To Darkness and to Death (29 page)

“Mmm-hmm,” Sabrina said, tucking a strand of silvered blond hair behind her ear and tasting the now-cooled chocolate.

“Reverend?” Courtney was holding the kitchen door open. Clare tore her eyes away from Sabrina Campbell’s now-clean spoon and trotted after the fast-moving brunette.

Courtney strode down the dank hallway, passing the boiler room, the sexton’s supply closet, smelling of disinfectant, and the shuttered doors to the undercroft, the church’s subterranean attic. She pounded up the narrow steps, Clare following on her heels, and burst through into the sunlit parish hall.

Noise assailed them. Three women and two men snipped stems and chattered loudly across the room. A tropical forest of blooms and branches was spread out on a plastic-sheeted table. Terry McKellan and Tim Garretson wrestled folding round tables off an enormous dolly and rolled them into place, rumbling like Ezekiel’s chariot wheels. A phone was ringing in the office. From the church, Clare could hear the music director and the choir, going over a particularly difficult section of the choral evensong they’d be singing tomorrow at four.

“
God of love and God of power, Make us worthy of this hour
,” the basses thundered down, only to be cut off by a shrill “No! No!”

The members of the floral guild spotted Clare first. “Thank heavens you’re here,” Laurie Mairs said, dropping her intertwined stems of roses and stephanotis and hurrying toward Clare. “The silver vases are all locked away, and Delia’s lost her spare key!” She shot a glance at the guilty woman, who shrugged her shoulders, smiling sheepishly.

“Delia, you have to let me or Mr. Hadley know if you lose one of the keys,” Clare said, raising her voice to be heard across the room. “That silver is irreplaceable. We can’t allow—”

“Clare!” Mae Bristol cut off what was threatening to become a rant with the authority only a forty-year career as an elementary school teacher can bestow. “Where have you been?” She bore down on Clare from the upper hallway, stopping only when she got within sniffing distance. “And what have you gotten into?”

“Miss Bristol.” Laurie Mairs, like many of the other parishioners aged forty-seven and under, seemed to find it impossible to address Mae Bristol by her first name. “I was just about to have Reverend Clare open the—”

“This will only take a moment, Laurie.” Mae peered up at Clare with her black-currant eyes. “Mr. Hadley has brought every banner ever sewn up from the undercroft. We need you to help us select which ones to hang. Some of the older ones are quite lovely, but I’m not sure they’ll take the strain of being hoisted up to the ceiling.”

“Reverend Clare!” Clare swiveled, following the alto voice to the hallway, where Karen Burns was waving a sheaf of pink message slips. Clare stared at Geoffrey Burns’s wife.

The Castles
. “Excuse me for just a sec,” she said, shouldering her way past Miss Bristol, Laurie Mairs, another member of the floral guild who had arrived to press their claim against Mae Bristol’s, and a miffed-looking Courtney Reid. Courtney, lovely, chestnut-haired, perfectly shaped, should have resembled Karen Burns, who was also all these things, but Karen wore her self-confidence and her simple, expensive clothes with an effortless style, while Courtney always seemed to be trying too hard. There was no love lost between the women.

“Have I rescued you?” Karen said, baring her perfectly white teeth. “Has Courtney spoken to you about making her the events coordinator at St. Alban’s?”

“What on earth do we need an events coordinator for?”

Karen shrugged. “Well, you know, she
was
the cruise director aboard one of those ships before she snagged Shaun Reid.” Her eyes glittered. “I understand she was ‘Kourtnee’ before the marriage.”

Clare tried to smother her smile. “That’s not very nice, Karen.”

“We first wives have to have some fun at the expense of these youngsters stealing away husbands twenty years older than themselves.”

“Somehow, I can’t imagine any twenty-four-year-old stealing Geoff away.”

“He knows what would happen.” She held up one hand and made a snipping motion.

Clare quickly stifled her laughter. No need to give the cluster of ladies glaring at Karen any ammunition. “Speaking of your husband, where is he?”

“He should be here any minute with the booze for the postevensong reception.”

“Oh, God, I’d forgotten about that.”

“How on earth could you forget the fifty biggest donors to the church meeting the bishop for an intimate cocktail party?”

“Do we have to serve drinks?”

“If you want to hit people up for money, believe me, it helps to liquor them up first.” She rustled the pink slips in her hand. “I’ve been calling everyone who’s RSVP’d to the evening reception. I’m reminding them that we’re asking everyone to bring a nonchurchgoing friend to enjoy the beautiful music in our stunning Gothic Revival sacred space.”

Clare could never figure out if Karen was serious or being ironic when she spoke as if she were reading out of a guidebook.

“After all,” Karen went on, “it’s all about bringing new members into the fold. New pledging members.”

Clare groaned. “I used to believe the three legs supporting the Episcopal Church were scripture, reason, and tradition. That was before I became a priest. Now I know the three legs are really get ’em in, get ’em back, and get their pledges.”

“He may already be down in the kitchen,” Karen said. “Let’s go see.” Clare trailed her down the stairs, through the hall, and into the kitchen. “Aha.” She pointed to a cardboard box containing several fifths on the counter.

Clare heard the sound of feet clattering down the stairs, and here came a small, sandy-haired man in a leather bomber jacket, arms wrapped around another box.

“Hi, sweetheart.” Geoff leaned back and pecked Karen on the cheek before depositing the second box on the counter. He sniffed. “What’s that smell?” He checked his pants. “Is it me? I was carrying Cody earlier—”

“It’s not you.” Clare stepped forward. “I was looking for you. I have a favor to ask.” She cocked her head toward the kitchen stairs. “How ’bout we go outside and I stand downwind?”

Squeezed in behind the Burnses’ Land Rover, Clare told Geoff about Becky and the hospital and Ed and the arrest. Burns didn’t say anything while she rattled out all the details she could remember, just
hmm
and
go on
and
I see
. When she finished, he folded his arms and frowned.

“Can you take his case? Even though he might not need to keep you on?” Clare asked.

Geoff nodded. “I’ll charge him a flat fee for advising him during questioning and arranging bail, if it becomes necessary. He can apply that toward my retainer if he decides he needs my services further.”

Clare blew out a breath in relief. “Thanks, Geoff. When can you get to the station?”

“I’ll go now if you help me hand Cody off to Karen.”

“You’ve got a deal.”

Geoff opened the back door and handed Clare a diaper bag disguised as an expensive tote. She slung it over her arm while Geoff eased the sleeping toddler out of his car seat. Cody Burns had dark hair pasted to his sweaty temples and was clutching a rubber squirrel scored by dozens of teeth marks. He let out a protesting whine and dug his face into his father’s shoulder. Burns shushed him and carefully transferred him to Clare’s arms. She buried her face in his fat neck and breathed in his sweet and pungent baby-boy smell. Still sleeping, he clutched at her. The squirrel fell, squeaked once, and bounced under the Land Rover.

“For God’s sake, get Mr. Squeaky,” Clare whispered. Burns dropped to his hands and knees, groping beneath his vehicle for the toy. Mr. Squeaky was vital to Cody’s happiness. The two-year-old came to church every Sunday with his parents, who did not like to leave him in the nursery, and Clare had grown almost used to the rhythmic squeaking that accompanied her sermons.

Geoff clambered up from the pavement and handed her the toy. “Don’t you need to give Karen the car seat?” Clare asked.

Geoff looked at her as if she had suggested he strap the kid to the running board. “We have car seats in all our cars,” he said. “But thanks.”

“Okay. Bye.” She turned and stepped slowly down the stairs, keeping a tight hold on the sleeping toddler and the toy.

Judy Morrison let Clare know Karen had returned to the office. Clare followed, Cody heavy and warm in her arms. When Karen spotted them, she crossed from the secretary’s desk and met them in the office doorway. She raised one perfectly groomed brow. “I take it my husband agreed to do that favor for you?”

“Yep. I’m sorry, I didn’t think of Cody. Is this going to be a problem for you?”

“Not if I can use your office instead of Lois’s,” Karen said, glancing behind her at the church secretary’s desk. “I just need a telephone.”

“You’ve got it.” They retreated to Clare’s office, which was warm for a change and filled with liquid afternoon light. Karen retrieved a baby blanket from the diaper bag and, easing Cody away from Clare, nested the sleeping toddler on Clare’s aged and saggy sofa.

“He can finish out his nap there,” Karen said.

“Great.” Clare bent over and kissed Cody on one rosy cheek. “I’d better get back to the others.”

“Oh!” Karen ducked out into the hall and reappeared a moment later, waving another stack of pink phone message slips. “I almost forgot. These are for you.” She laid them in Clare’s hand.

“All of them?” Clare couldn’t keep a note of horror out of her voice.

“Most of them are from Willard Aberforth. Diocesan Deacon Willard Aberforth.” Her exaggerated baritone gave Clare the feeling that Karen had spoken with the deacon herself—and had not been impressed.

“Yeah, he contacted me earlier this week. He said he wants to have a meeting with me.”

“He’s the bishop’s hatchet man, you know.”

“Karen!”

“I’m serious. One of the duties he performs for the bishop is making sure everything is ready for the annual visit. Another thing he does is make sure priests and congregations are toeing the line.” She leaned forward, her face grave. “Watch yourself with him. You’ve already had more controversy and publicity in two years than Father Hames had in twenty. I doubt the bishop looks favorably on that.”

“I didn’t expect the Spanish Inquisition,” Clare said weakly.

Karen’s mouth curved. “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition,” she said, completing the quote. “Don’t let Aber-forth get you in his sights. I think he’s got a lot more up his sleeve than the comfy chair.”

2:55 P.M.

Surgical recovery was an open room, with six beds widely spaced to admit crash carts and a team, if the worst happened. Not that it was going to be necessary for today’s solitary patient. She had been stirring fitfully for several minutes, her arrhythmic breathing and occasional moans a good sign that she was surfacing from anesthesia normally.

Since she was the only one in the room, the recovery nurse was ready when the young woman’s eyes cracked open. She laid her clipboard down and dropped her pen into her tunic pocket.

“Wha…” her patient croaked.

“Hello, Becky.” The nurse leaned over, not close enough to disorient the girl, but near enough so she could see and hear her. “You’re in the hospital. You were brought in with internal bleeding. You’ve had an operation, a splenectomy.”

“Hurts.”

“I bet it does.” The girl’s face was pale, throwing the rapidly purpling bruises on her jaw and temple into stark relief. Somebody sure did a number on her. “Dr. Gupta’s prescribed Percocet for you. Do you think you could swallow a pill if I helped you?”

“Mouth… dry.”

“That’s a normal effect of the anesthesia. Do you feel at all nauseous?” She reached toward the stainless steel bedside cart, where she had put a large plastic cup of crushed ice and water.

“No. Thirsty.”

“Okay. I’m going to press the button and raise the head of your bed… okay? Not too much?”

“My shoulder hurts.”

“That’s the gas left inside during the operation. It’s going to make you a little uncomfortable for the next few days.” She shook the Percocet out of its small paper cup.

“Ha… uncomfortable.”

“Yeah, I know. Medical terminology. We’re afraid if we tell you it’s going to hurt like a bear, you’ll get discouraged.”

Becky swallowed the pill. The nurse held the ice water upright for her while she drank it through a bendy straw.

“Not too much, now. Dr. Gupta will be in to see you soon, and when he gives the go-ahead, we’ll move you to your room. Then you can see your family. If you want to.” She had dealt with enough domestics, as the staff called them, to know that sometimes family members were the last people a battered woman wanted to see.

Becky closed her eyes. Opened them. “Police,” she said. Her face twisted. She tried to sit up.

“Ssh.” The nurse laid a hand firmly on the young woman’s shoulder. “We’ve already informed the police that you’re out of surgery. As soon as you’re strong enough to talk, an officer will be in to interview you. You can talk to him alone or have one of the nurses with you—whatever you feel comfortable with. In the meantime, you’re safe here. I promise you. No one can harm you.”

“Randy Schoof.”

The nurse paused, one hand on the bed’s controls. “What?”

“Randy. Schoof. Hit me.” She sank back with the bed, trembling with exhaustion.

“Take it easy,” the nurse said automatically.

“Randy Schoof,” Becky said. Her eyes slid shut. “Hurts.”

“The medication will take effect soon.” The nurse looked up at the wall clock. Dr. Gupta wouldn’t be back for another check until she called him. She looked at the phone hanging from the wall behind her station. Internal line only. “You rest,” she said. “I’ll let Dr. Gupta know you’re awake. Don’t try to talk.”

She crossed the white room. The doors hissed open as she approached and hissed shut behind her. She turned right down the hallway, where the floor station gleamed ahead of her like the light at the end of a darkened tunnel.

“Stacy?” The charge nurse glanced up, startled. “Can you take recovery for five minutes? The patient’s still resting. You don’t need to do anything.”