Evil Breeding

Cambridge rumor, certain dedicated birders had keys to the cemetery that enabled their fortunate bearers to observe birds at dawn, listen for night fowl, and otherwise pursue feathers and cheeps when Mount Auburn was closed to the public.
    “Don’t ask him that!” Rita was adamant. “What if he doesn’t? I think it’s only important birders who have keys. I don’t know whether he’s that important. He might be embarrassed to say so.” She paused. “Maybe this whole thing is a mistake.”
    “No, it isn’t. Really, Rita, it will be all right. No dog talk, no veterinary talk, nothing psychological, no keys.” With the kind of smirk Rita feared, I added, “We’ll just be ourselves.”
    When Artie Spicer arrived, he wasn’t at all what I expected. I’d imagined him as tall and hawklike, with a small head and long arms spread like wings. I guess I was afraid he’d make a predatory swoop at Rita. In fact, he was of medium height and had a burly build and a round face. His neatly trimmed lull beard blended into his short, curly hair. The conventional way to describe the color of both would be salt-and-pepper. To my eye, however, his hair and whiskers were a reassuringly familiar dark wolf gray.
    In agonizing over the choice of a restaurant, Rita had been determined to avoid anything “too Cambridge,” whatever that meant. Balsamic vinegar? Anything “too ethnic” was out. Despite his name, Artie Spicer might not like Thai peppers or authentic curries. High prices could scare him off. Dives and greasy spoons, however, were unacceptable. She finally settled on an upscale Japanese restaurant within the city limits, yet somehow not “too Cambridge,” and in Rita’s view not “too ethnic,” either. It was actually a good choice. Rita had made a reservation for the traditional section, so we had to take off our shoes and sit with our stocking feet in a little pit under the low table. The need to remove pieces of clothing and then wiggle into seats on the floor created an informal, almost intimate, atmosphere. Steve, who sat next to me, was probably uncomfortable; his legs were long for the small space. As usual, though, he was a good sport. He and Rita enthusiastically ordered sushi. Instead of embarrassing Rita by announcing that I’d just as soon swallow live goldfish as let bits of raw tuna and, oh yuck, eel—snake! raw snake!—pass my lips, I quietly asked for miso soup and shrimp tempura. Looking relieved, Artie Spicer, who sat across from me, gave me a conspiratorial little smile and did the same.
    Because the birding group at Mount Auburn was what Rita and Artie had in common, the talk started there and soon moved to the murder of Peter Motherway. By then, the soup and appetizers had arrived. The death by garroting of a man whose body had been left in a cemetery didn’t hit me as any more tasteful than the topics Rita had banned, but she didn’t glare at me or kick me under the table, and Artie did look interested.
    “Are people allowed near the Gardner vault again?” I asked. “Or do the police have it sealed off?”
    Rita and Artie exchanged a glance. He answered. “I didn’t see any sign of the police this morning.”
    “Neither did I,” Rita agreed. “Everything looked back to normal.”
    “What’s not clear to me,” Artie said, “is how anyone got in. Must’ve been in the night, Tuesday night. I’d’ve thought the guards would be around. I asked one of them. All he said was they didn’t see anything, and they can’t be everywhere at once. It’s a big place. Anyone have any idea why he picked the Gardner vault?”
    “I keep thinking about the robbery,” Rita said. “But I don’t know what connection there could be.”
    “I met Peter Motherway,” I told Artie. Heavily censoring references to dogs, I outlined the circumstances. “His father is a retired teacher of art history,” I said. “The house is like a museum, but it’s nothing like the Gardner Museum. It’s all Early American. Paintings. Furniture. Silver.” In deference to Rita, I refrained from mentioning what seemed to me the odd absence of any kind of dog art. The colonists didn’t like dogs, I reminded myself; in their art, dogs appeared only in the occasional family portrait. If Motherway had collected Egyptian art, the absence of dogs would’ve been strange; in his collection, it made sense. “And Peter didn’t strike me as a museum type,” I added. “But I didn’t really know him. It’s