The golem of Paris

Jonathan Kellerman

Book - 2015

"From two #1 bestselling masters of crime fiction comes an extraordinary thriller about family, murder, and the secrets that refuse to stay buried. It's been more than a year since LAPD detective Jacob Lev learned the remarkable truth about his family, and he's not coping well. He's back to drinking, he's not talking to his father, the LAPD Special Projects Department continues to shadow him, and the memory of a woman named Mai haunts him day and night. And while Jacob has tried to build a bridge to his mother, she remains a stranger to him, imprisoned inside her own tattered mind. Then he comes across the file for a gruesome unsolved murder that brings the two halves of his life into startling collision. Findin...g the killer will take him halfway around the world, to Paris--the city of romance, but also of gritty streets, behind the lights. It's a dangerous search for truth that plunges him into the past. And for Jacob Lev, there is no place more frightening. Jonathan Kellerman has long been known for his mastery of criminal psychology and his ability to create thrilling novels of nuanced drama and suspense. But in The Golem of Paris, he and Jesse Kellerman raise that suspense to a whole new level"--

Saved in:

1st Floor Show me where

MYSTERY/Kellerma Jonathan
1 / 1 copies available
Location Call Number   Status
1st Floor MYSTERY/Kellerma Jonathan Checked In
Subjects
Genres
Mystery fiction
Suspense fiction
Published
New York : G.P. Putnam's Sons [2015]
Language
English
Main Author
Jonathan Kellerman (-)
Other Authors
Jesse Kellerman (-)
Physical Description
497 pages ; 24 cm
ISBN
9780399171734
Contents unavailable.
Review by New York Times Review

DR. KAY SCARPETTA, who keeps US coming back to Patricia Cornwell's sprawling crime novels, is one tough broad. As chief medical examiner for the state of Massachusetts, she has no trouble dealing with the gory sights and smells of dead bodies and violent crimes. "A select few of us come into this world not bothered by gruesomeness," she says. "In fact we're drawn to it, fascinated, intrigued." What she can't handle are threats to the person she loves best in the world, her brilliant, prickly niece, Lucy. In DEPRAVED HEART (Morrow/ HarperCollins, $28.99), Scarpetta is on the scene at the "accidental" death of a movie mogul's daughter when she receives a disturbing surveillance video shot in 1997 by Carrie Grethen, Lucy's mentor (and first love) at the F.B.I. Academy in Quantico, Va. Because it suggests that Lucy was in possession of an illegal firearm, Scarpetta worries herself sick that Carrie, a malicious psychopath, will use the clip to undermine her niece's career. But for fuzzy reasons, Scarpetta keeps her worries to herself, unwilling to share them with her husband, an F.B.I. profiler, or her cop friend, Pete Marino. Not even when the F.B.I. comes down on Lucy. Once Scarpetta decides to ferret out Lucy's secrets, the novel becomes more of a psychological thriller than a crime drama, although that suspicious death isn't entirely forgotten. Scarpetta follows the autopsy on her computer screen and even wades into the murky waters of "invisibility technology," hoping to learn how "augmented reality or optical camouflage" might have figured in the case. But the real focus is on Scarpetta's obsession with Carrie: "For years she'd invaded my psyche I waited for her to torture and murder someone- I constantly looked for her when I was with Lucy and when I wasn't. Then I stopped." And then she started again. CHARLES FINCH'S VICTORIAN whodunits, with their resolutely aristocratic sensibility, can be a guilty pleasure for the more plebeian reader. His gentleman sleuth, Charles Lenox, is a partner in a London detective agency, but he's also the brother of a baronet and is married to the daughter of an earl. In HOME BY NIGHTFALL (Minotaur, $25.99), a sterling addition to this well-polished series, all of London is talking about the renowned German pianist who disappeared from his dressing room after a concert. But before Lenox can apply his wits to that locked-room puzzle, he must head to the family estate in Sussex, hoping to console his grief-stricken brother after the sudden death of his wife. A series of odd, mysterious thefts in the nearby town of Markethouse prove the perfect distraction for Sir Edmund Lenox, as well as a chance for Finch to dazzle us with his amusing studies of country folk and his offbeat approach to historical particulars. So while we're treated to all the showy details of an elaborate ball at an ancestral manor, we're also beguiled by tidbits about the importance in Victorian society of wearing a hat and the remarkable contributions of the era's fanatical amateur geologists to the field of natural science. OUTSIDE of a Marvel comic book, can a crime story have too many heroes - even if they're all great guys? Absolutely, and Robert Crais's latest novel, THE PROMISE (Putnam, $27.95), is a case in point. His go-to protagonist, the California private eye Elvis Cole, is first on the job when an executive at a company that manufactures the chemical ingredients for heavy explosives hires him to find its top engineer, a woman who has gone looking for answers after her son was killed in a terrorist bombing. You don't want to fool around with chemical weaponry, international terrorists or a vengeful mother, so Cole recruits his scary friend, Joe Pike, a soldier of fortune who brings along his own scary friend, a "professional warrior" named Jon Stone. These big boys do so much heavy lifting that we almost lose sight of two other heroes, first met in Crais's previous book, the K-9 officer Scott James and his partner, Maggie, a German shepherd with more personality than all of them put together. THE KELLERMANS ARE on the march. In THE THEORY OF DEATH (Morrow/HarperCollins, $26.99), Faye Kellerman writes with her usual sensitivity about troubled teenagers and young adults like Eli Wolf, a math genius whose naked body is found in the woods not far from his college in Greenbury, N.Y. Detective Peter Decker, who relocated to this upstate burg after a more eventful career as a Los Angeles cop, is too conscientious to write off Eli's lonely death as a suicide, but when he opens an investigation it lands him in the snake pit of academic politics. Writing to her strengths, Kellerman shows her customary compassion for isolated souls like Eli and social outliers like his Mennonite farm family. Kellerman's husband, Jonathan, and their son, Jesse, team up in THE GOLEM OF PARIS (Putnam, $27.95) on something truly off the wall - a classically constructed detective story featuring the tormented hero of a previous book ("The Golem of Hollywood") that morphs into a supernatural thriller combining elements of Jewish legend, religious mysticism and pagan mythology. While the novel's paranormal elements don't mesh easily with the procedural work, it's hard to resist a protagonist who does battle with demonic giants and is in thrall to a woman who's part angel and part bug.

Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [November 15, 2015]
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review

The Kellermans' uneven sequel to 2014's The Golem of Hollywood finds Det. Jacob Lev of the LAPD assigned to a clerical job in a remote airplane hangar east of Los Angeles after antagonizing his superiors in his last case. Special Projects, a recently formed group, has Jacob under 24-hour surveillance. In his boredom, Jacob becomes engrossed in the unsolved Marquette case from 2004, in which a mother and her five-year-old son were found shot in the forehead, their bodies in posed positions with their eyelids removed. When Jacob discovers a similar murder previously committed in France, those in charge grudgingly allow him to travel to Paris to investigate. Jacob's journey to uncover the killer leads him to explore several generations of interlocking family histories throughout Europe. The sophisticated, smart beginning, which interweaves interesting characters from different time frames, compensates only in part for the extended passages of tedious prose that bog down the novel's second half. (Nov.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Kirkus Book Review

Detective Jacob Lev takes on a brutal cold case and discovers that the murder has connections to his mother's murky past, a scary Russian oligarch, and a recent murder in Paris. After his last case (The Golem of Hollywood, 2014, etc.), which had him questioning his sanity and sort-of believing in supernatural monsters of retribution and which landed him in crime-fighting purgatory, Jacob is assigned to archiving cold cases in an industrial warehouse. But one of them, the gruesome 2004 murder of a mother and son, piques his interest, possibly because of his own backgroundhe had long believed his own mother to be dead, but she's now catatonic and living in a health care facility. Investigating the murder leads him to Paris, where a recent crime is an eerie echo of his case, and a Paris investigator seems determined not to see the connection. In pursuing his main suspect, a Russian billionaire, Jacob finds a chilling connection to his mother's past and a fateful trip she made to Czechoslovakia in her youth. Shadowing the investigation and his life are the enigmatic members of the Special Projects team and Mai, who's apparently the mythological golem and yet so much more. Father and son Kellermans continue their co-written Golem series with a fascinating and frightening glimpse into an imagined religious supernatural subculture and the very real brutality and inscrutability of Eastern Bloc secret police networks while also spinning an engaging crime-solving tale and setting up a more distinct Lev family link to the mysterious and unearthly events that will certainly keep popping up as long as Mai is free. A curious yet compelling mix of adventure, crime, and horror with paranormal and historical elements. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Chapter One.   Bohnice Psychiatric Hospital Prague, Czechoslovak Socialist Republic December 17, 1982   "The patient will wake up."             The Russian's voice is soft and careful, handling the words in Czech like an unfamiliar weapon.             She has taught herself deafness. How else to sleep in this deranged place, its nights clotted with moans and prayers to a God that does not exist, cannot exist, for the State has declared him dead. The State is correct. Proof of God's death is all around her.             Senseless, trying to hide. She cowers just the same as the Russian kneels to unlock her cage, his greatcoat opening like a pair of dark wings. The cell door stands ajar, admitting a sickly fan of light from the grease-smeared bulb that smolders in the corridor. "The patient will stand, please." She will be punished. Her cellmates want none of it. Fat Irena pretends to snore, blowing white balloons. Olga's fingers are knotted in the hollow of her belly.             The fourth bed is empty. "Little bird," the Russian says. "Do not make me ask again." She swings her feet to the freezing concrete, finds her paper slippers. They step into the low, broad passageway known as Bulvár sílenci. Lunatics' Boulevard. While the Russian finds the correct key, she assumes the mandatory posture, kneeling with forehead to the linoleum. Along the corridor, a feverish racket is stirring. The other inmates have heard jangling. They want to know. Who is leaving? Why? "The patient may stand." She rises, using the wall for support. He leads her down the Boulevard, past the staff room, where orderlies doze in armchairs under heavy doses of self-prescribed sedatives. Past physicians' offices, exam rooms, Hydrotherapy and Electroshock and rooms unmarked except for numbers. Rooms that cannot be labeled truthfully. The women's ward ends at two consecutive locked doors, gray paint peeling to reveal steel the same color. Where is he taking her? Syringes crunch beneath his boot-heels in the dank stairwell, the temperature dropping with every step. Upon reaching the ground floor, the Russian pauses to remove his greatcoat and drape it over her shoulders. The hem puddles. He places his ushanka on her head, ties the flaps under her chin. "I would give you my shoes," he says, tugging off his gloves, "but I must drive." He pauses, frowns at her. "Are you all right, little bird? You look unwell." Bare fingers brush her cheek. The sudden warmth causes the cold to constrict around her viciously, and she recoils, shivering. He withdraws his hand. "Forgive me." He looks almost remorseful, twisting the thick black ring on his index finger. "Do not be afraid. You are leaving this place." He offers the gloves. "Please." She steps out of the paper slippers and pulls the gloves on over her numb feet. They cover her to the ankles. He laughs. "Like a chimpanzee." She smiles obligingly. They step out into the frigid courtyard. The guard manning the hospital gate wears a Socialist Union of Youth pin his lapel. The Russian returns his salute and says that the patient Marie Lasková has been remanded into his custody. A riffle of paperwork, a signature, a second exchange of salutes. And like that, she is cured, no longer a menace to society, but a healthy, sane, productive citizen of the republic. The guard unlocks the gate and shoves it wide. "Ladies first," the Russian says. It's there, three steps away: freedom. Yet she does not move, gazing back across the courtyard, a brown scalloped mass. The snow of St. Catherine's Day, well on its way to Christmas mud. A single locust tree stands denuded, its branches pruned back to thwart escapees, the trunk wrapped in barbed wire for good measure. The Russian watches her patiently. He seems to understand what she is doing before she understands it herself. She is counting. The rows of windows, chiseled through concrete. The ravaged faces beyond. The afflicted bodies. The hunger and the thirst, the cold and the heat and the squalor. The names. She is counting them all, inscribing them in the ledger of her mind. She must bear witness. "Come, little bird. We should not keep him waiting. I left the car running." She asks who he is. The Russian raises his eyebrows, as though the answer should be self-evident. "Your son."   She turns the corner, moving fast as she can in her gloved feet. I'm coming, Danek . But the car draws her up short: a Tatra 603, squat, matte black, tailpipe stuttering exhaust, identical to the car that brought her in for interrogation so many lifetimes ago. Who knows? It may be the very one. They came to her door one afternoon, a pair of men with cement eyes . Inspector Hrubý requests that you accompany us. So polite! You couldn't possibly say no. She didn't worry. She didn't even bother to send Daniel next door, confident she'd be home in time to cook dinner. And what a dinner it would be: she had half a package of lasagne noodles. Not the gray Russian kind that boiled for hours without dissolving, but authentic, a little Italian flag on the box. Daniel was delirious with anticipation. When she went to the kitchen for her coat, he was eating them straight out of the box, crunching brittle planks between his teeth and giggling. She smacked his hand and stuck the box up on a high shelf, telling him she'd be back soon and don't be a pig. Downstairs, she got into the Tatra and spoke the name of her contact. She knew what to expect. For the sake of appearances, they would take her to the StB headquarters on Bartolomějská Street. Confirmation would require a phone call. They would let her go without apology or explanation, and she would board the tram back to her apartment. As they pulled into traffic, she sat back, preoccupied foremost with how to make a decent filling for the pasta without butter, cheese, oil, or tomatoes. Now she sees the car, maybe the same car, and her bowels clench. It's a hoax, another ingenious ploy to grind down her will and pulverize her spirit. The tinted back window drops in jerks. " Matka ." The voice is impossible. The face, too. She left a laughing six-year-old and has returned to a sober little judge. Lank brown hair tumbles down his forehead. He is not smiling. He looks as though he has never smiled in his life. "Why are you waiting," he says. Why, indeed. Cheeks streaming, she waddles forth, climbs into the back seat. And immediately he shrinks from her, pressing into the opposite door, his nose scrunched. She must stink. She takes his face in her hands and smothers it in kisses. Still he won't look at her, his eyes bent toward the ceiling. She says his name; kisses him, again and again, until he forcibly pulls away, and she falls back, her throat salty and raw. The Russian gets behind the wheel. He tries to shift into gear and stalls out. "Garbage," he mutters. Of all his cold-weather clothing, he has chosen to retain his scarf, and he pinches the fringe annoyedly, struggling to restart the motor. "You people don't know the first thing about making cars." She says Daniel's name again, softly. He sits with his body twisted away from her, glaring at the fists in his lap. "Mercedes-Benz," the Russian says. "Now that is a car." I thought I would be back for dinner, Danek. I thought we would eat lasagne. It's too painful to look at the back of her son's head, so she wipes her wet face, tells her heart to hold its tongue. The Russian manages to get the engine going and the Tatra plods along through Prague 8, toward Holesovice. She supposes she'll know their destination soon enough. Just as she did not question the men who came to her door, she does not question this new turn of fate. More often than not, the system takes away. Moments of generosity are not to be analyzed, but grabbed and hoarded like the boxes of Cuban oranges that appear in the shop windows without warning. You buy as many as you can afford, as many as you can carry, because you cannot know when they might appear again, if ever. You take more oranges than two people can possibly eat; you barter them for items you do need, toilet paper or socks; if you are enterprising, you swap some of the oranges for sugar, which you then use to make a loose marmalade of the remaining oranges. You keep the jars hidden in the bureau like golden coins, ready to be deployed in lieu of cash when noodles come along. But Miss Lasková Inspector Hrubý said, turning a jar in his hand. I must object: you made it far too sweet, you eliminated the bitter edge, which is makes a good marmalade. Tell me, who would want such sweet marmalade? He set the jar down, pushed a pencil toward her . Write down their names . Now the Tatra reaches the Čechův Bridge, iced over, its statuary in disrepair. Though dawn is hours away, she can make out the graceful silhouette of Old Town. She prefers it at night. Sunlight is cruel, revealing lost tiles like rotten teeth; creamy surfaces varnished black by the sooty, cancerous winds that blow in from the north. Against violet clouds, the buildings' regal contours assert themselves, and she feels a stab of kinship with these piles of wood and stone: beautiful, proud, soiled, secret. "There is a group of Western artists visiting Prague," the Russian says. "I believe you are acquainted with one of them." Her chest flutters. Yes, she is acquainted. "In three hours, they depart for Vienna. They will convene outside the old synagogue before proceeding to the train station. You will approach your friend and explain that you have been discharged. You will express a desire to leave Czechoslovakia. You will display counterfeit travel documents and ask to go with her and her group, in order to provide cover. She will agree, because you have established a prior relationship with her. There is a recording of a conversation which took place between you, in which she is heard promising to work for your release. Am I correct, little bird? Do you remember she told you that?" She will never forget it. She nods. "Once in Vienna, you will go to the American embassy. You will describe the horrors of your confinement and offer to defect. To prove your sincerity, you will supply information about a novel design for a nuclear power plant to be constructed outside Tetov. You obtained this information from doktor Jiři Patočka, a physicist with whom you have been romantic. I am sure you will have no difficulty describing your affair with him vividly. Allow me to introduce you." She studies the black-and-white snapshot of a man she has never met. "You will receive further instructions when appropriate." She glances at her son. "Yes, little bird, he comes, too. You understand we could not speak of this before. You have always been a loyal solider. I admire that quality. But we had to give you a plausible motivation to betray us." She understands perfectly. She prays that her son can understand, too. Do you see, Danek, the purpose of our suffering? Or will you hate me forever?             "So?" the Russian says. "Happy? Faith is restored?"             "Yes, sir." Then she worries that she's given the impression that her faith was ever compromised. She says, "Hopeful."             The Russian laughs. "Even better. What is life, without hope?" On Pařízská Street, he eases to the curb. Daniel throws open the door and dashes across the street toward the synagogue, gaping up at its serrated brow. The entire structure appears to be sinking into the earth, as though hell has opened its throat. She gets out, hopping over a ridge of black slush. Wide steps lead from the pavement down to a cramped, cobbled terrace. The Russian kicks aside wet garbage, clearing room to stand. Daniel explores pocks in the synagogue's exterior plaster, rising on his tiptoes in an attempt to grasp the column of iron rungs set into the wall, the lowest of which is still far too high for him. Her heart blossoms at this evidence that he remains a child, unaware of his own limitations.             He points to a peaked door at the top of the rungs, ten meters up. "What's that?"             "Really?" the Russian says. "Nobody has told you?" Daniel shakes his head. The Russian smiles at her mildly. "You can see for yourself why your nation is doomed. You lack pride." He says to Daniel, "This is an important part of Czech culture, little one. You have heard of the golem, surely." The boy fidgets. "...yes." "Are you telling the truth, or are you trying to avoid looking stupid?" "It's not his fault," she says. "They don't teach useless fables in school anymore." "Ah, but must everything have a practical application?" She hesitates. "Of course." The Russian laughs. "Well said, soudruzka . Spoken like a true Marxist-Leninist." He smiles at Daniel. "I will tell you, little one: through that door is the synagogue garret. You know what a synagogue is? A church for the Jews. Their priest, he is called the rabbi. There was once a very famous rabbi of this synagogue. They say he made a giant from clay. A monster, made of mud, three meters high. Taller than I, and you can see for yourself how tall I am. Fantastic, eh?" Daniel smiles shyly. "Alas, the creature could not be controlled. It had to be stopped." The Russian kneels, grasps Daniel by the shoulders with his huge hands, the fingertips and thumbs nearly touching. "But here's the interesting part. The golem is not dead. It is asleep, right behind that door. And they say that on certain nights, when the moon is full, it wakes up." Daniel tilts his head back, searching the woolly cloud cover. The Russian grins. "Yes. And if you are patient, and do what you must, you can draw it out. And if you say the right things, at the right moment, you can grab hold of it, and it becomes yours. It must do anything you command." He gives Daniel's shoulders a squeeze and stands. "So? What do you make of that, little one? Do you believe it?" Daniel's tongue protrudes in concentration. "Jews are dirty." The Russian bellows laughter. She says, "We don't speak this way about anyone." "Your mother is right, little one. Dirty or not, you are going to be traveling among them, so you had better mind your mouth. Are you still hungry?" The Russian looks at her. He wants his coat back. She hands it over, and he fishes out a chocolate. Daniel begins to tear it open before manners kick in and he glances to her for permission. "First say thank you." "Thank you," Daniel says, and he crams the chocolate in his mouth. The Russian says, "I hope you enjoy it very much." "Are we to wait in the cold for three hours?" she asks. "I will fetch the dossier," the Russian says. "Use the time to study it." He bounds up the steps and out of sight. She rubs her arms to keep warm, resentful that he took the coat with him. How long has she been free? Not an hour, and already finding something to complain about! Perhaps the Russian is right about the Czechs. But if they have no pride, it's because pride has been outlawed, per the dictates of men thousands of miles away. He left her the hat and the gloves, at least. She stamps and shivers, watching Daniel lick his fingertips. "Where did you learn to talk such rubbish?" "Berta says so." She starts to ask who is Berta before realizing he means Mrs. Kadlecová, the neighbor who has been caring for him in her absence. What can she possibly say to that? And what moral authority does she have to correct him? Not so long ago, she too might have said the same, without a second thought. spinavý zid : dirty Jew. Look at her now, enlightened, putrid, in tattered clothes. "What else does Berta say?" "That you are a collaborator." Bitch . I entrusted my child to you. "Do you believe her?" He shrugs. "Collaborators should be hung from the lampposts." "Did Berta tell you that?" "Everyone says so." "Who is everyone?" He toes the ground, shrugs again. My sweet boy, my cynical boy. Is that what you'd like to see? Your mother at the end of a rope? She says, "I'm sorry I was gone so long. I didn't know it would turn out this way. It will be different from now on. I swear to you." Silence. He says, "It's my name day." Of course it is. She had forgotten, wrapped up in her own shock. Of course it is this that makes a boy of six refuse to look at his mother--a simple error. With a simple correction. She could weep with joy. "There are no calendars in prison, my love. You're right, though. You're absolutely right, and I apologize with my whole heart. I'll tell you what we'll do. As soon as we're settled, we'll throw the biggest party you've ever seen. Do you hear me, Danek? You won't know where to begin opening presents, there will be so many. We'll have a cake. What kind would you like?" He looks at her uncomprehendingly.             "Over there, cakes come in many different flavors," she says. "Vienna is famous for its bakeries. Raspberry, lemon, marzipan, chocolate--"             "Chocolate," he says. "Very well then, chocolate it is. And lemonade, too--no, hot chocolate, it's too cold for lemonade. Chocolate cake and hot chocolate, a chocolate feast, doesn't that sound marvelous?" "How do you know?" he says. "What?" "How do you know they come in different flavors?" "Because I've been there, my love. I've tasted them for myself." His eyes widen. "You have?" "Many times." "When?" When I was young. When I was beautiful. When I didn't know any better . "Before you were born, darling." She takes a tentative step toward him, emboldened when he does not retreat. She slips her filthy hand into his clean one, and for a moment feels clean herself. "Well?" The Russian clomps down the steps, greatcoat billowing, a leather satchel under one arm. He sets it on the ground and stands akimbo, puffing steam. "Any sign of it?" It occurs to her that although she has seen him many times, she has never really appreciated his entirety. In the hospital, lights were kept low, and it was inadvisable to look staff in the eye--a sure way to draw unwanted attention. Now diffuse moonlight touches a long, pale, waxy face, a candle incised with the features of a man, at once handsome and ghastly and difficult to comprehend, as though his flesh is reshaping itself every second. His hair is the uncertain white of morning frost, his proportions an affront to common sense. Stunted teeth, snaggled and blackly rimed, are the sole evidence of his humanity. "Any sign of what?" she says. "The golem," he says. "What do you say, little one?" Daniel says, "I didn't see." "Nothing?" The Russian squats, begins undoing buckles. "That is disappointing." He opens the satchel and produces a fist-sized object wrapped in newspaper. "Can I see the dossier?" she asks. He begins peeling away layers of newspaper. "I must tell you: I lied." The last layer comes away to reveal a small earthenware jar. The Russian gingerly sets it on the cobblestones and reaches into the satchel for another wrapped item, a flat disc. "A full moon does not have the first thing to do with it." He unwraps a matching earthenware lid and places it on the ground. "The artists left weeks ago, little bird." He cups the jar in the broad belly of his palm, then carefully slots the lid between thumb and forefinger, so that he is holding both, leaving one hand free. "They are home by now, in their comfortable American beds, fucking their comfortable American girlfriends and boyfriends." For a third time, he reaches into the satchel, withdrawing a black-and-brown Makarov pistol. He flicks off the safety and stands up. "Not the boy," she says. "Of course the boy," he says, and he shoots Daniel. Daniel collapses, shins bent under thighs, a black hole oozing in his forehead. "Of course the boy," the Russian says. "That is the whole point." She cannot find the air to cry out or the energy to move, and she knows without a doubt that he is right, she is doomed, they all are, because at least she ought to be able to summon a sense of outrage, but there is nothing, she feels nothing. Gun in one hand, jar and lid in the other, the Russian stands with his eyes raised to the garret door, his lips moving like a housewife making a shopping list, murmuring. After a while, he frowns at her. "My hat." She stares at him. "Take it off, please." She does not move. "I do not want to soil it," the Russian says. She does not move. "Never mind," he says. He shoots her in the chest. Flattened against the frozen stones, she tastes the warm salty gush rising from her ruined heart. The clouds briefly part, and then the Russian's winged shape looms forth to eclipse the moon. # He waits for her eyes to dull, then turns and watches the door, chanting softly. Nothing. He studies the whore's body. Still alive? To be absolutely certain, he shoots her a second time, slightly to the left. Her blouse shreds. He looks up. Nothing. Well, one can only try. Try, and try, and try again. Mindful of a irritating throb, he loosens his scarf to give his skin some air, probes the rising cairn of flesh. He tucks his gun in his waistband, sighs wearily, and kneels to rewrap the jar. Freezing in horror. The lid is cracked--a thin black line from edge to edge. When did that happen? He must have set it down too hard. He was trying to do too many things at once. He only has two hands. It's typical. He was sloppy, overeager, careless, an idiot. He falls down onto his tailbone, rocking, shaking with rage. Idiot, idiot, clumsy idiot, see what you've done, the mess you've made; stop crying, insolent little shit, don't stare at the ground, be a man and look at me, look me in the eye, look at me , look. Excerpted from The Golem of Paris by Jonathan Kellerman, Jesse Kellerman All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.