Sister Eve and the Blue Nun (8 page)

“Excuse me, are you looking for someone?” the voice called out.

Eve froze for a second, and then, realizing there was no way out of this, she turned around as two men came toward her, a light in the next hall creating shadows as they moved. She tried to sound cheerful. “I heard all the racket, the sirens and everything. I wanted to see if Father Oliver knew what was going on.” She dropped her hand behind her back, trying to fold up the letter and stick it in her pocket. “But he's not answering. I guess that means he's somewhere else on the grounds.”

There was a pause as the two men before her seemed to be studying her. “Don't I know you?” one of them asked, the older of the two.

Eve didn't reply. She squinted, trying to see who was talking to her.

“I've seen you before,” he added, switching on his flashlight and shining the light in Eve's face.

Eve covered her eyes and figured she'd been recognized from one of the many activities she attended with her father, but she waited for him to figure it out for himself.

“You're Jackson's girl, the oldest, the nun.” He waited. “You live up here?”

Eve gave her best smile. The bright light had been lowered, turned off, but the bursts of color were still blurring her vision, and it was still hard to make out the identities of the men in front of her. She wasn't sure that she knew either of them, but she thought it was good that one of them knew the Captain. With the letter folded and shoved into her back pocket, she walked closer and stuck out her hand.

“Evangeline,” she responded. “Evangeline Divine. And yes, I still belong to the Benedictine Order here,” she added, deciding not to reveal everything about her situation.

The older officer took her hand. “You came home to take care of Jackson last year,” he commented. He was about sixty, with graying hair and a bulging midsection, and he was chewing on a toothpick.

She nodded, squinting up at the nameplate pinned to his shirt underneath his jacket. “Jared Bootskievely,” it read. She smiled, feeling somewhat at ease.

“Detective Boots,” she said, recalling her father's colleague and friend. It had been awhile since she had seen him, but she certainly remembered the nickname.

He grinned and leaned back on his heels. “Evangeline, the nun,” he said. “And your sister . . .” He pushed the toothpick from side to side and seemed to be thinking.

“Dorisanne,” she replied, filling in the blank.

“Dorisanne, right,” he said, clapping his hands together. “The Vegas dancer.”

Eve nodded.

“You two were quite a pair.” He thrust the flashlight back into its holder on his belt and rested his hands on his hips, nodding.

Eve shrugged, unsure of what to say. She cleared her throat nervously.

“Man, I was so sorry to hear about Jackson,” he continued. “But I understand from Hively he's doing okay now, one-legged and all.”

He turned to the officer at his side. “Captain Jackson Divine, spelled like
divine
, served on the force for more than thirty years, runs a PD agency up in Madrid. Good guy,” he explained. “Used to be paired up with Daniel Hively. You know him, right?”

The other man nodded.

“Yeah, good ol' Captain Jack. But whatever you do, if you meet him, don't get that last name wrong. Don't call him Captain Divine,” he added, mispronouncing the last name. “He hates that.”

The younger officer turned and looked again at Eve. “Detective Earl Lujan,” he said, introducing himself.

“He's new,” Officer Bootskievely noted, pointing his thumb at his partner. “Just transferred down from Taos.”

Eve turned to the other man, suddenly feeling a strange flutter in her stomach. With only the distant light, she couldn't see much, but he appeared to be about her age, dark-skinned, probably from
the pueblo, Eve assumed, recognizing the last name as a familiar one in Taos. She nodded and held out her hand to him, and he shook it. “Evangeline Divine,” she said, unable to pull her eyes away from the man standing before her.

There was an awkward pause.

The older officer cleared his throat. “So, anyway, one of the monks pointed us in this direction to find your guy. Oliver, same one I guess you were hoping to see.” Officer Bootskievely stepped toward the vice superior's door. He leaned in. “He didn't answer?” He turned back to Eve, who immediately realized that she was still gazing at the other officer.

“Um, no.” She quickly looked away, feeling slightly flushed but trying to shake it off. “He's not there,” she added, not giving away any clue that she knew exactly where Father Oliver was.

“Yeah, we're the last ones up here. I guess some deputies got the call first, over at the county office. Sent an ambulance and another set of paramedics. Then somebody got smart and called us in Santa Fe.” He winked at Eve and elbowed his partner.

Eve nodded again. She was starting to feel like one of those bobblehead dolls Dorisanne used to collect.

Detective Boots studied her. “You don't know anything about where the other officers and the man in charge might be, do you?”

Eve reached up and fingered the cross necklace she was wearing. “Um . . . I came from the chapel,” she explained. “I went there earlier to pray, and as far as I know there was no one else in there, and I didn't see anyone else down the other hall.”
At least
, she told herself,
it isn't really a lie
.

“What's down the other hall?” the seasoned detective wanted to know.

“Offices,” she answered, deciding not to explain about the recent changes from residential quarters to administrative offices, with the nuns forced out. “And the dining hall is on the other side of the main entrance. I don't know if you saw anything down there when you came in.”

He shook his head. “No, it was dark and quiet. Only saw the one monk, young guy, tall, blue eyes. He said he had been awake awhile and was watching everything out the window.”

The description he gave sounded to Eve a lot like Brother Anthony, and she wondered what he was doing in the dining hall and where else he had gone. She thought about the time and guessed that it had been more than an hour since she had last seen the monk.

“He was the one who told us the head honcho lives down here.”

Eve nodded again and then stopped herself from speaking for a moment. “Yes, that is true,” she finally responded, trying to figure out a way to leave the conversation and find Anthony. “Father Oliver is the vice superior of the abbey, and this is indeed his room.”

“Which he's not in?” Boots asked.

“Right, which he's not in,” Eve replied.

“So, besides this main building, chapel, offices, dining hall, and residence wing, what other buildings are on the property?” Detective Bootskievely wanted to know.

And finally here was the out she was looking for. “The guest quarters,” she answered. “If you just go out the main entrance like
you came in and head left, you can't miss them. I'm sure everyone must be down there.”

“Uh-huh. Guess you're right,” the man responded. The toothpick moved to the other side of his mouth and he reached up and took it out. “You tell your daddy Boots said hey. Maybe I'll come over to Madrid sometime and take him out to lunch.”

“I'm sure he would love that,” Eve responded.

She felt the officer studying her.

“You don't want to go down there with us? You don't want to know what's going on?” Boots asked.

She turned away and shook her head. “I don't want to get in anybody's way,” she said, trying to smile.

“Good nun response, I guess,” he replied.

“I guess,” she answered, nodding again.

“All right, good to see you, Sister.” And the older officer turned to walk away.

Detective Lujan, still not having said anything but his name, peered at Eve and gave a slight smile. “It was nice to meet you, Evangeline.” And then he paused. “I don't think he's still in the dining room. He seemed to be in a hurry, to pray, maybe.”

Eve was stunned and was about to explain she didn't know who he was talking about, but before she could say as much, he turned and followed the other officer, leaving her alone with her thoughts.

ELEVEN

“Anthony,” Eve whispered. After checking the young monk's room and finding it empty, she made her way to the dining room without running into any of the other monks or any other police officers. She chose not to switch on the lights, keeping herself and the room in the dark.

“Anthony,” she whispered again as she headed from the dining area toward the kitchen. She quietly pushed open the swinging doors, calling out his name once more. There was no one around.

Eve stood in the familiar space where she had spent so many hours when she lived at the abbey. Of all the rooms at the monastery, the offices and the gathering spaces, the chapel and the gardens, the kitchen had always been a place where Eve felt completely at home. Even though there were far better cooks than she among the residents at the monastery, she had come to love the work that was done in this place. Baking bread, making soups and stews, roasting chiles, and even brewing beer—there was so much about cooking and preparing meals that Eve loved.

Here, even if silence was being observed, the men and the women, the nuns and the monks, worked together like musicians in an orchestra, stirring and measuring, peeling and tasting, and this gift of creating the community's shared meals was a very high honor for the nun. If she was able to contribute even a small thing to the bounty spread on the table for her brothers and sisters at breakfast, lunch, or dinner, she felt whole inside, complete. And as she stood just inside the doors of the kitchen, she felt a twinge of sadness that the nuns would no longer be there, the women who were suddenly banned from it all. A long breath poured from her, and she shook away her thoughts of the changes going on around her and returned to the matters at hand, trying to imagine where Brother Anthony had gone.

If he had been in the kitchen or the dining room as the officers said he was earlier, it was clear he had left. If he had been working on the morning meal or getting himself something to eat, he was nowhere to be found. Eve walked back to the pantry where they kept nonperishable supplies and peeked in. Not there. Then she headed down a short hall, over to the large walk-in freezers, and, knowing it couldn't be seen from anywhere else, turned on a light. She was alone. Realizing she was not going to find Anthony there, she walked back into the kitchen and then into the dining room, pulled open the blinds, and looked out a window in the direction of the guest quarters.

Several monks and guests had gathered around the main entrance, and she could still see the lights of the patrol cars and ambulance flashing in the distance. A news van from a local television station had also arrived and was heading past the window where she stood, over to where the action was taking place. As soon as it passed by, she turned and noticed a vehicle exiting the grounds.

It was a pickup truck, an old one, white, with a taillight out. She couldn't make out the numbers on the license plate and she couldn't see who was driving, but she did think it was odd that a vehicle was leaving the premises. She wondered why the police hadn't stopped it, but when she turned back to see what was going on at the guest quarters, there was so much commotion she was sure no one was paying close attention to who was coming and who was going.

Someone was putting up yellow tape around the front room of the guest quarters, marking the area as a crime scene and no longer just a guest room. The death of Dr. Kelly Middlesworth, Eve realized, was no longer a secret between her, Father Oliver, and Brother Anthony. The news was about to be known by everyone.

She shook her head and closed the blinds, making her way to one of the tables in the room. She dragged out a chair and sat down, pulling the letter out of her back pocket that she had taken from the vice superior's desk and unfolding it. She spread it out before her and, turning on the flashlight app on her cell phone, began to read:

Dear Father Oliver,

I realize now the horrible sin I have committed. I cannot take back the evil that has been done to my sister, and I am deeply sorry for all of these things that have happened and see now that I have to go. I meant no harm to the other monks at the abbey, to you, or to my dear Kelly. I know I can never be forgiven for my sins. I can only pray that God will have mercy on me.

Your devoted son,

Anthony

Eve switched off the light, folded the letter back up, and placed it on the table. She knew it should be turned over to the authorities; it would certainly be seen as relevant to the crime. It didn't exactly bear a confession to murder, but Eve knew enough about the law to realize that if the police added this letter to the eyewitness report from Father Oliver that he had seen the young monk preparing the tray with tea near the time the victim was killed, along with the many reports from those who had seen the siblings argue at dinner, and the fact that he was now missing, things wouldn't look good for Brother Anthony.