The Shadow of Venus (3 page)

“Could she have worked here at some point or been a graduate student?” Claire asked.

“The detective showed me the photo, but I didn't recognize her. She hasn't been an employee or a student at the center since I've been here. I never gave Jane Doe a code, but somebody must have.”

Claire's mood was beginning to feel like she had dressed in scratchy brown burlap. “Wouldn't someone have noticed Jane Doe if she was in the Anderson Reading Room after hours? There are security guards on duty then.”

“There are, but they don't check ID. Suppose they did see Jane Doe and thought she was a grad student or a staff member. Could she have passed for one?”

“Yes. She wasn't outrageously dressed or out of control like Ansia.”

“There are lots of legitimate people who work late in the Anderson Reading Room. Detective Owen is going to show the photo to the guards. Maybe one of them will remember Jane Doe. If the guards find a door open or anything out of order at night they are supposed to report it to me. Every time someone punches in a code anywhere in the center the time and date are recorded. I told Detective Owen
I
would go through the records and see what I could find.”

“If s also possible someone carelessly left the door to the Anderson Reading Room open and Jane Doe let herself in.”

“Well, then, did someone leave the elevator door to the basement open, too? You can't get into the basement without taking the elevator and the elevator won't move unless you enter a code.”

“What's the room she died in like?” Claire asked. Like most people who worked at the library she avoided the utilitarian part of the basement.

Celia shrugged. “Beige. Depressing. There isn't much in there except for empty boxes and dead roaches.”

“That whole part of the basement is depressing, isn't it?”

“Some people think it's enlivened by ghosts,” Celia said. “Supposedly it's haunted by the very first librarian here, who is seen from time to time wandering around in a pinafore dress.”

“Have you ever seen her?” Claire asked.

“Only her shadow.”

“Did Detective Owen tell you about the illustration that was cut out of
Ancient Sites?”

“Yeah. I bet you were thrilled about that.”

“I wasn't happy. I brought in my own copy,” Claire said, opening it to the Spiral Rocks illustration. “It's possible Jane Doe cut out this particular illustration because it meant something to her.”

“The meaning of
those
rocks is obvious, isn't it?” Celia said, raising her thick and luxuriant eyebrows.

“Maybe there's a deeper meaning.”

“So to speak,” Celia laughed. “Why are you so interested in Jane Doe?”

“I met her, or maybe I should say I talked to her. I was standing by the duck pond at dusk last year and she came up and pointed out the Venus-Jupiter conjunction in the evening sky. She told me Venus was so bright it could cast a shadow. She said it was visible in the daytime to those who had eyes to see. Maybe she had an interest in astronomy or archeoastronomy.”

“Maybe,” Celia said. “The person here who knows the most about that subject is Lawton Davis in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences. You should talk to him.”

“I will. I spoke to Jane Doe again at the Jorge Balboa reading,” Claire continued, “when she offered me a seat. Ansia appeared in the doorway and began to recite an ode to heroin, drowning out Jorge Balboa. I got up to close the door and Jane panicked, pushed me aside, and ran out.” Claire didn't repeat the “You look beautiful” remark. She felt foolish doing so in front of Celia.

“Homeless people aren't in the best of mental health,” Celia said. “Maybe Jane suffered from claustrophobia.”

“If
she was claustrophobic, what was she doing in a locked room in the basement?”

“She didn't lock it herself,” Celia said. “The storage rooms have deadbolts that can only be locked with a key. The police didn't find a key inside the room. Trust me, I asked. Paul Begala in maintenance says he always locked that door before he went home and he locked it on Friday night. He didn't realize anybody was inside, he says. When he opened it again on Tuesday morning he found Jane Doe dead.

Because Detective Owen told me to, I'm going to check the records to see who used the code to get into the basement on Friday. But it won't prove anything. Any number of people could have gone down there on Friday. I pointed out to her that the elevator also stops at the stacks.”

“What about the Anderson Reading Room records?”

“I'll check them, too, but I think it will be the same story. The code only needs to be used after hours, but everybody who works or studies here has a legitimate reason to use the Anderson Reading Room day or night. I have to go.” Celia raised her eyes to the ceiling. “I have a meeting with Harrison.”

Harrison Hough, their prickly boss, was difficult in the best of times. “I suppose he's going to get on your case about Jane Doe entering the basement.”

“I suppose he is,” Celia replied.

Chapter
Four

C
ELIA RETURNED TO
C
LAIRE
'
S OFFICE JUST BEFORE NOON
, scowling in imitation of a disgruntled Harrison. “What did he say?” Claire asked.

“ ‘We must get to the bottom of this.' ”

“He has a knack for stating the obvious.”

“I was planning to go through the records, anyway. Here's what I discovered. There were three incidents this spring when security reported to me that they found the door to the Anderson Reading Room open at night but no one inside. On all three occasions the code of a doctoral candidate named Seth Malcolm had been entered. He could easily have left the door open for Jane Doe on his way out.”

“Did he use the elevator last Friday?”

“Several times. The last entry was at five
P
.
M
. I need to talk to Seth. He's not entitled to do his research here if he's been breaking library rules.”

“I want to be there when you talk to him.”

That remark elevated Celia's eyebrows. “Why?”

“I need to find out if he's responsible for the stolen illustration.”

“Do you know him?”

“We've met.” Claire remembered Seth as a lanky, preppy-looking student with long bangs and a nervous gesture of shaking them out of his eyes.

“He's writing his dissertation on Tobiah James, and that gives him access to the stacks, the Anderson Reading Room, and everyplace else in the library.”

Claire knew Tobiah James as an Easterner of independent means who wandered New Mexico in the early twentieth century studying the Pueblo Indians, sketching, and taking voluminous notes.

They discussed where to meet Seth. Claire was in favor of somewhere far away from campus where they wouldn't run into anybody they knew.

“But then I'd have to explain why I want to see him,” Celia said. “I want to surprise him with what I know.”

“What about Detective Owen? Won't she want to talk to him?” Claire asked.

“Sure, but I want to do it first. As Harrison just reminded me, supervising the codes is my responsibility. It's my job that's on the line here. We'd be better off hiding in plain sight someplace nearby. Then Seth won't suspect it's a big deal. He'll think I'm just assigning him a new code. How about
the
Frontier?”

It was a popular restaurant right across Central from the university. “All right,” Claire said.

******

Celia left a note in Seth's box asking him to meet her there the following afternoon. She and Claire arrived on time, sat at the window, and watched the street life pass by on Central while they waited for Seth to show up. As the time dragged on Claire asked Celia how she would interpret Seth's tardiness.

Celia's voice was acerbic with sarcasm. “Let me see. He got wrapped up in his work and forgot? He doesn't wear a watch? He thinks his time is more valuable than ours? He's a space case? He doesn't want to meet me because he's feeling guilty or embarrassed?”

“Is he a New Mexican?” Claire asked. New Mexicans were known for their elastic sense of time. Trying to get two New Mexicans together could take all day.

“No. He's from the East,” Celia replied. “He got his B.A. in American Studies from Boston University.”

“What brought him to UNM?”

“He got a fellowship to pursue a doctorate on Tobiah James. James was also from the East. Maybe Seth felt a connection. His advisor told me that he hasn't been doing his work and is in danger of losing his fellowship.”

“He's been seen doing research, hasn't he?”

“He's been spending time in the library, but he hasn't been turning in his papers.”

“Which raises the question of whether he was doing something else in the library.”

“Like stealing illustrations?” Celia asked.

“It's possible,” Claire said.

While Celia poured sugar into her espresso, Claire looked out the window and noticed Seth dodging traffic as he crossed the street. In the carnival atmosphere of Central Avenue, he looked alien in his khakis and white shirt with the collar open and the sleeves buttoned at the wrist. His preppy way of dressing made him stand out, reminding Claire of the way Jane Doe's pallid neatness made her stand out. Their very inconspicuousness made them conspicuous. Claire watched Seth slouch as he walked with his head down and his hands in his pockets. The mother in her wanted to admonish him to straighten up.

“Here he comes,” she said to Celia.

“At that speed it'll be another twenty minutes before he gets inside,” Celia replied. She went to the door and waved to Seth. When he didn't respond, she yelled at him. He looked up and quickened his pace.

After he entered the restaurant he went to the counter, got himself a Coke, and brought it over to
the
table. Before he sat down he took off his backpack and put it on the floor. His bangs separated as he bent over to sip the Coke, revealing a premature white streak in his mouse brown hair.

Celia introduced Claire.

“We've met, haven't we?” he asked. “Aren't you the rare-book expert?”

“Yes.”

“What's this about?” he asked Celia. “Are you assigning me a new code?”

“Have you heard about the woman who was found dead in the storage room?”

“Yeah. Sure. Of course. Hasn't everybody?”

“Did you know her?”

“She hasn't been identified. So how could I say whether I knew her or not?”

“I'll ask the investigating officer to show you her photo,” Claire said.

Seth's eyes widened as if the words “investigating officer” had set off an alarm. He turned back to his Coke and it gurgled as he sucked on the straw.

“I met Jane Doe,” Claire said. “I can describe her if that would help you to identify her.”

“Sure. Why not?” Seth said.

“She was in her late teens or early twenties. Her hair was thin and brown, shoulder length, very straight. She had high cheekbones and would have been quite striking if she had tried to be. She wore a pale dress on the occasions I saw her. Her appearance and demeanor were quiet and unobtrusive.”

Seth's eyes darted from Claire to Celia like a moth seeking the warmest place to light. Eventually they settled on the woman who had asked the question—Claire.

“I hope it wasn't her, but it sounds like Maia,” he said. “She was a homeless person who hung out in the library. She told me she spent her nights at the Hope Central Shelter. She was quiet, the kind of person who could study in the same room with you all day and you'd never notice her. Once I went outside to have a cigarette. She was sitting on the steps and we started talking. She was smart, very interested in learning. She would have made an excellent student if UNM would ever have admitted her.”

“Did she tell you why she was homeless?” Claire asked.

Seth shrugged. “All she ever said was that Coyote chased her and she ran away. In Greek mythology Maia is one of the seven daughters of Atlas and Pleione who became the constellation Pleiades. The sisters were pursued by Orion, the hunter, who saw them walking in the woods and fell in love with them. They escaped into the sky. Maia never told me where she came from or if that was her given name.”

“What did she mean by Coyote?” Claire asked.

“I don't know.”

“Did she tell you about the role Maia played in mythology?” Claire suspected a Ph.D. candidate
would
want to show off his knowledge and she was right.

“She didn't have to tell me about Greek mythology,” Seth said. “I already knew.”

“Did you let her into the Anderson Reading Room?” was Claire's next question.

Seth shook his head and his bangs fell down across his forehead. “I wouldn't do that. If I did, I would lose my fellowship.”

The records were Celia's department. Her bangle bracelets clinked as she placed her hands on the table and confronted Seth. “You checked into the Anderson Reading Room after hours on three nights this spring when security later reported to me that the door had been left open.”

“I use the Anderson Reading Room at night. It's the best time for me to work. I don't remember ever using it when I was the only one there. Anybody could have forgotten to shut the door when he or she went out.”

“A Quentin Valor illustration from
Ancient Sites
by Thomas Duval was found in the room with Maia. Are you familiar with that book?” Claire asked. She watched indecision play across Seth's face as if he was debating whether he wanted to appear knowledgeable or not.

Knowledge won out. “Of course,” Seth said. “The book is a classic. Every student of the Southwest knows that book.”