Aubrey’s back immediately flattened against her chair, as if she’d been struck in the chest by an invisible fist. She had seen the story’s byline:
By Dale Marabout
Her eyes went quickly to the story’s first paragraph. So did ours. It was a straightforward, hard news lead, the kind veteran police reporters like Dale Marabout can write in their sleep. It was still in the computer format reporters write in-ragged right, an unflattering sans serif type font:
HANNAWA -Police early this morning arrested Herald-Union reporter Aubrey McGinty for the November murder of the Rev. Buddy Wing.
She was expected to be charged and arraigned later today in Common Pleas Court.
Detective Scotty Grant called the 24-year-old newspaper reporter’s alleged involvement in the poisoning death of the nationally known television evangelist “both bizarre and frightening.”
“I’ve been investigating murders in this city for 22 years, and I’ve never seen a case twist around like this,” he said.
Grant said that McGinty fatally poisoned Wing after being assured of a job with the Herald-Union. “She killed Wing so she could later prove the wrong person was in prison, and make a name for herself,” he said. “She almost got away with it.”
Aubrey stopped reading. She pressed her hands together, as if to pray, and then rubbed her nose. Her eyes slowly lifted toward me.
“It was your lies,” I said. I was cowering behind my mug like it was one of those long shields the Crusaders carried. “The first lie made me curious. The second lie made me suspicious. The third convinced me.”
Aubrey slumped in her chair and wrapped her arms around her waist. “What kind of nonsense have you been telling people?”
I ignored her silly effort to throw the suspicion onto me. “Lie number one was that gift certificate you used to buy that jacket at Old Navy, after we made our first visit to the Heaven Bound Cathedral.”
Aubrey rolled her eyes, and made sure Tinker and Stan Craddock could see them roll. “Maddy, I explained all that.”
“Yes you did. After I confronted you about it.”
She bristled, just a tiny bit. “After you snooped into my private life.”
“I told you then, Aubrey. I don’t snoop. I get intrigued.”
“I told you the truth.”
“Yes you did. The old files I looked at bore that out. Your sister had been sexually molested for years by your stepfather-I’m betting you were, too-and after she took him to court, and after he was acquitted, she took her own life. I can only imagine what kind of guilt you felt. You told the social workers and the police nothing had ever happened to you, that you’d never seen nor heard your stepfather do anything to your sister. Were you afraid? Had he threatened you? Of course you’ve tried to keep your sister alive.”
Aubrey was furious. “Psycho-babble bullshit, Maddy. You’ve got me in a lot of trouble over your stupid psycho-babble bullshit.”
Another man joined us. It was Scotty Grant, chief detective in the Hannawa Police Department’s homicide unit. There was no need for an introduction. Aubrey knew who he was.
“At the time,” I continued, “I figured you were looking into the Buddy Wing murder because of your mistrust of the legal system. Your sympathy for its victims. I was very impressed.”
Aubrey’s eyes drifted back to her computer screen. She scrolled down. We all read:
Herald-Union Managing Editor Alec Tinker confirmed that McGinty had been investigating the Buddy Wing murder since March. She had presented him with compelling evidence that Sissy James, the 27-year-old Hannawa hospital worker who confessed to the murder, was in fact innocent.
James is now serving a life sentence at the Marysville Reformatory for Women.
Detective Grant said police now believe James confessed to protect Wing’s former protege, the Rev. Tim Bandicoot, who was expelled from the Heaven Bound Cathedral after a much publicized rift over the practice of speaking in tongues.
“Lie number two came on Easter Sunday,” I said. “Right here at the paper. You and Eric were in the cafeteria going over your files. Remember when I asked why you had two copies of the church directory? You told me you went back for an older one-because former members of the church were more likely to be suspects than present ones. Quick thinking. But I’d already seen that the two directories had the same date on the cover.”
Aubrey artfully put a look of mild shock on her face. “That can’t be right.”
I plowed ahead. “One possibility is that someone at the cathedral mistakenly gave you a current directory when you asked for an older one. Nobody at the cathedral remembers such a visit, by the way.”
“I did go back-”
“The other possibility, of course, is that you already had a church directory when you asked Guthrie Gates for the first one, during that visit with me.”
Aubrey changed her expression to one of confusion, as if I was some demented old duck. “So what point are you trying to make here, Maddy?”
“That you lied about having two identical directories when you didn’t need to lie,” I said. “You could have said, ‘I figured since you and Eric were helping we’d need two,’ or ‘I found another one in the morgue files you gave me,’ or ‘Don’t you remember? Guthrie gave us two.’ I would have believed any of that. But you intentionally lied. Because you’d had that other directory for months. You panicked.”
Aubrey’s eyes were drifting. I turned to see what she was looking at. Two uniformed police officers were leaning against the wall in sports. “You’re completely wrong about this,” she insisted hollowly.
I felt my own eyes tearing up. “I spent the next two weeks trying not to think the worst-I really did-but unfortunately for you I’m one of those miserable old buttinskys who just can’t say no to her curiosities. Take that day we were watching the police tapes at my house. Matter-of-factly you said procaine was used only in hospitals. But that’s not true. Paramedics carry all sorts of emergency medicines, including procaine. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that three weeks before Buddy Wing was poisoned you decided to write a story on Rush City’s EMS unit. You rode with them for four days and wrote a wonderful story about how they rushed around the county saving kids who drank Drano and old men having heart attacks. Could it be that once you’d decided on Buddy Wing as your victim, and then chose poor Sissy James as your suspect, you researched how she might do it? You learned she worked at a hospital, and knowing as much about poisons as you do, you decided on procaine as your poison of choice. But as the big day got closer, you began to worry. Would the procaine be enough to kill him? Especially in the cruel, clever way you planned to administer it? So you added the lily of the valley.”
Aubrey smirked, thinking she’d found something to discredit my analysis, I suppose. “Knowing as much about posions as I do? Where in that feeble mind of yours did you come up with that?”
I smirked right back at her. “This is no time for false modesty, dear. You know plenty about poisons. But before we get to that, let me tell you about lie number three. It was the most serendipitous thing. You remember that day in May when Dale Marabout popped his cork and quit? I felt just awful about it. And after stewing about it all week I went to Bob Averill, to explain all the stress Dale had been under. Your name came up and before I knew it I was telling him about my suspicions. He thought I was crazy. But after I told him about the church directories and your EMS story in The Gazette, and the way you found the real killer in the football coach case, and how you covered the squirrel poisoning at Kent-well.”
Before Aubrey arrived at the paper that night, Bob Averill and Dale Marabout had stationed themselves in a storage room by the elevator. Now they were standing behind us, like a couple of Houdinis materializing out of thin air.
“I’d like to say it was my idea,” Bob said, “but it was actually Maddy’s. She thought we should secretly hire Dale to investigate your investigation-on a freelance basis.”
Aubrey swiveled in her chair. “And you believe the crap he’s written, Bob? He’s been trying to fuck me since the day I got here.”
Bob Averill was shocked into silence. I was not. “If you mean in a sexual way,” I said, “God only knows what goes on inside a man’s head. But if you mean getting even with you for stealing his beat, that’s simply not true. Dale was pissed at Tinker, never you.”
Dale couldn’t resist. “For the record, I’m still pissed at Tinker.”
Tinker’s lips began to bubble. Before he could say anything, Bob held up his hands, like a pope calling for
