Poison Pen (8 page)

“Yes, thank you.”

“No wonder the man couldn’t find a publisher,” sniffed the PC. “I read a bit of it. I’m no expert, but I reckon it’s bloody awful.”

My stomach lurched. I couldn’t pull my eyes away from the bag on the table, which was crammed with fresh, bright white, neatly printed pages. I remembered the manuscript in Max’s carrier bag: typewritten, dirty, dog-eared and yellowed with age.

I had no idea who’d written the manuscript that had been strewn over Esmerelda’s carpet, but I was absolutely convinced it wasn’t Max Spectre.

I
did tell Inspector Humphries about the manuscript, but he wasn’t exactly impressed. He made a brief note of it and then we were dismissed: free to go.

Graham had to come home with us, and when we got back to the house Mum disappeared into the kitchen to start on supper. She was furious with both of us, which was hardly fair: it wasn’t us who’d gone and bashed Max over the head. But I couldn’t expend any energy worrying about Mum. Graham and I had to figure out what was going on.

“Whoever killed Max must have stolen his manuscript,” I told Graham. “I’m positive that one wasn’t his. But he definitely had the real one in his bag when he talked to Esmerelda. I saw it.”

“Theft…” mused Graham. “Robbery is number two on the Motives for Murder list. The intriguing aspect is that the manuscript was swapped. I wonder who would do that?”

“I suppose any of the authors could have,” I said. “All apart from Esmerelda. We were with her the whole time, there’s no way she had anything to do with it. But there’s still something odd about her…”

“The person who ‘discovers’ a body is very often the murderer,” Graham pointed out.

“But she didn’t leave our sight the whole time. She’s the only one with a cast-iron alibi.” I sighed. “How about Charlie? He didn’t want Max spilling the beans, did he?” I remembered Graham’s words about celebrity autobiographies being written by ghost writers, and suddenly a thought struck me. “Suppose Max’s book was his own autobiography? It might have had all the details about him finishing the last Sam the Striker book. That would give Charlie a motive for nicking it, wouldn’t it?”

“It would indeed. And Zenith might feel the same if we’re correct about him writing her book, too.”

“But she’d gone home by then,” I objected. “Although she’s rich enough – I suppose she could have paid someone else to do it.”

“I’m not sure that author assassination would be consistent with her religious principles.”

“That’s true. And even if Zenith was responsible, we’ve still got the problem of how today’s events fit in with yesterday’s attacks.” I paused to draw breath and then said, “I think we might be looking at two separate plots, don’t you? With two separate culprits. Someone wanted to kill Max, and they set it up to look like Esmerelda was the target in order to confuse the police. Maybe someone completely different did all that stuff yesterday. And that would mean that Esmerelda’s the only one who’s got away without being attacked…”

“…which brings us back to the idea that she might be the perpetrator,” said Graham, completing my sentence for me.

I thumped the arm of the sofa in frustration. “But she can’t have done it, can she? The death threats, the football and all that – she wasn’t even here.”

“As far as we know.”

“As far as we know,” I echoed. I thought for a few moments and then said slowly, “Of course, she could have been here without anyone noticing… If she was dressed differently – without the make-up and the posh frock – she’d be another person entirely. If she was in jeans and had her hair up in some sort of hat, for example, nobody would recognize her…”

“That’s very true. She seems to be a good actress. She freely admitted she’d been to drama school. We have no idea who she really is underneath the glitz and the glamour.”

“But why would she want to kill the other authors?” I wondered. “Back to the Vellum Prize, do you think? Could anyone want to win it so badly that they’d murder their competitors?”

“It’s worth a good deal of money,” Graham replied. “Yet she’s a bestselling author. You wouldn’t have thought she’d need the money.”

“It’s about reputation too, though, isn’t it? You win something like that and people look up to you. Maybe that matters to her. Maybe it matters more than anything…”

So that was that. We concluded that Charlie was definitely under suspicion for the murder of Max, but Esmerelda was somehow behind the attacks on the other authors. We didn’t know how she’d managed it, but she was our number one suspect.

Then the local news came on and all our theories were smashed to smithereens.

Esmerelda Desiree had just been found dead in her hotel room. Stabbed in the neck with a fountain pen.

The
news carried a long piece about Esmerelda Desiree and her glittering career. There were live pictures of the scenes outside the hotel where her body had been found. Goths had gathered with lighted candles in silent tribute to their heroine.

Graham and I watched the whole item with our mouths hanging open. There was clip after clip of Esmerelda on various sofas – it looked like she’d done every single chat show on every single TV station in every single country in the world. It would have been enough to make every other author sick with jealousy. Was that motive enough to kill her?

The feature ended with Nigella Churchill giving a long, slightly weepy interview in which she said that the literary world had lost one of its brightest stars.

“I talked to her just this afternoon,” said Nigella chokily. “I was fortunate enough to have been granted an exclusive interview. She told me about her forthcoming book,
Go West!
”

My ears pricked up at once. Beside me, Graham gave a sharp intake of breath. This was significant news.

“She refused to talk about that this morning,” I murmured.

Graham nodded, his eyes glued to the TV.

“Was it a sequel to
The Vampiress of Venezia
?” asked the interviewer.

“No – it was an historical novel set in the American West. I was privileged to see the manuscript when I interviewed Esmerelda. I was only able to read the first few pages, but it was immediately obvious that she’d produced another bestseller. It’s a tragic, tragic loss.”

The interviewer murmured something dull and conventional and then moved briskly on to a different item. I leapt up.

“That has
got
to be Max’s book!” I shrieked, punching the air. “I
knew
someone had nicked it!”

“So what are we saying? That Esmerelda somehow managed to steal Max’s work and then got killed for it?”

“That’s about the size of it. All we’ve got to do now is work out how. And why.”

“And then we need to discover who killed her.”

“No pressure, then,” I said with a grin. “I suppose we ought to start with the Why. She’s a mega bestseller. Why would she steal someone else’s work? Unless…” I grabbed Graham by the arm. “Suppose she
didn’t
write
The Vampiress of Venezia
? It’s possible, isn’t it?”

Graham’s brows contracted in a tight frown but I pressed on.

“Think about it, Graham. Esmerelda has stood out from the very beginning. All the others are nothing like their books, yet there she is – looking like a walking, talking vampire. The perfect package.
Too
perfect. I should have been suspicious about her right from the start. I bet she can’t write a word. That would explain why she was so reluctant to produce a sequel.”

“We have to consider two things,” said Graham slowly. “Firstly, the manuscript that appeared in her bedroom. If Max didn’t write it, who did? The same question applies to
The Vampiress of Venezia
. Who was the author of
that
if it wasn’t Esmerelda Desiree?”

“Another ghost writer?”

“Perhaps.”

“OK… So Esmerelda gets hold of Max’s book. Although I don’t see how she managed it.” I shut my eyes, remembering the few sentences they’d exchanged on the town hall steps. She’d cut across him with an offer of help. Interrupted him. Why? What had he been saying? I struggled to retrieve Max’s exact words, and at last they popped into my head. I spoke them out loud.
“I heard you…”

Graham looked at me, puzzled. “Heard me what?”

“No … that’s what Max said to Esmerelda.”

“What did he mean? Heard her on the radio? On TV?”

“It was more like he was going to say ‘I heard you might be helpful’, or ‘I heard you were nice’. As if someone had told him to try asking her. She cut him off before he could say any more.”

“So someone may have pointed him in her direction? Someone who was helping her get hold of the manuscript, maybe? That would suggest she was working with an accomplice.”

“Who? Another author? Charlie? Could he be involved?”

“I’ve no idea.”

We sat in silence, racking our brains. We were pretty sure Charlie would have wanted Max out of the way, but had he wanted Esmerelda dead too? Had he been her accomplice, then turned against her?

Unexpectedly, the television news gave us a completely different answer. The programme was just finishing with a summary of the headlines. It reported the very latest on Esmerelda’s death, and her publisher was giving a short interview. The name of his company appeared beneath him on the screen.

Fletcher, Beaumont & Grimm.

Mum
was still clattering around in the kitchen, but I could tell from the familiar rattle and bang that tea was fast approaching. We didn’t have much time left to work things out.

I’d heard the name Fletcher, Beaumont & Grimm before – not once, but twice. Charlie had told Max to contact them. Katie had given him their address. And now their name was plastered across the TV screen in big, block capitals.

“Our association with Esmerelda goes back some years,” the man from Fletcher, Beaumont & Grimm told the reporter. “She had a holiday job here when she was still at college. I like to think that was what inspired her to take up the pen herself. She was a great talent. She’ll be sadly missed.”

“Wow!” I said, turning to Graham the moment the news had finished. “Things are really starting to fall into place now, aren’t they? Do you reckon Fletcher, Beaumont & Grimm had one of those – what did Sue call it? – slush piles?”

“I would have thought it was an absolute certainty.”

“And Esmerelda worked there? So maybe
The Vampiress
wasn’t ghost-written. Maybe she nicked it.”

“But surely its author would have objected?”

“Not if she’d done away with them.”

We quickly switched on the computer and trawled frantically through the web looking for something, anything that would help. It wasn’t long before Graham had tracked down a tiny snippet of information on a newspaper website. It was one of those news-in-brief bits that you find tucked into a corner of the page, but it made sense of the whole confusing puzzle. It was dated three years ago and reported that a man had collapsed on the pavement outside the London offices of Fletcher, Beaumont & Grimm. It said he’d died of natural causes.

“I bet he didn’t,” I growled. “It’s too much of a coincidence. Maybe he’d been visiting the offices. I bet he had a manuscript too – I bet it was
The Vampiress of Venezia
. The dates would be right. Esmerelda must have stolen it, then killed him. Find out some more, Graham.”

But Graham couldn’t track down anything else about him. We couldn’t even discover his name. So we were left trying to fit all the pieces together, filling the gaps with wild flights of fantasy that would have made Francisco Botticelli proud.

Tea was a silent meal – Graham and I were in deep thought and Mum was still sulking big time. When it was over, she took herself into the garden to check on her cuttings, leaving me and Graham to load the dishwasher. It was then that I suddenly had one of those blinding flashes of inspiration. There was only one solution – one person – that tied every last little loose end together. The plate I was holding slid through my hands and cracked into pieces on the floor.

“We’ve been struggling with motives from the very beginning, haven’t we?” I said to Graham. “None of them made much sense. I mean, Charlie may have wanted Max out of the way, but why kill Esmerelda? Esmerelda could have had Max murdered, but she wouldn’t commit suicide with a fountain pen. Katie or Francisco or Muriel might have dumped manure on Zenith, but they wouldn’t have attacked themselves. Who’d have it in for a bunch of authors anyway? It doesn’t make any sense. But suppose someone was after just one author?”

“Esmerelda?”

“Yes. If that guy they found on the pavement
was
murdered by her… If he had friends or relatives who worked out what had happened… It’s the only thing that makes sense. Revenge, Graham. That’s what’s behind it all. The whole book festival was a set up. Those death threats must have been put in the bags before we arrived. The attacks … that business with the pigs … we kept saying how well organized it was. There’s only one person who could possibly have orchestrated it all.” I grabbed Graham by both shoulders. “Viola Boulder.”

“Viola Boulder?” Graham echoed incredulously. He looked at me as if I’d gone stark, staring mad.

I bent down to pick up the pieces of smashed plate, wrapping them in an old newspaper and shoving them impatiently in the bin. If I couldn’t persuade Graham that my theory was right, how on earth was I going to convince Inspector Humphries?

“Think about it,” I said earnestly. “She’d never organized a festival before. Why start now? The whole thing was a trap to get Esmerelda down here. Esmerelda was
meant
to die. The letters, the other attacks – all those were just a smokescreen.”

“But Viola was outraged about Charlie and the football,” protested Graham. “Don’t you remember?”

I did. I could recall her exact words. “It
hit
him. It actually
hit
him.” Her fury had been genuine, but maybe there was another way of looking at it. “Suppose the guy in the football strip was meant to
miss
Charlie and got him in the face by accident? That would explain why she was so angry.”