The Organist Wore Pumps (The Liturgical Mysteries) (33 page)

“
Makes sense,” I said. “Flatulent flatworms. Brilliant. But what makes you think I have anything to do with who gets the contract?” I asked.

“
We know you’ve got the goods on the Queen Bishop. One word from you and she’ll cough up that contract like Mr. Frisky on National Hairball Day. Then, once the Slugh Organ is installed, everyone will want one.”

“
Yeah, probably,” I agreed -- as agreeable as the head underdwarf, Agrin the Agreeable, who, as I’m sure he would agree, owed me seventeen dollars (three-years’ wages in Kooloobati), which was the princely sum I’d paid him to keep Sophie in the compost heap -- “but I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

I narrowed my gaze and pulled a salt shaker out of my pocket. The air was sucked out of the room by a hundred slimy blowholes. It reminded me of the U.S. Senate.

“
Didn’t you frisk him?” Sophie burbled at a slug that looked suspiciously like Nancy Pelosi, but with better plastic surgery.

“
I can’t stand to touch a gumshoe,” she (or he) squished back. “They give me the screamin’ willies!”

And that’s when the seasoning started.

•••

“
I’ve got the warrant,” said Nancy, walking up to our table. “Judge Adams is out of town. Judge Minton wasn’t too happy, meeting me at 6:30 in the morning. Not only did I have to stop at Dunkin’ Donuts and bring him a coffee and a cruller, but when he opened the front door, he was in his bathrobe.” Nancy gave an involuntary shudder. “And it wasn’t exactly tied shut.”

“
I know how you feel,” I said. “Mrs. Crampkin did the same thing to me last month when I went over to help her get her cat off the roof.”

“
Mrs. Crampkin’s a hundred and eight years old!” said Pete. “Maybe more.”

“
You just ain’t whistlin’ Dixie,” I said. “I haven’t seen that many wrinkles since Hannah dropped that case of prunes down at the Piggly Wiggly. Mrs. Crampkin looked like a bald Shar-Pei.”

“
Have some waffles,” Dave said to Nancy. “They’re delicious. We’re meeting Gaylen Weatherall in a couple of minutes. Then off to nail the perp. Well, if she’s home.”

Nancy slid a chair out from under the table and bellied up to a plate of Belgian waffles.

“
Perp?” I said to Dave. “Did you just say perp?”

Nancy laughed. “He
did
say perp.”

Dave hung his head in shame.

“
Can I come?” asked Pete. “I’ve got my Kevlar vest in the back of the truck.”

Cynthia walked up to the table and began to refill our coffee cups.

“
You’ve got a vest?” said Nancy. “Why? Why on earth would you have a vest?”

“
I’m going turkey hunting with the mayor here,” Pete said, smiling up at Cynthia. “It’s not that she’s a bad shot. It’s just that she’s the current beneficiary on my insurance policy.”

“
No,” I said. “You can’t come.”

“
You could deputize me,” suggested Pete.

“
Go ahead and take him,” Cynthia said. “Maybe he’ll get shot and save me the trouble.”

•••

We met Gaylen in Marilyn’s office at seven o’clock sharp. She was dressed for the day’s work in a wool skirt and matching sweater. Her long white hair was tied back with a ribbon.

“
What’s the rush?” she said, when Nancy, Dave, and I walked in. “I had to be here anyway for the children’s sunrise service, but you three look as though you’ve been up all night.”

“
We’ll tell you in a second,” I said. “Could we go into your office?”

“
Sure,” said Gaylen. She pulled her keys out of her sweater pocket and unlocked the office door. We followed her into the room. She walked behind her desk, sat down and looked up at us.

“
What?” she said, looking around, then, seeing what the rest of us saw, or rather didn’t see,
“Oh, my God!”

The reliquary was gone.

Chapter 41

The sun was just breaking over the top of the mountains when we knocked on the apartment door. We’d all noticed the black Ford Explorer 4x4 sitting in the driveway. The door swung open and an attractive woman smiled at us.

“
Come on in,” said Diana Terry. “I’ve been expecting you.”

“
Here’s our warrant,” Nancy said as she handed a folded piece of paper across the threshold. “For your apartment and your car.”

“
Yes,” said Diana. “So it is.”

“
Would you mind waiting with me outside?” I said. “While Dave and Nancy check your apartment?”

“
Not at all. Let me get my coat.”

“
I’ll go with you,” said Nancy. She and Dave followed Diana into the living room. Diana appeared a moment later clad in a heavy, quilted overcoat and wrapped in a scarf. She had a stylish knit cap on her head.

“
They won’t find anything, you know.”

“
I’m pretty sure they won’t, but we have to check anyway,” I said.

“
What made you suspect me?” Diana said. “Not that I’m guilty of anything, mind you. I’m just curious.”

“
A couple of things,” I said. “The first was the computer at the library. You were on the internet when Big Mel shorted out the transformer and all the power went out. I talked with you and Rebecca right after it happened. Remember?”

Diana smiled, but didn’t say anything.

“
Rebecca was planning an author Skype that evening. When the power came back on, Donald Mushrat raced to the only computer hooked to a printer. He had to finish his sermon. That computer was still logged in to your email, since you never logged out. Sometimes that happens.”

“
Hmm,” said Diana. “I can’t imagine that’s true.”

“
Mushrat couldn’t resist reading someone else’s email. He was like that. Then he read something that told him the recipient of the emails he was reading was a killer. He announced as much during his Bible study. ‘We have a Jael in our community.’”

“
I wouldn’t know about that,” said Diana sweetly. “I wasn’t there.”

“
Well, you certainly didn’t know I was in the choir loft,” I said, “but you were there. I saw you. You just didn’t stay with the others when I sent everyone to the fellowship hall. We got everyone’s statement. Yours wasn’t among them.”

“
Oh, right,” said Diana. “I was there. Now I remember. But then I had an emergency and had to leave.” She smiled again. “I’m sorry. I must have forgotten.”

“
We did some checking. You’re Hiram Frost’s niece. And you actually
are
an ex-nun. We thought that might just be a cover. You’d know the scriptures pretty well.”

“
Well, Uncle Hiram’s side of the family is Catholic,” said Diana. “I went to the convent when I was seventeen. I left ten years later. Priests aren’t always as holy as they’d like you to believe.”

“
You’ve been taking care of Hiram for a couple of years, doing some shopping for him, picking up his medicine...”

“
Oh, sure. I loved Uncle Hiram.”

“
You knew the house and you knew Hiram couldn’t manage steps anymore. That’s why you stashed Sal LaGrassa’s wine in your uncle’s basement. Of course, you had no idea about the bank foreclosing on the farm.”

“
I don’t know anyone named Sal LaGrassa. And I was
shocked
that Uncle Hiram had wine in his basement. Shocked, I tell you!”

It was my turn to smile. “It is Nancy’s and my considered opinion that Sal met his demise because you didn’t really want him to come to my house, steal his wine back, and kill Meg and me.”

“
Well, I do like Meg. She’s a nice person.”

“
That can’t be the only reason.”

“
Well, hypothetically, if I
did
know this Sal LaGrassa, he may have been acting more and more erratically. Not sticking to the protocols. He might not have been able to have been trusted anymore.”

“
So, I suppose I owe you a debt of thanks,” I said.

“
Well, if any of this were true, you certainly would.”

“
Anyway, as soon as Mushrat announced that he’d uncovered a killer, you knew he needed to go. You’d heard your emails read aloud on Sunday morning and you knew he’d been copying them. What you didn’t know is how much information he had. There could have been something in those emails that might have eventually led the feds straight to you. Something that Mushrat hadn’t figured out yet.”

“
Interesting,” said Diana.

“
So you shot him during the hymn. And you used a Glock just like the one I kept in the organ bench. But, before you did—in fact before you killed LaGrassa—you switched the barrels in the guns. To throw suspicion on me, just in case something went awry.”

“
How clever!” said Diana. “Why didn’t anyone hear the gunshot?”

“
Oh, please,” I said. “Do I even have to mention that you used a noise suppressor? A silencer? You probably shot him right through your purse.”

“
What’s a silencer?” said Diana, innocently, then added, “You know, you really shouldn’t keep a pistol in the organ bench.”

“
I’ve been told that before,” I said. “By the way, about the other email that Deacon Mushrat read. I hope I don’t have to worry about a twenty-thousand dollar murder-for-hire somewhere in this community.”

“
That is not something I’d worry about, if I were you.”

Nancy and Dave came out of the front door of the apartment.

“
Nothing,” Nancy said. “No Glock. No guns of any kind. No reliquary either. We’ll check the car, but I’ll bet there’s nothing there either.”

“
If it’s not here, where is it?” asked Dave.

“
Not that I know anything about what you’re talking about,” said Diana, “but, when I was up at the church last night with the kids, I saw an old box up in the choir loft.”

“
How much is that thing worth, anyway?” I asked.

“
Well, it’s priceless, of course, but I wouldn’t be surprised at a private auction estimate of seven or eight figures,” said Diana. “Or so I’ve heard.”

“
What’s it doing in the choir loft?” asked Nancy.

I looked at Diana Terry and smiled. “Someone stole it,” I said, “but then discovered she couldn’t get it out of town. She couldn’t leave it at her house, because the cops would be coming with a warrant. She couldn’t leave it in her car for the same reason. She had to put it back.”

“
But why did she leave it in the choir loft?” asked Dave.

I looked at Diana and she shrugged. “Maybe,” she said, “because that’s where she found it. You know, after the kids were done playing with it.”