Sister O'Marie - A Novena for Murder

Mary Helen was glad God seldom talked back, because she was pretty sure she knew what He would say. “Hold on! People murdering one another is not exactly the way I plan things! But relax, old dear, and stick with Me. We’ll work it out!” And she knew He was oh, so right.

Inspector Gallagher was waiting for them when they arrived at the college. Mary Helen spotted him immediately. His bald head stood out like a shiny buoy in the sea of slender, jeans-clad Saturday students gushing from the main entrance.

The Angelus bell began to toll twelve noon. Its low rhythmic notes rang out from the college bell tower and reverberated through the dripping fog.

Gallagher was all business after nodding to Mary Helen. “I’ve located two of the boys. Luis is supposed to be working on the second floor, main building. Leonel in the kitchen. They tell me Tony is somewhere on the grounds. We can look him up later. You want to requestion these guys-using the cult angle?”

“Right!” Slamming the car door behind her, Kate followed Gallagher up the stairs of the entrance to the main college building.

Probably going to talk to Luis first, Mary Helen concluded, feeling a bit left out. She was tempted to ask if she could go along when her stomach rumbled. She decided to follow its lead. Skirting the main building, she ducked into the sisters’ dining room where Eileen and Anne waited, as eager to hear about her visit to Senhora Rubiero as she was to tell.

The two inspectors found Luis guiding a heavy floor polisher back and forth across the already highly polished second-floor hall. The machine formed a glossy wave across the parquet as the young man maneuvered it from side to side. His movements were punctuated with a dull thud against either baseboard. Luis stopped abruptly when he saw them, his hand still clutching the vibrating polisher. The color drained from his sallow face.

“We’d like to ask you a few more questions,” Kate called over the hum of the polisher.

Turning off the machine, Luis limped toward them. He was a small, slight man with wide, frightened eyes.

“Okay.” He shoved his hands into his overall pockets. He looked to Kate like someone who was used to being bullied.

“Is there some place we can talk?” Gallagher asked.

Nodding, Luis led the way down the hall. After fumbling with a heavy set of keys, he let them into a narrow storage room.

“I know no more about murder. I told-a you everything I know,” he began as soon as they entered the room. The color had begun to return to his face.

“I’m sure you did.” Kate perched herself on the edge of a nicked table. “What we want to ask you about is something else. What do you know about Dom Sebastiao?”

The young man blanched. Kate could almost smell fear. “Nada,” he said, too quickly.

“Nothing? Are you sure?” Gallagher moved in closer.

“Only a little.” Luis shifted uncomfortably. Obviously, he was not used to lying.

“Tell us,” Kate urged. “It would help us find this murderer.”

“Only I know that the professor, he talks of it. Helps us to come to this country. To marry. To make the money. Some day, he say, we will return to Portugal rich men.”

He looked so hopeful that Kate was sure he had forgotten for the moment that the professor and his promises were dead.

“Where did you meet the professor?” she asked.

“I read about in the newspaper at home. He offers to bring young people over.”

“For free?”

Luis stared at her with disbelief. “Polica-lady,” he said, shaking his head sadly, “nothing is for free.”

“How much did you pay him?” Gallagher asked.

Luis calculated silently for a few moments. “Ten thousand dollars, your money.”

“And he brought over nine young people from your area?”

Luis nodded. Kate didn’t need to calculate ninety thousand dollars. Behind her, she heard Gallagher curse softly. She knew without even looking at him that he was enraged.

“Not bad for social work, if you can get it,” she heard him mutter.

“Were Carlos and Jose Gomes among the nine?” Kate asked.

Luis nodded.

“Their aunt is very worried about them. They both seem to have vanished. Do you have any idea where they may have gone?”

Luis shook his head. Kate thought she saw fear in his eyes.

“Senhora Rubiero told us that the Gomes boys talked to you often on the phone. Are you sure you don’t have any idea what happened to them?”

“No.” Small white saliva bubbles began to form at the corner of Luis’s mouth. Nervously, he checked the luminous dial on his watch. “The floor. I gotta finish. They no like if I take too long. Okay I go?”

“Okay.” Kate watched the slender young man dart from the storage room.

“He knows something he’s afraid to tell,” Gallagher said as he and Kate cut a crooked path through the small groups of students bunched on the staircase. “He’s not our murderer, though.”

“What makes you say that?” Kate followed him out of the building and down the side path toward the kitchen and Leonel.

“Too scared to kill. Did you see that guy, Kate? Everything about him looks like a frightened animal.”

“Yeah, but let’s not forget, Denny, what frightened animals do when they are backed into a corner.”

Gallagher shrugged, but said nothing. Kate knew he was right.

Leonel was easy to spot. His tightly curled head stuck out among the stainless steel pots. He stared belligerently at the two inspectors walking across the kitchen toward him.

Kate’s eyes met his. “Leonel, we’d like to ask you some questions.”

“What more you want with me?” He wiped his damp hands on his butcher apron and squared his shoulders. “I told you everything I know in your jail!”

“Everything you knew about the professor’s murder. But we’d like to ask you about something else. What do you know about this Dom Sebastiao business?”

Leonel’s hollow, mocking laugh rocked through the kitchen. Startled, several members of the kitchen crew turned to stare.

“Come.” Leonel motioned to the two officers and led them out the back door to the kitchen stoop.

“Tell us what you know about it, son.” Gallagher struck a match against the stone wall and relit his cigar. The small puff of smoke blended into the fog.

“I know that it is good-how you say? fitting?-that the professor was killed with the statue. An act of God!” His voice was venomous.

“Why do you say that?” Kate prodded him.

“Because he tricks us… makes fools of us… At home we are poor. He lends us money to come here. Now, we must pay back and pay back.”

He slammed a clenched fist against the door jamb. “We think at first he is like Dom Sebastiao. A savior… for the good of all. He will save Portugal… make it a powerful country once more. We will become rich here. Go home… marry. Become famous in our country. But no. He fools us, and we are the fools. He does not keep his promises. He controls our lives… keeps us poor. And then Carlos, Manuel, Jose… they disappear… Where are they? When I ask where, he shrugs.” His muscular body trembled with rage. “Bloodsucker! Whoever killed him was a santo !” Closing his eyes, he leaned back against the kitchen door. Small beads of perspiration stood out on his ashen face.

“Did you kill him?” Kate asked in a firm, quiet voice.

“No.”

“Do you know who did?”

Leonel did not answer. Kate studied the young man. “I asked if you know who did?” For a moment, she thought she caught a shadow of terror in his dark eyes. Then slowly, deliberately, he shook his head.