Misunderstood Metaphor

I recently found out that I misunderstood the meaning of a metaphor that I had heard for years.  Carla, Jane and I worked together with a particular woman.  Jane would say this woman "knows where the bodies were buried."  I had thought this meant this person knew everyone's secrets, and used those secrets to establish herself in a prominent position.

I was reading "Where the Bodies are Buried"* in the March 16, 2015 edition of The New Yorker.  It is a fascinating story about Gerry Adams and the Irish Republican Army.  In 1971, the I.R.A. abducted Jean McConville, a mother of ten, from a Belfast housing project.  She was a widow, and her ten children were orphaned.  When the kids grew up, they started to wonder what became of her.  When a person is missing, the family doesn't know if their loved one is dead or not, which then makes mourning their death complicated.  The oldest son suspected his mother was dead right away.  Some of McConville's other children were hopeful she was alive someplace, struggling to get home.

But I digress.  It turns out that the person who knows where the bodies are buried also likely called the hits.  They are the ones responsible for the death and hiding the bodies.  It is interesting to find out this subtle difference in meaning after so many years.  I didn't make that full connection until I read this article.

* Full Disclosure:  I am in the middle of this article, but wanted to write about this before I finished.  New Yorker articles are crazy long.**
** I am not in the middle.  I am five pages into this article and have fourteen to go.