life.”
“Sergeant Hayes,” he said, his hand outstretched.
The trooper shook his hand briefly. “Chief Van Alstyne.”
“Ready to help us make a quick close on this one?”
“You bet. Show us the way.”
Russ pivoted toward one of the squad cars. “Noble,” he shouted.
Noble Entwhistle popped up from his slouched position against the side of his car.
“You’re with me.” Russ pointed a finger toward Lyle, who had drifted up beside him. “You. To the hospital.” He lowered his voice. “Be good.”
“Funny,” Lyle said. “I was going to tell you the same thing.”
Clare had always considered the narrow brick stairs leading from St. Alban’s semibasement kitchen to street level her own private escape hatch. The great double door of the church was for Sundays and weddings and inconveniently faced Church Street’s public square, in the opposite direction from the rectory. The doorway out of the upper parish hall, opening onto Elm Street and the large parking space the church rented, was much more frequently used, like the driveway-side entrance in a house where the front door is too grand and inaccessible. As a result, the chances of Clare slipping in and out unobserved were slim to none. But few people used the kitchen stairs, which scuttled steeply up to St. Alban’s own minuscule parking lot and from there to a tall boxwood hedge dividing the rectory from the church grounds.
Her plan had been to sneak down the stairs, find Geoff Burns, and then hightail it out of there to her own house. She needed food and a shower. Or a shower and food. Maybe a sandwich in the tub.
The presence of an unheard-of three cars squeezed onto the postage-stamp-sized asphalt square was a tip-off that her plan was about to require some modifications. She nosed her Shelby against a plastic garbage bin and opened the door gingerly, so as not to smack into the neighboring Volvo.
She could see a sliver of the top of the door. Open. The sound of cascading silverware and voices conferring was almost drowned out by an enthusiastic rendition of “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.” That would be Judy Morrison, former Lutheran. Since her interpretation of gourmet cooking was crushing Pringles over her casseroles, Clare hoped she was on cleanup rather than the food prep crew.
Then she caught a whiff of something buttery and delicious. Her stomach lurched forward, and her feet followed. She pattered down the stairs, salivating.
Courtney Reid and Sabrina Campbell were talking, heads bent together, stirring pots on the eight-burner stove. Judy Morrison was elbows-deep in sudsy water, pans and canisters of silverware piled on the counters around her. All three women wore the HAVE YOU HUGGED AN EPISCOPALIAN TODAY? aprons that had been such a hit at the springtime fund-raiser.
“Reverend!”
Clare smiled to keep from wincing. She never heard the word without hearing her grandmother Fergusson sniffing,
“Hey, everyone. How’s it going?” The source of the mouthwatering odor was a huge baking tin crammed with tiny quiches. “This smells amazing. Can I have one?” Her hand was almost on one of the miniature tins when Courtney pinned her with a coolly arched brow.
“Only if you want to risk running out at the reception tomorrow.” Courtney’s nose wrinkled. “What is that smell?” She peered into the sink. “Judy, did you put something rotten down the drain?”
Clare made a tactical retreat. “Anything in the fridge?” She wrenched open the professional-sized refrigerator. “Holy cow, you’ve been busy.” Crustless, quartered bread towered next to mixing bowls filled with tuna salad and thinly sliced ham. Scallops enveloped in bacon strips awaited the broiler. Tiny, perfect strawberry cheesecakes bumped into miniature shish kebabs ready for reheating. And in pride of place, Clare’s own suggestion for the lunch: deviled eggs. Her favorite. Could she appropriate one or two? To taste-test? She glanced over her shoulder. Courtney was watching her.
“Uh-uh-uh,” the woman singsonged. Clare shut the door with a sigh.
Sabrina Campbell stuck a spoon into the pot she had been stirring and lifted it to her mouth, blowing on it. It was, Clare saw with a dizzy yearning, chocolate. “Where have you been?” Courtney asked. “We expected you hours ago.”
“I thought you’d be done by now. I mean, I’m really headed home to take a shower.” Clare realized that this statement didn’t cast her in the best light. She hesitated, not wanting to go into too much detail. “I got an early morning call from the search and rescue team. There’s been a young woman lost in the woods. I filled in until one of their more experienced volunteers replaced me.”
“Well, I won’t even begin to tell you what a nightmare it’s been here,” Courtney said. Judy Morrison, her face hidden from the younger woman’s view, grimaced; whether in exasperation or solidarity, Clare couldn’t tell. “First there was this awful mix-up with the crusts for the individual quiches. Then we had to go back to the store because the kiwi and the strawberries weren’t fresh.”
“There weren’t that many that had gone bad,” Judy said under her breath.
Courtney rolled on as if she hadn’t heard her. “And then we had a terrible time making the creme fraiche. I suspect the fat content wasn’t all it could have been.”
Judy mumbled something that sounded like “… if we had settled for whipped cream…”
“Anyway, we’re well sorted out now. D’you want to come upstairs and see how the setup is going? I was just headed up.” Courtney whipped off her apron. “Sabrina, you can keep an eye on my remoulade, can’t you?”
“Mmm-hmm,” Sabrina said, tucking a strand of silvered blond hair behind her ear and tasting the now-cooled chocolate.
“Reverend?” Courtney was holding the kitchen door open. Clare tore her eyes away from Sabrina Campbell’s now-clean spoon and trotted after the fast-moving brunette.
Courtney strode down the dank hallway, passing the boiler room, the sexton’s supply closet, smelling of disinfectant, and the shuttered doors to the undercroft, the church’s subterranean attic. She pounded up the narrow steps, Clare following on her heels, and burst through into the sunlit parish hall.
Noise assailed them. Three women and two men snipped stems and chattered loudly across the room. A tropical forest of blooms and branches was spread out on a plastic-sheeted table. Terry McKellan and Tim Garretson wrestled folding round tables off an enormous dolly and rolled them into place, rumbling like Ezekiel’s chariot wheels. A phone was ringing in the office. From the church, Clare could hear the music director and the choir, going over a particularly difficult section of the choral evensong they’d be singing tomorrow at four.
The members of the floral guild spotted Clare first. “Thank heavens you’re here,” Laurie Mairs said, dropping her intertwined stems of roses and stephanotis and hurrying toward Clare. “The silver vases are all locked away, and Delia’s lost her spare key!” She shot a glance at the guilty woman, who shrugged her shoulders, smiling sheepishly.
“Delia, you have to let me or Mr. Hadley know if you lose one of the keys,” Clare said, raising her voice to be heard across the room. “That silver is irreplaceable. We can’t allow-”
“Clare!” Mae Bristol cut off what was threatening to become a rant with the authority only a forty-year career as an elementary school teacher can bestow. “Where have you been?” She bore down on Clare from the upper hallway, stopping only when she got within sniffing distance. “And what have you gotten into?”
“Miss Bristol.” Laurie Mairs, like many of the other parishioners aged forty-seven and under, seemed to find it
