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gallery reception, there was no particular reason to go back home afterward. The night was cool and clear, and Carter was eager to get back to work on some small fossils that had been donated to the university, then passed along to him for identification. They were waiting for him in the lab he shared with several other members of the department, in the basement of the biology building.
    The building itself was open, which didn’t surprise him, but he was surprised to see, as he approached the faculty lab, that the lights were on inside; most nights, he could count on having the place all to himself. When he heard Eminem playing on the laboratory boombox, he knew whom to expect.
    Carter entered quietly, and for a second or two observed Bill Mitchell, perched on a stool, bent low over a specimen, rapping along under his breath. Mitchell was an assistant professor, and this was the make-or-break year for him; either he got on the tenure track or he didn’t. Privately, Carter knew he didn’t have much of a chance; his work just wasn’t good enough, his papers went unpublished, and he had a tendency to rub people the wrong way. But the guy was working overtime in a last-ditch effort to do something, anything, to make his name and reputation, and Carter couldn’t help but feel sorry for him.
    “You’re working late tonight,” Carter said, and Mitchell jumped.
    “Man, I didn’t hear you come in,” he said, pushing his glasses back on his nose. His long black hair, which always looked like it had enough oil in it to lubricate an engine, hung down over his forehead. For some reason, he looked even more nervous than usual. “I thought you taught a seminar on Wednesday nights.”
    “That was last semester.”
    “So how come you’re not home with your beautiful wife?”
    “My beautiful wife is working tonight,” Carter said, hanging his leather jacket on the back of the door. “I thought I’d just come in and catch up on some stuff.”
    Mitchell glanced down, as if unsure what to do, at the materials in front of him.
    “What’s that you’re working on?” Carter asked, but even as he moved closer, he could see for himself—and it didn’t make him happy. Mitchell had unsealed one of the glassine envelopes and was busy examining under the tensor lamp one of the fossil specimens that had been donated to the university.
    “Couldn’t resist,” Mitchell said, with a sickly smile. “I thought I might see something that could save you some time.”
    Carter didn’t say anything.
    “This one here, for instance,” Mitchell said, taking a breath, “looks like a fragment of a jawbone. I’m thinking Smilodon, but I’m really not sure. What do you make of it?”
    Carter didn’t know what to say. This was a pretty big breach of lab etiquette—not to mention professional ethics—and if he wanted to, he could get Mitchell into some fairly serious trouble over it. Mitchell, no doubt, knew that, too, which was why he was sweating bullets now. Carter reached over and punched the Stop button on the boombox.
    “Is that the first specimen you’ve opened?” Carter asked.
    “Oh, yeah, definitely. I mean, I was working on some other stuff, but I just kept seeing these bags out of the corner of my eye, and well, you know how it is—if you’re a paleontologist, how are you going to keep your hands off material this tempting?”
    “Yeah,” Carter said, dryly, “I know how that is.” He also knew how it was to be this desperate, this hard up for the kind of breakthrough work that would get you tenure somewhere. But that still wasn’t any excuse. “I think it’d be best if you let me do all the initial work on these; that’s what they pay me for.”
    “Absolutely,” Mitchell confirmed, switching off the tensor lamp.
    “And if I need some backup, I’ll let you know.”
    “Cool. No problem,” Mitchell said, slipping the specimen back into its envelope and handing it to Carter.
    Carter turned and went back to his