Killing Cassidy (15 page)

“Just after Easter, it was. He came here, said he wanted to talk. I was a little surprised. He'd made his Easter confession, and I couldn't imagine … well, he sat here, right in that very chair, Mrs. Martin, and told me he thought someone was trying to murder him.”

He shook his head. “I confess, for just a few minutes I thought he'd lost it. But then he began to tell me.

“That accident, falling down the steps, was just the most recent in a whole series. There'd been his car, first of all.”

“Oh, then he
was
still driving.”

“He had been. And reasonably well, for someone as old as that. But one day, about a year ago it'd be now, he was driving along that back road of his, and his brakes failed.”

I made a shocked noise.

“Yes. There might have been a terrible accident, but he was driving very slowly. He'd slowed still more, for a curve, or he'd tried to, but nothing happened. Well, there was no other traffic, and he had the presence of mind to run the car into a bank at the side of the road. He wasn't hurt, shaken up was all, but the car was fairly well beat up.”

“Did he have a mechanic look at the brakes?”

“No, he'd decided then and there that he wouldn't drive anymore. He just had them come and haul the car away, and he never mentioned the brakes to anyone until he told me.”

“It must have left him very isolated, not having a car way out there in the country.”

“He got a tricycle.”

I choked on my tea, and Father Kennedy chuckled.

“Oh, yes, he made quite a picture, pedaling along. It looked very much like an overgrown child's toy, except for being chain driven like a bicycle. The three wheels made it much more stable than a bike, and he didn't need to pedal as fast. Of course, it wasn't much good to him when the weather was bad, but he managed to get to the grocery store when he needed to, get in to town for mass, that kind of thing. His house isn't really that far out, you know. He got along just fine until the tricycle was stolen.”

I shook my head sadly. “Things like that never used to happen in Hillsburg.”

“They still don't, not often. Kids' bikes, yes. But who'd have any use for an adult tricycle? Anyway, it was the only one in town, and everyone recognized it. Nobody could possibly have used it, not around here. But stolen it was, and boldly, too. From in front of the pet store, in broad daylight. He'd come to town for some cat litter, and when he came out of the store, the trike was gone.

“He couldn't take his purchase home, of course, not without his transportation; the bag was too heavy. But it seemed there was no one around to drive him just then, so he said he'd collect the stuff later, somehow, and he started to walk home. Three miles, and it was a blustery March day, not terribly cold, but with a wind you could stand up against.

“Fortunately, I happened to be driving that way. I saw him and gave him a ride. I scolded him about walking on such a day, but he just glowered at me. Never said a word about the theft; I learned about that later. I think he felt like a fool for letting such a thing happen. Silly, of course, but he had his pride, and a temper, too, you know.”

“I do know. An Irish temper,” I added.

“And what would ye be meanin' by that?” he demanded in an exaggerated brogue.

But I'd heard the act before. “The sort that's like an April day, thunder and lightning one minute and soft sunshine the next. Your definition, as I recall.”

“And me own words used against me!” He twinkled at me for a moment and then sobered again. “You do see the implication, don't you? Of the theft?”

I saw, all right. “Someone hoped that his heart would give out, walking that far against the wind. Or that he'd get sick. That he'd get pneumonia. But he didn't—not that time. When did you say this happened?”

“Mid-March sometime. I don't recall exactly. I do know he never went for a long walk again. After the tricycle incident—and mind you, I thought it was nothing more than simple theft—I put my foot down and absolutely forbade him to gad about on his own. I didn't like to do it, and Kevin hated the idea like poison. No one wants to lose his independence, but I made him see, at last, that he was taking suicidal risks. The church frowns on suicide, you know. So he gave in, and we organized a schedule at St. Peter's. Someone phoned him every day to see if he needed to go anywhere or have anything brought to him.”

“Doc Foley said he was trying to convince Kevin to hire some help around the house.”

“Yes, we both were. Everyone knew the volunteer routine wouldn't work forever. He was getting frail; we worried about him falling and not being able to get help. That was another thing. His phone kept going out, and when the repairman would come, he'd never find anything wrong. There was a little fire once, too, one of the times when the phone wasn't working.”

I gasped.

“Yes. Oh, Kevin managed to put it out himself. Didn't do much damage. And eventually he got a cellular phone. But even so, it all added up to a dangerous situation. I'd talked to Doc about a live-in housekeeper, even home health care, but Kevin was fighting tooth and nail against it. In the end, of course …” He held up his hands and shrugged.

“Father, do you think … was his death natural, or … not?”

He thought for a long time, looking at the crucifix on the wall. “I don't see how it could have been anything but natural. He was lucid at first, you know, and of course I visited him in the hospital. He swore to me he hadn't taken any long walks. He'd had a flu shot, and hadn't been anywhere with lots of people to get exposed to bugs, except to mass, of course. And no one in the parish had pneumonia at the time, or even a serious cold.”

There was more to come; I could feel it. At last he raised his head and turned his bright blue eyes on me. “No, I don't see how his death could have been anything but natural. That's why I haven't been to the police. And yet, as I hope for heaven, I'm sure that it wasn't. I firmly believe my old friend was murdered, and I'll pray every day that you find out who did it.”

H
E'S
another one.”

“Another what?” I grabbed Alan's arm as I stumbled over an unexpected curb in the middle of the campus. “What are you talking about?”

“Another of your ‘nice people.' You assured me that most of the inhabitants of Hillsburg fell into that category, and I was a trifle skeptical at first. But Father Kennedy fits the description. And the police officer who took the time to make certain the cats were safe. And the young woman at the courthouse.”

“Yes, well, I've found out lately that there are quite a few of the other kind, too. And one of them killed Kevin.”

Alan cleared his throat, but I rushed on before he could say anything.

“Oh, I know you'll say we still don't have any evidence, and we don't. But we know now, for sure.”

“Actually,” he said mildly, “what I was about to say was that we now have a good deal of evidence. We know that certain things happened. When we can determine exactly when and how they happened, we'll be a good deal further on.”

“But that's just what we can't do! We can't go around asking people exactly when Kevin's brakes failed, or when his tricycle was stolen. Those are police kinds of questions. And we can't ask Darryl, because he might be the one.”

I started waving my hands in the air. “Alan, this is so frustrating! I feel like Harriet Vane in
Gaudy Night
. She couldn't investigate the Oxford mess properly, because any of the dons might have been the culprit.”

“You'll manage,” said Alan soothingly. “You've dealt with sticky situations before and learned the truth.”

“But that was in England!” I was almost shouting. I looked around. No one was paying any attention to us, but I lowered my voice. “I'm a stranger there, or at least an eccentric American who doesn't count. People will talk to me. It's entirely different here! This is the town where I grew up, and most people know me. Even the ones who don't can at least find out all about me if they want to, and they certainly won't talk if they have anything to hide. Oh, Alan, it's so stupid, but I can't seem to accomplish anything here on my own turf. And Kevin was counting on me!”

My voice had risen to a wail again. Alan steered me to a bench and sat down with me, his arm around my shoulders.

“My dear, I think we need a little distance from all this. It's not like you to lose your sense of proportion. Regardless of one's belief system, it's certain that Kevin is no longer troubled about who killed him. One way or the other, he's beyond worry. The concern is ours now. Our sense of justice and your love for Kevin demand that we continue the pursuit. But not, I think, just now. It's a splendid day. Haven't you some favorite haunt we could explore, just for a treat?”

I leaned back against his sturdy arm and sighed. “I'd feel like I was lying down on the job.”

“Come, now. There's no hurry, you know. Evidence isn't going to vanish now. Most of it is already gone by this time. If Kevin's death is to be solved, it will be solved not by the cigarette ash or the incriminating footprint but by”—he tapped his temple meaningfully—“the little gray cells.”

I giggled. Alan wasn't made to play Poirot; he's way too big and way too British. “Oh, I suppose you're right. And very good for me, my love. I do get carried away, don't I?”

“Just a trifle, now and again.”

“Well, then. Let me think. Clifty Falls is only about half an hour away. That's a state park just outside Madison that Frank and I used to love, especially in the fall. Or there's Madison itself. It's a beautiful little town with lots of nice old houses. Well, old by American standards. Victorian. They do a tour of them every year just about this time.”

“Right.” He stood and pulled me up. “We'll make a day of it. Do you want to change clothes?”

We ended up in the tiger sweatshirts. They were just right for Clifty Falls, which was cool in the shade. The sun sifted down through russet and gold leaves, making dappled patterns on the forest floor. We wandered the trails almost alone, the heavy park traffic had vanished with the passing of summer. I kicked through drifts of fallen leaves, listening to the crackle and smelling the sharp, dry perfume. “I feel about ten years old,” I told Alan. “It's all I can do not to run and jump in a big pile of them.”

We eventually found most of the cataracts that give the park its name, climbing steep sets of wooden steps up or down to vista points. At last, tired and sated, we stopped for a rest.

“It's a lovely place, Dorothy. A bit like parts of Scotland.” Alan had found a patch of sunshine and was sitting in the cushiony fallen leaves, his back against an oak tree. “I can understand why it's a favorite spot.”

“Mmm. Funny you should mention Scotland. This place is entirely different from Iona, but it provides the same sort of solace to the spirit.”

“It's the quiet, I think.”

A waterfall not far away provided a constant rush of background noise. A squirrel overhead in the oak tree chattered angrily at us, a blue jay jeered from the top of a white pine, and all the sparrows in the world, congregated in nearby bushes, tweeted and twittered their eternal soprano gossip. I smiled and agreed. “Nice and quiet.”

We sat in the noisy quietness, occupied with our own thoughts. Mine inevitably turned to our puzzle, and my peace of mind began to seep away.

“What is it, my dear?” asked Alan at last.

“Hmm?”

“You sighed.”

“I did?”

“Deeply. A long, gusty, nobody-knows-the-trouble-I've-seen sigh.”

I did it again, resentfully. “I was thinking about Kevin.”

Alan pushed himself away from the tree trunk and clasped his arms around his knees. “Feeling a bit sorry for yourself, are you?”

“Alan!”

“Dorothy, you've been moping about ever since we arrived in Hillsburg. Don't you think it's about time you told me about it?”

“I have not been moping! Well, maybe a little, but …”

Alan waited.

My fingers found an acorn and began to peel off the close-fitting cap. “It's childish, I suppose. I—this isn't home anymore!” My chin quivered. I gave my serious attention to the acorn, peeling off one thin strip of papery cap, then another. “I thought,” I said when I was sure my vocal cords wouldn't betray me, “that things would be the same, that people would be the same, that I would—would fit in here, the way I used to.” I threw away the acorn, now denuded, and started on another.

“You also thought,” said Alan gently, “that you would dazzle your friends with your English husband and stories about your detective expertise. Instead you find yourself—what? Rejected?”

“No,” I said shortly. Alan was trying to help. I would try to be fair. “Not rejected, exactly. Just—set aside. Unimportant. Not in the scheme of things anymore. And also—ineffectual would be the word, I suppose.”

“You think you've accomplished nothing to solve Kevin's murder?”

“Well, have I?”

“Of course you have, and if you'd let your mind dwell for five minutes on the case instead of on your hurt feelings, you'd know it.”

I glared at him. He reached over and took my hand.

“Put down that silly object you're so busily shredding and listen to me. You've let your feelings overcome your good sense, my dear. You've been bombarded by conflicting emotions ever since you arrived in this country. Outrage at the physical changes in your old environment, shock at the changes others perceive in you, grief at Kevin's death, frustration at your inability instantly to solve a murky problem. I've watched your self-confidence erode, day by day, despite the fact that you've kept doggedly working away at your puzzle. Now, my love, it's time you snapped out of it.