Read Murder at the National Cathedral Online
Authors: Margaret Truman
“So?” April Montgomery asked.
“So, it means that the murder of Priestly now differs in two ways from the murder of Singletary. Not only was the same type of murder weapon, which could have been coincidental, left at the scene in Priestly’s case, and not in Singletary’s, but robbery might have been the motive. It certainly wasn’t where Reverend Singletary was concerned. His wallet hadn’t been touched.”
“Meaning that two different killers were involved,” Joy Collins offered.
“Meaning only that such a possibility exists.” Smith asked what their reaction was to MPD’s announcement the night before that the possible murder weapon in the Singletary case had been found. Their collective reaction pretty much paralleled his and Annabel’s—namely, that the circumstances under which the weapon had been found were more interesting than the weapon itself. Bob Rogers, who tended to be the most reticent of Smith’s students, suggested that whoever placed the candlestick in the Children’s Chapel and called the police obviously knew who the murderer was and had been hiding the weapon in order to protect his or her accomplice.
“Then why would this person come forward now and lead the police to the weapon?” Smith asked.
“Maybe they had a falling-out,” Joe Petrella said.
“Possibly, but why just lead the police to the weapon? Why not place an anonymous call and inform the police of the murderer’s identity?”
“Maybe they didn’t have that much of a falling-out,” April Montgomery said, the hint of a rare laugh in her voice.
Smith smiled and changed the subject to the FBI sweep of Word of Peace.
April said, “I knew you’d bring that up. If you hadn’t, Professor Smith, I would have. Reverend Singletary was involved with that organization. It seems to me that any one of those lowlifes arrested last night could have killed him.”
Smith raised his hands into the air. “Wait a minute,” he said sternly. “Simply because a movement dedicated to something worthwhile is tainted by certain individuals is not cause to paint that organization with a broad black brush.”
“I agree,” said Joyce Clemow. “But do you think Reverend Singletary might have been doing something … well, dishonest, or destructive, or even disloyal?”
“No, I do not think that is much of a possibility. I think
Reverend Paul Singletary was a good man whose goodness led him, at times, into situations he would have been better served by avoiding.” Smith looked at his watch. “All right, on now to the subject of effective plea bargaining.”
As Smith was about to leave the building, Dean Jaffe’s secretary handed him a three-page fax that had arrived from Jeffrey Woodcock in London. It was a column in a British tabloid. Woodcock had scribbled on top of the first page,
“Thought you’d be interested in this, Mac.”
The article began:
The brutal, grisly, bloody murder almost two weeks ago of an Anglican parish priest named Priestly in the peaceful Cotswolds raised little interest outside of local authorities there. But this reporter and this newspaper have recently learned that the deadly blow to Priestly’s head might not have come from some lob looking to empty the priest’s pockets of his meagre belongings, despite the fact that the slain clergyman’s wallet was found days later in a neighbouring village. To the contrary, the wielder of the life-taking candlestick could well have represented an intelligence organization, even our own esteemed MI5, whose service to the Crown has not been without incidents of snuffing out life for the “greater good.”
Highly-placed sources who have agreed to speak with this reporter only on the condition that their names not be revealed claim that the Reverend Priestly lived a life far more exciting than administering last rites to dying sheep farmers. In fact, according to these highly-placed sources, Reverend Priestly had been asked to leave the military service under questionable circumstances early in his career. A copy of Priestly’s military discharge papers obtained by this reporter lists the reason for his severance from the service as “official,” a term often used by military
authorities to get rid of a troublesome person without saying anything good or bad about him.
Seems Priestly’s dirty deed had to do with a joint naval exercise between British and U.S. troops. According to our highly-placed sources, the Reverend Priestly, a decidedly left-of-center chap, walked away with some extremely sensitive videotapes on which the latest military technology was demonstrated in living colour. Our sources tell us that he passed those tapes on to a friend who shared his bleeding-heart tendencies. The identity of that friend is unknown, although this reporter is in the process of tracking him down.
The article went on to outline in sketchy terms more of Priestly’s background. Then it got to Word of Peace.
The Reverend Priestly was involved in a number of causes, local and international, most notably Word of Peace, a group whose professed purpose is to bring about peace on earth, but whose members evidently had less spiritual things on their agenda. A number of leaders of the movement were recently arrested in Washington, D.C., and charged not only with using funds raised for peace to line their own pockets, but with harboring a sizable nest of political operations. An Anglican priest named Paul Singletary, who was murdered in Washington’s National Cathedral, was a leading voice in the organization. Whether he would have been arrested, too, must remain conjecture, but our highly-placed sources assure us that he was a close friend of the slain Cotswolds priest, and we have further learned that he served with Reverend Priestly during that joint naval exercise. Whether Singletary was, indeed, the friend to whom Priestly passed the classified videotapes is unknown at this time. It is known, however, that Priestly had recently indicated to a close friend—perhaps Singletary, who visited with him in the
Cotswolds only days before his own murder—that he was about to make public what he knew about the flim-flam going on within Word of Peace. That, of course, would be sufficient reason for that organization, or at least someone from it, to silence him forever.
But there is more. Other highly-placed sources have informed this reporter that Reverend Priestly had been recruited by our own intelligence organization, MI5, and that he did its bidding to avoid having his unsavoury military indiscretions exposed. Was the Reverend Priestly about to blow the proverbial whistle on MI5?
Stay tuned.
Smith finished reading the fax, shoved it into his briefcase, and headed home. He and Annabel had discussed how little they really knew about Paul Singletary. But if there were even a modicum of truth to the suggestion that he’d passed classified tapes, he’d been a total stranger.
Clarissa Morgan watered plants in the villa on Virgin Gorda that had been rented for her. She then left the low white house carrying a small yellow carry-on bag, which she placed on the passenger seat of a white Toyota Corolla that had been leased for her. She opened the driver’s door, paused to look out over the shimmering azure waters that surrounded the British Virgin Islands, got into the car, and drove slowly around the island until arriving at Beef Island Airport, where she parked and entered the terminal. She knew she’d been followed by the same man in the Toyota minivan who’d been her shadow since her arrival in the BVI. She didn’t care, had never bothered to find out who he was. It didn’t matter. She knew
why
he followed her, and
who
had told him to. That was enough. It was all enough. “Enough!” she’d said to herself two days ago after returning home from dinner at a local restaurant. “Enough!”
“Your flight is delayed, Miss Morgan,” the petite, pretty native ticket agent said.
“How long a delay?”
The agent looked at her computer terminal. “Probably only a half hour.”
“Not so bad,” Morgan said, thinking that for Air BVI it represented being ahead of schedule. “Thank you. I think I’ll have some tea.”
The ticket agent watched the woman cross the small lobby and thought, Nice to deal with a visitor who doesn’t take a delay as a personal affront.
The man who’d been standing near the door approached the agent. “I overheard you telling that woman that her flight was delayed. Is that the flight to New York?”
“No, it’s to San Juan.”
“But it connects to flights to New York.”
“It can. It connects with many flights.”
“Thank you.”
The man, whose cheeks bore the spidery red lines of a heavy drinker, looked around the lobby as though in a state of confusion.
“Is there something else I can help you with, sir?” the agent asked.
He was startled at her voice. “No, no, thank you very much.” He walked in the direction of the small concession stand that sold coffee, tea, and sweets. He stopped a dozen feet away and watched Clarissa Morgan as she was handed a Styrofoam cup, paid the attendant, and went to a bench against the wall. Once seated, she looked at him and smiled. He turned away, glanced back, then went outside.
A half hour later Clarissa Morgan gave her boarding pass to the attendant, climbed the drop-down stairs, and disappeared through a door. The man went to a public phone. He pulled a dozen scraps of paper from the pocket of his soiled safari jacket, cursed, dropped several others to the ground, picked them up, cursed again, and found what he was looking
for. He put on glasses, leaned close to the phone’s dial pad, and slowly, tentatively, punched in numbers. The operator came on the line, and the man gave her a long series of numbers. “Collect,” he said. “Make it collect. Tell them this is Dedgeby from the BVI.” His accent was Cockney. He waited for several seconds, and then heard the sound of a phone ringing. After four rings a crisp voice said, “Yes.”
“A collect call from Mr. Dedgeby in the British Virgin Islands.”
“Hold on.” After a minute of static and crackling, the person said, “Go ahead.”
“Give me Control.”
“Hold on,” the man on the other end said. Seconds later another voice came on the line. “Mr. Dedgeby. What do you have?”
“The Morgan woman. She’s getting on a plane for Puerto Rico.”
“Is that so? Perhaps she has friends there.”
“I don’t know anything about that,” Dedgeby said, wiping perspiration from his brow. He didn’t like making a living watching other people. It was too demanding. But it paid well. Besides, it was that or jail. He preferred spending his days and nights in one of the local places, drinking rum. You couldn’t do that when you were told to watch somebody, had to be on tap all the time, waiting for them, spying on them, taking away time better spent with friends over some Pussers.
“Mr. Dedgeby.”
“Yes, I’m here.”
“You say she’s boarding a flight to Puerto Rico. Has it left yet?”
“No, it’s bloody well still here. These people don’t know how to run an airline. Probably sit out there in the heat for another hour.”
The man on the other end said, “Thank you for the information, Dedgeby.” A loud click broke the connection.
Dedgeby got into his battered minivan. It threatened not to start, but it eventually did, and he drove off, talking to himself, a smile on his face. “Bloody glad she’s gone. Hope she never comes back.”
“Leighton here,” Brett Leighton said into the phone.
“Sir, we received a call from Dedgeby in the BVI.”
“Yes? What did he have to say?”
“Miss Morgan has boarded a flight for San Juan, Puerto Rico.”
“I see. Is that her final destination?”
“Dedgeby didn’t know, sir.”
“Yes. Well, thank you for calling.” He hung up.
Two hours later Brett Leighton, wearing a new tweed suit tailored for him at P. A. Crowe in a way that accommodated his slightly leftward leaning posture, boarded a Concorde flight to New York. Once settled, he removed a piece of paper from his inside jacket pocket on which was written a flight itinerary, commencing in the British Virgin Islands and terminating in New York, with a two-hour layover in Puerto Rico.
“Foolish woman,” he said quietly.
The man seated next to him turned. “Pardon?”
Leighton smiled. “Nothing, sorry to disturb you. Nasty habit I have of talking to myself at times. Shan’t do it again.”
His seat companion smiled, too, and went back to his magazine.
Foolish woman, Leighton thought, silently this time. Involving women in such projects was always a mistake, in his judgment, and he’d expressed that view to his superiors on more than one occasion. Too emotional, too impetuous. Too likely to fall in love with the one person they shouldn’t. Here she was, promised a chance to stay alive if she’d just stay put. Well, he could have put someone on her in San Juan, but he believed that he knew where she was heading.
“Cocktail, sir?” a flight attendant asked.
“Yes, I think that is much needed. I’ve taken to talking to myself,” Leighton replied pleasantly. “Gin, a double, and please withhold the ice.”
That Afternoon—Indian Summer Fading Fast
Upon returning home from class, Smith placed a couple of calls to Terry Finnerty at MPD. He was informed on the first one that Finnerty was away from his office but would return shortly. Smith left his number, but decided not to wait for Finnerty to return his call. He tried again twenty minutes later. This time Finnerty was there.
“Congratulations, Terry,” Smith said, “on picking up the murder weapon.”
“Sometimes you get lucky.”
“I read that you got a tip from an anonymous caller.”
Finnerty chuckled. “Nothing but good citizens out there.”
Smith ignored the cynicism. “It was a man who called?”
“Yeah.”
“What did he say exactly?” Smith asked.
“I’ll read it to you. ‘You’ll find the weapon used to kill Reverend Singletary on the altar in the Children’s Chapel in the National Cathedral.’ ”
“Couldn’t have been plainer than that,” Smith said. “As I recall, the person who reported Singletary’s body was a woman.”
“That’s right.”
“Any doubts about the candlestick?”
“Whether it’s really the weapon? Nah. No question at all.”
“Thanks for your time, Terry. Just wanted to keep in touch.”