“Pal.” Her tone was matter-of-fact. She didn’t want to alarm him. “I don’t think I feel very good.”
Jack spun around. “What is it, hon?” His cool hand touched her forehead, and she could tell by his expression that she was on fire. “What hurts?” He scrutinized her face.
“My head is throbbing, and I feel hot and sticky.”
“What did you have to eat yesterday?”
Kate groaned and closed her eyes. Had she married her mother? A good meal or a good physic had been her mother’s solution to all illnesses.
“Where the hell did we put the thermometer?” He shuffled through the drawer of the nightstand.
“Try the medicine chest in the bathroom.”
Jack left the room to do just that. The phone rang. Eyes still closed, Kate fumbled for the receiver and was surprised to hear the voice of Comisario Ángel Serrano.
“I apologize, Inspector Murphy, for disturbing you again,” he said, sounding as if he were calling from a cave, “I was wondering if you have any more information on the American tourists.”
Kate felt much too sick to get angry. “Comisario,” she said, her throat raw, “it’s only seven in the morning here in San Francisco. I’m sure my friend has not yet been able to get to Redwood College, let alone to interview the dean or anyone else. As for the others, none of the offices or businesses are open yet.”
Kate heard him moan. “Of course, it is seven in the morning!” He sputtered, “I am so sorry, Inspector Murphy, I don’t know what I was thinking of. I should not have been so impatient. I hope I didn’t wake you.”
“No, no,” Kate said, craving a glass of water. “I understand.” And she did. Sometimes when you are on a case, you become so absorbed that you lose all track of time, let alone time in another country. “As soon as I hear from my friend, I’ll call you.”
Jack stood over her. “I can’t find the damn thermometer,” he said. “Only the baby’s, which is . . .” He held it up.
“Don’t even think of it.” Kate was not that sick.
“I’ll call the doctor?”
She tried to think sensibly, but all she wanted to do was sleep. “No,” she said. “We don’t even know if I have a fever. I’m probably just tired. But what about John?” She tried to struggle up.
Jack’s thick hand stopped her. “Don’t worry. I’ll get him up. Then maybe my mother will watch him.”
“Only for the day.”
Jack nodded and handed Kate some aspirin and a glass of cold water, which felt heavenly going down.
Later—Kate had no idea of how much later—she heard her mother-in-law’s voice in the distance. She felt a cool compress on her head. Waking from a restless sleep, Kate swallowed the warm soup Mama Bassetti spooned into her mouth.
Suddenly she was conscious of the quiet in the house. “Where’s my baby?” she asked in alarm.
“He is napping.” Mama Bassetti gave Kate some juice. “You should nap, too, Kate,” she said. “You’ll feel much better when you wake up.”
“But little John.” Kate felt tears sting her eyes.
“He’s just fine.” Mama Bassetti’s voice was soothing. “After his nap I’ll take him for a walk to the park. Then I’ll bring him in. He’s been in to see you three times already. I think the poor little angel is worried about you. Go back to sleep now, so you can wake up feeling better.”
“What’s wrong with me?” Kate asked, her eyelids heavy.
“I’m not too sure.” Her mother-in-law sounded almost amused. “But I think we should know by tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” Kate was drowsy. Why tomorrow? she wondered, and was asleep as soon as she formed the question.
Ángel Serrano was embarrassed. How could he have forgotten the time difference? Somehow the days seemed to have run together. Of course, Inspector Murphy’s friend had not yet had the opportunity to interrogate anyone else! She must think him a half-wit, although from her voice, she sounded too sleepy to think much at all. Maybe he should have stopped at two glasses of vino at dinner.
It was not the vino, he thought, making his way back through the narrow arcade of streets to the police station. It was this murder case that was driving him crazy.
He crossed the streets carefully. They were still slick from the rain. It would not do to fall. Ángel avoided the puddles. So far today he had also avoided the mayor, the clergy, and that infernal Héctor Luna from La Voca de Galicia. How long would his luck hold?
The newspaper would have a field day with him if he were unable to solve the case before those blasted pilgrims returned to San Francisco. That gave him only two days.
What if he needed to detain them? What would the American Embassy say to that? He didn’t know. He’d never had a case like this before. Tourists in Santiago usually lost their belongings, or bumped into things, or thought that they had been cheated. But murdered? Never!
“I do not want to be disturbed,” Ángel shouted, and slammed the door of his small office. He waited until the glass stopped shaking to open it again. “By anyone,” he roared. “Is that clear?”
“Yes, Comisario,” a small voice answered. It was the telephone operator. She seemed to be the only person left in the building.
Ángel pushed back in his chair, propped his feet on the edge of his desk, closed his eyes, and tried to think. After this morning’s interviews, every instinct told him that his suspects narrowed down to Rita Fong, Heidi Williams, or one of the DeAngelos. How could he prove it? None of them had a real alibi, so all of them had had the opportunity.
The key to motive might be with the information Kate Murphy’s friend uncovered. For that he must wait until she called him tomorrow.
The weapon! Could he find the weapon? After dinner, he had told María José that tomorrow afternoon she could help Zaldo search the Americans’ belongings. When he thought about it, the hair on his neck stood up. Did he need someone’s permission to do that? As comisario of Santiago he was within his rights. The murder was in his jurisdiction. Or was there some international law governing the situation? He didn’t need any more trouble with bureaucrats.
Ángel Serrano spent the rest of the evening searching for a book that would give him the laws for dealing with tourists.
THURSDAY,
OCTOBER 14
Feast of St. Callistus I,
Pope and Martyr
All morning Sister Mary Helen was conscious of a strange foreboding. An unnamed dread hung in the back of her mind like fog over the Golden Gate, waiting for a chance to roll in.
Her three “accidents” were at the root of it, she knew. Three is a charm—she tried to bolster her courage—and if I wasn’t harmed in three attempts, surely I’m safe. Perhaps the incidents were coincidences after all.
Yet hard as she tried, she could not rid herself of the ominous feeling. Several times she attempted to read, but she was too distracted. When a tour bus backfired, she jumped.
Her prayers were scattered, and even in ordinary circumstances, she felt little devotion to St. Callistus, an early Pope who was condemned for leniency. That’s a twist, she thought, abandoning her office book.
She rearranged the things in her suitcase, tensing when the chambermaid’s cart rattled by in the hall. Tomorrow they would fly home, or would they? What would Ángel Serrano do if he had not discovered the murderer? Would he let them return to San Francisco? He couldn’t do that. The murder had taken place in Spain in his jurisdiction. They were suspects. Would he detain them all? Wait until Sister Cecilia received that collect call!
“What is it, old dear?” Eileen asked finally. “Have you a case of the fidgets?”
“Sorry,” Mary Helen said. And she was. It is very annoying to be cooped up in a small room with someone like Eileen. She stared out of the bedroom window. Soft rain drenched everything. Full dark clouds fought with patches of blue sky, and at the moment the clouds were winning.
“I have cabin fever,” she said.
Eileen winked. �
��That’s an improvement. Yesterday it was submarine fever. Your spirits are moving up. By tomorrow you’ll be flying high, all the way home.”
Mary Helen groaned at the pun. I hope we are on our way home, she thought.
Eileen must have sensed her hesitation. “That nice Comisario Serrano with the name and face of an angel won’t detain us, will he?”
“I don’t know,” Mary Helen said honestly. “But if we can discover the killer, that’s no longer a question.”
Eileen blinked back any surprise she felt. Only her brogue thickened a bit. “What is it you suggest we do?” she asked.
“Launch out on a new tack. The old ones are getting us nowhere fast.”
“What tack is that?”
“Discovering the murder weapon!”
“The comisario said it was about two inches wide in the middle, narrow on the ends, perhaps padded. Have you any idea what we are looking for?”
“That’s my point,” Mary Helen said. “Let’s see if we can find something, anything, that fits the description.”
“That sound a little like finding a pimple on an alligator’s tail,” Eileen muttered.
Mary Helen pretended not to hear. This aging has some advantages, she thought. “In the mystery I’m reading, the victim is strangled with a circular knitting needle that the detective discovers at a yarn store.”
Eileen grimaced. “That will teach you to get on Sister Ursula’s bad side when she’s knitting.”
“Let’s walk along the Rua del Villar, the street with all those shops. Maybe we can find something that fits the description.”
“It is pouring down rain.” Eileen’s protest was halfhearted at best.
“We’ll stay under the arcade. María José always says that it clears up quickly.” As a show of her faith in María José’s expertise, Mary Helen grabbed up her Aran sweater instead of her raincoat.
Two hours later the two nuns, drenched to the skin, staggered into El Franco Restaurante for a cup of hot coffee.
“One more souvenir shop, and I may begin to wish that el botafumeiro had hit me,” Mary Helen quipped.
Eileen shivered. “Don’t say that even in fun. I don’t want to think of the possibility.”
Eileen was right. Mary Helen changed the subject before her earlier feelings of dread returned.
“Those shops were so jam-packed with people and things that it was hard to tell what they had,” she said, “let alone if it was the right shape or, more important, if someone in our group has one. I’m afraid that our shopping expedition was nothing but a wet waste of time.”
Always optimistic, Eileen shook her head. “Not necessarily,” she said. “You may have pneumonia tomorrow, but your fidgets are gone!” She dug into her purse and pulled out a dog-eared piece of paper. “And we did pick up a few more souvenirs to take home.”
She spread the paper on the table. “Here’s our list,” she said. “Let’s make sure we have something for everyone. I would hate to leave anyone out.”
Sister Eileen ran her finger down their list and, with Mary Helen’s prompting, wrote, “key chain, letter opener, medal” by the names that didn’t already have “black soap” next to them.
“Are we about done?” Mary Helen asked. She detested this part of traveling.
“All except for Shirley. What are you going to bring Shirley?”
“Can you think of something special?” Mary Helen felt a touch of guilt about leaving her hardworking secretary to wrestle with the last-minute details of the alumnae fashion show.
“There is a nice shop toward the end of the arcade,” Eileen suggested, “with brightly colored scarves. One of those might be nice.”
It did not take Mary Helen long to decide on a gift. The entire back wall of the shop was filled with colorful scarves emblazoned with flowers and shells and edged with a graceful flowing fringe. Since Shirley was attractive in every color, Mary Helen simply closed her eyes and pointed. Opening them, she discovered that she had picked a large shell-covered one in a beautiful shade of Nile green.
“Perfect,” Eileen said, and the salesclerk wrapped it in tissue paper.
“Nine hundred and fifty pesetas.”
The old nun rummaged through her purse and found the nine hundred in paper bills. She checked the pockets of her sweater for change. In her left pocket she felt two coins and something else. It was stiff and slick like a piece of shiny cardboard. She pulled out fifty pesetas and with them the Polaroid picture that Rita Fong had taken at the Madrid airport.
While the clerk rang up the sale, Mary Helen stared absently at the picture. It was of Eileen and herself looking weary and disheveled. Rita had caught her with her eyes shut. She’d also snapped three other pilgrims in the background. As she stared at them, Mary Helen’s heart quickened. Could that be what they were looking for?
“Eileen!” She pointed to one of the figures in the photo. “Look at this,” Mary Helen said, hardly daring to hope. “Can this possibly be the murder weapon?”
The salesclerk, who obviously understood English, gingerly handed Mary Helen her purchase.
Eileen squinted at the photo. “It could be,” she said slowly, controlling the excitement in her voice. “It very well could be.”
Oblivious of the steady drizzle covering the city, the two nuns flew, like honeybees to the hive, toward the office of Comisario Ángel Serrano.
For one frantic moment Mary Helen thought that someone was following them, but all fear dissolved as they mounted the steps of the police station.
Ángel Serrano’s eyes were sore. He yawned so widely that they watered, and that only made them ache more. Inspector Kate Murphy had called from San Francisco at four-thirty A.M. his time with some interesting facts about Professor DeAngelo. Ángel had been awake and mulling them over ever since.
“Sorry to disturb you, Comisario,” she began apologetically when he finally answered the phone in a sleepy haze. “I know you are waiting for my friend’s report on Professor DeAngelo,” Kate explained. In an instant he was wide-awake.
Quickly she told him what Inspector Gallagher had uncovered. Roger DeAngelo had come only recently to Redwood College in West Marin. Before that he was a full professor at a small college in Greensboro called Belmont College. He had a recommendation but not rave notices, and his reason for changing colleges was never very clear. “Health reasons,” his application had stated.
Gallagher had remembered that Belmont College in Greensboro was the same college that Lisa Springer’s mother had said Lisa attended.
Kate told Ángel the years that each had been at Belmont. “For whatever this is worth,” she said, sounding as if she thought it was worth plenty, “Lisa’s freshman year coincides with Professor DeAngelo’s last year at that college.”
“Were you aware of this? That’s Gallagher’s question, not mine,” Kate had said.
Ángel admitted he was not. “By their own admission,” he said, “none of the winners of this pilgrimage claims to have known any of the others before the trip.”
“Why lie about it?” Kate asked bluntly.
“That is what I need to discover,” Ángel said. Kate gave him Inspector Gallagher’s phone number at Homicide.
“Just in case you need him,” she said.
As soon as he reached his office, Ángel phoned Roger DeAngelo. “Did you ever teach at Belmont College in Greensboro?”
His question seemed to stun the professor. “Yes,” he said as cautiously as a soldier crossing a minefield. “Why do you ask?”
“Were you aware that Lisa Springer was a student there?”
“Of course I was not.” The professor’s tone was indignant. “When did she attend the school? Perhaps I had already gone.”
“No, Professor, you were there. In fact, her freshman year and your last year at that college are the same year.”
The professor gave a supercilious laugh. “Have you any idea how many freshman students there were at Belmont?”
“It seems
to me that a redhead as beautiful as Lisa Springer would stand out even in a crowd.”
“Probably,” DeAngelo admitted, “which further proves my point. If the girl was at Belmont, our paths must never have crossed.”
Ángel had chewed on that conversation ever since. The coincidence was too “coincidental” for him to swallow. It stuck like a popcorn kernel in his throat. It was the only link he was able to find between any of the suspects and the murdered girl.
What was he missing? Mentally he reviewed his interviews with the suspects one by one. Nothing clicked. Frustrated, Angel went through them again. Whoever the murderer was, he was an arrogant bastard, that was for certain. He had undoubtedly shoved the note under Lisa’s bedroom door.
If only he could discover who had written the note. “Zaldo!” he shouted.
The office door swung open immediately. “Sí, Comisario?” Officer Zaldo stood as stiff as a navy blue board. Even the hairs on his narrow mustache lined up at attention.
Exasperated, Ángel shook his head. “At ease, Esteban,” he said, “for the love of God, at ease, before you snap in two.”
Hurt clouded Zaldo’s eyes, and Ángel felt guilty. “I want you to bring Heidi Williams to me at once,” he ordered, like a centurion before his hundred men, and tried not to flinch when Zaldo clicked his heels. Too much American Mission Impossible on the television, he thought, watching Zaldo’s stiff back exit.
Closing his burning eyes, Ángel pushed back in his chair to think. The sound of quick footsteps echoed down the hallway and seemed to be heading toward his office. A prickle rose on the back of his neck. When his office door burst open with only the briefest knock, he fully expected María José and his sister. He was ready to explode with righteous indignation at their intrusion.
The sight of the two breathless nuns brought him bolt upright. “What is it, Sister?” He tried to keep the anxiety out of his voice. “What has happened?” He swallowed the “now.”
Murder Makes a Pilgrimage Page 24