letter from Minneapolis requesting residence while he studied at a local university. I never checked into it. Outside of your showing up here, I have no idea who you really are.”
“Well, hell, you could always look me up in the Kennedy Directory, Bob.” A testy note crept into Dunn’s voice,
“And what would I find?” Koesler too was getting irritable. “I would be surprised if I didn’t find a listing for a Nicholas Dunn assigned to a Golden Valley parish in the Minneapolis-St. Paul diocese.”
Dunn spread his hands. “So?”
“So how do I know that it’s you?”
“Huh?”
“If I were going to impersonate a priest, I sure as hell would make sure I picked a name and an identity that existed in the Catholic Directory. It wouldn’t make sense not to; it’s too easy to check.
“And another thing,” Koesler continued, though Dunn made a futile attempt to say something, “when we first met on that Saturday afternoon, you made a number of mistakes.”
“Mistakes? What-?”
“You said you were my new associate. And you’re not, of course; you’re ‘in residence’ here. If you were an associate, you’d have faculties to function in this archdiocese and all you’d need would be my delegation. But we had to get you faculties.” Koesler’s attitude seemed to say he’d made a very telling point.
“Bob,” Dunn was defensive, “I didn’t mean that in the technical canonical sense. I just meant that I was here not only just to live but to help out … to be your associate. I didn’t think you’d-besides,” he broke off, “that was a long time ago. What the hell are you getting at?”
“And that’s not all …” A note of triumph crept into Koesler’s voice. “You said that the three main drags in Minneapolis were named after priests. That would be Marquette, Hennepin, and Nicolet. Well, Marquette and Hennepin were priests, but not Nicolet. He was a French explorer.” Another point scored.
Dunn seemed genuinely embarrassed. “I knew Nicolet wasn’t a priest. It was just a slip of the tongue, nothing more. You can remember that conversation in such detail? My God, what a memory!”
“And wasn’t it a convenient accident, such a coincidence, that you just happened to show up at the exact moment Guido Vespa was going to confession plenty loudly enough for you to hear everything he said? You didn’t arrive in church just a few moments earlier when Vespa entered the wrong side of the confessional and I saw him?”
“You saw him? You knew who he was! I didn’t know that!”
“Sure, you got there conveniently after he’d entered the other side of the confessional so you wouldn’t appear to know that I’d seen him. But you saw him when he left the confessional. So you could pretend you were the only one of us who knew who he was. That gave you a dominant role to play. You could recognize him in the picture in the paper the next morning. I couldn’t have shut you out of this case if I’d wanted to. And the paper … did you know in advance that his picture was going to run in the paper?”
Dunn was reduced to just looking at Koesler. Dunn’s mouth hung open. Then, slowly, a smile began to form. Gradually, it became a grin. “I’ll be damned,” Dunn said, “you suspect me!” His head tossed. “I love it!”
Dunn’s reaction served to push Koesler into a somewhat defensive posture. “Well …” he drew out the word, “a coincidence is a coincidence because there’s no rational explanation for remarkable similarities. Once you can build that missing explanation, the chance of coincidence begins to vanish. There were a whole bunch of coincidences surrounding your arrival. It’s only natural to try to shoot them down with a reasonable explanation.”
“And you think,” Dunn was obviously beginning to enjoy this, “you think that I was in on this thing. That maybe I’m not who I seem to be. That maybe I’m not even a priest?”
The ease with which Dunn was voicing what Koesler had merely implied was beginning to unnerve Koesler.
“If what you suggest were true,” Dunn said, “what would I have to gain from all this?”
“I haven’t the slightest idea of what anybody had to gain from all this. As far as I know, the earlier part of Vespa’s story is true: John Keating piled up some astronomical gambling debts. I can believe that. That a contract was put out for his murder and that Vespa did the killing. That Vespa’s fake confession, to keep me out of the picture, was part of the contract. But there are other people in this case. And we don’t know who they are. Somebody put out the contract. Somebody shot Vespa and me because Vespa told me that the confession was a fake. Maybe the two ‘somebodies’ are the same person.
“What I’m getting at is there’s room for lots more people in this case. Maybe all those coincidences were not really coincidences. In which case, you made your entrance at the perfect time to play a part in this matter. And if that is true, I don’t know what part you may be playing or what you have to gain. Only that your presence in this is more than a little suspicious.”
Dunn was still smiling. Koesler wondered if Dunn was not underplaying all this too much. Where he might have reacted with anger, he was reacting with good humor. The latter was proving more effective. Was it all a very good act?
“At this point,” said Dunn, “I could move out. But I don’t want to leave Detroit. I really want those courses at U of D. And especially with the priest shortage, I could get a residence in almost any parish. But one of the reasons I asked to stay with you is because I wanted to see how you operate, particularly when, as you put it, you get dragged into these police investigations.
“Well, I’m getting a better picture than even I counted on.
“So here’s what I’ll do: If you don’t want to throw me out right now, I’ll prove to your satisfaction that I am the real Father Nicholas Dunn from Minneapolis. And that I’m still in good standing with the diocese and the Church. Then, if you want to suspect that a real priest could get mixed up in this, I’ll do what I can to put your suspicions to rest.
“How about it?”
Koesler’s immediate thought was that a “real priest” was already mixed up in this-Jake Keating. But he didn’t mention that. Instead, he said, “Okay, let’s take it from there. You continue on at St. Joe’s. But I don’t think it’s asking too much for some documentation on your status.”
“Done then. And no hard feelings?” Dunn extended his hand.
Koesler became aware that he wasn’t going to be using his right hand for a while. He reached out his left hand. “No, no hard feelings. Sincere apologies if my suspicions prove groundless.”
There was a perfunctory knock and a white-jacketed man entered the room. An identification card hung from his breast pocket; a stethoscope dangled from around his neck. There were introductions all around. Father Dunn then left, promising to see to the routine services at St. Joe’s until Koesler could resume his duties.
“You’ve attracted quite a mob out there,” the doctor commented.
“The media people? I’m not looking forward to that.”
“I’ll limit their time with you. Think you can go about fifteen minutes?”
“Yeah, I think so. How bad is it … my shoulder, I mean?”
The doctor shook his head and pursed his lips. He was a fine-looking specimen. His full head of salt-and- pepper hair was styled. His features seemed chiseled from impressive granite. From Koesler’s position in bed, the doctor seemed about seven feet tall. Probably he was a six-footer. He put Koesler in mind of God. Or, rather, someone who thought he was God.
“The slug came out nicely,” the doctor said. “There wasn’t much I could do about the shoulder. The rotator cuff is, for all purposes, gone. There’s a hole like this,” he cupped his hands to form a large O. “I debrided it …”
“You what?”
“I … gave it a haircut. Cut away the damaged tissue. I made sure the bleeding was stopped, and closed you up. Want to see?”
Koesler was about to pass on the show-and-tell portion of this program when the doctor folded the hospital gown away from the shoulder and with one fluid motion pulled the bandage away from the skin.
Koesler was grateful he was not terribly hirsute. At least there was no hair pulled out by the roots. He turned his head to study the area. It was what was left of his shoulder as colorized by Ted Turner. There were glorious reds, purples, and oranges against a white background.
He was surprised there did not appear to be any stitches. “I’m stapled!”
