Bones of Betrayal (Body Farm 4)

“You and that hateful policeman?”

“No,” I said, “just me. I’m hoping you can tell me another story.”

“I see,” she said. “You’re keeping me around for the entertainment value. Like that Persian king What’s-his-name.”

“Which king?”

“King What’s-his-name. I don’t remember his name. Nobody remembers his name. It’s the storyteller we remember. Scheherazade.”

“Oh right,” I said. “The Thousand and One Nights. She kept herself from becoming a one-night stand by spinning stories that never ended.”

“It wasn’t just that they never ended,” she said. “They wove together to make a tapestry, stories threaded within other stories. Like life, Bill, but without the boring parts. She was the queen of the cliffhanger, Scheherazade. Every dawn, just as he was about to lop her head off, she’d leave him in suspense.”

“I’m feeling some pretty strong suspense about something myself,” I said.

She was silent. “I could probably dredge up another chapter,” she finally said. “How soon should I expect you?”

“I could be there in thirty minutes, but I’ll wait a while, if you’d rather.”

“No need to wait. Tempus fugit, Bill. Sic transit gloria mundi.”

“What?”

“Time flies; so passes the glory of this world. I’ll have the door open and my vodka in hand.”

“Beatrice, it’s only nine A.M.”

“It’s five P.M. somewhere. It’s a big world, Bill. Don’t draw your boundaries small.”

* * *

This early in the day, the walkway to her front door was deeply shadowed by the roof overhang and the evergreens. Through the windows, though, the redwood paneling glowed warmly in morning sun that streamed through windows. I rang the bell, mostly to hear the high, clear tone that pealed forth when I tugged the clapper. Then I let myself in as usual, calling out, “Beatrice? It’s Bill.”

She didn’t answer, so I headed for the living room. She was sitting in her wingback chair, and as I entered the room, she raised a tumbler of vodka to me in a toast.

She waved me toward my chair, and I sat down and began to rock. A steaming cup of tea sat on the end table; I took the mug and cradled it in my hands, glad of its warmth, for I felt cold inside.

She studied me through watery eyes. “What sort of story would you like to hear today?”

“I’d like to hear a true one,” I said, meeting her gaze. “A true one about the death of Jonah Jamison.”

“How do you mean?”

“I realized something today,” I said. “Or heard something. It was as if Jonah’s bones whispered a secret to me; as if he, too, had a story to tell.”

“And what was the story? What did he whisper?”

“He whispered that he didn’t shoot himself.”

She leaned forward and cocked her head slightly — probably the very same posture she’d seen me assume for hours over the past two weeks. Then she frowned and shook her head. “Back up,” she commanded. “You’ve jumped straight to the ending. Begin at the beginning.”

I was confused. “Which beginning?”

“The beginning of the story Jonah’s bones told you. ‘It was a dark and stormy night in the anthropology lab…’ or whatever. Set the scene; let it unfold. Have I taught you nothing?”

“Ah,” I said. “Now who’s being kept around just for the entertainment value? I’m not as good a storyteller as you.”

“No one’s as good as I am.” She smiled. “But you have to keep trying. It’s the only way to get any better.”

I thought for a moment, then drew a breath and began again. “The neighbor’s dog woke me up before dawn today,” I said. “Not because he was barking loudly — it was only one little yip — but because I was half awake already. Sleeping badly. Fretting about something. I didn’t even know what it was, but I knew where it was. It was on my desk under the stadium. Down in that labyrinth whose windows look like they haven’t been washed since the Manhattan Project.”

She gave me a nod of approval. “Much better,” she said. “Go on.”

“Whenever I think I’m overlooking something in a case, what I do is put the bones on my desk where I can see them. Every now and then I’ll stop whatever I’m doing — grading papers or reading a journal article or eating a sandwich — and look at the bones. I try to keep my mind as empty as I can make it, and just look, hoping something new will catch me by surprise. Present itself to me. Speak to me. It’s like I’m trying to sneak up on something I already know, somewhere deep down, but can’t quite get ahold of.”

“That’s a good skill to cultivate,” she said. “You’ll need it more and more as you get older and start to lose track of things — names and faces and where you left your reading glasses and why you walked into the living room.”

I had the feeling she was trying to stretch my story out, and I couldn’t blame her. “I’ve been looking at Jonah Jamison’s skull that way for a week now,” I resumed, “but it hasn’t been working. Nothing new. Today, having dragged myself to work at six A.M., I found myself getting mad whenever I glanced at that damn skull. Almost as if he were being deliberately uncooperative. Too watchful for me to sneak up on, or something.”

“Well, he died during wartime in a top secret city,” she said. “You can’t really blame him for being vigilant, can you?”

“But I did,” I said. “I finally got so irritated I picked up the skull and put it in the box and closed the lid.”

“I guess you showed him,” she said.

“And that’s when I saw it,” I said.

“Saw what?”