Skull Duggery (13 page)

Marmolejo’s eyebrows drew together. “Do you mean another human skeleton?”

“Oh yes, but one of the Ancients, an Old One, you know? A thousand years old, maybe more.”

“Ah,” Marmolejo said with a sober little smile. “And now we find ourselves dealing with a New One, eh? A Young One. Well thank you, Chief. Now, Sergeant Nava, please tell me how it was it that you were made aware of these remains?”

The two men gradually relaxed further as Marmolejo asked his innocuous questions, gently and with no intimation of fault-finding or accusation, at least until he came to the crucial question.

“Sergeant Nava, can you enlighten me as to why the case was closed after a single month?”

Even before this, Nava’s huge, thick-fingered hand had been having trouble manipulating the tiny cup and saucer; watching him was like watching a trained bear trying to do some delicate trick that was too minuscule for his paw. Now he carefully, clumsily put them, clattering, down on the table. “It wasn’t closed, colonel,” he said, looking nervous again. “It was suspended.”

“Ah, suspended. I see. And can you tell me why it was suspended after a single month?”

“There was no place to go with it, sir. We couldn’t find out who the victim was. We looked through the records of three years ago, five years ago, eight years ago, to try to find a girl of that age who was missing. In all of Oaxaca we found no one it could possibly have been. And there were no clues-the murderer, the motive-nothing. And the case, it was so old-” Marmolejo made the smallest of gestures with his hand, only the faint shadow of a shushing gesture, but it was enough to stop Nava at once.

“What if it had been a boy, not a girl?” the colonel asked. “Would that have made a difference?”

“If it had been a-” A sweaty sheen had popped out on Nava’s forehead. “But the forensic report, it said-”

“I understand,” Marmolejo said kindly. “But now it seems the report may have been in error. Professor Oliver is going to look into that. Would you foresee any problem with reopening the matter if there is a reason; assigning some of your better men to it?”

“No, sir, absolutely not. With your permission, I would like to work on it myself.”

“Very good. I will let you know. As we proceed on these matters, I trust you will show Chief Sandoval and Professor Oliver every courtesy.”

“Of course. They have been extremely helpful, most obliging. We are most fortunate to have their expert counsel available to us.”

“Thank you, Sergeant.”

Nava, attuned to understanding a dismissal when he heard one, rose, bowed, and took his leave, still sweating but looking relieved to get out of there in one piece. His expression said it all: Madre de Dios, it could have been a whole lot worse.

“And now, Chief Sandoval,” Marmolejo said genially, “would you care for a little more of this excellent coffee?”

“Why yes, Colonel, I believe I would,” said Sandoval, smiling broadly and extending his cup. “With maybe a little sugar this time. But only if it’s not too much trouble, of course.”

“Actually, a lot better than I anticipated,” Gideon said, in answer to Julie’s asking about how the session at the Procuraduria General de Justicia had gone. “It was a little rocky at first-these Oaxaca cops are a scary bunch-but once their colonel got into the act it all smoothed over. Sandoval practically fell in love with the guy.” He smiled. “You know, on the way there, all he could talk about was what thugs and crooks and brutes they all are. But you should have heard him raving on the way back: ‘A fine man, the colonel, a real gentleman. I can see things will really be different now.’ Suddenly, he’s the policia ministerial ’s number one fan.”

He stretched comfortably out in the wooden lawn chair. They were sipping white wine on the Hacienda’s brick-paved interior patio, shielded from the late-afternoon sun by the wispy but sufficient shade of what Julie had informed him was a casuarina tree. “And what about your day?”

“Oh, Uncle Tony showed up with Jamie a couple of hours ago; that was the big event of the day. It’s amazing, Uncle Tony’s hardly changed at all-well, a little grayer, a little heavier-a lot heavier-but the same guy’s still inside, only even more so: cocky, loud, overbearing, self-centered, pretty nasty sometimes-”

“A real charmer, huh? I can hardly wait.”

“Well, it’s true, he can be a little hard to take, but he’s funny too. And generous, in his own way.”

“ ‘In his own way.’ Now there’s a phrase I’ve never understood. ‘He loved her in his own way.’ ‘He was grateful in his own way.’ What does it mean?”

“Oh, you’ll like him, you’ll see. It’s never boring around Tony. He’s unfailingly entertaining. In his own way, of course.”

“I see. And what about Jamie? How did he strike you?”

“Jamie? He’s gotten more than ever like Jamie-mousy, fussy, persnickety-”

“Well, he is a bookkeeper.”

“Gideon, I’m surprised at you!” She cried, but she was laughing. “That is hardly the kind of hackneyed, stereotypical remark that I expect from a respectable professor of anthropology.”

Abjectly, he bowed his head. “You’re right. I don’t know what came over me. Strike it from the record.”

“Consider it done. But Jamie-I’m making him sound worse than he is. He’s really nice, very likeable. Well, they all are, really. You’ll see…” She sipped her wine pensively.

“But?”

“But-I don’t know, I used to envy them all so much, living this romantic, exotic life in Mexico. Now I find myself feeling a little sorry for them all. What a strange kind of existence they have down here, when you think about it. Carl, Annie, Jamie-Tony for that matter-they’ve lived here all or most of their lives, but they’re not Mexican and won’t ever be Mexican. They’re not really American anymore either, for that matter, except technically. They’re foreigners wherever they are.”

“That’s true. Like the Man in the Iron Mask. Must be tough. The ones I’ve met so far, Annie and Carl, I noticed they both speak with a slight accent now, a kind of Mexican lilt. And my guess is that the Mexicans find their Spanish not quite right. It’s almost as if they don’t have a native language.”

“And yet they do seem happy enough when you look at them. Or at least not un happy.”

“Well, different people have different reactions. Me, I’m the way you are. I’d have a hard time living between two cultures like that.” He got out of his chair and stepped over to a nearby hammock hanging between two posts. “I think I’m going to give this thing a try.”

It was easier said than done, especially while holding a wine glass, but eventually he managed to get all his appendages safely in, while spilling no more than a couple of drops. “Mm, comfortable,” he said. “So tell me about what the work is like. Not too overwhelming, I hope.”

“Couldn’t have been easier. One departure-a nice, quiet German family that’s been here a week-and no arrivals, so all I have to worry about are the feminist professors. So mostly I just ‘supervised.’ And with Jamie here now, I can stop worrying about receipts, or check stubs, or reconciling the bank statement, knock on wood. Those professors, whatever else you might say about them, are very easy guests, nothing high-maintenance about them. No special requests, no complaints. Mostly they keep to themselves, but they’ve signed on for several of the hikes and horseback rides that Carl leads.

Seeing them around Carl, they don’t seem to be the man-haters you might think.”

Gideon laughed. “I think Carl qualifies as an alpha male. I understand they make allowances for alpha males. Look, if there isn’t that much to do, do you think you’ll be able to take a day off and go see Oaxaca with me? And maybe one or two of the archaeological sites? Couldn’t Jamie cover for you for one day?”

“Oh, I think I could, in a day or two. One archaeological site will be plenty for me, thank you, but the Oaxaca part sounds good. I’d like to see the city.” She thought for a moment. “Maybe even tomorrow, in the afternoon?”

“Ah, no, not tomorrow. I told the colonel I’d look at another skeleton for him. But maybe the day after?”

“ Another skeleton. I’m shocked. shocked.”

“Well, he asked me. By the way, I have another shock for you, or a surprise, anyway. That colonel I’ve been talking about-who do you think he turned out to be? Three guesses.”

“Mm, let’s see…” Julie sipped her wine and concentrated, looking up into the pale green, gently stirring branches of the tree. “Javier Marmolejo,” she said.

Gideon almost choked on his wine. “How the heck did you come up with that?”

“It wasn’t hard. I just mentally went over my list of all the Mexican policemen I know, and the total was one, and that one was Javier. So I took a wild guess. But how did he get to be a colonel in Oaxaca?”

It took five minutes to explain, by which time they had finished their wine. “Another?” Gideon asked, trying to sit up in the soft, moving hammock. “Assuming I can actually get out of this thing.”

Julie glanced at her watch. “No, it’s almost six. We’re all having dinner in Uncle Tony’s apartment. He likes to eat with everybody when he’s here. He’s read all about you, by the way, and he’s really anxious to meet you. Really, I think you’re going to like him.”

“Oh, I’m sure I will. Cocky, loud, overbearing, self-centered, nasty… What’s not to like?”

Tony’s “apartment” was in the Casa del Mayordomo, the one-time plantation manager’s house, now divided into quarters for Carl, Annie, Tony himself, Jamie, and Josefa Gallegos, the housekeeping manager who was, Julie had told him, more of a charity case than an employee; she was Tony’s aunt by marriage, the widowed wife of his mother Beatriz’s brother.

Other than the upstairs bathroom and bedroom, Tony’s unit consisted of one large, simple space with whitewashed walls that were hung with Mexican Primitive paintings. The room had been outfitted as a living room-dining room-a cove-like kitchen was tucked into one corner-with Mexican Colonial furniture, including a museum-quality, elaborately painted dinner table with the place settings-plate, spoon, fork (but no knife)-painted right on it.

Julie and Gideon were the last to arrive. When they got there the others were clustered near one end of the table, where bottles of mezcal, wine, and beer were waiting (Gideon noticed that the painted surface had received a thick coating of plastic or polyurethane to protect it from spills) and from which hors d’oeuvres were being served by Dorotea’s two teenage nieces, who were her kitchen assistants.

As Julie had implied, Tony had done some serious prepping on Gideon, and on forensic anthropology as well. With a few drinks apparently under his belt by the time they got there, he had quickly collared Gideon and pretty much appropriated him for discussion of matters osteological.

Julie had said that, despite a few disagreeable personality traits, he was likeable, and he was: a big, blustery, affable guy with a voice that sounded like the clatter of the Eighth Avenue Express coming up through a grate in the sidewalk. Physically, he was not an attractive man. He bore a three-day growth of stubbly beard, trendy if you believed the fashion ads, but as usual with men who had a few too many chins and not enough neck, he wound up looking more scruffy than macho. He was, as Julie had said, considerably overweight, with the bulgy, button-popping look that comes from having recently put on a lot of pounds that haven’t yet figured out where they are eventually going to settle. His flushed, yellowish skin, and the threadlike purple tracery of broken capillaries that emerged from the stubble and crawled up his cheeks and onto his nose spoke of the dedicated boozehound. But if he was a drunk, he was a genial drunk, on this night at any rate, and he had clearly taken a liking to Gideon.

“Hey, what are you drinking?” he said early on. “Is that wine? Nah, put that crap down, you gotta try this. You like mezcal?”

Gideon didn’t know. “I’ve never tried it.”

“Never tried it?” Tony was astounded. “Where’ve you been all your life?” He led Gideon to the drinks table and lifted one of several dark purple bottles with Hacienda Encantada labels. “Now, this stuff is special. This is made from maguey right on the property, the same plants they made the sisal from in the old days. I get it bottled at a distillery in Tlacolula. They only make a few cases a year. Okay, now do like I do.”

Gideon did as instructed. The mezcal was poured into a shot-sized, cylindrical glass and placed on a saucer with four lime wedges and a cinnamon-colored spoonful of salt mixed with powdered chile peppers. A wedge of lime was dipped into the salt mixture, sucked on, and followed by a sip of mezcal. Four wedges, four sips. Then on to the next saucer. Because Gideon knew that tequila also came from the maguey and he had never developed a taste for tequila, he hadn’t expected to like it, but mezcal turned out to have a rich, smoky taste, more like Scotch than tequila.

“It’s good,” he said truthfully, but turned down the offer of a third. Tony shrugged and poured one for himself. “Now, then,” he said, arranging the salt and lime wedges to his satisfaction, “I want to talk to you-” A slurp of lime, a sip of mezcal. “-about, like, racial differences in, like, cranial form…”

Ten minutes later, with Tony still monopolizing Gideon, the group sat down to dinner. “This guy,” Tony declared to one and all, with his arm draped collegially around Gideon’s shoulder, “this guy is famous. I Googled him; he’s all over the Net. The Skeleton Doctor.” The nape of Gideon’s neck was jovially, if a little too vigorously, squeezed. “Right, Gid?”

“Actually,” Gideon murmured, “not that it matters-”

“The Skeleton Doctor. They even had a TV show on him. On A amp;E.”

“Well, not on me. I was just a small part of it. It was-”

“And there was a whole article on him in Discover magazine.”

That much was true, but Gideon was getting uncomfortable. Tony was at the head of the table with Gideon on his left and Julie on his right. The rest, other than Jamie, who was chewing his lip and brooding over something, were smiling at him, or at least in his general direction, with apparent interest. But long-time professor that he was, he was an old hand at recognizing the glazed, overly bright stare and glassy smile of a captive audience. Tony Gallagher in full throttle was a hard man to ignore or to interrupt; no doubt even harder when he also happened to be el patron.