"Police hands didn't stop her mother from kidnapping her," Cynthia grumbled as the two made their way to the porch. There was nothing they could say or do about Martha's situation except to keep their telephone nearby and pray for the best.
Brandon Westlake moseyed by with Paulette and Ginger Dawkins, the first time Dean had seen the women voluntarily in one another's company. They asked about Martha and seemed to want to stay and chat. When conversation lagged, they apparently took the hint and retreated into Bird Song.
The Deans' conversation drifted away from the young girl's plight to Jennifer Radisson's recent pronouncement. The subject gave their minds a rest from Martha's plight.
"Welcome to the starting line," Dean said as they rocked away their frustrations. "We have no more idea whose bones Martha found than when we started. If they don't belong to Josh Mulligan, they could be years older than the 1960's."
"But the mine was worked in the sixties," Cynthia said. "If the body were there, someone would have discovered it."
"It was our assumption that the mine was being worked in the sixties. We based that belief on Josh Mulligan's reports to Paul Dawkins. If in fact those reports were all lies, he may have never even entered the Lucky Pup."
Cynthia nodded in agreement. "Then the body might have been there for much, much longer." She looked over at her husband. "Without the actual bones, how will we ever know?"
"We have the clothes, even though they're pretty nondescript. There are no labels. And there's the pack of cigarettes-the missing cigarettes. If we had a better description of them it might pinpoint the age of the victim."
"Maybe that's why the cigarettes are missing. Whoever swapped the bones took them for a reason. They might give away a date. Are cigarettes marked, like food? 'Smoke by such and such date?"
Dean chuckled. "I don't think so. But you're right. You could probably fix a date within a few years at least. I imagine they change packaging."
"Perhaps the bones are younger-not older," Cynthia said.
Dean thought a moment. "You could be right. Maybe we're aging this skeleton in the wrong direction. We dated the bones in the sixties based on circumstances-when we thought the mine was being worked and when it was sealed. Now we're still doing the same thing. But the mine has a second entrance. We found the back opening when Ginger went poking around up there with Dickinson Faust. Perhaps the body is much younger-only ten or twenty or thirty years old."
"When Fred gets out of jail, we'll have to send him back to his old newspapers-begin all over again."