Murder Makes a Pilgrimage (8 page)

With a bow Pepe went on to outline their schedule for the following morning: breakfast at eight; a tour of the cathedral at ten; dinner at two-fifteen. Mary Helen hoped that Eileen was jotting it all down.

“Tonight,” he said, “you are free. Some of you may be tired and wish to retire early. But for those of you who wish to prolong the evening”—he glanced meaningfully across the table at María José—“the hotel has several public rooms that are open with music for dancing. . . .”

Pepe’s words continued on, but Sister Mary Helen’s mind was already climbing the stairs to her room.

“What do you say, old dear?” Eileen, her gray eyes twinkling, leaned toward her. “Is it to bed or to boogie?”

Mary Helen moaned. “I am exhausted. How about you?”

Eileen nodded in agreement.

“I can’t quite figure out why.” Mary Helen squirmed out of her chair. “Is it jet lag or the heavy food?” She gathered up her pocketbook. “Maybe it’s the wine.”

“Perhaps, just perhaps, mind you”—Eileen followed her as she threaded her way through the crowd—“it’s our age.”

Mary Helen stopped short. Pushing her bifocals up the bridge of her nose, she glared at her friend. “I prefer to think it is the wine,” she said, “don’t you?”

Five minutes after they turned out the lights, Mary Helen was wide-awake. Maddening, she thought, struggling to find a comfortable position. Not a half hour ago I thought I’d fall asleep in my dessert. Now I’m in bed, and I can’t even doze.

“Are you awake?” she whispered, hoping Eileen had the same trouble. Her only answer was a soft, rhythmic snore.

Irked, Mary Helen rolled onto her side, punched up her pillows, and tried to think sleepy thoughts. The sound of laughter floated up through the floorboards, and a familiar tune, although for the life of her she couldn’t remember the words.

Footsteps came down the corridor, one set, two sets; then a loud burst of conversation. Mary Helen strained to hear. Although the words were muffled, the tone was abundantly clear—red-hot anger!

A door slammed, and Mary Helen pulled the covers up over her ears. The band switched to a raucous number, and the floor seemed to vibrate with the beat.

“Eileen,” she whispered, hoping for company. No response. How can anyone sleep through that? Mary Helen wondered, pushing back the covers. She lay in the darkness with her eyes shut. Was it jet lag? If she had it, why didn’t Eileen?

Suddenly the room seemed very stuffy with the musty odor of old furniture and the heavy red velvet drapes taking over. Air! That was what she needed: some cool night air to help her sleep.

She tiptoed across the room, fighting down the urge to jiggle Eileen’s bed. Although from the sound of things I could jiggle to my heart’s content and she’d never notice, Mary Helen thought with a twinge of envy.

Mary Helen pulled back the heavy drapes and flung open the window. To her surprise the Plaza del Obradoiro was filled with people, all kinds of people. It was as if darkness had brought the city roaring to life. She remembered reading in one of the books in the Hanna Memorial Library that at night Santiago de Compostela changes into a colorful, fascinating maelstrom. It was colorful and fascinating, all right, but from where she stood hardly dangerous. If anything, at least this part of Santiago seemed bright and cheerful and contented.

Large groups of students laughed and cavorted with one another. Children ran and played tag while their mothers gossiped. Older couples peacefully circled the plaza, passing bustling tourists laden with shopping bags. A policeman, his nightstick protruding from his yellow rain slicker, stopped to chat with a couple of men in berets. Amid them all a lone flutist stood beside his open case. A few sprightly notes floated up on the night air. Listening, Mary Helen felt a pang of sympathy for the boy’s mother, who had probably hoped for a Spanish James Galway.

She leaned farther out the window. The ledge was wide enough to sit on, and she was tempted to try it, maybe even dangle her feet. Only the thought of slipping and landing in the plaza in her nightdress stopped her. Not that she would have any particular worry if that did happen. It was Eileen who would be left with some fancy explaining to do to Sister Cecilia and the other nuns, especially Therese. Mary Helen amused herself thinking about what decorous Therese would say about such a fall from propriety. She chuckled at her own pun and wished Eileen were awake.

Outside, marbled clouds gathered around the apricot
moon, and Mary Helen smelled rain in the air. Poor Therese! Although she could drive you to drink without a cent in your pocket, she did try to be kind. Much as Mary Helen hated to admit it, they probably would need her umbrellas.

A sudden volley of sharp, angry Spanish took her by surprise. Whoever it was had just stepped out the front door of the
hostal
and was directly below.

She leaned out as far as she dared and caught a glimpse of a head and an ornate comb. As the figure stalked across the plaza, Mary Helen recognized María José. She squinted. Was that Pepe trailing her?

As impervious to those around her as they were to her, María José gesticulated furiously, stopping now and again to turn on Pepe and stab at him with her finger. Pepe, gesturing every bit as wildly, continued to dog her until the two of them disappeared behind one corner of the cathedral.

“What’s the matter?” Eileen’s groggy voice startled her.

“Nothing. I just can’t sleep.”

“Get into your bed, old dear. That might help.”

“I was in bed,” Mary Helen began, exasperated, but it was too late. Eileen had drifted off again.

Mary Helen sighed. Maybe that was good advice. Besides, if she stayed there in front of the open window, her feet were bound to get cold. Once that happened, she would never get to sleep.

Back in the soft, roomy bed she pulled the covers up over her shoulders and tucked her toes into the end of her nightdress. Dance music seeped up through the floor. The band was playing a medley of “oldies but goodies.” Maybe the guests were winding down. From the sound the band certainly was.

Resolutely she closed her eyes. But her mind refused to shut off and wandered downstairs. Were the other tour members still there or had some gone off to bed? By dessert Cora
had looked exhausted. Were the Fongs enjoying themselves? Odd little man, Dr. Fong. Did he dance? She’d bet Rita did.

And the DeAngelos. Was Bootsie still sitting, tight-lipped, ignoring her husband, or had they made up? She hoped so. Obviously María José and Pepe had not. Too bad!

With Pepe gone from the
hostal
, who was with poor Heidi? I hope she’s still having fun. In fact, I hope they’re all having fun. Mary Helen shifted into a more comfortable position, her thoughts growing fuzzy.

Oddly the only one she wasn’t concerned about was lovely Lisa Springer. Do or die, Lisa would have a good time. Mary Helen would bet money on it. More power to her, she thought dreamily, more power to her.

An angry small girl, whose face was vaguely familiar, but whose name Mary Helen could not quite remember, grabbed both her ankles. Shocked, Mary Helen struggled with this strange girl who carried a load of wet wash in the wicker basket on top of her head.

“Stop it this instant!” she shouted.

The girl simply smiled as if she hadn’t heard and, holding tight, forced Mary Helen’s toes into a large shell-shaped basin filled with ice cubes.

“Now, the soles.” The girl bared her teeth. The left incisor was crooked. The ice clinked as Mary Helen pushed hard against the bottom of the basin and wiggled wildly to wrench herself free from the girl’s icy grip.

“Stop it!” she shouted even louder, and this last shout was probably what woke her. She lay there, heart pounding, relieved that it was a dream. A least part of it was. Her toes were icy cold. The window! She had left the window open.

Shivering, she crossed the room. To her surprise the Plaza del Obradoiro was completely deserted. Except for the patter of soft rain upon stone, all was stillness. The plaza, delineated as it was by four large and beautiful buildings,
picked up the sound. And the low, steady trickle of water filled the quiet night.

Leaning out to pull shut the window, Mary Helen thought she saw someone standing on the steps of the cathedral. She squinted into the shadowy darkness. Probably just a reflection of some sort. In the dim light it looked like a person. But nobody stands that still, especially in the pouring rain.

A cough floated up from the floor below. Someone else must be standing by an open window, she thought, creeping back to her bed. Somebody else can’t sleep. She fluffed up her pillow and closed her eyes, feeling suddenly very tired. Exhausted, actually, and old, like St. Simeon, whose feast had been today. Poor old fellow had wished to live long enough to see Jesus, and as soon as he saw the Child, his first words were
“Nunc dimittis
. . . . Now you can dismiss your servant in peace. . . .”

She wondered, sleepily, if, when his bones began to ache and his eyes began to fail, Simeon regretted his wish. There was a Chinese proverb about being careful what you wish for because you may get it. Odd—isn’t it?—that you must be careful what you wish for, even if it’s seeing the Christ Child or wishing that everyone downstairs has fun.

Carpeted footsteps padded past the bedroom door. Two sets? Three sets? It was difficult to tell. Someone stifled a giggle. The party’s over, Mary Helen thought, wondering what time it was. By now, however, she was too sleepy to care.
“Nunc dimittis. . . .”

Sister Mary Helen awoke with a fierce craving for a cup of good, strong, hot coffee. Blinking, she rescued her glasses and wristwatch from the nightstand. No wonder! It was already seven-thirty.

Except for a gentle sough from Eileen in the next bed, the room was deadly quiet. No footsteps in the hall. No rumble of a chambermaid’s cart. The soft gurgle that water makes after a rain and the bark of a faraway dog were the only sounds she heard. It was as if the whole of Santiago were still in bed.

Orange spears of sun shot through the open drapes, and particles of dust twirled and climbed up the beam. “As thikke as motes in the sonne-beem.” The line from
The Canterbury Tales
popped into her mind, and with it her fellow pilgrims. How were they doing this morning? Surely some must be up by now.

Kicking her feet out of the covers, Mary Helen rustled around, hoping to rouse Eileen. Eileen didn’t budge. “Hopeless,” she muttered, dressing quickly.

With a click the bedroom door closed behind her, and Mary Helen stood in the ornate but empty hallway, wishing she had paid more attention to Pepe’s instructions about time and places for things.

A well-dressed man, looking all business, emerged from several doors down. On a hunch she followed him and with no trouble at all reached the
hostal’s
dining room at about the same time as Cora Bowman.

“Good morning, Sister.” Cora, her cheeks still creased with sleep, seemed genuinely glad to see a familiar face. “I’m dying for a cup of java. How about you?”

Before Mary Helen could answer, an ancient waiter in a stiff white jacket bustled them to a vacant table. Actually most of the tables in the spacious room were vacant. In the center of each a haystack of French rolls, buns, and croissants waited with butter curls and small jelly packets for the hungry to arrive.

“Café con leche, señoras?”
the waiter asked, a silver pot poised in each hand.

Mary Helen hesitated, but not Cora. “Without milk this stuff will put hair on your chest,” she snapped, pushing forward both their cups.

“Buffet.” The waiter nodded toward a long table down one side of the room. It was laden with platters of meat and cheeses, pitchers of juice—orange, pineapple, tomato, grapefruit—mounds of fresh fruit, and boiled eggs in large cockleshell bowls.

“Buffet,” he said in well-practiced English. “When you ready, please help.”

“Did you sleep well?” Cora asked, breaking off the corner of a croissant. Inwardly Mary Helen groaned. She hated to talk before her first cup of coffee, but how was Cora to know that?

Fortunately all Cora needed was an audience. “If you did sleep, it was a miracle,” she said. “What with that big row in the hallway. Enough to wake the dead, if you ask me. Except Bud, who sleeps like a dead man anyway. It would take Gabriel’s
horn to wake him up.” Cora stopped, undoubtedly searching for her original point.

Mary Helen raised her eyebrows to indicate that she was listening and took another sip of the thick, sweet coffee.

“All that racket!” Cora was back on track. “Bud and I had a nightcap downstairs with the others. Then we went up to bed. When we left, they all seemed to be having a ball.” She shrugged. “Pepe was dancing with the single girls. He must be worn out this morning. I was just falling off to sleep when I heard shouting and banging doors. I couldn’t make out the words, but whoever it was was hopping mad.”

Cora broke off another corner from the croissant, popped it into her mouth, and chewed it as if it were hard work.

“I’m dying to find out what it was all about. It was our group. I’m sure of that,” she said, and waited for Mary Helen to ask the obvious question.

Mary Helen bit. “How do you know it was someone in our group?”

“Because they were speaking American!” Cora was definite.

Mary Helen chose to explain that any number of people in the
hostal
might speak American English, not that Cora cared. Nor did she want to admit that she had heard the same angry conversation. It was far too early and far too lovely a morning to worry about anyone else’s quarrels.

Furthermore, she had not yet even glimpsed the cathedral. Although they were touring it officially later in the morning, Mary Helen decided she’d like to slip in now for a quiet look, say her morning prayers, perhaps attend an early-morning Mass.

She was about to excuse herself when Cora waved toward the entrance. “Another early riser,” she whispered as though they had formed a secret club. “Bootsie. Over here,” she called, pulling back a chair.