“Hey,” yelled Dewey, as one bomb found its mark. “No throwing! You’re only allowed to drop it!”
“Oops, sorry!” called Samantha, her apology followed by a plethora of stifled giggles. “We won’t count the points for that one.”
“Just wait until it’s our turn!” said Stuart.
“We have to get to a hundred first,” called Addie, dropping another hymnal. Bang! it went, and knocked Garth to the floor. Cheers came from the balcony and the boys redoubled their efforts to walk faster.
I watched for a moment, shook my head with a smile, and headed for the kitchen. As I walked past the chapel, I saw Gaylen setting up for the vespers service. I stuck my head in.
“Hi. How’s it going?” I said.
“Fine,” said Gaylen. “Everything is going great. The kids are upstairs busily drawing pictures of the Christmas story and we’ll be discussing their art during vespers. I think Kimberly Walnut’s finally got a handle on this thing.”
“I think that she does,” I agreed.
•••
Gaylen Weatherall’s office was open. I stuck my head in the door and saw the reliquary sitting on the side table beside her desk. I walked over to it and checked the lid just for fun. Locked. I was sixty-eight percent sure that it was the reliquary that the killer was after. Nancy, Dave, and I would be up all night, but we figured that, if we could nail her for grand theft, maybe the feds could make a murder case later. They’d been collecting a lot of evidence over the years. They might be able to put something together.
I knew that Gaylen would lock her office when she left for the evening and I was going to make myself conspicuous until then. Then I’d retire surreptitiously to my own office and listen to the microphone that Nancy had hidden on Gaylen’s bookshelf. I’d give her a call as soon as I heard our thief enter the rector’s office. Nancy and Dave would arrest her as she walked out.
•••
“Jeez,” said Nancy into her cell phone. “It’s three o’clock in the morning. What’s she waiting for?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe we’ve got this whole thing figured wrong.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
•••
At 4:15 my cell vibrated on the desk. I picked it up and flipped it open. “Yeah,” I whispered.
“You gotta get down here,” said Nancy, her voice full of urgency.
“What for?”
“There’s been another murder! Over at Old Camp Possumtickle.”
“The nudist camp?”
“Yeah. We just got the 911 call. We’ve got to go, Hayden.”
“Where’d the 911 call come from?” I said.
“I can guess, but we don’t know for sure. Anyway, Dave and I are going over there. Sorry. It might be a false alarm, but it might not. We’ve got to.”
“Go ahead. I’m right behind you.”
I stood and pulled my coat over my cast, and ground my teeth in frustration.
“Dammit!” I said under my breath.
Chapter 39
There had been no murder at Old Camp Possumtickle. In fact, there weren’t even any people at Old Camp Possumtickle, it being January and Old Camp Possumtickle now being Camp Daystar, St. Germaine’s Christian Nudist Retreat.
We spent an hour walking through the camp after Nancy picked the padlock on the gate.
“How about the 911 call?” I asked.
“I checked with Boone. It came from a cell phone. There was no number they could trace.”
“Did they say if it was a man or a woman?”
“Woman,” said Nancy. “Not that it helps much.”
“Well, let’s get back. I’m afraid I know what we’re going to find.”
“We could go pick her up,” suggested Dave. “Maybe she’s still got the box.”
“I kind of doubt that she’s still in town,” I said. “But we might as well get a warrant and go on over to her apartment. Nancy, go ahead and give Judge Adams a call.”
“Lemme wait until six, huh? Last time I called at five, he read me the riot act for fifteen minutes.”
“Yeah, fine,” I said. “Let’s go check the church and then go get some breakfast.”
•••
Gaylen’s office was locked. I reached behind the copy machine to get the master key. It was gone. I looked at my watch. 5:45.
“The Slab will be open at six,” said Dave. “You want breakfast, or do you want to call the priest and get the key?”
“We can wait a bit. She’ll be in at about seven for those kids. We’ll stop back then.”
Chapter 40
“We want the organ contract for the new Cathedral,” said Sophie Slugh. “The Slugh Organ Company will be the new standard in pipe organs for the 21st century.”
“Is that your company, Sophie? I never heard of it.”
“It used to be Peter Pooter’s Penny Pumpers, but Peter’s plan pooped out when he couldn’t make the pumps plather. It was an engineering problem. We simply replaced Peter’s penny pumps with Kooloobati gas-slugs. They supply all the air a pipe organ needs.”
“Makes sense,” I said. “Flatulent flatworms. Brilliant. But what makes you think I have anything to do with who gets the contract?” I asked.
“We know you’ve got the goods on the Queen Bishop. One word from you and she’ll cough up that contract like Mr. Frisky on National Hairball Day. Then, once the Slugh Organ is installed, everyone will want one.”
“Yeah, probably,” I agreed -- as agreeable as the head underdwarf, Agrin the Agreeable, who, as I’m sure he would agree, owed me seventeen dollars (three-years’ wages in Kooloobati), which was the princely sum I’d paid him to keep Sophie in the compost heap -- “but I don’t think that’s going to happen.”
I narrowed my gaze and pulled a salt shaker out of my pocket. The air was sucked out of the room by a hundred slimy blowholes. It reminded me of the U.S. Senate.
“Didn’t you frisk him?” Sophie burbled at a slug that looked suspiciously like Nancy Pelosi, but with better plastic surgery.
“I can’t stand to touch a gumshoe,” she (or he) squished back. “They give me the screamin’ willies!”
And that’s when the seasoning started.
•••
“I’ve got the warrant,” said Nancy, walking up to our table. “Judge Adams is out of town. Judge Minton wasn’t too happy, meeting me at 6:30 in the morning. Not only did I have to stop at Dunkin’ Donuts and bring him a coffee and a cruller, but when he opened the front door, he was in his bathrobe.” Nancy gave an involuntary shudder. “And it wasn’t exactly tied shut.”
“I know how you feel,” I said. “Mrs. Crampkin did the same thing to me last month when I went over to help her get her cat off the roof.”
“Mrs. Crampkin’s a hundred and eight years old!” said Pete. “Maybe more.”
“You just ain’t whistlin’ Dixie,” I said. “I haven’t seen that many wrinkles since Hannah dropped that case of prunes down at the Piggly Wiggly. Mrs. Crampkin looked like a bald Shar-Pei.”
“Have some waffles,” Dave said to Nancy. “They’re delicious. We’re meeting Gaylen Weatherall in a couple of minutes. Then off to nail the perp. Well, if she’s home.”
Nancy slid a chair out from under the table and bellied up to a plate of Belgian waffles.
“Perp?” I said to Dave. “Did you just say perp?”
Nancy laughed. “He did say perp.”
Dave hung his head in shame.
“Can I come?” asked Pete. “I’ve got my Kevlar vest in the back of the truck.”
Cynthia walked up to the table and began to refill our coffee cups.
“You’ve got a vest?” said Nancy. “Why? Why on earth would you have a vest?”
“I’m going turkey hunting with the mayor here,” Pete said, smiling up at Cynthia. “It’s not that she’s a bad shot. It’s just that she’s the current beneficiary on my insurance policy.”
“No,” I said. “You can’t come.”
“Go ahead and take him,” Cynthia said. “Maybe he’ll get shot and save me the trouble.”
•••
We met Gaylen in Marilyn’s office at seven o’clock sharp. She was dressed for the day’s work in a wool skirt and matching sweater. Her long white hair was tied back with a ribbon.
“What’s the rush?” she said, when Nancy, Dave, and I walked in. “I had to be here anyway for the children’s sunrise service, but you three look as though you’ve been up all night.”
“We’ll tell you in a second,” I said. “Could we go into your office?”
“Sure,” said Gaylen. She pulled her keys out of her sweater pocket and unlocked the office door. We followed her into the room. She walked behind her desk, sat down and looked up at us.
“What?” she said, looking around, then, seeing what the rest of us saw, or rather didn’t see, “Oh, my God!”
The reliquary was gone.
Chapter 41
The sun was just breaking over the top of the mountains when we knocked on the apartment door. We’d all noticed the black Ford Explorer 4x4 sitting in the driveway. The door swung open and an attractive woman smiled at us.
“Come on in,” said Diana Terry. “I’ve been expecting you.”
“Here’s our warrant,” Nancy said as she handed a folded piece of paper across the threshold. “For your apartment and your car.”
“Yes,” said Diana. “So it is.”
“Would you mind waiting with me outside?” I said. “While Dave and Nancy check your apartment?”
“Not at all. Let me get my coat.”
“I’ll go with you,” said Nancy. She and Dave followed Diana into the living room. Diana appeared a moment later clad in a heavy, quilted overcoat and wrapped in a scarf. She had a stylish knit cap on her head.
“They won’t find anything, you know.”
“I’m pretty sure they won’t, but we have to check anyway,” I said.
“What made you suspect me?” Diana said. “Not that I’m guilty of anything, mind you. I’m just curious.”
“A couple of things,” I said. “The first was the computer at the library. You were on the internet when Big Mel shorted out the transformer and all the power went out. I talked with you and Rebecca right after it happened. Remember?”
Diana smiled, but didn’t say anything.
“Rebecca was planning an author Skype that evening. When the power came back on, Donald Mushrat raced to the only computer hooked to a printer. He had to finish his sermon. That computer was still logged in to your email, since you never logged out. Sometimes that happens.”
“Hmm,” said Diana. “I can’t imagine that’s true.”
“Mushrat couldn’t resist reading someone else’s email. He was like that. Then he read something that told him the recipient of the emails he was reading was a killer. He announced as much during his Bible study. ‘We have a Jael in our community.’”
“I wouldn’t know about that,” said Diana sweetly. “I wasn’t there.”
“Well, you certainly didn’t know I was in the choir loft,” I said, “but you were there. I saw you. You just didn’t stay with the others when I sent everyone to the fellowship hall. We got everyone’s statement. Yours wasn’t among them.”
“Oh, right,” said Diana. “I was there. Now I remember. But then I had an emergency and had to leave.” She smiled again. “I’m sorry. I must have forgotten.”
“We did some checking. You’re Hiram Frost’s niece. And you actually are an ex-nun. We thought that might just be a cover. You’d know the scriptures pretty well.”
“Well, Uncle Hiram’s side of the family is Catholic,” said Diana. “I went to the convent when I was seventeen. I left ten years later. Priests aren’t always as holy as they’d like you to believe.”
“You’ve been taking care of Hiram for a couple of years, doing some shopping for him, picking up his medicine...”
“Oh, sure. I loved Uncle Hiram.”
“You knew the house and you knew Hiram couldn’t manage steps anymore. That’s why you stashed Sal LaGrassa’s wine in your uncle’s basement. Of course, you had no idea about the bank foreclosing on the farm.”
“I don’t know anyone named Sal LaGrassa. And I was shocked that Uncle Hiram had wine in his basement. Shocked, I tell you!”
It was my turn to smile. “It is Nancy’s and my considered opinion that Sal met his demise because you didn’t really want him to come to my house, steal his wine back, and kill Meg and me.”
“Well, I do like Meg. She’s a nice person.”
“That can’t be the only reason.”
“Well, hypothetically, if I did know this Sal LaGrassa, he may have been acting more and more erratically. Not sticking to the protocols. He might not have been able to have been trusted anymore.”
“So, I suppose I owe you a debt of thanks,” I said.
“Well, if any of this were true, you certainly would.”
“Anyway, as soon as Mushrat announced that he’d uncovered a killer, you knew he needed to go. You’d heard your emails read aloud on Sunday morning and you knew he’d been copying them. What you didn’t know is how much information he had. There could have been something in those emails that might have eventually led the feds straight to you. Something that Mushrat hadn’t figured out yet.”
“Interesting,” said Diana.
“So you shot him during the hymn. And you used a Glock just like the one I kept in the organ bench. But, before you did—in fact before you killed LaGrassa—you switched the barrels in the guns. To throw suspicion on me, just in case something went awry.”
“How clever!” said Diana. “Why didn’t anyone hear the gunshot?”
“Oh, please,” I said. “Do I even have to mention that you used a noise suppressor? A silencer? You probably shot him right through your purse.”
“What’s a silencer?” said Diana, innocently, then added, “You know, you really shouldn’t keep a pistol in the organ bench.”
“I’ve been told that before,” I said. “By the way, about the other email that Deacon Mushrat read. I hope I don’t have to worry about a twenty-thousand dollar murder-for-hire somewhere in this community.”
“That is not something I’d worry about, if I were you.”
Nancy and Dave came out of the front door of the apartment.
“Nothing,” Nancy said. “No Glock. No guns of any kind. No reliquary either. We’ll check the car, but I’ll bet there’s nothing there either.”
“If it’s not here, where is it?” asked Dave.
“Not that I know anything about what you’re talking about,” said Diana, “but, when I was up at the church last night with the kids, I saw an old box up in the choir loft.”
“How much is that thing worth, anyway?” I asked.
“Well, it’s priceless, of course, but I wouldn’t be surprised at a private auction estimate of seven or eight figures,” said Diana. “Or so I’ve heard.”
“What’s it doing in the choir loft?” asked Nancy.
I looked at Diana Terry and smiled. “Someone stole it,” I said, “but then discovered she couldn’t get it out of town. She couldn’t leave it at her house, because the cops would be coming with a warrant. She couldn’t leave it in her car for the same reason. She had to put it back.”
“But why did she leave it in the choir loft?” asked Dave.
I looked at Diana and she shrugged. “Maybe,” she said, “because that’s where she found it. You know, after the kids were done playing with it.”
“Really?” I said. “The kids were playing with it?”
“Maybe,” said Diana. “Not that I’d know, of course.”
“Of course, you wouldn’t,” said Nancy. “But I still don’t understand why someone didn’t put the reliquary in her car and drive out of town as soon as we were called out to Camp Possumtickle.”
“Probably,” said Diana, lookin
g over at me, “because some smart-ass cop put sugar in someone’s gas tank.”
•••
We checked the car, but Nancy was right. Nothing.
“Can we lock her up?” Dave asked as we walked back down the sidewalk.
“Nope,” I said. “Not yet. No evidence. No confession.”
“Nothing,” said Nancy. “Another hit-nun gets away scot-free. It’s the story of my life.”
“Oh, well,” said Dave. “Maybe Pete’s got some more waffles.”
Chapter 42
“Were you kids playing with that old box in Dr. Weatherall’s office last night?” I said.
I had all the children lined up in the fellowship hall, sitting in folding chairs. Kimberly Walnut came walking out of the bathroom and saw her little angels under interrogation.
“What’s going on?” she demanded.
Emily Douglas came out of the kitchen a moment later. She glared at her two twins. “Spill it,” she growled.
“It was Dewey!” said Garth, pointing a finger at the boy sitting two seats to the right.
“It was Moosey’s idea!” squealed Dewey. “I just unlocked the office.”
“It was Bern...” started Moosey, but then stopped. He sighed and slumped in his seat. “Yeah, okay,” he said. “It was me.”
“How did you get the key?” I asked.
“I found it behind the copy machine,” said Dewey. “It opens everything.”
“When did all this happen?” said Kimberly Walnut.
“When you and Mom were asleep,” said Garrett. “We’ve been playing in the church all night. But we didn’t take the box till almost morning.”
“Let me get this straight,” said Gaylen. “All you kids were running through the church all night. With the master key?”
“Yep,” said Garth. The other kids nodded. “Mom and Mizz Walnut were really snoring up a storm.”
Gaylen glared at Kimberly Walnut. Kimberly twitched.
The Organist Wore Pumps (The Liturgical Mysteries) Page 20