Primal Fear by William Diehl Page A

On one side of the large room was a staircase leading to the second floor, on the other was the doorway to the office. There was also a back door directly in front of him and a corridor in the comer that he assumed led to the church.
    A nun sat at a desk in the center of the room.
    “Hello, sister,” the lawyer said. “My name’s Martin Vail.”
    “Mr. Vail.” She nodded. “I’m Sister Mary Alice.”
    She was young, late twenties, and had a rather mischievouslook in her eyes. There was that sense of innocence and compassion one sees in the faces of most nuns, but something else, a spin on the look, something a little devilish.
    “I’m here to, uh… I don’t know just how to put it…”
    “Examine the scene of the crime,” she offered.
    “Exactly.”
    “Top of the stairs,” she said.
    “Thanks.”
    It struck him that she did not seem overly upset by the demise of the late archbishop. Perhaps she was putting up a good front. He went up the stairs. A uniformed cop was sitting beside the doorway into the bishop’s suite. Vail peered around the corner so he could see the bedroom. The grotesque bloodstains on the wall and carpet had turned brown.
My God,
he thought,
somebody really did butcher Rushman.
    “Who’re you?” the cop asked.
    “Insurance man,” Vail answered.
    “Lieutenant!” the cop yelled.
    Stenner entered the hallway from the kitchen. He stopped for just an instant when he saw Vail, then stalked down the hall to the door.
    “We’re turning into an item,” Vail said.
    “What are you doing here?” Stenner asked absently, as if he really didn’t expect or want an answer.
    “Scene of the crime, Lieutenant. I’m here in the interest of my client, which is our privilege. Unless Jack Yancey’s changed the law in the last couple of hours.”
    “We’re still working here,” Stenner said brusquely. “You’ll have your chance when we’re out.”
    Vail stared at the stained wall. “They really did a job on him, didn’t they?” he said.
    “Yes. You’ll see when you get the pictures. The package you ordered will be on the sergeant’s desk, first precinct, first thing in the morning. That includes the autopsy, which just came back.”
    “Thanks.”
    Vail watched as a technician finished cutting a swatch from the carpet and dropped it into a plastic bag.
    “I hope there’s something left to examine when you finish,” Vail said. “We’re going to be missing some tidbits here and there; I assume you’re going to share.”
    “Don’t be difficult,” Stenner said, looking back into the room.
    “I’ve got a subpoena here, Lieutenant…”
    “When we’re through we’ll let you know, Counselor. Now do you mind?” He pointed toward the door.
    Vail went back downstairs. Sister Mary Alice was gone. He walked across to the office and looked in.
    Standing alone on a small table facing the desk was a small bronze sculpture of Pope Paul VI, his arms extended as if to enfold the world, his head tilted in an expression of compassion. Hanging on the wall behind the desk—like a stem and resolute guardian of the premises—was a photograph of the only man to whom Bishop Rushman had been responsible, Pope John Paul II.
    The desk was a large, heavy mahogany piece, as were the three chairs arranged in a semicircle before it. It was a cold, austere room except for an easy chair in one comer, with several books and periodicals piled beside it, and well-stocked, built-in bookcases on the two side walls of the room, which added warmth to the otherwise stark interior.
    Vail entered the office, walking down beside the bookshelves. They were jammed with an eclectic mixture: religious periodicals, a leather-bound code of canon law, and religious tracts; foreign-language editions of novels by Dante, Dostoyevski and other great writers; the works of Rousseau, Locke, Hobbes and Darwin; as well as studies of the psyche by Freud, Kant and Schopenhauer.
    His desk was tidy. Telephone, Rolodex, two letter