Gentry wrestled the bats from his neck, then helped Nancy with the vespers that were viciously biting her hands and forearms. When she was finally free of bats, Joyce ran to help T-Bone and Kathy, who had gone to assist the sergeant. Apart from being vocally angry at herself for having lost the camera lights, Gentry was pleased to see that Kathy had it pretty well together.
The enormous bat hit the outer door hard. The lobby resounded with a thick, echoingthud.
While the others were still struggling, Gentry tied a handkerchief around his ankle to try and stanch the bleeding. Then he rose. The pain had abated somewhat and he put his weight on the foot. It wobbled as if it were asleep and his ankle flared hotly. Favoring his right leg, Gentry looked around for the shotgun. He spotted it lying near the display of the statue’s original torch, which had been replaced during the centenary restoration. The bat continued to hit the door. Gentry limped toward it, stopping several feet away, off to the side. He slipped his arm securely through the strap. He cradled the heavy rifle in his left hand and raised it to his shoulder.
“Come on, you misery,” he said through his teeth. “Come on.”
Behind Gentry, obviously frustrated with the tenacity of the remaining vespers, T-Bone had reached into his vest and retrieved the seltzer bottle. After shaking it vigorously, he shouted for the women to back away from the sergeant. Placing his thumb over the mouth of the bottle he turned the spray on the bats, concentrating on the ones clustered around Sergeant Gilheany’s head. The vespers hopped off; when they did, he stomped them as though they were spiders. Then, with the help of Kathy and Joyce, the sergeant was able to crush the rest of the bats.
Suddenly, the pounding at the front door stopped. After standing frozen for several seconds, Gentry lowered the shotgun.
T-Bone absently wiped his wet thumb on his trousers. “What coulda happened to her?”
“I don’t know,” Joyce said.
Kathy helped Sergeant Gilheany to her feet. “As soon as I can I want to go out and get Officer Berk’s remains.”
With the pounding stopped, they could hear the clawing of all the other bats. They were scratching on the stone walls, on the door, on the roof. It was claustrophobic and unnerving.
Gentry jumped when he heard a voice in his pocket. The radio. He slipped it out. “Gentry here.”
“Are you all okay?” It was Weeks.
“We lost one of the park officers,” Gentry said. “The rest of us are inside the fort. Can you see what’s happening?”
“We’re watching the statue from our window,” Weeks said. “And it looks like you’ve got two problems. The first is that every bat in New York seems to be nesting on the statue.”
“We know. What’s the second problem?”
Weeks said, “It looks like the giant bat found a way inside.”
Forty-One
When the Statue of Liberty was dedicated in October of 1886 it was the tallest structure built since the Pyramids of ancient Egypt.
A gift from France celebrating the hundredth anniversary of American independence, the152-foot-tall statue was designed by Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi. It portrays a woman stepping from broken chains and raising a torch of freedom. In her arm is a tablet representing law; on her head is a crown whose seven spikes represent the seven continents and seven seas over which it was hoped the light of liberty would shine. She looks toward one of those seas, the Atlantic, from atop a 152-foot-high pedestal.
Three hundred thousand rivets hold the statue’s beaten-copper skin to a metal framework designed by Gustave Eiffel. These supports function like springs, designed to give in winds reaching up to 125 miles an hour. This crisscrossing skeleton is attached to a central metal core that runs up the center of the statue. The core also supports a 168-step spiral staircase that enables visitors to walk from the foot to the crown. Only the upraised arm that holds the torch is off-limits to tourists. When the statue was first constructed, a design miscalculation caused the spikes of the crown to pierce the arm. The framework of the arm had to be reconfigured on the spot, weakening it.
The statue’s stone pedestal rests in the center of the starshaped Fort Wood that once guarded the entrance to New York Harbor. More than a century after being decommissioned, the fort was once again guarding the lives of those inside.
According to Gordy Weeks, the giant bat was using her hooks to make her way up and around the statue’s pedestal, and she appeared to be holding a human body in her claws. Weeks told Gentry he’d update him in a moment.
Sergeant Gilheany moaned when she heard about Officer Berk. She started for the door.
“Where are you going?” Gentry asked.
“No way am I letting that thing take him.”
T-Bone got in front of her. “You can’t do anything about it now.”
“Like hell. I can kill that monster.”
“No,” T-Bone said, “you can’t. You can get your own ass seriously killed though, and I ain’t gonna let you.”
“Sergeant, the man’s right,” Joyce said. “If you step outside, those little bats will be all over you.”
The sergeant looked from T-Bone to Joyce. Then she looked ahead as she wiped blood from a gash across her nose.
“You dumb rookie,” she said to the door. “I ordered you to come back. Why the hell didn’t you listen?”
“Because he knew what every cop knows,” Gentry said. “If we don’t block the shot, the bad guys score.”
“Save the pep talk for the cadets, Detective. If the four of you hadn’t come in like a bunch of-”
“What? Scared people who just got our butts kicked?”
“Yeah, something like that…”
The sergeant stopped speaking as a new sound came from above. It was high, muffled, and continuous. It sounded like a dumpster lid slowly being opened and shut.
“What the hell?” T-Bone said.
Weeks came back on. “Detective, it looks like the bat’s gone into the pedestal.”
“We’re hearing that,” Gentry said.
Just then the creaking stopped. A moment later so did the scratching outside the lobby.
“Now what?” Kathy asked.
“Maybe it’s naptime,” T-Bone said.
“No,” Joyce said. She turned quickly to Gentry. “It’s birth time. The statue’s right on the water. It’s cold down here, warmer up there. By how much, Sergeant?”
“About thirty degrees.”
“Which would make it well over eighty inside,” Joyce said. “That’s perfect for a new nest.”
“Detective, is that Dr. Joyce?” Weeks asked.
“It is.” Gentry held the radio closer to her.
“Tell her the small bats are starting to leave the statue. Some are heading back, some to Jersey, some to the other islands. Ask her if she has any idea why.”
“I do,” Joyce said. “The big bat’s dropped out of the ultrasonic range. She’ll be making vocal sounds while she gives birth, which means we’ve got to take her outnow. Otherwise we’ll have to deal with herand her wailing brood.”
“I hear you,” Weeks said. “I’m sending the SWAT teams right away.”
“They won’t get here in time,” Joyce told him. “If the bat’s like a normal vesper, we have about ten minutes to get to her.”
Gentry turned to Gilheany. “How do I get up there?”
“You don’t.” She came forward, her fingers wriggling for the shotgun. “This is my beat. I’m going up.”
Joyce fell in beside her. “I’m going with you.”
“I take it you’re a scientist?” Gilheany asked.
“Yes.”
“Good,” the sergeant said. “Then you can tell her ‘fuck you’ in bat talk before I blow her away.”
Gentry looked from Joyce to Gilheany. “All right,” he said as he handed the officer the shotgun. “But I’m going with you.”
“No you’re not. You’re limping.”
“I’ll be fine.”
“You’ll slow us down. And you don’t have a weapon,” Gilheany pointed out. “I can’t watch your back and hers.” She pulled her radio from a loop in her gunbelt. “Besides, I may need you down here. There are security cameras in the communications center. It’s located in the administration building about two hundred yards directly behind the fort. Code 6453359 will get you in. Go there. We’ll stay in touch.”