Lovely in Her Bones by Sharyn McCrumb

Author:Sharyn McCrumb
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780307761224
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2010-10-05T22:00:00+00:00

Pilot decided that at this point Duncan Johnson would interview someone besides the girlfriend. That way he could have a little hearsay to contribute to the conversation. People often said more when they had something to refute. He could have chosen any of the others to question next; the fact that he picked Victor was sheer spite. The sight of him snoring like a hog through a murder investigation made Pilot Barnes long to kick him; he settled for a rude awakening and some less-than-polite questioning.

“I don’t know who killed him,” Victor sulked. “He wasn’t a very nice man.”

“Wasn’t he?” asked Pilot genially.

Victor, detecting a sympathetic listener, told his version of the Peking man incident. In revised form, Victor was now convinced that he had made a slip of the tongue in a technical matter, and that Lerche had chosen to misinterpret his mistake, and to publicly humiliate him for it.

The deputy was puzzled. “What does it matter which pile of bones you saw in the museum?” he asked.

Victor smiled bitterly. “I assure you that anthropologists are perfectly capable of pitching fits over matters even more trivial than that.”

“Well, did he put anybody else’s back up thataway?”

“Not that I recall,” said Victor, implying that he had a mind above such things.

“There’s always his personal life to consider,” said Pilot carefully. “That business about his graduate student.”

“Wasn’t it awful?” Victor nodded. “I wasn’t here when The Wife showed up, but I imagine that it was quite a scene. Elizabeth and Jake seemed most uncomfortable.”

“Oh, you were out?”

“Yes. After that dreadful incident with Dr. Lerche, I had the most piercing migraine. The very air seemed to oppress me. Naturally, I went outside for a while in an attempt to lessen the agony. It’s merciful I wasn’t present for that scene between Mrs. Lerche and Mary Clare, because it would have been very bad for my nerves.”

“How do you know there was a scene between them if you weren’t around?” asked Pilot.

“When I came back in—”

“What time was that?”

Victor looked pained. “One doesn’t clock-watch on a dig. Nine-thirty or so, I expect. Well past dark. Anyway, when I came in, there was a strained atmosphere, as if everyone had just been at each other’s throats.”

“What were you doing wandering around in the dark till nine-thirty?” Pilot made the question an expression of friendly interest rather than an accusation.

“It’s obvious that you’ve never had a migraine,” said Victor with dark satisfaction. “Light hurts one’s eyes. I was just walking about in the dark waiting for the pounding to subside. Of course, I would have been better off lying down, but they were not going to turn off the lights in the common room. No one has any concern for my feelings.”

“Did you happen to go up to the cemetery?”

Victor hesitated. “Well … perhaps in that direction,” he admitted. “But I didn’t see anything.”

“How close did you get?”

“I may have just glimpsed the tent light shining through the trees. I didn’t see any movement.”

“Was that when you just started out or just before you came back in?”

“Somewhere in the middle, I guess.

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