An Error of the Moon

By Gerard Blackmore

A college is in crisis and four days of golden autumn will end with the shock of crimson.

 

In the early morning of October 25, 1988, a student jogging the placid campus of Vermeulen College, the prominent Catholic institution in Hampton, Indiana, discovers the body of the charismatic president of the college administered by the Congregation of St. John.

 

Roger Drouin, the college Chief of Police, is shaken. Five years earlier, he helped solve a sensational murder case in Rochester, Minnesota. Dispirited, he had left policing. Now he faces another tragic case, the murder of a priest, the friend who had brought him to Indiana. 

 

Apart from having to deal with an ambitious college provost whose daughter is now missing, he must navigate a forced alliance with the cheerless but brilliant County Chief of Detectives and deal with a religious leader who may be obstructing justice.

 

He has to find answers to questions about a popular professor of English Literature and her cynical husband. But beyond investigating the facts of a crime, Roger Drouin must confront matters of the heart—those of the dead president, the woman who loved him, and himself.

• Language: English
• Publisher: TEMPUS
• Release date: Sep 15, 2022
• ISBN: 9781778181023

Book preview

1

At 6:15 Wednesday morning, October 26th, Sylvia Reardon marked an X in that day’s slot on her 1988 desk calendar. She moved quietly to the door of her student apartment, turning the lock carefully so as not to awaken her roommate, Lynn Hewitt, who was still sleeping. She closed the door behind her, locked it and put the key in the back pocket of her gym shorts. Then she walked to the first-floor entrance, pushed open the front door of Hagen Hall and grimaced. Late October fog. She hesitated a moment, took a deep breath and started to sprint down the asphalt walk leading to the road around St. Margaret’s Lake, one of the two on the campus of Vermeulen College.

Third straight day of early morning jogging. Another new ritual for her eighteen-year-old life. She was now eight weeks at the prominent Catholic college in Hampton, Indiana, named, so she was told, after some Dutch priest. Already she was beginning to forget Hinton, Ohio and feel at home.

She turned left where the entrance walk met the lake road. Her route around the lake and through the campus was a little under three miles and she’d managed it yesterday quite nicely, stopping only once because a shoelace had come undone in her new SunStar running shoes. Ridiculously expensive but proof of dedication.

The first day she’d paused three times. This morning she had covered a mile and was actually feeling very good but not exhilarated. Exhilaration, she assumed, came after running approximately the circumference of the earth. She’d make it today without stopping. Or pausing.

The fog was lifting a little in the early dawn light. Up ahead she could make out the ducks and Canada geese. The geese had come to the lakes on their own, but some misdirected mallard-lover had apparently brought the ducks to campus several years back. Their droppings randomly dotted the asphalt for the next fifty yards.

Shit. Obviously, nobody in the college administration jogs or those ducks wouldn’t be allowed to wander all over the road. I’d have to be a running back to survive these land mines.

She turned off the asphalt road down the path which ran along the lake a few feet from the water’s edge. The path, covered by crushed stone, was only six or seven feet wide and was enclosed on both sides by short alder bushes. Those who wanted privacy, reflection or romance took the path. In the first year of her college career, she was avoiding all three. The compelling reason for taking the path this morning was the respect she owed her new shoes. Ducks must not besmirch SunStars. Not at forty-five dollars a pair.

She had nearly reached the halfway point, marked by two small jetties extending into the lake, fifty yards apart. As she ran along an adjacent path, she noticed small rowboats tied up to each. She’d heard that students with a more rustic refinement than she possessed actually fished the lake. She couldn’t imagine eating anything caught in waters frequented by those scuzzy ducks.

She saw the body.

She didn’t immediately think of it as a body. Her first reaction was that a person was lying face down in the water. The legs, and half the upper body, were on the bank, like somebody trying to drink from the lake. That’s why she didn’t freeze like you’re supposed to when you come upon a body lying in the water at 6:30 in the morning.

She stared. At first in mild surprise and then intently. This person wasn’t drinking from the lake. She felt no impulse to cry out for help. She slowed to a walk and then to an almost stealthy tiptoe, inching closer to the body as if approaching the edge of a cliff to peer over. Now she could see it was a body. The body of a man. A man wearing SunStar running shoes.

Then she screamed.

Security Officer Benjamin Purcell pulled into the parking lot of the Vermeulen College Police Office at 6:40 a.m. He had just finished the last campus security check of his shift and would be going home in an hour.

Uneventful night. Around one in the morning he’d received a call to one of the dorms. Some local city kids hanging about the windows. They’d scattered as he approached the residence in his car, and he didn’t bother going after them. Sometime later he came across two illegally parked cars. He ignored the one with the faculty parking decal and ticketed the other. That was it.

He had retired from the Hampton Police Department three years before, but two months into retirement he was so bored that he joined the college police force. After twenty-five years of dealing with all the crime the city of Hampton could produce, he had no difficulty handling what he considered petty campus criminals. The college, administered by the Congregation of St. John, had its share of thefts, break-ins, and assaults but it was all kept very low-profile. Apparently, there’d been a rape on campus four or five years ago but nobody seemed to know much about it. He remembered hearing some talk at the city police station at the time but he couldn’t recall any charges being laid. Until recent changes in federal legislation, Vermeulen policy had been to withhold its crime statistics, and all inquires regarding the police department were filtered through the college provost, Nicholas Zeiler. Purcell knew that Roger Drouin, the college Chief of Police, didn’t care much for Zeiler or his public relations polices, but he didn’t think much about it one way or the other. Never cared much for internal politics, he told the other police officers. He liked his chief, though. Drouin, the former French Canadian from the Rochester Police Department up in Minnesota, was a good policeman and a good boss. But politics was politics, so Purcell stayed out of it. He liked his job just fine. The majority of the 9,700 students were from out of state so you weren’t dealing with your own.

The police department building wasn’t impressive, just a large Quonset hut that the Reserve Officers’ Training Corp had used as a parade hall and quartermaster’s store when the military came on campus in 1942 at the beginning of World War II. During the sixties, the ROTC program had been moved to another part of the campus and campus police had taken over the premises. Given the nature of the work at Vermeulen, the building was adequate for the 38 men and women who policed the college.

He went inside. Good morning, Mar.

Morning, Ben. I just made a fresh batch on your coffee maker. You’ll need a dose of caffeine to see clearly this morning. Too much fog for October. Marlene Whitten, the dispatch clerk, was eternally pleasant. Some said she was just plain eternal and had come with the building. One of those reliable people of indeterminate age.

Thanks. He entered the cramped office to the left of the reception counter, dropped his hat on the desk and went to the coffee machine by the window. As he picked up his blue mug and poured in the fresh coffee, he looked at it and smiled as he usually did. His daughter had given it to him years ago. Printed on it in tiny gold stars was TOP COP POP.

He sipped. Been foggy most of the night, he said to Marlene through the open door of the office. Crazy temperature changes. Seemed to be lifting a little just before I came in.

He was looking through the window when he saw a young woman running up the long walk leading to the building’s front door. Running fast for a young lady, he thought. As he reached for the pack of cigarettes in the top pocket of his campus police jacket, he felt a twinge of guilt. Fifty-three years old, riding most of the night in a car, and smoking too much.

This fitness thing is really something, Mar, he said. All these kids running their brains out before they go to class. More power to them, I suppose. He put the cigarette between his lips.

She came rushing in the front door past the counter and into his office before he could light up. Then she was grabbing hold to both his arms with a wild look in her eyes.

You’ve got to come quickly. You’ve got to … there’s a body in the lake.

His arms were beginning to hurt from the fierce grip of her fingers. Suddenly she was out of breath and words. Purcell started to speak and the unlit cigarette fell between them to the floor.

Whoa, whoa. Take it easy, young lady. What’s the problem?

She let go of his arms and he eased her into the patent leather chair in front of the desk.

Now, what’s all this about a body?

Her shoulders slumped and she began to cry. I was running around the lake and I saw this body lying in the lake. I mean, like, I was on the path and not the road because the road was … and the person was drinking from the lake, like … It’s dead. The person is dead. She began to take sobbing gulps of air, emitting sounds in spasms as if she were hiccupping.

Easy now, Purcell said gently. He got down on one knee and put a comforting hand on her shoulder. You say you saw a body down by the lake? St. Margaret’s Lake?

She nodded.

If I take you in the car, you can show me where you saw the body? You think you can manage that?

She nodded again and gulped more air.

Okay then. Good girl. Let’s see what this is all about.

He knew he probably sounded like a father trying to assure his little girl there were no scary creatures in her bedroom, but he wanted to keep her calm. That’s why he decided not to rush her to the car. Get the poor thing settled.

He stood up, took his hat from the desk and slowly led her by the arm to the front door.

Something wrong Ben? Anything I should do? Marlene looked a little shaken, standing there with a hand to her breast. She’d overheard the ‘body in the lake’ business.

Just stand by, he said as they went out.

Stand by. Purcell gritted his teeth. Why’d I say that? As if he were working out of some radio station. Yet he wasn’t sure what this was all about. Had somebody been swimming and drowned? Did a boat overturn? Maybe a jogger collapsed?

You okay? Purcell asked the girl as they drove away from the security building.

Okay.

She sounded calmer. No sense driving frantically to the scene.

Whereabouts down by the lake?

The road by the statue. There. Turn right. The path is off the road just up a little further.

He wheeled past the imposing ten-foot bronze figure standing on a large concrete pedestal surrounded by rose bushes. Jesus on guard, left hand outstretched and right one pointing to a protruding flaming heart. Two weeks ago he’d been forced to climb the pedestal. Some character had placed a beer can in the statue’s left hand. Around the neck had been hung a sign saying I CHOSE BUDWEISER.

Unfortunately, nobody in security had noticed and it wasn’t till shortly before noon the minor sacrilege was reported. The student newspaper published a picture calling it the ultimate commercial and suggesting the college approach the beer company for a generous donation. The Administration was not amused and the provost sent a strongly worded memo to the campus police department regarding apprehension of the culprit. Chief Drouin privately dismissed the whole thing as a harmless prank but returned a memo to Zeiler informing him the incident was under active investigation. Purcell looked through his side window at the commanding, if not very comforting, Jesus.

He slammed on the brakes. The tires screeched. The girl and himself brought up against the wheel and dashboard.

Goddamn ducks! He glanced back at Jesus and the girl. Sorry.

He waited till the ducks scrambled off the road in a flurry of feathers and squawks.

It’s down the path there on the right, she said.

He moved the car slowly, alders scraping on both sides.

Just up there, she said. He’s lying on the path not too far beyond that jetty.

He? You could see it was a man?

It’s a man.

You didn’t touch the body or move it?

She gave him a frown.

He stopped the car and pushed open the door against the bushes. You stay here in the car and take it easy. And don’t worry.

The kindly father again, he thought, as he squeezed along the side of the car to the path.

Purcell didn’t see the body right away. He walked about twenty yards past the jetty to where the bushes thickened and the path veered away from the water. He realized he’d gone too far and turned back, moving off the path towards the edge of the lake.

He saw the legs first. Somebody lying face down in the water. He moved closer. A man alright. Fairly big. Over six feet tall.

He stepped near the water and felt his shoes sink in the mud. Dragging the body out of the water by the legs seemed crude so he reached down and put both of his hands under the man’s waist to turn him over on his back.

God almighty, he whispered. The back of the man’s skull had been crushed. He felt his stomach tense and thought he was going to be sick. He took two deep breaths, knelt slowly beside the body, wrapped his arms around the midsection and began to lift. The body was stiff and heavy.

This will never work, he muttered. He stepped out a little further into the water, lifted the trunk by the shoulders and got down into a crouch position behind the man’s back. Raising the upper torso out of the water, he slipped his arms across the chest, turned and began to drag him to the path.

When he finally laid the body on the side of the path, he was breathing heavily, his breath no more than grunts. He sat exhausted by the path for a moment before he turned to the body. The face was covered with mud. He pulled his handkerchief from his back pocket and, as if in a gesture of respect, started to clean the man’s face. Strange scene, sitting there in the quiet of an October morning gently wiping the face of a dead man. In all his years of police work he’d never before done anything like this.

He gazed at the face. His eyes narrowed. No.

He got to his feet and stared at the face again. Jesus!

Peering through the bushes, Sylvia Reardon couldn’t see exactly what the police officer was doing, although he was obviously struggling to get the body out of the water.

Now he came running towards the car and pushed the car door back against the alders and climbed in, wheezing as he turned on the police radio. Small beads of perspiration rolled down his face.

Dead? she asked.

He nodded.

You couldn’t give him artificial resuscitation or anything?

He didn’t respond.

The radio clicked in: Campus Police. Go ahead.

Marlene. Ben here. Call Lutheran General and have an ambulance dispatched right away to East Lake Road off Campus Drive. I’ll have the car out there to direct them in. And give me Chief Drouin’s home number.

He waited. Another click. 2-3-6-4-1-6-7, he repeated. Fine. And be quick with the ambulance. Out.

He picked up the car phone and began to dial.

Anything wrong? Sylvia realized immediately how ridiculous the question was.

"Hello, Roger. Ben Purcell. Sorry to call so early. We have a body … Yeah, in St. Margaret’s Lake … No, not a drowning … Yes, the ambulance is on its way.

The thing is … the body, Roger. I think it’s Kelleher … yeah, Father Kelleher, the president of the college."

2

Matthew Kelleher is dead.

Roger Drouin couldn’t absorb the news as he drove down College Boulevard. His house was just off the boulevard, minutes from campus, so he’d be at the lake before the ambulance arrived from Lutheran General. It had been Kelleher who arranged for him to buy the house.

He’s the reason I’m here.

Six years ago, Drouin had been at the lowest point in his life. Forty years old, he was on a year’s medical leave from the Rochester Police Department in Minnesota. Clinical Depression Syndrome the medical report said. Take a few months off, Roger, his chief suggested. You need the time and we need you. The department can’t afford to lose a lieutenant like you. Get away, do some fishing, forget about the bad guys. You’ll be calling me to come back to work before you know it.

But Drouin didn’t call and he didn’t forget what happened. What he did do was go fishing. Mainly up in the French Lake area where he had first come to live when he and his parents left the province of Quebec. He was thirteen years old at the time, aggressive and resentful of classmates who made fun of his inability to pronounce th and who expected him to play hockey like he was Rocket Richard.

Only in his fiery temper did he match the Montreal star.

French Lake was where he met Matthew Kelleher. The priest was on a two-week fishing holiday and staying with the pastor of St. Joseph’s Parish, an old friend of the Drouin family. He and Kelleher warmed to each other right from their introduction. They fished early in the morning, ate late dinners, and stayed up talking, sometimes long after midnight. After nearly a year of emotional immobility, Drouin had found someone with whom he could talk feely.

Reconciliation with oneself and with the rest of us, Kelleher called it. One night in the glow of the cabin’s fireplace and the warmth of too much bourbon, Drouin spoke about his wife Marian, her death, his love, his loneliness, his guilt. He told the priest she died because he was too consumed with being a good policeman when she needed him. That night in the cabin he nearly wept, nearly cried out as he desperately wanted, nearly let the pain pour from inside. In the end he only sat there for five minutes, rigid.

Give yourself time, Roger, Matthew had said, but don’t become too solitary.

Then they talked about police business. The priest told him about his plans for improving the college’s police department. The present chief of operations would retire shortly and perhaps Drouin, given his training and experience, might consider working with Kelleher at the college.

Drouin didn’t think that was what he wanted or needed at the time, but he said he was grateful nonetheless. Within three months he had moved to Hampton as the new Chief of Police at Vermeulen College.

Things had gone well. The department was being reorganized and he knew that along with establishing professional competence he was instilling pride in the people with whom he worked. Matthew Kelleher had told thim that his looking like a policeman and someone in charge had helped.

At five-foot-eleven, Drouin was heavyset with thick chest and neck and an almost stereotypical square jaw. The high cheekbones and dark, hooded eyes were French-Canadian. So was the curly steel-grey hair. It was also an inheritance of a Gallic temperament that four years ago had caused him difficulty with the college provost and soured their relationship. There had been a serious disagreement over the handling of an alleged crime. Kelleher hadn’t backed him on that one, and it had hurt, but he got over it. Long ago he’d acknowledged his stubborn spirit and conceded that sometimes it was wiser to yield.

As he came down East Lake Road, he saw the three college police cars. A small crowd had already gathered. He looked at his watch. Almost seven-thirty. He stopped the car, got out and walked over to Purcell’s car. A young woman was sitting in the front seat.

Morning, Roger, Purcell said. They were comfortably informal together. Ambulance hasn’t arrived yet. I’ve got both ends of the path secured. We’ve been as quiet as we can. Students are starting to come around asking what happened. It’s terrible. He was clearly distressed. You want to walk in there?

Sure. Who’s the girl?

Student from the college. Sylvia Reardon. She found him. Out jogging and saw him there. Scared half to death first, but she’s okay now. Bright young woman.

Drouin was surprised at Ben’s rapid pace, leading him along the path, as if he wanted him to confirm the identification and take charge of the whole dreadful matter. For his own part, Drouin was still hoping there might be a mistake, confusion, somebody who looked like Kelleher.

They walked past the jetty to the body lying on the side of the stony path like a man who had fallen asleep under the stars and hadn’t yet awakened to the morning light.

A police car was parked some fifteen feet up the path. Empty, but one of its occupants was nearby, having cordoned off the area. The other was standing near the body.

Morning, Chief.

Jack. Drouin greeted him and waved in brief recognition toward the other officer, Ray Ennis.

He was in the lake when I got here, Roger, Ben said. I pulled him out, set him down here.

Drouin stood silent, looking at the body. The familiar feeling of loss came over him. His throat tightened. He sucked in air and held it for several seconds. He thought he might tear up. Right there in the cool October breeze, standing next to an older cop who, like him, should have been by now inured to death.

He exhaled. Show me where you found him.

Just in there.

They walked the few steps through the alders. Purcell’s pants and shoes were soaked with mud and water. He was face down into the water. Right about here. He pointed to the spot. Probably shouldn’t have moved him, huh?

Doesn’t matter now. Get the specifics into your notes. You got someone taking pictures?

He’s on his way.

Did you call the county medical examiner?

He’s in Fort Wayne. Not due back till later this morning. Around ten, they said.

We’ll probably need county lab people as well. He shook his head. You said it’s not a drowning?

Purcell came back up to the path before speaking. He looked down at the body and sighed. The back of his head is fractured.

Drouin winced.

They knelt down beside the body and turned it slightly. Drouin took only a brief look.

Purcell reached down and brushed away a piece of mud caked to the man’s right ear. He didn’t get that wound from any fall, Roger. Certainly not into that lake. Either someone crushed his skull while he was lying there in the water, or he was killed somewhere along here and dragged in. Terrible job, no matter what. I mean, if you’re trying to hide a body, why leave it halfway in and halfway out?

The wail of an ambulance cut into Drouin’s silence.

I arranged for Saunders to direct the ambulance here, Purcell said.

Don’t move him till we’ve got pictures taken. And keep this whole area closed for the rest of the day. We’ll need a complete search. Every single thing noted. Every piece of garbage collected, recorded. Anything that can help us with the how and where of his death.

Purcell nodded. Anyways, how and where will be a hell of a lot easier than trying to find out why.

Drouin looked at Matthew’s face again. Longer this time, but still he turned away after only several seconds. What had always struck him most about the man was the serenity.

He still looks peaceful, even with his skull crushed.

We spend a good deal of life asking ‘why’ about a lot of things, Drouin said to Purcell.

The ambulance was coming up the path too fast. There was no one to be saved.

Take care of things, Ben. I’ve got to go see the provost. The college has to be informed.

As the ambulance halted and the attendants struggled out against the bushes, Drouin headed back to his car.

The provost of Vermeulen College walked smartly up the wide stone steps of the Administration Building which stood in the center of the college property with Dutch Elms lining the concrete walks of the north and south quadrangles. The walkways led to an impressive front entrance and a less decorous back. Built in 1892, it was designed by Samuel Ferry, a noted architect of the time, who described his work as historically eclectic. Nicholas Zeiler was inclined to attribute the design to indecisiveness.

He pulled open the front door and walked inside. The office of the provost was on the first floor, just past the porch of the main entrance and to the left, the first office seen upon entering the building. Zeiler always considered it to have been badly positioned. While it was the largest in the building and looked down the South Quad, he still considered spaciousness no substitute for position. The office had no sense of hierarchy.

He gazed down the high, long corridor which ran nearly eighty feet to the main administration offices. In wings to the left and right were the offices of the President and the Executive Vice-President, and on the walls on both sides between the various offices were large six by eight-foot oil paintings depicting significant events in the history of the catholic church in Indiana. Zeiler often stated that the dreadful paintings and the dismal corridor-lighting were a depressing combination, but neither was likely to be removed or changed.

On Wednesday, he arrived as he did every morning, at six-thirty a.m. His secretary, Florence Kendall, came to work at seven-thirty. He enjoyed the uninterrupted hour that let him take care of correspondence, establish agendas and prepare for meetings. Once, he told his wife Vivian that he considered his early morning procedure daily visioning. She had rolled her eyes.

He was a small man, not quite five-feet-six inches tall. He listed himself at five-seven. Combing his thinning blonde hair from one side of his balding head to the other was another vanity. An avid walker, he maintained his one hundred thirty-five pounds through meticulous adherence to proper nutrition programs. People, like universities, operated more effectively with regimen. His large oak desk was bare save for a pen holder and whatever document was at hand. IN and OUT trays indicated a clerk’s mentality and family pictures were emotional bric-a-brac.

His wife considered him too rigid. Teutonic was the word she had used. But he was proud of the singlemindedness he inherited from his German father. It held him in good stead during his years at St. Raphael’s. He’d gone on from the small parochial school just outside New York City to Fordham and had done well by his Westchester County roots. From New Rochelle to a doctorate in American History before the age of twenty-seven and then on to Boston College. His years teaching in Boston were perhaps the most enjoyable of his life. He had married there and his daughter Kristina was born the day he received tenure.

Nine years later, he had come to Vermeulen as Head of the History Department. Within four years, he was appointed provost. Other than the president, he was becoming the most powerful person on campus. If the Congregation of St. John because of declining members were unable to appoint a priest-successor to Matthew Kelleher, perhaps he would one day be president. If all that had come from being Teutonic, so be it.

Good morning, Florence. I assume our provost is in, Roger Drouin said as he walked past. The startled secretary was putting an armload of folders in the filing cabinet when the college police chief entered her office and she nearly dropped the files.

Mr. Drouin, she said, catching her breath, I’ll find out if Mr. Zeiler can see you.

I’m sure he will. He breezed by her, pushing the varnished wood door that opened into Zeiler’s office.

Good morning, he said.

Zeiler stayed seated behind his desk. I realize, Mr. Drouin, that you don’t bother with the formality of making appointments, but the courtesy of a knock—

I don’t have time for pleasantries with morning. He stood in front of the desk and looked down at Zeiler. Matthew Kelleher is dead. He was found down by the lake about an hour ago.

No preambles. No formalities.

The blood drained from Zeiler’s face. He opened his mouth to speak but no words came out. He lifted his hands from the desk.

Dead? Father Kelleher dead? Dear God, what happened?

Drouin walked over to the window facing the campus. The fog was gone and the sun was moving up in a cloudless sky. It was going to be a beautiful day.

We don’t know. Some young woman, a student here, was out jogging this morning sometime before seven. She found him down by St. Margaret’s Lake.

Zeiler got up and approached him. What do you mean ‘by the lake’? Did he collapse? Drown? What?

Drouin turned to face the provost. He was lying by the edge of the lake with a fractured skull. We’ll have to wait for the Medical Examiner’s report. The hospital ambulance took the body to Lutheran General. Medical Examiner Hollis is due back in the city later this morning. We’ll get a full report sometime today.

Zeiler was still visibly shaken. He walked back to his desk and sat. You have no idea when all this occurred?

No.

"Matthew Kelleher has been murdered. That’s