Part 18 (1/2)

”I'm not known for my warmth toward the press.”

”So I've heard.”

I must have looked surprised.

”I placed a call.”

So Morissonneau's life wasn't all that cloistered.

”I'll contact the Israeli authorities,” I said. ”It's likely the bones will return to them, and it's doubtful they'll be calling a press conference, either.”

”What happens now is in G.o.d's hands.”

I lifted the box. The contents s.h.i.+fted with a soft clunking sound.

”Please keep me informed,” Morissonneau said.

”I will.”

”Thank you.”

”I'll attempt to keep your name out of this, Father. But I can't guarantee that will be possible.”

Morissonneau started to speak. Then his mouth closed and he quit trying to explain or excuse.

12.

I DIDN'T COME CLOSE TO KEEPING WITHIN TEN MILES OF THE DIDN'T COME CLOSE TO KEEPING WITHIN TEN MILES OF THE limit, but luck was with me. Johnny Law was pointing his radar at some other road. limit, but luck was with me. Johnny Law was pointing his radar at some other road.

Arriving at Wilfrid Derome, I parked in the lot reserved for cops. Screw it. It was Sat.u.r.day and I might have G.o.d in my Mazda.

The temperature had surged upward into the low forties, and the predicted snowfall had begun as drizzle. Dirty mounds were melting into cracks and puddling pavements and curbs.

Opening the trunk, I retrieved Morissonneau's crate and hurried inside. Except for guards, the lobby was deserted.

So was the twelfth floor.

Setting the crate on my worktable, I stripped off my jacket and called Ryan.

No answer.

Call Jake?

Bones first.

My heart was thumping as I slipped on a lab coat.

Why? Did I really believe I had the skeleton of Jesus?

Of course not.

So who was in the box?

Someone had wanted these bones out of Israel. Lerner had stolen them. Ferris had transported and hidden them. Morissonneau had lied about them, against his conscience.

Had Ferris died because of them?

Religious fervor breeds obsessive actions. Whether these actions are rational or irrational depends on your perspective. I knew that. But why all the intrigue? Why the obsession to hide them but not destroy them?

Was Morissonneau right? Would jihadists kill to obtain these bones? Or was the good father las.h.i.+ng out against religious and political philosophies he viewed as threatening to his own?

No clue. But I intended to pursue answers to these questions as vigorously as I knew how.

I got a hammer from the storage closet.

The wood was dry. The nails were old. Splinters flew as each popped free.

Eventually, sixteen nails rested by the crate. Laying aside my hammer, I lifted the lid.

Dust. Dry bone. Smells as old as the first fossil vertebrate.

The long bones lay on the bottom, parallel, with kneecaps and hand and foot bones jumbled among them. The rest formed a middle layer. The skull was on top, jaw detached, empty orbits staring skyward. The skeleton looked like hundreds of others I'd seen, spoils of a farmer's field, a shallow grave, a dozer cut at a demolition site.

Transferring the skull to a cork stabilizer ring, I positioned the jaw and stared at the fleshless face.

What had it looked like in life? Whose had it been?

Nope. No speculation.

One by one, I articulated every element.

Forty minutes later, an anatomically correct skeleton lay on my table. Nothing was missing save a tiny throat bone called the hyoid and a few finger and toe phalanges.

I was sliding a case form onto a clipboard when my phone rang. It was Ryan.

I told him about my morning.

”Holy s.h.i.+t.”

”Maybe,” I said.

”Ferris and Lerner were believers.”

”Morissonneau wasn't so sure.”

”What do you think?” Ryan asked.