Having dumped her problem in my lap, Detective Hrivnak departed for her office, escorted downstairs by Eric, who still looked scared to death of her. He’d had some minor run-ins with the law before he came to work at the Society, so I could understand why he was spooked. He returned quickly. “Anything I need to know about, Nell?” he asked.
“No. And don’t worry—it’s not anything bad. She actually asked for my help on something.”
“It have to do with that poor guy who died?”
“I think so, but I’m not sure yet. I’m going to have to think about it. Could you close the door again?”
When he was gone, I sat sipping my tepid coffee and thinking, as I had told Eric. All right, the dead man had had in his pocket a grubby metal object that appeared to be brass when polished. The bartender said he and Scruggs thought it looked old, but they weren’t exactly experts. Then a stranger had walked in and agreed with them, and the stranger and Scruggs had gone off into the night. The bartender hadn’t recognized the stranger, and didn’t have a clue about what qualifications he had to judge random pieces of metal. Not much later, Scruggs had ended up dead in a rather peculiar accident.
I tried to work out a path for poor Carnell Scruggs. He had left the Society at the end of the workday and had apparently gone straight to a pub on Chestnut—only about three blocks away from the Society, toward the north. He had eaten a meal, had a couple of beers, and been befriended by a someone who left the bar with him. It was not clear whether they had stayed together outside the bar, or gone their separate ways. Then the plot got murky: Detective Hrivnak had told me that Scruggs lived a few blocks to the south of the Society, so it was somewhat logical that he might have walked by there on his way home from the bar. Regardless of why he was there, it was when he was near the Society that he had fallen or been pushed in front of an oncoming car and died. The metal object, whatever it was, had not been found on the body, or anywhere around it, although his wallet had remained intact. Was that important or incidental? Maybe he’d given or sold the metal thing to the stranger, maybe his new friend had stolen it, or maybe he’d dropped it somewhere or tossed it away after losing interest in it. I trusted Detective Hrivnak enough to believe that if her crew hadn’t been thorough in their first search earlier, they were going to scour the route Carnell Scruggs had followed now, looking for “an old, flat, curly metal thing.”
Much as I hated to admit it, now that we knew the man had been at the Society on the day he died, the odds were pretty good that he had found this object in the building. From the vague description it certainly didn’t sound like something a man like Scruggs would ordinarily carry around with him. The problem was, the Society had plenty of old, flat, curly things, and they were scattered all over the building. And Carnell Scruggs could have gone more or less anywhere, once he’d signed in, although I had no reason to believe he left the area where he was working. As Hrivnak had reported it, it seemed as though he hadn’t known what it was he’d found. It sounded like something he had just picked up and absently stuck in his pocket. He might not even have looked at that as theft. So where had it come from?
Duh. Scruggs had been part of the crew in the basement. That was the only work going on the day Carnell Scruggs had died. I needed to talk with Joe Logan, the head of the construction crew. I called down to Bob at the desk. “Has the construction crew come in yet?”
“Sure, they were here at seven thirty,” he told me.
“Where are they now?”
“In the basement.”
“Thanks, Bob.” I sat for a moment, trying to frame what questions I wanted to ask without sounding like I was accusing anyone of petty theft. Then I stood up and walked out to the hall. “Eric, I’m going to go downstairs and talk to the construction guys. I’m not expecting anyone, am I?”
“No, ma’am, you’re clear.”
“Okay. I don’t know how long I’ll be, but I won’t leave the building without telling you.”
I took the poky elevator down to the basement. It was easy to tell where the crew was working, because they were making a lot of noise. That wouldn’t make the patrons above them in the reading room happy when they arrived, but they’d been warned about the construction more than once, and there was nothing to be done about it. I followed the noise and recognized Joe Logan, but not any of the workers. I approached Joe and said loudly, “Can I talk to you?”
“Yeah, sure. Let’s take this outside.” He nodded toward the door I’d entered through.
We moved out into the hall, where the noise level was much lower. “This about the noise?” he asked.
“No, I expected that.” I moved a little farther down the hall, so no one could overhear. “What can you tell me about Carnell Scruggs?”
“Carnell? Poor guy—never could catch a break. He wasn’t part of the regular crew, but he was usually available on short notice for pickup jobs—I’ve hired him before, short-term, because I wanted to help him out. Terrible thing, what happened. The guy was a little short of a full deck, if you know what I mean, but he was willing and dependable, if you told him what to do. Why you want to know?”
I wanted to say, Because he’s dead, you dope, but I didn’t. “Was he a good worker?”
“Yeah, sure. Not the fastest guy, but he was careful, and he cleaned up after. I had no complaints about him, hired him when I could, like I said.”
“He was working down here the day he died?”
“Yeah. He helped clear out that hole we found.”
Lightbulb moment: What if the curly thing had come from The Pit?
“Where did the stuff you pulled out of it go?”
“You asked us to keep it, so we dumped it in a box, or maybe two—it’s around here somewhere. Wasn’t much down there, mostly trash. Old trash, though. A couple of bottles, broken stuff. Nothing modern, like no plastics. We figured the hole had been covered up a while ago, and then people had put stuff like cabinets on top of it and forgotten about it.”
“Any sign that it had been opened before you found it?”
“Nope, not for a long time. Lots of dust and stuff.”
“Who else was working on clearing it out?”
“I dunno—two, three guys? We didn’t get around to clearing it out until the end of the day, and everybody wanted to get home. I didn’t check to see who did what by then, but I know it got done.”
“How’d you get the stuff out? Was it big enough for someone to fit down there?”
“Just. Carnell was the smallest guy, so we sent him down.”
Bingo! I said to myself.
Joe went on, “Even he could barely bend down to reach his feet. Then he passed whatever he could reach out to the guys at the top. Good thing there wasn’t a lot more, because he wasn’t too happy about it. Didn’t like feeling all closed in.”
I wondered briefly if Hrivnak would send a forensic team to do a proper excavation and analysis of the pit, then almost laughed out loud. The construction foreman was telling me that our dead man had been in the hole on his last day, but we knew that the man had been killed outside. If—still an if—whatever he had carried away had come from the hole, how was I supposed to convince the Philadelphia Police Department that spending time and money on examining the pit would be of any use? I’d have to settle for seeing whatever else had been pulled up at the time.
Joe Logan was getting twitchy. “We about done here? Because we’ve got a lot to do if you want this project to stay on schedule.”
I turned my attention back to him. “Oh, sorry, yes. Thanks for answering my questions. Are you going to be heading up this project until it’s finished?”
“Yeah, for the construction part. The shelving and HVAC stuff, that gets contracted out.” He led me back to the room where we had started and pointed toward a couple of covered Bankers Boxes shoved in a corner. “There, that’s the stuff from the hole.”
“Would you mind having someone bring it up to my office? That would be a big help.” I wasn’t sure I wanted the mess in my more-or-less-pristine office, but I was worried that the boxes would somehow disappear if I didn’t keep my eye on them. After all, they might contain evidence of a murder. If they didn’t, I promised myself that I would get rid of them.
Joe assigned one of his men to pick up the boxes—which he did as though they weighed no more than his lunch—and he followed me to the elevator, rode up, and then trailed behind me to my office.
I thought I recognized him from my first visit to the basement. “I’m sorry—I never learned your name.”
“I’m Frank. Ritter. Nice place you’ve got here.”
“Thank you, Frank. You can put the boxes anywhere. Were you there when Carnell was clearing out that pit?”
“Yeah, I was there. Awful thing, that. He was an okay guy. He wasn’t real happy about getting more dirt on him, but he did what he was asked.”
“Do you guys get paid daily? Like, at the end of the day?”
“Mostly. Scruggs got paid that day because there wasn’t any more work for him. Was he robbed?”
“I don’t know. He still had his wallet, anyway. Well, thanks for carrying the boxes for me. Was there anything interesting down there, do you know?”
The man shrugged. “Can’t really say. Mostly dirt and broken stuff, as far as I could see. But you wanted it, so here it is. That all?”
I wondered if he was surly or just naturally brusque. “Did you know Scruggs well? Outside of work, maybe?”
He shrugged. “Carnell? Worked with him now and then. Can’t say we were friends—didn’t hang out after work or anything like that. I’m sorry he got killed.”
“What was he like?”
The man scrunched up his face as if it was hard to picture a man he’d seen only two days earlier. “Quiet, like. Kept to himself. Showed up on time, worked hard, left.”
“So you didn’t all get a drink on the way home?”
“Nah, nothing like that. He was kind of a loner. Look, I gotta get back downstairs.” He shifted from foot to foot.
“Go ahead. Thanks for helping me with this.”
“No problem.” He turned to leave, and I motioned to Eric to see him out. That left me sitting in my office staring at a pair of dirty boxes making dents in my nice carpet.
What now? Call Hrivnak and tell her she should look at the contents? She’d laugh at me. Dig into it myself? But I wasn’t even sure what I was looking for, and I was afraid if there was anything fragile in there, I might do more harm than good. I stalked around the boxes like I was circling my prey, and that’s when Eric returned.
“What’re you doing?” he asked, looking bewildered.
“I’m not sure. This is the stuff that came out of the hole in the basement. I’m wondering if maybe the man who died outside the building might have found something in the pit and taken it away with him, and that’s what got him killed. But now I’m afraid to look.”
Eric still looked confused. “Sorry, but you’re going to have to back up a few steps. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I mean, I know about that poor man, but why would he find anything in the building here?”
I realized that I hadn’t told him about the conversation I’d had with Hrivnak. I didn’t recall her saying that I couldn’t talk to people about what we’d discussed. Did that mean I could ask my colleagues to help? I didn’t feel I had to explain to all the staff, but Shelby would want to know because she was a friend and as development director she had access to a lot of the older records for the Society, and Lissa had already heard my suspicions and was looking into the history of privies. Marty marched to her own drummer and would no doubt show up and know more than I did, but I could talk to her later. I made my decision. “Eric, could you call Shelby and Lissa, if she’s in the building, and ask them to join me here?”
“Yes, ma’am.” He hurried to his desk.
I hoped I was doing the right thing. This wouldn’t count as interfering with a police investigation, would it? If we found anything that might have a bearing on the man’s death, of course I’d tell the police ASAP. But other than that, all we were doing was going through a heap of old trash from the basement. Did that make it a de facto part of the Society’s collections? I briefly considered adding Latoya to the group, to represent the collections side of things, but rejected it on the grounds that trash, no matter how historic, was definitely not her kind of thing. If we found anything that needed analysis or identification, I could bring her in then, I reasoned.
“They’re both on their way, Nell,” Eric reported a minute later.
“Great. Look, I want you to come in, too—saves me repeating everything. You can hear the phones from here anyway.”
Shelby had only to walk down a short hall, so she arrived promptly; Lissa appeared a minute later. “Haven’t seen much of you this week, lady,” Shelby said to me.
“I know—sorry. But in case you haven’t noticed, we’ve had a few small crises.” Like a body on the street, and multiple visits from Detective Hrivnak. I knew I could count on Shelby to understand—we’d puzzled through a couple of earlier “crises” together.
“I hear you. I assume you need our help? What’s up?” Shelby asked. “And what’s that all about?” she added, pointing to the boxes in the middle of the floor.
“Ooh, is that what they pulled from the privy?” Lissa said, looking eager.
Shelby turned to her and made a face. “Privy? Is that what it sounds like?”
“Sure is. Don’t worry, it’s clean,” Lissa told her.
“Okay, gang, listen up,” I said. “Detective Hrivnak told me this morning that Carnell Scruggs, the man who died, apparently left here after work and went to a bar a couple of blocks away on Chestnut Street, where he showed the bartender something small and made of brass that he pulled out of his pocket. It may be a stretch, but I’m guessing that it was something he found here. The construction foreman Joe Logan tells me that Mr. Scruggs was working on the basement cleanout before he died, specifically in the pit—he was the one they sent down to clean it out. These boxes here contain whatever stuff they found down there. I asked the crew to save it, in the interest of preserving our history.” Smart move, in hindsight, although not for the reasons I had expected.
“Is that all of it?” Lissa said, sounding disappointed.
“That’s what I was told.”
“And we care about this why?” Shelby asked, still looking confused.
“While the late Mr. Scruggs was showing this object he found to the bartender, someone else started talking to him about it, and they left together. I’m wondering if the second guy had reason to think that object meant something important. Whatever it was, Carnell Scruggs didn’t have it on him when he died, so either he lost it on his way home, which could have taken him down Thirteenth Street outside, gave or sold it to this mysterious stranger, or that the stranger took it from him. That’s why I want to know what’s in that box of stuff. If we find something similar and it’s nothing important, we can go back to business as usual. If there is something, we turn it over to the police as a clue. Everyone okay with that?”
Shelby gave me a searching look. “What’re you thinking? You’re guessing that this has something to do with why the man ended up dead?”
Well, yes, but that was a can of worms I didn’t want to open. I chose my words carefully. “The police are treating this publicly as a tragic accident, but since Detective Hrivnak is on the case, they must think there’s more to it. They have no evidence to suggest anything else. However, the object that Carnell Scruggs had in his pocket is a wild card here, so if it came from the Society, I want to know what it is.”
Nods all around. “What’re we looking for?” Eric asked.
“I don’t really know,” I said. “Something that survived being down in that pit for who knows how long—the foreman said everything that they pulled out was from a pre-plastic era, and Lissa can tell us when that hole in the ground would have been closed up. Hrivnak said the bartender described it as a few inches long, metal, maybe brass, flat, and curly.”
Shelby grinned. “So we’re looking through old trash for something flat and curly. Beats writing begging letters any day.”
“From 1907 or earlier,” Lissa said. “That’s when construction was finished here, that time around.”
“Let me get something to cover the floor,” Eric volunteered, “so then you can spread everything out.”
“Thanks, Eric.” He disappeared down the hall, and I turned to Shelby and Lissa. “Who said working here was dull?”
“Do you seriously think that this trash has anything to do with the man’s death?” Lissa asked.
“You know, Nell,” Shelby said, her tone skeptical, “traffic accidents happen all the time in the city.”
“I know that, Shelby, but I don’t believe it was just a random traffic accident. I swear I’m not looking for trouble. But you all know that it seems to find me.”
“Does that detective think there’s something suspicious about Mr. Scruggs’s death?” Lissa asked.
“She hasn’t said so, not in so many words, but I think she has doubts about the accident theory, too. She made sure to tell me that the man fell backward into the street, in front of that car.”
“Oh,” Shelby said, quick to grasp the significance of that. “She thinks he was pushed?”
“Officially this is still an accident. But if we brought her some new information, I think she’d listen. All I’m trying to do now is eliminate one possibility and make sure that the Society is in the clear.”
“What does Mr. Agent Man think?” Shelby asked.
“He thinks this is not his problem, and he has faith that I can handle this all by myself. He doesn’t know all the details.”
Eric returned with an aged drop cloth that was already dirty—perfect. He knelt and spread it out on the floor, then looked at me. “Should I hunt down some gloves?”
“Ladies?”
The women both shook their heads.
I waved a magnanimous hand. “Then dig in. Just try not to break anything—if there’s anything breakable in there. And watch out for splinters and broken glass, please.”
“What about spiders?” Shelby asked with a wicked grin.
“Don’t even go there!” We all knelt around the battered boxes, as if worshiping at some obscure shrine. I figured I had first rights, so I reached in and pulled out . . . a broken fountain pen. I laid it carefully on the drop cloth. “Next?”
We went round and round the group a few times. The boxes emptied, and the pile of detritus on the floor grew. We’d nearly reached the bottom when Lissa stopped and pointed. “There. It’s metal, flat, and curly.”
We all peered into the depth of the box, and I reached in and pulled out . . . a flat, curly piece of metal. I laid it on a clear patch of the drop cloth and we all stared at it.