Body Farm: Bones Of Betrayal Part 18

"Bush-league's a little harsh," he said. "Clarkson had already done some other History Channel shows. Things about World War II aircraft carriers and fighter planes and bombers. Not bad. Some glitzy stuff for A&E, too. But as I was saying-"

"Before you were so rudely interrupted?"

"Before I was so rudely interrupted," he echoed. "The afternoon of January tenth, he sends the fax and asks for illegal seconds on the cookies. And then n.o.body at the Doubletree ever sees him again."

"They thought he'd skipped out?"

"They just thought he was weird, or reclusive. He'd said he'd be staying for several weeks. They had his credit card on file, and the DO NOT DISTURB sign was hanging on the door. They were leaving him alone."

"January tenth," I said. "That was right before East Tennessee turned into Antarctica, if I remember right."

"It was," he said. "It was also one day after Leonard Novak checked out those library books about the Venona Project."

EMERT HEADED TO THE DOUBLETREE, to lead the search of Willard Clarkson's room. I headed down the hill once more, to the library. I was hoping that perhaps Isabella was back by now, her father's health improving, but the subst.i.tute at the Reference Desk dashed my hopes. She dashed my fallback hope as well: no, she didn't have any further details about how he was doing, or where I might send a get-well card, or when Isabella might be back. I tried to mask the frustration and embarra.s.sment I felt; I must look like either a stalker or a fool, I realized, to be pursuing a woman who didn't consider me worth turning to in a crisis.

"I was hoping to do a bit of history research today," I said. It wasn't true-it was a flimsy excuse for my presence here-but she unlocked the Oak Ridge Room for me, and I found it soothing, somehow, to be there. I looked through the notebook of photos from ORNL, and saw the Graphite Reactor take shape on a hillside, against the backdrop of a wooded ridge. I saw the immense U-shaped structure of the K-25 plant, which separated a gaseous form of uranium. The K-25 plant was the last to be completed but the largest in capacity, like some lumbering uranium freight train finally gathering momentum. I saw the oval racetracks of Y-12, their D-shaped calutrons linked by thousands of tons of silver borrowed from the U.S. Treasury. And I saw Beatrice, perched on her stool, one hand forever poised on the controls, altering the trajectory of uranium atoms and human history.

Looking through a binder labeled "Life in Oak Ridge," I saw men and women lined up for cigarettes, boys and girls decked out in Cub Scout and Brownie uniforms, football players in helmets and pads, baseball teams in caps. I saw two pretty young women-one white, one black-looking at a book together, the black woman pointing a finger at the page as the white woman read aloud. The white woman's eyes looked gla.s.sy.

I saw musicians playing and couples dancing. And among the dancing couples, I spotted Beatrice yet again. She was a photogenic young woman; if I were a photographer in wartime Oak Ridge, I'd have taken her picture every chance I got, too. In this photo, she was dancing with a handsome, smiling young man-a man who was not Leonard Novak. I checked the date on the photo: August 1, 1945. The Trinity test had shaken New Mexico two weeks before; in five more days, the city of Hiros.h.i.+ma would be decimated, and in eight days Nagasaki would share its fate. And at some point in the days or weeks after the photo was taken, the smiling young man would be shot at point-blank range and buried in a shallow grave, along with hundreds of pages of typescript. Were the pages a ma.n.u.script for posterity, or secrets for the Soviets? Or were they both?

I dialed Emert's number and the call rolled immediately to his voice mail. "I'm at the library," I said, "and I'm looking at a picture of Beatrice dancing with Jonah Jamison on August 1, 1945."

When I ended the call, my phone beeped to tell me I'd received a voice mail. While I'd been leaving the message for Emert, the detective had been leaving one for me. "Maybe our dead doc.u.mentary guy was after a big fish after all," his message said. "We're in his hotel room, and he's got a fat file of transcripts from the Venona Project."

As soon as I hung up, my phone rang. It was Emert again, live and in person this time. "Clarkson made some interesting notes in the margins of these Venona cables," Emert said. On July 22, 1945, someone whose code name was "Chekhov" had traveled from Oak Ridge to Hanford; the cable added that "Pavlov" had found the way to "Chekhov" and would soon submit a detailed account of the project. Clarkson had highlighted "Chekhov" and written "Novak?" in the margin. He'd also highlighted "Pavlov" and scrawled a pair of question marks.

"I think we should go see your friend Beatrice together," he said, "and ask her some more questions about her husband and her boyfriend."

CHAPTER 38.

BEATRICE STUDIED THE COPY OF THE PHOTOGRAPH I'D duplicated at the library. She looked from my face to Emert's and back again.

"Jonah was a handsome man, wasn't he? Yes," she said, "I had an affair with him." She turned to me. "That's why I had to have the abortion. How could I have a baby whose father had shot himself because of me?"

The casual way she said it stunned me, but Emert just shook his head. "I don't believe you," he said. "Why would he shoot himself over you? Why didn't you call the MPs when it happened? How'd you get the body way the h.e.l.l out by that uranium bunker?" The man did like to fire off multiple questions.

Now it was Beatrice shaking her head. "Don't you see, if I'd reported it, the scandal would have ruined Leonard's career, and that would have destroyed Leonard. Leonard buried the body. To protect us both."

I felt ten steps behind, struggling to catch up. "But Leonard was deeply conflicted about working on the atomic bomb anyhow," I said. "It might have been a relief to be forced off the project."

"No, you're wrong," she said. "Leonard's moral pangs about the bomb were his own private pain. Public humiliation would have been intolerable to a sensitive man like Leonard."

"So let me see if I understand this," said Emert. "You're saying he was too sensitive to face embarra.s.sment, but not too sensitive to bury a body in the woods?"

"Absolutely," she said. "Leonard was used to keeping secrets, and he was used to self-recrimination. He had a streak of martyrdom in him-but he wanted to be the one to nail himself to the cross, rather than be nailed there by anyone else. There was an edge of arrogance on his finely honed sense of guilt."

Something was nagging at me. Something written in four words on a small piece of paper. "Beatrice, did you talk to Novak after you heard from the man making the doc.u.mentary about atomic secrets?" She looked startled.

"I...I don't think so," she said. "I really can't remember."

"The phone company's computer can tell us if you two talked by telephone recently," said Emert.

"I might have," she said. "Wait, yes, I did. Briefly. Leonard called and asked if I had said anything to that dreadful television man about...anything. I told him no. I told him not to worry-that the man was just a TV muckraker. But Leonard was very upset. He said the man had all but accused him of giving the Russians information about the bomb during World War II."

Emert leaned forward. "And did Leonard give the Russians information about the bomb?"

"Leonard? Heavens no," she said. "But it wouldn't surprise me if Jonah did. I wasn't his only girlfriend, you know. He spent far too much money on women and whiskey. I don't see how he could afford his vices on a corporal's salary."

Emert stared at her stonily. "Lady, I think you're lying to me. I want you to come down to the police station tomorrow afternoon and give me a statement. I'll be asking you to take a poly-graph test, too, unless you're afraid it will incriminate you."

What she did next startled both Emert and me. Beatrice laughed. "Afraid? Detective, I believe every word I've said. Why on earth would I be afraid of a lie detector." Suddenly her head nodded forward, then jerked upright again. "Oh my, this has all been quite exhausting," she said. Her voice quavered a bit. "Would you gentlemen mind if an old woman goes to bed now? It sounds like I have a grueling afternoon in store for me tomorrow."

Emert scowled, but he rose from the chair, so I stood up as well. "One o'clock," he said. "Bring an attorney if you need one."

"What I need is a time machine, detective," she said, struggling to her feet and shuffling to the door with us.

CHAPTER 39.

THE PHONE RANG A DOZEN TIMES OR MORE BEFORE she answered. "h.e.l.lo?" She sounded old and tired. Not quavery, like last night; I was pretty sure the quaver had been for effect, to hurry Emert and me on our way. This sounded like the real deal. It was the same exhausted, defeated tone I'd heard an hour before in Eddie Garcia's voice, when he'd told me that the national registry contained no matching bone-marrow donor, and that Carmen's mother was coming up from Bogot to help take care of the baby for a while.

"Beatrice, it's Bill Brockton," I said. "I'm sorry to call so early. I'm wondering if I could come see you this morning?"

"You and that hateful policeman?"

"No," I said, "just me. I'm hoping you can tell me another story."

"I see," she said. "You're keeping me around for the entertainment value. Like that Persian king What's-his-name."

"Which king?"

"King What's-his-name. I don't remember his name. n.o.body remembers his name. It's the storyteller we remember. Scheherazade."

"Oh right," I said. "The Thousand and One Nights. She kept herself from becoming a one-night stand by spinning stories that never ended."

"It wasn't just that they never ended," she said. "They wove together to make a tapestry, stories threaded within other stories. Like life, Bill, but without the boring parts. She was the queen of the cliffhanger, Scheherazade. Every dawn, just as he was about to lop her head off, she'd leave him in suspense."

"I'm feeling some pretty strong suspense about something myself," I said.

She was silent. "I could probably dredge up another chapter," she finally said. "How soon should I expect you?"

"I could be there in thirty minutes, but I'll wait a while, if you'd rather."

"No need to wait. Tempus fugit, Bill. Sic transit gloria mundi."

"What?"

"Time flies; so pa.s.ses the glory of this world. I'll have the door open and my vodka in hand."

"Beatrice, it's only nine A.M."

"It's five P.M. somewhere. It's a big world, Bill. Don't draw your boundaries small."

THIS EARLY IN THE DAY, the walkway to her front door was deeply shadowed by the roof overhang and the evergreens. Through the windows, though, the redwood paneling glowed warmly in morning sun that streamed through windows. I rang the bell, mostly to hear the high, clear tone that pealed forth when I tugged the clapper. Then I let myself in as usual, calling out, "Beatrice? It's Bill."

She didn't answer, so I headed for the living room. She was sitting in her wingback chair, and as I entered the room, she raised a tumbler of vodka to me in a toast.

She waved me toward my chair, and I sat down and began to rock. A steaming cup of tea sat on the end table; I took the mug and cradled it in my hands, glad of its warmth, for I felt cold inside.

She studied me through watery eyes. "What sort of story would you like to hear today?"

"I'd like to hear a true one," I said, meeting her gaze. "A true one about the death of Jonah Jamison."

"How do you mean?"

"I realized something today," I said. "Or heard something. It was as if Jonah's bones whispered a secret to me; as if he, too, had a story to tell."

"And what was the story? What did he whisper?"

"He whispered that he didn't shoot himself."

She leaned forward and c.o.c.ked her head slightly-probably the very same posture she'd seen me a.s.sume for hours over the past two weeks. Then she frowned and shook her head. "Back up," she commanded. "You've jumped straight to the ending. Begin at the beginning."

I was confused. "Which beginning?"

"The beginning of the story Jonah's bones told you. 'It was a dark and stormy night in the anthropology lab...' or whatever. Set the scene; let it unfold. Have I taught you nothing?"

"Ah," I said. "Now who's being kept around just for the entertainment value? I'm not as good a storyteller as you."

"No one's as good as I am." She smiled. "But you have to keep trying. It's the only way to get any better."

I thought for a moment, then drew a breath and began again. "The neighbor's dog woke me up before dawn today," I said. "Not because he was barking loudly-it was only one little yip-but because I was half awake already. Sleeping badly. Fretting about something. I didn't even know what it was, but I knew where it was. It was on my desk under the stadium. Down in that labyrinth whose windows look like they haven't been washed since the Manhattan Project."

She gave me a nod of approval. "Much better," she said. "Go on."

"Whenever I think I'm overlooking something in a case, what I do is put the bones on my desk where I can see them. Every now and then I'll stop whatever I'm doing-grading papers or reading a journal article or eating a sandwich-and look at the bones. I try to keep my mind as empty as I can make it, and just look, hoping something new will catch me by surprise. Present itself to me. Speak to me. It's like I'm trying to sneak up on something I already know, somewhere deep down, but can't quite get ahold of."

"That's a good skill to cultivate," she said. "You'll need it more and more as you get older and start to lose track of things-names and faces and where you left your reading gla.s.ses and why you walked into the living room."

I had the feeling she was trying to stretch my story out, and I couldn't blame her. "I've been looking at Jonah Jamison's skull that way for a week now," I resumed, "but it hasn't been working. Nothing new. Today, having dragged myself to work at six A.M., I found myself getting mad whenever I glanced at that d.a.m.n skull. Almost as if he were being deliberately uncooperative. Too watchful for me to sneak up on, or something."

"Well, he died during wartime in a top secret city," she said. "You can't really blame him for being vigilant, can you?"

"But I did," I said. "I finally got so irritated I picked up the skull and put it in the box and closed the lid."

"I guess you showed him," she said.

"And that's when I saw it," I said.

"Saw what?"

"His left arm."

"His left arm? What about it?"

"It was strong."

She frowned, studying on this. "He was young. He was a soldier. Of course he was strong."

"What I mean," I said, "is that his left arm was stronger than his right arm."

"But how can you possibly know which arm was stronger? The muscle was long gone, wasn't it?"

"Yes. But the muscle left its story behind on the bone." She looked puzzled, so I tapped on the surface of the small pine table between us. "You see these two knots in this wood?" She nodded. "Two branches grew out of the tree trunk in those places, right?" She nodded. "Which of those two branches was bigger and stronger?" She tapped the knot closer to her, which was as big as the face on my watch-twice the diameter of the other knot. "The places where muscles fasten to bones are called muscle attachments; not a very imaginative name, but it's easy for students to remember." I flexed my left arm and made my bicep as big as I could, which wasn't all that big. Then I pressed the tip of my right index finger against the inside of my elbow and wiggled the finger. "The tendon from the bicep muscle attaches to the bones of the forearm right here, so that when you tighten your bicep, it pulls your forearm up." She set her gla.s.s down and copied what I was doing.

"Feels like twigs and thread," she said. "n.o.body would ever mistake this for a strong arm."

"Well, maybe not," I conceded. "But you're right-handed, so the twigs and thread are a little thicker and stronger in your right arm than in your left. So the muscle attachments in your right arm are a little st.u.r.dier than in your left. Now, UT football players-or Arnold Schwarzennegger, or anybody else with really big biceps-will have big, st.u.r.dy muscle attachment points, like k.n.o.bs or ridges, where the bone is reinforced to carry the load."

"So just like a nation or a generation," she said, "bone is tested and strengthened if you challenge it."

"Exactly," I said. "And what I realized today is that Jonah Jamison consistently-day in, day out, thirty years-challenged his left arm more than his right. That tells he was left-handed. So does the wrist.w.a.tch, which he wore on his right wrist. His handedness: that's how I can tell he was murdered."

She dropped both hands in her lap and looked down at them. "Handedness," she said. "What a small detail for a story to turn on."

"Yes," I said. "Crucial, but small. So small a man wouldn't give it an instant's thought if he were about to blow his brains out. He'd be preoccupied with bigger things-wondering how it came to this, wondering if he'll feel the bullet, wondering if he really has enough courage or enough despair to pull the trigger. It would never occur to him to wonder which hand to hold the gun in. He'd automatically, instinctively pick it up in his preferred hand. If he were Jonah Jamison, he'd pick it up with his left hand and press it to his left temple. Not his right temple."

"Yes, that has the ring of truth to it," she said.

"So the story I'm asking for," I said, "is the story of Jonah Jamison's murder. And don't circle back and claim that Novak shot him, because Jonah was already listed as AWOL by the time Novak got back from Hanford."

She sat perfectly still for a long time. The only sound in the room was the hollow ticking of a wall clock. The slow, steady ticking of background time. "All right," she finally said. "One last story."