Blood Ties (20 page)

“Henry has told me all about you,” Vivian said.

“Mrs. Dolan, what a shock this must have been.”

Vivian continued her appraisal of this beautiful woman. Maurice said, “And that is my niece, Martha.”

Catherine turned, and when she faced Martha her eyes widened. “Your niece.”

“My sister Sheila's daughter,” Maurice said.

Catherine took Martha's hands and held them. “I feel I already know you. Isn't that odd?”

“And this is Bernard Casey. My fiancé.”

“Oh, what a ring!” Catherine was still holding Martha's hands.

Vivian looked on beaming, as if her dream of one big happy family were finally coming true.

“Maurice, tell us about Catherine,” Martha cried.

“Don't you dare.”

“Oh, Catherine and I go way back. Way, way back. And now we're in business together.” Maurice told Martha and Bernard about the golfing range in Huntington Beach, a real gold mine, a gusher, the smartest move he'd ever made. “Thanks to Dad, of course.”

“I love your hair,” Martha said to Catherine. “Of course, you have the head for it. I wouldn't dare have mine cut so short.”

“I should hope not. Don't ever let her cut it, Bernard. It is exactly as it should be.”

“Do you golf, too?” Bernard asked.

“Not like Tiger there, but yes, I golf. Maurice would go out every day of the week if he could.”

Vivian said, “Now I am determined to visit California myself.”

And so it went on. George looked in, fresh from the OR, and blinked at the gathering.

“And I thought you might be lonely.”

He was introduced to Catherine. “You're a doctor,” she said.

“Pathology.”

She looked at Maurice. “I thought you said anesthesiology.”

“That's my father.”

“Well, I won't need his services. I'm still groggy from the flight.”

“You must stay with us,” Vivian urged. “We have plenty of room. And we can talk.”

“I'd love it. Maurice?”

“Be their guest.”

“I left my bag downstairs with the receptionist. I came directly from the airport.”

“That is so thoughtful,” Vivian said. “I'll get you settled. You can always see Maurice.”

“That's the plan.”

Bernard had to go back to the Loop, but Martha stayed, and in twenty minutes she was alone with her uncle.

“Would you rather I leave, too?” she asked.

“Stay. The only thing worse than watching daytime television seated is watching it lying down. Bernard's nice.”

“Isn't he? But what about Catherine?”

“What do you mean?”

“She seems to be making a claim.”

“We're close.”

“As pages in a book?”

“Hey.”

“Well, you always were a rogue. Are you going to marry her?”

“Maybe I will, now that I'm losing you.”

“You're a nut.”

“Any developments?”

She leaned over and whispered in his ear. “I'm going to meet her.”

“Good.”

“Now that it's arranged, I'm frightened.”

“How do you think she feels?”

14

Martha told Father Dowling that she now knew who her mother was and was going to meet her.

“At last.”

“And now I'm nervous. Just wanting to know has caused so much commotion, I wonder what meeting her might do.”

An imaginary real mother might well be preferable to the woman in the flesh. Still, Father Dowling admired Martha Lynch for her persistence.

“Do your parents know?”

“The Lynches? Just my father. He's already met her.”

“So you won't be entirely surprised.”

“His main point was that we look very much alike.”

In fact, the taciturn George Lynch had come to the noon Mass the day before and into the sacristy afterward. He declined an invitation to join the pastor for lunch—“I have to get back to the lab”—so they talked in the sacristy.

“Martha says you have already met Madeline Lorenzo,” Father Downing said.

“You know her name.”

“A priest is told so many things.”

“My fear is that Martha will next want to know who her father was.”

“That might be more difficult,” Father Dowling said carefully.

George Lynch then turned to his ostensible reason for coming into the sacristy. “She tells me that she wants to be married here, Father. I'm glad. Sheila and I were married in this church, and her parents before us. As the father of the bride I want you to know that I will take care of everything, all expenses. I want it to be a memorable wedding. Like my own.”

Father Dowling assured him that his expenses would not come from the parish but from florists, caterers, dressmakers, perhaps chauffeur-driven cars.

“Henry and Vivian speak so warmly of the way the school is now being used. Do you ever hold receptions there?”

“There's no reason why not. You will want to speak to Edna Hospers and secure the date.”

George went off immediately to speak to Edna about it, and Father Dowling went to his lunch.

“I thought you were lost,” Marie greeted him.

“Between the porch and the altar?”

Marie had long since learned not to respond to allusions she did not catch. Father Dowling ate his solitary lunch and afterward prepared to go out. Marie's eyebrows rose in a question. It was tempting not to tell her where he was going, but that would have been unwise. It was important that she know where to reach him. Edna might worry that the old people in the center could suffer an injury that would involve the parish insurance, but Father Dowling sensed that for the elderly one of the perhaps unconscious attractions of coming here each day was the proximity of a priest. At their age, the awful summons might come at any time, and they would want to leave this world fortified by the sacraments of the Church.

“I'll be at St. Joseph's Medical Center, Marie.”

“What's wrong with calling it a hospital?”

“I'll ask.”

Marie shook her head. Circumlocution was another sign of the times. As he drove across town, Father Dowling thought of the German word
Krankenhaus.
No ambiguity about that.

Henry Dolan had spoken to Father Dowling about Maurice. “I'm afraid he might have drifted away, Father. Until recently, he has been a great disappointment to us. And to himself, I think. Perhaps this operation is a blessing in disguise.”

Like many a concerned parent, Henry wanted a priest to bring his child back into the fold. Not an ignoble desire, certainly, but a commission usually difficult to fulfill. For all that, Father Dowling was anxious to meet the young man of whom he had heard so much—not all of it flattering, except when Martha had spoken of her uncle.

“Moving to California was the wisest thing he ever did,” Martha said. “If he had done it long ago, everything would be better. Families can be very oppressive. Not on purpose, maybe, but my grandparents never let up on Maurice.”

“He is settled down in California?”

“And there is a woman who seems to have designs on him.”

“Ah.”

“I kidded him that we could have a double wedding.”

Martha gave him a little sketch of Catherine Adams that concentrated on her haircut. “She's just flaky enough to be right for him.” Martha spoke of her uncle as if he were a difficult boy, probably something she had learned at home.

Before going upstairs, Father Dowling looked into the chaplain's office. Lance Higgins, in corduroy trousers, a coat sweater, and sandals but wearing a Roman collar, greeted him warmly.

“How's the
Krankenhaus
?”

Higgins laughed. He was in his thirties, one of the younger priests who were the hope of the future, always a joy to visit. “The house of cranks? Truer than you'd think. Do you have a parishioner here?”

“I came to see Maurice Lynch.”

Higgins's smile grew broader. “What a guy. He seems to have spent his life on the golf course.”

“Maybe he has a vocation.”

Talking with Higgins could be corrupting. He laughed at every joke, particularly the bad ones.

Higgins closed the door. “He just shook his head when I asked if he'd like me to bring him communion. You know how rare that is nowadays. Of course, I would have found out first if he was in shape.” Higgins was indeed of the new breed that so vexed Andy Greeley and the aging crowd of clerical rebels. “His mother seems concerned about him.”

“Was it a serious operation?”

“Wippel talks of it as routine, but if anything had gone wrong … Well, it didn't. Maurice Lynch came through it beautifully.”

There was a young woman with a crew cut sitting with Maurice Lynch. She rose from her chair at the sight of Father Dowling, showing the slight uneasiness a priest is used to.

Father Dowling went to the bed and told Maurice who he was. “Martha has told me all about you,” he added.

“Lies, lies. You will marry her?”

“That's right.”

The locution startled the young woman. Maurice laughingly explained and then introduced her. “Catherine Adams.”

“Ah, your fiancée.”

“My what?”

Catherine Adams lifted her brows and smiled prettily at Maurice. “You might have told me.”

“It was Martha, wasn't it, Father? What a matchmaker.”

“I like Martha,” Catherine said emphatically.

“Maybe it was Amos Cadbury.”

“Honestly,” she said. “In this town everybody knows everybody else.” She launched into the story of Amos and Henry Dolan coming to California to fetch Maurice. Amos had been such an old sweetie, she said. “Maybe I'll marry him.”

“I thought I was the older man in your life.”

“No, the handicapped one.”

“Every golfer is handicapped. Catherine has made a career deceiving two men into thinking she's nuts about them. Well, now my rival is gone.”

“Maurice!”

He assumed a serious look. “Sorry. A bit of a tragedy, Father. And right here in River City. Our friend was run down on the street.”

“Not Nathaniel Fleck?”

Catherine cried, “Don't tell me you knew him, too!”

“Only the name.”

“And such a name. He wouldn't listen to me when I told him he should use a pen name. Reginald Hedge or something like that.”

“It doesn't seem to have prevented his success.”

“I'm sorry I brought him up,” Maurice said.

“And you ought to be.”

There was an easy intimacy between the two, but it seemed to take place a level or two above real seriousness.

When he said good-bye, Father Dowling entered into the banter. “I'll be in my rectory if you need me.”

Catherine was standing beside the bed. She took Maurice's hand. “What's wrong with here?”

“Maurice will explain.”

On that ambiguous note, he went off down the hall. Maurice seemed arrested at the prep school level, but Catherine Adams was more difficult to read. Obviously she had not welcomed talk of Maurice's dead rival, if that was what Nathaniel Fleck had been. Ah, the modern world.

15

If every event were recorded, the world would soon be swamped by the accumulation. Of course, computers reduced everything to tininess, so the past did not submerge the present. In any case, it made police work easier. Cy Horvath was being assisted by a chubby young woman—Charlene, according to her name tag—who sat at the computer in the airline office in the Loop.

She said, “Give me that date again.”

Cy began with the day before the memorial. Charlene clicked keys, and the monitor became a blur of activity, then steadied.

“From LAX?”

“Los Angeles, yes.”

“There were four flights into O'Hare from there that day. Adams?”

“Catherine Adams.”

She leaned toward the monitor as she slowly scrolled. She shook her head once, then twice. Finally, four times. She looked up at Cy. “Zilch.”

“Why don't we just go back to the day before, and then the day before that, and—”

She was already doing it. Her fingers flew; flights and passenger lists appeared; she scanned them and shook her head. She struck oil when she had gone back five days before the memorial at Northwestern.

“Could you print that out for me?”

“Let me see your ID again.”

Cy opened and shut his wallet.

“That was fast.”

He opened it again. She looked from the photograph to him. “I hope the picture on your driver's license is better.”

She punched a button, and the printer began to whir. When it stopped, she tore a page free and handed it to him.

“Thanks.”

“Aren't you going to tell me?”

“No.”

She shrugged.

He said, “It's just routine.” He folded the printout and put it in his jacket pocket. Then a thought occurred to him. “Do you have a record of rental cars?”

“Of course not.”

He thanked her again and left. In his car, he sat behind the wheel and got out the passenger list Charlene had given him. Adams, Catherine. All it proved was that she hadn't walked or driven from California. She had arrived in midafternoon. Where had she stayed and how had she gotten there? O'Hare was ringed with hotels, and courtesy vehicles took passengers back and forth to them. The thought of checking them all—and, if he drew a blank, all those in the Loop—was not inviting. Maybe she had stayed in Evanston. That wasn't much help. To put off the evil day, he decided he would try the rental car agencies. They all had offices in the Loop, so that simplified it somewhat.

He got out of his car and went back inside. Charlene looked up in surprise.

“Let me use your phone book. The yellow pages.”

“You look familiar.”

“You've seen my photograph.”