Lovely, Dark and Deep (The Madeline Mann Mysteries) Read online

  Lovely, Dark

  and Deep

  The Second Madeline Mann Mystery

  by

  Julia Buckley

  Lovely, Dark and Deep

  Copyright © 2011 by Julia Buckley

  Published in the United States of America

  All rights reserved

  Names, characters and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher.

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  Cover Designer: Kelly Banos-Parra

  Cover Model: Pamela Quimby-Costello

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  “The woods are lovely, dark and deep,

  But I have promises to keep,

  And miles to go before I sleep,

  And miles to go before I sleep.”

  —Robert Frost, “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”

  To all the Dominican sisters who were my teachers.

  Lovely, Dark

  and Deep

  Then

  It was twilight, the last day of May, when Joanna went back to the fountain. She was breathless, fearful in a way she hadn't been before her visit. She normally prayed at the Mary statue for serenity, for strength, but today she prayed for her family and her friends while her feverish hands tended to her task.

  When she heard someone call her name, she jumped, turned, and saw the old nun, Francis, in the doorway, beckoning to her. She could hear the distant sound of a car turning into the long drive. Parishioners had been bringing flowers all day to adorn the fountain, the statue, and she tuned out the sound of the motor as she tried to hear what Francis was saying.

  “Joanna,” called the old woman again over the wind.

  Joanna, distracted by the task she'd just completed, looked behind her once at the peaceful pond, the fragrant floating lilies, the fish that darted like rapid golden arrows. She turned back and began walking, one, two, three steps, and then the car was there, faster than she expected, a blur in her peripheral vision: the impact and the pain and she was flying, flying, soaring above the pond and looking down at herself, the Joanna who fell to the ground, blood running from her head onto her pristine white habit, her hands together as if in one final supplication to the Holy Mother.

  Her spirit floated, watching the old nun push her old pained legs into motion. Even while she died, Joanna felt compassion for the living woman's anguish, evident in her cry for help as she knelt by the body, felt the pulse, kissed the hand. Joanna's spirit cringed at the laughter of the one who drove away, unnoticed and unrepentant, escaping into the spring dusk, a murderer.

  Part One

  Lovely

  Chapter One

  In October I'd dyed my hair blonde on a whim. My mother hadn't been pleased, but I'd noted as the months passed that she seemed to be adapting to the new color, even mentioning it to her friends in a way suggesting that I wasn't, after all, shaming the Mann family with my capricious decision. Finally, in late January, I knew that my mother approved when she recommended that I go to her own salon, where, if I intended to perpetuate the color, at least, she said, I should have it done right.

  So there I sat in the shampoo chair a week later, having my head pummeled by a hairy Hungarian man named Istvan, who worked at the salon part-time and who told me of his love for watching Magnum, P.I. re-runs on cable. His heavily accented voice spoke loudly in my ear. “I go to Hawaii myself, someday, I tink,” he told me, his unruly eyebrows floating above me as he palmed my head like a basketball. Istvan was not particularly gentle, but I'm sure not one customer had the courage to tell Miss Angie.

  “It must be beautiful,” I murmured.

  “What?” Istvan boomed.

  “Hawaii. It must be beautiful to visit. All those flowers and such,” I said conversationally.

  “Oh, yahh. And Magnum P.I. is such good detective. Handsome man, too, hey?” He winked at me, as though I might have a chance with the Tom Selleck of the past. Then he squeezed out the moisture in my hair so hard I felt a sudden empathy for all victims of scalpings.

  As instructed by my mother, who understood the etiquette of these things, I handed a dollar to Istvan the torturer before staggering over to Miss Angie's chair.

  It's true that my mother is kind of a control freak, but I find I can put up with it most of the time. I can't really complain, because when I do, my fiance Jack points out that I am perhaps even more controlling than my mother. It works for both of us, though, us Mann women. My mother is busy helping the new mayor put city hall in order (I had a part in deposing the old, corrupt mayor), and I find that my controlling instincts, my desire to put the universe in an order that I find pleasing, the desire, as I like to call it, to take vibe-restoring action, has been helpful in my role as an investigative reporter. In fact, it was since I'd gone blonde that things really started happening for me: I got engaged, I broke two corruption stories for the paper, and I got a raise from my boss, Bill Thorpe. I even got a call from the Tribune, offering me a chance to interview for a writing position. For now, though, I was happy to remain at the Webley Wire, a paper for which Bill Thorpe and I were determined to earn more and more recognition, and not just in Webley, Illinois.

  “Your mom told me what you'd like, hon,” Miss Angie said now, as I settled in. The chair was simulation leather and made embarrassing farty sounds, so I stopped wiggling. Miss Angie tossed her own platinum curls, quite a bold look for a fifty-year-old woman, but she carried it off. “Your mom said something a bit more golden, like the old Hollywood girls.”

  I shook my head. “I was thinking more white-blonde, like an ice princess. Like a Nordic Queen.”

  Miss Angie looked nervous. She shuffled her house slippers on the floor. “Your Mom has already paid me,” she said apologetically. That had been the deal. My mom offered to pay if I'd promise to stop dying my own hair. Now, however, I had to dance to her tune. My mother was determined to have a color she liked for the wedding pictures. I was getting married in June.

  I sighed. “Do you have some kind of shade chart?” I asked.

  “Oh, sure,” Miss Angie said, brightening at this potential way out of the problem. Perhaps there was a compromise in the little booklet with silver rings. She handed it to me and said, “Do you want to look for a while, hon? Because then I'll just run to the back and finish my Lean Cuisine. It'll take five minutes.”

  I agreed maybe this would be a good idea. "Sure. And if I need to call my mom?" I asked.

  "Right there on the counter, hon. You might want to look at 'Tropical Gold.' Or maybe 'Blonde Ice,' she said, trying not to take sides.

  I watched Angie walk away and disappear behind swinging doors. As my eyes traveled back, I noted a woman getting a haircut from Darlene, another of the stylists at Hair You Go salon. The woman was getting a short, no-nonsense cut, and her eyes seemed to be looking, not at the mirror in front of her, but deep into her own thoughts. Her face was looking more and more familiar. Webley is such a small town that I'm always seeing people I think I should recognize. After a while I'd learned to just let it go. It would either come to me, or it wouldn't.

  I looked back at the blonde heads in the flip-book. The models pursed their lips at
me disdainfully, as if the colors they were wearing were too glamorous for my lowly noggin.

  Finally I selected one that seemed a good compromise. It was called 'Blonde Minx.' I was smiling at the thought of telling Jack this name when Angie returned to me and gave the color her blessing. “I'll get things ready, hon,” she told me.

  “Angie, who is that woman?” I asked.

  “What woman?” Angie asked, wide-eyed.

  “Darlene's. In the chair across,” I said, inclining my head toward the still-preoccupied occupant.

  “That's Moira, hon. Sister Moira, I should say. From St. Roselles.”

  My mouth opened, then closed again. Sister Moira MacShane. I hadn't recognized her out of her habit. She'd taught me English not once, but twice, when I was a freshman and a junior. She'd been one of my favorite teachers at St. Roselle High School.

  “So—nuns get their hair done?” I asked.

  Angie laughed. “Why, sure, now that they get to show their hair. She's got some kind of important meeting today, wants to look nice. Let me just get the colors together, hon, and I'll be right back,” she said, scuffing toward the back room.

  Darlene was taking off the smock and saying, “Moira, dear, I think you're done, so you can pay Lisa on your way out.”

  “Oh—thank you,” said my old teacher distractedly, standing and brushing clippings from her blue pantsuit. She got up and I did too, meeting up with her at the front counter, where a girl with purple hair stood waiting for Sister Moira's money.

  “Sister Moira!” I said.

  She recognized me right away, even though I was no longer a teen and had changed my hair color. “Why, Madeline! Would you believe I've been thinking about you lately? And now here you are, obviously a sign from God!”

  I had never been called a sign from God; I was momentarily speechless.

  “You look just lovely, dear, and I read about your engagement in the Wire—congratulations!”

  “Thank you, Sister.”

  “And how is Gerhard? And Fritz?” Her voice trembled slightly on the second name. My brother Fritz was a nightmare to teachers, even as a memory. Sister Moira taught him in her freshman literature class and was never quite the same afterward. Fritz had become so enamored of the play Julius Caesar that he chose to perform a scene as his class project. He selected the moment when the ill-fated Cassius throws himself upon his sword. Fritz's friend Sam Dickerson was Brutus, and he actually earned extra credit for standing there and holding a tin foil sabre while Fritz over-acted his soliloquy. Anyway, the traumatic part happened when Fritz bellowed, “Caesar, thou art avenged, even with the sword that kill'd thee!” and launched himself at the weapon, whereupon gobs of fake blood came pouring out of his side. He hadn't mentioned the fake blood to Sister Moira, although he'd actually "researched" the recipe for the stuff in a Fangoria magazine.

  After Sister Moira recovered from what appeared to be a heart attack, Fritz was sent down to the office, indignant that he never received applause for his theatrical debut. Poor Sister Moira tried to transition into a grammar lesson, flecks of red still dotting her long white habit.

  “Fritz is fine,” I told her now. “He works at Barnes and Noble, but his dream is to make it big with his band.” I purposely didn't mention the name of Fritz's group, The Grinning Bishops.

  Sister Moira smiled. “Well, God bless him,” she said. “You Mann children were always so talented. Look how far your good writing has taken you, and Gerhard—I imagine he has a job in the math field?”

  Gerhard had always won the high school math contests. “He works for a computer company. He hopes to open his own someday,” I said. I noted that she seemed a bit restless, as though she might have an appointment elsewhere, and yet she continued to ask me questions about my family. Finally I changed the subject.

  “I didn't recognize you at first,” I admitted. “You look different—with hair.” I hadn't meant it to sound as rude as it did; luckily she laughed.

  “Oh, yes, I'm getting vain in my old age. What do you think?” she asked, fluffing her short gray cut.

  “I like it,” I said truthfully. What I had never realized was that Sister Moira was an attractive woman. She had lovely skin, and her blue eyes were framed by naturally dark lashes and only a few more lines than when I'd known her as a high school girl.

  “Madeline,” she said thoughtfully as she paid her bill. “I really have been thinking of you. I read your pieces, you see, in the Wire. All the work you did about exposing the mayor's behavior, and catching Logan Lanford's killer.”

  I didn't actually "catch" the person in question; actually she shot me, but I wasn't going to quibble about that now. I raised my eyebrows at Sister Moira, wondering where this was leading.

  “And I was thinking,” she continued, “that maybe you were the person I should contact about something that's been bothering me . . . . and then here you were, right in front of me. The Lord makes His ways known, Madeline.”

  “Yes,” I agreed diplomatically. Angie was back, and beckoning me to the chair.

  Sister Moira noticed this. “I won't keep you now, Madeline, but I'd like you to meet with me if you would. Let's see, tomorrow's Sunday, that's no good. Monday?”

  “Do you mean you want me to investigate something?” I joked.

  “Yes, dear.” She looked almost cheerful as she tied a rain scarf over her neat hair and pulled a trench coat from the nearby coat rack. She pulled on her coat, lowered her voice, and said, “Your experience makes me think—remember Sister Joanna?” she asked.

  I stared, uncomprehending. "But Sister Joanna was— "

  “Not here, dear. Let's meet Monday, and I'll tell you about it.” She squeezed my arm. “I already feel a weight has been lifted.” With a quick wave and a promise to call me, she stepped out into the unfriendly January afternoon.

  Shocked by her revelation, I returned to my squeaking chair, ready to submit to Angie's ministrations and begin my transformation into a Blonde Minx.

  My fiancé Jack picked me up in his new car, a blue Volvo. He'd bought it in honor of our upcoming nuptials; it was sporty, but had a good safety record for any babies that we might one day place in the back seat. Jack thought ahead.

  “Hey, sexy,” Jack said as I opened the door and hopped in. “Nice hair.”

  I leaned over for a brief kiss. Jack is very kissable, due in part to his clean-cut, boy-next-door appearance, and part to the one dimple that appears in his left cheek with the least provocation. “I'm a blonde minx,” I said.

  “Really?” Jack asked. “What is a minx? A little animal?”

  “No, that's mink,” I corrected, strapping in. “I'm a minx. You know, like a naughty girl.”

  “Mmmm,” Jack said appreciatively, playing with the radio dial.

  “So where's lunch?” I asked as we pulled away from the curb to the spunky rebellion of Joan Jett's 'Bad Reputation.' “Somewhere romantic?”

  “Well, as romantic as it can be with your brother there,” Jack answered with an apologetic smile.

  “Fritz or Gerhard?” I asked.

  Jack just looked at me. Of course. I didn't need to ask which of my brothers would be inviting himself to lunch with us, probably in the hopes that it would be free.

  “Fritz,” I concluded.

  “Yeah. He's been hanging around at our apartment for a couple hours. He says he has news, but he's waiting for you.”

  “Fine. I have news for him, too. Remember Sister Moira MacShane, my high school English teacher?”

  “Sure. The one who sang Shakespeare?”

  “Yes.” I smiled at the memory. Sister Moira, in order to help us remember certain rhyming couplets, would put them to music. I still knew them all, and sometimes sang them to Jack just to annoy him. “She was getting her hair cut. I think she thinks there was something fishy about Sister Joanna's death.”

  Jack drove silently for a while, his eyebrows up near his hairline. Everyone in Webley knew about Sister Joanna. She'd been a p
opular teacher at St. Roselle, and the music director of St. Catherine Church. More than a decade earlier, when I was a junior in high school, she'd been struck and killed by a hit-and-run driver right in front of the convent. Her death had raised a firestorm of controversy in Webley, first because the police had not caught the driver in question, and second, because residential speed limits in our town had been a cause of contention with the citizens for years. A large crowd had gathered for her funeral. Flowers and candles were placed at the “Mary Fountain,” the little statue surrounded by a pond that Sister Joanna had tended in her lifetime, and before which she was praying when she died. People marched for a week afterward, demanding justice for Sister Joanna and every other pedestrian who'd been hurt by speed limits that were too high.

  It was a moot point, really, because whoever had killed Sister Joanna had been speeding and most probably drunk. The speed limits were duly lowered, however, and today on a residential Webley street one must keep to a sedate twenty miles an hour.

  “She thinks Joanna was murdered?” Jack finally asked.

  “Well, she implied as much—hey, I thought you said Fritz was in our apartment!” I yelled, as Jack pulled up in front of The Old School, our affectionate term for Mr. Altschul's place. Altschul means "Old School" in German.

  “I left him there, I swear,” Jack said. We were both talking in the agonized tones of people who had contributed to the escape of a panther.

  Fritz was standing in the front yard of the Victorian three-flat that Jack and I called home. When we met, Jack had lived on the third floor, and I on the second. Now we'd consolidated our stuff in my second-floor apartment, and Mr. Altschul, our landlord, had rented the top apartment to a young accountant.

  “Oh, no, he's bothering Mr. Altschul!” I yelled as Jack parked the car. Fritz was, in fact, talking to our landlord as the latter shoveled nonexistent snow off of his pristine walk. Mr. Altschul was in his seventies and fit as a forty-year-old. He was always working on the house and grounds, and when he couldn't find a job he created one, as he was doing now, scraping the shovel across the practically snowless pavement while he listened to Fritz, who wore only a striped wool scarf for warmth over his jeans and flannel shirt.