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Chapter 4
William Smithback Jr. entered the dark and fragrant confines of the pub known as the Bones and sca
He spied the copper-colored hair of his new bride, Nora Kelly, at their usual table in the back. He waved, sauntered over, and struck a dramatic pose.
“‘But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks?’” he intoned. Then he kissed the back of her hand briefly, kissed her lips rather more attentively, and took a seat across the table. “How are things?”
“The museum continues to be an exciting place to work.”
“You mean that bioterror scare this morning?”
She nodded. “Someone delivered a package for the Mineralogy Department, leaking some kind of powder. They thought it was anthrax or something.”
“I heard about that. In fact, brother Bryce filed a story on that today.” Bryce Harriman was Smithback’s colleague and archrival at the Times, but Smithback had secured himself a little breathing room with some recent-and very dramatic-scoops.
The hangdog waiter came by and stood by the table, silently waiting to take their drink orders.
“I’ll take two fingers of the Glen Grant,” Smithback said. “The good stuff.”
“A glass of white wine, please.”
The waiter shuffled off.
“So it caused a stir?” Smithback asked.
Nora giggled. “You should have seen Greenlaw, the guy who found it. He was so sure he was dying they had to carry him out on a stretcher, protective suit and all.”
“Greenlaw? I don’t know him.”
“He’s the new V.P. for administration. Just hired from Con Ed.”
“So what’d it turn out to be? The anthrax, I mean.”
“Grinding powder.”
Smithback chuckled as he accepted his drink. “Grinding powder. Oh, God, that’s perfect.” He swirled the amber liquid around in the balloon glass and took a sip. “How’d it happen?”
“It seems the package was damaged in transit, and the stuff was dribbling out. A messenger dropped it off with Curly, and Greenlaw just happened by.”
“Curly? The old guy with the pipe?”
“That’s the one.”
“He’s still at the museum?”
“He’ll never leave.”
“How did he take it?”
“In stride, like everything else. He was back in his pillbox a few hours later, like nothing had happened.”
Smithback shook his head. “Why in the world would anyone send a sack of grit by messenger?”
“Beats me.”
He took another sip. “You think it was deliberate?” he asked absently. “Someone trying to freak out the museum?”
“You’ve got a criminal mind.”
“Do they know who sent it?”
“I heard the package didn’t have a return address.”
At this small detail, Smithback grew suddenly interested. He wished he’d called up Harriman’s piece on the Times internal network and read it. “You know how much it costs to send something by messenger in New York City these days? Forty bucks.”
“Maybe it was valuable grit.”
“But then, why no return address? Who was it addressed to?”
“Just the Mineralogy Department, I heard.”
Smithback took another thoughtful sip of the Glen Grant. There was something about this story that set off a journalistic alarm in his head. He wondered if Harriman had gotten to the bottom of it. Not bloody likely.
He extracted his cell. “Mind if I make a call?”
Nora frowned. “If you must.”
Smithback dialed the museum, asked to be put through to mineralogy. He was in luck: someone was still there. He began speaking rapidly. “This is Mr. Humnhmn in the Grmhmhmn’s office, and I had a quick question: what kind of grinding powder was it that caused the scare this morning?”
“I didn’t catch-”
“Look, I’m in a hurry. The director’s waiting for an answer.”
“I don’t know.”
“Is there anyone there who does?”
“There’s Dr. Sherman.”
“Put him on.”
A moment later, a breathless voice got on. “Dr. Collopy?”
“No, no,” said Smithback easily. “This is William Smithback. I’m a reporter for the New York Times.”
A silence. Then a very tense “Yes?”
“About that bioterror scare this morning-”
“I can’t help you,” came the immediate response. “I already told everything I know to your colleague, Mr. Harriman.”
“Just a routine follow-up, Dr. Sherman. Mind?”
Silence.
“The package was addressed to you?”
“To the department,” came the terse reply.
“No return address?”
“No.”
“And it was full of grit?”
“That’s right.”
“What kind?”
A hesitation. “Corundum grit.”
“How much is corundum grit worth?”
“I don’t know offhand. Not much.”
“I see. That’s all, thanks.”
He hung up to find Nora looking at him.
“It’s rude to use your cell phone in a pub,” she said.
“Hey, I’m a reporter. It’s my job to be rude.”
“Satisfied?”
“No.”
“A package of grit came to the museum. It was leaking, it freaked someone out. End of story.”
“I don’t know.” Smithback took another long sip of the Glen Grant. “That guy sounded awfully nervous just now.”
“Dr. Sherman? He’s high-strung.”
“He sounded more than high-strung. He sounded frightened.”
He opened his cell phone again, and Nora groaned. “If you start making calls, I’m heading home.”
“Come on, Nora. One more call, then we’ll head over to the Rattlesnake Café for di
Quickly, he dialed information, got a number, punched it in. “Department of Health and Mental Services?”
After being bounced around a bit, he finally got the lab he wanted.
“Sentinel lab,” came a voice.
“To whom am I speaking?”
“Richard. And to whom am I speaking?”
“Hi, Richard, this is Bill Smithback of the Times. You in charge?”
“I am now. The boss just went home.”
“Lucky for you. Can I ask a few questions?”
“You said you’re a reporter?”
“That’s right.”
“I suppose so.”
“This is the lab that handled that package from the museum this morning?”
“Sure is.”
“What was in it?”
Smithback heard a snort. “Diamond grit.”
“Not corundum?”
“No. Diamond.”
“Did you examine the grit yourself?”
“Yup.”
“What’d it look like?”
“Under coarse examination, like a sack of brown sand.”
Smithback thought for a moment. “How’d you figure out it was diamond grit?”
“By the index of refraction of the particles.”
“I see. And it couldn’t be confused with corundum?”
“No way.”
“You also examined it under a microscope, I assume?”
“Yup.”
“What’d it look like?”
“It was beautiful, like a bunch of little colored crystals.”
Smithback felt a sudden tingling at the nape of his neck. “Colored? What do you mean?”
“Bits and fragments of every color of the rainbow. I had no idea diamond grit was so pretty.”
“That didn’t strike you as odd?”
“A lot of things that are ugly to the human eye look beautiful under the microscope. Like bread mold, for instance-or sand, for that matter.”