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(back to page 5)
"Let's sit down for a moment," she said, and the older woman did so without resistance. "This is Detective Cooper. She needs to ask you a few questions."
Cooper set her mug on the counter, took her notebook from her bag, flipped it open, and paged through several sheets covered with small, precise script.
"We'll need at least ten pies," Mrs. Dudley said. "Everyone just loved Father."
Mo slid into the other chair and took Mrs. Dudley's hand in both of hers.
"You were Father O'Bannon's housekeeper?" Cooper asked.
"For twenty-seven years."
"What were your duties?"
"Oh..." Her eyes scanned the small room. "I do everything for Father." She drew a deep, shuddering breath. "Cook, clean house, do his laundry. The man would say Mass in his bathrobe if I let him."
She squeezed Mo's hands rhymically, probably unaware she was doing so. Mo watched the detective, who seemed to be just the least bit bored.
"I keep track of everything," Leona Dudley said.
"Do you live here at the rectory?"
"Oh, no. Mr. Dudley and I live over across from Fireman's Park."
"What time did you get here this morning?"
"I get his breakfast ready while he says the early Mass."
"And what time is that?"
"I usually start at six."
"Did you see or hear anything unusual this morning?"
"No." Her brow furrowed in concentration. "I don't think so."
"You didn't hear a siren when the policeman came?"
"Oh, yes. I heard that."
Detective Cooper frowned and made a note, her pen jabbing at the paper. "Did you see Father this morning?"
"No." Mrs. Dudley squeezed Mo's hand with surprising force, and Mo squeezed back.
"When was the last time you saw him?"
The tears started again. "Yesterday afternoon. He was going out to dinner."
"Did he say where he was going or who he was going with?"
"Oh, he didn't need to say. He has dinner with Father Kleinsorge every Sunday night, at Jerry's in Prairie Rapids."
"Did Father O'Bannon have any other appointments yesterday, that you know of?"
Mrs. Dudley shook her head. "If he had, I'd know. I keep all his appointments."
"Father didn't keep a separate calendar or appointment book?"
"No. Not Father O'Bannon."
Mrs. Dudley started to sob. Mo put an arm around her and pulled her close. "Maybe you could finish this later?" she asked Detective Cooper.
The detective flipped her notebook closed. "Sure. I'll need to talk to you, too."
"Okay."
Detective Cooper slipped a business card under her coffee mug on the counter. "If you remember anything else, please call me," she said. "I'll let myself out."
"I don't like her," Mrs. Dudley said as soon as Detective Cooper had left.
"I don't think she especially cares for us, either," Mo said. "Why don't you let me take you home now?"
She eased her arm off Mrs. Dudley's shoulders. The distraught woman looked around the kitchen, as if seeing it again after being gone a long time. "There's so much to do. We need to get the food ready."
"We can take care of that later. Maybe I could call Mr. Dudley for you, and he could come and get you."
"No! No," Mrs. Dudley said. "Don't trouble yourself. I'll call him."
Mo stood by the back door, looking out at the church, to give Leona Dudley some privacy with her phone call. An ambulance was parked in front of the church, the back door open. Two other cars had nosed up beside it. An attendant in a white coat appeared at the church door and rolled out a gurney, with another white-coated attendant handling the back. The black bag strapped to the gurney didn't seem large enough to contain a body. The two young attendants lifted the gurney, carried it down the steps, and slid it roughly into the back of the ambulance. One swung the door shut.
(continued on the next page)
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