Rueful Death (20 page)

"I don't know anything about the fires," she said _.ickly. "Like everyone else, I find them very frightening. Last night was awful. If Mother hadn't smelled the smoke, Sophia might have burned down."

"And the letters?" I asked quietly. "Do you know any-±ing about them?"

She bit her lip. "No, I really don't. I mean-"

"Father Steven suggested that I talk to you about them. He seemed to think you might have a special concern."

She glanced up quickly, then away. She seemed to have trouble meeting my eyes, but that might be a normal behavior for her. "Did he? Well, I suppose-I mean, I did speak to him."

"Do you have a special reason for being concerned?"

She looked down again, and pulled a dead leaf off the plant. "You're asking whether I've received one of the letters?"

"Yes," I said, hoping for an answer. "Have you, Sister?"

She shook her head fervently. Too fervently? Her pale hand seemed to be trembling.

"Do you know someone who has?" Maggie asked.

Another headshake.

I frowned. "Then why did Father Steven think you might-"

Her face was suddenly fierce. ' 'Because I told him what happened to me!" She sank down onto the stone bench beside the path, as if her knees wouldn't support her.

"Can you tell
us
about it?" I asked gently.

She was fighting back tears. After a moment, she swallowed and choked out, ' 'When I was a novice, someone in our class wrote… notes." Her voice grew stronger. "She

slipped them into our books or left them for us to find under our pillows or in the bathroom. I guess it started out as a prank, because the first ones were rather silly. Amusing, even. But then they began to say accusing things, hurtful,
virulent
things. And then-" She pulled in her breath.

"Go on," I said.

She shook her head. "I know this is hard for you to understand. Little notes, pranks, jokes-you must be thinking it's all very trivial. A tempest in a teapot."

To tell the truth, that's exactly what I was thinking. But trivial incidents can loom large and threatening in a community that's closed off from the outside. If you live in the teapot, the tempest fills your entire world.

"Please," I said. "I want to hear."

She firmed her mouth and went on, haltingly. "One of the other novices-my cousin Marie, and dearer to me than a sister-got several of the letters. She began to question her vocation, and a few months later, she asked to leave. Once she got out in the world, she…" She stopped, swallowed, tried again. ' 'She lost her bearings. She got involved with drugs. Three years later, she was dead."

Maggie dropped down beside Rose and put an arm around her shaking shoulders. "I'm so sorry," she murmured sympathetically. She fished in her jacket pocket and
pulled out a wad of tissues. "Did you know at the time
who was writing the letters?"

Rose took a tissue and blew her nose. "At the time, I preferred
not
to know, and I've been glad ever since. If I knew who she was, I don't think I could… I might have done something that…" Her eyes were swimming with tears. "Those poisonous letters
killed
Marie! If it hadn't been for them, she would have remained in the order. She'd be happy and content now, safe in the service of God. That's what I told Father Steven. Whoever is writing these letters is breathing out the same poisonous air. It can infect all of us!"

I wanted to say that Marie's vocation must have been

pretty shaky to start with, but it would have sounded heartless. And Rose was living with the truth as she believed it. There was no point in questioning her version of the story.

"I suppose someone spoke to the novice mistress about the letters," Maggie said.

"I believe so. I didn't feel it was my place, of course. All I could do was pray. I pray now, for Marie's soul and for the soul of this hateful person."

I studied her: a shy, quiet woman who spent time by herself, who worked in the herb garden where she could pluck a rue leaf or two to tuck into her letters. But Sister Rose's guileless distress hid nothing darker than her own sorrow. There was nothing to connect her to either the fires or the letters. Maggie hugged her, I thanked her, and we left.

Sister Ramona seemed a more promising informant, not only because Father Steven had mentioned her, but because she was one of the few people who had visited Perpetua before her death. After a short search, Maggie and I found her with several sisters in the craft room, working on the wreaths, swags, and braids that had helped to support St. T through the lean years. While they worked, they were listening to a Gregorian chant on a cassette player. I looked around at the quietly industrious group, surrounded by beautiful materials and intent on their crafting, and wondered how long they'd be doing this. At least some of them, I was certain, would prefer it to running a conference center or cleaning up after church bigwigs. I know I would.

Sister Ramona was a tall, elegant sister with flawlessly beautiful skin and long graceful fingers, the nails carefully shaped and nicely manicured. She might have been in her forties. She wore a denim apron over her habit, and she was standing in front of a heavy wooden easel that held a large straw wreath base in the shape of a heart. She had covered the heart-pretty skimpily, I thought-with dried artemisia and clumps of small heads of garlic. Beside her were boxes of red strawflowers, pink and red globe ama-

ranth, and bright red celosia, and a spool of red twist ribbon.

Sister Ramona stepped away from her work, studying it unhappily. "I tell Sister Miriam that I'm not very good at making these things, but she says I have to keep trying." She spoke petulantly, in a carefully modulated voice that sounded as if she might have had dramatic training. "It's crooked, isn't it? Maybe I should stick some more of those red things on the left. Would that help?"

I thought she should take it apart and start over again, but I didn't want to say so.

Maggie lowered her voice so she wouldn't be heard by the others. ' "This is China Bayles, Sister. Mother has asked us to help her answer some questions."

"Oh, yes, the investigator." She gave up on the wreath and began folding the twist ribbon into uneven loops. "Well, all I can tell you about the fires is that they frighten me to my very bones. The thought of somebody burning the place down around our ears is enough to keep me awake all night." She shook her head, sighing dramatically. "And how anybody could write those horrible letters-"

"What can you tell me about them?" I asked.

"Me?" Her eyes widened. "Well, I've never gotten one myself, if that's what you're asking. And of course I have absolutely
no
idea who's writing them. Not a clue, as Jessica Fletcher would say. But I have a theory about the bigger picture."

"The bigger picture?"

She looked down at the bow she had made and clucked crossly. "There, do you see? I've got it crooked
again.
I am so wretchedly clumsy at making these hateful things. I'd almost rather work in the kitchen than-"

"What bigger picture?"

She pulled the bow apart and began to loop the ribbon again. I wanted to take it out of her hands and show her how, but she probably wouldn't have thanked me. "Well, there's something awfully odd going on here, wouldn't you

say? I mean, there was Sister Anne's swimsuit hanging on the cross, just dripping with blood. They tried to tell us afterward that it was ketchup, but I know better." She held up the bow, examining it critically. ' 'And of course nothing like that ever happened at St. Agatha's. Life was much different there, much more varied. We had access to the theater and music and-Oh,
blast]"
She glared at the bow. "But it's the best I can do. Really, I'd rather work in the laundry than try to please Sister Miriam."

I tried again. "What about the bigger picture, Sister?"

She picked up the glue gun. "The blood was a sign, wouldn't you say? A portent, like all these terrible fires. And Mother Hilaria, dying in such a cruel way, and Sister Perpetua being taken. Who knows where it's going to end? I go to bed every night wondering if Hannah will burn to the ground before dawn." She dropped a large dollop of melted glue onto the bow.

"I understand you visited Sister Perpetua before she died."

"That's right." She thrust the bow onto a bare spot in the wreath and held it for a moment. "She was my novice mistress at the motherhouse in El Paso. I thought I should say something encouraging in her last illness."

Maggie tilted her head. ' 'Excuse me for interrupting, Sister. Were you in the same novice class as Sister Rose?"

Sister Ramona straightened the bow and stepped back, cocking her head. ' "There. I hope Sister Miriam is satisfied. Of course, she'll tell me there's not enough artemisia and that the loops aren't even, but-" She paused, frowning. "What did you ask?"

"About the novice class," I prompted.

"Oh, yes, Sister Rose. Yes, we were in the same class."

"Then maybe you recall the letters," Maggie said. "Poison-pen letters, Sister Rose said they were."

"Poison-pen letters?" Ramona began picking glue off her fingers with a distasteful look. "Yes, of course I remember. It was a sad affair. One of the novices left because

of it, and others got their feelings hurt. But I never saw any of the letters myself, and it was a very long time ago. Years and years. You might ask Sister Regina. She's bound to remember. She was always in the diick of things."

"Sister Regina was in your class?" I asked.

"Oh, yes," Ramona said promptly. "She's older, of course, because she was a nurse before she took her vows. Sister Olivia was in the same class. She and Sister Regina were friends. We called them the Bobbsey Twins because they were always bobbing up here and there, wherever you least expected them. They seemed to know things the rest of us didn't." She stepped back and wiped her hands on her apron. "Well, it's done, for better or worse."

"How about the other sisters here at St. T's-were any of them in your class?'' Maggie asked.

"Oh yes, several. Sister Allegra and Sister Ruth and Sister Rachel. Oh, and Sister John Roberta, too." She pursed her lips. "Of course, we were all quite devoted to Sister Perpetua, God rest her soul."

Olivia and Regina, the Bobbsey Twins.
Questioned Sr. O about Sr. P's letter,
Mother Hilaria had written. And later, she had questioned Sr. O and Sr. R about the letter to Sister Anne.

"You said something about a bigger picture," I said. ' 'What did you mean by that?''

Ramona shook her head. "It's just a theory. You probably don't want to hear it." She picked up a whisk broom and began brushing bits of dried flowers into a little pile.

I frowned. "If you have information-"

"Well, it's not exactly information. It's more like an explanation." She swept the flowers onto a piece of paper and dumped them into the trash can beside the table. "It's about the children of Israel, you see."

"The children of Israel?"

"God punished them by making them wander in the desert for forty years."

"I'm afraid I still don't-"

She gave me a pointed look.
"This
is the desert. And we're the children of Israel. We're being punished, although for what I don't know."

"I gather you don't like it here," Maggie said dryly.

"Like it here?" Sister Ramona gave a short laugh.
"Like
it here? Let me put it this way, Sister. I do not enjoy sweating in the sun in the fields in July. I detest the smell of garlic. I have no talent for making wreaths. I am
not
cut out for desert living."

"Why not ask for a transfer?" I asked.

"I already have," she said. "As soon as Reverend Mother General approves my request, I'm to go to our sister house in San Francisco." Her eyes took on a faraway look. "San Francisco. Can you imagine? It will be heavenly. Simply heavenly."

I didn't need to ask when she expected her request to be approved. Mother General might not know a thing about garlic, but she obviously understood a great deal about carrots and sticks.

'
'Now,''
Maggie said as we left the barn. ' 'I want to hear everything."

I told her what I had learned from the journal, including the fact that Mother Hilaria herself had received a letter.

"So," Maggie said when I finished, "all roads lead to Sister O and Sister R."

"The Bobbsey Twins." An odd nickname. I wondered how much animosity-and perhaps fear-might be behind it.

Maggie paused, frowning. "You don't suppose this poison-pen thing goes all the way back to the novitiate, do you?"

"I'm beginning to think it might." I looked at my watch. "I need to talk to Mother Winifred and let her know about Dwight. And I really have to talk to Olivia before I go any further-but I can't do that until tomorrow. That's when Mother expects her back from El Paso." I wondered what

kind of mood Olivia would be in when she returned. Not good, I guessed.

Maggie thrust her hands into her jacket pocket. "A few of us are getting together this evening to talk about the way things are going here. Would you like to come? We're meeting in Miriam's room. There'll be wine and munch-ies."

"The way things are going here-the changes, you mean?"

"Yes. There doesn't seem to be much we can do as long as the Reverend Mother General has her mind made up. But we're going to brainstorm anyway."

"Sorry," I said. "I'm having dinner in Carr tonight"

Maggie eyed me. "With Tom Rowan, I'll bet."

"And his father," I said quickly. Too quickly, maybe.

A smile quirked at the corner of Maggie's mouth. "Want me to say a prayer for you?"

"Why? Do you think I need one?"

"Why not?" she countered briskly. "A little prayer never hurt anybody."

The Lone Star Dance Barn was a couple of miles south of town on the Fredericksburg Road, just past Marvell's Meat Locker (Deer Processed Here-Try Our Venison Sausage!) and the livestock auction barn. It was fully dark by the time I parked the Dodge in the gravel parking lot and headed toward the building, pulling my denim jacket tighter around me. I was wearing a plaid flannel shirt under the jacket, as well as Levi's and boots and a wool cap, but the wind was cutting right through me. When it gets cold in Texas, you
feel
it.

The Lone Star Dance Barn was a giant metal building the size of an airplane hangar, splashed with red and blue neon. I opened a side door and found myself in an old-fashioned Texas dance hall, with a scuffed wooden floor bigger than a basketball court and a bare, uncurtained stage at one end. Scarred pine picnic tables were arranged a couple of rows deep around three sides, and beer signs and

banners-the tawdry graffiti of the country dancing crowd-covered the walls. It was 7 p.m. on a Monday night and the place was cold and empty and down-at-the-heels, like an old tart at midweek. But I knew what it would be like come Saturday midnight: the air hazy blue with tobacco smoke and loud with the wail of amplified fiddle and six-string guitar, the wooden floor packed with blue-jeaned, Western-shirted guys and gals wearing polished boots and silver belt buckles big as pie plates, arms linked, hip-to-hip, stomping and yeeha-ing happily through the Cotton-Eyed Joe.

There was no yeeha tonight, only the muted revelry of the barbecue joint at the front of the dance hall. This room was smaller and cozier, paneled with splintery barn siding and decorated with Texas memorabilia: rusty license plates that went back to the twenties, a
Don't Mess with Texas
sign over a Texas A &M trash barrel, Texas flags (all six of them), paintings of old barns and privies afloat on improbable oceans of bluebonnets, the stuffed head and shoulders of an enigmatic longhorn with red marbles for eyes. George Strait crooned a ballad on the jukebox, a cowgirl waitress in skintight jeans and Dolly Parton boobs shouldered a tray of beer pitchers through the crowded tables, and diners were hunched earnestly over plates of Tex-Mex, which is traditionally served in portions designed to satisfy the appetites of the entire Dallas defensive line. There was enough food on the tables to feed a third-world country for a week.

I did a quick scan of the room. Tom wasn't there, so I took a table against the far wall, putting as much distance as possible between me and the jukebox. I accepted a menu from the top-heavy waitress and ordered a Dos Equis. While I was waiting, I sat back to think about my conversation with Mother Winifred,- which had taken place at the foot of the garden in a fenced-in corner that was the home of a black and white potbellied pig named Delilah.

"Gabriella thought up her name," Mother had said as

she opened the gate. "She built that clever little house over there, too." The house, which was about five feet tall at the peak of its pitched roof, looked like a Hansel and Gretel cottage, with casement windows, a chimney pot, and a window box full of colorful plastic flowers. There was a miniature wooden ramp Delilah could walk up, and a pig-size swinging door, with her name painted on it in Old English letters. Mother dumped a panful of apple peels into a small trough and Delilah began happily to sort them out, deciding which to eat now and which to hide in her mound of hay and save for a midnight snack.

I knelt down and scratched Delilah's back while I made a full confession.

"You mean, Dwight
didn't
do it?" Mother exclaimed when I'd finished. "But I thought you said-"

"I jumped to the wrong conclusion," I said. There'd been plenty of justification, of course, but when it came down to it, that wasn't an excuse. I stood up. "I'm sorry, Mother."

"It's not your fault," Mother said.

"Yes it is," I said unhappily. "Of all people, I should know better." Some of my clients had been falsely accused, and I'd had to work hard to get them acquitted. And here I'd gone and done it myself. "It was a terrible mistake."

"Perhaps," Mother said. "But I do see the Lord's hand in it."

Mother must have better eyes man I have. "Where?"

She smiled. "Well, if Dwight hadn't gotten drunk and spent the night in jail-"

"You think the Lord put him there?"

"He works in mysterious ways, my child." She went to a faucet and refilled Delilah's water pan. "Of course, I'm glad to know that Dwight is innocent," she added. "Except for stealing Mother's journal, of course." She put the pan on the ground and Delilah, still chortling happily about her treasure trove of apple peels, trotted over for a drink. ' 'But now we're back where we started. If Dwight didn't set the

fires, someone else did." She looked up at me, distressed. "I'm sorry to tell you, but the sisters are very upset over the fire on Sophia's porch last night, especially in view of the fact that you are here to stop such things."

I wasn't surprised. Some probably thought that last night's fire might have been provoked by my presence, as perhaps it had.

"I've been wondering about Father Steven," I said. "Sadie told me that his face was scarred in a fire. Is that true?"

"So I've been told," Mother said. She bent over to stroke Delilah's happy pink ears. "It happened at St. Agatha's, some years ago. I don't know any of the details, but I'm sure Sister Olivia does." She straightened up, and Delilah, courting more attention, rubbed against her ankles like a cat.

I already had quite a few questions for Sister Olivia. I added that one to the list.

"I also heard that Father Steven is 'on probation,' " I said, "for something that happened in the past-at St. Agatha's, I assume. What does that mean?"

Mother gave an exasperated sigh. "Don't the sisters have anything better to do than gossip? But it's true, I'm afraid. There were several incidents involving… well-"

"Boys, I was told."

She shook her head. "So sad, really. The poor children. But the bishop is to be commended. He's taken quite a firm stand on the matter. Father Steven has the strictest orders not to-" Her jaw tightened. "But that has nothing to do with your investigations, I'm sure. Unless you think he could somehow be involved with-"

"With what? The fires?"

She looked at me. "Oh, surely not."

' 'He was here when each of the fires occurred, even last night. Did you believe him when he said he'd come after a book?"

"I took what he said at face value, I'm afraid." She

shook her head helplessly. "What possible motive could he have?"

"I don't know, Mother," I said. "But perhaps I'll have more answers after Sister Olivia tells me about the fire at St. Agatha's, and how Father Steven was injured."

I was still thinking about my conversation with Mother Winifred when Tom and his father walked in.

"How come you're not sitting under the longhorn?" Tom asked, jerking his thumb toward the table in the corner. "That's where Lyndon Johnson always used to sit when he stopped here."

"I didn't wear a hat," I said.

Tom Senior's blue eyes glinted. "Woman's got a right good sense of humor," he said to his son. "Makes up some for that outlandish name of hers." He spoke in an exaggerated Texas drawl that, to out-of-state ears, would probably sound like a parody. It wasn't. People in Texas- especially in rural Texas-really do talk that way.

"Hello, Mr. Rowan," I said.

He pulled out a chair and sat down. "What I wanta know," he said abruptly, "is how come you broke it up with my boy." His lopsided grin showed that he was only teasing. "Not good-lookin' enough for you?"

Tom's father was a tall, slightly stooped man in his mid-seventies with a weather-beaten face and thick, silvery hair. Except for a look of weariness and a few more lines, he didn't look much different from the man I'd met in Houston eight or nine years before. He was wearing a tweed sport jacket with an array of pins on the lapel-Chamber of Commerce, Knights of Columbus, Lions Club-and a bolo tie.

I grinned back. "How do you know Tom wasn't the one who broke it up with me? Maybe I wasn't pretty enough for him."

He chuckled shortly. ' 'If I thought the boy was that stupid, Fda drowned him when he was a kid. How the hell are you, China?"

"I'm fine," I said, and glanced at Tom, suddenly (and in spite of myself) feeling finer. He was relaxed and handsomely blond in a suede vest, open-collared blue shirt, and city-blue denims. He smiled, and I remembered yesterday's kiss. The electric tension was suddenly there again, crackling in the air, hghtning before a storm. I smiled back, tipping my head nonchalantly, but I'm not sure I brought it off.

To my relief, my Dos Equis arrived, Tom and his father ordered longnecks, and we fell into a discussion of the menu, which featured several rather adventurous items for a rural Tex-Mex joint. Tom and his dad decided on a large plate of nachos and the house salsa, reputed to be hotter than hades, to occupy us until the rest of the food arrived. Figuring that my mostly veggie monastery meals gave me a little leeway, I went for the steak
tampiqueno,
which was billed as an eight-inch pancake of mesquite-grilled beef enfolding onions and hot peppers, topped with cheese and ranchero sauce, plus
chicharrones
-Mexican-style chitterlings. Tom Senior and Junior ordered the usual medley of enchiladas and
chalupas
and
chiles rellenos
and retried beans. (Ordinary beans are fat-free and good for you. Why does lard have to taste so great?)

The ordering accomplished and the nachos and salsa duly delivered and given pride of place in the middle of the table, we moved to the munching stage of the meal, trading (as Texans invariably do) tall tales of the hottest salsas we have ever eaten. Finishing our repertory of salsa stories, we moved to recent history, and Tom asked me about the progress of my investigations. Figuring I might as well get it over with, I repeated my story of this morning's events- making it as amusing as possible-and admitted to having been wrong about Dwight on two counts. Then Tom asked the question I was getting tired of hearing.

"If Dwight didn't set those fires, who the hell did?"

"I'm working on it," I said. "Ask me tomorrow." After I talked to Sister Olivia, and found out the truth about the

fire that had so profoundly scarred Father Steven.

"So
oV
Royce has taken up target-shootin', huh?" Tom Senior asked with a grin. "Gotta keep your eye on them Townsends. Devious sons of bitches. Rena too. Among the four of 'em, they've got the county trussed up like a bull calf in a ropin' contest."

I pressed him for information about the Townsends, but he wasn't forthcoming. My guess was that they were big customers at the bank and it didn't do for him to bad-mouth them any more than he had to. But I did manage to learn some Rowan family history that I'd either never known or had forgotten.

Tom Senior had come back to Carr from the war in the Pacific with a Silver Star he'd earned on Iwo Jima for taking out a Japanese pillbox when his squad was pinned down by machine-gun fire. He married his high school sweetheart, Harriet, and had a son, Tom Junior. A few years later, he succeeded his father, Old Tom, as president of the Carr State Bank, which had managed to survive the Depression, but not by much.

When Tom Senior took over, business began to look up. He moved the bank out of the small brick building it shared with the feed store and into the two-story modern facility I'd seen on the square. Over the next three-plus decades, he tripled its staff and quadrupled its assets. Then Harriet died and illness struck him, and a couple of years ago Tom Junior-newly divorced from the woman he'd told me about yesterday-came home to move into Tom Senior's spot at the bank. He had also moved into the family home.

"Two guys bachin' it," Tom said wryly. "You can guess what that's like." He grinned at his father. "Although I've got to admit the old man can cook up a mean pot of spaghetti. His apple pie isn't half-bad, either."

"After Harriet died, it was either learn to feed myself or starve," Tom Senior said. "Hell, there's a limit to the number of bologna sandwiches a man can eat and five to tell it. Although I won't be tellin' it long," he added, without

a trace of resentment or self-pity. ' 'Doc Townsend says I can forget about makin' it to the half-century mark at the bank."

"What do those doctors know?" Tom grunted. "You've fooled ' em before. You'll fool 'em again."

Tom Senior went on as if his son hadn't spoken. "The boy here is carryin' on the fam'ly tradition." He glanced at Tom fondly. "Third-generation banker. Can't beat that with a stick. Course, it's in the blood. The Rowans are the best bankers in Texas, bar none."

"Watch it, Dad," Tom cautioned. "You'll break your arm patting yourself on the back."

The old man scowled. "Yeah, well, one thing I ain't so proud of, let me tell you." He picked up his beer. " 'Less you get off your can and start workin' on it, there ain't gonna be a fourth generation."

Tom colored. "Come on, Dad," he muttered. "You agreed-''

"He tell you about that woman he married on the bounce, after you and him split the sheets?" Tom Senior pointed his beer bottle at me, his pale eyes narrowing. "TV star, she was, name of Janie."

On the bounce? Tom wasn't looking at me.

"Real beauty. Family with money, too. Father's got a big spread down in Bexar County." The old man scowled at Tom, shaking his head. "Shoulda hung on to Janie when you had your rope on her, boy. Shoulda had a kid or two so there'd be somebody to take over the bank after you."

"Maybe I'll sell the damn thing," Tom muttered.

Tom Senior's mouth tightened. "You do that, and I'll come back to haunt you, sure as little green apples. I'll bring your mama with me, too."