Mind Over Murder

by William X. Kienzle

  “However—and here I come to the third and most important point—I don’t think the person responsible for Monsignor’s mysterious absence had to kill him to get revenge. I call your attention to the Spanish proverb ...” Koesler quoted the proverb as if it had only suddenly occurred to him; he thought he would allow himself a flamboyant touch at this point. “‘He who has lost his reputation is a walking corpse.’ If Monsignor Thomas Thompson’s reputation has been destroyed—and I think we all would agree that it most certainly has ...” Here and there around the room, heads nodded. “…then there is no need to kill him physically. The man is already a walking corpse.

  “But, we have said that if Monsignor were alive, and if he were here, he would not have allowed the destruction of his precious reputation. So, obviously, either he is not here—or if he is, he is not able to do anything about what is happening. And, I asked myself, who was in a position to arrange for such a circumstance—to remove Monsignor Thompson from the scene and yet keep him alive?

  “Lee Brand, of course. He began the actualization of his plan far from the Detroit area and has remained far, far away throughout.”

  There was a good deal of tumult among the officers.

  “Wait a minute,” one shouted above the others, “Brand sailed with his extra cabin empty and as late as last Wednesday, five days after Thompson disappeared, he still was not aboard the Alaskan Queen!”

  It took Koznicki almost a full minute to quiet the group.

  “Let’s postpone considering Mr. Brand and his empty cabin for a few minutes,” said Koesler, when comparative quiet was restored. “Let’s go back in time to when I first met the Brands. It was at the Fourth of July party at their home. Somebody, I think it was Brand’s wife, expressed the fear that something might spoil their daughter’s upcoming wedding. Brand said something about how that couldn’t happen, not with Monsignor Thompson as part of their game plan.

  “I mention this only to emphasize how dependent Lee Brand had made himself upon the Monsignor. We all know, from reading his diary, how the Monsignor manipulated and abused that dependency.

  “The next time I met Brand was in his office. In the short time I was there, I was amazed to hear him make two very questionable business rulings. He ordered an extremely low prime rate given to a man who, apparently, was in a position to grant Brand special favors. On the other hand, he denied a letter of credit to a man who obviously had every right to it, only because Brand disliked the man’s wife, who had gotten drunk at a Brand party.

  “To me, this is an indication that Mr. Brand does not just talk a good fight, he fights the fight. He is a mover and shaker, a wheeler and dealer. He is wily and ruthless. And he is not the type to be satisfied with half a plan. With, in effect, no more than a daydream.

  “Now, I’d like to bring up a couple of incidents that occurred, I think a week ago, Monday, when this investigation began.

  “The first took place in an office just down the hall. Joe Cox brought in Monsignor’s diary. Cox went from the defensive to the offensive when you began pressing him on his having taken the diary. I believe he said something to the effect that you guys—meaning you police—passed right over the diary earlier in the afternoon. Now, apparently, the officers in Homicide did not get to St. David’s rectory before Cox. Their involvement did not begin until the day after Cox found the diary. Homicide officers assumed Cox had been preceded by officers from the Fifteenth Precinct.

  “However, later that Monday morning, I was privy to a conversation between Inspectors O’Hara and Koznicki. As they were parting, Inspector O’Hara said something about the Fifteenth and Homicide starting out even. And Inspector Koznicki pointed out that it was officers from the Fifteenth who had found the car. In turn, Inspector O’Hara responded that it was Homicide who had turned in the missing person report on the Monsignor. At which point, Inspector Koznicki agreed that the two departments were, indeed, starting even. There was utterly no mention of anyone’s having searched St. David’s rectory before Cox got there.

  “At the time, I remember wondering if there were a third police force in this somewhere. Apparently, someone giving the semblance of police searched Monsignor’s belongings before Cox did. Now, St. David’s housekeeper mistook Cox’s press credentials for police identification. Who else, I asked myself, carries credentials that could resemble police identification?

  “When I was in Brand’s office, I remember expressing some amazement at what the man could accomplish. He replied—and he did so so confidently that I recall his reply verbatim—‘Private investigative agencies are good at quietly gathering information and arranging things that need to be arranged.’ And I recall thinking about what he said and how he said it, ‘My God, you’ve got your own police force.’

  “So, it’s my theory that it was Mr. Brand’s private investigative, agents who found Monsignor’s diary. And I suggest that when they entered the rectory, it was not to take anything, but to put the diary where it would be certain to be found.

  “Brand knew who was mentioned pejoratively in the diary. However, Brand’s knowledge of this leads me to at least a partial solution to another part of this puzzle. Of the six suspects, only two have seemingly satisfactory alibis. Brand is one. The other is Harry Kirwan, the only suspect not mentioned in the diary. Which leads me to the hypothesis that somehow Brand is responsible for the fact that the four others mentioned in the diary do not have alibis. He could not arrange the same fate for Kirwan for the simple reason that he did not know of Kirwan’s existence.

  “But I have no idea how he managed this. This is one of the unanswered questions.

  “Finally, we come to the Alaskan Queen and the empty cabin, which, I believe, is filled with Monsignor Thompson.”

  By now, none of his audience was dubious; they were all taking notes furiously.

  “A good percentage of the clergy are, from time to time, invited to be chaplains on a cruise. Even I have had such an invitation. As you can guess, the chaplain does not pay for his voyage. He is remunerated. However, as an employee of the cruise, his name does not appear on the passenger manifest. It is on the crew manifest.

  “That, in conclusion, is what I think happened to Monsignor Thompson. Mr. Brand made him an offer he couldn’t refuse. Probably via ship-to-shore phone. Brand arranged for the Monsignor’s transportation to a subsequent port-of-call. Once the Monsignor got aboard, Brand arranged for him to become ship’s chaplain. That would have pleased the Monsignor. He wouldn’t have to be beholden to Brand. You asked the Vancouver police to send you a copy of the passenger manifest. I think you will find his name on the crew manifest.”

  Koesler sat down. He had talked himself out. He was exhausted. But so sure was he that he had solved the mystery that he also was on an emotional high.

  There was a pause while all that Koesler had conjectured was absorbed.

  “There’s one way of checking this out,” Harris broke the silence. “Lynch, call the Alaskan Queen. Tell them to check the crew manifest!”

  Lynch left the room at a brisk gait. The air buzzed with murmured conversation. It was about fifteen minutes before Lynch returned.

  “Thompson is a member of the crew,” he announced. “The ship will dock in Vancouver tomorrow morning.”

  The murmurs grew louder.

  “All right,” said Koznicki, “enough! Patrick, get a plane to Vancouver. Take the diary and the newspaper clippings with you. Get on that ship and get to the bottom of this. Lieutenant Harris and Inspector O’Hara will handle the clean-up investigation.”

  The room was a hubbub.

  A now-beaming Koznicki approached Koesler still seated in the rear of the squad room.

  “Father,” said Koznicki, almost scooping the priest up, “come with me. I would like to buy you a very good lunch.

  “Now, tell me: what gave you your first inkling? What was the tipoff?”

  “Well,” Koesler answered, “when we discovered it was the parking attendant’s blood
on the tissues, I started with the supposition that maybe Tommy was alive and well. Then I just went on from there.”

  The two had a delightful and extended luncheon.

  10

  MEANWHILE, BACK ON THE ALASKAN QUEEN

  It was frightening. Nothing separated them from the now foreboding Pacific but a narrow ridge of planking. In spite of himself, Brand was filled with dread. Thompson, a shadow of his usually alert self, seemed oblivious.

  “Where? Where?” Thompson continued to scan the skies for the elusive lifeboats.

  “Right up there, Monsignor. One deck above us.”

  Thompson leaned precariously over the edge. “Oh, yeah. I see ’em now.”

  Thompson was only one small nudge from joining the fish of the sea. Vengeance is mine, thought Brand.

  No, rather vengeance will be mine, Brand amended.

  He was like the hunter who stalks his prey only for the sake of the hunt. Only to prove to himself he could have killed. It was too easy. Only Brand’s most trusted employees knew Thompson was aboard. Had Brand pushed ever so slightly, only the fish would have known that Thompson had left the ship.

  But no; Brand far preferred his original plan. Thompson would go on living while, unbeknownst to him, his reputation was slowly swirling down the drain.

  Instead of launching Thompson on a brief but terminal underwater adventure, Brand helped him toward sobriety. It was not difficult. Alcohol passed through Thompson at a remarkable rate, aided by the meal Brand had sent to the cabin.

  Had his hand been forced, Brand would have arranged for the ship’s Catholic chaplain to be called away—or induced away. But, as fate had it, the Coastal Line had only a minister and a rabbi for this cruise. The priest had had to cancel at the last minute, and there had been no time to book a replacement.

  Thus, the Captain was delighted to learn that Monsignor Thompson would be willing to act as Catholic chaplain. Catholics aboard had already missed Mass on Sunday once, and many were uneasy about it, even though it was explained there was no sin involved since it had been impossible for them to attend. The Captain never had that problem with Protestants or Jews, only Catholics. He was particularly pleased his new-found chaplain who would offer Mass daily held the rank of monsignor. It added a touch of class.

  Thompson, for his part, did not mind in the least. Having the status of ship’s chaplain and being, in effect, a member of the crew, freed him from obligation to Brand.

  Thompson had not known what to expect from Brand in this new relationship Brand had engineered. His uncertainty had been the cause of Thompson’s bringing his pistol along on this trip. He did not mind offering Mass daily; although ordinarily, on vacation he preferred ridding himself of all occupational hazards. But the minor inconvenience of spending thirty-five to forty minutes daily on Mass was little enough to pay for the supreme luxury of a cruise.

  Brand had provided all the clothing Thompson needed. There was no reason not to suppose that Brand had also made all necessary provisions for Thompson’s absence from the Detroit diocese, particularly in view of Monsignor Iming’s telegram. All was well.

  For Brand, the only fly in the pie occurred while the ship was docked in Vancouver en route to the scenic Inside Passage. First, it had been the Vancouver police, who had politely requested a copy of the passenger manifest from the purser’s office, and just as politely questioned Brand. Could he give them his whereabouts from the time he’d left Detroit the previous week, why were two cabins listed in his name, and could he tell them anything of the whereabouts of one Monsignor Thomas Thompson.

  He hadn’t needed many lies to answer them. He’d been on the ship since leaving Los Angeles, the extra cabin was for private cocktail parties he liked to throw—the public rooms are so… public; and no, he had no idea where Monsignor Thompson might be. Which, at that moment, was exactly true: Thompson could have been in any of a dozen activity rooms on any of six decks.

  However, the police visit did put him on the alert. By the time the reporters from the two Vancouver papers came on board, Brand had arranged for Thompson to have a lengthy private tour of the entire ship, including the bridge. There Thompson became fascinated with all the gadgetry, the one sonar and two radar scopes, the port and starboard automatic pilots. And there Thompson was able to bother the navigator with so many questions—maximum speed? Twenty-five knots. Cruise speed? Twenty-one knots—to the point where the navigator considered abandoning ship.

  Fortunately for Brand, the reporters came to him first. He was not only able to lie glibly, as only Brand could, but he was also able to play the cooperative and concerned source, accompanying each of the reporters, in turn, to the purser’s office, where he requested and received for them a copy of the passenger manifest.

  In actuality, Brand would not have considered his caper a failure even if Thompson had been discovered in Vancouver either by police or reporters. He was sure that if even part of Thompson’s diary reached the public eye, the consequences for Thompson would be ruinous. But the longer Thompson’s whereabouts remained undiscovered, the more time there was for Brand’s plan—that the whole story be told.

  And it was. Day after day, Brand received reports on what the News and the Free Press were publishing. While the rest of the passengers got a daily news bulletin containing only capsule resumes of major national and international news stories such as quakes in California and unrest in the Middle East, Brand alone received the juicy gossip from Detroit.

  As the ship cruised the Inside Passage, docked at Ketchikan and Juneau, and went through Glacier Bay, all went well. Thompson made new friends among the very wealthy and took notes to add to his diary on his return. Lee and Sunny Brand seemed happy and relaxed as they ate well and frequently, jogged in the morning, and danced late into the night.

  All the while, and known only to Lee Brand, in Detroit, Monsignor Thompson was becoming a walking corpse.

  It was in Sitka, Alaska, on August 21, with only five days left in the cruise, that the idea of having his cake and eating it too reoccurred to Lee Brand. Things had been going so well for him and his cause, he decided he could, with impunity, destroy Thompson’s reputation and the Monsignor to boot.

  It would happen as the result of an unfortunate accident. But it would have to wait till August 23, after the ship left Vancouver and cruised down the coast toward San Francisco. Once out of the passage, on the open sea, the entertainment director could once more stage the skeet shooting contests. Brand was familiar enough with skeet shooting to know exactly what he wanted done.

  Each shooter is permitted four consecutive shots at each turn. Brand need only reach the officer in charge of the ammunition. He, in turn, would make sure the third shell would have an inadequate supply of powder, thus jamming the barrel. The fourth shell would hold an inordinately heavy supply of powder. On the fourth shot, the skeet bore would explode in Thompson’s face and the poor Monsignor would die. Accidentally, of course.

  Brand was well-aware that in bribing a ship’s officer to rig the ammunition, he would be moving out of the safety of his own tightly knit organization for the first time in l’affaire Thompson. He was also cognizant of the element of great jeopardy in such a movement. Neither of these considerations was of sufficient weight, in Brand’s mind, to deter him from arranging for Thompson’s demise.

  For one, Brand found the jeopardy itself attractive. Part of what motivated him finally to have Thompson killed was that Brand had become bored playing cat and mouse. Like Henry Higgins, once Brand knew he’d won, the game grew deadly dull.

  Secondly, he did not fear moving beyond his circle of trusted employees and, in effect, placing himself in a vulnerable position as far as a mere ship’s officer was concerned. His supreme faith in the power of Money far outweighed any fear that the officer might implicate him.

  If the officer were to take umbrage when propositioned, why, it would be his word against Brand’s. No contest. However, once the officer decided to play along, he
would be as deeply implicated as Brand. His own participation would ensure his silence.

  But the most substantive reason for Brand’s confidence was Money. It was Brand’s basic philosophical approach to life: all one needed to do was ascertain how much a person demanded for whatever it was you wanted him to do. Pay the sum. And watch the deed get done. It had worked too perfectly in the past for Brand to have any serious qualms about its effectiveness now.

  The Alaskan Queen docked in Vancouver August 22 at 9 A.M. It was scheduled to leave port again at noon. After which Brand could begin putting his ultimate solution into operation.

  However, a few minutes after docking, a tall, handsome, disheveled man boarded the Queen. He identified himself as Sergeant Dean Patrick of the Homicide Division of the Detroit Police Department. A member of the Vancouver police accompanied him to substantiate Patrick’s official status and to provide jurisdiction if such were needed.

  Patrick asked to be directed to Monsignor Thompson.

  A deck steward took both officers to the Lido Terrace on Promenade Deck. Patrick instantly recognized Brand and Thompson, who were seated at the same table, drinking coffee. Patrick had seen too many pictures of both men to mistake either of them.

  It was odd seeing Thompson in the flesh. Patrick had come to take so for granted that the Monsignor was dead, the detective had never expected to see him alive.

  Patrick introduced himself and pulled up a chair. Brand seemed more startled than Thompson by Patrick’s presence.

  As Patrick explained his mission and began showing the newspaper clippings to Thompson, Brand relaxed and smiled. The game was over. There would be no ultimate solution tomorrow. But he had won the game going away and had been saved from committing a murder that already in hindsight would seem to have been a disastrous mistake. Besides, had he had the Monsignor done away with, Brand would never have been able to enjoy the cleric’s woe at learning what had happened to his reputation.