Medieval Murders

by Aaron Stander

  “I had coffee with him last week. We mostly talked about Bensen and Hendrickson. Since my mother died I’ve been,” she paused, “that’s not what I want to say. My father died when I was in high school, but I don’t think that really registered. Since my mother died, I’ve really thought about death. And starting with Bensen’s death, I’ve been obsessed with it. That’s what I was talking with Father Bob about. I’m not sure I mentioned Merchant, but I may have.”

  “But you don’t remember that, specifically.”

  “No, but I was pretty upset. I remember crying a lot. He makes me feel safe, I can let my feelings out.” She looked at Elkins. “Even if I told him, that would be the end of it. He wouldn’t tell anyone.”

  Elkins nodded in agreement. He didn’t want to say anything, but tomorrow morning he was going to focus on learning more about Father Bob.

  “We better get going. Stephanie is probably ready to serve. She says it’s one of your favorites.”

  “What is it?”

  “Can’t tell you, it’s Stephanie’s surprise. I can tell you she has some excellent Stilton on the cheese board.”

  As they crossed the lawn, she slipped her arm through his. Even though the sun was setting, the air was still warm.

  47

  The next morning, Wednesday, Elkins and Pascoe arrived at the Interfaith Religion Center at 9:30 in the morning. They parked in the back and hurried through a light drizzle to the main entrance and took the stairway down to Father Bob’s office at the back corner of the building. They stood at the closed door and looked at the schedule.

  “Looks like he’s not supposed to be in until 11:00,” said Ray. After knocking, he tried the handle; the door was locked. They noted that across from his office was the entrance to the building’s mechanical room. Pascoe unlocked the door of the mechanical room and ran her hand over the interior wall until she found the light switch. After Ray was in the room, she carefully closed the door behind them. The walls were covered with electrical panels, phone and cable boxes, controls for the heating and cooling system, and plumbing shut-off valves.

  At the back of the room was a steel door. Pascoe slid a master key into the lock. Then, grasping the handle near the end with a folded handkerchief, she pulled the door open and they peered into the tunnel.

  “Very convenient,” said Pascoe. “Let me quickly dust these for prints. Maybe he wasn’t as thorough at this end.”

  “Now if we just had a motive or some hard evidence,” said Ray. “We can’t ask for a search warrant just to do some fishing. Maybe we should look around his office.”

  Pascoe raised her eyebrows. “This doesn’t sound quite kosher.”

  “Oh, but it is. As the acting head of campus security, I’m also the titular head of the fire department, the fire marshall, if you will. I’m just making a routine inspection of a campus-owned building to make sure there are no potential fire hazards.”

  “Well, I’m not sure that...,” Pascoe’s rebuttal was interrupted by the chirp of her phone. She listened for a long moment and turned to Ray, “There’s been a shooting at the medical center, one of the staff psychiatrists.”

  “You get a name?”

  “Margrave.”

  “Dead?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Did they apprehend....”

  “No, the assailant got away.”

  Pascoe double-parked in front of the Professional Arts Building, joining a long line of emergency vehicles. The corridor outside Margrave’s office was blocked off, and Bill Baker, the head of security at the medical center was waiting for them.

  “What do you know?” asked Pascoe.

  “Not much. The security man at the staff entrance to this wing remembers Margrave arriving before 8:00. He says he commented to Margrave that he was the first one in.”

  “Any response,” asked Pascoe.

  “Just a greeting, nothing special that he remembers. This area doesn’t really get busy until close to 9:00. That’s when most of the clinics open.”

  “Who found Margrave?”

  “The young women who delivers mail and records.” Baker looked at his notes. “Her name is Amanda Bliss, said she had just pulled her cart off the elevator, this is the second office she stopped at. She said the door was ajar, and she saw Margrave on the floor.”

  “Did she see anyone in the hall or getting on the elevator?”

  “Says she doesn’t remember anyone specifically. I have her waiting at our office. I knew you would want to talk with her.”

  “How about Margrave?” asked Elkins

  “Two shots to the chest. He was unconscious when he was found. He’s in surgery. I don’t think they’re optimistic.”

  “Anything else?” Elkins asked.

  “I have a short list of all the people who were in the area at the time. No one remembers seeing anything out of the ordinary. The receptionist in the clinic down the hall said she heard a couple of loud pops, but she didn’t think anything about it. They’re erecting steel for the new addition just beyond that wall,” Baker pointed. “She just assumed the noise was from the construction.”

  Ray looked at the dark stain on the gray carpeting. The door to Margrave’s inner office was ajar. He swung the door wider and went in; he was looking for an appointment book. Margrave’s computer was on. Ray hit the space bar. The screen-saver, the medical center logo, disappeared.

  Elkins looked at Pascoe. “He logged into his calendar. The first appointment was at 8:00 A.M.”

  “Who’s the patient?”

  “FB,” he responded.

  48

  Father Bob was just coming out of the Interfaith Religious Center as Pascoe pulled into the circular drive next to the building. When he saw the police car, he ducked back into the door. Pascoe reached under her jacket, pulled out a 9mm automatic. “You call for backup,” she ordered as she left the car. Ray phoned for help and followed her in.

  The door of the mechanical room was just swinging shut as Pascoe reached the lower level. She unlocked the door and slowly swung it open. The lights were on, the room was empty, but the door into the tunnel stood open. She carefully approached the opening to the tunnel; in the distance she could see Father Bob moving from light to dark to light as he passed the evenly spaced bulbs. She cautiously pursued him, sprinting from one protected area to the next. Then he disappeared.

  Pascoe assumed he must have reached the corner near the Engineering Building. As she peered from behind a cement pillar looking for the next area that would provide cover, Pascoe saw the muzzle flash and heard the bullet ricocheting off concrete walls as it passed her. She waited, looking and listening. No sound, no motion. She darted forward again, staying low and moving cautiously, scurrying from one protected area to the next. When she reached the point where the tunnel made a ninety-degree turn, she carefully looked around the corner, then dashed across the tunnel, using some equipment cabinets for cover.

  Now she could see the figure again, this time at a greater distance. She pursued again, but suddenly he disappeared into the gloom. As she crouched in the darkness, she remembered the entrance to the carillon. She moved forward carefully, trying to find cover as she went.

  She reached the alcove for the carillon entrance and searched the opening for any sign of movement. All she could hear was the sound of her breathing and the steady mechanical hum of distant equipment. She stepped back and jammed the barrel of her gun through the wire light cage, breaking the bulb. She slid into the alcove, her eyes adjusting to the darkness.

  Pascoe holstered her gun and slowly climbed the steel rungs of the ladder. When her hands grasped the final rung, she peered through the open trap door and waited—no sound, no movement. She lifted her head through the opening; then she carefully pulled herself into the carillon, retrieving her gun.

  She paused for a moment. She didn’t have to go any farther. He was cornered. They could wait him out. There was no reason to pursue Father Bob. Then she thought about him standing wi
th a gun above the diag, crowded with students. She cautiously started up the stairs. Pascoe was less than half way when she heard a shot, slightly muffled. No bullets ricocheted off the granite walls around her.

  She stood for a long moment and waited, then slowly climbed toward the tower, gun at the ready, alert for any sudden movement above. Pascoe crept up the final few stairs. First she saw the bottoms of his shoes, heels on the floor, toes splayed at odd angles, then the legs, and finally the rest of the body. A pistol lay on the worn oak floor near Father Bob’s head in an expanding pool of blood.

  Pascoe stood there looking at the body. She heard Elkins climbing the stairs. He stood at her side for a long moment, breathing hard, and then he broke the silence. “We have the killer, now we need the motive.”

  49

  Ray stood at the side of the hospital bed. “How are you feeling today?” he asked.

  “Better, lots better. Today I feel like life might be worth living. For the last four or five days, I wasn’t sure. I’ve really learned about pain. I now have an understanding of what soldiers go through.”

  “I’ve been by to see you a couple of times over the last week,” said Elkins, “but you were sleeping. They’ve really kept you heavily sedated.”

  “Yes,” said Margrave softly.

  “I’d like to talk about what happened, if you feel strong enough. There’s no rush. We can wait a few more days, if that would be better.”

  Margrave looked up at him. “I can tell you what I know, but I don’t feel totally lucid.”

  Elkins placed a small recorder on the bedside table near Margrave. “You know that Father Bob killed himself?”

  Margrave nodded, “Wife told me. Where?”

  “The carillon.”

  “That fits.”

  “We’ve been able to piece together what happened, but we still don’t know why. That’s what you could help us with.”

  “Long answer or short answer?”

  “Whatever you can do.”

  “Short answer. He knew, as a therapist, I was going to have to go to the police. I’m sorry I waited. This might have all been prevented.” He paused, “Well, some of this might have been.”

  “What did you know about him?”

  “Well, I didn’t really know anything at first, but I finally put two and two together. I just didn’t think it was possible. During our last session, I finally realized that his problems where a lot more extensive than I had thought. Would you hand me the water,” Margrave gestured toward the tray at the side of the bed.

  Ray picked up the container—stainless steel, a straw sticking through a hole in the cover—and passed it to him.

  Margrave held the container carefully and drank from the straw, small sips, stopping to breathe between sips. Eventually, he handed it back.

  “I’ve known Father Bob for a number of years. He’s part of a university-wide group that meets for lunch once a month. The group includes people involved in counseling and therapy. I was impressed with him, smart, knowledgeable, verbal. A few months ago he contacted me, said he had some problems he needed help working out. He started seeing me twice a week. It took him a few sessions to tell me what was bothering him. Turns out he was sleeping with a number of the women he was working with.”

  “Working?”

  “Working, as in counseling. Told me he’d never been very good at celibacy, but this wasn’t just a sex thing. He was feeling a need to control them. Sex was the most powerful weapon. He told me there was a regular pattern. He would try to get a woman to fall for him, and as soon as he was sure he had her, he would drop her. I prodded him on the number of women. He told me he used to be involved with one woman at time, but in recent months he had two or three relationships going.” Margrave paused to regain his breath. “You can see the obvious ethical dilemma for me. I pushed hard on why he was engaging in this behavior, a behavior that was unprofessional and a betrayal of trust. I hate to invoke one of the clichés of the trade, but we quickly got back to mother.”

  “Mother?”

  “His mother. He was an only child and his mother left his father, left him as well, for another woman. This happened when he was eleven or twelve. He had little contact with his mother after that point. He was raised by a stern, protective father, who engendered in his son the anger and hatred he felt for his ex-wife. Bob was sent to a Catholic prep school and a Catholic university, and sometime late in his undergraduate career, he decided to enter the priesthood. He later got a Ph.D. in clinical psychology. And until all this started, by all appearances, he was quite effective.”

  “What triggered the change?”

  “Dalton, Constance Dalton. She came to him for help. She had gotten involved in a liaison with one of her colleagues....”

  “But I thought Dalton was in therapy with you.”

  “She was. She had been referred to me by Father Bob. He said her problems were beyond the scope of his counseling. Dalton was the catalyst that awakened all those feelings and all that anger he carried for his mother. You remember that it was an analogous situation. When Dalton started with him, she was considering leaving her husband and son for a woman. She was upset and confused. I guess after that he started to lose control. It took a number of months, but he became obsessed with getting the woman who, he felt, took Dalton away from her husband and son. It’s a powerful bit of transference. All he knew about the other woman was that she was one of Dalton’s colleagues, perhaps someone in the same specialty.” He stopped and gestured toward the container of water.

  Ray picked up the container. “This is almost empty, I’ll have to get you some more.” He carried it to the nursing station and returned with one filled with water and ice. Margrave passed it back to Ray after drinking.

  “When did you learn about this?”

  “He had an appointment on Monday. At the end of the session I think that he went further than he had intended to. When he came in on Wednesday I confronted him, asked him directly about his involvement in Benson’s death. He told me everything. I think he had planned to kill me.”

  “So tell me about Bensen.”

  “He said that he had assumed that Bensen was her lover. He knew that Dalton spent time with her, and everything he knew about Bensen suggested that she was a lesbian.”

  “Did he tell you how he did it, how he got her to the carillon?”

  “I asked. He said he set up a meeting with her in his office. Using the tunnels, he had purloined a small cylinder of nitrous oxide and a mask from the dental school. I don’t know how he put her under, if he overpowered her or what. All he told me was that he put her out using nitrous and used the steam tunnels to get her to the carillon. He said he waited until some of her colleagues started coming out of the department meeting, then gave her a quick push through the window. Said her academic robes were the window-dressing. He gloated when he told me about it, said it was the perfect crime.”

  Elkins asked, “Did he tell you how he got the academic regalia?”

  “Didn’t elaborate, but I realize now how sociopathic and very manipulative he was. I’m sure he was able to get people to do almost anything he wanted them to.”

  “How about Hendrickson?”

  “He said that after he killed Bensen, he became suspicious that perhaps Hendrickson was the object of Dalton’s affections. He had seen them having coffee in the Union, and he sensed that they were intimate. Father Bob said that once he killed Bensen, the second one was easy. He said he hadn’t really planned it, but when he saw her car at the Chesterton’s it was all too easy. He had raced sports cars in college and knew all he had to do was cut some brake lines. Said he didn’t know what effect it would have, and it turned out better than he hoped for.”

  “But why Arden?”

  “He had committed two seemingly perfect crimes. He thought he could get away with another one. He knew Arden and Dalton were friends, perhaps more than just friends. Arden had told him some ex-con had threatened her, so he decided to tak
e advantage of the opportunity. Said he couldn’t believe that it didn’t work. I asked how he felt about almost killing someone not involved. He said it happens in war, collateral damage.”

  “Dalton, we skipped her. Another nitrous oxide victim before the carbon monoxide?”

  “He said Dalton did herself in. He was sorry, but it was probably for the best. Said it’s hell growing up wondering about your mother, who she’s with, if she ever loved you. Bob said Dalton’s death would allow her son to get on with his life. He wished his mother had killed herself. At that point he pulled out a pistol and said something like, “ Of course you appreciate why I have to do this.’ That’s about all I remember.”

  “It fills in all the pieces,” said Ray. We will have to verify some of the physical evidence, but this ties it all together.”

  “You know,” said Margrave, “I’ve done work in post-trauma therapy—policemen, firemen, rescue people. After you were shot at, I was going to offer to give you whatever assistance I could. If fact, you were on my call list the day....”

  “I could still use it,” said Elkins. “As soon as you’ve recovered.”

  “We’ll probably have to bring in someone else. They can work with both of us,” said Margrave with a weak smile. “We’ll get a group discount.”

  50

  Ray was standing in the kitchen when Jane pushed the screen door open and came in carrying a brown grocery bag. She set the bag on the counter and slid under Ray’s arm and gave him a playful kiss on the cheek. “Stephanie sent you a gift. She said it was special.”

  “What is it?”

  “You’re going to have to look. It’s not a surprise if I tell you.”

  Ray reached in the bag and pulled out a bottle of Krug. He looked at the bottle and said, “Wonderful.”

  “There’s something more.”

  Ray looked in the bag again and pulled out a small can, frost forming on its exterior. “Stephanie is amazing; I don’t know how she remembered this.”