Good Year For Murder by A.E. Eddenden Page B

victim?”
    â€œThat would definitely be a guess. Nobody knows.”
    â€œI do.”
    Tretheway stared at Zulp for a moment. “Sir, if you have any new information …”
    â€œI have the same information you have, Tretheway,” Zulp interrupted.
    â€œNothing new?”
    Zulp shook his head. “Think, Tretheway. Use the old noodle.” Zulp rubbed his hands together. “It won’t wear out, you know.”
    â€œI’m sorry, Sir. I don’t understand.”
    â€œAha!” Zulp jumped up and started pacing excitedly. “Tretheway. Do you know what the twenty-fourth of August is?” Tretheway checked the calendar again. “It’s a Saturday.”
    â€œNothing else?”
    â€œNot that I know of.”
    â€œExactly.” Zulp sat down again. He leaned back in his chair, and basked in the warmth of withheld knowledge. But he couldn’t contain himself. “The twenty-fourth of August is St. Bartholomew’s Day!”
    Tretheway tried to look as though he’d just heard something meaningful.
    â€œDo you know who St. Bartholomew is?” Zulp asked.
    Tretheway shook his head without changing his expression.
    â€œAn apostle,” Zulp explained. “Of royal birth. Spent a life of hardship as a missionary. Met a tragic end. An Armenian hung him up on a cross. Head downward and flayed him alive.”
    â€œFlayed?”
    â€œSkinned.” Zulp rummaged in his desk drawer, ostensibly looking for a toothpick, but really to refresh his memory with the notes he had made at the library while poring over an obscure book entitled
High Days the World Over.
He found both. “St. Bartholomew had a special power over thunderstorms. Also cured people of rare diseases. Like catalepsy.” Zulp fenced with a stubborn piece of back bacon wedged between two molars. “But here’s the zinger, Tretheway. In the olden days, in some churches, they’d give knives to the congregation to mark St. Bartholomew’s Day. Because of the flaying. Matter of fact, he appears with a knife in more than one famous painting.” Zulp narrowed his eyes at Tretheway. “Now doesn’t that give you any ideas?”
    â€œAh, not right away.”
    â€œThen how about”—Zulp cleared his throat—’St. Bartholomew/Brings the cold dew.’ “
    Zulp kept staring at Tretheway. Tretheway shook his head.
    â€œWho are the Aldermen in ward three? Your ward.” Zulp asked.
    â€œAh…Ammerman and Gum.”
    â€œGum?”
    Zulp smiled knowingly. “And what’s his first name?”
    â€œBartholomew.”
    â€œExactly.” Zulp rose from his chair. He felt that his next statement was much too important to be made from a sitting position. “On August the twenty-fourth, early in the morning when the dew lies on the grass, the politician Bartholomew Gum will be stabbed to death. Or maybe flayed.”
    After an awkward pause, Tretheway spoke. “I don’t believe it.”
    â€œNeither did I at first,” Zulp said. “But logic and reason persisted. Discipline in thought, Tretheway.”
    â€œThere’s just one thing, though.”
    â€œHm?”
    â€œWell, to simplify matters, St. Swithin killed Vikings. And on St. Swithin’s Day, a Viking was killed. That’s Miss Tommerup.”
    â€œSo?” An edge of suspicion crept into Zulp’s voice.
    Tretheway attempted to twist into a more comfortable position. The chair twisted with him. “You’re saying that on St. Bartholomew’s Day, someone called Bartholomew will be killed. With a knife. Now to follow the pattern, shouldn’t someone who Bartholomew killed in legend be murdered?”
    â€œWhat do you mean?”
    Tretheway bit his thin lips and plowed on. “St. Swithin killed Vikings. Who did St. Bartholomew kill?”
    â€œI told you what he did, dammit! He did things with lightning. Cured sick people. He