Precious Blood(100)

That left just what it was Cheryl had said to the people she’d seen. Gregor knew she couldn’t have told any of them her real secret, not outright. If she had, things would have happened differently. Maybe she would never have been murdered. Certainly Andy Walsh, presented with a plain-spoken truth, would not have waited six weeks to do something about it. He hadn’t had that kind of patience. And Peg Monaghan…

Peg Monaghan, acquiring personal knowledge of something really wrong, would have gone straight to the police, or the Cardinal, or whoever might be concerned. She would have done that just as she’d gone to the police to identify the picture of Cheryl that had appeared on the six o’clock news, She was the only one who had gone. Tom Dolan might not have seen it. With the life the Cardinal made him lead, he didn’t have much time for television. The picture had appeared only twice, once on the six and once on the eleven o’clock news. It was given neither much time nor much play. Even local television stations weren’t interested in people like Cheryl Cass, in losers. They might given them significant air time if they were involved in a spectacular drug bust or the kind of savage murder that made blood run in the gutters. An ordinary sordid suicide would have been a big yawn. In this case, they were doing a favor for Colchester Homicide in general and John Smith in particular, nothing more. That was before Colchester Homicide found out there might be a connection between Cheryl Cass and the Chancery, and decided suicide was a much better solution.

Whether Judy, Andy, Barry, Scholastica, or Declan Boyd had seen that picture, Gregor didn’t know, and supposed he never would. Each of them had told John Smith he or she hadn’t. What was more intriguing was this: Why hadn’t Cheryl Cass told any of these people, straight out, that one secret that Gregor was sure had served as the motive for her murder? Every report he had seen said she was neither intelligent nor committed to discretion. She wasn’t sensitive to nuance, either. Scholastica said Cheryl had talked about Black Rock Park as “the second happiest day of her life”—Black Rock Park, of all things, that all of Colchester looked on as a horror story. Cheryl had told Scholastica other things, too, about her symptoms, her aches and pains, the ravages of cancer on the most intimate parts of her body. She had had no sense of privacy. Except about that one thing.

What one thing?

Gregor Demarkian looked down at the books and papers spread across the bed. It was Holy Saturday morning. Faint shafts of light were coming through the window of his room in Rosary House, and he was cold. He did not think he had been asleep. He rubbed his eyes and sat back against the wall. Hours ago, when he had finally figured out how the nicotine had been introduced into the wine in the chalice, and had gone with John Smith to the altar in St. Agnes’s Church to verify it, he had thought he was nearly done. Then he had come back here and it had struck him: motive, motive, motive. He still had no motive, and he didn’t have a hope of finding one.

The one hope he had thought he had had, the books about saints and their symbols the Cardinal had sent to St. Agnes’s for him by way of Father Tom Dolan, had so far come to nothing. He pulled himself away from the wall and looked down again at the papers, covered with the large, well-formed, symmetrical handwriting he had been taught to produce in school.

Goat, the closest of these said, and then:

    St. Margaret of Cortona (1247-97)—daughter of farmer—depicted as goat returning to farmer’s field, after having been astray—symbol for heretics and sinners returning to the church after a prolonged and public break.

    St. Francis of Assisi (1181—1226)—represented by various animals, including goat. Symbol of the need for Christians to cherish all God’s creation, not only the human part of it.

    St. Joseph, husband of Mary (first century)—depicted as or with goat in role as patron saint of married men—role not confirmed by Rome.

    St. Therese of Lisieux (1873-97)—depicted bringing goats and sheep into a fold—depiction unsuccessful as symbol—died out early twentieth century.

    St. Bridget of Sweden (1303-73)—depicted separating sheep from goats in churches—symbolic of her role in reforming the convents and monasteries in Sweden and Rome.

    St. Bartfoin (also known as St. Barry) (sixth century)—depicted some medieval illuminated manuscripts, thrusting away goat—symbolic of the rejection of sexual sin.



There they were, Gregor thought, the saints of the Catholic Church who had been, at one time or another, represented in art as goats, or with goats. What did he have? An obvious reference to Barry Field that might be too obvious. An equally obvious reference to Peg Monaghan, and an apt one. A less obvious reference to Cheryl Cass, through her confirmation name, as given to him by Scholastica in the notes and picture she’d let him have overnight. He couldn’t imagine Cheryl Cass reforming convents, or even entering one.