Several police cars were waiting at the end of the residential street in Lexington when McGuire and Lipson arrived. The detectives introduced themselves to the uniformed officers and instructed two of them to watch the rear of the house in case one Robert Kennedy Griffin should try to escape.
The house was a low ranch-style design, smaller and less impressive than its neighbours on the street, painted a robin’s-egg blue with white trim. A white picket fence ran around the perimeter of a lawn, which was succumbing to weeds.
“The kid, you really think he’s going to be here?” Lipson asked as they mounted the flagstone steps. Lipson had withdrawn his .38 police special and was holding it discreetly at arm’s length by his side. The uniformed cops had unbuckled their holsters and stood at the base of the steps, their hands resting casually on the pistol grips, their eyes anything but casual as they watched the lace curtains in the windows.
McGuire said no, he didn’t, but he placed his hand inside his jacket, lightly touching the grip of his own holstered revolver. With his other hand he reached out and rang the doorbell as Lipson stood to one side.
Chimes echoed inside the home, and McGuire heard the click-click of high-heeled shoes from within.
The door swung open, revealing a petite fair-haired woman in her forties, with sharp features beneath what used to be called a “sensible hair-do”—short and curly, neatly framing the high forehead and plucked and pencilled eyebrows. The nose was slim and turned-up, the eyes deep-set, the mouth a Cupid’s bow coloured with lipstick a shade too crimson.
She wore a shirt-waist, red gingham dress and dainty, white sling-back shoes. She smiled uncertainly at McGuire, but there was no fear or tension in her voice.
“Yes?” she asked. Her eyes found the two uniformed officers on her front yard and widened for a moment, but the smile remained.
“Mrs. Griffin?” McGuire asked.
“Yes?” Not just the same word as before; the same tone, the same inflection.
“Do you have a son, Robert Kennedy Griffin?”
In his years as a cop, including almost ten as a uniformed officer, McGuire had often been the bearer of disastrous news to parents and relatives. The procedure was unchanged: ask if the deceased lives at this address; ask if he or she is at home; when told they are not, ask to enter the home and break the news inside, beyond the gaze of neighbours and passersby.
But the procedure was well known to civilians. Uniformed police enquiring about the whereabouts of a son or daughter are not bringing news of a lottery prize. They bring only tragedy and adversity, an advisement of arrest or a quiet request to proceed downtown and examine remains.
McGuire expected the predictable response from the woman at the door, who seemed to be posing in a Donna Reed wardrobe, as though she were about to praise a laundry detergent. He waited for the hand to fly to the mouth, the eyes to open wide and begin to glisten, the chin to quiver, and the voice to rise in a wail of fear and panic.
But there was none of these expected reactions. The smile remained as broad as ever. The voice was steady—too nasal to be attractive, but firm and precise. “Yes, I have,” she answered. “But Bobby’s not here at the moment.”
McGuire felt Lipson relax beside him. “Would you know where we could find him?”
She leaned slightly through the door to see Lipson’s bulk hovering near the door frame. The detective smiled and nodded silently. “Bobby hasn’t been well,” she replied. “He’s at a hospital in Boston.”
“No, I’m sorry, he’s not,” McGuire said. He showed her his identification. “I’m Lieutenant McGuire, this is Lieutenant Lipson. May we come in and look around?”
The smile never wavered. “Of course you may.” She stood aside and welcomed them in. Before entering, McGuire turned and nodded silently at the uniformed cops.
The living room was filled with flounce and lace, flower-patterned slipcovers on overstuffed furniture, plastic flowers in coloured glass vases, stepped end tables topped by figurine lamps, and sentimental pictures in cheap brass and wood frames. In the corner to his left McGuire noticed a small, inexpensive electric organ. To his right he heard water running and turned to see an artificial waterfall flowing over plastic rocks into a plastic pool surrounded by stiff, green plastic plants. Directly above the waterfall a plaster statue of the Virgin Mary raised its hand in blessing. Her bare feet projected from beneath the hem of her robe; the toenails had been painted red.
“Mrs. Griffin,” McGuire said gently, “with your permission I would like to invite two of the Lexington police officers who are outside to come in and search the home for your son. I don’t have a warrant with me, but I can assure you I could have one here within the hour.”
The smile remained maddeningly unchanged. “That won’t be necessary, Lieutenant,” she replied. “Please invite them in. My home is open to anyone. Incidentally, please call me Muriel. Why don’t I make us some coffee while they look?”
McGuire glanced at Lipson, who shrugged, then returned to the front door and called to the officers.
The kitchen was separated from the living and dining area by a low divider. While she filled the coffee pot, Muriel Griffin called across to McGuire, “Incidentally, what does all of this have to do with Bobby?”
“We’d like to speak to him about the priest murders in Boston, Mrs. Griffin,” McGuire answered. He remained standing in the middle of the room, anticipating a shocked reaction. Facing him above the sofa was a photograph enlarged so much its details had become fuzzy and the texture rough and grainy. It was the picture of a man in his late twenties, wearing military dress. McGuire recognized him as the same man whose photograph he had seen in Bobby’s room at Lynwood Institute.
Two uniformed officers entered behind Lipson, touched their caps and nodded to Bobby’s mother. Lipson followed them down a short corridor, speaking quietly.
“Hello!” Muriel Griffin called out cheerily as they disappeared. “I’m sorry,” she said to McGuire as she filled the coffeemaker with water. “What were you saying about Bobby?”
“Mrs. Griffin . . .” McGuire walked towards her. “We think your son may be involved in the murders of three priests and a known homosexual in Boston.”
Muriel Griffin was counting spoons of coffee as she dropped them into the filter basket. “Five . . . six . . . seven . . . eight. That should do us, shouldn’t it, Lieutenant? Eight cups should be enough, don’t you think?”
“Mrs. Griffin—”
“You’re not going to call me Muriel, are you?” she said a little sadly, but still smiling.
McGuire leaned on the divider separating him from the kitchen counter. “Mrs. Griffin,” he said slowly and distinctly, measuring each syllable as precisely as she had measured the coffee grounds, “listen to me. We have a warrant for the arrest of your son on suspicion of four counts of first-degree murder.”
“I heard you, Lieutenant.” Muriel Griffin turned from the counter to open a cupboard door behind her. “You think Bobby had something to do with those horrible killings recently. Do you prefer sugar or would you rather have some low-cal substitute? I’ve gotten used to Sweet ’n Low because it seems recently I put on weight just like that.” She snapped her fingers, her back still facing McGuire. “Best I put out both, I suppose.”
McGuire stood watching her in stunned silence as she arranged cups on a tray, spread cookies on a plate and brought everything around the corner of the divider, humming all the while. He listened carefully and recognized the melody; it was “I Feel a Song Coming On.”
“Oh, good,” she said as she set the tray on the plastic laminate coffee table. McGuire could hear the heavy footsteps treading down the hall. “Just in time for your friends to join us.”
Lipson emerged from the hallway, followed by the uniformed cops. He looked at McGuire and shook his head silently.
“Mrs. Griffin, this is all very kind of you,” McGuire said across the divider. “But it is essential that we find your son as quickly as possible. Would you have any idea where he is?”
“Goodness, I assume he is at the Lynwood Institute,” she replied, folding several paper napkins into a fan design.
“He’s not.”
“Well, perhaps he is playing tennis somewhere. Bobby is a very good tennis player.”
“Mrs. Griffin,” McGuire said impatiently, “I can’t stress just how important it is that we find your son. For his sake and for the sake of others. Now, please tell us where we might locate him.”
She flashed her maddeningly sweet smile in McGuire’s direction. “Lieutenant,” she replied. “If the good people at Lynwood do not know where Bobby is, and you and all of your people don’t know where he is, then only God knows. And since He knows, He’s taking care of my Bobby. I know that. I’ve always known that.”
The coffee made, Muriel Griffin rounded the corner carrying it with her slim arm extended. McGuire noticed her plain gold wedding ring.
“I feel a little naughty, entertaining four big, handsome police officers here all alone in my house!” she giggled. It seemed as though McGuire’s plea for assistance had simply never occurred. “Please help yourself to the cookies, gentlemen. The fudge ones, they’re Bobby’s favourite.”
“When was the last time you saw Bobby?” McGuire asked, picking up the cue. He, Lipson and the two uniformed officers sat uneasily on the edge of the flowered sofa and chairs. The cops munched noisily on the cookies.
“Oh, it’s been a while now.” She was filling Lipson’s cup. “How’s that? Is that enough?”
“At the Lynwood Institute?”
“Yes.” She looked at each in turn, smiling pleasantly. “Does everybody have their fill? Good!”
“How was he when you saw him?”
She chose a side chair, sat back in it and crossed her legs. “Bobby looked wonderful! We had a spat that day, but it was nothing important.” She waved her hand, banishing the thought. “Parents and young people, they’re bound to have little disagreements. Even with a child like Bobby.”
“Your son, what kind of child was he?” Lipson enquired.
Muriel Griffin’s face lit up, and her smile grew even broader. “Angelic! From the first moment I saw him, I knew I had been blessed by God and by heaven.” She closed her eyes. “Goodness, if you could only have seen him. His father and I, we felt as though we had been chosen to bring perfection into the world, even perfection born of sin.”
“I suppose every parent feels that way, ma’am.” It was one of the Lexington police officers; he had drained his coffee cup and now sat balancing it on his knee.
For the first time, Muriel Griffin’s sunny composure disappeared, and her eyes snapped open, filled with fury. “Of course they do, officer. But I’m telling you this was different. Bobby was different. He was filled with grace and purity. You could see it in his eyes, in the way his face glowed when he sang in the church choir and when he prayed and when he would encounter a sister or a father on the street.” She gestured as she spoke, her hands jabbing the air or describing arches in front of her face. “As a little boy three, four, five years old he would walk right up to a father and ask ‘Have you talked to God today?’ He was born in heaven and he belongs to heaven and heaven watches over him every day of his life.”
She looked at each of the men in turn. “Oh, you poor, poor people, never to have seen the beauty and the heavenly grace of my Bobby. Everything flows through my Bobby’s fingertips. When he took piano lessons, he won his class recital each year. And have you seen his art?”
“Yes ma’am,” McGuire answered. “We’ve seen his art. Your son is certainly an extremely talented young man. There is no question about that.”
She rewarded his comment with a smile. “More coffee, gentlemen?”
The Lexington officer bold enough to suggest that Muriel Griffin’s parental pride might not be unusual stood uncomfortably and looked down at McGuire. “You mind if we wait in the car, Lieutenant?” he asked. “Should stay on call. And we can watch the house easily.”
McGuire said sure, he’d check with them before leaving. Muriel Griffin, the cop’s comment forgiven and her outburst forgotten, jumped to her feet and escorted him to the door, praising the wonderful spring weather they were being blessed with.
“How’s the rest of the house?” McGuire asked Lipson in her absence.
“Ozzie and Harriet meet the Wizard of Oz,” Lipson replied from the corner of his mouth. “You gotta see it.”
McGuire nodded as Muriel Griffin returned to her chair and smiled at each detective in turn. “Now then,” she said. “I understand you want to talk to me about my Bobby.”
For the next hour Muriel Griffin spun tales of her son Bobby as boy soprano, altar boy, athlete and artist. She wove her deep abiding Catholic faith among the stories like a fibre blended to strengthen the fabric of her life. It was an existence too idyllic to be real, too positive and optimistic to hold either tragedy or disappointment. During the telling her frozen smile and flashing eyes faltered only twice.
The first time was in response to McGuire’s question about her husband’s death. She turned and stared reverently at the grainy photograph suspended over the sofa.
“Bobby’s father was a hero,” she replied. “He died serving his country, and that’s the way he would want to be taken to God, I know. I know it for a fact.”
“Your husband, I understand he was killed in Vietnam,” Lipson said.
“Yes, that’s right. His aircraft was shot down.” She turned away from the picture to look at the detectives again. Her expression changed. The smile still tilted the corners of her mouth, but everything else was blank, and McGuire realized he was looking at a mask. “He survived the crash,” she said without expression, “but was hunted down by the enemy and tortured to death. Terribly, terribly tortured.” She looked back at the photograph. “And now he’s in heaven, waiting for Bobby and me.”
“How old was Bobby when this happened?” McGuire asked.
“Six. He was six years old.”
“It must have upset him a great deal.”
“It changed him,” she answered, looking at the men again. “He worshipped his father. His father was next to God himself. And when I told him how his father had died, and that his father was a great hero who would have wanted Bobby to follow in his footsteps, Bobby became more intense. Oh, he was still lovable and sweet and tender.” The mask dropped, and the eyes lit up again. “My Bobby couldn’t be anything else. But it was as though everything that had made my husband such a leader of men, so brave and so dedicated, all of it was suddenly transferred to my Bobby.”
The mask appeared a second time when McGuire asked if she had any photographs of her son they might see.
“I have no pictures,” she replied briskly.
McGuire said he was surprised that a parent so proud of her son would have no photographs of him.
“I had,” she said solemnly. “But Bobby destroyed them . . . in his bad times.”
“His bad times?”
She nodded. “About four years ago. Just before our doctor suggested we send Bobby to the hospital for treatment because . . . because of his problems.”
“What problems, Mrs. Griffin?” McGuire asked softly.
She lifted her chin and bit her bottom lip. The mask remained in place. “Bobby was struck dumb by the sight of God,” she said defiantly.
“He told you that?”
“No. How could he tell me if he was struck dumb? I know. I just know. Everything pointed to it, and Brother Halloran agreed.”
“Who is Brother Halloran?”
Muriel Griffin stood quickly and smoothed the front of her skirt. “I really would like some more coffee, gentlemen,” she said sweetly. “Could I get you some? Or more cookies perhaps?”
McGuire withdrew the poetry book from his pocket. “Mrs. Griffin,” he asked. “Do you recognize this book?” He stood and handed it to her. She studied its cover and shook her head. “No. No, I don’t think I’ve ever seen this book before.” She opened its pages. “Oh, poetry. I never read poetry, Lieutenant. Between the Bible and my work at the church and reading all my magazines, there just isn’t any time for poetry.”
“Would you mind looking through it for a moment?” McGuire asked her. “Near the end there is a page with markings on it in red ink. Can you find it?”
She turned the pages carefully, one by one, frowning periodically. Finally she stopped and read aloud: “The death of one god is the death of all.” She looked at the two men over the book. “Why this is gibberish, isn’t it? There’s only one God, and He doesn’t die.” Smiling nervously, she added, “Bobby would call this nonsense. I know he would.”
“Does the next section mean anything?” McGuire asked.
She read aloud again: “The monastic man is an artist. The philosopher . . . appoints man’s place in music, say, today, But the. . . .” She stumbled, then read the rest of the lines silently, her lips moving with the words. When she had finished, she handed the book back to McGuire and smiled at him. “I have no idea what it means,” she said. “But then, I was never very good at literature. I enjoyed mathematics in high school, and I graduated at the top of my class in household sciences.” She sat down again, folding her arms in front of her. “Do you like quilts, Lieutenant? I loved quilting. When I was a teenager, I made a copy of a colonial quilt that was accepted for showing at an art fair in Boston Common one year. My parents drove me there to see it. Back then it was a real treat to go to Boston, not like it is now, with some people commuting—”
“Mrs. Griffin,” McGuire said, interrupting her. “Who is Brother Halloran?”
She watched him for a moment, as though deciding whether to answer. Then, “Brother Halloran has gone to his reward, Lieutenant. He’s been gathered in the bosom of the Lord.” She lowered her eyelids and crossed herself.
“Who was he, Mrs. Griffin?”
She opened her eyes to look back at him. Her hands flew together, and she sat twisting her wedding ring nervously. “He was the man who . . . who told me Bobby had been struck dumb by . . . by the sight of God.”
“How did he know?”
“Because he was a man of God himself. He knew these things.”
“He was a priest?”
“He was a monk.” She took a deep breath and let it out slowly, noisily, and leaned back, her slim, freckled arms hanging over the edge of the chair. “After his father died, Bobby decided he wanted to be a priest. He wanted to serve, to be useful while he was on this earth, like his father had been. When Bobby graduated from high school, we went to visit St. John’s Seminary in Boston.” Her eyes closed in memory. “It was beautiful! Such lovely buildings, so much open space and grounds and shrines everywhere.” Her eyes opened. “But it wasn’t right for Bobby. ‘It’s too easy, Mother,’ he said to me. He thought it would be almost like going to Harvard. The beds were too soft in the dormitory, too many things would be catered for him.”
She lowered her voice and looked directly at the men. “That was Bobby, you see. No one was more intense about serving God than Bobby. No one expected more of himself than Bobby. So Bobby was prepared to experience life as a monk to test and strengthen his spirit before he would live the softer life of a priest.”
The door chimes sounded, and her hand flew to her throat. “More visitors?” she said with a smile, rising from the chair. Her heels clicked-clicked their way to the door.
A uniformed officer was waiting on the stoop. He touched his cap, called her ma’am and told McGuire that a priest had arrived, name of Deeley. “Send him in,” McGuire instructed as Muriel Griffin looked back and forth between the two men, her rose-bud mouth held open in surprise.
Deeley was wearing his black suit and collar. Muriel Griffin seized his right hand and squeezed it, looking up into his eyes and smiling like a schoolgirl with a crush on the high-school quarterback. They introduced themselves to each other, and the woman scrambled ahead of Deeley to offer the chair she had been sitting in, then quickly poured him a cup of coffee and walked briskly into the kitchen, chattering all the while about what an exciting day it had turned out to be and how much her Bobby would have loved to be here to meet this nice, young priest.
“What is this?” Deeley finally asked McGuire and Lipson, his voice lowered.
“It’s her son,” McGuire whispered. “We’re sure of it.”
Deeley lowered his eyelids. “Why?”
“That’s what we’re trying to find out.”
Muriel Griffin placed the plate of cookies reverently in front of Deeley, then edged her way onto the corner of the sofa, beaming at him. McGuire and Lipson, momentarily upstaged, slid along the sofa to make room.
“Do you like the cookies, Father?” she gushed after Deeley had nibbled at one.
Deeley told her they were excellent.
“They’re Bobby’s favourite.” She reached out and touched Deeley’s knee gently. “Are you here about Bobby?”
“I invited Father Deeley here,” McGuire explained. “I thought he might help us understand Bobby.”
Muriel Griffin kept her hand on Deeley’s knee. “Oh, I wish my son were here now. He would love to talk to you about the priesthood. You know, you remind me of him. I mean, just seeing you here makes me think of Bobby and the times when he and I talked about him becoming a priest.”
“Bobby went to a monastery,” McGuire interrupted, speaking to Deeley. “Wanted to be a monk. Why don’t you tell us all about it, Mrs. Griffin?”
Bobby’s mother ignored the suggestion. “Have you met the new bishop?” she asked. “Tell me, what do you think of him?”
“Mrs. Griffin—” McGuire began.
Muriel Griffin turned on McGuire, fury lighting her small eyes. “Please, Lieutenant! You come into my home making silly suggestions about my son, unbelievable things you think he might have done. The least you can do is allow the father and I to discuss matters of the church!”
It was Kevin Deeley’s turn to reach out. He took her hand, and when she looked back at him, he said, “Mrs. Griffin, I would be delighted to share some stories with you about things at the archdiocese. Even a little gossip perhaps. But right now why don’t you tell me and these two gentlemen about this monastery your son visited?”
She’s practically wetting her pants, McGuire mused, watching Muriel Griffin melt under Deeley’s gaze. He could pick her up and cart her off to a bedroom right now if we weren’t here.
Muriel Griffin finally wrenched her eyes away from Deeley’s and looked down at her lap. She toyed with her wedding ring as she spoke.
“Bobby had heard about an order in Brookline, over near Hancock Village—”
“The Order of Cesena?” Deeley interrupted.
She looked up and smiled at him. “Why, that’s right, Father.”
“Monks?” Bernie Lipson asked, looking up from his note pad. “We’ve got monks in Boston?”
“All the major orders are here,” Deeley nodded. “Plus Greek Orthodox, Coptics and spin-offs like the Cesenas.”
“Bobby said they were small and not very wealthy but trying to do good things. Like the Jesuits, he said. They’re trying to be a bridge of knowledge between the people and the Church, like the Jesuits.”
“You know something about these guys?” McGuire asked Deeley, who nodded in reply. Turning to Muriel Griffin, he said “You told us Bobby graduated from high school when he was sixteen. He was eighteen when he entered Lynwood. Where was he for those two years? At this monastery?”
Muriel Griffin continued twisting her wedding ring as she spoke. “Yes. He was learning the life of the ascetics. Studying scriptures and trying to find himself through simple work.”
“What happened when he came home?” McGuire asked softly. “Did he come back from the monastery catatonic? Unable to speak?”
She didn’t reply, not until Deeley reached across and touched her hand again. “Please answer him, Mrs. Griffin,” he said. “Please tell him what happened to Bobby at the monastery.”
“Bobby had seen God,” she answered boldly. “Brother Halloran told me that’s what happened to him. He had laid eyes on the glory of God and the Blessed Virgin.”
“You know where this place is?” McGuire asked Deeley, who nodded. “Let’s go,” McGuire said.
Muriel Griffin rose with them, distressed. “Father, you’ll stay, won’t you?”
Deeley begged off, saying he would return perhaps the next day, when he would be pleased to discuss her son and his ambitions for the priesthood. The promise seemed enough for Muriel Griffin. “Take comfort,” Deeley said as they stood at the open door.
“Comfort?” she asked, confused. “I have my comfort and my peace of mind, Father.” She smiled, smoothing her dress and patting her hair.
“About your son, I mean.”
The smile didn’t fade. “My son is fine, Father,” she said. “We stay in touch. He phones me often. In fact, he called me just last evening.”
McGuire and Lipson froze in place. “He did?” McGuire asked. “Where was he? What did he say?”
“I don’t know,” she replied defiantly. “Bobby never speaks. He never has to. He just calls and I hear . . . I hear him there, I can feel him there. Sometimes he’s so caught up in the grace of God that he just cries quietly like he did for so long after his father died. And I hear him crying, and I tell him I love him. He doesn’t say a word. But I know it’s Bobby. I know it’s my Bobby.”