As I asked the question, Miranda reached for the gun. Without even looking, Father Mike swept a leg in a wide, swift arc, knocking her feet out from under her. She landed hard, with a thud and a grunt. She kept trying, though, going for the gun and managing to get a hand on it just as Father Mike’s foot came down on her wrist. She cried out sharply in pain, and I struggled up to lunge for him. I was stopped short by the barrel of the rifle, jabbing into my throat two inches above the top of the Kevlar vest.
“I probably should kill you, lad, but I won’t. If I wanted you dead, I’d’ve let the reverend do the bloody bit. I don’t feel bad about shooting him and his ape—no penance needed for them two—but I don’t need more innocent blood on my hands. It’s asking for trouble, but I’ll be letting you go. I hope you don’t mind if I take a little souvenir with me, though.” He took the pistol from Miranda’s hand, then lifted his boot off her wrist. “Sorry to hurt you, miss. You strike me as a strong-headed lass, so I didn’t figure you’d listen if I just said, ‘Stop.’ I hope I’ve not done any serious harm.”
“I’ve got a bump on my head and maybe a sprained wrist, but I’ll be okay,” Miranda said. “Hurts a bit, but you saved me from the crazies, so if you promise not to kill me, I promise not to hold a grudge.”
He smiled at that—a smile that reminded me of the kind, comforting fellow who’d offered a friendly ear on the staircase at the library a few days and a lifetime ago. Looking at me, he cocked his head at Miranda. “She’s good in a pinch. I’d trust her with me back any day.” He tossed the preacher’s pistol over the railing, and it plunked into the water somewhere in the vicinity of the femur I’d lobbed a few minutes before. “Can I trust you two to sit here quiet-like till you can’t hear me scooter any longer?” I nodded; he turned and looked at Miranda, and she nodded, too. “Fair enough. After that, you can scream bloody hell and sic the coppers on me. If they catch me, it means I’ve lost me knack.”
He walked to the stone box sitting ten feet away, farther out on the bridge, where Reverend Jonah had left it. Lifting the lid from where I’d leaned it against the railing, he fitted it into place, but not before taking a quick look inside. Then he squatted and lifted the box, giving his right shoulder a shrug to keep the gun sling from slipping off.
“Those bones have brought bad luck to everybody that’s tried to latch onto them,” I said. “Are you sure you want them?”
He shrugged, and the box bobbed slightly. “It’s not up to me, lad. I’ve got orders.” He drew even with us, and as he did, he turned toward us. “Good luck to you both. I’d keep wearing that medal, lad—it seems to be working for you.”
He turned away, and suddenly a bright mist of red sprayed from his back. Father Mike sank to his knees and set the ossuary down with a thud, as if taken by a sudden need to pray. Then he pitched forward across the top of it.
“Oh shit oh shit oh shit,” gasped Miranda. She ran to him and laid a hand on Father Mike’s shoulder as the life gurgled out of him. “Oh Jesus Mary and Joseph.”
A man stepped from behind the corner of the tower at the end of the bridge and walked slowly toward us. “Hello, Docteur,” he said. “Bonsoir, mademoiselle.” The man was Inspector René Descartes.
“Inspector? How long have you been here?”
“Five minutes, maybe.” He shrugged. “In time to see the preacher and the muscleman die.”
My mind was whirling, spun by a trinity of fear, sadness, and anger. “You didn’t need to shoot the priest, Inspector,” I said. “He wasn’t going to hurt us.”
“But I did,” he said.
I was confused. “Did what?”
“I did need to shoot him.”
“Why?”
“Because he was taking the bones.”
“You could have just told him to put them down. He had his hands full. He was no threat.”
“He was a big threat, Doctor. Or a big problem, at least. Just as you and mademoiselle are.”
“I don’t understand, Inspector.”
“Do you know how much a French police inspector earns, Doctor?”
“No. Not enough, probably.”
“Enough for a one-bedroom apartment and a ten-year-old car and one week at the beach every August,” he said. “Do you know how much I can sell these bones for? Three million U.S. dollars.”
“How? Who’s left to sell them to, Inspector? The crazy Protestant and the commando Catholic are both dead now. The religious market would seem to have dried up rather suddenly.”