Cecilian Vespers (11 page)

“Do you suppose it could be your manner? Have I ever mentioned — I believe I have — that you can be a little brusque at times —”

“Oh, yer bollocks.”

I waved goodbye, and left for the office.

Just before the close of the workday I had a visit from Moody Walker.

“Come in, Moody. Don’t tell me you have something for us already!”

“You’re not paying me to sit on my butt doing nothing. I did a criminal record check on all the people who didn’t go on the bus trip.”

“Great. Did any names pop up?”

“Petrucci. You told me he has an alibi? Too bad.”

“Why too bad?”

“Because he torched a church back in 1979.”

“No!”

“Yeah. Arson conviction. Set fire to Santa Chiara’s Church down in New Jersey. Served just over a year, then got out on good behaviour. Nothing else on his sheet.”

“That’s enough, I’d say. I’ll have a word with him, alibi or no alibi. Anybody else?”

“Janice Gwendolyn Ford.”

“Jan Ford has a sheet?”

“Disturbing the peace. A protest in Tallahassee, Florida. It was only two years ago so I called the local police to see what they remembered. Not much. Just that she caused a ruckus at a demonstration. Cop said she hit somebody with her sign but she must have pleaded to the lesser charge.”

“What was she protesting, did the guy say?”

“The death penalty. They were about to fry some death-row inmate. Big crowd gathered outside the prison. Ford must be one of
those people who hate killing and violence, but doesn’t see any problem clobbering people who don’t agree with her!”

“I’ll see what she has to say. Any more criminals in the choir school?”

“No. Or nobody else who got caught anyway.”

I found Jan Ford that evening in her room at the Mother House, the massive grey stone building that is home to the Sisters of Charity at Mount Saint Vincent University. The Mount has an enviable location, high over the waters of the Bedford Basin.

Jan was doing her homework. Spread before her were a music dictation book, a pitch pipe, and a hymnbook. I recalled a time during choir rehearsal when Burke caught sight of a copy of that same hymn-book on a shelf in the loft. He stopped the music, marched over, picked it up by two fingers, gave it a look that should have rendered it a smoking ruin, and dropped it in the trash can. The choirboys were agog. Good thing I had left him behind when I set out for this interview.

“Hello, Ms. Ford. We were never formally introduced but —” “Monty. The lawyer. Yes, I’ve seen you around. Have a seat.” She cleared a chair for me. “Give me something that rhymes with Jesus.”

“Ephesus.”

“No, that’s not how it’s pronounced.”

“Oh. How about ‘pleases’? That would be damning with faint praise, though, wouldn’t it?”

“No, it could work:

Come to Jesus, He will please us.

Sister, brother, child of light.

Hail the dawn as His love on us.

We are pleasing in His sight.

What do you think?”

“It does rhyme. How do you like it out here? There’s a good view of Stella Maris Church across the Basin.”

“Yes, and I try to banish all negative thoughts when I look towards the peninsula and see the church. But it isn’t easy to maintain a positive frame of mind. What’s happening with the murder investigation? Did the monk really do it, or are they covering something up?”

“Why do you suppose they would do that?”

“The church authorities are masters at keeping unpleasant truths under wraps. That’s probably what’s happening here.”

“Is there someone in particular you think they’re covering up for?” “Well, certainly if it’s someone who’s in favour with the current regime, they might not want word to get out.”

“Who, for instance?”

“Oh, I’d say look around for the ones who are most intent on suppressing any kind of progressive reform in the church and you’ll be halfway to finding the killer.”

“So your theory is that a conservative killed Father Schellenberg? Why? He had taken a conservative turn himself in recent years. Wouldn’t they be on the same side?”

“Too little too late, from their point of view. The few inroads we’ve made in opening the church to a more ecumenical, pluralistic position can be attributed in part to Reinhold Schellenberg in his younger, more progressive days. Many in the church, at all levels, have never forgiven him for that.”

“How did you feel about Schellenberg?”

“I disagree with what you say, but I defend to the death your right to say it! That was my position.”

“Interesting choice of words.”

“Not my choice. I’m quoting — who? Voltaire?”

“I understand. But I’m wondering if there might have been someone else who felt they had been silenced by the current climate in the church, and took ‘defend to the death’ literally.”

“If you’re suggesting that someone in the open, forward-looking, life-affirming wing of the church would do something like this, you’re way out of line.”

“I may be, but we have to look in every direction. Before we leave that subject, though, I have another question for you.”

“What kind of question?”

“I understand you had a bit of trouble down in Florida.”

“I won’t even ask how or why you have that information about me. In the age of Big Brother watching, nobody should be surprised if her privacy is invaded.”

“That’s what happens when you get convicted of a criminal offence.”

“Speaking of offence, I find you a little offensive today, Monty. What are you suggesting, that because I defended my freedom of expression and got hauled off to jail by a bunch of uniformed thugs who should have been standing at my side rather than making their arrest quota, this makes me a killer?”

“Did you hit somebody?”

“Did I hit somebody with an axe and leave him in a pool of blood in a church in Halifax, Nova Scotia? No. Anything else I ever did is none of your business. End of story. If there’s nothing else you want to harass me about, I’ll get back to my composition.”

But I wasn’t finished with the interview yet. “What brings you to the schola cantorum? You must have known it would be a centre of very traditional music and liturgy.”

“Are you saying I should have been kept out? Not welcome in the club?”

“No, of course not. I just wondered.”

“Because if that’s what you mean, or if that’s what’s going on here, let me tell you I am willing to storm the barricades to make sure I and other like-minded persons have a seat at the table.”

“We already know that.”

“I’ll ignore that little jibe. And let me tell you something else. I did not appreciate the attitude of your friend Brennan Burke in our seminar the other day when I presented the choreography I was working up for the spring, but which I decided to share with the group. I don’t know how familiar you are with liturgical dance.”

“I, um —”

“No, I suppose you don’t know a thing about it. Well, don’t wait for Father Burke to introduce you to it. Anyway, Kyle, Tamsin, and I performed my ‘Ballet for the Birthing Season’ for the workshop. I admit I’m not the most graceful dancer but that’s not the point. I caught Burke exchanging looks with that guy Sferrazza-Melchiorre from Rome. Well, of course, you can’t expect the boys from the Vatican to
appreciate creative movement. It was almost as if Burke was saying:
Can you believe this?
Between you and me, I think he feels threatened.”

“Who?”

“Burke.”

“I’ve never known Burke to look, act, or feel threatened by anything or anyone.”

“Well, I wouldn’t expect you to admit it. But I think he feels threatened by strong women and their voice in the church.”

“I can tell you without reservation that, whenever I’ve seen him with women, it’s precisely the strong women he likes the best — those who don’t take any crap from men, including him. You’ve got him wrong on that score.”

“Right. Macho men sticking together. As usual.”

“Well, Ms. Ford, I am sensitive enough to suspect I’ve overstayed my welcome.” And sensitive enough to the mood to know I’d get nowhere at this point asking where she had been at the time of the murder. “I’ll let you get back to your work.”

“Which I probably won’t get to perform. At the Father Burke School of Music.”

“Which makes me wonder yet again why you signed up.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to understand. Goodbye!”

I stopped by St. Bernadette’s before work on Friday to fill Burke in on the previous day’s developments. I caught him just as he was leaving his room with a stack of books under his arm.

“What’s this, amnesty day at the library?”

“I’m giving a lecture on Saint Gregory to the theology students. Atlantic School of Theology.”

“I should go with you. Not to listen but to walk around the grounds. They’re blessed with one of the most beautiful, and valuable, properties in the city, overlooking the waters of the Northwest Arm.”

“It wouldn’t hurt you at all to come along. Broaden your education, Montague. Feel free to seek my guidance at any time.”

“I’ll do that,” I said. I sounded flippant but in fact I had often thought of seeking his priestly instruction. I was a highly educated
man in some fields of knowledge but I was embarrassingly ignorant in others, notably the finer points of religious thought.

“The theology school is Fred Mills’ alibi,” I said. “I can’t remember if I told you. He attended a lecture there.”

“Alibi for what?”

“November 22. The killing of Kennedy.”

“Ah. That makes sense. Just don’t be telling me it’s an alibi for the killing of Schellenberg.”

“Why do you say that?”

“There was nothing happening at the theology school on November 22. I got a call from one of the faculty members that day, asking about the planned lecture by Schellenberg. A crowd of them were going to come over for it. The building’s electrical system badly needed work, so they decided to send everybody over to hear Schellenberg and get the work done that afternoon. They turned off the lights and shut the place down. Everybody had the afternoon off once the Schellenberg lecture was cancelled.”

“So Fred Mills lied to me.”

“That’s hard to believe.”

“I’m sure it is, but there you have it.”

“Fred must have been up to something else. He’s the last person in the world I can see as an axe murderer.”

“None of them strike me as being axe murderers, Brennan. But one of them is exactly that. Anyway, your trip to the theology school appears to be legit, so I won’t keep you.” I gave him a quick rundown of my talk with Jan Ford and Moody’s discoveries about Ford and Luigi Petrucci.

“Santa Chiara’s. I know that church. At least I’ve seen it from the outside, driving by. Never heard about the fire, but I wasn’t around there in ‘79.”

“What kind of church is it?”

“It’s a beautiful big stone place with a dome and columns in the front. Something you’d see in Rome. Or Dublin. It’s still standing.”

“An old-style church? Sounds magnificent. I wonder what Petrucci’s problem was with that. What do you know about him?”

“He’s not a clergyman or a church musician, but he’s an arch-Catholic. Goes by the name of Lou. Works as an electrician in New
Jersey. His nephew is here, son of Lou’s widowed sister. The young fellow came to Halifax to play football for Saint Mary’s, so Lou drove up to see him and attend the schola. Somebody told me he’s bringing his wife and the lad’s mother up here after Christmas. The nephew, Giorgio, is the alibi; they had lunch at the Lighthouse Tavern. The police tracked Giorgio down at his girlfriend’s place. He wasn’t one hundred percent sure how long he and his uncle were together, but it sounded as if they were there till three-thirty or so. Petrucci looks clean.”

“Sounds it. But with the church-burning conviction in his background, we’ll have to check him out.”

We walked down the stairs and saw Mrs. Kelly emerging from the kitchen. It wouldn’t hurt to hear what she remembered about people’s whereabouts on the afternoon of the murder. I said goodbye to Brennan, and asked the housekeeper if I could direct a few more questions her way.

She sat me down at the kitchen table, gave me a cup of tea, and pushed a plate of tea biscuits in my direction.

“Thanks again, Mrs. Kelly. What’s your other name? Mrs. What Kelly?”

“Mrs. James Kelly. My husband passed on twenty years ago, God rest his soul.”

“I’m sorry. Well —” I stopped to sample the biscuits. “These are delicious.”

“Thank you, Mr. Collins.”

“Call me Monty.”

“Okay.”

“Why don’t you have a seat? If I need a refill, I’ll get up. We’ve already covered Father Schellenberg’s arrival. Now, let’s go through what you remember about the day he was killed. Do you recall anything about him that Friday?”

“No, Mr. Collins — I mean Monty. Sadly I cannot remember one thing about him that day. He may have come and gone through the front door. We never use it, but some of them don’t know that, so they use it.”

“Mmm. Did he get any phone calls?”

“I don’t know. The calls go directly to their rooms. If they don’t answer after four rings, the calls get rerouted down here.”

“How about some of the others? Most of them went on the bus trip but a few stayed behind. Let’s begin with Brother Robin.”

“I’m pretty sure I saw him a couple of times but I can’t say what time, whether it was morning or afternoon. I’ve tried to remember, but I just didn’t take any notice on the day.”

“All right. Father Sferrazza-Melchiorre.”

“He was in his room. I heard him playing music up there after Mass in the morning. Then he went out.”

“What time was that?”

“Lunchtime, or early afternoon.”

“Anything unusual about him when he left?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t actually see him. Just heard him say something in Italian to someone else as he was going out the door. Front door. We don’t use that door.”

“Do you know who he spoke to?”

“Um …”

“Did the person answer?”

“Yes, he did. I remember now — it was Father Burke. He answered in Italian.”

I couldn’t help asking: “Does that mean Father Burke was using the front door?”