Last Breath Page 3

  Main Street dead-ended at the entrance to the university. A wide brick arch bore the original name of the school-Benjamin Howe College -and its founding date, 1879. The arch covered a paved lane that wound slightly to the left and ended in a wide parking lot. A courtyard of sorts was formed by the three imposing buildings that framed the lot. All three were constructed of brick and appeared to have seen better days. While far from derelict, Daria noticed that the black shutters were all in need of paint, and the brick clearly needed pointing. She parked in a spot designated for visitors and got out of the car she’d rented at the airport.

  She folded her arms across her chest, and took in the campus that sprawled out around her. Disappointed to find that nothing looked familiar, she hunted in her purse for the index card on which she’d written the directions Dr. Burnette had given her on the phone.

  The building she wanted was directly in front of her. She swung her bag over her shoulder and headed up the front steps to a covered porch. Double doors-also needing a refresher-opened into a wide lobby. Steps to the third floor rose up in the center, and halls led off to either side. The carpets were just this side of threadbare and the paneled walls needed a good cleaning. Rectangular shapes on the walls above the dark paneling hinted of paintings that had once hung there, and the chandelier in the center of the lobby was unlit. The overall impression was one of past grandeur.

  Daria took the hall to the left as she’d been instructed, and stood outside the door bearing a wooden plaque with C. LOUISE BURNETTE, PHD PRESIDENT painted in black script. She hesitated, not sure whether to knock or just walk in.

  “May I help you?” a voice from down the hall called to her.

  “I have an appointment with Dr. Burnette,” Daria replied.

  “Dr. McGowan?” The woman walking toward Daria was short and squat and had dark hair that just grazed her shoulders. She appeared to be in her mid-forties and walked with a spring in her step. “I’m Vita Landis, Dr. Burnette’s assistant. You’re right on time.”

  She shifted the stack of papers from her right arm to her left and opened the door, holding it for Daria to pass into the reception area. This room, too, had seen better days.

  “How was your trip?” Vita asked as she walked around Daria and placed the papers in the middle of her desk.

  “Fine, thank you. It was a good day for a drive. Last night’s rain cooled things off a bit.”

  “Bound to get humid, though. Worst thing about this time of the year in this part of the country. Humidity. Means two things to me. Bad hair and mosquitoes.” She hit the intercom button on her phone. “Dr. McGowan is here, Dr. B.”

  Vita hung up and opened her mouth to speak, but before she could get a word out, the office door opened and a tall, slender woman dressed in a lightweight pale green pantsuit with a short-sleeved jacket stepped out, hand extended. She appeared to be in her mid-sixties, with light brown hair cut in a short no-nonsense style.

  “Dr. McGowan, I’m so pleased to meet you.” She gave Daria’s hand a hearty shake. “I cannot begin to tell you how happy we all are that you agreed to come.”

  “I’m delighted to be here,” Daria said truthfully.

  “Come in,” the woman invited, “so we can chat. Vita, if there’s any iced tea left, I’m sure Dr. McGowan would appreciate a cold drink after her drive. You did say you were driving from Baltimore, didn’t you?”

  “I did. I spent a few days with my parents in South Carolina, then flew into BWI and rented a car.” Daria took one of the two armchairs that faced each other at the far side of the room. The chairs overlooked a garden where dozens of roses were in bloom, and paths led to a pergola where stone benches sat. “This is lovely. The garden is beautiful.”

  “One of our history professors found a description of the original garden in a journal that Iliana McGowan kept through the 1920s. After her husband died-your great-grandfather-she devoted herself to raising their children and tending to her father, serving as his official hostess. At the time, he was still president of the university. I’m sure you’ve heard the story before. This was his office.” Louise Burnette had remained standing. “That’s him, over the fireplace. It’s one of the few paintings we kept out of storage when we removed the others.”

  Daria got out of her chair and walked to the portrait for a better look.

  “He looks quite dashing, don’t you think?” Louise Burnette asked.

  “He certainly does,” Daria agreed. “I’ve heard he was quite the rake. Loved the ladies, loved adventure, though supposedly after he founded the college, his adventures came to an end. He took his responsibility here quite seriously.” Daria turned and smiled. “Or so the story goes.”

  “He did a wonderful job putting the college together, and his generous endowment has kept Howe going through the years.” Dr. Burnette frowned. “At least, until now.”

  Daria looked at her quizzically.

  Vita knocked once on the half-opened door, then came in bearing a silver tray with a cut-glass decanter and two goblets. Daria noticed that the silver appeared to be freshly polished and the glasses gleamed as if recently washed.

  “I’ll just set this here for you,” Vita said as she placed the tray on a table between the two chairs. “Let me know if you need anything else, Dr. B.”

  “Thank you, Vita.” Dr. Burnette poured the cold tea. Handing one to Daria, she said, “I suppose I should get right to the point. Howe is in desperate need of funds. Our athletic teams have never been strong enough to pull in student athletes, and our campus is, as you may have noticed, a bit run-down. Each year it gets more difficult to attract good students. This year, our enrollment hit an all-time low. We’re not conveniently located, we don’t have an all-star faculty, and we lack the funds to attract the type of professors that could help our reputation.”

  “I thought you said Benjamin Howe left a generous endowment.”

  “He did, but with the drop in the number of tuition-paying students, we’re running through it more quickly than we’d like. The trustees met last month to discuss alternatives-selling off land, selling some paintings, perhaps a few of the buildings on the opposite side of the road-none of those options were particularly desirable, but the consensus was that we’d do what we had to do to buy a little more time. Later that night, after the meeting, I was walking back to my house-I live on campus-and I passed by the museum. It’s been closed for a number of years.”

  “I wasn’t aware of that.”

  “The funds weren’t there for a curator, and the building isn’t properly ventilated. It was closed ‘temporarily’ by my predecessor. It was pretty much forgotten. Well, we’d been talking about finding money for the school, and here we had our own museum with who knew what stored away down there. The next morning I started looking around, taking stock, and you’ll never guess what I found.”

  “The crates my great-grandfather brought back from Shandihar.” Daria found herself tapping her foot impatiently.

  “No. Well, yes, eventually, I was led to them. They’re buried somewhere deep in the basement behind a locked door, as I’ve since learned. But what I found that day was dinosaur bones, still on display from the last time the building was open, and some signs relating to another dig funded by the university around the same time as your grandfather’s.”

  “Oliver Jacobs’s dig.” Daria smiled. “Howe sent them both off with the promise that whoever returned first would be the first to exhibit their find. My great-grandfather was the first back but the building hadn’t been completed yet.”

  “And by the time the building was finally ready, he’d passed away. Jacobs’s findings were put on exhibit and written up in all the newspapers and magazines, and your great-grandfather’s discovery was pretty much forgotten over the years.”

  “And the Jacobs artifacts?” Daria asked.

  “Remain in the basement of the museum. In the 1950s, the museum was turned over to a man named Casper Fenn, who decided the emphasis here should be on Amer
ican natural history, so he proceeded to purchase or trade for all manner of things. Dinosaurs-small ones, of course-and animal skeletons, a collection of stuffed birds and monkeys.” She rolled her eyes.

  “He sold or traded some of the artifacts from the Jacobs dig for-”

  “Bones and stuffed animals, yes. Oh, and some Indian relics. Buffalo skins and a tepee,” she said drily. “They were a big hit with the school kids but really brought in nothing in terms of revenue.”

  “So what exactly remains of the Jacobs find?” Daria frowned.

  “There are still several crates of objects in the basement clearly marked as his. We do have the inventory, and for all his faults, Fenn kept impeccable records. Every sale, to whom, how much, when and where, it’s all written down. And in his defense, he did attract some positive attention to the school.”

  “Dr. Burnette, when we spoke, you said you wanted to talk to me about reopening the museum. That you wanted me to work on a display of my great-grandfather’s find. I thought that was what you called me here to discuss. Please understand, I left an important dig thinking that-”

  “Yes, yes, I’m getting to all that.” Louise Burnette leaned forward and patted Daria’s arm reassuringly. “I do intend to reopen the museum. I have every intention of displaying the Shandihar collection.”

  “And that would bring in the funds you need to keep the school going…how?” Daria wasn’t following the logic. “Are you aware of how expensive it is to exhibit such a find? You’re going to need to design special display areas. The building will certainly need upgrades of the mechanical systems. There’s publicity, there will be staff needed, insurance, security once you start reminding people what you have here. And then there’s my fee…”

  “I understand. But here’s what I’m thinking.” She took a sip of her tea. “If you could appraise the collection-set a value on it-we would have collateral for a bank loan. Once the display is ready and we can reopen the museum, we’ll be able to attract other experts like you from all over the world to view it. We can have symposiums here, host guest lecturers…”

  “Which would bring in little more than a drop in the bucket, compared to the costs.”

  “Yes, but we’ll be able to loan out the collection, won’t we? For a fee?”

  “Possibly,” Daria responded cautiously.

  “Until your great-grandfather’s find, Shandihar was thought to be a place that existed only in the epic poems written by ancient scribes.” Dr. Burnette’s eyes narrowed. “Between the time he found his lost city and now, there have been two world wars and any number of political changes in Turkey, where he made his discovery. The treasures of Shandihar have been forgotten, essentially, for over two thousand years.” She smiled. “There will be television specials, there will be books. And-God forgive me-if we’re lucky, coffee mugs and coasters.”

  “You’re looking at this as a strictly commercial venture.” Daria’s voice held a touch of disapproval.

  “With all due respect, Dr. McGowan, I have no other choice. The revenue this collection will generate will not only save this college, it will offer an opportunity for countless scholars to study up close the treasures of a lost civilization that have never before been exhibited. We’ll attract not only the most promising students in the field, but the best professors, just as we did a hundred years ago. Just as Benjamin Howe dreamed of when he financed not one, but two, expeditions.”

  She leaned closer to Daria and said, “Don’t you at least want to open those crates and see what your great-grandfather spent his life searching for?”

  “Dr. Burnette…”

  “Please. Call me Louise.”

  “Louise, I need to think this over. This project would take, minimum, a year, a year when I would not be in the field, and I-”

  “You’ve spent how many years ‘in the field’?”

  “What difference does it make?”

  “Twelve years, I think I read, but I had a hard time believing that,” Louise said. “That’s a long time to be living out of a suitcase.”

  “Dr. Burnette…Louise…I’m an archaeologist,” Daria said patiently, as one might explain to a child. “I’m the child of an archaeologist and an anthropologist. Until I was ten, I rarely stayed in the same place for more than six months.”

  “When you were ten, your parents both accepted positions at Princeton. They lived there for years. That’s hardly an outpost.” Louise had done her homework.

  “Yes. But even then, as soon as school was out, we’d be off for several months.”

  “Are you afraid you can’t remain in one place for a whole year?”

  “Could be a challenge.” Daria smiled in spite of herself. “I’ve been living in a tent for most of the past five.”

  “Might be a nice change, after all those years of living like a nomad.”

  Daria laughed. “Actually, I’m quite at home in a tent. I don’t own much, and I have no one to answer to. The nomadic life suits me quite well.”

  “Interesting.” Louise seemed to study Daria for a moment. “How about we walk over to the museum and take a look around?”

  When Daria hesitated, Louise leaned forward and said, “Aren’t you even curious? Don’t you even want to take a look?”

  “Of course, yes, I’d love to take a look.” Daria finished her tea and placed the glass on the tray. “Lead the way.”

  On the way across campus, Louise pointed out each of the buildings and their functions.

  “That’s the arts building,” she told Daria as they passed a building that appeared to have its roots in the 1920s. “Fine arts, mostly. Our art history and conservation departments have their offices on the second floor, and there are a few studios on the third. I’ve been told the light there is exceptional. There’s an addition on the back of the building-you can’t see it from here-where there are classrooms. Photography labs are in the basement.”

  “And the building next to it?” Daria asked.

  “Mathematics and the sciences. They have labs in both wings. The next building houses liberal arts; that brick building in front of us with the white pillars is the library.” She paused as they passed by. “Some of the archaeology professors have their offices in the basement.” Before Daria could comment, Louise hastened to add, “Their choice, I assure you. The department is officially housed over here on our right, on the second floor of that back wing. The Victorian-style mansion was once Howe’s personal residence.”

  “I’m pretty sure I was there once, when I was little, for some sort of reception.”

  “Oh, quite likely. Unfortunately, in the mid-nineties, the roof began to leak. It’s paid for its own repairs, though.” Louise smiled and added, “Wedding receptions. It’s quite the hot business. We’ve been renting it out for weddings and other special events for the past five years, and I must say, the old girl is definitely paying her own way these days.”

  She pointed to a building straight ahead. One story high and built in a semicircle, it had a brick courtyard at its center. “There’s the museum.”

  “It looks surprisingly contemporary,” Daria remarked.

  “It was designed by one of the architectural students here at Howe right around the turn of the last century,” Louise said as she dug for keys in her purse. “There was a competition and Benjamin Howe chose the design from the entries.”

  “I would have expected him to opt for something that blended in with the other buildings on campus.” Daria turned back to the building that had a different feel. “Except for the arts building and the mansion, all of the others look Georgian.”

  “Yes, very classical.” Louise nodded. “Your great-great-grandfather was going for a look that mimicked the older, great colleges and universities. The University of Virginia, for example, has that classical look, as so many other campuses do. He had high hopes for Howe.” She shrugged. “Unfortunately, we’ve never attained the level of prominence he’d wanted.”

  She found the keys and jingled the
m as they crossed the brick courtyard. Grass and weeds grew up between the bricks, and the landscaping that followed the curve of the building was badly overgrown.

  “It’s been completely boarded up for years, but I had all that removed anticipating your visit,” Louise told her as she pushed open the door. “It’s going to be a bit stuffy and dusty.”

  “Dust doesn’t bother me.” Daria followed her inside. “I’m used to dust.”

  They stepped into a large round room that had elevated glassed areas off to each side.

  “This is the reception room,” Louise explained. “Howe planned it to work as a gallery, as an exhibition hall, and a reception room. He called it the Great Room. There are photos from the opening back in 1912 which I’d be happy to share with you. Of course, Alistair was gone by then-he died in 1910-but Iliana and her father were there. His death actually put the opening off by a year while they scrambled to get the Jacobs collection ready to be displayed.”

  “I’d love to see the photos.”

  Daria walked slowly through the room, studying the few exhibits that remained. Small dinosaurs roamed in a procession over a sandy floor against a backdrop of enlarged photos of a generic desert. She tried to imagine a throng of people crowding around the glassed display areas. The room was comfortable and functional, and she couldn’t help but think how, if properly designed, the exhibits could be nicely arranged in the showcases. The natural light from not only the front and back, but overhead, enlarged the space and gave it an importance that artificial light would not have.

  “Very nice. Whoever designed this space did a good job of utilizing the natural light and the flow of the room.”

  Louise smiled, pleased that Daria approved of the room’s design.

  The corridors off to each side offered more space for exhibits. At the end of the hall to the right there was a short flight of four steps leading to a lower level where several offices were locked and forgotten. Another longer set of steps led down to the basement, which had no windows and was in total darkness.