They were quite surprised to see Faith, having expected to catch some wayward juveniles (not from Ale-ford, of course) fooling around with the bell. And they were flabbergasted when she blurted out, “Cindy Shepherd's been murdered and the body's in the belfry.”
The crowd immediately rushed off, leaving Faith and Benjamin in the dust. No one wanted to be left behind. Murder victims were about as rare in Aleford as Tories.
Faith took one look at the solid phalanx of retreating backs and decided that the safest place for a mother and child was home.
It had apparently not occurred to MacIsaac and his troops that the murderer could still be lurking about concealed in the underbrush, ready to strike again. It did occur to Faith, however, and this is why she left the scene of the crime ; to answer the questions of all those who have audibly wondered why she didn 't stick around and own up to A: ringing the bell and/or B: murdering Cindy, or even C: discovering a body in a town monument. Not a few held this to be the most heinous crime of all.
When the chief got to the belfry, saw Cindy's very obviously dead body, and turned to ask Mrs. Fairchild a question, he realized she wasn 't there. He quickly sent Patrolman Dale Warren, new to the job and pleased as punch at the turn it was taking, outside to find her. Dale never thought that she would simply go home. This explains the brief APB which went out all over the state for Faith and Benjamin after Patrolman Warren made a thorough search of the hill. Rather than being annoyed when she finally heard about it, Faith was terribly pleased that he had subtracted several years from her age—he made her twenty-four.
In any case, everything was straightened out that afternoon. Or, rather, nothing was straightened out about Cindy, but everything was straightened out about Faith.
Except she never did correct Dale. Young people today had few enough illusions to hold on to now that Martha Stewart was doing commercials for K mart.
Tom, meanwhile, had been running errands as a break from pastoral duties, and after leaving the bank was waiting on line in the post office when the person in front of him turned around and seemed mildly interested to see him there.
“Don't suppose you know that your wife found Cindy Shepherd's dead body up in the old belfry ? " he remarked.
Tom had heard the bell pealing earlier and wondered what was going on, but to say the idea that Faith was ringing it after finding the corpse of the president of his Young People's Club was the farthest thought from his mind would be to place that thought somewhere on Venus. He rushed home, correctly divining Faith's natural instincts. She had locked all the doors and was in the bedroom, shivering, with her down quilt pulled tightly around Benjamin and herself. Benjamin was smiling in cozy comfort and blowing little drooly bubbles.
She sobbed, "Where have you been, Tom? I've been calling the office for hours ! “
Then she burst into tears. It was not unknown for Faith to cry, in anger, sadness, and especially at the movies; but there was a qualitative difference to these sobs and it took Tom a long time to calm her down. Finally all three of them were bundled under the quilt and Faith started to talk.
“You can 't imagine how terrified I was, Tom. I kept expecting some maniac with a meat cleaver to come after us. And the body! I've never seen a dead person not in a coffin!”
Tom was holding her close and making comforting noises.
“All I was going to do was have a picnic," Faith wailed, “and there she was ! Of course it was lucky it wasn't somebody I liked.”
Tom looked as though he were going to say something and changed his mind.
“You were going to say I shouldn 't be speaking ill of the dead."
“Maybe something like that, but two things stopped me in time. It sounded inappropriately pontifical and besides I agree with you.”
Faith nestled closer to him. Tom might be a little too pious on occasion, but he was no hypocrite.
She was feeling very drowsy and now that she was safe she found her mind wandering to all kinds of interesting questions, such as who killed Cindy? And given her personality, why had he or she waited so long? Faith started to tell Tom, but when their two heads bent as one toward Benjamin, they both drew back quickly and she spoke first. "My turn or yours?”
By the time Tom had changed Benjamin, wondering as he often did how one tiny infant could produce such a volume of odiferous merde, the police had arrived, having eventually figured out Faith 's whereabouts.
She gave Charley an account of what she had seen or rather hadn't seen. There had been nothing to note that she could think of. They left, then returned an hour later. They had forgotten to fingerprint her and the CPAC unit from the DA's office was screaming for her prints so they could eliminate her. Faith noticed Mac-Isaac's fingers were inky; it looked as if his had had to be eliminated, too.
It was close to nine that night when the phone finally stopped ringing with calls from assorted well-wishers and gossip mongers. Even the most desperately curious would never break that New England taboo and call after nine o 'clock.
Faith was curled up in the blue wing chair next to the fireplace, which she had filled with pots of fiery gold and russet chrysanthemums until the weather called for logs. She was beginning to shake off the feeling of being terribly cold and terribly nauseated at the same time.
Tom walked into the room and threw himself down on the couch.
“ These calls are beginning to drive me crazy, Faith. They start out sympathetically, but somehow everyone manages to work in the bell. I really think they would rather you had put it to a vote at Town Meeting before you rang it.”
Faith had her legs draped gracefully over the arm of the chair. She had poured two glasses of Armagnac while he had been on the phone the last time and she held one in her outstretched hand now. She had been thinking about the murder and was starting to enjoy herself.
“I'm sorry you have to deal with all this, Tom, but think how much worse they'd be to me. Has anybody said anything about suspects? Other than Ben and I?"
“No, a few have mentioned feeling sorry for the Moores, but mostly they ask kindly if you and the baby are all right, then go straight to the bell. Oh, Mrs. Keller did offer the opinion that it was probably a tramp—not Cindy, you understand, but the murderer."
“Tramps don't usually carry around roses, Tom. That's the part I don't get," Faith said speculatively. "Who does something like that—a disappointed lover? A mad botanist ? Somebody who 's read one too many Georgette Heyers ? “
She took a sip of brandy, savored it, and continued. "And why kill Cindy in the first place? I mean, sure, there were any number of reasons to kill her. Even you, Tom, could have done the deed after a particularly heated Young People 's meeting. But why kill her now when she was about to leave town, presumably for good?"
“Just to set the record straight, I was talking to Mrs. Norris at the register of the Shop and Save. I was in fact returning a quarter I had found on the floor."
“Are you sure you 're still not an Eagle Scout or something ? I hope you do have to go to court and establish an alibi. There haven 't been too many trials with such exciting testimony lately.”
Tom grinned.
“ Well, she did see me pick it up, Faith. I suppose I could have said I would put it in the plate. Anyway I didn 't kill Cindy, despite the number of times I've said to you I'd really like to kill that girl.”