The Last Confession
Morgana de Guerre

Morgana de Guerre is a freelance writer who lives
in southern Louisiana with her mundane husband, a
punk daughter, a coven of cats and a psychotic
wiener dog. She has been called “twisted” by some
and “talented” by others, but prefers to think of herself
as borderline antisocial. She loves receiving
letters from her readers. You can email her at
voodoo@premier.net.
©Copyright 2001
Morgana de Guerre

Her hair was once titian, that subtle shade of red that poets
ascribe to Tiziano Vecellio, one of the greatest Italian painters in
history. I’ll take the romance out of it and call it what it looks like: a
peculiar shade of brownish-orange. Or had looked like. Now it was
streaked with vermilion and crimson where it clung to her face and
neck with clots of blood. She may once have been pretty or even
beautiful. Now she was just another corpse on the midnight to
seven shift in my precinct. I took a step back as the medical
examiner moved up to declare death. I didn’t need a medical
degree to tell that this lady had seen her last Mardi Gras.
Several streets over, sounds of party-goers in the French Quarter
rang in the night. Shouts and yells of revelry fell flat on this scene
of recent carnage. I took a roll of Tums out of my pocket and
thumbed three of them out, popping them into my mouth. The
chalky taste of the antacids mixed with the smell of blood and the
refuse of the alley we were standing in made me want to puke.
Suddenly it all seemed to be too much. Too much blood, too much
terror, too much death. The M.E. had finished his examination of the
body and they were zipping her into a black, plastic body bag;
strapping her onto a stetcher. No identification had been found near
the body; this would be entered into the system as another Jane
Doe, unless dental records or fingerprints were found to match a
name to the battered corpse being loaded into the meat wagon.
They closed the rear doors and got into the ambulance, driving off
slowly. Speed wouldn’t help their passenger and she would be
denied the last hoorah of sirens. When they got where they were
going she would still be dead and that’s all that really mattered to
her.
I turned at a touch on my coat sleeve and looked down into the
face of my present partner, Emile Boudreaux.
Emile was a short Cajun with olive skin and depthless black eyes
that could bore holes through a perpetrator and a smile that could
make the ladies swoon. He was lean but wiry enough for me not to
want to get on the wrong end of his fists. He was also the best
partner that I’ve had in almost twenty years of police work.
“We may have a witness,” Emile said.
I wouldn’t dare to hope.
The two of us walked together to the mouth of the alley where
two uniforms stood with a woman between them.
It took less than a minute to size her up. Taking out my
notebook I turned to a blank page and then looked at her, giving
the impression that I was prepared to disbelieve anything she said.
“I’m Lieutenant John Valentine, Miss . . .”
“Ellen Mitchell, sir.” She seemed shaky, which was to be expected
if she had just witnessed a murder as brutal as this one.
I wrote down her name and looked back at her, wondering what
a woman as uptown as this one was doing passing this way at two
o’clock in the morning on the eve of Mardi Gras. I would have
expected her to be prowling local artsy places looking for a
benefactor. “Do you live around here, Ms. Mitchell?”
“No sir, my car is parked over there,” she pointed to a Park-All-
Day lot up the street. “I was just passing by and heard a s-s-,” tears
welled up in her big, baby-blues and I hardened my heart further
against her. Society types. “Scream,” she finished. I nodded,
encouraging her. “I saw this man, at least I think it was a man, in
this long robe thing . . .”
Emile and I looked at each other. “A cassock?” I asked. “Like a
priest’s robe?”
Her baby-blues widened and she nodded. “Exactly like that.”
That turned out to be the gist of what she saw. When the victim
had screamed, Emily Mitchell had watched, frozen as the man or
woman in the robes had hit the victim repeatedly and then ran as
fast as she could down towards her car. Once inside that minimal
safety, she had played Good Samaritan and called 911 on her cell
phone, ready to flee if she saw anyone exit the alley where the
murder had taken place. I took down all other pertinent information
and we let Miss Baby-Blues go home for the night with the
stipulation that we would probably be calling her for a further
interview sometime soon.
Emile and I walked towards our car; a crap-brown four-door that
should have had “Undercover Police Car” stenciled on the side of it.
I slid behind the wheel and lit another cigarette. Emile rolled down 
his window halfway. We had a deal. I smoked and he silently
complained about it.
“So what do you think, Val?”
“I think she should have had more dress to go with those knobby
knees. Do I think she’s telling the truth? I don’t think she’s our killer
that’s for sure. Those society babes might kill for money, but I
doubt she’d whack some other broad in an alley for kicks.” I drew
deep on my weed and looked out on the night-dark street. The
streetlights on this stretch of road were few and far between and
only the ambient light from the city reflecting off the clouds
illuminated the road. We were parked right off the narrow,
cobblestone avenue next to the dead end where the body had been
discovered. The lights from the Crime Scene Unit fell short of the
mouth of the alley. Dead-end. It had definitely been a dead end for
that poor kid, I thought.
“We need to check with the ME’s office and find out when the
autopsy is going to be scheduled,” I continued.
“When we find out what killed this one, maybe we can put her
together with those others we found in alleys. I also think we need
to go back to St. Christopher’s.” I looked over at Emile. His face was
inscrutable in the vague city lights. I knew he was Catholic and
probably didn’t want to think that a priest or nun could have
bludgeoned these girls to death. Well, I was Catholic, too, though it
had been a while since I’d been to confession. And I had a strong
belief in Evil. Maybe I should tackle the church on my own.
There was another thing that was pointing me in the direction of
the Catholic Church nearest the scenes of the crimes. On each of
the previous three murders, a rosary had been found somewhere on
the bodies. After talking to the Medical Examiner who would
perform the autopsy, we’d know if this victim fit the same MO. We
had talked to the priest at St. Christopher’s Cathedral several times
and he had been less than helpful, but maybe we were asking the
wrong questions. Maybe another question and answer session with
Father Anthony was in order.
We drove deeper into the city, taking back streets, avoiding light.
I rolled my window down to get a cross-breeze from Emile’s
window and smelled ripe and fertile things growing. Humidity filled
each breath I took; the air coming in the window was cool off the
Mississippi. Finally we pulled up in front of the morgue offices and
parked in a slot reserved for police. I hated this place. It reduced
everything to measures and weights and the pitiful nakedness of
once living beings. We rang the bell next to the door and the night
security guard let us in. We took the well-known hall down to the
autopsy suite and asked the guard stationed there if Dr. Monroe was
inside. The guard nodded and motioned us through. Everybody 
knew everybody on this end of the dead night.
“Dr. Monroe,” I said as Emile and I walked towards him. The
autopsy suite was all bright white light and hard metal angles. It
smelled like alcohol and strong disinfectant and old blood. It
smelled like death.
“Hello, Val. Emile. I guess this one is yours? I was just getting
ready to start the post mortem. I figured you’d want the results fast.”
Dr. Monroe is taller than I am and I top six feet by a couple of
inches. But where I’m a big guy with broad shoulders, big arms and
a bit of a beer gut, Dr. Monroe looks like a scarecrow that has been
magically animated. His thin ankles poked out of the too short
scrubs he wore and his neck looked like a stork’s. He was a
sensitive guy, though, sensitive to others, sensitive to the dead. And
he had a wry but gentle humor that put people at ease. I liked
working with this Assistant M.E. Some of the others with their black
humor and remarks about the dead made me want to take out my
gun and give them a few extra holes. I guess I’ve been in the
business of dead people so long that I feel like they deserve respect
as much as the next guy, maybe more. The dead can’t get up to
defend themselves.
They had transferred the dead girl’s body onto a stainless steel
autopsy table and she was covered with a white sheet. I braced
myself for it, but you never really get used to seeing a life cut short
and reduced to a slab of meat on a table. Dr. Monroe pulled the
sheet down to lie at the woman’s feet and started speaking into a
microphone that would record the autopsy. Emile was as far away
from the table as he could get. He was leaning against a counter
and trying to look like he wasn’t going to pass out. His dark olive
skin looked yellow. I looked back at the corpse on the table.
Naked, pale, dead, what we are all reduced to at the end.
The examination turned up pretty much what I expected. Massive
head trauma, the weapon a large, heavy smooth-edged object. From
the angle of the wound, Monroe deduced that the killer was
standing behind and above the victim when he (or she) hit her.
After he had done the preliminary examination, Monroe went to a
table and came back with a clear plastic baggie labeled evidence.
Inside was a green glass rosary. I studied it for a moment before
handing it back to him. This definitely linked the cases. Time to talk
to Father Anthony while Dr. Monroe got on with his wet work.
On the way to the church my pager went off loudly, startling both
Emile and myself. I thought perhaps Emile had been dozing, but I
couldn’t blame him if he had been. We’d been awake longer than
either of us had expected. I pulled to the shoulder of the road to
return the call on my cell phone. To my surprise, Father Anthony
answered the number. He was extremely agitated and I couldn’t 
calm him enough to understand exactly what he wanted with us,
but I told him that we were on our way to see him and would be
there within minutes.
The church dated back to the 17th century and was one of the
oldest of those around the French Quarter. I have always admired
gothic, dark architecture and this was a perfect example of the style.
Behind the towering stone of the church, a simple stone house
stood, serving as the rectory for the priest. To the side of the church
was a wrought iron enclosed cemetery that looked to be well kept.
My attention was drawn to the double front doors of the church
where a dim slash of light escaped to chase the shadows away from
the stairs. Father Anthony stood at the right-hand door, holding it
open for our entry. We stepped into the vestibule and Father
Anthony locked the double doors behind us. Light from the bloodred
novena candles flickered and flared, painting the Holy Virgin’s
face with droplets of blood. The priest led us towards the altar and
finally stopped beside a marble stand with a beautifully ornate
golden candleholder set atop it. He looked at us as if we knew
already what he was upset about. We looked back at him blankly.
“But surely you see . . .” he waited for a few beats before
continuing, “the blood.”
I took another step forward and saw that the red coloring on the
candleholder hadn’t been cast by the novena candles as I had first
thought. There were splatters and splotches on the golden-hued
metal. “Emile, radio for the crime lab,” I said. “Father, has anyone
touched this recently?”
“This shouldn’t even have been moved. I don’t understand how
the blood could have gotten there. This is desecration.” He made
the sign of the cross.
I helped the old man to the first pew and sat down beside him.
He was trembling. He looked like exactly what he was. A kindly
parish priest close to retiring to wherever it was that parish priests
retired to. I gentled him and started asking questions, the same
questions I had asked him before. He gave the same answers. Then,
“All of these murders occurred on Thursday nights, Father, does that
mean anything to you?”
Looking at me for the first time he said, “Well, I offer confession
on Thursday evenings for those who can’t make the daytime hours
during the week.” His look turned almost beseeching, “You don’t
think confession has anything to do with these murders?”
“I’m afraid we can’t rule anything out at this time. We’re just
trying to follow up on any leads we may get.” But my heart was
beating a lot faster and my blood was racing in my veins. “Father,
do you know of anyone who is usually around at the time you offer
confession on Thursday nights?”
“Only the cleaning people,” he replied. 
Just then there was the rattling of keys and the outer doors
opened. A tall, husky woman filled the doorway and turned to lock
the door behind her. Her white hair was pulled back into a stern
bun and her eyes blazed with something that might have been
religious fervor. I looked at my watch. A little past four a.m. I
looked at Father Anthony as he watched the woman come down
the center aisle.
His face looked pale and gaunt. I got the feeling that the cleaning
people didn’t usually come to work at this time of the morning. I
felt the priest draw breath to say something and lay my hand gently
on his shoulder, warning him not to speak. We watched in silence
as the woman walked straight to the bloody candleholder and reach
to pick it up. I stood up, drawing my gun.
“I’m afraid I can’t let you do that, ma’am,” I said, moving towards
her. “Very slowly, now, put your hands on the railing behind you.”
Even though I stood a head taller than she and was aiming a gun
at her, even though she had been caught red-handed about to get
rid of evidence, even though she had to know she’d been caught...
she ran. I cursed under my breath, hoping at the last second that
the priest or God or whoever was hanging out in this church would
forgive my blasphemy, and took off after her. She ran through the
altar and chancel and through a hallway that led to the back of the
church, to the alley connecting it to the rectory. She was fast. I was
faster.
I brought her down cursing and screaming blue murder and
cuffed her hands behind her back. I Mirandized her and Emile
appeared at my side with the news that the lab boys were driving
up. I told him to watch our suspect and went back into the church
to see if I could aid the priest in any way. Father Anthony was
looking paler than he had earlier. I asked him if he needed medical
attention and he said he just thought he needed his bed. That was
something I could definitely agree with.
Sitting at my desk in the precinct house, drinking coffee and
smoking a cigarette, thinking about all that had happened because a
pious cleaning lady had overheard some confessions she hadn’t
liked. The night before, when we brought Miss Ida Smith into the
station to be booked for suspicion of murder, she had decided that
keeping her mouth closed hadn’t been in her best interests. She
declined legal representation and went on to make her own
confession, though not for a priest. Emile and I heard her
confession, but we weren’t able to absolve her sins. That was
between her and a jury of her peers.
I looked up from the paperwork on my desk to lock eyes with a
pair of baby blues that I had last seen about 12 hours earlier. I
dredged up a smile. I’m not the best of company when I’m rested, 
but when I haven’t slept in over 24 hours I can be a bear.
“I thought I’d stop by to see if you needed anything more from
me,” she said.
Today she was dressed in jeans and a white summer sweater.
Nice. “Not at the moment, Ms. Mitchell. I believe we’ve got this case
wrapped up nicely, though you may be called to testify.”
“Oh,” she said. Just that little word let me see and understand all
of her disappointment. “Well. I guess I’d better let you get back to
work.”
I pondered for a moment. What the hell. “Ms. Mitchell, wait.
Actually, I was just about to take a break, go down for a sandwich
and coffee. Care to join me?”
Her smile was all the answer I needed.