2024
Melinda had never interviewed a nun before.
It had taken some digging, but it turned out that Sister Mary Michelle, late of Monterey, was now residing in a convent in Pescadoro, only about an hour north of San Francisco. Melinda and Dennis had rented a car and driven up to the convent to meet her face-to-face. Still on edge after what they’d heard from ex-detective Fulton about how his missing-persons investigation had been quashed back in the day, Dennis had spent much of the drive speculating about how the Catholic Church could fit into a nefarious government conspiracy against Gillian, forcing Melinda to remind him that there was absolutely no reason to imagine that the then-twentysomething nun had been anything more than just another visitor touring the Cetacean Institute, enjoying an afternoon outing, back in 1986.
“Naturally I remember that day,” Sister Mary Michelle said, now in her early sixties. “Especially after what became of that nice Doctor Taylor afterwards.” She shook her head mournfully. “That poor woman. I’ve always wondered what happened to her.”
The interview was being conducted in a cozy outdoor garden behind the main convent building. Secular to her bones, Melinda felt a bit out of place, but she got a good vibe from the older woman, who seemed quite hale and hearty and easy to talk to. She was a far cry from the stereotypical stern, intimidating disciplinarian. Rosy cheeks warmed a round, open face. Melinda could easily visualize a younger Sister Mary Michelle oohing and aahing over George and Gracie one sunny afternoon long ago.
“Why don’t you take us through what you remember in your own words?”
“Gladly. Sister Mary Christine and I were part of a large group of visitors—maybe a dozen people or so—being given a guided tour of the institute by Doctor Taylor. She started out with a brief lecture about whales and how they were endangered, then took us outside to see George and Gracie in their tank. After that, she led us downstairs, where we could view the interior of the tank through a large underwater window. We were watching the whales through the window when this one fellow swam down and joined the whales, who didn’t seem all that alarmed by his presence. He even swam up to one of the whales—Gracie, I believe—and placed his hands against her head. At first, I thought maybe it was part of the exhibition, but then Doctor Taylor, who’d had her back to the window as she spoke to us, noticed the man in the tank… and she was not amused, to say the least. She dashed upstairs to deal with the situation, leaving us behind, and that was the end of the tour.” The nun paused to reflect on her memories. “Imagine my dismay when poor Doctor Taylor was reported missing later that week.”
Melinda nodded. So far this gibed with what she’d heard secondhand from Fulton. She’d also reached out, via email, to Bob Briggs, who confirmed that Gillian had discussed the incident with him afterward but that she had assured him it was no big deal. According to Briggs, she had been much more concerned about the imminent departure of George and Gracie; the business with the swimmer had been mentioned only in passing, which is why it had slipped his mind, compared to the more dramatic events of subsequent days.
“What can you recall about the man who swam with the whales?”
“Oh, I noticed him right away, even before he slipped away from the tour to dive into the tank. He was quite distinctive, with his long white robe and all. There was something very dignified and rather otherworldly about him. I remember wondering if he was a Buddhist monk of some sort.” She smiled impishly. “Call it professional curiosity.”
Melinda was grateful for the nun’s sharp memory. “Did you get the impression that Gillian knew or recognized him? Like possibly she’d had problems with him before?”
“No, but he spoke up when she was telling us about the dangers posed to whales by whaling. He seemed troubled that they were being hunted to extinction.”
“Can’t blame him there.”
Melinda had been pleased to discover that the humpback population had made a remarkable comeback since the eighties, thanks in large part to a ban on commercial whaling back in 1986; according to one report, humpback whales had rebounded to more than ninety percent of their numbers prior to the advent of modern whaling, even if other forms of marine life still struggled with the effects of pollution and climate change. Melinda liked to think that Gillian would be pleased by the humpbacks’ recovery, wherever she was.
“Nor I,” Sister Mary Michelle said. “You should have seen the gruesome footage of whales being butchered Doctor Taylor showed us at the beginning of the tour. Most disturbing.”
It sounded to Melinda like the nameless swimmer had good reason to be troubled by what he heard on the tour, despite Fulton dismissing him as a flake or pothead.
“About the man in the white robe, did he seem like he was mentally disturbed or possibly on drugs?”
“Not at all.” Sister Mary Michelle appeared surprised by the question. “To the contrary, he struck me as very thoughtful and composed. I was totally bewildered when he suddenly appeared in the tank with the whales. And so was his companion, from the looks of him.”
“Companion?”
Melinda’s pulse sped up. This had somehow escaped Fulton’s notepad.
“Oh, yes. There was another gentleman with him during the early part of the tour. I recall wondering how they knew each other, since the other man did not appear at all monkish.”
“No white robes? Unworldly air?”
“Far from it. As I recall, he was a handsome fellow with a confident manner. Blessed with movie-star good looks.”
“Good-looking?” Melinda had heard that description before, very recently.
Sister Mary Michelle grinned. “I’m a nun, not blind. Although truth to tell, I found the other man—the swimmer—even more compelling somehow. He had a certain… magnetism… to him that certainly drew my attention.”
“Uh-huh.” A wild idea distracted Melinda from the nun’s musings. Taking out her phone, she called up the sketch of Gillian’s mystery pizza date, which Fulton had been persuaded to let her take a photo of. She showed the portrait to Sister Mary Michelle. “Any resemblance?”
The nun squinted at the phone. “Why, yes. I’m almost certain that’s the gentleman who was with the swimmer that afternoon. How is it you have a drawing of him?”
“A confidential source.”
Ohmigosh, Melinda thought, her mind racing to connect the dots. Why had Gillian been dining out with an associate of the robed interloper who had messed with her whales just hours before, the night before she was last seen?
She and Dennis had tried to track down the waiter who had served Gillian and her date at the pizza place nearly forty years ago, only to discover that he’d died in a motorcycle crash several years later. Dennis, of course, had found this suspicious, despite her assurances that people were killed in traffic accidents every day, so it was hardly beyond probability that someone from 1986 might not have survived to the present. Heck, Melinda considered themselves lucky that so many principals from back then were still around to be interviewed.
“Does this help you?” Sister Mary Michelle asked. “If you don’t mind me asking.”
“No problem. To be honest, I have no idea what this means yet, but the plot is definitely thickening.”
“Well, I do hope you find out what became of Doctor Taylor. I only met her briefly, but she seemed to have a good heart, especially where her whales were concerned. I do hope nothing dreadful happened to her.”
Me too, Michelle thought. “Who knows?” she said to lighten the mood. “Maybe she ended up taking holy vows?”
“Stranger things can happen.” Sister Mary Michelle blessed Melinda with a smile. “Would you believe I used to be a runway model? Did beer commercials too.”