He said nothing, but she could hear the labor of his breathing.
“You have grandchildren. So do you, Craig. You know how cruel that was. Is this the kind of men you are? If so, I want your resignations from the board.”
“I told Mark that was perhaps unwise,” Atwell said finally.
“Perhaps unwise. Yes. Perhaps it was.”
“Will someone tell me what’s going on?” said Harvey Phelps.
“The paintings on the wall in the Pleistocene and dinosaur rooms are remarkably valuable. We had an expert from the Metropolitan Museum of Art come in today and appraise them.”
“The ones with the unicorns?” said Madge.
“Yes. Mark apparently had them appraised several weeks ago by someone at the Heron Museum of Art. He knew their value. That’s when he got the idea of buying the museum building and the paintings and moving us out to that second-rate Vista Building.”
She hoped she was sufficiently rubbing Craig’s and Gordon’s noses in it.
“Korey and Dr. Allison Onfroi from the Metropolitan Museum of Art are working on protecting them,” she added.
Craig Amberson and Gordon Atwell looked defeated. Apparently, Mark Grayson hadn’t told them about the paintings.
“I think this meeting is adjourned. We aren’t selling the museum. For our next board meeting we need to get down to the business of the museum, and put this mess behind us.”
Diane sat back in her chair, exhausted. Just as soon as she talked to Jonas about the provenience of the arrowhead, she was heading back to the hospital. Vanessa Van Ross smiled at her as she continued to fan herself with the budget figures.
Diane got the room across from Frank again. She didn’t think she’d ever be glad to be in the hospital, but the bed felt good, and all she wanted to do was sleep. Even though Jonas hadn’t yet received the fax about the sites where the arrowhead may have come from, she felt optimistic. The last thing she did before getting Laura to take her back to the hospital was to fax the sheriff all the information she had on the skeleton. Surely, someone somewhere would recognize the description.
Getting Grayson off her back and rooting out the vipers among her board members was a major relief. And although Jonas didn’t know it, she was going to beat him at chess with her queen sacrifice. Adding to all of that, Frank was much improved-and it was only five thirty. Now all she had to do was wait for the sleeping pill to kick in. She didn’t even know it when she fell asleep.
She dreamed of snakes. Black snakes crawling across the table in the boardroom. The boardroom was ankle-deep in them, with no place to step. Diane jerked awake. She hated snakes.
The hospital was quiet. She looked at the clock next to her bed. Three thirty-two in the morning. That was a long sleep, and her bladder was full. She went to the bathroom. When she came out, she felt like she needed to walk. She put on her robe and walked out into the dimly lit hallway. At the far end of the corridor two nurses were chatting at the nurses’ station. She walked across the hall and peeked in Frank’s room.
Henry was dozing in a chair. Frank was asleep. Her presence roused Henry, and he came out to talk to her.
“How are you feeling?” he said.
“Better. Restless. I imagine you and your brother are pretty restless yourselves.”
“We’re doing OK. Actually, it’s hard to get Linc to take a vacation. He tends to be a workaholic. Now he has nothing to do but rest. His wife told me to keep him here for as long as I can.” He and Diane laughed together.
“I haven’t seen your sister lately.”
“She went home to see Mom and Dad.”
Diane shook her head. “All this must be really strange to you and your brother.”
“Well, yeah, it is. I feel like I got dropped into a Sam Spade movie.”
Diane and Henry talked a while. She enjoyed getting to know Frank’s family. She’d have liked to get to know his sister too.
“You look like you need to get back to bed,” said Henry after a while.
“You’re right. Thanks for the company.” She walked back into her room and climbed in bed and went to sleep. She could see Henry standing outside Frank’s door. For the first time in a long while, she felt safe.
Diane dozed for a while and then jerked awake. She wished she had another sleeping pill. An uneasy feeling that there was something she should know stood on the edge of her dreams like an apparition shaking her awake every time she slipped into comfortable sleep.
The clock in her room said it was five twenty. She tried to go back to sleep, but it was no use. She got out of bed and went to Frank’s room. Henry was sound asleep; so was Frank. She picked up the computer by Henry’s chair and went back to her room. There was a chair in the corner of the room near a phone jack. She pulled another wooden chair up and sat the computer on it as if it were a desk. She plugged in the computer, booted it up and connected the phone cord to the jack. She’d remembered that missing persons for each state are posted on the Internet. Why hadn’t she thought of that before? She could look herself. But instead of going to the missing persons site, she went to the Google Internet search engine and typed in the words missing, male, hockey, spring break, 1998.
It occurred to Diane that people oftentimes put up Web pages seeking help in finding a loved one-a way of tacking up missing persons posters across the world.
She got 1753 hits on the first search. Too many. Glancing down the list, she saw that one hit was about a missing male cat whose owner played field hockey. She needed to tweak her search parameters. It was amazing how many hits she got with what she thought was an unusual selection of key words. She got short stories and lots of hockey sites. On her third tweak of the parameters, she realized she should put quotations around “spring break” so that it would be read as a phrase by the search engine. That cut the number of hits down to 512. After almost an hour of looking at Web pages, she was about to give up and go through missing persons records, state by state. It would take a while, but the current strategy was apparently turning into a wild goose chase. Before she gave it up, however, she added vegetarian and archaeology to the search criteria. This time there were four hits. The title of the first hit was: “Will you help me find my son?”
Chapter 48
Diane’s hands were shaking as she clicked on the link to the site. Immediately, a photograph of a young man, smiling, wearing a blue oxford shirt came up. He had dark hair and eyes, a bright smile and even, white teeth. He looked so young; maybe nineteen. His name was Aidan Kavanagh.
Reading about him was heartbreaking. The site was put up by his parents. They described his physical appearance, his height and weight. They told about his interests, what a good hockey player he was, how he broke his shin but made a winning goal just the same. He was from Washington State, had lots of friends. There was a picture of him with his girlfriend. He was majoring in business at Harvard but flirted briefly with archaeology.
The saddest thing was a message from his father asking that if his son was somewhere reading this to please come home because they loved him. She wondered if there were some issues between him and his parents.
He disappeared after March 28, 1998. His girlfriend had spoken to him on the phone that evening. He had decided to stay at school during spring break and study. After that phone call he wasn’t heard from again. His SUV was in the driveway of the house he shared with three other male students. They had gone to Fort Lauderdale during spring break, leaving him alone. No one saw him leave; no one saw anyone come to the house. He just vanished without a word to anyone, without a trace.
Until George and Jay Boone found his collarbone.
There was a number to call if anyone had any information. The instructions on the answering machine were to leave a message and number where the caller could be reached. Diane imagined they had to put in a special phone line. She wondered how many crank calls they got each month.
She looked at the clock. It was a little after 6:00 A.M. The hospital had b
een waking up for about half an hour. The hallway had grown steadily noisier as the sounds of the breakfast carts rattled down the hallway.
She dialed the number from the computer screen. One ring, then the answering machine. A voice with the same instructions.
Diane hesitated for a fraction of a second before she introduced herself to the machine.
“Hello, my name is Dr. Diane Fallon. I’m a forensic anthropologist and director-”
There was a sudden click on the other end and a mature male voice spoke. “Did you say you’re a forensic anthropologist?”
“Yes. I got your number from your Web page.”
“Is this about Aidan?”
“Possibly.”
“I’m his father, Declan Kavanagh. Have you found my son?”
“I don’t know for sure. Can I tell you what I’ve found?”
Diane explained only that skeletal remains were found in a remote area of a farm and that she had analyzed them. She told him that analysis of the remains suggested that the bones belonged to a young male, six foot two, who grew up in a cool climate and was basically a vegetarian, but ate fish. She wondered if perhaps he had a childhood allergy to beef. He’d had osteitis pubis, possibly from the side-to-side movement of playing hockey, and he should have had considerable groin pain from it at one time. He had olecranon bursitis that should have given him elbow pain, and a broken left tibia-shin. There was a possible archaeology connection. He disappeared probably between March and June of 1998-about the time of spring break for many schools. The sheriff of the county where the remains were located recently sent out queries across the country. She had plugged key words into an Internet search engine and came up with the Web page.
Diane had laid out all the findings briefly and clearly, as if she were giving a report. When she finished she heard a low groan on the other end that turned into a deep wail. She understood. She had taken away all his hope. She wanted to cry with him.
When he came back on the line, his voice was calm and emotionless. “You have described my son completely. Tell me where you are. I have X rays, dental records.”
Diane didn’t tell him the skull was missing. She thought it would sound too gruesome over the phone. She gave him her address.
“How did he die?” he asked.
“I haven’t been able to establish the cause of death. The severe injury to the shoulder could be the cause, but there is no way to tell. Nor can I say for certain the manner of death.”
“But it looks like murder to me. Is the sheriff looking for the killer?”
“First the remains had to be identified. We hope that will lead to the story of what happened, and that will lead to the killer, if it was murder.”
“You seem to be skirting around the issues.”
“No. I’m simply not going beyond what I know.”
“Yes. I’m sorry. You’ve obviously gone to great lengths to find out where the remains of my son belong, and I thank you. I’ll be leaving as soon as I can make arrangements.”
Diane gave him the name of the sheriff and his phone number.
Linc came in and looked at her chart. “You’re up and working. I thought I was a workaholic. How are you feeling?”
“Much better. I slept for a long time.”
“Good. Get back into bed and let me see if there’s any swelling. Your chart looks good. Any pain?”
“No. Just soreness.”
“I think you’ll have that a while.”
Diane got back into bed, and Linc felt for any swelling of her organs.
“So far, so good.” He listened to her heart and her lungs. “You’re doing better than I thought, with all the coming and going you’ve been doing.”
“How’s Frank?”
“He’s doing well. I’m pleased. Looks like the two of you will pull through.”
“I suppose you and Henry are anxious to go home.”
Frank laughed from the doorway. “Half the nurses think he’s a new doctor here.” Frank came in and took a seat beside Diane’s bed. “How’s she doing?”
“I think you can stop worrying, at least about this current episode.”
“I’ve put you through more than you bargained for,” Diane told Linc.
“It’s been good for me. I’ve enjoyed visiting with Frank. I’ve gotten to spend some time with Kevin. I just wish it were under better circumstances.”
“You look good,” Diane told Frank. “Your color’s back.” She gave his cheek a gentle pinch. “You growing a beard, or going for the rugged look?”
“I’m feeling better every day. I think they’ll let me go home in a few days.”
Diane looked up at Linc. “Can I go home?”
“You think one night’s rest does the trick? You can go home if you only go home and not to the museum. Will you do that?” Diane stared at him, and he shook his head. “You know, I can see it in your eyes. You have no intention of staying home.”
“I’ve identified him,” she said.
“Who?” Linc hesitated a moment. “The remains? You know who he is?” He pulled up a chair. “How? When?”
“Just now.”
“You figured it out from your hospital bed?” Frank grasped her hand and held it tight. It felt good that his grip was strong again.
“Actually, from that chair over there. I searched the Internet for missing persons.”
“Good idea. What made you think of that?” said Linc.
“Lying here with nothing to do but think. I have to look at the X rays, but he fits everything-he’s a hockey player, had all the symptoms we saw in the bones. He even dabbled in archaeology.”
“I don’t remember that,” said Linc. “How did that show up in his bones?”
Diane told him about the arrowhead with a site number on it. “I called the father and he’s flying down from Washington State with X rays. He’s coming to the museum. Can I go, huh, can I?”
“You’re really impossible. You think you can stay out of trouble?”
“Sure. We’re sliding home now. If we can solve this, things can get back to what passes for normal.”
“All right. But listen to me. No running, jumping, lifting, getting into fights, no late hours. I want you in bed, asleep, early at night and set up regular appointments with your doctor for a few weeks. We have to watch for any internal bleeding.”
“I can do all that.”
“I’ll see to your release. Don’t make me regret it.” Linc left the room, and Diane turned her attention to Frank.
“I was thinking, when you’re ready to go home, why don’t you stay at my place a few days? We can take it easy together.”
“Or you can stay at my house. I’m not sure I want to stay across from the Odells.”
“Linc told you about them?”
Frank laughed and held his chest. “God, it hurts to laugh. Yes. Strange people. Ben Florian, my partner, called. He apologized up and down for sending the information to the Rosewood police.”
“It’s all right now. I really think we’ve found the guy, and I think he’ll lead us to the murderer of your friends.”
Diane drove her car and parked in front of the museum. It looked like home. She was getting to love it more every day. Now that the problems with the Graysons were over, there’d be only the normal problems of museum life. Not that they couldn’t be difficult, but it wasn’t like dealing with snakes in the grass. Snakes. She wished she hadn’t thought of snakes.
Mike was there changing a flat tire on his SUV. He had the flat off and was about to put on the spare.
“Looks like I picked up a nail somewhere,” he said. “You look much better than the last time I saw you.”
“I’m doing good. Thanks for the information you gave me. It helped.” Diane looked at the brake disc exposed by the missing tire and rim. Her gaze shifted over his heavy SUV and back down at the disc. “That’s a heavy vehicle.”
“Yes. It is.”
“If the brake disc fell on you, it would
do some damage, especially if you were on a hard surface.”
He looked up at her. “Is that a threat?”
Diane looked at his puzzled face and realized she was thinking out loud and he had no idea what was running through her mind. She had to laugh.
She squatted down beside him and put a hand on the disc. “This is what caused the damage.”
“My Explorer? What damage?”
“No. Not yours, but one like it.” Diane was thinking about the damage to the shoulder girdle on the bones of the skeleton. “Before you put your tire on, will you make me a cast of the bottom part of the brake disc?”
“Sure. I can do that. It’s a little weird, but that’s what I’ve come to expect.”
“There should be some quick-drying stuff in the museum.”
“I’ve got some in the geology lab. I’ll get right on it.”
They walked into the museum together. Diane went to her office, Mike to the second floor.
“Diane, you look great!” Andie gave her a hug. “How are you feeling?”
“I’m fine. Just have to take it easy.”
“Anything you need, just ask. By the way, Donald was very relieved when he discovered your attack was about the bones. He thought it was Mark Grayson and the real estate business. He is really being nice. I hope it sticks.”
“It will for a while anyway.”
“I can’t believe what Signy Grayson tried to do to you. What if she’d gotten away with it?”
“She didn’t.”
Things seemed back to normal at the museum. It was a comfort. Andie and the staff had done a good job keeping up with things. She called Jonas’ office.
“Hi. We found the skull,” he said when he heard who it was. “I have it here. It had fallen through empty cavities in the pile, like you thought. The team is wrapping things up. Oh, and I got the correct site number.”
“I’ll be right up.”
The skull was resting on a doughnut ring on Jonas’ desk. The mandible was beside it. Diane picked it up. It was a typical male skull: prominent brow ridges, large nuchal crest at the back of the head to hold the heavier male neck muscles, large mastoid process, square jaw. Not that females couldn’t have these characteristics; they sometimes do, and some male skulls downplay the characteristics most often consistent with maleness. The skull also had typical Caucasoid characteristics. It was nice when everything fit.
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