The evening had started out smoothly enough. Normally Christine was uncomfortable making idle chitchat with the kind of people attending the gala—überwealthy patrons of the museum decked out in all their conspicuous finery—but for some reason, on that night she hadn’t felt self-conscious at all. Maybe it was because it was a Tuesday night, the weeknight traditionally open to the public free of charge, and so there were plenty of “normal” people mixed in with the tuxedo and gown crowd. Maybe it was that she was wearing heels and a lovely gray-green dress that matched her eyes, instead of the slacks and sensible oxfords that her job seemed to require, and she actually felt attractive. Or maybe it was just that she was getting more accustomed to speaking in public.
She had been flattered to have been asked to speak about the museum’s formative influence on her, and it hadn’t been difficult for her to come up with an enthusiastic speech. But she never got to give it. Thirty seconds into her talk she had turned to gesture, with a flourish, to a display case behind the podium. And she had frozen.
The case contained a life-size tableau of the sort the museum was so famous for. This one was a jungle scene set in Papua New Guinea, fitting for the reopening of the Oceania exhibit. Discernible, now, in the lush vegetation, was something she had not been able to see when she had been waiting in the wings to be introduced—a well-muscled warrior wearing a brilliant blue-green feather mask. Around his neck hung a carved stone amulet, gleaming under the bright casement lights.
The warrior, the mask, and the charm stone had taken her straight back to the Turama River basin and immobilized her in her tracks. Moments passed. When she turned around again to address the audience, Christine had found she was unable to speak. Eventually, she had made her way off the stage to haphazard and bewildered applause.
Now she was late for her ten o’clock appointment with Nona MacGowan, the institution’s resident botanist, who had sounded so young on the phone that Prusik had wondered if she’d called the botanist’s home number and gotten her daughter by accident. MacGowan was an expert on Midwest flora and a principal adviser to the University of Chicago’s arboretum collection. Christine hoped she hadn’t heard about the opening night fiasco in April, or worse yet, hadn’t been one of the puzzled people in the audience. She took a breath and brought her attention back to the case.
It was late August already and she was still mucking around with seeds and flecks of paint. The kinds of things you do when a case has gone cold—that’s what Thorne had said. While she was grabbing a sandwich yesterday, he’d gone into her office and stuck a red Post-it to her desk lamp, flawlessly written with his Montblanc nib: “Christine: Still expecting your report. Thx, Roger.”
What had happened to being a cop in the field? There wasn’t time enough for anything but writing up damn reports—a distraction from maximizing her efforts on the case. Too much time was wasted worrying how it might play out with the higher-ups. Christine sighed. She would push herself harder. Thorne hadn’t taken the case away from her, but she had a sense that it was only a matter of time before he did.
MacGowan had said for her to go all the way to the end of the south wing, past the Rise of Mammals and Dawn of Man exhibits. Her office door was next to a large alabaster crouching lion.
Dim light filtered down from skylights. Prusik knocked on a frosted glass door marked BOTANICALS: AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.
“Special Agent Christine Prusik.” She held out her hand to the woman who opened the door.
“Call me Nona.” The woman took Prusik’s hand in both of hers. She was dressed in brown work pants and a tweedy jacket that went with her outdoorsy face, which creased in all the right places when she smiled.
“Please call me Christine,” said Prusik, smiling in return in spite of herself.
“I’ve something to show you,” said Nona. She opened an inner office door and flicked on a bank of overhead fluorescent lights. Large wooden collecting cases lined the room from floor to ceiling, their drawers labeled with Latin binomials.
“Brian has spoken so highly of you,” Prusik said. Eisen had earlier supplied the botanist with several seeds taken from the Blackie victim’s clothing.
“Bless his heart.” Nona withdrew some samples in glassine. “As I told Mr. Eisen, I help set up the museum displays so specimens of elk are properly mounted next to bear grass or Western sage, for example.”
“So—what have you found?” Prusik asked, taking a chair.
The botanist held one of the sample bags up to the light. Small green pearls gathered along its bottom crease. “None of these seeds is a forest species per se.”
Nona took out a notebook with a yellow pencil clipped under a thick rubber band that held the book closed.
“They’re members of the mallow family, a big one. This particular variety grows quite tall, even in poor soil conditions along dirt roads or gravel driveways. It likes lots of sun. It’s not the sort of thing you ordinarily find in dense forest.”
Nona glanced down at her notes. “I understand from Mr. Eisen that this sample came from a rural farming district. This species is a fairly common variety in the Midwest. It frequently grows next to farmhouses and barns.”
Prusik imagined a painter whitewashing a barn, trampling over mallow plants, seeds sticking to him. “Something that might readily stick to a painter’s clothing?”
“Yes, that would be very likely, especially in summertime when the seeds are ready to disperse. They have a tendency to cling to clothing. They act very much like Velcro.”
“But you say it wouldn’t be the kind of plant found in a forest?” Prusik tugged at the gold stud in her right earlobe.
“No, of that I’m quite sure. This species prefers open spaces, plenty of direct sunlight. Unfortunately, it is quite common. You’ll even find it growing in many abandoned city lots here.” Nona stared down at the floor as if a mallow shrub might sprout up right there.
Prusik pondered the point. Betsy Ryan’s body had been found near the Little Calumet River. That was practically in Chicago.
Nona flicked the second sample bag with her fingernail. “This one’s an entirely different story.” The weathered lines around her eyes curved up. “Absolutely no relation to mallow.”
“What are they?” Prusik leaned forward, studying the tiny brown bits.
“Rosaceae multiflora, a species native to Asia but widely distributed in North America for centuries.” Nona circled the name in her notebook. “Sticky wicket, multiflora. You don’t go wandering into it willy-nilly without getting horrifically entangled.”
Prusik thought of Missy Hooper’s blackened, writhing corpse. She’d recovered a thorn off the girl’s sock. “Where does this multiflora like to grow?”
“This particular species you mainly find along the edges of fields—it’s the bane of farmers. Years and years ago they were planted as hedgerows to keep herd stock from wandering off. The thorns like the mineral-rich soils of the Midwest and spread easily, sending runners everywhere. It’s become quite a problem. Fields have been inundated. When livestock wander into the thorns, their necks get entangled, choking them to death. It wouldn’t be a surprise to find it growing near mallow. Thornbushes grow right up to fences, around barnyards, too.”
Prusik fished the vial out of her briefcase. “I realize your expertise is—”
“The charm stone!” Nona blurted out. “Where’d you find it?”
“Beg your pardon?”
Nona rotated her chair and leaned over. She removed a portable lamp from its metal carrying case.
“Shortwave UV. May I see that vial?” She switched on the lamp and passed the ultraviolet beam close over the glass vial. “Can you see it?”
Under the intense beam a green strip of light glowed on the yellowish rock. “What is it?” Prusik said.
“Invisible to the naked eye. We’ll need high-power magnification to read the micro-etch security lettering,” Nona said. “I’m sure it’s one of the charm stones that went missin
g during renovations last winter. Museums worldwide have had good luck retrieving stolen artifacts from the secondary collectors’ market using this identification technique.”
“These thefts were reported?” Prusik asked, frowning. “I don’t remember hearing anything about them.”
Nona nodded. “Oh yes, they were most certainly reported, though we did try to keep it all under the radar. Everyone on staff was interviewed by investigating officers, then reinterviewed by the museum’s administration. All of the exhibit halls on the second floor—including the one that housed the Oceania collection, where the thefts occurred—were undergoing major renovations last February and March. The floor was crawling with painters and sanders and construction contractors for two full months. The police figured it had to have been someone from one of the contractors’ crews.”
“How many stones were taken?”
“Five.”
Christine’s mind was whirring. Five stones. Two dead girls. One with a charm stone in her throat.
“And the thefts were discovered when, exactly?”
“The third week of March, as the work was being completed. The administration considered postponing the formal reopening, but ultimately decided to go ahead as planned. Less bad publicity that way.” Her voice took on a sardonic tone. “We wouldn’t want to discourage any potential donors.”
“Right. Anything else?”
“Oddly, nothing,” Nona said. “Only the charm stones. Oh yes, and the feather mask from the mannequin in the same Oceania display. A pity to lose that gorgeous mask. We’ve substituted another one in, but it’s not quite as vivid. I helped with background flora in the exhibit.”
The iridescent feather fragment recovered by Howard from the Blackie crime scene flashed through Prusik’s mind. “Could you show me?”
They left Nona’s office. The upstairs hallway teemed with grade-schoolers.
“All these exhibits”—Nona extended her arm to include the whole exhibit room, which included many Indonesian artifacts in display cases—“are now wired with electronic security.”
Prusik’s eyes locked on a spotlighted feather mask. Its iridescent shimmer sent her heart skipping, and she realized she’d averted her gaze too late. Christine looked back at the botanist and met a Papuan clansman’s bold dark stare. Tattooed cheek lines under wild-looking eyes displaced Nona’s kind, weathered features.
“I…need to go.” Dizzy waves distorted her voice. A hard pulse throbbed in her head. She couldn’t shake the image of her attacker’s black eyes staring through his mask of iridescent blue-green feathers, the lanyard around his neck, the stone hanging from it braced between his teeth. With both her hands gripping his knife hand with all her might, she hadn’t been able to prevent the assailant from stabbing the blade’s tip in just below her ribs, slicing downward to her hip.
Though she was standing in a dimly lit room, intense sunlight now warmed her shoulders. The sound of a hard rain now filled her ears. She couldn’t control it. Wet leaves and broken branches suddenly matted across the marble floor at her feet.
Prusik took a step back, breathing too fast, and heard Nona ask if she was OK. But the forensic anthropologist was caught in the coffee-colored Turama River again, choking, water rushing up her nose and sinuses, pummeling her ears, momentarily blurring her vision. At each turn, the river’s currents did everything possible to sweep her into the advancing clutches of her frenzied attacker. The Turama had been an obstacle course from hell; it had nearly owned her, and so had he.
“Christine?” someone said, stroking her hand. “Christine, are you all right?”
Prusik felt cold marble beneath her back. She forced her eyes open and looked up, seeking the woman’s face that went with the gentle voice. Nona helped her to her feet and guided her to a bench along the hallway. With difficulty, Christine pulled herself back into the present and rummaged clumsily through the contents of her purse on the bench, spilling half of the items onto the floor. She pried open the pewter pillbox and downed two tablets dry. Antianxiety medication took time her heart didn’t have. She inhaled, counting to five, and exhaled, counting back down to zero. Then she noticed the throbbing in her pinkie and released her clenched fist.
Maybe things were getting too personal. Maybe she should let Thorne take her off the case or—better yet—she should recuse herself. That would stump him. No, what she needed was her own forensic anthropologist to watch over her—a guiding spirit to steer her out of harm’s way. But she had survived New Guinea. Why wouldn’t it leave her alone then? Her ability to carve through the Turama’s churning waters had been her salvation. She had saved herself with her powerful swimming stroke. But still her heart beat too fast. Come on, drug!
Children in single file headed her way. A few minutes later a paramedic appeared in a fluorescent yellow jacket. She refused a stretcher but, in compromise, agreed to be escorted down to the ambulance, not wanting to make more of a scene than she already had.
The emergency vehicle was idling at the bottom of the grand staircase that led to the museum’s main entrance. She sat on the tailgate of the ambulance, between the open rear doors, answering the medic’s questions. Christine closed her eyes, thankful that neither Thorne nor Howard—nor any of her lab team, for that matter—had been present to observe firsthand another chink in her armor. Only Nona MacGowan had witnessed it, and she had left puzzled as to what it was all about.
After she flashed her badge and repeated that she was not in need of transport to the emergency room, the paramedics made her sign a release form, then left.
In the quiet of the car, Prusik traced her fingers over her blouse along the scar ridge beneath her ribs. In the frenzy of heat, mud, and battle, she’d slipped free from her attacker’s grip and dived into the churning mountain waters of the Turama. How had she survived? The wound had been more than a superficial cut, yet the flesh had held together, her life-sustaining fluids intact. The knife hadn’t punctured any of her organs. The wound hadn’t become infected. She hadn’t drowned in the river. Her fluids hadn’t been imbibed because of the Ga-Bong lust for blood, or in the reenactment of some ancient Papuan highland ritual to bring male and female into balance, or whatever her bird-of-paradise-feather-masked assailant had had for a reason.
She moaned softly. When would it ever leave her, this panic, this sense of doom? Telling herself again and again that she must have survived against all odds for some reason had done nothing to dispel the awful memories that followed her in and out of motels, down hallways, at her office, and into the woods while she was trying to do her job. It was always the same: death on the ground, death on the examination table, and death whispering into her head that it would find a way in. Finish the job.
Had it finally found its way in?
And the question that was plaguing her during her long workdays and at night in her dreams remained: How could slit-open Indiana girls with charm stones lodged in their lifeless throats be part of all that?
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Clouds were moving fast as the front pushed through. Only a few errant drops struck the windshield. He steered down the dirt two-track that led up to the large weathered barn, the site of his painting job. He waited, just as the man had said to do. Spanning the tired-looking asphalt shingles was a faded testimonial for Sweet Boy chewing tobacco from an era gone by. Annexed to the barn stood a one-story outbuilding in the same worn condition.
He kept the engine running. The WTWN announcer was finishing the 7 a.m. farm report. Corn futures were up on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. After an ad came the local weather report. Overnight rains should lead to clearing skies by midmorning. Good.
The hourly news report followed: “State Police Post Nine outside Crosshaven is continuing the search in Patrick State Forest for Julie Heath, age fourteen, who went missing four weeks ago on July twenty-eighth. Those who wish to volunteer to be part of the search party should contact—”
He clicked off the broadcast. A short man in
one-piece bib overalls was approaching fast, holding down the front brim of his straw hat. He got out before the farmer reached the bed of the truck.
“You’ve come early,” the man said. They shook hands. “Fred Stanger. Glad to meet you. Lonnie Wallace at the Sweet Lick Resort said you were the man to get. A damn fast painter, he said.” The farmer turned and surveyed his buildings. “Not much to look at. What do you guess?”
“Still a bit wet,” the painter said, kneading his hands.
“Nah, not for staining. It’ll be OK to get started. There’s a good breeze. Them upper boards are damn near dry enough. I’m just looking for a once-over. Nothing fancy.”
Stanger leaned sideways to see into the truck bed. “Got enough stain?”
The painter nodded. “Plenty for the job.”
“Like I said, five hundred dollars for the whole deal. Half now, half when you finish. Sound all right with you, Jasper? It’s Jasper, right?” Stanger noticed that the painter’s wrist was bandaged. “Cut yourself?”
“Just a scratch.” The painter pulled his sleeve down.
“Wife’s a retired nurse. You might want her to give it a look, make sure it’s not infected. Looks like your bandage could use changing.”
Jasper said nothing. He removed the triple-tier aluminum ladder he’d borrowed from the Sweet Lick Resort garage bay and one of the gallon tins from the bed.
Stanger stepped closer. “Would you like some help carrying—”
The painter swung his ladder, blocking the man from getting any closer to the truck. “It’s OK.”
“You’re forgetting something, aren’t you?” The farmer held out a wad of folded bills.
The painter balanced the stain on the top rail of the bed long enough to slip the cash from the farmer’s hand.
Stanger eyed him for a moment before nodding. “I’ll have the wife bring you down some iced tea around noon.”
“Don’t bother.” Jasper didn’t raise his voice. “Carry my own thermos with me.”
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