Free The Counterfeit Murder in the Museum of Man by Alfred Alcorn Page A

I said. And I would have let him dangle awhile longer had not reporters begun to call.
    Feidhlimidh de Buitliér is a smallish, ill-favored man, his hair tonsured like a monk’s above a hirsute if well-trimmed face of a piece with the coarse tweeds he wears regardless of the season. Now he sat in front of me behind a frown of puzzled apology and explaining how he had scarcely begun to write a report to me about the counterfeit coins when unknown parties leaked its contents to the press.
    “Why didn’t you inform me earlier that you were testing the collection?”
    “Sure, I had no real proof,” he replied with what seemed to me feigned and overplayed incredulity. Or perhaps it was the effect of his brogue, which thickens and thins according to context. I have on occasion heard him in unguarded moments sound like someone from the Lower Midwest.
    “That’s not the issue,” I said coldly.
    “I have it all here,” he said, placing a folder on the desk between us and ignoring my remark.
    “Last week I sent you no less than three e-mails and left a telephone message,” I persisted.
    “I was out of the office. All week. Sick leave.” His yellowish brown eyes met mine with a glint of challenge before turning away. He reminded me that he had gone on record, in writing, as opposed to acceptance of the collection until at least a few of the coins could be tested for authenticity.
    “You should have been careful about confidentiality,” I said, opening the folder.
    “We’re part of the academy,” he said with a significance I didn’t gather right then. “People don’t believe there should be secrets.”
    I caught again the insolence of his eyes. I said, “I don’t care what people believe. I want all press inquiries directed here. I want no show-and-tell with you on camera.”
    When he began to protest, I put up my hand. “Mr. Butler …”
    “De Buitliér …”
    “Yes. De Buitliér.” I smiled pleasantly to put him off guard. Then I said, “Was Mr. von Grümh aware that you were testing samples from his collection for authenticity?”
    He simulated puzzlement with a convincing frown, but with the hesitation of someone dissembling. “I don’t think so. I don’t know. To what is it relevant?”
    “His murder.”
    “I don’t see …”
    “I don’t expect you to.”
    He again gave me a challenging glance.
    I returned it and said, “I should tell you that I have grown very ambivalent about our Greco-Roman Collection. I am of half a mind to give the whole damn thing to the Frock.”
    “Really?”
    “Yes, really. But I’m sure you would find working under Col Saunders to your liking, if he would have you. I think that’s how they arrange things there.”
    He subsided back into his beard and tweediness, his eyes revealing nothing.
    “That’s all for now,” I said presently without looking up from his report, from language such as “… despite my objections as to the authenticity of the specimens in the collection and as to their provenance …”
    I don’t trust the man in the least. It wasn’t just that he had challenged me, which he had done in his muffled, occluded way. No, it was recalling how, as he entered my office, he had cast an appraising eye around, as though sizing up what he hoped soon to occupy.
    I read through the report and then again. It was competent enough, indeed, quite thorough. Worried had been right about the use of the electron microscope and its ancillary equipment.
    Between press calls, I contacted young Edwards, who is in charge of exhibitions, and told him to remove the von Grümh collection from display and secure it.
    The media asked me the same questions in the same way. What was going through your head when …? When did you first find out that …? They got tough. Why didn’t you verify at least a sampling from the collection before taking it? How is it possible with all of today’s hard science to be fooled by fakes?
    And then the most provocative