The Counterfeit Murder in the Museum of Man_ A Norman De Ratour Mystery - Alfred Alcorn [1]
Though loath to leave the vehicle and its very still occupant unattended, I turned to go up to my office to call the police. Were I more of my time, I would have been carrying one of those pocket phones people are incessantly talking into in the most noisome way. But I have never been much of a “phone person,” preferring in solitary moments to converse with myself rather than with others, that is, to think.
My office occupies a corner on the fifth floor of the magnificent old pile dating from the nineteenth century that houses the museum. As I walked toward its gentle, redbrick conflation of Gothic and Romanesque styles, I felt that once again it had become haunted by evil. Once again, somehow, somewhere, a murderer lurked among the ancient galleries and oaken cabinets full of priceless objects. Or in among the state-of-the-art, highly digitized premises of the Genetics Lab, which is part of the museum and the crucible of so much mischief.
I took the rattling elevator up to my office, put through a call to Lieutenant Tracy’s private number, and left a message. I was scarcely back downstairs and heading across the deserted parking lot, it being relatively early on a Sunday morning, when the first cruiser came careering off Belmont Avenue like a blue flashing banshee and headed straight for the death car.
As I approached on foot, I was appalled to see the two uniformed officers charging around the vehicle in a way that would have compromised any clues left in the surrounding gravel. One of them, a brash-faced young man with a waxed crew cut, looked up as I drew near and said, “This is a crime scene. You can’t hang around here.”
I stopped well short of the car and replied, “I’m the one who called it in. And if I do say so, I think you should both stand back and wait until Lieutenant Tracy and the crime scene unit arrive.”
They both huffed and puffed at me for a moment, but they knew I was right and withdrew rather gingerly to stand at a distance. One of them, rather portentously, told me I should wait as well, to give a statement if nothing else. I replied that it was exactly what I intended to do.
More sirens sounded presently, and it wasn’t long before an unmarked sedan with one of those stick-on roof flashers pulled up and Lieutenant Tracy got out and came over to me. We shook hands and exchanged pleasantries. It was the first time I had ever seen him in casual clothes — chinos, sneakers, and a wind-breaker over a turtleneck jersey. He then approached the Jaguar, but carefully, and peered inside. He conferred briefly with the two officers before returning to me.
Decker sniffed and wanted to lick him, but I kept the leash tight.
“Anyone you recognize, Norman?” he asked.
“The real estate developer Heinrich von Grümh,” I said. “He’s also one of our honorary curators.”
The lieutenant looked at me and shook his head. “What is it about this place, anyway?”
His reference to a series of bizarre and unsavory murders at the museum gave me an inner wince. I managed a shrug. “It’s the last thing we needed.”
When the crime scene crew pulled up with their new van and began unloading technical gear, Lieutenant Tracy accompanied me into the museum. It being a Sunday, there were plenty of visitors in the galleries, but backstage it was deserted as we took the elevator. When we got to my office, the police officer, an old friend by now, took a moment to gaze westward toward the Hays Mountains and then to the north, to Shag Bay and the breeze-brittled water dotted with the taut sails of pleasure craft.
“A beautiful day,” he said, sounding a rueful note as we got down to business.
He sat in front of the desk, and I pulled open the drawer where I keep files on all our curators, actual