Saldana raise her voice or speak a discouraging word. She was an optimist, a caring person—and it pissed me off that anybody would do this to her place. Was it mere vandalism, or did someone hold a specific grudge?
Seeing the smashed-out windows, I unfolded one of the Black Glass, Inc. flyers I’d taken from our office. “Maybe you should give these people a call. It’s a new company that specializes in repairing and replacing windows in the Quarter. I’m sure they deal with regular transparent glass as well as opaque windowpanes.”
She perused the advertisement. “Thank you, Mr. Chambeaux. I like to use local services if I can.”
Her zombie helper looked at me, and the hammer in his hand slipped out of his rubbery fingers. The tool fell on his foot, but he didn’t feel it.
Mrs. Saldana gave a schoolteacherly tsk. “Jerry, you just dropped a hammer. Pay attention. You wouldn’t want to hurt somebody. You could get damaged too. We wouldn’t want that, would we?” Embarrassed, the zombie bent over and picked up the tool.
“Anything else I can do to help out?” I asked.
Her smile reminded me of a grandmother’s kisses and the smell of apple pie. “It’s not me you should be worried about, Mr. Chambeaux. It’s those poor unnaturals who need my help. What a setback!” Dismay was plain on the old woman’s face. “This damage caused a delay in today’s services. I don’t know how I’ll serve breakfast to the needy . . . although I think we can manage coffee. Jerry?”
“Coffee . . .” he said, and shuffled inside through the gaping hole of the ruined door.
Mrs. Saldana smiled at me. “Come on in. Jerry is going to sweep up some of the mess.”
Inside the front room, the old woman used a thumbtack to put the Black Glass flyer on a corkboard she had mounted on the wall. The rest of the board was crowded with snapshots of unfortunate unnaturals she had helped—a toothless grinning werewolf, two ghouls who wore angelic expressions on their faces, and rotting Mel, my very first case as a PI in the Quarter. A sincere handwritten note in blocky letters, written with thick clumsy lines, as if a child had used a brownish-red crayon: Thank you, Mrs. Saldana! We love you and the Hope & Salvation Mission.
In the main room, ten beige metal folding chairs sat in front of the small lectern where Mrs. Saldana delivered her sermons. Each folding chair held a well-thumbed Bible and a stained hymnal. A rarely used piano had been pushed off to the corner. I remembered that Mrs. Saldana had tried to teach Jerry how to play, but he wasn’t dexterous enough to keep up with any fast melodies. A card table held a tray of cookies as well as a large percolating coffeemaker.
From inside, the old woman turned around and looked out the damaged front of the mission, where plywood now covered one of the two windows like an eye patch. “I’ve got to get that door fixed, or maybe I should leave it off. This is a mission, after all—we’re here to help people. We welcome everyone in need.” She made up her mind. “Yes, indeed, the door to Hope and Salvation should never be locked.”
“A locked door didn’t deter whoever vandalized the place yesterday,” I pointed out. “Do you have any idea who may be responsible?”
“I haven’t the foggiest,” she said automatically, and her lips turned down in a flicker of a frown; I caught the expression before she formed an accepting smile again. “Whoever it is doesn’t know that God loves them. My life’s calling here, Mr. Chambeaux, is to give comfort and assistance to poor unnaturals. They can’t help who they are, but they can control their urges. They can be good people if they stay on the straight and narrow. If I find whoever did this, I shall have to show them love and understanding . . . although I’m inclined to give them a stern lecture as well.”
“Officer McGoohan is working on the case,” I said. I didn’t want her haring off in pursuit of whoever had done the damage. She might get hurt.
“Yes, indeed. Such a nice policeman. Always so helpful. I’ve given him all the information.”
I nodded. “He’s a good man, ma’am, but he is overburdened. He and I help each other out on cases, so maybe I can give him a lead.” I thought about the people harassing Sheldon Fennerman, wondered if they might have