“Do you remember why he left the dig?” asked Frost. “Did something happen? Did he not get along with the other students?”
“No, I think it was because he got bored here. That’s why he took that internship out in Boston. That annoyed me, because I would have taken on a different student if I’d known Bradley wouldn’t stick it out here.”
“Boston?” Jane cut in.
“Yes.”
“Where was this internship?”
“Some private museum. I’m sure his father pulled strings to get him in.”
“Was it the Crispin Museum?”
Professor Quigley thought about it. Then he nodded. “That may have been the one.”
EIGHTEEN
Jane had heard that Texas was big, but as a New England girl, she had no real appreciation of just what big really meant. Nor had she imagined how bright the Texas sun was, or how hot the air could be, as hot as dragon’s breath. The three-hour drive from the airport took them through miles of scrub brush, through a sunbaked landscape where even the cattle looked different—rangy and mean, unlike the placid Guernseys she saw on pleasant green farms in Massachusetts. This was a foreign country, a thirsty country, and she fully expected the Rose estate to look like the arid ranches they passed along the way, low-slung and spread out, with white corral fences enclosing parched brown acreage.
So she was surprised when the mansion loomed into view.
It was set on a lushly planted hill that looked shockingly green above the endless expanse of scrubland. A lawn swept down from the home like a velvet skirt. In a paddock enclosed by white fences, half a dozen horses were grazing, their coats gleaming. But it was the residence that held Jane’s gaze. She’d expected a ranch house, not this stone castle with its crenellated turrets.
They drove to the massive iron gate and stared up in wonder.
“How much, do you think?” she asked.
“I’m guessing thirty million,” said Frost.
“That’s all? It’s got, like, fifty thousand acres.”
“Yeah, but it’s Texas. Land’s gotta be cheaper than at home.”
When thirty million dollars sounded cheap, thought Jane, you know you’ve stepped into an alternative universe.
A voice over the gate intercom said: “Your business?”
“Detectives Rizzoli and Frost. We’re from Boston PD. We’re here to see Mr. and Mrs. Rose.”
“Is Mr. Rose expecting you?”
“I called him this morning. He said he’d speak to us.”
There was a long silence, then the gate finally swung open.
“Drive through, please.”
The curving road took them up the hill, past a colonnade of cypress trees and Roman statues. A circle of broken marble pillars stood mounted on a stone terrace like an ancient temple partially felled by the ages.
“Where do you get the water out here for all these plantings?” asked Frost. His gaze suddenly whipped around as they passed a fragmented head of a marble colossus, its remaining eye staring up from a resting place on the lawn. “Hey, do you think that thing’s real?”
“People this rich don’t have to settle for fakes. You can bet that Lord Carnivore guy—”
“You mean Carnarvon?”
“You can bet he decorated his home with real stuff.”
“There are rules against that now. You can’t just snatch things out of other countries and bring them home.”
“Rules are for you and me, Frost. Not for people like them.”
“Yeah, well, people like the Roses aren’t going to be too happy once they figure out why we’re asking these questions. I give them about five minutes before they throw us out.”
“Then this will be the nicest damn place we’ll ever get thrown out of.”
They pulled up beneath a stone portico, where a man already stood waiting for them. This was not one of the hired help, thought Jane; this must be Kimball Rose himself. Though he had to be in his seventies, he stood tall and ramrod-straight, with a handsome mane of silver hair. He was dressed casually, in khaki trousers and a golf shirt, but Jane doubted he’d picked up that deep tan simply whiling away his retirement on the links. The vast collection of statuary and marble columns on the hillside told her this man had far more compelling hobbies than hitting golf balls.
She stepped out of the car into air so dry, she blinked in the parching wind. Kimball didn’t seem at all affected by the heat, and the handshake he gave her was cool and crisp.
“Thank you for seeing us on such short notice,” said Jane.
“I said yes only ’cause it’s a sure way to end these damn fool questions. There’s nothing here for you to chase after, Detective.”
“Then this shouldn’t take long. We only have a few things to ask you and your wife.”
“My wife can’t talk to you. She’s sick and I won’t have you upsetting her.”
“It’s just about your son.”
“She can’t handle any questions about Bradley. She’s been fightin’ lymphocytic leukemia for more’n ten years now, and the littlest upset could tip her right over.”
“Talking about Bradley would upset her that much?”
“He’s our only boy, and she’s attached to him. Last thing she needs to hear is that the police are treating him like a suspect.”
“We never said he was a suspect, sir.”
“No?” Kimball met her gaze with a look that was both direct and confrontational. “Then what’re you doing here?”
“Bradley was acquainted with Ms. Edgerton. We’re just touching all the bases.”
“You’ve come a long way just to touch this base.” He turned to the front door. “Come in, let’s get it over with. But I’ll tell you now you’re wasting your time.”
After the heat outside, Jane welcomed the chance to cool off in an air-conditioned house, but the Rose residence was startlingly frigid and made to seem even less welcoming by the marble tiles and the cavernous entrance hall. Jane looked up at the huge beams that supported the vaulted ceiling. Though a stained-glass window let in squares of multicolored light, wood paneling and hanging tap estries seemed to absorb all brightness, throwing the house into gloom. This was not a home, she thought; this was a museum, meant to show off the acquisitions of a man addicted to collecting treasures. In the entrance hall, suits of armor stood like soldiers at attention. Mounted on the walls were battle-axes and swords, and a decorated banner hung overhead—the Rose family crest, no doubt. Did every man dream of being a nobleman? She wondered which symbols should be displayed on the Rizzoli family crest. A beer can and a TV, maybe.
Kimball led them out of the grand hall, and as they stepped into the next room, it was as if they’d passed from one millennium into another. A fountain trickled in a courtyard tiled with brilliant mosaics. Daylight shone down through a vast skylight, spilling onto marble statues of nymphs and satyrs at play near the fountain’s edge. Jane wanted to linger, to take a closer look at the mosaics, but Kimball was already moving on, into yet another room.
It was Kimball’s library, and as they stepped in, both Jane and Frost stared up in wonder. Everywhere they looked were books—thousands of them, shelved on three stories of open galleries. Tucked into niches were Egyptian funerary masks with enormous eyes staring from the shadows. On the domed ceiling was a painting of the night sky and its constellations, and arching across the heavens was a royal procession: an Egyptian sailing vessel followed by chariots and courtiers and women bearing platters of food. In a stone hearth, a real wood fire crackled, an extravagant waste of energy on this summer day. So this was why the house was kept so cold, to make a fire all the more cozy.
They sat down in massive leather chairs near the fireplace. Though July heat blazed outside, in this dark study it might be a winter day in December, the snow flying outside, with only the flames in the hearth to ward off the chill.
“The person we’d really like to speak to is Bradley, Mr. Rose,” said Jane. “But we can’t seem to
locate him.”
“That boy’s never in one place for long,” said Kimball. “Right at this moment, I couldn’t tell you where he is.”
“When was the last time you saw him?”
“It’s been a while. I don’t remember.”
“That long?”
“We stay in touch by e-mail. Every so often, a letter. You know how it is these days with busy families. Last we heard from him, he was in London.”
“Do you know where in London, exactly?”
“No. That was a few months ago.” Kimball shifted in his chair.
“Let’s just cut to the chase, Detective. The reason you’re here. This is about that girl in Chaco Canyon.”
“Lorraine Edgerton.”
“Whatever her name was. Bradley had nothing to do with it.”
“You seem pretty sure of that.”
“’Cause he was here with us when it happened. Police didn’t even bother to talk to him—that’s how little they cared about seeing Bradley. Professor Quigley must’ve told you that?”
“Yes, he did.”
“Then why bother us about this now? It was twenty-five years ago.”
“You seem to remember the details well.”
“Because I took the trouble to find out about you, Detective Rizzoli. About that missing Edgerton girl, and why Boston PD’s mixed up in a case that happened in New Mexico.”
“You know that Lorraine Edgerton’s body recently turned up.”
He nodded. “In Boston, I hear.”
“Do you know where in Boston?”
“The Crispin Museum. I read the news.”
“Your son worked at the Crispin Museum that summer.”
“Yes. I fixed that up.”
“You got him the job?”
“The Crispin Museum’s always short of cash. Simon’s a lousy businessman and he’s run that place into the ground. I made a donation, and he gave my Bradley a job. I think they were lucky to get him.”
“Why did he leave Chaco Canyon?”
“He was unhappy, stuck out there with that bunch of amateurs. Bradley’s dead serious about his archaeology. He was wasted out there, working like some common laborer. Days and days of just scraping away at dirt.”
“I thought that’s what archaeology was all about.”
“That’s what I pay people to do. You think I spend my time digging? I write the checks and I come up with the vision. I guide the project and choose where to excavate. Bradley didn’t need to do grunt work in Chaco—he knows damn well how to handle a trowel. He spent time with me in Egypt, on a project with hundreds of diggers, and he had a knack for looking at the terrain and knowing where to excavate. I’m not just saying that because he’s my boy.”
“So he’s been to Egypt,” said Jane. Thinking about what had been engraved in that souvenir cartouche: I visited the pyramids, Cairo, Egypt.
“He loves it there,” said Kimball. “And I hope one of these days he’ll go back and find what I couldn’t.”
“What was that?”
“The lost army of Cambyses.”
Jane looked at Frost, and judging by his blank expression he had no idea what Kimball was talking about, either.
Kimball’s mouth curled into an unpleasantly superior smile. “I guess I need to explain it to you all,” he said. “Twenty-five hundred years ago, this Persian king named Cambyses sent an army into Egypt’s western desert, to take the oracle at Siwa Oasis. Fifty thousand men marched in and were never seen again. The sands just swallowed ’em up, and no knows what became of them.”
“Fifty thousand soldiers?” said Jane.
Kimball nodded. “It’s one of the big mysteries of archaeology. I spent two seasons hunting for the remains of that army. All I turned up were bits of metal and bone, but that was all. So little, in fact, that the Egyptian government didn’t even care enough to lay claim to any of it. That dig was one of my biggest disappointments. One of my few failures.” He stared at the fire. “Someday I’ll go back. I’m gonna find it.”
“In the meantime, how about helping us find your son?”
Kimball’s gaze returned to Jane, and it was not friendly. “How about we wrap up this conversation? I don’t think there’s anything more I can help you with.” He stood.
“We only want to speak to him. To ask him about Ms. Edgerton.”
“Ask him what? Did you kill her? That’s what this is all about, isn’t it? Trying to find someone to blame.”
“He knew the victim.”
“Lot of folks probably did.”
“Your son worked at the Crispin Museum that summer. The same place where her body has just turned up. That’s quite a coincidence.”
“I’ll ask you both to leave.” He turned toward the door, but Jane did not move from her chair. If Kimball was not going to cooperate, it was time to move to a different strategy, one that would almost certainly provoke him.
“Then there was that incident on the Stanford University campus,” she said. “An incident you know about, Mr. Rose. Since it was your attorney who arranged for your son’s release.”
He pivoted and strode toward her so quickly that Frost instinctively stood up to intervene. But Kimball halted just inches from Jane. “He was never convicted.”
“But he was arrested. Twice. After following a female student around campus. After breaking into her dorm room while she was sleeping. How many times did you have to bail him out of trouble? How many checks did you write to keep him out of jail?”
“It’s time for you all to go.”
“Where is your son now?”
Before Kimball could respond, a door opened. He froze as a soft voice called out: “Kimball? Are they here about Bradley?”
In an instant his expression transformed from rage to dismay. He turned to the woman and said, “Cynthia, you shouldn’t be out of bed. Please go back, darling.”
“Rosa told me two policemen came to the house. It’s about Bradley, isn’t it?” The woman shuffled into the room, and her sunken eyes focused on the two visitors. Though her face had been stretched taut by plastic surgery, her age still showed in the rounded back, the drooping shoulders. Most of all it showed in the wispy gray hair that feathered her nearly bald scalp. As wealthy as Kimball Rose might be, he had not traded in his wife for a younger model. All their money, all their privilege, could not change the obvious fact that Cynthia Rose was seriously ill.
Frail as she was, supported by a cane, Cynthia stood her ground and kept her gaze on the two detectives. “Do you know where my Bradley is?” she asked.
“No, ma’am,” said Jane. “We were hoping you could tell us.”
“I’m going to walk you back to your room,” said Kimball, and he took his wife’s arm.
Angrily she shook him off, her attention still fixed on Jane. “Why are you looking for him?”
“Cynthia, this has nothing to do with you,” said Kimball.
“It has everything to do with me,” she shot back. “You should have told me they were here. Why do you keep hiding things from me, Kimball? I have a right to know about my own boy!” The outburst seemed to leave her out of breath, and she tottered toward the nearest chair and sank down. There she sat so motionless, she might have been just another artifact in that dark room of funerary objects.
“They came to ask about that girl again,” said Kimball. “The one who disappeared in New Mexico. That’s all.”
“But that was such a long time ago,” murmured Cynthia.
“Her body has just been found,” said Jane. “In Boston. We need to speak to your son about it, but we don’t know where he is.”
Cynthia slumped deeper into the chair. “I don’t know, either,” she whispered.
“Doesn’t he write you?”
“Sometimes. A letter here and there, sent from strange places. An e-mail once in a while, just to say he’s thinking of me. And that he loves me. But he stays away.”
“Why is that, Mrs. Rose?”
The woman r
aised her head and looked at Kimball. “Maybe you should ask my husband.”
“Bradley’s never been all that close to us,” he said.
“He was until you sent him away.”
“That has nothing to do with—”
“He didn’t want to go. You forced him.”
“Forced him to go where?” asked Jane.
“It’s not relevant,” said Kimball.
“I blame myself, for not standing up to you,” said Cynthia.
“Where did you send him?” asked Jane.
“Tell her,” said Cynthia. “Tell her how you drove him away.”
Kimball released a deep sigh. “When he was sixteen, we sent him to a boarding school in Maine. He didn’t want to go, but it was for his own good.”
“A school?” Cynthia gave a bitter laugh. “It was a mental institution!”
Jane looked at Kimball. “Is that what it was, Mr. Rose?”
“No! The place was recommended to us. Best of its kind in the country, and let me tell you, the price tag reflected it. I only did what I thought was best for him. What any good parent would do. They called it a therapeutic residential community. A place where boys could go to deal with … issues.”
“We never should have done it,” said Cynthia. “You never should have done it.”
“We had no choice. He had to go.”
“He would have been better off here, with me. Not sent to some boot camp in the middle of the woods.”
Kimball snorted. “A camp? More like a country club.” He turned to Jane. “It had its own lake. Hiking and cross-country ski trails. Hell, if I ever go off my rocker, I’d love to be sent to a place like that.”
“Is that what happened to Bradley, Mr. Rose?” asked Frost.
“He went off his rocker?”
“Don’t make him sound like a lunatic,” said Cynthia. “He wasn’t.”
“Then why did he end up there, Mrs. Rose?”
“Because we thought—Kimball thought—”
“We thought they could teach him better self-control,” her husband finished for her. “That’s all. Lotta boys need tough love. He stayed there for two years and came out a well-behaved, hard-workin’ young man. I was proud to take him to Egypt with me.”
The Rizzoli & Isles Series 10-Book Bundle Page 202