Ocean Blues

by Glen Ebisch

  “The church would be happy to reimburse the department for the cost of the wig,” Clarissa said, knowing full well it would come out of her own money. There was no way she was going before the Board to request money for her assistant’s wig.

  Rudinski sighed. “Probably it’s about time the department got a new blond wig anyway. The hairstyle is out of fashion with today’s streetwalkers.”

  “Good to know,” Ashley said. “I wouldn’t want to be mistaken for a woman of the night.”

  Rudinski gave her a look, which seemed to suggest that wasn’t likely to happen.

  “Thank you, officer,” Clarissa said. “We appreciate the department’s generosity.”

  “Yeah, right,” Ashley said.

  As Clarissa escorted Rudinski to the door, he whispered, “See you Saturday.”

  She gave him a discreet nod. When she turned back to the room, Ashley was staring at her.

  “Did he whisper something about me?” she asked.

  “No, not at all.”

  Ashley shook her head, as if she didn’t quite believe it.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Clarissa felt that time had slowed to a crawl. She had entered Mrs. Evanston’s room at three-thirty. It was now almost five and she still hadn’t been able to escape. The woman was known for her many hobbies, most of them picked up quickly and soon discarded. Her most recent hobby was genealogy; pages of poster paper had somehow magically appeared from the small table next to her bed. These painstakingly traced her roots back many generations, and she was expounding in great detail on each branch of her family tree, which seemed to be a mighty sequoia. Clarissa expected to see Adam and Eve eventually appear at the top if this went on long enough, as it no doubt would unless the nurses came in with Mrs. Evanston’s supper. Just when Clarissa was about to plead that she had an important meeting back at the church, a nurse appeared with a tray of food. The pages of names disappeared as quickly as they had appeared, and Mrs. Evanston gave Clarissa a dismissive wave of her hand as she settled down to her food.

  Feeling slightly annoyed but relieved, Clarissa left the hospital, and pulled her sweater closely around her in the chilly night air of early autumn. She returned to the parsonage, her mind focused on the influence that past generations had on the present. She was particularly focused on Sam Cryer’s short life and the time he had spent with his father. Living with a drug user and then finding his body was clearly a formative element in Sam’s early life. It had given him a hatred of those who used drugs and those who sold them. Possibly it had also planted the seeds of the behavior that would lead to Sam’s early death.

  Back at the parsonage, Clarissa heated up a plate of the casserole that Mrs. Gunn had left for her last night, which she had not touched. She had decided to have some tonight and then suggest to Mrs. Gunn that she might like to take the remainder home for herself. Although she felt much better than she had yesterday, Clarissa still didn’t feel that her appetite had completely returned. That might be due to the blow to her head or perhaps it was the result of worrying so much about Tyler. She leafed through the day’s local newspaper, remembering what Officer Rudinski had told her about the importance of keeping up with town events. That was true not only for law enforcement but also for those in the ministry.

  She also realized that in a few days she would be going on her first date with Rudinski, so she should really stop calling him by his last name. That was fine when he was on the job, but would sound ridiculously formal on a date. His first name was Roger. She’d have to make a point of calling him by that. She wondered why she had agreed to go out with him. She had Andrew and maybe Tyler. Why add another man to the mix? All she knew was that there was something charming about his down to earth honesty, and his simple desire to do his job well. There was absolutely nothing put on about him. Money and prestige didn’t mean much to him as long as he was doing his job well and protecting those he cared about. With Tyler there was always the drama of his attempts to find his way in life, which often seemed like a lengthy soap opera, and Andrew, although he didn’t make much of it, clearly appreciated the finer things that money could buy. She wondered if that difference between them in values would eventually lead to conflict.

  Deciding that it was time to clear her mind of all these personal musings, Clarissa walked over to the church office to see if Ashley had left anything important for her on the desk.

  She found the copies of the monthly report, neatly collated for her and ready to be handed out at tomorrow’s meeting. To one side, she found a printout of the news article Ashley had found about Tony Cryer’s apprehension for buying drugs with his son in the car. The byline on the story said Passaic, New Jersey. Clarissa paused for a moment, wondering when she had heard that city mentioned recently. But she couldn’t quite pull it back into her memory. Deciding that there wasn’t anything pressing that had to be worked on tonight, she walked down the short hall to the sanctuary. She turned on the upper lights, which illuminated the chapel with a gentle glow, leaving the corners in shadows. She went to her favorite pew, the third from the front, and sat silently for several moments, letting her mind gently move away from the issues and troubles of the day. If there was a supreme power in the universe, which she believed there was, this was when she felt closest to it. It wasn’t a stern, judging deity with convoluted doctrines and harsh demands; it was more a sense of warmth and orderliness that never failed to calm her mind.

  She heard a sound from the direction of her office, and couldn’t remember if she had locked the door. Lieutenant Baker would not be pleased. She had been attacked twice in the office at night, and he had sternly warned her that even in Shore Side you need to exercise some caution. She forced the disturbing thought out of her head, and let herself be enveloped again in the sense of peace. Suddenly, she remembered where she had heard Passaic mentioned recently.

  “Hello, Clarissa,” a man’s voice said. Her head jerked up, and she looked down to the end of the pew where a tall figure stood.

  “Hello,” she answered, still not sure whom she was talking to.

  The man drew closer until she recognized him.

  “Hi,” she said, recognizing Sam’s math tutor, Ted Sullivan, the man, as she had just remembered, who told her the other day that he had once lived in Passaic.

  He smiled and sat down in the pew turning his body towards her. “I went to your office, but no one was there. I hope you don’t mind that I walked through to the church.”

  “Not at all. What did you want to see me about?” she asked, hoping she sounded calm and unaware of Sullivan’s background.

  “Although I haven’t known him for long, Tyler and I have gotten quite friendly since his arrest. He calls me at least once a day to keep me up to date on how your investigation is going. Congratulations, by the way, on solving the problem at The Ship Wreck Inn. Sorry to hear that you were injured.”

  Involuntarily, Clarissa touched the bandage on her forehead.

  “Do you think you’re going to be able to link the murder back to the bar where the boy was killed?”

  “We’re going to try. The police are looking into the backgrounds of all the regulars at the bar,” she said trying to sound like this was their only avenue of inquiry.

  Sullivan nodded. “I never realized that Sam was on such a crusade against drugs. I imagine that wouldn’t have made him very popular at a place like the Slipped Anchor.”

  Clarissa nodded, sensing that somehow he had guessed that she knew the truth.

  “Tyler told me you were going to ask the police to check on everyone who knew Sam to see if anyone had been in trouble for drugs. That sounds like a good idea. Have you done it yet?”

  “No, I told them to concentrate on people who had something to do with the Slipped Anchor Bar. That should be enough.”

  “But if that doesn’t result in any leads, you are going to have the police expand their inquiries to include everyone who knew Sam?”

  “I doubt that will be
necessary.”

  Ted smiled. “I stopped in your office on my way in here. On the top of your desk I saw the article about Tony Cryer being arrested.”

  “You shouldn’t be poking around my office,” Clarissa said, trying to sound angry rather than scared.

  “Sorry, it was rude of me, but you see I think I may have accidentally given away some important information the last time we talked. Do you know what that is?”

  Clarissa sighed. She was tired of playing dumb. It clearly wasn’t going to work, and she hoped that being more assertive might help her defuse the situation.

  “Sure, that you lived in Passaic and that’s where Tony Cryer was arrested.”

  Ted nodded approvingly. “Good, now we’re getting somewhere.”

  “And let me guess. You were the guy who sold drugs to Tony one of those times when his son was along.”

  “More than once, Clarissa. Sam was always with his father in those days. The boy saw me many times, I’m afraid. When he showed up as one of the students I was supposed to tutor, I hoped he wouldn’t recognize me. It had been years, after all. Our first session together went fine, but during our next meeting I could see him studying me when I wasn’t looking, and I knew it was only a matter of time. And sure enough, the third time we got together he accused me of being the man who had sold drugs to his father, and said he was going to notify the police. I tried to tell him that I was a different man now, but he wouldn’t listen to me.”

  “So you called him and arranged to meet with him outside his place of work that night, and you killed him.”

  “I didn’t want to. I tried to explain to him how much I had changed. I’d been arrested for possession shortly after Tony died, and did my time in prison. I’d always loved mathematics, so when I got out, I went to college and got my degree and my teaching certification. This is all I’ve ever really wanted to do with my life.”

  “But Sam wouldn’t listen.”

  “He just kept shaking his head, and saying it didn’t matter. I was still a drug dealer. Like all my time in prison didn’t count.”

  “How did you get a job as a teacher if you’d been in prison?” asked Clarissa.

  “I was only twenty when I was arrested, and fortunately I didn’t have much on me at the time. So after six years I was able to get my record expunged. I didn’t put it down on my application for the job in West Shore Side. I knew they wouldn’t find a record of it, and they might not have hired me if they knew. If Sam put the police in Shore Side on to me, they would be able to find out about it from the cops in Passaic where I was arrested, and I’d have lost my job. I had waited six years to have a clean record so I could start teaching, and now Sam was going to take it all away from me. He just wouldn’t listen.”

  “So you killed him.”

  “Do you think I wanted to?” Sullivan shouted, making Clarissa jump. “I love kids, but he was going to destroy my life, and I couldn’t have that.”

  “Why are you telling me all this?” Clarissa asked.

  “Because I want you to understand why I have to do what I have to do. If you get the police to dig into my background, they might find out about my conviction. I can’t let you do that anymore than I could let Sam.”

  He reached behind his back with his right hand and came out holding a crow bar. He slowly began to stand up. Clarissa didn’t wait for him to get to reach his feet. She lurched forward and pushed him backwards. Not pausing to hear him hit the floor, she turned and began to run in the opposite direction out of the pew. By the time she got to the end, she could here his feet behind her on the wooden floor.

  For a few desperate seconds she was uncertain where to go. He was between her and the door to the office, so that was out. The front door to the church was locked, and she had no time to fumble for the key on her key ring. She had only once chance.

  She turned left and ran up the aisle. When she reached the back wall, she pushed open the small door to the bell tower, and scrambled up the stairs. Before she reached the top, she could hear him cautiously making his way up, no doubt confident that he had her trapped. She pushed open the door at the top of the stairs and stopped short. She knew the floor wouldn’t support her, so she had no choice. She reached out as far as she could and hunted around for the bell rope, finally finding it like a thick snake hanging down from the ceiling. She grabbed onto it and swung out into the middle of the bell tower, causing the bell to toll mournfully, just as Ted Sullivan charged into the small room.

  Clarissa immediately heard a cracking sound and a grunt of surprise as the floor gave way beneath Sullivan’s feet. Suddenly, she felt a hard pull as a hand grabbed her right foot. Her arms quivered and began to spasm as she realized that Ted had seized her leg and was hanging on to her to save himself from falling. The bell rope began to burn her hands as the added weight caused Clarissa to lose her grip. Knowing she only a few seconds before they both crashed down to the vestibule below, Clarissa drew back her left foot and brought it down as hard as she could on his hand. There was a grunt of pain and effort. Ted’s hand slipped down, but failed to completely release its grip. He was still hanging onto her foot. She was about to try one last desperate kick when slowly the shoe began to slide off her right foot.

  With a sudden gasp, as he realized what was happening, Ted’s hand disappeared from her foot. He cried out briefly as he crashed through the floor below.

  Clarissa’s arms were almost numb with effort, but she still had to make her way back to the solid floor at the entrance to the bell tower. Slowly she began to swing back and forth, attempting to develop some momentum as the bell rang in rhythm with her efforts. Finally, knowing she couldn’t last much longer, Clarissa released the rope as she was swinging toward the doorway, and with a desperate sideways twist, she managed to fall through onto the top step of the stairway.

  She lay there a long moment recovering her strength. Then with deliberate care she went down the stairs, through the church, and into the office. Carefully making sure both doors to the office were locked, she called the police. But in the distance she could already hear a siren, no doubt in response to the tolling of the bell. As she dialed 9-1-1, Clarissa recalled having learned that the slow tolling of a single bell was the signal for death.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  “Did you really have to prove so conclusively to the Board that the floor needed to be replaced?” Samantha Jones asked, a smile playing across her lips as she and Clarissa stood in the vestibule looking up at the large hole in the ceiling.

  “There’s nothing like visual evidence,” Clarissa said with a tired grin.

  “What happened to the guy who fell thorough there?”

  “He shattered his pelvis. He’s in intensive care.”

  “Ouch. He must be in a lot of pain. Of course, given what he did to that boy and planned to do to you, it’s hard to feel very sorry for him.”

  “He wasn’t evil. He just found himself in a desperate situation and violence seemed to him to be the only way out.”

  Samantha nodded, not expressing an opinion either way.

  “Will you be able to do anything to keep the rain out until the Board authorizes the replacement of the floor?” Clarissa asked.

  “I’ll get a larger, thicker tarp and put it up there by this afternoon. It’s only a temporary solution, but it should keep the rain out of the vestibule.”

  “Sounds good. I appreciate your coming over so promptly to take a look at it.”

  Samantha touched her on the shoulder. “Is there anything else I can do? I know you had a rough night.”

  Clarissa nodded. She had spent half the night at the police station giving her statement, and explaining what she believed the circumstances were leading up to Sam’s death. Lieutenant Baker said that he would contact the Passaic Police Department to confirm Ted Sullivan’s arrest on drug charges, and they would get a search warrant to go through his rooms, hoping to find Sam’s missing cell phone, which Sullivan had taken to hide his call to
the boy on the night of his death to arrange their meeting. Baker had also promised that if things checked out, charges would be dropped against Tyler by the next day.

  After that, she had gone back to the parsonage and slept until noon, and still felt rather groggy.

  “No, I think I just need a bit of time to adjust to what’s happened. Otherwise I’ll be all right.”

  “Yeah, it was that way after combat, too. You needed time to absorb what had taken place and to realize that you were still alive.”

  Clarissa said goodbye to the sacristan and went through the church and back to the office. Ashley glanced up from her computer screen and studied Clarissa with a concerned expression.

  “Still okay, Boss?”

  “Never better,” Clarissa said with a forced smile.

  “You got a call from Andrew. He wanted you to call him back. I think he wants to see how you are. But he did say that the charges have been dropped against Tyler. He’s already called him.”

  As if on cue, the door opened and Tyler walked into the office. He gave the two women a big smile. “Have you heard?”

  “I just did,” Clarissa answered and gave him a hug. Even Ashley jumped up and gave him a second one, winking at Clarissa over his shoulder. “I’m sure you’re glad that this is all over.”

  “I certainly am.” Tyler paused. “I know last night was traumatic, but do you have a moment to talk?”

  Clarissa nodded and they went into her office. They sat facing each other for a moment, neither one speaking. Finally, feeling some tension in the air, Clarissa began, “Are you going back to your job at the center?”

  Tyler shook his head. “I’m not sure they would take me back even after the charges were dropped. They’re going to get enough bad publicity from having employed Ted Sullivan.”

  “Are you looking for another job in the area?”

  He cleared his throat. “I got in touch with the pastor at the church where I was working before I moved down here, and he’s willing to take me back as the youth minister. I think I’m going to do that. It’s time I got on with my life.”