“He had spent Christmas here before, and knew perfectly well that ‘Animal, Vegetable, and Mineral’ would form part of the entertainment. He had only to gather up the necklace from the table when it came to his turn to retire, and he knew he could count on at least five minutes by himself while we were all arguing about the choice of a word. He had only to snip the pearls from the string with his pocket scissors, burn the string in the grate, fasten the pearls to the mistletoe with the fine pins. The mistletoe was hung on the chandelier, pretty high—it’s a lofty room—but he could easily reach it by standing on the glass table, which wouldn’t show footmarks, and it was almost certain that nobody would think of examining the mistletoe for extra berries. I shouldn’t have thought of it myself if I hadn’t found that pin which he had dropped. That gave me the idea that the pearls had been separated, and the rest was easy. I took the pearls off the mistletoe last night—the clasp was there, too, pinned among the holly leaves. Here they are. Comphrey must have got a nasty shock this morning. I knew he was our man when he suggested that the guests should tackle the decorations themselves and that he should do the back drawing room—but I wish I had seen his face when he came to the mistletoe and found the pearls gone.”
“And you worked it all out when you found the pin?” said Sir Septimus.
“Yes; I knew then where the pearls had gone to.”
“But you never even looked at the mistletoe.”
“I saw it reflected in the black glass floor, and it struck me then how much the mistletoe berries looked like pearls.”
FATHER CRUMLISH CELEBRATES CHRISTMAS
by Alice Scanlan Reach
Alice Scanlan Reach is well known in the mystery field for her charming and frequently exciting stories about Father Crumlish. For evidence of her skills, just read on.
“Eat that and you’ll be up all night with one of your stomach gas attacks.” Emma Catt’s voice boomed out from the doorway of what she considered to be her personal sanctuary—the kitchen of St. Brigid’s rectory.
Caught in the act of his surreptitious mission, Father Francis Xavier Crumlish hastily withdrew the arthritic fingers of his right hand, which had been poised to enfold one of several dozen cookies cooling on the wide, old-fashioned table.
“I—I was just thinking to myself that a crumb or two would do no harm,” he murmured, conscious of the guilty flush seeping into the seams, tucks, and gussets of his face.
“It would seem to me that a man of the cloth would be the first to put temptation behind him,” Emma observed tartly as she strode across the worn linoleum flooring. “Particularly a man of your age,” she added, giving him a meaningful look.
The pastor swallowed a heavy sigh. After Emma had arrived to take charge of St. Brigid’s household chores some twenty-two years ago, he had soon learned to his sorrow that her culinary feats were largely confined to bland puddings, poached prunes, and a concoction which she called “Irish Stew” and which was no more than a feeble attempt to disguise the past week’s leftovers.
So he was most agreeably surprised one day when Emma miraculously produced a batch of cookies of such flavorful taste and texture that the priest mentally forgave her all her venial sins. And since it was Father Crumlish’s nature to share his few simple pleasures with others, he promptly issued instructions that, once a year, Emma should bake as many of the cookies as the parish’s meager budget would allow. As a result, although St. Brigid’s pastor and his housekeeper were on extra-short rations from Thanksgiving until Christmas Eve, many a parishioner’s otherwise cheerless Christmas Day was brightened by a bag of the sugar-and-spice delicacies.
Now, today, as the priest quickly left the kitchen area to avoid any further allusions to his ailments and his advancing years, the ringing of the telephone was entirely welcome. He hurried down the hallway to his office and picked up the receiver.
“St. Brigid’s.”
“It’s Tom, Father.”
Father Crumlish recognized the voice of Lieutenant Thomas Patrick “Big Tom” Madigan of Lake City’s police force and realized, from the urgency in the policeman’s tone, that his call was not a social one.
“I’m at the Liberty Office Building,” Madigan said in a rush. “A guy’s sitting on a ledge outside the top-story window. Says he’s going to jump. If I send a car for you—”
“I’ll be waiting at the curb, Tom,” Father interrupted and hung up the phone.
“Big Tom” Madigan was waiting outside the elderly office building when Father Crumlish arrived some minutes later. Quickly he ushered the priest through the emergency police and fire details and the crowd of curious onlookers who were gazing in awe at the scarecrow figure perched on a ledge high above the street.
“Do you know the man, Tom?” Father asked. He followed the broad-shouldered policeman into the building lobby, and together they entered a self-service elevator.
“And so do you, Father,” Madigan said as he pressed the elevator button. “He’s one of your people. Charley Abbott.”
“God bless us!” the pastor exclaimed. “What do you suppose set Charley off this time?” He sighed. “The poor lad’s been in and out of sanitariums half a dozen times in his thirty years. But this is the first time he’s ever tried to do away with himself.”
“This may not be just one of Abbott’s loony notions,” Madigan replied grimly. “Maybe he’s got a good reason for wanting to jump off that ledge.”
“What do you mean, Tom?”
“Last week a man named John Everett was found murdered in his old farmhouse out in Lake City Heights. He was a bachelor, lived alone, no relatives—”
“I read about it,” Father interrupted impatiently. “What’s that got to do—”
“We haven’t been able to come up with a single clue,” Madigan broke in, “until half an hour ago. One of my detectives, Dennis Casey, took an anonymous phone call from a man who said that if we wanted to nab Everett’s murderer we should pick up the daytime porter at the Liberty Office Building.”
“That’s Charley.” Father nodded, frowning. “I myself put in a good word for him for the job.”
“Casey came over here on a routine check,” Madigan went on as the elevator came to a halt and he and the priest stepped out into the corridor. “He showed Abbott his badge, said he was investigating Everett’s murder, and wanted to ask a few questions. Abbott turned pale—looked as if he was going to faint, Casey says. Then he made a dash for the elevator, rode it up to the top floor, and climbed out the corridor window onto the ledge.”
“But surely, now, Tom,” Father protested, “you can’t be imagining that Charley Abbott had a hand in that killing? Why, you know as well as I that, for all his peculiar ways, Charley’s gentle as a lamb.”
“All I know,” Madigan replied harshly, “is that when we tried to ask him a few questions, he bolted.” He ran a hand over his crisp, curly brown hair. “And I know that innocent men don’t run.”
“Innocent or guilty,” Father Crumlish said, “the man’s in trouble. Take me to him, Tom.”
When Father Crumlish entered the priesthood more than forty years before, he never imagined that he was destined to spend most of those years in St. Brigid’s parish—that weary bedraggled section of Lake City’s waterfront where destitution and despair, avarice and evil, walked hand in hand. And although, on the occasions when he lost a battle with the Devil, he too sometimes teetered on the brink of despair, he unfailingly rearmed himself with his intimate, hard-won knowledge of his people.
But now, as the old priest leaned out the window and caught sight of the man seated on the building’s ledge, his confidence was momentarily shaken. Charley Abbott had the appearance and demeanor of a stranger. The man’s usually slumped, flaccid shoulders were rigid with purpose; his slack mouth and chin were set in taut, hard lines; and in place of his normal attitude of wavering indecision, there was an aura about him of implacable determination.
There was not a doubt in Father Crumlish’s min
d that Abbott intended to take the fatal plunge into eternity. The priest took a deep breath and silently said a prayer.
“Charley,” he then called out mildly, “it’s Father Crumlish. I’m right here close to you, lad. At the window.”
Abbott gave no indication that he’d heard his pastor’s voice.
“Can you hear me, Charley?”
No response.
“I came up here to remind you that we have been through a lot of bad times together,” Father continued conversationally. “And together we’ll get through whatever it is that’s troubling you now.”
The priest waited for a moment, hoping to elicit some indication that Abbott was aware of his presence. But the man remained silent and motionless, staring into space. Father decided to try another approach.
“I’ve always been proud of you, Charley,” Father said. “And never more so than when you were just a tyke and ran in the fifty-yard dash at our Annual Field Day Festival.” He sighed audibly. “Ah, but that’s so many years ago, and my memory plays leprechaun’s tricks. I can’t recall for the life of me, lad—did you come in second or third?”
Again Father waited, holding his breath. Actually he remembered the occasion clearly. The outcome had been a major triumph in his attempts to bring a small spark of reality into his young parishioner’s dreamy, listless life.
Suddenly Abbott’s long legs, which were dangling aimlessly over the perilous ledge, stiffened, twitched. Slowly he turned his head and focused his bleak eyes on the priest.
“I—I won!” he said, in the reproachful, defensive voice of a small child.
“I can’t hear you, Charley,” Father said untruthfully, striving to keep the tremor of relief from his voice. “Could you speak a little louder? Or come a bit closer?”
To Father Crumlish it seemed an eternity before Abbott’s shoulders relaxed a trifle, before his deathlike grip on the narrow slab of concrete and steel diminished, before slowly, ever so slowly, the man began to inch his way along the ledge until he came within an arm’s reach of the window and the priest. Then he paused and leaned tiredly against the building’s brick wall.
“I won,” he repeated, this time in a louder and firmer tone.
“I remember now,” Father said, never taking his dark blue eyes from his parishioner’s pale, distraught face. “So can you tell me why a fellow like yourself, with a fine pair of racing legs, would be hanging them out there in the breeze?”
The knuckles of Charley’s hands grasping the ledge whitened. “The cops are going to say I murdered Mr. Everett—” He broke off in agitation.
“Go on, Charley.”
“They’re going to arrest me. Put me away.” Abbott’s voice rose hysterically. “And this time it’ll be forever. I can’t stand that, Father.” Abruptly he turned his head away from the priest and made a move as if to rise to his feet. “I’ll kill myself first.”
“Stay where you are!” Father Crumlish commanded. “You’ll not take your life in the sight of God, with me standing by to have it on my conscience that I wasn’t able to save you.”
Cowed by Father’s forcefulness, Abbott subsided and once more turned his stricken gaze on the pastor’s face.
“I want you to look me straight in the eye, Charley,” Father said, “and answer my question: as God is your Judge, did you kill the man?”
“No, Father. No!” The man’s slight form swayed dangerously. “But nobody will believe me.”
Father Crumlish stared fixedly into Abbott’s pale blue eyes, which were dazed now and dark with desperation. But the pastor also saw in them his parishioner’s inherent bewilderment, fear—and his childlike innocence. Poor lad, he thought compassionately. Poor befuddled lad.
“I believe you, Charley,” he said in a strong voice. “And I give you my word that you’ll not be punished for a crime you didn’t commit.” With an effort the priest leaned further out the window and extended his hand. “Now come with me.”
Hesitatingly Abbott glanced down at the priest’s outstretched, gnarled fingers.
“My word, Charley.”
Abbott sat motionless, doubt and indecision etched on his thin face.
“Give me your hand, lad,” Father said gently.
Once again the man raised his eyes until they met the priest’s.
“Give me your hand!”
It was a long excruciating moment before Charley released his grip on the ledge, extended a nail-bitten, trembling hand, and permitted the pastor’s firm warm clasp to lead him to safety.
It was Father Crumlish’s custom to read the Lake City Times sports page while consuming his usual breakfast of coddled egg, dry toast, and tea. But this morning he delayed learning how his beloved Giants, and in particular Willie Mays, were faring until he’d read every word of the running story on John Everett’s murder.
Considerable space had been devoted to the newest angle on the case—Charley Abbott’s threatened suicide after the police had received an anonymous telephone tip and had sought to question him. Abbott, according to the story, had been taken to Lake City Hospital for observation. Meanwhile, the police were continuing their investigation, based on the few facts at their disposal.
To date, John Everett still remained a “mystery man.” With the exception of his lawyer, banker, and the representative of a large real-estate management concern—and his dealings with all three had been largely conducted by mail or telephone—apparently only a handful of people in Lake City were even aware of the man’s existence. As a result, his murder might not have come to light for some time, had it not been for two youngsters playing in the wooded area which surrounded Everett’s isolated farmhouse. Prankishly peering in a window, they saw his body sprawled on the sparsely furnished living-room floor and notified the police. According to the Medical Examiner, Everett had been dead less than twenty-four hours. Death was the result of a bullet wound from a .25 automatic.
Although from all appearances Everett was a man of modest means, the story continued, investigation showed that in fact he was extremely wealthy—the “hidden owner” of an impressive amount of real estate in Lake City. Included in his holdings was the Liberty Office Building where Charley Abbott had almost committed suicide.
Frowning, Father Crumlish put down the newspaper and was about to pour himself another cup of tea when the telephone rang. Once again it was Big Tom Madigan—and Father was not surprised. It was a rare day when Madigan failed to “check in” with his pastor—a habit formed years ago, when he’d been one of the worst hooligans in the parish and the priest had intervened to save him from reform school. And in circumstances like the present, where one of St. Brigid’s parishioners was involved in a crime, the policeman always made sure that Father Crumlish was acquainted with the latest developments.
“I’ve got bad news, Father,” Madigan said, his voice heavy with fatigue.
The priest braced himself.
“Seems Everett decided to demolish quite a few old buildings that he owned. Turn the properties into parking lots. I’ve got a list of the ones that were going to be torn down and the Liberty is on it.” Madigan paused a moment. “In other words, Charley Abbott was going to lose his job. Not for some months, of course, but—”
“Are you trying to tell me that any man would commit murder just because he was going to lose his job?” Father was incredulous.
“Not any man. Charley. You know that he didn’t think his porter’s job was menial. To him it was a ‘position,’ a Big Deal, the most important thing that ever happened to him.”
Father Crumlish silently accepted the truth of what Big Tom had said. And yet… “But I still can’t believe that Charley is capable of murder,” he said firmly. “There’s something more to all this, Tom.”
“You’re right, Father, there is,” Madigan said. “Abbott lived in the rooming house run by his sister and brother-in-law, Annie and Steve Swanson.”
“That I know.”
“Casey—the detective who tried to question
Charley yesterday—went over to the house to do a routine check on Charley’s room. Hidden under the carpet, beneath the radiator, he found a recently fired .25 automatic.”
The Twelve Crimes of Christmas Page 11