The Counterfeit Murder in the Museum of Man

by Alfred Alcorn

  “Thank you.”

  I waited a moment. “You already know pretty much what I know about Saunders. But when this letter arrived, I took it upon myself to question him.” I picked up the several pages of printout and held them by both hands. “This is an account of that interview. I was about to make a copy and send it over to Mr. Duff.”

  The lieutenant nodded. A gleam of eagerness had come into his eyes.

  “You should also know that I may have some evidence pertaining to the Sterl case.”

  “Go ahead.”

  I allowed myself a small smile. “I will turn over to you this and evidence I have just received pertaining to the Sterl case on two conditions.”

  “I’m listening.”

  “First, you and Chief Murphy are to do everything in your powers to have the charges against me dropped. My lawyer tells me they are completely spurious. I wouldn’t be so anxious, but I have a meeting of the Board of Governors on July twenty-fourth. If I am still out on bail, I will be forced to resign.”

  “I’ll do everything I can.”

  “Second, I want credit for what I’ve done in any statements to the media by the Seaboard Police Department.”

  “Agreed.”

  I hesitated.

  “You’ve got my word.”

  I pondered awhile longer. I called Doreen and asked her to make a copy of my interview with Saunders for the lieutenant.

  Then I positioned my laptop so that we could both see the screen. He leaned forward. I clicked the icon for the Stella Fox sequence. He watched with a keen concentration. Then he turned to me, shaking his head. “Amazing. This could help us considerably.”

  “You’ll need a forensic lip-reader,” I ventured.

  “More like a Serbo-Croatian forensic lip-reader.”

  “Really?”

  “She’s from Croatia originally. A place called Split. I think he might be as well. Could you play it again?”

  I clicked the icon.

  “That’s you, isn’t it? Checking her out.”

  “That’s me.”

  “Can I get a copy …?”

  I handed him one of the disks in a cover. Doreen came in just then with copies of my interview with Saunders. I gave him one.

  He stood up smiling, took my hand and shook it warmly. “This will get the chief on your side. Duff listens to him. And I’ll make sure you get full credit if this breaks the case.”

  Finally, I thought, after he left, things were starting to go my way. The tide had turned. If the DA’s office dropped the charge, the board could not fire me. But I knew I was still vulnerable.

  So that, even armed with an edge of self-confidence and with Harvey Deharo in tow, I faced the Oversight Committee meeting with the “Neanderthal Issue” at the top of its agenda in a state of some foreboding. I wanted to ignore them, but I remained vulnerable.

  Not that it didn’t feel like cheating, showing up with Harvey as an expert witness, so to speak.

  All the usual suspects were there when Chair Constance Brattle began by thanking me for agreeing to attend the meeting to discuss what she called “this very important issue.” Adjusting her bifocals, she went on, “I know you hold that this committee has no sway in matters involving the Museum of Man. Suffice it to say that the Chair and many members of the committee disagree with that assumption. And it may not be long before that misconception is cleared up.”

  I did not rise to the bait, but sat impassively, more relieved than ever to have Harvey there.

  The Chair then read from the Bugle’s account. “ ‘Despite criticism from experts on the need for diversity in role modeling, officials at the museum … will be spending several hundred thousand dollars to replace the current models with what one source called ’white skinned, red-haired Caucasians.’ ”

  She cleared her throat and knit her hands together. “I will reserve any comments on the matter for later. I have moved it to first on the agenda to accommodate Mr. de Ratour’s special guest, Harvey Deharo, who, as most of you know, is Director of the Ponce Foundation and runs the Genetics Lab.”

  “He also teaches a course in genomic archaeology,” I put in.

  Harvey bowed and nodded to those he knew.

  Professor Laluna Jackson raised her palm. “I would like very much to start off,” she said. And, with assent from the Chair, she began reading a prepared statement, one hand open, fingers together jabbing the air in front of her as though to conduct her emphatic speech, the jangle of her brightly colored plastic hairties adding a kind of timpani.

  I regarded her closely. Harvey could be right about her origins, the he-to-she transformation. It might have been her jaw and the way she moved her shoulders. Or her slim waist and not much behind. I might have been fascinated in some perverse way by that possibility and from her manner of speaking were it not for what she said.

  “First, I want to say, that the plans of the current management to eliminate the multicultural aspects of the Stone Age diorama strikes me as more in line with the museum’s unstated purpose, which many of us view as a showplace of white male triumphalism.”

  She glanced around as though for applause and continued. “Speaking professionally, I can assert with confidence that we will be victimizing all peoples of color by filling an exhibition devoted to our ancestors with white-skinned, fair-haired people.”

  She paused again, then lowered her voice to signal that she was about to say something profound. “It is not just the vulnerable groups alive today that I am concerned about. No, it is the Neanderthals themselves. To depict them as pale-skinned and fair-haired would be to victimize them all over again.”

  My friend Harvey raised a finger. “Could you tell us how they were victimized in the first place?” He wore a quizzical expression bordering on facetiousness.

  “Well,” said Professor Jackson, her elocution a touch uncertain, “it’s not my field of expertise, but my research shows that the Neanderthals comprised a peaceful hunter-gatherer society living in harmony with nature when they were exterminated by white Europeans.”

  “I see. Could you tell us what research you’re referring to?”

  “Research?”

  “Yes. Any references, sources, citations?”

  “Well, nothing that specific. As I said, it’s not my field of expertise. But it’s common knowledge that the Neanderthals were exterminated. In fact, they comprise a group we call ‘proto victims.’ ”

  “Proto victims … Common knowledge, hmmmm.” Harvey had just an edge of British archness in his voice. “It might interest you to know, Professor Jackson, that it is generally agreed among Neanderthal specialists, or, rather, specialists in Neanderthal studies, that the Neanderthals were vanquished by dark-skinned invaders from the east who originated not long before in Africa.”

  He had everyone’s rapt attention.

  “However, there is considerable debate as to whether the Neanderthals interbred with the invading AMHs, that is, anatomically modern humans, or were driven extinct by them. It’s entirely possible the AMH invaders used the Neanderthals as a food source …”

  “You mean—?” someone asked.

  “Yes. They probably ate them.”

  Harvey handed around copies of a paper he had brought with him. “What I’ve given you is the abstract of a research article regarding pigmentation among Neanderthals. As you can see, a melanocortin one receptor allele with reduced function is associated with pale skin color and reddish hair among people of European descent. I can send anyone interested the entire paper.”

  Professor Brattle said, “Where did the specimens originate, the ones they took the DNA from?”

  “Italy and Spain.”

  Professor Jackson rolled her eyes. “That is precisely the problem. Why does everything have to be so Eurocentric in this country?”

  “Maybe because most of us are of European descent,” Father O’Gould suggested mildly.

  “Europe is where most of the fossils and remnants of Neanderthal m
aterial culture have been found,” Harvey said.

  “Then all the evidence is not in?” Professor Jackson persisted.

  Harvey looked amused. “You’re right. All of the evidence is not in. If we waited for all the evidence to be in, nothing would happen. The world would turn into one big faculty meeting.”

  “Is there definitive proof that there were no black- or brown-skinned Neanderthals?” Professor Randall Athol of the Divinity School asked.

  Izzy Landes said, “There’s no definitive proof that whales can’t do higher mathematics. How do you prove a negative?

  Father O’Gould cleared his throat. “Most of the extant research on Neanderthals has been done in Europe and the Middle East …”

  Chair Brattle rapped her figurative gavel. “We’re not getting anywhere with this.”

  Professor McNull frowned.

  “Why does that not surprise me?” the Reverend Lopes said. But with a smile.

  Harvey glanced at his watch. “I’m afraid I must have my say and leave.” He smiled. “Let me put this in terms on which Professor Jackson and like-minded members of the committee might be able to agree.” He waited a moment.

  “To begin with, there’s the science, which, as far as Neanderthal skin pigmentation goes, looks pretty good. Mind you, there’s lots more we need to know and won’t know until a complete genomic sequencing is carried out. At this point, we can only guess as to how much body hair either sex had. There is much debate about Neanderthal speech. For instance, they may not have separated singing from talking.”

  “Life as an Italian opera you mean?” Izzy asked brightly.

  “Well, certainly more than parlando. Perhaps like a Broadway musical.”

  “They were the original lowbrows,” I said.

  Harvey resumed, “We know that they had large noses, negligible chins, heavy brows, and tool development little beyond that of Homo erectus. But, whatever their development, in the popular mind, Neanderthals were, well, Neanderthals. Their lives were, if not solitary, then poor, nasty, brutish, and short. It could be argued that to assume these primitive humans were people of color would be to reinforce entrenched racial stereotypes.”

  He gathered his papers. “And on that note, I will take my leave. But first, let me say that one might have expected resistance from the white community, such as it is, should we plan to show these primitive humans who were fated to go extinct as fair-haired and pale-skinned.”

  Having tossed that little bomb, he rose, gathered his papers, bowed toward the chair, and on the way out slipped me a folded piece of paper.

  Izzy, at his facetious best, said, “So, is it not a slur against white people to have these early forms of humanity depicted as fair-skinned and red-haired? Should we not keep in mind the sensibilities of the Irish, for instance?”

  “As prognathically challenged?” someone asked.

  Father O’Gould cleared his throat. “I think if the physiognomies of the models were made hirsute and chinless, there shouldn’t be any cause for concern on the part of Irish sensibilities.”

  Izzy, in all apparent seriousness, asked, “Are you suggesting, S.J., that the Irish are sufficiently well chinned to be secure in their chinliness?”

  Thad Pilty, of all people, bit. He said, “I doubt very much there’s any hard data on Irish chins.”

  “Then let’s do the research,” Izzy said with mock enthusiasm. “Norman, you could check the museum’s Skull Collection. You must have any number of Irish specimens down there.”

  “I could find out easily enough.”

  Chair Brattle asked, “What would be the criteria?”

  “Oh,” said Izzy, pretending to be incredulous at her ignorance. “You could see how they measure on the ICI.”

  “The ICI?”

  “The International Chin Index. It’s an anthropometric term.”

  “I’ve never heard of it.”

  “That doesn’t surprise me.”

  “This is all very well and good,” Corny Chard put in. “But what about the chinless Hapsburgs? We could create an international incident.”

  “What’s the point of all this?” someone asked.

  “Ah,” said Izzy. “If we can prove that the Irish are known to be well chinned, perhaps exceptionally well chinned, then we wouldn’t have to worry about portraying the Neanderthals as fair-skinned and red-haired, especially if we emphasized their relative chinlessness for the sake of accuracy.”

  Then he laughed, thoroughly enjoying himself. It was Izzy, after all, who once said, Of course I suffer fools gladly. They are a source of great amusement.

  As this frolic proceeded, I surreptitiously opened the piece of paper Harvey had handed me. It was a printout from a Web-based background checking service calling itself Who Was Who.com. He had been right on. Laluna Jackson, PhD, sociology, Peachtree University, had graduated from Farland High School in Millerstown, Massachusetts, as John J. Johnson. The graduation picture showed a slight young man with dark blond hair and a resentful, uncertain smile.

  I refolded the paper and looked up to hear the Reverend Lopes say, “Seriously, there is the issue of white pride.”

  “White pride is nothing but a euphemism for the worst kind of racism,” Professor Jackson retorted.

  “What about black pride?”

  “Black pride is the response of a people who have suffered systematic victimization.”

  I was tempted to interrupt this collegial discourse and pass the printout around. But to what purpose? I have no stomach for embarrassing people in public, or in private for that matter. Besides, in this day and age, Ms. Jackson could well be commended for having the courage to be what she wanted to be, to have found and created her true persona at the cost of considerable trauma and expense. And who, anymore, is to say that she’s not right?

  I slipped the paper into a folder and turned to Bertha Schanke who was asking, “Why not just leave the diorama the way it is? No one’s objecting.”

  I cleared my throat. “That’s true, Bertha. But the Museum of Man is a serious institution. We deal in the truth as far as we can ascertain it.” I glanced at Professor Jackson and allowed myself to add, “Besides, there’s already enough counterfeiting going on.”

  14

  At first I thought it was just a joke in questionable taste, an attempt by Alphus and Ridley to get a rise out of me. It wouldn’t have been the first time. Little did I suspect it would end in nightmare. The fact is, I am lucky to be walking around like a free man.

  Let me start with this afternoon. Actually with yesterday afternoon, as I am writing in the small hours, unable to sleep. I had tried several times during the day to reach Diantha out at the cottage. But she refused to pick up or click on, which always leaves me with an unraveled feeling.

  A general staff meeting in the Twitchell Room had gone badly, in part through my own inattention. Ah, the problems. Everything from moldering skulls to accounting decisions to weakening attendance figures. My authority, never that of a tight-ship captain, has begun to slip. There was an absence in the room that turned out to be me. Several times I glanced through the tall windows at the deep blue sky that is endless and timeless and wondered what I was doing there. The thought of a large, powerful martini when I arrived home kept me going. Not for the first time I feared I might be slipping into alcoholism.

  Because the construction of said drink began shortly after I came through the door of my abode. I am partial to Cork Dry Gin (not that it matters after the first one) and a touch of ordinary vermouth rinsed in ice and poured over an unstoned olive.

  Though Alphus had been alone for several hours, which usually renders him morose, I found him in a strangely agitated state. He was dressed in a sports jacket, a kelly-green summer-weight thing, along with a shirt and tie and pressed Bermudas. He avoided my eyes and pretended an interest in the small kitchen television, which showed forest fires blazing in the remote West. He is not adept at dissembling, but when I asked him, putting some force into my voice
, what was going on, he merely shrugged.

  I was nursing my martini and feeling the better for it when Ridley showed up wearing very dark glasses. He, too, acted nervous in the manner of someone trying to appear casual.

  “Okay,” I demanded of both of them, “what’s up?”

  Alphus gestured that they were going to a restaurant.

  “Really?” I did not take them seriously. I was confident no restaurant would serve them. “Sure, gentlemen. And I have a window seat on the next shuttle to the space station.”

  Alphus shook his head and repeated more emphatically what he had said before.

  “And how do you plan to arrange that?”

  Ridley signed in his slow, southern way, “Alphus is my Seeing Eye assistant.” He took out what looked like a baton and telescoped it into the kind of white cane used by the blind.

  It began to dawn on me that they might be serious, that they might try to carry it off. “Where do you plan to go?” I asked.

  “The Edge,” Alphus said, a note of defiance in his movements.

  I shook my head. “I can’t allow it.”

  “You can’t stop us.” Alphus managed to make his signing seem like a growl.

  “I can call the police.”

  They both looked at me as though they had caught me cheating at some elaborate game we played. More to the point, I was helpless. Call the police? And tell them what? That I am responsible in a semi-legal way for a chimpanzee who is pretending to be a Seeing Eye ape in service to someone who is not blind, both of whom are heading for an upscale restaurant on the Seaboard waterfront?

  “All right. But how are you going to get there?”

  Ridley took out his raspberry or whatever those things are called. “Text,” he signaled. “Taxi.”

  I tried to divert them. I told them we could order in anything they wanted. I told them we could cook up a feast together. Invite people over. Have it catered so that it would be like a restaurant. But to no avail. They not only insisted on doing it, but pleaded for me to accompany them. I refused, of course. I told them I would not be party to such a farce. I told them it wouldn’t work. I told them they might be breaking the law. Besides, they forgot that I was out on bail as an accessory to murder. Any trouble with the police, and I could end up in jail.