Harlot's Moon (18 page)

I felt confused and lonely, and terribly sorry for myself.

I tried to kiss her but she moved away just in time to avoid me.

"I'd better get these in there before they get cold," she said.

T
he Wilsons lived in an expensive area of the city, in a formidable house of glass and brick with strong linear roof lines and three balconies. By now, I had my headlights on and all the time I was angling my way up the steep curving asphalt drive, I sensed eyes upon me. Probably somebody peering out from one of those wide but cunningly concealed balconies.

A new Mercedes Benz four-door sedan and a two-door BMW were parked outside the attached three-stall garage.

Twilight had turned the sky a purple color that I always associate with the Nevada desert. Birds cried intense and lonely songs in the hardwood windbreak on the west side of the house.

As I walked up to the door, I breathed in some of the expensive air. It smelled and tasted fresh.

Ellie Wilson opened the door. "Mr. Payne. I'm surprised to see you."

"I'd like to talk to Bob, if that's possible."

"Why, of course. But it probably would've been better if you'd called ahead. He's on the phone long-distance with his brother right now. Sometimes they talk for more than an hour. One time they talked two hours."

If she was nervous about me meeting Bob, she hid it well. She was dressed in a tailored black and white hound's-tooth suit. Her blonde hair was swept back into a loose chignon. The effect of the hairstyle emphasized her long and elegant neck, and the fine classical bones of her face. The suit made me wonder if she was just getting in, or going out.

"Why don't I get you something to drink," she said, "and then I'll let Bob know you're here."

She stood back to let me into the house. "I should apologize for the scene at the restaurant."

"Thank you - but it really wasn't your fault."

"Are you here to talk more about Father Daly?"

"Yes."

"I just hope we can get this wrapped up soon. It's already hurting the fund-raising, according to Bob. He had lunch at his country club this afternoon and several of the men there said they'd rather hold the checks they pledged. They want to see where this all leads."

"Where it leads?"

"You know, if there is some kind of scandal involved."

I shrugged. "A priest being found murdered in a motel room is already something of a scandal, I'd think."

We talked as she guided me through the house. The foyer led to a step-down living room with a dramatic sloped ceiling, a huge fireplace and three sliding glass doors. The air was even more expensive inside than it had been outside.

I sat in a leather armchair near the darkened fireplace.

"A beer for you, or a drink?"

"Diet Pepsi if you've got it."

She laughed. "Don't let my husband hear you say that. He doesn't trust people who don't drink. He says that they have something to hide and that they're afraid it'll come out."

"I'll still take a Diet Pepsi."

Losing points with Bob Wilson didn't exactly intimidate me.

She started to walk away and I said, "You never did explain how your earring got in Father Daly's room the other night."

"No," she said, looking at me bluntly. "I guess I never did, did I?"

She turned and walked out of the room.

I felt sell-conscious sitting in the armchair so I got up and walked around. The sunken living room was like a gladiatorial pit, the weapons of choice being the innuendo and insult and smirk favored by the country clubbers Ellie had mentioned earlier. Their weapons were every bit as deadly as the spears and knives and hand-axes favored by the Roman gladiators.

There was an antique table in one corner, covered with family photographs.

There were five Wilsons: Bob, Ellie and two girls and a boy. The kids all looked healthy and sane. Bob managed to swagger even while he was standing still to pose. All of Ellie's photos depicted a woman with a distinct air of melancholy about her. The most intriguing photo showed a sweet-faced Ellie at age five or six, two of her front teeth gone, being held up in the arms of a slight, handsome man in a DX service station uniform.

"That's my father," she said from behind me, "on the happiest day of his life. He came back from the Korean War with a badly fractured leg and nightmares about how he'd been tortured as a prisoner of war. He hadn't finished high school so his options were limited. He spent fifteen years working in gas stations owned by other people. Then on his fortieth birthday, he opened his own station. That's the photo you're looking at."

"Even back then you looked a little sad."

I set the picture down, turned around, and accepted the glass of Diet Pepsi she handed me.

"I didn't care much for my mother," Ellie said. "She went out a lot on my father, and it eventually broke him. Spiritually, I mean. He was always sure she would change someday but she never did. I guess some of his sadness rubbed off on me."

That didn't fit in with what I'd been told about Ellie's mother being super-religious. Or maybe it did. Maybe she'd punished Ellie so harshly to assuage her own guilt. And maybe Ellie had done the same to her children.

None of this was anything I could ask about.

"Just what we need," Bob Wilson said. "More psycho-babble. Didn't you get enough of that with Father Daly?"

He'd obviously been listening. He was also obviously unhappy.

He wore a white button-down shirt, V-neck brown sweater, tan chinos and white running shoes. He carried a drink the color of honey. Scotch, I assumed.

"Ellie loves drama," he said. "She can never get enough of it, can you, dear?"

"Just the way you can never get enough of bimbos, I suppose."

He laughed. "We're giving you a taste of our home-life, Payne. But believe me, it can get a lot rougher than this." He went up and put a fond arm on Ellie's slender shoulders. "I need women in my life, and she needs grief. We're a perfect match."

"I'll leave you two alone," she said, sliding out from his heavy arm. "I'll talk to you later, Robert."

When she was gone, he said, "The first thing I want to do is apologize for the scene I made in the restaurant. I'm a total ass sometimes. You want some scotch?"

"No, thanks."

"Let's sit down."

We sat in facing leather armchairs and he said, "You don't have anything in mind where my wife's concerned, do you?"

"You mean like sex?"

"I mean exactly like sex."

"She's a beautiful woman."

"And that translates to what? That you're going to try and spear her?"

"Such an elegant way of putting it."

He'd been wrong about himself. He wasn't an ass sometimes. He was an ass all the time. He was perfect for heading up a parish committee. Such posts usually go to pious hypocrites like him.

"I'm not here to talk about your wife, Wilson. I'm here to find out what the hell you were doing in Father Daly's motel room the other night."

"That's a damned lie. I wasn't anywhere near there."

"I've got an eyewitness who says you were. An eyewitness any district attorney would love to put on the stand."

Right, I thought. And just pray Tommy Hubbard didn't bring up his association with the Rangers or mention the fact that he probably hadn't been gainfully employed for several years.

Wilson sipped his scotch and stared at me.

Then, quietly, he said: "You're not bluffing, are you?"

"No, I'm not."

"It was that sonofabitch two doors down, wasn't it? Some old deadbeat, right? I saw the bastard out of the corner of my eye. I just kept on walking."

"Why were you there?"

"None of your business."

"Legally, you're right. I don't have any authority to make you explain yourself to me. But I can always call the police."

He waved a thick angry hand. "For her. For Ellie. Why the hell else would I go out there?"

"Why for Ellie? Why did she need help?"

"She wasn't going to see him anymore. She couldn't take the way he was obsessed with her. They never slept together or anything like that — she wouldn't let it go that far. But she was pissed at me for one of my little escapades and so she started seeing him as a counselor and then one thing led to another and he was in love with her."

He shook his head. "They're all fucking crazy at that rectory. Father Ryan yells at people in the confessional and Father Daly wasn't happy unless he was getting parish women to fall in love with him, and even your friend the Monsignor—" He stopped himself.

"What about my friend, the Monsignor?"

He shrugged. "He's a piss poor leader. Only reason the Archbishop gave him the gig is because he used to be such a big deal in sports - Steve Gray, I mean. All the talk going around about priests being fags and child molesters, the Archbishop figured it'd be a good thing to have a sports hero for a Monsignor. Strictly PR. Your friend Gray couldn't run a fucking one-pump gas station, let alone a big parish like St Mallory's. I run the god-damned thing. And even he'd tell you that if he wanted to be truthful."

"You didn't finish telling me why you were in Father Daly's room the other night."

He sipped some more scotch then sat back, visibly relaxing as he did so. He must have felt in control again.

"He called her early in the evening, Daly did. I picked up and listened to them talk."

"There's nothing like privacy."

"Hey, the guy's trying to fuck my wife. Why should I give him any privacy?"

"You think Ellie listens in when your bimbos call?"

He sulked. Nobody had treated him this badly in a long time.

"Look, asshole, what I do is my business. You understand?"

"What did Father Daly say on the phone?"

He sighed. "Said he needed to talk to her. Said he just wanted her to come out for a little while. To the Palms. The room he usually had. Anyway, she did. She felt sorry for him. He gave her a whole raft of shit about how he'd leave the priesthood and run away with her, if she'd agree to divorce me. The sonofabitch was so pathetic, he got her to give him one of her earrings. As a memento, he said. She got home and I confronted her and she told me everything and I decided to go out and pay him a visit myself. Which I did. I wanted to tell him to keep away from my wife, or I'd call the Archbishop of the Hilton diocese - this diocese - and Father Daly would be out."

"And he said what to all this?"

Another sigh. "He didn't say anything. He was dead when I got there."

"Describe the scene."

"What?"

"Tell me exactly what you saw when you got there."

He told me. Nothing much had changed from what I'd observed when I'd met Steve Gray out there.

"Then what did you do?"

"I went and had a couple of drinks at a bar. I was real shook-up and confused. Then I just drove home."

"Why didn't you call the police?"

"Are you crazy? I didn't want to get involved."

"You have any idea who killed him?" I said.

"None."

"Maybe Ellie killed him."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"It's always a possibility," Ellie said, coming back into the room. Her glass was filled with the same amber liquid her husband was drinking.

She came over and sat on the arm of his chair. "I could have killed him, Bob."

"Could have. But didn't."

She caressed his hand. "Or maybe you killed him."

"I was mad enough to but I didn't."

She took his hand and set it on her very nice thigh, his big possessive bear paw of a hand, and when I saw them sitting there like that, I once again felt like a rube, because there was something that I profoundly didn't understand about their relationship. For all her complaints, she clearly got some kind of satisfaction from being with him; and for all his faithlessness, he was still caught up with her.

Or maybe there was some kind of spiritual S&M that I didn't want to know about in their relationship.

"I didn't kill him, Payne," Wilson said. "Just to put your mind at ease."

"And I didn't kill him either, Robert," Ellie said in her nice, quiet, polite voice.

"I don't think he believes us, dear," Wilson said, and then let out with one of his looming laughs.

I set down my glass and stood up.

"I'll be going."

"He's pissed," Wilson said.

"Bob, you've goaded him enough," Ellie said. "Then: "Let me walk you to the door, Robert."

"No, thanks," I said.

I started walking.

"Or maybe I did kill him, Payne," Wilson said from behind me. "Maybe I was drunk and I just don't
remember
killing him.

The booming laugh again.