Murder at Monticello

by Jane Langton

  Captain William Clark, March 31, 1805,

  at Fort Mandan

  There was something of which Augustus Flaminius Upchurch was deeply ashamed, so ashamed that his mind refused to connect it with himself, because the real Augustus Upchurch had received the McIntire Award from the Charlottesville Chamber of Commerce and a citation from the Rotary Club of Richmond. And in 1978 the Charlottesville Daily Progress had called him Man of the Year. Augustus had a scrap-book full of flattering newspaper cuttings—although, looking at them recently, he had been surprised to see how old and yellow they were.

  The shameful thing was his fascination with a pornographic tabloid he picked up at a convenience store on the other side of town, along with the Richmond Times Dispatch and the Charlottesville Daily Progress.

  The porno sheet was always on the same place on the shelf, right next to a Christian magazine with headlines like HIDDEN BIBLE MESSAGES REVEALED.

  At home he always dropped the respectable papers on the hall table, then carried the lurid sheet into his bedroom and turned the pages avidly, gazing at the sexy girls with their big breasts:

  Strictly Hot Babes!

  Wet & Ready 24 Hours a Day!

  Gentlemen, Start Your Engines!

  Live Sexy Coeds!

  Horny Asian Sluts!

  The sexy tabloid always ended up in a plastic trash bag. It had nothing to do with the rest of his life. It certainly had nothing to do with the charming young lady at Monticello.

  But Augustus was aware that the world had two levels. When he got up in the morning the rising sun shone on the cars in which sober people were driving to work, his soft-boiled egg looked up at him with its cheerful yellow eye, his coffee steamed in the last of his wife’s delicate cups, and the radio hummed softly with news about faraway wars. That was the normal everyday world.

  But there was another one entirely, a swamp in which the supporting pillars of the good bright world were planted, their fragile foundations shifting sideways and threatening to collapse.

  And of course, to his shame, he knew that he was part of it. The weird pages of the Adult Services section of the sexy tabloid appealed to his darkest inner nature. Maybe he was just a dirty old fart.

  Well, no, of course he couldn’t be that, because he wasn’t really old. At least he didn’t look nearly as old as he was. Whenever Augustus adjusted one of his jolly bow ties in front of the mirror he told himself that white hair didn’t mean a thing. After all, plenty of young men were prematurely gray.

  Chapter 15

  … we are all day engaged packing up Sundery ankles to be sent to the President.…

  Box No. 1 … package No. 3 & 4 Male & female antelope, with their Skelitons …

  Box No. 2 … 1 Robe representing a battle between the Sioux & Ricaras against the Minetares and Mandans.…

  Captain William Clark, April 3, 1805,

  leaving Fort Mandan

  Tom rode back from a trip to Charlottesville with his backpack full of groceries. His camping cuisine was hobo-style—beans to be eaten from the can, bread and peanut butter, bananas, packaged cookies, Pepsi and bottled water. This time there were some oddities in the bag—a paper of pins and a roll of shelf paper.

  His bike was small, only 250 cc’s, but it was still a struggle to get it up the steep hillside. Halfway up, he stopped to catch his breath.

  At once he was aware of something fluttering in the bushes. It was a cecropia moth, caught in a spider’s web. The great wings were flailing. Tom leaned his bike against a tree, took out his pocketknife, and slashed at the web. At once the moth flapped up into his face and took off.

  Do a good turn to fish or fox, and marry the king’s daughter. Tom looked around dreamily for a beautiful maiden in floating garments and failed to see one. Instead he tripped over a tree root and fell flat.

  It had been a bad morning. He had run into his mother in the supermarket. She had snatched at his arm and fixed him with her maternal gaze. “They do know you’re coming back?”

  “Who do you mean?” But Tom knew perfectly well what she was talking about.

  “The medical school. I assume you’re all set for next year?”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Tom.

  It had been like one of those fierce encounters on the Missouri River, when one of the men had come face to face with a grizzly bear. Ursus horribilis horribilis, that was his mother all over.

  Now rolling his bike into the clearing around his tent, he found himself wondering if the big healthy girl he had met yesterday was a king’s daughter in disguise.

  It was too bad she was just another Jeffersonian sentimentalist, but at least she didn’t seem stupid. Maybe she could be persuaded to the right way of thinking, if only she’d listen. Unfortunately, he had made her so mad she’d probably report him as a trespasser, and then his idyllic retreat in the woods would be over.

  Now, forgetting about Fern, Tom unpacked the things he had bought in town. He put the groceries away in the cardboard box under the bed and pulled the wrapping off the roll of shelf paper.

  His pharmacopeia took up all the room on the card table. Tom unrolled a short length of paper, cut it off with a pair of scissors, and laid it flat on his cot. The blankets were too soft for a desk, so he slid books under the shelf paper, picked up a pencil, and got down on his knees. Then, using a ruler, he drew a horizontal line.

  The shelf paper was a time line. Eventually it would stretch all the way from May 14, 1804, when the expedition started up the Missouri River, to September 23 in the year 1806, the day of their triumphant return to St. Louis.

  He made a spot with his pen. Above it he wrote carefully. “May 14, 1804, Capt. Clark sets off up the Missouri from the camp at River Dubois with the pirogues and the keelboat.”

  Then he sat back and looked at what he had done. To his astonishment his eyes were wet, he was filled with delight. He had made only a few scrawls on a piece of paper, and yet they propelled him through time and space, they carried him back and back. He was with the expedition on the river. The great journey had begun, and he was part of it.

  Fern ate her paper-bag lunch on a bench at the far end of the west lawn. When she was finished she strolled along the North Terrace Walk and ducked into the tunnel that ran under the house from north to south. Blinded at first, she soon made her way to the foot of the stairs and climbed the three flights to the top.

  Back in the Dome Room, she abandoned the latest timid chapter of her book and wrote a letter to her sister.

  Dear Peg,

  A person shouldn’t forget another person’s birthday, especially when that other person is one’s own beloved sister. Happy birthday, darling Peg. I’m sending you an absolutely unauthentic bowl from the Monticello Gift Shop, accompanied by a guarantee that Thomas Jefferson never owned one like it in his whole entire life.

  Of course you’ll want to know how my new grant is working out. Well, naturally it’s fabulous.

  No, no, that’s a rotten lie. The truth is, I can’t do it. The moment I walked into my splendid office in Jefferson’s house, every room of which is crammed with objects displaying the richness of his mind, the man himself disappeared. Thomas Jefferson I mean.

  I should tell you that there’s a strange person hanging around outside. At first I thought, aha, I’ve found him at last, because this guy is tall and skinny with red hair tied on the back of his neck the way the founding fathers tied theirs whenever they were signing a Declaration of Independence or making important remarks like Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness, et cetera.

  At first I thought he was a vision sent from on high to help me in my Quest. But alas he’s only a human being, and pretty dumb at that. He thinks the only important thing TJ ever did was the Lewis and Clark expedition. How can he say that?

  So I’m still all at sea. Please advise.

  Love, Fern

  P.S.—I forgot to answer your warning about the big bad serial killer. I know, I know, he’s big news in Virgini
a. It’s really boring, the way people talk about him all the time. But don’t worry. I always drive straight home to my wonderful little apartment in Lewis and Clark Square, and then I go right in and lock the door. I’m not hitchhiking on a lonely road or walking around alone at night. So I’m fine. Don’t worry, I’m being really careful.

  P.P.S. Peg, remember when your Sunday-school teacher, Mr. Brisket, thought you were such a cute, cuddly little creature, he wanted to hug you to death and kiss you all over? Well, I’m beginning to have uncomfortable feelings about Mr. Upchurch, the old man who chose me for this award. He keeps dropping in and inviting me to lunch!

  Chapter 16

  Our vessels consisted of six small canoes, and two large perogues. This little fleet altho’ not quite so rispectable as those of Columbus or Capt. Cook, were still viewed by us with as much pleasure.… We were now about to penetrate a country at least two thousand miles in width, on which the foot of civilized man had never trodden.…

  Captain Meriwether Lewis, April 7, 1805,

  leaving Fort Mandan

  Mr. Upchurch’s car was a large and imposing Mercedes Grand Prix, glittering with chromium trim. Fern hated it at sight, but when he opened the door for her, she climbed in.

  He was a cautious driver. As he made his way slowly down the curving road encircling the hill, Fern caught a glimpse of Tom Dean kneeling among a clump of trees. He looked up and met her glance and gaped with surprise.

  Fern wanted to roll her eyes and shrug her shoulders. I’m just a kidnapped hostage. But the car was creeping around another curve.

  The hotel in Charlottesville where they had lunch was like the car, conspicuously luxurious. Mr. Upchurch pulled out Fern’s chair, then sat down on the other side of the table and smiled at her tenderly. Fern could only gaze at his tie, mesmerized by its bold red-and-green stripes, which vibrated and jumped back and forth.

  Wrenching her eyes away, she stared at the menu and ordered a salad. But it was impossible to say no to the glass of wine pressed on her by Mr. Upchurch, or to the hot rolls and turtle soup. Coffee came to the table in a steaming espresso machine. The little cups were piled with whipped cream. Fern sipped reluctantly, her stomach clenched with tension.

  Afterward she asked to be taken back to work, partly to make a clean break with Mr. Upchurch and partly to make use of the rest of the day. But after the heavy meal in the hotel she found it impossible to concentrate. And anyway, on this first hot day of the season, the Dome Room was sweltering.

  She went from window to window, unlatching the catches, pushing open the noble circles of wood and glass. They were hinged in the middle. The bottom half swung out, the top in.

  Outside the house, on the west lawn, Henry Spender was working with a couple of groundskeepers and Howie Plover. Where should they put the caterer’s tent? Would there be room for four-hundred folding chairs?

  Howie nudged Henry Spender, and wagged his head at the open windows below the dome. “Looks kinda funny,” he said, glancing at the curator.

  Henry looked at Fern’s windows, and his eyebrows went up. He said, “Mmmmm.” But then he decided it didn’t matter. As a curator he had the gift of distinguishing between trivialities and important matters. Briskly he turned back to the problem of the chairs.

  Upstairs, behind the open windows, the magnificent chamber was still unbearably hot. Impulsively Fern decided to go right out and buy an electric fan.

  She found one at the Bargain Mart on Hydraulic Road.

  The Bargain Mart was often frequented by George Dryer.

  He happened to be there at the moment, buying himself a bottle of hair color, because this morning on the news— George always watched the TV news—somebody who called herself a witness said the killer had red hair.

  A witness? What goddamn witness? There’d never been any fucking witness! Still, the kooky female just happened to be right about his hair, so George was here to do something about it.

  Slowly he walked up and down the aisle, examining the profusion of shampoos and hair conditioners and the forty feet of shelf space devoted to hair coloring. Studying the beautiful girls in Mocha Shimmer or Midnight Mink or Black Licorice, he decided on Cappuccino. Then once again he had to buy a bunch of shirts and long-sleeved sweats.

  It was a joke, and it made George laugh, the way his back yard was like the places the cops dug up because they were full of bloodstained bodies, only his was a cemetery of bloodstained shirts. There wasn’t much else you could do with a bloody shirt. No good washing it, no good burning it. You had to bury it.

  In the checkout line, he was just behind a woman with long brown hair all down her back. She was lifting a big fan up on the counter. Interested, he watched her carry it outside. “Hurry it up,” he said to the checkout girl, slapping down his shirts and his packaged hair color.

  But the checkout girl was fiddling with the paper feed on the cash register. It was three fuming minutes before he could run out to the parking lot.

  Naturally, the fascinating female was gone.

  The black pavement in front of the Bargain Mart was sending up such waves of heat, Fern dumped her new fan on the back seat of her car, jumped in behind the wheel, and zoomed out of the lot. At home she went straight to her phone as usual, to see if there were any messages.

  There was only one. Her sister had called from Indiana, responding to Fern’s letter. Peg’s recorded voice was loud and anxious.

  “Honestly, Fern, did you read your letter before mailing it to me? Do you have any idea what you SAID? First you mention this nasty stranger in the woods, and then you insist you’re in no danger from that scumbag, the creep who’s still running around loose after murdering all those women. FERN, BE CAREFUL! CALL ME! And, hey, whatever happened to Jim Reeves?”

  Fern flopped on a chair and pulled off her shoes. Funny, Peg hadn’t mentioned the unwanted attentions of Mr. Upchurch. Because maybe Mr. Upchurch was a greater menace to her health and safety than Tom Dean. In fact, he had already made a dangerous sexual assault.

  After depositing her on the walk in front of the East Portico, he had held her hand a little too long and asked her to call him Augustus.

  Chapter 17

  … we had been halted by an occurrence, which … I cannot recollect but with the utmost trepidation and horror … the upsetting and narrow escape of the white perogue … in this perogue were embarked, our papers, Instruments, books medicine … almost every article indispensibly necessary to … insure the success of the enterprize in which we are now launched to the distance of 2200 miles.…

  Captain Meriwether Lewis, May 14, 1805

  … the Indian woman … caught and preserved most of the light articles which were washed overboard.

  Captain Meriwether Lewis, May 16, 1805

  The canvas walls of the tent were shivering a little. Tom Dean was at home.

  Fern walked closer. She had found her way back to his hidden camp, after spending half an hour heading in the wrong direction.

  The corners of the tent flap had been lifted and attached to poles, making a shady front porch. Fern stood at a polite distance and called, “Anybody home?”

  There was a pause. The tent stopped shaking. Then Tom looked out and said, “Oh, hi.”

  She moved forward a few inches. “I just want to say I’m sorry I was so cross. I don’t agree with what you said, but I shouldn’t have been so rude.”

  “It’s okay.” Tom looked at her blankly, and then his face brightened. “Come in, I want to show you something.”

  His strip of shelf paper was pinned to the wall of the tent. It hung limply away from the sloping fabric.

  He explained, “It’s a time line for the travels of Lewis and Clark. Look, come close.”

  He talked excitedly, drawing his finger along the line from May 14, 1804, to the 21st. “This is where they set out on the Missouri River in earnest, Clark and Lewis and all the men together, in a heavy rain.”

  Fern stared and said nothing.

>   “Here they are at the mouth of the Osage River.” Tom propelled her across the tent to a book lying open on his cot. “The Osage River, see? It’s right here. It’s Captain Clark’s map for this part of the Missouri. Okay”—Tom pulled her back again to the time line—“so here we are again, June 2, 1804. Beautiful country, that’s what they found. They killed a few deer.” He looked at Fern fiercely. “That’s the way they had to live every day. Every single day they had to kill deer, bear, antelope, whatever, or else go hungry.”

  “What if it rains?” said Fern.

  “It did rain. It didn’t matter. They went right on through rain and snow and starvation and every kind of obstacle.”

  “No, I mean, what if it rains on your tent? The paper will get wet.”

  “Oh, I know.” Tom’s cheerfulness faded. He touched the time line with a tender finger.

  “Where do you live? Can’t you do it there?”

  Stubbornly he said, “No, I can’t. I live here.”

  “But you can’t stay here forever.”

  “I suppose not.”

  Then Fern spoke in a dream. “How would you like to see where I work?”

  Surprised, Tom jerked his head up at the hill. “You mean up there? You work in the house?”

  “Right. I’m trying to write a book about Jefferson. I have this really neat place on the third floor. I’ll show you. Come on.”

  Chapter 18

  Last night we were all allarmed by a large buffaloe Bull, which … ran up the bank in full speed directly towards the fires, and was within 18 inches of the heads of some of the men who lay sleeping.… When he came near the tent, my dog saved us by causing him to change his course … leaving us by this time all in an uproar.…

  Captain Meriwether Lewis, May 29, 1805

  Someone was knocking at the door of the curator’s office. It was Gail Boltwood, Henry Spender’s favorite tour guide.