Dead Past (29 page)

 

Among the bones from the warehouse, a lot were missing and most were broken, either from the explosion and fire or from McNair’s handling. None of the carpels or tarsal bones were present, nor were the terminal phalanges of the hands and feet. In fact, all the smaller bones of the skeleton were missing.

There were more than one of several bones—two left femora, two first, ninth, and eleventh thoracic vertebrae, two right ulnae, four innominates, and three scapulae. Diane didn’t try to separate out the skeletons, but laid duplicate bones beside each other. It was a strange and sketchy skeleton, an incomplete bony overlapping of two victims.

Diane went into the vault, retrieved the bones collected from the apartment house basement, and laid them out on another table—not mixing bones that had a clear provenance with those that did not. She also brought out the partially reconstructed skull, fully expecting to find some of the missing parts among the new batch of bones.

She selected out all the skull fragments from the warehouse bones and began piecing them together. It was another long, painstaking process, but one she hoped would come close to putting the whole picture together. She had the back of the second cranium assembled when she looked at the clock on the wall and saw that it was in the wee hours of the morning. Time to quit. She left everything in place and locked the door behind her.

Because of the late hour and her exhaustion, she decided to stay the remainder of the night in her museum office. She’d slept on her couch before and had blankets and pillows for that purpose. She had a full bathroom, and a change of clothes in the closet.

The staff lounge was on the way to her office and she stopped to raid the vending machines of candy bars and peanuts to make up for missing dinner.

“What are you doing here so late, Dr. Fallon?” said the third-floor night security guard.

“Working. I think I’ll just stay the night here in my office,” she said.

“I don’t blame you; it’s too late to go home now,” he said.

Diane made her way back to her office, locked all the doors from the inside with the locks that only she had a key to, and settled in.

It was hard to get Izzy out of her mind. They’d never gotten along, but she felt great sympathy for him and his wife. Losing a child is something you never get over. This whole episode was just too tragic.

As she threw away her candy and peanut wrappers, she became aware of a chain of thought that had been trying to surface from somewhere deep in her mind. All along, she and Garnett had assumed the most likely motive for the murders was to shut Stanton and McNair up, to protect the kingpin behind the meth lab. Everyone assumed Blake Stanton was involved with the meth lab because when he tried to hijack her car he was obviously fleeing from the scene of the explosion. Then when the museum thefts came to light, the likely motive for Stanton’s murder changed and appeared to have something to do with his thievery.

But there was another, more compelling motive they needed to consider seriously—revenge for the killing of all those students.

The explosion touched a lot of people in ways that they would never get over. She could understand the righteous anger that would lead someone to want to wipe out the people behind it.

Jin was right, it probably was the killer’s cigarette butts. He—or she, but probably he—had suspected McNair and tailed him. The killer spied on McNair in the warehouse, saw how he was destroying evidence, and became convinced of his guilt.

Why did the killer suspect McNair in the first place? Because he spent more than he could afford on an arson investigator’s salary? If everyone thought his wife had money, why would his spending raise a red flag? There was something else, or perhaps a lot of little things, that pointed to him. Someone knew more than the police investigation about what was going on with McNair and, rather than revealing that information, they killed him.

Diane made up the couch, slipped on a sweat suit, and snuggled under the covers. She drifted off into a restless sleep and awoke in the morning with a feeling of anxiety. In the shower, she realized it was the Joana Cipriano murder that was bothering her—and the coincidence of the house numbers. And even though Juliet and Joana didn’t look alike up close, their descriptive similarities—same age, blond hair, and blue eyes—were disturbing. From a distance they would be very similar. However, there were many blond-haired, blue-eyed young women in the city. Half of them, thought Diane, worked in the museum. She tried to shake the feeling, but it wouldn’t go. Mainly because she didn’t believe in coincidences.

She got out of the shower, dried off, and dressed. The clothes hanging in her closet were a brown linen pantsuit and cream-colored silk blouse. The clothes weren’t as warm as she would have liked, but the suit had been in the closet since fall, and she hadn’t thought to change it for warmer clothes. She finished dressing, folded up her bed clothes, and unlocked her doors. She was at her desk working when Andie came in, followed by Garnett. Good.

Garnett pulled up a chair and sat down. Several seconds ticked by before he said anything. Diane noted that he looked more rested than she felt.

“The GBI’s going to be investigating Councilman Adler and the meth lab business,” said Garnett. “He’s in a frenzy, hollering about scurrilous politically motivated accusations. But at least he has something to keep him busy for a while.”

“Have you identified the face from the first basement victim?” asked Diane.

Garnett nodded. “One of our former drug unit detectives recognized him as Albert Collier. He was collared many times for drug possession, dealing, using. He was also a former student at Bartram. We’re talking to his associates, trying to discover who the second person in the basement might have been. I’m hoping we can tie the whole thing to Adler and get rid of the son of a bitch once and for all.”

“How is the commissioner taking all this?” asked Diane. She thought of him in his long black fur-trimmed overcoat, standing out in the snow, trying to make decisions that would appease everyone.

“I told him that if he visits the museum, he should wear sackcloth and ashes and crawl up the steps. Right now he’s worried about the fallout affecting his chances of reelection.

It certainly affected my vote,
thought Diane. “About the murders,” she said—lest the human cost of all this get lost in the politics. “I think the motive may be revenge for the student deaths.”

“Murders? You including Blake Stanton?” asked Garnett. “We’re thinking now that he wasn’t involved in the meth lab. Just an innocent bystander like the rest of the students. The university has had some rare books taken from the library, and several departments have reported money missing from petty cash amounting to quite a bit. What they all had in common was Stanton. That’s what he was involved in. Why do you still think the same person that killed McNair killed him?”

“We all assumed that because he tried to hijack my car while fleeing from the fire, he was involved with the meth lab. His killer may have made the same assumption. At the time of Stanton’s murder, we weren’t aware of his role in the museum thefts. Perhaps neither was the killer. By the time we discovered what were perhaps his true crimes, the deed was done, he was already dead.”

“How have you come to the conclusion that it was revenge-motivated?”

“By seeing how profoundly everyone who was touched by this tragedy has been affected. One mother tried to commit suicide, all are devastated. It’s easy to see how someone could hold a great desire—perhaps an overwhelming desire—to make the guilty pay. Among many there is a great need for justice. And among a few there may be a righteous outrage growing from the perception that justice may not be served and the guilty could go unpunished for a horrendous crime.”

Garnett sighed and bent his head, staring at the slate floor between his feet. “You’re talking about a vigilante. I can’t say I haven’t had the same suspicions. I don’t like it. I would hate having to arrest someone for doing something that in the right circumstances I might do myself,” said Garnett.

“I know,” said Diane. “I have similar feelings. That’s why I’ve decided to simply collect evidence and turn it over to you. But there’s one thing to remember. If I’m right and someone’s desire to bring vengeance on the guilty was the motive, they were wrong with Blake Stanton. He was probably innocent of those deaths. He was simply a thief.”

“Yeah, I’d thought of that, too,” said Garnett.

“I’m reconstructing the skull of the second basement victim with the bones we got from the warehouse. I’ll let you know when I have a face.”

Garnett nodded. “I’ve been so caught up in sticking it to Adler, that I’ve”—he stood up and shrugged—“I need to get back to work. I’ll keep you informed.”

Diane started to ask him not to, but she didn’t. After he left, she went to the crime lab to check on things there. Only David was in.

“How did things go last night? Did any of you get any sleep?” asked Diane. From the bags under his eyes, she thought not.

“No,” he answered. “Neva followed Jin home this morning. She said she was going to make him get some rest.”

“How was he last night?”

“Good. He seems OK. He’s pissed that someone stole his cigarette butts. He’s convinced they would have broken the case,” said David.

“I think the perp was convinced also.”

David nodded and yawned.

“Why don’t you go home and get some sleep?” said Diane.

“You didn’t get any sleep. I saw the reconstruction you were doing in your lab last night.”

“Actually, I did get a few hours. I stayed the night in my museum office. Nice and comfy. Why don’t I take you down to the restaurant for breakfast and send you home?”

“That sounds great. Yeah, I can get behind that idea. By the way, I put some more bones in your lab. We concentrated on retrieving bones last night because we thought that would yield the best results,” said David. “Early this morning Garnett told us that the GBI will be handling the evidence from here on out. So, our plan worked out well. I’m glad to hand it over to them. I wasn’t looking forward to going through all the junk.”

“I’m glad they are involved, too,” she agreed. “I’ll work on the skull today. I have a feeling that Jin is going to get his DNA lab.”

“There’s something he wants to know but is afraid to ask,” said David.

“What’s that?” asked Diane.

“Does he still get the lab if the police are the ones to break the case?”

“They’ll probably break it on our evidence, so yes,” said Diane.

“You’ve already decided on a lab haven’t you?” said David.

“If you tell Jin, I’ll transfer you to taking care of the dermestid beetle colony for the rest of your life.”

“He won’t hear anything from me,” said David.

Diane treated herself and David to a big breakfast in the restaurant. She wished her personal choices weren’t always centered between either food or sleep lately. And she hadn’t even had a run in the past week and a half. Maybe this evening.

After breakfast she sent David home, and she went back to the museum office to call Juliet’s grandmother.

 

Diane dialed the number that Laura had given her. After seven rings, an older woman answered.

“Who is this? I don’t know anyone at a museum.”

Mrs. Torkel obviously had caller ID. Diane started to speak, but Ruby Torkel started again before she could get a word out.

“Unless it’s Juliet. Is that you, Juliet? What are you doing calling me from work? Does your boss know you’re calling me from there?”

Diane smiled. “Mrs. Torkel, I’m Diane Fallon, the director of the RiverTrail Museum of Natural History.”

“Well, what are you doing calling me?”

Good question,
thought Diane.
How am I going to approach this?

“I’m also the director of the crime lab in Rosewood. . . .”

“Crime lab? Juliet’s not in trouble is she? She’s not a bad girl,” Mrs. Torkel said, concern evident in her voice.

“No, Mrs. Torkel, Juliet is not in trouble,” said Diane. “I’m helping to find out what happened to her in 1987.”

There was silence on the other end of the phone for a long moment.

“She got snatched, that’s what happened.”

“She was a child and it was a great trauma for her. She is very frightened by what little she remembers.”

“It’s best not to remember,” said Mrs. Torkel.

“Her fears are very real. She wants to know what happened so she can get rid of those fears once and for all. What she does remember is blurred and fragmented.”

“She never remembered anything before. Lord knows the police tried to get something out of her.”

“Juliet is a lovely young woman now, but she’s haunted by this incident from her past. I’d like to help her; she is a good employee.”

“What does she do there exactly?” asked Mrs. Torkel.

“She takes care of our seashell collection and she makes kits to teach schoolkids about seashells,” said Diane.

“She always did like to collect seashells with me. She calls them mollusks now. I don’t know what that is. What do you want to know?”

“She told me about a doll that you said she stole,” said Diane.

“You thinking that had something to do with her kidnapping?”

“Maybe,” said Diane.

“I don’t see how. She was kidnapped in Arizona. She got that doll here in Florida.”

“I thought it might help her remember that time in her life,” said Diane. “Didn’t she get that doll just before she was kidnapped?” It was a guess on Diane’s part, but she had a feeling she was right.

“Why, yes, she did. She was visiting me just a month before she got kidnapped. She came home with that doll. She was playing with some child she met on the beach. That’s where I live, here on the beach, here in Glendale-Marsh. It was a nice doll and people don’t just give away nice things.”