Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine. Vol. 101, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 610 & 611, March 1993

Regina Fastnekker was the youngest daughter of a prominent Winnetka family whose fancy it was to be an anarchist. A modern political theory class at De Paul had convinced her that man and human society are fundamentally corrupt, reform is an illusion, and the only constructive thing is to blow it all up. Something, Regina knew not what, would arise from the ashes, but whatever it was, it could not be worse than the present situation, and there was at least a chance it might be better. On the basis of a single chemistry class, Regina began to make explosives in the privacy of the apartment she rented in the Loop. Winnetka had become too irredeemable for her to bear to live with her parents anymore. It was when one of her bombs went off, tearing out a wall and catapulting an upstairs neighbor into eternity, that Regina confessed to several bombings, one a public phone booth across the road from the entrance to Great Lakes Naval Base. When she was arrested, Regina’s hair was singed nearly completely off and that grim bald likeness of her was something she blamed on Richard. In a corrupt world, Regina nonetheless wanted to look her best.

“You’re part of the problem, cop,” she shouted at him.

“Sure. That’s why you’re going to jail and I’m not.”

“Someday,” she said meaningfully.

“Someday what?”

“POW!”

Emtee Dempsey’s eyes rounded as she listened. “How much longer will she be in jail?”

“How much longer? She was released after two years.”

“When was that?”

“I don’t know. A couple months ago.”

“Richard, won’t you have another beer?” Emtee Dempsey asked, pleased as punch. “I myself will have a cup of tea.”

“Well, we can’t have you drinking alone.”

Having found out what she wanted, Emtee Dempsey chattered on about other things. It was Richard who returned to the subject of Miss Butterfingers.

“In court she screamed out her rage, threatening the judge, everyone, but when she pointed her finger at me, looking really demented, and vowed she’d get me, I felt a chill. I did. Nonetheless, she was a model prisoner. Got religion. One of the Watergate penitents spoke at Joliet and she was among those who accepted Jesus as their personal savior.”

“Then her punishment served her well.”

“Yeah.”

“Well, that cancels out Regina Fastnekker,” Joyce said when Richard had gone.

“We could make a methodical check,” Kim said.

“Or you could insist that your guardian angel tell you who has threatened Richard and his family. I should think you have a right to know if you have to put up with him wherever you go.”

“I’ll do it.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t insist on it when you talked with him.”

Kim accepted the criticism, particularly since she was kicking herself for not finding out more from... But she hadn’t even found out his name.

2

The next day two things happened that set the house on Walton Street on its ear, in Emtee Dempsey’s phrase. At five in the morning, the house reverberated with a tremendous noise and they emerged from their rooms into the hallway, staring astounded at one another.

“What was that?” Joyce asked, her eyes looking like Orphan Annie’s.

“An explosion.”

As soon as Emtee Dempsey said it, they realized that was indeed what they had heard. The old nun went back into her room and picked up the phone.

“It works,” she said, and put it down again. “Sister Kimberly, call the police.”

Joyce said, “I’ll check to see...”

“No.” Emtee Dempsey hesitated. Then she went into Kim’s room which looked out over Walton Street. They crowded around her. What looked to be pieces of their Volkswagen lay in the street, atop the roof of a red sedan, and shredded upholstery festooned the powerlines just below their eye level.

“Now you know what to report.”

Kim picked up her own phone and made the call.

They were up and dressed when there was a ring at the door. Their call had not been necessary to bring the police. Emtee Dempsey was pensive throughout the preliminary inquiry, letting Kim answer most of the questions. At ten minutes to seven she stood.

“We must be off to Mass.”

“Maybe you better not, Sister,” one of the policemen, Grimaldi, said. He wore his salt-and-pepper hair cut short and his lids lay in diagonals across his eyes, giving him a sleepy, friendly look.

“It is our practice to attend Mass every morning, Sergeant, and I certainly do not intend to alter it for this.”

When he realized she was serious, he offered to drive them to the cathedral and Emtee Dempsey was about to refuse when the drama of arriving at St. Matthew’s in a squad car struck her.

“Since we might otherwise be late, I agree. But no sirens.”

He promised no sirens, thereby, Kim was sure, disappointing Emtee Dempsey.

It was, to put it mildly, a distracting way to begin the day. As it happened, their emerging from a police car at the cathedral door was witnessed by a derelict or two, but otherwise caused no sensation. Once inside, Emtee Dempsey of course put aside such childishness. It was not until Richard joined Grimaldi later that Emtee Dempsey brought up Miss Butterfingers.