The Christmas Night Murder Read online

  We drove back to Miranda’s house and I picked up my car. It was past noon and I wanted a quiet, warm place to read the letters.

  —

  I sat in Father Grimes’s study and opened the envelope with the earlier date. Father Grimes was out and the housekeeper insisted on making a tray for my lunch, but it hadn’t come yet and I wasn’t feeling hungry for anything except the contents of Julia’s letters.

  The paper she had written on was a fine quality white with her monogram on top of the first sheet. The date was late September, the handwriting clear and flourished, as though written by someone with artistic talent. As Miranda had described, the letter detailed the life of a novice at St. Stephen’s. Julia’s activities were all very familiar to me from the five A. M. rising for morning prayers to the household charges, classes, reading, and early bedtime. She mentioned names that I knew, among them Angela, whom she liked and admired, and Sister Clare Angela, the superior, whom she found somewhat distant. In this first letter there was no mention of Sister Mary Teresa, but “Father Hudson River” earned a few lines indicating her respect for him.

  She said her parents and grandmother had been to visit the previous Sunday and how glad she was to see them. In the next sentence she wrote that she had heard nothing from her “Sweet Doubter” but that she hadn’t really thought she would.

  When she had pretty much covered all aspects of her new life, adequately and rather eloquently, I thought, she asked a bunch of questions for Miranda to answer. What was she studying? What were the professors like? Was she dating as she had said she would or was she sitting in the dorm thinking of Tony? (I assumed that was the Tony Miranda had eventually married.) The tone and the questions were very eighteen-year-oldish. She sounded like a sweet young girl enjoying and sharing a new experience, nothing more or less. From what she said I could not have determined whether she would stick out her novitiate or give it up at the end of a year as some girls did. She certainly didn’t seem unhappy or stressed or ill or suicidal.

  The second letter was quite different. The first page was a rapturous comment on Miranda’s first letter to her. On the second page she returned to life at St. Stephen’s, but the tone was more sober. She was starting to become introspective, to ask herself questions, to think about how she fit into the religious community. Father McCormick was helping, and he was helping, too, to work out unspecified problems that she had not felt free to discuss with anyone before. Then there was Sister Mary Teresa,

  a woman, I suppose, about Grandma’s age but whose life could not have been more different. She has taken an interest in me, I’m not sure why, but I am grateful for it. Sometimes when I sit by myself on a bench behind the chapel and think of where I am going, I feel that forty years from now I would like to be like this lovely woman, lending a hand to a novice. And then I laugh because it’s so far away and there is so much to come in between and who knows if there will even be novices by then! But I hope so. It’s a good life, Miranda.

  But further along her upbeat tone cooled. Grandmother Farragut had told her her mother was not well. The doctor was changing the medication and maybe it would have a good effect; everyone hoped so. Father McCormick was wonderful.

  I think of him more as the big brother I never had than as the counselor I know he is. And I need a counselor now. I need something to get me through these difficult days. I am so worried about my mother. I should have taken her with me to St. Stephen’s. She would like it here, That’s silly, isn’t it?

  There was a break in the letter at that point, and when Julia picked it up again, she dated it a few days later. The handwriting was now less perfect. It sprawled as though the writer were in a great hurry. She mentioned her mother again, then said she had not been sleeping well, that she had had disturbing dreams and often woke up confused. Sister Mary Teresa was there to help and Father Hudson River had not failed her. She had even received a card from her “Sweet Doubter” and that had helped to cheer her.

  There wasn’t much more. I could tell from the date that the terrible night of Thanksgiving was not far away, that the worst—or second worst—night of her young life was just ahead of her.

  There was a knock on the door and the housekeeper came in with my lunch, a bowl of good-smelling soup, a sandwich, some fruit, cookies, and coffee. Father Grimes was well taken care of. I thanked her and she left quickly.

  As I ate I read the letters a second time. Then I looked at them page by page, inspecting the handwriting. The deterioration was striking. When I compared the first page of the first letter with the last page of the second letter, I could hardly believe they had been written by the same person.

  I finished my lunch, expressed my thanks, and drove back to St. Stephen’s. Upstairs in the superior’s office I showed the letters to Joseph and told her how I had spent my morning.

  She looked up from the second letter and her face was masked in sorrow. “What is clear is that she was confused and she recognized her confusion. This letter may have been her last or only attempt to get the truth out.”

  “The truth about her brother,” I said.

  “And now the brother is out of prison and shopping for groceries with his grandmother. I wonder how much his grandmother knows.”

  “Everything Julia committed to her diary. She knew Julia had been writing in her diary before she committed suicide. I’m sure she read those pages after hiding them from the police.”

  “We’ll never see those pages, Chris. Even if we knew for certain that they existed and that Mrs. Farragut had them, if she’s kept them secret this long, she would destroy them before she would let anyone read them. If you saw the two of them together today, it means she’s helping her grandson back into society, and I can’t fault her for that. It’s certainly better than abandoning him. The question is whether he kidnapped Hudson and, if so, what he’s done with him.”

  “And why he may have killed Sister Mary Teresa.”

  “That may not be too hard to explain. Suppose Foster befriended her after Julia left St. Stephen’s, or after Julia died. Only two nuns went to the funeral. They must have been very visible and would surely have spoken to the family and signed the book. Julia may have spoken of Mary Teresa when she was home. From these letters it’s clear there was a bond between them. If Foster wanted to keep tabs on the goings-on at St. Stephen’s, especially what was happening to Hudson, what better way than to keep in touch with a nun who was fond of Julia and who may well have believed the story about Hudson?”

  “I asked her about it,” I said, remembering her response. “She said Sister Clare Angela had said it should never be discussed.”

  “And Mary Teresa would never disobey Sister Clare Angela’s caution, not after seven years, not even with a change of circumstance. Let’s look further. Whoever was abusing Julia, whether it was the father or the brother, that person knew she had never told anyone. If she had, someone—a friend, a teacher—would have done something about it.”

  “I agree,” I said. “Miranda Gallagher would have told her mother. What Julia did was try to handle it herself by leaving the house. Only it was too late. She’d been hurt too badly to help herself.”

  “But Foster knows Julia didn’t talk about it. If she had told Mary Teresa, Mary Teresa would have brought it to the attention of Sister Clare Angela or the Farraguts. There was no seal of the confessional on her conversations with Julia. Only a confession to a priest is sealed. So Foster feels safe. He stays in touch with Mary Teresa and one day she writes and tells him that Hudson is coming to visit. She also knows, because we all knew, that he was stopping in. Buffalo on Christmas Eve to visit friends.”

  “And he has the good luck to be released from prison that morning.”

  “Exactly.”

  “We still have the problem of the extra car at the thruway rest stop.”

  “True, but that will solve itself when we have the whole picture. What happens next is that after Hudson’s car is found in Riverview, you seek out Mrs. F
arragut and start asking questions.”

  “And Foster gets scared. He thinks Sister Mary Teresa put me onto his grandmother, that she’s made a connection between Hudson’s disappearance and her telling Foster where and when Hudson was arriving.” It was plausible; it fitted a lot of what we knew.

  “For all we know,” Joseph said, “Foster may have been staying with his grandmother and may have heard your conversation. He decides then he’d better speak to Mary Teresa and he makes an appointment to see her that night. Her mind had been undependable lately, sometimes sharp, sometimes very ragged. He may not even have known that before he met her. We’ll never know what she said, but he may have felt he had to silence her to protect himself.”

  For the first time I had the feeling we might be getting somewhere. There were some problems. Sister Mary Teresa would surely not have written to someone in prison, but perhaps she had written to a box number and his grandmother had forwarded his mail. It was a small point. Like the extra car at the rest stop, it would work itself out.

  And then it hit me. “Mary Teresa didn’t know Julia had a brother,” I said. I remembered our conversation very clearly. “I mentioned the name to her and it didn’t ring a bell. She had never been to the Farragut house. She didn’t know there was a brother.”

  Unexpectedly, Joseph smiled. “Take a break, Chris. You’ve learned so much and you’ve pushed yourself so hard. It will come together when it’s ready. If someone has been keeping Hudson alive, they’ll do it another day. And if he died on Christmas Night, we will always remember him for what he was.”

  I picked up the two letters and left her office. I didn’t want to think of Hudson as dead, but there had been no ransom request, no phone calls, no sightings, just a vehicle left on the street a healthy walk from a closed train station. Father or son, son or father. I went down to my room and tried to clear my mind.

  23

  I remember the walk back to the mother house after Jack and I had said our vows. We kissed in the back of the chapel and then went out into the sunshine. I have never felt happier, never felt so surrounded by friends. We stopped about halfway along the path and greeted our guests. There were several I had never met and plenty of nuns that Jack had not yet met, and everyone was smiling. Out of the corner of my eye I saw someone videotaping and someone else taking shots with a camera. I hadn’t arranged for any of it; it had just happened.

  When our impromptu receiving line had come to an end, we followed the crowd to the Mother House. There we had our wedding feast, laid out in a sumptuous buffet prepared by Jack’s sister, Eileen, and supervised by Melanie Gross’s mother, who had truly understood that we wanted less than a formal banquet and more than an informal bite to eat. How Marilyn Margulies and Eileen Brooks had managed to work together so well is still a mystery to me but one the international community ought to explore.

  The community room had been cleared of its heavy furniture and filled with round tables covered with deep pink damask. Jack and I sat with Sister Joseph, my cousin Gene, the Golds, and Jack’s parents, while everyone else was free to sit wherever they wanted. Mrs. Margulies had not really approved of that, but I had insisted. Everywhere I turned there were happy people, including several children dressed so extravagantly that I was surprised they were having such a good time. Jack’s mother, who had very much wanted a wedding in New York, seemed to be having the best time of all.

  It was everything I had wanted, a day in the country, a meeting of friends, a good meal, a happy occasion. For the year that I had known Jack I had been tasting his sister’s food, leftovers from her catering business or new dishes she was experimenting with. For our wedding everything was perfect, not only in taste but in appearance. It was a far cry from convent fare, not to mention my own cooking. Eileen outdid herself that day, and I think she picked up some future clients.

  On that day all the leftovers went to St. Stephen’s. The only thing we took for ourselves was the top layer of our wedding cake, which Eileen boxed for us and froze, to be eaten on our first anniversary if Jack doesn’t come home famished one night and decide he can’t wait.

  I closed my eyes and thought of how beautiful that room had been, how sweet the flowers had smelled, how sure I was that I was taking the best step of my life. Joseph was right. It was good to think of something else when you’re caught in gridlock.

  —

  I must have been asleep because the knock on the door roused me harshly. It took a moment for me to remember where I was, and when. I half expected to see green leaves out the window.

  “Chris?”

  “Yes, come in.” I went to the door, but Angela was already inside.

  “Gosh, sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you.”

  “It’s OK. I don’t have time to waste. Is there a call?”

  “Someone’s here to see you—Sister Mary Teresa’s niece, grandniece actually, I think. She just drove in from Syracuse.” For the funeral, although Angela didn’t say so. “Joseph thought you would want to talk to her.”

  “I’ll just wash up. I’ll be right down.” I used cold water and brought myself back to thinking clearly. This would be Ann-Marie, who had written letters to Mary Teresa, a young woman with children, someone who cared about her aunt.

  She was sitting near the lighted Christmas tree with the still unclaimed presents in the cotton snow underneath. Joseph was with her and they were both drinking tea, something I thought I would appreciate myself.

  “This is Mary Teresa’s grandniece Ann-Marie,” Joseph said, rising as I approached. “I’ll leave you two together. There’s a cup for you, Chris. Put some sugar in it. You look like you need some quick energy.”

  “I didn’t know it showed.” I turned to the niece and we said hellos. She was a young woman, not very tall, a little busty, a little rounded in the hips. She looked nothing like Mary Teresa. Probably for the benefit of the nuns she was wearing a navy wool skirt and a pink-and-gray-striped cotton shirt. Her face was pale and had only a little lipstick that had mostly worn off and her hair was pulled back, more, it seemed, to keep it out of the way than to make a fashion statement.

  “Sister Joseph tells me you think my aunt’s death is connected to the death of that novice several years ago,” she said when we were sitting down.

  I recounted Hudson’s disappearance and my conversations with her aunt, telling her I was sure there was a connection.

  “I just can’t believe she died that way.” She had put her cup down and was staring into a place I could not see.

  I wanted to say something, but nothing sounded right. She had wanted her aunt to die quietly in her sleep after a long life. “I knew her for a long time and I always liked and respected her. She was kind to newcomers, tolerant of mistakes, helpful, principled. She knew how to laugh.”

  “Yes, she did.” Ann-Marie turned toward me. “And she told a good story.”

  “A lot of good stories.” I sipped my tea. I wanted to ask some questions, but I didn’t want to interfere with her grieving, to appear unfeeling. I was almost ready to give up and do it later when she said, “She was my grandmother’s sister, you know. She was the last of her generation. When that poor girl died six or seven years ago, my mother came out here to help my aunt get over it. I was twenty-one, I remember. It was before I got married. Aunt Mary never believed that girl killed herself.”

  “We talked about that, that Julia may have changed her mind at the last minute, when it was too late, when things had gone too far.”

  “That’s not what she meant at all. She thought Julia was murdered. She told me that.”

  I felt like ice. The Mary Teresa I had known had been a team player. She did not talk behind people’s backs; she didn’t snipe; she would not have known how to be sarcastic. That she had believed Julia was murdered, that she had said as much to this young grandniece, was a surprise and a shock.

  “Would you tell me—do you remember what she said?”

  “My mother brought her home after the girl
’s funeral, to help her get back on her feet. We had a guest room for her. She used to visit us on vacations. I remember my mother tiptoeing around and telling us to be quiet because Aunt Mary was trying to rest, and Aunt Mary came out of her room and said if she rested any more she surely wouldn’t be able to sleep at night and what she really wanted was a good stiff drink of Scotch.” Ann-Marie laughed. “I’d never heard her say anything like that before.”

  “Did she get her Scotch?”

  “She sure did. My mom poured it for her and I watched her drink it. Then she started to talk.”

  I was almost holding my breath, waiting for her to go on. She moved in her chair and her elbow touched a branch of the Christmas tree and bells rang softly. Ann-Marie turned toward the tree as she heard them and shook another branch, smiling at the sound. It was distant sleigh bells, children going to grandmother’s house. As much as the smell of cookies is Christmas, the sound of those bells is the essence of the holiday.

  “She told us this kind of wild story, of a young girl just out of high school entering St. Stephen’s as a novice. Aunt Mary said how nice she was, what a fine young person she was, and how something seemed to go wrong after the first month or so. I don’t remember all the details, but it sounded like the girl—did you say her name was Julia?”

  “Yes. Julia Farragut.”

  “That Julia had awful problems. Someone in the family was sick, I think.”

  “Her mother wasn’t well.”

  “OK, her mother. And her mother killed herself, didn’t she?”

  “On Thanksgiving.”

  “And then Julia left the convent.”

  “That’s right.”

  “But there was more to it,” Ann-Marie said. “There was someone else, a man—I wish I could remember.”

  I didn’t want to put words in her mouth. “Julia was counseled here before her mother’s death,” I said.

  “Yes, that’s the priest who’s missing now, isn’t it? Sister Joseph was telling me about him before you came down.”