by Vicki Delany
“Perhaps it’s for the best. I’ve had total writer’s block. Now that Ruthie’s out of the way, my creative muse will be free to express herself. I don’t want anyone to think I’m trying to imitate her. My new book is about a star of the dance halls who joins forces with Wilkie Collins to solve crimes. Totally different.”
“Totally.”
Suddenly, she whirled on me. “You’re not writing a book, are you?”
“Me? No.”
“I shouldn’t have told you. It’s my idea. You won’t steal it, will you?”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” I said. “Besides, I sell books. I don’t write them.”
“What about you?” she snapped at Jayne.
“Too busy baking.”
“Will you look at the time,” I said. “We’d better be going.” I dashed for the boardwalk, Jayne hot on my heels, as the first drops of rain began to fall. We left Paige trying to light a fresh cigarette in the wind.
“Loony tunes,” Jayne said once we’d reached the Miata.
“I fail to get the reference, but I have no doubt as to the meaning. Delusional might be an understatement.”
“She’s held a grudge against Renalta all these years.”
“So it would seem. Instead of simply getting on with it and attempting to write something of her own, it appears that all Paige is capable of producing is some vague unoriginal idea.”
“Do you think she killed Renalta?”
“I have no trouble believing that Paige wanted to kill Renalta. But to actually do it? I suppose that’s possible. The manner and scene of Renalta’s death—at a book signing, surrounded by her adoring fans—would be the sort of thing Paige would consider fitting.”
“Are you going to tell the police this?”
“Not necessary. Paige made a point of being hostile on two occasions and being escorted off the premises by the police. They’ll track her down soon enough.”
“Sad.”
“Almost Shakespearian. At first Paige told us she was sorry Renalta’s dead, because that meant she wouldn’t get the acknowledgment she was after. Then she changed her mind as fast as a raindrop could fall and said Renalta’s death had freed her. When her so-called muse doesn’t magically appear, she’ll soon be back at resentment. All Paige has is her bitterness. She’s totally committed to their danse macabre.”
“What’s that?”
“The dance of death. But not in the literal sense. She wouldn’t want it to end. I think it possible, but unlikely, Paige is the killer.”
I turned the engine on and put the Miata into gear. “Then again, I have been wrong before.”
“You have?” Jayne said. “I must have missed it.”
“Most amusing. I’d very much like to talk to Nancy.”
“The over-the-top fangirl?”
“I can think of no way of locating her. I don’t even have a last name. Let’s go to the Harbor Inn and see if the police have finished with Linda. We can offer our condolences.”
“I’ll call Kevin and ask if they’re available now.”
“No,” I said. “I want to talk to her privately.”
On the way up the long, curving driveway to the Harbor Inn, we passed a WLDP car coming down. Louise Estrada was driving, Ryan Ashburton in the passenger seat. It would be impossible for them not to see me, so I tooted my horn cheerfully and waved. They did not wave back. Once again, I wondered if I should get a less conspicuous car. I checked my rearview mirror as we drove into the parking lot, but flashing red and blue lights did not break through the rain.
In the nineteenth century, a wealthy and politically influential Boston family built the house that is now the Harbor Inn to be their summer home. The family ran out of money and/or interest in the mid-twentieth century, and the property was abandoned for years, slowly falling into gentle disrepair. It was saved from complete collapse by a budget hotel chain that did some quick and cheap renovations to turn it into an unremarkable two-star hotel with nothing going for it but a fantastic view out to sea. Andrea and Brian Morrison, a highly ambitious and hardworking young couple, bought the property a few years ago and restored it to its stately grandeur. It’s now one of the nicest (and one of the most expensive) hotels in West London.
Andrea herself was behind the reception desk when Jayne and I came in, following a family returning from a day at the beach loaded down with umbrellas, towels, beach bags, and coolers. The adults were so pink skinned, I wasn’t at all surprised to hear them chattering among themselves in strong Irish accents.
Andrea turned to me with a welcoming smile. “Good evening, Gemma. Hi, Jayne. Are you two here for dinner?”
“A tempting suggestion,” I said, “but no. I’m looking for a hotel guest. Linda Marke?”
Andrea’s face settled into serious lines. “Oh, yes. Renalta Van Markoff’s assistant. The police have just left. I heard Renalta collapsed at your store earlier. It’s so tragic.”
“Did you meet Renalta?” I asked.
“I did. I know I’m supposed to treat every one of our guests the same as any other, but I have to say, I was so excited when I realized who she was. I can’t believe I was talking to her only hours before she died.”
“You spoke to her today?”
“Yes. I’m a huge fan.” Brian Morrison had popped into the bookshop yesterday and bought Hudson House as a gift for Andrea. “I managed to get away from the desk when she was in the restaurant having breakfast and ran up to our apartment for my copy of her book. Here, let me show you. It’s my pride and joy. Be right back.” She slipped through the door behind the reception desk and was back moments later with a thick hardcover.
The hotel was quiet at the moment, and no one needed to be attended to. Andrea opened the book, flipped to the front, and showed me what was written on the title page with as much pride as a new mother showing off her baby: To Darling Andrea. With thanks for a marvelous stay. It was signed, in red ink and dramatic script that took up half the page, R. Van Markoff.
“How far have you gotten?” Jayne asked. “Gemma gave me an advance copy and I’ve finished it.”
“I’m about half through. I was up far too late last night reading,” Andrea said. “It’s so exciting. Don’t you just love Desdemona’s husband, Randolph? He’s so mean, it’s wonderful to see the way she cleverly puts him down.”
“Ahem,” I said. “Can we leave the fan club meeting for another day?”
“I won’t spoil the ending for you,” Jayne said, “but it finishes with a zinger of a cliffhanger.”
“Oh, don’t tell me that. I hate cliffhangers. You have to wait a whole year to find out what happens next.”
“But now we’ll never find out.” Jayne gave her head a sad shake. “There won’t be any more books.”
I was rapidly losing control of this conversation. If it didn’t end now, I’d soon find myself in the private rooms having tea and biscuits and discussing who would be the best choice to play Desdemona in the movie version.
“Absolutely fascinating,” I said. “Clearly a conversation for another day. Now may I remind you, Jayne, we are here to extend our condolences to the author’s employees?”
“Give me a call when you’ve finished it,” Jayne said. “We can have a little book club meeting or something.”
“That would be great,” Andrea said. “I know I’ll have lots of questions. Do we ever find out why Sherlock . . . ?”
“Did many people want to meet Renalta?” I interrupted.
“Oh, yes,” Andrea said. “Everyone was so excited that she was staying here. She was never too haughty to talk to her fans, either.”
“Were you here when she left for the signing at my store? That would have been shortly after one.”
“I still can’t believe it.” Andrea wiped her eyes. “I was behind the desk. A handful of people were waiting in the lobby with books to be signed. She was so charming and gracious. She signed them all and invited everyone to come to the bookstore for her talk. I
would have loved to have been able to go, but we’re so busy on summer weekends, I couldn’t get away.”
“Tell me about the people who were waiting. Did anyone seem particularly agitated, interested, nervous maybe?”
She shrugged. “Not that I noticed. That good-looking young man who’s always with her tried to hurry them along, but she insisted she had time for her fans.”
“You mean Kevin, her publicist?”
“Kevin Reynolds, yes.”
“Who made the bookings here and for how many rooms? I promise you I don’t have a prurient interest.”
“I know you’re no gossip, Gemma. Linda Marke called me on Thursday morning, very early, to ask for three rooms. She was lucky to get them. We’re pretty much full with the season starting, but I’d had a cancellation of two rooms the night before. The main suite wasn’t booked, so I gave her that one as well. They’re all charged to Linda’s credit card.”
“Thanks, Andrea. Can you call Linda’s room for me? Tell her I’ll meet her at the bar.” I thought Linda would be more comfortable chatting in a public place than in her hotel room.
Andrea placed the call. “She’ll be right down,” she said to me.
I was saved from further conversation about Renalta Van Markoff’s latest, and last, tome by the arrival of a group wanting to check in.
A quick glance had shown me that the outdoor restaurant was almost full, but the small, comfortable lobby bar was empty. Rain continued to fall, but as it often does on the edges of the ocean, the clouds were quickly heading inland. A few people had to move to a more sheltered table, but most of the patio restaurant was covered by umbrellas or awnings, which protected diners from anything but the most driving rain.
In contrast to the flower-filled patio restaurant with views out to the ocean, the bar is more of a winter place. Leather sofas and chairs, low tables, dark wainscoting and striped wallpaper, deep-red carpets, a glass-paneled wall reflecting rows of bottles. The sort of place, I always imagined, in which Holmes and Watson would feel completely at home. Jayne and I took seats around a small table next to the large, thankfully now unlit, fireplace. “A cheese platter, please,” I said to the waitress. “And some of the nuts and olives. We’ll order drinks when our guest arrives.”
“Why were you asking about people having their books signed by Renalta?” Jayne settled herself comfortably into a deep leather chair. “Seems natural enough, once they realized the author was staying here.”
“No reason,” I said.
Jayne looked as though she didn’t believe me, but I was saved from further questions when Linda came into the bar. She was dressed in the same clothes, plain verging on dowdy, which she’d worn to the Emporium. Her eyes were not wet, but they were tinged with red, and traces of dried tears were written all over her face. She twisted a white cotton handkerchief in her fingers.
Jayne and I stood up as she approached our table. “Thanks for seeing us.” I gestured to the tray of cheese, olives, condiments, and crackers. “I thought you might not have eaten lately.”
She gave me a tight smile. “That was kind of you.”
We all sat down, and the waitress bustled over. I asked for a glass of Sauvignon Blanc, and Linda said, “Same for me.” Jayne nodded in agreement.
“First of all,” I said, “my condolences.”
“Thanks.”
“Have you worked for Renalta long?” Jayne asked.
“Two years.”
“Since her first book came out,” I said.
Linda cut off a thin slice of blue cheese, placed it on a cracker, and added a dab of relish. She studied the food but made no move to lift it to her mouth.
“It went further than a business arrangement, didn’t it?” I said. “Your relationship with her.”
She placed the cracker on a cocktail napkin. She didn’t look at me. “Renalta Van Markoff was my mother.”
I tried not to look shocked. I’d guessed they might be distant relations. Marke. The obvious pseudonym of Van Markoff. Renalta’s casual rudeness toward Linda. But mother and daughter? I had no idea.
Jayne glanced at me. When I said nothing, she said to Linda, “If I may say, you don’t look much alike.”
“I mostly take after my father’s side of the family. My coloring’s more like my mother, but she dyes . . . dyed her hair, and her contact lenses are a false color.” Linda sighed. “We always had an unusual relationship. She was never much like a real mother to me. The way other girls’ mothers are, taking their daughters to school, arranging playdates, going to the playground together or on shopping expeditions. She was always distant, I’d suppose you’d say. I was an only child. My parents divorced when I was in middle school, and they shared custody of me, although I spent a lot more time at Dad’s.”
“Where’s your father now?” Jayne asked.
“He died shortly after I graduated high school.”
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“He was a writer also. They started out together, both struggling to get their first novels published. Neither of them got anywhere, and rather than taking comfort in each other, they got more and more bitter. It was not a nice place to be, between them.”
“But your mother was a huge success,” Jayne said.
“That only came much later, after my dad died. She wrote for years, has drawers and computer files crammed full of unpublished stuff. She wrote what’s called literary fiction: you know the sort of thing, Gemma, multigenerational drama and angst in a small town in middle-of-nowhere, USA, surrounded by fields of wheat or rows of corn. It was only when she adopted a pen name and turned to historical mysteries that she got published. The first of those books was an instant success, and she . . . well, she needed an assistant. I’d been laid off when the independent literary agency where I worked closed, and the only work I could get was freelance editing. So we decided to work together. It wouldn’t suit her persona, as she saw herself, having a relative working for her. I don’t think she wanted anyone to know she was old enough to have a daughter my age.”
Jayne snorted.
“She wanted me to call her Miss Van Markoff in public. And so I did. It all grew from there.” Linda picked up her cracker again. She put it down again. “Sometimes I even forgot she was my mother.”
“Does Kevin know?” I asked.
“Yes. I sometimes think he lives in our pockets, so it was hard for him not to know. Otherwise, it’s a secret.”
“What about the publishers and her agent?”
“Renalta doesn’t have an agent. Not a proper one. We got our first contract with McNamara and Gibbons without one, so we never bothered. We didn’t really need one. With my experience working at an agency, I can negotiate the contracts. As for M and G . . .” She shook her head. “They had no need to know about our personal relationship.”
“I assume she got the name Van Markoff out of Marke. Is that your father’s surname?”
She nodded. “Mom legally went back to her maiden name of Smith when they divorced. I kept Dad’s name.”
The waitress placed three glasses of wine on the table. Jayne and I sipped at ours while Linda stared off into the distance.
At last Linda turned back to us. “The police asked me who would want to kill my mother.”
“And what did you say to that?”
“I said I have no idea. And I don’t. My mother wasn’t exactly easy to get along with. She could be distant, imperious, even openly rude sometimes. Her success went directly to her head, I’m sorry to say. She absolutely loved being an author. The fans, the book signings, the writers’ festivals, the gushing e-mails.” Linda’s shook her head. “But to kill her?”
“Paige Bookman?”
Linda sighed. “Oh, yes. Paige. Poor, sad, lonely, pathetic Paige. She was exactly like my mother, but on the flip side of fame. I don’t see Paige killing anyone though. Is that what the police think?”
“I don’t know what the police think,” I said. “I’m just mentioning it b
ecause she’d been thrown out of my bookshop earlier.”
“Were there other Paiges in your mom’s life?” Jayne asked. “Other people who resented her success and thought it should have been theirs?”
Linda let out a sad chuckle. “Paige is an original. Thank heavens for that.”
“Did Renalta have any trouble with overly enthusiastic fans?” I said. “‘Fan’ is derived from the word ‘fanatic,’ after all.”
“Renalta had her fame, but it was hardly on the Brad Pitt or Angelina Jolie level. Sure, some of the fans could be pushy sometimes. Some could be strange. There was the time, not long after the publication of the first book, when we were invited to a literary festival in Vermont. We were new at this, so I didn’t check into it too much. Mother and I drove up to Vermont, all excited about going to a festival. We’d been booked into a local B and B for the night. Turns out there was no festival. No guests, no other authors. Just one woman who owned a B and B and wanted to meet Renalta and have her stay over in her house. Creepy. Mother tore a strip off me, let me tell you, for not investigating it. It was after that incident that we decided to hire our own publicist. The one at McNamara and Gibbons hadn’t checked into this festival either.”
“Kevin Reynolds.”
“Kevin’s only been with us for four months. Mother goes through publicists like Kleenex. They don’t last long.” Linda smiled without humor. “Her daughter’s the only one who can put up with her for any length of time.”
“You said your mother liked being an author,” I said.
“She loved it.”
“Yet I got the impression she was nervous about public speaking.”
“Oh, yes. She was in great form talking to individuals or even small groups but suffered from a serious case of the nerves if she had to speak to a crowd in a formal setting. Like actors who after thirty years on the stage still throw up in the wings. And moments later they step out to dazzle the audience with their prose. We went to a psychologist who specializes in that sort of thing. She said Mother was subconsciously afraid that someone in the audience would stand up and denounce her as a fake and gave her a small routine to go through before speaking. It helped a lot.”