Jeffery Deaver

Narrated by William Dufris. Listen to an excerpt.

They were the vanished, they were the unfortunate.

To the human smugglers — the snakeheads — who carted them around the world like pallets of damaged goods, they were ju-jia, piglets.

To the American INS agents who interdicted their ships and arrested and deported them they were  undocumenteds.

They were the hopeful. Who were trading homes and family and a thousand years of ancestry for the hard certainty of risky, laborious years ahead of them.

Who had the slimmest of chances to take root in a place where their families could prosper, where freedom and money and contentment were, the story went, as common as sunlight and rain.

They were his fragile cargo.

And now, legs steady against the raging, five-meter-high seas, captain Sen Zi-jun made his way from the bridge down two decks into the murky hold to deliver the grim message that their weeks of difficult journeying might have been in vain.

It was just before dawn on a Tuesday in August. The stocky captain, whose head was shaved and who sported an elaborate bushy mustache, slipped past the empty containers lashed as camouflage to the deck of the seventy-two-meter Fuzhou Dragon and opened the heavy steel door to the hold. He looked down at the two-dozen people huddled there, in the grim, windowless space.  Trash and children’s plastic blocks floated in the shallow tide under the cheap cots.

Despite the pitching seas, Captain Sen — a thirty-year veteran of the seas — walked down the steep metal steps without using the handrails and strode into the middle of the hold. He checked the carbon dioxide meter and found the levels acceptable though the air was vile with the smell of diesel fuel and humans who’d lived for two weeks in close proximity.

Unlike many of the captains and crew who operated “buckets” — human smuggling ships — and who at best ignored or sometimes even beat or raped the passengers, Captain Sen didn’t mistreat them. Indeed he believed that he was doing a good thing: transporting these families from difficulty to, if not certain wealth, at least the hope of a happy life in Meiguo, the Beautiful Country, America — and, of course, making a great deal of money for himself in the process.

On this particular voyage, however, most of the immigrants distrusted him. And why not? They assumed he was in league with the snakehead who’d chartered the Dragon: Kwan Ang, known universally by his nickname, Gui, the Ghost. Tainted by the snakehead’s reputation for violence, Captain Sen’s efforts to engage the immigrants in conversation had been rebuffed and had yielded only one friend. Chang Jingerzi — who preferred his western name of Sam Chang — was a forty-five-year-old former college professor from a suburb of the huge port city of Fuzhou in southeastern China. He was bringing his entire family to America: his wife, two sons and  Chang’s widower father.

A half dozen times on the trip Chang and Sen had sat in the hold, sipped the  potent mao-tai that the captain always had in good supply on his ship and talked about life in China and what the Chang family would do once they were in the United States.

Captain Sen now saw Chang sitting on a cot in a forward corner of the hold. The tall, placid man frowned, a reaction to the look in the captain’s eyes. Chang handed his teenage son the book he’d been reading to his family and rose to meet the captain.

Everyone around them fell silent. “Our radar shows a fast-moving ship on course to intercept us.”

Dismay blossomed in the faces of those who’d overheard.

“The Americans?” Chang asked. “Their Coast Guard?”

“I think it must be,” the captain answered. “We’re in U.S. waters.”

Sen looked at the frightened faces of the immigrants around him. They looked at one another. Like most shiploads of illegals that Sen had transported,  these people — many of them strangers before they’d met — had formed a close bond of friendship. And they now gripped hands or whispered, some seeking, some offering reassurance. The captain’s eyes settled on a woman holding an eighteen-month-old girl in her arms. Her mother — whose face was scarred from a beating at a re-education camp — lowered her head and began to cry.

“What can we do?” Chang asked the captain. The immigrant took this news hard. Captain Sen knew he was a vocal dissident in China and had been desperate to flee the country. If he were deported he’d probably end up in one of the infamous jails in western China as a political prisoner.

“We’re not far from the drop-off spot. We’re running at full speed. It may be possible to get close enough to put you ashore in rafts.”

“No, no,” Chang said. “In these waves? We’d all die.”

“There’s a natural harbor I’m steering for. It should be calm enough for you to board the rafts. At the beach there’ll be trucks to take you to New York.”

“And what about you?” Chang asked.

“I’ll head back out to international waters. They can’t arrest me for shipping empty containers — that’s not a crime. By the time they board, you’ll be on highways of gold, heading toward the city of diamonds. . . .  Now tell everyone to get their belongings together. But only the most important things. Your money, your pictures. Leave everything else. It will be a race to the shore. Stay below until the Ghost or I tell you to come up top.”

Captain Sen hurried up the stairs, on his way to the bridge. As he climbed the steep ladder he said a brief prayer for their survival to Tian Hou, the goddess of sailors, then dodged a wall of gray water that vaulted the side of the ship.

Captain Sen found the Ghost standing over the radar unit, staring into the rubber glare shade. The man stood completely still, bracing himself against the rolling of the sea.

Some snakeheads dressed as if they were wealthy Cantonese gangsters from a John Woo film but the Ghost always wore the standard outfit of most Chinese men — simple slacks and short-sleeved shirts. The Ghost was muscular but diminutive, clean-shaven, hair longer than a typical businessman’s but never styled with cream or spray.

“They will intercept us in fifteen minutes,” the snakehead said. Even now, facing interdiction and arrest, he seemed as lethargic as a ticket seller in a rural long-distance bus station.

“Fifteen?” the captain replied. “Impossible. How many knots are they making?”

Sen walked to the chart table, the centerpiece of all ocean-crossing vessels. On it sat a U.S. Defense Mapping Agency nautical chart of the area. He had to judge the two ships’ relative positions from this and from the radar; because of the risk of being traced, the Dragon’s global positioning system and her EPIRB emergency beacon and Global Maritime Distress and Safety System were disconnected.

“I think it will be at least forty minutes,” Captain Sen said.

“No, I timed the distance they’ve traveled since we spotted them.”

Captain Sen glanced at the crewman piloting the Fuzhou Dragon, sweating as he gripped the wheel in his struggle to keep the Turk’s head knot of twine, tied around a spoke, straight up, indicating that the rudder was aligned with the hull. The throttles were full forward. If the Ghost was right in his assessment of when the cutter would intercept them they would not be able to make the protected harbor in time. At best they could get within a half mile of the nearby rocky shore — close enough to launch the rafts but subjecting them to merciless pounding by the tempestuous seas.

The Ghost asked the captain, “What sort of weapons will they have?”

“Don’t you know?”

“I’ve never been interdicted,” the Ghost replied. “Tell me.”

Ships under Sen’s command had been interdicted twice before — fortunately on legitimate voyages, not when he was running immigrants for snakeheads. But the experience had been harrowing. A dozen armed Coast Guard sailors had streamed onto the vessel while another one, on the deck of the cutter, had trained a two-barreled machine gun on him and his crew. There’d been a small canon too.

He now told the Ghost what they might expect.

The Ghost nodded. “We need to consider our options.”

“What options?” Captain Sen now asked the Ghost. “You’re not thinking of fighting them, are you? No. I won’t allow it.”

But the snakehead didn’t answer. He remained braced at the radar stand, staring at the screen.

The man seemed placid but, Sen supposed, he must’ve been enraged. No snakehead he’d ever worked with had taken so many precautions to avoid capture and detection as had the Ghost on this voyage. The two dozen immigrants had met in an abandoned warehouse outside of Fuzhou and waited there for two days, under the watch of a partner of the Ghost’s — a “little snakehead.” The man had then loaded them onto a chartered Tupolev 154, which had flown to a deserted military airfield near St. Petersburg in Russia. There they’d climbed into a shipping container, been driven 120 kilometers to the town of Vyborg and were loaded onto the Fuzhou Dragon, which Sen had sailed into the Russian port just the day before. He himself had meticulously filled out the customs documents and manifests — everything according to the book, so as not to arouse suspicion. The Ghost had joined them at the last minute and the ship had sailed on schedule. Through the Baltic Sea, the North Sea, the English Channel, then the Dragon had  crossed the famous starting point of transatlantic voyages in the Celtic Sea — 530N 70W — and had  begun steaming southeast toward Long Island.

There was not a single thing about the voyage that would arouse the suspicion of the U.S. authorities. “How did they do it?” the captain asked angrily.

“What?” the Ghost responded absently.

“Find us. No one could have. It’s impossible.”

The Ghost straightened up and pushed outside into the raging wind, calling back, “Who knows? Maybe it was magic.”

* * *

 

Named A Notable Book Of The Year
– New York Times

“Veterans of the series won’t be surprised by Deaver’s surgical skill in cutting between predators and prey, setting up taxing ordeals and violent confrontations, and springing surprises long after a less inventive plotter would have thrown in the towel.”
– Kirkus Reviews

“The group’s race against time showcases Jeffery Deaver’s many talents, particularly intricate plotting, plenty of surprising twists, and breakneck pacing. This is a real standout from a writer whose previous thrillers have earned him a solid following among mystery fans.”
— Amazon.com

Narrated by George Guidall. Listen to an excerpt.

Question:  In one sentence can you describe The Vanished Man?
Jeffery Deaver: The Vanished Man pits Lincoln Rhyme and Amelia Sachs against a psychotic illusionist (think David Copperfield meets Hannibal Lecter) who commits a series of brilliantly executed crimes in New York using magic, escapist and illusionist techniques. Lincoln and Amelia enlist the aid of a young woman illusionist to help them track down the killer, who’s dubbed “The Conjurer.” Oops, that’s two sentences. Sorry.

Question: The magic elements in the novel are fascinating. What made you decide to feature magic in this book?
Jeff: Readers familiar with my books know that I love to trick my audience with “sleight of hand” in my plots the same way illusionists do in their shows. I thought it would be natural to write a book about the subject of illusion itself, while incorporating even more of my typical plot twists and surprise endings than I normally do.
Magic tricks are made up of the “effect” (the illusion the audience sees) and the “method” (the mechanics of creating that illusion). This whole book is a series of effects—performed by The Conjurer, Lincoln Rhyme . . . and myself. But don’t worry; unlike real illusionists I reveal the methods at the end of the novel.
The actual idea for the story was inspired by a performance of the Big Apple Circus, which I took my business partner’s son to several years ago. We were blown away by the quick-change act and I thought, what a scary thing if a criminal could change appearance and become a whole different person in a matter of seconds.

Question: Are the illusions and tricks described in the book really performed by magicians or did you create them?
Jeff: All of the illusions and tricks described in the book are real though naturally I’ve varied them somewhat since in my book The Conjurer is trying to actually destroy lives and cause havoc while most of the danger in real performances is, of course, illusory.

Question: Which is your favorite illusion? And do you have a favorite magician?
Jeff: There are so many . . . . As much as I enjoy watching some of the spectacular illusionists like David Blaine and David Copperfield, I think I’m most impressed with quick-change artists like Arturo Brachetti and sleight-of-hand artists like Ricky Jay. James Randi, the Amazing Randi, is indeed amazing—not only is he a superb parlor magician and escapist but he’s a famous debunker of fake psychics. I’ve also enjoyed the sick-and-twisted humor of Penn and Teller’s brand of illusion.

Question: How do you think the Conjurer in The Vanished Man stacks up against your other villains, like the Bone Collector and the Coffin Dancer?
Jeff: Villains are very important in suspense fiction not only for the evil element they add but because they bring out the hero’s character. If the bad guy in a book is a superficial caricature, then the hero’s victory against him means little. I also think authors must create villains that, in a small way, readers care about. We don’t want him to succeed, of course, but we have to feel his losses and setbacks. I’ve tried to create multidimensional villains in all my books and I hope The Conjurer is no exception. He has a troubled past, a brilliant mind and an amoral nature and he’s a master of his trade. I think readers will be particularly interested in his curious relationship with his “Revered Audience.”

Question: This is the fifth book in the Lincoln Rhyme/Amelia Sachs series. What are your expectations for this series?
Jeff: Very simple: I have fans around the world who love Lincoln and Amelia and as long as they want to read books about this duo, I’ll keep writing them—and I’ll keep writing them according to my reader’s expectations. My job is to entertain my own revered audience and not introduce story lines they won’t enjoy.

Question: With each new book in the series you have evolved Lincoln and Amelia’s relationship. How would you define their relationship in The Vanished Man?
Jeff: We’ve seen Lincoln and Amelia go through some tough times—particularly in, say, The Empty Chair. I wanted to make things a bit more stable for them in The Vanished Man with regard to their relationship; the personal challenges they face in this book have to do with Amelia’s advancement in her career and Lincoln’s new approach to confronting his quadriplegic condition.

Question: This will be two series novels in a row for you, with last year’s bestseller, The Stone Monkey. Will you be making it three in a row with your next book or will you be writing a stand-alone novel next?
Jeff: My intent has always been to alternate the Lincoln Rhyme novels with others, largely because I have a number of ideas that I think would make compelling and fun stories and yet that wouldn’t work as Lincoln Rhyme novels. My book for 2004 is a thriller that takes place over two days in Berlin during the 1936 Olympics. I did two Lincoln Rhymes in a row because the Berlin book has taken an extra year to write due to all the research (and, frankly, because I thought the idea for The Vanished Man was so much fun I couldn’t wait to write it.) My book for 2005 will be a Lincoln and Amelia novel.

Question: Do you plan on writing a sequel to The Blue Nowhere?
Jeff: I think I’ve probably mined the vein of Internet crime in The Blue Nowhere but it’s very likely that we’ll see Wyatt Gillette and Frank Bishop make appearances in future books—just like Tobe Geller from A Maiden’s Grave has appeared in several of my later books. (Parker Kincaid, by the way, from The Devil’s Teardrop makes a cameo appearance in The Vanished Man.)

Question: Any final comments on The Vanished Man?
Jeff: I’ve tried to make this one my “twistiest” book yet. I’d love to hear from readers who manage to figure out the ultimate ending (well, endings plural; there are, naturally, several.) A clue: Read those evidence charts—just like Lincoln Rhyme does!

 

“The expert magician seeks to deceive the mind, rather than the eye.”— Marvin Kaye, The Creative Magician’s Handbook

Chapter One

Greetings, Revered Audience. Welcome.

Welcome to our show.

We have a number of thrills in store for you over the next two days as our illusionists, our magicians, our sleight-of-hand artists weave their spells to delight and captivate you.

Our first routine is from the repertoire of a performer everyone’s heard of: Harry Houdini, the greatest escape artist in America, if not the world, a man who performed before crowned heads of state and U.S. presidents. Some of his escapes are so difficult no one has dared attempt them, all these years after his untimely death.

Today we’ll re-create an escape in which he risked suffocation in a routine known as the Lazy Hangman.

In this trick, our performer lies prone on the belly, hands bound behind the back with classic Darby handcuffs. The ankles are tied together and another length of rope is wound around the neck, like a noose, and tied to the ankles. The tendency of the legs to straighten pulls the noose taut and begins the terrible process of suffocation.

Why is it called the “Lazy” Hangman? Because the condemned executes himself.
In many of Mr. Houdini’s more dangerous routines, assistants were present with knives and keys to release him in the event that he was unable to escape. Often a doctor was on hand.

Today, there’ll be none of these precautions. If there’s no escape within four minutes, the performer will die.

We begin in a moment . . . but first a word of advice:

Never forget that by entering our show you’re abandoning reality.

What you’re absolutely convinced you see might not exist at all. What you know has to be an illusion may turn out to be God’s harsh truth.

Your companion at our show might turn out to be a total stranger. A man or woman in the audience you don’t recognize may know you far too well.

What seems safe may be deadly. And the dangers you guard against may be nothing more than distractions to lure you to greater danger.

In our show what can you believe? Whom can you trust?

Well, Revered Audience, the answer is that you should believe nothing.

And you should trust no one. No one at all.

Now, the curtain rises, the lights dim, the music fades, leaving only the sublime sound of hearts beating in anticipation.

And our show begins. . . .

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