They stepped over a chewed-up wooden lintel and out into the late-afternoon sun. "There 'tis," Montgomery said. "You can see why I took it for a hunter."
Kevin could. The ragged-edged hole was the work of a large-caliber weapon. But it wasn't the size of the shot that interested him. It was the van itself. The big, white, paneled Chevy Astro was identical to the one Sister Lucia Pirone had been driving.
X
He hadn't called before hauling over to his sister's farm, so it was his own damn fault his mother was there to see the blowup. He heeled his squad car into her driveway-the old one, not the new one-and was pounding up the steps before the engine stilled. He hammered on the front door. "Janet! Goddammit, open up!"
The door opened. He saw empty air where he expected Janet's face and looked down. His mother frowned up at him. "What on earth are you fussing about now, Russell? Swearing at the top of your lungs right out in front of God and everybody. What if the girls had been home?"
One-handed, he swung the door all the way open and pushed past her rotund form. "This is official business, Mom." He strode into the McGeochs' living room, nearly knocking over his niece Kathleen's music stand. Empty plastic laundry baskets and piles of folded clothing covered the sofa. Sneakers in assorted sizes and shades of pink were piled like a canvas landslide against the TV console. "Janet!"
Janet appeared from the kitchen, a full laundry basket in her arms. Her lips thinned. "Clare told you."
"Clare told me," he said. "And I don't know who I'm madder at, her for keeping it a secret or you for laying it on her. This is a goddam murder investigation, Janet. Don't you get it? We got three dead men to account for. That's a little more important than you saving a few bucks on your taxes."
"I told you everything you needed to know about the body! It doesn't matter who found it!"
"That's not your call to make!"
"Would somebody tell me what in Sam Hill's goin' on?" their mother asked.
"Janet and Mike have a whole crew of illegal workers at the new farm. It was one of them found the body on their property, not Janet. She lied about it, and she got Clare to back up the lie, and she's kept on lying despite the fact that we're up to three bodies now and there may very well be some connection between the migrant workers and the murders." He shoved his hands in his pockets and tried to breathe deep. The drive over hadn't cooled him off any.
Their mother pinned Janet in place with narrowed eyes. "This true?"
"We hired those workers in good faith. It wasn't our fault we got screwed over by the employment agency!"
"Is it true?" Margy's voice was relentless.
Janet glared at the wall. "Yes."
Their mother closed her eyes for a moment. When she opened them, she had an expression both Russ and Janet knew well. Knew and dreaded. "Janet Agnes," she said, "I am ashamed of you."
Russ could see Janet fighting not to drop her head. "I'm sorry you feel that way, Mom." Her voice was unsteady. "But when it comes to the farm's future, to my family's future, I have to do what I think best."
"I'm tryin' to think of a way hidin' the facts in a murder investigation could be best," Margy said.
"We need those workers to survive. I was afraid that if he knew about them, Russ would have to turn them in to Immigration and Customs, and Mike and I'd be left trying to run two hundred head between the two of us. Native-born hands would cost us twice as much, if we could find anyone to take on the job."
Russ shook his head. "You should have just asked me. I checked with the town attorney back in April, when your men first went missing. Unless someone's been arrested for a crime, I don't have any obligation to ask about their status, legal, illegal, whatever." He felt his anger leaching away. "Why didn't you just ask me?"
His sister looked at him, disbelieving. "Because if the answer had been different, you would've called ICE. You might've been sorry, but that wouldn't have stopped you."
"Then you should have told me." Margy's voice was sharp. "It's my farm too, you know. I don't expect to be treated like some old fool with an open purse and a closed mind."
"I'm sorry, Mom. Really." Janet turned to Russ. "And… I apologize to you, too. For the… for not asking. And for coming between you and Clare."
He did not want to go there. "Forget it. Lemme interview your men. See if anyone saw anything. Then we'll call it quits."
THE FEAST OF ST. ALBAN
June 23
I
The Feast of St. Alban was traditionally celebrated, in Millers Kill, with a bake and white-elephant sale, the sort of fund-raiser designed to maximize the work required of parish volunteers and minimize the return. In the three years Clare had been rector, she'd been inching the senior festival committee members-a blue-rinse bunch who had controlled the event for close to two decades-toward a more active and profitable fund-raiser.
The arrival of Elizabeth de Groot in January, followed by the unfortunate slip-and-fall of the committee chair later that month, opened the door for a change. With half the committee in Florida for the winter months, the new deacon and the equally ruthless-in-a-good-cause Karen Burns engineered a bloodless coup, inserting themselves as "temporary chairs." They shot down the white elephant, source of so much of Clare's office furniture, and took the bake sale off the table.
In its place, on Sunday night they were having an all-you-can-eat dinner (one ticket), a silent and live auction (another), and, as an inducement to hang around till the end of the bidding, a public dance in the park across the street from the church with Curtis Maurand and his Little Big Band (free, but contributions accepted).
Thanks to Elizabeth's ability to wheedle donations-she got such extraordinary results Clare wondered if threats of force were involved-they were having a blowout that, with luck, would fund half their yearly outreach program.
Elizabeth and Karen agreed that well-lubricated bidders were free-spending bidders, so the auctions were accompanied with cheese, hors d'oeuvres, and a never-ending stream of donated bottles-one of which was clutched in the hands of Clare's date.
"Vicar! Mrs. Burns!" Hugh Parteger waved plastic glasses toward an auction table, where Clare and Karen were counting their chickens before they hatched. "Merlot? Or Cabernet?" Several female committee members behind the silent auction tables stared at Hugh. With his British accent, double-pleated trousers, and two-hundred-dollar haircut, the New York resident was an exotic specimen for Millers Kill.