The Love Potion Murders in the Museum of Man

by Alfred Alcorn

  I nodded as though I understood, but didn’t really, except in some abstract sense of knowing that we all have an impulse to answer death with life.

  We got dressed and attended to the doleful necessities. I called the Medical School to whom Elsbeth had left her body. A couple of hours later a vehicle arrived from Flynn’s Funeral Home and bore Elsbeth away after Diantha and I, alone and then together, spent a few more moments with the still and still-beautiful form lying on the bed.

  Diantha called Win Jr. and remained some time on the phone with him. “Like talking to an imitation human being,” she told me. She hugged me again, to assure and be assured. “It’s amazing. He wanted no details, no times, or what she said, or anything else. Let me know, he said, when you’ve made arrangements for a memorial service. But Win’s never quite connected with his own species, never mind his own family.”

  For some reason we found ourselves both quite ravenous. So together, already like a long-established couple, we made ourselves an old-fashioned breakfast — bacon, eggs, toast, orange juice, and coffee. But I’m afraid it only gave us the energy for grief, at first together, talking about Elsbeth, her vitality of old, her foibles, and her knack for turning life into an occasion.

  Then alone. When I went upstairs afterward, the mystery of death persisted. Where had Elsbeth, where had life gone?

  I spent the rest of the morning making phone calls to our little network of friends. I phoned Lotte and Izzy, who were very kind. “Come to dinner tonight, you and Diantha,” Lotte insisted. I accepted for both of us.

  I called Alfie Lopes, who said he would say a prayer for Elsbeth, “though, frankly, Norman, I doubt that she really needs one. I have feeling she’s already the life of some heavenly party.”

  I called Korky and left a message. I fear for the dear boy’s reaction. He already has so much to contend with.

  I called Father O’Gould, and he said he, too, would say a prayer.

  Upstairs, in the drawer of the little desk she used for her correspondence, I found a sealed envelope addressed to me. Inside was a letter written several weeks after we had learned the terrible news of her condition.

  Norman dearest,

  I know you are sad right now (or, at least, I hope you are!), but time, I know, will heal your heart. Along with my dear children, the best part of my life has been you. I thanked God every day for the chance to spend these last few, blissful years as your wife. Perhaps it is only the courage of fatalism, but I find myself less fearful hour by hour of what lies ahead. My only worry is for you and Diantha. It would be mawkish to nudge you into each other’s arms, but I only pray that you will, in some loving way, take care of each other. I am gone, Norman dearest, but I have every faith that somehow, somewhere, I will be waiting for you.

  With love forever,

  Your adoring Elsbeth

  I wept again, and then again later at dinner, with tears and with that inner weeping of the heart, with a kind of sorrowful joy, exacerbated, no doubt, by the generous hand of Izzy, who kept filling my glass at dinnertime with a wonderful new Malbec from Argentina. Indeed, as I write this now, my head and my heart both thump painfully, and I feel the first faint yearnings for that void where I might go in search of Elsbeth.

  30

  Oh, Elsbeth, where are you? Why did you leave me again? My house is empty. My heart is empty. My soul is empty.

  Grief is never comic. But it can be grotesque. I writhe on a rack of loss and lust. The ghost of Elsbeth beckons but so does the living presence of Diantha. I have had to all but manacle myself to keep from leaving my empty bed and falling at the foot of hers, on my knees, imploring, take me, hold me, give me life again.

  But Diantha has grown distant in her own grief. She spends more time at her work now, a fixture in front of a fixture. She has promised to go to the Curatorial Ball with me, but that seems a pathetic sop to what I now crave in the core of my being. I feel like one of evolution’s bad jokes, surviving only to suffer. A poor forked animal. Forked, all right. Diantha has been gone nearly every night and does not return until the wee hours. On what debaucheries, I can scarcely, in my fevered state, imagine. I suspect she’s going out with that mocking fraud of a restaurant owner. Perhaps it’s a reaction to her mother’s death. I am powerless to do anything, to help her in the way she needs help.

  I’ll probably excise this outburst later on, but I needed to get that off my chest. A reluctant Calvinist, I am of the old school, neither a Papist who can bare his soul to some sympathetic priest nor a dupe of the therapeutic racket that exacerbates, while purporting to cure, the pathologies of self-absorption. And I have, despite my many good friends, none I want to bother with my troubles. And self-pity is a poor form of self-reliance.

  I’ve found work a solace. The very furniture seems welcoming. The contents of my in-basket have proved a balm where I can lose myself in detail, the pickier the better. And Doreen is being extra sweet to me. Not to mention that I am knee-deep in a murder investigation.

  Indeed, I arrived to find an e-mail from Nicole Stone-Lee. She reports that it’s clear from notes and memoranda deftly hidden on Professor Ossmann’s hard drive that he was working on some kind of aphrodisiac. It seems likely that in reviewing research done by Professor Tromstromer and Dr. Woodley, he stumbled across a combination of compounds that had “a profound effect” on the sexual activity of various small mammals. She noted that there seemed a lot more to plow through and would report back as soon as she had anything else of interest.

  I forwarded the e-mail along to Lieutenant Tracy, made a hard copy for myself, and then erased it. I left word with Ms. Stone-Lee thanking her and asking her to refrain from e-mail in the future as I was not all that sure how secure it was. I’m wondering whether it would be helpful if the lieutenant and I paid a visit to Professor Tromstromer. I can think of several insinuations to lay before the big gnome. How much did he know about Ossmann’s use of his research? Were Tromstromer and Woodley working on something that Ossmann stole? Does Tromstromer stand to gain with the removal of Ossmann and Woodley from the scene?

  And speaking of Mr. Bain, I had a fruitful conversation with Professor Brauer early this afternoon. I had left word at his office to drop in when he got a chance. He came by just after lunch. Our relations have always been cool, and we didn’t pretend any great cordiality beyond a business-like handshake. We indulged a minute or two of small talk before we got to the point.

  “I understand,” I said, “that a production company making a film of your book would like to use the premises of the MOM for background shots.”

  “That’s true,” he said. “I believe Malachy Morin is taking care of details.”

  “Mr. Morin isn’t taking care of anything,” I said, “despite what he might be telling you to the contrary.”

  Professor Brauer wrinkled his smooth pate in frowning. “He tells me it’s a done deal.”

  “It is not a done deal, Professor Brauer. The university in general and Mr. Morin in particular have no say whatsoever regarding the premises of this museum. But it doesn’t surprise me that he has been less than straightforward with you. He has always had a tendency to tell people what he wants them to hear regardless of the truth.”

  “Did you ask me in here just to tell me that?” His expression was decidedly baleful.

  “If I had, you could take it as an act of courtesy.”

  His frown turned to puzzlement. “Then what did you ask me here for?”

  I cleared my throat. “I’m willing to consider some very restricted use of the museum for the film in return for some information.”

  “What information?”

  “I want to know who, in the Long Pig Society, funded Corny’s trip to the headwaters of the Rio Sangre.”

  He did something of a double take. He had the expression of one suddenly thinking quite deeply about something. “Well, that’s privileged information.”

  “I understand. And these are privileged premises. And as you know, I hav
e very good relations with the Seaboard Police Department. I’m quite sure I could arrange to keep your crews from getting anywhere near the place.”

  He sighed. “If I do tell you, it’s strictly, strictly confidential.”

  “Of course.”

  “I want to be able to use the Skull Collection.”

  “Okay.”

  “And the Oceanic exhibit.”

  “With restrictions.”

  “Understood. And outside shots, doors and one or two window shots.”

  “Within a period of no more than …”

  “Say three weeks.”

  “Two and a half.”

  “Done. You’ll get a call from Mr. Castor.”

  “Yes. I’ve spoken to him before. And now …”

  “Yes. You know this is in absolute confidence.”

  “Understood.”

  “For your protection as much as anyone else’s.”

  “I understand.”

  “Most of the funding came from Freddie Bain.”

  “Freddie Bain,” I said. “The restaurateur?”

  “Yes. Among other things, the proprietor of the Green Sherpa.”

  “Yes. Of course. He makes quite an impression. When did he join the club?”

  “Not long after the trial. Of the Snyders brothers. He’s quite a man about town, if you didn’t know.”

  “I didn’t. Are his interests in matters anthropophagic purely scholarly?”

  “I’m not sure. He’s the kind of person who talks but doesn’t say much.”

  We left it at that. I felt I had learned something valuable, but I wasn’t sure what. I also remained under the distinct impression that Raul Brauer was holding something back. What else did he know about Freddie Bain and what the man was up to? How did he get the kind of throwaway wealth to fund an expedition like Corny’s? Not from a restaurant, surely. What, if anything, were his connections with Ms. Celeste Tangent? Why was the FBI interested in him?

  Not that it matters. Not that anything matters. I continue this weird, bifurcated existence. I fill my life with this stuff only to find it empty at the end of the day. I suppose the only thing to do in these situations is to invent another life for yourself. But I don’t want another life. I want what I had and what now exists only in the sunshine of memory.

  But what memories! Into little more than two years we packed a lifetime. We had the most marvelous little wedding at the Miranda Hotel overflowing with friends and champagne. We honeymooned for three glorious weeks in France. (Izzy has remarked that people in relationships go to therapists; people in love go to Paris.) Elsbeth, I have come to realize, was like a magnifying lens, shaping, brightening, and intensifying my life.

  No more. No more! It is like the sad old days again. I think I’ll make my way over to the Club. There are people there. Someone might ask me to join their table. If nothing else, the waiters talk to you, they smile, they bring you things.

  31

  Diantha, dressed alluringly in slacks, a clinging jersey, and a tailored jacket, came in to see me at the museum this afternoon. My delight at her appearance vanished when I learned she wanted to borrow the car to drive out to Eigermount, Mr. Bain’s country place. I was perfectly willing to let her take the old thing, but then she had another idea. “Why don’t you drive me out instead? That way you can see Freddie in his natural habitat. It’s surreal, to use one of your words.”

  When I declined, she persisted. “Oh, come on, Dad, you need an outing.”

  I couldn’t really refuse, even though I was busy with year-end budget matters. Dealing with surpluses, I’ve found, is quite as tiresome as dealing with deficits. So we took a cab home, where Diantha packed an overnight bag.

  We then drove northwest out of Seaboard to the Balerville Road and the picturesque little town of Tinkerton. Where the road forks just beyond a bridge that crosses Alkins Creek, we went right. The route climbed for several miles through gloomy stands of pine and hemlock and brought us eventually to a turnoff that would have been easy to miss. We drove into it and made our way along a narrow paved drive.

  Well, Diantha was right about one thing. Seemingly out of nowhere, like a castle conjured in a tale about sinister fairies, rose a great round structure of cut granite. Nestled in a rug of evergreens, it towered at least four stories against the side of a steep declivity. The windows, narrow vertical slits with Gothic arches, blinked at the visitor uncomprehendingly, bringing to mind that line in Yeats about the pitiless sphinx.

  A baleful kind of folly, I thought immediately, but let that impression seem, in my outward expression, a kind of awe. “A Martello tower writ large in the woods,” I said, as though giving it some kind of architectural context might blunt the sense of foreboding I felt wafting from it.

  We pulled up across from the main entrance — two massive oak doors with studded hinges set in a portal with pointed arch and curved surrounds of weathered stone. I wanted to drop Diantha and scuttle back to the office. I wanted really to keep Diantha in the car with me and drive away. But as in a dream bordering on nightmare, the oak doors opened, and Freddie Bain, in loose trousers and one of those Russian tunics cinched around the waist, came forth.

  The man positively clung to me. He wouldn’t hear of my returning without coming in for a cup of tea or a glass of wine.

  I parked the car, and we crossed over a virtual drawbridge spanning a dry moat before entering through the great doorway. Such places are not really my cup of tea, but I admit the basic design had a vulgar grandeur to it. Indeed, it reminded me of the museum, only circular, the central core an atrium around which rooms led off from balustraded balconies. Sconces in the form of torches alternated with large oils on the walls, which, made of marble or synthetic marble, gave off a dark shine. An octagonal skylight opened dimly at the top.

  Diantha, apparently knowing the place well, went into a kitchen off the main floor to see about tea. Mr. Bain showed me around. He was particularly proud of the immense fieldstone fireplace that, situated on the side of the building against the mountain, rose up through three stories, narrowing as it went before disappearing into the wall. Somewhat prosaically, the heads of mounted game — mostly deer — looked down with glass-eyed serenity from over the fireplace.

  “I had a moose up there, but he was too … how do you say …”

  “Lugubrious,” I suggested.

  Then, as though on the same subject, he said, “Permit me to express my condolences on the death of your wife, Diantha’s mother.”

  I nodded and murmured my thanks, feeling oddly compromised. “This is quite a space,” I said, sweeping my arm around the area. There were sofas and several armchairs upholstered in black leather on a raised stone area before the fireplace and a dining table with chairs not far from the kitchen door off to one side. Otherwise, the remainder of the ground floor, a vast expanse of polished hardwood that gleamed, remained bare. “What do you use all this for?” I asked.

  “Human sacrifice,” he said, and laughed, making a sound devoid of humor. With a sharp glance, he went on. “I hear you have a very interesting tape from the late Professor Chard.” We had stepped up onto the raised area, and he was indicating an armchair to one side of the fireplace.

  I tried to dissemble any double take. “Diantha told you?”

  “She says you call it quite … sensational.”

  “That’s one way of putting it.”

  “Strange that you didn’t mention it to me when I first asked you.”

  “The widow wants it kept private.”

  “Ah, yes, the widow.” Mr. Bain pursed his wide mouth. His frown was nearly confiding. “I don’t know quite how to put this delicately, Mr. de Ratour, but I believe that tape is my property.” He turned and scarcely had to stoop to enter the fireplace, where he tended to the lighting of paper, kindling, and logs.

  “On what grounds do you base that claim?” I asked as evenly as I could.

  “As you know from Professor Brauer, the Green Sherpa funded m
ost of that expedition.”

  “He told you he told me?”

  “He did.”

  “In that case Professor Chard should have sent the tape to you. Yet he very clearly sent it to the museum.”

  “We had an understanding.”

  “In writing?”

  “We are men of the world, Mr. de Ratour. We are gentlemen. We don’t need lawyers to keep ourselves honest.”

  “Perhaps, but I’m afraid you’ll have to discuss this with the museum counsel. I have given the family my word as a man of the world that the tape will be kept sealed in a vault for the next fifty years.”

  The fire now roaring dramatically behind him, as though he had stepped, a blond Lucifer, from the flames, Freddie Bain smiled grimly. “We will discuss this matter at a more appropriate time … Norman. You don’t mind if I call you Norman?”

  “Not at all.” But I did in a way. The inner cringing that people like Mr. Bain provoke in me had reached my throat. I glanced around. To change the subject, I said, “You built this yourself?”

  “I did. With an architect indulgent of my whims.”

  “Which are also many, I presume.”

  “They are.”

  “Your restaurant and gift shop must do well to be able to afford this kind of whimsy. Not to mention …” I left it hanging.

  “Whimsy?” he repeated, perhaps offended. “Oh, I have many other … resources.” He moved out over the coffee table across from me. “Would you like to try a cigar? From Havana.”

  “No, thanks. I never learned to enjoy tobacco.”

  “One of life’s little pleasures.” He toyed with a cigar but didn’t light it.

  “You seem to have a penchant for things Russian.”

  “I have a penchant for many things.” He looked in the direction of Diantha, who was emerging from the kitchen in the company of a little old lady in head scarf and frumpy clothes, a veritable babushka. “Among them beautiful women.”

  “I would think Diantha worthy of more than a penchant.”