'We have about a hundred birds from Audubon's original collection,' she said, walking briskly down the central corridor. 'Unfortunately, Audubon was not much of a taxidermist. The specimens have been stabilized, of course. Here we are.'
They stopped before a large, gray metal cabinet that looked almost like a safe. Marchant spun the center dial and turned the lever handle. With a sigh of air, the great door opened, revealing inner wooden cabinets with labels, stuck into brass label-holders, screwed to every drawer. A stench of mothballs washed over D'Agosta. Grasping one drawer, Marchant drew it out to display three rows of stuffed birds, yellowed tags around each claw, white cotton-wool poking out of their eyes.
'Those tags are Audubon's originals,' said Marchant. 'I'll handle the birds myself--please don't touch them without my permission. Now!' She smiled. 'Which ones would you like to see?'
D'Agosta consulted his notebook. He had copied down some bird names from a website that listed all of Audubon's original specimens and their locations. Now he trotted them out. 'I'd like to start with the Louisiana Water Thrush.'
'Excellent!' The drawer slid in and another was pulled out. 'Do you want to examine it on the table or in the drawer?'
'Drawer is fine.' D'Agosta pushed a loupe into his eye and studied the bird closely with many grunts and mutterings. It was a ragged-looking thing, the feathers askew or missing, stuffing coming out. D'Agosta made what he hoped was a show of concentration, pausing to jot unintelligible notes.
He straightened. 'Thank you. The American Goldfinch is the next on my list.'
'Coming right up.'
He made another show of examining the bird, squinting at it through the loupe, taking notes, talking to himself.
'I hope you're finding what you're looking for,' said Marchant, with a leading tone in her voice.
'Oh, yes. Thank you.' This was already getting tiresome, and the smell of mothballs was making him sick.
'Now--' He pretended to consult his notebook. '--I'll look at the Carolina Parrot.'
A sudden silence. D'Agosta was surprised to see Marchant's face reddening slightly. 'I'm sorry, we don't have that specimen.'
He felt an additional wash of annoyance: they didn't even have the specimen he'd come for. 'But it's in all the reference books as being here,' he said, more crossly than he intended. 'In fact, it says you have two of them.'
'We don't have them anymore.'
'Where are they?' he said, with open exasperation.
There was a long silence. 'I'm afraid they disappeared.'
'Disappeared? Lost?'
'No, not lost. Stolen. Many years ago, when I was just an assistant. All that remain are a few feathers.'
Suddenly D'Agosta was interested. His cop radar went off big-time. He knew, right away, that this wasn't going to be a wild goose chase after all. 'Was there an investigation?'
'Yes, but it was perfunctory. It's hard to get the police excited about two stolen birds, even if they are extinct.'
'Do you have a copy of the old report?'
'We keep very good files here.'
'I'd like to see it.'
He found the woman looking at him curiously. 'Excuse me, Dr. D'Agosta--but why? The birds have been gone for more than a dozen years.'
D'Agosta thought fast. This changed the game. He made a quick decision, dipped into his pocket, and brought out his shield.
'Oh, my.' She looked at him, her eyes widening. 'You're a policeman. Not an ornithologist.'
D'Agosta put it away. 'That's right, I'm a lieutenant detective with NYPD homicide. Now be a dear and go get that file.'
She nodded, hesitated. 'What's it about?'
D'Agosta looked at her and noted a thrill in her eyes, a certain suppressed excitement. 'Murder, of course,' he said with a smile.
She nodded again, rose. A few minutes later she returned with a slender manila folder. D'Agosta opened it to find the most cursory of police reports, a single scribbled paragraph that told him nothing except that a routine check of the collection revealed the birds were missing. No sign of break-in, nothing else taken, no evidence collected at the scene, no fingerprints dusted, and no suspects named. The only useful thing was the time frame of the crime: it had to have occurred between September 1 and October 1, as the collection was inventoried once a month.
'Do you have logs of all the researchers who used the collections?'
'Yes. But we always check the collection after they leave, to make sure they haven't nicked something.'
'Then we can narrow down the time frame even further. Bring me the logs, please.'
'Right away.' The woman bustled off, the eager clomping of her shoes echoing in the attic space as she descended the stairs.
