know I needed to explode until I did. DeVere was made to order. So …” Pat smiled. “… all’s well that ends well-” She broke off as she spotted her editor leading two visitors in her direction.
Pat felt a flutter of excitement; one of the visitors was Zoo Tully. The other was Father Robert Koesler.
In her job, Pat had met quite a few Detroit-area clergymen. But she knew one better than Father Koesler. Several stories she had covered either revolved around him or events he had been involved in. Only a few days ago, she’d interviewed him in the hospital. So she was well aware of his injury and how it had come about.
Introductions were unnecessary, as Pringle had encountered Tully and Koesler at St. Waldo’s.
Bob Ankenazy got to the point without preamble. “Pat, these two gentlemen need access to Hal Salden’s basket. You got in there the other day. Got time to help them now?”
“Sure,” Pat said. “Hal’s basket is getting to be a popular place.”
“Popular?” Tully’s interest was evident.
“The DeVere … uh … woman was poking around in there a few minutes ago,” Pat said. “I threw her out!”
Tully nodded. “Good for you.” No law against it, but odd that DeVere would be interested in Salden’s notes. He would preserve the incident in his mental file.
Ankenazy went back about his business as Lennon led Tully and Koesler to Salden’s desk. “How’re you getting along, Father?” Pat asked as they neared the desk.
“It’s okay. Hurts a bit.”
I’ll bet, thought Pat. Something here must be pretty damn important to drag a wounded priest away from needed rest and recuperation. Her never-quiet reporter’s instinct went into high gear.
When Tully had been investigating the missing priest, Pringle had told her, Koesler had been in tow. Not that that combo was unique. In the past few years, when there had been a strong Catholic element in a homicide investigation, Tully and Koesler had become a version of Disney’s Spin and Marty.
But that was over and done with. The police had abandoned the search for Father Keating. As far as the authorities were concerned, Keating undoubtedly had been murdered. But they couldn’t find the body and they had no suspects.
That was how things lay when Tully had been here a few days ago. He’d been working on the murder of Hal Salden. And Father Koesler had been nowhere in sight.
Then Koesler was shot-along with Guido Vespa, the once and maybe again mobster. Koesler was there because Vespa had asked the priest to meet him. At least that’s what Koesler had said in the hospital interview. Why? Who knows? According to Koesler, they were shot before Vespa got very far in explaining himself.
So then what? The cops should be out looking for whoever shot Vespa.
Instead, Tully’s back to search Hal’s basket. Why? They hadn’t found that much in it. Tully couldn’t have forgotten what he’d seen. He wanted Koesler to take a look. Why?
Hal Salden was a religion writer. Koesler’s a priest. Could that be the connection? Not very strong. If that were the connection, why wouldn’t Tully have brought Koesler with him the first time? Afterthought? Maybe.
Nothing else came to mind immediately. But it was an interesting puzzle. Definitely worth looking into.
Pat sat at the keyboard, the two men looking over her shoulder. She punched out HOLY SMOKE and the screen lit up. She waited for a reaction, but none came. Well, Tully had seen Hal’s little joke before. But Koesler made no comment. Serious business.
She punched up the “miracle” story of the allegedly possessed girl whose levitation was supposed to be curtailed by assigning a tall priest to get her down from the ceiling.
“Do anything for you?” Tully asked. Lennon knew the question was intended for Koesler.
“Outside of the fact that I don’t believe it, no, it doesn’t do anything for me,” Koesler replied.
Lennon moved on to the story of the Rochester Episcopal parish that had gotten its first female priest.
“What about this one?” Tully asked.
Koesler perused and pondered. “It would be a good story for Hal,” he said thoughtfully. “There’s lots of drama and conflict in women’s rights-or the lack of them-in the Church. This is an internal matter with the Episcopal Church, but I can understand the problem. Allowing the Mass to be offered in English, letting lay people distribute Communion, the greeting of peace-things like these generated an awful lot of bad feelings and anger in the Catholic Church some twenty-five years ago. And a lot of that is still going on. And none of that approaches having a female priest, let alone a female rector. I happen to believe it’s the right way to go. But I can understand how some parishioners would react. The problem is, in which direction would their anger be focused? Would they be angry at the people who hired her? Ordained her? Or at the Church that made it possible? Or at the woman herself? Or the reporter who made their discomfort and pain so public? Would they kill the messenger?”
“Kill the messenger?” Lennon repeated softly. “Hal would be the messenger. But … I don’t think so.”
“In any case,” Koesler said, “I don’t see any connection.”
Connection? What connection? Lennon moved her prior theory-that there was some sort of link between the shootings of Salden and Vespa-from the back to the front burner of her mind.
Tully interrupted her thoughts. “Go on to the third item we were looking at the other day, Pat.”
Again, Koesler studied the words on the screen. “To tell the truth,” he said finally, “I don’t see what these have to do with anything. ‘Shells! look into … trace down! could be key!’“He looked at Lennon. “Does anybody know what this means?”
“I’m the one who thought this might be significant in some way,” she admitted. “I was wondering about Hal’s using all those exclamation marks.”
“It’s legitimate punctuation,” Koesler observed.
“Uh-huh,” Lennon agreed, “except that Hal Salden scarcely ever used an exclamation mark. There are people who use two or three of them after some statement they think is super important. That bugs the hell out of me. Then there are those who almost never use one. Hal belonged to that group. And look there: ten words and three exclamation points. It’s just odd. But I haven’t the slightest idea what the message means.”
“Shell Oil comes to mind,” Koesler said. “But I’ve got no clue why a religion writer might be interested in Shell Oil.” Pause. “Wait a minute: There’s a ‘K’ at the end. Could that stand for Keating? Father John Keating?”,
Without response, Lennon flipped back to the St. Andrew’s item, and pointed to the solitary “K” at the bottom of that listing.
“I hadn’t noticed that,” Koesler said. “Two references to Keating in two different unconnected items? That doesn’t make any sense, does it?”
“We noticed the ‘K’s too,” Tully said. “Seems that Salden used to be a sportswriter.”
“Ah …” Koesler caught on immediately. “… and the ‘K’ stands for strikeout. Which is what I just did.”
“It’s okay, Father,” Tully said. “Not every hunch pays off. This was sort of a wild guess-that Salden’s notes might have rung a bell for you. It doesn’t look like that’s gonna happen. Sorry. Why don’t I get you back to the rectory and you can get some rest?”
Koesler agreed. But privately he had to admit he’d felt better in this city room than he had in the rectory. Distraction was proving to be a pretty effective anodyne. He resolved to keep his mind focused on anything but his misery.
Lennon watched thoughtfully as the two men left the room. There had to be some sort of connection between the shootings of Salden and Vespa. But what? Why had Tully brought Koesler-a wounded priest-into the Salden killing?
In any case, whatever Tully had hoped Koesler would find in Salden’s notes the priest had not found. So now what? Does Tully give up on trying to establish some sort of link between the shootings? Now that her interest has been aroused, should Pat Lennon give up trying to find out what the police are doing?
Fat chance.
23
If memory served, Lieutenant Tully usually arrived at work unusually early. That was why Father Koesler dialed Homicide at 7:00 A.M.
Koesler, in a steadfast effort to keep his mind active, thus distracting himself from discomfort, hadn’t needed
