Sister Eve and the Blue Nun (4 page)

Anthony shook his head. “I can't tell . . . It's something I found and shouldn't have taken in the first place. I was wrong to take them. I know that now. Father Oliver said not to tell anyone else and that we'd just take them back, and that's what I was going to tell her. I was going to tell her that I needed the pages back and that she was just going to have to wait until we went through the proper channels and that she'd be the first to have access to them later if we got them again, but that we had to take them back.”

He was rambling, and Eve was having difficulty following what he was saying. “So, this thing, these pages, Kelly had them in her possession?”

He nodded. “I gave them to her when she first arrived.

“Last week,” he added and then smiled. “She was so happy.” He looked at Eve. “I really made her happy.”

Eve smiled in return. “But she wasn't supposed to tell anyone about them?”

He nodded again. “I just wanted to give her some time with them alone, let her enjoy this revelation all by herself, as one of the first people to know about it.” He reached up and pounded his forehead with his fist. “But I was wrong to do it, and Father Oliver
said I was and that I needed to get them so that we could take them back. But she had already told people and she was going to tell everybody at the presentation tomorrow.” He stopped and looked at Eve. “The conference,” he said. “What will we do about the conference? I don't know what to do.”

“Anthony . . .”

He was rocking back and forth, both hands now clenched and pushed against his forehead. “What have I done? What have I done?” he kept asking as he continued to rock.

“Anthony.” Eve tried to get his attention once again. She pulled at his arms, but he was too strong. “Anthony, listen to me!” she shouted.

“I've killed her . . . I made this happen . . . It's my fault . . . I've killed Kelly,” he repeated over and over.

“Anthony, you didn't kill her. Let's go to her room and let me see what has happened. We'll make this right, I promise,” Eve said, her hands still on his arms. “Let's just go to her room.”

“I can't go back there.” He was shaking his head. “I can't go back.”

“Okay, you stay here,” Eve instructed him. “I'll go to her room and see for myself. I'll call an ambulance and the police. I'll help make this right.”

He stopped rocking and dropped his hands from his face, looking Eve in the eye. “It's too late. You can't make this right. It's too late.”

FOUR

Eve was able to pull herself away from Anthony, who promised he would wait for her in the chapel, and she ran as fast as she could all the way to the guest quarters and to the room where she knew the young professor was staying. She was winded when she arrived at the door, conscious that she wasn't in the greatest shape. She bent down, grabbing her sides, trying to catch her breath.

There was no one around that part of the monastery as far as she could see. It was late, and the New Mexico night sky was dotted with bright stars and a full moon. It was chilly too, even though it had been seasonably mild for the high desert winter. Eve could hear coyotes in the distance, three, maybe four, a pack, she couldn't tell for sure, but the cries were familiar to the nun, and she wondered how far away the animals were from the Pecos abbey.

She stood up, breathing normally, and leaned in, placing her ear to the door, trying to hear if there was any noise coming from the small guest room at the end of the quarters that had been built
with the intention of being the residence of the nuns—a place away from the monastery proper that Father Oliver had hoped would change the archbishop's mind about making the nuns leave. In the end it didn't sway the leaders of the diocese, and the residences became the guest quarters.

Eve felt her heart rate quicken, knowing that it had nothing to do with her run from the chapel but was because she didn't know what she was about to find in the guest room occupied by the religion professor. There was nothing coming from inside, no sounds of any kind as, slowly, she reached for the doorknob, turned it, and opened the door.

The overhead light was burning inside, and when Eve looked in she immediately saw the young woman lying near the center of room, between the bed and the small wooden desk. She was on her right side, one arm raised above her head, the other resting on her chest; her legs were bent at the knees, one in front of the other. She was wearing a robe, probably her nightgown underneath, Eve assumed, with her pale white feet stuck beneath the chair that was pulled away from the desk as if she had been sitting there at one time.

Eve entered the room and then shut the door behind her, aware that she should not touch anything but also knowing that she needed to make sure Kelly was really dead. She had to feel for a pulse, had to make sure the young woman couldn't be helped. Eve walked over and knelt down by the victim, placing her fore and middle fingers on the woman's neck, and waited. She held her breath, trying to listen for a heartbeat, trying to will the young woman back to life. But there was no pulse. Anthony was right. His sister was dead. Quickly, Eve made the sign of the cross over
the woman, bowed, closed her eyes, and said a quick prayer for the soul of Kelly Middlesworth.

Eve stood with plans to search for a phone, knowing that she must call the police, but she couldn't help herself. She didn't move, and instead of trying to find a phone, she glanced around, trying to take and keep a mental picture of everything in the room. She had been working with her dad as a private detective for only a few months, but there were some lessons she had learned well.

From wall to wall she studied everything. The narrow bed by the desk was covered with a thick brown comforter that appeared ruffled, not as if someone had slept under it recently, but rather as if someone had been sitting on top of it. There were two pillows, both pushed against the headboard and situated one in front of the other, giving the appearance that they had been placed that way to be leaned against and not slept upon. A blanket was folded and lying across the end of the bed. The room was warm, the heaters still on and working in all the buildings of the monastery for the late winter season. A small crucifix hung on the wall over the bed, and a thin pair of tan curtains were closed over the only window in the room.

On top of the desk next to the bed were five books, hardbacks, religious in nature, she thought, all somehow pertinent to Dr. Middlesworth's studies. Eve recognized the spine of one, a copy of
The Mystical City of God
, the book written by Sister Maria in the 1600s, a book the nun claimed had been given to her word for word by the Virgin Mary. The others appeared to be books about the Spanish sister, even a novel written about the appearance of the nun to the Indians in New Mexico. Eve thought she had read
that one, suggested to her by one of the monks after she had first become interested in the woman known as the Lady in Blue.

She noticed the tray, the small teapot, the cup and saucer, and a small pitcher with what looked like honey, all items that she recognized from the kitchen at the monastery. She saw a legal pad with scribbled notes; several manila folders; a computer bag; a thin binder, closed, white; and a small glass with several pens and pencils inside. That was all Eve could see on top of the desk. A long gray sweater hung on the back of the chair, and a trash can stood near the bathroom with several pieces of rumpled paper inside. A lady's navy-blue skirt and jacket, along with a pink silk blouse, hung on the outside of the closet, the hooks of the hangers placed over the top of the door, which was partially open.

Eve looked around slowly as she took notes in her mind of everything she was seeing. Her father, Captain Jackson Divine, had taught her how to pay attention to details when he was in the police force and she was still a young girl. He said that entering a person's house or private room was always an opportunity to learn about that person, that what a person owned and how they kept their personal items spoke volumes about who that person was, which was why he always made Eve and her sister, Dorisanne, keep clean rooms. He demanded neatness and tidiness from his children so that even if these were not traits they actually valued, they would always give the appearance of being that way.

Eve glanced into the bathroom without moving from where she stood at the desk. She could see a towel hanging on the shower curtain rod and toiletries lining the windowsill. A mat lay on the floor next to the tub; the light was on, and everything seemed to
be in place, even though she was not able to see the area around the sink, the area just behind the door.

Clearly, Eve thought, there had been no struggle that caused young Kelly Middlesworth to die. The two rooms gave the appearance of an occupant who had showered without incident, sat at the desk, and then lay on the bed to think or more than likely read, and who was planning to dress up the following day in a newly pressed navy-blue business suit. Nowhere in the room that she could see was there evidence of foul play, nothing out of order except, of course, for the dead woman who still lay at her feet.

Eve looked down again at Anthony's sister. She was pale, like the monk, and her curly hair spilled around her. Her eyes were closed and there was a slight lift to her lips, almost but not quite a smile, as if she had found a measure of contentment before she passed, as if she had died at peace. She took one last glance across the room that the woman had occupied for almost a week before her death, and the first thing that caught her eye this time was the tray and the pot and the cup, still half full.

She took in a breath and made the sign of the cross once again, knowing that she was about to do something she shouldn't really do, then she yanked the sleeve of her hoodie over the fingers of her right hand to prevent leaving prints, leaned forward, and reached for the cup. Slowly, she wrapped her hand around it and brought it to her nose, getting a good whiff of its contents, smelling a slight almond aroma. She was just about to put the cup back where it had been when suddenly the door flew open, startling her, causing her to drop the cup, which immediately fell to the floor, breaking into pieces.

FIVE

“What are you doing?” Father Oliver asked as he moved into the room, closing the door behind him. “You shouldn't be here, Sister.” He looked away from Eve and then down to the floor, discovering the dead woman near the bed. He immediately made the sign of the cross and dropped to his knees beside her. He felt her neck for a pulse and then bowed to pray.

Eve knelt down next to the desk to examine the mess she had made. “I ran into Anthony in the chapel. He told me that he had come by and found his”—she stopped, turning her gaze to the abbot beside the body, near where she was kneeling—“found her dead.”

Father Oliver was still praying as Eve considered what she should do with the broken shards and the tea that had spilled on the desk chair and the floor around it. She saw all of the pieces scattered around her, knowing that she had broken what likely had been the cup the young woman had been drinking from. She realized that she had mishandled a very important piece of evidence in
the investigation of Kelly's death, and now that the accident had happened, Eve wasn't sure whether to leave everything as it was or clean it up.

Maybe I should call the Captain
, she thought, knowing that he would surely be able to tell her what action she should take. But just as that thought registered, she knew he would not be pleased that she had walked into a crime scene and compromised the investigation, and before he offered advice, she'd have to hear all about the bad decisions she had made.

She shook away the idea, deciding not to make that call.

“How long have you been here?” Father Oliver asked, startling Eve, who was still beside him, kneeling on the floor, trying to figure out what to do.

She stood up, making sure not to touch anything else. “I just got here,” she answered. She looked at the clock on the small table next to the bed. “About fifteen minutes ago,” she added.