Nun After the Other

by Alice Loweecey

  “Hey, Aunt Giulia.” Cecilia waved a napkin at her. “Mom’s making pancakes. Want some?”

  “I was at a breakfast meeting, but thank you.”

  Anne beamed like the perfect housewife in an infomercial for the newest amazing griddle. “Giulia, I hope you don’t mind. I knew these three would come downstairs as though their last decent meal happened a week ago.”

  “I’d planned to come home and do the same. Is Frank awake?”

  “Would we be this quiet if he was?” Cecilia rolled her eyes. “I’m so repressed.”

  Pasquale snorted. “You’re so funny I forgot to laugh.”

  Giulia cringed. “Grade school humor. How I’ve missed it.”

  The brilliance of Anne’s smile increased. “I know, right? It’s great to hear their jokes again.”

  Not being evil enough to explain her sarcasm, Giulia changed the subject. “Where’s Carlo?”

  Cecilia pointed out the back door. “Where else?”

  Frank groped into the kitchen, plaid pajama pants on the bottom and a neon orange Police Benevolent Association basketball t-shirt on top. “Coffee?”

  Giulia poured from the full carafe. He took the mug before she added sugar and milk.

  “I need the hard stuff this morning.” He pulled out a chair and buried his face in the steam.

  Anne stacked the last four pancakes on a serving plate. “Breakfast’s ready. Cecilia, call your brother in, please.”

  Since she wasn’t eating, Giulia served. The kids did indeed eat like a starving horde and Frank kept up with them. Anne and Giulia cleaned up afterward and the kids packed.

  “Thank you a million times for bringing them home with you.” Anne flung her arms around Giulia, flapping the dishtowel against her neck.

  “We’re family.” She set another plate in the dish rack. “Besides, we’re also the founding members of the anti-Salvatore society.”

  Anne grimaced. “I talked to the doctors yesterday when I picked up the minivan keys. They have no idea when or if he’ll wake up. One of the nurses gave me papers for when I file his disability claim.” The angry face faded. “I’ll need the money to pay the mortgage and feed us. He closed our joint bank accounts when I left, but Cecilia, the little spy, knows the new passwords so I don’t have to try to explain our situation to another stranger.”

  “If Cecilia turns to the dark side, the world will be in trouble.”

  The spy bounded into the kitchen. “Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go! I’m packed. Those two are being slugs. Want to leave them behind?”

  “Are not and no way.” Pasquale and Carlo dropped their bags on the floor. Carlo kept right on walking out to the garden.

  Giulia called after him, “You can come visit her when your mom can drive you here.”

  “He can bike here,” Cecilia said.

  “If your mother’s okay with it.”

  Cecilia headed outside to share the plot with her brother. Anne had her blissful smile on again. Pasquale looked at his mother like she was an unknown biological specimen. Carlo ran inside.

  “Ma, can I bike here to visit Scarlett? Can I?”

  Anne said without hesitation, “When your homework and chores are done.”

  Pasquale elbowed his siblings. “Ma, what’s with the face?”

  Anne broke down and wept on Giulia’s shoulder. Giulia said to the kids, “She’s happy she can be your mom again.”

  Pasquale made a rude noise. “She’s always been our mom. She just did something stupid and Dad won’t let her stop paying for it.” He walked over to Frank and shook his hand, adult to adult. “Uncle Frank, I was going to be a cop when I grow up but now I’m going to be a lawyer because lawyers get to be judges. I’m going to make sure shit like Dad did to us doesn’t happen to other families.”

  Frank answered adult to adult as well. Giulia passed napkins to Anne. The kids hauled their suitcases and sleeping bags to the foyer.

  Anne threw open the front door, her smile belying her blotched face and puffy eyes. “Let’s go home.”

  When the house was theirs again, Zlatan’s wriggle was the first thing Giulia told Frank about the breakfast meeting. Frank swooped her up and deposited her on the couch. He spent the next fifteen minutes with his hand on her belly. He looked up at last with a ginormous pout on his face.

  “I don’t feel anything.”

  “Frank, he’s only about eight inches long. Wait another month and I’ll wake you up in the middle of the night and he can kick your hand as long as you like.”

  “It’s a date. Now tell me how The Scoop tried to subvert you to their side.”

  Thirty-Eight

  When Giulia entered the office Monday morning, Sidney and Zane were reading news stories from the local paper and all four network affiliate TV websites.

  “This newspaper reporter must have had to make a deadline.” Zane put on a Serious Newscaster Voice. “The cause of the fire is as yet unclear, as is the identity of the body.” He broke character to laugh. “Listen to this comment: ‘Is your journalism degree drawn in crayon by your kindergarten teacher?’ Ouch.”

  Sidney jumped up and down in her chair. “Ooh! Ooh! Somebody got pictures of the body.” She tapped keys. “It looks like Garfield’s butt stuck in a cat door.”

  “I keep trying to find a picture from the inside, but nobody got lucky.”

  “Lucky is not the word I would use. I wish I could learn the art of unseeing things.” Giulia went straight into her own office and booted her computer. With the same energy as her niece and nephews, Sidney and Zane ran in after her.

  “You were there?”

  “What really happened?”

  “Who’s the victim?”

  “How did you avoid all the rubberneckers with cell phones?”

  “Is Frank on this case too?”

  “Is it one big double murder case?”

  “I’ll buy your next coffee if you’ll tell us everything.”

  Giulia failed to keep a stoic face. She did manage a stern reply to Zane’s last sentence. “Driscoll Investigations is not open to bribery.” Then she softened it. “Besides, I hear there’s new research out. Three cups a day instead of two. I’m trying not to get my hopes up.”

  Sidney opened the curtains and raised the window. “There’s a beautiful breeze, which for a change doesn’t smell of sausage from the pizza place. As you are refreshed by the morning air, take pity on your hard-working staff left out of your exciting weekend adventures with dead bodies.”

  Giulia’s hands paused on her keyboard. “Sidney, motherhood is making you poetic.”

  “Dead bodies are poetic?” Zane grasped the edge of the desk. “Ms. D., log in please so you can tell us all the details.”

  Any time Zane cracked his MIT genius shell pleased Giulia. Also, Sidney waxing poetic deserved a reward. She logged in, scanned her emails, and saw nothing which couldn’t wait.

  “My phone rang at one in the morning.”

  Sidney groaned. “Did it wake the kids?”

  “Spoken like a mother. Fortunately they sleep like rocks. I drove to the convent and was escorted to the cellar.” She closed her eyes a moment.

  Sidney bounced on the balls of her feet. “What was it like? Tell. Tell.”

  “Sidney, you are the queen of perky and sweet, and you’re the one bugging me for gruesome details?”

  Her assistant gave her a wide-eyed, innocent look. “All the best love stories have a villain. What’s the point if the heroes don’t have an obstacle to overcome?”

  Zane reverted to human computer mode. “Gaston. Maleficent. Jafar. Darth Vader.”

  “Darth Vader?” Giulia ran through the plots of Star Wars IV, V, and VI.

  “Zane watches Disney movies?” Sidney’s expression switched to faux shock.

  “My girlfriend lik
es them and she doesn’t give me grief about my gaming weekends.”

  “Compromise can be beautiful,” Giulia said.

  “The true obstacle to Han Solo and Princess Leia getting together, if you’re willing to discount their ingrained prejudices as the larger obstacle.”

  Giulia dragged the conversation back on track. “It was the most horrific sight I’ve ever seen and no, I’m not going to describe it.”

  “Boo,” her staff said in unison.

  “Guys, I watch horror movies without any effect, and the state of the body gave me nightmares.”

  Zane whistled.

  “I will confirm three things: The body was Victor Eagle’s, the visible evidence looked like he was trying to commit arson, and as of early this morning all of the nuns are suspects.”

  “Hold it.” Sidney crossed her arms. “Old, sick nuns are suspects?”

  “They’re not all old and sick. Two of them have been continuously vocal in accusing Eagle Developers of underhanded practices.”

  Sidney’s eyes tried to roll out of their sockets. “I don’t care. Shooting off your mouth doesn’t equal homicidal maniac.”

  “There’s a revenge motive.”

  Sidney’s eyes now tried to roll across the floor to Zane’s feet. “Mr. Practicing Buddhist, one of those nuns is as likely to shoot, stab, or bludgeon someone as you are. Or I am. Or Giulia is.”

  Zane studied Sidney and Giulia in turn. “I can’t argue with your reasoning.”

  Sidney spun on one heel and raised the window screen. Sticking her head out the open space, she shouted, “Attention, Cottonwood! Zane Hall admitted I was right! Someone call the newspaper!”

  When she restored the screen and turned around, Zane gave her a sweet smile. “I’m being polite because we’re in front of Ms. D., but payback looms in your future like an errant TARDIS.”

  Sidney’s smile rivaled his in sweetness. “I’ve survived projectile vomiting and explosive diarrhea. Bring it.”

  “Ahem. We are in a work environment. As owner-operator of said environment, I officially did not hear this conversation.”

  They ranged themselves in front of her desk, the picture of repentant coworkers prepared to take on new duties.

  “I am giddy with power,” Giulia said. “Can you guys give me a hand? Zane, everything else you can dig up on Barbara Beech. And I mean The Scoop style of digging.”

  “Do I have time to run out and buy a can of hair spray to get into character?”

  She allowed herself a smile. “A good cosplayer works from within.”

  “I am humbled.”

  “Sidney, can you apply your pre-nuptial mojo to Victor Eagle’s personal life? I think Beech will take over the company, but perhaps an ex-wife or adult children are lurking.”

  “If Zane’s Ken Kanning, does that mean I’m Pit Bull? I really don’t want to shave my head.”

  “Since you can’t grow a beard, my advice to you is the same as Zane’s: Real cosplay comes from the heart.”

  A minute later the sound of dueling keyboards reached her ears.

  Thirty-Nine

  “Ms. D., a Sister Bartholomew is on line one and she’s hyperventilating.”

  Giulia extricated herself from three different email strings involving current cases. “Bart? What’s wrong?”

  “They’re tearing Crankenstein apart! They’re taking out my clothes and my books and they’re bagging up my painting supplies.”

  “Bart, slow down. Who’s in your RV?”

  “The police! They showed me a warrant and I knew I couldn’t tell them no and Olive thinks I’m a suspect and Eugenie wants to know if I hid my baseball ba-a-t…” The last word ended on a sob.

  “Bart, listen. I’m leaving now. I’ll be over there in about fifteen minutes. Don’t leave the house and don’t interfere with the police.”

  Lurkers—the same or new ones or a mixture of both—massed on the convent sidewalk to watch the installment of the Police versus RV show. Giulia drove around the block to park the Nunmobile. Nash VanHorne met her as she cut through two rows of minuscule backyards.

  “Morning, Giulia. The little nun said she called you.”

  “Morning, Nash. What’s going on?”

  “We’re hunting for incendiaries. The fire was caused by—wait a sec, I have to get the names right.” He tapped his phone screen. “Calcium hypochlorite and polyglycol.” He turned his screen for her to read. “Also known as brake fluid and pool shock, among other things. Our chem guys gave us a list of possibles to look for. Two female officers are searching the nuns’ rooms now.” They neared the convent’s back door. “Whatever happened to plain old gasoline and a match?”

  “No one cares about tradition anymore.” She smiled up at the tall detective. “Seriously, Nash, a convent of infirm and overworked nuns as murder suspects?”

  “Look at it from an objective standpoint, Giulia. He was stuck head first inside their cellar window. We found the remains of an incendiary device. If he wedged himself tight enough, he was possibly helpless. Any one of those nuns except the one in the wheelchair could’ve come downstairs and—I’m reaching here—torched him with those chemicals or used a baseball bat to knock the plastic bottle out of his hands to keep it off the newspapers. We found melted remnants of a plastic bottle.”

  “I suppose so, being objective. But—”

  “If we don’t cover all the angles, no matter how far-fetched, our boss who you claim is such a teddy bear will turn into a rabid grizzly.” He blocked her progress with one arm. “Reporter at two o’clock.”

  They cut hard right into the narrow aisle between two houses and peeked back around the corner of one like Charlie Chaplin and Jackie Coogan in The Kid.

  “Clear,” Giulia said.

  Their trek across back lawns ended at the narrow convent driveway. The houses on either side squeezed so tight against Bart’s RV, Giulia expected the brake lights to bulge. The police personnel dismantling it kept bumping into shake shingles on one side and peeling painted wood on the other. Faded green flecks clung to their clothes.

  “How’s it coming?” Nash said to the one labeling a bag containing a used bottle of turpentine.

  “We’re about ready to put it back together.”

  “Impressions?”

  An annoyed face. “Waste of time. Baseball bat’s clean. So is anything else weapon-like. This—” he held up the bagged turpentine— “isn’t even worth testing, but we’ll put it through the gamut.”

  “About what I expected.” Nash turned to Giulia. “Your little nun has been staring at us through the window the whole time. See if you can calm her down, would you? I need to ask her some more questions.”

  The only good part of the morning was Steve the Chihuahua cutting his “adorable injured puppy” act short when he recognized Giulia. He wouldn’t even accept a pet before he turned his back on her and retreated to the kitchen. Bart’s terrified face wiped away Giulia’s lingering smile.

  “Come sit with Aunt Giulia.” She led Bart to the sofa. A spring stabbed her butt as a reward, so she squeezed onto the same sagging cushion as Bart.

  Shudders coursed through Bart. “I was helping Dorothy for something to do, but I had to get away from Eugenie and Olive. Olive kept winking at me like we shared a secret and Eugenie cackled every time she looked at me. Then she wheeled herself into her room and told me she’d lend me her overnight bag for when the police hauled me off to jail.”

  Giulia grasped Bart’s arms. “Look at me.”

  Bart raised Precious Moments eyes to Giulia’s face.

  “I don’t use vulgar language, but what I think of Eugenie would shock my parish priest.”

  Bart snorted. Then she looked around with those big eyes as though Eugenie’s wheelchair was sneaking up on them from the hall.

  “Better now?” Giulia r
eleased Bart. “Detective VanHorne wants to talk to you again. Don’t jump. You’re not a frightened rabbit and he’s a gentleman who volunteers with his girlfriend at the SPCA.”

  “Stay with me, please.” Bart clutched Giulia’s sleeve.

  “If you need me, of course.” She raised the window and called, “Nash, when you’re ready.”

  “Come out here, would you?”

  Bart hung behind Giulia until Giulia took two steps back and gave her a nudge between the shoulder blades.

  Nash’s crooked smile radiated charm when he chose. He chose now. “Sister Bartholomew, we’re doing our best to put everything back where we found it. We’re taking a few things with us, but we’ll replace them when we’re finished.”

  Bart’s Precious Moments eyes returned. “Yes, sir.”

  “I don’t bite, Sister. Now can you tell me again everything you recall about what woke you up early Saturday morning?”

  “It was some kind of noise, but it didn’t happen again after I was awake. I’m a light sleeper because I live in my RV.” Anyone listening to Bart for the first time would think she was the worst kind of repressed nineteenth-century nun. “Then I heard a voice. The walls in there are thin enough to make paper airplanes out of. I was wide awake, but the voice came from downstairs and I couldn’t tell if it was a man’s or a woman’s.”

  Nash kept his gaze on Bart. The last of the gawkers on the sidewalk drifted away. Lack of an immediate and sensational arrest, perhaps. No news cameras or reporters were in sight. Giulia did a sweep of the visible area and didn’t see anyone—in other words, The Scoop—lurking around corners. Bart kept looking past the detective as her few possessions were reloaded into the RV.

  “This isn’t a great neighborhood, even now when most of the houses are empty. I’m the youngest one here, so I got the baseball bat and got ready to bust a kneecap.” She swallowed. “I didn’t hit him. I swear I didn’t hit him. His head was in one piece. You saw his head, right?”

  “We aren’t prepared to release any details yet. What did you do next?”