Laura Lippman - Another Thing to Fall

He slapped a fabric-covered album on the coffee table with his left hand, holding fast to his gun with the right. So that was the scrapbook, the repository of his dreams.

“Over the years, we forgot about it, figured out no one ever saw it. But then this Mann of Steel show comes to town, and once Bob reads the pilot script, he’s sure it’s our story. Our idea was stolen and passed on to the son, but it’s still ours.”

“Phil Tumulty doesn’t send Flip birthday cards, much less give him ideas,” Ben put in, wan but defiant. “If Phil Tumulty had a great idea – and he hasn’t had one for years – he’d keep it for himself.”

“Shut up,” the man said, swinging the gun back to Ben. “Shut up. You’re the one who took our idea, you’re the one who gave it to Flip. Phil Tumulty never saw it because you took it . Say it. Admit it.”

Ben straightened up, although it took him some effort. “I would – if I did. But I honestly don’t remember. If I ever read your scenario, it was, what? Fifteen years ago? Do you think I sat on it all this time, while developing other shows, thinking, Boy, this Duchess of Windsor Hills is my golden ticket? I don’t remember it. Maybe I read it, maybe I didn’t. But… I… didn’t… remember… it, so how could I steal it?”

The man stood up, shaking all over, and Tess believed that he would have pistol-whipped Ben if it hadn’t required stepping over Alicia’s body to get to him. He was enough of an amateur to be squeamish. Good to know.

“There’s time travel, same as ours,” he said, holding up the index finger of his left hand. “A regular guy – factory worker in ours – involved with a royal woman.” Middle finger out, followed quickly by his ring finger, which had a slender gold band. “And, finally, there was the concept of the alterna-history, how things change if you disrupt even one tiny thing. You had Napoleon, we had Nazis, but it was basically the same.”

“Maybe,” Ben said. “Possibly. If I ever saw it – only I didn’t.”

That was enough to goad the man into standing up, crab-walking past Alicia’s body, and smacking Ben with the pistol. Ben’s nose started to gush blood, and he whimpered. Tess tried to get her hand inside her bag where her Beretta waited, safe and serene, but she wasn’t quick enough.

“Is that what everyone has been looking for, this letter written years ago? Is that the proof you needed to bring your claim against the production?”

“It’s not proof-” an unrepentant Ben began nasally, hands clapped over his bloody nose, and while Tess was impressed by how ballsy he was, she tried to cram a world of meaning into one stern look. Shut UP .

“We didn’t keep a copy. Bob didn’t even have a computer then. People didn’t, in 1992, and we didn’t think to photocopy it. We thought we were dealing with an honorable man. He kept calling the office, asking for a meeting with Flip Tumulty, sure he would do the right thing if he knew. The girls kept putting him off, although this one” – he gestured at Alicia’s body – “didn’t mind selling him the pilot script, so he could start working on the comparison chart that our lawyer recommended. But after that, she stopped taking his calls, made the other girl deal with him.”

Alicia had sold Wilbur “Bob” Grace the scripts, then taken Selene’s and Johnny’s money to wreak havoc on the set. Whatever one thought of her ethics, she was certainly entrepreneurial.

“So who found the letter, after all?” Tess asked.

“Ms. Sadowski. She called Bob, all excited, said she had found what he wanted. Then, two days later – she denied it all, said she was mistaken. I knew she was lying. But Bob gave up, and Alicia got fired, so she didn’t have access to Flip anymore. I had to get to the other one, don’t you see? I knew she had it, that she couldn’t destroy it. And once I got into her apartment, I was more sure than ever it was at the office, but I couldn’t go back there…”

Back there . Tess’s mind registered that. He had been to the office and Greer’s apartment. But it had all been for naught.

“Alicia found it, Friday night,” Ben said. “She was the one who planted the smoke bomb, then hid in the building until the firefighters left. Then she went into the office and found it. The only thing I can’t figure out is where, because I’ve been looking for it since Greer died.”

“The base of Flip’s Emmy.” Tess gave him a sad look, aware of the irony. “Lloyd dropped it just last night, and the band popped off, and I remembered how you said-”

“That Greer was always buffing Flip’s Emmy, that she had just brought it back from being shined up. Damn. I can’t believe Alicia figured that out and I didn’t.”

The man with the gun had grown impatient, or perhaps he felt frustrated that even a firearm couldn’t guarantee him center stage. “It was my property, with Bob gone. She had no right to sell it. But I came here this morning, and she said she was going to meet with Ben next, see what he was willing to pay, and that she would get back to me.” He was waving his hands as he spoke, getting more and more worked up. Tess didn’t think that was to anyone’s benefit. “ Get back to me . Do you know how many times I’ve heard that? Do you know how many times I said that, back when I had a job? I’ll get back to you . It always means they won’t, that you’ll have to call and call, and ask to speak to their supervisors.”

Tess gave him a chance to catch his breath, then asked: “Can I see it?”

“What?”

“The letter, the one you say you gave to Ben.”

“It’s not a matter of saying. I have photographic proof.” He gestured again to the scrapbook lying on the coffee table in front of Ben, then opened it with his left hand. He was being very disciplined about maintaining his grasp on his gun, much to her disappointment.

Tess looked. There indeed was a young Ben, in the background of a photo, which had been carefully labeled. GEORGE ON THE SET OF THE LAST PAGODA, SUMMER 1992.

“You’re George?” she asked. Fifteen years had worn much differently on this man than they had on Ben. Harder. Was it just that the trip from twenty to thirty-five was less fraught than the journey from early forty-something to late fifty-whatever? Or had this man weathered a much tougher fifteen years than Ben?

“I’d prefer to be called Mr. Sybert. I deserve that courtesy.”

“Okay, Mr. Sybert.”

Ben looked stricken, as if knowing the man’s name put them at greater risk. It’s not Reservoir Dogs and he’s not Mr. Brown, Tess yearned to tell him. For one thing, you’re not tied to that old sofa. For another, you still have both your ears. There was a dead body at their feet and the man had already revealed his relationship to Wilbur Grace. His name was small potatoes.

“So you came here this morning, thinking you were going to be given this letter?”

“Yes.”

“And you just happened to have a gun with you?”

Mr. Sybert hesitated, working through the implications of Tess’s question.

“None of this matters, Mr. Sybert,” she assured him. “I’m not a police officer, and this isn’t a confession. I’m merely curious. I want to know your side of things. Did you come here, knowing you would use violence if Alicia didn’t give you what you wanted? Or was it more like the night at the production office, where you lost control and killed Greer when she refused to listen to you?”

“I didn’t kill that girl,” he said tentatively, as if testing a story out. “She was dead when I got there. I started to search for things, but I got scared and left.”