Fallen Angels (27 page)

“Hmm?” I looked from my handbag in my lap to
Lulu’s face, which was plastered again this morning with makeup.
Well, why not? Nothing Sister Emmanuel had harangued us with
yesterday mentioned anything about makeup or the use thereof,
although I knew from articles I’d read that she greatly disapproved
of what she considered “wicked women.” I wondered what she thought
about the “wicked men” who used them. But that was a whole ’nother
kettle of fish. Anyhow, Lulu wasn’t wicked, but she did wear a lot
of makeup, which was a trademark of the “wicked” group, or so I’d
been led to understand.

“You came down those stairs like a man on a
mission. Or a girl on a mission, I guess.”

“Yeah,” I said, borrowing a word from Lulu’s
vocabulary. “I’m definitely on a mission. I’m going back to the
Angelica Gospel Hall, and I’m going to get a handle on exactly what
Mrs. Chalmers did there.”

“You really think the church is involved
somehow in her murder?” Lulu appeared as skeptical as she
sounded.

“Not the church itself, but somebody
connected with it. Yes, I do.”

“Yeah?”

I lifted my hands and spread them in a
gesture of despair. “Everyone else has been ruled out, Lulu!
Somebody
committed that murder, and
it wasn’t Ernie! I’m the one who found him drugged and tied up,
remember?” I added bitterly, “Even though the police don’t believe
me.”

“Rotten bananas, all of them,” she
muttered.

“Besides, while I can see Ernie killing if he
had to . . . say, if someone he loved was in danger or something, I
can’t feature him brutally bashing a client on the head and pushing
her down the stairs. Especially if the client was a woman. For one
thing, we don’t have enough clients that we can afford to be
killing them off.”

Although I hadn’t meant the comment to be
funny, Lulu laughed. Eventually, even I saw the humor in my boss’s
too-few clients. With a sigh, I rose, feeling a little more chipper
after my chat with Lulu. “Don’t forget, we’ve got a date for lunch
at the Ambassador this coming Wednesday, Lulu.”

Her eyes brightened up. “That’s right. I can
hardly wait. I’ll wear my very best dress.”

Oh, boy. I couldn’t wait to see that. “I’ll
be back in a bit. If Ernie or Phil ask after me, tell them I’ve
gone to do their jobs for them.”

“At the Angelica Gospel Hall?”

“That’s where I aim to begin, yes.”

“I dunno, Mercy. That lead seems kind of slim
to me.”

“Yes. It seems slim to Ernie and Phil and
Detective O’Reilly, too, curse them.”

“Hey, don’t curse me.”

“I won’t. I’m just angry with those three men
at the moment.”

“See ya later.” Lulu went back to filing her
nails.

Were they all right? Ernie, Phil, O’Reilly,
and Lulu? Was there no connection between that wretched church and
the death of Mrs. Persephone Chalmers? And, of all nonsensical
things, I still wanted to know why she didn’t call herself Mrs.
Franchot Chalmers. Was that something to do with the church, too? I
understood that Sister Emmanuel didn’t care for earthly titles, but
why wouldn’t Mrs. Chalmers use her husband’s first name in
correspondence and stuff like that? When she first called Ernie in
that stupid, breathy voice of hers, she’d called herself Mrs.
Persephone Chalmers.

Nuts.

Thanks to the late, generous legacy of my
great-aunt Agatha, I took a cab from the Figueroa Building to the
Angelica Gospel Hall. Only when we were almost there did I wonder
if the church might not be open on Mondays. But churches were
always open, weren’t they, so that people could go in and pray? Or
was it only Catholic churches that were open all the time? Shoot. I
didn’t know. Still, at least the administrative staff should be
there, I thought.

Did churches have administrative staffs?

Nuts again. The things I didn’t know about
the Angelica Gospel Hall could fill a library. Actually, they
probably would, if you cut out and pasted into books all the
articles written about the Hall and Adelaide Burkhard Emmanuel. My
mind boggled at such a library, and I wondered if religious
libraries really existed. They must, mustn’t they? Heck, before
King Henry VIII, didn’t the monks in all the monasteries write
those illuminated manuscripts? They must have been kept in
libraries. I think.

The cab pulling to a stop in front of the
Hall stopped my mind from wandering down fruitless paths, which was
a good thing since I was already confused enough. I paid the
cabbie, got out, and stared at the immense edifice before me for a
few moments. Two huge radio towers had been installed a few years
before, so that people all over the United States could hear Sister
Emmanuel’s message. From what I read in the papers, thousands of
people believed that message and sent her money to prove it.

Was Sister Emmanuel only in this religious
thing for the money? After meeting her, I couldn’t believe it.

That didn’t leave out all the people who
worked with her, though. What if Mrs. Chalmers had uncovered some
dire plot to divert some of the money that people sent in,
supposedly to help with the church, so the money was lining
non-church pockets? That would be a good motive to kill her,
wouldn’t it?

It was difficult for me to imagine the
fluttery Persephone Chalmers uncovering much of anything, but that
was because I held her in what I’m sure was irrational dislike. And
she was dead. Shame on me.

With a sigh, I started walking up the wide,
white stairs to the big doors of the church. If I were to guess,
I’d guess, Sister Emmanuel had designed those stairs—or she’d had
someone else design them—so that people would believe themselves to
be on a stairway leading to heaven as they climbed them. Was that a
cynical thought? Was I turning into an Ernie-type female?

Ghastly thought. Almost as ghastly as the
notion of turning into a Mother-type female.

On the way up those stairs, I worried that
the huge double doors might be locked. Then what would I do? Was
there a back entrance to the place? Well, of course, there was. And
a couple of side ones, too, but they wouldn’t help me gain entry if
they were all locked, would they?

I needn’t have worried. The front door to the
sanctuary opened with nary a whisper, thanks to whoever oiled the
hinges on a regular basis; perhaps that, too, was one of Brother
Everett’s many tasks. The church was very well maintained. Well, it
should be, given that it had such a huge congregation, all of whom,
I presumed, donated money, or time and effort, or some of all of
these to its upkeep. Imagine that. One smallish woman had created
her own gigantic empire in the name of God. While I was still of
two minds about Sister Emmanuel’s message, I admired her sincerity
and plain, good old marketing ability. That she’d also, according
to some published articles I read, trampled the Bible under her
feet to come up with her own version of Jesus Christ’s message
wasn’t anything new. People had done that since the year aught, I
suppose. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have huge churches of all
denominations, would we? And probably before the year aught, as
well. If not, we’d all be united under one idea about God and how
His church should be run.

My philosophical mood dissipated as I walked
through the gigantic lobby and into the sanctuary. By gum, people
were there! There weren’t many of them, but still, it was kind of
nice to know the Hall welcomed folks all day long. One woman knelt
at the altar, and a couple of other folks seemed to be praying in
pews.

Looking around, I didn’t see hide nor hair of
Sister Emmanuel, however. Drat. I’d really wanted to speak to her.
For all her religious fervor, she’d seemed a sensible woman when
I’d met her, and I was pretty sure she wouldn’t pooh-pooh my ideas
as Ernie had. In fact, she was probably eager to discover who had
murdered one of her flock. It didn’t look good to have congregants
butchered, after all. Mrs. Chalmers’ affiliation with the Angelica
Gospel Hall had been written about in many a local newspaper, and
Sister Emmanuel would undoubtedly welcome the arrest and conviction
of her murderer.

That’s what I told myself as I walked toward
the chancel, trying to recollect how one got to Sister Emmanuel’s
office. There had been a door and a hall and . . . Oh, bother.

“Sister Allcutt?”

Startled, I spun around to see a familiar
face. Thank goodness! “Sister Everett, I’m so glad to see you.”

“I must say I’m rather surprised to see you,”
she responded in what didn’t sound to me like a very welcoming
voice. Nevertheless, she walked toward me, a very, very large,
robust woman in a white gown. I got the impression most of the
insiders who worked within these hallowed walls wore white
regularly.

“If I could, I’d like to speak with Sister
Emmanuel for a minute or two. I won’t take up much of her
time.”

Sister Everett reached me. She towered over
me, and I had to bend my head back to look into her eyes, which
seemed cold and distant, although that might just be my prejudice
showing. “Sister Emmanuel and Brother Everett left some time ago to
go to an interview at a radio station downtown.”

“Oh.” Darn it. “Do you know how long they’ll
be gone?”

“No, I don’t.” She pasted on a smile. “Is
there anything I can do for you?”

Was there? Shoot, I didn’t know. What the
heck. I suppose it was the duty of a good private investigator to
use the materials at hand. “Well . . . I’m here to do some more
investigation into the Chalmers murder,” I said, rather weakly I’m
afraid.

Sister Everett heaved a deep sigh. “I don’t
know what you expect to find out here, but if you’ll assist me in
straightening out the hymnals in the pews, perhaps I can answer
questions for you while we wait the return of Sister Emmanuel.”

“Happy to help,” I said, meaning it. At least
the woman was willing to answer my questions, providing I could
think of any.

“What we need to do,” she said as she walked
to the front of the sanctuary, “is make sure all the pews contain
two hymnals and one Bible in each holder. People are always
stuffing Sunday bulletins into the holders, and we must be sure to
remove them and any other trash they leave behind.” She sniffed.
“You’d expect people would treat the house of God with some
respect, wouldn’t you?”

“Indeed, yes.” We sure did back in Boston,
anyway. If Chloe or I had even thought about leaving behind a
hankie or a church bulletin, we’d hear about it for weeks.

She carried a big white cloth bag kind of
like a pillow case, into which we stuffed all left-over bulletins,
irrelevant pieces of paper, and so forth. “So, what did you want to
ask?” Her voice sounded crisp and efficient.

“Well, let me see.” Sheesh. I’d already asked
everybody all the questions I could think of. “Um, how long was
Mrs. Chalmers a member of the church?”

Another sniff. “I recall seeing her for the
first time about a year ago.”

“I see. And did she ever attend church with
another person?”

“She and Sister Pinkney were very close, I
believe. I don’t know if they ever traveled here together.”

“I see.” Now what? Well, what the heck. “What
about Mr. Chalmers? Did he ever attend church with her?”

“Not that I know of. I don’t even know what
the man looks like, but I don’t recall seeing her enter the
sanctuary with a man.”

“I see.”

“The only person I recall seeing Sister
Chalmers with regularly was Sister Pinkney.”

“I see. Did you know that Mrs. Pinkney’s
husband was—probably still is—against Mrs. Pinkney attending the
Angelica Gospel Hall?”

“Yes, indeed. Sinful man. I pray daily for
Sister Pinkney and for Mr. Pinkney, too, that he’ll see the light
and stop persecuting the poor woman for doing God’s work.”

“Did you know that he wrote threatening
letters to Mrs.—I mean Sister Chalmers?”

Sister Everett’s eyes widened, and she turned
her head to look at me. “Goodness gracious, no! Did he really? Is
the man insane?”

“I don’t know. Writing threatening letters
certainly isn’t a very nice thing to do.”

“Do you believe he might be guilty of the
woman’s death?” Sister Everett went back to tidying the
sanctuary.

“I thought so, but he seems to have a solid
alibi. The police have looked into his whereabouts at the time of
the crime thoroughly.”

Frowning, Sister Everett said, “Hmm. That’s
too bad.”

Her words surprised me a little bit, even
though I agreed with them. Mr. Pinkney would have made a great
villain. “Yes, it is, but now we have to find out who else might
have had a motive for her murder.”

“I shouldn’t think there would be a paucity
of suspects,” Sister Everett said dryly.

“Oh? Why is that?”

We’d worked ourselves to the middle of the
sanctuary, Sister Everett tossing bulletins away and tidying up
hymnals and Bibles like a mechanical wind-up doll, and I following
meekly in her wake, straightening hymnals and Bibles and picking up
extraneous trash.

Still frowning, she said, “Sister Chalmers
was an odd woman.”

She could say that again! “She was? In what
way?”

“I don’t mean to speak harshly of the dead,
but she did some very strange things from time to time. She was
forever fainting during the sermon—from an excess of heavenly zeal,
she said.” From the tone of her voice, I gathered Sister Everett
believed the fainter had other motives. “She certainly garnered
unto herself a lot of attention when she did that. From lots of
men. As well as women.” She added that last comment almost
grudgingly.

My goodness! Could we have been wrong about
Mr. Chalmers? Had he been jealous of his wife’s attending church
here for personal reasons? I struggled to find a tactful way to
find out.

“Um . . . do you think Mrs. Chalmers was . .
. ah, trying to attract the attention of men? Or of one man in
particular?” I hate to admit it, since it points out my own
naivety, but I was shocked. Intellectually, I knew that men and
women had affairs with other people’s spouses all the time, but . .
. well, I was still shocked. And I worked for a private
investigator who pursued straying spouses all the time. Maybe there
was no hope for me. Dismal thought.