LC 02 - Questionable Remains (5 page)

"Please stay for dinner," Grace asked.

"Thank you," said Lindsay, "but I need to shower and change....
She looked down at her clothes.

"We have a guest room," interrupted Grace. "You have your
luggage. You could stay the night and leave from here."

"I couldn't impose-"

"You wouldn't be imposing," said her husband, putting an arm
around his wife's shoulders. "We would be honored if you would
stay."

The trip to the Lambert farm had been an interesting diversion,
and Lindsay was looking forward to resuming her vacation plans,
but there was an urgency in their request that caused her to consent. Besides, she was tired. Excavation was hard work.

Marilee jumped up and down when she heard that Lindsay was
staying. After Lindsay took a shower and changed, the irrepressible five-year-old took her on a tour of her bedroom, which shouldn't have taken long in a ten-by-ten room. But Marilee was a collector: rocks, leaves, various kinds of teeth, bird nests, dolls, and just
things she found, all nicely categorized and neatly placed on
shelves in her room.

Lindsay named the teeth for her. She had a tooth from a cow, a
horse, a dog, a raccoon. As Lindsay identified each one, Marilee
asked, "How do you know that?" and Lindsay showed her the
identifying characteristics of each. Marilee listened, wide-eyed,
soaking up the information.

"Is this your brother's?" asked Lindsay, holding a small
square box containing a deciduous human molar on a piece
of cotton.

Marilee nodded. "He traded it to me for this rusty thing I
found."

Lindsay smiled and set the box down. Interesting, she
thought. Joshua's molar had a rare extra cusp.

"What is this?" Lindsay picked up a deep red-brown
piece of weathered wood leaning against the wall next to
Marilee's shelves.

"It's a piece of wood from a ship," Marilee said proudly.
"I found it on the beach. See the holes? Daddy said they had
wooden pegs instead of nails to hold the ship together. It's
real real old."

"I'm impressed," said Lindsay. Marilee beamed.

"I'm glad you're staying tonight," she said.

Lindsay took hold of Marilee's hand and walked with her
to the dining room. Dinner was pot roast with potatoes and
carrots, green beans, squash, and cheesecake for dessert.
The setting was elegant white china and silver on an offwhite lace tablecloth. The buffet, hutch, and chairs were of
polished cherry. On the wall hung a Norman Rockwell print
of Thanksgiving dinner, which Lindsay imagined matched
this dining room on holidays. The Lamberts were going out
of their way to make Lindsay's stay enjoyable, but it was
always a little uncomfortable for her to be in the home of
strangers, even ones as nice as the Lamberts.

They passed each dish of food around the table, and
Lindsay helped herself to some of everything. Grace filled
Marilee's plate, but Lindsay could see she wanted to do it
herself. "That's not the calf, is it?" she asked as her mother
cut up her meat. "Joshua said we were having it for supper."

"Joshua, why do you tell her such things?" said Grace,
frowning at him. "No, it's not the calf. That's buried and
gone."

"Calf?" asked Lindsay.

"When we were on vacation," young Joshua volunteered
energetically, "one of Mr. Steven's calves got loose and got
its head hung up in a hole in our shed and died. Boy, what
a stink when we got back."

Lindsay was sorry she had asked.

"No talk about the calf at the dinner table," said Miles.

Joshua laughed. Marilee clearly did not think the episode
funny at all.

Marilee and Joshua chattered throughout the meal, and
Lindsay commented to their parents on how smart they
were.

"Both our children are smart," said Miles with pride.
"Joshua is a straight-A student, and the teachers are already
planning an accelerated program for Marilee. They sure
didn't get their brains from me." He smiled at his wife. "I
hardly made above Cs. It must have come from Grace."

"We got lucky with the kids," added Grace. "Maybe they
got it from my brother. He was the smart one in the family.
He was good at figuring things out."

Everyone was quiet for a moment.

"It's time for you kids to go to bed," said Miles.

"It's early," Joshua protested.

"Then you can play in your room," said his father.
"Marilee, it's your bedtime."

Marilee shook her head and pointed to Lindsay. "I want
to show her my books."

"Now, Marilee. Dr. Chamberlain is our guest," said
Grace.

"I don't mind, really," Lindsay said.

"Show her just a few. I'll make a fresh pot of coffee,"
Grace told Lindsay. Marilee went happily off to get ready
for bed.

Marilee had quite a collection of books. Lindsay picked
up one about collecting seashells and rocks; the one beside
it was about Native Americans. Another one was about
what different people, like teachers, policemen, nurses, and doctors, do at their place of work. "These are good books,"
Lindsay told her.

"Kelley gave me a lot of them. She always brings me a
book when she comes to visit."

"Kelley?"

"She's my cousin."

"Would you like me to read you a story?" asked Lindsay.

"I'll read," Marilee said, confidently.

Marilee took the book about Native Americans and
crawled up on her bed. Lindsay sat beside her. Marilee read,
pointing to each word and pronouncing it clearly and deliberately. Lindsay was surprised and pleased that the book
was as accurate as it was simple.

"You read very well," she told Marilee.

"I like to read," she said, smiling up at Lindsay.

"I'd better let you get to bed."

Marilee shook her head. "More."

"I think your mother made coffee "

"Just one more page, please?"

Lindsay relented and listened to just one more page,
which turned into two pages, after which Lindsay tucked
her in and turned out the light.

Miles and Grace Lambert waited for Lindsay in the sitting room. Miles sat uncomfortably on the white and gold
brocade sofa, his hands gripping the seat as though he were
not in that room by choice. Grace poured coffee from a silver coffeepot that was part of a silver service sitting on the
cherry coffee table. A large manila envelope lay next to the
tray. Grace handed a white bone china cup and saucer to
Lindsay.

Lindsay took a sip of coffee as she sat in a wingback chair
that matched the sofa.

"We're glad you stayed," Grace said. "It's been a treat for
Marilee. She's always bubbling with questions, and we
can't always answer them."

"She has quite a collection of things."

"She's a little pack rat all right," said her father. "Did she
show you the piece of wood from the shipwreck?" He
seemed as proud as Marilee.

"Yes. She said she found it on the beach," said Lindsay.

He nodded his head. "We took our vacation back in April.
Went to Florida-bad timing, too many young people." He
shook his head. "But we had fun, didn't we, Grace?"

"It's the first trip we'd been on since our honeymoon. We
took the kids to the beach and Disney World. Then we came
back ..." She didn't finish her sentence, but took a sip of
coffee.

As they made light conversation, Grace eyed her husband the way one does when they want someone to bring
up an agreed upon subject. Miles set down his cup and took
a breath. Lindsay quietly sipped her coffee.

"Dr. Lindsay," he began. "We-my wife and I-have a
question. We understand that you can tell an awful lot
about what happened to a dead person from just looking at
their bones."

"Sometimes," Lindsay said cautiously.

"Grace's brother, Ken, died and-"

"No, he was killed, murdered," interrupted Grace, leaning forward. "I believe I know who did it, but I can't get
anybody to listen to me."

LINDSAY DIDN'T KNOW what she had expected to hear
from the Lamberts, but it wasn't this. She stared at Grace a
moment, but before she had a chance to speak, Grace began
telling her about her brother. She handed Lindsay a photograph in a silver frame of a thin, lanky young man with
handsome features leaning casually against a restored
Mustang convertible. He had brown, almost blond, hair
falling onto his forehead. As Lindsay looked at the picture,
Grace told her how much she adored him, how good he was
to her, how much he loved life.

Lindsay had observed that people seem to feel that if they
could only make her understand how much a person was
loved-that they were a real person and not a statistic-she
would understand how important it was to do her best and
make no mistakes when she examined their bones. Above
all, she would treat them with dignity. Grace wanted
Lindsay to know her brother as she knew him.

Miles, however, did not seem to share Grace's opinion of
Ken's good nature. When Lindsay cast glances at him during Grace's narration, he had his head down or stared out
the window lest he be called on to verify his brother-inlaw's virtues-or so Lindsay suspected.

"The last time I saw him," Grace continued, "was the first week in January a couple of years ago. He and his wife,
Jennifer, went to Colorado to visit her folks at Christmas.
We drove up to Tennessee to see them right after they got
home. He'd had a bad skiing accident out there. He broke
his ankle and a couple of ribs, bruised up his face real bad.
He looked terrible." Grace bit her lower lip.

"He was doing that-I can't remember what you call itsome kind of daredevil skiing, where you go straight down
a mountainside. Had a fall. It's a wonder he didn't kill himself then," said Miles. Lindsay could see he was having a
hard time keeping quiet about his brother-in-law. She also
saw that Miles believed Grace's brother's death was his
own fault, and it was only for his wife's sake that he was
going along with asking for Lindsay's help.

"How did he die?" Lindsay asked, still being cautious.

"Ken was a caver," answered Miles. "He had a caving
accident."

"Ken was a good caver. He was safety conscious. He took
care of the people who went caving with him," Grace said.

"Caving is dangerous," insisted Miles. "Even the best
cavers have accidents. Caves are unpredictable."

Grace looked at her husband with no malice. "Miles
thinks I'm wrong," she said. "That I'm too grieved. But I
know my brother."

"We need to just tell her what we know," said Miles. His
wife nodded and looked to him to tell the story.

Miles went on. "Grace is right: Ken knew caves, around
here and all over in Tennessee and Kentucky, too. But he
would sometimes go off caving with friends and not tell anybody where they'd gone. They might've taken off to Atlantic
City or California as far as anybody knew."

"Ken was always a little wild," said Grace, "full of life.
He liked to see and do things."

"Two years ago, Ken and a couple of friends went off like
that, not telling anybody, and just didn't come back.
Nobody knew where they were. The sheriff thought they'd left town. His buddies were just as likely to up and take off
as Ken was."

"He had a business," said Grace. "He wouldn't have left
his business. Ken was serious about that."

"That's true," said Miles. "He sold sporting equipment,
expensive stuff. Did pretty good. He was in it with his wife.
It was her money that started it."

"It was her that killed him," said Grace. "She got a ton of
insurance money. Extra for accidental death."

"How was he finally found?" asked Lindsay.

"Some other cavers in Tennessee found him," Miles said.
"Just this past May. We'd not been back a month from our
vacation. The cavers just happened on his remains, his and
his friends'. I understand it was a pretty hard cave to
explore, one of the most dangerous. That's why it took so
long to find them. The cave is on private property, and hardly anybody goes there. Apparently a cave-in of some sort
trapped them." Miles took Grace's hand. "They died there."

"Jennifer arranged it. I know she did."

"Is his wife a caver?" asked Lindsay.

Grace stared at her a moment, puzzled at the question.
"No, I-"

"It would be hard to arrange a cave-in so that you wouldn't get caught in it, too, and so that the authorities wouldn't
find evidence," said Lindsay.

"There was some talk of Jennifer having an affair with
some guy," offered Miles. "Grace thinks that the two of
them killed Ken and his buddies in the cave, then somehow
removed the evidence."

His wife nodded. "When they were found, they were
nothing but bones. We were thinking that maybe you might
be able to see something from the bones that the authorities
missed."

"Surely they are already buried," said Lindsay gently.

"That's true," said Miles. "But the sheriff took pictures
when they were found, and I had them blown up." Miles picked up the manila envelope from the table and opened it.
Grace averted her eyes.

Lindsay looked at the black-and-white photographs he
handed her. The first one showed a pile of rocks with blue
jeans and boots sticking out from under the rubble. The next
photograph showed three individuals who had been
crushed under the rubble, looking all the more flattened
because they had been skeletonized. The other photographs
were close-up shots of bony hands that were still articulated.
The skull of one of the skeletons had rolled away and come
to rest about two feet from the body. Miles identified that
skeleton as Ken Darnell, Grace's brother. The other skulls
were apparently still attached by remaining ligaments. The
photographs were good, but the skeletons were clothed.

"Do you have any photographs of the bones by themselves?"

"No, that's all we have. We know it's not much," said
Miles.

"Who identified the bones?"

"The authorities in Tennessee," answered Miles.