The Nameless Ones

A Thriller

John Connolly

• Publisher: Atria/Emily Bestler Books
• Year: 2021
• Print ISBN: 9781982176983
• eBook ISBN: 9781982176990
• Subtopic: Literature General

“One of the best thriller writers we have.” —Harlan Coben, #1 New York Times bestselling author

From the international and instant New York Times bestselling author of The Dirty South, the white-knuckled Charlie Parker series returns with this heart-pounding race to hunt down the deadliest of war criminals.

In Amsterdam, four bodies, violently butchered, are discovered in a canal house, the remains of friends and confidantes of the assassin known only as Louis.

The men responsible for the murders are Serbian war criminals. They believe they can escape retribution by retreating to their homeland.

They are wrong.

For Louis has come to Europe to hunt them down: five killers to be found and punished before they can vanish into thin air.

There is just one problem.

The sixth.

With John Connolly’s trademark “dark, haunting, and beautifully told” (Booklist) prose and breathless twists and turns, The Nameless Ones is an unputdownable thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat.

1

Home is the sailor, home from the sea,

And the hunter home from the hill.

—Robert Louis Stevenson, “Requiem”

CHAPTER I

The two figures were by now a familiar sight, if only to a select few, for even ones such as these, who guarded their privacy so assiduously, must inevitably become known to some of their neighbors. For a time, they had not been seen out together, and only the black man, generally believed to be the younger, was noticeable on the street and the surrounding blocks. It was rumored that the other, the older (marginally) and less elegant (by a more considerable degree), was ill, or perhaps recovering from illness, although questions directed, however discreetly, to Mrs. Evelyn Bondarchuk, the woman who occupied the first floor apartment in their building, were met with a stony silence from the lady herself, and the disapproving yaps of her assorted Pomeranians.

According to local lore, it was Mrs. Bondarchuk herself who owned the property, although she carefully concealed her interest through the use of shelf companies, a series of lawyers at least as tight-lipped as she, and a Dickensian amount of paperwork—not that anyone was unduly troubled by this minor act of deception, which had long ago mutated from suspicion into fact. After all, this was New York City, and more specifically Manhattan, where various levels of eccentricity, reinvention, and even downright criminality were, if not a given, then at least quotidian.

But the truth of the matter was that Mrs. Bondarchuk was merely a tenant, albeit one who functioned also as a watchdog, since her chair by the bay window of her apartment offered a clear view of the street in two directions. (Mrs. Bondarchuk’s bark, it might have been said, was probably worse than her Pomeranians’ bite, although it was a close-run thing, and none of the neighbors was in any hurry to test the hypothesis. The Pomeranians were nippy little beasts when the mood took them, but Mrs. Bondarchuk possessed an undeniable solidity, and all her own teeth.)

A few years earlier, there had been some unpleasantness at the property involving a man with a gun, but it, and he, had been taken care of. Since then, Mrs. Bondarchuk had committed with even greater acuity to her role as first line of defense. She now understood it was more than a sop from her landlords, a pointless task offered out of pity to an old woman, or a well-intended effort to endow her twilight years with a sense of purpose. No, Mrs. Bondarchuk was essential to them, and she loved them for making her so. She had even inquired about the possibility of being given a gun, although this suggestion was politely rebuffed. Mrs. Bondarchuk’s feelings were not hurt, though. She had asked more out of interest than actual desire. She did not wish to own a gun. In her youth, her father had retained a seven-shot Nagant M1895 revolver from his period of service in the Soviet military. He had kept it clean, well oiled, and concealed beneath a floorboard in the bedroom. Mrs. Bondarchuk had used it only once, when a vagrant entered the house and attempted to rape her mother. Mrs. Bondarchuk—or Elena Tikhonov as she was formerly known, before the changes to her name wrought by emigration, anglicization, and marriage—shot him in the chest, and later helped her father and mother to bury the remains in the forest. She was twelve years old.

Then, as now, she was untroubled by what she had done. The vagrant was bad, and had she not acted as she did, he would undoubtedly have hurt or murdered her mother, and possibly Elena, too, before going on to commit further degenerate acts. And, yes, the Sixth Commandment declared “Thou shalt not kill,” but Mrs. Bondarchuk had always believed that Moses, in returning from Mount Sinai, had neglected to bring with him a final tablet, the one containing all the fine print, possibly because his arms were already full.

Mrs. Bondarchuk had never shared with another soul outside her immediate family the details of the killing: not with her late husband, whom she had loved dearly, and not even with the two men who owned the building in which she lived, although she was certain that they, at least, would have understood. There was, she felt, no particular benefit to be gained from raising the subject. The vagrant, after all, was dead, and a confession was unlikely to alter that fact. Mrs. Bondarchuk was also in possession of a clear conscience on the matter, and while she might, in the years that followed, have occasionally contemplated shooting someone else—certain politicians, for example, or particularly patronizing shopgirls—she had managed to resist the temptation, helped in large part by not being in possession of a suitable weapon. All in all, it was probably for the best that her landlords had not agreed to provide her with a gun. Shooting someone in extremis might be forgivable, but one shouldn’t make a habit of it, regardless of provocation.

---

AND HERE THEY CAME now, Mr. Louis and Mr. Angel, these two men whom she adored like errant sons, the first tall and black, the second short and, well, whiteish. He had lately been so ill, her Mr. Angel, and he had already suffered so much; this, Mrs. Bondarchuk had always intuited from his face and eyes. He was recovering, though, even if he was now slower than before. His partner, too, regarded him differently, as if the sickness had reminded him that, in no time at all, one of them must inevitably be parted from the other, and whatever days remained to them were better spent in accord.

But at least they were not alone. They had friends. There was the private detective, Mr. Parker, who brought her candy from Maine; and the two brothers, Tony and Paulie Fulci, who were so gentle for such big men, and whom she could not imagine hurting a fly—other people possibly, perhaps even probably, but not a fly.

And they in turn had Mrs. Bondarchuk, who prayed for Mr. Louis and Mr. Angel every night. She prayed that they might have a good death, one marked by ritual and a proper burial, and therefore the salvation of the soul; and not a bad death, an interment in some pit without a blessing or a marker, in the manner of a wandering rapist. Death was the inescapable path. One’s thoughts were over the mountains, but death was always behind one’s shoulder. Death was an old woman who slept in hell, and took her instructions from God. She was inevitable, but not implacable. She could be spoken to, and negotiated with. Amuse her, interest her, and she might move on.

Mr. Louis and Mr. Angel, Mrs. Bondarchuk believed, greatly amused Death.

---

ANGEL WAVED TO MRS. Bondarchuk as they approached the stairs leading to the door of their building.

“Do you think Mrs. Bondarchuk has ever killed anyone?” he said.

“Definitely,” said Louis.

“No doubt in your mind?”

“None at all.”

“I thought it was just me.”

“No, she’s killed someone for sure. Shot them, is my guess. Remember that time she suggested we give her a gun?”

“Yeah,” said Angel. “She was kind of matter-of-fact about it.”

“Maybe we should have let her have one.”

“We could always give her one for Christmas, if her heart is still set on it.”

“She’s Orthodox. We’d have to wait until January.”

“On the other hand,” said Angel, “might be best to stick with candy and a Macy’s gift card.”

“Still, it’s something to keep in reserve in case she gets bored of candy.”

Angel paused to watch a crow alight on a nearby tree.

“That’s sorrow, right?” he said. “One for sorrow, like in the rhyme.”

“I don’t think it counts where we’re concerned,” said Louis.

“No,” said Angel, “I guess not.”

---

MRS. BONDARCHUK HAD ALSO noticed the crow. She crossed herself before offering up a brief prayer of protection. She remained constantly aware of auguries—the appearance of owls, ravens, and crows, the births of twins and triplets—and kept note of her dreams, waking up in the night to add the details of them to the little writing pad by her bedside, wary always of visions of bread and bees, of teeth falling from gums, of church processions. She had yet to give a watch as a gift, eat from a knife, or mark a fortieth anniversary. She sat down before going on a journey, even if only to the store, in order to confuse any evil spirits that might be lurking, and never put the garbage out after sunset. On the wall by her front door hung a cross of aspen, the cursed wood, which possessed a talismanic power against evil, just as the potency of a vaccine relies upon the element it contains of its target disease.

But perhaps more than any of this, Mrs. Bondarchuk believed that death, rather than marking an end, represented only an alteration, if a fundamental one, in the nature of existence. The dead and the living coexisted, each world feeding into the other, and the next realm was a mirror of this one. The dead remained in contact with the living, and spoke to them through dreams and portents.

One had to learn to listen.

And one had to be prepared.

---

ANGEL FUMBLED FOR HIS keys. Louis appeared distracted, even weary.

“You look tired,” said Angel.

“You say.”

“I have an excuse. Cancer beats all hands.”

“I didn’t sleep so well last night,” said Louis. “Comes with getting old.”

“You’re sure that’s all it is?”

“Yes,” Louis lied.

He had been dreaming again, the same dream. It had been coming to him more often in recent months. In his dream he stood by a lake and watched the dead immerse themselves in its waters, wading deeper and deeper, farther and farther, until finally they were lost to the great sea. Beside him stood a little girl: Jennifer, the dead child of the detective Charlie Parker, whom Louis had watched being buried. She held his hand. Her touch was warm against the coldness of his skin. In life, he had known her only from a distance. Now death had made intimates of them.

why are we here?

His voice seemed no longer his own. He heard it as a faded whisper. Only the girl spoke without distortion, for this was her dominion.

“We’re waiting,” she said.

for what?

“For the others to join us.”

and then?

She laughed.

“We shall set black flags in the firmament.”

And he would wake to the memory of her touch.

None of this he chose to share with Angel. They had few secrets from each other, but those they had, they kept close. Had Louis spoken of his dream to Mrs. Bondarchuk, she might have advised him to be very wary, and gifted him a cross of aspen. But he had no intention of discussing his recurring dream with her, just as he had elected not to mention it to Angel.

Which was unfortunate, because Angel had been having a very similar dream.

CHAPTER II

The old man walking the quiet, dark stretch of the Herengracht in Amsterdam no longer dreamed; or perhaps, given his knowledge of the peculiarities of the human consciousness, both waking and sleeping, it would have been more correct to say that he did not recall his dreams. Maybe, he thought, he simply preferred not to do so, and had managed to communicate this to his psyche during the accumulated decades of his time on earth. By this stage of his life, he was happy just to enjoy some semblance of a night’s sleep, even one destined to be disturbed by the call of his poor, failing bladder.

His name was De Jaager. He had a first name, although it was rarely used even by close friends, of which he had few. De Jaager was his actual patronym, and translated as “The Hunter.” It was only partly accurate as a descriptor. For the most part, De Jaager was a regelaar, a fixer, but that lacked a certain dignity and authority; and he had, when necessary, assumed the role of hunter, although he typically left the final bloodletting to others, and resorted to such extremes only as a last resort. He was also, it had to be admitted, a criminal—by action, nature, inclination, and association—but he had always behaved with honor in his dealings with his own kind, because there was nothing worse than a felon who could not be trusted, and even malefactors required a code of conduct.

But that was all in the past. He was currently in the final stages of leaving behind this condition of malfeasance, just as he would soon surely retire from life itself. He had shed his business interests, both legitimate and otherwise. He had rid himself of warehouses and manufactories, and paid off those who had remained loyal to him over the years, so that most would never have to work hard again. He was a man preparing for the end, discarding the base matter of this world until all that remained were flesh and memories, and death would ultimately take care of those, too. When he was done with his unburdening, he intended to retire to his small cottage in Amersfoort, where he would live in solitude and anonymity, surrounded by books and the remembrance of those he had lost.

Only one extraneous property remained to be sold: the safe house on the Herengracht, which had been used by only a handful of individuals over the years because it was the most secret and secure of his outposts. Most recently it had been occupied by three men who had come to Amsterdam seeking a book. They had left bodies in their wake, along with a legal mess that had required De Jaager to expend considerable effort and funds to clean up. He had also lost one of his own people, a young woman named Eva Meertens, of whom he had been most fond. Her death, in turn, had necessitated arranging the killing of her murderer, an employee of the U.S. government named Armitage. It had all been very complicated and unsatisfactory, not to mention risky, and confirmed De Jaager in his belief that retirement was now the only reasonable option for a man of his advanced years.

The safe house had been stripped of all but the most inexpensive of furnishings, and De Jaager’s lawyer alerted to his client’s desire for a quick sale. Already the lawyer had interested parties eager to view the property, even though its precise location had not yet been shared with them. The starting price was fiv...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Author’s Note
• Part 1
• Part 2
• Part 3
• Part 4
• Acknowledgments
• About the Author
• Copyright