Show Business Is Murder (37 page)

“Between you and me and Charlie Chaplin,” Alf said. “Corrine's breath smelled like she'd been drinking some thousand proof.”

Alf hurried off behind the flat of a Civil War battlefield.

If the doc said Corrine had a heart attack, he couldn't kill Vogel and make it look like a heart attack. There are coincidences and coincidences, but . . . Kenny got an idea.

No Bronte sister act with only one Bronte sister. One Bronte sister with a broken leg and no act. Show business tradition. “Break a leg, girls,” someone would say when the house was good and they remembered.

Kenny would find a way to break a Bronte leg, probably Charlotte's. Charlotte was stronger. She'd recover faster. Not
fast enough to get back in the season. And Kenny wouldn't have to kill her. So, get rid of the seals and one Bronte and Kenny would make the cut.

When? The sooner the better. Why not now?

Risky, but look at it this way: Corrine's dead. Charlotte's distraught. She comes down the steps crying her eyes out. She trips, with a little help from Kenny hiding under the stairs. It shouldn't kill her. With luck, a broken leg, especially if he hits the leg hard when he trips her. Hit the leg, duck into the janitor's closet under the stairs, go through the window, close it, back around fast to the stage entrance, to the sound of people screaming about the double tragedy. Get a chance to feel Liz leaning against him again. Bonus.

He moved under the stairs, hid in the shadows, picked up a broom leaning against the wall.

The seals on stage were blowing their horns. He could hear the Brontes coming, comforting each other.

“Maybe one of us should stay with her,” Liz said.

“Go on,” Charlotte said. “I'll be right up.”

Perfect. Liz was heading back to the women's dressing room. Charlotte was already coming down the stairs. He heard her at the top step. Then the second. Saw her ankle. Nice ankle. She was moving slowly. Kenny was sweating even more now. Life or death. Kill or be killed, but he wasn't going to kill her.

He thrust the broom handle between the steps and swung it hard against Charlotte's ankle. Charlotte screamed, maybe she reached for the metal railing. She tripped and tumbled down the last nine stairs, but Kenny had already put the broom back and was closing the closet door behind him.

He went through the window. Cold out there. Sudden shocking chill. His sweat froze. He felt dizzy. Had to move fast. Around the corner, stepping through a thin layer of ice into a puddle of icy water. Hurrying, taps sliding on ice under snow.

Inside, Liz heard her sister, ran down the stairs screaming. The two-man pit band got louder to cover whatever the hell was going on backstage. Alf appeared, shouting “Chrissake, what now?”

Charlotte lay at the bottom of the steps, her eyes closed, her sister cradling her head.

“Oh God, Char. Oh God.”

The old man who guarded the stage door shuffled over, tucking his pipe in his pocket. Vogel came down the stairs quickly and knelt at the fallen dancer's side. He touched her forehead, cheek, put his ear to her chest.

“Water,” he commanded.

Alf ran for water.

Charlotte opened her eyes.

“What son-of-a-bitch tripped me?” she demanded, woozily sitting up.

“You fell down the stairs,” Vogel said gently.

“You were upset about Corrine,” said Liz.

“Someone tripped me,” Charlotte said. “Help me up.”

Vogel lifted her as if she were a raggedy doll.

“My ankle hurts like hell,” she said leaning over to look at the purple and red welt.

She tested it.

“For chrissake, who are you?” asked Alf looking at a lean, white-haired man in an overcoat and muffler who had apparently come in the stage door while they were busy with Charlotte.

“I've come at a bad time,” the man said.

“It could be worse,” said Alf. “The roof could collapse.”

“Happened in the Fairfax in New Haven four years ago,” said the stranger. “I was there. No one was killed but . . .”

Charlotte was limping around now.

The white-haired man turned not toward the stage door but the door that led into the theater.

“No,” said Alf. “You're here for chrissake. What do you want? You a cop? That's all we need.”

“No,” said the man. “I'm looking for Kenneth Poole.”

“Kenny?”

“I just saw his act. I'd like to talk to him and to you two,” the man said looking at Liz and Charlotte.

“We've got a dead woman upstairs,” said Vogel softly. “This is a bad time.”

“Where is Kenny?” asked Charlotte as the pit band played
By the Sea
to accompany Scrimberger and his seals off the stage. The applause was the best of the night.

“What's with all the noise?” Scrimberger asked.

Both seals barked. Scrimberger threw each of them a fish from the bucket he was carrying.

“Corrine's dead,” said Liz tearfully. “And Charlotte was almost killed.”

“I wasn't almost killed,” said Charlotte. “Someone tripped me.”

“Can you still dance?” asked the white-haired man.

Charlotte looked at him and said, “By tomorrow I'll be perfect, unless I break my leg kicking the hell out of whoever—”

“Where is Kenny?” asked Liz.

The stage door flew open, letting in a frozen blast of air. Standing in the doorway was a chubby little man in a black coat and derby hat wearing black gloves and carrying a black pebbled-leather satchel.

“Someone should be with the body,” the chubby man said, closing the door behind him.

Scrimberger muttered something and led his seals past the stairs to the downstairs room reserved for animal acts so the cats, dogs, seals, parrots, and occasional chimp wouldn't have to go up and down stairs.

“Buddy Donald is upstairs with her,” said Liz.

“For Chrissake,” said Alf rubbing his forehead. “Buddy's supposed to be on next.”

“Upstairs?” said the chubby man.

“Corrine's upstairs,” said Liz pointing to the landing.

“Corrine?” asked the chubby man. “What in the blazes on a cold night in hell are you talking about? I'm Doctor Milton Frazier. Someone called about a dead body. I practically tripped over it right out there.”

He pointed to the door through which he had come.

“And,” he said. “It's no she. It's a he, and even though I've worked with you vaudeville people before, I don't think his name is Corrine. And what's he doing out there without a coat on a night like this and a little U.S. flag on his chest and . . .”

Alf dashed to the stage door, opened it, and ran out. Buddy Donald, short and wiry with very little hair, who had once been a tenor and was now a comic, came hurrying down the stairs saying, “I'm on.”

He ignored everyone, adjusted his cuffs and walked onstage.

“It's Kenny,” Alf said coming back through the stage door. “He's out there. He's dead.”

“I just told you he was dead,” Doctor Frazier said. “Close the door.”

Alf closed the door.

“What happened to him?” Liz cried.

It was Charlotte's turn to comfort her sister.

“Looks to me like he slipped on a patch of ice by the steps,” said the doctor. “Looks to me like he must have been in a hurry, which is not a good thing to do on ice, especially when, as I could see, you're wearing tap shoes. Left leg's broke. Hit his head on the ice. There's another body?”

“This way,” said Vogel motioning for the doctor to follow him up the stairs.

The doctor stopped at the top of the stairs and said, “Call the police. And try to stay alive till they get here.”

“Shame,” said the white-haired man, buttoning his coat. “I'll come back and talk to you two young ladies tomorrow.”

“About what?” Charlotte asked.

“About being in a movie,” the man said. “My name is Lee DeForest. I have a studio here in Chicago. I'm starting to make movies with sound to show in theaters like this one, short movies with music. I'd like the two of you to do your act for my cameras and sound tomorrow.”

“You're kidding?” said Charlotte.

“No,” said Alf. “I heard of him. He makes movies with sounds. We're thinking of showing them here.”

“I show them all around the country,” he said. “You get paid well, I think, and people all over the country get to see you. I can assure you, you'll be famous.”

The sisters looked at each other and simultaneously said, “Sure.”

“I really came to see Mr. Poole,” DeForest said with a sigh. “One of my people said he would be perfect for movies. Tap dancing. Music. Pity. Now if you tell me where you are staying, I'll have a car pick you up at, say, eleven tomorrow?”

“We'll miss the first show,” said Liz.

“Miss the first show,” said Alf with a wave of one hand and the other on his forehead. “We're three acts short. We'll show an extra movie.”

Winner of the Agatha, Anthony, Macavity, and Shamus awards for her short stories, and Edgar-nominated twice for her Cass Jameson series,
Carolyn Wheat
embarked on a new venture with
How to Write Killer Fiction
. This unique approach to writing the crime novel explores “the funhouse of mystery and the roller coaster of suspense” so that the writer can create the ideal reader experience in either genre. She is currently at work on a book about detective characters as archetypes. She offers writing workshops and teaches regularly at UCSD.

Edward D. Hoch
is a past president of the Mystery Writers of America and winner of its Edgar Award for best short story. In 2001 he was honored with MWA's Grand Master Award. He has been guest of honor at the annual Bouchercon mystery convention, two-time winner of its Anthony Award, and 2001 recipient of its Lifetime Achievement Award. He is also recipient of Life Achievement Awards from the Private Eye Writers of America and the Short Mystery Fiction Society. Author of over 875 published stories, as well as novels and collections, he has appeared in every issue of
Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine
since 1973. Hoch resides with his wife Patricia in Rochester, New York.

Annette Meyers
was born in New York, grew up on a chicken farm in New Jersey, and came running back to Manhattan as soon as she could. She has a long history on Broadway (assistant to Harold Prince) and Wall Street (headhunter and arbitrator, NASD). Her first novel,
The Big Killing,
featured Wall Street headhunters Xenia Smith and former dancer, Leslie Wetzon, who stumble over bodies on Wall Street and Broadway. There are now seven Smith and Wetzon novels and an eighth,
Hedging,
will be published in 2005. In
Free Love,
set in Greenwich Village in 1920, Meyers introduced poet/sleuth Olivia Brown and her bohemian friends.
Murder Me Now
followed. With husband Martin Meyers, using the pseudonym Maan Meyers, she has written six books in The Dutchman series of historical mysteries set in New York in the seventeenth, eighteenth, and nineteenth centuries. Both Annette Meyers's and Maan Meyers's short stories have appeared in numerous anthologies.

John Lutz
is the author of more than thirty-five novels and approximately 250 short stories and articles. His work has been translated into virtually every language and adapted for almost every medium. He is a past president of both the Mystery Writers of America and the Private Eye Writers of America. Among his awards are the MWA Edgar, the PWA Shamus, the Trophee 813 Award for best mystery short story collection translated into the French language, the PWA Life Achievement Award, and the Short Mystery Fiction Society's Golden Derringer Lifetime Achievement Award. He is the author of two private eye series, the Nudger series, set in his home town of St. Louis, and the Carver series, set in Florida, as well as many non-series suspense novels. His
SWF Seeks Same
was made into the hit movie
Single White Female,
starring Bridget Fonda and Jennifer Jason Leigh, and his
The Ex
was made into the HBO original movie of the same title, for
which he co-authored the screenplay. His latest book is a suspense novel,
The Night Watcher
.

“Janet Evanovich meets The Fugitive.” That's what author Tim Dorsey calls
Elaine Viets
's new Dead-End Job mystery series.
Shop Till You Drop
is the first in the Signet series. Elaine actually works those dead-end jobs in this South Florida series. She has been a dress-store clerk, a bookseller, and a telemarketer who called you at dinnertime. She was nominated for three Agatha Awards in 2003 for Best Traditional Mystery for Shop Till You Drop, and two short stories, “Red Meat” and “Sex and Bingo.”

Angela Zeman
, a former director of MWA, is the author of
The Witch and the Borscht Pearl
(Pendulum Press). The cozy novel, praised in reviews from
Publisher's Weekly
and other venues, features characters from the popular Mrs. Risk “witch” short story series. Mary Higgins Clark chose a Mrs. Risk story for her anthology,
The Night Awakens
. The second Mrs. Risk novel is expected to appear soon. Her suspense story in Nancy Pickard's anthology,
Mom, Apple Pie, and Murder,
was reviewed by PW as “magical.” “Green Heat,” her story in the MWA anthology
A Hot and Sultry Night for Crime,
also garnered high praise from
Publishers Weekly
. She also writes nonfiction articles about the mystery field, both alone and with her husband, Barry T. Zeman, who is an acknowledged authority on the history of the mystery and antiquarian book collecting. They contributed an article to MWA's 2003 handbook edited by Sue Grafton (Writer's Digest Books):
Writing Mysteries
.
http://www.AngelaZeman.com
.

Another original story by
David Bart
appeared in the 2003 Mystery Writers of America anthology,
A Hot and Sultry Night for Crime,
edited by Jeffery Deaver. David's work
has also been published in
Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine
and
Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine
. One of his many stories published in
AHMM
was translated and reprinted in a Paris anthology. He is presently working on a suspense novel in addition to short stories and is an active member of the Mystery Writers of America, South West Writers, and PWA. David lives in New Mexico and can be reached at [email protected].

Bob Shayne
has been nominated for two Edgars for his TV movie “The Return of Sherlock Holmes”—also nominated by the Writers Guild of America as Best TV Movie of the Year—and for “Ashes to Ashes and None Too Soon,” one of twelve scripts he wrote for the popular 1980s TV series “Simon & Simon.” Pierce Brosnan is attached to star in and produce Shayne's upcoming movie
Once a Thief
. This is his first short story. He is also developing a series of historical mystery novels featuring the Naomi Weinstein character.

Mark Terry
is the author of two mystery series, one featuring Dr. Theo MacGreggor, a consulting forensic toxicologist, and one featuring Megan Malloy, a computer troubleshooter. He is also a frequent book reviewer, technical editor, and freelance writer. His work appears regularly in
Mystery Scene Magazine,
and has appeared in
The Armchair Detective
and
Orchard Press Mysteries
. He has published nearly one hundred book reviews, dozens of columns and articles, and even the occasional poem. His “day job” is in the field of genetics. He lives in Michigan with his wife and sons. Visit his website at
www.mark-terry.com

Gary Phillips
writes in various mediums from the short story form to comic books to scripts, as a general practitioner of mass media. And what few forays he's had into
the arena of Hollywood has taught him that show bizness ain't a business for sissies.

 

Parnell Hall
is the author of the Stanley Hastings private eye novels, the Puzzle Lady Crossword Puzzle mysteries, and the Steve Winslow courtroom dramas. His books have been nominated for Edgar and Shamus awards. Parnell is an actor, screenwriter, and former private investigator. He lives in New York City.

Susanne Shaphren's
first nationally published mystery was
The Visit,
a Fiction Award story in the March 1972 issue of
Weight Watchers Magazine
. Her articles and short stories have been published in an eclectic alphabet soup of magazines including:
Authorship, Better Communication, Crosscurrents, Delta Scene, Golden Years, Hibiscus, Jack and Jill, Lady's Circle, Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Plot, Short Stuff,
and
The Writer
.

A transplant from Washington, D.C.,
Libby Fischer Hellmann
has lived in the Chicago area twenty-five years. Her amateur sleuth series, featuring video producer Ellie Foreman, made its debut in 2002 with
An Eye for Murder,
published simultaneously by Poisoned Pen Press and Berkley Prime Crime.
A Picture of Guilt
was released in July, 2003, followed by
An Image of Death
in February 2004. Her short stories have appeared in both American and British publications. When not writing fiction, Libby writes and produces corporate videos. She is also a speech- and presentation-skills coach. She holds a BA from the University of Pennsylvania and an MFA in Film Production from New York University. She lives on the North Shore of Chicago with her family and a Beagle, shamelessly named Shiloh.

By the age of thirty,
Charles Ardai
had been a Shamus Award–nominated mystery writer, founder and CEO of a $2
billion Internet company, and a managing director at the investment and technology development firm
Fortune
magazine called “the most intriguing and mysterious force on Wall Street.” His proudest accomplishment, however, is having appeared as an extra in Woody Allen's “Radio Days.” Mr. Ardai lives in New York.

Gregg Hurwitz
is the author of
The Tower, Minutes to Burn, Do No Harm,
and
The Kill Clause
. He holds a B.A. in English and psychology from Harvard University and a master's degree from Trinity College, Oxford. He lives in Los Angeles.

Show business may be murder, but somehow
Steve Hockensmith
has managed to survive his brushes with it—so far. A freelance journalist, he has covered pop culture and the film industry for
The Hollywood Reporter, The Chicago Tribune, Newsday, The Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Total Movie, Cinescape,
and other publications. He also recently sold the movie rights to his Derringer Award–winning story “Erie's Last Day,” and a short film based on the story is in the works. His short fiction has appeared in
Ellery Queen's Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine,
and
Analog
. But what he really wants to do is direct . . .

Shelley Freydont
is the author of the Lindy Haggerty mystery series (
Backstage Murder, Midsummer Murder, A Merry Little Murder
). She has toured internationally with Twyla Tharp Dance and American Ballroom Theater and has choreographed for and appeared in films, television, and on Broadway. She is a member of MWA and Sisters in Crime (President of NY/TriState chapter 2001–2003).

Robert Lopresti
is a librarian and songwriter in the Pacific Northwest. Thirty of his stories have been published in
Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine,
and many other places. One of his stories was nominated for the Anthony Award in 1994.

Mat Coward
is a British writer of crime, SF, horror, children's, and humorous fiction, whose stories have been broadcast on BBC Radio and published in numerous anthologies, magazines, and e-zines in the UK, US, and Europe. According to Ian Rankin, “Mat Coward's stories resemble distilled novels.” His first non-distilled novel—a whodunit called
Up and Down
—was published in the USA in 2000 by Five Star Publishing. The same publisher produced his first single author collection,
Do the World a Favour and Other Stories
in 2003.

Stuart M. Kaminsky
is the author of fifty-six published books, forty short stories, and five produced screenplays. He was one of the writers of the A & E Nero Wolfe television series. He won the Edgar for best novel in 1989 and the Prix De Roman D'Aventure of France in 1990. He has received a total of six Edgar nominations for his novels and short stories. Kaminsky writes the Toby Peters series, the Porfiry Rostnikov series, the Abe Lieberman series, and the Lew Fonesca series set in and around Sarasota. He has also written two “Rockford Files” novels. Kaminsky has a B.S. degree in Journalism and an M.A. in English Literature from the University of Illinois and a Ph.D. in Communications from Northwestern University. He taught film history, filmmaking, and creative writing at Northwestern University for sixteen years before going to Florida State University in 1988 to head the Graduate Conservatory in Film. He left FSU in 1994 to write full time. He now lives in Sarasota with his wife and family, and finds time to play a lot of softball.