"Kendel and Dr. Briggs came up and told me about it. Also about the amulets. They said we're going to do a three-D reconstruction of the face?"

"Yes, Neva Hurley will be doing it."

"This is going to be so nice. Dr. Fallon, I had this idea. I've been looking at Egyptian stuff and what their houses looked like with that adobe-looking wall around the front yard and all, and I thought it would be fun if we could re-create one in the museum. If we can't do a life-sized one, maybe a miniature city." "Andie, I think that's a great idea. Tell Jonas about it tomorrow."

"See? Indispensability-that's who I am. See you tomorrow."

Diane envied all her staff who were going home.

She sat down at her desk to have a look at her mail and remembered that she was supposed to be having dinner with Frank tonight. She looked at her watch.

He wouldn't be getting home from Atlanta for an other hour. She'd have time to go see what the heck Garnett wanted, then go to Frank's.

She gave her mail a brief look. Most of it was things that Andie could take care of-or already had taken care of. She looked at her E-mail and responded to messages from two of her curators.

Her final message was one line, no signature. I THINK WE SHOULD MEET.

A chill ran through her. She stared at the message for several moments and realized that she was holding her breath. She exhaled and started to type a re sponse, and stopped. What would she say? What did he want? To give up? She didn't respond. Maybe she and Garnett could set something up. Right, Right, some inner some inner voice said, put your life in the hands of the Rosewood put your life in the hands of the Rosewood police. That's a plan.

She shut down her computer and headed out the door. The candy apple red Ford Explorer was parked in front of the museum. It was indeed very red. Hard to miss. She got in and drove to the police department, calling Garnett on the way to tell him she was coming. She showed her identification to the policeman at the duty desk. Of the four policemen who were there, all of them smirked at her. Even the sergeant on duty was trying hard to make his face an objective mask.

One of these days, she'd have to sit them down and ask what the h.e.l.l their problem was.

In the detective's squad room she was met with more amused stares and half heard a comment that someone would like to be a fly on that wall. Great, Kingsley probably profiled her out to be an axemurdering maniac. She knocked on Garnett's door.

Chapter 34.

Garnett rose from behind his desk as Diane entered his office. "Diane. Please sit down." He motioned toward his conference table as he pulled out a chair and sat down. Diane pulled up one of his chairs and sat down opposite. He formed his hands into a steeple and looked very uncomfortable.

"Diane, I don't want you to take this the wrong way."

"Douglas, I pride myself in always taking things the right way."

He was taken aback for a moment. He looked at Diane as if there might be some coded message in what she said. Or perhaps it was her uncustomary use of his first name. But he was making this sound like a trip to the princ.i.p.al's office, and she was going to stay on equal footing.

"Yes, of course. It's come to my attention . . ." He paused.

Come to his attention. Hadn't she had this conversa tion before . . . with the mayor? Perhaps that's why he looked so uncomfortable.

"Appearances are very important."

Okay, she thought, she thought, am I not wearing enough makeup...too much? am I not wearing enough makeup...too much?

"Yes, appearances are important, among many things."

"What I mean is, when you get on the witness stand, you must not only be above reproach, but appear to be above reproach."

"Like Caesar's wife."

"Who?"

"Never mind. Is there something you're trying to say?"

"Defense attorneys look for the least sign of impro priety to impugn the character of a witness in order to win a case."

"Some do. Where are we going with this con versation?"

"It has come to my attention that you are..." Garnett seemed to be searching for the right words. ". . . Dating men half your age."

Diane threw back her head and laughed-which did bewilder Garnett. He looked at her with a frown. She hardly knew where to begin her response to such an asinine statement.

"I won't even address the point of view that a woman dating younger men somehow impugns her character. I'll simply cut to the truth of what has come to your attention. Frank Duncan is two years older than I am. Now, I realize that spending all that time in the jungle sun put a few wrinkles on my face that I wish I didn't have, but really, Douglas, I don't think I look almost eighty."

Garnett opened his mouth, then closed it and opened it again. "I don't mean Frank."

"He's the only man I'm dating."

"You've been seen having a romantic dinner with a much younger man who works for you."

Garnett settled back in his chair and from the look on his face, he did realize how ridiculous it sounded for him to call her into his office for such a nebulous thing. She was sure when it was reported to him, prob ably through Izzy's boss, it came out something like she was some s.l.u.t robbing a cradle, putting moves on her underlings.

"Define romantic."

"Well, romantic, candlelight..."

"I think I see where this originated. I ate dinner with one of the geologists who works in the museum. We belong to the same caving club and we were dis cussing caving business. The restaurant was the one at the museum. It's on the same floor as my office, and I use it frequently. In the evening all the tables have candles. It never occurred to me to blow it out, but then I'd have been sitting in the dark.

"If your informant had seen me a week earlier, he'd have seen me having dinner in the candlelight with my head conservator, who's about the same age as the geologist. However, he's black and has dreadlocks, so I suppose that would have caused quite a stir with your informant. A month ago, I had lunch with one of the docent interns. He's nineteen. One of the chil dren in his party hid in the museum and he couldn't find him for an hour. It upset him greatly, and I had to calm him down. We ate lunch on the terrace, so that could have been construed as romantic. About once every two weeks I have lunch or dinner with my archaeologist, and we often play chess together. Of course, he is much older than me and I suppose the reversal of ages doesn't impugn my character, so my a.s.sociation with him doesn't count.

"Douglas, I have had dinner or lunch with over half the people I work with. I'm head of the museum, and it is not a nine-to-five job for anyone. We often work over dinner. I will not stop interacting with my employees because it offends some busybody's sense of propriety. If it comes up in court, I will handle it."

Diane had managed to keep her voice calm and even during her whole diatribe. When she finished, Garnett sat for a long moment without speaking.

"I think I was probably misinformed," he said.

"Is that the only reason you wanted to see me?"

"We're under a lot of pressure to make our crime lab work. I was just doing a little troubleshooting be fore anything got out of hand."

"Our crime lab is functioning superbly. I think what is out of hand is gossipmongers and pa.s.sive-aggressive bullies. I think you had better turn your attention to your stationhouse staff, who all appear to be preoccu pied with pettiness and character a.s.sa.s.sination, and ask yourself why they are failing in their surveillance duties." Diane paused a moment. "If you can't tell, this makes me very angry."

"I can see."

"No...I mean it makes me really really angry." angry."

"I don't doubt you."

"The caller-on one of his calls when I was pushing for justifiable reasons for murder-he talked about gossip and bullying."

"What are you getting at?"

"He used those as examples. It must have been for a reason. What might a gossip do to someone who's on the edge? Whoever is calling me-if he's the killer, his motive was not the motive of a serial killer. I think it was more specific and focused. He wanted to get even. He seems obsessed with personal justice. If that's true, he probably knew the victim or victims- provided he really is the killer."

"So you're saying, if he killed the victims in Cob ber's Wood, it had to do with revenge?"

"I suppose that's what I'm saying. Look, Frank is expecting me to come to his house for dinner with him and his daughter. I'd like to not be late. I've put in very long hours, and I'd like to take this evening off."

"Of course. I'm sorry for holding you up. And . . . I'm sorry for the other thing."

"Douglas, I think I know who's spreading this rumor. If it's who I think it is, he's a good friend of Frank. And since this person met me last year and heard those first unfounded rumors about me, he hasn't wanted to let go of the notion that I'm not good enough for Frank. If you talk to him, advise him of how appropriate it is to mind his own business. Pettiness has no place in what we're trying to do here.

"And speaking of what we're trying to do here, I got another E-mail from our friend. He wants to meet."

Garnett raised his eyebrows. "He wants to meet with you? How do you feel about that?"

"I'm thinking it might be a good idea, under the right controls."

"Let me think about it."

"It may be the only way we're going to catch this guy. Has Sheriff Braden made any headway?"

"We've sent the pictures out and searched missing persons. No hits. Of course, it's still early on getting anything back on the drawings. We're searching for similar murders across the country. Both Braden's men and mine have been asking around at truck stops for anyone suspicious, or anyone who may have talked about the murders, or anyone who has picked up hitchhikers that look like the drawings. We have a photograph of a waggoner's knot we've shown around at the stops. Found several guys who know what it is and use it, but so far no leads on our guy. We've tried to get a list of end buyers for that particular type of orange carpet, and that information, apparently, is simply not available."

"Strange. We have all that forensic evidence stack ing up in my lab and absolutely no one to attach it to."

"It's frustrating, for sure. In the Chris Edwards and the Raymond Waller murders, neighborhoods. We've talked we've canva.s.sed the with everyone they knew and worked with, including their families. We're doing the same with Kacie Beck. My gut still tells me it's Steven Mayberry for the Edwards and Beck murders. With what you told me about your talk with the journalism student-what was her name, Madi son something?"

"Madison Foster."

"That's it. I'm convinced wards were into something. Kacie Beck to protect himself. He might feel that everyone thinks he's dead and he likes it that way. For Raymond Waller, it was someone after his collec tion. He didn't know any of the other victims. It was just a coincidence that he was Dr. Webber's a.s.sistant and worked on the hanging victims."

Everything Garnett said seemed plausible, and she was actually impressed with what he and the sheriff were doing.

"Then maybe what I should do is take the guy up on his offer to meet. I think maybe he wants to turn that Mayberry and Ed Maybe Mayberry killed himself in and he just needs a push, and he's using me to push him into it."

"It will be very dangerous. You'd have to insist on meeting him on your terms, not his."

"I know. If he wants to come out in the open . . ."

"You really think he wants to get caught?"

"I don't know. It's possible, but ask the profiler."

Garnett looked at his watch. "I'll go to Kingsley's hotel tonight and have a talk with him. Have you re sponded to the guy yet?"

"No. I was waiting to talk with you first."

"I'm going to have to really think about this. Let's talk tomorrow."

Diane left the station house wondering what their faces would look like the next time she had to visit. It would be nice to have succeeded in wiping the smirks off them. One thing she was convinced of-she couldn't expect their help if she was in trouble.

Chapter 35.

Star met Diane at the door and hugged her. Her hair was all one color-black-and was short. She had a ring in one nostril.

"Uncle Frank's heating up dinner. He brought home Chinese, which means we'll have Chinese left overs for the rest of the week."

"Probably."

Frank's house was an old Queen Anne set off the road. It had polished hardwood floors, walls painted a light sand color, and oak and walnut furniture as substantial as the house. It always smelled like furni ture polish and always shined. It was a comfortable house, a house much like Frank-traditional, reli able, solid.

"So, I hear you have a mummy. Can I see it?"

"Yes, we have a mummy and, yes, you can see it if you would like."

"Cool."

"Hey." Frank came in and gave her a peck on her lips. "How you doing?"

"I'm glad to be having a break."

"You look tired."

"I've had a string of long days."

"Sit down, relax. I'll get you a drink of wine." "Can I have one?" Star was being mischievous. "No," said Frank.

Star laughed.

Diane kicked off her shoes and curled her feet under her on the stuffed sofa. Star lay sideways across an overstuffed armchair.

"You can stay here some time," Star said. "You and Uncle Frank don't have to just get together when I'm out of the house."

"We're together now."

"You know what I mean."