The Bone Conjurer. Alex Archer

Columbia University. She spied the Olive Tree Deli and made a note not to forget to eat today. She’d forgone breakfast in lieu of excitement over her current find. The skull, tucked in the reassembled box and nestled in its lamb’s wool, joggled in the pack on her back.

      Her cell phone rang and Bart McGilly’s name flashed on the screen.

      He started right in. “Annja, one of these days your messages are not going to be funny anymore. You were joking about swimming in the Gowanus Canal. What kind of monsters do your producers think you’ll find in that filthy water?”

      “Sorry, Bart. I wasn’t kidding. I’ve still the lingering scum in my bathtub to prove it. I don’t know what’s in that water—and please, if you know, don’t tell me—but it certainly wasn’t a day at the beach. And it had nothing to do with Chasing History’s Monsters.”

      “Seriously? Annja, don’t do this to me. So there’s a body? For real?”

      “Young. Probably late twenties would be my guess. Male. Dark hair and slender.”

      “How’d he end up in the canal?”

      “Sniper shot to the brain.”

      His silence could be interpreted as surprise, but Annja pictured Bart grasping his throat and shaking his head. There she goes again, his silent thoughts broadcast loudly over the greater consciousness.

      “It’s not like I seek out these sorts of situations, Bart.”

      “Oh, really? Because with your record a guy would be inclined to believe that is exactly what you do. What, do you listen to the police scanner? Track nefarious transactions online?”

      “Is that possible?” she wondered curiously as she stepped onto the university grounds and followed the sidewalk south.

      “Annja.” Bart sighed.

      “I got an e-mail from a guy with an artifact he wanted me to look at.”

      “So anytime a stranger pings wanting to show you something, you just make a date? Wait. Don’t answer that one. I don’t want to know. I’ll send a team out to check the canal. Do you know who the victim is? Who was shooting at—hell, the both of you? Are you okay?”

      “It’s just an abrasion, but I almost got a pierced ear out of the deal.” She spoke quickly to alleviate his gasping protest. “After the first bullet, I thought it wisest to get the hell out of there. Down was the only way I could come up with at the time. As for the dead man, his Internet ID was Sneak. At least in the archaeology forum where he found me it is. I don’t know who he is. Didn’t have any ID in his backpack.”

      “In his—you removed evidence from the body?”

      Bart groaned. Annja imagined him clenching his fists in frustration.

      “Had to, Bart. I’m not going to let a valuable artifact get flushed through the canal like a hunk of sewage. Speaking of which—no, I don’t even want to know. A skull was in his backpack, along with a bunch of funky tools. I’m thinking he was a thief because there was a stethoscope and some kind of hand drill. Oh, and lock-pick tools.”

      “I need to take a look at the tools, Annja. All of them are evidence. Have you touched them? Of course you have.”

      “Sorry.”

      “How did you meet this guy?”

      “Online.”

      “Right. At the Dangerous Dating Depot?”

      “Oh, Bart, you made a funny.”

      “No, I’m trying to fit myself into the strange world you seem to navigate with startling ease. You said there was a skull?”

      “It’s why I agreed to meet the guy in the first place.” Annja turned down a tree-lined sidewalk toward Schermerhorn Hall.

      “So you have the skull. What are you doing with it now? Or do I want to know?”

      “I’m an archaeologist, Bart. Skulls are our thing. Don’t you know we bone botherers like to tote around various bits and bones to keep us company?”

      Another groan. She was having far too much fun teasing him when she knew the situation was serious. A dead thief could account for that.

      “I’m taking it to a professor at Columbia right now. Going to have him date it and see if I can begin to place it on a historical time line. If I can do that I might be able to track it to a point of origin. And then we’ll have an M.O. on the thief. Maybe.”

      “What makes you think your alleged thief isn’t just a wacko? A killer? What if it’s a random skull? Annja, what if it’s from one of his kills?”

      “You surprise me, Bart. I didn’t think you jumped to conclusions so easily. And why would someone kill for a random skull?”

      “Why would someone kill and not go after said random skull?”

      Annja glanced over her shoulder. She was sure she hadn’t been followed because she kept a keen eye to her periphery. No snow today; in fact, it was warmer by fifteen degrees, so it felt almost tropical. In a thirty-degree kind of way.

      “It’s pretty hard to go after something sitting at the bottom of the canal. Besides, it’s an infant skull.”

      “A baby? Christ, Annja, it doesn’t add up.”

      “It does from my end of the stick. It’s an artifact, Bart, not a victim. At least, not from this century.”

      “I hate working on crimes against children. It’s so sad. Fine. I’m heading out to the canal. You keep an eye over your shoulder. And please, promise me, you won’t meet any more strangers without having them vetted by me first?”

      “I can’t promise…”

      “Woman, you are going to give me a heart attack.”

      “Hey, that reminds me, we haven’t had a decent meal out lately.”

      “Because you’re always trekking across the world, posing for TV cameras and sticking your nose in danger.”

      “You love me for it, admit it.”

      Bart’s sigh made her smile. She’d successfully redirected him from her dangerous dabbling with the criminal mien.

      “Give me a call after you’ve talked to the professor, will you? I’ve got some time tomorrow night. We can meet and you can bring along the evidence you’ve contaminated. How about Tito’s?”

      “Sounds like a plan. Me and my contaminants can make it.”

      Tito’s was one of their favorite places to meet over a plate of Cuban pulled pork with sweet plantains.

      Bart was one of few friends Annja had in the city, and she valued that friendship tremendously. Though she couldn’t deny he was also a handsome single man who, on more than a few occasions, sat closer to her than a friend should, stared into her eyes longer than a friend should and made her think of him much more than the average friend should.

      The redbrick front of Schermerhorn Hall popped into view through a line of lindens. “I’ll talk to you later. Thanks, Bart.”

      6

      Schermerhorn Hall, a four-story colonial redbrick building, sat just off Amsterdam Avenue. Annja liked the street name. How cool would it have been to live in the seventeenth century when New York was New Amsterdam?

      “Not as cool as you wish,” she admonished.

      While it was interesting to conjecture a life lived in a previous century, the appeal of it only lasted until Annja reminded herself of lacking plumbing, sanitation, medicine and the Internet.

      The building was quiet as she entered. Classes must be in session, she thought. As she passed various classrooms the doors were open to reveal dark quiet rooms. No one about. Odd.