Ghost at Work

by Carolyn Hart

  Kathleen approached me, one hand outstretched, her gaze desperate and determined. She came within a foot, took a deep breath, reached out to grip my arm.

  I lifted my free hand, patted her shoulder.

  She went as rigid as a pointer sighting quarry. “You’re here. You really, really are. But you weren’t. Now you are. I don’t understand.”

  “You worry too much, Kathleen. Relax and accept your good fortune. First we must deal with Daryl’s cell phone. Here’s what I want you to do…”

  My instructions were simple, but she repeated them, frowning as she muttered, “…at the end of the dock.”

  It would take only a moment to retrieve the cell phone from the roof. “I’ll meet you there in half an hour.”

  Kathleen tossed her head like a fractious horse. “I have to pick up the cupcakes for Bayroo’s homeroom Halloween party and visit Mrs. Mossman at the hospital and check on the shipment of candles for the Altar Guild. Can’t you bring it here?”

  I shook my head. “If that cell phone were found in the rectory, you’d be in big trouble. It won’t take long. You’ll have time for your errands.”

  She shivered. “It’s awfully cold outside.”

  “Brisk, but secluded. Wear gloves.” I finished the last sip of coffee.

  “Gloves?” Her tone was wary. “Why do I have to wear gloves?”

  I was amazed. Had Kathleen never read a mystery? Perhaps I could provide a reading list. I never missed a Leslie Ford novel. She gave such an interesting picture of wartime Washington. I’d read her latest, Mrs. Latham’s Primrose Path, just before I visited the Department of Good Intentions. No wonder I was sent to assist Kathleen. “We don’t want your fingerprints on Mr. Murdoch’s phone. I’ll see you there.” I was fading from view when I realized that perhaps I should be clearer. “Actually, I’ll see you, but you won’t see me.”

  Kathleen stood at the end of the weathered wooden dock, hunched in a navy peacoat with a red-and-blue plaid scarf tied under her chin.

  I settled on the railing, the telephone in one hand. I was quite comfortable in a gray lamb’s-wool coat and gold cashmere scarf. I had forgotten how much fun it was to shop, although a catalog couldn’t match going to Lassiter’s. Lassiter’s had been Adelaide’s finest women’s shop in my day. Of course Brown’s in Oklahoma City had been my favorite store. I wrinkled my nose, remembering the scent in the bath-powder-and-perfume section.

  Kathleen’s face looked pinched.

  The dock, understandably, was deserted except for us. Bulbous gray clouds looked as immovable as elephants at rest. A gusty wind corrugated gunmetal-gray water. Autumn-faded reeds rippled. The lake was in the center of the small nature preserve that adjoined the church property. The preserve on one side and the cemetery on the other provided St. Mildred’s with a sylvan setting. Cedars and pines crowded the shoreline, providing a sense of remoteness. It was a perfect spot for our rendezvous, close to the rectory but at a safe remove.

  Kathleen stared fixedly at the small telephone. “I’d better take it before someone sees it hanging there, although I don’t know what kind of fool would come here on a day like this. But I’m here. It would be just my luck to have a nature class trot onto the dock. Or who knows? Maybe the Altar Guild will show up. Nothing would surprise me.” She sounded despairing.

  I was pleased to see that she wore soft leather gloves. I handed the phone to her.

  She took it gingerly, flipped open the lid. It still reminded me of an oddly shaped compact. I moved to watch over her shoulder. The small screen suddenly glowed. A jaunty tune sounded.

  Kathleen pushed and clicked. “See, you can take pictures.” She held the phone up and suddenly wind-whipped water was in view on the tiny screen. Another click and the lake disappeared. “You can save them, too. Daryl kept a bunch. I’ll do them in order.” She clicked again. A picture appeared on the screen.

  Kathleen looked puzzled. “How odd.”

  Pictured was a close-up of a shaky signature at the bottom of a printed page. I squinted to make out the name: Georgia Hamilton. I moved closer, the better to see, but Kathleen clicked and the image was gone.

  Kathleen wriggled uneasily as if sensing my nearness.

  I was sorry to crowd her, but I wanted a good view. “What do you think it means?”

  “I have no idea. Georgia Hamilton almost died a few weeks ago, but she rallied and she’s home again.” Kathleen’s tone warmed. “She’s amazing. Ninety-five if she’s a day and she never misses the early service. I suppose Daryl handles some of her investments.”

  Kathleen clicked again. She made a strangled noise in her throat.

  The photograph was amazing in its clarity and detail. Kathleen sat on a puffy cream leather divan. Bright red-and-gold wrapping paper mounded near the open box in her lap. She held up a red satin nightgown, her eyes wide, her mouth agape.

  “Daryl snapped the picture just as I opened the box.” She glared at the screen. “I didn’t know what was inside. How could I know? But how do I explain to anybody—especially Bill—why I was sitting in Daryl’s cabin and opening what was obviously a present and pulling out a sexy red nightgown? When Daryl called Wednesday and asked me to the cabin, he said he needed a chance for a private visit with me about Raoul. He thought it was only fair—oh, his voice was so greasy—that he and I have a conversation before he spoke to Bill. Then he hung up. I called his cell and he didn’t answer. I know he looked and saw it was me calling and of course he didn’t answer. I was in a panic. I had to go. When I got to the cabin, he offered me a drink. I said no and he was all—oh, you know how it is when somebody’s hitting on you.”

  I found the expression interesting. It was new to me, but I understood exactly what she meant.

  “I told him what happened with Raoul. He pretended to be sympathetic, said he knew I’d been terribly lonely and Bill worked far too hard. Daryl said he was relieved there was nothing to this story that was getting around about me and Raoul, and since we’d cleared everything up, he had a small gift for me.

  “I didn’t see how I could refuse to open it. I’d just pulled out that hideous nightgown when he took my picture. I asked him what he thought he was doing. He said he liked to take pictures with his phone and this was such a good shot he should probably print out a picture for Bill or put it on the church Web site, but if I treated him nicely, he’d keep the shot for himself.”

  Kathleen’s eyes blazed. “He said a good start would be for me to try on my new gown. He put the phone in his pocket. There was no way I could get it from him. I told him”—her voice was harsh—“exactly what kind of a louse he was and then I jumped up and threw the gown and the box and the papers in the fireplace and ran out of the cabin. He came after me, but I got in my car and locked it and got away.” She jabbed at the phone and the picture disappeared.

  Another click, a new picture. A man in his forties with thinning blond hair and sharp features hunched at a desk, writing on a piece of stationery. The sag of his head and the bleak emptiness of his expression spelled defeat, despair, hopelessness.

  “Who is it?” But the picture was already gone and Kathleen shot me a mutinous glance. If she knew, she didn’t intend to tell me.

  Another click. An untidy middle-aged woman looked warily over her shoulder. She wore the blue smock of the Altar Guild. She held a collection plate. Behind her was the counter with the vested chalice for Sunday. A crucifix hung on the white wall above the counter. Walnut cabinets jutted into the room.

  I knew at once that she was in the sacristy after a service, probably a weekday Communion since she was apparently doing the service alone. “She’s counting the collection.” Collection isn’t formally taken at a weekday service, but the plate is left out for any donations.

  Kathleen’s brows drew down in a worried frown. “Maybe something startled her.”

  The woman in the photo’s expression was oddly craven and wary.

  I didn’t doubt that Kathleen and I were considering the
same unpalatable possibility. Was a member of the Altar Guild getting ready to filch from the offering plate?

  Kathleen deleted that picture, retrieved another. “Oh dear.”

  A furtive hand tucked a handful of bills into the pocket of the blue smock.

  “Oh.” Kathleen’s soft cry was a lament. “I can’t believe it. I don’t know what to do. But—” Swift clicks and that image, too, disappeared.

  “Who was she?” I was sure Kathleen knew.

  Kathleen pressed her lips tightly together.

  “Kathleen”—an awful possibility struck me—“are those pictures gone forever?”

  Her expression defiant, Kathleen looked toward the sound of my voice. “You bet they are.”

  I was horrified. “You’ve destroyed evidence that might help the police.”

  She lifted her chin. “I don’t care. Let the police find out who killed him. I’m not going to get people in trouble, maybe ruin their lives, just because Daryl was nasty enough to take pictures of them when they were down. I know that’s what he was doing. Sure, he may have been right to go after some of them, but let them get found out some other way.” Her brows drew together in a worried frown. “I wonder if the rest of the pictures are like this.”

  She clicked twice. In one image, an elderly black man was placing cans of food in a brown grocery bag. In another, the police officer, Anita, her face impervious, was framed in an open car window.

  Kathleen relaxed as the screen went blank. “Those last two don’t amount to anything. That’s Isaac Franklin, our sexton, and he’s probably filling a sack from the food pantry for a needy family. The policewoman”—Kathleen’s smile was satisfied—“was Daryl’s bête noire. He saw himself as macho man and drove like he thought he was Dale Earnhardt.”

  I was never a NASCAR enthusiast, but I remember Bobby Mac’s excitement when Dale Earnhardt had arrived.

  “She put a stop to that. Everywhere Daryl went, she seemed to be behind him. He got tickets faster than confetti spills. It was great to see him drive through town at thirty miles an hour. I loved it. I didn’t even mind when she gave me a ticket a couple of weeks ago.”

  “You got rid of all the photos? For good?” I had to be sure.

  “Every single one.” Her stare, a trifle to the left of my face, was unabashed.

  I understood Kathleen’s reluctance to involve innocent persons in a murder investigation, but what if one of them was the murderer? I felt a civic responsibility. I had already complicated the police efforts by helping Kathleen move Daryl’s body, though I still believed I’d made the right decision. Kathleen was innocent. Otherwise I wouldn’t have been sent to her aid.

  The cell phone was another matter. I had removed it from Daryl’s body. The information it contained might make a difference in the search for his murderer. Somehow I had to aid that earnest police chief, though I wasn’t sure what I could do. “Kathleen, we can’t ignore what we’ve discovered.”

  She wasn’t listening. She did something else with the phone, muttered, “Three saved messages. I called him back. I’d better check.” Click.

  “Thursday. Four-fifteen P.M., ‘I can’t believe what you did.’” The voice was young, male, and anguished. “‘I just found out from Lily.’” There was a silence, then a quick, choked, “‘You’ll pay for this. I swear you will.’”

  Kathleen punched a button.

  I sighed. One more piece of information, forever gone.

  “Thursday, five-oh-seven P.M.: ‘Mr. Murdoch—’” It was Kathleen’s voice. “‘There’s been—’”

  She punched.

  “Thursday, eight-twenty P.M.: ‘You got to call me.’” It was a woman’s voice, young but hoarse. Bravado mingled with desperation. “‘Listen, Daryl, I got to talk to you. You promised…Please. Call me.’”

  Kathleen punched. “All gone. But”—she stared at the phone—“even though I erased the photos, there might be images somewhere inside.” Abruptly, she raised her arm and flung the telephone far out into the lake.

  CHAPTER 8

  I knelt by the chimney on the rectory roof and picked up the head cover holding the gun. Kathleen’s disposal of the cell phone was an unexpected complication. I had intended to convey both the phone and gun to Chief Cobb. Now the phone was gone.

  I’d done my best to assist Kathleen. In fact, my mission appeared to be successful. Likely I would soon be recalled to Heaven, but I was uneasy. I had interfered with the proper investigation of a crime.

  I looked Heavenward. Thick dark clouds obscured the horizon. Wind pushed at me. I was definitely still here. I took that as a clear indication that I should proceed. But proceed to do what?

  Arrange for Chief Cobb to find the gun.

  The thought was direct and breathtaking in its simplicity. Thank you, Wiggins. I pulled the gun out of the head cover. My new coat, the gray lamb’s wool I’d selected from the catalog to go with my elegant pantsuit, had capacious pockets. I tucked the gun in my pocket. I was ready to depart for the police station, but fortunately I glanced down. I was invisible. My coat was invisible.

  The gun was not invisible.

  Even though the sky was overcast, someone might look up and note the flight of a gun through the sky if I swooped to the police station, especially since I didn’t know where it was.

  I pulled the gun out of the pocket, returned it to the head cover, and placed the bulging head cover beside the chimney.

  I shivered. Despite the lamb’s-wool coat, I was getting cold. It was time for a respite. In a flash, I returned to the rectory kitchen. I hung my coat on a coat tree, retrieved the flamingo mug from the dishwasher, and filled it with coffee. I found a notepad and a pen near the telephone. I settled at the table, positioning my chair where I would see anyone approaching the back porch.

  I drew a gun on the notepad. I had to figure out a way to get it to Chief Cobb. Moreover, the information I’d gleaned from observing Kathleen with the cell phone might be essential in solving the crime. Quickly, I jotted notes:

  PICTURES

  Signature of Georgia Hamilton, apparently on a legal document of some sort.

  A man in the depths of despair.

  A member of the Altar Guild apparently stealing from the collection plate.

  Isaac Franklin, the sexton.

  The policewoman who showered tickets on Daryl Murdoch.

  CALLS

  He spoke of Lily. A young male voice. The caller had to be Daryl’s angry son, Kirby.

  A desperate woman begged Daryl to call her. However, the call was recorded after his death, which might indicate innocence. Or might not.

  I sipped coffee, drew the face of a bloodhound with drooping ears and a worried expression. The cell phone was gone, but I knew what I had seen and heard. I was uncertain whether any of that information could—or should—be provided to the police. For now, I had recorded everything.

  I looked around the kitchen, seeking a safe spot to keep my notebook. It was unfortunate that worldly objects, unlike my imagined clothing and coats, couldn’t simply disappear for me. But they couldn’t and didn’t. I zoomed up to the ceiling and checked above the bottle-green oak china cabinet. I put the notebook behind the top molding.

  I wondered if Chief Cobb was making progress. Last night, when I’d wished to be in the cemetery, there I was.

  What if I wished to be at the police station?

  The two-story cream-colored stucco building covered the northwest corner at the intersection of Lee and Tishomingo, one block south of Main Street. Old Glory and the Oklahoma flag with its sky-blue field fluttered in a stiff breeze from a slender white flagpole. Shallow steps led to a central doorway. On one end of the second floor, barred windows looked as gloomy as the overcast day. I studied the inscription on the cornerstone:

  ADELAIDE CITY HALL

  1994

  DEDICATED BY MAYOR HARVEY KAMP

  I remembered Harvey as a long-haired, sneaky friend of my son. Ah, the wonders of maturity.


  I went inside and checked the directory. On the first floor were the mayor’s office, city planning, water, public works, planning commission, and treasurer. Now the mayor was a woman, Neva Lumpkin. Chief Cobb, the police department, jail, city attorney, and municipal court were on the second floor.

  Chief Cobb sat at his desk, studying papers. He emptied a packet of sugar into a steaming mug of coffee. Stark fluorescent light emphasized the deep lines that grooved his face. Moisture rings and scrapes marred the battered oak desk, but Matisse prints added color to one dingy beige wall. Large bulletin boards, a detailed street map of Adelaide, and a map of the county hung on the wall opposite his desk.

  I was intrigued by a machine similar to a skinny television set that sat on a leaf jutting from the desk. A luminous green screen glowed. A flat keyboard sat in front of it. Chief Cobb swiveled in his chair to face the screen. He lifted his hands, frowned, shook his head. He punched the intercom button on his desk.

  “Chief?”

  “Yeah, Colleen. What’s the password this week?”

  A sibilant hiss sounded from the intercom.

  He looked irritated. “Don’t whisper. James Bond isn’t crouched under your desk, waiting to hear the password so he can crack security for the Adelaide Police Department. Changing the password every week wastes everybody’s time. Doesn’t the mayor have enough to do without figuring out a silly rule like that? Who can remember a new password every week? I, for one, can’t. And I forgot to write down the new one.”

  Colleen’s voice was low. “Uh, Chief, the mayor suggests city employees write down a password and keep it in a desk drawer.”

  “That’s secure?” He was sardonic. “Okay, okay. I’ll write it down. What is it this week?”

  There was a long pause.