Final Edge

CHAPTER 10

A continuing light drizzle dampened Lucas's windshield under the gunmetal-gray sky that had encircled the city since he'd exited the Starbucks cafe. The convent orphan home emerged from the smudged-gray overcast distance, prompting Lucas to point and say, "Damn, there it is. Man, this place looks bleak."

She agreed, staring ahead. "Dour, like something out of a Dickens novel."

Our Lady of Miracles stood in stark contrast to the other structures in the residential and commercial area, as if it silently claimed special historical status, attested to by its cornerstone, dated 1914. Its light gray stone walls had been planted here before Houston's urban sprawl had engulfed it, as if the urban blight had mushroomed around its ivy- covered walls.

On all sides of Our Lady's gated grounds, the noisy, busy streets crisscrossed one another while seeming to divert around the convent church. East, west, north, south, all the streets were filled with traffic and low-rent, high-rise apartments, duplexes, brownstones, and gray-stones in need of upgrading and repair. Trash, bottles, cans, fast-food bags, crushed containers, scattered cups, careworn, bruised automobiles with flat tires and broken windows, all littered the area as one cancerous blight.

The convent itself appeared neat, orderly, and clean, but its gates had captured a lot of the debris, clinging to the black wrought-iron stays that separated Our Lady of Miracles from the community.

The convent was also encircled by billboards and an array of mind-numbing signs touting establishments ranging from McDonald's to strip clubs. The old convent church looked besieged, surrounded as it was by storefront establishments-a pizza parlor, a Blockbuster, a beer hall, a coffee shop, an insurance firm, and a carpet-and-tile outlet. Sitting squarely in the middle of all the hubbub of the teeming city, Our Lady's ancient stones and spiraling pinnacles, the solid, gray shape of its bell tower some three stories high, stood behind its locked iron gate. Attached to the church itself stood a long, meandering orphanage, a building for housing, boarding, feeding, and schooling the young women who called this place home.

Lucas next saw a short, heavy set nun in a black habit struggling to keep an umbrella over the head of a taller woman in a white habit, the mother superior. Sister Elizabeth Portsmith, no doubt. Portsmith raised a single hand to acknowledge the car at the gate, her features half masked by the black umbrella. She seemed to be directing traffic, telling the shorter, stouter, and younger woman what to do. The younger nun struggled to keep her mother superior dry with one hand while getting the gate open with a jammed handheld electronic device. Finally, the gates opened inward on a small square of fieldstones that made up a parking lot and driveway.

Meredyth traced the enormous pinnacles of the church skyward, the gray stones streaked from the rain. The drizzle had not worsened, but the darkening sky had become nearly black by the time Lucas found a comfortable parking spot alongside a convent van. The little lot was tight and difficult to maneuver in, but finally he switched off the engine.

Climbing from the car, Lucas and Meredyth saw that the mother superior and her assistant had made their way to a doorway alongside the church parking lot, and both the assistant and Portsmith were motioning Lucas and Meredyth to enter at this cottage like entrance where a red door stood. Mother Superior Elizabeth appeared quite aged and winded, as if the short time she had spent out at the gate had been too much for her, Lucas thought. He wondered at her age, at the number of years she'd spent here and elsewhere in service to her faith.

She appeared the obvious mainstay of her small citadel, stem, stoic, accepting that at such times as this, she must allow her bastion to be compromised, allowing a nonbeliever like Lucas inside. He guessed that if she could have her way, Mother Elizabeth would keep them out like the clutter plastered against her gate.

"She look in good health and happiness to you?" Lucas whispered in Meredyth's ear, referring to the mother superior, whose face appeared dusted with flour.

"Careful, Lucas. She could kick your red butt."

By now the shorter, sprier nun had disappeared into the church ahead of Mother Elizabeth. After introductions, Mother Elizabeth, looking even older than before, guided them through a winding, semi darkened corridor to her expansive, mahogany-lined, ornate office. Inside, the walls were lined with oak-wood shelves filled with books and religious objects. Once seated behind her massive, shimmering dark wood desk. Mother Elizabeth finally asked, "Now precisely how can we at Our Lady of Miracles possibly help the Houston Police Department in a homicide investigation, Lieutenant Stonecoat, Dr. Sanger?" Mother Superior seemed to stress every other word. She radiated gravity, solemnity, grace.

Lucas outlined all that had occurred, the story causing Portsmith to gasp more than once. He brought the horror of the Post-it Ripper back to her doorstep, explaining that the package sent to his home had Our Lady as its return address.

"Such cruelty in mankind," she muttered. "But to think anyone here could possibly have anything to do with such horrors, no. No, it must be a ruse," she instantly suggested, her right hand holding down her left on the desk before them. "It can't possibly have anything to do with our home here."

"There's another connection to here," Lucas added, "two, in fact. One, my landlord, who took the parcel, said it was delivered by a young woman dressed in a Catholic school uniform. Two, your convent school is not far from where I live."

"It's impossible," she automatically replied. "Only a handful of our girls are considered trustworthy enough to go beyond the gates of Our Lady, and none of our girls could possibly involve herself in such a soulless crime." The mother's hackles rose up now, the hair on her neck alert, her very skin bristling, her eyes and ears like those of a hunting dog alerting on a kill. She gritted her teeth behind a firmly set jaw and searched Lucas's face, and then Meredyth's, for some sign that they must know they were in the wrong place and wasting not only their time but hers.

"From an investigative standpoint, Mother Elizabeth," replied Lucas, "it's good news that you can narrow down the number of young ladies here who enjoy the freedom to come and go."

"It'll save us a great deal of time," agreed Meredyth.

"I'm not so sure I should simply turn my girls over to be interrogated by police. Should I call in Carver?"

"Carver?"

"The convent lawyer."

"That will only complicate things," Lucas replied.

"For you perhaps."

Meredyth waved her hands. "We only want to speak to the children to determine if one among them delivered the package, possibly for money, Mother Elizabeth. We don't think the girl in question knew what was in the parcel."

"I still think I should call Mr. Carver. I am not well versed in any law other than ecclesiastical law. And while his expertise is property and investments, I know his first question to me will be did you two display a warrant to question my girls, minors most of them." She lifted her phone, making Lucas groan. She glared at him. "I am a simple woman and need guidance."

Lucas looked her firmly in the eyes. "Carver will only cost you more hours, Mother Elizabeth, and isn't time your most valuable commodity, aside from your flock here, I mean? If we have to go and come back with a court order, it'll only mean more disruption of your schedule here."

Mother Elizabeth had only to punch her speed dial for Carver. She held the phone in a moment of silence, her eyes closed as if in prayer. Finally, she calmly placed the phone back on its cradle. "All right, but you realize if one or more of the girls refuse to talk to you, she has the sanctuary of these walls, and therefore the right of refusal. If you have a problem with that, then perhaps I should call Carver."

Lucas opened his palms to her. "Refusing to talk to police? We get that all the time, Mother. It's called the Fourth Amendment."

"Sanctuary predates the U.S. Constitution, Detective."

Meredyth grabbed him and huddled heads with him, whispering, "Don't try to match wits with this woman."

Meredyth then straightened in her seat and addressed the mother superior. "We accept any conditions necessary to speak to the girls," Meredyth added.

"All right, Dr. Sanger, Detective."

"But before you begin piling on more conditions, ma'am," Lucas said, "I want you to know what we have. Fact, a twenty-eight-year-old young woman, abducted and brutally murdered, her head severed with an ax, two"-he held up his fingers-"two whacks with a dull blade, and some fiend sent her head in a UPS box to us. If one of your girls can give us a description of the man who she acted for, then we may stop this satanic individual from harming his next victim, who quite possibly could be one of your girls, if she's spending time with him."

Meredyth added, "The Lourdes woman's family deserves some closure, Mother Superior. Surely, you can understand our need to act quickly before another part of this woman is mailed to someone, perhaps her mother and father."

The mother superior relaxed her gaze and relented. "Well…I suspect our Mr. Carver has enough on his plate. All right. I'll have the trustworthy girls we allow to interface with the community called up to my office, and you may speak with them, but I must be present during any…inquisitioning."

"In-what?" asked Lucas.

"During interrogations, Lucas," explained Meredyth.

"Your presence could make them hesitant to talk freely," Lucas pointed out.

"Those are my terms. Take them or…or we call in Mr. Carver, and you can deal with him."

"No, no. Your being present actually may spur the truth from your girls, I suspect," said Lucas.

"Are there any other girls who you suspect capable of finding their way off the grounds other than your trustees?" asked Meredyth.

"None. We run a very taut ship here. Now, I'll have Sister Audrey call each of the girls to come out of their classes. There's a room to your left where you can question each."

"I'd also like to examine your records," added Meredyth, who had stiffened somewhat in her seat, her eyes roaming about the convent office. "I'm particularly interested in newborns turned over to your care in 1984."

"And the significance of that year has to do with your case?" she asked, her forehead creasing below the line of her habit.

"A third connection to the convent orphanage. Mother Superior," said Lucas.

"I was involved as an intern at the time with Child and Family Protective Services-it was called then, placing children in the care of various orphanages in and around Harris County and Houston, including yours." Meredyth took a deep breath. "We may be far off here, but there may be some connection between the killer's interest in your convent and my short association with your orphanage, Mother Elizabeth."

"That was some twenty years ago, and I was not here in 1984," she thoughtfully replied, "and those records will be difficult to access."

"But you have them?" asked Lucas.

"In the basement, yes. Along with anything and everything stored there since before my time here." She made a tsk-tsk noise with her dentures, her wrinkled face puckering. Lucas guessed her age at somewhere between sixty- nine and seven-five.

Mother Elizabeth then pressed the button on what appeared an ancient intercom system, spoke to her aide, Sister Audrey, and asked her to round up the six girls she had in mind. "Anyone else you know who may have had any dealings outside the gates in the past week, send them along as well, Sister Audrey, dear."

A voice like a clanging cowbell came back over the intercom, "But Mother Superior, that will disrupt a number of classes."

"Just arrange it, Sister."

"Right away, Mother Superior."

"Would you care for coffee and a roll while you wait?" asked Mother Elizabeth, pointing to an um beside which lay an array of pastries, cups, saucers, and napkins. "All prepared here on the premises. I have made the school here completely self-sufficient, save for a few necessities we require. You must stay long enough to inspect our gardens in the courtyard, our dining facilities, the sleeping quarters, and the classrooms. We teach all the subjects, including the arts, music, Latin, and Greek, but we also teach self- sufficiency-self-reliance as well as a reliance on God."

"I'm not sure we have that much time this trip out," said Meredyth, "but perhaps next visit."

From somewhere in one of the buildings, the sound of stringed instruments wafted up to them, muffled with the occasional strident chord.

"Detective," said Mother Elizabeth to Lucas, "do help yourself to coffee and a pastry, and I'll have mine with cream and a cinnamon roll. Dr. Sanger?"

"Just coffee, black, Lucas, thanks."

Lucas played host for the elderly nun and Meredyth as they continued to talk. "How good is your success rate for placing children, Mother Elizabeth?" asked Meredyth.

"We pride ourselves on an eighty-five-percent rate, but that does leave fifteen percent behind, but even these girls have a better start in life than they might otherwise have had. The ones who grow up here, once they reach eighteen years of age, can decide on remaining or going out into the world."

"Finally given choice, hey?" muttered Lucas from the coffee urn.

"At age twenty-one, I'm afraid we must push them from the nest altogether. Church policy."

"Then actually they have no choice at twenty-one, only at eighteen," Lucas replied, serving Elizabeth's coffee and roll, and drawing a disapproving look from Meredyth, whose eyes clearly reminded him of what she had warned- don't challenge the old girl.

"We'd like a list of young women who've left this year, both the twenty-one-year-olds and the eighteen-year-olds who've opted out," replied Meredyth. "Is that possible?"

"I'm quite sure Sister Audrey can provide you with both lists, yes, before you leave today. I suppose one of our graduates could be your courier. Much likelier than one of the girls you'll meet today."

Meredyth and Lucas exchanged a glance as he placed her hot coffee between the two women. He sat back down with his own coffee and roll, not hungry but forcing it down out of an attempt to keep Mother Elizabeth happy. As in Cherokee custom, it felt true here that an offering of food should not be turned down. That it was an insult to do so.

Mother Elizabeth thanked Lucas and added, "You must tell us what you think of the girls' cooking. The children do all the food preparation themselves."

Lucas sampled the offerings. "Delicious," he declared.

"Has this work ethic of raising crops, food preparation, and doing other in-house jobs always been in place here?" asked Meredyth.

"I'm afraid not. I began slowly making Our Lady work as a self-sufficient entity with the children being the principal workforce when I came here in 1994. It took some doing to move the chore list out of the hands of the sisters of the convent and into the hands of the children, I can tell you, but it has paid off handsomely for the well-being of all."

"It makes good sense to me," said Lucas. "Keep them busy. Idle hands…devil's playground, all that."

"I'm just guessing, but did you grow up on a reservation, Lieutenant? You are Native American, aren't you?"

"Yes to both questions," he replied.

"Then you know the importance of a self-sustaining village. The Church was at one time planning to close down Our Lady altogether, but miraculously and with a lot of determination and everyone's effort, we returned it to a viable and healthy institution."

"What you mean is that the orphanage was no longer losing money. Is that right?" asked Meredyth.

"We must operate under a budget like any other institution, yes."

"You're paid so much for each child you take in each year they remain with you, correct?"

"Correct."

"Then what incentive have you to find them homes?"

Lucas wondered when Meredyth had decided to challenge the matriarch of this fortress.

"The incentive of the heart, Dr. Sanger." Mother Elizabeth's eyes penetrated through Meredyth now like ice picks. "The cost-saving measures I have implemented here do not include sabotaging legitimate foster care and/or adoptions. We are still quite aggressive in finding suitable families for our girls, and I resent any implication to the contrary, Doctor. I'm not so sure you're not still with Child and Family Welfare, Doctor, sent here by that terrible woman, Allison Talmadge, who has, for a year now, attempted to have our license to act as an orphanage and adoption agency revoked."

"Trust me," Meredyth quickly said. "I have no ties to that agency any longer, and I don't know anyone named Talmadge."

"We're here strictly on a police matter," added Lucas, fearful the woman would invoke the name of her lawyer again.

"That Talmadge woman has sent spies here before, all of them anti-Catholic in their thinking."

"I'm sorry, Mother Superior, please," Meredyth said. "I really didn't mean to imply-"

"You asked what incentive we have to place our children. The incentive that has always been the very spirit of Our Lady of Miracles, to inspire the love of God and the trust in Him and hope in their young and innocent hearts. Certainly, we are not always successful, but I am extremely proud of our results, so your coming here like this in search of one of our children, who may have had a hand in this crime, either wittingly or unwittingly, well, it is unsettling to begin with, but I am not so old and brittle as to have no fight left in me, my dear doctor."

Lucas simply smiled and nodded to her, displaying his admiration for the elderly woman. She was a match for anyone. He couldn't help but like her.

"Please accept my apology if I've offen-"

Sister Elizabeth's phone rang, and she halted Meredyth with an upraised hand, and grabbed the phone with the other. She began to converse with someone at the other end. "Don't be taken in, dear. Listen to yourself. You know very well what to do. You're telling me, so tell the man! You will not accept pitted, wrinkled, ugly discards!"

Meredyth took this opportunity to lean into Lucas's ear and whisper, "Don't forget that the abductor had a woman working with him."

"And you think she could be a recent graduate from here?" asked Lucas.

"I don't know. Do you?"

"Ask her if she's had any recent vandalism or destruction of religious icons in the church."

Mother Elizabeth continued on the phone. "Be firm, Rachel, dear! You're in charge down there! It's your kitchen, and what happens if you bake with poor ingredients? Exactly." She hung up, a smile and a lilting shake of her head, and she explained, "Some neighborhood vendor trying to pawn off bad cherries and vegetables back of the kitchen. Rachel's twenty years old, and she's leaving us next year, but for now she's still in charge of our kitchen."

Lucas made a mental note, picturing the savvier girls as knowing a way off the grounds via the kitchen. If vendors came to that back door to barter, that door must swing both ways.

"So Rachel's one of your fifteen percent whom you could find no home for."

"Not I. She was sixteen when I arrived. You know the odds of placing a child of sixteen? Of course you do. Mother Orleans tried to place her, of course, but Rachel simply never worked out in any of the homes Orleans placed her in. I've read the poor child's history."

"She's spent her entire life here?" asked Lucas, standing now, staring out the window down on the rain-soaked courtyard.

"Not so bad really. Since age four when her parents were killed in a plane wreck, but she has learned skills and life lessons to carry her through. Still, she has a hard time saying no to people. We have little time left to work on it, but she'll get it if I have to brand it on her forehead."

Elizabeth's intercom buzzed into life. Sister Audrey's voice came over. "First of the girls is here, Mother Superior."

"Who is it, Sister?"

"Melanie Polk, Mother. Do you want me to send her in now?"

Sister Elizabeth held Sister Audrey in suspense for a moment, addressing Lucas and Meredyth instead. "I know this child is innocent, but I promised you all our trustworthies who go out into the community. Shall we go into my conference room?"

"Yes, let's," replied Meredyth, gathering up her coffee.

"Send the child round to the conference room hallway door, Sister Audrey. We'll speak to her there. And Sister, send for Rachel Wade too, when she can get free."

As they moved into the conference room, Lucas and Meredyth sitting beneath a painting of the Last Supper, Lucas asked, "Mother, has there been any vandalism or destruction of property done against the convent?"

"Nothing major… nothing we haven't been able to handle internally."

"Then there has been some?"

"The usual mischief one expects with children."

"Defaced paintings, statues?"

"Mustaches and spectacles from time to time. Nothing serious, although someone set a fire in the convent once, again before I came on here."

Lucas asked, "The convent…the residence rooms, sleeping quarters, all that?"

"Yes, it was a fire begun in a broom closet beside Mother Orleans's room-now my room. On damp days, I can still get a whiff of the charred walls.

"Again, I was not here during Orleans's stewardship of the convent, but they determined it was student smokers. The little darlings had found what they thought a good place to light up. Carelessness and youthful stupidity. I'm told a book of matches and some butts were found among soiled rags."

"Anyone charged or reprimanded?" asked Lucas.

"From what I understand, the mother superior handled their punishment, and it was severe."

"This girl Rachel…was she involved in the fire?" asked Meredyth.

"Yes, among others. Orleans got to the bottom of it, got hold of the ringleader."

"Rachel?"

"No, Rachel is a follower. It was her friend of the time, Lauralie."

"We'd like to talk to this Lauralie as well then," Meredyth said. "Whoever our girl is, she's got a bold streak in her."

"That would be Lauralie, but she's no longer here. Graduated in 2000…January, and has been out there on her own since. She dropped by from time to time at first, but she stopped coming by."

"And why did she stop coming by?" asked Meredyth.

"She would have to tell you that, but I'm afraid I have no current address or way to get hold of Lauralie. So…shall we begin the inquisition of my young ladies now?"

Meredyth caught a glint in the old girl's eye, and she realized now that Mother Elizabeth wanted to corner their quarry as well, if and when she could be identified.

Mother Elizabeth opened the door on the first young lady, the voices of others who'd begun to gather at the bench outside wafting into the conference room. "Do curb your tongues, ladies," she called out to those in the hallway. "This isn't an amusement. Claudia, let's begin with you."

A frightened young lady demurely entered, her big eyes curious about the visitors from the outside world. Her attention to Meredyth's clothes and jewelry seemed all- consuming, like a fire burning from within, dying to get out but held in check.

Lucas put himself in the girl's shoes, faced with a detective, a psychiatrist, and a mother superior asking questions of her. Either it would terrify some truths from her, or it would cause her to shut down and provide them with nothing. Lucas had interrogated hundreds of teens with criminal records or on the way to building one, but he'd never interrogated anyone with an austere nun perched in a corner, looking on vulture-fashion. He feared they would get nothing from the girls.

They had exhausted the afternoon in interviewing nine young women, ranging in age from a plump fifteen- year-old to a series of seventeen-soon-to-be-eighteen-year- olds, and three at nineteen and twenty, two of whom sounded less than eager to leave the convent, and one who appeared downright troubled at the prospect of leaving, and was weighing the wisdom of becoming a nun herself. "Possibly in order to stay cloistered here," Mother Elizabeth said of the girl after she'd gone. "Not a good enough reason to join the order."

All the young ladies exhibited good manners and respect for Elizabeth, even love, mixed in with fear of her. They all spoke highly of Mother Elizabeth and the programs she'd instituted at Our Lady of Miracles.

Their last interview was with Rachel from the kitchen. As with all the other girls, Rachel knew nothing about delivering a parcel to Lucas's house above Tebo's tavern. "I'd never go near no tavern, Mother Superior," she repeated.

"Please, Rachel, dear, say any tavern, not no tavern," admonished Mother Elizabeth. "We do not never speak in no double negatives… not around here," she explained to the adults, making Lucas frown.

Meredyth quickly asked the girl, "Rachel, do you know how we could get in touch with your friend Lauralie who's left the home? Lauralie?"

"I dunno where she is. I swear I lost touch. We stopped being friends like way before she left."

Meredyth sensed a fear in Rachel, but a fear of what, of whom? Mother Elizabeth or Lauralie or both? Mother Elizabeth suggested, "Why not speak to the sixteen girls who've recently graduated and opted to leave the convent, all now living on the outside? They're all on the list Sister Audrey's preparing you. Lauralie Blodgett is only one of them."

"Is there anyone in that group, Rachel, who had a boyfriend on the outside?" Meredyth pressed the girl, ignoring Elizabeth's interruption.

Rachel again looked to her mother superior before saying, "You should try to talk to all of them."

"Any among them who didn't like life here at the convent or was discontented in general? Anyone who liked destroying things around here, maybe setting a fire?" asked Lucas.

Rachel looked to her mother superior again before answering. Getting a nod from Mother Elizabeth, she replied, "That'd be Lauralie."

"We keep hearing that name come up. She was something of a bully, I understand, always getting into trouble and detention," said Meredyth.

"Everyone was glad to see her go."

"But you two were friends, weren't you?"

"I broke it off with her; she started wanting to do things…I–I-I didn't wanna do."

"What sort of things? Like smoking? Getting into trouble?" pressed Meredyth.

"Mother Superior, I don't like to talk about this."

"It's all right, Rachel. Be forthright. Tell the doctor everything, Rachel."

Rachel wrenched her hands and stuttered. Finally she spat it out. "Sexual things. She wanted to play with me, to put things into me. Wanted to fondle me, sleep with me."

Mother Elizabeth sat without the slightest twinge, a stone statue. "It's all right, child. It's all right."

"Lauralie had a way of making you do things. I had a hard time with her. Saying no to her. I finally told Mother Orleans, and she was going to punish Lauralie, but that's when Mother Orleans had that awful accident, and after that Lauralie left me alone when you came to the home, Mother Elizabeth."

"Lauralie was always looking for someone to love her," said Elizabeth. "She somehow had gotten the fixed idea in her head that she could only be loved in 3 sexual manner."

"Perhaps she was abused in one of the homes she was placed in at an early age?" asked Meredyth.

"I have no record of an incident of that type." Elizabeth sighed deeply "Sad really. Even Father William could not help Lauralie, try as he might. He called her a hopeless child once. I had to straighten him out on that, none of our charges is without redemption. Lauralie had her redeeming qualities. She was tenacious and persistent in her struggle to learn who her parents were, for instance, admirable in her determination, I'm told, even at an early age."

"She just always said…said we both of us needed the experience for when we got out into the real world," said Rachel, her voice having raised an octave, as if wanting to outdo her mother superior. "I had to fight her off every night for a time. She liked to kiss me and touch me all over."

"That's enough, Rachel!" Mother Elizabeth put an end to it, and Rachel curled back in on herself like a closing flower.

They said good-bye to Rachel, Mother Elizabeth walking her out to the hallway, conferring with her in a whisper. Meredyth and Lucas only caught snatches of each voice: Mother: "…don't care-" Rachel: "She's evil-" Mother: "What you think-" Rachel: "…name shoulda been Laura-LIE! with… capital let-" Mother: "Enough."

Rachel: "You tell me…stand up…strong, but…won't let me."

Mother: "Get back…kitchen, now!" Rachel: "And Father Wil… touched me again." Mother: "No more. Later… talk privately." Rachel, stomping off, shouting back: "She pushed her." Silence…more silence. Then a reverberation of Rachel's voice from the end of the corridor. "She's evil…was always evil. She hurt the mother."

Mother Elizabeth rejoined them in the conference room, quickly reassuring her guests that "Lauralie Blodgett was not so discontent or unhappy as the picture the other girls painted. True, there was a time she was in constant trouble, but her discontent came of a genuine longing to know her roots, to know about her birth mother and father. That's quite understandable, don't you agree, Doctor?”

“Yes, quite."

"Her school record is filled with cases of theft and lying as a child, and constant bouts and arguments with both the sisters here and her classmates."

"Any bouts with statuary, icons, paintings?" asked Lucas.

"She was often caught destroying property, yes. But she was just a troubled child, not so different from Rachel, unable to fit in with foster families. Very similar histories, those two, and for a time they were friends, and I thought it good for Lauralie…she was such a loner, you see. I encouraged their…closeness, but I had no idea until Rachel came to me with her lurid stories of nighttime rape that…that what Mother Orleans had put a stop to had again flourished. For a long time, I prayed Rachel was making it up to get attention, but I caught Lauralie at her one night and that was the end of it."

"This Mother Orleans was in charge here when Lauralie first arrived as an infant?"

"My able predecessor, Mother Sara Orleans."

"The one whose room still smells of smoke?" asked Lucas.

"The one who had an accident? Is she in retirement? Can I meet with her?" asked Meredyth.

"The unfortunate accident proved fatal. It's why I was called here to take over."

"How did she die?" asked Meredyth.

"A fall down a flight of steps in the night. She apparently got up in the middle of the night and slipped on the stairs. Her skull was fractured. She was in a coma for weeks until the decision to release her came from the family. Tragic really."

"Sounds like Mother Orleans lived a dangerous life for a convent nun," said Lucas, drawing a stern look from Elizabeth Portsmith.

"Let's get back to this Lauralie," said Meredyth. "Was she ever adopted?"

"No, never adopted, but once…no, twice actually, she went into a foster care situation; both before my time here. However, I've read about the placements in her records, the reasons behind her being returned to Our Lady. I always read the histories on all the children I am responsible for."

"What are the reasons she didn't do well with her foster parents?"

"In both cases, she never made it past the trial period. In both cases, wonderful situations that ought to've led to adoption simply failed, largely due to Lauralie's self- destructiveness."

"Can you be more specific, Mother?" pressed Meredyth.

"Unruliness, stubbornness, a kind of underlying fear of being out there and not in here where at least she knew the rules. She was eleven the first time, thirteen the second time. But by then-"

"Patterns of behavior were set," Meredyth finished for her.

"Did she bum down a house? What?" asked Lucas.

"No, nothing so dramatic, but just as destructive in its way. She wouldn't be guided, would not follow the simplest of rules, throwing temper tantrums, balling up into the fetal position for hour upon hour, refusing to eat, starving herself to skin and bone, lashing out, acting out. She simply refused to be a part of her new family. Hurt newfound siblings. Pitiful shame really. It was quite severe when she was young, but by the time I came on the scene, she was simply withdrawn and sullen."

"Is that when she started the fire in the closet in the convent?" asked Lucas.

"By that age the children who have not been adopted, often they become, I hate to say, toughened to the fact that they are not adorable little creatures that people want to adopt, and so they often play the role of the exact opposite, the un adorable, unruly delinquent. It can become worse still when they leave our controlled environment. It's why I counseled Rachel and Lauralie to remain with us to at least twenty-one. Rachel chose to remain, Lauralie did not."

"In what ways did she hurt her adopted family siblings?" asked Meredyth.

"She scalded one with hot soup. Another time, she almost smothered one to death with a stuffed animal down her throat. I forget the other instances."

Rage, Meredyth thought. "And after leaving here, she cut off all communications?"

"Not at first. At first, she'd call from time to time. I lost touch after her call about her mother's death."

This got Lucas's renewed interest, and Meredyth said, "But she had just found her mother."

"That's what made it so tragic-this beautiful reunion cut tragically short, but then God works in mysterious ways."

Mother Elizabeth stood and glided back toward her office. Lucas and Meredyth followed, Lucas getting the door for them. Elizabeth continued speaking as they walked. "He certainly confuses me at times, to put so much heartache on that single forsaken child. I called her my fawn, my poor forlorn child, so lonely and abandoned."

"How exactly did her mother die?" asked Lucas.

The mother superior had returned to her desk, sitting stiffly behind it now, as if using it as a barrier between herself and the city officials before her. "Lauralie's sudden appearance after all the years obviously brought back a great deal of grief, and one night Lauralie's mother, an alcoholic, drank herself to death. I suppose in a fit of remorse and guilt over having abandoned Lauralie in her infancy.

"Imagine, she located her birth mother, living right here in Houston, and they were getting to know one another, doing famously according to Lauralie, when suddenly she left her again. After that, Lauralie's calls became infrequent, and soon nonexistent. She'd been living with her mother, but I tried contacting her there, only to learn she'd vanished, and I've worried about her, prayed for her since, and now you are here."

"What about her father?" asked Lucas.

"Deceased. She learned of it from her mother. Died some years before. She told me she laid flowers at his grave."

"When Lauralie was here at Our Lady, given her record of trouble and vandalism, however did she become a trustworthy?" asked Meredyth.

"She earned it. Straightened up her act, as they say, mightily. Took Mother Orleans's death very hard, she did…as did all the girls, but I convinced her that Mother Orleans would want her to pull out of her depression."

"And she made a miraculous recovery?" Meredyth watched the nun's response closely. She had begun to analyze the woman, Lucas realized.

"Yes, miraculous… with the help of God…came to her senses, began using that intellect I convinced her she had to use to survive on the outside."

"Inventive, resourceful, and adroit, would you say?"

"Only in the best sense. She turned a comer in her mind, began soaking up knowledge, learned to like the programs I put into place, and excelled."

Meredyth, nodding added, "Particularly the Work for Trust Program?"

"In everything, she began to excel, to discover her own power, that she owned her intellect and her emotions and must turn them toward the greater glory of God."

"Despite all the hardships life had meted out to her?"

"Perhaps because of them. Small miracle, I say. She learned to control her pent-up rage and anger at the world, and win trust points in the bargain."

Mother Elizabeth stared out into space as if picturing Lauralie. "Previous to my taking charge, she would do nothing around the convent, and although a bright girl, her grades were deplorable." She shivered with the thought. "She spent most of her time staring out the windows and swinging on the gate out there. After my programs were initiated, she was soon outside those bars looking in."

"Then as early as what, fifteen, sixteen, she was off the grounds at times, looking for her parents?" asked Meredyth, probing.

"Oh, no! It took time, years. She took to winning trust only after she'd turned seventeen, and she graduated and opted to leave at eighteen. It was in her junior year of high school that I allowed her some latitude in her search for her parents, although I warned her she might not like what she found out there beyond the gates of Our Lady."

"Careful of what you wish…you may get it," commented Lucas.

"Something like that, yes."

Meredyth, a strand of hair falling over her right eye, asked, "Did you open her records to her?"

"Not exactly. She broke into them one night and found them on her own."

"Clever girl."

"Cunning when she wished, yes. This was before we had our heart-to-heart. It was after that that I gave into her unquenchable desire to locate her parents, to help her in any way that I could. However, I failed her miserably."

"How so?" Meredyth tiptoed lightly. Lucas knew to keep quiet. Mother Elizabeth wiped a tear from her eye.

"Her mother was no longer at the recorded address or phone number, and I had an institution to save, and so…. Still, that young lady kept doggedly at it, taking it entirely upon herself to research her mother's whereabouts. Primarily, that meant she was spending more and more time away from here and on the street in her quest."

"Where are the records on Lauralie's adoption now? Can we have a look?" Meredyth asked.

"Archive files, as I said, in the basement. Not pleasant surroundings. Are you sure?"

"I'll brave the surroundings. Perhaps your assistant could show us the way?" asked Meredyth.

"I'll fetch Audrey, and we'll both show you the way. I need the walk, exercise for a bad hip and knees." Ignoring the intercom, she went next door to Sister Audrey.

Alone with Meredyth now, Lucas said, "Remember what Kelton said about the vandalized grave of a guy named Blood at Greenhaven Meadows?"

"Off Berwyn, yeah."

"Blood is not far off from Blodgett. This girl's name is Blodgett. You think Kelton may've gotten it wrong?"

"Or maybe we have a genuine coincidence?"

"Might be worth a look-see all the same. Greenhaven Meadows Cemetery's not too awfully far from here."

"If there's time, depends on the condition of these records I want a gander at, and I want to get back downtown before the courthouse closes, and you…you wanted to hit the mortuary, remember?"

"First things first, I know. Lauralie, you're reckoning, is one of the infants you placed, right?"

"If so Lucas…and if she turns out to be the courier we're seeking, God forbid but then there's a tie between this place, the Ripper, her mother, the murder of Mira Lourdes, and me…."