Dead Hunt dffi-5

by Beverly Connor

  The walls were the same hue as the sofas. They gave

  the room a golden glow. There was a full bathroom

  and closet where she kept changes of clothes. It did

  not look like an interrogation room.

  She closed the door behind them. ‘‘Can I get you

  something to drink?’’ she asked.

  ‘‘No, I just had breakfast. Maybe later. Great bedand-breakfast, by the way.’’ He studied her for a moment. ‘‘This looks serious,’’ he said and smiled as if it

  really were not.

  He and Ross Kingsley must be from the school of

  FBI philosophy that says friendly is okay, she thought

  as she looked at his sparkling white teeth. She wondered how much of it was his act to make people trust

  him. She sighed. It didn’t really matter. She poured

  the money out on the table.

  He raised his eyebrows in surprise. ‘‘What’s this?’’

  he asked.

  ‘‘I really don’t know. It arrived in this morning’s

  mail. This came with it.’’ She gave him the note. ‘‘That’s it? ‘Bitch’? Do you know what it means?’’

  he asked.

  ‘‘No. I haven’t a clue. Not much of one anyway. I

  was attacked here in the museum last night by the

  same man who attacked me in the hospital. He called

  me a bitch on both occasions.’’ Diane told him about

  the attacks, about his anger, and what he had said—

  about her being a dirty dealer.

  ‘‘You think it may be related to the artifacts?’’ he

  asked. ‘‘Why didn’t you tell me yesterday when I was

  here about the first attack and what he said?’’ That’s the trouble when you decide to withhold

  important information from the FBI. They want to

  know why and you need a really good explanation.

  Diane took a deep breath.

  ‘‘I wasn’t sure it was related. I had just been attacked in my home; that’s why I was at the hospital.

  Well, not exactly attacked. Let me start from the

  beginning.’’

  Diane told him about waking up in the wee hours

  of the morning, about falling in the blood.

  ‘‘The assault at the hospital was violent, and whatever happened in my apartment was extremely

  violent—they seemed at the time to be related. The

  artifacts—well, that wasn’t violent. At least not at our

  end, though something may have been going on at

  Golden Antiquities. When I woke up yesterday morning I was drugged and confused and it took a while for

  the barbiturates to get out of my system. Apparently

  someone had put sleeping pills in both my and, I suspect, Ross’ drinks when we dined together. That’s why

  he fell asleep at the wheel. At least that’s the hypothesis until he gets some tests back. But, that’s why I

  slept through a violent murder in my living room.’’ ‘‘Okay, I’ll admit, that’s not a bad answer. Ross was

  drugged too? Why?’’ Jacobs asked.

  ‘‘I think someone wanted to make me sleep soundly.

  But rather than keep up with who got which drink,

  they just doctored both of ours,’’ said Diane. ‘‘I just

  discovered that the waiter who filled our drinks didn’t

  show up for work yesterday.’’

  ‘‘That’s cold. Ross could have died,’’ said Jacobs.

  He shook his head. ‘‘There was only blood, no body

  in your apartment?’’

  Diane nodded. ‘‘The blood trail indicated the body

  was dragged outside and put in the trunk of my car.’’ Jacobs cocked an eyebrow. ‘‘They didn’t arrest

  you?’’

  ‘‘The DA wanted to. The barbiturates in my tox

  screen gave me an alibi of sorts. I’m not out of the

  woods.’’

  ‘‘No one saw anything?’’ he asked.

  ‘‘Or heard anything, which is really strange. I can

  hardly walk across the floor without my downstairs

  neighbors calling up and telling me to be quiet. And

  my neighbors across the hall live to eavesdrop on

  what’s going on in my apartment—they even broke in

  once because they were sure I was harboring a forbidden cat.’’

  He smiled and shook his head. ‘‘Do you know who

  the blood belonged to?’’

  ‘‘The DNA is a match to Clymene O’Riley,’’ said Diane. He looked startled. ‘‘Ross’ Clymene?’’ he asked. ‘‘The very one,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘I thought she was in jail,’’ said Jacobs, ‘‘. . . or did

  I hear that she escaped?’’

  ‘‘Yes, she escaped, right after I visited her at her

  request. That’s another long story,’’ she said. ‘‘Well, you’re right. None of this makes any sense.

  Why would Clymene escape and then show up at your

  apartment?’’ he asked.

  ‘‘I don’t know. Why would someone else decide to

  kill her there? The whole thing had to be premeditated and coordinated. And why drug me?’’ said

  Diane. ‘‘I’m aware that all of this makes me look

  guilty of something.’’

  ‘‘Maybe that’s the point. If Clymene blamed you

  for her conviction, could she be behind the artifact

  problem? It started before her demise,’’ he said. ‘‘I don’t see how . . .’’ She stopped.

  ‘‘What?’’ he asked.

  ‘‘Clymene’s late husband, the one she was convicted

  of murdering, was an amateur archaeologist. Clymene

  boned up on archaeology in order to lay her trap for

  him,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘So she could have made contacts,’’ said Jacobs.

  ‘‘See?’’ He patted Diane on the hand. ‘‘You need to

  tell your doctor all your symptoms, no matter how

  much you think they are unrelated, and let him make

  the diagnosis.’’

  Diane smiled. ‘‘It hadn’t occurred to me that Clymene might have masterminded this. All she would

  have to do is get Golden Antiquities to switch the

  artifacts and make a call to the newspapers.’’ ‘‘That’s a possibility,’’ said Jacobs. ‘‘I’ll look into it.

  I’ll see if Randal Cunningham had any dealings with

  Clymene. Did she have friends, known associates?

  Some people in prison have a following.’’

  ‘‘She had visitors. And there’s a possibility she

  conned Rev. Rivers, the prison counselor, into helping her escape. He was found murdered at his home after

  she broke out,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘Something went bad for her,’’ mused Jacobs. ‘‘If

  it’s true that she orchestrated all of this, I wonder

  what went wrong.’’

  ‘‘Orchestrated. That’s what’s been going through my

  mind. The whole thing feels like some kind of game.

  If it were just a simple crime, it wouldn’t be so hard to

  understand. Motives would be more straightforward. I

  know there is no way either Kendel or I or anyone

  else at the museum could make the artifact switch

  work as a moneymaking plan the way it was done.’’ ‘‘Could it be a game Clymene started but now can’t

  finish?’’ he said.

  ‘‘Maybe.’’ Diane began gathering up the money. ‘‘I need to take the whole package for analysis,’’

  he said.

  Diane shook her head. ‘‘We don’t know if it’s related to the artifacts. I’ll have my lab do it. Look,

  yours is backed up
and this isn’t a priority for the

  FBI, but it is a priority here. Besides, it might just be

  a contribution to the museum. Granted, patrons don’t

  usually insult me when they are donating, but some

  of them are not pleased with me lately.’’

  He smiled and agreed. But Diane knew it was because he had no choice. There was no physical connection to the envelope and money he could make with

  his case. It just looked suspicious. For that matter, he

  didn’t even know if the wayward artifacts were his

  case either. It was all just suspicion.

  ‘‘So, you run the museum and the crime lab. Anything else?’’ he asked.

  ‘‘I’m also a forensic anthropologist and have an osteology lab in the building,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘I know there’s a story here,’’ he said.

  ‘‘There is. A very long one,’’ she said.

  ‘‘Maybe over lunch when Ross comes,’’ he said. There was a knock on the door and Andie entered.

  ‘‘I’m sorry to interrupt.’’

  Diane walked over to her with the envelope. ‘‘David called and you are wanted in the crime lab,’’

  Andie whispered. ‘‘The federal marshals are here

  again. So is that FBI guy, Kingsley, and some other

  folks from the police station. David is afraid they may

  want to...well... arrest you.’’

  Chapter 31

  ‘‘Okay, thank you, Andie,’’ said Diane as she looked into Andie’s worried eyes. She was a little surprised that Andie hadn’t suggested she go out the loading dock exit and avoid the whole thing altogether. ‘‘It’s all right. Go back to your desk. I’ll let you know if you need to bring me a toothbrush.’’

  Diane smiled at her as she shut the door. Diane stood for a moment and closed her eyes before she turned back to Agent Jacobs.

  ‘‘I have to go,’’ she said. ‘‘I’ll have Andie show you to Bookkeeping.’’

  ‘‘I have really good hearing and the acoustics in this room are quite superior,’’ said Agent Jacobs. ‘‘I’d like to come with you. See how Ross is doing. Do you think you are going to be arrested?’’

  He said it as if it was such a normal thing. Not cause for alarm or disgrace. Just a simple statement. Diane was wondering if he was that unflappable in his un-FBI persona.

  ‘‘I think they probably found where I hid the body. I probably left my letter opener stuck in her back with my fingerprints on it,’’ she said. Then she added, ‘‘That’s a joke.’’

  ‘‘I can tell a joke from a confession,’’ he said. ‘‘So, you think they found the body?’’

  ‘‘I think that’s probably why the marshals are here—tying up loose ends,’’ Diane said. ‘‘I guess it’s all right if you come along. It’ll give you a chance to fight over who gets to take me in.’’

  ‘‘You believe that I’m about to arrest you?’’ he said, amusement twinkling in his eyes. Diane was glad that someone found all this funny.

  ‘‘I’m sure you catch a lot of people with your friendly charm,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘You think this is an act?’’ Jacobs put his hand over his heart in mock pain. ‘‘And here I thought you trusted me.’’

  ‘‘I obviously do; I spilled my guts to you, didn’t I?’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘I see, you just weren’t fooled.’’ He was still smiling, but Diane thought he probably had elicited a lot of information with his friendly manner.

  She got a light sweater out of the closet and put it on.

  ‘‘Like all of us, you have a job to do,’’ she said. ‘‘Those artifacts came from somewhere and they are unprovenanced. You have to be suspicious. But I hope you see that neither Kendel nor Jonas could have hoped to get by with anything. If anyone could, it would be me. I control everything here. Or at least I thought I did.’’

  ‘‘I think it’s too early to fall on your sword,’’ he said as Diane led them out the back door of her office.

  ‘‘I’m not falling on my sword. I just think Kendel and Jonas need to be protected from whatever mischief is going on here,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘Ross said you have a highly developed sense of justice,’’ said Jacobs as they walked through a small door into the Pleistocene room.

  A docent was telling a group of Japanese tourists about woolly mammoths. One man was arguing about whether or not the giant beasts were really here in Georgia.

  ‘‘I hope he didn’t mean I’m prone to take justice into my own hands,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘You mean like killing Clymene? No. He said you believe in a justice system. That’s why, when you were a human rights investigator, you collected evidence all those years even when there was no court in which to present it,’’ he said.

  So Jacobs knew more about her background than he had admitted, she noticed.

  ‘‘I’m glad he thinks so highly of me,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘He does. All these Richard the Third T-shirts have fair trial written all over this museum’s identity,’’ he said.

  ‘‘You’re familiar with Richard the Third issues?’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘I took a lot of history and art history in college. That’s how I ended up in this section of the FBI. These guys were really big,’’ he said as they passed a giant bison.

  ‘‘You should visit the dinosaur room while you’re here,’’ said Diane.

  ‘‘I will. I’ll visit the whole building before I leave.’’

  ‘‘Do you know where the artifacts belong?’’ Diane asked after a moment.

  She went through the large entrance to the mammal room, where more tourists were viewing the dioramas of taxidermied and skeletonized animals in artists’ recreations of their natural habitats. This is where I was attacked, she thought. Here among all the animals. It looked so harmless in the daylight.

  ‘‘No. It’s hard to prove something is stolen when you didn’t know it existed in the first place. That’s the problem trying to deal with looted artifacts. The thing that made the Getty Museum case so great was one of the principals had photographs in his apartment of the artifacts actually being looted. You don’t get that kind of hard evidence often. I need a witness. And with Cunningham Jr. dead, there isn’t one at the moment. Cunningham Sr. apparently knows nothing about what his son was into, and a couple of his employees have vanished. I’ve got BOLOs out for them. So far, nothing. That says a lot. The other employees either know nothing or are not talking. I’m hoping the Clymene thing is a lead.’’

  ‘‘I hope so too,’’ said Diane.

  They reached the elevators in the center of the museum. Several people were waiting. When the doors opened, more people poured out. Diane was always glad to see the museum so busy. Walking into an exhibit room during open hours and finding no one was disheartening.

  All the visitors got out on the second floor. The third floor was dedicated to exhibit preparation, library and archives, and offices. Except the west wing. That was the crime lab.

  ‘‘You know, you didn’t have to cooperate with me,’’ said Jacobs. ‘‘You could have stonewalled me.’’

  ‘‘We don’t want objects that are not ours. We would like to have the ones that are ours. I couldn’t see how not cooperating would help in any way.’’

  They were walking past the staff lounge when a hand reached out and tapped Diane’s shoulder. She jumped back, ready to fight—or run.

  ‘‘I’m sorry, Dr. Fallon. I didn’t mean to startle you.’’ Diane caught her breath. ‘‘That’s alright, Dr. Albright. What can I do for you?’’

  Dr. Albert T. Albright was the curator of dinosaurs and had helped acquire a couple of very nice velociraptors.

  ‘‘I had this idea for an exhibit,’’ he said.

  Diane could see the excitement dancing in his eyes. She hated to brush him off.