Bishop as Pawn Page 0,26

he let the pen fall to the sheet.

This was not going to work.

“Can you tell me, Herbert? Try! Try to tell me!”

Demers let his head fall to the right so he was directly facing Carleson. His lips twitched faintly. Carleson placed his ear as close as he could without blocking Demers’s lips.

Nothing.

Carleson turned his gaze toward Demers. “Try to move your lips! I’ll try to read your lips!”

He watched intently. There was a slight movement. “‘Heh … heh …’” Carleson spoke trying to articulate the expression forming on Demers’s lips.

“‘Heh … hel … help …’ ‘Help? ‘Help’ … is that it?”

“‘Help m … help me …’ ‘Help me’? ‘Help me’? Is that it, Herbert? Help you what? What do you want me to help you with? Another word, Herbert! Give me another word!”

“‘D … da … die.’ ‘Die’? ‘Help me die’? You want to die?”

Of course he does, stupid, Carleson told himself. Wouldn’t you in his condition?

Demers, having delivered his message, relaxed. He seemed to sink back into the pillow as if he were part of the headrest.

“I’ll tell the doctor what I just saw you do, Herbert. Maybe the doctor can help you die now that we know what you want. Hang in there. I’ll do everything I can.” Carleson took the man’s right hand and held the bony appendage firmly.

He had serious doubts that anything would come of this. The doctor would have no proof of Herbert’s desire other than the word of one priest. Carleson was certain Demers could not repeat his performance. Carleson was certain the status would remain quo.

This poor man wanted only one thing: release. Eventually, of course, God would take him. Meanwhile, he would be imprisoned in his shell of a body.

But, wait. Domers had asked him. The old gentleman had said it with all the strength he could summon. “Help me die.” That’s what he’d said. “Help me die.”

It was a desperate plea that would continue to haunt and torment the priest.

Could he? Would he?

Carleson had no immediate answer.

CHAPTER

SIX

“This old Springwells area isn’t what it used to be.” Sergeant Neal Williams was driving.

“What is?” From the passenger seat, Lieutenant George Quirt scanned the storefronts, small business establishments pressed so close to one another it seemed impossible to insert a dime between them.

The two officers had spent several hours interviewing several priests who had attended last night’s gathering. The groundwork had been done by other officers on the task force.

These preliminary investigations had disclosed that four of the priests—Fathers Echlin, Dorr, Dempsey, and Bell—had been at the party until the very end. Two others—Fathers Carleson and Koesler—had left only a short time before the party broke up.

The importance of these six lay in the fact that one or another or more had been present through the entire evening. So, together, their recollections of the event would cover everything that had happened or been said.

Of course, the police had already interrogated Carleson. And, since it had been determined from their questioning that Koesler had said little at the gathering, he had not been questioned.

“I remember this neighborhood,” Quirt said. “European. Irish, Polish, Slavs, Germans, French. Now look at it. Spics took over.” He slowly shook his head. “Might just as well be Mexico City.”

“Maybe,” Williams said. “But they’re keeping it up pretty well. Not a lot of boarded-up storefronts. And look at the housing down the side streets. Pretty good shape.”

Quirt grunted. Williams was too young to know what always happened in areas like this. You get your blacks and they’re shiftless and lazy. And they look different, for Chrissakes. They’re used to living in the dirt down south, in houses that are falling apart. Let ’em get in a decent neighborhood up here and—instant slum.

“Now, your spics can fool you. Most of ’em look like whites. But give ‘em a little northern winter and watch ‘em hibernate. Too many of ‘em can’t even speak the language. They expect us to speak spic.” Quirt smiled at the phrase he was sure he had just created. Speak spic. He’d have to use it on the guys soon.

Quirt was by no means Williams’s favorite human being. But he was on the lieutenant’s squad so there wasn’t much he could do about that. Williams wasn’t alone in his feelings toward Quirt. Most of the rest of the squad was only too well aware that as a detective, Quirt was no better than average. His arrest record was a combination of diligent—even superior—police work by the squad topped