can't look into a crystal ball and know what they'll do. I'm still digging. I don't know what the hell's happening yet."
"You evidently know more than we do," Eve said. "Who are 'they'?"
"The Cabal."
"Sounds like a witch's coven," Galen said.
"It's not funny." Nathan gave him a poisonous glance before turning back to Eve. "Don't you think I was tempted to just let you go on with the reconstruction until I could find out who you were working on? If you don't finish, I risk losing my story."
"Then why didn't you?"
He grimaced. "Ethics. The bane of my existence."
"Inspiring," Galen murmured.
"The truth."
The man's reply was both bad-tempered and defiant, but Eve thought she could also sense honesty. "How did you know I was working on the skull?"
"I didn't. I followed the skull and staked out the church." He paused. "I'm not the only one. I almost stumbled over two guys near the church."
"Guards. There are four, sometimes five," Galen said. "And much more talented than you."
"I'm a journalist, not a thug."
"From where did you follow the skull?" Eve asked.
"Well, I didn't exactly follow it. Etienne told me it was going to be taken to the church."
"Etienne?"
"Etienne Hebert." He drew a deep breath. "Look, I can't have a cigarette, so will you at least give me a cup of coffee? I need the caffeine."
"This isn't a social occasion," Galen said. "Conversation first."
"Oh, for God's sake. If I hadn't intended to tell you everything I know, I wouldn't have come here tonight. As you've pointed out, I'm no great shakes at this kind of thing."
"True. But it could be a ploy."
Eve made a decision. "We'll go down to the kitchen and get some coffee. He looks like he could use it."
Galen shrugged. "Whatever." He stood aside as Nathan got up and headed for the door. "I hope you don't regret it, Eve."
"A cup of coffee?" She followed them out into the hall. "I don't think that's being particularly soft. I have questions to ask, and he may as well be comfortable while he answers them." She gave Nathan a cool glance. "And I assure you that you will answer them."
-------------------
Ten minutes later she was pouring steaming coffee into Nathan's cup. "And who is Etienne Hebert?" "I don't think the present tense applies to Etienne."
Nathan took a drink of coffee, and gave a deep sigh of satisfaction. "I think Jules killed him." He held up his hand at Eve's exclamation. "Okay, okay. Let me do this in my own way. I'll start at the beginning. About a month ago I received a phone call at my office from a man named Etienne Hebert. He said he knew what had happened to Harold Bently, and that Bently was the smallest part of the story. He asked me to meet him outside New Orleans, at a little crab shack on the Mississippi."
"Why you?"
"How the hell do I know? Maybe because I covered the Bently disappearance for the newspaper." He took another sip of coffee. "Anyway. I met him. He was a big guy, not over twenty-one or -two, and seemed a little simple at first glance." He shook his head. "But he wasn't that dumb. After I talked to him for a while, I realized he was smarter than I first thought. He was just troubled, and feeling guilty about talking to me. He had a big brother, Jules, and there was no way he wanted to get him in trouble. It was obvious he had a king-size case of hero worship. Etienne was only a fisherman, but Jules was the smart one in the family. He was the only one who made it to college." He grimaced. "Maybe it would have been better for him if he hadn't. He was a junior at Tulane when the Cabal recruited him."
"What's the Cabal?"
"It's a secret society that's been in existence since the early 1900s."
"Secret society?" Galen said. "Be for real."
"I couldn't be more serious."
"And the society is named the Cabal? For God's sake, that means secret society. They must be seriously lacking in imagination."
"They're called that because their members are drawn from the top echelon of other organizations." Nathan grimaced. "And they think of themselves as the ultimate secret society."
Galen snorted.
"That was my reaction until I did my homework," Nathan said. "There are hundreds of secret societies around the world, and the U.S. has taken them to its heart. The Freemasons, the Odd Fellows, Skull and Bones." He studied Eve's expression. "I know. They all sound a little ludicrous—unless you study the membership lists. Did you know both George Bush and George W. Bush belong to Skull and Bones, and George W.'s only comment about his membership was that he couldn't talk about it?"
"So what? I assume there's no proof that Skull and Bones is involved in any nefarious activities?"
"No proof. But there are also members in positions of power in the CIA and on Wall Street and practically every level of the business world. It's not only Skull and Bones. The Trilateral Commission and the Council on Foreign Relations have always been influential. The Bilderberg Group is supposed to be so powerful it can influence worldwide politics itself. Margaret Thatcher's career took off like a rocket after she attended a Bilderberg meeting. The same thing happened to Tony Blair after he was invited to a meeting in Vouliagmeni, Greece. In 1991, David Rockefeller invited Arkansas governor Bill Clinton to a meeting in Baden-Baden, Germany."
"Now wait a minute. I respect Bill Clinton and Tony Blair."
"So do I. I'm not accusing them. I'm just trying to show you the influence a secret society could wield. Probably the great majority of the members of these societies are totally in the dark about the activities, unaware of the elite groups in their organizations. I don't even know which groups are part of the Cabal. Maybe none of the ones I mentioned. Maybe all of them." He shrugged. "Etienne didn't know how many secret societies were involved. He only knew what Jules had told him, and that was that the Cabal comprised the highest echelon from several organizations, and that these elite members used their societies to influence the world economy."
"How?"
Nathan shrugged. "How the hell do I know? But didn't you find it weird
that the gas prices went up so high recently when there was no lack of oil?"
Eve had been as angry as everyone else at that increase at the gas pumps. "And how could they do that?"
"Use your imagination. There are supposed to be members of OPEC, Wall Street shakers, and Japanese computer executives in the Cabal."
"Supposed? That's not good enough. Give me names."
"If I knew who, do you think I'd be here? I'd be back home in New Orleans writing my story."
Nathan's gaze searched their faces. "Dammit, it's true. What else can I tell you? I watched the stock market before and after the Greenspan announcements. There was always a flurry of activity from the same banking quarters, and fortunes were made as soon as the announcement came through. They know what's going to happen before it happens. Secret societies pervade our past and our present. They have power in every quarter. Almost every U.S. president of the twentieth century was a Freemason. Hell, George Washington's inauguration ceremony was Masonic. Lyndon Johnson's advisors were in the Council on Foreign Relations when he escalated the Vietnam war. The first peace negotiator for Bosnia was Lord Carrington, chairman of the Bilderberg Group." Nathan drew a deep breath. "Okay, don't accept what I'm telling you as gospel, just look at the possibility. When men of power get together, it's natural for them to try to combine and push to increase that power. They work in the dark and behind the scenes, because if the public knew they were being manipulated they'd be yelling to the high heavens. It's been that way since the first secret societies in Egypt and Samaria in the B.C.'s. The Cabal's worked for decades to form a spiderweb of tremendous power, and they're not going to let that power be jeopardized."
Galen shrugged. "I don't see how any organization composed of such powerful, renowned figures could even meet without attracting attention."
"They usually don't meet. They communicate by messenger and, more recently, on the Internet. The only exception is when something really big is going down and they have to get together to form a clear-cut majority. When they do meet, they schedule it at a place and time where it seems natural that they would all be present. Like a royal wedding. According to Etienne, the last meeting was at the Summer Olympics. No one suspected that they were there for anything else but to cheer on their national teams."
"And was Etienne recruited by the Cabal?"
"No, his brother tried to persuade the Cabal to accept him, but they didn't believe he was good material. However, they had a gem in Jules. Etienne said Jules was brainwashed until he believed that everything the Cabal said and did was right, that a strong guiding hand was necessary to preserve peace and the status quo. He became their dirty-tricks expert."
"Assassin?"
Nathan nodded. "He was trained in a terrorist school in Libya, but he developed his own techniques. He became an expert, and worked for the Cabal for ten years before the Bently murder."
"Murder? You're sure he was murdered?"
"Etienne said he was there when it happened, and I have no reason to think he lied to me."
"I thought you said he was refused by the Cabal."
"But Jules trusted him and took him along on a number of jobs. Etienne was no problem to Jules until it came to Bently. Something bothered him about the Bently killing."
"What?"
"He wouldn't tell me. He just said it was wrong, and that why the Cabal was doing it was wrong, too. He didn't like the murder, and he didn't like bringing the skeleton back two years later. It must have worried him seriously to cause him to break with a brother he'd previously always followed blindly."
"But not enough to go into detail."
"He still hoped to change his brother's mind about the Cabal, and he only wanted to use me as a safety net in case he couldn't do it. He said someone had to know about the Cabal and stop them. He said we had to hurry." He paused. "He was worried about something that Jules had been ordered to do in Boca Raton. He kept saying that we had to stop them before October twenty-ninth."
"Why?"
"That's all he'd say. I thought maybe it was a Cabal meeting, but there aren't any scheduled events that would give them an excuse to be in Boca at that time. So maybe it has something to do with Bently." Nathan grimaced. "It's all guesswork. I was frustrated as hell. He told me they were going to bring the skeleton here, but not when or why. He said he'd call me again after the skeleton was in place at the church." He paused. "He didn't call me."
"There was no skeleton," Eve said. "Only a skull."
"Really?" Nathan frowned. "He said skeleton. I wonder what happened to—"
"A skeleton has infinitely more possibilities for DNA," Galen said. "The skull had no teeth, either. Etienne's work?"
"Maybe," Nathan said. "If it was, then I imagine Jules was a tad upset. I warned Etienne to be careful. Stealing a skeleton isn't exactly the most cautious act."
"But you didn't try to stop him."
"I'm a reporter, and this had all the earmarks of a great story. I won't feel guilty about doing my job. Etienne was hardly as pure as the driven snow." He smiled grimly. "But, unfortunately, I do have a conscience where innocent lives are at stake. That's why I'm here."
"It took you long enough to decide to come to warn us," Galen said.
"I had to think about it." He scowled as Galen lifted a brow. "It's the truth." His glance shifted to Eve. "Then I read about Marie Letaux's death, and the article indicated you were struck by the same food poisoning. I tried to tell myself it could be an accident. Hell, it could have been. But when Pierre Letaux died ... Too much coincidence, considering what Etienne had told me. I chewed on it for awhile, and then decided I couldn't wait until you finished. I'd have to risk my story. So pack up your bags and get the hell out of here."
Galen looked at Eve. "Not a bad idea."
"You believe him?"
"Enough. The evidence is growing, and I don't like it. Added to what Quinn told us tonight, I think we'd be prudent to fold our tents and flit away."
She didn't like it, either. Nathan's story of secret societies with that much control over people's day-to-day lives was both frightening and outlandish. And so was the fact that she'd been lured to this job by Melton, who could be in cahoots with the man who had used her daughter's death as a tool. The thought brought a bolt of pure rage surging through her.
"Eve?"
"I'm thinking." Galen was right. Whether or not the Cabal existed, the evidence for some sort of conspiracy was mounting. Capel's and the Letauxs' deaths should have been enough for her in themselves. It was only her obsession with finishing Victor that had kept her from admitting it.
Victor.
"We're getting out of here," she said. "But I'm not leaving the skull. Victor comes with us."
"What?" Nathan asked. "Why?"
"Because she wants to do it," Galen said. "And I'm beginning to want her to do anything she can to thumb her nose at those bastards. Eve, we can't trust anything Nathan says until I check him out, but if you're not going to be a cat's paw, then you have to be on your own turf."
"And take Victor with us," Eve said flatly. "I'm not giving him up until I make up my mind what we're going to do."
Nathan shook his head. "You're actually stealing him?"
"Just borrowing his skull for a little while. Until I make a decision, he's mine. It's my choice what happens to Victor. Not Hebert's or Melton's or any half-baked secret society. Let them all run around and kill each other. They're not going to use Victor in their plans." She glanced at Galen. "The church may be locked at this time of night, Galen."
"Are you hinting I should get out of here and do a little breaking and entering?"
"You seemed to do well enough at Marie Letaux's house. Will the church be a problem?"
Galen shook his head. "What do you need from your workroom?"
"Victor. My tools, the leather skull case, the box with the glass eyeballs. Rick is always at the church when I get there in the morning, Galen. If he's there, I don't want him hurt."
"I'll keep that in mind, but he may be part of this, you know."
She didn't want to believe that of Rick. "And maybe he's not. Maybe he doesn't know anything about this. Until we're sure any of this is true, I don't want him hurt."
"Are you going to leave it to me where we're going?"
"You said that your job was to provide what was needed. Provide."
"Taking the skull is a mistake." Nathan's voice was harsh with intensity. "If you go away and hide, they may abandon the search eventually. Take the skull, and they'll come after you. They'll suspect you know something and they'll never give up. Why won't you listen to me?"
"Because we don't have any proof you're anyone more than a second-story man with a glass jaw," Galen said.
But Nathan's desperation was very convincing, and Eve felt a sudden frantic surge of urgency. "We are listening to you within limits. That's why we're leaving Baton Rouge. I'll pack our bags and be ready to leave when you get back, Galen."
Nathan sighed. "If you won't do the sensible thing, then I may as well help you pack."
"No, you're coming with me," Galen said. "I'm not leaving you alone in the house with Eve."
"For God's sake, after all I've told you, I think I deserve a little trust."
"Words aren't worth anything. Trust is earned. You'll have to prove yourself."
"By risking my neck at that church?"
"Good a way as any." Galen glanced back over his shoulder at Eve. "Do you know how to handle a gun?"
"Yes."
"There's one in my duffel. Get it. I don't like leaving you in the house alone."
"Then let me stay, dammit," Nathan said.
Galen ignored him. "Scoot, Eve. Get moving. We may be in a hurry when I get back. I need to get a couple items from the kitchen cabinet, and then Nathan and I will be on the road."
Chapter Nine
Where were they?
Eve's gaze anxiously searched the darkness, but she could see nothing but the shadowy outline of the church.
It had been over thirty minutes. Surely they should be back by now.
Unless something had happened to them.
She wouldn't let herself think that. Galen was too smart to have let himself be caught, and she had heard no sound of conflict while she had been standing here on the balcony.