“What happened to you? You look as if you were attacked by a bear.”
“I was.”
“What?” I released his hand in disbelief. “By a bear?”
“No, not by a bear, but I was attacked . . . Mugged would be the proper term. It happened on my way from the airport. I pulled over at a truck stop on Route 22 in New York to eat and take a bathroom break. And there, right in the diner’s parking lot, I was robbed.”
“My God, are you okay?”
“I’m banged up, but all in all, I’m fine.”
“Any idea who did this to you?”
“No . . . But, the reason that I’m here is—”
“Did the thug—”
“Thugs. There were two attackers.”
“Did they take anything?”
“My pride and some of my faith in humanity.”
“Right. But did these thugs take anything more worldly?”
“They took my valise, wallet, passport, credit cards, cell phone, and $57 in cash. They sped away and left me with $0.35 in change, €10, my car keys, and some bruises. I spent an hour filing reports with the police and getting patched up. It hurts a tad to drive. I may have cracked a rib or two.”
“You drove here?” I said with concern.
“Huh, now? Oh no, Old Brother Peter from the St. Louis Abbey dropped me off here on his way to Stone Hill College in Massachusetts. He’s giving a lecture at the school tomorrow morning. In fact, Peter and a fellow brother fetched me from the diner where the attack happened and drove me up here.”
“You could have waited until tomorrow morning to come by—”
“Morgana thought it best that I should come straight over. I’m so sorry about your uncle’s passing. I remember him being a pretty good guy.”
I gave a slight, affirming nod. “He was. And unlike me, my uncle was a steady churchgoer.”
“There is still hope for you, Rich,” said Joe, with a wry smile. “Anyway, I spoke with Morgana, and she told me to come over here as soon as I could.”
“You told him that? Why?”
Morgana took a step closer to Joe, giving me one of her ‘Don’t question me’ looks. “I thought it best that he should come as soon as possible. He has something to tell—”
“Where are you staying? In town?” I asked, half oblivious to what Morgana was trying to tell me.
“At The Green Mountain Abbey,” said Joe.
“The Benedictine’s place in the hills? They allow Jesuits?” I quipped.
“Yes,” Joe replied with a grin. “There is a new spirit of ecumenism among the ordered clergy. I have been assigned to the Abbey as a guest spiritual director,” said Joe with detectable glee. “In reality, I’m there because I’m owed some back vacation time. I’ll be at the Abbey until a new assignment comes through for me. There is some scuttlebutt about the Society establishing a retreat house around here. I’m sure I will be involved somehow when the time comes.”
“When did you get back to the States?”
“I arrived . . . late the day before yesterday . . . I think? I’m a bit off with jet lag, time differences, and being mugged, and everything . . . But more importantly, I came here tonight to see you and—”
“I am glad that you did. It’s so good to see you, but . . . you getting robbed. Have you been checked out by a doctor?”
“I saw a paramedic at the scene. As I said, I’m a little banged up, but I’m fine.”
“Did you get a good look at the car of the guys who robbed you? Get its plate number?”
“All that I can remember was that it was a dark-colored SUV. Black . . . maybe dark blue? I didn’t get its tag number.”
“Bad luck. But you haven’t seen a doctor? Maybe you should—”
“Richard,” sternly interrupted Morgana, ending my rush of inquiries. “Let Joe speak.”
“Right, sure, no problem. I only wanted to know if Joe—”
Morgana shot me that, ‘Richard, shut up,’ look of hers. So, I took a few deep breaths, bit my tongue, and listened.
“Rich, I appreciate your concern, but believe me, I’m okay . . . But here’s the thing . . . I guess the best way to tell you is to speak, ‘right on,’ as the Bard would say.” Joe took a painful breath before he spoke. “Rich, I may have been somehow involved in your uncle’s death. That is why I wanted to speak to you, alone, as soon as I could.”
It took several seconds for Joe’s words to sink into my already assaulted brain. “You killed Uncle Raymond?” I said in disbelief.
“No! But I may have been somehow connected with his death.”
I was dumbfounded. “What? . . . How?”
Morgana stepped next to me and gently embraced my arm. “When we talked on the phone, Joe and I thought it best that he see you straight away. That is why I called you to come home, immediately . . . and come alone.” She clenched my arm tighter. “The two of you should talk before speaking to the authorities.”
“What? I don’t understand. Joe, if you know something about my Uncle Raymond’s death, you must go to the police.”
“I agree, of course, Rich, but I wanted to talk with you first before I did,” said Joe in that familiar ‘I know best’ voice of his.
My brain tried to grapple with what was going on, but I was tired. My response was a simple acquiescent, “Fine.” Morgana suggested that Joe and I go into the living room to have our chat. She, on the other hand, would brew some homemade decaf chai for us all.
Upon entering the room, I quickly plopped myself down on the sofa, asking, “What did you mean, Joe, when you said that you may be connected to my Uncle’s death?”
“It’s a little complicated,” said Joe, apologetically as he slowly eased himself into our winged-backed chair that was reupholstered in a midnight blue velour material. “Well, Rich, it is like this—”
As he began his story, a very curious optical effect took place. The room’s muted lighting hit the chair and Joe’s black suit in such a way that it made my friend seem to disappear and reappear when he moved in his seat. Like Alice conversing with the Cheshire Cat, I’d be talking to Joe, and his body would unexpectedly dematerialize into darkness, leaving only his familiar, slightly ruddy face with his round spectacled eyes for me to focus on—it was very disconcerting.
“—I was in Rome last week finishing up a seminar at the Collegio Americano del Nord, when, out of the blue, I get a call from an old mentor of mine—”
“Who?”
“Oh um, Father Jorge. He’s a fellow Jesuit. We met while I was on assignment in South America some years back. Anyway, he tells me that I should go to the Curia Generalizia that very afternoon. He said that someone urgently needed to speak with me.”
“At the Curia Generalizia, the Jesuit Pentagon?” I quipped.
“Our headquarters, if you need a label. Anyway, Jorge, my friend, wouldn’t tell me any details over the phone, but he was quite insistent that I should get myself over there that afternoon. Since I hadn’t anything important planned that day, and Jorge was an old friend, I agreed. When I arrived at the Curia Generalizia, I was escorted to a small room and introduced to a Father Robert Mason, an American Jesuit, who, interestingly, knew your Uncle Raymond.”
“Really? He knew my uncle.”
“According to Mason, he did. In fact, they saw met in Austria when your uncle was overseas.”
“Uncle Raymond was in Austria during the 1950s?”
“It seems so. Mason told me that your uncle, ‘the Sergeant,’ and he were close associates back then.”
“Uncle Raymond was in the army? And a Sergeant?”
“Mason said that your uncle was in the American Army of Occupation. His unit left Austria in late 1955. Mason also told me that your uncle was a ‘courageous and generous man.’ And that he had rightfully earned the gratitude of many important people, which, regretfully, would never be publicly expressed.”
“That is good to hear, I think. But what did Uncle Raymond do for such praise?”
“I haven’t a clue, and he didn’t elaborate.”
“Wow, who would have thought,” I muttered as my uncle was becoming more and more a man of mystery with every passing hour.
“Apparently,” asked Joe, “Uncle Raymond never told you anything about his life in the army or being in Austria? According to Mason, your uncle was stationed near the city of Linz for almost a year.”
“No, he never said anything about his military service that I remember. Though it could have been that I was just not paying attention. My mother was always accusing me of not paying attention.”
“That sounds like your mom. She had a certain . . . way about her.”
“That she did. You have no argument with me there on that point.”
We both grinned.
“My Uncle Raymond’s living in Austria would explain how he knew the lyrics to so many German beer drinking songs.”
“Beer drinking songs?”
“When I was young, my uncle threw several Octoberfest picnics at his house, and during the festivities, he sang all the traditional beer tunes. In fact, at my first Octoberfest at my uncle’s, Mother made me and Kyle wear lederhosen and sing Ein Prosit der Gemütlichkeit for the guests.”
“How did the two of you feel about that?”
“Kyle looked the way I felt—stupid.”
“That must have been a sight,” said Joe, chuckling. “Anyway, Mason knew that I would be back in the States and in this area, so he asked me to contact your uncle and to give him something. Well, two things, actually.”
“What were you supposed to give him?”
Joe reached into his jacket’s side pocket, took out a white envelope, and handed it to me. “The old fellow said your uncle was seriously ill. So, he wanted to him give this mass card for his recovery.”
I opened the unsealed envelope, and, indeed, it was an ornate mass card written in Italian that was issued by some reclusive alpine monks. It was signed, “To ‘The Sarge,’ a man faith, humility, and a cat lover with deep appreciation, Bob Mason—P.S. Get well soon.” I showed it to Joe.
“No chance of recovery now,” I remarked. “Someone should tell these monks not to waste their breath.”
“Don’t fret. Your uncle’s soul will be prayed for by those contemplatives for fifty years.”
“It is good to know that I have a backup,” I quipped.
“Prayers serve the people who pray them, as well as, for those of their intentions.”
“You see, I never thought praying was purely altruistic.”
Joe gave me a dismissive smile and then reached into his inner breast pocket of his jacket. He took out a yellow envelope. “Mason also gave me this.”
“What is it?” I said as he handed me his charge.
“Don’t know. Mason slipped that envelope to me when his newly assigned health aide was called out of the room for a moment. I don’t think Mason liked him much. Anyway, Mason told me that the time had come to put things right.”
“What things?”
Joe shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“What do you think Mason meant?”
“Again, I don’t know. But Mason stressed that the fewer people who knew about that yellow envelope, the better. I wasn’t going to question him about it. The poor guy was old, obviously not well, and seemed a little confused at times. To tell the truth, I was more intrigued at the time that Mason lived in Shafton Glenn and knew your uncle than I was about the contents of the envelope.”
“Really? He was from Shafton Glenn?”
“Yep.”
“Uncle Raymond never said anything about any priest friend named Mason,” I muttered as I noticed the heftiness of the packet in my hands. “Did this Father Mason say why he didn’t just mail this thing to my uncle?”
“I did.”
“And?”
“The old priest said that its contents were much too personal to send in the international mails. He said that the Sarge was very loyal to him over the years and that your uncle deserved what was promised to him. And that is what is in that envelope.”
“Really? This is all pretty weird,” I remarked as I tried to make sense from Joe’s story, but I couldn’t. “And you really have no idea what’s inside the envelope?”
“No, not at all,” replied Joe. “Father Galamb, his attendant, then returned, and Mason started talking about the Pope.”
“I don’t recall my uncle saying anything about a Father Mason . . . I didn’t even know Uncle Raymond was in the army. What was this Father Mason like?”
“Well, old. Any details that I know about Mason are the ones that he told me himself. We met in a small office at the Curia Generalizia. The man looked quite emaciated. He sat in a motorized wheelchair, and he was on oxygen. He bragged a bit about being a cancer survivor—though I figured just barely. I would say that Mason was in his late eighties or early nineties, though I would believe it if I were told that he was a hundred. Mason said that he had retired decades ago, though he never mentioned what he actually did in the Society. Age and poor health did him in, I suppose.”
“Age and declining health will do us all in at the end, my friend,” I mused.
“Mason must have been quite a character in his prime,” continued Joe. “The old man had an alluring quality with those steely blue eyes of his. He was one of those individuals who, in his prime, could give you a look that would either charm you or scare you to death, depending on the need at the time.”
“Obviously, this Father Mason knew about you being assigned to the Abbey and its proximity to my uncle’s place.”
“That he did. But at the time of our meeting, I just chalked that up to overhearing some in-house scuttlebutt. In the Society, we, eh . . . hear about all sorts of things through the grapevine.”
“And did you learn anything about Mason while toiling in the Jebbie vineyard?”
“I knew of him, but I knew nothing specific about him. In fact, after our meeting, I had asked around, but I couldn’t find anyone who knew much about him. He had been out of circulation for a while, and many of his contemporaries had passed on.”
“No doubt, considering that he was in his nineties.”
“Was is the operative word,” declared Joe. “A few hours before I left Rome for the States, I received a text saying that Mason had passed on. It’s eerie that he died just three days after I visited him.”
“Cause of death?”
“Don’t know. When I got the word, I assumed it was by natural causes. But now, in the light of your uncle’s death . . . ”
“Are you trying to link my uncle’s murder with Mason’s death?”
“Rich, before I left Mason, he asked me to limit my telling anyone about visiting your uncle and not to say anything about the yellow envelope to anyone.”
“Why? Who cares? Who would want to care?”
“My thoughts, exactly. I pressed the old fellow for a little more information about this errand that he was sending me on. But he only added, ‘There is no need to involve you or anyone else further in this matter.’ Then, like I said, Father Galamb returned, and Mason abruptly started talking about our new pope. I got the hint and dropped the subject.”
“Nothing more was said about this envelope?”
“No. But as I was leaving, I bent down to shake Mason’s hand. With a surprisingly strong grip, the old guy pulled me lower to his mouth and whispered a warning of sorts. He said that if your uncle offers me something to eat, that I should decline. ‘Tell the Sergeant,’ Mason instructed me, ‘that you heard that he makes a great cup of coffee.’ The old man stressed again for me not to eat anything at your uncle’s.‘Have coffee; but don’t eat anything that is not prepared in front of you except for, let’s say, some instant macaroni and cheese. That should be safe. I don’t want you to get sick.’ Then the old guy chuckled to himself as if he had just heard a joke.”
“Wow, macaroni and cheese? That’s interesting. But Joe, how does this all connect with uncle’s
death?”
“Since I had arrived in the States, I’ve had the feeling that I am being watched.”
“Joe, this is a little crazy.”
“Yup, I know it sounds crazy. I do hear the words coming out of my mouth, and they do sound crazy. But when I was mugged, I got the strong impression that the muggers were looking for the envelope you’re holding.”
“What makes you think that they were after this,” I said, holding the envelope to the light of the nearby table lamp.
“After one of my masked assailants had roughed me up and gone through my pockets, he muttered, ‘Nichts.’ Then with several punches to my ribs and a swift knee to the groin, I went to the ground like a sack of potatoes. They, in turn, ransacked my car, collected most of my personal items, and, upon the arrival of the black car, skedaddled.”
“How did they miss taking this envelope?”
“Yeah, that’s the funny part of this whole thing. I inadvertently brought the envelope with me into the diner. I had it tucked inside a magazine that I was reading—”
“America?”
“Uh?”
“The magazine.”
“Ah, no, Commonweal. When I finally made it back to my table in the diner, I found that my magazine, the envelope, and my waffles were waiting for me, exactly the way I had left them.”
“Thank God for small miracles and for you not being killed.”
“Amen to that.”
“What happened next?”
“Well, my cute waitress—”
“Cute?”
“I may be a priest, Rich, but I’m not blind.”
“Right.”
“Anyway, she came to my aid, giving me an ice pack and a clean towel to mop up my blood. She said that she had seen what happened and had called the cops.”
“I am glad she did. But do you think that what happened to you is connected—”
“To your uncle’s passing?”
“To my uncle’s murder!” I quipped in disbelief
“Let’s say death,” Joe countered calmly. “And yes, I think that they are linked.”
“Oh Lord, this is so far-fetched, Joe. I learned that the two men who attacked my uncle were looking for some kind of fish that they believed he had.”
The Hotspur Affair: A Richard & Morgana MacKenzie Mystery Page 5