Sister O'Marie - A Novena for Murder

At the mention of the two young men, Senhora Rubiero’s black eyes flashed anger. “Carlos and Jose-two young fools. Ah, my poor sister-their mother… I promise her I take care. But, the young stupidos …”

Mary Helen watched, fascinated, as the woman’s thick hands began to move as quickly and nimbly as her tongue. The subject of her nephews had completely taken away any inhibitions she might have had. She warmed to her subject.

“They come. They stay. They go. They say nothing. No hello. No good-bye. No Gracia , Tia . How you call? Ingrates? And, ah my poor sister. What should I tell her?”

She paused to breathe and wring her hands. Mary Helen found it difficult to tell whether she was more upset about the ingratitude of her two nephews or about reporting their absence to her sister.

“If only my Alberto was here,” she said, tapping her wedding ring. “He would take a care. They come home, eat, sleep, say nothing. But what is a poor woman to do? If only Alberto was here.” She blessed herself. Apparently, Alberto had gone to his eternal reward, one he had, no doubt, earned.

“I am only a woman,” she repeated, shaking her head sadly. Butler’s couplet rang through Mary Helen’s mind. “Women, you know, do seldom fail, to make the stoutest man turn tail.” This had, no doubt, been the case with Alberto and the nephews.

“I cannot go to these hang-outs.” She spat out the last two words.

Kate perked up. “Could you tell me about these hang-outs?” she asked, pulling a small notebook from her brown leather purse. “Where are they located? Who do the boys go there with?”

Senhora Rubiero’s eyes narrowed. “I don’t know where they go. They never tell me, the tia . They go with other young fools… other solteiros .” Realizing that her two visitors did not understand her last word, Senhora Rubiero translated. “Solteiros . How you call? Bachelors-bachelors who never want to marry.”

Kate nodded. “Who were these others?” she asked, her pencil poised.

Senhora Rubiero ignored Kate’s question. She didn’t even seem to notice he poised pencil. Jockeying her ample hips into a more comfortable position, she continued. “When we come from the old country, we work hard, pay back our benefactors. Help our relatives back home.” Mary Helen recognized the familiar ring. A generation gap in any nationality sounds the same.

“Not like now. Now they think money comes with the sun. Fool around. Don’t care for family. Live together, boy and girl, without marry.”

Mary Helen could feel Kate stiffen at the “live together without marry” line. Direct hit, Mary Helen thought, remembering her dinner last night. The old woman paused dramatically. Obviously, she had given this lecture many times before. Most recently, probably, to her nephews.

“The Sister, she understand.” Senhora Rubiero wagged her head.

“Have you any idea who these friends are, Senhora?” Kate asked.

“Other young fools.” Senhora Rubiero’s eyes darted toward the phone. “I hear them talking. Luis, Tony, my friend Erma’s cousin Manuel, Leonel, Jose. He now calls himself Joe. Fernando, Salvador, Fatima’s boy, Angelo, some more I don’t know. They speak of Sebastiao. He will come, a savior. Save them, save Portugal. Madre de Deus.” She blessed herself. “Save them! Stupidos ! Only work. Work to be saved. Hard work will save them. No savior.”

Sebastiao. There it was again. “Who did they think this Sebastiao would be?” Mary Helen asked.

The old woman shrugged “Crazy, si ?”

“Luis, Tony, Manuel, Leonel, Jose, who calls himself Joe, Fernando, Salvador, and Angelo,” Kate read back from her note pad. “Do you have last names or phone numbers for any of these fellows?”

Senhora Rubiero pushed herself out of the overstuffed chair and waddled toward a back room.

“What do you make of it?” Mary Helen asked Kate as soon as the old woman had gone.

“If the last names jibe, these are the same people the professor helped, and at least four of them are at the college.” She shot a quick glance at Mary Helen. “Maybe we’ve hit upon the link. Maybe it’s this Sebastiao business.”

“For the men, perhaps-but Marina and Joanna? And why would someone murder Joanna?”

“Maybe both men and women belong to this-what should I call it?-cult. Or maybe Joanna was on to something. Maybe something rotten. Maybe that’s why Senhora Rubiero’s nephews have vanished, pronto. Afraid Joanna would have blown the whistle. And maybe one of them decided to make sure she wouldn’t.”

Mary Helen suppressed a grin. It amused her to hear this trim, well-dressed, cultured young lady talk like a cop.

“What I can’t figure is, if they were into something, something they all wanted, why kill the professor? Why destroy the goose that lays the golden egg?”

Mary Helen resisted the temptation to tell her that only a professora could lay eggs. “Perhaps the professor wasn’t all he was cracked up to be,” she said, remembering Leonel’s outburst. Calling your savior a devil, a filthy animal, a flesh-eater, and a bloodsucker could hardly be construed as complimentary.

She was just about to relate the incident to Kate when Senhora Rubiero reappeared in the doorway. She was carrying a small, flowered address book, well-worn at the edges, which she handed to Kate.

“By the way, Senhora,” Kate asked, “did you ever hear your nephew talking to any women? Marina or Joanna, perhaps?”

“If they talked with girls, I would not be so worried. Maybe marry, settle down.” The older woman shook her head sadly. “Now, some tea? Coffee?”

“No, thank you.” Kate rose from the couch. “We’re on duty, and I’d like to question some of these young men you have mentioned.” Senhora Rubiero looked disappointed to be losing her audience.

“May I keep this for a few days?” Kate held up the address book.

“Si , Officer.” The Senhora bowed graciously and escorted her guests to the front door. “What numbers I need, I know.” She smiled broadly, every one of her strong, white teeth as straight as a die. Mary Helen ran her tongue across her own slightly overlapping front teeth. And I bet every single tooth in her mouth is hers, she thought, smiling back.

“That’s some old lady!” Kate flipped on the ignition in the Plymouth. “I was beginning to wonder if those two nephews might have disappeared out of self-defense.”

“Could be.” Grinning, Sister Mary Helen fastened her seat belt. “But that would not account for what happened to the others. Or for the reason Leonel is so concerned about their leaving-how did he put it?-‘poof, without even a good-bye.’ ”

Kate faced her passenger. “Leonel worried about the others leaving? Poof? You never mentioned that before!”

“I must have,” Mary Helen said quickly. She wouldn’t want Kate to think for one moment that she was withholding evidence. Why, she was just beginning to feel that they had struck up a bit of a partnership, and she, for one, was enjoying every minute of it. Not the murder part, of course, but the detecting. She didn’t want to be dropped. The old nun could feel her face redden. For a moment she felt ridiculous. But hadn’t someone once said, “If we err in our liking of detective stories, we err with Plato”? Well, if they hadn’t, they surely should have!

“I’m sure I told you.” She added a little emphasis. “Just before you picked up Leonel, he told me he was worried about some in the group the professor had brought to this country.” She glanced over at Kate. The young woman’s jaw was firm.

“Go on,” Kate said.