Icy Clutches

By the time Gideon had mixed the Duco-and-acetone solution, coated the fragments, and set them out to dry, it was 12:20. He locked up the contact station and went seeking fresh air to clear the sharp fumes from his lungs. He walked out to the end of the wooden pier that began a few paces away and jutted two hundred feet into Bartlett Cove. Here and there the silver flank of a salmon would break the rippled surface of the water momentarily and disappear again, almost before the eye had registered it, leaving a small splash like an afterimage. Above, dark wisps of cloud drifted like flecks of ash under a luminous, oyster-gray cloud sheet. He leaned his elbows on the railing and stared down at the dark water.

Murder. No mere intellectual exercise this time, no decades-old shards of bone posing a dusty forensic puzzle. Flesh-and-blood murder. So had the other been, of course, but what a difference time made. Tremaine had been alive yesterday; Gideon had talked to him. And no more than three hours afterward someone had stolen a passkey to his room and strangled him—had pressed brutal thumbs into the fragile, elderly windpipe, holding them there until Tremaine's face turned purple from the desperate need for air, and his tongue stuck out, and his mouth frothed, and his eyes popped. And the left superior cornu of his larynx snapped.

The killer had left him lying on his back while he—or she—rummaged through the closet, looking for something of Tremaine's to make it look like a credible suicide. He had found the boots, removed the laces, wrapped them around Tremaine's neck, hoisted the body into position—that couldn't have been an easy job—and knotted the laces around the hook. Then, for a little extra verisimilitude, the overnight case—cum—gallows stool had been provided. The killer had left, perhaps immediately, perhaps waiting until late at night, through either the window or the door, locking it behind him.

Had there been an argument? Had Tremaine threatened to reveal something that someone wanted hidden? Had someone...Still looking at the water, Gideon shook his head. Too early for answers. Too early for the questions. There was nothing to go on yet.

Who the “someone was, was easier. The possibilities, after all, were limited. It had to have been one of the five people Tremaine was working with. Who else was there with any connection to him?

The dark underclouds were thickening, the day growing colder. Tiny whitecaps were forming even in the protected cove. Two or three hundred feet down the wild shoreline, across a shallow, rock-strewn inlet, the breeze ruffled the neck fur of a mother bear and cub browsing choosily among the blueberry bushes. Gideon zipped his windbreaker up to his neck, but still the wind chilled him. He turned to head back and saw someone peering into the window of the contact station, face pressed against the glass, hand to his forehead to block the reflections. When the figure moved, Gideon recognized him.

'Arthur!” he called.

Tibbett turned around. “Gideon! I was just looking for you.” He hurried to meet Gideon, his pale face doughy with misgiving. A cardboard box was clamped under one arm. “Is it definitely true? He was murdered?'

'I'm afraid so.'

'Awful. The vultures have already begun to gather,” he said with distaste. He blew out his cheeks, walking hunch-shouldered with Gideon back toward the head of the pier. “I've just had a call from the Anchorage Daily News, wanting to know if a press conference has been scheduled yet.'

'You'll probably have to hold one eventually, Arthur. Tremaine was a nationally known figure.'

'You don't really think so!” Tibbett's head jiggled back and forth in disapproval, but beneath the surface Gideon sensed a dawning excitement; the glittering exhilaration of involvement with murdered celebrities. Gideon had seen it before, in cops, coroners, even priests. Why not an assistant park superintendent?

They had reached the head of the pier. Arthur stopped and looked at him with mild reproof. “Owen told me about the other murder—the old one, the skull. You might have told me, you know.'

'Well, I didn't want to bother you,” Gideon said lamely. “I wasn't really positive at first.'

'But you're positive now?'

'Yes.'

'Do you know, I don't think there's ever been a murder in this park before. And now, here we are with two in two days.” He started a nervous giggle, but broke it off. “You know what I mean. Oh, I almost forgot. This is for you.” He extended the box.

Gideon took out a white kitchen scale. “For me?” he said, confused.

'You said you needed an accurate scale. You wanted to do some kind of regression equation on the bones.'

'Oh, yes, that's right.” He'd forgotten all about it. It had been mentioned originally only to soothe Arthur's anxieties. There was a way to use bone weights to find out whether a set of bones had come from the same person, but you needed the right bones, and Gideon didn't have them. Of course, with Owen's rangers out searching for more, there was a possibility that they'd turn up, and then a scale would come in handy. But not this scale.

'Actually, Arthur, I'd need something a little more accurate. This—'

'Accurate?' Arthur cried. “Good heavens, man, this is a Cusinart!'

'Well, I know, and I'm sure it's a good one. But it's a spring scale. I need a—what do you call it—a beam scale, a counter scale.'

'You don't mean the old-fashioned kind where you put little weights on one side?'

'Right, and something that will weigh in grams and centigrams.'

'I'll see what I can do,” Arthur said. He was put out. The box was snatched back. “I'm afraid I have more bad news for you,” he said grumpily. “We've been unable to come up with the records you wanted. If such things ever existed.'

'Records?'

'Of the recovery of those bones in 1964; the ones that came out of the glacier. Owen told me you were interested.'