Body In The Belfry

suited her slightly philosophical musings on beginnings and endings. Unlike its murky neighbor, it was a cemetery in which one could believe life would go on forever. Today, at the end of Cindy's life, those spring thoughts seemed a long time ago.

Faith looked around at the people gathered at Cindy 's grave : the Moores ; youth group members, looking scared and awe-stricken ; parishioners ; friends of the Moores ; just about everybody else in Aleford not in one of the other categories ; and a few obvious reporters. Only the putative chief mourner was absent.

In fact he wasn't. As Tom moved onto Wordsworth 's second stanza, Dave Svenson was gazing down on the assembled group through binoculars from a small hill north of the cemetery. Unlike Faith, he was not thinking about what Cindy was wearing. In fact, he found it hard to believe it was Cindy, but he knew that the lowering of the casket and those clods of earth that fell upon it were once and for all signaling an end to some part of his life—for better or worse.

Since leaving the Fairchilds on Saturday morning, he had been staying with various friends. He managed to call his parents, but did not tell them where he was so they wouldn 't have to tell any lies to the police. His mother had cried, but she didn 't advise him to turn himself in. He knew he had made the right choice.

All his friends were trying to piece together what they knew and what they heard that the police knew, but so far it was a total mystery. No one, least of all Dave, could figure out why Cindy had been killed. And especially why she had been killed in such a strange way. The Alliance might have been buying the tramp theory—or saying so— but none of Dave 's friends were.

He had spent most of his time with Steve, who lived on the outskirts of town. Steve's parents had bought a farm in Aleford during the sixties, intending to live off the land. Now in the eighties, they found themselves making a small fortune selling chevre and wild mushrooms to New York and Boston specialty stores. Dave had been living in their barn and eating whatever Steve could sneak out to him. He was heartily sick of goat cheese and hoped he would never have to eat it again. It was fine for his Swedish relatives, but he frankly preferred Velveeta (a fact that, had it come out at the time, might have taken the edge off Faith's partisanship).

So Dave stood under the gaily colored tent of leaves that in another time and setting might have been his bridal canopy.

He focused his binoculars on indlvidual faces : his parents, dour and Ibsenesque; the Moores harder to read, a mixture of confusion and something that might have been sadness. Faith looked as if she was thinking of something else and Reverend Fairchild just perfect, serious, but not fake either.

Dave was so intent on the scene before him that he did not hear the branches snapping behind him. He was leaning against a tree trying to figure out what exactly he was feeling besides relief and fear when the biggest hand he had ever seen in his life came down hard on his shoulder. He froze.

“Dave Svenson?' the hand's voice asked quietly. 'Yes,' said Dave, figuring it was pointless to argue or run.

“ My name is Detective Lieutenant John Dunne. I've been looking for you.”

Dunne was happy. He was seldom disappointed. They just couldn't stay away. You could count on it. They always turned up for the funeral.

Down in the cemetery, the group had dispersed. Manyof the mourners, or more accurately, attendees, had returned to the Moores' house for the traditional funeral baked meats—in this case, thimbles of dry sherry and tea sandwiches. Faith eyed the sandwiches suspiciously. Anchovy paste on trustless triangles of white bread and maybe some egg salad spread a tenth of a millimeter thick. Still, people were managing to put away quite a lot of them. What would they do with real food ? Faith asked herself. If ever a demand existed, it was here.

She took some sherry in a fragile glass and looked at it appreciatively. Sandwich glass, the exquisite blownthree-mold variety. Just what she would have expected at the Moores. It was lovely not to be disappointed. In a way, the sandwiches matched the setting and occasion, too, but there was such a thing as going too far. She walked over to the window seat, covered with chintz roses, and sat down to think a few wistful thoughts.

It was still a, beautiful day and people were strolling in the garden. It was not really a mournful occasion, but there was an undercurrent of tension, not lessened by Charley MacIsaac 's presence at the funeral and now back at the house. He joined Faith, balancing a tiny Spode plate heaped with sandwiches and something that was not dry sherry in a tumbler. Faith smiled up at him.

“Hi, Charley, where's your big friend?'

“He does give you a start at first, I'll say that,' Charley replied, “ but I don't know what he 's up to today. Said he was coming to the funeral.'

“Maybe he's busy tracking down a hot lead,' Faith said. ' In any case, what's the talk down at the station ? Anything new ? '

“ Now, Faith, you know I can't discuss it with you.'

“Charley! Is that fair? After all, if I hadn't found her, you wouldn't even have a case,' Faith argued with perfect illogic, which nevertheless seemed to convince MacIsaac.

“Well, you know we're looking for a certain person to question and after that maybe we 'll have something to say.

“Oh, that 's as ridiculous as the tramp theory! You've known Dave all his life. You can't honestly believe he would kill anybody ! “

Charley looked Faith straight in the eye and drained his tumbler. 'Faith, anybody can be a killer given the right place and the right time. Even you would kill to protect that baby of yours, right ? Or Tom ? '

“ Yes, of course, but it's not the same ! '

“It's all the same in the end. And I'm not saying Dave did kill Cindy. We just want to know where he was and where he's been.”

Faith had to be satisfied with that and, disgruntled, left MacIsaac. Of course he was keeping something from her. How was she ever going to help clear Dave if she couldn't find out what was going on ? She felt it was rather mean of Charley not to share what he knew. It wasn't as if she would snitch to Detective Dunne.

She looked around the room for Tom. How long did they have to stay anyway ? She had had enough of the mystery for one day, and the sherry on an empty stomach—no, she would not eat fish paste sandwiches—was making her slightly queasy. Or maybe it was MacIsaac.

Oswald Pearson was busily jotting down notes and Faith wondered what he could be writing. Descriptions of what everyone was wearing ? She noted today he didn't seem the dandy he usually was. Oswald was a round little man in his early forties who had compensated for an early loss of hair by growing a precise Van Dyck beard. The few hairs left on his head were carefully drawn across his scalp and had a tendency to rise together in a solid phalanx whenever a breeze drifted by. Today his pink and white complexion looked gray and white. Faith couldn't imagine that he was upset at Cindy's death, especially since the headlines it was producing were increasing his circulation beyond the town limits. Maybe he was coming down with the flu. Where was Tom ? When she was forced to medical speculation about the inhabitants of Aleford, she knew she had reached boredom 's rock bottom.

Just then Robert Moore came into the living room with Charley MacIsaac and said something to the Sven- sons. They all went out into the hall and Faith saw Erik Svenson reach for the phone. Eva Svenson clutched his arm. As if a message had been delivered, those who had been outside in the garden came in and the talking stopped.

MacIsaac left the hall, went out to his car, switched on the radio, its blare jarring the silence unpleasantly. No one could make out what was being said. Abruptly, Charley drove off.

Erik put the phone down. With Eva quietly weeping at his side, he came into the room and told them, 'Dave is at the police station. That was Detective Dunne. What he said exactly was they're holding him for questioning.”

Eva stood absolutely still, with a bewildered expression on her face. Her eyes were locked on one of the portraits of Patricia's ancestors and she looked as though she wished her family had never heard of the Moores—or Aleford either. That they could all have stayed on the farm in Sweden and never come across the ocean at all.

Tom stepped forward. 'I'll go down with you, Erik, let me get my coat.' He came over to Faith, gave her a kiss, told her he would meet her at home, then left the room. The Svensons waited immobilized, until Tom came back with Robert. Robert took Eva's arm. ' I've called another lawyer and he 's meeting us there.' That seemed to