Stranger Than Fiction

by Emelle Gamble

  Silently Tillie pushed her half-frame glasses back up her skinny nose and stood up. Her shoes squeaked against the hardwood floor. “You have to keep me informed of what you find out, Claire. I don’t want you doing this alone.”

  “I’m glad I can count on you.”

  After Tillie let herself out of the apartment, it was a while before an uneasy drowsiness claimed Claire. As she drifted into sleep, she replayed the day. Tony had been knocked out, twice. She had been shot at after being chased through muddy woodland. A girl had been murdered. Were these events all the work of one person?

  Claire closed her eyes tightly. It was too horrible to think how far the ring of deceit could widen among people she knew.

  Chapter Ten

  Tony doused the headlights and sat back to light a cigarette. The street was deserted except for a lone figure heading toward the entrance of Claire’s building. The person, bundled in a long raincoat and black hat, continued on past the entrance, and Tony relaxed.

  Whoever shot at Claire could return for another try, but everything looked peaceful for now.

  Studying the windows of the graceful, hundred-year old building, Tony counted up three stories. All Claire’s lights were out. Well, what did he expect at four in the morning? That she would be sitting up with candles burning, pining for him?

  These silent questions increased his remorse over his behavior yesterday. Tony cursed and flipped the butt of the cigarette out the window. If only he had not been such a jerk to Claire at the police station. If only he had asked her to stay and talk a little more before she left his house. His behavior tormented him. In an attempt to keep his personal history from repeating itself, he had done to Claire what he had accused her of.

  He had judged her, did not keep an open mind. Because of his animosity toward Billings Newcastle, he had never given Claire the benefit of the doubt.

  Flinging the Volvo door open to the chill air, Tony stepped out and slammed it behind him. It was time to put prejudice aside. Claire Kennedy was everything she seemed. Honest, forthright, principled.

  He was going to tell her that. If she was asleep, he would just sit in front of her door until daylight, then pound on it until she let him in.

  But would she be interested in anything he had to say?

  The question slowed him down, and with his head cocked to one side in his distinctive manner, he kept walking. Maybe. At any rate, it was time to stop pushing aside his feelings for her because of the damned complications of Patricia Snow and Cauldron Press.

  Crossing into the light shining on the sidewalk, Tony smiled at a trio of young toughs walking toward him. They glared back, but he did not mind. Even with the possibility Claire would slam the door on him, he could not wait to see her.

  * * *

  Claire moved stiffly around her apartment, her sore muscles mementos of her flight through the marshy woods. Chilly in the lace teddy, she removed her favorite silk shawl from the back of a dining room chair and wrapped it around her shoulders.

  Though it was barely four in the morning, she was wide-awake and restless. Pausing in front of the hutch that housed her VCR, she considered a movie. No, she decided, walking into her darkened kitchen, she would do something quieter.

  Like eat. Maybe food could numb the ache that gnawed at her ever since she had left Rhode Island.

  Staring into the refrigerator, Claire was shocked to see most of the shelves empty. This was something she rarely let happen. Though she usually had to put dinner off until ten or later, Claire enjoyed well-balanced, home cooked meals. Just like Mother never made.

  Sighing over that little zinger from her childhood, she opened a bin. A brownish onion and a shriveled tomato rolled toward her. She had not shopped on Thursday. On Thursday she had been in Rhode Island.

  With Tony.

  Merely thinking his name made her miserable. This is impossible, she told herself. Everything that happened between them was touched by anger and mistrust. Two ingredients fatal to love.

  Love?

  Claire shook her head and reached into the freezer for the double chocolate-chip Haagen Dazs. Dishing out half of it into a blue china bowl, she grabbed a spoon and returned to the living room. Collapsing into the overstuffed chair, she dug in.

  At that moment, she heard measured, careful footsteps outside her door. She waited. The footsteps moved on, steadily growing fainter until they were completely gone.

  Giddy with relief, Claire got more comfortable. She was not one to be skittish about living alone, but tonight she wished she had a roommate. A black haired, broad-shouldered roommate. Ignoring that thought, she dug into the ice cream again.

  As the cool sweet comfort melted down her throat, various plans of action skirted across her consciousness. It was too early to call Mr. Harrison. But the telephone beckoned, making her hand tingle at the thought of the rich vibrations of Tony’s voice, though she knew she could not call him, either.

  He had made it clear he did not want to speak to her.

  Depressed by the thought, Claire rose and crossed the shadowy room to Woofer’s cage. She rubbed the cool antique brass. Like most of the things she collected for her apartment, this had been carefully chosen. After a childhood without permanent furnishings, she had become a veritable pack rat about acquiring things, especially solid heavy chairs or anything chintz upholstered.

  Her ex-husband had not fought her attorney’s plan to buy out his interest the condominium apartment, and she had never regretted it.

  It was home. Her first and she loved it.

  Fighting unexpected tears—”Good, old self-pity,” she scolded herself aloud—Claire removed the flowered cover from the cage. “Wake up birdbrain. I need company.” Her greeting netted her a playful bark and growl from her feathered friend, who hopped up and down restlessly to be let out. “Okay, okay. But you can’t have my ice cream.”

  The bird jumped through the cage door, then soared up to the valance above the sheer lace drapes. Watching Woofer’s antics, Claire sat back and continued eating, her brain racing.

  She should have asked Tony about Damien Laurent’s story. Was the Greek woman who sued him for plagiarism the same one he had lived with, but never married?

  As she pondered that, more questions sprang to mind. What about Roz Abramowitz? Would Mr. Harrison have any chance at all against Newcastle if Roz made the connection between Winesong and Snow?

  Fat chance, she thought. Roz would broadcast to the whole publishing industry that Usherwood had been sent a manuscript identical to The Poison Pen Pal by one unknown, now dead, writer.

  Quietly Claire scraped the last mouthful from the bottom of the bowl. Plagiarism was the worst sin imaginable to people who took pride in the creative process. As an editor, she was crushed when Tony had leveled his charges against Cauldron.

  It must have killed him to live through his trial and conviction, she realized. The cockatiel landed on her shoulder, and she made kissing sounds at it. “The worst part of it is, Woofer, that until Tony found that damn letter I stole, he believed me.”

  Woofer cocked his head and soared off.

  A noise from the direction of her door diverted her attention. Turning, Claire stared through the shadows. Now what? She listened, hoping not to hear the sound again.

  But she did. A tiny squeak of wood followed by the rotation of metal against metal.

  Someone was turning the knob.

  In a quick glance, Claire noted the door chain hanging unengaged. And she had not noticed before that the dead bolt was open. Oh no, I didn’t lock up after Tillie left last night.

  Claire slowly lifted the china bowl off her lap and put it and the spoon on the floor. Clutching her shawl, she tiptoed toward the bedroom, but then stopped. The rattling was getting louder, the grinding serious now. Whoever was in the hallway was trying to jimmy the lock.

  The gunman from yesterday. Her skin was damp with perspiration, her stomach a frozen ball of fear. She glanced around for a weapon. In the u
mbrella stand next to the desk, a marble headed cane gleamed in the half-light of the room.

  Claire grabbed it and changed direction. There was not time to call the police, but she would scream her lungs out if she had to. Surely one of her neighbors would hear.

  Her hand gripped the heavy stick as she waited. The noise at her door had stopped. Had the person outside heard her? Were they poised, waiting to break the door down and attack? For several minutes she did not move, the tension making her arms tremble.

  No longer able to stand the suspense, she moved the, last three feet to the door. With stiff fingers she engaged the bolt then jumped back, raising the stick higher.

  Footsteps instantly approached, followed by a soft knock. “Claire? Are you awake?”

  Incredulous, she lowered the stick and stared blankly at the partition separating her from a man whose voice she had instantly recognized. “Tony?”

  “Yes. Open the door.”

  Relief flooded through her. She fumbled with the dead bolt, and then pulled the door open. Above her, Woofer began yapping, his Doberman pinscher impersonation in top form as he buzzed down from the draperies toward the man she let in.

  “What on earth are you doing here?”

  “This,” he replied, enveloping her in his arms and crushing her against him. Claire was too surprised to struggle against his kiss, and after a moment, she joined in wholeheartedly.

  As Tony tightened his arms around her, Woofer dive-bombed from above, barking madly. “Ouch. That damn thing pecked me.” Tony ducked his head and took a swipe at the attacking bird.

  Claire started to giggle, because he had missed the bird by several feet. They both began to laugh, leaning against each other for support. Finally, Claire wiped her eyes with her left hand, realizing she still clutched the cane for protection.

  “Where in the world did you get that?”

  She smiled and put her weapon down. “Damien Laurent gave it to me last Christmas. He collects them. I carry it with me when I jog. It makes a great show of force.”

  “I’ll bet.” Tony slipped his arm down around her waist, seemingly content to stand in her entryway forever.

  “What were you doing out in the hall?”

  He pushed his curling hair off his forehead. “I’m sorry. I was going to wait until you were up, and I was just checking to be sure your door was locked.”

  Claire immediately sobered. She moved away from Tony into the living room to snap on a table lamp, and then met his eyes. They glittered like agate. “Why did you come here, Tony? You’re supposed to stay in Rhode Island.” A sudden hope sprinted into her mind. “Did they find Pearl Loney?”

  “No, they haven’t. I came to see you because I wanted to apologize.”

  “You’re lucky I didn’t shoot you.”

  “Do you also have a gun? I’m glad I live in Rhode Island.”

  “No. But you didn’t know that.” Claire felt vulnerable all of a sudden as Tony’s eyes roved over her body silhouetted in the soft light. “What do you have to apologize for?”

  “I was a jerk yesterday. I shouldn’t have kept accusing you, badgering you like I did. You were the one who was being chased all over the place by some jerk with a gun.”

  She remembered a quote she once read, attributed to Ernest Hemingway. “You can tell the size of a man by the size of the thing that makes him mad.” Claire understood Tony’s anger at her yesterday; it was the same she had for him the day they met. “It’s okay. But aren’t you getting yourself into even more trouble by leaving the state?”

  “Yeah, probably.”

  Claire pulled the shawl off the floor where she had dropped it and swung it around her shoulders. She motioned for Tony to sit down. Her own legs were weak; both from the after effects of adrenaline and that welcoming kiss Tony had delivered. “How did you make it past the doorman?”

  “That clown? He was asleep. I buzzed him from the outside and he never even woke up. Since the lobby door was wide open, I just came upstairs.”

  Hearing a door creak in the hallway, Claire saw that hers was still standing open. She rose and went to close it, venturing a peek into the hall. Her neighbor, Mrs. Heinz, was leaning out of her apartment, her hair net pulled down over her eyebrows. “Are you okay, dear? I heard something.”

  “Yes, thank you, Mrs. Heinz.”

  “Are you sure? I can call 911. They’ll be here in an hour or so. Or I can call Mr. Mason. He has his World War II sword, you know.”

  Suppressing a smile, Claire used her most persuasive voice. The last thing she wanted right now was another interview with a policeman. “Really, I’m fine. But thanks again.” With a friendly wave, she locked the door behind her and turned back to face Tony. “Well, at least you didn’t get attacked by my neighbors. You’re lucky; one of them has a sword.”

  “He should replace your doorman.”

  “It’s obvious someone should. Maybe they’ll hire me when Cauldron Press closes down.” Though she was sitting several feet away from him, Claire saw Tony flinch at that remark.

  “Maybe we can keep that from happening, Claire.” He stared at her a long moment. “I know you didn’t steal that manuscript from Patricia Snow. And I know I didn’t murder her. I was hoping we could work together and prove it.”

  “Thanks for finally believing in me, Tony. And for your information, I’ve decided to tell Mr. Harrison we can’t publish the Winesong book until all your accusations have been answered.”

  Tony patted his jacket pocket for a cigarette. “How do you think he’ll take that news? I thought he wanted everything kept quiet.”

  “He did. But that was before.” The memory of Patricia’s lifeless body sizzled through her mind. “Before all the violence. Mr. Harrison is, above all, a reasonable man. He’ll see we have no other choice.”

  “Are your instincts about people always right?”

  A tiny smile accentuated the single dimple near Claire’s mouth. Slowly she nodded her head in the direction of the front door. “Usually. Although I never would have guessed you’d do such a convincing impersonation of a watchdog.”

  “I guess you bring out the beast in me. Speaking of beasts, where’s that idiot bird?”

  On cue, Woofer barked twice, and then growled from the direction of the bedroom. Claire felt her excitement grow. Not just because Tony finally believed she had integrity, but also because he must care a great deal to come and see her. Had he even forgiven her for stealing Roz’s letter?

  Claire put off asking about that. “He’s guarding my bedroom. He won’t hurt you anymore.”

  “Where’d you get that thing? Trade in your pit bull?”

  “He was an inheritance from my dad. He won him in a pot, playing poker with a man who trained Dobermans.”

  “Hell of a pot.” Tony glared at Claire and then ran his fingers along the stubble on his face.

  “He’s a nice companion.”

  Chewing on the inside of his cheek, he nodded. “Interesting, anyway. So, what’s next? Have you talked to Harrison?”

  “Not yet. But I’ve got some things I want to check out at my office this morning.”

  “Yeah? Like what?”

  As much as she trusted Tony, she did not want to make any statements she could not back up with action. But she had decided to get ahold of Sarah Winesong’s address and go see her before Monday morning. “I’ll let you know. Promise.”

  A wary look crossed his face. “Okay. I’ll go with you. Until the police find who killed Patricia, I’m going to stay in New York.”

  “Why?”

  “To protect you.”

  “Protect me? That’s very sweet, but unnecessary.”

  Even to his own ears, the words sounded corny. But he meant them. He was not going to let her out of his sight until Sarah Winesong, or whoever was behind all the mayhem of the past few days, was locked up. “I disagree. Like you said, I’m a great watchdog.’

  “No.”

  “No? What do you mean, no? You a
re the most stubborn woman I’ve ever met.”

  “I’m stubborn? What about you? You’re supposed to be in Rhode Island. Until the troopers find the justice of the peace and get her corroborating story, you’re under suspicion for murder. They’re not going to take kindly to your disappearing act.”

  Lighting the cigarette he had held in his hand for several minutes, he shook out the match, looking in vain for an ashtray. “Too bad. I’ll prove they can trust me.”

  “Do you always decide to do your own thing, regardless of the law?”

  Tony flushed. “What do you mean by that?”

  Claire drew a deep breath. “I’m talking about A. A. Nichols, the cookbook author. I’m talking about a lawsuit for plagiarism. Which you lost. Etcetera, etcetera. I’m talking about all the things regarding Patricia Snow you’ve probably decided not to tell me.”

  Tony sat immobile, his eyes looking off into the distance. “How did you find out about that, Claire? Who told you?”

  “What difference does it make? All that matters is that you didn’t.”

  The seconds stretched into minutes, and Claire began to shiver as Tony sat and smoked. Finally, unbuttoning his jacket, he sat back. “Okay. Let’s talk.”

  Claire’s heart pounded. Now that it was time to finally hear his side, she had the urge to run.

  “Several years ago, in the late seventies, I did a series of cookbooks. Recipes and gardening tips, natural food lists, and things like that. All my years traveling around the country with my folks, I did the cooking. After college, my experimenting paid off. I made a lot or money from my cookbooks, and then went to Europe to play a while. I’d always wanted to try my hand at some other kind of writing, so I began researching a kid’s history book. Outlined it, roughed up a hundred pages of character sketches of leaders, saints, outlaws.

  “Not dry dates and battle stuff, but action pieces that could get a kid interested in the characters, not the historical significance crap they try to give you in school.” Tony paused, his eyes staring across the room.

  “That’s when you lived in Greece?”