Dust to Dust

unusual,” said Jonas. “Why is that a big deal?”
    Diane turned the face around. “The nose and mouth area is solid, no breathing holes. I know they could have been sculpted shut afterward, but Marcella would have realized that too. There was some other reason she wanted me to look at this. She also said to look at pieces she hadn’t put together yet.”
    “Are you saying this might be a death mask?” said Jonas. He put his hands on his hips and looked at her with a great deal of skepticism. “You know, she may have just been worried about preserving her work. Marcella is very dedicated.”
    “I know she is, and I’m not saying this is a death mask. I’m just saying Marcella wanted me to take a look,” said Diane. “If she were concerned only that her work was being cared for, she would not have asked me to take a look. I know nothing about pottery. I do know about other things, and I believe that’s why she wanted me to look at it.”
    Diane began pulling out all the boxes that held the pieces she assumed belonged with the mask. Jonas helped her clear space in the office to work, piling some of Marcella’s books and papers on the floor beside her desk.
    “I called it a mask,” said Diane, “but according to her notes, Marcella thinks the piece might be a stylized pitcher—the liquid would be poured out of the eyes. Not a functional use, I imagine.”
    “But interesting symbolism,” commented Jonas. “Especially if . . .” He let the sentence hang.
    Diane carefully lifted out the potsherds still resting on their backing of paper.
    “These single pieces were surrounding the face in the sandbox on her worktable. Marcella placed them on this paper and drew an outline around each piece. Presumably they are all part of the same set,” she said, looking at Jonas.
    “Okay, let’s see what we have here,” said Jonas. “She’d have sorted and examined all of them first. You may find more information in her computer. She has a pretty sophisticated three-dimensional program she uses to assist in reconstructing pots.”
    “Do you know how to use the program?” asked Diane.
    “You want me to take a look?” he said.
    “Would you?”
    “Sure,” he agreed. “I imagine you guys have one similar to it up there.” He looked up with his eyes, indicating the crime lab on the floor above.
    “I have one in the osteology lab for skull reconstruction,” Diane said.
    As she conversed with Jonas about the merits of computer programs, Diane examined the sherds. A few had imprints reflecting irregularities similar to what might appear on the back of a shaved human head.
    In the second sample she unpacked were three pieces that immediately caught her eye—broken fragments, each with a protrusion. She picked them up and examined them and then fit them together. Diane had made many casts of skulls for her forensic cases and she recognized what she was looking at—the cast of a sharp-force-trauma wound.
    “Well, damn.This is what Marcella was concerned about.” Diane showed it to Jonas and explained what it was.
    He examined the piece under the light and with the microscope, then stood up. “This is terrible, just terrible. Couldn’t it be something else?” he said.
    “I don’t know. Maybe,” said Diane. She looked at all the broken pieces laid out on the table. “It looks like the potter sculpted the clay around a head. How did he get it off?”
    “Cut it in half,” said Jonas. “Artists sculpting in clay will often create a work, then cut it in half so they can scoop out the center clay. Thick pieces of clay tend to blow up or crack in the kiln, so they scoop out the inside to make it hollow and then they put the pieces back together and sculpt over the seam. This artist could have sculpted the clay around the head to get the form he wanted, then cut the clay into pieces to remove it from the head, and then put the pieces back together to make the piece whole again.”
    “I see why this was on her mind,” said Diane, almost to herself. “It may not be involved in what happened to her, but it still needs to be looked into.”
    As Diane was leaving the hospital room, Marcella had said the word artist . Diane assumed she meant “Find the artist.” She wondered now if Marcella meant she had already found the artist? Could these pieces be younger than they thought? She would get Hanks to ask Marcella.
    “Do you think you could reconstruct the whole pot—pitcher—whatever it is?” she