The Hour of Death Read online

  “I actually carry two. One for me and one for a lady.”

  “You’re joking.” Lucy blew her nose more loudly than she had meant to and, folding the handkerchief, wiped her eyes.

  “No. I do. You’re not looking like you want to go back into the concert.”

  “Would you mind?”

  He grinned. “No. I’m only here for the Hallelujah Chorus and it takes forever to get to it.” He opened the car door for her. “Fancy a pint?”

  * * *

  Parker’s phone buzzed just as Lucy finished telling him the whole story about why she was in Wales. The sounds of the small pub they had found near St. Asaph went on around them. They hardly noticed. He was staring at her with such surprise that he ignored his phone until she pointed to it. She watched him as he read the text. “I have to respond to this. I’m not on duty, but everyone’s at a barn fire in Wrexham. There’s been a minor accident on the A5.”

  “Isn’t the cathedral on the A5?”

  “It’s about a mile this side of the cathedral.” He glanced at this watch. “The concert must have ended. Although the reception is probably still going on.” He stood and held her coat for her. “Coming with me, or shall I drop you at the abbey? It’s on the way.”

  “I’m coming,” she said sliding into her coat. Parker Clough was more interesting than she had given him credit for. And as Sister Gwenydd would be quick to point out, he wasn’t bad looking.

  In less than ten minutes, they were pulling up next to a car at the side of the road, its flashers blinking. From where she sat, Lucy could see that the back tire was blown out.

  “You stay here,” Parker said. “I’ll keep the car running so the heat stays on.”

  Lucy watched as Parker walked to the car. He leaned in and talked for a few moments, then she saw him open the car door and a tall, thin woman stepped out. Lucy knew who it was even before she moved into the headlights of the cruiser. The Right Reverend Suzanne Bainton.

  * * *

  “It isn’t that I didn’t wonder about you over the years. I have often thought of you and what you might be like.”

  Suzanne and Lucy sat in Parker’s backseat while he changed the tire on Suzanne’s car. Lucy was glad it was dark. She didn’t want to betray too many emotions. She certainly didn’t want to have a repeat of her car-park meltdown. She had imagined this meeting with her birth mother ever since she had decided to come to Wales, and now it was here.

  “It’s not that you don’t have a mother. You have a wonderful mother. And I am immensely grateful …” Here Suzanne Benton’s voice caught and she cleared her throat, “immensely grateful to her for all that she has been to you. She has been everything to you that I couldn’t have been. I hope you understand that.”

  “I do. Totally. It isn’t that.” Lucy paused, unsure how to continue.

  “Unmarried and pregnant in the late 1990s wasn’t easy. Nor was it the usual path to ordination.”

  “I can imagine. You were actually younger than I am now.”

  “And now I feel old,” Suzanne said, smiling.

  “And you should know that I’m not looking for the love and security one gets from parents. I have that. My parents are great. It was just that … I was hoping …” Lucy’s voice trailed off.

  “Hoping what?” Suzanne looked out the front window and winced as Parker swore at a stubborn lug nut on her flat tire. “What did you hope?”

  “For one thing, that you would be a famous artist.”

  “I collect art, if that’s any help.”

  “Well, it is. Sort of. I guess you don’t have to be an artist. I mostly just wanted to see you. You know, in real time and space.”

  “And now that you have, how are you doing?”

  “I’m OK.”

  “Is there anything you’d like to ask me?”

  “Who is my birth father?” At this, Lucy noticed that Suzanne Bainton stiffened.

  “That is the one question that is off-limits.” Suzanne Bainton looked directly at Lucy. “I can’t … won’t … tell you.”

  “Why? I thought maybe he wasn’t on the birth certificate because … you know?”

  Suzanne’s eyebrows shot up. “You thought perhaps I didn’t know who the father was? It’s not that, he’s a dangerous man. He wouldn’t want to know that you have … surfaced.”

  “So he is around? In the area?”

  “Lucy, I’m not telling you anything about him.”

  “You have to. I haven’t come this far to not even be allowed to know his name.” Lucy hated the whine in her voice, but she couldn’t seem to stop it. “Really, shouldn’t it be up to me whether or not I know who he is?”

  “I could not be your mother then and I’m not replacing her now—but I know one thing—no mother would put her daughter in that kind of danger. And I simply won’t.”

  Just then a car pulled up to the side of the road and slowed almost to a stop. Lucy tried looking in the window of the driver’s side, but it was too dark to see anything. Parker, who had been crouched behind the left side of Suzanne’s car working on the flat, stood up. The driver hit the accelerator and roared off. As the car pulled away Lucy thought it looked like the same blue Subaru that had run Sister Agatha off the road two nights earlier.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Sister Agatha thought a hot cup of Welsh Brew and a crispy oatcake would make the perfect Christmas Eve afternoon tea. She had been dispatched to the village to purchase a small bottle of brandy for Sister Gwenydd’s Christmas pudding. What good was Christmas pudding if you couldn’t light it on fire? She settled into the back booth and sent Father Selwyn a quick text. At the Buttered Crust. Join me?

  She looked around her. The tea shop was doing a slow trade on this late afternoon. Most people were probably already home with their families preparing for the Christmas Eve celebration and then for Christmas day itself. As a child, Sister Agatha had been convinced that animals could talk on Christmas Eve and, deep down, she still wondered. Of course, she knew they couldn’t, but the magic of Christmas, especially Christmas Eve, was still alive for her. The long, dark dreariness of Advent would end in the celebration of the birth of the Christ child.

  She turned as the bell above the door jangled and Father Selwyn’s voice boomed “a blessed Christmas Eve!” to Keenan behind the counter. She wondered what kind of tinned fruit Keenan might bring them. Was there a holiday tinned fruit?

  “Are the sisters all coming to St. Anselm’s for Lessons and Carols tonight?” Father Selwyn asked, sliding into the booth across from her. He had left his hat and long coat on the rack at the door.

  “Of course. We wouldn’t miss the cantata for anything.”

  The Christmas cantata was originally scheduled for the week before Christmas, but with Emeric in jail, the choir had fallen off its tight schedule. Add in the problems of Constable Barnes being occupied with the murder of Tiffany and the arrest of Millicent, and the bass section was sorely under-rehearsed. Not to mention the fact that Tiffany had been first soprano. Father Selwyn had suggested that they incorporate it into the Christmas Eve service at St. Anselm’s instead to provide a few extra nights of rehearsal. The choir enthusiastically agreed, and so it was tonight at eight o’clock. All the residents of Gwenafwy Abbey, including Lucy and Ben, were attending.

  “We’re having our own candlelight service earlier this evening. We’re calling it Christmas Evensong. And Lucy says she has a surprise for us—at five o’clock—so I need to get back.”

  “A surprise during the service? I didn’t think Lucy concerned herself much with worship?”

  “She says she’s an atheist, but I don’t believe her. Anyway, I think it’s something she’s painted.” A large sheet-draped canvas had been placed at the front of the chapel, to be revealed at the Christmas Evensong. It had added an extra bit of anticipation to the day. Although the recent events of the murder, the dognapping, the crash of the van, and the menacing note had all taken their toll on the sisters, especially Re
verend Mother, Christmas was still Christmas at the abbey. When she left that day and headed out, she could hear Sister Gwenydd’s Bose speaker blasting Frank Sinatra in the warming room and smell the delicious fragrance of Christmas cookies drifting from the abbey kitchen. There was definitely a day-before-Christmas buzz in the air that no amount of murder and intrigue could diminish.

  Keenan stopped by their table and Father Selwyn ordered a pot of Welsh Brew for both of them, and an oatcake—extra crispy—for Sister Agatha. A bowl of fruit for himself. “You’ll share your oatcake, right?” he said to her.

  “Of course. How is Millicent?”

  “Not good, really. It’s Christmas Eve and she’s sitting in jail. There’s no hope of a hearing until after the holiday, so she’s stuck there.”

  Sister Agatha said nothing, thinking of the pink oval on the whiteboard. She opened her notebook and flipped through a few pages.

  “I’ve been thinking about something. “It’s that blue Subaru. The first time I saw it was when I walked into the village the day Tiffany was killed. It nearly knocked me into a gorse bush.”

  “Did you get a look at the driver?”

  “No. I was too busy picking myself up out of the ditch. And then, when I was looking for clues about the dognapping, I noticed that there was blue paint residue on the stone wall in front of the abbey as if a car had sideswiped it and tire treads that were not those of the minivan. I’m thinking it was the same car.”

  “Or not,” Father Selwyn said. “It could have been any car.”

  “True … but it was definitely a blue Subaru that sideswiped the minivan—may it rest in peace.” She turned the page and scanned down. “It was a blue Subaru—or at least Lucy thinks so—that drove past them the night of the flat tire. Whenever the blue Subaru shows up, Lucy is in the area and suspicious things happen. Except for that first time, when I was walking into the village.” Sister Agatha thought for a minute. “Actually, Lucy was in the village that day. I heard her tell Sister Gwenydd she would help with the shopping if they could run to the art store in Wrexham. And the car came up the hill from the village. I wish we were in our incident room where we have all this drawn on the white board.”

  “Alas, our incident room has turned into the St. Anselm’s annual Santa’s workshop. The Sunday school teachers are at this very moment assembling stockings to hand out at the cantata.”

  “All of our hard work gone? That would never have happened to Armand Gamache and Jean Beauvoir. Fortunately for us, I took a photo of the white board and have it on my phone.”

  Keenan came by the table with their order.

  “Sorry it took so long,” he apologized. “We’re shorthanded on Christmas Eve.”

  Keenan continued to stand there for a minute. Father Selwyn looked at him. “It’s just that you usually drink Glengettie tea, Father Selwyn. And this is Welsh Brew.”

  “True, Keenan. You are a good man to notice. But today, I guess I was just in the mood for something else.”

  “You know who else drinks Glengettie?” he said placing their order on the table.

  “If you don’t mind, Keenan, Father Selwyn and I are …”

  “That big politician.”

  “Devon Morgan?” Sister Agatha asked. Would that scourge on humanity not leave Pryderi alone? Especially the day before Christmas?

  “About an hour ago, I guess. With Mr. Colwyn. Mr. Colwyn didn’t order tea though. He didn’t order anything. Who goes to a tea shop and just sits there with nothing?”

  “Mr. Colwyn?” Sister Agatha looked at Father Selwyn. “Lewis?”

  “He was my botany teacher. Nice but really tough. Funny too. For a teacher he had a real sense of humor.” Keenan looked toward the window. A gaggle of teenaged girls walked by, and even though they didn’t look his way, Sister Agatha noticed that he turned red.

  “Mr. Colwyn didn’t even say anything, which was weird, because in class he talked and talked. He’s sort of a comedian. On the last day we got to watch one of his old movies instead of doing work.”

  Keenan began to amble away, then turned back. “He wanted to know about that girl with the red hair. Lucy.”

  “Lucy?” Sister Agatha spoke slowly. “What did they want to know, Keenan?”

  “Just if I’d seen her in the village today.”

  “What did you say?”

  I said, “ ‘What do you think she is? My girlfriend?’ I mean, seriously, like I could get a girl like her?” Keenan smiled shyly. “She’s hot, you know? No offense, Sister.”

  “None taken, Keenan. Although she isn’t just ‘hot.’ She is also an extraordinarily talented artist.” Sister Agatha began to gather her things together and shove them into her book bag. Her hands began to flutter with nervousness. Why was Devon Morgan asking about Lucy?

  “Has Devon Morgan been in here before?” Father Selwyn asked. “The politician?”

  “No,” Keenan said, looking out the window again. “I’ve only seen him at the Pryderi Hotel. I valet there. Midnight Saturday till seven on Sunday mornings. I park his car for him. A Mercedes. Nice. That’s why I’m never at mass, Father.”

  “Worship doesn’t start till ten. I bet you could make it.”

  Keenan shrugged.

  “When did you last see Devon Morgan at the hotel?” Sister Agatha asked.

  “Not for a month or so. He used to go there with Mrs. Reese.”

  Father Selwyn spewed his tea across the table. “With whom?”

  “Mrs. Reese. You know. The artist lady. The one who died. Which is sad. Of course.”

  Sister Agatha watched as the young waiter drifted back to the front counter. Father Selwyn had gone pale. “Late nights at the hotel with Tiffany?”

  “Do you think they were having an affair?”

  “Well, not to cast aspersions, but if they were arriving after midnight on Sunday morning it seems a little obvious. I do recall Emeric saying that Tiffany had been missing choir. And because she was our best soprano, that was a big deal.”

  “Devon Morgan was having a relationship with a woman who is found murdered the day after she meets Lucy for the first … and last … time?”

  “And now Devon Morgan is asking about Lucy? And why was he with Lewis Colwyn?”

  “Tell me again what Suzanne Bainton said to Lucy about her birth father?”

  “That if he knew that Lucy was in the area, it could be dangerous for her.”

  “But she didn’t say his name?”

  “No. Just that he was a powerful figure and …” Sister Agatha’s eyes went wide. “You don’t think …?”

  “I do.” Father Selwyn stood up and grabbed his hat.

  “But what’s the Tiffany connection?”

  “I have no idea. But I think it’s time for Suzanne Bainton to give us some answers.”

  Sister Agatha and Father Selwyn pulled their coats on and hurried across the room. Just as they were about to leave, Sister Agatha turned and looked at Keenan. He stood behind the counter staring at his mobile.

  “Keenan,” she said. “Did you say Mr. Colwyn let you watch a movie on the last day of class?” Keenan nodded yes.

  “What was the movie? Do you remember?”

  “Sure, I remember,” he said. “The Wizard of Oz. It’s like his favorite movie. He was always quoting it in class.”

  Sister Agatha and Father Selwyn left the tea shop at a run.

  * * *

  “This is my fault,” Suzanne said. She sat behind her massive desk in the diocesan office. Her voice trembled and her hands shook as she clutched a file folder in front of her. Sister Agatha had never seen the bishop so rattled.

  “What is your fault?” Father Selwyn asked. Sister Agatha glanced at the clock on the wall. The nuns’ Christmas Evensong started in exactly one hour. She knew that Reverend Mother was expecting her to be there for the service, which was to be followed by a traditional Welsh dinner and gift exchange, rounding off the evening with the cantata at St. Anselm’s. She especially didn’t w
ant to miss the unveiling of Lucy’s surprise.

  Suzanne Bainton sat back and stared at the top of her desk. “Oh my God. Devon.”

  “Are you saying that it’s true, then? That Devon Morgan is Lucy’s birth father?” Sister Agatha asked.

  Suzanne Bainton nodded but didn’t speak.

  “Holy mother!” Father Selwyn breathed quietly.

  “I was in seminary. My first year. And I met Devon at a food kitchen, of all places. He was serving the homeless dinner. I later found out he did things like that just for the publicity—it made for a great photo op. He was nearly twenty years older than I, and at the age of twenty-three I found a man in his forties intriguing. Especially one as charming and wealthy as Devon Morgan—handsome, nice car, always paying me compliments. We were together for three months when I found out I was pregnant.”

  Suzanne Bainton shook her head. “I was ecstatic. I actually thought he would marry me and we would live happily ever after.”

  She paused, and Sister Agatha thought perhaps she wasn’t going to keep talking, but she did.

  “I knew he was married. But he told me he was unhappy, and he was going to leave her, and that I made him happy. I actually believed him. Of course, he ended our relationship as soon as I told him I was pregnant. I left his apartment that night for the last time and I think I grew up about ten years on my drive home.”

  Suzanne Bainton walked over to the window and stood with her back to them, looking out. A gentle snow had begun to fall. A white Christmas. They all sat in silence for a moment. Then she turned back.

  “At first, I wanted to keep the baby. But common sense—and panic—kicked in. I was a graduate student with no money. I lived in student housing. And if I told the seminary that I was pregnant, would I even have a job in the future? The Church in Wales has come a long way in twenty years since the first woman was ordained, but …” The bishop paused. Sister Agatha resisted looking at the clock. “He tried to pressure me into an abortion, but there I drew the line. I’m not saying a woman shouldn’t have that choice, but it wasn’t for me. In the end, I agreed to …” Suzanne Benton’s voice broke, but she immediately regained her composure. “I agreed to take the baby to Bernardo’s and tell them that I didn’t know the name of the father.”