Heaven's Bones Read Free

come back to see what’s needed. Sebastian,” the measured tones were close to Robarts’ ear. “You’re of no help here, not now.”
    â€œSebastian!” Margaret’s breath came in painful gasps, and she was holding Janet so tightly that the girl’s hand was turning white. “Don’t leave me!”
    â€œNow, Mrs. Robarts,” said Symons. “We’ll take care of you, not to worry.”
    Robarts felt Meadows grasp his shoulder, and all the strength seemed drained out of him. Symons’ assistant hurried into the room, a competent doctor of much promise who Robarts had met oftenenough but whose name he could not recall.
    Symons followed Robarts to the door while the assistant instructed Janet to keep wiping Margaret’s forehead with a clean, wet cloth. “I fear she’s too narrowly made to push it out easily. But we are here now, and I’ve seen harder births.”
    â€œWhere the mother lived?” hissed Robarts.
    Symons wrapped a great beefy hand, so incongruous with the delicate work he was capable of, around Robarts’ upper arm.
    â€œWe will do our best,” he said, “but this is not the place for you now. You must wait outside.”
    â€œNo! I want to help—I must help!”
    But Symons was gently forcing him out.
    â€œYou know this is not the place for you, Sebastian,” he said. “Now let us do our work.”
    â€œWhat can I do?” said Robarts. The feeling of helplessness was intolerable.
    â€œPray,” said Symons, and closed the door in his face.
    So Robarts pressed against the door and prayed, while Margaret’s groans sounded over the clinical, impersonal mutters of Symons and his underling, and when he could straighten up he saw he’d left bloody handprints on the painted surface.
    Saint Margaret with the Wyrm, Saint Katherine with the Wheel, Saint Teresa in her Tower …
    Where had he heard that? In Rome?

    He remembered: Margaret stopping by the gypsies’ stands outside the Vatican, pausing to examine the trinkets and cheap jewelry.
    â€œGold from a secret treasure,” squawked the vendor, wrinkled and brown as a berry and missing half her teeth. She wore a kerchief of bright, beautiful colors—red and blue and rose—elaborately binding up her hair. “Gold from a Roman house—no one knowswhere. But my son found it, my lady, and …”
    â€œNonsense,” said Margaret, so gentle and friendly in her manner that the crone stood a moment with her mouth open, and then laughed until she turned dusky red. Margaret smiled at her and continued looking over her wares.
    The vendor, her manner frank and open now, showed her the bracelets and medallions, explaining which was what, with no claims of rare and ancient and improbable provenance. Sebastian was content to let her linger, and himself enjoyed watching the pigeons fly in great waves over St. Mark’s Square and the bustling groups of people, both native and foreign. The gypsy vendor’s voice was a soft murmur in the background, and he caught the sound of names strange and familiar: George, Theresa, Veronica.
    â€œAnd this, Margherita,” said the crone. “She will protect you in travail, in childbirth.”
    â€œOh, I think I’d better have her, then,” said Margaret, giving him a sly look. As she pulled money from her purse the woman suddenly cupped her cheek with a brown, wrinkled hand.
    â€œYou will need it, my child,” she said, her voice low and serious. “And I will pray for you.”
    Margaret had laughed gently, and tucked away the little medallion of St. Margaret, and they hadn’t mentioned it since. But now Robarts remembered with a sick chill the mutter of the old woman when she bowed her head as they passed:
    Saint Margaret with the Wyrm, Saint Katherine with the Wheel, Saint Teresa in her Tower …

    On the other side of the door Margaret screamed.
    Damn