Before Sunrise
She went out, closing the door behind her. Phoebe’s one assistant on staff, Harriett White, was taking the classes through the exhibits. Harriett was widowed, and in her fifties. She’d once been a professor of history at Duke University, but she didn’t want to go back to a full-time job. She’d applied at the museum without any real expectation of acceptance, and Phoebe had phoned her the minute she read the application. At first, she couldn’t understand why someone with Harriett’s credentials would be applying for an assistant’s job, but she learned that Harriett wanted a less demanding position that enabled her to continue in the field she loved. The woman turned out to be a hard worker and much appreciated.
PHOEBE HESITATED for a minute before she opened her middle drawer and took out a small prayer wheel dangling a feather—not an eagle feather, or she’d have been in trouble. It was an odd little gift. Cortez had mailed it to her the week after her graduation. It was one of only two letters she ever had from him. It contained this prayer wheel, wrapped in rawhide, with the feather attached and a blade of sweetgrass woven into the center. Cortez had said that his father wanted her to have it, and to keep it close. She wasn’t superstitious, but it was something of his family…and precious. She was never far away from it.
Next to it was another letter, very thin, with her name and address scrawled in the same hand that had addressed the letter with the prayer wheel. She touched it as if it were a poisonous snake, even after three years. Gritting her teeth, she made herself take out the small newspaper clipping it contained—nothing else had been in the envelope—and look at it. It reminded her not to get sentimental about Cortez.
She read nothing except the small headline—Jeremiah Cortez Weds Mary Baker. There was no photo of the happy couple, just their names and the date of the wedding. Phoebe never forgot that. It was three weeks to the day from her graduation from college.
She tucked the clipping back into the envelope, pushing back the anguish of the day she’d received it. She kept it beside the prayer wheel always, to remind her not to get too nostalgic about her brief romance. It kept her single. She never wanted to take a chance like that again. She’d thrown her heart away, for nothing. She would never understand why Cortez had given her hope of a shared future and then sent her nothing more than a cold clipping about his marriage. No note, no apology, no explanation. Nothing.
She would have written to him, if for no other reason than to ask why he hadn’t told her he was engaged. But there was no return address on the second letter. Worse, the letter she’d written to him at the first letter’s address was returned to her, unopened, as unforwardable. She was shattered. Utterly shattered. Her sunny, optimistic personality had gone into eclipse after that. Nobody who’d known her even three years ago would recognize her. She’d cut her hair, adopted a businesslike personality and dressed like a matron. She looked like the curator of a museum. Which was what she was. Sometimes she could go a whole day without even thinking about Jeremiah Cortez. Today wasn’t one of them.
She shoved the envelope to the back of the drawer and closed it firmly. She had a good job and a secure future. She kept a dog at home for protection in the small cabin where she lived. She didn’t date anyone. She had no social life, except when she was invited to various political functions to ask for funding for the small museum. Sadly, the politicians who came to the gatherings had little money to offer, despite the state of the economy. Probably it was that her small museum didn’t have enough political clout to offer in respect to the funding it needed. They got some through private donations, but most of their patrons weren’t wealthy. It was a hand-to-mouth existence.
Phoebe sat back, looking around the office which was as bare of personal effects as her little house. She didn’t collect things anymore. There was a mandala on the wall that one of the Bird Clan of the Cherokee people had made for her, and a blowgun that a sixth-grader’s father had made. She smiled, looking at it. People were always surprised when they were told that the Cherokee people had used blowguns in the past to hunt with. Usually they were more surprised to find that Cherokee people lived in houses and didn’t wear warbonnets and loincloths and paint, unless they were portraying the historical Trail of Tears in the annual pageant, “Unto These Hills,” on the not-too-distant Quallah Indian Reservation near Cherokee, North Carolina. People had some strange ideas about Native Americans.
THE PHONE RANG while Phoebe was trying to force herself to answer her e-mail. She picked it up absently. “Chenocetah Cherokee Museum,” she announced pleasantly.
“Is this Miss Keller?” a man’s voice asked.
“Yes,” she replied, ignoring her computer screen. The man sounded disturbed. “What can I do for you?”
There was a hesitation. “You can arrange to have a site dated by organic material, can’t you? Don’t you have a small foundation budget to help with that sort of thing?”
“Well, yes, although we can date by tree ring age…”
“I mean skeletal remains,” he added. “I have a skull…I have a whole skeleton, in fact. There’s a great deal of patination, and in situ in a cave with Paleo-Indian lithic specimens, Folsom point if I’m not mistaken…There are two effigy figures that would certainly date from the Hopewell period, very fine…The skull has an enlarged brain case and wide nasal cavities, the dentition is indicative of…well, the skull is possibly Neanderthal in origin.”
She actually gasped. She clutched the phone so hard that her knuckles went white. “Are you serious? We’ve never dated anything back further than ten to twelve thousand years, and that’s at a site in Tennessee, not North Carolina. There simply are no authenticated Neanderthal remains anywhere in North America…!”
“That’s right. But I…found some,” he said. “I think I…found some.”
She sat up straight. “Is this some sort of hoax?” she asked coldly. “Because if it is…”
“I know you’re wary—I don’t blame you.” He paused. “I’m a doctor of anthropology visiting the area. I know what I’m talking about. This is no hoax. But…they’re covering it up,” he added in a rushed whisper. “He said that if this gets out, they’ll kill him, they’ll kill me! They’ll do anything to keep the project going. If we tell, they’ll be shut down indefinitely while the site’s being excavated. Of course, it would mean national publicity as well, and it will bankrupt him!”
“Him, who?” she demanded. “Where’s the site? And who are you?”
“I can’t tell you…not yet. I’ll call you back when I can. They’re watching me…!” On the other end of the line, Phoebe heard a loud knock and the sound of a door opening. There was a woman’s strident voice in the background, but it was muffled. She guessed that he must have put his hand on the receiver. “Yes, I was just…speaking to my daughter! Yes, to my daughter. I’m coming!” he called to his visitor. Then he came back on the line. “I’ll speak to you later…goodbye,” he told Phoebe. There was a sudden noise and the phone slammed down.
She pressed star 69 on her phone to get the number that had called her, but it had been blocked at the source. She ground her teeth together and put down the phone. Maybe it was just a hoax, she thought. There had been several such “discoveries” over the years, including one in California that professed to show a set of human remains, which would predate the Cro-Magnon period—and those so-called Neanderthal findings were dated by one of the most famous anthropologists on earth. But the date was controversial and it was discounted by most authorities. There was a similar story from New Mexico which put forth the theory that a set of remains found in a cave were over thirty-five thousand years old, but they mysteriously vanished before they could be scientifically evaluated. Whether those cases were hoaxes or not could never be proved. The newest archaeological controversy revolved around Kennewick man, a California find, who was purported to be from the Paleo-Indian period, but who did not have predominantly Native American features. That controversy was still raging.
Perhaps this man who’d called her was just some crackpot with time to kill, Phoebe reasoned. But he’d sounded very sincere. And frightened. She chided her own gullibility. It was nothing at all and she was overreacting. She pulled up her computer screen and got back to her e-mail.
THE DOOR OPENED unexpectedly, and a tall, well-built man with a light olive complexion, short black hair and dark twinkling eyes stuck his head in. “Time to eat!” he said.
She looked up from her computer screen, smiling at the deputy sheriff. “Hi, Drake. Marie said you were bringing lunch. Thanks!”
“No sweat. I get hungry, too, Miss Keller, and sometimes I have to eat on the run,” he drawled, moving into the office with two box lunches. “Which is why mine is still in the car. I’m on my way to a call now. I brought these for you and Marie.” She punched a button on her phone. “Marie, Drake’s here with food!”
“I’ll be right there!” she called excitedly.
“At least somebody’s happy to see me, even if it’s just my cousin,” he said with mock disappointment. “You’re preoccupied.”
“I am,” she agreed, closing down the computer program. She looked up worriedly. “I just had a call a couple of hours ago. Maybe he was a crank, or a crackpot. But he sounded scared.”
Drake’s easy smile faded. He moved closer. “What was it about?”
“He said something about human skeletal remains that might date to the Neanderthal period being covered up by some contractor,” she said, boiling the conversation down to its basics. “He hung up abruptly. I tried to get his number, but he had it blocked.”
“Neanderthal remains. Uh-huh,” he said mockingly.
She smiled. She’d forgotten that he’d taken an Internet course on archaeology that had been offered through the museum.
“I suppose it was just a joke,” she added.
“Somebody hoping to graduate from high school. He’ll trip himself up, like that kid who wrote a bomb threat to his school on his father’s letterhead paper,” he added. She nodded. “Thanks for bringing the salads. It’s a long way to food from here,” she pointed out as she dug in her purse to pay him back.
“I can’t get you to come out with me,” he commented on a sigh. “It’s the next best thing to have lunch here,” he added. “I’ve got to go.”
Marie stuck her head in the door. “I’m starved! Thanks, Drake. You’re a sweetie, even if you are my cousin!”
He cocked an eyebrow at her. “At least somebody thinks so,” he said morosely, with a speaking glance at Phoebe.
“Oh, she’s off men,” Marie told him chattily.
He frowned. “Why?”
Phoebe shot Marie a warning glance. She held up both hands, looking sheepish, and changed the subject.
CHAPTER THREE
THE NEXT MORNING, Phoebe heard sirens racing past her small cabin just as she woke up. She hoped there hadn’t been some terrible accident. The mountain roads were narrow and some were dangerous in this part of the area. They’d had flatland tourists go over guardrails occasionally. The drop was inevitably fatal.
She dressed and grabbed a quick cup of coffee before she drove her old Ford to work. The museum parking lot was usually empty at that hour, except for her car and Marie’s. But a sheriff’s car was sitting at the entrance with the motor running.
Frowning, she got out of her vehicle, shuffling her purse and briefcase. At the same time, Drake got out of the patrol car. But he wasn’t smiling, and he looked uneasy.
“Hi,” she greeted him. “What’s up?”
He rested his hand on the butt of his service revolver in its holster as he approached her. “You said you talked to a man yesterday about some skeletal remains, right?”
“Right,” she said slowly.
“Did he give his name?”
“No.”
“Can you tell me anything about him?” he persisted somberly.
She hesitated, thinking back. “He said he was an anthropologist…”
“Damn!”
Her lips parted. She’d never seen easygoing Drake look so angry. “What’s happened?” she asked.
“They found a DB on the Rez,” he said quietly.
She blinked, trying to recall the terminology. “A dead body,” she translated, “on the reservation.”
He nodded curtly. “Just barely on it, about a hundred feet or so from the actual boundary. He appears to be of Cherokee descent, because we also found a tribal registration card, with the name and number missing, and we found part of a membership card from a professional anthropological society, which we assume was his—the part with his name was missing. So was his driver’s license.”
She gasped. “That man who called me…?”
“Looks like it could be. We can’t go on Cherokee land unless we’re asked. And this makes it a federal matter. But I have a cousin on the reservation police force, and he told me. It’s all real hush-hush. The FBI is sending a special agent out to investigate, someone from that new Indian Country Crime Unit they’re forming. I just wanted to warn you that they will want to talk to you.”
“What?”
“You were the last person who spoke to the victim,” he said. “They found your telephone number scribbled on a pad next to his phone at his motel and looked it up in the phone book. That’s when Cousin Richard called me—he knows I hang around the museum a lot.” He studied her worried expression. “Somebody killed the guy, in his motel outside Chenocetah, or on the deserted dirt road where he was lying. The road leads the back way onto some construction sites, near a mountain honeycombed with caves. A jogger found him lying on the side of the road early this morning with a bullet in the back of his head. She’s still being treated for shock at the local clinic,” he added.
Phoebe leaned against a pillar at the front of the museum, trying to catch her breath. She’d never imagined that she might end up involved in a murder investigation. It took a little getting-used-to.
“Maybe I should join her,” she said, and not completely facetiously.
“You’re not in any danger. At least…I don’t think you are,” he added slowly.
She lifted her face and met his eyes. “Excuse me?”
He frowned. “We don’t know who killed him, or why,” he said. “Unless that story of his was concocted. And even if it is, there are three new big construction projects underway in the area. If what he told you is true, there’s no way of knowing where he was looking when he found that site.”
“Who did he work for?” she asked.
“They don’t know yet. The investigation is still in its preliminary stages. There’s one other thing—you can’t tell Marie.”
“Why not?”
“She can’t keep her mouth shut,” he replied quietly. “There’s an investigation going on, and I’m telling you about it because I’m worried for your safety. I don’t want it told all over the county, though.”
She whistled softly. “Oh, boy.”
“Just in case, have you got a gun?”
She shook her head. “I shot a friend’s pistol once, but I was afraid of the noise and I never tried it again.”
He bit his lower lip and drew in a long breath. “You live out in the country. If I can get a target, will you let me come out and teach you how to shoot?”
She felt the world shake under her feet. Drake was happy-go-lucky on ordinary days. But he wasn’t kidding about this. He was genuinely worried about her. She swallowed hard.
“Yes,” she said after a minute. “I’d be glad to have you teach me, if you think it’s necessary.” She gave him a searching look. “Drake, you know something you aren’t telling me,” she murmured.
“A site like that, with an unknown set of possible Neanderthal remains…” he began slowly. “If it existed, it would make it impossible for any developer to build on it. We’re talking millions of dollars in time and materials and labor, wasted. Some people would do a lot to avoid that.”
“Okay,” she said, forcing a smile. “So I’ll learn to shoot.”
“I’ll talk to the FBI agent when he, or she, gets here,” he added, “and see what we can come up with by way of protection.”
But she knew how that would end. Government agencies, like local law enforcement, had the same budget problems that she did. Funding for around-the-clock protection wouldn’t be forthcoming, despite the need, and she certainly couldn’t fund it herself. All the same, the thought of taking a human life made her sick.
“You’re thinking you couldn’t shoot somebody,” he guessed, his dark eyes narrowing.
She nodded.
“I felt that way, before I went into the Army,” he told her. In fact, he’d just come out of it the year before, after a stint overseas. “I learned how to shoot by reflex. So can you. It might mean your life.”
She winced. “Life was so uncomplicated yesterday.”
“Tell me about it. I’m not directly involved in the investigation, but jurisdiction is going to depend on where the murder actually took place. Just because he was found on the Rez is no reason to assume he was killed there.”
“Would a killer really want the FBI involved?” she asked.
“No. But he might not have known he was involving federal jurisdiction. The local boundaries aren’t exactly marked in red paint,” he reminded her with a cool smile. “The dirt road where the body was found looked as if it was close to Chenocetah. But it wasn’t. The reservation boundary sign was lying facedown about a hundred yards from where the tire tracks stopped.”
She pursed her lips, thinking. “The killer didn’t see the reservation sign. Maybe it was at night…?”
He nodded, smiling. “Good thinking. Ever considered working on the side of truth and justice, fighting crime?”
She laughed. “Your department couldn’t afford me,” she pointed out.
“Hell, they can’t afford me, but that didn’t stop them hiring me, did it?” he asked, and grinned, showing perfect white teeth. “You take care of your museum, and I’ll do my best to take care of you,” he added.
She frowned.
He held up a hand. “In a nice, professional way,” he added. “I know you think I’m an overused man.”
She did gasp then. “Marie!” she raged aloud.
He laughed. “I’m not offended, but that’s why I said you shouldn’t share secrets with her.” He lifted both eyebrows. “Actually, it’s a little like peacocks.”
“It’s what?”
“A peacock makes a fantastic display to attract females. His feathers may be a little ragged, and the colors may be faded, but it’s the effect he’s going for. Sort of like me,” he added, smiling faintly. “I’m not Don Juan. But if I pretend I am,” he said, leaning toward her, “I might get lucky.”
She laughed with pure pleasure.
“Didn’t you see that movie with Johnny Depp, when he thought he was Don Juan?” he teased. “It worked for him. I thought, why the hell not? You never know until you try. But I had to lose the cape and the mask. The sheriff wanted to call in a psychiatrist.”
“Oh, Drake, you’re just hopeless,” she said, but in a softer tone than she’d ever used with him.
“That’s better,” he said, smiling. “You’ve been wearing winter robes. Time to look for spring blossoms, Miss Keller.”
“Sometimes you actually sound poetic,” she pointed out.
He shrugged. “I’m part Cherokee. Remember, we’re not just ‘the people,’ we’re, ‘principal people’ in our own tongue.”
Every tribe was “the people” in its own language, she recalled, except for the Cherokee, who called themselves “principal people.” They were an elegant, intelligent people who had their own written language long before other tribes.
“No argument?” he asked.
She held up a hand. “I never argue with the law.”
“Good thinking,” he stated, straightening so that his close-fitting uniform outlined his powerful body.
Before she could reply, the sound of a loud muffler caught their attention. Marie pulled into the parking lot in her old truck, which was pouring smoke from the tailpipe. She cut off the engine and it made a loud popping sound.
Diverted, Drake went to it at once, motioning for Marie to open the hood. He stood back to let the smoke dissipate, waving it with his hand. He peered in over the engine and fiddled with a valve.
He stood up, shaking his head, while Marie waited with a worried look on her face. “It’s carburetor backfire, Marie,” he told her. “If you don’t get it fixed, it could catch the truck on fire.”
“I’m not convinced that would cost less than replacing it,” Marie muttered. “Oh, I hate this thing!”
“It’s just old,” he told her, smiling. “Maybe a little…overused.”
Marie went scarlet. “I’ll go phone my brother at his garage right now!” She didn’t even look at Phoebe as she ran past her, fumbling with her key when she realized the door was still locked. Fortunately she didn’t think to ask why.
Drake and Phoebe were laughing softly.
“I won’t tell her a thing,” Phoebe promised.
“I’ll see what else I can find out. Maybe Saturday, for the lessons?” he added.
She nodded. “I get off at one.”
“I’ll arrange my schedule so I’m off that afternoon,” he promised. He glanced toward his squad car, where the radio was crackling. “Just a minute.”
He strode to the car and picked up the mike, giving his call sign. He listened, nodded and spoke into it again.
“I’ve got to go,” he said. “The FBI agent is on his way. They want us to assist,” he added with a grin. “I suppose my investigative abilities have impressed somebody at the federal level!”
She chuckled. “See you Saturday.”
He waved, jumped into the car and sped away.
“WHAT WAS GOING ON OUT THERE?” Marie asked curiously.
“Drake’s going to teach me to shoot a gun,” Phoebe said. “I’ve always wanted to learn.”
Marie was oddly subdued. She moved to the desk and looked across it worriedly. “I know you don’t want to trust me with any important news, after I blabbed to Cousin Drake about what you said. I’m really sorry,” she added.
“I’m not mad.”
Marie grimaced. “My brother says they found an anthropologist dead on the Rez this morning, and gossip is that he spoke to you yesterday. You’re in danger, aren’t you, and now you can’t tell me because you think I’ll tell everybody.”
Phoebe was shocked. “How did your brother know…?”
“Oh, we know everything,” she said. “It’s a small community. Somebody from one clan finds out and tells somebody from another clan, and it’s all over the mountains.”
“Worse than a telephone party line,” Phoebe said, still gasping.
“Really,” Marie agreed. “You could stay with me,” she added. “Your place is way out.”
“Drake’s going to teach me to shoot.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “You didn’t like him.”
“He grows on you.”
She smiled. “He’s my cousin. I think he’s terrific. He may strut a little, but he’s smart and brave. You could do a lot worse,” she added.
Phoebe glared. “He’s only giving me shooting lessons,” she said firmly. “I’m still not ready to get interested in a man, overused or not.”
Marie ignored that. “He’ll look out for you. So will my other cousins and my brother, if you need it,” she told her. “You’ve done a lot for us. We don’t forget favors, especially with family.”
“I don’t have a drop of Native American blood, Marie,” Phoebe said firmly.
Marie grinned. “You’re still family,” she mused, and turned away. “I’ll get to work.”
Phoebe watched her go absently, her mind still on the dead man. It was upsetting that someone she’d spoken to the day before had been murdered. What was also upsetting was the destruction of a potentially precious site. If there were Neanderthal remains at a construction site—although she seriously doubted it—it would rewrite the history not only of North Carolina, but of the continent. Certainly it would shut down the developer, no question. Was that a reason to kill a human being? Phoebe, who had no love of money past being able to pay her bills, couldn’t comprehend what some people might do for great wealth.