“We didn’t have another breakin, did we?”
“Oh, hi, Diane,” said Andie.
“No,” said Korey. “Just telling Andie about the non-action posture the police took. And I was delivering these.” He handed Diane an envelope. “They turned out pretty good.”
Diane opened the envelope and took out photographs of the fingerprints. “How about your office, Korey? Was anything missing?”
“It had been searched, but nothing missing. Somebody was looking for something, that’s for sure.”
“I’ll see if I can get these prints run through the system. Korey, do you know Mike Seger very well?”
“Just met him. He was looking around in the conservation lab the other day, and I showed him some of the geology stuff we found in the basement.”
“What kind of guy does he seem to you?”
Korey shrugged. “He seemed an all right guy. You don’t suspect him of breaking into the lab, do you?”
Diane was taken aback for a moment. She’d been thinking about Melissa and not the breakin. “No, not at all. There are a lot of new people coming in from the university, and I just wondered what your take on him was.”
“Fine. I like him. Seems to know his business.”
“Thanks, Korey. I’ll let you know if I find out anything about the fingerprints.”
Diane went back to her desk and pulled out her calendar, skimming over today’s schedule. There was no urgent business. Dylan Houser wanted to meet about her computer. She could put that off for another day.
She called up her E-mail. Jonas Briggs had sent his next chess move, pawn to queen four. Diane thought a moment, visualizing the chessboard in her mind’s eye. The beginning game moves weren’t hard to remember, but before long she would have to go up to the second floor and look at his board before she moved. She E-mailed him to move her knight to the queen’s bishop three position.
It hit her suddenly. She jumped up from her computer and hurried into Andie’s office.
“Andie, what were you saying when I came in?”
“Hi, Diane?”
“No, before that. When you were speaking with Korey.”
“Oh, he was telling me how the police weren’t the least interested in finding who broke in to the lab, and I said they were more interested in finding out who peed on Mrs. Crabtree’s flowers-oh, and finding trespassers.”
“You were more specific than that about the trespassers.”
“Some taxidermist?”
“Why did you say that?”
Andie shrugged and looked wide-eyed. “I don’t know, I was just making conversation.”
“No, I mean why did you use those examples?”
“Oh. I like to read the sheriff’s incident report in the paper. Sometimes they’re real funny, like this woman who reported that someone broke into her house, messed up her bed and left an unused condom on her dresser. Why?”
“Can you tell me more about the taxidermist and the trespassers?”
“Let me see.” Andie rolled her eyes upward, thinking. “It began as a complaint from a woman. Her neighbor was shooting off a gun. The neighbor-a taxidermist-said he heard someone trespassing. Apparently, they were disturbing the cows in his pasture, or something like that, and he fired a shot in the air. That’s all there was to it.”
“When did you read this?”
“Just a few days ago. Why?”
“Do you know his name?”
“Something sort of funny.” Andie thought a minute. “Luther, Luther Something? Why are you asking me all this?”
“Tell you later.” Diane went back to her office, closed the door and dialed Frank’s cell phone number.
“Diane, how you doing this morning?”
“I’m fine, really.”
“That’s good. I was worried.”
“It was good to share Ariel with someone. She was special.”
“Yes, I can see that she was.”
There was a distance in Frank’s voice that puzzled her. If she hadn’t known him better, he sounded like someone who didn’t want to hear from a one-night stand. As she started to speak, she heard a pinging in the background, then an intercom voice calling for a doctor.
“Frank, where are you? Is everything all right with you? How’s Kevin?”
“Kevin’s fine. But I’m at the hospital. I got a call when I got home. Star tried to commit suicide this morning. She’s not good.”
“Oh, Frank.” Diane’s voice trembled.
“I didn’t want to tell you, I mean, after last night, but. .”
“Do you know what happened?”
“It was after they picked up her breakfast. She used a corner of her bed to cut her wrists. God, she had to be desperate to go through that. They said she lost a lot of blood.”
“An otherwise healthy person can lose up to forty percent of their blood volume before they even require a transfusion.” After she said it, Diane realized that it must have sounded so technical and cold. She wanted to be comforting. “I can come over.”
“I don’t know what to do,” he said.
So much sadness. Diane felt guilty. Last night her story, and now this.
“Find out who did this to her family. It won’t heal her overnight, but it will help.”
“I know, but right now, I don’t know what else to do,” he repeated. “We got all this information, but what does it leave us with?”
“That’s why I called. I think I know where to look for the rest of the skeleton.”
Chapter 22
The other end of the phone was silent except for the hospital sounds in the background.
“The skeleton?” Frank finally said. “You mean the one the collarbone was taken from? You know where it is?”
“Maybe. I’m not certain, but it’s a good lead. Remember I told you that it might be someplace where animals were processed? Andie told me about an item in the sheriff’s incident report about someone trespassing on land belonging to a taxidermist.”
Sheriff’s incident report. Diane just realized that probably meant it was in the county and not the city limits- not the jurisdiction of the chief of detectives but in the jurisdiction of the county sheriff. She hoped that boded well for their investigation.
“I remembered the mounted animal heads in George’s house, and that sounded like a good lead. This was just a few days ago. The trespasser could be someone looking to recover a body he left there several years ago, hoping it would never be discovered.”
“That does make sense.”
Diane could hear relief in his voice. Hope is a powerful thing.
“Do you know the taxidermist’s name?” he asked.
“It might be Luther.”
“Luther Abercrombie. He’s mounted a fish or two for me. Did some work for George too. You too, as a matter of fact.”
“Me?”
“If I’m not mistaken, Milo Lorenzo bought some stuffed animals from him for the Georgia collection.”
