Phillip Margolin - Sleeping Beauty

“What a pleasant surprise,” Maxfield said as soon as the door closed behind the guard, but he did not look pleased.

“Thank you for seeing me, Mr. Maxfield.”

“Credit my appearance to curiosity. Except for my lawyer, I haven’t had a visitor since I was sentenced. And I would never have guessed that you would be my first.”

“Are you being treated okay?” Ashley asked, trying hard to hide her anxiety. As soon as the words were out, she realized how inane the question sounded, but Maxfield took it seriously.

“Death row isn’t quite the Ritz, but I suspect I’m treated as well as one can be in my circumstances. The guards actually give me paper and pen and let me write. They probably assume that I’ll be more docile if I’m occupied.”

He smiled, but his face was tight. “You might be interested to know that I’m working on a novel about an innocent man who is unjustly sentenced to prison. I sent some sample chapters to my former editor in New York. He’s very interested but he doesn’t want to ink a contract if I’m going to be executed. The publishers are afraid that I won’t be alive long enough to finish the book. But enough about me. Why are you here?”

“I wanted to ask you some questions. If you answer truthfully I may be able to help you.”

“Help me what?”

“Get out of here.”

Maxfield cocked his head to one side and studied Ashley with renewed interest. “Why would you of all people want to help me?” he asked.

“I…I have some doubts about the verdict.”

“It’s a little late for that, isn’t it?” Maxfield laughed bitterly. “Thanks to you and Casey I’m a dead man.”

“You left out someone else who bears part of the blame.”

“Oh, and who is that?”

“You, Mr. Maxfield. You lied about key evidence. Your case might have turned out differently if you’d told the truth.”

“What are you talking about?” he asked warily.

“You lied about what happened in the boathouse. That’s the first thing. I don’t know why you did that but you did. And you lied about your novel.”

Maxfield colored and shifted uncomfortably in his seat. “My novel?” he repeated.

Ashley steeled herself and looked Maxfield in the eye. “You didn’t write it. You plagiarized the serial killer novel.”

“Who told you that?” Maxfield asked angrily.

“No one. I figured it out. One thing always nagged at me. You’re smart. Everyone says so. You had to be, to write so well. My mother went on and on about your books. That’s why she took your course. And I couldn’t figure out how someone so smart would do something as dumb as read the part of your book where the killer eats the pie to one of the few people in the world who would understand its significance. But once I considered the possibility that you didn’t write the scene it all made sense. You had no idea that the person who murdered my father ate that snack.”

Ashley paused for Maxfield’s reaction, but he held himself rigid and gave her none.

“I read the two drafts, Mr. Maxfield, and I’ve read your books. You wrote the manuscript with your name on it. That manuscript has the same style as A Tourist in Babylon and The Wishing Well. The man who killed my father and Tanya Jones wrote the other manuscript. The first draft is so different that it had to be the work of someone else.”

Maxfield still said nothing, but he didn’t stop her either.

“I was in court when Delilah Wallace played the tape of the interview Detective Birch conducted at the jail in Omaha. You sounded shocked when he told you that the scene you read to my mother was just like what happened in my house. You didn’t know. You could have told Birch that the book wasn’t yours then, but, as bizarre as it seems, I think you’d rather die than admit you can’t write anymore.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Is it? You failed at everything you tried until you wrote Tourist. Your whole identity was wrapped up in the success of that book. Instead of being a screwup, you were suddenly revered, respected, rich, and world-famous. Then The Wishing Well flopped, and you came up empty when you tried to write another novel. You had your moment of fame and you wanted it back. You saw the serial killer novel as your way to return to the top. Who wrote the first draft, Mr. Maxfield?”

“You think I can’t write anymore? You’re accusing me of…of stealing someone else’s work?”

“I know you did, and I think your pride kept you quiet. We all thought that you were this superintelligent genius writer, but I think you’re really a one-book wonder who would rather die than admit you stole someone else’s idea for a book because you couldn’t think up an idea of your own.”

Maxfield’s eyes dropped. He looked utterly destroyed.

“The reviews, those first reviews. They said I was the new Hemingway, the new Salinger, the voice of my generation. Everyone said it. The money came so fast, everything came so fast.” Maxfield’s face fell. “And it went so quickly. When The Wishing Well flopped, my editor told me it was the sophomore jinx; that I’d tried too hard. He told me to take my time with the next book and that I’d be back on top in no time. Only there was no next book. I couldn’t come up with a single idea. Every time I tried I came up dry. Then the money ran out and they sued me. After I was forced out of Eton College I couldn’t get a respectable job. Everyone knew about my drinking and the falsified résumé and what happened with that student. I had to teach high school, for God’s sake. My only way back was with a new book.”

“Who sent you the serial killer novel?”

“I don’t know. I was critiquing manuscripts for money. Even with my salary from the Academy I was barely getting by. This one came anonymously through the mail, with a cash payment. There was a post office box for the return address. I saw the potential immediately. The writing was crude but there was such power in it. Now I know why. It was real: the horror, the reactions of the victims and the killer, the writer had experienced them.”

“The author was bound to read your novel. Didn’t you think he would recognize it?”

“I didn’t care. I was at rock bottom. And I figured I’d win any lawsuit. I was going to destroy his manuscript when I was done, and I was the famous writer. I thought I was dealing with a nobody.”

“Why didn’t you tell anybody that you didn’t write the book after you were arrested?”

“I tried once. Right before I testified, I told my lawyer that I’d stolen the idea for the book. He told me that no one would believe me. He was right. The manuscript was next to my computer. My handwritten notes were all over it. My name was on every page of my manuscript.”

“What happened in the boathouse?” Ashley asked quietly.

Maxfield kept staring at the floor. He said nothing.

“What does it matter now?” Ashley asked. “You’re already sentenced to death. It can’t get any worse.”

“You’ve got a point there. You certainly do.”

He ran a hand across his face. “I didn’t kill your mother. Terri was dead when I walked into the boathouse.”

“Go on.”

“I was almost there when I heard the first scream. I froze. That scream was terrible. It paralyzed me.”

Ashley knew exactly what he meant.

“When she screamed again I went to the boathouse.”

“Did you see Randy Coleman running away?”

Maxfield shook his head. “I made that up.”

Ashley looked shocked. “If the police believed you, Coleman could have been tried for murder.”

Maxfield’s features hardened. “He deserved to be. He tried to kill you in the parking lot at Sunny Rest. I didn’t lie about that. And he murdered Terri when he was trying to kill his wife.”