The Last Man in the World Explains All

by D Krauss

  *

  "Doctor Bainbridge?"

  The weedy little man looked up from the table, his slip-on magnifiers bugging his eyes out so all Mark saw were pupils. Cross between a man and a cricket. "Yes?" a weedy voice to match.

  "I'm Detective Sanger." He paused, but nothing stirred in the giant pupils. "I called you last week? About an artifact?"

  The giant eyes blinked in some puzzlement and then Mark saw his brow clear. "Ah, yes, the arrow! So sorry, Detective, I'm very distracted and can't remember from one day to the next what I'm supposed to do." He snapped the magnifiers off his head and his eyes shrank back to normal. Mark smiled.

  "Please, please, here." Bainbridge pulled a stool up to the work table while hustling several cloths off to on one side and pushing several brochures to the other and slam-closed a huge volume of full-sized parchments as he rearranged lamps and spotlights and was, before you knew it, sitting expectantly, blinking at the package Mark carried.

  "Uh…" Mark said.

  "It's quite all right, quite all right, Detective," Bainbridge fluttered a pale hand at him, "I know it's evidence and I must be very careful, can't compromise the integrity, wouldn't want to ruin a case, now."

  "You've done this before?"

  Bainbridge sat back a bit, the fluttering hand resting on his chest. "Yes, on stolen artifacts from time to time. The FBI uses me on their Native American cases."

  "Really? So that's why the Smithsonian referred me to you."

  "Yes, it's become sort of an inside joke. They've started calling me Joe Leaphorn."

  Mark just looked at him.

  "Oh. Sorry. He's a character in some Navajo mysteries. Sorry," and Bainbridge was flustered and both hands fluttered now and it was all Mark could do to keep from laughing out loud. So anxious not to offend.

  "'Fraid I don't read a lot of mysteries, Doctor. Occupational hazard."

  "Ah, yes," Bainbridge's eyes lit up appreciatively. "Yes, I can see that, definitely. The same reason I don't read Westerns."

  "Sure." Mark sort of got it. "Well, then." Mark laid the package down and undid the seals, carefully unfolding the cloth until the arrow lay exposed under the spots.

  Bainbridge stared at it. "My. Oh my." He then lapsed into silence.

  Mark sat quietly, watching him. Bainbridge was all eyes, absorbed by the arrow. The minutes dragged. Mark stood it for a bit and then stared around the workroom. Lots of charts with timelines and colored graphs and pictures tacked haphazardly to cork boards leaning precariously on tables that had open boxes and pottery and feathers and bones scattered across them. Bainbridge must have about ten projects going at once.

  "It is," Bainbridge said suddenly, startling Mark, "absolutely, without a doubt, one of the best reproductions of a Powhatan arrow I have ever seen."

  "Really?" Mark's brows rose.

  "Yes. Exquisite work. May I?" and he reached for the arrow without waiting for permission. The evidence tech in Mark screamed a silent "No!" but all possible prints and DNA and fiber had already been gleaned, so relax.

  "My, oh my," Bainbridge murmured again and Mark swore he caressed the arrow. "Whoever did this really knows his art. See here?" Bainbridge leaned the shaft so close to Mark he had to move back. "The feathers are not glued. They're secured around the front with cording, looks a lot like sinew. Only modern arrows are glued along the whole feather, something most forgers don't know. Forgers tend to impose anachronisms on their work. That's how they're caught."

  "So it's definitely modern work?"

  "Oh, undoubtedly."

  "No way it's an original?"

  "Oh, no. This is a definite forgery."

  "What proves it's a forgery?"

  'Oh, well, that's simple. If this was real, it would have to be over 400 years old."

  "400 years?"

  "Yes, maybe 450. This forgery is pre-Jamestown, before European technology began to influence Native American arts. The pigments are cruder, the scoring more primitive."

  "How do you know it isn't 400 years old?"

  "Well..." Bainbridge smiled, a shy look coming over him. He genuinely didn't want to show how smart he was. Mark found that refreshing. "This is in too exquisite shape to be that old. It would have suffered rot and mold and damage, even if it was carefully preserved. If it had been in any collection, even a private one, I would have heard about it." He held it up, admiring. "I would like to meet the craftsman."

  "So would I. You said this was Powhatan's?"

  "Not Powhatan's, Powhatan."

  Mark cocked his head. "I thought Powhatan was a person."

  Bainbridge dropped back to the smile again. "He was, but only because of a translation error. Powhatan is the nation's name. The chief's name was Wahunsonacock, but the English applied the tribe name to him. There were actually a lot of tribes that belonged to that nation, but we know them collectively as Powhatan."

  "Wasn't he Pocahontas' father?"

  "That's him." The smile remained.

  "So, the Powhatans, they were all around here?"

  "Oh, yes."

  "In Fairfax County?"

  "A branch of them called the Tauxenent."

  "Hmm." Mark thought for a moment. "So, this arrow wouldn't be out of place here."

  "Well, no. The forger is very well steeped in Powhatan lore, has to be, which narrows your suspect list somewhat. To even me," and Bainbridge's smile went from shy to genuine pleasure. Vicarious thrill.

  Mark looked at him. "The arrow was used to murder someone."

  Bainbridge blanched. "What?"

  "And our lab says that's real deer sinew and real bear grease slathered all over it. 400 year old sinew and bear grease, I might add."

  Bainbridge was open mouthed, staring at Mark. "But, that's, that's just…"

  "Impossible?"

  Bainbridge blinked and held the arrow out at arm's length, maybe repulsed by its recent employment, who knew, but still fascinated. "What happened?"

  "A man walking his dog in the woods was shot with it."

  Bainbridge started, turned to Mark with wide eyes. "Where?" he asked, insistent.

  "Uh," Mark recoiled a bit from Bainbridge's sudden press, "in Daventry. In a place they call—"

  "The Ghost Woods," Bainbridge breathed, finishing it. He turned to the arrow and paled, placed it hastily on the table.

  Mark frowned and wondered, for a second, how far up the suspect list he should advance the little dweeb. "How did you know that, doc?" he asked, suspiciously.

  "I heard it on the news," the hands fluttered again, all over the place, "and when I did, I remembered…" he jumped to his feet. "Wait here. There's something I have to show you," and with a pat on Mark's shoulder he whirled, a lab coat tornado, and ran out the room.

  "What the hell?" Mark watched Bainbridge's back disappear around a corner. He whipped out his cell phone and speed-dialed Greg. "Hey. Me. Yeah, still at the Smithsonian. Quick, I want you to run everything on a Doctor Cary Bainbridge…Yeah, that's the spelling… I have no idea what his DOB is… No, I can't get it. Run the DL, for chrissake… Gotta go," and he hung up as Bainbridge's lab coat swirled back into view, entering as he had left, face working, hands fluttering, one of which carried a parchment.

  "Doctor," Mark's voice was a warning.

  "Oh, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry. I don't mean to be so dramatic, but…" He rested his eyes on the arrow again. He stilled, stepping near it, fascination covering his face.

  "Doctor?"

  "Oh, yes. Again, so sorry. See, when I first heard the report about the poor man killed in the Ghost Woods what, a month or so ago? Yes? Well, it jogged a memory, something I read in grad school." He pulled his stool near the arrow and sat over it, the parchment resting against the table. Mark stared at him. "See, Detective, there are a lot of stories from the time of the Jamestown settlement, when the English made first contact with the Native Americans. The Pocahontas story is probably the most famous, but there are a lot more. A lot. I compiled several of them as p
art of a research project."

  "Doc…"

  "Yes, yes, sorry, this is just so, well, odd. It's just so odd. Anyway, some of the settlers were great chroniclers, John Smith among them, although he wrote most of his stuff years later and there's a lot of doubt about them. How Pocahontas rescued him is thought something he made up, or maybe something Wahunsonacock cooked up ahead of time…"

  "Doc!"

  "Sorry! Sorry! Anyway, an anonymous chronicler recorded a story he heard from a Tauxenent priest down near where Mt. Vernon is today, around that area, anyway, probably at Namassingakent village, although we're not certain."

  Mark glared at him.

  "I know. I'm getting there. Sorry, I am doing this so badly. The story concerned a white demon who'd been in the Plentiful Place, that's what the words translate to, and that a famous warrior had shot the white demon and the demon had disappeared, like smoke."

  "Doc, point?"

  "The Tauxenent renamed the place the Ghost Woods, and made it taboo. No one from the village was allowed to enter it after."

  Mark blinked at him. "You mean, those woods?"

  "Yes, they're the same ones."

  Mark sat back, regarding the fluttery, anxious little man. "Doctor, you are, of course, not seriously suggesting…"

  "There's a picture."

  "Huh?"

  Bainbridge grabbed the parchment and rolled it open, holding the ragged edges down on the table. "The chronicler copied it from a lodge drawing. It's been copied a hundred times since, but, still clear," and Bainbridge gestured with his chin.

  This is nuts, Mark thought, but he stepped around and looked.

  It was a stick figure, like you'd expect from an Indian painting. But there was a little more to it, some parts fleshed out, and it was in color. The stick figure was black, but it had white hair. It was wearing what looked like a long coat with clearly drawn buttons going down the front to what looked like dress shoes on its stick feet. And it held what could only be a leash, which was attached to some wolf-looking dog. An Indian figure was drawn beneath the man, shooting a bow. Up at an angle. And the arrow was sticking out the man's back, through the heart.

  Mark felt a chill go up his spine.

  "In the story," Bainbridge murmured, "the animal on the leash was a wolf. Tell me, was the dog wolf-like, say, a Malamute? Or, a Husky?"

  Mark just looked at him, speechless.