One Grave Too Many

“That’s just it. Since I was getting an office here, the department head took my office and put me in another broom closet of an office space. Now I have two places to keep my brooms.”

“Oh. That wasn’t supposed to happen. I was hoping to add to what the faculty who come here had, not take away.”

“You’re not familiar with universities, are you?”

“Not since I was a student.” Diane looked around the room, searching for a compromise.

“I’ve got this research I’m working on. I really need more room. I’m sharing space at the university, and they want me to move my research here, but it looks like I’ll be sharing lab space with everyone here too. Taking this position has cut my resources more than in half.”

Diane turned back to her. “No, this is your lab.”

“Mine? This is my lab?”

“And the collection manager’s. He has to use it too. But as curator of animal collection, you’re in charge.”

“What about the geologist?”

“She has her own lab.”

“And the entomologist?”

“All the collections have their own labs.”

Sylvia looked around the room again. “I. . that’s different. I thought I had to share this space with everyone. They said this was a small museum.”

“It is, in terms of the number and variety of collections, but it’s a big building. It was decided that providing lab space would make a smaller museum desirable.”

“Don’t tell my department. They’ll want to send over some of the tenured faculty to replace me.”

“It’ll be our secret.” Diane handed her the vial. “This looks like a fish rib to me. Is it?”

Dr. Mercer took the vial and peered at the thin bone inside. “Yes, it is. I can’t tell you what kind of fish. Ribs are not really distinguishable among fish. Possibly bass or trout. Where did it come from? Sometimes that’s a clue.”

“Inside the marrow cavity of a broken human clavicle.”

Sylvia Mercer glanced at Diane and back at the fish bone. “How odd. Is it some ritualistic burial practice? I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“No. This is a modern suspicious death.”

Sylvia silently looked at Diane, her brow creased in deep furrows. Diane felt some explanation was warranted.

“Before I became director of the museum, I was a forensic anthropologist.” Diane took the bag containing the section of clavicle from her blazer pocket. “A detective asked me to look at this bone that was found by someone. The fish bone was inside it.”

“Yes, I think I heard someone say you’re an osteologist. I must say, you were thorough if you found it inside that bone.”

Not thorough enough, thought Diane, or I would have found it the first time around.

“I appreciate the identification. Choose any type of window treatment for your office that will work best for you. Tell my assistant, Andie Layne, and she’ll order it.” Diane stepped past Dr. Mercer and sat down at a dissecting microscope. She removed the broken clavicle from its bag, placed it on the stage and focused on its surface.

“Will you be using the lab for your forensic work?” Sylvia had come up behind Diane and was looking over her shoulder.

“No. This is a onetime thing.”

“Where was it found?”

“That’s a good question. It was given to the detective without provenience.”

“Is there anything you can tell from just that one piece?”

Diane briefly described what she knew about the bone as she examined its surface under the microscope.

Having missed the fish rib the first time stung, and she wasn’t going to miss anything else. But she found nothing on the weathered surface that hadn’t been evident with the hand lens. She tore off a piece of butcher paper from a roll hanging on the wall and gently shook and tapped the bone over it. A few flakes landed on the paper, along with a tiny brown oval that looked like a dark flake of popcorn shell. She put the paper on the microscope stage and examined the objects.

“What is it?” Sylvia leaned over Diane’s shoulder, looking at the microscope stage with interest.

“I’ll have to check with the entomologist, but I believe it’s a cap from a blowfly puparium. Its presence inside the bone cavity is as unusual as the fish rib. At this stage of development, the blowflies have moved away from the carrion and burrowed underground. Because this is a cap, we know that the adult blowfly did emerge.”

Diane looked at her watch. She had a board meeting in just a few minutes.

The faunal lab, like all the labs in the museum, had a specimen photography setup-a maneuverable camera stand with lighting that allowed the object to be photographed from different angles. Before proceeding with her analysis, she placed the bone on the camera stage and snapped pictures of it from several views.

She found another vial in the lab supply cabinet for the new material. After placing the new material in the vials and labeling them, she took the bone saw, put in a new blade and cut a sample of bone that was more than enough for her friend to test.

Sylvia Mercer looked on as Diane found a specimen bag and box to ship it in. “What kind of test are you going to do on it?”

“Stable isotope. It’ll be interesting to see if I can find any useful information.”

“It will. I’d think that modern diet wouldn’t lend itself to a test like that.”

Diane finished addressing the package and started for her office. “I’ve got to run. Andie has catalogs of office furniture, curtains and blinds and things. She’ll help you find whatever you need.”

In her office, she locked the vial in her filing cabinet and was putting stamps on the package when she heard Andie go into her office. Diane retrieved the budget figures and the fax information and opened the door between their offices. “I know you just came back from some errands, but I really need you to overnight this package for me.”

Andie stood with her keys still in her hand. “Sure. I’ll do it now.”

“Thanks.” Diane looked at her watch again. It was almost time for the meeting. She wondered if Donald had gone up to the conference room yet.

With file folders in hand, Diane locked her door and walked around the corner to Donald’s office. When knocking brought no response, she turned the knob. It was locked. Few people in the museum had master keys, but she was one of them. She opened his office and walked in, closing the door behind her.

To Diane, Donald’s office did not reflect his personality. His thinking, as well as his work, often seemed disorganized to her ordered sensibilities. But his office was something else, better organized than hers. It didn’t seem like him at all. Framed National Geographic covers decorated his walls, along with shadow boxes displaying rocks and minerals. A faux zebra-skin rug covered the area in front of his desk. Animals carved from a variety of exotic woods stood between books on his shelves. She would never have thought that Donald had decorated it, had she not seen him carefully measure and hang the pictures and place the books and carvings on the shelves.

She remembered when he had come to her with the catalog showing the desk he wanted-one of the few times his interaction with her was cordial. The polished dark walnut desk with the black ebony inlaid top was one of the most expensive pieces of office furniture they were ordering. The choice defied his characteristic argument for thrift. He had wanted that desk, and she’d agreed to purchase it partly because she hoped it would help their future interactions.

Diane wasn’t sure what she was looking for in his office. Some evidence she could confront him with. She didn’t approach his desk or his walnut filing cabinet. She didn’t intend to rifle though his things. Pangs of guilt gnawed at her for venturing without permission this far into his office.

Nothing stood out to point to his guilt. Maybe it wasn’t him. Then who? Not Andie. It could have been Andie,