He gave her a look that felt sharp even in the shadowy hallway, then shrugged. “Sure. Why not?”
She led him down the hall to the ornate frosted glass front doors, then gestured to the broad foyer with a wave. “This is Lena’s territory. She’s our receptionist. The parlor here is our waiting room, for the rare occasions when someone actually comes to visit. The upstairs is mostly empty, although we do use a few rooms up there for storage.” Rebecca’s original intent when she’d purchased the house had been to live on the second and third floors, but her husband had nixed that idea. Her work infringed on their personal lives enough as it was; he’d known that if she lived above the office, he would never get her to himself. Since they had divorced only a year or two later, Teryl assumed he’d never succeeded at that even living across town from the agency.
She led him back the way they’d come, pausing in the doorway of each office. The first was where Ellie, the agent who handled all of their nonfiction clients, worked. Sue, the agent who worked with the majority of their fiction clients, was two doors down. In between the two was Bridget, the assistant they shared. Next was the kitchen, then her own office, followed by Rebecca’s, the supply room, and, at the end of the U-shaped hall, the file room.
Once part of the formal dining room, it was closed off now, windowless and airless. All the business of the Robertson Literary Agency was contained within its four walls, including every piece of paper Rebecca had ever collected regarding John Smith and Simon Tremont.
Resolutely ignoring the uneasiness centered in her stomach, she located the files she wanted, stacked them on top of one of the cabinets, then scooped up the entire bunch. John moved to take them, but she shook her head, tightened her grip, and led the way out again.
If the agency were any bigger or Rebecca any less successful, Teryl would be lucky to be sharing a cubicle with Bridget. But the agency wasn’t bigger and Rebecca was successful, and Teryl’s office was right next door to Rebecca’s. She was close enough to be summoned by intercom or with a shout, if her boss felt like shouting—which, depending on her mood, she often did. She was also close to the kitchen, where, every morning and afternoon, she brewed a pot of Rebecca’s favorite flavored coffee, where Lena often baked brownies when no one was dieting, and where Teryl usually ate the sandwiches she bought for lunch at the deli a block down the street.
The office wasn’t nearly as big or as beautifully decorated as Rebecca’s or Ellie’s or Sue’s, but considering where she ranked in importance, Teryl was happy to have any private space at all. Besides, she liked the place. The rolltop desk that was pushed flush against one wall had character, and the old leather chair that squeaked whenever she moved was comfortable and big enough to draw her feet into the seat. Built-in shelves were filled with books, many of them written by the agency’s clients, many her own personal favorites. When work was slow and the day was chilly or dreary or wet, she liked to close the door, slip off her shoes, curl up on the padded seat that extended the length of the triple window, and read the day away.
She laid the files on her desk, sat down, switched on the green banker’s lamp that sat on top, and automatically tucked her bag into the bottom left file drawer. The only other places to sit were the secretary’s chair, small and none too comfortable, in front of the computer in the corner, or the window seat. John didn’t move in either direction. Instead, he was examining the few personal items on display. She watched him, wondering what he thought of the group picture that looked more like a multinational mob than a family. Did he question the significance of the poster for a movie made before she was born? Did he find it odd that she’d hung a Mardi Gras poster above her desk when she had never experienced Mardi Gras and, at the time she’d hung it, had never even been to New Orleans?
Or did it merely remind him of the wish that had landed her in so much trouble? I always wanted to come to New Orleans for Mardi Gras. I always thought it would be fun, just once in my life, to be wicked in New Orleans.
At last he went to the window seat and sat down. Facing her, he leaned back against the wall, stretched his legs out in front of him, and brushed a tendril of hanging ivy away from his shoulder. “I guess we’re ready.”
She glanced at the folders. Was she ready to betray the trust Rebecca had placed in her? Was she ready to betray Simon Tremont—provided the man in New Orleans was the real Tremont and not, as John claimed, an impostor? Was she ready to prove John right or—far more likely—to prove him wrong? Was she ready to convince herself that he was, as she had feared the last four days, crazy as a loon?
Instead of reaching for one of the files, she picked up a pad and pen and offered them to him. “Write your name for me.”
He leaned forward to take them, scrawled his signature across the top sheet, then moved to hand them back.
“Write his name, too.”
His gaze narrowed. “I never sign anything with that name.”
“Humor me.”
With a disapproving scowl, he obeyed, handed the pad over, then sat back again.
There was nothing distinctive about the signatures, either his own or Simon Tremont’s, Teryl thought. There were no swirls, no left-handed slant, no peculiar habits in dotting the i’s and crossing the t’s. It was just an average signature, not too neat, not too controlled.
But, she discovered a moment later when she opened the top file, it was an exact match for the signature on every contract that filled the folder.
It was also an exact match for the change of address form delivered to the agency four months ago—the change of address form that John claimed not to have sent.
She’d proven nothing. He’d suggested an explanation himself only yesterday: maybe he knew Simon. Maybe they’d been neighbors or buddies. Maybe he’d had access to Simon’s house and to his records. Maybe he’d gotten hold of Simon’s signature and had learned to copy it so perfectly that even Simon would be hard put to tell them apart.
Or maybe the reverse was true. Maybe John was telling the truth. Maybe his signature matched the contracts because he had, in fact, signed them all. Maybe the man who was masquerading as Simon Tremont was the one who had learned a perfect forgery, and maybe that was why the name on the change of address form matched everything else.
Putting the question aside for the time being, along with her guilt, she began combing through the records, searching for questions to ask, for details an impostor shouldn’t know. With each answer he gave her, she grew less and less certain of anything.
The man had a terrific memory. Whether he was relating dates and information from his own life or retrieving memorized facts from someone else’s life, he was incredibly accurate. He knew Simon’s income for the last eleven years, down to within a few thousand dollars—mere pocket change for an author of Tremont’s stature. He knew the terms of Simon’s contracts. He knew the contents of correspondence Rebecca had sent Simon and knew more than Teryl about the other publishers who had, on two occasions, tried to woo Simon away from his publisher. He knew the sweet deals they had offered, knew Rebecca’s response—stay on the first one, go with the second—and knew the reasons Simon had outlined in his letters for choosing to remain with Morgan-Wilkes.
He knew too much. But there was still one answer he couldn’t give her.
“How did he do it?”
John simply scowled, but she continued anyway.
“If the man in New Orleans is an impostor, how did he write Resurrection?”
His voice taut with barely restrained frustration, he answered in clipped, sharp tones. “Obviously, he stole my outline.”
“Stole it from where?”
“From here. From Morgan-Wilkes. From my house. I don’t know!”
“So you think someone broke in here or at your house or at the publisher, and you or Rebecca and the rest of us or the Morgan-Wilkes people never noticed.”
He moved abruptly, from a comfortable sprawl on the window seat with a tapestry pillow beneath his head to an
upright position, leaning toward her, his arms resting on his thighs. “If someone got access to my outline in one of those three places, he would also get access to my records. He would find out my real name, my mailing address. He could get everything he needed to convince Rebecca and Morgan-Wilkes that he’s me.”
Everything, Teryl thought doubtfully, that John had just provided her. All the details. All the figures. All the evidence. Had he come by the knowledge legitimately, or had he gained possession of it in exactly the way he had just described? Had he staged a break-in that had gone undetected and gathered the material he needed to make his claim? Did he know so much about Simon Tremont because he was Simon Tremont… or merely because he wanted to be him?
“You have to admit, it would explain a lot,” he said.
“It doesn’t explain one thing, John. The book. You admit yourself that you couldn’t write it. He did. He delivered it to the office in person. Maybe he could have stolen your idea. Maybe he could have stolen your outline. But, John, how could he have stolen your talent? If you really are Simon Tremont, if the man in New Orleans really is an impostor, how could he have written the book that the real Tremont couldn’t write? How could he write it in Tremont’s style? How could he write it with Tremont’s talent?”
In the stillness that followed her questions, the old grandmother clock out in the hall chimed the hour. Two o’clock. She was hungry, tense, and tired of thinking. Tired of wondering. Tired of asking questions and finding no easy answers.
“I need to see it,” he said suddenly. When her only response was a blank stare, he went on. “The manuscript, Teryl. I need to see it. I need to read it. I need to know how he did it.”
She numbly shook her head. “I can’t help you with that.”
“Rebecca has a copy. You saw it. You read—”
She interrupted. “She took it home with her. I told you that. It’s somewhere in her house, locked safely away.”
“Ask her if you can read it.”
“I can’t. No one gets an advance look. Morgan-Wilkes isn’t even doing advance reading copies for the reviewers. They want the release date to be the great unveiling.”
His shoulders sagged just a little; then, once again, his determination abruptly renewed. “What about my bank?”
She settled more comfortably in the chair. “What about it?”
“I can get a statement from my banker. He handled my accounts, my investments.”
“He knew you were Simon Tremont?”
“No. But he knows I cashed big checks from the agency three or four times a year. I can get some sort of affidavit from him to that effect.”
“And what will that prove?” she asked, regretting the doubt that crept into her voice. “That you know where Simon banked? That you know his account numbers?”
He glared fiercely at her. “I’ll send him a copy of my damned driver’s license photo. He knows my name. He knows my face. He can tell you that I’m the same John Smith who’s cashed a few million bucks’ worth of checks drawn on the Robertson Agency. He can tell you that I’m the only one authorized to conduct business on those accounts. Would that convince you?”
“It would certainly help.” If he could get such a document. If the bank that cashed Tremont’s checks could verify that John was, indeed, the man they had cashed them for. It would go a long way toward making a believer of her.
Rubbing the stiffness from her neck, she asked, “Are you hungry? There’s a deli down the street. We can get some sandwiches and bring them back here.”
“Why?”
“We’re not finished. There’s still—”
“You don’t believe me, do you?” he interrupted.
She looked guiltily at the floor.
“You sit there asking questions, trying to placate me, and all the time you’re looking for some rational, logical way to explain all this. What have you decided? That I knew Simon Tremont? That I learned to copy his signature? That I got hold of all this information about him and memorized it? That I avoided him in the studio in New Orleans and the next day in the hotel because I was afraid he would recognize me? What are you going to say when the bank comes through? That maybe I worked for him? That I conducted his personal business for him in order to protect his privacy?” He was silent for a moment; then he quietly, pleadingly asked, “Can’t you even consider the possibility that I’m telling you the truth?”
She left the chair and walked to the far end of the window to stare out. “It’s the book, John. I know the man in New Orleans wrote it.” She sighed and looked at him. “I don’t know if you can write anything other than your name.”
He sat motionless for a long time; then, from the corner of her eye, she saw a blur of movement as he got to his feet. Instinctively she tensed, hoping he wouldn’t come too close, hoping he wouldn’t get too angry.
He walked to the door, paused there long enough to say, “Let’s go,” then walked out. She listened to his footsteps moving down the hall toward the back door. A moment later she heard the door click shut, and a moment after that he came into sight again as he approached his truck.
Feeling far wearier than she could logically explain, she went to her desk, gathered the folders there, and returned them to their proper place in the file room. She came back to her office, intending to get her purse and to shut off the lights, but as she stood there in front of her desk, keys in hand, she hesitated. She knew what she was about to do was foolish and irrational. It would prove nothing. Still, she sat down in the big old chair and, bending forward, used the small silver key on her ring to unlock the bottom right file drawer. It glided out smoothly, automatically stopping, and she reached into the small compartment in the back, into the deep space unused by the hanging folders that filled the front. Her fingers closed around the slick paper of a book jacket, and she carefully lifted it and the volume it protected out of the drawer and laid it on the desk.
Masters of Ceremony. Two years old, it was Simon Tremont’s most recent book and the fifth installment in the Thibodeaux series. It had been—until Resurrection—his best book and her favorite. It had given readers everything they had come to expect from Simon: a marvelously intricate plot where nothing was what it seemed; characters so real that you’d swear you knew them and so exquisitely drawn that you shared their pain, their pleasure, and their sorrow; villains so fearfully normal; terrors so innocently called to life, and writing that flowed so smoothly, so effortlessly, that reading it was sheer delight.
Her own copy of the book, the one she had read and reread until the pages were dog-eared and the spine was creased, was at home in her living room, sharing shelf space with all the other Tremont novels. This one was new, barely touched. It had been taken from one of the bookcases in the parlor only a few months ago and placed right here, in the middle of her deskpad, where she would find it when she returned from an afternoon dental appointment. She might have missed meeting her idol that day, but she’d gotten a souvenir of the visit all the same: this book that Rebecca had asked Simon to autograph for one of his greatest fans. Ordinarily, it held a place of honor on the upper shelf of her desk, but her last work day before leaving for New Orleans, she had locked it away in her drawer. It wasn’t that anyone in the office might develop a case of sticky fingers; if they wanted an autographed copy, Rebecca would get them one. Still, it was one of the very few Simon Tremont autographs in existence and her most prized possession. Better to be safe than sorry.
She fingered the artwork on the jacket, a street scene easily recognizable as the French Quarter: a corner building, a shop below, an apartment above, the elaborate wrought-iron balcony, the lush plants trailing down, the spires of St. Louis Cathedral rising into an ominously colored sky in the background, and, hardly noticeable on first glance, second, or even third, the voodoo doll in the dimly lit apartment window. Even now, months since her last reading of the book, a brief glance at the small doll, made of Spanish moss with sticks for arms and dressed in black and red clo
th, was enough to send shivers down her spine. Simon Tremont, whoever he was, had worked his magic extraordinarily well.
With a sigh, she opened the book, turning to the title page, and laid the sheet of notepaper John had signed above the blue-inked message. The first part of the autograph was easily read: To Teryl, with best wishes. The signature—Simon Tremont—wasn’t. There was a swooping S and a recognizable i, a T that slashed across the page and a decent re, but the remaining letters in both names deteriorated into a series of loops and curves.
They looked absolutely nothing like the Tremont signature John had done for her a few hours ago. But why would they? John had learned the Smith signature before Simon’s coming out. Before Simon had autographed anything with his pseudonym.
“What is that?”
Before she had a chance to react to the question or even to process the realization that she was no longer alone, John reached over her shoulder and picked up the book. Abruptly, she scooted her chair to the side and stood up as he flipped the cover shut. Harsh lines formed at the corners of his mouth when he recognized the book. They etched deeper when he opened it again, when he saw the paper with his own versions of the signatures, when he read the note inscribed on the page.
“He can’t do that! Goddamn it, he can’t take credit for my work! I won’t let him!” The notepaper fluttered to the floor as he grasped the title page and ripped it out. He’d caught the next few pages, too, and Teryl, in shocked stillness, watched the Chapter 1 heading drift to the floor in a rain of paper fragments. “Do you know how hard I worked on this book? Do you have any idea how many weeks I spent researching the story, how many weeks I spent writing it? And this bastard comes along years after the fact and says, ‘It’s mine; I wrote it,’ and everybody believes him. Well, goddamn it, it’s not his, it’s mine!”
Filled with fury, he threw the book with all his strength. It crashed against the opposite wall, making her flinch; then it fell to the floor, pages opened and bent back, the jacket half-off and creased, the binding weakened and torn near the top. She flinched again when he turned toward her and drew back with fear in her eyes. It drained his anger and left him looking guilty and ashamed. Even though his rage had passed as quickly as it had come, even though he was calmer now, she couldn’t relax. She couldn’t force her muscles to loosen. She couldn’t fill her lungs with air. She couldn’t rid herself of the sudden, aching need to cry for the loss.
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