Harald and Cash looked puzzled. Cash had never seen an embarrassed nun.
'Sorry. There was a lot of animosity. Would you explain now?'
Cash took it, kept it simple, did no editorializing. 'We're playing a long shot. Hoping this man might be your brother's son or grandson.'
John added, 'We hoped you'd be willing to view the corpse. To let us know if you think that's possible.'
'Well, I suppose. Sister Celestine won't mind an extra hour with the children.' She smiled a delightfully wicked little smile.
Cash couldn't help observing, 'I think you'd like my wife's aunt, Sister Dolorosa. She's a Benedictine. At a convent in northwestern Pennsylvania.'
'Oh? Well, I'd better tell Mother Superior. Be right back.'
Sister Mary Joseph returned while John was on the phone to the morgue. 'I've always had a feeling this would come back on us. Fiala Groloch should've been burned for witchcraft.'
Cash didn't respond verbally, but his surprise was obvious.
'I know. That's not charitable. Not Christian. But if Satan ever sent his emissary, Fiala Groloch's it.'
'That much bitterness? After all these years?'
'Oh, it's not Jack. I was too young to understand at the time, but he was the devil's disciple himself. He probably deserved whatever he got. Did you meet her? I hear she's still there. And strong as ever.'
'We did. She seemed like a nice old lady.'
'Old? I wonder how old she really is.'
'About eighty-five, I guess. She only looked about sixty, though.'
'At least she's aged some.'
'I don't understand.'
'When it happened… whatever happened with Jack… she looked about forty…'
'Early thirties, I heard, but you're the only one I've talked to who knew her then.'
'About forty. And even then there wasn't anybody who remembered when she didn't live there. Her house was built when that part of the city belonged to the private estate of a Mary Tyler. When I was a child, the old folks said it'd been built right after the Civil War.'
'I figured the eighteen eighties, just guessing.'
'My grandparents came over in eighty-three. She and the house were there then, and had been for a long time. My grandmother told me she'd heard that there'd been a man who was supposed to be Fiala's father. He disappeared too, I guess. Miss Groloch told people he went back to the old country. Nobody ever heard which one it was. She used to get out and around in those days. Didn't lock herself in till after Jack disappeared.'
'The name sounds like eastern European.' He wasn't really hearing the sister. That Miss Groloch might be 130, or even older, seemed so ridiculous that her words just floated across his consciousness like unsinkable ice. His only reaction was to make a note to tell John to check the tax and building records on the Groloch house.
Harald returned. 'Okay. All set, Norm. Got to hit it now, though. The morgue people are spooked about having the stiff around so long.'
'Sister?'
'I'm ready.'
During the trip downtown Cash tried to draw the woman out on her feelings toward Miss Groloch. He failed. She retreated into a shell not at all in keeping with the warmth and spirit she had shown earlier.
Sister Mary Joseph made the sign of the cross again when the attendant rolled the corpse out. Several times. Cash feared she would faint.
But she got a grip on herself. 'Do you have his clothes?'
Harald spent a half hour hunting them up. Then the Sister merely glanced at them. She found a chair, sat, thought for several minutes. Finally, 'You'll think I'm crazy. And maybe I am. But that's Jack. Those are the pants he was wearing the day he disappeared. I remember. I was sitting on the front steps with Colin Meara from upstairs. Jack gave me a dime and told us to get a soda before the old man heard about us holding hands on his own doorstep. He winked at Colin and went off whistling. He had his lucky tarn on, and his hands stuffed in his pockets. Sergeant, it's him. How can that be?'
Harald grinned like a Little Leaguer who had just pitched a no-hitter. Cash just sat down and put his face in his hands. 'I don't know, Sister. I don't know. This thing's getting crazier and crazier.'
'How did he die?'
'Scared to death, the coroner says.'
'Is that possible? I mean…?'
'It's possible. Not common, but possible.'
'But how'd he keep so long? They didn't have freezers.'
'He died March third. About 9:30 p.m.'
'This March? That's impossible.'
'I know it. You know it. But that there Jack O'Brien don't know it. Didn't know it. He was barely cold when they found him. His body heat had melted the snow…'
