by Sibel Hodge
“But if the St Nicholas collection was valuable, why not beef up security while it was here?”
“Lack of money, really. The museum has charity status. We don’t charge an entry fee here, so we rely on grant funding from the Department for Culture, who have recently cut back our budget. It’s a sad state of affairs.”
Or an incredibly opportune advantage for would-be thieves.
“Did you or your staff notice anyone or anything suspicious since the St Nicholas Collection arrived?”
“Well, I can’t speak for my staff—you'll need to ask them directly—but I certainly didn’t. Although I am tied up in my office a lot of the time, doing admin and logistical work these days, so I don’t often venture out onto the museum floor during open hours. After we’re closed and I’ve finished my work, I still like to wander around the building.” A wistful smile lit up his face. “I never tire of seeing the amazing exhibits that have been collected through years of painstaking work.”
“Can you show me where the collection was taken from?”
“Of course.” He stood. “Follow me.”
We headed back upstairs, past Colin, who was busy supervising a couple of carpenters who were working on the new door, and into the exhibit room to the right of the entrance. A glass display cabinet sat in the centre of it. Shards of smashed glass littered the floor, along with a wooden display stand.
Alistair pointed at it. “That was where the wooden box containing St Nicholas’s relics was kept. It’s about fifty centimetres by thirty and lined with red velvet to cushion the bones.” He then pointed to two larger display cabinets underneath the window, also smashed. “The other items were all in there.”
After the door had been ram-raided by the Land Rover, I calculated it would’ve taken maybe ten minutes maximum for the thieves to break into the cabinets and make off with their booty. Even though the museum alarm system was set to high alert at the police control room, cutbacks meant the fewest number of staff possible would be on duty. And if those officers were already dealing with an incident, it would take even longer for someone to arrive—a fact the offenders had probably been well aware of.
“Is it OK to start clearing up now?” someone asked from the entrance of the room behind us.
I turned round and saw a middle-aged black man with grey hair and a grey beard. He wore a navy boiler suit and carried a broom and dustpan with a long handle.
“Do you need to see anything else?” Alistair asked me.
I took one final glimpse around the room. “No.”
“In that case, yes, John, please start. It’s upsetting to see it like this.”
John nodded and wheeled in a large plastic container behind him, avoiding my gaze.
Alistair’s mobile phone sang out a classical tune in his pocket. “Excuse me for a moment, please.” He answered his phone and stepped into the corridor. “No, Mother, I’m a bit busy at work. No, I’m afraid I can’t stop by and see you at lunchtime today. Ask the nurse if they can give you one.”
I tuned out and directed my attention to John as he got to work. “Hi, I’m Amber, from Hi-Tec Insurance.” I thought of the staff list Brad had given me and recalled his surname. “You’re John Lane. Is that right?”
“That’s right.”
“And what's your job here exactly?”
“I’m the caretaker and general maintenance man.” He kept his head down, sweeping up fragments of glass.
“Have you noticed anything suspicious going on here lately? Anyone hanging around, or taking a strange interest in the St Nicholas exhibit?”
He stopped sweeping and glanced up at me. “It’s a museum. Aren't people supposed to take a strange interest in things?”
I smiled. “How about stranger than usual?”
“Not that I’ve noticed.” He looked down again, moving around the room. Sweep, sweep, sweep.
“Anyone asked you for details about the collection or security system of the museum?”
He stopped, leaning his elbow on top of the broom handle. “I like my job very much. I’ve worked here for twenty-five years, and even though I’m not the most academically gifted person in the world, I like being surrounded by all the nature exhibits. It makes me feel like I’m going some small way to being a custodian of our natural history, and I take that seriously. We all have a responsibility to do what we can. Instead of killing and forcing these amazing creatures and animals and birds of this world into extinction, we all need to do more to preserve them. Every one of us is a caretaker of the earth's species.”
“I completely agree. Except for spiders. And mosquitoes. Oh, and fleas.”
“Everything has a purpose of some kind. Even arachnids and insects.” He shrugged.
Hmmm, totally disagreed with that part, but hey ho.
“Anyway, I’m not about to blow my job to steal some ancient artefacts, if that’s what you’re asking.” He met my gaze with sincere, watery brown eyes, and I knew he was telling the truth. Call it a knack or intuition, but in all my years of being a police officer, I had honed my lie-detecting skills. There’s always something that gives people away. Usually an unconscious tick or twitch. The flick of a gaze, the fidget of a hand, curl of a lip, tap of a foot. Something is there if you know where to look for it.
I smiled. “Thanks, John.”
He smiled back. “I hope you find the people responsible. Next time, they might be back to take the animal or bird collection, and that would be a huge loss to humanity, too.”
They can take the insect collection, though, with pleasure.
Alistair stepped back into the room at that moment. “Sorry about that.”
“No problem. I need to speak to your other staff. Are they still here?”
“Yes. Margaret Richardson is the assistant curator and ornithology exhibit specialist. Sally English is in charge of our animal exhibit, and Elmer Hunt is the insect specialist. They’re all cataloguing their respective collections and offices to make sure nothing is missing. Let me take you to Margaret first.”
As we walked out of the room, my mobile phone rang. I looked at the display. Hacker.
“Sorry, I need to take this.” I wandered down the corridor, in the opposite direction of the entrance away from Alistair, to where I wouldn’t be overheard.
“Yo,” I said. “What've you got for me?”
“Yo. So, I checked the CCTV footage of the robbery last night. Three men wearing black with balaclavas rammed the door in a Land Rover Discovery. I checked the plate, and it was reported stolen a couple of hours before. The footage shows them entering the building and going directly to the display, where they smashed the cabinets with hammers and loaded the collection into sacks. I'm assuming they left the Discovery at the entrance, since the front of it was all smashed up and they wouldn’t want to draw any unwanted attention to themselves during the getaway. They then got into a second Discovery waiting for them outside, also stolen. I’m still trying to enhance the video to see if I can come up with any distinguishing features of the offenders.”
“OK, great. Have you started the background checks yet?”
“Yep. Alistair Cooper lives alone. His mother is suffering from Parkinson's and is in a nursing home paid for by him. His salary just about covers it, along with his living expenses and mortgage. According to his bank accounts, he’s a thrifty spender, but the nursing home is weighing on his finances. It’s possible he may have been involved in stealing the collection.”
“He doesn’t seem like a likely candidate to me. I think he was genuinely upset it’s been stolen and blames himself that such an international treasure has possibly gone forever.”
“Margaret Richardson is divorced, with two daughters. One's eighteen and about to start uni. One's twenty-one and in her last year at uni. Margaret was married to Anasztaz Kovacs, a barrister, for twenty-five years, and their divorce was final last year. She didn’t get much in the way of a divorce settlement from him, though, probably because her husband knew s
ome great divorce lawyers! She seems to get by on her salary and doesn’t have any excessive spending habits.”
“But uni is expensive these days, though, isn't it? Maybe she was tempted to supplement her income with a spot of antiquity theft.”
“Maybe. John Lane has worked at the museum for twenty-five years. Never married. No kids. Lives modestly in a council flat. No debts or vices I can see that might entice him to try to make some big cash after all this time.”
“OK.”
“Sally English has an online shopping addiction.”
“Really? Is she in debt?”
“Hell, yeah. She’s got various store cards and credit cards with a combined debt of twenty-five grand.”
“Wow.”
“Uh-huh. She’s got several county court judgements against her to repay them. Looks like she’s way behind on her mortgage, too, and her house is about to be repossessed.”
“Oooh, big motive to steal some priceless relics, then.”
“Absolutely. And then we come to Elmer Hunt, who seems…well, weird.”
“Weird how? I mean, he dresses those horrible brain-sucking fleas in clothes and calls it education. Is it weirder than that?”
“That’s pretty high on the weirdometer, but this takes it one step further. He’s into formicophilia and subscribes to a formicophilia fetish magazine and online chat room.”
“What the hell is that? Licking Formica products?”
“No, it’s when people like to be crawled on and nibbled by insects, such as ants and spiders.”
My jaw nearly hit the floor, and I shivered involuntarily. “Please say you’re joking.”
“I’m not. It gives them some kind of sexual pleasure, apparently.”
“Oh. My. God. And I thought I’d heard everything before. That is just nuts.”
“Yes, but being nuts doesn’t mean he’s one of the thieves. He’s originally from Canada. His dad was a very wealthy entrepreneur, and when his parents died ten years ago Elmer was left with an inheritance of five million dollars. He spent eight years travelling to weird and wonderful places to collect rare insect species then took the job at the museum two years ago. If he’s involved in the robbery, he didn’t do it for the money.”
“Right. Can you also check out a guy called Colin Prescott. He’s a security guard who usually works at the Natural History Museum building in London, but he’s on loan here until the door is fixed. He might not be anything to do with it, seeing as he’s only just turned up, but there’s something about him that seems off.”
“Sure. I’ll let you know. Yo.”
“Yo.” I hung up and walked back to meet Alistair, who stood with his arms folded in front of the new front door that was busy taking shape.
Colin glanced at me and smiled, but the pale-blue eyes behind it were flat and cold.
“Are you ready to see Margaret now?” Alistair asked.
I tore my gaze away from Colin. “Absolutely.”
We headed along the opposite side of the corridor to one of the ornithology exhibit rooms. A petite woman with fiery-red shoulder-length curls and pale skin with an abundance of freckles was bent over one of the display cases, checking items off a list on a clipboard. She wore a tight black pencil skirt and an emerald-green silk blouse with a cream silk scarf.
She glanced up when she heard us and exhaled a relieved sigh, a hand springing to her throat. “Well, it looks like they didn’t touch anything in here. Thank God for that! I was extremely worried about the dodo exhibit, but it’s still intact.”
“What a relief. We can be glad of some small mercies, at least.” Alistair touched his palms together in a prayer-like gesture. “Margaret, this is Amber Fox from our insurance company. She’d like to ask you some questions.”
Margaret gave me a wide smile. “Of course. I’ll help in any way I can. It’s simply despicable that someone could do such a thing.”
“If you'll excuse me,” Alistair nodded to me. “I’m afraid I have to phone my London counterparts and liaise with them regarding some matters.”
“No problem. You go ahead.” I turned to Margaret.
“Would you like to sit? I have an office downstairs if you like.”
“No, here's fine. I just need to ask you some quick questions.”
She smoothed her skirt over slim hips. “I completely understand, although I don’t know how much help I can be. I left here around six p.m. last night, met up with one of my daughters for a quick dinner on the way home, and was in bed by ten. The first I heard of this was when Alistair phoned me at about five this morning to ask me to come in and check my exhibits.”
“Did you notice anyone suspicious hanging around the grounds or St Nicholas display prior to the burglary?”
“No. I’m either in my office during the day or giving scheduled daily tours and talks in here, so I haven’t had much to do with the St Nicholas relics. That’s Alistair’s baby.” She tilted her head, thinking for a moment. “No, I can honestly say I haven’t noticed anything odd around here.” She glanced over my shoulder for a moment before dragging her gaze back to me and lowering her voice. “Although I’m very surprised Alistair didn’t arrange for more security for the relics. There was an attempt to steal the display before, when it was loaned to the National Historical Museum in Madrid.”
Hmmm. Interesting. “When was that?”
“Last year. Two thieves hid in the museum at closing time. They actually hid inside the stuffed-bear collection, if I remember correctly. Then they attempted to steal the relics, but the metal security shutters were activated before they could get away, and they were trapped in the building.
“How did they manage to hide in a bear?”
She shrugged. “I think they were prehistoric. Huge things. There was a big hollow in the middle of two bears in the exhibit, and the thieves climbed inside.”
“Did Alistair know about it?”
“Of course. I spoke to Alistair about it. As the assistant curator here, I felt like I couldn’t stay silent and let a potential theft happen again.”
“So you asked him to increase security?”
“Yes, the responsibility for the museum rests with him, but ultimately we’re governed by the National History Museum in London. Alistair said our budget wouldn’t stretch to more security, which is true, but I’m sure if he’d have asked London for the loan of a security guard for the week the exhibit was here, they would’ve agreed. I mean, we’re talking about St Nicholas’s bones here! The very embodiment of Santa Claus! Of Christmas as we know it. Lack of budget shouldn't be responsible for losing something so culturally and historically significant.” Her cheeks flushed red, and I felt her disdain for Alistair’s management skills dripping from every word. “He said his hands were tied. That he couldn’t run to the museum director every time there was a problem to sort out, because he’d look incompetent.” She raised her eyebrows, letting me know in no uncertain terms that she felt Alistair was definitely incompetent in his role. “Well, they wouldn’t listen to me, and look what's happened.” Her nostrils flared with anger. “And now it’s their own fault it’s been stolen.”
“The people who attempted to steal it before—do you know if they’re still in prison?”
“As far as I know. I think I remember reading that they received a ten-year sentence.”
“Can you think of anything else that might help?”
She tilted her head again, pausing for a moment. “I’m afraid not.” She gripped one of my hands in hers and covered it with the other. Her skin was soft and warm. “Please try and get the collection back, won’t you?”
I gave her my best reassuring smile. “That’s my plan.”
Chapter 3
I was tossing up in my head who to see next—Sally or Elmer. I secretly hoped I would never have to set foot in Elmer's insect exhibit room, but I really wanted to speak to him in his natural environment. People can give away a lot of clues when they feel comfortable with their surroundings. Th
en I had a light bulb moment. I could ask to speak to him in his office. I bet he had only a few exhibits down there. Surely, he wouldn’t have any giant fleas or spiders in there. Those would all be on public display, unfortunately for the public and poor children, who were probably psychologically affected by it forever. Come to think of it, maybe that’s where my spider phobia came from.
I knocked on his door and heard a deep, drawn out voice say, “Come in.”
He sounded a bit like Vincent Price from those old Hammer House of Horror films I watched when I was a kid. I half expected creepy organ music to start, Dracula to appear all fanged up and hungry, and bats to shoot out of nowhere, flying into my hair to scratch my brain out. I’d had a bat in my hair once before, and it wasn’t pretty. I’d managed to set a building on fire. It was all the bat's fault, though.
I pushed open the creaky door and found Elmer sitting behind a desk swamped with paperwork that made even Alistair’s look tidy. I needn't have worried about Elmer looking like Dracula. It was ridiculous, right? My imagination was running wild. Instead, Elmer was more like Lurch from the Addams Family—tall, grey skin, grey hair, and grey eyes. He looked like he’d been dead for a hundred years and then dug up again. Maybe even two hundred.
I remembered to shut my mouth and swallowed hard to work some moisture back into my throat. Come on, Amber, get a grip! You’re an ex-police officer. A shit hot, tough investigator who's taken on hardened criminals. Your insect phobia is just creeping you out, that’s all. A Lurch look-a-like is a piece of cake!
I took a deep breath and plastered a wobbly smile on my face. “Hi, I’m Amber.”
“Yes. I heard you’d be coming to talk to me. Hello.” He smiled, revealing long, pointy canines.
Lurch meets Dracula. Eeek! OK. Calm down. You’ve got a case to investigate.
I walked into the room but didn’t dare sit down on the chair in front of Elmer's desk in case there was a stray spider or ant around. Maybe he’d been doing a spot of formicophilia in the office in his lunch hour. Yuck.