Kill Your Darlings (A Mallory Mystery)

by Max Allan Collins

  “But Roscoe Kane wasn’t larger than life. I think his work may prove to be larger than death, but never mind. Roscoe was a flawed, eccentric man, and I loved him like a father.”

  Halfway back in the audience, stage right, Jerome Kane leaned forward in his seat.

  My voice continued to rumble through the big room: “I have to reveal something, now, that—unfortunately—may cast a shadow on Roscoe Kane’s reputation.”

  Gregg Gorman leaned forward in his seat; Mae Kane covered her eyes with a gloved hand.

  “You are all aware, I’m sure, of the forthcoming ‘recently discovered’ Dashiell Hammett novel, The Secret Emperor... only, the novel wasn’t ‘discovered.’ It was concocted out of a five thousand word fragment by Hammett, whose authenticity is not in any doubt. The novel, which is based on that genuine fragment, was written by Roscoe Kane.”

  A collective gasp went up.

  The reporters and TV people, at stage left and right, seemed to wake up; eyes popped open.

  And Gregg Gorman, sitting forward in his seat, looked at me with red-faced anger.

  “Roscoe Kane was a bitter man,” I said. “He had been blacklisted, or so he felt, by the publishing community; no new Gat Garson novels had been published in this country in fifteen years. He had also been largely ignored by mystery fiction’s fan community, their critics and reviewers. In his heart, Roscoe knew he was a mystery writer of the first rank; and when he was given the opportunity to finish a novel by his hero, Dashiell Hammett, he jumped at the chance. To prove his worth. And to put one over on those who’d blacklisted and rejected him. The publishers. The fans.”

  The room got very quiet. Gorman had sat back in his chair, but his face was still very red. Jerome Kane had a small smile; Evelyn Kane did, too. In the front row, Kathy looked a little frightened. And Mae Kane was crying quietly into a handkerchief.

  “The first person to cast doubt on the authenticity of The Secret Emperor was G. Roger Donaldson,” I said. “Mr. Donaldson—who on this very stage received some rude treatment from me this morning, for which I apologize—came to me with his suspicions. He’d read the manuscript, having been asked by its ‘discoverer’ to help verify its authorship; at first he’d been convinced. But then he had second thoughts. It occurred to him that Roscoe Kane might have been capable of having written this and, after Kane’s suspicious drowning, Donaldson approached me with a copy of the manuscript. He wanted my opinion as a Roscoe Kane authority. Did I think Kane might have ghosted this book?”

  Donaldson, next to Kathy, smiling faintly, nodded at me.

  I went on: “I read The Secret Emperor last night. Through internal evidence, I can prove Kane wrote this book. His literary fingerprints are all over it. But I would like to add that it is a first-rate Hammett pastiche. I would trust it will one day see print, and enhance Roscoe Kane’s reputation—at least his literary reputation.

  “Now, as to the question of who is responsible for this hoax—who has attempted to swindle Random House and all of you mystery fans out of your money—it is of course none other than my good, good friend Gregg Gorman....”

  Gorman stood and thrust a finger toward me. “That’s a lie!” Without a microphone, his voice had a hollow, impotent quality, about as forceful as a stone rattling around in a can.

  But he shouted on: “A complete fabrication! You have no proof, Mallory! Get him off the stage, somebody—aren’t there any security guards in this joint?”

  I took the check out of my pocket. My voice coming out of the loudspeakers was like the voice of God, where Gorman was concerned. “When I confronted Gregg Gorman earlier today, he offered me ten thousand dollars, up front, to keep quiet about Kane’s ghost job; and ten thousand more, six months after the book’s publication. He made this offer in front of a witness. He gave me this check in front of several more. G. Roger Donaldson and Kathy Wickman, specifically.”

  Donaldson and Kathy stood and turned toward the audience and nodded their heads.

  Then they sat down.

  So did Gorman, defeated; sat down heavily and slumped forward. He looked, as if for help, toward Mae Kane. Mae Kane didn’t look at him.

  I continued. “I hope you people, and the thousands upon thousands of mystery readers you represent, will not look too unkindly on Roscoe Kane. He paid a heavy price for his involvement in this fraud; much heavier than the loss of his reputation. Roscoe Kane was my hero—but he was also a man. A flawed one—as has been every man I’ve ever met, to one degree or another. But I do think he had in mind to do something—something that, had he been able to do it, would’ve made him look better, in your eyes, and posterity’s.”

  The room was dead silent; five-hundred-some rapt faces were fixed on me... everyone in the room was looking at me—except Gorman and Mae Kane, the former gazing downward, the latter staring blankly off to her left, her tears dried, now.

  “I believe Roscoe Kane intended to reveal his authorship of the so-called Hammett book,” I said. I spoke softly, but it came across loud—not so much because of the loudspeakers, but because of the words themselves. “I believe he intended to reveal this all along. But initially, I think, he planned to allow the book to be published, and be received well by the critics and readers; then, possibly, he planned to pack up his share of the loot and head for Mexico or somewhere. But I know... knew... Roscoe. I know his ego. He would’ve told. Eventually he would’ve told. He’d have wanted his horse laugh on the publishing industry. He’d have wanted to have the last word with the fans. And his killer knew that.”

  The room got noisy, then, but quieted down when I continued: “Yes—his killer. Because Roscoe Kane was murdered. I discovered his body, with his wife Mae. The evidence on the scene indicated murder, but the Chicago coroner’s office disregarded it, and my theories. So, today, in public, in front of this audience and these television cameras, I challenge the city of Chicago to reopen the death of Roscoe Kane, for a possible—probable—homicide investigation.”

  The room went berserk; murmuring escalated into near shouting, and the TV minicam cameramen bore down on me, and reporters with microphones were moving in, too.

  “Please,” I said, motioning to them to keep back. “Allow me to continue. I believe Roscoe had decided to reveal his complicity in the Hammett hoax, before publication of the book. And because of that, I think he was murdered. I think the murder was impromptu, almost a crime of passion, motivated though it was primarily by greed. And I also think I know who did it.”

  A hush fell over the room; I looked at Evelyn Kane—she looked at me.

  “I know who did it, and I’m prepared to share my opinion and my reasons for it with the police. Unfortunately, it would not be proper for me to share it with you people, here.”

  The room got noisy again, and I had to call out to be heard, even with the microphone: “Right now, there’s an award to be presented—to Mae Kane, Mrs. Roscoe Kane, would you please step forward?”

  The room got funeral-parlor quiet again, and Mae rose from the audience like an apparition in black. She floated to the front of the room, the silver arcs of her hair swinging gently, and took the plaque from me. The plaque pictured the cover of Kill Me, Darling, the first Gat Garson novel; she didn’t look at it, though. She looked at me. Her face was white; her expression was blank; the tracks of tears could be seen against her pale makeup.

  “Mal,” she said. “Why did you do this?”

  I leaned across the table and pretended to be looking at the plaque, smiling as I did. The room was noisy again, people discussing, arguing, the revelations I’d dropped in their laps; the media people were keeping their distance from me at the moment.

  I was away from the microphone now; no one could hear me but Mae.

  I whispered: “You did it, Mae. You did it. Roscoe and Evelyn were getting back together. Her companionship offered him more than your bed ever could. She gave him his self-respect back; she’d convinced him to expose you and Gorman and the whole scheme, before t
he fact. So that he’d be the hero of the piece, the media star. So that his career might be able to start all over again, and you’d be left behind.”

  She looked at me with wide, empty eyes.

  I said, “When the police investigate, they’ll find it all out, easy enough. You arrived at the hotel and went up to his room—you knew what name he’d registered under. Did you ask for a key at the desk, or was the room unlocked? No matter. You went in and took off your coat and drowned him; then you put your coat back on over your clothes and disposed of the wet towels you’d sopped the bathroom floor up with, and you came down to the lounge and found me. And made a fall guy out of me, as Gat Garson would say. I found it a little odd that you left your coat on after we found Roscoe, even when you lay down on the bed, but I didn’t make much of it; then it occurred to me you might’ve left it on because your clothes under there were wet, still wet. From drowning him.”

  The wide eyes filled with tears; actress tears? I couldn’t tell.

  Then, softly, so that no one could hear but me, she answered: “I didn’t plan it. He was asleep in the tub. I held him under; he didn’t even wake up. He didn’t suffer. He just went away....”

  The sounds of the shots shattered all else—stopped all discussion in the room; two shots, loud startling, commanding all attention.

  Mae Kane’s wide eyes went wider still, as the impact threw her forward; then like a ragdoll she flopped back, keeping on her feet somehow, Raggedy Ann managing to stand impossibly up, and she looked down at her black dress. Two red holes, stacked one atop the other, like two periods ending sentences, like a bright red colon: then blood welled out the bottom one, turning it into a semicolon; she covered the semicolon with both hands and then brought them away from her, looked at them, the blood on them, and tried to scream.

  But didn’t make it.

  She fell forward, against the table, knocking the podium off, her bloody hand touching my shirt as I leaned forward toward her. I looked up.

  Evelyn Kane was standing in the aisle behind where Mae Kane had stood; smiling like a skull. Holding a long-barreled .38 in her two gripped hands, the proper firing stance Roscoe had taught her when he’d schooled her in the use of a Garson gat such as this. The flap of the brown purse slung over her shoulder was open from where she’d withdrawn the revolver. Slowly she lowered the still smoking gun and let go of it; let it drop. It clunked on the floor near Mae.

  People were standing and shouting, a few screaming, a few even scurrying out of the room.

  But it had happened so fast, most of them were just standing there, like me. The two bullets had cut through Mae and right past me, under the table and into the wall, and I hadn’t even ducked for instinctive cover. The gun had been shot, the bullets had flown, before I knew what had happened.

  Enough people had rushed out of the room, though, for Evelyn to find a chair to sit down and quietly wait. Wait for the police, that is. She didn’t have to wait for the media—the print reporters and TV news-people with their minicams were already gathered around her.

  Mae was getting some media attention, too—flashbulbs were popping. I came around the table to her. Tom Sardini had her cradled in his arms, checking her pulse; not finding one, of course. I leaned down and closed the lids over the wide eyes; there was blood in her silver hair. I don’t know how it got there. She still smelled like jasmine.

  For some reason, it occurred to me to retrieve the Life Achievement Award, which had tumbled out of Mae’s fingers when the two bullets hit her. But I couldn’t find it.

  Some fan had gotten to it and taken it as a souvenir.

  Kathy came up to me, face wet with tears; she touched the bloody hand-smear on my shirt, as if touching wet paint, and said, “Oh, Mal.”

  That said it all. I put an arm around her shoulder and glanced about the room. Gorman was gone. Tim Culver, an arm around the shoulder of a shaken Cynthia Crystal, was escorting her out. Jerome Kane was standing in the aisle, ashen.

  He moved down the aisle and found his way to where Evelyn Kane was seated, besieged by media people. He pushed his way in and sat down next to Evelyn the Grotesque, as he had so often called her, and held her hand.

  PART FOUR

  SUNDAY

  19

  When I woke up Sunday morning, Kathy was gone; she’d left a note saying to call her in her room when I woke up, so I did. She said to stop by for her and we’d have breakfast.

  After several hours of questioning by the police in the afternoon, and another hour of dealing with the media, we’d had the rest of Saturday to ourselves. And a pleasant Saturday it had been, considering the traumatic shadow the shooting of Mae Kane had cast. Kathy and I skipped the Saturday evening official Bouchercon banquet (Donaldson was the speaker) and, thanks to that friend of mine in the cast, we got to see Second City after all. And, prior to that, wandered about North Wells Street, looking in the book shops and antique shops and even taking in the wax museum and Ripley’s Believe It Or Not, believe it or not.

  Today I’d be heading back for Iowa, and Kathy for Pennsylvania, which I regretted.

  And I told her as much, shortly after she let me into her room. She was packing. She had an eleven o’clock plane to catch and it was nine, now.

  She closed the lid on her suitcase and smiled at me. “It’s been a real eye-opener meeting you, Mal. You’re just like your books.”

  I put my hands on her waist. “I hope that’s a compliment.”

  “Of course it’s a compliment. I love your books.”

  “But do you love me?”

  “Sure. You know I love ya.”

  The “ya” bothered me.

  “Kathy,” I said. “I don’t mean to be a hopeless romantic, but I thought we set off a spark or two. I know we’re separated by a few miles, but maybe we could do something about that.”

  Wry smile #692. She bussed my cheek. “We’ll have to do this again sometime.”

  And she moved away from me and went into the bathroom, where she was gathering toiletries up to put in a flight bag.

  “Do what again?” I asked. “Have a little two-night stand at a convention?”

  She looked up, smiled one-sidedly, arched a brow. “Sure. Why not?”

  “I was hoping for a little more. Why don’t you come spend a week with me, sometime soon. Or why don’t I come spend a week with you....”

  She walked out of the bathroom and stood solemnly before me. “Look, that just isn’t possible.”

  “Why?”

  “I’m sort of... married.”

  “Sort of married?”

  “Well, Ron and I keep it loose. I don’t wear a ring or anything and neither does he. We give each other space. But not that much space. You can’t come visit me and I can’t come visit you. But, maybe next year. Next Bouchercon.”

  My mouth felt dry. I tried to swallow and couldn’t quite bring it off.

  “Is that what this was? Just another Bouchercon?”

  “Hey, come off it, Mal. It’s a convention; a weekend away from home. Boys’ night out; girls’ night out. Didn’t you ever hear of that?”

  I nodded. “I heard of it. I just thought... we might be something more. Why didn’t you tell me you were married?”

  Wry smile, arched brow. “Why didn’t you ask?” She patted my cheek. “I’ll tell you why you didn’t ask... because it was just another Bouchercon, and I’m just another girl. Don’t try to make it anything else, you sweet romantic sap.”

  I found a little smile somewhere. “I won’t play the sap for you,” I said.

  She patted my cheek again; very softly. “I got time for breakfast. You want to buy me some? Or is it my turn?”

  “You buy,” I said.

  As I was holding the door open for her, she said, “I suppose you’re going to break your promise to me now.”

  “What promise?”

  “You’ll turn this into a book. You won’t be able to resist.”

  I shrugged. We were headed for the elevat
ors.

  “Now that Evelyn Kane killed Mae Kane in front of God and the TV cameras and everybody,” Kathy said, “she’ll be a celebrity. A regular literary cottage industry’ll grow up around her and what she did yesterday.”

  “This year’s Jean Harris,” I said, glumly.

  “Right,” Kathy said, cheerfully.

  We got on the elevator. There were going to be some rocky nights, back in Iowa. I was going to have to live with the memory of Mae Kane dying in front of me; I was going to have to wonder if I had somehow caused that, somehow stage-managed that death.

  And I was going to wonder if Kathy Wickman’s feelings for me were really as shallow as she wanted me to believe.

  I knew one thing, going down in the elevator with her. When I got home I’d frame that original cover painting, from Murder Me Again, Doll, and hang it somewhere prominent. Looking at it would provide the sort of bittersweet experience I can’t resist—like listening to Darin sing “Beyond the Sea”; painful, but it reminds me I’m still alive.

  And it wasn’t that the painting would remind me of Roscoe Kane; that was a loss I’d already faced.

  Just before the elevator doors opened, I gave her a wry smile. “You really do look just like that girl in my Gat Garson painting,” I told her.

  “I know,” she said.

  But she wasn’t smiling.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Photo Credit: Bamford Studio

  Max Allan Collins is the New York Times bestselling author of Road to Perdition and multiple award-winning novels, screenplays, comic books, comic strips, trading cards, short stories, movie novelizations, and historical fiction. He has scripted the Dick Tracy comic strip, Batman comic books, and written tie-in novels based on the CSI, Bones, and Dark Angel TV series; collaborated with legendary mystery author Mickey Spillane; and authored numerous mystery series including Quarry, Nolan, Mallory, Eliot Ness, and the bestselling Nathan Heller historical thrillers. His additional Mallory novels include The Baby Blue Rip-Off, No Cure for Death, A Shroud for Aquarius, and Nice Weekend for a Murder.