The Love Potion Murders in the Museum of Man_ A Norman De Ratour Mystery - Alfred Alcorn [0]
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
First published in serial by Salon.com in 2001.
For information about permission to reproduce selections from this book, write to:
Steerforth Press L.L.C., 45 Lyme Road, Suite 208,
Hanover, New Hampshire 03755
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Alcorn, Alfred.
The love potion murders in the Museum of Man : a Norman de Ratour mystery / Alfred Alcorn. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-1-58195-237-7
1. Aphrodisiacs — Fiction. I. Title.
PS3551.L29L68 2009
813′.54 — dc22
2008044688
This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
1
It is with reluctance and foreboding that I trouble these pages with an account of a tragic, unseemly, and suspicious incident here at the Museum of Man. I say “reluctance” as I do not wish to serve as amanuensis to a nightmare. Nor do I wish to prompt iniquity with words. I would rather, on this lovely evening, sit back and gaze out of my high windows at the Hays Mountains, where I can see the first flares of autumn touching with scarlet and gold those rolling, mist-tendriled hills. But write I must. Because yet again I have a presentiment of evil uncoiling itself within the womb of this ancient institution.
Let me start with this morning. Just as Doreen was heading down to the cafeteria for our coffees, Lieutenant Tracy of the Seaboard Police Department appeared in the doorway of my fifth-floor domain. Dapper as ever in charcoal suit, buttondown off-white oxford shirt, and plaid tie, the officer reminded me that he took his coffee black. The amenities of small talk attended to, the door closed, we got down to business.
“I’m here to see you, Norman, about the Ossmann-Woodley case.” His tone indicated that he spoke off the record.
“Ossmann-Woodley,” I repeated with a sigh, not entirely surprised. “I was under the impression, Lieutenant, that the case was too riddled with imponderables to begin an investigation. It’s most unusual, I know, and not a little embarrassing for the museum, given Professor Ossmann’s affiliation.”
Thanks to the tabloids and those television programs devoted to the tawdry and the sensational (for which my dear wife, Elsbeth, has a decided weakness), much of the world knows that, just a week ago, Professor Humberto Ossmann and Dr. Clematis Woodley, a postdoctoral student, were found dead quite literally in each other’s arms; indeed, in an unequivocally amorous embrace.
Foul play, other than double adultery — they were both married — has not been ruled out. In short, we have two corpses and enough circumstantial evidence to indicate corpus delicti. For instance, a security guard found them, not in some comfortable bed or even on the couch available in a nearby office, but on the floor of one the laboratories. There, judging from the disorder — an overturned chair, some smashed pipettes, and a terrified white rat running loose — their lovemaking had been spontaneous and energetic, if not violent. Rape does not appear to have been involved inasmuch as Professor Ossmann was a smallish man, a good two inches shorter and twenty-five pounds lighter than the formidable Dr. Woodley, who played rugby for Rutgers, albeit on the women’s team. Moreover, neither participant had disrobed in a manner suggesting premeditated lovemaking. Professor