Max Collins - Nice Weekend for a Murder

A ripple of laughter was followed by applause, and Curt moved rather more quickly through the crowd than he might otherwise have, not pausing to chat or sign any of the books of his which various guests had brought along to the session. He knew something was afoot.

“What is it, Mal?”

“Not here,” I said. “Ms. Wright’s office?”

“It’s Miss,” she said, and smiled at me.

“There’s been a fucking murder,” Jill almost hissed. Nobody heard it but Mary and Curt and me, but she’d made her point.

Mary wasn’t shocked by Jill’s profanity, Mohonk manners, Quaker tradition, or not. But she did purse her lips in a skeptical smile and narrow her eyes the same way... but only for a moment. Our expressions apparently were ominous enough to get the point across.

Not to Curt, though.

“Mal,” he said, grinning, “if you’re pulling some cute counter-prank and making us the butt—”

“Let’s go to Miss Wright’s office,” I said. “Now.”

Curt pushed the air with his palms in a conciliatory manner. “Settle down, settle down. We’ll go to my suite. It’s closer, and we can have a drink. Mary’s office is shockingly short on Scotch.”

We walked wordlessly down the corridor, Jill unzipping her ski jacket, climbing out of it, her face blank, but blank in a way that I knew meant anger. Whether the cause of that was the intrusion of Rath’s death upon our more or less pleasant afternoon, or her dislike of Mary Wright, I couldn’t say. And I wasn’t about to ask.

Curt unlocked the room. We stood out in the hall as he went in. I caught a glimpse of his wife Kim, napping on the bed in a lacy slip, her bosom half-spilling out, heaving with sleep; she was a beautiful woman, but I didn’t give a damn. Violent death puts a damper on my libido.

A few minutes later, Kim exited, wearing a turtleneck sweater and slacks and a dazed expression. She smiled sleepily.

“Curt said you wanted some privacy,” she said. “Ours is not to reason why...” And she shrugged and waved and went away.

We went in. I unsnapped my jacket and found a chair to lay it on. Curt was pouring himself a glass of Scotch over at the table that served as a makeshift bar. Some vodka and bourbon and various bottles of soda were there as well.

“Can I get anyone anything?” he asked.

Mary Wright said no, and Jill went over and poured herself a couple fingers of bourbon. I asked him for some Scotch.

“On the rocks?” he asked.

Boy did that conjure the wrong image. I shivered and said, “Straight up will do. Just a little. I just want to warm up inside.”

Jill stood looking at the orange and yellow and red painting that leaned in its frame against the wall above the fireplace; its whirlpool effect seemed to draw her in. Then she pulled away and downed the bourbon in a couple of belts.

Curt sat on the edge of the bed, swirling his Scotch in his glass; Mary Wright stood nearby. So did I. Jill and her bourbon lurked back by the painting.

“Mal,” Curt said. “Before we get into this, I’d like to say I can understand your wanting to stage some sort of reprisal. You’re stubborn and you don’t like to be had. I can understand that. But you’re having fun this weekend, aren’t you? Let it go at that.”

Mary said, “What are you talking about?”

Curt said, “Do you mind if I tell her?”

“Go ahead,” I said.

And he did. His version, of course, treated what I’d seen last night out my window as if its being a prank were an established fact.

But when he finished, I said, “What I saw was not a prank. Kirk Rath really is dead.”

Curt smirked and sighed as if both amused and frustrated by the behavior of an irrepressible child; Mary Wright’s eyes again narrowed, and she tilted her head to one side, brunette hair swinging.

I told them, slowly, carefully, what Jill and I had seen.

“You’re serious,” Curt said, though not sure yet.

“Deadly fucking,” I said.

“Quit saying that word,” Mary said, suddenly irritated.

“ I’m the one who said it before,” Jill said.

Mary whirled on Jill. “Why don’t you just shut up?”

Jill said, “What are you going to do about it?”

“What do you want me to do? Pull your hair out?”

“I mean about the murder,” Jill said. Hands on her hips. “Don’t lose your composure, dear.”

Mary had nothing to say to that. Her face fell, and her rage went with it. Ashen, she sat on the bed next to Curt; they looked like lovers in the midst of a bedroom quarrel, not sure what move to make next. Curt had one hand on one of his knees, the other, with the Scotch, was in his lap. He was studying me.

“You are serious,” he said, as if he didn’t believe his own words. “This is not a joke.”

“It’s not a joke. It’s not a goddamn joke! Do we look like we’re kidding? Are either of us that good an actor?”

He looked at me hard and then he stood; Mary continued to sit, lost in worry.

He came and put a hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have laughed off what you told me before.” He was shaking his head; he seemed embarrassed and bewildered. “What can I say? I steered you wrong.”

“I can see how you thought what you thought,” I said. “I’ve been around these people today. I’ve seen how caught up in their game they are. How obsessive they are about it. I can see why you figured it for a prank.”

“But it wasn’t a prank,” Jill said. She was over pouring herself some more bourbon.

“So it would seem,” Curt said, shaking his head, more in amazement than bewilderment now.

“I should call the police,” Mary said, sick about it.

“Yes you should,” I said.

She used Curt’s phone. Before long she was talking to somebody called Chief Colby. I wondered if that meant he was head cheese.

Soon I was talking to the chief, filling him in.

“You’re a good observer, Mr. Mallory,” he said.

“Thank you. What do we do now?”

“Wait there at the mountain house. We’ll be right up.”

I hung up the phone. Outside the wind was rattling the windows, whistling through its teeth.

“Cops are on the way,” I said.

“Good,” Jill said.

“They’ll have a hell of a time,” I said, “getting up to Sky Top now.”

“It really is coming down,” Curt said with a fatalistic shrug, looking out the frosted window at the snow. “What was he doing back here?”

“Who?”

“Who do you think? Rath. He left last night — why did he come back and get himself killed?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted. “Maybe he only pretended to leave.”

“But why?” Curt asked. “And why would somebody kill him Thursday night, outside your window, in the broad moonlight, and then lug him up to Sky Top?”

“Beats me,” I said. “Hell of a place to hide a corpse — right out in the open where the next hiker will find him.”

“Whoever did it,” Jill said, “hauled the corpse up in Rath’s own car. Maybe to get both of them out of sight, just for the moment.”

“Just for that evening,” Curt said, nodding. “Perhaps the murderer did his — or her — deed and then took off.”

Mary seemed to perk up, just a bit. “You mean it wasn’t necessarily someone who was here for the Mystery Weekend?”

“Not necessarily,” I agreed. “It could have been somebody who followed him here, or came looking for him. His coworkers knew where he was going; it was no secret.”

The phone rang. Curt answered it, then held it out for Mary. “It’s for you.”

“Yes?” she said. “Yes? Oh... oh, really. Well, I’m not surprised... Yes, well, thank you.” She hung up and sighed and looked around the room at all of us, including Jill, shrugged elaborately and said, “That was the Gate House. The road up the mountain’s been shut down.”