Murder at the National Cathedral

by Margaret Truman

  Smith ignored the liqueur Tony was offering but sipped the steaming hot mug of coffee set before him. “Too early in the day for anisette,” he said.

  “Might keep you awake, uh?”

  “Something like that.”

  “What’s the case, the priest?”

  “Yes. How did you know?”

  “When I’m not too busy, I watch a little TV. Your name came up. Somebody charged?”

  “No, but on the assumption that someone will be at some point, I’m lining up what ducks I can.”

  “What would you want me to do?”

  “Check into Father Singletary’s background. Everything. Discreetly, though. I have to go out of town and don’t want to lose time here. Annabel and I are leaving tomorrow for London on our honeymoon. We’ll be back in a week. I have to find someone who can move on it. Need a report ready when I return.”

  “Yeah, well, Mac, maybe I could do it. Be good to get away from here for a while. Maybe good for Alicia ’n me, too. It’s too close bein’ together all the time. Yeah, I’ll do it. What’s a week? Besides, if I have to tell you the truth, and to you I do have to tell the truth, I’m not exactly what you’d call busy. Business is lousy.”

  “Sorry to hear it.” Smith stood and clapped Buffolino on the back, then handed him an envelope. “A retainer. And the particulars on what we know so far.”

  Buffolino looked at the check. “This is a tenth, huh?”

  “It’s a third.”

  “Yeah? Okay, but only for you.”

  “Me and a house of God. Do you good to get out of this place and try another. Thanks. See you in a week.”

  “Ciao, baby.”

  Smith’s last commitment before he and Annabel left for London was at the Sevier Home in Georgetown. He never seemed to find the time to visit his mother as much as he had promised himself he would, which always prompted a nagging feeling of guilt that was uncomfortable—and unnecessary, he reminded himself whenever it set in. For this visit, he had blocked out most of the afternoon.

  They spent a good deal of it out in the gardens surrounded by English boxwood and huge azalea bushes, holly, and black walnut trees. Josephine Smith always insisted that her son stop and read a plaque in the ground along Azalea Walk:

  The kiss of the sun for pardon, the song of the birds for mirth, one is nearer God’s heart in a garden than anywhere else on earth.

  These times with his mother were always peaceful. They could also be inspirational or amusing when he was depressed. His mother was an unfailingly optimistic person. Her standard response to “How are you?” was “Wonderful. I got up this morning, took a breath, and it worked. What more could I ask for?”

  They finished their visit by sitting on the expansive porch that overlooked the gardens. They were alone; another resident of the home played the piano—badly—on the other side of the window behind them. “Well, how does it feel to be a married man again?”

  “Good,” Smith said, taking his mother’s hand in his. “I’m a very lucky man to have someone like Annabel.”

  “I wondered how long it would take you to come to that conclusion,” said his mother. “You certainly dragged your feet.”

  He laughed. “Mother, you and Dad sent me to law school so that I would learn to weigh all the facts and not make snap judgments.”

  “No matter, it makes me feel good and proud that you and Annabel are now married. I never did like the arrangement you had.”

  “Why not? It worked very nicely.”

  “I like things tidied up, Mac. And the law to go with love. Marriage does that.”

  “Yes, it certainly does. I really have to be going. I still have things to do before we leave.”

  “London,” she said wistfully. “It’s been a long time since I’ve been there.”

  “We’ll go soon, the three of us, maybe in the spring. The weather is better then.”

  Each knew what the other was thinking. As healthy and vivacious as Josephine Smith was, the reality that she was in the final phase of her life could not be denied. Would she be alive to take to London in the spring? Mac mused. He dearly hoped so. Although he didn’t spend nearly enough time with her, he liked the fact that she was there, alive, that her first breath in the morning continued to “work,” and that she was available to him. He didn’t look forward to the day when she wouldn’t be.

  After Mac and Annabel’s plane had passed Cape Cod and they had been served caviar and smoked salmon, Mac showed her the written autopsy report. When she was finished reading, she said, “Charming prose style. Anything in here strike you as unusual?”

  “Yes.”

  “What?”

  “The item about the weapon having been swung on a horizontal plane.”

  “Yes?”

  “Paul was sitting in the pew when he was found. It seems to me that if you’re going to hit a man while he’s sitting, the blow would tend to come from over his head. You’d hit him more toward the top of the head, not the side.”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “So, it also seems to me that unless the murderer was crouching, it’s unlikely that Paul was seated when he was killed, as the position of the body suggested.”

  Annabel thought for a moment. “Or he was hit by a short person. Then again, it’s possible that Paul was struck while standing and fell into the pew.”

  Smith shook his head. “No, he was sitting there, neat and proper. Sure, he was leaning against the wall, but his body was not in a position that would have resulted from falling there.”

  “What conclusion do you come to?” she asked.

  “I have to assume that because the blow was delivered in a horizontal plane and not from above, you are right, that he was probably standing when he was hit. Then it doesn’t make any sense that if he came upon an intruder, was hit, and fell to the floor, the intruder would take the time to prop him up in the pew. Hit-and-run assailants don’t rearrange bodies, they just hit and run. It could have been someone he knew, but it was almost surely someone who knew the cathedral. When you add to this the lack of blood, it points to his being murdered somewhere other than in that small chapel and brought there.”

  “Even so, who would bother to do that? Why would someone do that? Wouldn’t there be blood where he was killed?”

  “Yes, there would be, unless the murderer did a hell of a good job of mopping up. MPD’s been scouring the cathedral, but that’s a lot of ground to cover and a lot of dark corners.”

  “Chances are it didn’t happen far from that chapel. Paul was not heavy, but he certainly wasn’t a wisp of a man. Maybe the garden outside Good Shepherd.”

  “Maybe, although the M.E.’s report said his clothes were clean, no grass stains or dirt.”

  “That doesn’t mean they weren’t there. I remember you delivering a lecture to one of your classes about how often routine things like that are missed during autopsies and clothing analysis.”

  “I know, I know, and you’re probably right. It’s not likely to have happened far from the chapel.”

  She put caviar, chopped egg and onion on a crustless toast wedge and savored it. Smith disliked caviar and had given his small jar of beluga to her, a ritual they always went through when flying first class. “Did Terry Finnerty raise this when you talked to him?”

  “No. He simply handed me the report. No, that’s not true. He handed me the report and asked me a lot of questions. I get the feeling he’s being nice to me, is cooperating because he sees me as a conduit into the cathedral. He’s going to be very disappointed.”

  As the shiny, immaculate black Austin taxi took them from Heathrow Airport to Duke’s Hotel in the heart of London, Annabel snuggled close to her husband. “I’ve never been on a honeymoon,” she said.

  “Nor will you ever be on another one,” he said.

  They fell silent; she knew what he was thinking, that he’d spent his honeymoon with his first wife in London many years ago. They’d stayed at the Savoy, a favorite hotel of Smith’s. He
’d considered suggesting the Savoy for Annabel, too, but thought better of it. Too much like bringing a new wife into the home of a former one. He and Annabel had stayed at Duke’s on their last trip to London, and decided the little jewel tucked away in the middle of the St. James’s district suited them perfectly, with its elegantly furnished suites, attentive staff, and convenient location.

  The driver pulled into the tiny courtyard in front of Duke’s and, as London taxis are designed to do, turned around, if not on a dime, certainly on a ha’penny. They were greeted with reserved but real enthusiasm at Reception. On previous visits, Mac had always signed them in as Mr. and Mrs. Mackensie Smith. This time he did it with quiet, proud conviction, and legitimately.

  It was ten o’clock at night London time, but five hours earlier by their body clocks. The hall porter took their luggage to what would be their honeymoon suite, number 25 on the fourth floor, and Mac and Annabel walked into the small, cozy lounge. Gilberto, the barman, came around from behind the bar and shook Mac’s hand, kissed Annabel on the cheek.

  “Meet Mrs. Smith,” Mac said.

  Gilberto, who’d been smiling broadly, frowned. “I have met Mrs. Smith before,” he said in his Italian accent.

  “No you haven’t,” Mac said. “We’ve only been married two months.”

  The smile returned to Gilberto’s face. “Ah, I understand. That deserves a celebration.” He went behind the bar, and Mac and Annabel took the two barstools. There were three other couples at tables in the small room, and one pair had overheard the conversation. “Congratulations,” the man offered.

  Mac and Annabel turned and smiled. “Thank you,” they said.

  “Let me buy you a drink,” the man said.

  Gilberto placed his hands on the bar and said to the other customer, “Grazie, but this is my treat.”

  The bar in Duke’s Hotel was known to many Londoners and American guests not only because of the professional charm of its barmen, Gilberto and Salvatore, but because they were supported by the hotel in an ongoing search for the rarest ports, cognacs, and Armagnacs. A dozen bottles stood on a special shelf behind the bar. There was an 1802 Napoleon cognac, an 1894 B. Gelas et Fils Armagnac, and a 1908 Ware’s port. Only the port was unopened; it was on sale for £500, approximately $750. A one-third gill of the Napoleon cognac, barely enough to cover the bottom of a large snifter, cost £150, or about $225.

  Gilberto took a half-empty bottle of Grahams 1945 port that sold for £40 per glass and carefully filled two small, elegantly etched aperitif glasses. He placed them in front of Mac and Annabel and said, “Salute! To love and marriage and to my good American friends.”

  Mac and Annabel held the glasses up to each other, then tasted. “Superb!” Smith said. They placed the glasses on the bar and continued to look at each other. Gilberto put the glasses on a small silver tray. “What suite?” he asked.

  “Twenty-five,” Smith said.

  “I will take these to your room. You may prefer to be there.”

  Smith knew that Jeffrey Woodcock would insist upon dinner at Wilton’s, a popular restaurant on Jermyn Street that served up traditional food in traditional ways in an atmosphere that was a little too stuffy and clubby for Smith’s taste. Wilton’s, he thought, was the sort of place that perpetuated the stereotype of British cooking as being bland, boiled, and without verve. It was precisely those qualities that attracted Woodcock to it, however. He was as clubby as the restaurant—a perfect match. There was one advantage to Wilton’s for Mac and Annabel. It was within a few blocks of Duke’s Hotel.

  Judith Woodcock, whom Mac had met only once, was an animated woman with gray hair who doted on her husband, which he seemed to relish, and like him was given to repeating. She reminded Mac a little of his own mother, a younger version, of course—he knew Woodcock was sixty-two; Judith was probably within a year or two of that.

  After a dinner that surprised Mac with its excellence, the four of them walked back to Duke’s and settled at a corner table in the bar. The conversation eventually came around to what Mac called the subsidiary purpose of their visit to London—aside from honeymooning, of course.

  “That’s shocking, absolutely shocking,” Woodcock said when Mac told him that Paul Singletary was the priest who’d married them. “Had no idea,” Woodcock said. “I met the poor chap twice when he was over here discussing this Word of Peace project. Charming young man … well, perhaps not so young, but certainly charming. Yes, perfectly charming.”

  Smith pressed his knee against Annabel’s beneath the table. She was in a discussion with Judith Woodcock, but Mac knew she was tuned in to both conversations with equally clear reception, something at which she was expert.

  “How did you have occasion to meet him?” Smith asked.

  “As I said, this peace project he was involved with. The church was reluctant to enter into any sort of supportive posture without consulting the firm for a legal opinion. We saw nothing wrong with it, although I must say there were some individuals involved who are not the sort of chaps I would invite to the club.” Woodcock laughed; Mac smiled. “No, not to the club, or to Wilton’s, for that matter. Still, nothing wrong with the movement. One can’t very well be critical of efforts to bring peace to the world, can one?”

  Smith shook his head. “No, one can’t.” Now I’m repeating, he thought.

  “Do your police chaps have any leads?” Woodcock asked.

  “Not yet,” Smith replied. “One of the things I’ve promised the bishop of the National Cathedral I’d do while we’re in London is to attempt to trace Paul’s tracks during his last visit. He evidently returned to Washington a day earlier than he’d planned.”

  “That so? Why?”

  “I don’t know. I have a letter of introduction to the archbishop of Canterbury from Bishop St. James in Washington. I was hoping to learn something from him about Paul’s visit.”

  “I can certainly pave the way for you over at Lambeth,” Woodcock said. “I was there just the other day.”

  “You were?” Smith said. “Do you meet often with your clerical clients?”

  Woodcock laughed; it had a certain forced ring to it. “No, just on occasion. When something comes up that needs discussion.”

  “Any talk of Paul Singletary’s murder the last time you were there?”

  “No, absolutely none.” He didn’t repeat “None.” Smith knew his friend was not being honest.

  “Word of Peace?” Smith asked.

  “Pardon?”

  “Word of Peace. Is that what you were meeting at Lambeth about?”

  “No … well, yes, that is a continuing topic of discussion.”

  “The church … the archbishop, that is, has been supportive of the movement, I gather.”

  “Yes, quite.”

  “Do you deal with the archbishop himself?”

  “No, almost never. Frankly, Mac, I’ll be surprised if your letter gains you an audience with him. He sees very few people. Rumor has it he’s not been well, but I can’t confirm that. No, I deal with Reverend Malcolm Apt.”

  “I know the name. Our bishop mentioned him to me, indicated he’s sort of an information officer for the church.”

  “Yes, that and many other things. He seems to be directly involved in almost every aspect of Lambeth, almost all aspects, a right-hand man-of-all-seasons for the archbishop.”

  “I intend to call him in the morning,” said Smith, “see if I can arrange an interview with the archbishop.”

  “Well, as I said, don’t count on it. Chances are you’ll meet with Reverend Apt.”

  Annabel turned to Jeffrey Woodcock and said, as though she’d been part of the conversation, “You can see that this husband of mine plans a busy honeymoon.”

  Both the Woodcocks laughed. “Very clever of you, Mac,” Jeffrey Woodcock said, “working in enough business to satisfy your Internal Revenue chaps back home. Write off your honeymoon. Damned clever, I’d say.”

  Smith didn’t bother explaining that
he hadn’t even thought of that until Woodcock brought it up. They finished their drinks and walked the Woodcocks to where they’d parked their Jaguar on Jermyn Street. During the short walk, Smith had the feeling that Woodcock had something to tell him, perhaps a favor to ask, but was not sure whether he should. Smith’s feeling was confirmed after Mrs. Woodcock was inside the Jag and Annabel was bidding a final good night to her through the open window. Smith and Woodcock stood next to the driver’s door. “Mac,” Woodcock said, “I was wondering if I could impose upon you while you’re here for a bit of legal consultation. Frankly, I could use the American view of things.”

  “Go ahead,” Smith said.

  “Not here, not now. Would you be able to find some time tomorrow?”

  Smith glanced over the roof of the automobile at Annabel, who didn’t seem to be hearing the conversation. Did he dare build another business meeting into the honeymoon? He decided to take the chance, provided it didn’t take more than a little conversation with Woodcock. They agreed to meet the following day at eleven at Woodcock’s office.

  Back in Suite 25, and bundled up in fluffy terry-cloth robes provided by the hotel, Smith asked Annabel what she thought of the Woodcocks.

  “Very nice people. Very nice. Very nice.” He laughed. She asked, “What are you meeting him for tomorrow?”

  “You …?” Yes, she did have a remarkable ability to tune in on two conversations at once, even across the roof of a car. “I don’t know. He said he needed my counsel on something, a legal matter. I really couldn’t say no. He did pick up dinner.”

  “No such thing as a free lunch,” she said.

  “No, there isn’t.” He looked at his watch. “I suddenly am very tired. How about settling in for a good sleep?”

  “Sounds lovely. Will I see you at all tomorrow?”

  “Of course. We’ll meet for lunch. We have theater tickets and …”

  “Sorry, Mac, can’t make lunch. Business. I forgot to tell you that I called that collector, Pierre Quarle, and made a date with him for lunch tomorrow.”

  “You did. What’s he like?”