Mel and I were headed for her car when someone tugged at my sleeve. “Beau?”
I turned and was surprised to find Sister Mary Katherine and another nun standing behind me. The second woman was tiny, a good ten years older than Sister Mary Katherine. The somber occasion hadn’t clouded the merry twinkle in Sister Mary Katherine’s eyes.
“I’d like you to meet Sister Elizabeth,” she said. “She’s a good friend of mine. I believe I told you something about her, Beau. Before Sister Elizabeth took her vows, she was Maribeth Hogan. Many years ago she was my camp counselor.”
I remembered the story well-about how a camp counselor had looked out for Bonnie Jean Dunleavy during the terrible hours, days, and weeks after her parents died in the car accident. Somehow it came as no surprise that Maribeth, like her younger charge, had also become a nun.
“Yes,” I said. “I do remember. I’m glad to meet you.” The grip of Sister Elizabeth’s handshake was far stronger than I would have expected. “And this is a colleague of mine, Melissa Soames.”
“Are you going to the reception?” Sister Mary Katherine asked.
I nodded. “Me, too,” she continued. “For closure.”
I wasn’t at all sure I agreed that visiting the old murder scene one last time was necessary, but I kept my mouth shut. If Sister Mary Katherine and Freddy had decided closure was called for, who was I to argue the point?
“One more thing,” Sister Mary Katherine added. “I heard the terrible news about Dillon Middleton as I was driving into town this morning. That young friend of yours, Heather-is she all right?”
“She’s not all right now,” I said. “But she will be eventually.”
“Yes,” Sister Mary Katherine said. “She will. I’ll keep on praying for her. So will everyone at Saint Benedict’s.”
Mel, impatient with the delay, waited until we were in the car before she called me on my sin of omission. “Shouldn’t you have told Sister Mary Katherine about what’s going on with Bill Winkler and Captain Kramer?”
“No,” I said, “I don’t think so. This all started when Sister Mary Katherine went to see Elvira. She’s already carrying around enough guilt. Why add more right now? She’ll find out soon enough.”
Mel and I weren’t the first to arrive at Elvira Marchbank’s postfuneral reception, nor were we the last. Sister Mary Katherine parked her minivan directly behind Mel’s BMW. The four of us ambled up the walkway together. Tom Landreth, a potent drink in hand, stood at the doorway, personally and expansively welcoming arriving guests. I would have expected to find the Marchbank Foundation’s executive director at the door as well, but Raelene Landreth was nowhere in evidence.
Uniformed servers greeted guests as well, taking coats or orders for drinks. Mel and I gratefully accepted cups of coffee. As I took the first sip, I caught sight of Sister Mary Katherine walking the perimeter of the room with her head bowed and hands clasped as though she were treading hallowed ground and finally having a chance to honor Mimi Marchbank, the murdered woman who had once been kind to an isolated child named Bonnie Jean Dunleavy.
The room was crowded. People were talking and laughing while a string quartet played in the background. It seemed more like a high-class cocktail party than it did a postfuneral reception. Having had nothing to eat since breakfast, I started in on a plate stacked high with hors d’oeuvres when, much to my surprise, Detectives Jackson and Ramsdahl came looking for me.
“What are you guys doing here?” I asked.
“Looking for Raelene Landreth,” Jackson said grimly. “Somebody finally got a look at the phone records Kramer dug up. If calling each other twenty times a day is any indication, I’d say she and Bill Winkler are going at it hot and heavy. We’re thinking she may have some idea of where he’s disappeared to. She may even have picked him up when we were looking for him and brought him here. Now which one is she?”
“She was at the funeral,” I told them, “but I haven’t seen her since.”
Mel had joined us in time to hear the news. “Whoa,” she said. “That puts things in a whole new light. Hold on while I go ask Tom Landreth if he’s seen his wife.”
I watched while Mel wove her way through the crowd. When she spoke to Landreth, I could see he was somewhat befuddled. He looked around the room and shook his head in a dazed way. In other words, he didn’t know where his wife was either.
Mel was coming back toward me when Sister Elizabeth appeared at my elbow. “Excuse me, Mr. Beaumont, but have you seen Sister Mary Katherine? We were about to leave when she said she wanted to go outside. Now I can’t find her.”
There are times in my life when I simply know things. The sudden sinking sensation I felt in the pit of my stomach told me this was one of these times. I had seen Sister Mary Katherine walking meditatively through the house. If she had stepped outside, I had a pretty good idea of where she might have gone-back to pay a final visit to her old hiding place, the secret hidey-hole that had once saved her life. The problem was, there was a good chance Bill Winkler might be hiding there right now.
“Come on,” I said. “Let’s go.”
“Where?” Jackson demanded. “What’s going on?”
There wasn’t time to explain. I turned to Mel. “Are you wearing a vest?”
“After this morning, are you kidding? I wouldn’t leave home without it.”
And neither would I.
By the time I made my way through the crowd to the front door, I was having second thoughts. I already knew Bill Winkler was armed. There were far too many people here for the kind of confrontation that might well ensue. I stopped on the porch outside. The sun had come out, bringing with it a brilliantly blue sky. I think I would have been happier if it had been raining.
“We need more people,” I said. Nodding, Detective Jackson reached for his phone. I turned to Sister Elizabeth, who had followed us out onto the porch. “I think whatever’s going down will happen behind the house next door,” I said. “Back there in the greenhouse. Until we know for sure, we have to keep everyone else inside. No one comes in or goes out. Can you do that?” Nodding, Sister Elizabeth stepped back inside.
“You think Bill Winkler’s back there, too?” Mel asked.
“I’d bet money on it.”
Detective Jackson was on his phone. As I spoke, he relayed everything I said to Dispatch. “You want all the neighboring streets cordoned off?” he asked at last.
“ASAP,” I said. “These two houses share a common backyard. I’ll go up between the houses and see what I can see. Kendall, you take the far end of this house. Hank, you go to the far end of the one next door.”
“What about me?” Mel asked.
For half a second I was torn. On the one hand, I didn’t want to do anything that would put Melissa Soames in any more danger than she already was. On the other hand, there wasn’t anyone else I wanted watching my back. I had lobbied hard against having another partner, but it seemed God had given me one anyway.
“You’re with me,” I said.
Sticking close to the wall of the house where the Dunleavys had once lived-the house where Elvira Marchbank had died-Mel and I made our way up the shared driveway. When I could peek around the corner, I half expected to see the run-down building and the weedy backyard Sister Mary Katherine had described. Instead I saw a state-of- the-art greenhouse and a well-tended expanse of yard.
From the greenhouse came the sound of voices. I motioned for Mel to be still in hopes we could hear what was being said.
“I’m leaving now,” Bill Winkler announced. “The only question is whether or not you’re coming with me.”
“I’m afraid,” Raelene returned. “There are too many cops.”
“And they all know that I shot a cop, too,” Winkler replied. “Even if they haven’t already, they’ll figure out the rest of it soon enough. We’ve got to get out of here. Now.”
As Winkler spoke, he and Raelene stepped out of the greenhouse.
The words had barely crossed my mind when Sister Mary Katherine appeared, stepping like an apparition out from a sheltered spot between the greenhouse and a towering laurel hedge.
“You won’t get away,” she said. “I know who you are.” She turned on Bill Winkler and added, “When I first
