“Anyway, some of the priests in these parishes were not at all helpful. I’d say almost hostile. But most of them were cooperative, and admitted that, ‘Father did tend to drink a bit Saturday nights, sometimes Sunday afternoons. But not so’s it would interfere with his ministry.’ See, Father, just like when he was in the agency: blotto, but somehow bringing in the business.”
Koesler shook his head. “And this problem is current?”
“The most recent road citation is within the past month,” Mangiapane replied.
Koesler thought back to Sunday evening, when Augustine had missed all the excitement of Krieg’s little game of whodunit. The monk hadn’t been ill; he’d been dead drunk.
“But Lieutenant,” Koesler addressed Tully, “I believe you said you were pretty sure Augustine’s drinking was the reason Krieg was able to blackmail him. There’s more?”
“We don’t know,” Tully admitted. “There may be more. The point is, this is for sure. The guy has a serious drinking problem. And the other point is, it’s enough. There’s no telling how messed up he’d be if this gets public. For one thing, the cops’d stop letting him off the hook. The courts would have to treat him like any other drunk and, with his history, which would be dragged into it, he could be in the slammer for a long, long time or, at very least, have to submit to court-ordered treatment.”
“And if all this came out,” Koesler reflected, “his history of alcoholism, his drunk driving, the favors he’s gotten from the authorities in Massachusetts”-he shook his head-“he might be able to get published by P.G. Press, but probably any legitimate publisher would hesitate to take a chance on him.”
“That’s about it,” said Tully. “Krieg has him over a barrel, just like Benbow and the late rabbi. See how it’s all coming together? We almost don’t need the nun. We could almost presume the four writers are a matched team. Almost. But we’re investigating her too. I’ll bet there’s somethin’ in her past that’s bad enough that, just like the others, she couldn’t say no to Krieg and make it stick. When we find what the nun’s hiding, we’re gonna start playing hardball with the other three. One or more of them are gonna have a lot of explaining to do.”
As Tully was completing this statement, Koesler grew aware of a disturbance just outside the dining room. The noise was no sharper than the hubbub already produced by the crowd; yet it had a different, more urgent tenor.
Two men-police officers, as it turned out-burst into the room. They belonged to Tully’s squad, so they reported to him rather than to Koznicki. “Zoo,” one of them, nearly out of breath, said, “Come on! It’s Krieg!”
Tully followed the two detectives at a dead run. He was followed in turn by Mangiapane, Moore, Koesler, and Koznicki. The latter two were in no physical condition to move this fast, but the excitement of the moment gave them unexpected impetus.
No thought was given to the slow elevator; the group took the stairs. Three floors up, then down the corridor to the private rooms assigned to the workshop faculty. All, especially Koznicki and Koesler, arrived winded. Other uniformed officers had sealed off the staircase as soon as the first contingent left the main floor. Thus, none but the police and Koesler were now on the third floor. Suddenly, Koesler caught sight of an ashen-faced Krieg sitting on a chair in the hallway. An unlit cigar hung from loose fingers; he seemed close to shock.
Koesler was as puzzled as he had ever been.
From what the detectives had said, and the dispatch with which they’d taken the stairs, he’d thought Krieg must have been found dead. But here he was, looking like death warmed over, but not moribund. Not yet.
“What happened?” Tully’s tone and bearing suggested that one or another of his officers might have blown an assignment and exposed Krieg to danger.
“Nothin’, Zoo,” said one of the uniformed officers. “But plenty might have.”
“Well?” Without doubt, Tully wanted a complete explanation, and quickly.
The same uniformed cop replied. “We’ve been with Reverend Krieg all morning, Zoo. Nothin’ happened until we all came up here to his room after breakfast, just a few minutes ago. When we got to his room we were about to go in and he was about to light up that cigar there. .” He gestured toward the cigar, which Krieg continued to hold loosely. “Freddy here caught it first and knocked the lighter out of his hand, or we all coulda been fried.”
Tully turned to the first officer’s companion, evidently Freddy.
“Gas, Zoo. . couldn’t be anything else,” Freddy said. “Somebody must have saturated Krieg’s room. If he had lit that lighter, the fumes would have caught it and we woulda had one hell of an explosion.” Freddy spoke casually enough but there was a slight tremor in his voice. Clearly, he knew just how close he and the others in that entourage had come to a sudden, fiery death.
“Okay,” Tully said. “You done good, Fred. Cordon off this area and get the ‘techs up here for prints, pics, and whatever. By the way, did you check: Are Augustine, Benbow, or Sister Marie in their rooms?”
The first officer answered. “We checked, Zoo. Nobody else is up here. Not the monk, the nun, Benbow, or his wife. We would have been the only ones to get it and none of us would be talkin’ to you now.”
The hint of a smile crossed Tully’s lips. “Nobody here. Isn’t that interesting. It would have told us one thing if only one of them wasn’t here. But none of them! That tells us a different story completely. Okay,” he said to the officers, “get crackin’.”
Tully and Koznicki went directly to Krieg. They spoke to him, not loudly, but audibly enough for Koesler to overhear.
“Reverend,” Koznicki said, “this is the second attempt on your life in two days. Is it not time you cooperated with us?”
Nothing about Krieg changed. He remained in a stupor state. It appeared that he hadn’t heard the Inspector.
“How many times,” Tully rephrased, “do you have to come close to getting killed before you get worried about it?”
“What?” Krieg seemed to be coming out of his trance.
But the detectives were sure Krieg had heard at least Tully’s question, so they did not ask a third time. They merely waited.
Finally, Krieg spoke. “Tragic, tragic, but. . accidental, I’m sure.”
“The only accident,” Koznicki said, “happened when Rabbi Winer drank a poison intended for you.”
“And,” Tully added, “nobody tripped and spilled gasoline inside your room. Somebody who knew that you smoked a lot-and that would include everybody who shares this corner of the building with you, the cigar smell was that strong-planned to let you blow yourself to kingdom come.”
Krieg opened and closed his eyes several times as if trying to regain focus. “I find that very hard to believe.”
“Believe!” Tully said forcefully.
“We know what is going on, Reverend,” Koznicki said.
“What’s going on?”
“Yes. We know that you very badly wanted these four authors to sign contracts with your publishing company,” Koznicki said. “You tried every legitimate way you knew to get them. They all refused. Somehow you were able to discover embarrassing secrets in their lives. Then you began in effect to blackmail them with these secret events-threatening to reveal them if the writers would not sign. Now it seems obvious that one or more of these writers is trying to silence you. On consecutive days there have been two attempts to kill you. Does this not frighten you? Anger you?”
“You know these so-called secrets?” Krieg challenged.
“Uh-huh,”Tully said.
“All four?”
“Three. But we’ll know the fourth before long,” Tully said.
“It seems to me, then,” Krieg said, “that you know as much or more than you claim I know. With all that alleged information, you should be able to solve this case. If someone is trying to kill me-a hypothesis I deny-then you have all you need to catch the person. That is your job, isn’t it?”