Edited to Death (19 page)

“Yes, we. We’re in this together. Quentin wanted it that way. The two of us were…”
he paused dramatically, “the last date on his Palm before he died.”

I snorted, “Quentin had a little leather datebook. He thought Palm Pilots were pretentious
and inconvenient, and besides, they ruined the line of a man’s jacket. Furthermore,”
I added, “I’ve just come from listening to lectures from Michael and Moon. They don’t
want me running around being a detective, and I can’t say I blame them. That’s what
the cops are supposed to do, blah, blah, blah. Besides, if somebody’s going to go
after one of my kids.…”

“Hey, get serious. If somebody knows you’re snooping around, and they know about your
kids, nobody’s safe until we figure this thing out.”

“Get thee behind me, Satan,” I said. On the one hand, there they were, the voices
of reason—Michael, Glen, Inspector Moon. On the other, Calvin and his youthful arrogance
that we could figure this out. Plus, my own need to “tidy things up,” and not to do
what I was told. And some bastard thought he could get at me through my kid. I felt
a flush of anger wash right over what I knew I should do—throw Calvin out and get
to work.

“Over, under or through,” I muttered, conveniently forgetting the context but latching
onto the idea. I glanced at my watch. “Okay, maybe we can nose around a little bit
more, just to see if we can feed information to Inspector Moon.”

“I knew you’d see it my way,” he said, patting his pockets. “Now, last night I reviewed
what we know and what we don’t.” He pulled a notepad out of his breast pocket, much
like the one Moon carried. He flipped open the cover and re-established his feet on
the desk.

“Here’s what we know: average size killer, could be tallish woman or a medium-height
man. Someone Quentin knew, probably, since he let them in. Someone who either knows
you—”

“Don’t remind me.” I shuddered.

Calvin looked up briefly. “Buck up, Mags. Or knows
about
you and the kids.”

“Okay, that narrows it down to fifty of our dearest, most intimate friends.”

“Come on, Maggie, it does not. There actually can’t be that many people who knew Quentin,
know about you and the kids—and have a motive.”

“You’re right,” I said. “But I think we’re on the wrong track here.”

“Such as?”

“Remember what Andrea said about mystery stories? About if something disappears and
someone gets ‘offed’, I believe, was the term she used, then there’s your murderer.”

“And so?”

“Well, Andrea got me reading mysteries again. I haven’t done it for years. Last night
when I couldn’t sleep, I started reading one of the Maigret mysteries—you know, Georges
Simenon. And Inspector Maigret says, ‘I shall know the murderer when I know the victim
well.’”

“The victim? Quentin?”

“Right. There’s something about Quentin we need to know, and when we do, we’ll know
who killed him.”

“Like something from his past?”

“Maybe. I’ve got a friend sleuthing in London for me.”

Calvin cocked one eyebrow and tapped his pencil on his teeth.

“London?”

“Yes. Quentin went to school there. Some old friend of his wrote him recently, and
there was peculiar stuff in the letter.”

“Hey,” said Calvin. “For someone who doesn’t want to detect, you certainly seem to
have an international network of investigators at work for you.”

I grinned. “Just a resourceful little housewife.”

“Housewife-editor,” said a voice from the door. Gertie was leaning in the doorway,
clutching a batch of pink message slips. “Just a housewife-editor who needs to get
an issue out.”

Guiltily, I said, “Gertie, I’m sorry. I’m here! I’m working. Throw this guy out.”

Calvin stood. “No need to throw me out. I’ve got an assignment out at the Broadway
Test Kitchens.”

“What are you shooting?”

“Not shooting. Just meeting. There’s a convention of food editors in town and they
want to talk with me about doing a coast-to-coast photo essay on harvesting greens.”

“Greens.”

“Greens. Mustard. Arugula. Radicchio. That stuff.”

“Actually, radicchio is red,” I pointed out.

“Whatever happened to poor old iceberg lettuce? Didn’t it have a renaissance a while
ago?” mused Gertie.

“Don’t ask,” said Calvin. “It’s back in salad purgatory, covered with Thousand Island
dressing, waiting to be recalled to service.”

“Go,” I said.

“I’ll call you later,” he said. “We’re onto something; I know we are.”

After Calvin disappeared, Gertie sat down opposite me, clearing a space on her side
of the desk.

“Don’t tell me,” I said. “I know it never looked like this when Quentin was here.”

“Okay,” she said, “I won’t tell you. You already know. Now here we go, Madame Editor,”
she said.

In half an hour, we covered correspondence, reviewed the editorial, design, and production
budget for the next quarter, and scheduled the next staff meeting. Gertie gathered
her notes and started to stand. She stopped.

“Maggie?”

“What have I forgotten?”

“It’s not that.” She picked up Quentin’s Rolodex and riffled the pages. “I know you
really loved Quentin.”

“You did, too.”

“I did, I did. But I didn’t idealize him.” She put the Rolodex down and looked at
me. “You know how they say no man is a gentleman to his valet? Well, no man is perfect
to his secretary or whatever highfalutin title they’ve given me. Quentin wasn’t an
exception.”

“I knew that.”

She shook her head. “I’m not sure you did.” She hesitated. “I knew about the two of
you.”

“You,” I said, “and the rest of the city, apparently.”

“Don’t flatter yourself,” she said dryly. “But I kept pretty close track of Quentin’s
schedule. I knew where he was and when—and with whom.”

“Listen, Gertie—”

She held up her hand. “You don’t need to explain anything to me. It was your business
and Quentin’s. But you should know, there was a certain ruthlessness about Quent.
He knew what he wanted and he went after it. You may think what took place between
you two was an accident or something that just happened. But I’m willing to wager
Quentin had it in some master plan. I know how he talked about you and what he thought
of you. And I think he decided, for better or worse, that some day he’d make his move.
Or let you make yours.”

I remembered Saks. Whose move was it?

“I think,” said Gertie, “that’s why Claire hated him so much. I think she felt as
if she’d fallen into, and then out of, some grand scheme Quentin had.”

“Why are you telling me this, Gertie?”

“I just want you to know I think you are on to something.”

“What do you mean?”

“When I came in, you and Calvin were talking about knowing the victim. That’s right,
I somehow feel it. Pay attention to who Quentin really was. And you’ll find out who
killed him.”

“I think that, too,” I began.

She interrupted, “Of course, a plainspoken midwestern girl like myself can’t help
but wonder why you’re so involved in all this.”

I struggled to explain. “It’s the same question I keep asking myself. I think it’s
a whole collection of bad reasons. Maybe because I found his body, and that makes
me feel responsible in some weird way. Or because he was waiting for Calvin and me
to arrive when it happened. Maybe because I feel so awful about—”

“Cheating on Michael?”

“That’s part of it. I feel as if I contributed to some enormous mess in the world,
and sooner or later, somebody has to pay for messes.”

“If that’s so,” observed Gertie, “I’d say that Quentin’s the one who paid the price.
And you’re making a big assumption that it had anything to do with you.”

“I’m not,” I insisted. “I just feel responsible for something.”

Gertie sighed. “You are. You’re responsible for fixing things up with Michael, but
that’s not my business. But who am I to talk? I couldn’t make my marriage work.” She
stood up. “Of course, he was a jerk, and I just had to wait ’til the kids were out
of the house so I could get on a plane and get out of town. But then, Michael doesn’t
seem like a jerk to me.”

“He’s not,” I began. “But Gertie—”

She held up her hand. “Uh-uh. You’re my boss now; go confide in a girlfriend about
your marriage. But this magazine is my business, so…” she gestured at the message
slips, “get to work. You’re in a business with deadlines.” She stopped at the doorway,
and I could feel one parting shot coming. “You know, Maggie, you’re the girl who thinks
she’s smarter than anybody else. If you ask me, that’s the real reason I think you
keep poking your nose into the cops’ business.”

I looked at her. “Is that a respectful way to talk to your boss?”

“Quentin trained me to be insubordinate,” she said, and disappeared down the hallway.

Gertie was right about way too many things. Though I couldn’t imagine confiding in
any of my friends about my screw-up with Quentin. They all thought Michael was near-perfect.
“You’re so lucky,” they were always cooing. “Michael’s a nice guy, and he cooks, and
he’s great with the kids, yada-yada-yada.” Damn, it’s a pain being married to Signor
Perfect, when you’re the one who’s not, who’s restless, who went looking for excitement
in inappropriate places.

So work I did. Reviewed page proofs, harangued a tardy writer or two, looked at comps
(full-size color comprehensive mock-ups) of the next issue, confirmed press time at
the printer, and reassured the advertising sales manager that
Small Town
was good for the next quarter. Gertie brought me a salad for lunch—iceberg lettuce,
yet—and I ate it with the phone tucked beneath my chin. I looked up to see Andrea
crooking a finger at me from the doorway.

“Come on, get up,” she said. “Fresh air, sunshine, a little exercise.”

“I can’t,” I said.

“Indeed you can,” she said. “I’ve been working at real jobs a lot longer than you
have. You need to be up, up and about. Let’s go. Twenty-minute walk up to Chinatown
and back. Do you a world of good.”

“Okay, okay. One call first.”

And I picked up the phone to check in at the Webster School. The night before, Michael
and I had agreed to a twice daily check-in at the school, just to make sure nothing
was amiss. Plus, we had wheedled permission from the school to let Josh carry a cell
phone, just for a week or so.

“Everything fine?” Andrea asked as we rode down the elevator.

“I guess so,” I said.

“Good. I’ve been thinking about our detecting careers. Shall I tell you what I’m wondering?”

“Tell away.”

“I’m wondering about the benefit that Claire was running at the Cock of the Walk.
Who was it benefiting again?”

“Skunkworks.” I groaned as Claire’s face floated into my memory.

“What’s wrong?” asked Andrea.

“I’m just remembering I’ll get a chance to ask the horrible Mrs. Hart about it myself.
Live and in person. We’re having dinner with her and Uncle Alf tomorrow night.”

“Lucky you,” said Andrea. “But anyway, you can get some information out of her about
Cock of the Walk.”

“You’ve been talking to Calvin,” I said as we came to Portsmouth Square in the heart
of Chinatown. “He thinks that story is the key to all this.”

“What do you think?”

“I think he may be right. There’s something Quentin wanted us to go after in that
story, and we just can’t figure out what it is.”

“How have you gone after it?”

“I haven’t done anything since our field trip there yesterday.”

“Calvin’s done some digging, though.”

“I know, he started to fill me in this morning until Gertie threw him out.”

Andrea smiled. “I wish I’d seen that. Well, he didn’t find out much. Orlando owns
Cock of the Walk with some silent partners. He’s listed as managing partner of the
Catalog Club in the city records. That’s the name of the partnership. Apparently,
this group came up with a lot of cash, because Calvin talked to the restaurant designer
who did the place over when they bought it. It may not be our taste, but they spent
a lot of money. That, plus that big benefit opening they did for Claire, means someone
had to come up with serious money.”

“Maybe illustration is a more lucrative line of work than I’d thought,” I said.

Andrea wrinkled her nose. “I’d say not. I checked with Linda Quoc, and she claims
Orlando seems pretty cavalier about his fees. He’s more interested in placement and
illustration credit.”

“Wealthy family?”

Andrea shrugged. “Maybe. I know we talked about it yesterday, and I’m even more convinced
he must have some other source of income.”

She tugged at my arm. “Detour, right through here.”

“Andrea, I’ve got to get back.”

“Me too. But we need some gelato first.”