One Grave Too Many dffi-1

by Beverly Connor

  “Here, where?” said Diane.

  “Where the mammoth is standing,” said Laura. Milo Lorenzo was Diane’s predecessor, as well as the one who recruited her to the museum. Most of the renovations and ideas for the exhibits were Milo’s. Taking RiverTrail from the old-fashioned model of simple static cataloging and displaying of artifacts into the current concept of museum philosophy-interactive, educational, and research oriented-was his dream. The building plans Donald wanted to complain about were Milo’s.

  “This is where he had his heart attack?” said Diane. She remembered the last time she had talked to him on the phone. He was in as much hurry as she was for her to finish her job in South America and come to Rosewood to take up her new position as his assistant director. He’d died two days later.

  Laura and Harvey nodded. “If the old boy had to die,” said Harvey, “this was as good a place as any.”

  Diane left Laura and Harvey reminiscing about Milo and walked to the giant short-faced bear exhibit, stepped up on the platform, and picked up a microphone placed there for her. She caught the attention of the quartet and gave them a signal to stop playing. With the sudden cessation of the music the crowd stopped talking.

  “Hello, everyone. I am pleased to welcome you, our board of directors, our best and most generous supporters and honored guests, to the preopening reception of our Pleistocene room.

  “Most of you knew Milo Lorenzo and knew about his dreams for the museum. So it is with great pleasure that I invite you to see what we’ve been doing to make his dream a reality. Thanks to each and every one of you for your help and support, which have made it possible.”

  Diane looked at the faces and wondered if she had made any sense. She hated speaking in public and had this vision that halfway through all her speeches, she began speaking nonsense syllables. But they clapped, and considering herself lucky, she quickly stepped down and threaded her way through the sea of tuxedos, fancy dresses and champagne glasses and greeted all the guests.

  It was tiring, making small talk and smiling, being political. She felt like a shape-shifter becoming weary of holding the same shape, and the evening was just getting started. At least, everyone seemed to be having a good time, and there was a genuine interest in the exhibits. That was the most important thing: the exhibits.

  On her way to join guests who were touring other rooms, she stopped by to speak to Gary, Leslie and Samantha, standing with their proud parents next to the sloth exhibit.

  “They all did a great job,” Diane told the parents. “It is a fine sloth.”

  “Does that mean we get an A?” asked Gary.

  Diane nodded. “Sure does.” She smiled as a father took a photo of her and the students with the huge skeleton towering over them.

  As she was making her way out of the Pleistocene room, the quartet started a piece from the Peer Gynt Suite. Diane froze in her tracks, her heart pounding against her ribs. She grasped the edge of a huge planter to keep herself from running out of the building.

  Chapter 5

  Diane’s body was crushed by waves of almost unbearable grief and fear. I’m in the museum, she told herself over and over as the music taunted her, growing louder and louder until the violins were screaming at her. She wanted to scream at them to stop, but she stood still, making her hands into tight fists, breathing deeply. She caught her breath, stood several moments longer, turned and looked at the faces of the musicians, then at the crowd of guests. Everyone appeared normal. The music ended abruptly and the only sound was clapping. Diane stood still, collecting herself. Finally, she was able to walk on unsure legs to the quartet.

  “That piece wasn’t on the play list,” she said, trying to sound casual.

  It must not have worked, because that look of having done something wrong but not knowing what swept across their faces.

  “It was in your note,” said Alix, the first violinist. She flipped through her music and produced a piece of paper.

  Diane took it from her. The hand-printed note on museum stationery said, Please add “In the Hall of the Mountain King” to the play list. Her initials were at the bottom.

  “It was here when we returned from our first break. Luckily, we knew an arrangement for it. I mean. . is there something wrong?”

  Diane forced a smile and shook her head. “No, nothing’s wrong. Someone from the staff probably wanted to hear it. They often use my name when ordering things.” Apparently, with wild abandon, she thought. “All of you are doing a beautiful job. I’ve gotten several compliments, and Mrs. Harris wants to talk with you about doing a library function.”

  “That’s great. We really appreciate this opportunity, Dr. Fallon,” said Alix, and the other three murmured in agreement before they took up their bows and prepared to perform their next arrangement.

  Diane turned and took another long look at the crowd. Everyone was eating, talking or looking at the exhibits. No one was looking in her direction. She walked among the guests, the note folded up in one hand, smiling at each face she met. No mischief-makers or secret enemies showed themselves.

  Frank, his son and his ex-wife were looking at the computer video depiction of the receding Laurentide Ice Sheet that brought a close to the Pleistocene period. She relaxed at the sight of Frank. Silly, she thought. It was probably nothing. One of the staff just wanted to hear that piece of music. It’s a well-known piece.

  She was starting toward Frank when she thought she heard her name jump out of the flow of voices around her. She looked in the direction from which she thought it had come. Over by Bison antiquus a group of board members, contributors and local real estate brokers, looking like a clutch of emperor penguins, stood talking to each other.

  David Reynolds, Cindy’s husband, was there. Diane suspected that the reason the pair had wrangled an invitation through Frank was so David could meet with some of Rosewood’s high rollers. She strolled in their direction.

  “Diane,” said Mark Grayson. “We were just talking about you. Great party. I’ve got some good news.”

  Mark held out his arm as though he intended to wrap it around Diane’s shoulders. She stopped beside Harvey Phelps, opposite Mark, leaving his arm to gather air. Donald was there. Diane met his gaze briefly. She wondered if somehow he was responsible for ordering almost a hundred and fifty thousand dollars’ worth of unneeded museum exhibits and signing her name to the order. Donald was a good illustrator. Did that translate into the ability to forge a signature?

  “Good news?” she asked Mark. She glanced at Harvey, who raised a bushy eyebrow in her direction. “Tell me.”

  “The price on the old Vista Building has come down considerably.”

  “And?” Diane prompted.

  “With those picture windows, big rooms, and its central location, it would make a great museum. The board can sell this property for a premium price and have money left over for some of the other things on Milo’s wish list.”

  “I’ve seen the Vista. It has only one large room. The rest are too small for our needs. The parking is miserable. There is absolutely no place for a nature trail, and I suspect the price is dropping because it’s hard to sell, sitting as it is on the edge of a high-crime area. Besides, we’ve spent quite a bit restoring this place, and I think it’s wonderful.”

  Mark’s face hardened. The others looked into their drinks. “This building’s much too big for our needs. Besides, it’s a steep climb up here in the winter,” he said. “It could be dangerous for busloads of children.”

  Harvey Phelps slapped him on the back. “Oh, I don’t know, Mark. We haven’t had a decent winter in years.”

  Diane gave Harvey’s arm a squeeze and left them talking about the weather. She sought out Frank and Kevin. “I hope you guys are having a good time,” she said.

  “Great.” Kevin answered for everybody. “Do you have any human bones?”

  “Yes, we do. Actually, a great many of our skeletal exhibits are made from casts of real skeletons. They aren’t real bones,
but they’re exact replicas. We have a nice exhibit of Homo sapiens and his distant ancestors in the primate room.”

  “Do you have any bones from murder victims?”

  Diane shook her head. “This is strictly natural history. We have rocks, shells, bugs, dinosaurs, mammals and plants. But no murder.”

  “Why did you quit investigating murders?” he asked.

  “Kevin!” cautioned his mother.

  “Yes, Diane, why did you quit?” This was from Gordon Atwell, president of the bank that held the museum’s mortgage.

  “Traveling all over the world got tiring. I wanted to settle down in one spot. Lead a normal, quiet life, for a change.”

  “I guess when you’ve seen one mass grave, you’ve seen them all, huh?” He patted her on the shoulder. “There’s Amberson. I need to talk to him.”

  Diane was glad to see him go off in another direction.

  “What do I need to take in school to learn about bones?” asked Kevin.

  “What grade are you in?”

  “Eighth.”

  “You need to be strong in your sciences, especially biology. You need math. If you have any anatomy courses, that would be good. You’ll need chemistry later on. And, of course, you have to learn your bones.”

  Kevin frowned. “Why do I need math?”

  “There’s a lot of measuring and calculations to do. Bones have a consistent size relationship with each other. You get as much information from the size indexes and ratios as you do from the physical examination of the bones themselves.”

  “You should see what she told me about a piece of collarbone,” said Frank. “Darn near told me what the guy had for his last meal.”

  Diane started to laugh with the others when a thought flashed through her mind. She looked at Frank. “I think I can tell you what he ate.”

  Frank looked shocked for a moment. “I was joking. You mean you can? From a bone?”

  “Not his last meal, but we may find a bit of information that might help identify him.”

  “How?” asked Kevin. “How can you tell what he ate by looking at his bone?”

  “You have to remove the collagen-that’s one of the components of bone-superheat it and turn it into gas so a mass spectrometer can detect the chemicals in the collagen.”

  “Wow. I really want to be a forensic anthropologist.”

  “Actually, the person I’m going to ask is a physical anthropologist. He studies bones too, among other things, but without the crime part. This is called stable isotope analysis. It’s the same method used to tell us the diet of Neanderthal man. We’re going to put one of the computer information programs about it in the primate exhibit.”

  “How do you tell what he ate?” asked Kevin.

  “Have you studied isotopes in school?”

  “Sort of.”

  “Then you know isotopes are like different species of atoms of the same element.”

  “Yeah. .”

  “You know about carbon fourteen, used for dating objects. Carbon fourteen is an unstable isotope-it’s radioactive and decays over time. Because it decays at a constant rate, you can measure the decay to tell how old something is. It’s a little more complicated, but that’s basically it.”

  Kevin nodded. Diane was watching to see if his eyes were about to glaze over at all the science, but he listened attentively, so she continued.

  “Carbon also has two stable isotopes that don’t decay. So does nitrogen. And each has different ratios in the different types of foods-like vegetables, meats and fish. When we eat these things, the same ratios of the isotopes are absorbed in our bones, which means we can measure the ratios with a mass spectrometer and possibly find out what the person ate all his life. Like carbon fourteen tests, it’s more complicated, but you get the idea. Using it for this bone is a long shot. Most people in the U.S. have pretty much the same diet, but it could supply some more information about the individual. We might get lucky and he ate only red meat and potatoes all his life.”

  “Kevin, come here and look at this.” David Reynolds motioned his stepson to another of the computer animations. Kevin was reluctant to leave the conversation, but his mother, Cindy, pulled him away and went over to watch the mammoth animation with her husband.

  “That’s fascinating,” said Frank. “I’ll suggest it to the Rosewood police when I give them the bone.”

  “Did you get in touch with your friends?” asked Diane.

  He shook his head. “Not yet. I’ve been calling. I think George said he was going out of town for a couple of days. He should be back today, though. I’m going over there tomorrow.”

  They were interrupted by the muffled strains of “Ode to Joy” coming from Frank’s jacket.

  “Should have left this thing at home,” Frank mumbled. He stepped away from the others and answered his phone.

  Diane stole a glance at him and saw him drop his arms to his sides, lean on the column and put a hand to his face. She went over and touched his arm.

  “Frank?” asked Diane. “Are you all right?”

  He shook his head. “I have to go. It’s George and Louise. The ones with the missing daughter. The two of them and their son were found dead in their home.”

  “Dead?” whispered Diane. “How?”

  “I don’t know. I’m going over there. Look, Diane, I need to. .”

  “It’s all right. Do what you have to do.” She walked him to the door. “I’m so sorry.”

  “I’ll call later. Tell Kevin I had to leave. Poor kid’s used to me taking off in the middle of things.” He kissed her cheek, and Diane watched him walk to the parking lot before she closed the door.

  Dead-a whole family gone. She put the flat of her palm on the door to steady herself. A missing daughter, and now this. A sudden tap on her shoulder made her jump.

  “I’m sorry, Doc.” It was Jake Houser, the security guard. “I didn’t mean to startle you.”

  “Is everything all right?”

  “Just fine. I wanted to tell you that I’ve been hearing the phone ringing in your office. I wouldn’t mention it, but whoever it is is persistent.”

  “Thanks. I’ll go look at the caller ID.”

  “Oh, and. .” He grinned broadly. “My son’s here. Guest of Kenneth Meyers. He has a summer job working for him. I’d like you to meet him.”

  “I’d like that, Jake. Let me check this out, and I’ll introduce myself. I overheard you talking to Frank yesterday. You must be really proud.”

  “Proud’s putting it mildly. Dylan’s a great kid. It’s hard these days to raise a good kid. I’m proud-and lucky. Was that Frank I saw leaving just now?”

  “He had to leave. Some friends of his were found dead in their home.”

  Jake’s happy expression dissolved into a frown. “Do you know who?”

  “I think their names are George and Louise Boone, and their son, Jay.”

  Jake backed up and leaned against the wall, his mouth open. “George and Louise. I know them. I play poker with George. Are you sure?” He reached for his cell phone. It rang in his hand and he almost dropped it. “Houser here.”

  He paused. Diane watched the frown on his face deepen.

  “I think so.” He held his hand over the mouthpiece.

  “My God, it’s true. George, Louise, Jay too. They need me down at the station. We’re shorthanded. I know you’ve been very flexible with me. . ”

  “It’s all right. Tell Leonard you’re going. I think I saw him heading for the upper floors not long ago.”

  “Thanks, Doc. Thanks.” He paused, looked as if he wanted to say more, but instead contacted Leonard on his walkie-talkie.

  Diane walked to her office and unlocked her private door. She was just about to punch the play button on her answering machine when the phone rang again. It frightened her. Frank’s, Jake’s, and now hers-a conspiracy of phones bringing bad news? She trembled slightly as she reached for it.

  “Diane Fallon,” she said into the receiver.

/>   “Diane. I’m glad I found you. I’ve been calling your home.” It was Gregory. “We’ve lost track of Santos, and believe his right-hand man, Joachim, may have entered the United States last week. I’m trying to verify it.”

  Diane’s knees suddenly felt weak, and she sank onto her chair. “You think he’s coming here?”

  “We don’t know that. I don’t even know if the reports are true. You know how hard it is to verify things. I’ll find out. I just wanted to warn you of the possibility. I don’t want you to worry, Diane. I wouldn’t even have called, but I thought you might hear the news from another source.”

  “Is the team still down there?”

  “I’ve called them back. . temporarily. They think they’ve located two more mass graves, and I don’t want to start excavation until things are a little more settled.”

  So Gregory was more worried than he let on, she thought. “Is something else going on?” she asked.

  “I don’t know. President Valdividia told some of his friends he’s going to take a vacation. You know how unsettled Puerto Barquis has been the past few months.” He paused. “He may be. . what do you Americans say? Getting the hell out of Dodge.”

  “Something rather disturbing has happened here.”

  “Something to do with Santos? What is it?”

  Diane told him about the museum party, the music and the note.

  There was a long pause before he spoke. “Of course, it could be a coincidence.”

  “It probably is,” she said. “But if it isn’t, what would be the point? What would he gain?”

  “The point might be to put fear into those who took your place.”

  “Of course, if he shows he can reach any of us, wherever we are, that would be an effective weapon of terror. But it may not be him at all. There are other things going on, things related to the museum.” She opened the drawer and fingered the printouts from the fax as she explained the duplicate orders. “I suppose it could be some clumsy attempt to discredit me.”

  “You don’t think that might be related to Santos too?”

  “It hardly seems likely. I’m under pressure to move the museum and sell the property to developers. This probably has more to do with that. I just can’t see him sending someone up here to make it look like I ordered too many specimens.”