Page 47 of Dead to Rites

“Same guy who sealed that door the first time,” he commented. “Took him two days, but Hazel said he did good work.”

Wes seemed very competent, but I didn’t think that was the issue here.

I didn’t want to ask the question, but I also knew I couldn’t ignore any theories, no matter how far-fetched they might be. “Do you think he was the intruder from last night?”

Mack was silent for a moment, considering. “He’s tall and slim, so that matches. But Prescott’s full of people like that, so I can’t tell you for sure that he’s the same person. It could have been a tall woman just as easily. I don’t want to be certain about something when I’m not.”

An unsatisfactory answer, but at least an honest one.

“Thanks, Mack,” I said.

Roz told me there was no point in sticking around, not when there wasn’t anything I needed to do, and she had Marco there with her. So I walked home through the slanting golden light of a late October afternoon, breathing in the scent of woodsmoke and watching red and orange and yellow leaves drift down onto manicured lawns. It was beautiful and completely exotic.

I’d never experienced a real autumn before.

When I went inside, Hazel was waiting in the parlor, and Chauncey was curled up on her chair. I wondered how much time he spent there while I was gone, but she didn’t seem too worried about it.

“Tell me about your day,” Hazel said.

It wasn’t so much a request as a command.

But that was fine. I’d already gotten used to the way Hazel wanted to debrief me whenever I walked in the door.

So I gave her a rundown of the funeral — the reporters outside, the bishop from Phoenix, the phalanx of white-clad priests. When I described the way Hal didn’t get up to receive communion, I saw her eyes narrow slightly, but she didn’t say anything. And I also told her how Wes Lindley had come by the bar to give an estimate on the bar repair.

As soon as I mentioned his name, her face went still.

“What is it?” I asked.

“I don’t know for sure,” she replied slowly. “I’ve been thinking about that door all day. I had it sealed for a reason. I didn’t write down that reason in my journal because at the time, it didn’t seem to matter — I just didn’t like having an unlockable connection to a building I didn’t own. So I had it sealed, and I had Wes do it because he was my late husband’s friend’s grandson. That’s how we do things around here.”

She paused, and those sharp, dark gray eyes narrowed slightly.

“And now Father Frank is dead, and someone tried to get through that door last night.”

I stared at her, all the unformed doubts and suspicions that had been swirling around in the back of my mind suddenly taking form. “Hazel,” I said, “are you saying that Wes — ”

She cut me off almost immediately. “I’m not saying anything. I’m only saying that we don’t know, and I want you to be careful around that family until we do. All of them.”

Her tone was so emphatic that I nodded meekly, which wasn’t very much like me. But it seemed to satisfy her, because she vanished, leaving Chauncey and me alone in the parlor.

It was still early, only a little past five, but I realized I was hungry. No big surprise, considering I hadn’t eaten anything since breakfast.

“Come on, Chauncey,” I told the dog, “let’s go rustle up some grub.”

He followed me into the kitchen, tail wagging, where I heated up some tomato soup and made myself a grilled cheese sandwich. Something about the brisk air that day made that meal seem like the perfect dinner.

Or maybe it was mostly because tomato soup and grilled cheese were the ultimate comfort food, and I really needed to be comforted right then.

Tomorrow would be a full week since Father Frank’s murder, and Halloween was a few days after that. I wasn’t sure why I thought that was significant, except it was a reminder of how fast time was passing.

How long before a murderer’s trail went cold?

I didn’t know. I’d never done anything like this before.

But I knew I had a lot to do.

Chapter 12