Blue Labyrinth

28

The Microforms Reading Room on the first floor of the New York Public Library’s main building was brightly lit, packed with machines for reading microfilm and microfiche, and too warm for comfort. As he took a seat beside Margo, D’Agosta loosened his tie and unbuttoned the top button of his shirt. He watched as she loaded a reel of microfilm onto their machine and threaded it through the mechanism and onto the takeup spindle.

“Christ,” D’Agosta said. “You’d think they would have digitized all this by now. So what are we looking at?”

“The New-York Evening Independent. It was quite comprehensive for its time, but verged toward more sensationalist stories than the Times.” She glanced at the microfilm box. “This spool covers the years 1888 to 1892. Where do you suggest we start?”

“The skeleton entered the collection in ’89. Let’s start there.” D’Agosta tugged his tie down a little farther. Damn, it was hot in here. “If this guy got rid of his wife, he wouldn’t wait around to dispose of her body.”

“Right.” Margo nudged the big dial on the front of the microfilm machine into forward. Old newspaper pages scrolled up the screen, first slowly, then more quickly. The machine made a whirring noise. D’Agosta glanced over at Margo. She seemed a different person when outside the Museum — more at ease.

He couldn’t shake the feeling that, while this might be an interesting exercise, in the end it wouldn’t move his own case forward — even if Padgett had killed his wife and stuffed her bones in the collection. He found himself freshly annoyed at Pendergast for the way he’d stopped by the Museum, asked just enough questions to raise D’Agosta’s own hopes for the case — and then disappeared without a word. That had been five days ago. D’Agosta had begun to leave increasingly testy messages for Pendergast, but so far they had borne no fruit.

Margo slowed the machine again as they reached 1889. Page after page passed: stories about New York politics, colorful or lurid foreign events, gossip and crime and all the attendant hustle and bustle of a city still growing at flank speed. And then, in late summer, something of interest appeared:

“My God,” Margo murmured. “So he did kill his wife.”

“It’s just an arrest,” D’Agosta told her. “Let’s keep going.”

Margo moved through the next several issues. About a week later, another related notice appeared. It had become more important now and was given its own story.

D’Agosta scoffed. “Even back then, the Museum was more concerned with protecting its reputation than helping solve a crime.” He paused. “Wonder what this patent medicine was. Probably loaded with cocaine or opium.”

“The condition doesn’t sound like your standard drug addiction. Wasting… that was nineteenth-century-speak for terminal. Now, that’s interesting…” She paused.

“What?”

“It’s just that one of the tests I conducted on the skeleton did show some anomalous mineralization. Perhaps Ophelia Padgett was suffering from a bone disorder or other degenerative condition.”

D’Agosta watched as she moved forward through the newspaper’s later issues. There were one or two brief mentions of the upcoming trial; another brief dispatch stating the trial was under way. And then, on November 14, 1889:

Dr. Evans Padgett, of Gramercy-Lane, who had been accused of murdering his wife, Ophelia, was today acquitted of all charges laid against him by the presiding judge in the King’s Courtroom at 2 Park Row. Although certain eyewitnesses came forth to describe Padgett’s veiled statements about ending his wife’s existence, and circumstantial evidence was presented by the attorney for the State of New York, Dr. Padgett was declared exonerated because no corpus delicti could be found, despite the most diligent search by the Manhattan constabulary forces. Padgett was set free by the bailiff and allowed to leave the Court a free man as of noon on this day.

“No corpus delicti,” D’Agosta said. “Of course there was no body. The old guy had it macerated in the Osteology vats and then stuck the bones into the collection, labeling them Hottentot!”

“The science of forensic anthropology wasn’t very advanced in 1889. Once she was reduced to a skeleton, they’d never have been able to identify her. The perfect crime.”

D’Agosta slumped in his chair. He felt a lot more tired now than when he’d entered the room. “But what the hell does it mean? And why would this phony scientist steal one of her bones?”

Margo shrugged. “It’s a mystery.”

“Great. Instead of solving a week-old murder, we’ve uncovered a century-old one.”