Lethal Legacy

FORTY-ONE

I rang Jasper Hunt the Third’s apartment, and the butler answered.

“He’s asleep, madam. Do you know the hour?”

“I apologize for calling so late. I’m trying to find out where his father is buried. Would you happen to know?”

“Certainly, madam. In Millbrook, on the family estate. We shall all be in Millbrook one day, God willing.”

I thanked him and hung up.

We were back in Bea’s office. The helpful curators were still searching for books, with a new emphasis on volumes related to Shakespeare.

Mike was on Bea’s computer. He had Googled Jasper Hunt’s obituary and was reading aloud to us. “Yeah, looks like Junior and his father were laid to rest beside their wives-no mention of mistresses-and their beloved pets. The reinterment took place in the 1980s, when Jasper Three created a plot for them on the back forty of the horse farm-immediate family, servants, and still plenty of room for Patience and Fortitude. Looks like the Dutchess County society event of the season.”

“Does it say why there was a reinterment?” I asked.

“Guess they had a layover someplace else, Coop. I see a road trip up the Hudson in your future,” Mike said. “No mention of books, Bea.”

“Bibliomaniacs have done it forever,” she said. “Put their favorite books in their burial chambers with them. You’re the military buff. You know the name Rush Hawkins?”

“Civil War general. Led a volunteer cavalry troop called Hawkins’s Zouaves.”

“Well, he built himself a mausoleum in Providence so he could be surrounded by all his books after he shuffled off his mortal coil,” Bea said. “Elizabeth Rossetti, too.”

“The writer’s wife?” I asked.

“Yup. Dante Gabriel Rossetti placed his unpublished poems in his young bride’s grave at Highgate Cemetery, along with a Bible. The poet had a change of heart a year later and reclaimed his work for publication-somewhat dampened by exposure. The vellum pages are at Harvard now. It’s been done forever.”

“Worth considering,” I said.

“You’re good at exhumations, Coop.”

My only other experience like that had been the sad task of reexamining the body of a teenage girl whose original autopsy had missed the telling signs that motivated her killer.

“How long do you want to keep the staff going at this tonight?” Bea asked.

“I think most of them are about to hit a wall,” I said. “Maybe we should knock off and start them fresh in the morning.”

My cell phone vibrated and I reached for it to see whether it was a call I wanted to take.

“We can secure everything right here,” Mike said. “We’ll have a detail at this very door around the clock.”

Bea grimaced. It was obvious she didn’t like the idea of entrusting all these treasures to outsiders who didn’t respect the integrity of each book, atlas, map, and document the way these curators did.

“I promise you, they’ll be fine,” I said, pressing the talk button as I recognized the number of Howard Browner, one of the senior forensic biologists at the DNA lab. “Howard? It’s Alex.”

“Am I catching you at a bad time?”

“Still working, Howard. You, too?”

“Yeah.”

Browner-whom Mike called the Brainiac-was brilliant and dedicated to his work, one of the first experts in DNA technology who had trained many of us in this evolving science since its introduction in the criminal justice system.

Mike spun his finger in a circle, telling me to hurry the call so we could help Bea close up. I rolled my eyes at him.

“You have something for me?” I asked.

“I’ve been in the lab all day. Got handed this assignment late afternoon. It’s kind of interesting, along the lines of what Mattie’s been working on with you for the Griggs case.”

“Wrap it up, Coop,” Mike said.

“Thanks for thinking of me, Howard. I’m sort of tied up with Mike right now.” Interesting was not what I needed at the moment. “Can it wait till Monday?”

“Sure, Alex. It’s just a bench hunch.”

Browner wasn’t calling about a match in the databank but something his gut instinct was feeding him as he looked at profiles at his bench, as the lab workspaces were called.

“You mean a familial search?” I asked. “Is it Wesley Griggs?

Despite Mike’s prodding, I was anxious for a development that might impact Judge Moffett’s decision.

“No. Nothing new on that front.”

“I’ll call you first thing when I get to the office, Howard. Okay? You know how Mike is. We’re trying to shut down for the night.”

“Understood. Just make a note to tell me if the father of one of your witnesses is still around. I’d like to get a swab from him.”

“A witness in which murder case?” I asked. “Are you talking Griggs?”

Mike stood still and put his hands on his waist, staring at me as I listened to Browner.

“No, no, Alex. They’ve added me to the team on the BarrVastasi homicides. I’m working on a cigarette butt Chapman submitted.”

“That’s got to be the one he picked up from the floor of the squad. The smoker is a woman named Minerva Hunt,” I said. “What’s so interesting about it?”

“I had it right on my bench when the fax came through from London a few hours ago. I’m looking through all the profiles, and I see that the smoker and this guy, the drunk driver from England-well, they’ve got an allele in common at each one of thirteen loci we’ve tested. They match perfectly,” Browner said, his normally flat delivery lifted a decibel with excitement. “I know how you like this forensic stuff, Alex.”

My mind was racing to make the connection between the players. “Tell me what it means, Howard.”

“I can’t be certain till I get a paternal swab, but if I enjoyed betting as much as Mike does, I’d have to say I’m looking at a half brother and sister here. Same father, different mothers. Isn’t that wild?”

Alger Herrick-the infant who’d been abandoned by his teenage mother on the steps of an orphanage in England-was in all likelihood the illegitimate child of Jasper Hunt III, the blood brother of Talbot and Minerva Hunt.