Beverly Connor - Dead Secret

“That’s the unusual part. The company wants me to work for them on a job-by-job basis-kind of open-ended contract work. This proposal is really an application for a job in the museum-an official job. Right now I work there because of my assistantship in the Geology Department at Bartram, and that won’t last forever.” He took a deep breath, and it looked to Diane like his eyes were drooping. “In the written proposal, I’ve got several ideas for exhibits for the museum.”

He stopped for a long moment and closed his eyes. Diane was about to leave when he spoke up suddenly.

“What I was thinking is that I could work part-time at the museum with enough hours to get insurance and benefits. I would continue to do the duties I do now. When I’m off working for Extreme Research, I can also collect rocks, minerals, fossils, whatever, for the museum, and make videos of some of our explorations. I think an exhibit on extremophiles, for instance, would be popular-I outlined a plan in the paper.”

“It’s an intriguing proposal.”

“Does it work for you?”

“I like it. I’ll need to think about it. When do you need to know something?”

“No deadline, but sooner rather than later, if possible.”

“I’ll give it serious thought, Mike. It’s a good idea,” she said. “But now I really should let you get some rest.”

Diane stood just as Neva came in the door bearing flowers and a bright smile. She set the flowers across from Mike’s bed and went to his bedside.

“You’re looking good. How do you feel?” She bent over to kiss him on his cheek, but he turned his head and kissed her on the lips.

“Thanks for the flowers. They are for me, aren’t they?”

“No. Your doctor’s really cute. They’re for him.” She kissed him again.

Diane was relieved to see Mike’s interest in Neva. His attraction to Diane had become more of a joke between them than anything serious, but seeing that he genuinely liked Neva put her at ease.

“How’s your arm?” Neva asked Diane.

“Sore, but that’s all. I’ll see you guys later. I’m going to the museum.”

As Diane was leaving, three young women came into the room and gathered around Mike. They looked like graduate students, she thought. She noticed that Neva started to back away, but Mike held on to her hand.

Diane met Korey coming into the museum along with a throng of visiting children and two tour buses. It was good to see the museum crowded and noisy.

“Begging you’re pardon, Dr. F.,” said Korey. “Why aren’t you at home taking it easy?”

“If I get to feeling bad, I’ll go home. There’s just so much to do in the museum and the crime lab.”

“That’s why you have all those people working for you.”

“I know, but I’ve been gone for a couple of weeks. . I get uneasy leaving things that long.”

Korey grinned and waved as they parted company at the stairwell and he went up to the conservation lab on the second floor. Diane continued on through the double doors to the private office of the museum. Several of her staff gathered around when they saw her, and expressed their concern about her and asked about Mike. Diane held out her arm to show them that it was still functional and that she would live, and she gave them a short briefing on Mike’s condition.

Her chair felt good when she finally sat down behind her desk. The first thing she did was call Kendel and Andie to her office.

“Andie, Neva is bringing by a proposal from Mike. Make a copy and give it to Kendel.” She turned toward Kendel. “I’d like your opinion on it as soon as you have a chance to evaluate it.”

Kendel nodded. “Sure. Mike always has good ideas.” After catching up with Kendel and Andie, she walked upstairs to the labs. Her arm was throbbing, but she didn’t want to take painkillers if she could get by without them.

In her osteology lab two boxes sat on a metal table. The tag on one told her it was from Lynn Webber, the Hall County medical examiner. That would be Caver Doe. Lynn had autopsied the mummified body and had her diener strip the bones of the dried flesh so that Diane could examine them. Lynn’s report said the probable cause of death was infection from a compound fracture of the tibia exacerbated by kidney damage consistent with a vertical-height fall. Lynn noted that at this point the manner of death looked like an accident, but she couldn’t be sure.

The second box was from England-the Moonhater Cave bones. On top of the box was a large envelope with photographs of the bones, the cave, and the so-called salt maiden. The salt maiden was obviously a carved stalagmite. She wondered if the part of the story about turning a woman to salt was added much later, when someone saw what looked a little like a face in the cave formation. It would be interesting to hear all the various stories about the cave and the bones.

She took the Moonhater photographs and the Caver Doe medical examiner’s report into her office and sat down behind her desk. This office, unlike her other one in the museum, was stark, almost bare of personal items. The pale off-white walls and green slate floor did little to warm up the room. She had hoped the burgundy sofa and chair and walnut desk furniture would add something to the atmosphere, but it was a room much like the watercolor of a wolf hunting in the wild she had hanging on one wall-lean and efficient-looking.

Diane picked up the phone and called the crime lab a few doors away and asked David and Jin to bring her up to speed on what they’d been doing while she was on vacation-and whether they had discovered anything at Mike’s crime scene. She didn’t look forward to that part. Her arm continued to throb.

Jin bopped into her office, pulled the burgundy stuffed chair up close to her desk and sat down. David sat down on one end of the sofa and propped his feet up on the other end. He rubbed the top of his bald head as if that would make his hair grow back.

“How come I don’t have one of these in my office?” said David.

“Because you don’t have an office,” said Diane.

“Oh, yeah, that’s right. I have a cubicle with maggots.”

“You are welcome to use my couch if you leave your maggots behind.” Diane flashed him a grin, then took a deep breath. It was time to get started. “Where are we with the cemetery stabbings? Do we know anything about the perp? Were there any more vics?” She said it as if she didn’t know the victims, as if she herself weren’t one of them.

“We’ve kept in touch with Garnett. As far as we know you and Mike are the only two,” said Jin.

Why? wondered Diane. Why the two of them? “Did you find anything at the site?”

“Nada,” said David. “Not a damn thing. If he was lurking behind one of the monuments or a tree, he wasn’t drinking, eating, smoking, chewing gum or tobacco, spitting or spewing blood-or at least he left no evidence if he was doing any of those things. We found a bracelet with a broken clasp, but it turned out to belong to one of the mourners, and Garnett cleared her. She was eighty-seven and not given to homicidal mania.”

Diane smiled briefly. “So where does that leave us?” she asked.

“As far as the crime scene, nowhere,” said David. “Neva brought us Mike’s clothes and your jacket. We’ve processed them. The fibers that we found on Mike’s clothes are from the museum van. Your coat only had fibers from your office chair, Mrs. Van Ross’s clothes and the limo.”

“So that’s no help,” mused Diane. “Do we have anything?”

“The doctor said that the weapon you and Mike were stabbed with was as sharp as a scalpel, had a double edge and was at least six inches long,” said David. “My guess is it’s an expensive knife-or rather a dagger, since it was double-edged.”