by Lev Raphael
Driving through the calm, bright, tree-lined, and almost picture-perfect streets north of campus where breaking the law generally amounted to illegal parking or a frat house hosting a noisy party, the idea that our lives had been touched by murder yet again seemed preposterous.
When we got home, my answering machine read only one message. Stefan waited there while I played it.
“Nick?” It was Priscilla, voice quavering. “I didn’t kill Chloe. I did not kill her. You have to believe me.”
Perhaps because I’d been rude to Angie, I decided I had to return Priscilla’s call. I looked up her number in my faculty directory while Stefan was off in the kitchen pouring us glasses of Perrier. There was no answer at Priscilla’s, and her machine wasn’t on. Maybe she hadn’t been home when she called. I could picture her drunk in some bar. Hey, that’s where I’d be after a threat from a policeman when I was the chief suspect in a murder.
Falling asleep that night, I felt sorry again that I’d just ignored Angie, but I was too tired to try calling her (I knew she’d be up late—all my students were). In a sudden flowering of clarity just before I drifted off, it occurred to me that Angie’s enthusiasm might have been based on something real. I had asked her to check out Priscilla, hadn’t I? So maybe she’d seen or heard something I needed to know.
But right now, sleep was more important.
THE NEXT MORNING, Saturday, my first thought was, “It’s almost over.” The conference was half done, and I would never have another burden like this again.
“How about coffee in bed?” Stefan asked.
“How about breakfast in bed? Hell, how about the weekend in bed, maybe my whole life. I’ll become a wisecracking invalid and make sardonic observations about politics and my health, like Alice James.”
Stefan was pulling on his black silk robe and turned from his closet.
“Alice James? Why not aim a little higher?”
“Okay. Alice Kramden? No, Alice in Chains.”
“Don’t show off. You’ve never heard a single one of their songs.”
“Maybe not. But my students play them in class on their Sony Discmen—that is, when they’re not getting calls on their cell phones or using their laptops to do a paper for another class.”
Stefan left the room before I got started on my “O tempora, O mores!” aria. I lolled under the covers, glad that we’d had the bedroom redone over the summer. The fresh wallpaper and paint made the room seem lighter and more open.
I fell back asleep, but Stefan’s gentle hand on my shoulder woke me up. He’d put a small tray on my night table with two fragrant mugs of coffee. Vanilla hazelnut—not a bad choice for a Saturday morning. Stefan sat on the edge of the bed near me, blowing on his coffee to cool it.
“Maybe I won’t bother going up for tenure,” I brought out. “I could just quit and hang out here. Shop, cook, read.”
“Like your mother,” Stefan said.
For as long as I could remember, my mother had lived what Stefan recently dubbed the Countess Tolstoy life. Even when she was taking care of me as a child, she still managed to have long lunches with her friends, take walks in Riverside Park, read important long books like The Magic Mountain, The Brothers Karamazov, A Dance to the Music of Time, The Alexandria Quartet, and of course Remembrance of Things Past (once each in French and English). She even dabbled in contemporary criticism, delighting in Foucault. “Oh, he’s delicious. Just like science fiction!” she had announced with glee.
Because Stefan knew my mother’s literary tastes, I said, “I won’t read anything heavy, just beach trash.”
“Will you have time while you’re packing because we have to move to an apartment?”
With cinematic wistfulness, I batted my eyelashes and said, “A girl can dream, can’t she?”
Stefan wasn’t the only one to remind me of reality that morning. When we were dressed and having breakfast, the doorbell rang, and I was sure it had to be bad news.
I approached the front door as carefully as if it might come flying open under the assault of commandos.
Detective Valley stood there, looking as bilious as his green suit. He barged into the front hall. “Have you seen Priscilla Davidoff? She’s wanted for questioning and can’t be located.”
I closed the door behind him. “You think she’s here?” I asked sweetly. “Do you want to search the house? Where should we start?”
Valley cooled off a little.
Stefan asked Valley if he wanted to sit down and we all headed for the kitchen. Valley passed on coffee, tea, or even water.
“We obtained a search warrant for Priscilla Davidoff s house late last night, but no one was home. And her car wasn’t there. But that’s not the best part. The lady, she had hundreds of books about murder and crime and such.”
“Of course she did,” I said. “She was a mystery writer. It was part of her research.”
“Research, huh? Is it research when there’s a whole wall of her study that’s covered with news clippings and magazine articles about Chloe DeVore? And a dartboard with DeVore s photo in the center?”
I hesitated, and looked at Stefan, who mouthed, “I told you so.” I cringed at the thought of someone getting a search warrant to go through my study. Who knows what they’d find and what they’d think.
“You want more?” Valley said. “On her desk, the last page in her diary that she wrote on, it talks all about how crazy she felt to be around Chloe DeVore.”
“But she told you she hated Chloe. That’s nothing new.”
“How about this?” Valley pulled a slip of paper from his shirt pocket where he’d evidently copied something down from Priscilla’s diary. He read it slowly: “‘I feel like an animal with its leg caught in a trap, only I can’t figure out how to chew it off to get free.’”
Stefan and I both shuddered.
“It’s all there,” Valley said.
I had no idea where Priscilla was, but Valley’s certainty infuriated me.
“So what if she hated Chloe DeVore? So what if she was even obsessed with Chloe, and wished she was dead? That doesn’t automatically make her a murderer, does it? Lots of writers hate other writers and hope they die or disappear or somehow get stopped from writing. But how often does that translate into murder?”
I looked to Stefan for confirmation, but he wouldn’t meet my eyes.
Valley was not impressed by my defense. “You tell me this. How often is the jealous writer a mystery writer, and she’s playing out one of her own plots?”
“You’re being too literal. Only an idiot would kill someone just like they’d killed a person in their own book.”
Valley smiled as if I’d just placed a bet on a losing hand. “Remember last year, when you told me that at SUM, people hate each other so much it’s deadly? And I know for a fact that professors can be stupid, real stupid. So, yeah, Priscilla Davidoff killed someone and wasn’t too bright about it. That’s hard to believe?”
I kept at it. “What about the two Wharton societies and how much they hate each other?”
Valley shrugged. “None of that seems connected to Chloe DeVore.”
I poured myself more coffee, unable to back down. I was as stubborn now as one of my overconfident students arguing for a higher grade. “Okay, then look at all the people who acted strangely at the reception when Chloe and Vivianne walked in. They could be guilty. Crane Taylor, Devon Davenport, Gustaf Carmichael, Grace-Dawn Vaughan, even Van Deegan Jones and Verity Gallup.”
Valley smirked. “Maybe they just don’t like lesbians.”
I closed my eyes, fighting the very foolish temptation to say that Gustaf Carmichael was probably a lesbian.
“She called me last night to tell me she didn’t do it. Why would she call me if it wasn’t the truth?”
Valley dismissed that. “Maybe she thinks you have some pull. Who cares? It doesn’t mean anything.”
Valley asked me who Priscilla’s friends were in the EAR department, but I couldn’t re
ally answer that. And I had to admit I didn’t know that much about her personal life, hadn’t ever been to her home or gone out to dinner with her.
“Then you’re not in any position to judge if she’s a killer, are you?”
Bested, I gave up.
As he left, Valley warned me (and Stefan), that if I heard from Priscilla, I had to tell her to contact him immediately—or else—and I had to call him as soon as I heard from Priscilla. “I’m heading to my office,” he said.
I trailed back to the kitchen, and Stefan set his empty mug down noisily on the counter. “What the hell where you doing, grandstanding like that? Why are you suddenly defending Priscilla? It made you look like an accomplice.”
I hadn’t yelled at Valley, so Stefan got the blast instead. “Because I killed Chloe DeVore, okay!”
Before Stefan could shout back at me, the doorbell rang again. We looked at each other and, yes, he said the clichéd “Who could that be?”
“It’s probably Joanne Gillian and she wants to do an exorcism. Are we busy?”
9
WHEN I OPENED the front door gingerly, Angie Sandoval was there, smiling and waving at me as if she were a game show contestant greeting “the folks at home.”
“Can I come in, Professor Hoffman? I know you’re probably thinking, like, ohmigod! who does she think she is? But I have to talk to you because my news can’t wait, so please, please, please can I come in? It’ll just take a few minutes!”
“Of course,” I said, deeply mortified to have stomped on her enthusiasm last night. Jeez, was I going to turn into a bitter old man like so many of the other professors at SUM? Was that my future?
I let Angie in and started apologizing about my rudeness last night, but she shrugged it off, clearly still so excited by her news that last night didn’t matter.
“No prob! It was pretty late.”
I suppose that meant late for someone my age….
“Can I have some coffee?” Angie barreled down to the kitchen, where Stefan was already pouring her coffee, since her bright cheery voice carried quite well. He asked if she’d had breakfast, and she nodded.
“This coffee is kickin’. Thanks.” Angie parked herself in the same chair Detective Valley had loomed in just a few minutes before, and the contrast almost made me laugh. He was a gargoyle, she was a teddy bear.
She dumped a small shoulder bag at her feet.
“Okay,” she said as authoritatively as a judge banging his gavel. “This is all the stuff I’ve been checking out. I’ve been into SUM’s periodical holdings on computer and surfing through the libraries at other schools. Like, is there a link between Chloe DeVore and other people attending the conference? Anything that would be a reason for murder?”
I looked at Stefan, who seemed just as impressed by Angie’s doing what was obvious to her, but we hadn’t even thought of. That was the age difference. The Internet wasn’t second nature to us, though it was to a college student.
“That’s great!” I said.
Angie smiled and went on. “They’re literary scholars, right? So I figured maybe something to do with books or articles or something academic. And I found a shitload of stuff.”
“What did you find?” Stefan asked.
Angie bounced a little in her seat. “This is so cool! I found a book review in the New York Times years ago.” She reached down into her shoulder bag and pulled out a small fuchsia ring binder with three-by-five file cards in it, and flipped open to the first one. I was tempted to ask if she’d ever considered bibliographies as a career.
“This review? Chloe DeVore totaled some novel by that Gustaf Carmichael.” Angie added that it was the last reference she could find anywhere to any book of his.
“I didn’t know he wrote a novel,” I said. “Boy. What a nightmare that must have been to have someone as big as Chloe DeVore trash your first book—and in the Times. It’s the kiss of death.” I was imagining what that might have done to Stefan, and from the stricken look on his face, I think he was having the same dark fantasy. “So unless Carmichael wrote under a pseudonym after that, Chloe killed his career.”
Angie nodded vigorously. “And then he killed her, when he got the chance.”
“Maybe,” Stefan said.
Angie and I exchanged an indulgent smile that said, Yeah, right! Of course he did it. Well, probably.
“It gets better.” Angie flipped to another file card. “Did you know that Chloe DeVore was once married to Crane Taylor?”
“No way!”
Angie nodded. “Way.”
It was Stefan’s turn to smile.
“I found a reference to an essay or paper they did together and Chloe’s name on it was DeVore-Taylor. Which means they were married, right?”
Stefan told Angie then that Crane Taylor had fled the reception room when he saw Chloe, so this could explain his behavior, and why he was upset about her memoir. “Either the marriage ended badly, or he’s jealous of her success, or—”
“Or he’s just a miserable human being,” I said. “We don’t know if whoever got Chloe intended to kill her, do we? Maybe it was an argument that got out of control.”
Angie shook her head. “There wasn’t any argument. No one heard any voices down the corridor. I haven’t overheard anyone at the conference talking about it. But wait, there’s lots more.” She turned a few cards over. “Devon Davenport? He was almost Chloe’s first editor.”
Stefan frowned. “Almost—what does that mean?”
Angie explained. “He was working on her first book, but they had a fight about something and she refused to stay with him after that. She ended up at a different publisher, and she’s the only writer he ever lost like that. She was a big success, right? So that would piss him off mega big-time, I bet.”
“It sure would,” I said.
“Where’d you find that out?” Stefan asked her. “I don’t remember it at all.” In a lower voice he added, almost to himself, “Well, it’s not like I’ve studied her career.”
Angie consulted her file cards. “I read it in Publishers Weekly. Something really small.”
I grinned. “What a blow to that bastard’s pride!”
“I’ve got all the photocopies and stuff if you need them as evidence or anything,” Angie said, reaching for her bag. But I assured her we had enough for the moment.
“Wow,” I said, thinking of the strange confluence that had brought these Chloe-haters together. All because of the move at SUM to prove it was friendly to women!
Stefan sat down at the table with us. “I have a question. We didn’t know about Davenport and Chloe, but Priscilla had to. So why didn’t she mention it?”
Well, I was stumped on that one, and so was Angie.
“Whatever the case,” I said, “Davenport must have been trying to get Chloe back as one of his authors by buying her memoir. It looked like she said no, and humiliated him at the reception for a second time.”
Stefan shook his head. “This is all interesting, but it doesn’t amount to much, does it? Is any of it a reason to kill a woman?”
Fumbling at her index cards, Angie looked hurt and baffled by Stefan’s skepticism.
“It’s plenty,” I shot back. “Hatred, jealousy, vindictiveness. Those are the reasons why Priscilla looks like a murderer, right? Plus some very circumstantial evidence? So why are Devon Davenport, Crane Taylor, and Gustaf Carmichael any less likely as murderers? And don’t forget Grace-Dawn Vaughan either. Just because she was so open about hating Chloe for dumping on her in a novel didn’t mean she ever forgave Chloe. Talking about it openly is a perfect cover.”
Angie muttered, “Grace-Dawn Vaughan,” and made some notes. Evidently she hadn’t tracked down that piece of scandal.
“Did you find anything about Jones or Gallup?”
“No.” Angie made more notes.
“How about Chloe’s connection to Edith Wharton?” Stefan asked. “And the two societies?”
Angie seemed puzzled. “There isn�
��t anything, I don’t think.”
Stefan gave me an annoying “Told you so” look.
I asked him to hand me the cordless phone from the counter by the refrigerator and pulled out my wallet for Valley’s card. Stefan and Angie watched intently, as if I was doing something dramatic, and both of them drooped a little when I said, “He’s out? No, no message.”
I hung up, drooping myself. “We’ll just have to tell him later. Listen, there’s still time to make breakfast at the Campus Center. Is your car here, Angie?”
“No, it’s on campus. I walked.”
SO WE DROVE over together, completely unprepared for the mob scene in the dining room. The noise was so loud out in the hallway I was sure that another dispute had broken out between the rival societies. Inside, the room was electric with tension. Conferees were walking around, gesticulating, waving pieces of toast to emphasize their points, guzzling coffee. Their faces were alive. Well, as alive as they’d ever get.
It was as if they were at NASA headquarters dealing with a space shuttle in trouble.
Serena spotted me and beetled over. “Priscilla Davidoff was just mentioned on SUM radio. She’s dead.”
Around me, I heard other people saying Priscilla’s name. I fell into the nearest chair and Serena filled me in. “A student found her this morning, in her car.”
Serena explained that Priscilla’s car had been parked in one of the vast commuter lots at the edge of campus, and she’d apparently shot herself. The student who found her was in shock after the discovery, and currently being treated at SUM’s Health Center. Serena repeated every thing as if unsure I’d comprehended it all. Maybe I hadn’t. Behind me, I heard Angie say “Wow” over and over. Stefan stood with his hands on my shoulders as if to steady me.
It was my fault. Priscilla had killed herself because I’d told Valley too much. I should have just kept it all to myself.
“What a story,” Devon Davenport was crowing to Grace-Dawn Vaughan. “‘Jealous Lesbo Writer Kills Famous Author and Offs Herself.’ It’s an instant book and a fucking movie of the week. This conference is a gold mine!”