A Skeleton in the Family

by Leigh Perry

  I went on. “It was mostly guesswork. I had a list of students who’d never finished their degrees at JTU, and went through it until I got to Allen’s name. The story of his disappearance matched the timing for the skeleton. I promise that nobody else knows.”

  “I’m glad to hear that. And I must say that you have excellent research skills. You should really consider publishing some papers.”

  Great. Even murderers had career advice for me. “One thing I didn’t find out is exactly why you killed him. Was it something to do with Dr. Kirkland’s data?”

  “Precisely. You may know she made her reputation with her own dissertation, a seminal work about migratory patterns of early man as shown by the remains of prey animals. Computers weren’t easily accessible then, at least not to zooarchaeology grad students, so she had to calculate her statistics by hand. Somewhere along the way, she made a mathematical error, and without realizing it, invalidated her results.”

  “So her premise was wrong?”

  “Completely. But nobody knew that in the nineteen eighties—the study wasn’t replicated until just a few years ago, and everyone assumed the original study was flawed by not having a statistically significant sample.” He stopped. “I’m sorry, I realize this isn’t your field. Let me just say that it was an honest mistake, one that Dr. Kirkland never realized.”

  “But Allen did.”

  “When computers became more common, she decided it would be worthwhile to have her data input for future scientists to use. She hired the boy to take care of it for her, and just before Christmas break, he realized there was something wrong with the results. Dr. Kirkland wasn’t on campus that day, so he came to me.”

  “You were her research assistant, right?” The picture Sid and I had both spotted in the JTU yearbook was of Kirkland and Michaels in a lab bent over a tray of fossils.

  He nodded. “I told him that she couldn’t have made a mistake like that, but he showed me the numbers. I was horrified! If word had gotten out, she could have been accused of falsifying data on purpose. At the very least, every study she’d ever done would have been reviewed, and there was no telling what else they’d find. In the meantime, she’d probably lose her privileges as a professor and I’d be without the head of my thesis committee. Even if I’d had time to find another, who would have wanted me? My thesis work was based on hers—if hers was faulty, so was mine. My career would have been over before it started.”

  “But Allen didn’t care about that?”

  “Oh, he was sympathetic, but he was an undergrad. He didn’t really understand what it meant. Nobody who hasn’t been through it really understands.”

  Once again, he had a point.

  “He wanted me to call Dr. Kirkland right away, and when I tried to stall, he said he’d find her number himself. Then he turned away from me, and—”

  “And you hit him.”

  He nodded, looking ashamed. “I had to stop him. Dr. Kirkland was completely devoted to science. If she’d learned there were discrepancies in her data, she’d have been the first to report it, no matter what the cost to her own career.”

  “Or to yours.”

  “Not just to mine. She’d advised other students, and all of them would have been affected. Even her own children’s research would have come under scrutiny.”

  “So you hit him out of desperation, and killed him to hide that. And the skeletonization?”

  “To hide him, of course,” he said, as if it were the only reasonable thing to do. “With Dr. Kirkland gone for the holidays, I had all of Christmas break to get the job done. It took time away from my dissertation, of course, but that couldn’t be helped.”

  “Then you marked him with the ID of another skeleton.”

  “I’m impressed—you have figured it all out. Yes, I replaced our specimen with the new one, and donated the older one to a high school for gifted students. Anonymously, of course.”

  “Of course.”

  “I admit that I panicked when the new skeleton went missing from the classroom, but now I realize that Dr. Kirkland had it all along. By the way, how did you find out she had it?”

  “What?” I’m sure I looked confused—Dr. Kirkland had never had Sid.

  “You must have known,” Michaels said. “I saw this suitcase in her office before you stole it.”

  “I didn’t steal it.”

  “Come on, you didn’t exactly keep it a secret. One of your McQuaid colleagues sent an e-mail about it, and I immediately recognized the ID number. Then when I looked at the photo she included, I recognized the suitcase as well. How did you know to steal it?”

  “I told you, I didn’t steal it!”

  “Then how did you get it?”

  I couldn’t think of anything reasonable to say, so I went for the unreasonable. “It followed me home.”

  He looked pained by what he clearly thought was inappropriate humor. “If I’d had any idea that Dr. Kirkland had the skeleton in there, I’d have taken the case myself when I first saw it. It would have saved me a lot of trouble.”

  “You mean like breaking into the adjunct office at McQuaid? And into my house?”

  “And the car.”

  “Which wasn’t even mine,” I said, thinking of poor Yo’s battered Corolla.

  “How was I to know? It was your parking pass. I don’t know about McQuaid, but at JTU only the person to whom a permit is assigned is supposed to use it.”

  I was momentarily bemused by his indignation for what seemed like a pretty minor offense compared to murdering two people.

  “While I was trying my best to get the skeleton back, your colleague was trying to use it to get a job. When I didn’t respond to her note, she got in touch with one of the professors here and told him about it. I only found out after the fact that it was actually here in this room. If I’d known, I would have bought it from you on the spot.”

  I didn’t bother telling him that I would never have sold Sid.

  Michaels said, “I was considerably relieved when I got the phone message that the skeleton would be left for me in the vestibule.” He cocked his head quizzically. “I’m confused by what you intended. First the obviously faked voice on the phone, then leaving the suitcase as promised, followed by sneaking back into the building. Did you mean to trap me? Blackmail me? What exactly did you expect to accomplish?”

  I’d been wondering that very thing ever since I’d woken up tied to a chair with a murderer in front of me, and my reasoning would make no more sense to him than it was currently making to me. “I was going to give the skeleton back, but I changed my mind.” Then, to distract him from the utter inanity of that statement, I asked, “What about Doctor Kirkland? You killed her, too, didn’t you?”

  “I had to,” he said almost sadly. “Once she retired, she decided to finally finish putting her data into digital form—she’d given up the attempt after her intern disappeared. She wanted to use one of our students, but knowing what she’d find, I blocked her.”

  “So she went to McQuaid.”

  “And soon enough found the mistake. She called to tell me, and as I suspected all those years ago, had no concept of the damage the revelation would do to me, her children, or her other students. Even to the university. I hope you don’t think me any less of a scientist, but human costs outweigh a minor scientific error, certainly in this case.”

  He didn’t want me to think he was a bad scientist? I’d thought that living with a skeleton had resulted in some of the strangest conversations of all time, but this one was raising the bar.

  “So you’ve got me, and you’ve got the skeleton. Now what?”

  “I’ll destroy the skeleton,” he said calmly. “Pulverization and then an acid bath should take care of it. Then there will be nothing to tie me to the boy’s death.”

  “What about me? A fresh body won’t be nearly as easy to
get rid of as a skeleton. Or are you going for another skeleton approach?” Would I wake up like Sid some day?

  But Michaels made a calming gesture. “There’s no need to be concerned. Just sit there quietly until I’m done, and then I’ll let you go.”

  “Seriously?”

  “You’re no threat to me. You have no evidence, and the police won’t listen to you—no offense, but you’re the oddball who carried a skeleton around in a suitcase. You can go about your life on the fringes of academia as long as you stay away from JTU.”

  It was all totally reasonable, given his twisted frame of logic, but I’d been deceived by too many college administrators in the past not to be able to see the signs. Besides which, I wasn’t going to let him destroy Sid.

  “You’re lying,” I said flatly. “As soon as you’re done with him, you’re just going to kill me, too. HELP! HELP! HELP!”

  “Stop that,” he said, but I could hear the edge in his voice. “Nothing is going to happen to you if you just cooperate.”

  “HELP! HELP! HELP!” I was yelling as loudly as I could, even though I really didn’t expect anybody to hear except Sid, and he wasn’t moving. For the first time, I really started to believe that my friend had gone on to . . . wherever . . . leaving his skeleton behind at last. Since there was nothing to lose, I kept on yelling.

  Finally the facade of the rational academic broke, and the desperate man showed his face. “Stop it!” He grabbed Sid’s thighbone by one end and lifted it over his head. “Shut up!”

  I refused to die with my eyes closed, which is why I saw when the bone swiveled in his hand and the end Michaels meant to bring down on my head conked him on his instead.

  He staggered, and blood welled up in his hair. He shook himself like a dog, and raised the bone again, this time gripping it with both hands. Again it came down on him and not me, and he bellowed in pain.

  The motion was unmistakably a Shinigami chop.

  “Sid?” I said.

  There was a horrendous clatter as the bones went over the edge of the table, and then Sid rose up behind Michaels. Most of him anyway—Michaels was still holding his thighbone. But Sid managed fine without it as he wrenched the bone out of Michaels’s hand and brought it down on top of his head yet again. The man’s eyes rolled up and he fell to the floor with a satisfying thunk.

  “Sid!”

  “Not Sid,” he said. “The Bone Ranger!”

  “Coccyx, Sid, is that why you waited so long to move? Were you trying to come up with a joke?”

  “A hero always shows up in the nick of time.”

  That was Sid. “Well, the Bone Ranger better stay around long enough for me to thank him.”

  50

  “What did you tell the police?” Deborah asked after expressing her disgust at Sid’s pun.

  It was several hours later, and we were back home. Deborah had actually spoken to Sid more than once, and was sitting next to him on the couch, while I was in the armchair near the armoire. Deborah and I had hot chocolate, Byron was snoozing on the rug, and I’d caught Sid patting him once. It was like a Norman Rockwell painting, if he’d ever painted the Addams Family.

  I said, “I wanted to keep it simple—the simpler the lie, the harder it is to disprove. So I told them how I’d figured Michaels was the killer, and that when I got home and found the suitcase with Sid missing, I went out to JTU to get it back.”

  “Didn’t they ask why you did something so stupid?”

  “Of course, so I admitted that it was extremely stupid. I’d hoped I could sneak in and get the skeleton without being caught. Which I almost did, after all. And I didn’t call them because they wouldn’t have believed me, and your pal Louis admitted that was true.”

  “What was he doing in North Ashfield?”

  “He was visiting another cop when the call came out, and he tagged along. He sends his best, by the way.”

  Deborah pretended not to be pleased.

  “Anyway, I just kept saying I’d been an idiot—”

  “Which was true!”

  “—and they just kept shaking their heads, but they believed me. Who lies to make herself look dumb?”

  “No comment. So Michaels supposedly caught you and—”

  “And drugged me, tied me to the chair, and was about to hit me when I yelled for help—all of which was true. The untrue part was when I said I’d wriggled partway out of the ropes and shoved him, making him slip and hit his head. Then I worked myself the rest of the way loose. Of course, we put a different bone into his hand to make the cops think he was planning to use that instead of Sid’s femur.”

  “When, in reality, Sid untied you.”

  Sid grinned, obviously delighted that she was actually calling him by name. “I thought it would look more realistic if I let her get herself out.”

  I said, “Not only did he just watch while I wriggled and squirmed, he gave ‘helpful’ advice, too.”

  “And I was watching Michaels to make sure he didn’t come to.”

  “You just wanted another excuse to hit him,” I said, and Sid didn’t deny it.

  “Then what?” Deborah asked.

  “I sent Sid out to hide in the van before I called for help. When the cops showed up, I told them that Michaels had already destroyed most of the bones by the time I got there. All that was left were a tooth and a bone from the wrist that had gotten pushed under a table.”

  Sid said, “I donated a tooth with a filling, so maybe they can compare it with Allen’s—I mean my dental records. And the wrist bone was the one that was broken and healed when I was alive, so it might show up in my medical records. Or they may be able to scrape up enough DNA to test, if they can find a sample to compare it to.”

  “I doubt they’ll bother,” I said. “They were really more interested in Dr. Kirkland’s murder. I don’t know what kind of physical evidence they’ll be able to put together for that, but I’m hoping there’s enough to charge him. Just kidnapping me should get him into enough trouble to lose his job, and I imagine university officials are going to be looking into that research data now. I bet he even loses his doctorate.”

  “Is that enough?” Deborah asked.

  “It might be all we can get.”

  “What did Michaels say while you spun this fairy tale?”

  “Not a word. He lawyered up immediately. He probably doesn’t remember everything anyway. Head blows tend to cause amnesia of the events right beforehand. Besides, if he did see Sid, he’s not going to admit it unless he’s aiming for an insanity defense.”

  “So that’s it?”

  “Well, I may have to perjure myself if it ever comes to trial, but if it keeps Sid safe, I can live with that. Otherwise we all live happily ever after.”

  “More or less,” Sid said. “I can manage the happy even if I suck at living.”

  Deborah rolled her eyes. “Geez, you two deserve each other. I’m going home now. I suppose this is a hugging occasion.”

  “If you insist,” I said, but I gave her a good firm hug anyway.

  Then she looked at Sid. “Well?”

  He jumped up so fast, he left a couple of phalanges on the floor. I tried not to tear up while they hugged—briefly—but failed. Then Deborah said in a slightly too-loud voice, “’Night, all,” and headed out the door.

  “Wow,” Sid said happily. “Wow.”

  “I know.”

  “Do you think she’ll let me come stay with her sometimes?”

  “Not in a million years.”

  “Yeah, I didn’t think so. Well, I suppose I should be getting back up to the attic.”

  “There’s no rush.”

  “Are you sure? When is Madison due home? Or is she spending the night at her friend’s house?”

  “Actually, she’s here right now.”

  “What?”

>   Madison pushed the door of the armoire open—from the inside—and stepped out.

  “Hi, Sid.”

  51

  “But—but how—” was all Sid could get out when he saw Madison.

  I said, “I called Madison before I got to the van and told her about you. I’m not sure if she believed me—”

  “Of course I did!” Madison insisted.

  “Okay, she did, but I figured seeing would really be believing, so I told her to hide in your armoire. I hope it wasn’t too stuffy in there.”

  “It could use a few more air holes.”

  “But—but—” he stammered.

  “By the way, this is for thinking I’d freak out over you.” She reached over and thumped him on the skull, then winced. It was a maneuver that required practice, but I suspected she’d have plenty of time to perfect her technique.

  I demonstrated it on him myself and said, “And that’s for not telling me why you really wanted to hide from Madison.”

  “Ow!” he lied.

  “You were afraid she was going to pull a Deborah, weren’t you?” It had taken a ludicrous amount of time for me to figure that out, but in my defense, I’d been mightily distracted.

  “Maybe—I mean—and the murder stuff—” He hung his skull in embarrassment. “If I’d had a heart when Deborah quit talking to me, it would have broken. I didn’t want to go through that again.”

  “And when I left you here? Did you think I was abandoning you?”

  “No, not really. I understood why you had to go, and why you couldn’t take me, but . . . it hurt. I didn’t want to get to know Madison and then lose her, too. Or what if she’d hated me and you had to choose between us? Of course you’d pick your daughter—you wouldn’t want to be stuck with me.”

  “Sid, get this through your thick, empty skull right now: You are not going to lose us! We’re not stuck with you—you’re stuck with us.”

  Sid couldn’t cry, not really, but he came as close as he could—he was speechless. So I took the opportunity to fill him in on who he’d been before. “Just like I said, Sid, you were always a nice guy. I mean, Allen.”