Murder in the Queen's Armes (13 page)

"Fine," Abe said.
"Delicious."

Hinshore’s narrow face lit up with pleasure. "I’ll tell the missus. And now perhaps a little cheese? We have a fine old Brie and some first-class Gorgonzola. A little more St. Emilion to go with it, perhaps?"

They had the cheese but not the wine. Julie’s brows knitted. "Gideon," she said, spreading the pungent, runny Brie on a slice of bread, "this student you think was murdered—"

"There’s no ‘think’ about it. The broken ulna and radius, the fractured hyoid, the crushed larynx—"

She shut her eyes and waved the bread at him. "All right, I believe you."

Gideon grinned as he cut some blue-veined Gorgonzola. "I’m starting to sound like Merrill."

"Heaven forbid. We’d have to get a divorce." She popped the bread into her mouth and licked her finger. "From what you said, Inspector Bagshawe thinks the killer is someone at the dig, maybe Nate himself. Is that right?"

"He didn’t say it in so many words, but that was the impression I got, yes. With Nate at the head of the list."

"But why? Why not somebody from outside the dig?"

"Well, I think Bagshawe’s just beginning with known factors. Where else could he start?"

"Didn’t Alexander belong to some kind of motorcycle gang in Missouri? Couldn’t there have been some sort of grudge, and they bumped him off?"

Abe looked accusingly at Gideon. "Bumped him off? This is what comes of being married to a skeleton detective? And such a nice girl she was."

"She certainly was," Gideon said. "But no, I don’t think a motorcycle gang is too likely. Why come all the way to nice, quiet Dorset to do it, when he could have been just as easily bumped off the road in nice, quiet Missouri?"

He turned suddenly to Abe. "Do you remember if Nate is left-handed?"

"No," Abe said promptly.

"No you don’t remember, or no he’s not left-handed?"

"No he’s not left-handed."

Gideon heaved a relieved sigh, then looked up. "How can you be that sure? You haven’t seen him in years."

"Because," Abe explained. "I remember. Julie, you’re thinking something?"

"Uh-huh, I am," she said slowly, reaching for another piece of bread. "Let me ask this. Now don’t you two jump down my throat—remember, I don’t know the man—but is there a possibility that Nate Marcus actually did kill him— to keep him from telling whatever it was?"

Gideon was hardly about to jump down her throat. His protests to Bagshawe notwithstanding, the idea ranged uncomfortably about the perimeters of his mind. "I don’t think so, but I’m not as sure as I’d like to be. What do you think, Abe? You probably know him better than I do."

Abe still had a little dinner wine left. He swirled it thoughtfully. "You know how you read in the paper when there’s some terrible murder and the mother says, ‘No, it couldn’t be my son who did it, such a darling boy, always so polite’? Well, this is how I feel about Nathan. Maybe not always so polite, but a murderer? Impossible." He drained the wine, tilted his head, lifted a white eyebrow. "Still, who knows? All the time the criminologists are telling us anybody could be a murderer with the right motivation."

"I don’t really believe that, though," Gideon said.

"Me neither," said Julie.

"Me neither," said Abe. "
Nu,
so much for the criminologists."

Gideon paused in the act of slicing a chunk of Gorgonzola and snapped his fingers softly. "Something just occurred to me. I need to make a telephone call. Be right back."

He found Barry Fusco on his first attempt, at the Coach and Horses, and waited impatiently while the landlord called him to the telephone.

"Barry, when I was up at the dig a couple of weeks ago, you came down to the gate to let me in. Are you responsible for letting people in, or were you just being helpful?"

"Huh?" Barry sounded as if he’d been asleep. "No, I’m on gate duty this month."

That was what Gideon had hoped. "So you’d know about any visitors?"

"Uh-huh," Barry said through a yawn. "I mean, we all have our own keys, but if it’s a visitor, someone who doesn’t have one, I’m supposed to let him in."

"Do you remember if there were any other visitors the day I was there?"

"There were some school kids—"

"No, they left before I did. Was there anybody there after me?"

"Uh-uh. Nope."

"Why so sure?"

"Because the whole time I’ve been on, I only had to let visitors in twice, and that was on the same day—you and that school group. That was it."

"You’re positive?"

"Sure. Nobody else. We used to get some people in the summer, but not now. What’s the difference, Dr. Oliver?"

From the way he was talking, Gideon knew he hadn’t heard about Randy. Evidently, Bagshawe hadn’t yet made his trip up the hill. "Barry," he said casually, "are you right-handed?"

"Am I…" He laughed, as if Gideon had asked him a riddle. "All right, I’m right-handed. Why?"

"What about the others? Leon, Sandra, Dr. Frawley?"

"I don’t know. I think everyone’s right-handed, but I’m not sure. Wait a minute, Randy’s a lefty. He used to pitch Class-A ball. Did you know that?"

"I think I did hear something about it. Thanks a lot, Barry."

"Things are shaping up," Gideon said as he returned to the dining room. "It looks like it must have been somebody

from the dig who killed him. If not Nate, then one of the others: Frawley, Leon, Sandra… who am I forgetting? Oh, Barry. Five suspects."

"How come?" Abe asked. "Why?"

"Let’s assume I’m right about Randy’s body being tossed into that lagoon from the top of Stonebarrow Fell itself, okay? Well there haven’t been any outsiders up to the fell since
before
Randy was killed—I was the last one, in fact…. So an insider must have done it. Simple."

"How do you know this?" Abe asked. "About no outsiders." The fatigue seemed to have left him; there was color in his cheeks and a liveliness in his eyes; he sensed a mystery, an adventure.

Gideon told him about the call to Barry. "I suppose someone could have climbed over the fence, and Barry might not have seen him, but that’s pretty doubtful. It’s a pretty small dig."

"Gideon," Julie said, "you’ll need to tell Inspector Bagshawe about this, won’t you?"

Gideon nodded. "I was going to call him in the morning anyway—about the lagoon."

On Hinshore’s suggestion, they took their coffee in the Tudor Room, where the fire had been renewed for them. For a few lazy minutes they sipped quietly, gazing into the orange flames.

"I got a question," Abe said, still looking into the fire, his cup at his lips, the saucer held just below it. "This theft of the Poundbury skull in Dorchester; where do you think it fits in?"

"Fits in with what?" Gideon asked.

"With what?" Abe repeated, waggling the saucer impatiently. "With everything—the whole
mish-mosh.
"

"Why should it fit in at all?"

Over the rim of his cup, Abe looked at him as if Gideon had asked why one and one should be two. The old man put the cup down and wiped his lips with a napkin. "Listen, how far from Dorchester to Charmouth?"

"Thirty miles, maybe."

"Fine. Now, let me ask you: In your whole career, did you ever run into a… what are they calling it…an inquiry into a dig?"

"Not personally, no."

"No," Abe said. "What about a murder on a dig?"

"No."

"No. And stealing a calvarium from a museum? This, did you ever see?"

Gideon shook his head.

Abe nodded his. "No, no, and no. Three things that never happen, and they all happen inside of a few weeks of each other, and inside of thirty miles of each other. And you think they’re just three separate pieces of monkey business, nothing to do with each other?" He looked at Julie and jerked a thumb at Gideon. "Some detective!"

Gideon grumbled in mock annoyance. "In the first place, Dr. Goldstein, I’m
not
a detective—"

"Hoo, boy, you’re telling me."

They all laughed then, and Gideon poured more coffee for them from the silver pot. "Maybe you have a point, Abe," he said.

"Of course. And here’s another connection between all three things: you."

"Me?"

"You. You just happen to discover Poundbury’s missing; you just happen to arrive here the next day; you just happen to be the one Alexander wants to tell a secret—and you just happen to be the one that winds up analyzing the poor guy’s bones."

"But it’s true: I
did
just happen—"

"Of course." He put down his half-empty cup and rose.

"I think I’ll go ahead to bed now." He clasped Gideon’s shoulder and spoke to Julie. "This husband of yours; sometimes his fancy-dancy anthropological theories get a little
ungepotchket
—you know
ungepotchket?
"

Julie shook her head.

"Screwed up," Gideon murmured. His years of friendship with Abe had taught him a great many Yiddish expressions—by osmosis, as it were.

Abe narrowed his eyes, considering. "Screwed up? No, this I wouldn’t say.
Ungepotchket
is more, well… unnecessarily rococo."

Julie laughed. "Does it really mean that?"

"Sure," Abe said. "But about Gideon, this I got to say. Wherever he is…always it gets interesting. Good night, folks."

His papery face suddenly crinkled in a laugh, and on the spur of the moment Gideon got up and gently embraced the frail figure. "Good night, Abe. Sleep well. I’m glad you’re here."

When he had left, Gideon said to Julie, "He really could have a point, you know."

"Of course I got a point!" floated down the hall, followed by the closing of a door.

"Well," Julie said, "you
do
seem in the thick of things for a man who was going to be uninvolved."

"I know. It’s funny, isn’t it? But none of it was my doing, and once I give Bagshawe a call in the morning—and go up to the site at ten—I’m out of it."

Julie smiled and leaned back comfortably in her chair. In the firelight her cheeks were peach-colored and transparent-looking, as smooth and soft as the petals of a rose; she might have been a candlelit Madonna of Geertgen or La Tour. "Sure you are," she said. "All the same…"

"All the same you just have a feeling."

"Uh-huh."

"Me, too. And to tell the truth, I wish there
was
something I could do."

"Well," she said, and leaned forward to stroke the line of his jaw, "Abe’s certainly right about one thing. Life with you isn’t dull."

   THE next morning Gideon called police headquarters. Inspector Bagshawe wasn’t in, but Wilson Merrill was. The pathologist began to talk excitedly as soon as he picked up the telephone; the remains had definitely been identified as those of Randy Alexander.

"How?" Gideon asked, "Dental records?"

"Yes, the forensic people telephoned the police in Missouri—or is it Missoula? Or are they the same place?—and were put in touch with the young man’s dentist. Indeed, Alexander’s dental records matched exactly what we’d found in the cadaver. The charts are on their way, but there’s no doubt about it. The only mildly disturbing element, of course, is the state of decomposition of the body after only two weeks, but I suppose we just have to attribute that to—"

Gideon quickly outlined his hypothesis about Alexander’s body having lain in the warm lagoon at the base of Stonebarrow Fell for two weeks before it drifted out to sea.

"Why, yes, that would account for it, of course!" Merrill was delighted. "In summer, no doubt, someone would have discovered it the next day, but in winter there’d be no one on the beach to find it. Splendid work! I’ll go and have a look at that lagoon myself." There was a pause. "Oh, I say. That would mean—unless there are similar lagoons in the area—that he might very well have been thrown from Stonebarrow Fell itself, wouldn’t it?"

"I’m afraid so. Highly likely, I’d say. And what’s more, it appears that there haven’t been any visitors to the dig for a month, so…"

"Oh, dear. The murderer would have to be a member of the expedition, wouldn’t he? Unpleasant."

"It looks that way, yes. But of course I might be off-base. I’m afraid the inspector will think it’s all pretty speculative."

"I’m afraid it’s a better guess than you think. The instrument that broke Alexander’s arm has been quite positively identified as a mallet from the tool chest of the excavation."

"But how is that possible? How could you make such an identification?"

"Not I, but our forensic scientists in London once again, and a first-rate piece of sleuthing it was too. Do you remember Inspector Bagshawe’s idea about the sleeve of Alexander’s leather jacket providing some clue as to the weapon?"

"Yes, of course."

"Well, it provided more than a clue. In the first place, there was an indentation in the leather, indicating that the weapon had a flat striking surface with a well-defined circular margin—like that of a hammer or a mallet. Now, adhering to the leather itself—embedded in it, actually—they found a ragged scrap of paper."

"Paper? But it’d been in the water for two weeks. Wouldn’t it rot?"

"So I should have thought. But, I am instructed, that doesn’t always occur. In this case, the sizing had indeed rotted away, but the paper fiber itself was still there, as was some cement on the back of it, and there was even a ghost of printing on it which, under analysis, turned out to be the lowercase letters
a
and
s.
Intriguing, isn’t it? Now what would you guess this mysterious shred of paper to be?"

Gideon was silent. Even if he’d had any idea, he’d hardly have wanted to spoil Merrill’s enjoyment.

"Ha." Merrill cleared his throat. "Well, to make a long story short, the paper was an adhesive label of the sort put on objects to identify and price them. What had happened was that the tag had apparently been placed on the mallet carelessly, so that it was draped over an edge of the striking surface, partly on that surface itself, partly on the side of the mallet’s head, where it belonged. Moreover, the part that was on the striking surface had not adhered thoroughly— one corner had gotten folded over, so that the adhesive side of it was facing up. Do you follow me?"