Bishop as Pawn Read online

  Quirt looked at Carleson. “Funny how you keep popping up at the center of things, isn’t it, Father?” He turned back to McCauley. “So you took a nap? Conveniently from 4:00 to 6:00.”

  “No. I went up to my room about 3:00 in the afternoon. I read for a while. Watched a little basketball on the TV. And then napped a bit. Until about 5:00, I guess. Then I got ready to go. We left about 5:30. The dinner was at 6:00.”

  “Anyone who can corroborate your whereabouts during this time?”

  McCauley smiled lopsidedly. “No. We each have our own separate rooms. As far as I know, the others did just about what I did.”

  “But you can’t know for sure. Maybe we should get the other three priests in here. One of you could have been with the bishop, couldn’t that be true? Maybe, since no one can testify that you spent all that time in your room, maybe you spent some time with the bishop. Eh?”

  “Not hardly,” McCauley said.

  “No? Not hardly? Why’s that?”

  McCauley looked almost helplessly at Carleson.

  “He couldn’t have spent time with the bishop,” Carleson said.

  “Why not?” Quirt’s question was expectant.

  “Because,” Carleson explained, “because the bishop was with me.”

  “Between 4:00 and 6:00?”

  “There wasn’t anything odd or out of the ordinary about it.” Carleson chose to ignore the implication in Quirt’s question. “Given my druthers I’m sure I’d have spent the afternoon the way Dave did. It’s sort of natural, especially for guys our age. That weekend liturgy can sap you. So, I was going to relax a while before leaving for the Cathedral. But the bishop wanted to go out.”

  “Out?”

  “An afternoon cocktail party in Grosse Pointe.”

  “The bishop doesn’t own a car?”

  “The bishop doesn’t … didn’t … even own a driver’s license.”

  “You were his chauffeur?” Quirt sounded incredulous.

  Carleson simply nodded.

  “Did the bishop go out much? Travel?”

  “A bit.”

  “And with Detroit’s mass transit being what it is, and, I suppose, the bishop being a bishop, he wouldn’t want to depend on that. All in all, I guess you had to haul him around quite a bit.”

  Again Carleson nodded.

  “So, yesterday,” Quirt said, “just what did you and the bishop do and when did you do it?”

  Carleson sighed. “He waited until about 1:00 in the afternoon to tell me. To be honest, I tried to beg off. But he insisted that it was important—‘essential’ was the word he used—for him to be at this gathering. He said there would be important people there—people who could do lots for the Latino community—”

  “From your tone of voice,” Quirt interrupted, “I gather you didn’t believe him.”

  “That depends. That there were many wealthy people there was probably true. That any of them would lift a finger for the community was … well, doubtful.

  “Anyway, I don’t think the bishop would ask anybody to show some genuine commitment.”

  “You didn’t want to do it,” Quirt said. “You didn’t think there was any point to it. But you did it anyway? Sounds kinda heroic!” The tone was laced with sarcasm.

  “Look, Lieutenant, I’m no hero, or martyr, or saint. The way this arrangement began, it was supposed to be a short introduction to this urban ministry, sort of a brief probationary period.”

  “What happened? You keep signing up?”

  Carleson snorted. “The deck was stacked. Diego loved the arrangement. Out of nowhere he got a slave. Each time I was due for an independent assignment, Diego would pull rank with the head of the Curia—the one who proposed assignments.”

  “Couldn’t you go over this … this guy’s head?”

  “I’m not a crybaby … at least I try not to be.”

  “Back to yesterday,” Quirt ordered.

  “Yes, well, there was no getting out of it. So we left here about 2:00. The party started at 1:00, but Diego always likes to make an ‘entrance.’ The party was at Harry Carson’s home. He’s an executive with Co-merica Bank. There must have been about fifty people there … at least while we were there.”

  “You attended the party?”

  Carleson smiled briefly. “I am a priest. I would never have been left alone to wait in the car. Actually, I would have preferred that; I just hang around on the fringes on these occasions. Anyhow, Diego had promised me we would leave by 5:00 so I could join the others here and go with them to the Cathedral.

  “But as the afternoon wore on, he showed no inclination to leave. That is, until this guy showed up at the party. It was about four o’clock, maybe a little later. He acted surprised to see Diego there. But the minute he spotted him, he headed for him like a guided missile. They had a few hot words before Carson steered them into another room.

  “After a while, Diego came out looking somewhat the worse for wear. He was obviously embarrassed. He came right over to me and said we were leaving right then and there. He didn’t even say good-bye to anybody. That was about 4:30. We got back here about 5:00. I went upstairs immediately to freshen up for the party. I don’t know where Diego went … I suppose to his office.”

  Tully was alert for almost the first time during this interrogation. “Who was the guy who created the scene with Diego?”

  “I don’t know. I never saw him before. But that doesn’t mean much: Lots of people at these affairs Diego dragged me to I would meet for the first, and often the last, time.”

  “Then,” Quirt said, “you were the last one to see Bishop Diego alive.”

  “Not quite, Lieutenant. I was at least second last. Whoever killed him would have been last.”

  “Now, see here, Lieutenant, this is becoming patently unfair!” McCauley said forcefully.

  Quirt was about to reply in kind, when experience and instinct told him to swallow it and see what happened next. So, rather than trump McCauley’s ace, Quirt put on an attentive and agreeable face, encouraging McCauley to complete his thought.

  “You seem determined to twist everything we tell you into some sort of statement of guilt. I’m speaking mostly on behalf of Father Carleson here. Aren’t you supposed to read us our rights or something?”

  “I’m not arresting anyone. Or even charging anyone with anything.” Quirt was downright benevolent.

  “We’ve tried to tell you,” McCauley forged on, “in the most tactful manner at our command that the late Bishop Diego was … a difficult man. And I say this cognizant of the maxim nil nisi bonum.” He slipped into the Latin aphorism.

  “What?” Quirt meant to halt any incursion of a foreign tongue, and especially Spanish.

  “Nil nisi bonum,” McCauley repeated, and then clarified, “Nil nisi bonum de mortuis … nothing but good of the dead. Say nothing about the dead except good things.”

  The explanation seemed to satisfy Quirt, so McCauley continued. “In spite of the nil nisi bonum disclaimer, we have been very open about the actual, and largely abrasive personality of, uh, our fallen comrade. All right, he was difficult to get along with—a challenge, to say the least.

  “Speaking for my fellow Basilians, after we learned what to expect from him, we were not enchanted with the prospect of his being here with us. But that was the arrangement the diocese made, and we were ready to live with it. That did not imply that any or all of us wished him harm, or, per impossibile, that any of us would kill the man.

  “And, all right, Father Carleson was much more involved with the man than the rest of us were. But that was the decision of the diocese and Don was willing to live with it. It had to end sometime!

  “Bishop Diego was a most difficult man. He made life pretty miserable for any number of people—mostly priests. And Bob Carleson was not alone in being a special target of the bishop.”

  Quirt thanked his instinct and experience for letting McCauley ramble on. This was exactly what he was hoping for—another
lead, maybe someone as good a suspect as Carleson. “And who would that be? Someone who was a ‘special target’ for the bishop?”

  McCauley blanched. Too late he realized he had fallen into Quirt’s trap. Now he had no recourse but to implicate another priest as a possible murder suspect. In the brief interlude that Quirt gave him to consider what he’d say next, McCauley tried to rationalize his blunder. Eventually, Ernie Bell would have become entangled in this investigation. Among priests particularly, Bell’s combat with Diego was common knowledge. If he, McCauley, had not revealed this fact, someone else surely would have.

  McCauley’s attempt at self-exculpation wasn’t entirely effective. But it was the best he could muster at the moment. “Well,” he said at length, “Father Ernest Bell has had some problems with the bishop.”

  “No, no, Father,” Quirt said unctuously, “you and your friends here have had ‘problems’ with the bishop. Father Carleson has had his life made miserable by the bishop. Father Bell have much the same experience?”

  Reluctantly, with much hesitation, McCauley told of the enmity that had grown steadily from almost the first meeting of Bell and Diego. Bad chemistry, McCauley declared. In any case, the conflict had escalated to the point where it was now larger than just the two men. Bell’s very parish was under attack by the bishop. Everyone involved in the Latino community was in agreement that St. Gabriel’s parish was vibrant and growing, doing great work, really. But would the power structure downtown realize that? Or would they be influenced by a bishop who had been brought into the diocese for the very purpose of providing leadership to the Latinos? Bell, understandably, was beside himself with concern for his parish and his people.

  Quirt did not grasp the essence of the dispute between the clergymen. But he very clearly recognized a suspect when he saw one. And this Father Ernest Bell surely qualified. “So,” Quirt said, “if I got this right, you, you’re saving that this Father Bell felt threatened by Bishop Diego.”

  “Yes, I guess that’s a fair statement.”

  “The power structure of the local Church could close down a parish if it wants to?”

  “Well, I don’t want to give the impression that they’d do such a thing capriciously. But, with the clergy crisis and all, sometimes a closing does solve a bunch of problems. Especially if a nearby parish can take over the displaced parishioners.”

  “But now” —Quirt’s tone was eager—-” now Bishop Diego is dead. And Father Bell’s problems seem to be solved … don’t they?”

  “Well … yes,” McCauley admitted. “But that doesn’t mean—”

  “Lieutenant,” Carleson broke in, “are we quite done here, at least for the moment? I’m way behind, and getting more so, on my hospital rounds. Do you mind if I leave now?”

  Quirt, pleased with his progress and eager to begin checking out his theories, did not bother to answer Carleson, but merely waved him away.

  Carleson left immediately.

  McCauley was about to follow suit, when Sergeant Mangiapane stuck his head in the door. “Zoo,” Mangiapane said almost breathlessly, “the autopsy’s over—”

  Tully shook his head and inclined it toward Quirt, who was obviously not pleased with what he took as a slight.

  Mangiapane shrugged and turned to address Quirt. “This’ll make more sense, I think, if we go to the bishop’s office.”

  “Let’s go.” Quirt led the way.

  Return to the scene of the crime, thought McCauley. All those crime movies weren’t a complete waste of time after all.… Although he assumed that he had been dismissed, he decided to tag along.

  The rectory’s entrance, appropriately enough, fronted on Ste. Anne Street. A sidewalk led to a rise of wooden steps. The heavy door opened to a small foyer that in turn led to a long hallway. Bishop Diego’s office was the first door to the right after entering the corridor.

  The office itself was moderately large. Had there been much furniture or bric-a-brac, it would have looked crowded. However, it was sparsely outfitted. The eye-catching feature was the previously mentioned collection of photos adorning the walls. They came close to constituting a Who’s Who of Detroit, with the bishop’s image the only constant in each of them.

  Now assembled in the office were Mangiapane, Tully, Quirt, Kleimer, and Father McCauley.

  “Doc Moellmann,” Mangiapane began, referring to Wayne County’s medical examiner, “says that the bishop was hit once—a powerful blow to the back of the head between the crown and the neck. The weapon was a blunt instrument—a pipe, or a heavy bottle, or a baseball bat. We haven’t turned up anything yet.

  “We found the bishop sitting in this chair and slumped over the desk. This figures out pretty good. The fatal blow was at a slightly downward angle. The bishop was kinda tall, almost six feet. If he’d been standing, to get that kinda angle, the perp’d have to be a giant.

  “But if the bishop was sitting, then the perp’d be in the neighborhood of five feet six or seven—someplace between five-five and five-eight.

  “Also, the time of death that we were estimating at between four and six o’clock yesterday evening is on the nose.

  “As far as prints go, they’re all over the place. Everybody and his mother’s been in here touching things—and they don’t spend a lot of time dusting. One of the guys said they probably got Gabriel Richard’s fingerprints in here.” Mangiapane was alone in thinking this quite humorous.

  “We been through this office and the bishop’s room upstairs,” he continued, “but we didn’t find anything out of the ordinary.”

  “Nothing unusual!” Father McCauley exclaimed. “You don’t think all that money is unusual?”

  “All what money?” Quirt was feisty.

  “The bishop always kept some money—he called it petty cash—in the office here. We advised against it, of course. We told him it could be an irresistible temptation. We told him he’d be lucky if the worst that happened would be that somebody would steal it.”

  “You mean Diego kept money here in the office?” Quirt pursued.

  “That’s right.”

  “And it was commonly known that he did?”

  “Well …” McCauley hedged, “I wouldn’t say that it was common knowledge. Not everybody on the street would know about it. Sometimes the ‘deserving poor,’ as the bishop referred to them, or a family in desperate need of food or clothing—things like that. Well, the bishop liked to help such people.…” McCauley looked at the policemen. “He wasn’t a complete villain, you know. And” —he gestured to include the pictures on the walls—“he had friends in high places. He could—and did—tap some pretty wealthy people. With them he called it his ‘discretionary fund.’ They usually contributed generously.

  “Anyway, I thought you would find that unusual or out of the ordinary,” he concluded.

  Mangiapane was furious. “We didn’t know about it! We didn’t know anything about it. Where does he keep it?”

  McCauley, rocked by the vehemence of Mangiapane’s reaction, spoke almost apologetically. “Why, right here in the cabinet.”

  It was an ordinary metal cabinet, about five feet high and two feet wide. Its double doors swung open to reveal four shelves. McCauley reached toward a container about the size of a cigar box.

  “Don’t touch it!” Quirt shouted.

  McCauley nearly leaped back from the box. His nervous system could not stand shocks like these.

  After a moment, as everyone stood transfixed by the nondescript box, Mangiapane picked up a small stack of file folders from the desk, slid the stack under the box, and lifted it to the desk. Then, taking a letter opener, he flipped the catch lock and, with the opener, raised the lid.

  The box was empty.

  “How much did he keep in there?” Quirt asked, after a moment of silence.

  “Oh, $4,000, maybe $5,000,” McCauley said.

  “Could he—would he—have given it all away?” Tully asked.

  McCauley shook his head slowly. “I don’t
think so. I’ve never known him to let the supply dwindle down to nothing.”

  “Mangiapane,” Quirt said, “get the techs back here. I want the box dusted.”

  Mangiapane was dialing before Quirt finished the order.

  Tully’s mouth curled in a slight smile. “Well, well, possibly a robbery/murder.”

  “Or,” Kleimer said, “somebody wants it to look like a robbery,’ murder.”

  Tully looked quizzical. Quirt seemed puzzled, but recovered quickly. “What do you want to take, Zoo?”

  “I’ll take the quarrel at the party yesterday, and hit the streets.”

  “Check,” Quirt said.

  Tully and Mangiapane left without further comment.

  Kleimer’s eyes went from McCauley to Quirt, who got the hint. “You can leave now, Father.”

  That was all the word McCauley needed. He was gone.

  Quirt turned to Kleimer. “What’d you mean about somebody wanting this to look like a robbery/murder?”

  “Sit down for a minute,” Kleimer invited.

  The two sat facing each other, knees almost touching.

  “Picture this as a news story, George.” Kleimer’s gestures conjured up headlines. “‘Bishop Killed by Crackhead,’ or, ‘Bishop Killed by Wealthy Socialite’—or ‘Bishop Killed by Priest.’” He looked at Quirt fixedly. “You get it?”

  Quirt thought a minute. “That pretty well covers the possibles we got now.”

  “Yes, but more …” Kleimer edged his chair closer. “‘Bishop Killed by Crackhead’: How does the public react to that?” He didn’t wait for a reply. “It’s old hat. The big, important thing is the word ‘Bishop.’ But that he was offed by some nobody, some street kid with a head screwed up with crack or whatever—that’s run of the mill. Killings like that are in the news all the time. Everybody knows these punks will do anything for a fix. So he kills a bishop … too bad. But that’s life in the big city.

  “Now” —Kleimer’s tone grew emphatic—” take, ‘Bishop Killed by Wealthy Socialite.’ Better. Why would one of the movers want to take out a bishop? Would he do it himself? Or would he hire somebody? People would want to know. There’s a juicy story for you.”