The faces in his album.
The boy in the snapshot in Jean Laurier’s desk.
Way?
I returned to Danny’s office and checked Spider’s file.
Wherever a form queried race, a check marked the little box beside the word
Yet.
I looked at the clock. Twelve forty.
I went to the kitchen and downed a yogurt and a granola bar. Popped a Diet Coke. Considered.
Returned to gluing.
Again and again I circled back to one simple truth.
People misrepresent when filling out forms. Men record themselves as taller. Women record themselves as slimmer, younger.
People lie.
One thirty.
Not too late.
I punched a number into my BlackBerry. Area code 910.
Twelve rings, then the line went dead.
Clicking off, I entered a different set of digits. Though the lab was cool, sweat now beaded my brow.
“Sugarman’s Funeral Home,” a syrupy voice purred.
“Silas Sugarman, please. Temperance Brennan calling.”
“Hold, please.”
“Dance of the Blessed Spirits” from
“Dr. Brennan. What a pleasure. You’ve returned from Hawaii?”
“I’m calling from Honolulu.”
“How may I help you?”
“I’m in need of personal information on Spider Lowery.”
“Perhaps you should talk to Spider’s daddy.”
“Plato isn’t answering his phone.”
“I’ll do what I can.” Apprehensive. “Within the bounds of ethical constraints, of course.”
“Of course. Are the Lowerys Native American?”
Sugarman didn’t reply for so long I thought he’d found my question offensive. Or an invasion of privacy.
“You mean Indian?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Hell’s bells, little lady, most folks in Robeson County have a papoose or two up the old family tree. My own great-grandma was Indian, God rest her soul.”
“The Lowerys, sir?”
“Course they’ve got blood. Plato’s half Lumbee, his wife too, come from up the road in Pembroke.”
Sugarman referred to the Lumbee, a Native American group taking its name from the Lumber River.
Descended mainly from Cheraw and related Siouan speakers, the Lumbee have occupied what is now Robeson County since the eighteenth century. They’re the largest tribe in North Carolina, the largest east of the Mississippi River, and the ninth largest in the nation.
And perhaps the most disadvantaged.
The Lumbee were granted formal recognition as a tribe by North Carolina in 1885. Three years later they started pressing claims with the federal government for similar recognition. To date, they’d met with limited success.
In 1956, Congress passed a bill acknowledging the Lumbee as Indian, but denying them full status as a tribe. As a result, they are ineligible for the financial support and Bureau of Indian Affairs program services provided to officially recognized groups.
All forty-seven thousand are pretty cheesed off.
“—don’t take my meaning wrong.”
“Of course not.” I couldn’t wait to get off the phone. “Thank you so much.”
Danny was still in his case review meeting.
