The Mephisto Club

closer, emerging at last from his dusty hiding place, did she see the creased face, the wire-rim spectacles. Distorted blue eyes peered at her through thick lenses.

“You wouldn’t be that woman from the police, would you?” he asked.

“Dr. Von Schiller? I’m Detective Rizzoli.”

“I knew you had to be. No one else would wander in this late in the day. The door’s normally locked by now, so you’re getting a bit of a private tour here.” He gave a wink, as though this special treat should stay a secret between them. A rare chance to ogle dead bugs and stuffed birds without the hordes pressing in. “Well, did you bring it?” he asked.

“I’ve got it right here.” She removed the evidence bag from her pocket, and his eyes lit up at the sight of the contents, visible through the clear plastic.

“Come, on, then! Let’s go up to my office where I can get a good look at it under my magnifier. My eyes aren’t so good anymore. I hate the fluorescent lamp up there, but I do need it for something like this.”

She followed him toward the stairwell, matching her pace to his agonizingly slow shuffle. Could this guy still be teaching? He seemed far too old to even make it up the stairs. But Von Schiller was the name recommended to her when she’d called the comparative zoology department, and there was no mistaking the gleam of excitement in his eyes when he’d spotted what she had brought in her pocket. He could not wait to get his hands on it.

“Do you know much about seashells, Detective?” Von Schiller asked as he slowly climbed the stairs, his gnarled hand grasping the carved banister.

“Only what I’ve learned from eating clams.”

“You mean you’ve never collected them?” He glanced back. “Did you know Robert Louis Stevenson once said, ‘It is perhaps a more fortunate destiny to have a taste for collecting shells than to be born a millionaire’?”

“Did he, now?” I think I’d rather be a millionaire.

“It’s a passion I’ve had since I was a child. My parents would take us every year to the Amalfi Coast. My bedroom was filled with so many boxes of shells I could barely turn around. I still have them all, you know. Including a lovely specimen of Epitonium celesti. Rather rare. I bought it when I was twelve, and paid quite a dear price for it. But I’ve always thought that spending money on shells is an investment. The most exquisite art of Mother Nature.”

“Did you get a look at the photos I e-mailed you?”

“Oh, yes. I forwarded the photo to Stefano Rufini, an old friend of mine. Consults for a company called Medshells. They locate rare specimens from around the world and sell them to wealthy collectors. He and I agree about your shell’s probable origins.”

“So what is this shell?”

Von Schiller glanced back at her with a smile. “You think I’d give you a final answer without actually examining it?”

“You seem to know already.”

“I’ve narrowed it down, that’s all I can tell you.” He resumed climbing the stairs. “Its class is Gastropoda,” he said. Climbed another step. “Order: Caenogastropoda.” Another step, another chant. “Superfamily: Buccinacea.”

“Excuse me. What does all that mean?”

“It means that your little seashell is, first of all, a gastropod, which translates to stomach foot. It’s the same general class of mollusk as a land snail or a limpet. They’re univalves, with a muscular foot.”

“That’s the name of this shell?”

“No, that’s just the phylogenetic class. There are at least fifty thousand different varieties of gastropods around the world, and not all of them are ocean dwellers. The common land slug, for instance, is a gastropod, even though it has no shell.” He reached the top of the stairs and led the way through a hall with yet more display cases containing a silent menagerie of creatures, their glassy eyes staring back at Jane in disapproval. So vivid was her impression of being watched that she paused and glanced back at the deserted gallery, at cabinet after cabinet of mounted specimens.

Nobody here but us murdered animals.

She turned to follow Von Schiller.

He had vanished.

For a moment she stood alone in that vast gallery, hearing only the thump of her own heartbeat, feeling the hostile gazes of those countless creatures trapped behind glass. “Dr. Von Schiller?” she called, and her voice seemed to echo through hall after hall.

His head popped out from behind a cabinet. “Well, aren’t you coming?” he asked. “My office is right here.”

Office was too grand a word for the space he occupied. A door with the plaque-DR. HENRY VON SCHILLER, PROFESSOR EMERITUS-led to a windowless nook scarcely larger than a broom closet. Crammed inside were a desk, two chairs, and little else. He flipped on the wall switch and squinted in the harsh fluorescent glare.

“Let’s see it, then,” he said, and eagerly snatched the ziplock bag that she held out to him. “You say you found this at a crime scene?”

She hesitated, then said, merely, yes. Rammed down the throat of a dead woman was what she didn’t say.

“Why do you think it’s significant?”

“I’m hoping you can tell me.”

“May I handle it?”

“If you really need to.”

He opened the bag and, with arthritic fingers, he removed the seashell. “Oh yes,” he murmured as he squeezed behind his desk and settled into a creaking chair. He turned on a gooseneck lamp and pulled out a magnifying glass and a ruler. “Yes, it’s what I thought. Looks like about, oh, twenty-one millimeters long. Not a particularly nice specimen. These striations aren’t all that pretty, and it’s got a few chips here, you see? Could be an old shell that’s been tumbled around in some hobbyist’s collection box.” He looked up, blue eyes watery behind spectacles. “Pisania maculosa.”

“Is that its name?”

“Yes.”

“Are you sure?”

He set down the magnifying lens with a thud and stood up. “You don’t trust me?” he snapped. “Come on, then.”

“I’m not saying I don’t trust-”

“Of course that’s what you’re saying.” Von Schiller scuttled out of his office, moving with a speed she had not known he was capable of. Annoyed and in a hurry to defend himself, he shuffled through gallery after gallery, leading Jane deep into a gloomy maze of specimen cabinets, past the stares of countless dead eyes, and down a row of display cases tucked into the farthest corner of the building. Clearly, this was not a well-visited section of the museum. Typed display labels were yellowed with age, and dust filmed the glass cases. Von Schiller squeezed down a narrow corridor between cabinets, pulled open a drawer, and took out a specimen box.

“Here,” he said, opening the box. He took out a handful of shells and placed them, one by one, on top of a glass case. “Pisania maculosa. And here’s another, and another. And here’s yours.” He looked at her with the indignation of an insulted academic. “Well?”

Jane scanned the array of seashells, all of them with the same graceful curves, the same spiraling striations. “They do look alike.”

“Of course they do! They’re the same species! I know what I’m talking about. This is my field, Detective.”

And what a really useful field it is, she thought as she took out her notebook. “What’s the species name again?”

“Here, give that to me.” He snatched away her notebook and she watched him write down the name, scowling as he did it. This was not a nice old guy. No wonder they hid him away in a broom closet.

He handed back the notebook. “There. Properly spelled.”