The Book of the Dead (20 page)

She found the bank of switches and brushed them on with a plump forefinger. Rows of old glass and bronze light fixtures blazed, casting a mellow incandescent glow over the partly refurbished hall. She paused for a moment in the doorway, fists parked on bulging hips, looking around to make sure all was in order. Then she began moving down the hall, her giant butt swaying as she hummed old disco tunes to herself, twirling a ring of keys in her hand. The jangling keys, clicking heels, and off-key voice echoed through the large chamber, creating a reassuring cocoon of noise that had seen her through thirty years of nighttime employment at the New York Museum of Natural History.

She reached the annex, smacked on the bank of lights there, then crossed the echoing space and swiped her card in the new security doors leading to the Tomb of Senef. The locks disengaged and the automatic doors opened with a humming sound, revealing the tomb beyond. She stopped, frowning. Normally, the tomb should be in blackness. But despite the hour, it was brilliantly lit.

Damn techies left the lights on.

She stood in the doorway, pausing. Then she tossed her head and sniffed disdainfully at her own uncertainty. Some of the guards who’d had family working here in the thirties had begun whispering about the tomb being cursed; how it had been boarded up for good reason; how it was a big mistake reopening it. But since when was an Egyptian tomb not cursed? And Mary Johnson prided herself on her brisk, matter-of-fact approach to her job.
Just tell me what to do and I’ll do it. No bullshit, no whining, no excuses.

Curse, hell.

With a cluck, she descended the broad stone stairs into the tomb, humming and singing, her voice echoing about the close space.

Stayin’ alive, stayin’ alive…

She walked across the well, her immense weight swinging the bridge, and passed into the chamber beyond. Here, the computer geeks had set up tables of equipment, and Johnson was careful not to trip on the cables snaking across the floor. She glanced disapprovingly at the greasy pizza boxes carelessly stacked on one table, at the Coke cans and candy bar wrappers lying about. Maintenance wouldn’t be through until seven. Well, it wasn’t her problem.

In her three decades at the museum, Mary Johnson had seen it all. She’d seen them come and go, she’d been through the museum murders and the subway murders, the disappearance of Dr. Frock, the killing of old Mr. Puck, and the attempted murder of Margo Green. It was the biggest museum in the world and it had proved to be a challenging place to work, in more ways than one. Still, the benefits were excellent and the leave was decent. Not to mention the prestige.

She moved on, passing into the Hall of the Chariots, stopping for a cursory visual check, and then stuck her head into the burial chamber. All seemed in order. She was on the verge of turning back when she caught the whiff of something sour. Her nose wrinkled instinctively as she searched for its source. There, on one of the nearby pillars, was a splatter of something wet and chunky.

She raised her radio. “M. Johnson calling Central. Do you read?”

“This is Central. Ten-four, Mary.”

“We need a cleanup crew down here in the Tomb of Senef. Burial chamber.”

“What’s the problem?”

“Vomit.”

“Christ. Not the night guards again?”

“Who knows? Maybe the techies, having themselves a big old time.”

“We’ll get maintenance on it.”

Johnson snapped the radio off and did a brisk turn around the perimeter of the burial chamber. In her experience, piles of vomit seldom dropped alone: better to find out the rest of the bad news right away. Despite her size, she was a very fast walker, and she had completed more than half the circuit when her left shoe skidded on the slick floor and her momentum carried her sideways and down, landing her hard on the polished stone.

“Crap!”

She sat there, shaken but unhurt. She’d slipped in a puddle of something dark and coppery-smelling, and she’d broken the fall with both hands. When she held her hands up, she immediately recognized the substance as blood.

“Lord almighty.”

She rose with care, looked around automatically for something to wipe her hands on, found nothing, and decided to go ahead and wipe them on her pants, since they were already ruined. She unhooked her radio.

“Johnson calling Central, do you read?”

“Roger that.”

“Got a pool of blood here, too.”

“What’s that you say?
Blood?
How much?”

“Enough.”

A silence. From the large pool of blood she’d slipped in, a dribbling trail of splatters led toward the huge, open granite sarcophagus that stood in the center of the room. The flank of the sarcophagus, engraved in hieroglyphics, had a prominent smear of gore along its side, as if something had been hoisted over and dropped inside.

Suddenly, the very last thing in the world Johnson wanted to do was look inside that sarcophagus. But something—perhaps her strong sense of duty—made her walk slowly forward. Her radio, held unheeded in one hand, squawked.

“Enough?” Central squawked again in a high voice. “What’s that supposed to mean,
enough?
”

She reached the lip of the sarcophagus and looked inside. A body lay on its back. The body was human—that much she knew—but beyond that, she could tell nothing. The face was gashed and scored beyond recognition. The breastbone was split and the ribs yanked open like a set of double doors. Where the lungs and other organs should be was nothing but a red cavity. But what would really stick with her, and haunt her nightmares for years to come, was the pair of electric-blue Bermuda shorts the victim wore.

“Mary?” came the squawking radio.

Johnson swallowed, unable to answer. Now she noticed a smaller trail of blood and gore, dribbling its way into one of the small rooms that branched off from the burial chamber. The mouth of the room was dark and she couldn’t see inside.

“
Mary?
Do you
read?
”

She slowly lifted the radio to her lips, swallowed again, found her voice. “I read you.”

“What’s going on?”

But Mary Johnson was slowly backing away from the sarcophagus, eyes on the little dark doorway in the far corner. No need to go in there. She’d seen enough. She continued backing up, then carefully turned her bulk around. And then, as she approached the exit to the burial chamber, something seemed to go wrong with her legs.

“Mary! We’re sending security down right away!
Mary!
”

Johnson took another step, wobbled, then felt herself sink to the ground, as if borne down by an irresistible force. She rolled into a sitting position, then toppled backward almost in slow motion, coming to rest against the door lintel.

That was how they found her, eight minutes later, wide awake and staring at the ceiling, tears rolling out of her eyes.

C
aptain of Homicide Laura Hayward arrived after most of the crime scene investigation work had already been completed. She preferred it that way. She had come up through the homicide ranks and knew the scene-of-crime investigators didn’t need a captain breathing down their necks to do good work.

At the entrance to the Egyptian gallery, where the crime scene perimeter had been erected, she passed through a knot of police and museum security personnel, talking in hushed, funereal voices. She spotted the museum’s security director, Jack Manetti, and nodded at him to accompany her. She stepped up to the tomb’s threshold, then paused, breathing in the close and dusty air, taking stock.

“Who was here last night, Mr. Manetti?” she asked.

“I have a list of all authorized employees and subcontractors. There are quite a few, but it seems all of them checked out of the museum through security except two technicians: the victim, and the one who’s still missing. Jay Lipper.”

Hayward nodded and began walking through the tomb, making a mental note of the progression of the rooms, stairs, passageways, building a three-dimensional image in her head. In a few minutes, she arrived at a large, pillared room. She quickly took it all in: the tables laden with computer equipment, the pizza boxes, the cables and wires running in all directions. Everything was festooned with evidence tags.

A sergeant came to greet her, a man older than her by a decade. She thought his name was Eddie Visconti. He looked competent, had a bright, clear eye, dressed neatly, deferential but only to a point. She knew it was tough for some of the rank and file to report to a woman younger than they were and twice as educated. Visconti looked as if he could handle it.

“You’re the first responding officer, Sergeant?”

“Yes, ma’am. Me and my partner.”

“All right. Let’s have a quick summary.”

“Two computer technicians worked late: Jay Lipper and Theodore DeMeo. They’d been working late every night this week—lot of pressure to open the exhibit by deadline.”

She turned to Manetti. “And when’s that?”

“Eight days from today.”

“Proceed.”

“DeMeo went out for pizza at around two, leaving Lipper behind. We checked with the pizzeria—”

“Don’t tell me how you know what you know, Sergeant. Stick to the reconstruction, please.”

“Yes, Captain. DeMeo returned with pizza and drinks. We don’t know if Lipper had already left or if he was attacked in the interim, but we do know they didn’t have time to consume the food.”

Hayward nodded.

“DeMeo put down the pizzas and drinks on that table and went into the burial chamber. It appears the killer was already there, and surprised him.” He walked toward the burial chamber, Hayward following.

“Weapon?” Hayward asked.

“Unknown at this point. Whatever it was, it wasn’t sharp. The cuts and lacerations are very ragged.”

They entered the burial chamber. Hayward took in the extravagant puddle of blood, the smear on the stone coffin, the trail of gore into a side room, the bright yellow tags everywhere like fallen autumn leaves. She glanced around, locating each fleck of blood in turn, noting the shape and size of the droplets.

“A splatter analysis indicates the killer came at the victim from the left side with weapon raised, and brought it down in a way that partially cut through the victim’s neck and severed the jugular vein. The victim fell but the perp continued to slash and cut, far more than necessary to kill. There were more than a hundred cuts to the victim’s neck, head, shoulders, abdomen, legs, and buttocks.”

“Any sign of a sexual motive?”

“No semen or other bodily fluids. Sex organs untouched, anal swab clean.”

“Keep going.”

“It appears the perp half chopped, half punched through the victim’s breastbone with the weapon. Then he pulled out some of the internal organs and carried them into the Canopic Room and dumped them into a couple of very large jars.”

“Did you say
pulled
out?”

“The viscera were torn away, not cut.”

Hayward walked over to the small side chamber and looked in. A technician was on his hands and knees, photographing spots on the floor with a macro lens. A row of wet-evidence boxes stood against one wall, waiting to be carried away.