The Twelve Crimes of Christmas (16 page)

“Shut
up,” Annie snapped, shooting her husband a
baleful
glance.

“First
time the crazy fool ever had a decent-paying job,” Steve continued, ignoring
her. “And what does he do?” He cocked his thumb and forefinger. “Gets a gun and—”

“Shut
up, I said!” Annie’s face flamed angrily.

“Hiya,
Father,” a jovial voice interrupted from the doorway. “You here to referee?”

Father
turned and saw that the tall burly man entering the kitchen was one of the
stray lambs in his flock—George Floss. Murmuring a greeting, the priest noticed
that Floss was attired in a bathrobe and slippers.

“It’s
my day off,” George volunteered, aware of Father’s scrutiny. He yawned widely
before his heavy-jowled face settled into a grin. “So I went out on the town
last night.”

“That
explains your high color,” Father remarked dryly. He turned back to the table,
where Annie and Steve sat glowering at each other. “Now, if you can spare a
moment from your bickering,” he suggested, “maybe you can tell me what happened
to set Charley off again.”

Steve
pointed a finger at Floss. “He’ll tell you.”

“Charley
was doing fine,” George said as he poured a cup of coffee from a pot on the
stove. “Didn’t even seem to take it too hard—at least, not at first—when I told
him he was going to be out of a job.”

“You
told
him?” the priest said sharply.

“Why,
sure,” Floss replied with an important air. “I’m the super at the Liberty
Building. Soon as I knew the old dump was going to be torn down, I told
everybody on the maintenance crew that they’d be getting the ax. Me too.” He scowled
and his face darkened. “A stinking break. There aren’t too many good super jobs
around town.”

He
gulped some coffee and then brightened. “Of course it won’t be for some time
yet. That’s what I kept telling Charley. But I guess it didn’t sink in. He started
worrying and acting funny—” He broke off with a shrug.

“You
haven’t heard the latest, George,” Steve said. “That cop—Casey—was here nosing
around Charley’s room. Found a gun and the Everett guy’s wallet.”

“No
kidding!” Floss’s eyes widened in surprise. He
shook his head and whistled.

“Gun,
wallet, no matter what that cop found,” Annie shrilled, waving the paring knife
in her hand for emphasis, “I don’t believe it. Charley may be a little
feebleminded, but he’s no murderer—”

The
air was suddenly pierced by a loud and penetrating wail. In an upstairs bedroom
a child was crying.

“Now
see what you’ve done,” Steve said disgustedly. “Started the brat bawling.”

Annie
gave a potato a vicious stab with her knife. “Go on up and quiet her.”

“Not
me,” Steve retorted with a defiant shake of his balding head. “That’s your job.”

“I’ve
got enough jobs, cooking and cleaning around here. It won’t kill you to take
care of the kid once in a while.”

Father
Crumlish had stood in shocked silence during the stormy scene. But now he found
his tongue.

“It’s
ashamed you should be,” he said harshly, turning his indignant dark blue eyes
first on Annie, then on Steve. “When I baptized our little Mary Ann, four years
ago, I told both of you that you were blessed to have a child at your age and
after so many years. Is this disgraceful behavior the way you give thanks to
the good Lord? And is this home life the best you can offer the poor innocent
babe?”

He
took a deep breath to cool his temper. Annie and Steve sat sullen and wordless.
The only sound in the silence was the child’s crying.

“I’ll
go and see what’s eating her,” George offered, obviously glad to escape from
the scene.

“I’ve
an errand to do,” Father told the Swansons. “But mind you—he held up a warning
finger—“I’ll be back before long to have another word or two with you.”

Turning
on his heel, he crossed the kitchen floor, walked down the hallway, and let
himself out the door. But before he was halfway down the steps to the street,
he heard Annie’s and Steve’s strident voices raised in anger again. And above
the din he was painfully aware of the plaintive, persistent sound of the crying
child.

Lieutenant
Madigan was seated at his desk, engrossed in a sheaf of papers, when Father
Crumlish walked into headquarters.

“Sit
down, Father,” Big Tom said sympathetically. “You look tired. And worried.”

Irritated,
the pastor clicked his tongue against his upper plate. He disliked being told
that he looked tired and worried; he knew very well that he was tired and
worried, and that was trouble enough. He considered remaining on his feet,
stating his business succinctly, and then being on his way. But the chair next
to Madigan’s desk looked too inviting. He eased himself into it, suppressing a
sigh of relief.

“I
know all this is rough on you, Father,” Madigan continued in a kind tone. “But
facts are facts.” He paused, extracted one of the papers in front of him, and
handed it to the priest.

Father
Crumlish read it slowly. It was a report on the bullet which had killed John
Everett; the bullet definitely had been fired from the gun found in Charley
Abbott’s room. Silently the pastor placed the report on Big Tom’s desk.

“This
is one of those cases that are cut and dried,” the policeman said. “One obvious
suspect, one obvious motive.” He shifted his gaze away from the bleak look on
Father’s face. “But you know that with his mental record Charley will never go
to prison.”

Abruptly
Father Crumlish got to his feet.

“Can
you tell me where I’ll find Detective Dennis Casey?” he asked.

Madigan
stared in astonishment. “Third door down the hall. But why—?”

Father
Crumlish had already slipped out the door, closed it behind him, and a moment
later he was seated beside Detective Casey’s desk. Then, in response to the
priest’s request, Casey selected a manila folder from his files.

“Here’s
my report on the anonymous phone call, Father,” he said obligingly. “Not much
to it, as you can see.”

A
glance at the typed form confirmed that the report contained little information
that Father didn’t already have.

“I
was hoping there might be more,” the pastor said disappointedly. “I know you’ve
been on this case since the beginning and I thought to myself that maybe there
was something that might have struck you about the phone call. Something odd in
the man’s words, perhaps.” Father paused and sighed. “Well, then, maybe you can
tell me about your talk with Charley. Exactly what you said to him—”

“Wait
a minute, Father,” Casey interrupted. He ran a hand through his carrot-hued
hair. “Now that you mention it, I
do
remember something odd about that call. I remember hearing a funny sound. Just
before the guy hung up.”

“Yes?”
Father waited hopefully for the detective to continue.

Casey’s
brows drew together as he tried to recall.

“It
was a sort of whining. A cry, maybe.” Suddenly his eyes lit up. “Yeah, that’s
it! It sounded like a baby—a kid—crying.”

As
Father Crumlish wearily started up the steps to the rectory door, his left foot
brushed against a small patch of ice buried beneath the new-fallen snow. He
felt himself slipping, sliding, and he stretched out a hand to grasp the old
wrought-iron railing and steady himself. As he did, the package of statuettes,
which he’d been carrying all these long hours, fell from under his arm and
tumbled to the sidewalk.

“Hellfire!”

Gingerly
Father bent down to retrieve the package. At that moment St. Brigid’s chimes
ran out. Six o’clock! Only two hours before Evening Devotions, the priest
realized in dismay as he straightened and stood erect. And in even less time
his parishioners would be arriving at church to kneel down at the crib, light
their candles, and say their prayers.

Well,
Father thought, he would have to see to it that they wouldn’t be disappointed,
that there would be nothing amiss in the scene of the Nativity. Moments later
he stood in front of the crib and unwrapped the package. To his chagrin he
discovered that the tumble to the sidewalk had caused one of the lambs to lose
its head and one leg. But Herbie Morris could easily repair it, Father told
himself as he stuffed the broken lamb into his pocket and proceeded to put his
replacements in position. First, in the center of the crib, the Infant. Next,
to the left, the First Wise Man. And then, close to the Babe, another unbroken
lamb that he’d purchased.

Satisfied
with his handiwork, Father knelt down and gazed at the peaceful tableau before
him. Ordinarily the scene would have evoked a sense of serenity. But the priest’s
heart was heavy. He couldn’t help but think that it was going to be a sad Christmas
for Charley Abbott. And that the man’s prospects for the future were even
worse. Moreover, Father couldn’t erase the memory of what he’d seen and heard
at the Swansons—the anger, bitterness, selfishness, and, yes, even the cruelty.

Hoping
to dispel his disquieting thoughts, the pastor started to close his eyes. But a
slight movement in the crib distracted him. He stared in astonishment as he saw
that a drop of moisture had appeared on the face of the Infant and had begun to
trickle slowly down the pink waxen cheeks.

Even
as he watched, fascinated, another drop appeared—and then the priest quickly
understood the reason for the seeming phenomenon. The greens that Emma had
placed on the roof of the stable had begun to lose their resilience in the
steam heat of the church. The fir, pine, and holly boughs were drooping,
shedding moisture on the face of the Child….

In
the flickering rosy glow of the nearby vigil lights it struck the priest that
the scene seemed almost real—as if the Child were alive and crying. As if He
were weeping for all the people in the world. All the poor, lonely, homeless—

Father
Crumlish stiffened. A startled expression swept over his face. For some time he
knelt, alert and deep in thought, while his expression changed from astonishment
to realization and, finally, to sadness. Then he rose from his knees, made his
way to the rectory office, and dialed police headquarters.

“Could
you read me that list you have of the buildings that John Everett was going to
have torn down?” Father said when Madigan’s voice came on the wire. The
policeman complied.

“That’s
enough, Tom,” the priest interrupted after a moment. “Now tell me, lad, will
you be coming to Devotions tonight? I’ve a call to make and I thought, with
this snow, you might give me a lift.”

“Glad
to, Father.” Suspicion crept into Madigan’s voice. “But if you’re up to
something—”

The
pastor brought the conversation to an abrupt end by hanging up.

Herbie
Morris was on the verge of locking up The Doll House when Father Crumlish and
Big Tom walked in.

“Can
you give this a bit of glue, Herbie?” Father asked as he handed the storekeeper
the broken lamb.

“Forget
it, Father,” Herbie said, shrugging. “Help yourself to a new one.”

“No
need. I’m sure you can fix this one and it’ll do fine.”

Then,
as Herbie began to administer to the statuette, the pastor walked over to a
display of flaxen-haired dolls and leaned across the counter to select one. But
the doll eluded his grasp and toppled over. The motion caused it to close its
eyes, open its mouth, and emit the realistic sound of a child crying.

“I
see your telephone is close by,” Father said, pointing to the instrument on a
counter across the aisle. “So it’s little wonder that Detective Casey thought
he heard a real child crying while you were on the phone with him at
headquarters. One of these dolls must have fallen over just as you were telling
him to arrest Charley Abbott for John Everett’s murder.”

The
priest was aware of Madigan’s startled exclamation and the sound of something
splintering. Herbie stood staring down at his hands, which had convulsively
gripped the lamb he’d been holding, and broken it beyond repair.

“I
know that you were notified that this building is going to be torn down,
Herbie,” Father said, “and I know these four walls are your whole life. But
were you so bitter that you were driven to commit murder to get revenge?”

“I
didn’t want revenge,” Herbie burst out passionately. “I just wanted to keep my
store. That’s all!” He wrung his hands despairingly. “I pleaded with Everett
for two months, but he wouldn’t listen. Said he wanted this land for a parking
lot.” Morris’s shoulders sagged and he began to weep.

Madigan
moved to the man’s side. “Go on,” he said in a hard voice.

“When
I went to his house that night, I took the gun just to frighten him. But he
still wouldn’t change his mind. I went crazy, I guess, and—” He halted and
looked pleadingly at the priest. “I didn’t really mean to kill him, Father.
Honest!”

“What
about his wallet?” Madigan prodded him.