“That’s all very true, Mrs. Benbow,” said Winer. “But there is one indisputable fact that must be faced: Klaus Krieg is dead. In all truth, I must confess I am not sorry. God forgive me, but I am almost relieved. I never thought I would be completely unmoved by another person’s death, but I am. I’ll say it, and I think in our hearts we will not deny it: The world is a better place without Klaus Krieg.”
“And somebody killed him,” Benbow said.
“And somebody killed him,” Winer repeated. “Not likely one of the student waitresses or one of the facilitators. Then, who?”
“An outsider,” Martha suggested. “Somebody who hated him and was physically and emotionally capable of killing him. That must be it! Surely not one of you. Someone none of us knows.”
“I think not,” Sister Janet said. “Since this is the only building on campus in use just now until the workshop students check in, we were able to pull in the security guards, sort of circle the wagons more closely. Actually, this building is quite secure now. I don’t think an outsider could have gotten through without being detected.”
“That pretty much-inevitably-brings us back to us, doesn’t it?” Benbow said.
“The three of us,” Marie said. She seemed almost in a trance. As if this were a stage production and she were in the audience instead of being one of the participants. “Father Augustine was unconscious-or so it seems.” She was unwilling to dismiss any possibility no matter how remote. “And Martha, Janet, and Father Koesler were together. None of them could have returned to the dining area without the others knowing it. That leaves Rabbi Winer, Father Benbow, and. . me.”
Silence.
Everyone knew what the next consideration must be, but no one wanted to consider it.
Finally, Benbow enunciated it. “Given we had motive, which of us had the opportunity?”
The three self-consciously considered each other.
Benbow sighed. “Okay, I’ll begin. I didn’t see either of you after we left the dining room until we returned after he’d been killed.”
“And,” Winer said, “I didn’t see either of you.”
“This is ridiculous,” Marie said, “but I did see Fathers Benbow and Augustine, though only briefly.”
“All right then,” Benbow said, “where were we? We were all headed for the same general location. How did we get separated? Why didn’t we, except for Sister here, see each other? As far as I’m concerned, I started up the front staircase to the second floor. Father Augustine was with me, but he was walking sort of unsteadily, weaving a bit. I asked him if he needed any help, but he just shook his head and mumbled something. I didn’t realize he was not well. So I walked ahead of him. Lost him at the turn of the staircase. Then I went to my classroom.”
“Was the facilitator there?” Winer asked.
“What kind of question is that?” Benbow bridled.
“A very ordinary sort of question,” Winer replied gently, spreading his hands to signify its innocence. “If there was anyone in your classroom, you would have a witness to testify that you were with someone else when the shot was fired.”
“Well. . well. . in fact there wasn’t anyone else in the classroom,” Benbow stated. “But there’s nothing odd about that. The facilitator wasn’t in Augustine’s room when he got there. And he must have arrived there after I got to my room: I left him staggering around behind me on the staircase. His facilitator didn’t get to his room until just about the moment the gun was fired. She found him unconscious-or so it seemed.
“So there was no one in my room to provide an alibi: so what?” His tone was challenging.
“So nothing,” Winer said. “It’s a natural consideration to want to know where everyone was at the time of a crime.”
There was an awkward pause.
Then Sister Marie spoke. “The reason neither of you saw me was that I took the elevator. I saw Father Benbow and Father Augustine start up the stairs. It was as Father Benbow said: Father Augustine was quite unsteady. I thought of offering to help him, but I knew that Father Benbow would be more capable of helping him in every way. . you know, man to man.
“I had to wait for the elevator for quite a few moments; it is very slow.” She looked to Janet for corroboration.
Janet nodded vigorously.
Marie continued. “Finally, when the elevator arrived, I got on alone. The door had just opened at the second floor when I heard the shot. I immediately pushed the first-floor button. When I got off the elevator, I heard the commotion in the dining area and I hurried there. That’s why I was the last to arrive. But I didn’t see anybody from the time the two men took the stairs until I returned to the dining room. I have no way of knowing whether Father Benbow continued up the stairs or doubled back.”
“That, Sister, is a cheap shot!” Father Benbow was nearly shouting. “What right have you to suggest that things did not happen exactly as I described them? What right have you to imply that I might be the killer?”
“I didn’t-”
“For that matter,” Benbow cut in, “how do we know you actually took that elevator? When I turned to go up the stairs, I saw you standing at the elevator. I didn’t see you get on the elevator. How do we know you actually took the elevator? You were alone, as you yourself testified. What if you-”
“I beg your pardon, sir!” Marie shot back.
“Please,” Sister Janet broke in, “before this goes too far, let’s hear from Rabbi Winer.”
“As it so happens,” Winer began, “after we left the dining room, I was going to go up to the classroom, but I stopped first to go into the kitchen and compliment the cooks on the meal.”
“But I saw you,” Benbow said. “I watched you at dinner. You hardly touched your food. Why would you compliment a cook for a meal you didn’t eat?”
“You presume too much.” Winer was teaching, which is what a rabbi does, and his tone indicated just that. “You presume because someone does not eat, the food is not well prepared. It is a presumption against fact. There can be many reasons a person does not eat.
“In any case,” the rabbi returned to his narrative, “I stopped in the kitchen to compliment the cooks. They were so pleased, that nothing would do but that I meet everyone in that very well-kept kitchen.
“And that,” he smiled, “is where I was when the shot was fired.”
Benbow was taken aback. “You mean you had all those witnesses?”
Winer continued to smile.
“If you were so close to the dining room,” Marie said thoughtfully, “you must have been in position to see who did it!”
Winer shook his head. “Reaction time. We were all so startled by the noise, nobody reacted immediately. Unfortunately, by the time we reached the dining room, whoever had done it was gone.”
As anyone and everyone could deduce, that left Father Benbow and Sister Marie.
It was at that moment that Father Koesler decided to leave the room.
From the very beginning he had not been implicated since he had been with the two women. Not only was he not implicated, he had not contributed a word to this entire rehash of the crime. He surmised he would not be missed. And he was proven correct: No one seemed to note his departure or miss his presence.
This, Koesler had been thinking through the whole process, is ridiculous. There’d been a murder. The only sensible thing to do was to call the police. He had a hard time imagining that, of all the professional people here, he was the only one who thought of a police investigation. Could it be that the amateur detectives assembled thought it was their duty to solve the crime?
No matter. The police were needed, and he would make the call.
Ordinarily, in an emergency one dials 911. Koesler knew the procedure well enough: 911 would summon uniformed officers assigned to this precinct. Once satisfied there was a probable murder, they would notify Homicide. Particularly since so much time had already been wasted, he determined to cut through the red tape and get right to the heart of the matter.