The Bones She Buried: A completely gripping, heart-stopping crime thriller(60)

They climbed the creaky steps to the second floor. A musty smell filled the air and threadbare burgundy carpet lined the hallway, softly illuminated by two hanging lights, giving off a vague yellow glow. The doors to the units were wooden and looked as though they’d been painted many times over the years, so that now they all looked some kind of indeterminate dark brown color. At the door marked “4”, they stopped and Mettner knocked. A few moments passed, and he knocked again.

For a second, Josie wondered if Tracy Schmidt was dead inside, smothered, her body sprawled across the floor. But then they heard movement and a woman’s voice call out, “Just a minute.”

Footsteps could be heard padding across the floor before the door finally squeaked open. An elderly woman with stooped shoulders, short gray hair and a thin frame stared back at them. She wore navy blue sweatpants and a matching sweatshirt. A pair of pink slippers added a splash of color to her ensemble. Wrinkles bunched and sagged on every inch of exposed skin, from her long face to her arthritic hands. Thick glasses rested on her narrow nose and yet she squinted at them. “Who’re you?” she asked.

Josie let Mettner make the introductions. Before they had even pulled out their credentials, she waved them inside, moving slowly and carefully. It was a studio apartment, Josie soon realized, no bigger than Josie’s own living room. There were only two places to sit—her twin bed or the saggy mauve recliner right next to it. A tray table sat next to the recliner, holding a remote control, a cup of coffee, some tissues and several pill bottles. At the foot of the bed was a small table with a television on it, and a dresser. Opposite the bed and recliner was a small countertop, sink and stove. A wooden door painted black was cracked open next to the kitchen area. Josie could make out the bone white of a porcelain toilet.

“Sit,” Tracy Schmidt said. She lowered herself into the recliner.

Josie and Mettner sat on the edge of the twin bed on top of an ancient floral comforter. Mettner pulled out his phone and opened his note-taking app. “Thank you for speaking with us, Ms. Schmidt.”

The woman waved her hand in the air again. “Don’t get many visitors. Not anymore. You’re here to talk about St. Agatha’s, are you?”

Josie said, “We know it was a long time ago, but we were hoping you could help us. Do you remember a student named Colette Riggs? She would have been in St. Agatha’s between 1958 and 1966.”

Tracy nodded. “Lettie. That’s what she was called back then. That’s what I knew her as—she just died. I saw it in the paper. Couldn’t get to the funeral, though. I don’t get around too well anymore. I guess she was killed, then. Is that what it means when an obituary says the person ‘died suddenly’?”

Mettner said, “Sometimes, I think it does.”

“What does St. Agatha’s have to do with it?”

Josie said, “We’re not entirely sure yet. But we’re trying to track down someone she went to school with at St. Agatha’s—a man. We didn’t see his name on the list of students although Colette’s was on it. She told her husband that his name was Ivan. Evidently, her mother knew him as well.”

Two spots of pink rose in Tracy’s cheeks. She blinked several times. “I know the one.”

Josie’s heart did a quick double tap; the thought that they might actually get some answers to one of their lines of inquiry sent adrenaline surging through her veins.

“Was he a student there?” Mettner asked.

“Yes. He was. Same grade as Lettie. They were close, those two. You see, both their mothers worked in the rectory. They were charity cases. They only went to St. Agatha’s because their mothers were employees. They got discounted tuition.”

“If he was a student there, then why isn’t his name on the list?” Josie asked. “Colette’s name is there.”

Tracy blinked rapidly again. One trembling hand reached over to the tray table and plucked a tissue from the box. She used it to dab beneath her rheumy eyes. “It’s cause of what happened. Those bastards took his name out of the records so there would be no evidence.”

Josie felt a prickle along the nape of her neck. “What happened?”

“What do you think happened?” Tracy snapped. “One of the priests got hold of poor Ivan and started messing with him. Doing… things to him.”

Mettner said, “Ivan told?”

“No, of course not. Back then you didn’t tell about things like that. Especially not boys. It was Lettie who told. She saw them one time. Ivan was an altar boy and one day, Lettie’s mother sent her into the sacristy to dust, and she saw the priest interfering with Ivan.”

“Who did she tell?” Josie asked. She knew that even now, sex abuse scandals in the Catholic Church were extremely touchy subjects, and many victims did not get the justice that was their due even when they did alert their parents and the authorities about what was happening.

“Me,” Tracy said. “She came to me, crying, upset. We were close, me and Lettie. She was such a sweet thing. A fiery, sweet thing. Ivan didn’t want her to tell anyone at all. They were in the eighth grade, and they’d be going off to high school. He was convinced once the year was over, he would have to see the priest a lot less. I think he just didn’t want anyone to know. He was ashamed.”

“That’s terrible,” Josie said as Mettner tapped away on his phone. “What did you do?”