Cry From The Grave
Chapter 47
Beverly Overton let go of the doorknob, shocked at the presence of the seated sleuth barring her path to Isabel's purse.
"How did you get in?" she asked.
"Same as we just did," said Tori, who entered the room with Missy Crabolli. "Walked straight through the door. Detective Ballack just happened to get access from Reverend Fisher."
Ballack moved toward Beverly, never taking his eyes off her. When he was within four feet, he looked at her hand.
"I can guess the story behind that wound, Mrs. Overton. I can tell you or you can tell us."
He gestured toward the table. Beverly sat down, her eyes flicking from side to side, assessing her situation. Crabolli walked to the other side, sitting down and lifting her arm sling onto the table. With a blistering glare, she opened the right side of her jacket to disclose her firearm. Tori slowly covered the distance to the door and locked it from inside. She came back to Beverly's left side and showed her piece under her jacket as Crabolli had.
Beverly suppressed a cough and looked meekly at Ballack. "The service will begin soon. I am singing. You can't keep me here."
"Oh," Ballack said, stretching his arms over his head, a casual move that belied the saturnine atmosphere. "I've seen the order of the service. You're not due to come up for some time. At least until the commendation of the body. And don't you think it's pathetically ironic?"
"What?"
"You, singing at this, an event designed as the eternal homegoing of a man whose neck you skewered with a hunting knife just a little over one hundred hours ago?"
"When did you know?"
"I had an idea when you didn't know the correct version of twelve o'clock."
"Excuse me?"
Ballack released his stretch. He reminded himself to be professional and not act like he was enjoying this sequence.
"When you told me you'd been to see Lincoln, and I said that quote," he said more calmly.
"The one about the chimes?"
Ballack nodded. "Hearing the chimes at daybreak, I said. I changed Falstaff's quote. Both Shakespeare's version from King Henry the Fourth and what was said in the movie were 'We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow.' I figured you either failed high school English or else you were lying about having seen the movie."
"I went to see my neighbors Sunday night when they returned from the movie," Beverly said. "It was late, but I had already taken care of Rory Giles, so I needed an alibi. When Mandy excused herself to go to the bathroom and her husband was changing in their bedroom, I looked in her purse and found the ticket stub. But thinking up a trap like that on the spur of the moment, Detective. I'm somewhat impressed." Beverly burned him with a wicked, glazed look.
"I figured it was worth a shot," Ballack replied. "Of course, I didn't tell my partners anything about my impressions. I didn't want to be or have them distracted by a non sequitur if it came to that. I'm sure they didn't like being kept in the dark for so long, but I believe they might find it in their hearts to forgive me."
"Happens rarely," said Tori. "I forgive you."
"How about you, Missy?" Ballack asked.
Crabolli kept her eyes rooted on Beverly Overton. "We're cool, C.B."
Ballack leaned his right elbow onto his armrest. "Let's go back. You go by Beverly Overton now, but your first name is Jennifer. Beverly is your middle name. Your second middle name, to be exact. Born Jennifer Ella Beverly Trafford."
"How did you discover that?"
"A little trip up to Clayton to look at records. Divorced from Howie Dunnigan, you kept his surname until you married Lawrence Overton. You performed a nice little trick with 'J.E. Beverly' on your marriage certificate. We compared that with everything we found at the Recorder of Deeds and drew the right conclusion. It was a partial guess, but given that I nailed you on the Lincoln quote, we were riding a hot streak."
Beverly, stone-faced, said nothing in reply.
"Of course," Ballack continued, "upon your marriage to Howie Dunnigan, you were eighteen months removed from the tragic death of your brother, which you and your parents blamed on Dr. Dean Hibbler. The lawsuit reaps your family over three million dollars, a portion of which I'm thinking you believed should have been yours."
"Trust fund," Beverly snorted. The organ music reverberated through the hallway. "It became my parents' hoard."
"You must have believed with all your heart you'd get it eventually. You might not have been the best sister to Dave, but his death caused you to suffer, right?"
"I suffered, yes. But how and how much is my story. You have no right to it."
Ballack clenched and released his right hand. "No, you're right. I have no right. Maybe it was guilt, wondering if you could have been a better sister. Perhaps it was bearing this weight of anger for years and years and not having a true outlet." He drummed his fingers on the table. "No, maybe it was taking your rage into a marriage that never had a chance. Or it could be something more."
Tori spoke for the first time in several minutes. "Like missing out on the money."
"Here you are," said Ballack. "Frustrated beyond belief that your parents put their war chest from a Phyrric legal victory into a trust fund. Untouchable. Unreachable. Sure, your second husband might have made a fine living for you. That combined with your nursing created a nice nest egg. But it wasn't enough, was it? Always wanting more, were you."
"It explains quite well how you could be in possession of your parents' two Rugers," Crabolli barked.
"Settle down, girl," Ballack murmured softly. "Settle down. But Detective Crabolli makes a fine point. The insurance company found there were several items missing from your parents' house after the fire, but two of note were the guns."
Tori shook her head. "Cold. Absolutely cold to torch your own parents alive."
"They took away the money! I deserved my money!" screamed Beverly Overton.
"Bound them, too."
"Oh, for God's sake!" Beverly was shaking now. "That trust fund was to go to me upon their death, and then they call out of the blue one day. The typical accusations. I was ungrateful, I lacked compassion, I avoided them, all my concern was wrapped up in myself. They practically accused me of wanting to leave Lawrence at the time. That's when they dropped the news they had gone to Dean and gave him the money back! Gave it to him! The person who killed my brother! All for the sake of setting themselves free from sadness by forgiving him. Well, if they weren't going to hand the money over to me later, they didn't have to live a long life rejoicing in their philanthropy."
"But it didn't end there, did it, Beverly?" asked Ballack. "Evil only begat more evil, and the thirst for revenge was never assuaged. You noticed that Hibbler had signed on with St. Matthew's Grove, and that's when you made your move."
"That was to be a burr in his saddle as much as possible," Beverly said, "but of course, once we found out that closure was possible--if not inevitable--that was too much for me."
"A knife in his neck," agreed Ballack. "You obviously went in through the copy room?"
"The idiot might have hated me, but even he fell for the excuse that I needed to cut through to the library. He never saw the knife I cupped in my hand, the blade going right up against the underside of my arm." She stopped, rubbing her wrist as if to resurrect the memory. "I stole it from him, by the way."
"No doubt. And it was you who ambushed us at Hibbler's lakehouse.
"I was lurking around St. Matthew's last Saturday night. I had a tendency to take Isabel's messages, anything to help. I caught your voice mail and knew I couldn't have you on my trail. I put my car about a half-mile away on foot and put myself in a thicket about thirty yards away, on the other side of the service road running the far side of the house. I wasn't expecting to have the chance I did."
"The chance?" Crabolli exploded. "You shot my partner and nearly killed him! You shot me clean through the shoulder!" She launched herself out of her chair and glared so angrily at the killer that Ballack immediately put decent odds on Beverly never walking out of the room alive.
"Missy, for crying out loud. Let's wrap this up before Tori has to sit on you," groaned Ballack. He looked back at Beverly. "But the deaths of Father Giles and Helen Smith? I assume it's because you suspected they knew something."
"For Rory, I had to. He practically cornered me after he met with you Sunday when you questioned us about our alibis after the lakehouse shooting. He never accused me bluntly, but he took me aside and said, 'Beverly, perhaps you know by this point that the truth is the only weapon for this present battle.' He thought he was being clever, but even I saw through it. I couldn't give him time to consider going to you. I stalked him that night and when he went back to St. Matthew's after dinner, I followed him there."
"And you couldn't do with merely killing him," said Tori. "You had to use the altar."
"That's when your whole world started collapsing," Ballack remarked. "The next day. Not just the Lincoln quote bungle, but you also had a new bandage and your wound was as fresh as when I noticed it Sunday. Begging it off as a burn from the copier was a bad idea; I saw it was a blister between your thumb and index finger. Firing the Ruger that often that quickly makes for a lot of heat, and your hand couldn't take it."
"You sure have taken your time piecing the puzzle together, Detective Ballack," Beverly hissed.
"And you haven't seen him at his best," said Tori.
"That brings us to Helen Smith," Ballack said, wanting to complete this arrest, "and we spoke to David already today. You must have been on the roof, listening to Helen telling him about her dark ghost schussing up Eden way. So you had to get rid of her."
"Not that anyone there would have thought her babbles were anything more than the eruptions of an elderly mind. But I couldn't take the chance and have the rumor mill snare James, Daryl, Verna, and the others."
"Thus, you park at Eden for the second time in two days and made the same run. You strangled her in her room, went out the staff door, shot across the lawn, and drove around for an hour before coming in to work."
"You know I parked at Eden?"
"We discovered your parking ticket," Tori smiled.
An unexpected lull fell upon the room, at which point the opening hymn burst forth through the wall, and the initial strains of 'Guide Me, O Thou Great Redeemer' pressed upon their ears.
"All for revenge?" asked Ballack.
Beverly returned his stare. "Revenge was my fuel, but not my destination. I hoped for St. Matthew's to continue on. It should have, under Isabel. Hibbler's death was my gift to her."
"But you were sounded out by two others," replied Ballack, "making their deaths necessary. And the river of blood washed away any chance of Isabel receiving your gift."
"She deserved it," Beverly sighed. "It should have been her."
"It seems as if you love her," remarked Tori.
"Yes. Yes, it was love."
Ballack gritted his teeth. He had seen enough of the twin poles of love, the redemptive and destructive extremes. This was just too perverse to take.
Beverly Overton placed her hands on the table. "I'm going to jail?"
Missy Crabolli had reached her limits of patience. "If it was up to me, you heartless broad, you're going to die."
"Missy, please!" Ballack snarled. "But yes, Mrs. Overton, we are going to arrest you."
Her eyes grew soft and she placed her head gently in her hands. A minute passed before she lifted her face, tears glistening in her eyes. The hymn had ended.
"I know I don't deserve this, but I have one request," she stated.
Ballack shifted in his wheelchair. "Go on."
"I have no right to ask, but in a few moments, it will be time for me to sing. This may be my last time to do so. I...could I?"
Ballack rolled toward her, stopping a yard from her.
"You're right," he retorted. "You don't deserve it, and you truly have no right. But I don't want Dr. Hibbler's funeral to be a time when confusion reigns. He at least deserves an orderly memorial." He signaled his partners to move toward the door. He continued, wagging his finger at her, "I will allow you to sing. But you listen and you listen well. I will have Detective Crabolli stand at the far transept and Detective Vaughan at the near transept. I will be at the back of the church, joining Commander Krieger. You will sing your solo, and when the music stops, you will come up the center aisle toward Commander Krieger and myself. Missy, Tori, you will keep abreast of Mrs. Overton's pace coming up the side aisles. Any questions, Mrs. Overton?"
"I have none."
He moved another foot closer and their eyes locked. "One final thing, Mrs. Overton. Don't try any funny business or try to escape. These ladies are excellent runners and will outpace your attempt. And they are excellent shots, even if one of them is one-handed right now."
"I understand," Beverly said, then, as if addressing a monarch, she mouthed a quiet "Thank you."
"Detective Crabolli, please escort Mrs. Overton to the back door of the nave."
As soon as they left the vestry, Tori let loose a deep breath. "Do you think that's wise, Cam?"
"It's the ultimate defeat for her," Ballack replied, "even if she doesn't recognize it. She kills Hibbler, and now she will honor his life before being arrested for his murder."
"And if she tries to resist?"
Ballack thought for a moment. "She won't." He moved toward the rear of the nave. "She won't."
Ballack leaned his right elbow onto his armrest. "Let's go back. You go by Beverly Overton now, but your first name is Jennifer. Beverly is your middle name. Your second middle name, to be exact. Born Jennifer Ella Beverly Trafford."
"How did you discover that?"
"A little trip up to Clayton to look at records. Divorced from Howie Dunnigan, you kept his surname until you married Lawrence Overton. You performed a nice little trick with 'J.E. Beverly' on your marriage certificate. We compared that with everything we found at the Recorder of Deeds and drew the right conclusion. It was a partial guess, but given that I nailed you on the Lincoln quote, we were riding a hot streak."
Beverly, stone-faced, said nothing in reply.
"Of course," Ballack continued, "upon your marriage to Howie Dunnigan, you were eighteen months removed from the tragic death of your brother, which you and your parents blamed on Dr. Dean Hibbler. The lawsuit reaps your family over three million dollars, a portion of which I'm thinking you believed should have been yours."
"Trust fund," Beverly snorted. The organ music reverberated through the hallway. "It became my parents' hoard."
"You must have believed with all your heart you'd get it eventually. You might not have been the best sister to Dave, but his death caused you to suffer, right?"
"I suffered, yes. But how and how much is my story. You have no right to it."
Ballack clenched and released his right hand. "No, you're right. I have no right. Maybe it was guilt, wondering if you could have been a better sister. Perhaps it was bearing this weight of anger for years and years and not having a true outlet." He drummed his fingers on the table. "No, maybe it was taking your rage into a marriage that never had a chance. Or it could be something more."
Tori spoke for the first time in several minutes. "Like missing out on the money."
"Here you are," said Ballack. "Frustrated beyond belief that your parents put their war chest from a Phyrric legal victory into a trust fund. Untouchable. Unreachable. Sure, your second husband might have made a fine living for you. That combined with your nursing created a nice nest egg. But it wasn't enough, was it? Always wanting more, were you."
"It explains quite well how you could be in possession of your parents' two Rugers," Crabolli barked.
"Settle down, girl," Ballack murmured softly. "Settle down. But Detective Crabolli makes a fine point. The insurance company found there were several items missing from your parents' house after the fire, but two of note were the guns."
Tori shook her head. "Cold. Absolutely cold to torch your own parents alive."
"They took away the money! I deserved my money!" screamed Beverly Overton.
"Bound them, too."
"Oh, for God's sake!" Beverly was shaking now. "That trust fund was to go to me upon their death, and then they call out of the blue one day. The typical accusations. I was ungrateful, I lacked compassion, I avoided them, all my concern was wrapped up in myself. They practically accused me of wanting to leave Lawrence at the time. That's when they dropped the news they had gone to Dean and gave him the money back! Gave it to him! The person who killed my brother! All for the sake of setting themselves free from sadness by forgiving him. Well, if they weren't going to hand the money over to me later, they didn't have to live a long life rejoicing in their philanthropy."
"But it didn't end there, did it, Beverly?" asked Ballack. "Evil only begat more evil, and the thirst for revenge was never assuaged. You noticed that Hibbler had signed on with St. Matthew's Grove, and that's when you made your move."
"That was to be a burr in his saddle as much as possible," Beverly said, "but of course, once we found out that closure was possible--if not inevitable--that was too much for me."
"A knife in his neck," agreed Ballack. "You obviously went in through the copy room?"
"The idiot might have hated me, but even he fell for the excuse that I needed to cut through to the library. He never saw the knife I cupped in my hand, the blade going right up against the underside of my arm." She stopped, rubbing her wrist as if to resurrect the memory. "I stole it from him, by the way."
"No doubt. And it was you who ambushed us at Hibbler's lakehouse.
"I was lurking around St. Matthew's last Saturday night. I had a tendency to take Isabel's messages, anything to help. I caught your voice mail and knew I couldn't have you on my trail. I put my car about a half-mile away on foot and put myself in a thicket about thirty yards away, on the other side of the service road running the far side of the house. I wasn't expecting to have the chance I did."
"The chance?" Crabolli exploded. "You shot my partner and nearly killed him! You shot me clean through the shoulder!" She launched herself out of her chair and glared so angrily at the killer that Ballack immediately put decent odds on Beverly never walking out of the room alive.
"Missy, for crying out loud. Let's wrap this up before Tori has to sit on you," groaned Ballack. He looked back at Beverly. "But the deaths of Father Giles and Helen Smith? I assume it's because you suspected they knew something."
"For Rory, I had to. He practically cornered me after he met with you Sunday when you questioned us about our alibis after the lakehouse shooting. He never accused me bluntly, but he took me aside and said, 'Beverly, perhaps you know by this point that the truth is the only weapon for this present battle.' He thought he was being clever, but even I saw through it. I couldn't give him time to consider going to you. I stalked him that night and when he went back to St. Matthew's after dinner, I followed him there."
"And you couldn't do with merely killing him," said Tori. "You had to use the altar."
"That's when your whole world started collapsing," Ballack remarked. "The next day. Not just the Lincoln quote bungle, but you also had a new bandage and your wound was as fresh as when I noticed it Sunday. Begging it off as a burn from the copier was a bad idea; I saw it was a blister between your thumb and index finger. Firing the Ruger that often that quickly makes for a lot of heat, and your hand couldn't take it."
"You sure have taken your time piecing the puzzle together, Detective Ballack," Beverly hissed.
"And you haven't seen him at his best," said Tori.
"That brings us to Helen Smith," Ballack said, wanting to complete this arrest, "and we spoke to David already today. You must have been on the roof, listening to Helen telling him about her dark ghost schussing up Eden way. So you had to get rid of her."
"Not that anyone there would have thought her babbles were anything more than the eruptions of an elderly mind. But I couldn't take the chance and have the rumor mill snare James, Daryl, Verna, and the others."
"Thus, you park at Eden for the second time in two days and made the same run. You strangled her in her room, went out the staff door, shot across the lawn, and drove around for an hour before coming in to work."
"You know I parked at Eden?"
"We discovered your parking ticket," Tori smiled.
An unexpected lull fell upon the room, at which point the opening hymn burst forth through the wall, and the initial strains of 'Guide Me, O Thou Great Redeemer' pressed upon their ears.
"All for revenge?" asked Ballack.
Beverly returned his stare. "Revenge was my fuel, but not my destination. I hoped for St. Matthew's to continue on. It should have, under Isabel. Hibbler's death was my gift to her."
"But you were sounded out by two others," replied Ballack, "making their deaths necessary. And the river of blood washed away any chance of Isabel receiving your gift."
"She deserved it," Beverly sighed. "It should have been her."
"It seems as if you love her," remarked Tori.
"Yes. Yes, it was love."
Ballack gritted his teeth. He had seen enough of the twin poles of love, the redemptive and destructive extremes. This was just too perverse to take.
Beverly Overton placed her hands on the table. "I'm going to jail?"
Missy Crabolli had reached her limits of patience. "If it was up to me, you heartless broad, you're going to die."
"Missy, please!" Ballack snarled. "But yes, Mrs. Overton, we are going to arrest you."
Her eyes grew soft and she placed her head gently in her hands. A minute passed before she lifted her face, tears glistening in her eyes. The hymn had ended.
"I know I don't deserve this, but I have one request," she stated.
Ballack shifted in his wheelchair. "Go on."
"I have no right to ask, but in a few moments, it will be time for me to sing. This may be my last time to do so. I...could I?"
Ballack rolled toward her, stopping a yard from her.
"You're right," he retorted. "You don't deserve it, and you truly have no right. But I don't want Dr. Hibbler's funeral to be a time when confusion reigns. He at least deserves an orderly memorial." He signaled his partners to move toward the door. He continued, wagging his finger at her, "I will allow you to sing. But you listen and you listen well. I will have Detective Crabolli stand at the far transept and Detective Vaughan at the near transept. I will be at the back of the church, joining Commander Krieger. You will sing your solo, and when the music stops, you will come up the center aisle toward Commander Krieger and myself. Missy, Tori, you will keep abreast of Mrs. Overton's pace coming up the side aisles. Any questions, Mrs. Overton?"
"I have none."
He moved another foot closer and their eyes locked. "One final thing, Mrs. Overton. Don't try any funny business or try to escape. These ladies are excellent runners and will outpace your attempt. And they are excellent shots, even if one of them is one-handed right now."
"I understand," Beverly said, then, as if addressing a monarch, she mouthed a quiet "Thank you."
"Detective Crabolli, please escort Mrs. Overton to the back door of the nave."
As soon as they left the vestry, Tori let loose a deep breath. "Do you think that's wise, Cam?"
"It's the ultimate defeat for her," Ballack replied, "even if she doesn't recognize it. She kills Hibbler, and now she will honor his life before being arrested for his murder."
"And if she tries to resist?"
Ballack thought for a moment. "She won't." He moved toward the rear of the nave. "She won't."
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