“Forgeries,” Dash said quietly.
Bea picked up one of the slips, holding it up to the light from the window. “The paper stock is right for the time period. The bank stamp is authentic—see how it’s slightly off-center?”
“That was their style back then,” Deidre said, adjusting her reading glasses to examine the slip more closely. “I remember because I helped with the church bookkeeping for several years in the eighties. Every deposit slip had that same off-center stamp. The teller—Mrs. Kowalski—had terrible aim with that thing, but she’d been at the bank since the fifties and nobody had the heart to correct her.”
“So someone made these deposits using forged signatures,” Dottie said. “Someone was stealing from the recreation center fund and making it look like Reverend Pickering was responsible.”
“There’s a note,” I said, unfolding a piece of paper that had been tucked behind the deposit slips. Tommy’s handwriting again, this time more hurried, the letters cramped together like he’d been writing fast.
Found these in evidence box marked Financial Records. Not part of official file. Sheriff Milton told me to lose them. Said case was closed and this would only muddy waters. But these don’t match Pickering’s known handwriting samples. Someone framed him. Need to verify signatures before I go to Milton again.
The note was dated October 3, 1985—just over two weeks after the murders.
“Tommy knew,” Walt said, his voice rough. “He knew someone had framed Pickering.”
“The question is,” Dash said, “did Milton bury it because he was part of it, or because someone with more power told him to?”
I stared at the deposit slips, at those too-perfect signatures, and felt something cold settle in my stomach. Someone had been embezzling from the church building fund, using Reverend Pickering’s name to cover their tracks. And when Pickering started asking questions about the missing records, when he threatened to go to the bank for copies, they’d killed him to keep him quiet.
“We need a handwriting expert,” I said. “Someone who can prove these signatures are forged.”
“And we need to go through Pickering’s notebook again,” Dash said. “See if he documented anything about discovering the embezzlement, about who might have had access to forge his signature.”
“Financial records, building fund meetings—anything that connects to this,” Walt added, already making notes with his characteristic precision.
“Or maybe whoever was stealing reported the records as missing themselves,” Bea said quietly. “To cover their tracks when Pickering started asking questions.”
I moved to the table where we’d spread out the church picnic photograph, the one from just two months before the murders. The original print from Michael Bailey’s box had been faded and small, but Walt had worked some kind of technological magic after he’d scanned it into his laptop.
“My grandson showed me this trick,” Walt said with obvious pride. “You scan the photograph, then use this program to sharpen the pixels and increase the resolution. Makes everything clearer. Brings out details you couldn’t see in the small print.” Walt adjusted his reading glasses as he studied the enlarged version.
“All right,” he said, pulling out a notepad with the precision of someone about to catalog evidence. “Let’s identify everyone we can. Between all of us, we should know most of these faces.”
Bea leaned forward, her reading glasses catching the light. “Lord, look how young everyone was. That’s Martha Hendricks in the front row—see the woman with the enormous hat? She always wore those things to outdoor events. Died of ovarian cancer, bless her. Her daughter married that awful man from Columbia who ran off with his receptionist.”
“Betty Walters,” Deidre said, pointing to a plump woman holding a paper plate piled high with food. “She made the best deviled eggs on the island. Brought them to every church function for thirty years. Her son is the one who opened that tackle shop on the pier.”
“Roger Hammond.” Walt indicated a man in the middle row with salt-and-pepper hair. “Died in a single-car accident on Highway 17. His widow Linda sold their house within six months and moved to Hilton Head. Never came back, not even for funerals of friends.”
“He was on the finance committee,” I said.
I studied Roger Hammond’s face—pleasant enough, smiling at the camera, one hand resting on the shoulder of the woman beside him.
“That’s Gene Forsythe next to him,” Bea added, tapping a heavyset man with a thick mustache who stood with his arms crossed. “His grandson runs the sporting goods store now, but I heard he’s looking to sell to developers for a bunch of condos.”
“Who’s that?” I pointed to a thin man with wire-rimmed glasses standing at the edge of the group, slightly apart from the others as if he’d been caught trying to leave the frame.
“Craig Baker,” Walt said. “Accountant. We play dominoes together at the senior hall on Friday mornings. I was going to try and corner him there and see what he remembers about that time. He’s sharp as a tack. And I’ll know if he’s lying to me. We play poker on Monday nights, and he’s a terrible liar.”
Deidre had moved on to another section of the photograph. “Oh, there’s Patsy Jenkins and her husband James. Patsy made the best peach cobbler. James died of a heart attack about twenty years ago, and Patsy moved to Florida to be near her daughter.”
“Stay focused, Dee,” Walt said. “We don’t need a society column report.”
“I am focused,” she protested. “I’m providing context. These are real people, not just names on a list.”
She was right, of course. Even in the midst of a murder investigation, these were neighbors, fellow church members, people who’d brought deviled eggs and peach cobbler to picnics. People who’d raised children and paid mortgages and lived entire lives on this island.
“There,” I said, pointing to a young man in the back row with dark hair and an earnest expression. “Who’s that? He looks kind of familiar.”
