“It’s a law firm,” Detective Emiliani said. “A big one. Weren’t they the one that handled the, uh—”
“The pedophilia scandal, yes,” Robert said. “Or rather, they handled part of it. They represented several of the individual parishes. There was another firm that represented the archdiocese as a whole. It was very complicated. But yes, you see, that’s how Bernadette got the job. My predecessor got it for her. Father Dunedin. He tried to get her a job as a secretary, but of course that didn’t work out.”
“Why didn’t it work out?” Demarkian asked.
Robert shrugged. “Well, you know, Bernadette was a remarkable person. She had very good sense, and she was very devout. She had great practical intelligence. She knew what was wrong with the lottery. She and Marty owned that trailer of theirs. She decided they would, and six months later she did it. She was aiming for a house. If she hadn’t gotten sick, she would have made it. She could calculate the interest on a credit card in her head. But it was like watching an idiot savant. Other than money—even with numbers, if it didn’t have to do with money, she was dead. She just wasn’t very bright.”
“And Marty Kelly? What about him?”
“Well,” Robert said, “it’s one of those things. He dropped out of school at sixteen. He was always in trouble. He was always doing drugs. He probably did some stealing. He was lucky not to get caught, and he was lucky to fall in love with Bernadette. She refused to go out with him if he didn’t go back and get his high-school diploma, and then she refused to marry him if he didn’t register at the community college. She brought him to church. She got him off all drugs except two beers with the game on the weekends. She turned him around. When it first happened, you know, I wasn’t really very surprised. I could see that Marty might not be able to face his life with her gone. She made a different person of him.”
“You don’t think she might have been ready to leave him?” Demarkian asked.
“No,” Robert said. “Bernadette was the most committed Catholic I’ve ever known. If Marty was beating her up, she might have left him. If he was acting up, she might have left him. But it would have taken the marital equivalent of thermonuclear war. I know she died from arsenic, but if you’re thinking Marty killed her, you’re wrong. Marty could no more kill Bernadette than I could fly.”
Demarkian nodded, and Robert found himself thinking that he liked this man. That surprised him. He had expected to feel tense and under pressure, but instead he felt the way he always did when he gave interviews, like when the press came to ask questions about the outreach programs that Mary McAllister and the nuns had made such an important part of parish life. He stretched out his legs and sat back. If he wasn’t careful, he really would go to sleep.
“Let’s talk about Sister Harriet for a minute,” Demarkian said. “She was the parish coordinator. What does the parish coordinator do?”
“She coordinates the parish,” Robert said, and smiled. “She keeps the schedules straight. Mass linens sent out to the laundry. First Communion breakfast not in conflict with the Senior Citizens’ Celebration. Rosaries and scapulars ordered for First Communion . Bibles ordered for Confirmation. Mass schedules made out so that both I and the parochial vicar say Mass every day and all the Masses that are supposed to be celebrated are celebrated. That kind of thing.”
“What about money?” Gregor asked. “Did she have anything to do with the money?”
“I’m not really sure what you mean,” Robert said. “She had something to do with money, of course, because she had to make sure there was enough money in the budget to buy the rosaries and that sort of thing. But she didn’t deal directly with the parish finances. That’s Sister Thomasetta’s job. She’s the comptroller.”
Demarkian paused in his pacing—he was all over the room, from one wall to the other, from one painting to the other, from the windows to the couch and back again—and said, “What about her background? Did she come from a wealthy family?”
“I have no idea,” Father Healy said. “I never asked her. I’m sorry, but at least in the old days the nuns weren’t supposed to tell you about their backgrounds. Not that I was around in the old days, of course, but most of the Sisters here are very traditional, and I try to be sensitive to, well, you know—”
“Yes, I do know. What about Bernadette Kelly? Did she come from a wealthy family?”
“Oh, no,” Robert said. “I know Bernadette’s family—well, her father, anyway. Her mother died when she was eight. Diabetes, too. Her father worked in a factory most of his life. Then he got laid off in the early eighties and clerked in a liquor store for a while. Her brother is a mechanic somewhere in Delaware. They’re very good people, very solid people, but they’ve never had much money.”