The Sinner: A Rizzoli & Isles Novel

care.”
    “Even the poorest patient in this country would have found treatment.”
    “You’d certainly hope so. Because Hansen’s disease is a public health issue.”
    “Then the chances are this woman was an immigrant.”
    Cawley nodded. “You can still find it among some rural populations around the world. The majority of cases worldwide are in only five countries.”
    “Which ones?”
    “Brazil and Bangladesh. Indonesia and Myanmar. And, of course, India.”
    Dr. Cawley returned the skull to the shelf, then gathered up the photos on her desk and shuffled them together. But Maura was scarcely aware of the other woman’s movements. She stared at the X ray of Rat Lady, and thought of another victim, another death scene. Of spilled blood, in the shadow of a crucifix.
    India, she thought. Sister Ursula worked in India.
             
     
    Graystones Abbey seemed colder and more desolate than ever when Maura stepped through the gate that afternoon. Ancient Sister Isabel led the way across the courtyard, her L. L. Bean snow boots peeking out incongruously from beneath the hem of her black habit. When winter turns brutal, even nuns rely on the comfort of Gore-Tex.
    Sister Isabel directed Maura into the Abbess’s empty office, then she vanished down the dark hallway, the clomp-clomp of her boots trailing a fading echo.
    Maura touched the cast-iron radiator beside her; it was cold. She did not take off her coat.
    So much time passed that she began to wonder if she had been forgotten, if the antique Sister Isabel had simply shuffled on down the hall, her memory of Maura’s arrival fading with each step. Listening to the creaks of the building, to the gusts rattling the window, Maura imagined spending a lifetime under this roof. The years of silence and prayer, the unchanging rituals. There would be comfort in it, she thought. The ease of knowing, at each dawn, how the day will go. No surprises, no turmoil. You rise from bed and reach for the same clothing, kneel for the same prayers, walk the same dim corridors to breakfast. Outside the walls, women’s hems might rise and fall, cars might take on new shapes and colors, and a changing galaxy of movie stars would appear and then vanish from the silver screen. But within the walls, the rituals continue unchanging, even as your body grows infirm, your hands unsteady, the world more silent as your hearing fades.
    Solace, thought Maura. Contentment. Yes, these were reasons to withdraw from the world, reasons she understood.
    She did not hear Mary Clement’s approach, and she was startled to notice the Abbess was standing in the doorway, watching her.
    “Reverend Mother.”
    “I understand you have more questions?”
    “About Sister Ursula.”
    Mary Clement glided into the room and settled in behind her desk. On this bitterly cold day, even she was not immune to winter’s chill; beneath her veil, she wore a gray wool sweater embroidered with white cats. She folded her hands on the desk and fixed Maura with a hard look. Not the friendly face that had greeted her on that first morning.
    “You’ve done all you can to disrupt our lives. To destroy the memory of Sister Camille. And now you want to repeat the process with Sister Ursula?”
    “She would want us to find her attacker.”
    “And what terrible secrets do you imagine she has? Which sins are you now fishing for, Dr. Isles?”
    “Not sins, necessarily.”
    “Just a few days ago, you were focused only on Camille.”
    “And that may have distracted us from probing more deeply into Sister Ursula’s life.”
    “You’ll find no scandals there.”
    “I’m not looking for scandals. I’m looking for the attacker’s motive.”
    “To kill a sixty-eight-year-old nun?” Mary Clement shook her head. “There’s no rational motive that I could imagine.”
    “You told us that Sister Ursula served a mission abroad. In India.”
    The abrupt change in subject seemed to startle Mary Clement. She rocked back in her chair. “Why is that relevant?”
    “Tell me more. About her time in India.”
    “I’m not sure what you want to know, exactly.”
    “She was trained as a nurse?”
    “Yes. She worked in a small village outside the city of Hyderabad. She was there for about five years.”
    “And she returned to Graystones a year ago?”
    “In January.”
    “Did she talk much, about her work there?”
    “No.”
    “She served five years there, and she never spoke of her experiences?”
    “We value