Same Time, Same Murder: A Gil and Claire Hunt Mystery

by Robert J. Randisi

  “What did you learn from that?” Gil asked.

  “That Mr. Ablow is probably a good agent,” Donovan said. “What did you learn?”

  “That he has an exaggerated opinion of the importance of his client.”

  “And, by extension, of himself, probably.”

  “That’s a given.”

  “Where is he from?” Donovan asked. “It sounded like he was trying to hide an accent.”

  “Australia, I think. I not sure, though.”

  Donovan thought a moment, then said, “You’re probably right. I can see that.”

  “Who’s next?” Gil asked.

  “Well, according to you, I’d be wasting my time talking to the other writers, but I think I’ll do it anyway. And, of course, the editor. Is that the same as the publisher?”

  “Generally speaking,” Gil said, “when people talk about a publisher, they mean the company, and the editor works for the company.”

  “I see,” Donovan said. “You’re really being very helpful, Gil. I don’t know about you, but I could use a break. Why don’t we meet back here in ten minutes?”

  “Fine.” Gil hadn’t noticed it before, but now that he had watched Donovan talk with Ablow, he had the feeling the detective used much the same tone with him.

  Suddenly, he felt like a suspect himself.

  Chapter 32

  During the break, Gil felt he should go to the dealers’ room and tell Claire what was going on. He didn’t want her to think he’d just abandoned her. He took the elevator down to the lobby, but when the doors opened, he was intercepted by Lowell Fleming before he could walk ten feet.

  Fleming was Dave Spenser’s co-organizer for the convention. While Spense was from Seattle, Fleming was local, an Omaha book dealer with a Book Den franchise. It wasn’t a mystery bookstore, but Fleming did have a huge mystery section, which he kept well stocked. Gil had only met Fleming at a convention the year before. Spense and Fleming were there plugging this Omaha event.

  “Gil Hunt!” Fleming said, stopping short as he was crossing the lobby. “Just the man I was looking for.”

  “Hi, Lowell. Why were you looking for me?”

  “I need your help.”

  Gil couldn’t believe how in demand he was. Since meeting Claire Duncan, all he’d wanted to do was spend time with her, get to know her, but apparently that wasn’t meant to be.

  “Lowell, I really have to be—”

  “Look, Gil, I know Spense is your friend.” His tone was amazingly accusatory.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “I think he’s gone off the deep end, what with this murder and all. He’s never around when I need him.”

  “I thought you guys were co-organizers? You don’t need him to make decisions, do you?”

  “He’s the one with the contacts,” Fleming said. “He’s the one who knows all the writers personally. And he’s the one who planned most of the events. I did a lot of the scut work here in town—you know, dealing with the hotel, getting book bags and giveaways.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  “I need him to pull his end here. That’s the problem,” Fleming said. “He’s the one with the checkbook—I got people screaming to be paid, things I have to go out and buy. Do you have any idea where he is right now?”

  “Uh, no, I don’t, but—”

  “Well, neither do I.” The man looked ready to tear his hair out, and with the receding hairline he was sporting, that would not have been a good thing.

  “Look, Lowell, if I see Spense, I’ll tell him you’re looking for him.” Gil started to walk away, but Fleming grabbed his arm.

  “I’m sorry,” Fleming said when he realized what he had done. He released Gil’s arm immediately. “If you see him, could you talk to him? Calm him down? I mean, I know the murder was a terrible thing, but it hasn’t increased our attendance as much as Spense said it would, and frankly, I’m the one who’s about to lose it here, Gil.”

  “Spense said the murder would increase attendance?” Gil asked. “When was this?”

  “Right after it happened. I guess he was looking for a silver lining, you know? But there isn’t one.”

  “Attendance is that bad?”

  “Apparently, Westerly was not a very good choice for guest of honor,” Fleming said. “He just didn’t pack them in the way we thought he would. Frankly, I didn’t think asking him was a good idea. I mean, my customers really don’t like those historicals he writes, but Spense was insistent.”

  No wonder Spense has been going crazy, Gil thought. He pushes for Westerly to be guest of honor and the man doesn’t draw—dead or alive.

  “Okay,” Gil said, “I’m sorry, Lowell. I’ll find Spense and talk to him.”

  “Thanks. I’ve got a couple of authors who aren’t on panels and I don’t know where to put them.”

  Gil wanted to get to the dealers’ room, but Fleming’s dilemma really seemed to have the man frustrated.

  “Do you have a schedule with you?”

  “Uh, yeah, sure . . .” Fleming pulled one from his pocket.

  “Who are the authors? Maybe I can help.”

  As luck would have it, Gil knew the authors’ work and, although he didn’t know them personally, was able to suggest to Fleming a couple of panels where he could add the writers.

  “Wow,” Fleming said, “thanks a lot. You saved my life. I’ll find these guys and tell them what’s going on.”

  “Glad to help—and when I see Spense, I’ll have a talk with him.”

  “That would be great.” He smiled weakly. “Maybe I’ll make it through this whole thing in one piece after all.”

  “I’m sure you will.”

  Fleming went one way, and as Gil prepared to head for the dealers’ room, the elevator doors opened and Detective Donovan stepped out.

  “Hey, Gil,” he called. “Break time’s over.”

  Gil looked at his watch. It was more than three hours since he’d left Claire in the dealers’ room. He only hoped she wouldn’t get angry and leave.

  Chapter 33

  Gil sat through the interrogation of two more writers, but he could tell that Donovan had taken his advice. The detective’s heart just wasn’t in it, and he held each of the men for only a few minutes.

  But that wasn’t the case with Westerly’s editor.

  Barry Newcomb was a senior editor at Oak Mill Press, but there were many senior editors in the business. In truth, the man had very little in the way of pull. Newcomb was thirty-five, and he had been a regular at these conventions for about seven years. Gil knew a few of Newcomb’s other authors, and none of them was very impressed with his editorial abilities.

  “Thanks for coming, Mr. Newcomb,” Donovan said. “I’m sure you know Mr. Hunt.”

  “Yes, hello, Gil.”

  “Barry.”

  Gil had been on a panel with Newcomb a couple of years before when someone had wanted to put together a book dealer, an editor, a critic, and two writers to discuss serial-killer books. Gil found that Newcomb’s knowledge of the subgenre was severely lacking.

  “I assume you’re pretty upset about Mr. Westerly’s murder?”

  “Upset?” Newcomb asked. “Shocked is more like it. And when I called my boss in New York, he was appalled.”

  “Why?” Donovan asked. “I mean, wouldn’t his books sell better now that he’s dead? You could republish them all and make more money.”

  “First of all,” Newcomb said, “it doesn’t work that way. These are books, not priceless works of art. Second, we don’t own his complete backlist.”

  Donovan looked at Gil.

  “Backlist just means all his previously published books.”

  “I see,” Donovan said.

  “We were in the process of negotiating for them, almost had them, too.”

  “What happened? His agent queer the deal?”

  “His agent?” Newcomb asked. “The man who would be Dominick Abel?”

  Again, Dono
van looked at Gil for an explanation.

  “Mr. Abel is considered the agent to the stars in the mystery field,” Gil said.

  “And Ablow is not Abel.” Newcomb said. “It’s kind of a joke in the industry. Anyway, no, it wasn’t his agent who tossed a monkey wrench into the works. It was his wife. So we were still in negotiation, and now this.”

  “What about his new book?”

  “He was still working on it,” Newcomb said. “It’s months late. Now we’ll probably never get it.”

  “So, with him dead, your company is screwed.”

  “Definitely.”

  “And on a personal level? You’ve lost a friend?”

  “Hardly,” the editor said. “He was hell to work with, and his wife was worse.”

  “You publish her, as well?”

  “No, but she literally runs—or ran—his career.”

  “I thought that was his agent’s job.”

  “So did his agent,” Newcomb said. “The two of them never really got along. In fact, I wouldn’t have been surprised if at some point he’d fired his agent and allowed his wife to represent him.”

  “Was there a danger of that?”

  “A distinct possibility, if I’m any judge.”

  “And you two weren’t friends?”

  “No,” Newcomb said. “I don’t find it wise to become friendly with my authors.”

  “Well, would you have any idea who would want to kill him?”

  “No,” Newcomb said, “I really didn’t know him that well.”

  “But . . . you worked with him?”

  “I got his manuscripts, edited them, sent them back in the mail for changes—not that he’d make them willingly.”

  “What about negotiations?”

  “That would go on between me and the agent,” Newcomb said. “So you see, I can’t help you with any personal information.”

  Gil had been watching Newcomb closely the whole time he was talking. The man seemed nervous, while, as Gil recalled, in the past he had always projected an air of calm, and an arrogance born of ignorance. He was the kind of man who thought he was cool but didn’t have a clue what it actually took to be cool. In Gil’s neighborhood in New York, they would have said a guy like Newcomb “thinks who he is.” And he usually put on a good show—but not today.

  “I don’t think Mr. Newcomb can help you further, Detective Donovan.”

  Donovan looked at Gil, who had kept silent through most of the meetings that morning, and frowned.

  Gil shrugged. “Hey, that’s my input.”

  Donovan hesitated, then said, “All right.” He looked at the editor. “Thank you for your time, Mr. Newcomb.”

  Newcomb stood up. “I hope you catch the bastard who did it. He’s costing me no end of trouble, not to mention money.”

  Donovan waited until Newcomb had left the room, then turned to Gil. “What was that all about?”

  “Something wasn’t right about him. He seemed too nervous.”

  “Do you think talking to a police detective might have had something to do with that?”

  Briefly, Gil explained what he knew about Newcomb’s personality.

  “I know people like that,” Donovan said. “I guess I’ll have to find out what made Mr. Newcomb so nervous.”

  “Are we done here?” Gil asked.

  “Yep.” Donovan pushed his chair away from the table. “Thanks for your help, Gil. I may be calling on you again.”

  “I hope not.”

  “Why?”

  Gil stood up. “I don’t like being used.”

  “What makes you think I’m using you?”

  “I’ve watched you talk to all these people this morning.”

  The detective cocked his head to the side. “And?”

  “And you were handling them.”

  “What’s your point?”

  “You’ve been talking to me the same way,” Gil said. “You’ve been handling me, haven’t you?”

  The two men regarded each other for a few moments, and then Donovan said, “I’ve been doing my job, Mr. Hunt.”

  “Mr. Hunt? Not on a first-name basis anymore. Should my feelings be hurt?”

  Donovan smiled. “Thanks again.”

  Gil stood there as Donovan left the room, marveling at how he’d stood up to the detective. After all, he wasn’t a private eye; he was just a bookstore owner.

  Chapter 34

  This time, Gil made it across the lobby of the hotel before he was stopped.

  “Hey, dude,” mystery writer Percy Parker called out. “Not used to seein’ you out of the dealers’ room.”

  Parker was a transplanted Chicagoan, now living in Las Vegas. Gil had met him at a convention in Chicago almost twenty-five years ago. After all those years, the man’s ebony skin was still smooth and unblemished, but his hair was now streaked with gray.

  “Hey, Percy, it’s good to see you.” The two men shared a warm handshake.

  “I went by your table, but you weren’t there,” Percy said. “Saw a pretty lady, though. Friend of yours?”

  “A new friend,” Gil said, then added, “At least I hope she’s still feeling friendly toward me. I’ve left her sitting there all day.”

  “What’s this I hear about you bein’ involved in that Westerly murder? Man, imagine that, murder at a mystery convention.”

  “I found the body; that’s all.”

  “Folks are sayin’ you’re workin’ on the case. When did you become a detective?”

  “It’s a long story, Percy, and I’ve got to get back. I’ll tell you about it some other time, okay?”

  “Sure, but I’m only lettin’ you go because I saw that lady you’re rushin’ off to see. We’ll catch up later.”

  “Thanks,” Gil said. He slapped his friend on the back and rushed off toward the dealers’ room.

  Wendell Payne knew Gil Hunt’s business was selling books, so he decided to wait for him in the hall by the door to the dealers’ room. He’d finally talked Graciella into trusting somebody other than him with her story. Now all he had to do was talk Gil into being that somebody.

  “Hey, Wendell.”

  The big black man turned to see a bellman bearing down on him.

  “What’s up, Hank?” he asked the man.

  “Bell captain’s been lookin’ for you,” Hank said.

  “Damn! I got somethin’ important on, Hank. Can you cover for me?

  “I guess so, but where do I tell him you are?”

  “Tell him you didn’t see me. I’ll explain it all later.”

  “Okay,” Hank said, “it’s your ass on the line, not mine.”

  Wendell turned back toward the dealers’ room just in time to spot Gil walking in. Thankfully, the distraction hadn’t caused him to miss the man.

  “Mr. Hunt!” he called, rushing forward.

  Gil heard his name and closed his eyes. He’d almost made it! He considered not stopping, but when he turned, he saw Wendell Payne and was glad for the chance to speak to him.

  “Wendell,” he said. “I’ve been looking for you.”

  “And I’ve been looking for you, sir. Have you got a few minutes? I need to take you someplace so we can talk.”

  “What’s wrong with right here?”

  Wendell looked around. “Too many people,” he said. “And I especially don’t want that detective cornin’ by.”

  “You don’t want to run into Detective Donovan?”

  “No, sir, I don’t!”

  “Why?”

  “I’ll tell you that outside. Please, Mr. Hunt, it’s very important.”

  “Wendell, I really should get back to my table,” Gil said, pointing in Claire’s direction.

  But the man was insistent. “Please, sir, it’s a matter of life and death.”

  Gil didn’t know if Wendell was just being melodramatic.

  He looked across the room and could see Claire talking to a customer. So close, he thought. He waited a second, hoping she’d glance his way so he could
at least wave. But she didn’t.

  When he looked back at Wendell, it was the fearful expression on his face that made Gil finally give in.

  “Okay, but we’ll have to make it quick.”

  “I can’t tell you how much I appreciate this. Thank you, sir,” Wendell said, leading the way down the hall.

  Chapter 35

  Claire had had a difficult time maneuvering through the groups of enthusiastic conventiongoers. By the time she had reached Gil’s table, she’d convinced herself that he would be sitting there, patiently waiting for her. But when she’d arrived, everything was as she had left it.

  “Can you cover for me now?” the dealer at the next table asked. “If I don’t have a cigarette, I’ll scream.”

  “Sure,” Claire said, taking a bite out of her candy bar.

  “Gil’s sure lucky to have you. And happier than I’ve ever seen him.”

  “Really?”

  “You two are good together.”

  Claire smiled to herself as the woman walked away, buttoning her cardigan.

  When she finished the last of her soda, Claire checked her watch. Gil had been gone three hours. Life with him—so far—had certainly not been dull.

  An elderly man approached her. “Do you have any Robin Westerly books?” he asked. “And if they’re signed, even better.”

  Claire was unfamiliar with Gil’s inventory and surprised it was the first time all day someone had asked for one of Westerly’s books.

  “If we do, they’d be in that section.” She pointed, remembering Gil had told a customer yesterday where the new releases were.

  “Can’t see it,” the man said, putting on his glasses. “Nope, I don’t see one.”

  She stood up to go around the table and look for herself, when she spotted Gil across the room. He was talking to someone and didn’t appear to be very happy with the conversation.

  “Maybe you have one behind the table?” the man asked.

  “No.” Her attention momentarily snapped back to the customer. “We don’t keep any stock back there.”