One Grave Too Many

“That makes sense. I’ve been calling people all day to make sure that I found what I think I did, and I also took the liberty of inviting an expert out to the museum—I’m flying her in from New York.”
    “New York?” She almost gasped. It was not like Korey to do such a thing without asking her.
    “I also know what this moving-the-museum thing is all about.”
    “You do? You know why Mark Grayson wants to sell the museum?”
    “I know why he wants to buy it. Those.” He nodded his head toward the wall murals. “It turns out they were painted by a relatively little-known artist named Robert Camden, who died at the turn of the century at the age of ninety-one. The tiny unicorns in his paintings were one of his trademarks. He may have been little known then, but like our friend here . . .”—he pointed to the pteranodon above them—“the value of his paintings has soared. They’re now selling for several million dollars apiece.” He turned his head again to Diane. “And we have twelve of them.”
    Diane stood and walked over to the painting—a huge brontosaurus, head held high on his long neck, walking and dragging his tail. Between his front feet, almost obscured by the dust he created with each step, was a small unicorn. The detail of the painting was remarkable. The brontosaurus’ hide was painted like the skin of an elephant, with all the lines and wrinkles and shades of gray. The distant mountains had such clarity and distinction that Diane thought she could probably find them somewhere if she tried.
    Korey joined her standing by the painting.
    “You’re not joking, are you?” she asked.
    “Nope. I found the initial sketches of the paintings and a reference to the painter in the material we gathered from the basement, and, I don’t know, something just clicked in my head. Wouldn’t it be interesting to find out about him, you know, have an exhibit of the drawings and the man? I made some calls to friends in art conservation and they referred me to several other experts, who were all quite excited, let me tell you. A woman is coming down from the Metropolitan Museum of Art tomorrow to have a look at them.”
    “It’s a good thing we built a railing to keep wandering hands off the walls,” said Diane.
    Korey nodded. “I think we’ll have to do more. I was thinking a Plexiglas wall, so no one can get under the railings.”
    “I can’t believe this,” said Diane. “When they were found, didn’t anyone investigate their origin?”
    “From what I can find out, Milo asked someone from the art department at Bartrum University to come over and have a look. He declared them interesting.”
    “But Signy Grayson recognized them.” Diane recalled the snatch of conversation she heard between Signy and her husband—“If it weren’t for me, you wouldn’t even know about them.”
    “Yes,” Korey said, “I think her husband was going to buy the museum building through one of his companies. I believe when you sell buildings, certain things always go with the building—like the walls and anything attached to them. At any rate, he’d have the contract written so he’d get the paintings for a fraction of their value. And if it was true about the golf course . . .”
    “You know about that rumor?”
    “It’s hard to keep secrets in a place like this. Everyone’s been worried about their jobs.”
    “I’m sorry about that. I never had any intention of selling the museum.”
    “Some were afraid you’d be forced to.”
    “It would take some serious errors or malfeasance on my part for them to be able to unseat me. They were trying. That’s what all those extra supply orders were about.”
    “How far did they expect to get, ordering extra paper clips?”
    “They also sent orders out for a duplicate set of these guys.” She pointed at the dinosaurs.
    “That’d be a lot of money, but as soon as the Bickford called . . .”
    “Exactly. The person who did the ordering didn’t understand the process. He didn’t know they would have to call about details of the order.”
    “This campaign doesn’t seem well thought-out on their part,” said Korey.
    “I believe that’s because it was carried out by several people. The extra orders, I think, were done at the instigation of someone who worked with Grayson. I believe Grayson and his cronies were doing other things that might very well have had an impact.”
    “Like what?”
    Diane went back to the bench and sat down. She was