“I don’t know what you’re talkin’ about, Tal.”
I stood. I didn’t get why he was shining me on. “This isn’t funny, Rob.”
He slid his teacup onto his desk before he shrugged on his jacket. “Ya got that right, at least.”
Was I losing my mind? “C’mon.” I dragged him back to Didi’s bloodstained office. Fewer people. The spatter guys, one of whom was perched on a ladder, were still taking measurements, but Didi’s body was gone. I’d soon be talking to her family. Except . . .
I shook my head. I couldn’t quite see where she’d been resting. I moved forward, slipped under the tape to get a better look.
“So?” Kranak said.
I stared to the right and to the left of markers that indicated where her body had rested. I saw pools of blood congealing on the linoleum, but no words. None.
“This is creepy, Rob. Didi wrote the word ‘bloodfet.’ ” I pointed to where she’d inscribed the word. “Right there. I saw it.”
“Hey, Bruce,” Kranak said to the guy on the ladder. “You find any words? Anything like that?”
Bruce shook his head. “Nope, Sarge.
“What about under that pool of blood,” I said. “Maybe it oozed over the word or something.”
The blood spatter specialist peered down at us, shaking his head. “When we get there, I’ll look again. But I doubt it.”
“Well, don’t doubt it. Just find it.” I turned and left.
Kranak said something I couldn’t hear, then followed me. “Bruce’s the best blood guy I know, Tally.”
I stood in the hall, my body flushed with anger and a touch of fear. “Whatever. What about the crime scene photos?”
“They show nothing like you describe.”
“I know what I saw.”
“Bruce’ll check. Promise.”
“Sure. He sounded awfully certain he’d find nothing.” I walked through the keyed door and into the lobby, headed for MGAP. Kranak stopped me with a hand on my arm.
“Hold up, Tally,” he said.
I faced him. “Something hinkey’s going on. I know what I saw. I don’t much enjoy being treated like a three-year-old. Or doubted. Or questioned.”
He snorted. “You’re not. But the word may be gone, Tally. You, of all people, know how the mind imagines stuff.”
“I didn’t imagine this.” I got a pen and a pad at the front desk and wrote out the word I’d seen scrawled in Didi’s blood. “Here. She wrote it. I don’t know why it’s gone, but it matters. Understand.”
“Sure do. But you know as well as I that I can’t do anything without evidence.”
“Just keep an eye out, okay?”
“Promise.” He looked at the paper. “Promise.”
I kissed his cheek, nodded, and looked down. The toe that peeked from my open-toed pumps was stained with Didi’s blood. “Oh, hell.”
It was hard handing off Didi’s sister and brother-in-law to Gert and her team. But I didn’t work there anymore.
Still, I ached for them, for Didi, for her friends and family at OCME. She was this wild-haired wonder, and she didn’t deserve to die that way. Not at all.
Right after the viewing and ID, I slipped back inside the far reaches of OCME to say my farewells. They mattered, at least to me they did, those good-byes. Funerals and such were different. The remains were embalmed to waxy perfection and often dressed and dolled up in clothes and makeup they’d never have worn in life. I remembered seeing a good friend’s nails painted bright red in her casket, her newly manicured hand clutching the Bible, King James Version. She never would have used red on her nails. Nor would she have allowed a Bible in the casket with her.
The remains we all saw at funeral homes were really about the bereaved, not the deceased. Or so I believed.
So I made it a point with my cases and with my friends to say my good-byes privately.
I stood in the large refrigeration room, a place I knew intimately. Didi lay on a steel gurney, just like all the others. She was encased in a white plastic bag, and, I guessed out of respect, someone had covered her with a sheet. She hadn’t been autopsied yet. I didn’t envy the ME that one. Cutting one of your own was hard.
I sighed and rested my hand on her forehead. I stroked her wiry gray hair that was still matted with blood. “You were crazy, Dee. Just nuts.” I ran my hand up and down her arm, as if that soothing motion might help her. One truth—it helped me to deal.
She was frozen in time, just like one of her reconstructions. I slipped two fingers over the bruise that had bloomed on her cheek. “Who hit you? Why? Who did this to you?”
The mole she’d always talked about removing remained beside her left eye. It was sexy, but Didi was not.
Had the Zuni governor come back? Or maybe the Geographic people? Someone else—who?—wanted to possess that which he shouldn’t. I saw Didi fighting him and . . .
I smoothed my hand across her thin forearm. “Oh, yes, Dee. We’ll find out. That we will. Never fear. We’ll make him pay.”
“What do you mean there are no photos of Didi’s reconstruction and the skull?” I stood, arms folded, and stared at Addy Morgridge until I was sure she’d relent and tell me she was mistaken.
“Sorry, Tal. No.” She waved a hand. “Please sit! You’re obviously distraught and dealing with that terrible sight of Didi’s corpse.”
“No, I’m not!” I said.
“Sit.”
The leather squeaked as my tush landed hard. “I am not distraught. Much. Not too much.” Suddenly I was fighting tears. “Why no photos?”
“The governor. His request, our acquiescence. We had to respect his wishes, Tally.”
“Ah, jeez.”
Addy lit a cigarette. Boy, didn’t I wish . . . “She was something, that one,” Addy said.
I nodded, chuckled. “A character. One of a kind.”
“All that talent, gone.” She inhaled deeply and allowed the smoke to dribble out her nose. “And here. How dare they.”
“Have you called the governor? Told him about—”
Addy nodded.
“Mind if I talk to him?”
She stubbed out the cigarette. “Yes.”
“Why?”
She lit another one. “Sergeant Kranak said you’d be trouble.”
A prick of pain. I was sure Kranak hadn’t said it like that, but . . . funny how those words hurt. I guessed he’d moved on, just like me.
“Sergeant Kranak’s right,” I said. “But I don’t work here anymore, which sure looks like a good thing.” I contemplated telling her about the two snaps I had of the reconstruction, the ones I’d taken with my phone and only pretended to erase. Later. I’d tell her later, after I’d talked to the Zuni governor.
Outside Addy’s office, I made sure I e-mailed the photos home. If they were the only pictures of Didi’s reconstruction, they were priceless.
Once I got home, I brought up my e-mail. There were the two images, one a full face and one in profile. I wished I’d ignored Didi and taken more. Didi. I’d caught her on camera, too. Just her back, bent over some hunk of un-formed clay, her bony hands and slightly hunched shoulders a portrait in intensity.
She was so damned good at what she did. So devoted to her work, to the past she wished to bring back to life.
The photo said it all. Life, there now, then—poof. Gone. In a blink. I looked at her image again. She was alive there, intensely so. And now . . .
I could not see the value in stealing a skull, a bunch of potsherds and a clay bust. I couldn’t see the value at all.
I failed to find the Zuni governor that night, at least in the flesh, so I Googled him instead. He appeared to be a complex man who aimed to blend old and new Zuni ways into one, much to the frustration of certain young Zuni firebrands.
He carved Katsinas for a living and also for the tribe. I flipped through pages of pictured Katsinas, once called Kachinas. According to Barton Wright, who wrote extensively about American Indian art, Katsin
as represented the spirit essence of everything in the real world. White noted that the idea of the Katsina Cult is that all things in the world have two forms, the visible object and its spirit counterpart, a dualism that balances mass and energy. Katsina dolls are never toys—I’d known that—not even when given to Hopi or Zuni children. These spirit “dolls” can assist with prayers. They’re carved from cottonwood root, which had become increasingly scarce, and painted to represent the real Katsinas or spirit beings.
I’d seen Katsinas many times on my visits out West. Governor Bowannie was obviously a master carver. His pieces were sought after by many high-end collectors. They were worth thousands, and I knew the traders and retailers profited mightily. I had no idea what the governor himself received.
I continued searching, in part out of fascination, but found no way to communicate with the governor or learn where he was staying in Boston. Someone at OCME had to know. After all, he was now part of Didi’s homicide investigation.
Since she was killed at OCME, she would fall under state, rather than Boston, jurisdiction. I knew a couple of detectives I could call. I’d rather leave Kranak out of it, if possible. I’d wait a couple of days, let things settle, then get the governor’s location.
I tapped a few keys and looked up the Steamship Authority’s ferry schedule on my computer. Plenty of ferries were running to the Vineyard. No more phone calls. I’d hop a ferry tomorrow and visit Delphine’s shop myself.
CHAPTER FIVE
Indian Summer—there was nothing like it. The drive to Woods Hole was spectacular, and Penny and I made the 10:45 A.M. ferry to Vineyard Haven with ease. On this late-September Wednesday, with the sky a glossy blue and the air crisp with promise, I could hardly imagine murder staining someone’s life.
I stood on the top open-air deck and wrapped my hands around the rail. Gulls wheeled and cawed and dived for tidbits tossed by passengers. It was loud—the crossing always was—with the sea and surf and wind in my ears. I tightened my sweater from the sea-chill.
How I loved the ocean! The sea brought memories of my dad and Veda and the possibility of the infinite.
I laughed and ruffled Penny’s fur. Hank always said he loved when I “waxed poetic,” as he called it. I usually found my yammerings, in retrospect, pretty silly.
We debarked at Vineyard Haven, and I immediately relaxed. I was crazy about the Vineyard, especially when the summer people had fled. Then you could feel her bones. She was old and no matter how much they flossed her up, her earthiness reappeared each winter. She was a working island, where life was hard and could be cheap. In the old days, folks struggled to survive. I admired their determination and grit.
As I stepped on the dock, I spotted a tall, hearty-looking man with a wispy beard and a seaman’s grin. Dan Black and his wife Belle were dear old friends. She’d grown up on the Vineyard, but of the two, he looked like the stereotypical Old Salt. In truth, he was a cowboy from Durango, Colorado, who’d come east to college on a fencing scholarship.
“Dan!” I waved and was suddenly engulfed in the kind of wonderful bear hug where you can hardly breathe. I laughed and returned it. Penny barked.
“Where’s your lovely bride?” I asked upon my release.
“Putting together some bluefish pate for lunch before you head off on your big adventure. Delish!” He caught my eyes and the smiling glint faded to sadness. “I’m sorry about Doc Cravitz. She was a good one.”
“Yes,” I said. “She was.”
He smoothed a hand over my tangly hair. “Are you all right?”
Was I? “I guess. It was tough, finding Didi that way. I’ve sort of been possessed by this whole thing, y’know?”
“I hope not too much. Sounds like this was a real nasty one.”
“Yes.”
“I’ll take my murders fictional, as you know.” He hefted my backpack and led us through the crowd.
“I want to drive by Delphine’s shop, okay?” I said as I slid into the passenger seat of Dan’s red Jeep Cherokee. The truck backfired, seemingly in protest, and his hands tightened on the steering wheel.
He snapped me a nod, then took a right, and then another onto Main Street. I wished we had time to stop in at Bunch of Grapes books and the Sioux Eagle jewelry store, two of my favorite shops in all the world.
“Next time we’ll stop and shop,” said mind-reader Dan.
“Oh, you know me too well.”
He grinned and tipped his cap. “Which is pretty nice, isn’t it?”
“To have friends like that?” I said. “Yes, it is.”
We continued down Main, through the shopping area where I’d once seen President Clinton and Chelsea leave their motorcade and shop for books. At the time, I’d talked to Buddy, the president’s chocolate Lab. He was a handful for the Secret Service agent who held his leash—a wild and sweet dog, and I was saddened when I heard about his untimely death.
Dan turned left, then made a right onto North William Street.
“Pretty,” I said. “I love this drive. One of these days I’ll make it out to West Chop.”
He chuckled. I never seemed to get beyond Delphine’s shop and her American Indian artifacts. We were only minutes from her shop and home, and I felt the usual anticipation.
“Belle and I are thrilled to have you here, so don’t take this wrong, but you shouldn’t . . . I’m not good with you going to that shop.”
“Why? We’ve always had a kick going there before. You’re the one who introduced me to Delphine.”
He nodded. “To plenty of people. She’s a good woman. I wanted her to thrive, but . . .” His fingers danced on the steering wheel.
“You don’t have to tell me, Dan.”
He nodded. “I know. Delphine had an affair with my brother-in-law. More than twenty years ago.”
“But he was married to—”
“Belle’s sister? Yes.” He lowered his window, and the air slapped our faces. Penny scooched closer so her nose poked out the window.
“Why are you telling me this now?”
He nodded. “It matters. What with the doc’s death and all. Belle’s sister killed herself over it.”
I hadn’t known. Sad stuff, and all too typical of human relationships and frailties. I was glad I hadn’t told him about the reconstruction, just that I wanted to visit Delphine’s shop.
“You’re up to something,” Dan said. “Oh, you haven’t told me what, but I feel it, my dear. Of course I do. You plan to ferret stuff out.” He almost smiled. “You’re the best ferreter I know.”
“Gee, thanks. I would never—”
“I can’t have Belle, well, upset,” he said. “You know? Can’t have it.”
He made the left onto Old Lighthouse Road, and we were soon bumping and thumping down the potholed dirt surface.
About half a mile up the road, I spotted Delphine’s large nineteenth-century Greek Revival home that also served as her shop. “Park under this tree, please?” I said. “Right here. I’ll walk the rest of the way.”
He looked at me, straight on, and my jocular friend had vanished beneath a fierce and disturbing exterior, one that held a silent threat.
Penny growled.
“Dan?”
His barrel chest bellowed, then sank. He rested his chin on his chest. “I never should have told. Jerry was a fool. Delphine would never breathe a word of it. But you, Tal . . . that’s why I told you. That’s all. Delphine has that death on her head.”
I didn’t like the sound of that one bit.
Penny stayed by my side as we set off down the road, hugging the tree line. I didn’t mind the walk. It felt good to be outside, and I would call Dan when I was ready to go back to his place. The side of the road was sandy, another thing I loved about the ocean, and sand slipped inside my sandals. A soft breeze lifted my tentacled curls, brushing one across my face. I pushed it away. A car rounded the curve, and I stepped into the shadow of an overhanging oak.
Once the car passed, I walked on and
soon came to the end of a white picket fence flooded with long-past rosa rugosas. I peeked out from a large flame bush beginning to turn.
A woman stood in the stoop of the front door shop entrance. She wore a T-shirt beneath her billowing lavender jumper, granola-style. I couldn’t see her face, but she bore the stance of someone young and bristling with life. Long, tiny braids flowed from her bandana-bound hair. The braids were white-blond and dangled to the small of her back, while wispy curls danced around her face. They swayed as she talked on her cell phone, and I felt her smile even this far away. Her left hand waved and dipped, and her braids bobbed like bouncing puppets when she nodded.
I’d bet that was Zoe. The shop was obviously open, but not busy. A perfect time to chat, take a look around and get a sense of what was going on.
I took a step forward. In that moment, a pink Cadillac convertible rounded the corner and beeped. The thing was a boat, circa 1960, complete with fins. My, my. Damn, someone was primed for shopping and . . .
“Tally!” hollered the woman in the driver’s seat.
The woman wore a pink scarf wrapped tight around her head and neck, a la Kim Novak in Vertigo. Except, this woman I knew and . . .
Penny began barking like crazy, full of excitement and joy. Who the hell? “Carmen? What are you doing here?”
The Cadillac halted in a screech and billows of dust.
“Geesh, Carm,” I said. “I’m trying to be secretive here!”
My best friend’s face fell. “Crap. Sorry. Belle told me you were on the Island, going to Delphine’s shop, so I came looking for you.”
I looked back at the shop. The girl on the phone had disappeared, presumably inside. Ah, well. So much for stealth.
“This is obviously not a coincidence, dear friend,” I said. “What are you up to?”
“Me? Nothing. Coincidences can happen. I was vacationing here. Down from Maine.”
“Where’s the family?” I snagged Carmen’s arm as she moved forward. “And what’s with the pink car and scarf?”
She gave me one of her goofy looks, a la Lucy. “The restaurant’s been doing, um, not so hot. We needed something else. Bob, well, he’s, let’s just say it’s up to me. I’m not entirely here to vacation. Nope, I’m also here as Ms. Organic Mary Kay.”
The Bone Man Page 5
