Dead Secret (5 page)

“What good luck you had your crime scene people with you.”

“Wasn’t it? We got a call out to Jin and he brought the crime scene kit. We found quite a few things that may have belonged to the deceased. There’s no indication so far of who he might be. We’re calling him Caver Doe.”

“Caver Doe . . . nice. How long do you think he was down there?”

“The body was pretty well desiccated, and he had an old carbide lamp with him. Several decades, I’m thinking—maybe from the fifties, maybe earlier. I won’t know until I examine him.”

The telephone’s sudden ring was shrill compared to the music that had just been playing. Diane wasn’t going to pick it up. But a glance at the caller ID told her it was Gregory.

Gregory Lincoln was Diane’s former boss at World Accord International. He had seen her through the tough time when her adopted daughter was murdered in South America. Even though now he was back in his home in England and she in the States, they had kept in touch and talked at least once a month.

“Diane, this is Gregory.”

“Hi, Gregory, it’s good to hear from you. It must be in the wee hours of the morning there. Is everything all right?”

“Just fine. It’s not too far beyond midnight. I do some of my best work at this time.”

“How’s your family?” Diane smiled at Frank. He leaned back on the sofa and took one of Diane’s feet and began to massage it. Frank had a knack for massage. She forced her mind back to what Gregory was saying.

“Marguerite is fine. The boys are in the United States. They went to space camp this summer. Got this thing about wanting to be astronauts. And how’s your museum faring?”

“We inherited an Egyptian mummy, so now everyone thinks we’re a real museum.”

Diane heard him chuckle. Gregory had the sort of low, throaty laugh that made you want to laugh along with him.

“You don’t say. A real Egyptian mummy. You’ll have to send pictures. Marguerite loves mummies.”

“I will. He was unwrapped, but we managed to get our hands on the amulets that were in his original wrappings. Our Web site has pictures. I’ll e-mail you the URL.”

“Your museum is the reason I called. I’m afraid I volunteered you to a friend. I hope you don’t mind.”

“Volunteered me?”

“Your expertise. He’s sending you the bones of a witch.”

Chapter 7

“The bones of a witch?” said Diane. “Did I hear you right, Gregory?”

Frank lifted his brow, gave her that okay-this-is-interesting look of his, took her other foot and began kneading tender spots on the bottom of it.

“Perhaps I should have said the bones of an alleged witch. This is going to take a bit of explaining.”

“I’m all ears.”

“There’s a charming little museum here in Dorset we like to visit with the boys. It’s really more like the old cabinet of curiosities. It’s housed in this charming sixteenth-century cottage. John Rose is the proprietor. He’s collected a lot of odd bits of the cultural and natural history from around here. I think he barely makes a living at it. One of his main attractions is a skeleton called the Moonhater witch.”

“Moonhater witch?” Diane raised her eyebrows at Frank and he returned a quizzical look of his own.

“Legend has it that the skeleton was found in Moonhater Cave—the name, I believe, refers to smugglers. Anyway, the stories say the witch was killed by a young man. Seems he stabbed her with some sort of magical sword, but not before the witch had turned his bride into a pillar of salt.”

“Fascinating story, but I won’t be able to tell him if she was a witch.” She grinned at Frank, who, from his knitted brow and upturned lips, was anxious to hear the other end of the conversation. She retrieved her foot and leaned her back against him before the faces he was making caused her to burst out laughing.

Gregory chuckled. “I don’t think he expects that. John doesn’t believe in witches. Legends aside, he would like to know something about his skeleton.”

“I’ll be glad to look at the bones. But tell me, there are plenty of forensic anthropologists in the UK; why—”

“Is he sending it across the ocean? That’s where the story gets a little more bizarre.”

“It gets more bizarre?”

Frank began massaging her shoulders and neck.
He is really is good at this,
thought Diane as she moved her shoulders under his grip.

“There are two other parties interested in possessing the bones. One party is the owner of Moonhater Cave. It is one of several caves in the area that are tourist attractions. It has the pillar of the unfortunate girl.”

“The pillar of salt she turned into? It’s in the cave?”

Frank stopped and turned so that he could see her face. His eyes twinkled the way they did when he was about to hear the punch line of a joke. Diane smiled at him and pointed to her shoulders. He rolled his eyes and resumed kneading her muscles.

“Yes. It’s actually a rather large column formation that had the good or bad luck, depending on your perspective, to have a vague resemblance to a woman. The image has been enhanced by the creative use of a chisel and sandpaper. Whoever it was did quite a good job, actually—subtle, made good use of the natural form of the stone for her flowing gown.”

“And the cave owner wants the bones back to go with his statue.”

“Yes. Sort of keep the family together.”

“Who’s the other party?” asked Diane.

“A handful of Druids or Wiccans. Marguerite tells me there’s a difference, but I don’t know what it is. They claim the bones are of an ancestor. Of course, given that they found a descendent of nine-thousand-year-old Cheddar Man, that very well could be true.”

“Cheddar Man was found somewhere near you, wasn’t he?”

“Close. In Somerset, actually, in Cheddar. Somerset also has a cave with a statue of sorts, only this one is of a witch who was turned to stone by a monk. There are bones associated with it too—which are owned by a museum in Somerset. The Somerset cave owner is trying to get those bones back. Probably where the Moonhater Cave owner got the idea. Caves with stories are rather popular here.”

“So he thinks the Druids—or Wiccans—or this other cave owner might try to steal them?”

“He’s afraid they might. The Wiccans involved are some kind of outcast coven, or whatever, it seems. They threatened John with black magic—something that’s prohibited by the Wiccan home office, apparently. Anyway, John feels his bones would be safer if they were examined in the U.S., and I told him I’d help. So . . .”

“Sure, I’ll help.”

“Great! John will be delighted. I thought you would, so I took the liberty of telling him to go ahead and send them. They are already on their way. John said he’ll call. He wants to talk with you before you actually do the analysis.”

“Does he know if the bones were actually found in the cave?”

“No.”

“I’ll need samples of soil from the cave.”

There was a pause for a moment. “A sample will be sent along to you shortly with the bones.”

“Why does it sound like there is a story there?”

“Because I collected the sample. Marguerite and I went on a tour of the Moonhater Cave. And I surreptitiously collected a sample from the floor. Marguerite said I was disgraceful. The owner has some strict rules about carrying things out of the cave, but she provided the distraction—quite shameful, really.”

Diane laughed out loud at the image of the very proper Gregory and his wife on a mission, stealing dirt from a cave. “How did Mr. Rose acquire the bones?”

“Bought them from a family who had them in a box in their basement for about a hundred years—that is, they were in the basement for a hundred years.”

“Was the story of the provenance written on the box?”

“No. It was handed down. So you see, the whole thing’s rather iffy. John is actually glad now that the bones have no provenance. It strengthens his case—not that he really has anything to worry about.”

“Gregory, it sounds interesting. I’ll look forward to examining them.”

“I think so. Thanks for helping out. I’ll let you get back to whatever you were engaged in. Oh, how is David?”

Gregory liked to keep track of his former employees. Especially the ones who worked for him at the time of the massacre that killed Diane’s daughter and many of their friends at the mission in South America.

“He’s doing fine. You know he’s doing crime scene work for me.”

“He’s okay with that?”

“Yes. We’ve put several criminals in jail, and David has found that satisfying.”

“That’s good. I think about all of you a lot. And you and your fellow, Frank, are fine?”

“Yes. We’re going on a vacation tomorrow for two whole weeks.” Diane put a hand over Frank’s as she talked about him.

“Good for you! He must be something special to be able to pull you away from work.”

“He is indeed.” Diane squeezed his hand. “Good to hear from you, Gregory. Take care.”

Diane hung up the phone and turned toward Frank. “That was Gregory.”

“I gathered. Your side of the conversation was interesting. Sounds like you have another body from a cave to look at? A witch?” Frank grinned at her.

“That’s what he said—a witch with a story.” Diane related Gregory’s side of the conversation to Frank’s chuckles.

“Pillar of salt. It sounds rather biblical. You know,” he said without losing his smile, “it seems to me that a lot of people die in caves.”

Diane kissed him rather than go where that conversation was leading.

The next two weeks passed by in a relaxing blur of fishing, hiking and cuddling up with Frank. Diane was surprised at how easy it had been to let go and just enjoy being on vacation. Frank seemed to have just as easily been able to let go of his job. That was a good sign, she’d thought several times. They enjoyed each other’s company. Only occasionally did she find her mind wandering to Caver Doe and the witch bones—she couldn’t deny she was intrigued. Unfortunately Diane had to cut her vacation short by one day. Andie, Diane’s office manager at the museum, had called and told her that Helen Egan, the grandmother of Diane’s friend and mentor, had died and that the funeral was scheduled for Sunday.

Diane arrived back at her office on Sunday morning rested and happy that the museum was still standing and the crime lab was not overflowing with unprocessed evidence. In fact, it looked as if they didn’t need her. She wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing. She smiled and sifted through the stack of clippings Andie had cut from the papers while she was gone. She found a two-week-old front-page story about the mummified caver they had found, along with everything Diane had told the deputy. She noted with satisfaction that they didn’t have any pictures.

Yesterday’s paper lay on top of her cluttered walnut desk. The headline across the front page read:
Helen Elizabeth Price Egan, 1891-2005
. Most of the front page was taken up with the story of Vanessa Van Ross’s grandmother, who had died at age 114. Diane and some of the museum staff were going to her funeral later in the morning.

Vanessa Van Ross was the most prominent member of the museum board, RiverTrail’s most generous contributor, and Diane’s mentor. Diane stared at the photograph of the young Helen Elizabeth, wondering if she had any idea she would go on to live a hundred years after it was taken.

Andie Layne, Diane’s administrative assistant, came bop-ping in with two cups of steaming hot tea, put one in front of Diane and sat down in the chair opposite her desk.

“Good to have you back. You and Frank get a lot of fishing in?”

“Sure did. He taught me how to fish for trout. A lot more active than sitting in a boat with a pole. We had a great time.”

“So you think you guys will ever get married?”

Diane took another drink of tea, hoping Andie didn’t see the grimace on her face. Life with Frank would be great, and he had certainly hinted that they should marry, but Diane was convinced that they got along so well because they saw each other so little. They were never in each other’s pockets, tripping over each other’s feet, or irritated by each other’s idiosyncracies.

“Things are going well the way they are,” muttered Diane.

Fortunately, Andie didn’t linger on the subject, but went dancing on to the next thing on her mind.

“Neva told me about the caving trip you guys had. Wow. Exciting.” She pointed to the newspaper clipping peeking out of the folder, sipped her tea and swung her legs back and forth. “That mummy you found—you think it was an accident or murder?” Her thick auburn curls shook as she talked in her animated way, and she looked delighted at the thought of murder.

“Accident is the most likely scenario.” Diane sipped her green tea. It tasted like Andie had squeezed an orange into it.

Andie looked over at the photograph on the wall of Diane descending on a rope into the vertical entrance of a cave. “I just don’t see how you all can go down into a cave like that. I would be terrified.”

“It’s fun. You kind of have to like dark, closed-in places.”

Diane glanced at her e-mail as she listened to Andie. Nothing urgent. Andie had answered and filed away most of her messages while she was gone. She could also see that Kendel had handled the rest. Life had gotten easier in the museum since she’d hired Kendel Williams, her assistant director.

Between Kendel and Andie, her absence was hardly noticeable. That is, if she didn’t look at the stack of queries from her curators—requests for larger budgets, more room, and all the assorted concerns they invariably had.

“I understand it’s really beautiful inside a cave. I’ve seen pictures. . . .”

“Sometimes caves are beautiful; sometimes they’re pretty ugly. Depends on the cave. But every cave has its own magic. This one we’ve been mapping’s pretty nice. Very large, with a variety of formations.”

“Neva said you almost had a bad fall. That sounds scary.”

“Sort of. Mike threw me a rope, so it ended well. We did find the lost caver because of it.” That was how Diane handled the question about her fall when it came up—made light of it, praised Mike, and diverted attention elsewhere. So far, with everyone except Frank, it had worked.

“The lost caver. That sounds forlorn, doesn’t it?” Andie stared for a long moment at the photograph of Diane hanging on the rope, then laid a folder on Diane’s desk. “These are the letters that need your signature. But you can wait till after the funeral. Wow, a hundred and fourteen. Imagine that. After she became a teenager, she lived another hundred years.”

“It is amazing to think about. Vanessa has had her grandmother a long time. This must be hard on her.”

“If I’m gonna live that long, I’d hate to live most of my life as an old woman,” Andie said.

“Spoken like a youngster,” a soft voice behind her said.

They looked up to see Vanessa Van Ross standing in the doorway wearing a dark blue silk suit. Her silver hair was swept up in her usual French twist.

Andie turned bright red. “Mrs. Van Ross, I am so sorry. . . . I didn’t mean . . . I . . . I’m so sorry.”

The older woman put an arm around Andie’s shoulder. “That’s all right, dear. I tell my doctor the same thing every time I see him. They’ve been able to put a man on the moon for over thirty years, but they still can’t make me look twenty.”

Andie was a little consoled. “May I get you some tea?”

“No, thank you, dear. I just came to ask Diane if she would ride with me to church. The children are taking Mother. I love them all dearly, but right now the three of them are too much.”

“Certainly. Would you like to go now?”

She looked at her watch. “It’s a little early. I thought I’d just enjoy the museum until it’s time to leave. You go about your business. Maybe I will take a cup of tea.”

Andie hurried off to make a cup. Diane led Vanessa into the private sitting room adjacent to her office.

“Feel free to stay in here if you like. I just need to check in with the crime lab.”

As she spoke, raised voices—between Andie and someone whose voice Diane didn’t recognize—filtered in from Andie’s office.

“I demand you allow me to see her now,” the disembodied voice said. Diane and Vanessa raised their brows at each other.

“I suppose I’d better go see about this. Andie will be in with your tea shortly.”