A Ghostwriter to Die For
Page 22
“Now, I want you all to relax,” Gypsy Rose was saying. “I’ll be, for lack of a better word, going into a trance—but don’t let that intimidate you. I’ll still look like myself, but my spirit guide will be in residence in my body. She’ll be your channel to the world beyond. And while I’m gone, there’s no reason to keep quiet; the spirits enjoy lively audience participation. So ask questions. We’re all here to get some answers from the dead and solve this mystery, aren’t we?”
“Who’s your spirit guide?” Glory asked.
“Zelda Fitzgerald,” Gypsy Rose said with pride. “And I’ve been told that when she’s taking my place, I assume her accent and demeanor. Zelda will ask Dick’s spirit guide to put in an appearance; then his guide will address our questions to Dick. However, Dick himself may choose to speak to us. Either directly or through another medium.”
“Does Zelda always show up?” Barry DeWitt asked, sounding like less than a true believer.
“Well, a séance isn’t always scientific,” Gypsy Rose explained. “I currently have three guides. One of them, Gray Feather, is an old master who only appears on special occasions. Who knows? You may meet him tonight.”
“Who’s the third?” Sally Lou sat on the edge of her chair.
“Mother, please, stop trafficking with Satan,” Isaac Walton said.
“The third’s a newcomer.” Gypsy Rose smiled. “Showed up for the first time last summer. But she values her privacy in the world beyond as much as she did here on earth. I’ve promised never to reveal her identity. However, I can assure you that she won’t be putting in an appearance tonight. The lady abhorred the press and considered Dick Peter’s column to be the most repugnant of all.”
Good Lord. Had Jackie O become Gypsy Rose’s latest spirit guide?
“For God’s sake, Gypsy Rose, let’s get started,” Robert Stern said. Isaac Walton shuddered.
But Gypsy Rose was gone.
“You all better make this snappy,” a flirty voice with a slight Southern accent said. Gypsy Rose’s lips were moving; however, I knew we were listening to Zelda. “I left a marvelous All Hallows Eve affair to come here. Bram Stoker is the guest of honor. Gerald Murphy and Scott have been plying him with liquor. So you all can understand why I’m in a hurry to return.”
“Zelda?” My mother spoke. Mom, of course, was well acquainted with the blithe spirit, who’d been a frequent conduit to my father.
“Hello, Maura. Jack sends his love.” Zelda was both charming and disarming. “Now, who’s Glory Flagg? There’s a master guide present who wishes to speak to her.”
“Me.” Glory’s voice faltered and she fidgeted with her fur.
I glanced around the semicircle. The crowd seemed mesmerized.
Then a gruff cough caught our attention. “This is Gray Feather speaking.” All traces of Zelda had vanished. Gypsy Rose’s posture and attitude had undergone a dramatic change and her voice now sounded stern and humorless. “The wretched soul of Richard Peter is residing on a plane in the far reaches of the world beyond where contact is almost impossible.”
“So the show’s over?” Mila asked, starting to stand up.
“Please be seated, Madame. Almost impossible, I said. Let me explain. Souls travel through eternity in packs. Therefore, some of your own current spirit guides may be acquainted with Mr. Peter’s guide. Miss Flagg, I have had telepathic communication with your guide, who may be able to assist us in this endeavor. I ask your permission to channel her.”
“Yeah. Like I could stop ya. Go ahead.” Glory winked at Gray Feather.
“Miss Flagg?” A cold female voice inquired. “You have summoned me?”
“Are ya my spirit guide?” Glory asked. “What’s yer name?”
“Betsy Ross.” She sounded proper and pragmatic. I wondered—aside from the obvious patriotic name connection, and Flagg was really Fuchs—why Ross had been assigned as Glory’s guide.
Dennis said, “I’m sure I dated Ms. Ross in high school during another lifetime. I recall sitting next to her during home economics. That girl revolutionized sewing.”
Modesty said, “Shut up, Dennis.”
Glory laughed. “So do we get to talk to Dick?”
Betsy Ross sighed. “I would suggest, Miss Flagg, that you reveal whatever it is that you’re covering up. And why. Deception clouds any clear communication with the world beyond. Especially on the remote plane where Mr. Peter has descended.”
Glory grabbed Keith Morrison’s hand. “I guess now’s as good a time as any.”
He removed his Batman mask and beamed at her.
“Now, Jake, don’t be mad at me,” Glory began. “Ya gotta understand, business is business. Right?” Where the hell was she going with this? “Anyhoo, when Keith’s Pax Publishing officially bought out Harvest House today, we came to our final decision that a mystery by Dick Peter, ya know, the one you’re ghostwriting...” My gasp at her callous breach of confidentiality interrupted her, but not for long. “Well, it’s just one Dick book too many. Keith thinks my manuscript about my life with Dick—which he will now be publishing—is destined to be a bestseller. Yours would only hurt my sales. Ya see, it’s a question of literary supply and demand. Nothing personal, Jake.”
“Are you crazy? I’d like to remind you and Keith Morrison that I have a contract.”
“I’m afraid you don’t, Jake,” Dennis said. “Keith never got around to signing it.”
“And you’re just telling me this now.” I could hear the quiver in my voice.
“Look, Jake, I knew about the pending merger.” Dennis’s voice wavered too. “That’s the main reason why I’ve been sitting up nights with Morrison, but I only found out about the book today.”
“Mr. Kim has also been kept busy working on my deal with Keith’s new publishing empire,” Isaac said, apparently in an effort to defend Dennis.
“I thought one book connected to Dick was all the market could bear,” I said.
“Jake, dear,” Sally Lou said, “Isaac’s book has nothing to do with Dick. He’s writing about some dirt-poor gal called Sunday, who comes from a small mining town but grows up to marry an English lord.”
“And there’s something else I want to confess,” Glory said. This woman sounded like Bill Clinton. “I’m getting married.”
“What are you planning to do with the current Mrs. Morrison?” Modesty asked.
Glory giggled. “Not to Keith, silly. All these years, I’ve never revealed who the other man had been in Dick’s and my longtime ménage à trois. I only wanted Dick’s files to see if he’d used my mystery man’s real name—so I could expunge it. But with the book coming out and all, that man—the one true love of my life—said, ‘Go for it, Glory.’ Harry Brett and I will be married in Kenya next week.”
Barry DeWitt led the scattered applause. However, I think I was more upset about Glory marrying my favorite adventure author than I was about giving up the ghostwriting deal.
Gypsy Rose, once again her own person, called the séance back to order. “Gray Feather’s troubled. Before he left, he told me that Betsy Ross has reached Dick’s spirit guide, the Marquis de Sade, and that Dick’s ready to confront his killers.”
Ben didn’t miss his cue to push the VCR play button and pull open the curtain.
Three frolicking naked bodies—who appeared sad rather than sexy—filled the large television screen in the alcove. Though still more than a tad upset, I felt the pride that Poirot always displayed at his denouements when Mila screamed, “Michael, I told you to trash that tape! How could I, a Macovich, ever have slept with the idiot of the century?”
Epilogue
“So this case began with one devil and ended with another. I do like symmetry,” my mother said, as she poured Too-Tall Tom a cup of tea. The ghostwriters had gathered at Gypsy Rose’s tearoom for a recap. Mom and Gypsy Rose were fussing over us. It wa
s Tuesday afternoon, one week, almost to the hour, since I’d signed on as Dick Peter’s ghostwriter. And the only dangerous liaison remaining on my calendar was this Saturday night’s dinner date with the doctor/waiter, Fredric. I found myself looking forward to the challenge.
Modesty said, “Jake, you do realize that Mila murdered Allison and Barbara because she thought they might know too much?” I shivered, nodded, then gulped my tea. I’d worried all along that I might be killed for knowing too little.
“Isn’t Michael just saying that to save his own tail?” Jane asked.
“Well, he is going to testify against her,” I said. “Mila’s not talking, but Robert Stern told Ben that Barbara Ferris hadn’t noticed anything unusual on the night that Dick was stabbed. And it appears our red devil, Mila, actually committed all the murders. I’d bet Mila must have regretted killing Allison. Remember, she’d stolen Dick Peter’s six Delft daggers, using one to stab him, perhaps planning to frame Allison. According to Michael, neither Allison nor Barbara had witnessed Mila and Michael going into Dick’s office or, for that matter, anywhere at Manhattan that night. Michael claims Mila spotted Allison, then smelled Barbara’s perfume, and later panicked and decided they both had to die. Isaac Walton was more fortunate. He’d left before show time.”
“But you didn’t see Mila the morning of Allison’s murder,” Too-Tall Tom said.
“Michael was there. He says he let her in the back door. Remember, Mila lived right around the corner from Manhattan.”
Gypsy Rose passed around the bagels. “Mila might have murdered Robert Stern too, except for Jake’s dumbwaiter distraction.”
Too-Tall Tom wrapped his arm around me, “Good work, Jake. Now, do tell, did you suspect Michael before you watched him cavorting on the video?”
“Only had a nagging itch,” I said. “He remained a long shot. Michael had reported Walton and Morrison had a huge row at MSG; but neither Walton nor Morrison confirmed that. Now I realize Michael had been planting a red herring.”
“Speaking of that skunk, Morrison,” Modesty said, “why didn’t he tell Joe Cassidy that he had Dennis Kim, a fellow skunk, as an alibi for the night and early morning of Allison’s murder?”
“Dennis called this morning, full of apologies and promises,” I said. “I asked him that very question. He said Morrison had been worried that the police might want to know what he and Dennis had been talking about. Keith would rather have been considered a suspect than reveal any discussion of his upcoming publishing empire.”
Modesty slapped cream cheese on a cinnamon raisin bagel. “And of course Dennis Kim would have been bound by that confidentiality crap he thrives on, wouldn’t he?”
“What about my favorite choice, Barry DeWitt?” Too-Tall Tom asked. “How come Mila Macovich and Keith Morrison seemed to have become his new best friends? Did Mila really plan to marry him?”
“No way,” I said. “As the video shows so graphically, Mila stabbed Dick so she could be with Michael. All that money she would inherit was a bonus. This wasn’t just another ménage à trois. The lady was in love, but Dick Peter wouldn’t release her. And Jen suspected them from the beginning. That’s why she didn’t want to talk to the police.” I sighed and took another sip of tea. “Mila was using DeWitt as a beard, a diversion to protect Michael until they could be together.”
“And Morrison’s reason?” Jane asked.
“I think he told Modesty and me the truth yesterday. He only went to see DeWitt because he thought Barry would be delivering a eulogy and Morrison didn’t want him to steal the show.”
“So where in the world is Jennifer?” Too-Tall Tom asked. Relishing the drama, I reached into my tote, pulled out a printed-out email, and read, “Arrived Venice this morning. Signora Giatto arranged for me to stay with her cousin. Chatted with a man on waterbus who looks just like that Italian guy in Summertime. Meeting him tonight in St. Mark’s Square. Going on to Harry’s Bar. Hope Michael rots in jail. Will return to testify, but first I’ll dine at Cipriani’s, walk across the Bridge of Sighs, and drift in a gondola. Love to the ghostwriters. Ciao, Jennifer.”
About the Author
Noreen Wald lives in downtown Sarasota, Florida with her husband, Steve. Their sons visit often. Hey, surf and sun are great lures. She has served terms as a local chapter president for Mystery Writers of America, as well as Executive VP and Secretary for their National Board of Directors. A winning contestant on seven television game shows—including Jeopardy!—Noreen later worked for Goodson-Todman and Merv Griffin Productions. She’s lectured at the Smithsonian, the CIA , the National Press Club and aboard the QE II. Her Ghostwriter Series was a Mystery Guild selection and praised in The New York Daily News, The Sun-Sentinel, and hit #1 on The Dallas Morning News bestseller list.
The Jake O’Hara Mystery Series
By Noreen Wald
GHOSTWRITER ANONYMOUS (#1)
THE LUCK OF THE GHOSTWRITER (#2)
GHOSTWRITER TO DIE FOR (#3)
REMEMBRANCE OF GHOSTWRITERS PAST (#4)
GHOSTWRITER FOR HIRE (#5)
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