Lovely in Her Bones (14 page)

The doctor’s eyes twinkled. “Call out the Coast Guard! Boy, wouldn’t I love to see Duncan Johnson’s face when the floating feds hauled him off that fishing boat.”

Pilot Barnes, who had been thinking of doing just that, did not smile. “I guess it’s up to me, then,” he said, but he wrote the phone number of Duncan Johnson’s hotel on the front of the phone book.

M
ILO WATCHED
it grow light. Across the valley the intersecting planes of woods and pasture changed from gray to green against the black shapes of the mountains. He had grown tired of fighting for sleep at five in the morning and slipped out of the church. He filled the bucket at the nearby stream so that he could start the coffee before the others woke up. Alex used to get up early too, Milo thought. Many mornings he would come into the office straight from a hot shower in the gym, following his morning run. He used to ask Milo to join him, but Milo never took him up on it. He would always answer that during his career as all-night security person he had seen enough sunrises to last him a lifetime. He wasn’t awake now to appreciate the beauty of the morning.

“Milo?” Elizabeth peered out of the side door of the church, yawning sleepily. “What time is it?”

“Quarter past dawn,” said Milo absently.

“How long have you been out here?”

“I don’t know. I thought I’d make coffee as long as I was up.”

“Is it ready? The deputy up at the site might like some.”

Milo looked down at the bucket of water beside him. “I forgot to make it.”

Elizabeth sighed. “Wait here.”

In a few minutes she had returned with the camp stove, the large yellow coffee funnel, and a pot to boil the water in. Scooping water from the bucket into the pot, Elizabeth said, “I’ll brew it up out here. That
way I won’t wake up anyone inside, and you won’t be alone.”

“I don’t feel like talking,” said Milo.

“Very likely not,” nodded Elizabeth. “But why don’t you think out loud?”

“I just can’t believe Alex is dead,” said Milo. “To Alex death wasn’t an inevitability, it was a puzzle.”

“How so?” asked Elizabeth quietly as she spooned coffee into the filter.

“A corpse was a puzzle. What could it tell us by this bruise or that distortion of bones? I guess I always thought of Alex as manipulating death … to make it tell us things. Now he’s just another case for some other examiner. An occipital fracture to be catalogued with the rest.”

“Not to you. He’ll never be just another case to you. The question is: where do we go from here?”

Milo, startled out of his reverie, looked at her for the first time. “What do you mean?”

“The project. Do we pack it in, or what? The others will be wanting to know.”

Milo was looking toward the path that led to the excavation site. The woods were still dark, so that the path seemed to be a strip of light that stopped abruptly at the trees.

“You realize, of course, that there is a murderer out there, and he could be waiting to pick off the rest of us?” Elizabeth shivered.

“Of course I realize it! Why else would I be hesitating about finishing the project? I want to do this as a memorial to Alex—but I can’t let his students get killed in the process.”

“I’m going inside to get the cups,” said Elizabeth.

When she came back, Milo had not moved. He was still staring out across the valley, lost in thought. Elizabeth poured the coffee. “You know, Alex’s death may not have anything to do with the project,” she remarked, trying to sound casual.

Milo grunted. “What about the computer damage? Was that a coincidence too?”

“I guess not,” Elizabeth admitted. “I wish I knew what Alex wanted to talk to you about.”

Milo looked up. “What do you mean?”

“Before you got back from town last night, he came into the church looking for you. I got the impression that he wanted to ask you something.”

“What else did he say?”

“Just that you should go up to the site when you came in. Oh, and before that he told me that he had checked my skull measurements.”

“How were they?”

“He didn’t say. What do you suppose that means?”

“I don’t know. Maybe nothing, but it’s all we have to go on. I’m going to check those skulls.”

“So we’re going on with the project?”

Milo poured his untasted coffee into the weeds. “I am, anyway.”

    Milo waited until after breakfast to talk to the group. Not that a discussion of business would have dampened the meal; hardly a word was spoken. Still, he wanted their full attention when he spoke, because he was conscious of the formality of the occasion. They were all looking at him with the embarrassment caused by the presence of unshared grief. He wondered if Mary Clare had recovered from her infatuation, or if she was trying to avoid pity.

“I think we should talk about what we’re going to do,” Milo began uncertainly. “I guess all of you realize that Alex Lerche was a dedicated scientist who was about to make a great contribution to anthropology when he … when he died,” Milo finished faintly.

“And Milo wants us to carry on with the project,” said Elizabeth quickly, before he could get wound up again.

“Of course he does,” said Mary Clare.

“But the man was murdered!” sputtered Victor. “Surely we can’t stay up here in the woods with a killer loose!”

“Maybe we ought to vote on it,” said Milo.

Jake stood up. “It is for us, the living, rather to be dedicated here to the unfinished work they have thus far so nobly advanced,” he said solemnly.

“Damn straight,” said Mary Clare. “Y’all can vote all you want. Alex told me to do research at MacDowell, and I’m going.”

“Jake, that was a beautiful speech,” whispered Elizabeth when he sat down.

“Yep.” nodded Jake. “Gettysburg Address. It seemed appropriate.”

“I’m going to stay,” said Milo. “And since I’ll be heading up this project, maybe I’ll be in the most danger, but I think I owe it to Alex to finish. Anyone who wants to stay with me is welcome.” He looked doubtfully at Elizabeth. “Maybe you ought to check with your folks or something, though.”

Elizabeth was indignant. “I’m a college graduate too, you know! Just because you live with my big brother doesn’t mean you have to act like him! Of course I’m staying!” She had not considered the question at all, but Milo’s protective attitude had settled it.

“I’m staying too,” said Jake.

Victor signed. “I suppose I shall carry on,” he said grudgingly. “I know how much Dr. Lerche relied on me.”

Mary Clare stifled a giggle. “Well,” she said. “I’m all packed, so I reckon I ought to get on the road.”

Elizabeth frowned. “What about the funeral?” she asked. “Shouldn’t we go to that?”

“No,” said Mary Clare. “That funeral is going to be a faculty meeting run by the well-dressed widow. If you want to remember Alex, you’d best do it right here.”

“I’d like to go,” said Milo softly, “but I think if it were up to Alex, he’d want us right here.”

“It’s settled then,” said Jake. “We carry on.”

    Daniel Hunter Coltsfoot accepted the thermos of coffee as if he were a prisoner instead of a deputy. He had passed an uneasy night among the skulls in the site tent, listening intently for mountain lions and ax murderers—neither of which had disturbed his night-long vigil. Elizabeth and Milo had taken the precaution of hailing him from the edge of the clearing, in case he had been provided with a loaded gun for the occasion. When he peered out of the tent at them, Elizabeth waved the thermos and called out, “Good morning!”

Coltsfoot hurried out of the tent, remembered the possible presence of evidence, and began to tiptoe toward them like one crossing a minefield. “Boy, am I glad to see you guys!” he announced. “Is that for me? Wow, thanks. You think it’s okay to drink on the job?”

“As long as it’s coffee,” Milo assured him with a straight face.

“Thanks. Have you seen Pilot Barnes this morning?”

“I expect he’ll be along,” said Milo. “We wanted to get back to work.”

“Oh, gee, I don’t know about that,” said Coltsfoot. “They said something about coming back this morning to check for evidence.”

“It’s okay. We won’t disturb the site until they’ve been over it. But they took pictures in the tent last night, didn’t they?”

Coltsfoot tried to remember. “I think so.”

“All we want are the skulls from inside the tent,” Elizabeth said. “I want to remeasure them. I expect you’ll be glad to have them out of the way, won’t you?”

Coltsfoot frowned, suspecting a slight on his bravery. “It’s all in the line of duty, ma’am,” he drawled.

“I’m sure it is,” said Elizabeth quickly. “I only meant that an outdoor man like yourself must feel cramped in that tiny tent, and we could get that box out of your way.”

“We’d be right where you could see us,” Milo put in. “Just under that tree over there, doing measurements. You can watch.”

“I don’t know …” Coltsfoot struck a pose, pretending to conjure up the regulations he had never seen.

“We’d like to go on with our work … as therapy for our grief,” said Elizabeth with a soulful look into the deputy’s eyes.

“Well, gee … I can relate to that. Okay, pack ’em up. I don’t see what harm it could do since the body’s gone.”

“I don’t see what those skull measurements have to do with Alex’s death,” Elizabeth whispered when they were out of earshot.

“Just a hunch,” murmured Milo, turning a skull upside down. “Did you have to say that bit about therapy for our grief?”

“I’m sorry, Milo. But it worked. It got you the skulls. Now what are you looking for?”

“Never mind,” said Milo, intent on his examination.

“You don’t think I killed him for criticizing my work?”

“Shhh! Keep your voice down. Anyway, he didn’t criticize your work, did he?”

“No,” Elizabeth admitted. “But you have only my word for that. Anyway, I’d be surprised if I did everything exactly right. I
am
new at it.”

“I don’t think that’s what Alex wanted to see me about,” Milo whispered. “He would have understood all that. Besides, I’m not checking measurements.”

Elizabeth looked at the way he was handling the skull, noticing for the first time that he had not
picked up a measuring tool at all. “No, you aren’t,” she agreed. “What
are
you doing?”

Milo glanced furtively in the direction of the tent, but Coltsfoot was not watching them. “I’m looking for a ringer.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“A ringer. Now, you can’t mention this to anybody. Do you understand that? Especially not the sheriff’s department.”

“I promise, Milo.”

“All right. Don’t react when I tell you this. I think one of those skulls isn’t what it’s supposed to be. Alex must have noticed it.”

“You mean one is a fake? I know I’m a beginner, but I certainly would have noticed that!” said Elizabeth indignantly.

Milo sighed. “I don’t mean a plastic one, Elizabeth. Of course they’re all real skulls; but they are all supposed to belong to early nineteenth-century Indians. Now suppose one of them isn’t.”

“Isn’t a nineteenth-century Indian?”

“Right. What better way to dispose of a murder victim than to bury him with a bunch of other bodies?”

Elizabeth nodded. “Can you prove it?”

“More than likely—if I’m right.”

“How?”

“Lots of ways. Depends on how long it has been buried. If it has been there less than five years, the skull should be lighter than the rest. Of course, the easy way to tell—if we get lucky—is the teeth.”

“Of course! If the ringer has metal tooth fillings in his mouth, we can be pretty sure he wasn’t a nineteenth-century Indian.” Elizabeth picked up a battered brown skull and peered at the dark stumps on the maxilla. “This one definitely never saw a dentist,” she announced.

Milo tapped the smooth cranium. “It was pretty old. No suture closures.”

They worked for a while in silence, comparing skull coloration, and brushing dirt away from molars to see if a dark filling lay concealed beneath. Occasionally Milo would pick up a measuring tool if Coltsfoot happened to be looking in their direction.

“Why don’t you want the sheriff’s men to know what you suspect?” asked Elizabeth after a while.

“Because if a new body was dumped into the gravesite, it was done by the locals. We’re outsiders. I don’t know who we can trust.”

“Suddenly I don’t feel very safe,” said Elizabeth. She looked at Coltsfoot out of the corner of her eye, wondering if he was as innocuous as he appeared.

“I just wish I knew who we’re looking for,” said Milo fiercely. “That would help. I wonder if there is any way that we could discreetly ask questions about missing persons around the area.”

Elizabeth’s eyes widened. “Missing persons! Milo! I think I know who we’re looking for.”

In an urgent undertone she recounted the details of the Moonshine Massacre, ending with the disappearance of the sheriff’s nephew. “And he has not been found to this day,” she finished solemnly.

Milo rocked back on his heels and picked up a skull from the box. “That must be it,” he agreed. “One of these skulls must be him.” After a moment’s scrutiny, he set the skull back in the box. “Not this one, though. Keep looking.”

He watched for a moment as Elizabeth deftly hoisted another specimen. She had a steady hand, without a trace of beginner’s squeamishness. “You’re doing very well, Elizabeth,” he said awkwardly. “I’d just like you to know that—”

Elizabeth shook her head. “No, Milo,” she said gently. “Not until this is over.”

    Pilot Barnes and Hamp McKenna rode in silence along the Sarvice Valley Road. Pilot was too preoccupied
with his newly complicated responsibilities to engage in small talk, but despite his worries, he looked out across the valley with a stir of satisfaction. There were pastures of scrubby black cattle, and mounds of green hills attached like ribs to the spine of a wooded mountain. Weathered barns and laden apple trees became postcard pictures framed by split-rail fences.

At least this hasn’t changed, Pilot thought. He wished he could say the same for the rest of the county. The new four-lane, which had been built to speed tourists on their way to Asheville, and the motels and gift shops designed to slow them down, were sources of jobs and revenue, he supposed, but their ugliness saddened him. A mainstream of American culture had washed over the mountains, drowning most of what had been there before, and leaving flotsam of rusted car bodies and old beer cans. Pilot Barnes wondered how long the Cullowhees could hold out against the tide, or if in fact they wanted to.