They kept at it for a few more minutes, but the floor nurse made them leave as Harmony’s blood pressure and pulse rose.
“Are you mad at me, Vic?” Harmony whispered when the police had left.
“Mad at you? Why on earth?”
“For—for saying Clarisse’s name when it was you standing there.”
“My mother has been dead for over thirty years, and she’s still the person I want to wake up to when I’m in pain or grief,” I said, bending to kiss her forehead. “You called for the person you need most.”
“I was going to fly back in the morning and now I can’t and I think—if I stay on—I can’t stay in Reno’s apartment.”
“Of course you can’t fly out today, and of course you’ll stay with Mr. Contreras and me.”
Abreu and Finchley were waiting for me outside Harmony’s room, wanting to know what she’d confided in me.
“She misses her mother. Foster mother, the one who loved her. Not the birth mother.”
“You think she knew the scum or knew why they were in the apartment?” Finchley asked.
“If she does, she’s a better con artist than Bernie Madoff, and believe me, nothing in her personal finances suggests she knows much more than how to sell a rosebush.”
My offhand comment made me think of Leroy/Lawrence Fausson and the hoard under his floorboards. I couldn’t imagine anything that would connect Reno to Fausson, nothing except me, but it made me wonder whether the sisters had a cash stash. Were the perps looking for hundred-dollar bills?
I’d lost track of what Finchley was saying, but he seemed to be reading my mind, or part of it: What did I really know about the sisters, and could Harmony have come out here to check on some scheme of Reno’s that wasn’t panning out?
“You still going to talk to Richard Yarborough tomorrow—today, I mean?” I said. “You’ll find that’s a theory that resonates well with him. Good night, or morning, whatever it is.”
19
Special Delivery
Mitch was in the Mustang. When we got home, I had to take him for a walk—he’d had a stressful night, first taking care of Harmony, then dealing with agitated cops, and finally being cooped up in a hospital garage.
It was five when I crawled into bed; it seemed a scant second later that my phone alarm woke me with the chipper message: Your first meeting today, Monday, is at ten a.m. with Candra van Vliet at the Oriental Institute.
I cursed in Italian, then English, and wished my Polish granny had taught me to swear in that language as well. I had completely forgotten the appointment. I reset the alarm for nine-forty-five—I would call then and say a family emergency required me to reschedule.
When I lay down, though, I couldn’t relax. My right hip was throbbing after last night’s frenzied action, reminding me that I’d been shot at as I left Lawrence Fausson’s apartment.
There seemed to be a bizarre symmetry between Reno and Fausson. Both were connected to people who wanted to break into apartments and ransack them. Come to think of it, I didn’t know whether the pair who’d attacked me last week actually searched Fausson’s apartment. Maybe they’d gone there to shoot him and been disappointed not to find him, so they’d shot at me as their second choice.
I got reluctantly to my feet and turned on my espresso machine. When I went into the bathroom I saw that some of Harmony’s trash bin had gotten stuck in my own hair. I jumped under the shower and scrubbed my hair until my scalp tingled. Maybe that would persuade my brain that I was alert enough to think.
Professor Van Vliet’s voice on the phone Saturday had been cool, even arrogant, which made me dress as if I, too, were cool and potentially arrogant. I put on trousers and a sweater in navy cashmere, with a rose blazer whose severe cut balanced the soft color. The Lario boots I’d bought in Milan several years ago. A light dusting of makeup. When I looked in the hall mirror on my way out, my eyes still looked tired.
I stopped at Mr. Contreras’s apartment long enough to give him a précis of last night’s excitement and to let him know I wouldn’t have time to walk the dogs this morning. Conversations with him are never short, but the idea that Harmony had been in danger, and needed a safe place to stay, roused his protective instincts. He started working out a bus route for getting to the hospital to collect her.
“I’ll put her in a cab to bring her back here, won’t make her stand on a street corner waiting for a bus, so you go talk to whoever you’re chomping at the bit to get at and I’ll take care of your niece.”
I kissed him on the cheek and slipped out while he was deciding what tonight’s dinner menu would be. I stopped at my office to print out copies of the pictures I’d taken at Fausson’s apartment, as well as the group photo on his Facebook page.
I hadn’t taken time for breakfast, but I didn’t want to eat at the wheel and risk spilling food over my good clothes. I gobbled a banana and headed south to the University of Chicago.
I hadn’t been in the neighborhood for several years. The university had gone on a building frenzy—new dorms, new apartments on the perimeter. It was just on ten when I found the sole parking garage for the campus. I jogged the half mile across the quads to the Oriental Institute. So much for cool and professional.
The Institute, its weathered stone draped in ivy, looks like a Hollywood idea of an academic building. Its narrow facade makes it seem smaller than it is, especially since its two neighbors are the massive university chapel and an outsize shrine to Chicago economics—God and Mammon facing off across the quad, with the Institute caught in their cross fire. Students and work crews sat on the benches between Mammon and the Oriental Institute, most hunkered in front of their devices, drinking coffee.
The Institute entryway was made of stone or concrete, and the lighting was about as bright as the interior of a pyramid. A student at the information desk didn’t look up from his computer as I approached, even though the high ceilings amplified my footsteps.
“I have an appointment with Professor Van Vliet. You don’t need to look at me, just tell me how to get to her office.”
He pointed at the stairwell behind me. “Second floor, down the long hall, turn right, first door on your left. There’s an elevator if you need it. And it’s pronounced ‘Flee-it,’ not ‘Vleet.’”
I thanked him meekly as I turned away. The stairs were worn and slippery. I held on to the railing after skidding on the landing.
When I reached Professor Van Vliet’s office, she was talking to a balding sunburned man who was bent over her desk, looking at her computer screen.
“Where is Jamil these days?” the balding man asked.
“No one’s heard from him in months. I am very much afraid—” She broke off when she caught sight of me. “Who are you?”
I could have gone back to sleep after all, but I walked into the office and handed her a card. “We have a meeting for ten o’clock.”
Van Vliet glanced at the card. “Oh, yes. The detective.”
She looked to be in her forties, her muddy blond hair pulled back into a chignon. Her skin wasn’t as tanned as I would have expected for someone who spent her life under the desert sun, but she had squint lines around her eyes. As I’d guessed, she was dressed with a casual elegance: jeans, western boots and beaten silver belt buckle, with an expensive camel hair jacket over a skintight sweater.
“A detective?” the balding man said. “That’s premature, Candra, and something I wish you’d spoken to me about first.”
“I haven’t called the police, Peter: this person says she has questions about Leroy Fausson.”
“Fausson?” Peter’s face twisted in puzzlement. “He hasn’t been part of the Institute for years.”
“Yes, which is why before I told her anything, I wanted to know more about who she is and why she is asking such questions. Ms.”—Van Vliet looked at my card—“yes, Warshawski—this is Peter Sansen, the director of the Institute. So please tell us why you are asking questions about a man we have neither of us
seen for some time.”
“He’s dead. Murdered.”
Both archaeologists became quiet. I could hear phones ringing in other offices and the clanking of a radiator as the heat came on.
“On Saturday you said he was dead,” Van Vliet said finally. “Why could you not say he was murdered? Where did this happen?”
That seemed like a strange question: not when, or how, but where. Like Felix, asking where he was from. “We don’t know. His body was found in a forest preserve west of town, but he was killed elsewhere. Do you think you know where?”
Her eyes widened in hauteur. “Certainly not. As I said, I have seen nothing of Fausson, really since we evacuated our dig at Tell al-Sabbah. And that was when the civil war in Syria began to spread, so easily seven years ago.”
“What made you come to us?” Sansen asked.
I pulled out Van Vliet’s book on Urban Development in the Chalcolithic from my briefcase. “He had her book by his bed. We can’t find out anything about him, where he worked, what his background is. He’d hung outsize photos of archaeology digs on the walls of his apartment, so when I found this book, I was hoping you’d know something about him.”
“He stole this!” Van Vliet’s eyes narrowed with contempt. “The Institute’s collection doesn’t circulate.”
“Then you can reshelve it,” I said. “What else can you tell me?”
Van Vliet spread her hands and I saw her rings, plain wedding band and a wide silver ring with turquoise insets. “He had been a graduate student here in archaeology, but at the time we evacuated, we had already told him we would not be able to renew his graduate fellowship. He didn’t return to Chicago with the rest of us.”
“You left Syria in 2011?” I asked.
“It was not until early 2012, in point of fact. Probably we should have left sooner—I sent most of our people home, but there were steps I needed to take to preserve—not the dig, that would not have been possible—but the artifacts. Perhaps it was foolhardy; my husband certainly thought so.”
“He’s an archaeologist as well?”
Van Vliet laughed derisively. “He would not thank you for that suggestion. No, he is a neurologist, and he sent me text after text telling me to leave Syria at once.”
“We need to finish our own discussion, Candra,” Sansen said, “so as soon as you’ve told this detective what she needs to know. . . .”
He didn’t leave the room but leaned against a filing cabinet, which, like the rest of the surfaces in the office, was covered both with books and small artifacts. I’d seen only his right profile when he was at Van Vliet’s desk, but now, his whole face revealed, I saw an ugly puckering along the right jawline and down along the neck. A burn wound, not recent but very visible.
I realized I was staring and looked quickly away—at a stone figurine with eight breasts holding down a stack of papers on Van Vliet’s desk. She had horns sprouting from her head, which made up for a nearby cow, whose horns had broken off, leaving only two worn stubs.
I took out a notebook and tried to focus my attention. “Right. You canceled Fausson’s fellowship. Why was that?”
Van Vliet steepled her fingers. “He didn’t have a strong commitment to archaeology, that is, to the level of detail you need in the field. His interest lay in the romance of the Middle East. He wore a kaffiyeh, rode around the desert on a motorbike. He even learned to ride a camel. I suggested if he wanted a graduate degree, Middle Eastern politics would be more suitable, but I do not believe he has—had—the discipline necessary for scholarship.”
Definitely Lawrence of Arabia. “How did he react to the news?”
“He was quite angry—yes, I think anger is not too strong a word, even though we had spoken about this matter many times during the two years he was at the Tell.”
“Did he threaten violence against you or the dig?”
“He couldn’t have threatened more violence than was already happening,” the professor spoke bitterly. “You must remember that your country had by then invaded Iraq; we dealt constantly with refugees and with looters. Fausson did not threaten retaliation, if that is what you are asking.”
“He spent two more years in the Middle East after you left. What would he have been doing?” I showed Van Vliet the pictures I’d taken of Fausson’s passport stamps. Sansen stepped over to look.
“His Arabic was very good, if I recall correctly,” Sansen said. “He might have been teaching English in these countries—there’s always a demand for native speakers. He could even have become a tour guide for Americans, or enjoyed being a nomad on his motorcycle.”
“He’s dead, poor boy.” Candra gave a tight smile. “Nil nisi bonum. Let’s just say he had great potential that he squandered.”
“Is there anything else?” Sansen looked at his watch.
“Fausson had a collection of poetry by a Syrian named Kataba.” I produced the book. “Could he have been working on a translation?”
She took the book from me. “Oh! Tarik Kataba.”
When she pronounced the name, it sounded like a series of clicks. “Kataba was someone we met in Saraqib, but he ran afoul of the regime. I was afraid he had died, but someone told me they had seen him here in Chicago.”
“Recently?”
She gave a tiny headshake, which made the gold spirals in her ears seem to spin. “Not in the last few weeks, but perhaps at Christmas? I don’t remember.”
“Fausson had a picture on his Facebook page taken at some kind of meeting. Is Kataba in the group?” I didn’t try to pronounce the name as Van Vliet had.
Sansen and Van Vliet looked at the group shot I’d captured from Fausson’s page.
“That is in fact Leroy Fausson.” The professor tapped the man in the safari jacket.
She looked more closely at the faces, then pointed at a dark man in a plain white shirt standing in the back row. “This could be Kataba, but I met him only a few times. He had a bicycle repair shop in Saraqib and I took my own bike in there once to get a new tire. He also led tours of the region; perhaps that is how Leroy Fausson got to know him. When he should have been digging, Leroy was often out touring other villages.”
She wasn’t going to tell me directly why she had taken away Fausson’s fellowship, but she kept giving side jabs that gave me a picture.
I put the Facebook picture on top of Kataba’s poems. “The group was meeting somewhere; there’s writing in Arabic on the walls. Can you read it?”
The professor rummaged on her desk for a magnifying glass and studied the posters. “They seem to be slogans: a child chases a butterfly and releases a dream to follow all its life. syria lives in my heart, but my heart is big and can also hold america. They could be lines from poems, especially if Kataba is in the group, but my modern Arabic is far from fluent, and I don’t know contemporary poetry.” She gave a wintry smile. “The wedding poem of Inanna and Dumuzi is as modern as I get. Not that it was written in Arabic, of course.”
“I’ll take your word for it. This woman was also in a photograph from the dig in Fausson’s apartment.” I tapped the freckled face. “Was she one of your students?”
Sansen bent over the picture, palms on Van Vliet’s desk. “That’s Mary-Carol, Mary-Carol Kooi. I didn’t notice her at first. She did a very nice piece of work for her dissertation, even though her time at Tell al-Sabbah was cut short. She’s working here as a postdoc. I didn’t know she had stayed in touch with Fausson.”
“Nor did I,” the professor said. “Perhaps she thought we would judge her unkindly. I’m sorry not to be more helpful, Ms. Warshawski, but Director Sansen and I need to continue a conversation of our own.”
Sansen straightened and held out a hand, but in the cramped space he managed to knock over the eight-breasted figurine. In his fluster to pick her up and make sure she wasn’t damaged, he swept a box off the front of the desk. I lunged at it, but I only managed to grab one of the flaps. A grubby checked cloth fell out.
When I squatted to col
lect it, a metal figurine rolled out. It was about five inches high. When I looked at it closely, I saw it was a man with a giant fish draped so that the head lay across the man’s head and the skin covered his shoulders and torso like a cloak.
20
The Fish-man
I picked up the checked cloth and handed cloth and fish-man to Van Vliet. She snatched the figure and studied it under her glass.
“I don’t think it is damaged in any way,” she finally said. “Really, Peter, for a man who can take a piece of pottery out of hard earth without leaving a scratch, how can you be so clumsy inside an office?”
“I need the desert air for scope,” Sansen said, unrepentant.
“What is it?” I asked Van Vliet.
“We’re not sure,” she said. “That is, we know it is a figure that the Sumerians used in their dwellings. We know that their sages and deities included these half-fish, half-men in a group called the Seven Sages. We have sometimes seen them in castings of collections of deities and demons, with the fish-men standing at a sickbed. But beyond that we know very little of their function.”
“Lawrence Fausson had a cloth like this in his closet,” I ventured, holding out the checked fabric.
“Lawrence?” Van Vliet echoed. “You never met him, but you accept his Lawrence of Arabia persona? At any rate, this cloth is typical Syrian weaving. Leroy liked to wear them; it was part of his saying, ‘I’m not like the rest of the colonial predators: I understand this land and these people.’”
“You don’t think Fausson sent this statue to us, do you?” Sansen said to me.
“I don’t know.” I was taken aback. “When did you receive it?”
“It was here this morning, addressed to me, although my name was misspelled,” Van Vliet said.
I’d dropped the box when I knelt to collect the figurine. professor van fleeat was written across the top in block capitals, but there wasn’t any address. I asked if there’d been packing paper around the box when she got it, but Van Vliet shook her head.
Shell Game Page 11