Relic

“What you mean, ripe? It just perfect! Under here we got the burner. It keep the water at an even ninety-five degrees. See, first we gut the carcass and drop it in the vat here. Then it rot and in two weeks we pull the plug and drain everything down the sink. What we got left is this big pile of greasy bones. So then we refill the vat [124] and add a little alum and boil those bones. You don’t want to boil them too long, they get soft.”

Von Oster paused again for air. “You know, just like when they cook the chicken too long. Phhhhtui! Bad! But those bones still greasy, so we wash them mit the benzene. That make them pure white.”

“Mr. Von Oster—” Smithback began. If he didn’t redirect this interview quickly, he would never get out. And he couldn’t stand the smell much longer. “I was wondering if you could tell me a little about the shaman group you worked on. I’m writing a book about Superstition. You remember our conversation?”

“Ja, ja! Of course!” He charged over to a desk and pulled out some drawings. Smithback switched on his microcassette recorder.

“First, you paint the background on a double-curved surface, so you get no corners, see? You want the illusion of depth.”

Von Oster began describing the process, his voice pitched with excitement. This is going to be good, Smithback thought. The guy’s a writer’s dream.

Von Oster went on for a long time, stabbing the air, making sweeping gestures, taking deep breaths between his heavily accented sentences. When he was finished, he beamed at Smithback. “Now, you want to see the bugs?” he asked.

Smithback couldn’t resist. The bugs were famous. It was a process Von Oster himself had invented, but was now in use by all the large natural history museums in the country: the beetles would strip a small carcass of its flesh, leaving behind a cleaned, perfectly articulated skeleton.

The “safe” room that housed the beetles was hot and humid, and little larger than a closet. The beetles, called dermestids, came from Africa and lived in white porcelain tubs with slick sides, roofed with screens. The beetles slowly crawled over rows of dead, ski

[125] “What are those things?” Smithback asked, peering at the bug-covered carcasses inside the tubs.

“Bats!” said Von Oster. “Bats for Dr. Huysmans. It will take about ten days to clean up those bats.” He pronounced it “zose bets.”

Between the odors and the bugs, Smithback had had enough. He stood up and extended his hand toward the old scientist. “I gotta go. Thanks for the interview. And those bugs are really something.”

“You’re most welcome!” Von Oster responded. “Now, wait. Interview, you say. Who you writing this book for?” The idea had suddenly occurred to him that he’d been interviewed.

“For the Museum,” said Smithback. “Rickman’s in charge of it.”

“Rickman?” Von Oster’s eyes suddenly narrowed.

“Yes. Why?” Smithback asked.

“You working for Rickman?” Von Oster said.

“Not really. She’s just, well, interfering mostly,” Smithback said.

Von Oster broke into a pink grin. “Ach, she poison, that one! Why you working for her?”

“That’s just the way it happened,” Smithback said, gratified at having found an ally. “You wouldn’t believe the kind of crap she’s put me through. Oh, God.”

Von Oster clapped his hands. “I believe it! I believe it! She making trouble everywhere! This exhibit, she making all kind of trouble!”

Suddenly Smithback was interested. “How so?” he asked.

“She in there every day, saying zis not good, zat not good. Gott, that woman!”

“That sounds like her,” Smithback said with a grim smile. “So what wasn’t good?”

“That, what you call it, that Kothoga tribe stuff. I was in there just yesterday afternoon and she was carrying on. ‘Everybody leave the exhibition! We bring in Kothoga figurine!’ Everybody had to drop work and leave.”

[126] “The figurine? What figurine? What’s so sensitive about it?” It suddenly occurred to Smithback that something so upsetting to Rickman might someday be useful to him.

“That Mbwun figurine, big deal in the exhibition. I not know much about. But she was very upset, I tell you!”

“Why?”

“Like I tell you, that figurine. You not heard? Lots of talk about it, very very bad. I try not to hear.”

“What kind of talk would that be, for instance?”

Smithback listened to the old man for quite a while longer. Finally, he backed himself out of the workshop, Von Oster pursuing as far as the elevator.

As the doors rolled shut, the man was still talking. “You unlucky, working for her!” he called after Smithback just before the elevator lurched upward. But Smithback didn’t hear him. He was busy thinking.

= 20 =

As the afternoon drew to a close, Margo looked up wearily from her terminal. Stretching, she punched a command to the printer down the hall, then sat back, rubbing her eyes. Moriarty’s case write-up was finally done. A little rough around the edges, perhaps; not as comprehensive as she would have liked; but she couldn’t afford to spend any more time on it. Secretly, she was rather pleased, and found herself eager to take a printout up to Moriarty’s office on the fourth floor of the Butterfield Observatory, where the project team for the Superstition exhibition was housed.

She thumbed through her staff directory, looking for Moriarty’s extension. Then she reached for her phone and dialed the four-digit number.

“Exhibition central,” drawled a voice. There were loud good-byes in the background.

“Is George Moriarty there?” Margo asked.

“I think he’s down at the exhibition,” the voice responded. “We’re locking up here. Any message?”

[128] “No, thanks,” Margo replied, hanging up. She looked at her watch: almost five. Curfew time. But the exhibition was being unveiled Friday evening, and she’d promised Moriarty the material.

As she was about to get up, she remembered Frock’s suggestion that she call Greg Kawakita. She sighed, picking up the phone again. Better give him a try. Chances are he’d be out of the building now, and she could just leave a message on phone-mail.

“Greg Kawakita speaking,” came the familiar baritone voice.

“Greg? This is Margo Green.” Stop sounding so apologetic. It’s not like he’s a department head or anything.

“Hi, Margo. What’s up?” She could hear the clacking of keys coming over the line.

“I have a favor to ask. It’s a suggestion of Dr. Frock’s, actually. I’m doing an analysis of some plant specimens used by the Kiribitu tribe, and he suggested I run them through your Extrapolator. Perhaps it will find some genetic correspondences in the samples.”

There was silence. “Dr. Frock thought it might be a useful test of your program, as well as a help to me,” she urged.

Kawakita paused. “Well, you know, Margo, I’d like to help you out, I really would. But the Extrapolator really isn’t in shape yet to be used by just anybody. I’m still chasing down bugs, and I couldn’t vouch for the results.”

Margo’s face burned. “Just anybody?”

“Sorry, that was a poor choice of words. You know what I mean. Besides, it’s a really busy time for me, and this curfew won’t help matters any. Tell you what, why don’t you check with me again in a week or two? Okay? Talk to you then.”

The line went dead.

Margo stood up, grabbed her jacket and purse, and went down the hall to retrieve her printout. She knew [129] he was pla

A few minutes later, Margo walked slowly across the deserted Selous Memorial Hall. Two guards were stationed at the entrance, and a single docent stood inside the information center, locking away ledgers and arranging sale items in preparation for the next day’s visitors. Assuming there are any, thought Margo. Three policemen stood just under the huge bronze statue of Selous, talking among themselves. They didn’t notice Margo.