Ink-Slinger Murder Read online

  “People really hold him up as this big deal, huh? What happened?”

  “Couldn’t handle it, I guess. The fame, money, the pressure to perform. There could be any number of reasons. Some people, who shall remain nameless—Farmer,” Brian coughed the name into his clenched hand, “suggest that the old man just hasn’t gotten it in him anymore. And who can blame him for that? He produces some of the best novels of the last century, leaves a legacy that will outlast him, or any of us, then is gone. Who could ask for more?”

  “He seems kind of lonely, if you ask me,” said Cassy. “I’m not sure I’d trade one for the other.”

  This produced a satisfied chuckle in Brian. He raised his glass.

  “I’ll drink to that.”

  Chapter Seven

  Patty was close to ecstatic when Cassy handed her the signed Bogsnatcher novel. The girl alternated between clutching the tome to her chest and re-reading the inscription again and again as if it might change and she didn’t want to miss it.

  She really was getting too old to be referred to as a girl, but Cassy always thought of Patty as a kind of little sister. Naive, excitable and most of all a lot of fun.

  Somehow, she’d managed to get involved in the organization of the festival on a volunteer basis, as were most who were working there over the weekend. Receiving the book, complete with Caroline Cuthbert’s scrawl, had been like a brief island of peace in a maelstrom of chaos.

  “Oh Cassy, it’s all gone hectic,” said Patty leaning into her erstwhile boss. They were secluded in a little corner of an as yet empty makeshift stage erected in the largest marquee. It was to be the site of the author’s panel later that night, and already people were camping outside despite a several hours’ wait.

  “It’s always going to be hectic, Pats,” said Cassy. “You try running a store full-time.”

  “I do, don’t I?”

  There was no possible way Cassy could raise her eyebrow any higher without it looking like she was having a seizure of some kind. “Really? You take people’s money and occasionally restock the shelves. I appreciate what you do for me, but let’s not overstate things.”

  “You’re right. I’m not sure I’m cut out for this. The worst possible thing has happened.”

  What Patty thought was bad didn’t always tally with the actual worse thing possible.

  “What could possibly have gone wrong. Not enough chairs?”

  “If only. I’ve lost the star attraction!” Patty slumped.

  “Frowd will be here. He just doesn’t want to draw too much attention to himself. The crowds are probably putting him off,” said Cassy indicating the zombie-like collection of individuals massing at the entrance. Patty didn’t seem to understand what was being said to her.

  “Frowd? That old guy? Cass, I’m talking about Caroline Cuthbert.” She held the book up as a way of illustration.

  “Don’t worry about her, it’s all part of the act. She’ll show up late and get everyone’s attention. There’ll be sincere apologies and photo opportunities and then she’ll dominate the panel.”

  “You really think so?” implored Patty. “I said I’d be in charge of getting the panel together. My one job, Cassy, and I’ve blown it.”

  “You’ve not blown it. We’ve still got two hours.”

  All of a sudden, Patty tensed and grabbed Cassy by the shoulders. She looked right into Cassy’s eyes.

  “You have to go find her.”

  “Me?”

  “There’s no panel without her.” Patty was seriously underestimating the rest of the guests, each of whom Cassy knew would be far more entertaining.

  “I’m part of the panel, Patty,” said Cassy. “Do you want to be two people down?”

  “To be completely fair, and I mean no disrespect—” Patty started to say but was interrupted by Cassy slapping Bogsnatchers against her lips.

  “Okay, I’ll do it. You go wrangle the rest of them. I’ll track down the faerie woman.”

  The force with which Patty hugged her nearly brought both of them crashing down.

  “Steady!”

  “I owe you big time. Love you so much, Cass.”

  Most of the places people stayed at when visiting this little corner of the world had been booked out months in advance, including the out-of-town lodge and many places in the neighboring Nottingham. Such was the unexpected popularity of the festival. But for someone with as much clout, fame and above all money as Caroline Cuthbert, this had absolutely no impact on her whatsoever.

  Patty had given Cassy the address of a place in the suburbs, one of the larger modern builds that stuck out like a sore thumb among the colonial architecture that was so prevalent in Havenholm, but taken on its own merits, it was decent enough and certainly fit for the Faerie Queen. The house had apparently been rented at a not-insignificant cost, all paid for by the author herself. Presumably, the family who’d rented it to her had taken the opportunity to have a vacation, or maybe even booked a room for themselves. The price they could have charged for the weekend would have been astronomical. Cassy cursed herself for not thinking of it herself. She could have slept in the Spicery while visitors occupied her little apartment.

  The forecast had predicted rain, which would have been a welcome relief from the oppressive heat they’d been getting the last few weeks, but it was holding off for now. Cassy trudged up the short driveway to the front door still perplexed as to why she was on this errand and not Patty. Even Dot could have been entrusted with this kind of job.

  “Hello?” Cassy called through the door, her knocking having been ignored so far. Her calls too went unheeded, so she went around the back. Calls to the number she’d been given for Cuthbert were also fruitless, but as she neared the high fence of the back garden, Cassy though she heard a phone ringing. She dialed once more to make sure it was the number she was calling. She tapped redial then put her ear to the stained wood of the perimeter fence. Once more, a phone rang.

  The problem now was trying to get into the garden, or indeed the house itself, to see why Cuthbert’s phone had been abandoned. And if it hadn’t, why was the author willfully ignoring it? She sized up the fencing and found it far too tall for her to scale. Not that it would have been impossible for her to climb over, but rather she would have attracted too much attention. The sight of a woman too old to be climbing anything other than stairs hoisting her ungainly self into someone’s back yard was sure to draw more than a few unwanted glances. This wasn’t exactly a secluded area.

  There was another way in, but if she were caught, it would have caused far more problems. But with no alternatives in mind, Cassy decided that she had to resort to what she knew best.

  The fence was made of long strips of pine and smelled strongly of that particular scent. If the wood had been too old, her spell might not have worked, but it had clearly been put up relatively recently. Cassy placed her left hand against the wood, her palm splayed open. With the other, she retrieved a stick of chalk from her back pocket. This was in no way an extraordinary thing to have on her person. A good witch is never without three things, the primary of those being chalk. The other two are a closely guarded secret.

  Pinching the chalk between her fingertips, Cassy drew as perfect a circle as was possible on the uneven surface. She then marked out several ornate symbols that looked more like pictographs of animals than any kind of recognizable language. Having completed one at each of the points of the compass, she drew a slow and tightly wound spiral starting at the very center of the magical seal expanding outward until the pictographs themselves were obscured. As soon as this happened, Cassy withdrew the chalk and stepped away to admire her handiwork and to watch the tiny sprouting leaves emerge from the dormant wood.

  Timidly at first, like a reticent kiss on a first date, small budding leaves came forth all along the height of the vertical slats of wood. Then the slats themselves began to warp and reconfigure themselves. Although, this wasn’t so much changing shape as reverting to a previous
form. Where once there had stood planed planks of treated pine, there now grew new saplings. The spell wouldn’t last for long; Cassy estimated she had fifteen minutes tops before the weak spell wore off (she never had been very good at these types of nature incantations). Soon, the trees would twist back into their planned shape and the fence would be complete once more. Cassy squeezed through the small gap that had formed, glancing briefly to check that no one had spotted her.

  Chapter Eight

  The garden beyond was simple, little more than a carefully maintained lawn. There were no flowers or bushes, but a section near the house had been tilled over to accommodate a barbecue. Plastic garden furniture had been stacked up in one corner save for a single chair around which were sprinkled several cigarette butts. This was clearly where Miss Cuthbert had her “alone time.”

  She knocked on the glass of double doors at the back of the house. Curtains had been pulled, so she couldn’t see in. When she received no response, Cassy stepped back, frustrated.

  There was no sign of the phone Cassy had heard, so she decided to call it again. She looked around while the call connected and saw nothing else of interest. When the phone did ring, it was from behind Cassy, toward the house. She saw that a small horizontal window leading to the kitchen had been opened a fraction, and it was from through this small gap that she now heard the shrill ringtone. Taking one of the plastic chairs, Cassy climbed up to the gap.

  “Miss Cuthbert,” she said, aware that she looked sort of odd, balanced on one foot, craning up to the window. “It’s Cassandra Dean. The local author.” Cassy winced at the description. She really wasn’t an author. “We’re just concerned that you might—”

  For the first time, Cassy looked through the window to the kitchen beyond.

  “—not make it to the panel on time.”

  There was no chance of her making it at all. Cassy cupped her hands around her eyes to shield her vision from the sun and came up close to the window. Caroline was there alright, but It became all too obvious why she hadn’t answered Cassy’s calls.

  With a gasp, Cassy staggered back and searched for her phone only to realize that it had been in her hand. Flustered, she dialed Patty to give her the bad news.

  “Hey Boss!” came Patty’s eager voice. “Tell me that you have her and that she’s on her way.”

  “I don’t think Caroline Cuthbert’s going to make it, Patti.”

  Chapter Nine

  “What happened?” Brian questioned. “Tell me everything.”

  “Do you really need to know? Are you always this morbid?”

  “I’m a horror writer so, yeah. It’s my job.”

  “Alright. I’ll tell you. But I don’t want to see any of this on social media or even gossip around the festival. She deserves a little respect.”

  “A little. I agree.”

  “I don’t think the police want to announce anything until later. They say it’ll cause unnecessary panic. So, under your hat, okay?”

  “My hat, if I had one, is firmly secured to my head.”

  “Also, I think they want to get the festival out of the way before letting the cat out of the bag.”

  “Alright, alright. My lips are sealed. So tell me, did you see her?”

  “Yeah… I was at this house she’d rented. She hadn’t shown up yet, so somehow I was reeled in to go fetch her. I knocked and there was no reply, so I went around back and um… found a gap in the fence. I looked through the kitchen window, and there she was. On the floor.”

  “Just lying there? How did you know she was dead?”

  “No. She wasn’t lying down. She was sitting up, I guess. I mean, she was propped up against the refrigerator. Sort of slumped forward.”

  “Propped up? What did you do?”

  “I tried to get in. I thought I might be able to smash the window or something but apart from some plastic chairs, and a barbecue that was cemented into the ground, there wasn’t anything heavy I could use.”

  “Did you get in though?”

  “No. I just had to call James—I mean, Deputy Jones.”

  “James, huh?”

  “Shush. Do you want to know what happened or not?”

  “I do, I do. Carry on. Don’t mind me.”

  “So, I wait around for them to show up and I can’t tear myself away from the window—you know, looking right at her. It’s then that I see something. By contrast, it was dark inside so I hadn’t spotted it before, but clouds started to come over and it balanced out the light.”

  “So what did you see?”

  “There was something written above her head.”

  “Wait, —do you mean on the fridge?”

  “Yeah. Not in fridge magnets either. In blood.”

  “Okay. In-ter-est-ing. So…?”

  “Well, Deputy Jones gets there real quick, and we both went inside the house.”

  “Forget about that! What did it say?”

  “I’m getting to that. Let me tell the story.”

  “I can tell you do non-fiction.”

  “Again, shush. So, where was I?”

  “James took you in to get a look at the murder scene.”

  “He did. He smashed the back door glass with his gun, reached in and opened up. We went to the kitchen to see if she could be saved, but I knew it was already too late. Weirdly, the kitchen floor was covered in water, like about an inch. It was all mixed in with blood. I stayed out but James went in to check on her.”

  “Why all the water? Had a tap been left running or something?”

  “No, it was from the freezer. The lower half of the refrigerator was a freezer cabinet and the ice had melted, but get this—it had melted and poured out through a pipe that had been stuck through Caroline’s neck and right into the freezer. It must have hit something inside because it had completely defrosted. Are you okay? You look pale.”

  “I’m good. Just tell me what was written above her.”

  “Are you sure you’re okay?”

  “Cassy, I’m fine, but tell me: above her head, written on the fridge, was it ‘Creatures such as we…’?”

  “How—how did you know that?”

  “In her own blood?”

  “Apparently. But Brian, you have to tell me how you knew?”

  “I think I may have to start drinking again. The pipe, the fridge…oh man, the words. You know what this is, right? Do you recognize it?”

  “No, of course not.”

  “It’s from a book. Not just any book; this is straight out of Rise, Devil by one Maximilian Frowd.”

  “You serious?”

  “Believe me, I know my 70s pulp horror books, especially his. Not one of his best but you have to agree you don’t forget a scene like that.”

  “You have to be joking.”

  “I’ve got the book right here! I was going to get him to sign it. Damn, I should have done it before he started killing people. I won’t get the chance now. Not that he would have done it anyway. He kind of disavowed his early hack career.”

  “Will you please not joke about this. A woman died. Horribly.”

  “Sorry. You’re right, it just sounds so perfect, and I don’t mean that in a good way. I mean, it’s all far too elaborate to make sense. Why go to such trouble?”

  “You don’t think it was Frowd, do you?”

  “No I don’t. I really was joking. Damn, now I really do need a drink.”

  The festival continued as scheduled with one noticeable absence. The public was told that Caroline Cuthbert would be unable to attend the panel later that night, which had now been rescheduled. All but a few people were informed of the truth and those who had been briefed were asked to keep quiet until progress had been made in what was clearly an ongoing murder case.

  Of the authors due to speak at the panel, Cassy and Brian Vidor were the only ones with any knowledge of the truth. He’d been the first person she’d seen on her return to the festival grounds. She’d told Patty that Caroline hadn’t answered her repeated k
nocking and had probably decided that the country air was not for her. It wasn’t like the festival was going to impact her already best-selling book series. The implication that Caroline was behaving in her own selfish interests was perhaps unfair considering her true fate, but it sounded a lot more believable because of it.

  Chapter Ten

  A crime unit had set up operations in the rented house, but no outward sign of an investigation had been marked out. The Sheriff’s patrol cars had been moved away, and no police tape had been used. It was proving to be a more efficient way of keeping the public at bay than signaling that something bad had happened in the house. Everything looked normal for now.

  Cassy had left the house and was told by Deputy Jones to behave as usual, to attend the panel and not to mention the murder to anyone. She agreed that this was the best course of action, though inevitably, the news would get out. For now, it was in the interests of the investigation for the law to control the release of information. She thought it an odd oversight on her behalf that she’d almost immediately spilled the beans to Brian Vidor, but she felt comfortable around him. Her confession had proven useful too. His revelation about the origin, or at least blueprint, of the gruesome murder had got her thinking.

  Still feeling a bit shaky, her hands trembled if she was still for too long—Cassy waited in the Green Room at the festival replaying her discovery over and over again in her head. Brian had been there to comfort her but had left due to a prior engagement. So it was Jennifer Thatcher, looking like one of her own heroines, though thirty or forty years senior, dressed in a floor-length flowery blue skirt, who now took her hand.

  “I do believe that you have a severe case of the nerves,” she diagnosed having looked Cassy up and down. “Not used to public engagements?”