Death Goes on Retreat

by Carol Anne O'Marie

  That quick dip into seraphic theology mollified Felicita for the moment. Mary Helen was grateful. They were nearing the dining room door. If she wanted a chance to proceed with her “unsuspect” plan, she’d have to ask Felicita a few questions, cross her off the list. Considering the state of Felicita’s nerves, this was probably the best chance she’d have.

  “Sister, I was wondering,” Mary Helen began, hoping she sounded as if the idea had just occurred to her. “Early Monday morning, did you hear anything or see anyone?”

  Felicita looked piqued. “You mean the morning that you found the body?”

  Was she just sensitive or did that sound like an accusation? Whichever, Mary Helen chose to ignore it. “Yes,” she said a little crisply, “that morning.”

  “I was asleep. Sound asleep. I heard nothing. I told Sergeant Little that.” Felicita hesitated. The color drained from her face, leaving two round red circles high on her cheekbones. “You don’t think for one minute that I had anything to do with . . .”

  Raggedy Ann in a coif, Mary Helen thought crazily, surer than ever that it was Felicita and not Mother Superior who could not bring herself to say the word murder.

  Before Felicita uttered another sound, Beverly slammed out of the kitchen door. She held a pancake turner like a scepter in her right hand. “Get that man out of my kitchen,” she shrieked at the three of them.

  Felicita gulped.

  “What man?” Mary Helen asked.

  “That priest! That Father Ed!” The rage emanating from her coffee-brown eyes made them look as if they were “perking.”

  Felicita caught her breath. “What in the world did he do?”

  “I know what he calls me,” Beverly hissed. The yellow haystack of hair wobbled uncertainly under her hairnet.

  Prudently, Felicita did not ask for specifics. “I’m sure he’s just joking.”

  “Well, he can keep his jokes to himself.” Beverly’s blazing eyes narrowed. “A little of that bastard goes a long way.” She faced Felicita with a fury turning cold and dangerous. “Are you going to tell him or am I?”

  Turning on her heel, Beverly banged the kitchen door hard enough for the glass to rattle.

  “All I need now is a broken window,” Felicita said dully.

  “That would be the least of your worries,” Eileen observed cheerfully. Obviously she was trying to buoy up the mood!

  Felicita stiffened. Her pale blue eyes had the vacant look of one whose thoughts are somewhere else. “You know, Sisters”—each word fell with a thud—“I can really understand how a perfectly good person can be driven to murder!” Nervously she twisted the end of her long black scapular. Her face was stony. “Before this thing is over,” she said in a perilous whisper, “I just may kill someone myself.”

  When Mary Helen pulled back the door, she immediately felt the tension in St. Jude’s dining room. The breakfast was set out buffet-style, and men moved down both sides of the long table with a forced air of concentration. They stopped at chafing dishes full of fluffy yellow scrambled eggs and bacon and at baskets over-flowing with muffins.

  Here and there, an elastic smile snapped and a too hearty laugh echoed in the quiet. Sister Felicita, who had burst into the dining room ahead of them, disappeared through the swinging door into the kitchen. Mary Helen heard the rumble of angry voices coming from behind it.

  Several wary sets of eyes shifted toward them. “With those same expressions and striped suits, we could all be in an old Cagney movie,” Mary Helen whispered.

  Eileen “humphed” in agreement.

  Despite the strain in the room, Mary Helen found the aroma of coffee and freshly fried bacon irresistible. “Doesn’t everything smell delicious!” she exclaimed aloud.

  Con McHugh, regal in any circumstance, straightened up in front of the scrambled eggs. “Please join us,” he said, offering Mary Helen his plate, “ladies first.”

  Without a second thought, she took it and stepped in line ahead of the monsignor. This presented the perfect opportunity to talk to him, if the room hadn’t been so unnaturally quiet. Once they sat down, maybe things would be more relaxed.

  Sister Eileen slipped in line behind Andy Carr and was giving a conversation her best try. Poor Father Carr, blinking bloodshot eyes, attempted to act alert. “Did you sleep well?” Mary Helen heard her ask pleasantly.

  “Take a look at his face, Sister,” Ed Moreno called from the end of the line. “He looks as if Amtrak ran through his room last night and he was directly in its path.”

  Carr frowned and fingered his beard, which looked grayer and scruffier than it had yesterday. “What’s the matter with my face?” he asked good-naturedly.

  This brought groans and guffaws from the other priests. “Do you want me to tell you?” Tom offered.

  Mary Helen took advantage of the horseplay to wait for the monsignor. If her plan was going to go according to schedule, he was next on her list of “unsuspects.”

  “Sister, here’s a seat.”

  She felt her heart drop when Sergeant Little offered her the empty chair beside him. But her luck was holding.

  “After you,” Monsignor McHugh said, and they crossed the room together to join the police officer.

  Maybe this was going to be better than she expected. The sergeant might ask questions of his own. She would simply piggyback on them.

  Scarcely had Sister Mary Helen been seated when, as if by some silent agreement, the table filled up. Crowded as it was, no one chose another spot in the large dining room. It was as if no one wanted to miss anything that was said.

  An unnatural silence descended on the group. Sergeant Little ate hungrily, glancing up every few bites to smile or to pass the salt and pepper. Forks scraped on plates. Ice clinked in water glasses. A butter knife clattered to the floor.

  Finally, Tom Harrington could stand it no longer. Mary Helen watched him muster all the poise and polish of a television host. “Bob,” he addressed Sergeant Little in a deep, commanding voice. “Can you tell us why you asked for our car keys?”

  Little finished jockeying the last bite of egg from his fork, wiped his mouth, and set down his crumpled napkin. Slowly, his brown eyes as sharp as any red-tailed hawk’s, he studied each one in turn.

  Mary Helen followed his gaze. Did he see what she saw? Eminent, regal Monsignor McHugh, whose square shoulders sloped a little this morning under the burden of her grim discovery. Capable, generous “Handy Andy” Carr, a man’s man, confidant of policemen, firemen, alcoholics, and you-name-its. Young, idealistic Mike Denski with the too-long sideburns and the guileless blue eyes. Tough, wiry, witty Ed Moreno, whose chestnut hair was just beginning to thin. Handsome Tom Harrington with the crooked grin, who, as the saying goes, never met a stranger. Or was he seeing only the cold, calculating face of a killer? She waited for him to speak.

  “Your car keys?” Little’s smile was friendly. “Thanks so much, by the way, for cooperating with the Sister. I wanted the keys to your cars”—he paused dramatically. Mary Helen felt that he had played this scene innumerable times before.

  “—because Greg Johnson was driven here to be killed. I am checking to see if it was in one of your vehicles.” He gave another friendly smile.

  An electric silence stunned the room. The monsignor’s distinguished profile turned the winter-wheat color of his hair. For a moment, Mary Helen feared he’d go into shock.

  “One of us?” Unexpectedly, it was young Mike Denski who recovered his voice first. His tone was high, squeaky, and definitely enraged. “Are you telling me, Detective Sergeant, that you suspect one of us is a murderer?” He didn’t risk the answer.

  “Why, why—we’re—we’re—” he stammered, as though trying to remember exactly what they were. “We’re priests, for God’s sake!” he said finally. “Priests help people. They encourage people to live. They don’t kill them.”

  “Bob knows that.” The police chaplain in Andy Carr spoke up. “He’s just doing his job.”

  “B
ut to even suspect that one of us . . .” Denski was breathless with rage.

  The lad “doth protest too much, methinks,” skittered through Mary Helen’s mind.

  “We do have original sin, you know,” Tom said. Then added with a touch of sarcasm, “I’m sure they told you that in the seminary.”

  Denski’s eyes searched his fellow priests in disbelief. “None of you is saying anything. Does that mean that you agree with him? That the killer could be one of us?”

  When no one answered, Denski jumped up. His chair clattered to the floor. Tom, who was beside him, righted it.

  Mike Denski’s young face burned. His eyes darkened. He turned them on Little. “I can’t swallow that you really believe . . .” Suddenly he was speechless.

  Ed Moreno shrugged. “Every barrel has a few bad apples, kid. Remember Rasputin? And wasn’t Richelieu a cardinal?”

  “Now is hardly the appropriate time for a Church history lesson,” the monsignor said, each word dropping like a cube from an ice maker.

  “I didn’t say I believed or disbelieve it, Mike.” Little’s voice was still calm and friendly. “I’m just checking it out. Like Andy says, it’s my job.”

  Somewhat appeased and, Mary Helen suspected, a little embarrassed, Denski sank back into his chair. She cleared her throat. “What I can’t believe,” she said, remembering her own trek up the pathway, “is, regardless of how Greg Johnson came here, that someone got him to the grotto.”

  Pushing her bifocals up the bridge of her nose, Mary Helen studied Little, waiting for his explanation.

  The sergeant touched the edge of his mustache. “You hit it right on the head, Sister,” he said with a wide smile. “That’s the real puzzler. I’m working on the easy stuff first. After we figure out who brought Johnson here, the perp himself can tell us how he persuaded the victim to walk up there.”

  His glib answer did not satisfy Mary Helen nor, she suspected, him either. “Did the murderer have the knife to his throat?” she wondered aloud. “Or were two people involved? One would need to be very intimidating. Or was Greg unconscious? Then, the murderer needed something to transport him. A place like this must have a wheelbarrow. Most likely he was motivated—or persuaded—to climb that hill for a reason we are unaware of.” She looked at Sergeant Little.

  “I told you this lady was great,” Ed Moreno burst out.

  Mary Helen’s face flushed. Sergeant Little looked puzzled. Mary Helen sighed; not that Holy Hill murder business again! She’d prefer that the sergeant—in fact the entire Sheriff’s Department—stayed in the dark about that. It made her digging so much easier. In her experience, as soon as a police department, any police department, knew that she was looking into things, they became excessively touchy, which, of course, made everyone’s life more difficult.

  She pursed her lips and gave Father Moreno her best schoolmarm face, willing him to be still. He didn’t seem to notice. Grinning around at the others, Ed was about to spill the beans when Sister Felicita exploded like a sonic boom from the kitchen door. Her face was mottled and her pale eyes blazed.

  “And you!” she shrilled, startling everybody. One short finger pointed directly at Father Moreno. “You stop it! Do you hear me? You stop calling Beverly names! In fact, you stop talking to Beverly altogether. I’m having enough trouble around here without you getting her all upset. Do you understand?”

  With searchlight eyes, she swept the group. “Do you all understand?”

  A charged silence followed the question. Felicita herself stood clenching her fists. Her bottom lip quivered.

  A meek “Yes, Sister” rose from somewhere followed by a self-conscious hush. Mary Helen wondered who would break it. If she were betting money, she’d put it on Eileen. Something inherent made her old friend want to set things right. She hoped Ed Moreno wouldn’t try a joke. Anything close to humor would surely send Felicita into tears.

  The situation was saved by the unexpected appearance of Laura Purcell. The oblique rays of sun coming through the plate-glass windows showed off every wrinkle and pucker on Laura’s white shorts and halter. Strands of auburn hair, still unsmoothed, waved like an aura about her head. The unhealthy gray of her face made her green eyes darker, more haunted.

  “You must be hungry, dear,” Felicita said, apparently glad of the distraction. She scurried away.

  Shivering despite the mounting heat, Laura made her way to the table. Mike and Tom shifted to make room for her and Andy drew up an extra chair.

  “How are you feeling this morning, Laura?” the monsignor asked kindly.

  Laura was about to say something when Felicita reappeared with orange juice. “Start with this,” she said, “and then tell me what you feel like eating.”

  Woodenly, Laura did as she was told. The others watched in silence while she sipped the juice.

  “Is there anything I can get you?” Eileen had been quiet for longer than Mary Helen expected.

  Tears hung in the corners of Laura’s eyes. “Just get me Greg’s killer,” she said in a tone of cold fury. “Tell me who he is and . . .” She closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath. “I will do such things—what they are yet I know not—but they shall be the terrors of the earth.”

  Sister Mary Helen was startled. Not so much by the young woman’s ferocity as by her ready and apt command of Shakespeare. Othello, wasn’t it? But then, why not? After all, Laura Purcell was a drama major.

  Kate Murphy slammed the car door. Stamping her feet against the cement sidewalk to keep warm, she waited for her partner to lock up. It wasn’t even safe to leave a police car unlocked anymore, she thought, disheartened. Above her the bruised June sky shifted, and in the distance a foghorn roared a single baritone blast.

  “I guess the old lady’s home.” Gallagher pointed to Marva Johnson’s faded brown landing barge of a Mercury in front of the pink palace. Both looked cheerless. Only the terrazzo steps glistened in the dripping fog.

  The marimba sound of the doorbell echoed in the silent house. Cautiously, the front door cracked open. A wary brown eye took them in.

  “Oh, it’s you two again.” Mrs. Johnson’s voice was low and gravelly. She pulled open the door just wide enough for the two detectives to slip inside, then slammed it shut and leaned against it.

  She shivered. “That cold would go right through you, if you aren’t careful.” She pulled her blue wool cardigan closer around her.

  Kate was startled at the woman’s appearance. Overnight her face had turned a ghostly white, and deep, tired lines seemed spread over it. Patches almost the color of her sweater brooded under her eyes. Her gray bubble of hair was stiff and flat where she had slept on it.

  Looking at her now, Kate thought she might very well have just been released from a hospital. She followed Mrs. Johnson into the living room. By contrast with the chill outside, the heat of the house was stifling. The pungent soil-smell of the potted plants choked Kate, and perspiration trickled down from her underarms.

  She glanced toward Gallagher, who already was running his finger around his shirt collar. She’d better make this quick!

  Oblivious of the temperature, Mrs. Johnson sat in her padded rocker. On the end table beside it, a cigarette burned in an ashtray, unnoticed. Methodically she pushed back and forth, back and forth. A soft squeak timed each rock. At her insistence, Kate and Gallagher perched on the edge of the slip-covered sofa.

  Marva Johnson’s face tightened. “Have you found my son’s killer yet?” Her glinting eyes turned on Gallagher. “Is that what you’ve come to tell me?” The thin lips stretched into a tight smile. “That you’ve discovered what I’ve known all along? That it was that girl, that Laura, who led my boy to his death?”

  Gallagher cleared his throat. “No, ma’am,” he said. “My partner’s come upon some new information and she’d like to ask you a few more questions.”

  How smoothly Gallagher made that handoff, Kate thought, watching Marva Johnson’s eyes shift toward her. Everything about him said tha
t he didn’t want to touch this lady with a ten-foot pole, to use one of his own favorite clichés.

  “Mrs. Johnson.” Kate’s voice was soft. “Laura Purcell informed us that your son received a phone call at about three-thirty on the morning that he was killed.”

  The woman’s lips curled into a sardonic grin. “And what were they doing together at three-thirty in the morning? I ask you that, Kate!”

  “The point here is—” Kate began gently.

  “The point is,” Mrs. Johnson interrupted, all the lines on her forehead collapsed into one fierce frown, “that they were together at three-thirty in the morning. At that hour, decent, God-fearing people are at home asleep.” She sighed. “Nothing good can come from a young girl and a young boy being together so late at night. I told Greg that, and Janice, too, time and time again. When they lived here, I insisted that they be home by eleven. And they were, too, if they knew what was good for them.” She gave a short, cruel chuckle. “The hours after midnight are the Devil’s hours. Those are the hours that are full of the temptations of the flesh. At that time of night we are weak. We are mortal. We fall.” She seemed to savor every word.

  “We must be sober. We must be watchful. We must resist him, for Satan and his helpers, like Laura, have the fires of hell waiting to catch souls and toss them like leaves into a bonfire. At every moment, the Devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour.”

  Despite the heat, Kate shivered. Mrs. Johnson’s words were so graphic, her feeling so strong, that Kate almost visualized a red-horned devil stalking the Johnsons’ living room. All this hell and damnation when the woman thought the pair was just talking! Imagine what she’d say if she knew that Laura and her son were actually living together.

  Kate shot Gallagher a warning look. If he mentioned it, they’d never get out of here. Her signal wasn’t necessary. The expression on his face showed he wasn’t about to offer any such information.

  The squeak, squeak of the rocking chair was the only noise in the room. Mrs. Johnson, her brown eyes glazed over, had fled to some other reality. Watching her, Kate felt an overwhelming pity for the Johnson kids. Imagine growing up in this upright, judgmental, unforgiving home! No wonder they were so eager to leave it.