Saving Cecil (11 page)

“No,” he said. “But I
do
have a question for you.”

“Ask away,” I said over the top of my mug.

“Is your daughter married?”

Oh, good grief
. “No.”

“Spoken for?”

“No.”

His expression turned quizzical. “You're not very encouraging.”

I didn't have the heart to tell him that Henri goes through three guys like him—hot body, to-die-for face, mediocre job, scant ambition—a month. “No. Call her if you want. She's unattached. Just consider yourself warned.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means she's got a lot on her plate right now. You'd be a nice … distraction for a while but that's all there would be to it.” His blank stare said I wasn't getting through. “You'll get all attached, then poof! She'll be off to the next distraction and you'll be just another piece of wreckage floating in her wake. I've witnessed this pitiful scenario
many
times.”

He continued to stare, undaunted. I sighed, removed one of her business cards from my purse, gave it to him, then headed home.

By the time I got off US 1 and onto I-40, it was almost eight o'clock and I had come up with a whole new plan of attack in searching for Baker's killer. Well, it wasn't really a plan of attack, more like a fact-finding expedition, which centered around the wild hog breeding operation. The fact that he was in camo—good for spying on the operation—and found on a path that eventually, albeit circuitously, led to the pens, told me it was something to look into.

I was so deep in thought when I pulled the minivan into the drive that at first I didn't notice vehicles belonging to Bud, Henri, and Will, respectively, parked in the drive. “What the hell,” I said aloud as I pulled around a catering truck and into the garage.

After lowering the door with the remote that still worked despite having been submerged in Pocket Creek, I shoved it back in my purse and opened the door to the kitchen. Delicious aromas enveloped me. “She's home!” Henri called, then disappeared through the swinging door as a chef, complete with tall white h
at, starched tunic, and rotund belly, poured wine into a balloon glass for me.

“Thank you,” I said, glancing around my kitchen. It looked like the set of
The Iron Chef
. Just then Bud busted through the swinging door and, before I could even sip my wine, swept me off my feet and planted a great, big sloppy one square on my lips. It felt so good, I just went with it. When we came up for air, chef and cooking crew applauded! To my great embarrassment, I giggled.

“You're just in time, Mom,” Henri said, apparently having forgotten her recent claim to have had enough of Bud and me. “When Dad let me know he was flying in tonight, I started thinking. Since you both missed my last attempt at letting you sample the wedding food before the big event, I thought tonight would work perfectly. We're serving your favorite, French country cuisine. The one thing you've both actually told me you wanted.” This last she muttered under her breath. “Dinner will be a little later than we expected, but as it turns out, you're both a little late, so it's all good.”

“Dinner?” I said.

“You haven't eaten have you?” she asked anxiously.

“No!” I lied. “I'm famished! Let's do this thing!”

Late that same evening, I dropped an Alka-Seltzer in a glass of water and gulped it down as I enjoyed watching Bud shed his clothes. He tossed them onto the lounge chair in my bedroom and said with a happy grin, “I don't know who's more excited about this event, the kids or us.”

Yeah, that's a tough one.
“Well,” I smiled, still enjoying the show. “I can only say it can't get here soon enough.” Bud narrowed his eyes. “No. I mean it. I can't wait.” I'd never told him about my little catfight with Henri, and didn't plan to. I was just damn glad she'd calmed down, because lately I'd taken to breaking out in a cold sweat at the thought of having to take her place in the slow torture known as wedding planning.

To be honest, no matter how much of my life had been spent as Bud's wife, I could never handle conspicuous consumption. Even after I finally clawed my way to my own financial independence, I wasn't comfortable with throwing money away on such things as five-course meals for five hundred people in a tent fit for a Bedouin sheik set up in … . I suddenly realized I didn't know where the wedding was to be held. Probably a little detail I ought to inquire into.

Had I ever known where it was to be? Probably, but since the where of it wasn't as important to me as the point of it—being with Bud for the rest of my life—I guess I'd forgotten. I didn't have long to ponder the question that night because just then Bud let me know he had other plans for me that didn't involve my memory.

ELEVEN

I'd arrived
at the
site early Friday morning and was on my knees in the doghouse, spinning the dial on the floor safe. I'd left the house before Bud even woke up, wanting to get a jump-start on the day.
The last tumbler fell into place and as I turned the handle I heard Tulip's toenails click on the floor behind me. She'd entered through the open office door. The weather was so gorgeous, I'd left it open. Besides, she likes to come and go as she pleases and conduct her wide patrols. Apparently a canine can never be too careful.

Still crouched, I was shuffling through the logs when she dropped an object beside me.

“Whatcha got there, girl,” I said, setting the papers aside to inspect her find. At first I thought it was the stick she'd pulled from under the tarp at the clay pit yesterday. It didn't take a rocket scientist, or even a geologist, however, to see that it wasn't. It was a fossilized bone. The significance of the find wasn't lost on me either. This was huge!

The object I now held in my hand was a bone from a long-extinct vertebrate. More than that, I couldn't say. Lucky for me, however, I knew lots of paleontologists. Suddenly recalling that one of them, a cl
ose friend, might be in the area, I scooped my iPhone from my purse and pulled up the cell number for Dr. Jonathan Byron Watson.

“Cleo!” he answered brightly. “What a nice surprise.”

“Not nearly the surprise you're going to get when I tell you what I'm holding in my hand,” I said, barely able to contain my excitement.

“Do tell. What
are
you holding?”

“Uh, only the fossilized bone of a large vertebrate!” Stunned silence floated between us. “Watson? Are you there?”

“Yes. Yes, my dear, I'm here. But are you sure?”

“Well, I'm sure it's a fossilized bone,” I said, pacing back and forth across the trailer. “And, considering the environment in these parts back during the Triassic, I'd say it's likely from one of the larger reptiles. Plus, it's remarkable in its detail. I can even make out a trace of where a tendon was attached. The rest, well, that's over my pay grade.”

“I have to see it! Where did you find it? Does anyone else know?”

“I would send you a phone photo, but … ”

“No!” Watson interrupted. “It's too risky!”

“Exactly,” I said. “And to answer your other question, it's hard to say but I believe the only other person who knew about it is dead now … ”

“What?”

“Long story, but for now let's go with the premise that no one else knows about this and keep it that way.”

“My sentiments exactly. Until we know what we're dealing with, of course.”

“When are you coming down here to your research site in the Durham sub-basin?” I asked.

“I'd come tomorrow, but if I cancel a preplanned meeting, well, it might send up a red flag. You know how it is with us old bone hunters. We're a suspicious bunch. It would be better to wait for my next scheduled trip in about a week.”

“How is your Mayfly research going?”

“Terrific. Even better than I expected. But I want to be in on this find, if there is one, of course. And don't worry, you'll get all the credit.”

“That's something we'll have to talk about later.”

“I can't tell you how much this means to me, Cleo, to have something like this as a career topper. You know, old girl, if it does turn out that you've found a complete fossilized skeleton, it will take an entire team of paleontologists, geologists, and archeologists to bring it to light. Why, bringing such a project to fruition will take years!”

“I'm happy and honored to include you,” I said as I sat at my desk, marveling at the wonderful bone before me. “Get back with me when you know your arrival time.”

“Right-O!”

I'd just tapped my phone off when I heard footsteps on the stairs outside the open door.

“Hi!” chirped Sara Lauderbach. “I was hoping you'd be here. Is this a bad time?”

“No. It's not a bad time at all,” I said, sliding the bone under the log sheets on my desk. “In fact, I've been thinking about you.”

“Really?”

She and Clinton had been in the back of my mind ever since I'd found the clay pit. “Sure,” I said. “I wanted to ask how your paper is coming along.”

“That's why I'm here!” she said as if I'd be surprised. “Do you think I could bother that nice man who showed me around last time? I'd like to ask him some technical questions.”

“Let me check and see what he's got going on right now. As long as we aren't having some type of problem with the well, he'd be glad to talk with you.”

“That'd be super!”

“No problem. I'll step out and ask him right now.”

“Want me to come with you?” she asked as I moved to the door.

“If you'd like.” I looked out the open door to the drill pad. “Uh-oh,” I said. “I see they're making a connection right now. Joining another three sections of pipe to the drill string. We should let them finish that first. While we wait, mind if I ask you a question about Clinton?”

“Not at all,” she said, taking a seat on the cot.

“When you guys were little, did you ever play in the woods? You know, build forts, dam up creeks, go exploring, stuff like that?”

“Oh, sure.”

“What about your brothers?”

“The little ones were too small back when Clint and I were kids and my older brother, well, he thought of us as a bad rash. So it was mostly just the two of us. Our favorite game was Lewis and Clark. There's not a part of this farm we don't know.”

“Did you ever find any of the red clay beds, the kind used by the brick makers around here?”

“Yes,” she said. “There's an old brick pit on the farm. Mom hated the day we found that! She'd get so angry at us when we'd come back to the house covered in that red sticky stuff. Even Clorox won't totally wash it out.”

My pulse rate ticked up. “Can you show me?” I asked, moving to a corkboard, which covered most of the wall above my desk. I'd tacked an enlarged copy of the aerial there.

“Wow!” she said. “This is neat! I've never seen the whole farm at one time.” I pointed out a few orienting markers for her like barns, roads, and creeks. “Okay then, the old brick pit would be right about … here in this patch of woods, down in this shallow depression.” She'd pointed to the very spot where Tulip had found the fossilized bone. “I'm told,” she continued, “that my great grandparents used the clay to make the bricks that were used in the foundations of buildings right here on the farm. In fact … oh, wow, you're going to love this … ”

“What?” I prompted.

“Well, there are layers of a red slate-type of rock in the clay. If you break a piece of this slate just right, sometimes you can find little impressions of leaves and bugs and stuff. I even have a few pieces in my room. I haven't thought of doing that in years … ” She grew quiet.

“Do you think Clint did? Remember that slate bed, I mean. Maybe go back and look for more fossils there?”

Sara shrugged. “Honestly, I've been so wrapped up in helping take care of my parents since the accident, I haven't had time to think of much else, but it wouldn't surprise me. He'd become so fascinated by fossils, it seems logical anyway. Why do you ask?”

“Just curious,” I said, then looked back out the door. “Okay. I see the guys are finished with the connection now and I've got to get back to work. I'll take you to Jackie and you can fire away at him with your questions. He loves the opportunity to educate civilians on what a clean source of energy natural gas really is. Then, when you're ready to move on to the next stage of your paper, production and distribution, let me know.”

I put the fossilized bone in the safe and locked it. Then I scurried around, logging in last night's samples and taking care of reports, phone calls to the main office, and the usual morning duties. The timing worked out perfect. Just as I finished, Sara drove her little Nissan past my office window on her way off-site. I strapped on my Beretta, tossed my camera in my field bag, and Tulip and I headed to the clay pit.

I had some documentation to do and I wanted to do it in private.

Instead of going straight to the clay pit, it seemed prudent to first make sure no one was at the hog pens. Besides, I still wanted to know the identity of the man in the green Toyota truck. Did he work for Arthur Lauderbach? Was he in charge of tending the hogs? He certainly didn't look the part.

It took a good half hour of fast walking to make it to the last section of woods, the one that contained the pit and the hog pens. Here I adopted a wary mode. I didn't have to caution Tulip; she was just as anxious as last time we were here.

The North Carolina Wildlife Commission considered feral hogs a serious problem that required drastic measures to correct. Hence the yearlong open hunting season. They carry diseases like hoof and mouth and pseudorabies virus. Some of these diseases can even be transferred to humans, plus they do hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage to crops every year. So why would anyone want to increase their numbers by crossbreeding?

I could only come up with one reason.

To create a larger, more impressive hog to hunt, a trophy hog, if you will. I also had a theory.

Say someone was crossing feral with domestic hogs, then taking the biggest, most fearsome boars and fattening them up, maybe even making them more aggressive with hormones and steroids, and using them as trophies in a
secret
hunting club. Since secrecy would be paramount, guns would not be allowed. Too noisy. Wouldn't that leave only bow hunters as members? Made sense to me.

Made sense, too, that an arrow could have accidentally hit young Clinton on his way to the red beds to look for fossils—wounding but not killing him. It even made some sense that the guilty bow hunter panicked—knowing his missed shot could rain down all manner of crap on everyone involved—and ran away without calling for medical help. That the bow hunter, finding Clinton wasn't dead, finished him off with a knife … now that didn't make sense. Not to me anyway. Unless Clinton recognized him …

With that happy thought in my head and holding Tulip's collar with one hand, I parted thick undergrowth to reveal the hog pens. Damn! The green truck wasn't there. I was hoping to get its tag numbers. Just then, the hogs began to oink and squeal. Crap! I'd forgotten to check wind direction, and they'd picked up my scent. Well, I never claimed to be a hunter. Time to head back the way I'd come.

When I reached
the fork in the trail, I ducked under overhanging limbs and trotted down the path to the pit. The faded
camouflage tarp was still where I remembered it, covering an area of the pit near the edge beside a tall stand of mare's tail weeds. My breath caught in my throat at the thought of what the next few minutes might mean to me and to Watson, but most of all, to Clinton.

Fortunately dry weather, normal for autumn in North Carolina, had been the case lately and the clay wasn't extremely sticky. I moved to each corner of the tarp to see what was securing it to the ground. Twine tied to wooden stakes held it down at three ends, but on the bottom left corner—the one Tulip had rooted under—it was broken. With trembling fingers, I lifted it …

“Well, hello there, Cecil,” I said quietly.

The skull of Cecil, the cartoon dragon that had delighted me as
a child in reruns of the old Bennie and Cecil Show, stared back at me. At least that was my immediate impression. A shaky breath of disbelief escaped me as I knelt for a closer look. My next thought: this find was even bigger than I'd first realized. I was staring at the
intact
skull of a rauisuchian, a meat-eating reptile from the Triassic age.

How did I, an economic geologist, have enough knowledge of large vertebrate fossils—a subject covered many years ago during my undergraduate days—to identify this one? Because a skeleton of this particular type of reptile had been big news back in 1999. A student from UNC had found it while on a paleontological field trip to a brick pit owned by the Triangle Brick Company right here in the Sanford sub-basin. The story had fascinated me then and I'd followed it ever since.

As it turned out, the lizard was one of the most significant fossil finds in the history of the state. Interestingly, by the time the team of experts who took over the recovery and restoration of the fossil had finished their work six years later, they had even learned how the giant lizard met its fate.

The skeletons of several crocodile-like creatures who attacked it lay underneath. Not only that, but the undigested contents of the rauisuchian's belly contained four other specimens. Unfortunately, most of the lizard's skull was missing, accidentally torn away by a dozer. This made Cecil, with his perfectly intact skull, truly unique.

Wanting to take in the entire creature, I untied the bottom right corner of the tarp and folded it above the skeleton. As I did, I wondered if it had been young Clinton who'd placed the tarp here. I really wanted to believe it was.

After all, he knew of the existence of the pit. He was a paleontology major. And, he was in the woods wearing camo. Then I had a thought. Since the tarp was also camo, if I could prove it came from the same place as his clothes, it would go a long ways toward proving that he was the one who'd discovered Cecil. I scanned the tarp and found stenciled on its underside: GI Joes's Army Surplus, Durham, NC. Its faded condition suggested it was at least a couple of years old.

Stepping carefully alongside the skeleton, I positioned myself between his massive legs and gazed at the miracle before me. It was as though the giant beast had just stretched out on the bank of a swamp 250 million years ago, died, and was quickly covered by a mudflow. Or, maybe the mudflow killed him. Whatever. The fact he was still here, perfectly preserved, as though waiting for someone to discover him eons later, was truly … well, I could think of no better word to describe it, miraculous.