Page 183 - Labelle Gramercy, On the Case

Jury-rigged

Then it dawned on me. If Napoleon usually played a riskier hand,
then he normally would have won or lost a fair amount of money in a
hurry, ending his participation sooner. But if his intent were to record
his location, sitting in on that game was a great strategy—which
would mean he knew a murder was going to be committed. Great!
That could only strengthen my argument. I tuned back in to Labelle’s
critical recitation.
“Alexander Simulian attended a midnight mass followed by a pre-
dawn vigil and sunrise service at the Eastern Orthodox church
downtown. He told you he has done this every year since his mother
died. How long ago was that?”
I scrabbled through another file of biographical trivia. Alexander’s
statement had sounded so pious and filial that I had not considered
the ramifications. Oops.
“Two years ago.”
“Anyone accompany him to the church?”
“Other than our man? No, but a lot of people remember him. He
was wearing a red shirt and white tie.”
She probed me with her piercing gaze.
“And over that?”
“A dark green pinstripe sharkskin suit and a black patent leather
overcoat. He showed us the garments when we questioned him. If
anyone else had had shown up in the same outfit it wouldn’t have
been coincidence.”
“How dark was it inside the church and outside in the
procession?”
“Inside? Just candles. About a thousand of them. Do you want me
to calculate the lumens for that?” I was getting testy.
“No, thank you. I have all the algorithms I need. Is that church
Old or New Calendarist?”
“What?”
“Never mind. I can use my own ephemerides and figure it out
relative to the ecclesiastical versus paschal full moon and the
astronomical versus fixed vernal equinox. Yes, I see that the moon
was well past the last quarter on that date. Was it an overcast night?”
I got hold of myself. “Yes.” At least I had checked the weather
report. And concluded that the nocturnal illumination was minimal.

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