by Dean James
Robin gazed at me through narrowed eyelids. I wondered fleetingly what he would have said, had not one of his subordinates been present. “I am not at liberty to say at the moment, Simon, though I assure you my men and I have things well in hand.” Why did he clam up all of a sudden? Perhaps he had no idea who the killer was, or perhaps he did and was simply waiting to find the evidence he needed to proceed with an arrest. Either way, I realized that he had nothing more to say to me at that point.
Robin stood. “Thank you, Simon, as always, for your very willing assistance in our inquiries.”
“And as always, you are most welcome, Robin.” I grinned, then turned and walked out of the room.
On the way up to my bedroom, I continued to speculate. Did Robin know, or didn’t he? I hated not knowing. I had narrowed the field down in my own mind to two suspects, but I still didn’t know why. And frankly, I was just too damn nosy to wait to hear it from Robin. I wanted to know, and I wanted to know as soon as possible.
All of which meant, naturally, that I would have to take matters into my own hands. Be a catalyst, as it were. If I didn’t, there was no telling how long this dreary affair might drag on, and I was ready to be done with Kinsale House. I would, of course, fulfill my obligation to Lady Hermione, however she saw fit.
Giles continued to snore in peace on my bed, and I sat for a few minutes watching him as I thought about what I wanted to do and how best to achieve it. Robin would no doubt be rather angry with me, particularly if I was wrong and the whole thing somehow misfired. But he would get over it, one way or another. And if I was right, well, then Robin would be welcome to take all the credit I wasn’t seeking the limelight—at least, not in this way.
The thought of danger didn’t bother me, because only a few things could really harm me permanently. Since I very much doubted that anyone at Kinsale House knew I was a vampire, I reckoned I should be safe.
The tricky part would be working around the men that Robin had stationed in the house, not letting them know what was going on until I actually needed them to collar the murderer. After, that is, I had wrung the confession out of him or her. Unlike vampires of old, I can’t shape-change, or turn myself into a mist and slip under someone’s door, then reassemble all the molecules and all that rot. I’m thoroughly corporeal these days, though I have to admit that sometimes it might be quite a lark to go misting about.
Giles had had enough of a nap by now to sleep off the worst effects of his excess of drink at dinner. Time to wake him up, which I did, more gently than he deserved.
“What is it, Simon? What do you want?” Giles regarded me with bleary eyes as he tried to focus.
“I want you to wake up, Giles. I need your help with something.” I sat beside him on the bed and poked him in the side.
Giles stretched one arm above his head for a moment and yawned, then leaned in toward me and rested his hand on my thigh. “I’m ready, Simon. How may I be of assistance?”
“If you don’t behave, Giles,” I said in a severe tone, “I shall pour cold water over your head.” I got up from the bed and stood beside it, staring down at him.
Giles yawned as he sat up. “Very well. Pardon me, but I’m knackered. What is it you want then, Simon? More bloody boring research?”
“If you’re awake and listening now, Giles, I shall tell you.” I sat down in my chair, and Giles folded his legs under him and sat in a semi-lotus position on the bed.
“I’m listening.”
I gave him a quick summary of everything that had occurred downstairs, and soon his eyes were wide open with interest. I concluded with my interview with Robin.
“What are you going to do now, Simon? Surely you’re not going to sit by patiently and wait for Robin, are you?” His cheeky grin was all too knowing.
“No, Giles, I’m not. The first thing I’m going to do is a little reading. The research you’ve done, which you’ve called boring, has actually been tremendously useful. I suspect it may yield more helpful information in one particular case. And I want you to be ready to help me in case I need to dig up something else.”
Giles saluted smartly. “Ja tuohl, Herr Commandant!”
“Leave the humor aside, Giles, and go splash some water on your face.”
Muttering under his breath, Giles did as I asked. I turned to the stack of folders Giles had put together, and searched through them for a particular one. Opening it, I began skimming through what Giles had been able to unearth on Ashford Dunn. I didn’t believe he had lived a blameless life, as he had so cheekily asserted earlier, and I was convinced there had to be something in his past that had made him vulnerable to Nina and her methods.
Giles hadn’t been able to find much about Dunn. Before now he hadn’t granted many interviews, and the media mentions Giles had unearthed were all items about him that revealed only the broadest details of his life. Born and reared in Iowa, he had attended the state university there, then had gone on to law school in the East. His school was not one of the better-known ones, but he had clerked at the Iowa State Supreme Court, and afterward he had landed a job at a prestigious firm. Then, suddenly, two years ago, after only two years at the firm, he had quit his job to devote himself to writing.
I sat and thought about that resume for a moment. Dunn hadn’t had a particularly distinguished academic career, yet he had apparently had a brilliant, albeit brief, career as a lawyer. Something about that combination didn’t ring true.
“Giles!” I called to Giles, who was in his room fiddling about with his laptop.
He came to the door. “Yes, Simon?”
“Here’s what I want you to do.” I glanced at my watch. It was still only a few minutes before nine.
“There’s still time to call the States before offices close down for the evening. I want you to make a few phone calls for me and see what you can find out about Ashford Dunn.” Quickly I sketched out what I wanted to know, and how I thought Giles might obtain the information.
Giles grinned. “What fun, Simon! I can look up the phone numbers on the Internet, and the rest I can talk my way through.”
“Good! Go to it.” I sat back and waited and let him do his own particular brand of magic. I could have made the calls myself, of course, after having Giles obtain the proper phone numbers for me. But Giles has considerable charm, not to mention a voice and an accent that can talk most people into doing any number of things they wouldn’t normally do. (It’s a good thing for both our sakes that I’m not most people.)
In less than half an hour, Giles had found out what I wanted to know. It’s amazing how willing some people are to talk, even when they shouldn’t. The urge to gossip is very basic to human nature, luckily for nosy folk like me!
Giles laughed gleefully as he recounted what he had learned from one of the secretaries at the law school. “Lucky for us, Simon, that I hit upon a dear old thing who had been at the law school for donkey’s years. She couldn’t tell me what you wanted to know fast enough.”
“Did Dunn actually attend law school there?”
“Yes, he did,” Giles replied. “He made it through three semesters by the skin of his teeth, according to our dear, helpful Mrs. Mills from Iowa. If he hadn’t been so good-looking and able to talk himself out of various scrapes, he would have ‘flunked out’—I believe that was the phrase she used.”
“Quite a helpful lady,” I observed.
“She would have been even more helpful had I had the time to indulge her.” Giles laughed. “I also asked her whether she knew anyone named Wanda Harper, and you were right about that one, too. Seems Harper worked there briefly at the law school, and it was at the same time that Dunn was a student. The old girl had lots more stories to tell, but those were the main things you wanted to know. But there is one other and very important fact.”
“Which is?”
“According to Mrs. Mills, Dunn never graduated from that law school. He was supposed to be transferring to another school, but she said she very much dou
bted another school would have taken him.”
“Ah! Very interesting! If he had transferred to another school, he would have said in his bio.” I frowned. “That certainly makes a clerkship at the state supreme court unlikely.”
“Exactly,” Giles said. “Now, on to the next call. I was able to talk to someone in the personnel office at the law firm where Dunn said he worked for a couple of years.” His grin grew even broader.
“Okay, give! What did you find out?”
Giles flashed me a big smile. “They never heard of him. I asked how he could go around claiming to have been an employee of theirs, and the chap said that the firm employs several hundred lawyers in offices around the world. Unless someone bothered to check, it might not come to their attention that someone claimed to have worked there. But he assured me that Dunn had never been employed by this firm.”
“So Ashford Dunn’s legal background is very shaky, to say the least. He’s not a bona fide lawyer.”
“Doesn’t sound like it to me, Simon.”
“He’s a fake, Giles, and he knew the first victim before he ever came to England. Add that all together, and we have an excellent motive for murder.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
“Time to put the next part of the plan into motion, Giles,” I said. Quickly I outlined what I wanted him to do. “Got it?”
“Got it, Simon. You can count on me.” His earnest smile reassured me. “I’ll be waiting right here with my mobile phone.”
I tapped my pocket. “And mine is here, ready to ring you with the signal should I need you.” I walked over and picked up the phone from the bedside table. I punched in the butler’s extension and waited.
“Ah, Dingleby, could you tell me how I might find Miss Yaknova’s room?”
Dingleby could and did. I thanked him and rang off. “Here I go, Giles,” I said. “Wish me luck.”
“How about a kiss for luck, Simon?” His saucy stare offered an invitation that I decided not to resist, just this once. I leaned toward him and brushed his lips with mine.
I drew back to find him pouting. “Always leave them wanting more, eh, Simon?” he said.
“Exactly! Now, don’t fall asleep!”
“I won’t,” Giles said. “Be on your way.”
In the hall, the door closed behind me, I stood for a moment and eyed the guards Robin had posted in the hallway. As long as I acted as though I weren’t doing anything wrong, perhaps they wouldn’t stop me. According to Dingleby, Nina’s room was on this same floor, down the other wing. Ashford Dunn occupied the room next to her. I headed in that direction, nodding politely to the guard posted near the head of the stairs. He returned my nod and let me pass without question.
I counted the doors until I got to the right one. I knocked, and a moment later I heard Nina’s voice. “Who is it, and what do you want?”
“It’s Simon, Nina, and I want to talk to you.”
I waited a moment; then the door opened. Nina glared at me. “What the hell do you want, Simon?”
“If I might come in, Nina, I have a little proposition for you.”
She stared at me for a moment, considering. Then, stepping back, she opened the door and motioned for me to enter.
I did my best to ignore the so-called decor of this room. It was just as spacious and just as hideous as my own. Unlike mine, however, it reeked of cigarette smoke. Lady Hermione would not be pleased at having to air this room out for a week or two, but I doubted Nina cared that much how Lady Hermione would react.
The door that connected this room to the next one was closed at the moment, but I figured that Ashford Dunn was there, with his ear to the key-hole, figuratively if not literally. He’d be well aware of what transpired in this room, which was just what I wanted.
Nina lighted another cigarette before motioning for me to sit. I sat down and waited for her to take a seat near me. The chairs were only a few feet from the connecting door, which suited my little scheme perfectly.
“What is this little proposition of yours, Simon?” I had waited for Nina to speak first. Normally, she would have waited me out, but perhaps she was tired of playing her usual little games.
“I believe you will agree, Nina, that we all now find ourselves in a rather difficult, not to say delicate, position with the events of the last day or so.” I was giving it my pompous best, and I could see Nina’s eyebrows beginning to twitch in irritation. “You find yourself suddenly without some of your most stellar clients, not to mention that they’re also some of your biggest earners. We, on the other hand, find ourselves needing an agent who will be as aggressive as you have been in making good deals for us. It seems to me, therefore, that we each need something, and perhaps we can come to some kind of accommodation. ”
“Your point being...?” Nina said, expelling smoke in a furious puff. “Stop gas-bagging it Simon. Did the others appoint you their spokesman?”
“No, Nina, I’m speaking on my own behalf. The others may choose to do the same thing, of course. But this is about me.” I paused to let her think about that for a moment. “I need something from you, but I think perhaps you need more from me.”
Nina’s eyebrows rose at that. “Go on.”
“Here it is. I’m willing to let you continue as my agent, but we have to agree on certain terms. You will not—I repeat, not—come up with any more little schemes to force me into going public about my books. Is that understood?”
I got a very expressive rolling of the eyes for that one. She sat and thought for a moment. “Understood, Simon. What else?”
“You will sign a statement to that effect, to be witnessed by my solicitor, and kept on file in their offices.”
“Oh, really, Simon. That’s a bit much, don’t you think?”
“No, Nina, I don’t think. Someone needs to hang tough on you, and it might as well be me.”
“Very well, then. I will sign a statement to that effect.”
“Good,” I said, offering her a smile. “Then I think we can do business.”
“Is that it?”
“Not quite,” I said. I sat and waited for a moment. “You’re also going to have to give up the boy toy next door.”
“What do you mean, Simon? Don’t be absurd. Why should I give up Ash? He’s going to make us both millions!” Nina ground out her cigarette in an ashtray already overflowing with butts and immediately reached for another.
“Do you really want to be in bed with a murderer, Nina?” I asked in an intentionally offensive tone.
“Surely you’re not saying that Ash murdered those two women?” Nina’s outrage might have convinced someone else, but it didn’t convince me.
“Come off it, Nina. Either he did it or you did. Nothing else makes sense.”
She didn’t respond.
“Well, Nina, dearest, did you kill them?”
“No, I did not!” she snapped back at me.
“There you are, then. Ashford Dunn killed them.”
“Why would he do that?” Enough scorn dripped from those words to make a good-sized puddle on the hideous carpet.
“Because, my dear Nina, he’s an absolute fake, and you know it.” I listened closely, and I could hear the knob turning, oh, so quietly, on the connecting door. Dunn was definitely listening to what was going on in here.
“A fake? How so?”
Nina wasn’t going to give an inch; that was clear. “Don’t be bloody stupid, Nina. The game is up, and it’s time you realized it. If you’re not careful, you’re going to end up in prison with him. Is that what you want?”
She remained obdurate. She just sat there and stared at me.
“Look, Nina, I know he’s not really a lawyer, and it won’t be long before Robin Chase knows it, too. How is it going to look to his publishers, who’ve laid out quite a lot of money, when Dunn is exposed in all the tabloids as someone who couldn’t manage to finish law school? Nor did he clerk at the Iowa Supreme Court or have a job with a prestigious law firm in Boston. He’s
a fake, pure and simple, and he killed two women to cover that up.” Still Nina said nothing.
“If that’s not enough for you, my dear, how about this? Were you aware that Dunn and Wanda Harper knew each other back in Iowa? When he was a student—and evidently not a very good one— and she worked in the law school’s office?”
That one really rankled her, even though she wasn’t saying anything yet.
“And one more thing, dearest Nina. I’ll bet it was Wanda Harper who introduced you to our young Mr. Dunn. Wasn’t it?” I didn’t wait for an acknowledgment. “They reeled you right in, had you right where they wanted you.”
Nina cut loose with a string of profanities, many of which focused on the murderous Mr. Dunn and his less-than-illustrious forebears. Lady Hermione would no doubt have found it exceedingly common. I was simply relieved to have gotten through to her at last. After this, Nina would be willing to shop her boy toy, no question.
“I take it, then, you’re ready to see sense, Nina, dear?”
“That bloody wanker!” Nina said, the flow of obscenities having weakened into the merest trickle. “I can’t believe him—or that bitch Wanda. They set me up. They bloody well set me up!”
“So you’ll be more than happy to cooperate with the police?”
“I can’t get to that dishy detective fast enough, Simon,” Nina assured me. “I’ll nail that wanker’s balls to the wall; see if I don’t.”
Poor Nina had been aching to rip someone to shreds, ever since Lady Hermione had humiliated her downstairs. Dunn deserved everything that was coming to him, and he’d be lucky if Robin got to him before Nina did.
I was reaching into my jacket pocket for my mobile phone when Dunn flung the connecting door open and startled Nina into dropping her cigarette and lighter onto the floor.
