23

I went to see Humpty Dumpty. I had no idea where he lived, but the last time I saw him, he could barely walk. My gut told me I’d find him passed out in his office chair at the library. If he made it that far.

I called Sarah and begged her to meet up with Miles. She sounded tired and confused, but I managed to convince her. She had no idea what was going on, and when she did, she would probably hate me, but at least she’d be safe. That was good enough for now. There was a sick feeling in my throat that kept pulsing: you did this. But I swallowed it down. Right now, I was the investigator. Humpty had reached out to me. I was the one he would talk to. I had a job to do.

The library was open twenty-four hours, but it was after midnight on a Sunday, and it was deserted when I got there. I kept my hat low and tried not to look over my shoulder too much.

I headed for the administrators’ wing: forsaken on a busy night and now positively gravelike.

There was a soft light under the door of Humpty’s office. A good sign. The nameplate announced ARTHUR PEABODY, HEAD TUTOR OF LEGAL METHOD.

I knocked softly.

No response.

I knocked again.

Nothing.

I tried the door.

It was unlocked. I slipped into the room. I saw the dome of Humpty’s head over the back of the chair. A few liver spots. Some wisps of white hair.

“Mr. Peabody?”

Nothing.

“Mr. Peabody?”

Passed out, I thought. I wondered if I could rouse him.

Then I heard it.

A soft, gurgling noise. I thought of a child blowing bubbles in milk with a straw.

Oh, no.

What was it? Was he choking on his own vomit, like a drummer in a rock band? Or something else…

No.

I pushed the thought out of my head and walked closer.

The office was perfectly silent, except for that faint gurgling noise. I was suddenly slapped across the face by the sound of a clock chime.

I jumped, let out a nervous little laugh, and kept walking.

Still no movement from Humpty.

“Mr. Peabody?”

I got close enough to touch his chair.

I reached my hand out. My fingers were trembling.

The chair wheeled around slowly as I pulled on the leather arm.

Arthur Peabody was holding his neck. Rivers of blood spilled through his fingers.

“Oh my God.”

I grabbed for the phone on his desk. He caught my arm and squeezed it.

“No,” he hissed.

“I’m calling 911.”

He tried to shake his head. With every turn, the river between his fingers surged.

“Please,” he whispered.

I could barely hear him. His fingers clawed into my arm. He was trying to pull me in. He whispered into my ear.

“Now or later… they’ll… get me…” he wheezed.

“I can protect you.”

When I saw his face, I knew what he thought of that.

“… let it… happen…”

“Please. I can’t.”

His mouth worked in my ear.

“I missed… my… chance.”

“Chance for what?”

His mouth felt wet. Pink froth appeared at the corners.

“… not… dying…”

His whole body started to shake. His lips were turning blue. His eyes were fading. They were distant, blind. I was losing him.

“Please, Arthur, I need your help.”

He made wild, incoherent noises. His eyes rolled back in his head.

“Please. Tell me something. Anything.”

His life was spilling out all over me. The desk was rapidly turning dark red in an expanding pool. I needed his help. Now.

“Arthur say, something.”

Just hissing; twitching muscles.

I had a vivid memory. In the hallway. The day Bernini fired me. Peabody said something about a joke. Bernini was furious.

– Why don’t you tell him the joke?

– Enough. Remember your deal.

That meant something to him. Something important.

“Arthur, listen to me. What was the joke? The one Bernini didn’t want me to hear?” I shook him hard. “The joke, Arthur.”

For a split second, his eyes seemed to focus. The memory pulled him back.

“The joke…” he whispered.

“Yes. YES. The joke. Tell me.”

He started moaning. His eyes rolled back up-all I could see was white, the tiny delicate veins.

“What’s the joke?” I shouted, cupping his face and pushing my nose into his.

He was moving his lips, just the last echoes of a memory. Mindless. Gone.

I pushed my ear right against his foaming mouth.

“… if… you… want to… know… about the V and D…”

“YES? YES?”

“… look… at… it… with… four… eyes…”

And then his stare went blank, and the gurgling stopped.

Arthur Peabody was dead.

I couldn’t stop shaking. A man had just died right in front me. Someone who’d risked his life to help me. Whatever they were up to, Humpty had found the courage-at the very end of his life, in his own crazy way-to turn on them.

Except that now he was facedown in a pool of blood on his desk, and I didn’t know anything-except a stupid childish riddle with no answer. What now?

I rendezvoused with Miles at a seedy motel on the outskirts of town, the one families never used on Parents Weekend. Miles had paid in cash and used a fake ID from the bowels of his wallet, a vestige from his college days. Lenny Wurzengord, it said. Miles had been so proud of it back then. He even wrote me a letter explaining his genius: no one would ever suspect it was a fake ID, because no one on earth would choose to be called Lenny Wurzengord.

I knocked on the door to room 18 and prayed Sarah would be in there. Seeing Humpty Dumpty had pulled back the last curtain between myself and death, which frankly had never seemed that scary to a young guy who lived in his parents’ basement. But now it wasn’t a concept anymore. It was red and sticky and all over my hands. One more night sleeping in the Dead Man’s room and I would’ve been the one gurgling and grabbing my throat.

Sarah was there, sitting at a small table, next to a stack of papers-Miles’s first attempt at writing everything down for our protection. For a second she looked relieved to see me, like I was there to tell her it was all a joke. Then her eyes went wide. She stared at my arms, which were spattered with Humpty Dumpty’s blood. She ran to me and turned my hands over and over, looking for a wound to fix. She asked me what was going on. I tried to explain, but everything came out jumbled. I kept apologizing. More than once she said, “But I don’t know anything about this.”

“I know, but we spent the last twelve hours together. We went out of town together. See how it looks? To them?” She shook her head again. “I’m sorry,” I said, again and again.

“Listen to me,” Miles said. His voice was sharp and it popped the bubble Sarah and I were in. “We don’t have time for this.”

I looked around the room.

“Where’s Chance?” I asked.

Miles shook his head. “I don’t know. His roommates haven’t seen him.”

That hung in the air for a moment.

A phrase popped into my head: no way out.

“Miles, they killed Peabody. I didn’t get what we needed.”

“Okay, focus,” Miles said. “Think. What do we know? What do we assume?”

The words were magical-this was just a trial, a case we could break apart and analyze. For a moment, the image of Professor Peabody coughing up blood was gone.

I tried to lay it out, like a courtroom time line.

“We know there’s a club. We know Bernini is in it. We assume Nigel, Daphne, and John have just been initiated. We know Humpty Dumpty”-Who? Sarah blurted-“was involved somehow, but he turned on them, and they killed him.”

“Good,” Miles said. “We know they’re obsessed with immortality. We know they studied failed quests for it: Bimini, the alchemists, etcetera… What else?”

“We know Peabody wanted me to see that obituary. We know it had a picture of a man who supposedly knew the exact day he was going to die. We know I met that man at a V and D event. Let’s suppose, then, that his death was merely a cover. He was old, and it had to appear like he died. But he wouldn’t, really… He would keep on living, hidden somewhere…”