War and Peas

fortune.“
    “Who else heard this man talking to Sharlene?“ Babs asked.
    Jane shrugged. “Anybody might have. They were in that room just off the entry. There are lots of exhibit cases in there. I stayed behind the one I was looking at simply because I didn’t want to intrude.”
    Babs shook her head. “No, it doesn’t make sense. Even I knew about legumes and nitrogen, but I can almost promise you that nobody involved with the museum is an expert on genetics and DNA.“
    “But an outsider might be,“ Shelley said. “An outsider wouldn’t know about the pea bin in the basement,“ Babs said.
    “I’m not sure you’d have to be an expert,“ Jumper said. “It’s not an area of the law I’ve had reason to study, but my guess is that if you had possession of the peas, you could hire an expert. Or turn the matter over to an interested scientific facility under a royalty arrangement. But you said it was during the Depression that the family grew the peas. Even if there were still seeds around, would they grow?“
    “How long do peas remain viable?“ Babs asked, probably knowing nobody had the answer.
    Shelley spoke up. “I don’t know about peas, but some grains will grow after hundreds of years.“
    “And even if you couldn’t grow them, you might be able to clone cells to determine the genetic makeup,“ Jumper said. “Could that be why somebody tore up the basement the other day—looking for that ledger?“
    “I’d wondered that, too,“ Jane said.
    “And if he or she went back to search again—“ Jumper went on.
    “Derek might have found the searcher—“ Shelley said.
    “Or been the searcher,“ Jumper amended. “What if he’d overheard the conversation about the special pea and gone down to look a couple days ago? Then, when I told him that he wasn’t going to be appointed director, he went back to make a more thorough search so he could steal the peas before he left?”
    Jane shook her head. “No, I don’t think so. There would be no reason for someone to kill him just because he was looking for the pea ledger. Unless he was in it with someone else.“
    “Like Georgia,“ Shelley said.
    “We have turned into ghouls,“ Babs said. “This is all wild, irresponsible speculation. And it’s not our job. It’s up to the police.“
    “True,“ Jumper said, chastened by her tone. “But it’s up to us to tell them all we know. And part of what we know is the relationships of the people here at the Snellen.“
    “Yes, of course. I’m sorry. Old-lady nerves,“ Babs said. “All right. Let’s don’t wander off into a science none of us knows anything about. Justlook at the overall picture. If Derek’s death actually did have something to do with the peas, and if we assume that his death and Regina’s are connected in some way—“
    “I think that’s a logical assumption,“ Jumper said. “I can’t believe we have two murderers operating independently.“
    “—then what has Regina got to do with the pea—what was it called? Little Beauty? That’s impossible. Nobody had ever heard about it until after Regina was dead.”

Nineteen

    Jane excused herself, theoretically to visit the rest room, actually to get away from the others in the hope that her own mind would clear. It seemed that no matter how they looked at the situation, eventually they splatted up against a brick wall of common logic. She sensed that they were wallowing in a swamp of speculations where there was an answer hovering over their heads that they hadn’t bothered to look at.
    Or maybe she was going a tad batty herself. She wished she had a better idea of what the police knew, but she suspected that, for all their technical expertise, they were as baffled as she.
    The officer lounging at the door of the boardroom let her go without any difficulty. Apparently the confinement in the boardroom was merely a suggestion, not a requirement. Jane decided to make a preventive visit to the bathroom, and when she was washing her hands, Sharlene came in, pushing the door with her derriere and holding her hands in front of her as if they were contaminated. “Laser copier dust,“ she explained.
    Jane turned on the faucet for her and leaned back against an old steam-heat radiator under the window. “So you’re being allowed to do your work?“
    “Somebody has to if we’re going to run the museum and get moved. Thank heaven we didn’t have any tours scheduled today, since the police have closed us