The Mother's Day Murder (16 page)

I had the sisters’ names, addresses, and phone numbers in my notebook and I found them quickly. The first one was Betty McCall. I dialed the number.

A woman answered as though she were right next to the phone.

“Mrs. McCall?”

“Yes?”

“This is Chris Bennett. I’m a friend of your sister, Sister Joseph. Katherine.”

“Oh, yes, hello. Where are you calling from?”

“I’m in the building of the insurance company your sister worked for some years ago when she took a leave from St. Stephen’s.”

“I know just where that is. Will you come and have a cup of coffee with me?”

“I’d love to.”

She lived in a pretty, white, colonial-style house about twenty minutes from Fine and Houlihan. If I had to guess, I’d say she was fifty, give or take, which is about what Joseph is. She was wearing a dark pantsuit and tugging at the collar of a dog that desperately wanted to go out.

“How nice to see you, Chris. Are you afraid of wild animals?”

I laughed. “Not that one.” I bent over and patted the dog, murmuring the kind of sweet nothings that seem dedicated to dogs and babies.

“I’ve got the coffee ready and I’ll put this little troublemaker out in the yard so we can have a little peace. You look just like what I expected.”

“Did Joseph tell you about me?” I wondered if that was the name I should have used.

“We still call her Katherine and yes, she talked about you from the time you were a child and first went to visit the convent.”

“She saved my life back in those days,” I said truthfully.

“It seems to be her nature. It’s hard to believe, growing up with Katherine, that she would have become the person she is now.”

“Have you talked to her lately?” I asked, stepping gingerly into my unpleasant task.

“She called and said there was some problem that no one had to worry about but you might call. She said she’d given you my number and my sister’s. I didn’t expect you to fly to my front door.”

“I had some other people to see,” I said. “And it’s much nicer to look at someone when you’re asking questions.”

“Milk? Sugar?”

“Just black, thank you.”

There were slices of cake on a platter and tasting a crumb I realized it was gingerbread, a favorite of mine. When Betty had poured, we sipped our coffee and I took out my worn notebook. Needless to say, by the time I was ready to ask my first question, I liked her so much I couldn’t imagine that she would ever have practiced the deception that I had suggested to Jack over the phone.

“I’m interested in the year, about twenty years ago
or so, when Joseph—Katherine—came back here on leave from the convent.”

“I remember that quite well. She stayed in Mom and Dad’s house which was on the other side of town from where the insurance company is.”

“Where were you at that time?”

“I was already married. We hadn’t bought this house yet. We lived in some nice garden apartments not too far from Mom.”

“Did you see a lot of Katherine that year?”

“Oh, yes. We were over at Mom’s a lot and she came to us—they all did—for Sunday dinner and we got together whenever we could.”

“Did you have children at that time?” I asked.

“Let’s see.” She seemed to be counting years. “Yes, I had two. A boy and a girl. They’re both out of college now and living on their own.”

“You have another sister, I think?”

“That’s Hope. She’s close enough that I get to see her as much as I want.”

“Where was she living that year?”

“Mmm. She’d had some health problems and she was still home with the folks.”

“And that’s where Katherine was living, too?”

“Yes. It was a wonderful house, a room for everyone. That house must be a hundred years old now.” The thought made her pause.

“Was it Hope who stitched up skirts for Katherine to wear to work?”

“It must have been. She’s always been a very talented seamstress. She can look at a picture of a dress and figure out how to make it. A real gift.”

“Is she married now?”

“Oh, yes. Has a wonderful husband.”

“Children?”

“Well, no. As I said, she had some problems and that kept her from having children. But she’s active in the community and in the church and she’s leading a very full life.”

“She never adopted,” I said, not looking at her.

“There was some talk, but no, they decided not to.”

“Did she ever—have a miscarriage or anything like that?”

Betty shook her head. “She couldn’t have them. That was about it.”

I decided not to press it. I didn’t want to tell her what the story involving Joseph was, since Joseph apparently hadn’t told her herself.

“That year that Katherine was home, what kind of year was that? Was there anything memorable about it?”

“Memorable. My goodness, if there’s one year in my life I’ll never forget, it’s that one. There’s never been another year like it, to which I say, thank goodness.”

17

I felt a surge of hope swell inside me. Perhaps I had finally hit on the right question, one that would yield productive answers. “Could you tell me about it?” I asked.

“Well, just having Katherine home for all that time was memorable. She lives so far away and we just don’t get to see her all that often. And then there was B.G.”

“B.G.?”

“He was a cousin on my father’s side, Barton Gilbert Bailey. We called him B.G. from the time he was a little bit of a thing. He got sick and we knew it was bad. I’m sure that’s why Katherine came home. She wanted to see him before he died. She thought maybe she could take care of him but that didn’t work out. He needed more medical attention than she could give him. And he had a little boy. So we took Little B.—or rather, Mom and Dad did; I wasn’t living there at that time—and B.G. went to the hospital. He did come back home once or twice, I think, but it didn’t last. He died while Katherine was living here.”

“Didn’t he have a wife to help him?” I asked innocently.

“She was gone by then. Georgianne was one of those
women in the nineteen seventies who decided she’d had enough of life as a wife and mother and took off. You wouldn’t remember, you’re too young, but some women did that. Said they were sick and tired of staying home and doing useless things around the house and off they went somewhere else to do things they thought were useful. Most of them,” Betty said with a hint of derision in her voice, “ended up running day care schools and things like that, taking care of other people’s children instead of their own.”

“Is that what she did?”

“That’s exactly what she did. B.G. was well rid of her.”

“What happened after he died?” I asked, purely out of curiosity. I couldn’t imagine this had anything to do with what happened to Joseph.

“She never came back,” Betty sighed. “She’d taken herself to California and she thought the weather there was just lovely, much nicer than we have in Ohio. She inherited the house, of course, because they never divorced and she sold it for a bundle, but she left Little B. with my parents, who sent him out to see her every summer at their expense.”

“Where is Little B. now?”

“He’s not far from here. I guess he’s all mixed up on how he feels about his mother but he never went out to California to stay. He seems to take to Ohio weather better than she did.”

“This is great gingerbread,” I said, wanting to put an end to the turn the conversation had taken. Betty was clearly angry at her cousin’s wife’s behavior, and I couldn’t blame her.

“Well, we all love it and it takes only a minute to bake. More coffee?”

“I’d love some.”

She poured for both of us and then she heard the scratchings at the back door and left to let the dog in. “He’s never satisfied,” she said cheerfully. “But I guess he’s had a good run. Maybe he’ll lie down and rest after all that hard work.” She leaned over and petted the dog affectionately.

“Was that what made the year so memorable,” I asked, “Katherine coming home and your cousin dying?”

“That was also the year my brother disappeared.”

“Disappeared?” I said.

“Well, I guess you’d say he ran away.”

“Katherine said you had a brother and she didn’t know where he was.”

“Well, it all happened that year. Timmy was always trouble. Mom always said thank God she’d had three daughters and one son and not the other way around. Not that it always works that way. My son is an angel.”

“So’s mine,” I said. “He’s two and a half.”

Betty laughed. “They’re all angels at that age. Even Timmy was a doll when he was little. But in his teens he just kept getting into trouble. It was awful. Sometimes Katherine was able to help, but mostly it was one thing after another. When he left Ohio, we just didn’t know where he was.”

“You mean you’ve never heard from him in twenty years?”

“Oh, we’ve heard from him, but not very often. The last time must have been five years ago. I think he was in Canada then. He’d been in Mexico the time before.”

“Was he living at home with your parents when he took off?”

“He had been, but then he got his own little place for a while.”

“How did you find out he was gone?”

“He sent a letter to Mom and Dad. Said by the time they got it, he’d be gone. That was it. Mom cried for weeks. Then B.G. died and she cried some more. What a year. We can all do without one like that again.”

“What did your brother do?”

“Oh, he worked at this and that, a mechanic in a garage, helping out in a Laundromat that his friend owned, things like that. He never had what you’d call a steady job. Mom always gave him money when he needed it so he didn’t go hungry, and I guess he had enough to pay the rent when he moved out of the house.”

I looked at my watch. I had to make a decision right away and cancel either the hotel room or my return flight. “Do you think I could talk to your sister?” I asked.

“I can call her for you.”

“I’d appreciate that.”

She went into the kitchen and came back with a cordless phone. While she dialed I hoped I’d be lucky. She had said her sister was busy at community affairs, which meant she was likely to be out in the afternoon. “Hope? Hi, it’s Betty.”

Good, I thought. I listened while they exchanged sisterly gossip. Then Betty asked if I could come over. She looked over at me. “She’s free now. You could be there in twenty, thirty minutes.”

“Fine.”

She made the arrangements and I asked if I could call the airline. I assumed I’d be going back tomorrow but I
asked if they would leave the ticket open. That done, Betty wrote directions to her sister’s house and I was on my way.

Hope McHugh’s house, which was occupied by two adults, was larger than her sister’s and set on a larger piece of property. It was meticulously kept, the plantings absolutely exquisite. There was a three-car garage attached and I was led to wonder how two people could drive three cars, and gave up. I have learned that possessions have little to do with need once you get past the basics.

Mrs. McHugh opened the door at my ring, a melodious chime that went on and on, and it was clear that she was the great beauty in the family. Younger than Betty and probably a little younger than Joseph, she had the remnants of strawberry blond hair and skin to match.

“Chris?” she said with a welcoming smile.

“Hi.”

“Please come in. Betty called a little while ago and my sister Katherine called the other day. She said you had questions for us.”

I explained, without going into detail, that there was a problem and it seemed that events of that year Katherine was on leave were the key to what had happened.

“Well, I remember that year very well. It was the worst year of my life.”

The entry hall of the house was a two-story atrium, natural light streaming from above and a magnificent chandelier that could provide its own light when the sun was down. Straight ahead at the back of the house was a beautiful room that we sat down in, the windows looking out on the grounds and a pool that would have had
my Eddie running for his bathing trunks. We are a family of swimmers. I told her how beautiful it all was and then took out my notebook and pen.

“You’ve really come prepared,” she said.

“I’ve talked to several people and it’s important to preserve what they told me.”

“I’d love to have you work on one of my projects.”

“I understand you’re involved in charitable work.”

“It’s what I do. We raise funds for the hospital, for the church, for babies with HIV. It keeps me busy and it’s God’s work.”

“That’s wonderful,” I said, meaning it. “About that year …”

“That was the year Timmy left, the year Katherine came back, the year B.G. died. God, I haven’t thought about B.G. for such a long time. How can it be twenty years?” Her eyes glistened with tears.

“I understand you were ill yourself that year.”

“Yes, I guess so. When trouble hits, it just doesn’t seem to stop.”

“What made you ill?”

“It was—it was my reproductive system. It left me unable to have children.”

“Were you hospitalized?” I asked.

“For a few days.”

“Which hospital?”

“Good Samaritan. It’s a Catholic hospital near here. It’s where B.G. died.” She looked at me, her eyes full. She attempted a smile. “You sure have dredged up an awful lot of painful memories in a very short time.”

“I apologize for that, Hope. I really do. It’s just that it may be important.”

“I understand.”

“You’ve never been pregnant, then? Never had a miscarriage?” I wanted to know how far she would go with the truth I was looking for.

“No. Never.” It was a whisper. “They gave me a hysterectomy.”

“In your twenties?” I sounded as horrified as I felt.

“It was twenty years ago. It’s what they did then. Things have changed a lot. You can use drugs today where at that time they didn’t exist.”

“I’m sorry for your trouble,” I said.

“It was a long time ago. I’ve led a very lucky life since then. I have a wonderful husband and I devote my time to doing what I think is good.”

“It is good. Let me ask you something else. Katherine said someone made skirts for her to wear to work. Was that you?”