A MYSTERY STORY

by Leigh Lundin

Solve and enjoy the following little mystery courtesy of Hal White.

A Reverend Dean Mystery

by Hal White © 2008

Detective Michaels was interested in facts, and he tolerated little sentimentality in the process.

"Reverend. This is certainly a … surprise," Michaels said, implying that it wasn’t necessarily a good one. "What can I do for you?"

"I’ve come to talk about the case –" the old man started, but the detective cut him off.

"Reverend, look," he said, placing his forearms on the desk as he leaned forward. "Some people in this department think you can walk on water. But I’ll be honest. I’m not one of them. I’m a trained professional. You’re not. You’re a pastor, for Pete’s sake. Despite what you see on TV, police work is specialized and complicated. I’m sure you’re a very good minister, but in a criminal investigation, you’re out of your depth. You have to leave this to the professionals."

Although he felt strongly on the subject, Michaels realized he may have hurt the old man’s feelings. He tried to placate the reverend by giving him an example of what he meant.

"Take these photos, for example. You wouldn’t know how to analyze information like this."

The reverend looked at several 8 x 10 color photographs spread across the detective’s gray metal desk. They appeared to be the interior of a large bedroom.

"Well, Detective, since I don’t know what you’re trying to do, I’d have to agree. Perhaps if you told me exactly what you’re looking for…?" the cleric replied, with a twinkle in his eye.

Michaels immediately realized that he’d made a mistake. He shouldn’t have mentioned the pictures to begin with. But now that he’d brought them up, he had to explain them. In an effort to get rid of the old man, he gave a quick summary of the photos.

"They’re pictures of a crime scene," he said curtly. "The victim had state-of-the-art locks on his bedroom door and a cell phone by his bed. Yet he opened his bedroom door in the middle of the night and walked straight into the arms of a burglar. So here’s the question. Why would someone that security-conscious open his door – presumably because he heard a noise – rather than wait in his bedroom and call us?"

Reverend Dean was intrigued. To Michaels’ annoyance, he stepped around the detective’s desk to get a closer look at the photos. The pictures gave a three-hundred-sixty degree view of the room, including the floor, bed and most of the ceiling.

"This door leads to the bathroom?" the reverend asked, pointing to one of the photos.

"Yes. It’s the master bath. So we know he didn’t open the door to go to the bathroom, or to get a drink of water."

"Mmmmm. It is difficult-" the reverend began.

"See what I mean? This proves-"

"But I do have a suggestion for you."

The detective rolled his eyes. Surely his day could get no worse than this.

"Note the floor," the reverend began. "Do you see the bedspread? It’s been thrown off the bed with no thought or order."

"Yeah? So?"

"Now look at the blanket. It’s been tossed off, as well. Also in a disorganized fashion. But it overlaps just half the area of the bedspread. Thus, it was probably thrown off separately from the spread."

"So?"

"Now look at the sheet. It’s not on the floor, but merely laid across half the bed; far more organized than the first two items."

"Reverend, look –"

"The important thing," the old man continued, "is that each item was removed separately. One at a time."

"Reverend, what’s your point?"

Reverend Dean shrugged, then offered an explanation.

"It’s just a guess, Detective – and a hasty one at that – but I think your victim was hot. First he threw off his bedspread, then he threw off his blanket, finally he pulled off his sheet."

The reverend pointed to the photographs.

"He might have had an expensive alarm system, but look at the walls of his room. There’s no thermostat. All a burglar needed to do was enter his house, turn the thermostat to ninety, and wait until the owner opened his door to adjust the heat. Initially, when the burglar turned up the temperature, the victim didn’t wake up. He merely tossed off his bedspread, and later his blanket, while half-asleep. Eventually, however, the heat fully roused him – which accounts for the more orderly condition of the sheet – and he rose to check the thermostat. That’s why he opened the door. By the way," he asked sympathetically, "is this poor man dead, or comatose?"

Michaels was stunned by the old man’s explanation – which no one had considered – as well as his question.

"Uh … why do you think he’s either?"

The reverend shrugged as though the explanation were obvious. Which it was.

"If he could speak you’d be talking with him instead of studying these photographs. Thus he’s either dead, or so disabled that he can’t communicate with you."

The detective lowered his eyes and sighed. "He’s dead. We believe he was hit over the head as soon as he opened the door."

Upon saying that Tom Michaels rose, walked past the reverend and closed his office door.

"Sit down, Reverend. Perhaps I misjudged you. Let’s talk."

Hal White

About Reverend Dean

A few months ago, I came across the web site of Hal White, author of the Reverend Dean stories. Like many of us, Hal is an aficionado of impossible and locked room mysteries. Naturally, we invited Hal to write a column for Criminal Brief. The upshot was that Hal sent me an inscribed copy of The Mysteries of Reverend Dean, which I read on the train to Bouchercon.

Reverend Dean is like a Baptist’s Father Brown plus a pinch of the Rabbi who retired late, but the six stories remind me of mysteries from the first half of the 20th century, early Ellery Queen and S. S. van Dine, when mysteries had a purity of plot line. Such stories typically focused on the puzzles, but Hal White manages to sketch a little characterization as well, as exemplified by Rev. Dean’s adventures with Hamburger Helper.

As for solving the mysteries, I scored moderately well, starting off a bit rocky in the first story, getting one of the three murders right plus the killer. By the time I got to the sixth and final story, ‘Murder at the Fall Festival’, I nailed the answer, although it wasn’t until Dean’s visit to Wal-Mart that the pieces clicked into place. That story features a one page mystery-within-a-mystery bonus, what you just read above.

Perhaps the greatest mystery is how to find the book. You can’t simply walk into your local Borders or Barnes and Noble and order it. Reverend Dean is published by a tiny Minnesota publisher called Lighthouse Christian Publishing, which seems unaware of Ingram, the industry’s largest distributor of books.

Do not fear; order the books from Amazon.com. For puzzle purists, The Mysteries of Reverend Dean is a very satisfying read.