Beverly Connor - One Grave Too Many

She pulled a pearl gray pantsuit from her closet, slipped it on and grabbed a nutrition bar for breakfast on the way out. The sun was shining. It looked like it was going to be a clear day. A surprise, because rain was in the forecast. She headed for the hospital, praying that Frank was improved.

Diane slowed down as she approached the front desk. Fear was creeping inside her, fueled by the vision of asking to see Frank and being told he was gone-dead. This is just silly . She marched up to the desk and asked if she could visit Frank Duncan. As she asked, she saw Linc and Henry in the waiting room and walked over to them.

“He’s stable,” Linc said before she asked.

“That’s a relief.”

“You look better too.”

“Got a little adrenaline rush last night.” She grinned and told them about Mrs. Odell and the draperies. The two of them laughed with her, and it felt good.

“Thanks for your help last night,” said Diane.

“I may be mistaken,” said Linc, “but I’d be willing to bet he’s an avid hockey player.”

“I’m going to call Frank’s partner today and ask him to put out a missing persons query. Maybe we’ll come up with something.”

“Would you like to see Frank?” asked Linc.

“Yes. Yes, I would.”

Linc led her to the ICU and stayed outside the door as she went in. Frank was awake. He looked so pale. She took his hand.

“Hey,” he whispered. “Thinking about you.”

“Good, I hope.”

“Always.”

“Linc’s been a big help. Did he tell you?”

Frank nodded. “Interesting.”

“I met your partner. I thought I’d ask him to put out an inquiry about our guy.”

“He’ll do that.”

“I won’t stay long. I just needed to see how you are. Getting an infection wasn’t a good idea.”

“No. Seemed like it at the time, though.” He gave her a wan smile.

Diane squeezed his hand. “I saw Star yesterday. She’s OK. Her lawyer’s trying to get her bail. I said she could stay with me.”

Frank held tightly onto her hand. “Thanks.”

“Get better.” She kissed his cheek. “There’s something I need you to do for me when you get well.”

He attempted a grin. “And what would that be?”

Diane leaned over and whispered in his ear. “Teach me how to box.”

“How’s he doing, really?” she asked Linc on the way out of the ICU.

“Holding his own. Frank was never one to overuse antibiotics, so that’s in his favor. He usually responds well to them. That’s always a concern-finding an antibiotic that will work.”

“Has there been any. . other trouble?”

“No. Henry and I are always here. Most of his visitors don’t go into ICU. They’re content to get information from us or the desk.”

“Perhaps I’m just being paranoid.”

He smiled. “Maybe, but if you’re not, it’s good to be prepared. Henry and I don’t mind.”

When Diane left the hospital, she went to the jail. She didn’t expect to be able to see Star, but thought perhaps the person on duty would tell Star she had been there checking on her. She was surprised when they put her in the same room as before and brought Star in to see her. Her bandages were off her arms, and Diane could see the four-inch red scars running up each arm. She also noticed that there were no telltale needle marks on either arm. Whatever drugs Star had been taking were not intravenous. That was something.

“How’s Uncle Frank?”

Diane told her about the infection. She feared if Star heard it from another source and she hadn’t told her, it would damage the shaky trust Star was building with her.

“He’s doing well. His brothers are there. One is a doctor himself and he gives me the real poop on how Frank’s doing.”

“All this is my fault, isn’t it?”

“What do you mean?”

“If Mom and Dad hadn’t given Uncle Frank that bone to get the police to look for me. . that’s what started everything.”

“First of all, we don’t know if the bone is related to what happened to them. Second, and most important, it’s the person’s fault who murdered them. Don’t lose sight of that.”

“Still.”

“Star, don’t borrow trouble. You have enough to deal with. How are the guards treating you?”

“The one on duty now’s nice. Her name’s Mrs. Torres. She’s good to me.”

“That’s good. Are you good to her?”

“You bet. In fact, she wanted me to ask you if there are any openings at the museum for a gardener. Her son’s looking for a job.”

Diane laughed. “What’s his name?”

“Hector Torres.”

“Tell her to have him come to the museum. I’ll give the head groundskeeper his name.”

Star grinned. Diane could tell she liked the idea of being a broker from her jail cell. If it kept her happy and made her life easier, a job for her guard’s son was a small price to pay. Diane just hoped the guy had something to recommend him.

She said good-bye to Star and got in her car. As she started it up, she realized she was counting on Star’s being innocent. What if she wasn’t? She didn’t want to think about that possibility.

The first order of business when she got back to her office was to call the head groundskeeper and ask him to look positively on Hector Torres when he made an application.

“If he turns out to be a problem, send him to me to work it out.”

“Sure thing,” he’d told her. “No problem.”

Whoever was trying to make Diane look irresponsible should have simply waited a while and she’d have done it herself; they need not have tried so hard forging order forms. Hiring someone just to make Star’s life easier, putting both Jonas and Sylvia on the excavation-none of this had anything to do with the museum. She hoped Torres turned out to be a good worker. She shoved her feelings of guilt aside and went up to the second floor to finish with the skeleton.

As she opened the door to the vault, she half expected the bones to be gone, that someone had come in during the night and taken them away.

But the skeleton was there, brown bones laid out in basically the order they appeared in the body, on the table waiting for her to discover something else that would help identify them.

Before she started Diane gave Jonas Briggs a call at the site to see how they were doing.

“Just fine. Sylvia just identified a Cebus capucinus .”

“A monkey?”

“We also found a Sus scrofa .”

“Someone had a pig stuffed?”

“It was hard for me to imagine too.”

“Interesting finds. How about a Homo sapiens skull?”

“No, not so much as an H. sapiens tooth.”

“That’s too bad.”

“We’re still looking. Have you made another move?”

She hadn’t. She thought for a moment. “King-side castle.”

“That’s really the most logical.”

“Are you going to play both sides now?”

“You’re not one of those people sensitive to critique, are you?”

“You’re not one of those cocky winners, are you?”

Jonas chuckled. “I E-mailed you my report. Testing this new computer, which the entire crew wants now. It’s really nice.”

“I’ll tell Kenneth. He’ll be pleased.”

Diane thanked him for the work and started back on those bones of the skeleton that she did have, which was about 86 percent of them. She examined each bone again, looking for any mark that might give a clue as to what had happened to him.

She had found all the healed breaks and lesions already. She didn’t find any new cut marks or chipped bones that might indicate if he were stabbed or shot. His hyoid bone was intact, which indicated that he was probably not strangled, but she couldn’t rule it out either. There was nothing but the severe injury to the shoulder and underlying bones. Although not a fatal blow in itself, he could have bled out from such an injury, or gone into shock and died. But there was no way to know.