Aaron Elkins: Icy Clutches

"Wrong,” Pratt said.

Owen faltered.

"You people ought to get your facts straight,” Pratt said, looking from Owen, to Minor, to John. “James Pratt's been dead for thirty years. My name's Gerald Pratt. Gerald Harley Pratt."

John waited for what seemed like a long time before answering.

"No,” he said, “I don't think so."

They had finally gotten out to sit on the end of the pier; to lie, rather, looking up at the thin, luminous cloud sheet, Julie directly on the planks, Gideon with his head propped on her belly.

"I understand,” Julie said lazily, her fingers in his hair, “about deltoid tuberosities and waitresses. I understand that you and Worriner misidentified that humerus as male when it was actually Jocelyn's. What I don't understand is how you get from there to Pratt's being guilty."

Gideon covered a relaxed yawn with his hand. The effects of the aspirin were well along and, even with the cloud layer, enough sunlight was getting through to put a comfortable glow on his forehead. “Well, I just started wondering if it was simply a matter of chance that we never found any of James Pratt's bones-or if maybe he hadn't been killed after all."

"Hey-” Julie said.

"Which started me thinking about Gerald Pratt. Wasn't it conceivable-barely-that Gerald Pratt wasn't Gerald Pratt?"

"Hey-"

"That he was really James Pratt? After thirty years, with his hair thinning, and his nose broken, and a mustache, who was going to recognize him? He was claiming to be James's brother, after all, so it'd be perfectly natural for them to look a lot alike."

"Hey, wait a minute!” She sat up. His head, so tenderly looked after a few minutes ago, bounced from her abdomen to her lap. “That's my theory."

"Your theory?” Squinting against the bright gray sky, he peered innocently up at her face. “What do you mean, your theory? You thought it was Shirley."

"I know, but you just took my theory and-and applied it to Gerald. I was the one who thought it was funny that we only had bones from two people. I was the one who-"

Laughing, he reached up to grab one of her gesticulating hands. “Of course it's your theory, Julie. I realized you were on to something the minute you brought it up. It just needed-"

"You did not. You told me it wouldn't fly, and then you changed the subject. To my infraclavicular fossae."

"Well, who could blame me for that? But on sober reflection I came around. You had it figured out long ago. You just had the wrong person.” He smiled. “One of those little details."

"Well, I was sure doing better than anyone else,” she said spiritedly. “In case you forget, I was also the one who pointed out-to universal derision-that Tremaine didn't actually see James Pratt killed, and for all we knew he was still alive. At which point I was sneeringly encouraged to leave it to the pros. Or am I remembering it wrong?"

"No,” Gideon said ruefully, “you're remembering right. Had we but known."

There was a thin, fluttery buzzing in the southeast. They looked up to see a pontooned airplane dropping out of the cloud sheet over Icy Strait and making for Bartlett Cove. It looked like the same cheerful blue-and-white Cessna that had brought Dr. Wu and taken away Tremaine's body. This time it had come for Pratt, who was going to be turned over to the state for prosecution.

"Anyway,” Gideon went on, as she settled back on her elbows, “I realized that if this guy really was James Pratt, it gave him a reason for getting rid of the femur. He didn't know I'd already sexed it, and he didn't want me to find out it was Jocelyn's."

"Why not? If-wait a minute, how could he possibly know it was female?” She cocked her head at him. “As I recall, you were raising the same objection when I was suggesting this, all of two hours ago."

"Yeah, but I forgot about one thing: I pretty much told him myself. When I met with Tremaine's group last Tuesday I told them the right femur they'd brought back from Tirku was male. Pratt knew it had to be Fisk's, because it damn sure couldn't have been his. Now we come up with another right femur. He'd know right away-and only he would know-that it was Jocelyn's, because who else was there?"

"Okay, I see that. Now go back for a minute. Why should he care whether you found out it was Jocelyn's? I mean, nobody aside from me ever doubted that she was dead in the first place. What was he worried about?"

"I guess he was worried about us putting it all together, which is just what we did. See, before this, only one person had been positively ID'd, and that was Steven Fisk. But now, with a female femur in hand, we'd have to know we had Jocelyn Yount too. That leaves only one person not positively dead: James Pratt. And that made him nervous. He didn't want people thinking too much about that."

"So he gets rid of the femur before it's sexed,” Julie murmured, “or, rather, before he thinks it's been sexed.” She lay slowly back down, her fingers laced behind her neck, Gideon resettled his head on her belly.

"Not only sexed,” he said. “At the press conference Arthur very helpfully announced to the world that he was giving me a scale that would allow me to determine which bones belonged to whom, which Pratt couldn't have been too happy with, because none of them were going to belong to James."

"Obviously."

"Obviously to Pratt. He didn't want it to be so obvious to John."

"Now that I think about it,” Julie said, “Arthur also told everyone where the bones were-at the contact station."

"The dark, isolated, unguarded contact station, yes. Pratt really wasn't taking much of a risk going there, you know. It was just luck that I came back when he was there."

"Yes, you've always been lucky that way,” she said dryly. The little airplane was already on its way back out. They both sat, arms around their knees, and watched it skim over the water, pick up speed, and finally lift off, beelike, to quickly disappear against the flat sky. Nearer, only a few yards away, a line of small, stubby-winged birds shot over the surface of the water like so many black bullets in pursuit of it.

"Pigeon guillemots,” Julie said absently. “Gideon, why did Pratt have to kill Tremaine? Why did he steal the manuscript? What difference did it make if-"

Gideon held up his hands. “Hey, lady, all I know is bones. Ask John about the rest."

"And-now wait a minute, how did he get off the glacier?” She turned to him, eyes narrowed. “When it was my theory we were talking about, you said it was impossible. And where has he been all these years? And-"

"Bones,” Gideon said. “That's all I know."

John prodded the gelatinous cube tentatively with his fork. “What is it?"

"Tofu lasagna,” his wife said patiently.

"Why is it green?"

"It has spinach in it."

He continued his unenthusiastic probing. “Do I like it?"

"You love it. Trust me."

"I don't know, Marti…"

"Mellow out, babe,” said Marti, who was sometimes given to this kind of locution. “Give it a try."

John looked skeptically at her, used his fork to cut an almost invisible wedge, and put it cautiously in his mouth.

"Not bad,” he admitted.

"Of course not,” she said, pleased. Marti Lau was a loose-limbed Chicagoan (nee Marsha Goldenberg), good-looking in a long, big-jointed way; candid, flip, and perpetually happy. “You know,” she said to Gideon and Julie, “he only thinks he's a junk-food freak. Actually, he likes anything once he tries it. The guy's a human garbage disposal."

"I wouldn't argue with that,” Gideon said.

They were in the Laus’ Queen Anne Hill apartment, the first time they had gotten together since Glacier Bay, ten days earlier.