"I'm on the staff."
"Good. The doc is already here. We want you to identify a body, if you can. Come this way."
Kennedy led Rocks to the large basement room, the other two plain-clothesmen following behind.
This was the room where the specimens brought back from the four corners of Asia were uncrated and cleaned and prepared for display on the floors above. Loot from the tomb of forgotten kings, bits of pottery from Ephesus, a winged bull carved out of the stone of Nineveh, mummy cases from Egypt—for Egypt was included by the museum—beads from the valley of the Tigris-Euphrates, big and little, the relics of lost and dead centuries were piled here. Even in the daylight the place was ghostly.
Photographers were popping flashlight bulbs and taking pictures of the exact position of the body. As Rocks entered they took their last picture and stood aside and the doctor from the coroner's office bent over the body and began his examination.
Then Rocks saw the body on the floor. He recoiled. "My God! That's Samuel Morton."
His respect for Morton amounted almost to reverence. Morton was a world-wide figure in the field of archeology, and to Rocks Malone, he was little short of a god. Rocks had looked up to this man, had longed to be like him. On the next expedition, Rocks was to go along as Morton's assistant.
Now Morton was dead.
"What—what happened?" Rocks whispered.
The doctor stood up. His face was ashen.