When I arrive at the suite, Honey and Spiro are sitting in the living-room area. Honey, in a navy knit couture number, is crying. Maybe last night isn’t forgotten after all. Could Honey’s night have been similar to mine? Did she wonder how she could have let some petty remark undermine what could have been a bonding moment? And what is Spiro doing here? Is this some sort of family intervention?
“I’m sorry, Tanzie, but the Hyatt doesn’t do room service at lunch,” Honey stutters through sobs. “Ryan said he could pick something up for us.”
Her reaction to having to modify a lunch order seems extreme, but after last night, I’m not sure how well I judge my sister’s moods and reactions. Clearly, sensitivity isn’t my strong suit. “Is that why you’re crying, Honey? It’s okay, really,” I say in a lame attempt to appease the situation.
Honey gives me an incredulous look, and again I turn to my childhood friend for some help. Spiro gives Honey’s hand a couple of pats, and then he stands up and walks toward me.
“Mrs. McCrery died last night,” Spiro says. It’s a calm priestly voice that showcases years of experience with similar painful situations. I exhale and say nothing, because I can’t think of anything to say. I feel a bit ridiculous for having misread the situation so profoundly. Sitting down next to Honey, I put my arm around her, expecting tension. But there isn’t any. Instead, Honey collapses onto me as if we’re the closest of confidants.
“Was she sick?” I look over at Spiro, who has positioned himself on an occasional chair across from the couch.
“Gunshot wound,” he says again, using his professional voice.
“Murder?” I ask.
“Self-inflicted,” Spiro says sadly. Honey shakes her head.
“She killed herself?” I ask softly.
“So it appears,” Honey says, dabbing her eyes. I resist the urge to point out that I may have been right last night about Tina, so I instead get up and grab a bottle of water out of the mini fridge.
“Let me fix you a cup of tea, Honey,” I offer, but my sister shakes her head. I don’t know what to do. I pour a finger of scotch and bring it over to Honey. At first she waves it away, but after I put it down on the table next to her, she concedes and takes a sip.
“Can I ask you something, Spiro?” I say. “Is it possible that Tina was stealing from St. Benedict’s?”
“I don’t believe it,” says Honey emphatically. “I know people. She was absolutely not a dishonest person.”
“What do you think, Spiro?” I ask again, not wanting a repeat of last night’s drama.
Spiro looks uncomfortable. “I can’t comment,” he says. “Listen, I just stopped by to say goodbye to you, Tanzie. I’m being transferred to a parish in Fresno tomorrow.”
“Fresno? Why?”
“I’ll tell you why,” chimes in Honey. “Archbishop Mauriello doesn’t want you snooping around. That’s why!”
I wait for Spiro to offer a rebuttal or say something reassuring—that this reassignment is a coincidence, that it’s normal—but he doesn’t say anything for some time.
“I’m leaving tonight, and I need to get packed,” he finally says, and he walks across the room and gives me a goodbye hug.
“Spiro, do you want me to continue with the investigation?” I ask. As I see it, Tina McCrery, as the bookkeeper, was the only one who had the opportunity to steal from St. Benedict’s. Now she’s dead, so what would be the point of bringing her crime to light? There’ll be a new bookkeeper now, which means that the thefts will stop. As far as I’m concerned, the case is closed.
Spiro doesn’t answer right away. “Probably not,” he says finally, shaking his head. “I really can’t talk about this right now. I’m sorry, Tanzie. You came all the way out here to help me.”
On the one hand, I’m hugely relieved. If he’s letting me off the hook, my penance is over. I can graciously back out of my commitment to Spiro, complete my audit for CoGenCo, and then get on with my life. On the other hand, it’s a huge coincidence that Spiro is being transferred just after the bookkeeper’s death. Something here isn’t right.
A knock on the door interrupts my thoughts, and Ryan appears with some salads, which he places on the dining table.
“I really need to go and spend the rest of the day with my mother,” Spiro says. “She’s very upset about my transfer. She’s eighty-five, you know.”
“I can’t believe she’s eighty-five.” I can’t believe I’m fifty-five, for that matter. “How did we all get so old?”
Spiro smiles.
Vreseis Cosmo was a fixture at my house growing up. She and my mother would talk for hours over coffee while Spiro played with my sisters and me. We considered the Cosmos family, since Spiro was an only child and we had eight.
“We’ll take care of her, Spiro,” Honey says, looking up from her scotch. “The O’Leary girls will take care of her. Except for Tanzie, that is. She lives in Houston.” Her voice is low. Scotch infused. “Tanzie, you need to move back here to San Francisco, and you need to start going to church again.”
Does she really expect me to pack up and move to the most expensive city in the world, just like that? I’m getting annoyed here, but I know she’s upset, and I was the one who poured her the scotch.
After Spiro leaves, Honey sits down at the table with me. She blows her nose and wipes it repeatedly before looking up. “I’m not hungry,” she says, pushing the salad away.
I am hungry, and I start eating my salad, which is a marvelous Crab Louis with avocado.
“I meant what I said about Archbishop Mauriello,” Honey says after a few minutes, “and Spiro knows that something’s going on. I think Tina told Spiro something before she died, but Spiro can’t say anything.”
“Why not?” I ask. “She’s dead.”
“A priest can never divulge a confession, even after the person dies,” she explains. “It’s sacred. I know Mauriello, and he’s … he’s a snake.” Honey purses her lips, stopping herself from going on. Maybe it’s considered un-nunly to rant about an archbishop. “He is so pompous, tooling around the Bay in his yacht. Taking all the who’s who of San Francisco up to some boutique winery in Napa for ‘retreats.’”
I perk up here a bit. “He has a yacht?” I ask. “Not much of a vow of poverty going on.”
“Priests don’t take a vow of poverty, Tanzie. Not unless they’re Jesuit.” Honey reminds me once again of my Catholic knowledge gap.
“Where does he get his money, then?” I ask. “Is he from a rich family?”
“Hardly,” she says. “Did you know he was a street thug as a teenager?”
How would I know that? I think, but I just shake my head.
“Sister Ignatius told me,” she continues. “He was in and out of foster care and juvenile detention until one of the priests took an interest in him and sent him to a Catholic group home. He became a star athlete at the Catholic high school in Morristown. He seemed to turn his life around. Then he joined the seminary and began his climb up the hierarchy.”
“That sounds like a great story, Honey,” I say. “Don’t you believe people can change?”
“Absolutely I do. I’ve seen it,” Honey says emphatically. “But he doesn’t have any family money, so how can he afford a yacht? I did a little research on my own, Tanzie. I Googled red flags for embezzlers. Living beyond their means is number one.”
I am well acquainted with those red flags but, in the interest of family harmony, decide to let her school me on the subject. And the truth is, she’s right, although there are plenty of people who live way beyond their means without pilfering to solve their problems. Still, controls that might prevent theft are often lacking in small organizations, and the head honcho usually has plenty of access. It’s not impossible that Mauriello is the thief, but that certainly doesn’t explain why Tina would kill herself. My money’s still on the bookkeeper.
“Look, Honey,” I say. “Even if he is stealing, there’s nothing for me to do. Spiro said he thought we shouldn’t continue with this investigation.”
My sister lowers her eyes, and I sense a seclusion episode looming.
“I’d like to clear Tina’s name,” she says, breaking the silence. “I don’t want people thinking her sad death was because she was a criminal. Tina would never steal from such a wonderful organization as St. Benedict’s, and I don’t want anyone thinking that she would.”
“Who thinks that?” I ask.
“You do.” Honey takes the last bit of scotch in her glass and walks over to the bar to put it in the sink. She leans with her back resting on the cabinets, arms crossed.
I fish around for more bits of crab on the plate. I’m down to just the lettuce and hardboiled egg.
“Honey, really. What do you want me to do?”
“Nothing. Nothing, Tanzie. It’s all right. Just go back to Houston, and don’t worry about anyone but yourself.”
Oh God, here it comes—classic Catholic guilt trip. I’m getting tired of it, and I’ve just made up my mind to tell her I’m leaving for Houston as soon as I can, when I get up to fetch another bottle of water and bang my shin on the table leg.
“Ouch!” I shout.
I look at Honey and shake my head. I get the message, I say to myself, sitting back down.
“Okay, so tell me why you think the archbishop is the one who’s embezzling,” I say calmly once I sit back down. “Even if he is suspicious in your eyes, couldn’t there have been plenty of other people responsible?”
“Because of Spiro’s transfer,” she answers. “Why now, right after Tina died? The day after, even? Spiro’s been here for years. What’s so urgent that he needs to leave right away?” Honey asks.
“I don’t know.” I shrug.
“Well, I do,” she says. “I think Tina knew the archbishop was stealing, and she told Spiro that before she died. Her final confession.”
“All right,” I say. “Then why did Tina kill herself? Why didn’t she just tell the police? Don’t Catholics go to Hell if they commit suicide? That’s what I remember from Catholic school.”
“They’ve softened their position. You would know this if you hadn’t left the church, Tanzie.”
I let the remark go by, offering it up to Tina McCrery, who could probably use some help given the circumstances. Honey reaches down and takes two bottles of water from the refrigerator. She hands one to me, and I thank her for reading my mind.
“I understand that you’d prefer to just go home and forget about this whole situation,” she says, “but can you just tell me, before you do, how I should do an investigation? Can you just help me do this? Is that too much to ask, after all I’ve done for you?”
I’m still not convinced. As suspicious as Mauriello’s yacht is, we didn’t see anything unusual in the bank statement. There’s an accusation but no evidence at all. It’s the opposite of Westwind, where the whole situation is full of red flags, yet I know for a fact that the accusation is false. All this makes no difference to my sister, though, and I can see that she will not give up.
I sigh. “Yes. For as long as I’m here, I can help you,” I say finally.
She doesn’t look surprised. “All right, tell me where to start,” she says.
“Can you somehow get a hold of the rest of Mrs. McCrery’s—I mean, Tina’s—accounting records?”
“Great. Maybe we can break into the archbishop’s office?” my sister, the nun, suggests.
“Breaking into offices is not what I do for a living,” I say, wondering if Spiro somehow divulged my confession to my sister using some ecumenical technicality. “Where is the archbishop’s office?”
“Near Geary and Franklin,” she says. “Over by St. Mary’s Cathedral. It’d be easy for me to run over there for the files quickly, before you get back this evening, and then we’ll look at them together tonight.”
It’s not presented as a choice, so I give Honey the list I gave Spiro, updated to exclude the documents he’s already given us. Then I mumble an expletive as I look at my watch. It’s five minutes to two.
“Thank you, Tanzie. This means a lot. God is on our side, and he will thank you, Tanzie. You’ll see. He works in very mysterious ways.” The comment is sincere, but I can’t help feeling exhausted from having been sucked back into an investigation I thought I’d shed. My penance continues, it seems. Perhaps the good Lord will help me keep all the plates spinning.