Body In The Belfry ff-1 Page 6

  “ I don 't think it's a sin to be proud of the accomplishments and personalities of another generation. We are their inheritors, after all—and the fruit on my own family tree makes quite an assortment," Faith commented. She studied the ships again. "We had some seafarers, too, and I wish I had paintings of their vessels. These really are treasures."

  “Oh, Faith, as you can see, this is an acquisitive family. Not much ever goes out of here." Patricia was smiling at her genetic foibles. A shadow crossed her face. "I had planned to give Cindy some family things as a wedding present. Now they won't be leaving.”

  And a good thing, too, thought Faith.

  The next morning Faith sat in church with anticipation.

  Tom had been up late the night before writing his sermon, having abandoned the one he had worked on all week. She liked Tom 's sermons, and not just because he was her husband. They were a mixture of good sense, eloquence, devotion, and almost never were boring.

  She looked about. Sunday had dawned fair and bright, but no one seemed to have skipped church to rake leaves or go for a drive to see the foliage. The sanctuary was full.

  Tom had selected "A Mighty Fortress Is Our God" for the opening hymn, and the congregation did it full justice, then worked its way through the service to the responsive reading of Psalm 22. Faith began to have some idea of where Tom was heading when she heard him intone, “ The Lord hear thee in the day of trouble ; the name of the God of Jacob defend thee"; and the congregation's response, "Some trust in chariots, and some in horses : but we will remember the name of the Lord our God.”

  It was a time of trouble. The worshipers had entered the church in relative silence, without the usual cheerful Sunday buzz of greetings. There had been a few uneasy glances toward the Moores as well as at other fellow parishioners. It was clear that nobody knew what to do.

  The Old Testament lesson was from Job, chapter 24. Faith had predicted that book, and now she congratulated herself on how well she knew her husband.

  The New Testament lesson was Matthew 12. “ A house divided against itself shall not stand." Tom spoke the words slowly, with precision, and a note of warning in his voice.

  At last it was the sermon. He climbed the stairs to the pulpit, which was raised above the congregation. All eyes were drawn upward. He didn 't waste any time.

  “Murder is an abomination against the Lord.

  “The murder of one is a murder of all. We have lost a young person of this parish, slain before her maturity and we are slain with her. The task we face now is to comfort the grieving and look to this house. Not with suspicion, but with strength. Not with the gossip that inevitably accompanies such a tragedy and has been such an affliction for her family, but with words of care and concern.

  “ It is a time that bewilders us. Which, like Job, tests our faith and poses fundamental questions.

  “But like Job we must arrive at the same answer. He cries out, ‘ And if it be not so now, who will make me a liar, and make my speech nothing worth ?'

  “Job knew the answer. We know the answer. It is here with us in this place and in all the other places we inhabit. It is God who makes Job a liar and liars of all of us who curse him for the random events of this earthly life.

  “ Fear walks among us. I can feel it coming from you today, but our fears must take us closer to God, not away. We must walk with our fears toward God the fortress and make our house endure in his love and justice.

  “ Now let us pray. For strength in God and each other and for Cynthia Shepherd.”

  Faith bowed her head. The sermon had been longer, but these were the phrases she turned over in her mind as she prayed. The silence before the service had not been as quiet as she thought. It was full of apprehension and unspoken fears. Tom had tried to dispel it, and when they stood up and shook hands with their neighbors at the close of the service, she knew he had been successful. Patricia and Robert went up to him and he embraced them warmly.

  They walked home after retrieving Benjamin from the volunteers who ran the child care during the service. Faith took Tom's hand, "It couldn't have been easy, Tom. But somehow you managed to do it. All the awful things I've been thinking about Cindy dropped away and I felt terribly, terribly sad. She should be very grateful to you."

  “Thank you. I think the congregation is going to be fine, but it's a tough time.”

  As they went through the back door into the kitchen, the phone rang.

  “Probably more plaudits, darling. Why don't you get it?" Faith said, "I'11 start lunch.”

  Tom picked up the phone, listened, and exclaimed, "Oh, no! Of course, I'll be right there. Have you called the police ? " He listened again briefly, said good-bye and hung up. Faith was by his side in a flash.

  “ What's happened ? “

  Tom looked grim. " Apparently while we were all in church taking in that uplifting sermon of mine, someone broke into the Moores' house and ransacked Cindy 's bedroom. Patricia is very upset and Robert asked me to come.”

  Faith grabbed her coat. " I'm coming too ! “

  “I thought you might say that.”

  4

  They were at the Moores' in record time. They managed to disengage the seat belt from Benjamin's infant seat without waking him. Unpredictable as he was in almost everything, he could always be counted on to fall into a deep sleep at one in the afternoon. Faith thought it was Nature's way of evening up the score.

  Tom carried the baby bucket with Benjamin up the front stairs, where they were momentarily halted by Patrolman Warren. It was no surprise. There must have been five or six police cars in the drive. Faith put her finger to her lips and pointed to Ben. Whether it was the sleeping baby or the memory of his earlier mistakes in judgment, Dale hurriedly opened the door and ushered them in. Patricia was waiting in the hall.

  “Put Ben in the study, Faith, there's too much commotion upstairs. We'll be in the living room," she said softly.

  Faith walked into the living room just as Robert was finishing a sentence, "... never been broken into in its entire history. Such a violation ! "

  “Do you have any idea what they were looking for ? Did Cindy keep cash or valuables around ? " Tom asked. "She had some good jewelry that belonged to her mother, but that 's at the bank. I suppose there were some other things of value, but nothing much, and I doubt she had any money. She seemed to think credit cards had replaced currency," Robert answered.

  “The police brought us her jewelry box a short while ago to see if anything was missing. It had been dumped out, but her pearls and a watch she wore when she dressed up were still there." Patricia stopped, then spoke again in an anguished tone. "Just think of all the other valuable things in the house, the silver, the rugs, the paintings ..." Patricia's face tightened as she catalogued her beloved possessions. "Thank goodness we surprised them and they didn't get that far," she added.

  “But why start in Cindy's room ? " Faith asked.

  “ Exactly," concurred Robert, "We We have to asume it 's tied in with the murder, that there was something she had that would incriminate the murderer.”

  Faith wondered how she could get upstairs and take a look at Cindy's room. The police were obviously going over it with a fine-tooth comb for fingerpints, stray hairs, distinctive buttons, calling cards. She was pretty sure from the way the chandelier shook that Dunne was up there.

  It was going to have to be the old bathroom trick. She stood up and excused herself demurely.

  Why don't you use the one upstairs, Faith ? " Patricia never missed much.

  The stairs and upper hail were carpeted with an oriental runner, so Faith was able to linger undetected for a moment outside Cindy's bedroom door. "Ransack" had been a mild description. Detective Dunne, his back to her, stood in the center of a room that looked as if the Vikings had joined Attila the Hun to pay a call on the Sabine women. All the drawers were pulled out, the bed torn apart and the pillows slashed. Enough shoes for an Imelda were flung about the room, and pictures had been ripp
ed from their frames. Faith was fascinated. From what she could see, it seemed Cindy had an entire mirrored wall of closets. She glanced at the ceiling. No. Robert and Patricia must have drawn the line somewhere.

  She was just about to take a step nearer when John Dunne glanced in one of the mirrors and their eyes met in mutual annoyance. He turned abruptly, strode to the door in one step, and shut it.

  Faith continued down the hall to the bathroom. She might as well use it as long as she was there ; it would give her time to think. It was possible that the Moores had interrupted the intruder before he or she had had a chance to find anything. This was certainly the thought behind Dunne 's thorough search. Faith doubted she would be asked to join the team, so she had to think of something else. Or someplace else She went back downstairs and stopped in the study to check Benjamin. He was sound asleep and looked cherubic. These were moments to treasure and recall when you were wiping baby cereal off your clothing.

  Jenny was outside the door. She looked a little lost and more than a little angry.

  Faith said sympathetically, " I know. Cindy again. It is dreadful and shouldn't be happening."

  “She would have been very ticked off at the mess they made of her room, though," Jenny said with some satisfaction.

  Faith looked at Jenny and the tiny thought that had sprouted upstairs burst into bloom.

  “Jenny, maybe what they're looking for was never in Cindy's room. This house must have dozens of hiding places. If they bothered to rip open picture frames, it must have been small. Can you think of any place she might have hidden something that size '1"

  “Well, the maple secretary in the study has two secret drawers and so does a little lap desk that they used to take to sea long ago, but I doubt she would use these because we all knew about them. And besides Mom is always cleaning and she might find it.”

  Jenny paused. " If I were going to hide something, I think I'd put it in the playhouse, because no grown-ups ever go there and there are no little kids anymore.”

  “Where is the playhouse ? "

  “Down near the river. Do you want to go look?”

  I thought you'd never ask, Faith thought as she replied, "That sounds like a good idea.”

  She ducked her head into the living room to tell Tom she was taking a walk with Jenny. He was discussing the funeral again with Patricia and Robert and she knew she wouldn't be missed.

  It was beautiful outside and warm. They rustled along in the leaves down the long slope to the river. Nestled under the trees was a white playhouse, the kind every child dreams of having—a small porch in front and two child-sized rooms. There wasn't much in it—two chairs, a table, and a wooden play stove in one room ; some doll beds and a brightly painted chest of drawers full of dress-up clothes in the other.

  The house was big enough for Faith to stand up in. She and Jenny systematically went through everything. Nothing. Faith reached up to feel on top of the wide, exposed ceiling beams.

  Just over the door she found it. A tin box. She grabbed it and it came tumbling down with a crash. It was an old Louis Sherry candy box that had probably once held someone 's treasured mementos. Cindy 's collection spilled onto the floor. Jenny rushed to her side.

  “What is it ? Do you think that's what they wanted ? " Faith looked down at a bunch of photographs, a couple of joints, some cash, a matchbook or two, and some cocktail napkins. There was also a roll of film.

  “Yes, Jenny, I think we can safely say this is what everyone is looking for. Could you run back to the house and have your parents tell the police what we've found ? I'll stay here. Tell them we haven 't touched a thing." Jenny sped up the hill.

  But looking is not touching. Faith crouched down as close as she could get to the contents without disturbing anything. She was the one who had found it, after all. And John Dunne didn 't seem the type to exchange boyish confidences.

  Obviously it was the pictures. And they were hot enough to have melted the box. Cindy was evidently into porn—with herself as the star. The photos Faith could see completely featured Cindy in bed with different partners. It looked like Cindy had set the timer on the camera and raced back into position, unless there had been a third party to the fun. In some shots, the man was asleep, or exhausted. In others, the man was awake. Faith didn't recognize them. Some of the shots were close-ups. Unusual to collect snapshots of male organs you have known, but everyone has to have a hobby of some sort, Faith supposed. She didn't recognize any of those either.

  Another photo was partially covered, but she could make out a city sidewalk, a convenience store, and part of another building. What was it doing mixed in with Cindy 's personal Playgirl gallery ?

  The backs of some of the photographs had initials and dates. One had the name of the Crowne Plaza—Holiday Inn 's answer to the 'Ritz Carlton—printed below the date. An enchanted evening ?

  Then there was the money. Quite a bit of money if all the bills were Ben Franklins, as the top ones were. Was Cindy blackmailing someone? If she had been, why? Cindy had a lot of money of her own, and would have more. She probably demanded and got a generous allowance. Why would she have blackmailed people ? Faith knew you were never supposed to be too rich or too thin, but it still didn't match her image of Cindy.

  Then there were the joints, two small ones, the matches, and the napkins. The matchbook she could see was from a motel in Ogunquit. It didn't look like the sort of place the Moores would have stopped for a family vacation. It did look like Cindy's speed—the right cable channels and one of those beds that ate quarters. The other matchbooks and more photographs were under the napkins.

  Faith was trying to decipher the letters and numbers written on a napkin when Dunne arrived. She stood up quickly. He was leaning over the porch and peering in the door. There wasn't a ghost of a chance that he could get in the tiny building.

  “The next time you have a hunch, would you be so kind as to tell us, Mrs. Fairchild? This isn't one of your Upper East Side scavenger hunts," Dunne said in what Faith knew was a controlled voice. He obviously wanted to scream at her.

  “West Side," she said, pushing it. She knew she should have told them, but how was she going to help Dave at all if she didn 't find things out on her own?

  “ Did you touch anything ? "

  “ Only when I reached for the box. It's open because it fell.”

  Dunne looked at her skeptically. She inched past him and started back to the house. He called after her, "Mrs. Fairchild."

  “Yes?"

  “Your baby 's crying.”

  She didn 't bother to thank him.

  Tom was in the kitchen pacing up and down with Benjamin.

  “I think he 's hungry, Faith. But the Moores want to know what 's going on, so I'll keep him out here while you tell them, then we'll go."

  “Oh, Tom, this isn 't going to be easy. How do you tell two people who've just had their home broken into that their recently murdered ward may have been, from the look of it, a blackmailer?”

  Tom stopped, shook his head, and said, "I know this is happening, Faith, but tell me it's not."

  “The Pandora's box Jenny and I found was full of naughty pictures of Cindy and her conquests and a large amount of cash. Undoubtedly she kept the photos for her own entertainment, but it's possible that several of her beaux might not have wanted them for the family Christmas card. Some of the pictures seem to have been taken while her partner was asleep and unknowing.”

  Tom looked grim. "What else did you see ? "

  “Nothing else that made any sense to me, but I'll bet everything in there was something that could threaten somebody.”

  Faith told the Moores as gently as she could and was a bit startled at their reaction. They seemed relieved that the break-in had a specific object in mind, an object that was now found. It wasn't an attack on the house, or on them—just on Cindy.

  Tom and Faith packed Benjamin back in his car seat and left, passing Eleanor Whipple, some sort of ultra-removed cousin of Patrici
a's, on the drive. She was carrying a pie and a shopping bag filled with what lookedlike all the produce she had put up the summer before. She continued swiftly up the walk with that purposeful Yankee stride that age seems not to diminish, but intensify. Oswald Pearson, editor of the town paper, notebook in hand and hot on the trail of another sensational story for The Aleford Clarion, was a few paces behind her. Obviously the word had gotten out.

  On the way home in the car, Faith told Tom about the Moores' reaction to her news.

  “Faith, at this point, I don't think anything Cindy did would surprise them. They're numb. Maybe when it's all over it will hit them, but right now I imagine they simply want to get the funeral over with, have the police find the killer, and go back to their lives.”

  Which was just about what Patricia said the next day at the monthly meeting of the Ladies' Alliance, now the Women 's Alliance—but nobody ever remembered to call it anything but the Alliance.

  When Faith arrived in Aleford as a new bride, she had no idea what to expect of the group, which she knew it was one of her duties to join.

  “Only if you want to, Faith," said Tom. "Really, this is my job, not yours. What you do is totally up to you." So sweet and so naive, thought Faith.

  To her amazement, she enjoyed the meetings in the church social hall and discovered the group did an enormous amount of good in a characteristically unobtrusive manner. Originally founded as a sewing circle to make feather-stitched layettes for orphans, the women now raised money for some of the church 's projects, but mainly for The Pine Street Inn in Boston, a shelter for the homeless ; and a local drug and alcohol abuse program. Additionally most of the women worked as volunteers at one or the other place. The Alliance Christmas Bazaar was a blockbuster moneymaker, with people ar- riving from all over the Greater Boston area to snap up Mrs. Lewis 's pinecone wreaths or an Attic Treasure from the table of the same name. Faith couldn't believe the amount of money they made each year, but seeing how industriously they stitched away at each meeting, it was perhaps inevitable. Idle hands and all that. She had had to start knitting again, something she loathed, but it was the only handwork she knew how to do other than the running stitch. She did not burden last year's fair with her lumpy muffler, but gave it to Tom for Christmas instead. The ladies were more than pleased to get jars of her fraises des bois confiture with cassis and dozens of melt-in-your-mouth hazelnut cookies, most of which never made it past the church parking lot.