Carnosaur Crimes (3 page)

“I'm Special Agent Outerbridge. FBI.” He flashed an impressive laminated I.D. and a gold shield. “I work out of the Montana Resident Agency under the supervision of the Salt Lake City Evidence Response Team.” His grin revealed pearly white but slightly crooked teeth. Deep facial creases bracketed his mouth. Light gray eyes were soft and non-threatening, yet he stared at the star-shaped badge clipped to Dorbandt's belt with cold appraisal. “Are you in charge?”

Ansel's eyebrows rose. She stole a glance at Dorbandt who watched Outerbridge with equal curiosity.

“ I'm Lieutenant Dorbandt. Lacrosse County Sheriff's Department. Chief Flynn from the Big Toe Police Department arrived first on the scene. He's down by the river. We just barely notified the BLM. Why are you here?”

It was obvious to Ansel that Outerbridge and Dorbandt were at some unofficial law enforcement crossroads with one another. She didn't understand the rules of engagement, but it looked like a good, old fashioned pissing contest between two Alpha male coyotes to her.

Outerbridge delayed his response by casually pushing his I.D. into his pocket and turning a speculative gaze toward her. Ansel stared back, watching him take in her Amerind features without showing any reaction. She said nothing. Neither did Dorbandt.

“We've been monitoring the police bands for calls like this,” Outerbridge finally responded. Then he half-turned. “Let me introduce you to my ERT officers. Agents Walthers and Skinner.”

The rigid, clean-cut academy clones nodded on cue when named. Walthers' face remained set in stone, rigid and non-smiling. Skinner smiled at Ansel from beneath a wavy bang of carefully- combed black hair. His skin's ruddy color didn't come from the sun, and his broad cheekbones, and narrow nose told her that he was a Native American. She grinned back.

“And this is Doctor LaPierre. She works for the National Park Service.” Outerbridge motioned toward the pretty, full-bodied woman.

LaPierre adjusted the tan straw hat above her black pageboy and moved forward so quickly that large hoop earrings clanked against her rouged cheeks. “Everybody just calls me Dixie. Glad to meet you both.”

“What's your specialty, Doctor?” Dorbandt asked.

“Paleontology. I'm acting as a consultant.”

Outerbridge edged Dixie smoothly aside and peered carefully at his men. “I want this area secured. Necessary personnel and witnesses only. Go over everything grid by grid. I don't want anything missed.” At his command, the team headed for the river.

Dorbandt fixed his cross-hair on Outerbridge. “A paleontologist. Exactly what type of case are you working?”

The agent didn't bat an eye. “I'm not at liberty to say, Detective, but this incident has just become part of a larger federal investigation. The BLM will be assisting and advising, of course, but we're in charge of managing, collecting, and preserving evidence. We appreciate your help so far. I'm sure you've done a good job. It's nothing personal.” Outerbridge followed the canned speech up with a beguiling smile, then stepped away.

Ansel's heart sank. She watched the group retreat out of earshot, then yanked off the stifling smock. Her sizzling glare should have seared through Outerbridge's skull, but it didn't. She passed the lab coat to Dorbandt.

“For once Bieselmore is right,” Ansel admitted. “We're screwed.”

Chapter 4

“Even a small mouse has anger.”

Tribe Unknown

Ansel sat at her drawing table and stared at the ink drawing she'd lined so quickly.

Funny - in her mind's eye - she had imagined the scene so clearly. Now she didn't like the black and white, prehistoric picture at all.

The clear skies above the Cretaceous coastal marshland were cloudless and hot. Insects flew from a shagbark forest, and dragonflies buzzed over the sluggish wetland waters. Amphibians jumped over the tops of tangled ferns and toppled, rotting tree trunks as a dinosaur herd of thirty-inch high Gasparinisaura skittered to and fro amidst the swampy foliage.

A monstrous bipedal dinosaur crashed through the tree line. The Giganotosaurus opened its mouth and roared, a master predator causing havoc and confusion before selecting his prey. The panicked herbivores scattered as enormous snapping jaws - twice their size - came within striking distance. The chase was on.

The drawing showed the vicious attack from a ground level perspective. The towering Giganotosaurus approached head-on, neck low and reptilian eyes gazing down its massive, bumpy snout. A doomed Gasparinisaurus raced ahead, tail whipping sideways, legs outstretched in mid-leap, spiked front thumb-claws splayed, and beaked head turned to watch the slobbering jaws scant inches away.

It was all wrong. A maw of serrated teeth ringed the Giganotosaurus' tongue and a yawning, black gullet cavity. The portrait background was too shadowy. The foreground lacked detailing strokes. Every line and dot gravitated toward accentuating that cavernous mouth which eclipsed all other subjects on the page. The overall visual effect was gruesome and frightening.

Ansel threw down her pen. Not exactly what the authors of a new book on momentous Argentine dinosaur discoveries had in mind, she thought. She'd been commissioned to create a large portfolio of realistic dinosaur drawings for a U.S. publisher. The majority of drawings had been completed during the last two months. This was the last picture.

Ansel nervously fingered her Iniskim. Her drawings were usually group studies of interacting species or individual action poses showing the natural, daily behaviors of eating, hunting, or nesting. They resembled photographic scenes - so fine was her stroke and so realistic-looking her ink, watercolor, and airbrushing techniques, which she had perfected through years of experimentation and practice.

Her work was well known in scientific circles because her renderings withstood the scrutiny of degreed academics who valued scientific accuracy based on zoology, botany, and environmental biology over subjective, artistic visualizations. She had learned early that their critical support was essential for establishing her professional reputation.

This portrait of a recently discovered Giganotosaurus, however, had a demonic look. In life, the giant reptile stretched forty-five-feet long and weighed up to nine tons, bigger than the largest Tyrannosaurus ever found. More lightly built than its American cousin, Giganotosaurus had long legs, short arms with three-fingered claws, and a six foot skull.

Ansel glanced at the towering piles of Giganotosaurus fossil photos, specimen drawings, skeletal measurements, environmental notes, and fossil site impressions the authors from South America had sent her. After studying this scientific data for weeks, her Giganotosaurus sketch resembled a tawdry comic book cover; two dimensional and distorted. Something had skewed her perspective and muddled her purpose.

“The poacher,” Ansel said out loud, remembering just how much seeing that burnt corpse hanging from the Allosaurus' mouth had haunted her the past two days. Her revulsion and disbelief had spilled from her subconscious and onto the paper like poison weeping from a wound. Her creative juices were tainted.

Disgusted, she rose from the stool and went over to a half-refrigerator beneath a counter in one corner of the room. She opened the door to find slim pickings. A six-pack of canned Coke. Bottled water. A plundered bag of bite-size Snickers. She pulled a Coke from its neck ring and pawed through the cold plastic pouch for the last two chocolate bars. Nervous energy made her ravenous.

Ansel avoided the drawing board and plopped on the large pit sofa positioned on the other side of the room partitioned inside the large red airplane hangar. She'd purchased the steel building, along with her double-wide trailer, two years before. The large building contained the work shop where she had sculpted the first life-sized model of the museum's Allosaurus and also stored a personal fossil collection. Munching on the first candy bar, she leaned into the leather cushions and stared up at the twenty-foot high ceiling joists.

Who had tried to steal the river footprints? What kind of man would risk committing a felony to poach fossils? Did he have a wife? Children? Did anyone miss him and wonder what had happened to him? Ansel tore open the second candy wrapper.

The poacher had known what he wanted and how to get it. Carnosaur bones were the rarest dinosaur remains to be found. Since large reptilian herbivores far outnumbered the carnivores, the complete fossil skeletons of large predator species were considered the holy grails of vertebrate paleontology.

Although a nicely preserved footprint from a North American species like Tyrannosaurus, Allosaurus, or Albertosaurus was considered only a trace fossil, it would still bring in thousands of dollars on the commercial black market. For the right price, a private collector, fossil dealer, or unscrupulous museum director could purchase one with no questions asked. She had to find out what was happening in the case.

The next edition of the weekly
Big Toe Tracker
wasn't out yet and though the local TV stations had swarmed around the museum like blowflies on sheep, they knew little or nothing about the vandalism or death. The FBI and the BLM had built a Jericho Wall of silence around the crime scene that even the sound bytes from a newsie's satellite hook-up couldn't crumble. Dorbandt had disappeared, and Bieselmore hadn't called to gab about what the FBI had done.

Ansel got up and tossed the Coke can and wrappers into a trash bin beside her art table. She'd work on the Giganotosaurus drawing when she felt more objective. Her portfolio deadline was near, but a few hours lost today wouldn't make much difference. Better to distance herself than continue drawing useless pictures which would completely clog up her artistic flow.

She set the security alarm, exited the hangar, and walked along a well-worn path through a field of parched grass that spanned several acres behind her blue and white trailer. Usually this strip of land, which had once been a grass runway for the former owner's Bonanza six-seater, burgeoned in the summer with an assortment of colorful, wild perennials. Scorching western winds and dust had reduced everything into a straw-brown mat. Gone were the rainbow hues of beargrass, Indian paintbrush, Astor, columbine, and Dogtooth violet.

As she walked toward the back porch, Ansel glanced at two Langstroth beehives several hundred feet away. Concern for each colony of fifty-thousand bees furrowed her brow. Would there be enough pollen to sustain them through the summer and winter? She made a mental note to get Feltus Pitt, a local beekeeper, over to inspect the hives.

Her thoughts intent on the bees, Ansel almost ran into the couple suddenly appearing on the path. Startled, her hand went to her chest. The last thing she expected was anyone walking behind her forty acres of land unannounced. She'd had a bad experience in the past with people sneaking onto her property to do her harm.

“You scared me,” Ansel accused, trying to calm her racing heart.

“Sorry,” said a blonde-haired woman wearing a toupe hat with a Department of Interior patch on the bill. A gun belt accented her uniform. “We knocked on the trailer door, but nobody answered.”

“Ansel Phoenix?” asked the tall, stocky man beside her.

“Yes.” Ansel squinted against the sun. He wore no hat and had a short, well-trimmed moustache and chin beard. His belt holster was bigger, and he carried a clipboard with a gold pen on it. His look was all business. “What can I do for you?”

The man pulled out a gold shield from his breast pocket. “We're from the Bureau of Land Management. This is Ranger Eastover from the Red Water station. I'm Assistant Special Agent-In-Charge Broderick from the state office. I'm investigating the attempted theft of dinosaur prints from the Big Toe Museum. I'd like to ask you some questions.”

“All right. Let's go inside.”

Ansel led the BLM officers through the cluttered back porch and up some trailer steps. The double-wide was roomy and outfitted with nice furniture in shades of blue and brown. Luckily she'd been spending most of her time inside the hangar so the living room looked clean and orderly. No bowls of fossils percolating in acid solutions on every flat surface, digging tools on the floor, or journals draped over the chair backs to mark her place.

“Have a seat.” She sat in her favorite chair, an antique ladder-back rocker beside the bay window. A quick glance through the glass, and she noticed the white and green BLM patrol pickup with topper and light bar parked on the front drive.

Broderick sat on the blue sofa across from Ansel, his stocky legs barely able to fit behind the glass coffee table. He fussed noisily with his clipboard and pen. Eastover sat beside the SAC officer. It was obvious that she didn't enjoy his proximity despite the smile plastered across her pretty, mid-thirties face.

“I'm surprised you're here. I'm not on the museum staff,” Ansel said.

“I'm interviewing a lot of people,” Broderick quipped. “What's your profession, Miss Phoenix?”

“I'm a paleoartist.”

“So you have a working knowledge of fossils, their scientific significance, and monetary values?”

“I'm not an expert, but I know a nice fossil specimen when I see it. What's this about, Agent Broderick?”

“You were at the museum yesterday, weren't you?”

“For a bit.”

“And it's your dinosaur sculpture by the river?”

“Parts of it.”

Broderick's gaze pinned her. “What do you mean?”

“I didn't build it. The Big Toe town council paid a commercial advertising company to construct the shape to my specifications. I just handcrafted the skin, which was fashioned from latex molds of my original sculpture, assembled the rubber pieces over the frame, and spray-painted the exterior with life-like, acrylic colors and lacquers.”

Broderick scribbled long and hard. “How long were you working on museum property?” c

“About six weeks on and off.”

“During that time, did you ever notice anything strange?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Ever see anyone working there or hanging around who looked or acted suspicious?”

“I've never heard or seen anything out of the ordinary when I've visited the park.”

“Why were you at the museum yesterday?”

“By accident,” she lied. “Dr. Bieselmore and I are members of the Pangaea Society. A paleontology organization. We had some business to discuss.” Ansel glanced at the ranger who sat like a statue, hands folded obediently in her lap.

Broderick flipped through his clipboard papers. “You were involved in a shooting last year that resulted in a fatality, weren't you?”

“How did you find out about that?”

“It's my job, Miss Phoenix. Tell me about it.”

“I was being stalked by a killer, and my life was in jeopardy.”

“I understand, but wasn't there a fossil artifact involved, too?”

Ansel didn't like that question. He was subtly insinuating that she had something to do with stealing dinosaur tracks. Determined not to show her concern, she rocked slowly in the squeaky walnut chair.

“Partially. There were a lot of factors contributing to last year's murders, all of which were beyond my control. I'd be glad to give you the number for Detective Dorbandt at the Sheriff's Department. He'll tell you everything about the shooting incident you'll need to know.”

Broderick noisily snapped his pen beneath the spring-loaded clip. “I've already been there,

but there's plenty of follow-up work to do.” He gazed at her pointedly.

“So what's going to happen to the museum?” Ansel asked, her obsidian eyes fixed on him in return.

“It's closed.”

“For how long?”

“Indefinitely. It's part of a crime scene, and my office has to re-evaluate the merits of either allowing the property to remain as a special land-use area open to the public or dedicating it as a fully protected national landmark open only to scientists. It's possible the fossil tracks will be removed from the park and placed in a federal repository for preservation and study.”

“What federal repository?”

“Probably the Museum of Paleontology at the University of California.”

Ansel's cheeks flared red. “Those fossils belong here in their natural state where they can be studied and enjoyed by Montanans.”

Broderick shrugged. “Scholars from all over the world go to UC to study their fossil collections. They're always re-evaluated. Fresh discoveries aren't made just in the field.”

“You still don't understand, Agent Broderick. Our museum generates a lot of income for the city. You can't take Big Toe's livelihood away.”

With a nod he said, “You're right. I can't. However, the state director, under a Secretarial Order, can issue a permit for the removal of vertebrate fossils to qualified paleontologists under certain terms and conditions.”

“I don't think it's going to come to that,” interjected Ranger Eastover out of the blue. She gave Ansel a commiserating look.

“We'll get a fossil specialist out here and see,” Broderick pronounced.

When Eastover said nothing further, Ansel asked, “Doesn't the FBI already have a paleontology consultant with them?”

Broderick shook his head. “The BLM uses real field experts, not desk jockeys like LaPierre.” He suddenly rose to his feet. “I have everything I need for the moment. If I have more questions, I'll be back.”