A Circumstance of Blood

by Jeannette Batz Cooperman

  Adrenaline surged back, and she ran up the two flights of stairs ahead of them. When she burst through the door, Connie smiled with relief.

  “You sent Colin after me, didn’t you?” Sarah asked, reaching over to squeeze her hand. “Thank you. It’s all fine. We’ve got just one question. Exactly when was it that Adriana asked for Philip’s file?”

  A quick scrawl. ‘Which time?’

  “She got it twice? Tell me both times.”

  Connie wrote, ‘Early in fall term, first. He was unusual − I figured she just wanted to get a better handle on him. Early Nov. she asked for the file again.’

  Sarah turned back to Colin. “She knew who his father was from the start. Maybe it seemed like the best revenge to sleep with his son.”

  “I doubt Adriana would have . . .”

  “Hear me out. Mid-term, North comes to the parent-teacher conference and says he’s loved her all these years. At first she doesn’t believe him. But, by Christmas, she’s fallen back in love with him and, in January, they sleep together. She can’t let him learn she slept with his son.”

  “And once Philip finds out North wasn’t his biological father, he wants to hurt him by telling,” Colin said slowly. “It was the ultimate weapon.”

  “Jesus,” Jimmy breathed. “I thought I was messed up. So Adriana killed Philip?”

  “I doubt she went there intending to,” Sarah said. “She’d just had sex with North for the first time. She probably just wanted to beg Philip’s silence. But when she got there, he was in la-la-land, and the heroin and syringe were staring at her.”

  “That means Adriana tried to kill Graham, too?”

  Sarah’s cell rang again.

  “Markham! Thank God.” O’Rourke’s tone was so fervent, it worried her. It wasn’t like him to invoke a deity. “You got my message?” he asked.

  “I’ve been a little busy. What’s up?”

  “Tell you in person − I’m in the school parking lot. Where are you?”

  “In Colin’s office.”

  When O’Rourke saw Jimmy he grabbed his upper arm and shoved him into a chair.

  “He didn’t do it,” Sarah said wearily. “We think we know who did.” She summed up what they knew.

  “Yeah? And you think she tried to kill your little friend Graham, too?”

  “That was me,” Jimmy said. “And I didn’t try to kill him. The drug’s harmless. I honestly thought he killed Philip. And I needed him to confess.”

  “So your own part wouldn’t come out?” Colin asked. He didn’t wait for an answer, just headed for his office door.

  “Too bad,” O’Rourke said loudly. “He woulda liked to see this.” He set a brown mailer tube on Connie’s desk. “Somebody with a Scottish accent tried to sell it.”

  Colin came back, pried the tube open with his fingernail, then pulled out the map an inch at a time and lay it flat. “So you suspected me?” he asked almost idly, preoccupied with positioning Connie’s pen cup and notepad to weight the fragile, curling paper.

  O’Rourke shook his head. “Too obvious. You’re smart enough to underplay the accent. I’m thinking it was the same guy who bought The Devil’s Breath.” He shot Jimmy a look.

  “We never should’ve let Philip have that map,” Jimmy said, working up a righteous indignation. “I took it with me that night. I was going to put it back where it belonged. After he was − after his body was found, I was sick with worry. I thought I’d somehow killed him myself and, even if I hadn’t, somebody would find out I’d been there and suspect me. I figured a stolen map might be a diversion.”

  He sounded far less bothered by this confession, but Colin’s lips were pressed together in a white fury. “And you used a Scottish accent.”

  “Oh, don’t worry, I’ll tell the police,” Jimmy said, rising. A little of the old buoyancy had returned. “I’m going to go turn myself in.”

  *

  The thought of Jimmy getting fingerprinted and thrown into a cell with steel bars made Sarah dizzy. “You really didn’t do that much that was illegal,” she said.

  “He bought street drugs. He sat by while a student shot up. He shoved a needle into his arm and extracted his blood for a bizarre ritual designed only to keep the boy from revealing statutory rape.” Colin’s voice was a monotone, but every word landed like a blow. Pale, Jimmy walked to the door without looking back.

  When the door shut, Colin said, “We have to give Adriana a chance to explain.”

  “Call the cops first,” O’Rourke advised. “Or you’ll join your friend at the booking desk for aiding and abetting.”

  “We don’t even know if Sarah’s right.”

  “You really want to take a chance?”

  Sarah knew she was right. It sat heavy in her gut, unwelcome but so suddenly obvious it refused to lift. “I’ll call Morganstern’s office number,” she said. “It’s after six, so she won’t be there. I’ll leave a message saying we have an idea of who killed Philip, and we’ll let her know the minute we’re sure.”

  A grudging nod from O’Rourke − his prodigy was learning. Once she’d made the call, he led them to his Jeep Cherokee, bragging about how he’d souped up the engine.

  “She lives just down the hill,” Colin pointed out. The two of them were still butting heads, and Sarah was sick of it. All she cared about was the light in Adriana’s windows. She was home.

  Desperate to get this over with, Sarah would have banged loud and fast, but Colin gave three firm, evenly spaced knocks.

  “North?” Adriana called. “Come on in. I’m changed and ready.” Her gauzy skirt had an asymmetrical hem that grazed the floor, and her hair hung loose. When she registered who her visitors were, she gave them a puzzled smile and invited them to sit.

  Sarah brushed over O’Rourke’s identity, calling him a friend, and said they needed to talk. When they were all seated in a very English, lightly floral living room, Colin leaned forward and looked her in the eye. “I’m certain you didn’t go to his room intending to kill him. But it’s time to tell the truth and be done with it.”

  Sarah hadn’t expected him to leap right into it. A tiny strangled noise came from Adriana’s throat, and her lips went white.

  “You slept with Philip, didn’t you?” Sarah asked, making it a by-the-way sort of question, like asking if Adriana spoke Spanish. There was a long, dead silence, the only movement in the room their shallow breathing. If she hadn’t slept with him, Sarah thought, she would have denied it.

  Sarah risked a glance at Colin, just as his eyes sought hers, and the contact steadied her. “You couldn’t bear for North to know,” she continued. “And Philip would’ve loved to tell him.”

  In a single fluid motion, Adriana stood and walked out of the living room. O’Rourke was faster and blocked her.

  “I’m not running away.” Her diction was crisp, a teacher’s correction. “I simply need a glass of water. You’ll forgive me if I don’t offer you tea.”

  “Let her go,” Colin told O’Rourke, who stepped aside but kept his eyes on Adriana’s back while she took a juice glass from the shelf over the sink. She let the water run before she held the glass under the tap, tossed out the water, filled the glass again and drained it. She set the glass carefully on the counter, upside down.

  When she came back, she walked past all of them and stood by the window. Sarah squinted at the silver frame on the table behind her and saw a young man in aviator goggles, a young Adriana playfully tying a white silk scarf around his neck. Never dreaming what she’d do, years later, to recapture that feeling.

  For a quick second, she met Sarah’s eyes. Then she began speaking, aiming her gaze at a spot high on the ivory wall. “After North left, I panicked. Philip kept threatening to tell him, said it’d serve him right. But if North found out I’d slept with his son . . .” She shuddered. “I knew I’d lose him again. So I walked up the hill and slipped inside the dorm. It was late enough that the boys were all
in bed, and if I ran into anybody I could always say I needed a book back that I’d lent him. I knocked on Philip’s door, really softly. He didn’t answer, so I went in. Somehow I had to convince him to keep the secret.” She exhaled a long breath. “At first I thought he was just asleep. Then I saw the needle and vial on his nightstand. ‘Just a little more,’ I thought. Who knew how much he’d already shot up? If he woke up fine, I’d bear whatever happened. But it was my chance. I deserved a chance.”

  “Philip didn’t?” Colin’s voice was ice. Out of the corner of her eye, Sarah saw O’Rourke step close to him.

  “Were you going to kill Steven, too?” she asked, her voice still conversational.

  “Of course not,” Adriana said, equally calm. Where had that fluttery, ethereal creature gone? “I was worried Philip might have bragged about laying a teacher, and I figured if I scared Steven badly enough he’d get hysterical, and nobody would believe anything else he said.”

  Colin stepped into the kitchen, and Sarah saw him pull out his phone.

  “You’ll excuse me if I use the bathroom?” Adriana said, not waiting for an answer.

  Colin’s call took forever − was he telling Morganstern the whole story? O’Rourke’s mouth worked like he was chewing gum. Sarah recrossed her legs, tried to breathe.

  When Colin came back, Adriana still hadn’t returned.

  “She’s in the loo,” Sarah said.

  “Too long,” O’Rourke added. “But maybe that’s a good thing.”

  “What the hell does that mean?” Colin snapped. “Call 911.” He crossed to the bathroom and pressed his ear against the door. O’Rourke reached for his phone in slow motion. Without even turning around, Colin yelled, “Call them.”

  “It’ll take too long,” Sarah said. “You’ve got to go inside.”

  “Yeah, all right,” O’Rourke said. “Get outta my way.”

  Sarah grabbed Colin’s arm and pulled him away from the door just as O’Rourke hurled his bulk. The door banged open, Adriana turned from the sink, he crashed into her, and a thin rim of silver flashed. O’Rourke gasped and dropped to the ground.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  Colin paced Morganstern’s office while she and her sergeant interviewed a pale, bloodied Adriana, her wrist cocooned in white gauze.

  When the detective came back, she looked haggard. “Adriana confessed to injecting a lethal dose,” she said, “and Jimmy admitted drugging Graham. I think he was hoping to get Graham to write out a confession − there was a notepad on the bed − but the boy lost consciousness first.”

  “Jimmy seriously thought that would work?”

  “It wasn’t stupid. He slipped the drug into Graham’s beer and then accused him over and over of killing Philip. If somebody found Graham afterward, with The Devil’s Breath still in his blood, there was a good chance he would have confessed. As he did, to Sarah.”

  “So Philip slept with both Jimmy and Adriana?”

  “With Adriana, it was a coup. With Jimmy, I think he was trying to force him to be honest about who he was. And, resorting to cruelty when he refused.”

  “So all this was because of me,” Colin said, his voice bleak.

  “Don’t flatter yourself, Father. It was a lot more complicated than that. Jimmy’s probably been in love with you for years, but he would have gone on that way, saying nothing, for many more years. Philip broke open those defences.”

  “Did he − was Jimmy . . .”

  “Attracted to young boys? Not as far as I can tell. Philip was older than his years − you’ve all told me that. Jimmy was a fun challenge. It’s always easy to seduce somebody you’re not in love with.”

  Colin raised one eyebrow. “I wouldn’t know.”

  She smiled. “Maybe you should pay closer attention. Anyway, Jimmy couldn’t take the chance of Philip telling you, or anybody else, and using his lapse to ruin the school. He knew the flashblood ritual would intrigue Philip. Stupidly, he thought it would shut him up.”

  “And instead it gave Adriana a way to kill him. Would she have done it anyway?”

  “You’re religious, Father. In your world, things are fated, ordained, ‘meant to be’. What I think about is the way a chain of tiny, tiny decisions can change everything. Get us killed, save our lives, make us into something we never wanted to be.”

  Colin thought of all the turning points, each one harmless on its own, and how inexorably they could move you away from what was good and sane and true. “Either way, we lose control in the end.”

  She nodded. “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”

  *

  Sarah awoke exhilarated. Her back and shoulder ached, her face was bruised, her nose was tender and raw, and her nerves felt like they’d been singed by lightning, tiny jolts of electricity still jumping at random. But her heart floated, weightless. Colin hadn’t killed Philip. And, Jimmy hadn’t either. She hugged Simon so exuberantly he wriggled away and ran for a tennis ball.

  Listening to the previous day’s voicemail, she was touched by the frantic note in O’Rourke’s voice when he couldn’t reach her. He’d done all this for her and nearly lost his life in the process. If Adriana had palmed a longer knife from the kitchen counter . . .

  As it was, the knife had entered between two ribs and barely nicked his heart. The last message from him had come late at night, no doubt after sweet talking a nurse to charge his phone. “Markham? I just left an anonymous tip about our cop friend. He was a good source on the street, but you were right. He does too much damage.”

  Perversely, she felt a twinge of regret. Wingert had tipped them off about a priest making a drug buy, and that had narrowed the field to two. They did owe him . . .

  On the other hand, maybe that was why O’Rourke had dimed him. Not in a burst of conscience, but to avoid him cashing in those favours.

  Sitting up in bed, she called Kat and told her everything; called Rob and got no answer; called Casper. “It’s done,” she said without preface. “We know who killed Philip. And I can’t reach Rob.” Probably sleeping in with his phone turned off, after all his exhausting research.

  “You’re still at the school?”

  “For a day or so.”

  “I’ll tell him to get out there as soon as he can. I want you to help him shape the story.”

  “Gladly,” she said. For once, she meant it.

  “Oh, and Sarah, about that seminary story? Yeah, no.”

  “Seminary story? What on earth are you talking about?” Shivering, she pulled the blankets up to her neck.

  “Somebody called from the archdiocese, trying to find a female reporter who was doing a story on seminary teachers so they could send over a press kit. Had to be you.”

  Her laugh burbled, carefree for the first time in months. “I just needed some information. Yes, I know I shouldn’t trade on my press credentials. It was an emergency.”

  “I wasn’t worried about your ethics, just your instincts. I figured that between Haiti and a murder . . .”

  “I’d lost it?”

  “Just that you were probably ready to write a little fluff. I’ve got something better, though. There’s this kook who’s running for mayor by asking every St. Louisan to give him one plank for his platform. He has them write their dream for the city on a two-by-four, and he’s going to build a stage out of them and announce his candidacy. You could hang out with him while he builds it, write a colour piece.”

  God, she thought, I’ve got to get that foundation job.

  *

  Ehrlich strode into Colin’s office, Connie making helpless motions behind his back. “Congratulations, Father. It seems Mrs. Portel has decided not to sue after all. She says her son talked her out of it.” He cleared his throat. “I suspect Mr. Schucard played a role as well.”

  Another day, Colin might have begrudged the man his thanks. Ehrlich made doing his job sound like granting favours, and it flashed Colin back to the rich
kids at prep school. “Here you go, McAvoy. My mum said you might want some of my old sweaters.”

  Today though, Colin was so elated he didn’t mind humbling himself. “I appreciate what you did, Bishop. Please convey my gratitude to Mr. Schucard as well.”

  “You’re more than welcome,” Ehrlich said, patting Colin’s upper arm. “I have a great deal of faith in you, Father McAvoy. We may not agree on methods or priorities, but young men like you are what the Church needs to go forward.”

  It was like pulling back your bedspread and finding a giant spider cuddled up beneath the covers, pen-stroke legs beckoning. “I don’t − I really − well, at any rate, thank you,” Colin stammered.

  After Ehrlich left, he paced, out of sorts, trying to recapture the morning’s sweet relief. Connie walked in with the mail, wearing the worried look that had become habit since Philip’s death. When Colin told her the lawsuit had been dropped, her face cleared, and she waved her hands in the air like a rock groupie.

  After she left, he crossed to the door and locked it so carefully, the click was inaudible. For a long time he sat motionless at his desk, fingers steepled under his chin, listening to the wall clock’s hands tick. Then he turned to his computer, keyed in Ehrlich’s address, and began to type.

  ‘I have thought about this step many times, yet now I find I am uncertain how to proceed. After months of careful deliberation and prayer, I have decided to leave the priesthood. Should you wish me to stay at Matteo as headmaster, I would be happy to do so, but I understand if you prefer that the school be run by a Jesuit. I presume this letter will laicise me, stripping me of the right to say Mass or perform any sacramental function. Please let me know what further steps you wish me to take.’

  Should he thank him for the privilege of serving in his diocese? Screw it. He signed the letter, sealed the envelope and felt his heart lighten. He tried to imagine Sarah’s expression when he told her and caught himself smiling. Not yet, he told himself. You’re not done with the hard part yet.

  Disconcerting, to realise he knew Morganstern’s number by heart. “Lieutenant? Colin McAvoy. Listen, I’m sorry to bother you. I just have one quick question. Where is Jimmy now?”