When I came downstairs with Eddie the next morning, Joseph and Jack were fixing a sumptuous breakfast. While I fed Eddie, or at least tried to guide the food into his mouth, Joseph described the sunrise with great enthusiasm.
“I don’t remember the last time I saw the sun rise over the ocean,” she said. “It was just wonderful. Even without my usual sleep, I feel energetic.”
We ate heartily, Tina’s notebook on the table.
“You know I have to turn that over to Curt Springer,” Jack said.
“It’ll probably just reinforce his theory that Tina killed Ken, and Dodie killed Tina.”
“Tina may well have killed Ken,” Jack said. “What do you think, Sister Joseph? You haven’t expressed many opinions on our double homicide.”
Joseph laughed. “And it’s presumably the reason for my visit. Well, I’ve been accumulating facts and opinions, and I do have a few things on my mind. First, it’s not out of the question that Tina murdered Mr. Buckley. But if she did, I would have to assume that she did not walk into his bedroom, put a bullet in the back of his head, and walk out, whether she set fire to the house or not. No one has come up with the slightest motive for her to kill him, including her notebook. So we would have to imagine that she had a conversation with him in which he disclosed something quite terrible to her, so terrible that she used the gun she had brought along just in case.”
“So what’s the motive?” I asked.
“Since, according to Tina’s own notebook, she did not find any indication that ‘Uncle Bill’ was killed in a fight, drowned in the ocean, fell down dead of a heart attack or stroke or any other event in the police file, it would have to be something that Mr. Buckley was himself involved in or had direct knowledge of. Now, it’s rather too unlikely that Buckley himself killed ‘Uncle Bill.’ It really stretches the imagination to think that Tina stumbled on the killer quite by chance when looking into the Great Fife. It’s more likely that Bill’s disappearance is connected with that fire, and that Buckley knew about it because, as a fireman, he was personally involved in it.”
“I don’t mean to break your train of thought,” Jack said, “but it’s been nagging at me that there’s one person we haven’t talked to who might have direct knowledge of that fire, the police chief at that time, Jerry O’Donnell.”
“He’s in Key West, I think,” I said.
“I can do better than that. Curt gave me his phone number on one of my visits and I just haven’t thought about calling him. How’s about now?”
“I think you should,” Joseph said.
Jack dialed, as I worried about the phone bill we were leaving behind. Mel would have to get it for us so we could—
“Yes, I’m looking for Jerry O’Donnell…Chief O’Donnell,” Jack began, explaining the who and what of his phone call.
We sat back and listened, although it sounded as though Jack wasn’t getting very much from the retired policeman. There was more small talk than substantive conversation, but when Jack hung up, he looked like someone who had just made chief of detectives.
“O’Donnell had the day off. Someone in his wife’s family got married that day, and he didn’t get back till late Tuesday to see the ashes.”
“Then we haven’t missed anything from him,” Joseph said.
“There was one titillating bit of information,” Jack said, his lips curling in a smile. “O’Donnell said that when he was away from Fire Island, he always appointed someone to stand in for him. Usually it was the fire chief—who’s dead now by the way; he died a couple of years ago—but the fire chief turned him down that day because of the picnic, and he was going home that afternoon. So he got someone else. He picked Ken Buckley.”
There was a collective “Ahh” from Joseph and me, and Eddie, sitting on the floor, looked up and pointed at Joseph, calling, “Doe, Doe,” as though he wanted to join in the fun.
When we finished laughing, I said, “This is really very neat. Whether the firemen were called or the police were called, Ken Buckley would be there. And I bet he wrote up the police file on the Great Fire.”
“Which we’ve never seen,” Jack reminded us. “All we know about that file is what Chief La Coste told Tina and Tina put in her book. Which wasn’t much.”
“If Ken Buckley was trying to hide something,” Joseph said, “I doubt whether the police file would tell us much.”
“But what are we talking about? Did Tina’s Uncle Bill burn down the Norrises’ house? And if he did, what happened to him? And why would he do it?” I turned to Jack. “I wish we could find Dodie Murchison. Maybe Tina told her something she didn’t write in her notebook.”
I got up and dialed the number yet again with no success. This time I waited for the machine to answer and I left a message: “Dodie, this is Chris Bennett Brooks. Please talk to us. We’ll be in Blue Harbor till Sunday afternoon, then at our home.” I dictated the numbers, although I was sure I had already left them yesterday.
“Sister Joseph, I have to apologize. I interrupted you when I called Jerry O’Donnell. You were telling us what you’ve come up with, and I hope you can still remember what you were going to say.”
“Yes, absolutely. Don’t worry about interruptions, Jack. Each one seems to add something important, and that call was no exception. I agree that it would be nice if you heard from Attorney Murchison, but it would be especially nice if it turns out she didn’t murder Tina. Because if she murdered Tina, it’s simply an angry lover getting revenge. If someone else murdered Tina, the reason may lie in what happened at the Great Fire, and that’s what interests me. I can’t tell you who Uncle Bill is or whether he was Tina’s father, as she hoped he was. But I think something happened that night in the Norrises’ house that led all these years later to Tina spending the summer across the street and to the death of Ken Buckley. More than that, I believe there are people here on Fire Island, including the Hersheys, who know exactly what happened and who have kept it secret all these years.”
“Because they were involved in it?” I asked.
“Possibly. Possibly because withholding information is a crime and they have reasons why they can’t tell what they know. Possibly because they were involved in some way in whatever happened. And I don’t think Mrs. Norris left a pot of stew on the stove when they went home. And she doesn’t think so, either.”
“I see why you dash up to St. Stephen’s whenever you need help,” Jack said. “I like the way you think, Sister Joseph. I like the way you look at things.”
“This has been a new and really very gratifying experience. I was able to look at the faces of those who had direct knowledge, to see their discomfort, to observe their dodging the truth or how they explained away facts that displeased them.” She turned to me. “I see why doing this kind of work holds your interest. It certainly complements the teaching of poetry.”
“It’s different,” I admitted. “And it’s very satisfying. I gather from what you’ve said that you think some of the people we spoke to yesterday were lying to us.”
“Oh, yes. And it comes down to your lost keys, Chris.”
“The keys. I don’t—”
“You’ll see when you think about it. People don’t always lie to keep back the truth. Think about the photos we saw at the Hersheys’, their children now grown up and married. Recall the way people answered your questions or how they didn’t.”
“If Dodie Murchison didn’t kill Tina in a fit of jealousy, what do you think her part in all this is? Why did she go to see Tina the night that Tina was killed?”
“Perhaps just to find out what Tina knew. You told Murchison that you saw Tina leaving the Buckley premises. Maybe Murchison just wanted to check it out for herself, to see if Tina would confirm that she was at the Buckley house. After all, you claimed Tina was there; she claimed she wasn’t. You both gave statements to the police and they contradicted each other. You couldn’t both be telling the truth. Miss Murchison had a couple of reasons to care what happened to Ken Buckley. One may have been romantic. The other, if your sources are accurate, may have been legal. He was her client. She might decide to disclose Mr. Buckley’s legal business to someone who stood to benefit if he signed the papers. But before she does anything, she wants to know what happened, who killed him, who set the house on fire.”
“I wonder,” I said, “if Tina’s search and Dodie Murchison’s business with Ken Buckley are connected.”
“They may be. Murchison told you that what troubled him had happened a long time ago. There’s no telling what ‘a long time ago’ means to any person. But if she’s in her early thirties, a long time ago may mean when she herself was a teenager, and that could be fifteen years ago.”
“I think this is getting more complicated instead of simpler.”
“Means you’re getting there, honey,” Jack said.
Joseph smiled. She seemed amused at how Jack and I interacted. Jack’s a pretty low-key guy, and he’s helped make me a somewhat more casual person than I was when I left the convent.
“There’s another reason Tina may have lied about seeing you at the fire,” she said. “Among the possibilities are that she went to see Buckley, and she found him dead and she ran. Or she went to see him and they had then-talk, and she left before the murderer arrived. I’m not sure why she was there in that coat if that’s what happened, but who knows? Maybe she left him upstairs and went to look for something in the house. Maybe she heard the shot and maybe she didn’t. But one possibility is that she saw the murderer, before or after he killed Ken Buckley, and, more important, that he saw her.”
“And she got away,” I said. “So she had to pretend that she hadn’t been there and hadn’t seen him to protect her own life.”
“It could explain why she lied.”
“It also gives us another motive for her being killed, to keep her quiet. But you know, it doesn’t get Dodie Murchison off the hook. She could have killed Tina because Tina killed her lover, and she could have killed Tina because Tina saw her kill Ken.”
“I’m sure Murchison knows something that will help you,” Joseph said. “I hope you find her before the police do.”
“So do I.” Jack leaned over and helped Eddie find something that had rolled away. “Chris, would you give Ida Bloom a call? She seemed so sure that there was nothing going on between Ken and Dodie except business. Ask her if she knows what the business was.”
Before I had a chance to ask Ida my question, she talked about the funeral yesterday, how many were there, which well-known people showed up, how Eve and her sons had looked. Finally, I asked her about Dodie Murchison.
“You mean the lawyer? The one who came to the house a couple of times?”
“That’s the one.”
“Eve just said Ken had business with her. I didn’t ask and she didn’t tell.”
“Then Eve knew about it.”
“Oh, yes. She mentioned it to me at the beginning of the summer.”
I got off as quickly as I could and reported my news.
“So whatever it was, whether it was the prenuptial agreement or something else, he confided in his wife,” Joseph said.
“Or lied to her,” my cynical husband said.
“I would guess by now Mrs. Buckley could tell a lie from the truth. The fact that she mentioned it to her friend would mean she believed him.”
“That leaves the missing diamond earring,” I said.
Joseph nodded. “My understanding is that earrings for pierced ears are quite secure. Since it wasn’t torn off, we have to assume that it fell off or that someone removed it carefully, either Tina or another person. If it was another person, why take only one? That may be the relevant question.”
When Eddie was napping, Joseph and I went outside to stroll and have our last conversation together before she left. We talked mostly about St. Stephen’s. They had one novice joining the convent in the fall, and I could tell from Joseph’s voice and from her comments that she was worried about the future of the convent. Like so many others, it was aging and little new blood was being added. Joseph was young enough that she had decades ahead of her as an active nun, but there were few of my age and almost none in their twenties. It was depressing to think about, that this wonderful institution might come to an end, especially when the college associated with it had a fine reputation. Already, Joseph had had to hire several secular teachers, one of whom I knew replaced me.
But the nuns who remained were in good health. Sister Cecilia, who was studying nursing in New York, would be returning within a year and she would be able to work in a nearby hospital and care for the elderly nuns in the Villa as well. So ultimately Joseph was upbeat, no surprise to me.
We stopped and chatted with Marti Jorgensen, who was sitting on a chair on the beach in shorts and a shirt. Too cool for a dip today, she told us. But a nice breeze to sit in.
We went back to the house, talking about the Norrises and the Hersheys, what they knew and what they might be holding back.
“What we have to remember,” Joseph said, “is that if Tina went around asking questions, she may have stirred up old memories and old grudges, reminded people of buried truths. I think someone may have gotten scared or possibly may have made a connection that went unnoticed for all those years.”
“And somehow Ken Buckley was part of it and was made to pay for it.”
“Whether he was guilty or not.”
Eddie woke up and then it was lunchtime, first his and then ours. And when it was over, Joseph was ready to leave. Jack carried her little bag downstairs and I put it on the wagon, more so that Joseph could see how things happened on Fire Island than because it was too heavy to carry to the ferry.
She had said good-bye to Eddie when he went up for his nap, and now she said it to Jack, and we left.
“There’s one last thing,” she said, as we approached the bay. In the distance we could see the ferry coming toward the shore, and on the pier were several people with empty red wagons, waiting for friends. “I know Chief La Coste is a dear old man, and he seems like a very kind person and deeply affected by Tina’s death, but I don’t think he’s entirely truthful when he talks about the Great Fire.”
“And other things. I’m not sure where that leaves me.”
“I’m not sure either, Chris. But I believe the Hersheys and the Norrises are also keeping things to themselves. It looks like the ferry is landing.”
“It is. I wish we’d had more time together.”
“So do I, but considering that I dashed out on almost no notice at all, it’s been a wonderful time.”
“For us, too.”
We hugged and I carried her bag to the ferry.
The last thing she said was, “Look for that key, Chris, and when you find it, remember what I said.”
I waited till the ferry pulled away, waving and throwing kisses, feeling teary at her departure although I was deeply happy she had been able to come. When the moving boat became too small for me to see her anymore, I turned and went back to begin our big cleanup.