The Christie Caper - Carolyn Hart [38]
“Hey, Annie. Relax. Today’s going to be fun.”
“I know.” She spread her hands helplessly. “It goes around and around in my mind. First, I think it’s just a prank—even if a vicious one. Then I get this icy feeling of panic, and I wonder if a killer’s just biding his time.”
“Cool it, sweetie. You aren’t the militia. Frank and Billy will be here every minute today, keeping an eye on Bledsoe. Nobody will try anything.”
“I hope not.”
“Come on, Annie. Smile. This is your great day, the start of the conference sessions. You’ve worked hard for months, now it’s time to have fun.”
It certainly was. She felt a spurt of resentment. Why had Neil Bledsoe come to her conference? Just to make some people miserable? It was a heck of an investment of time (a full week) and money (six hundred dollars, which included registration, meal tickets, hotel room, and conference fees) simply to indulge in petty harassment.
“Damn him,” she snapped aloud. She didn’t have to tell Max who had elicited her wrath. “What if he stalks around the conference like he did at Death on Demand, upsetting people, causing scenes? Or shows off, like he did at the fête?”
“What if he does?” Max speared a chunk of cantaloupe. “I know you want everyone to have a good time, but life is full of unpleasant surprises, and most people handle them just fine.” He reached for a second brioche, drew back his hand, murmured, “Actually, this is a holiday,” and picked up the roll. He didn’t, of course, put butter on it, opting instead for fruit spread. He bit into the brioche and mumbled, “Everybody knows he’s here now. No more shock value in that. The people who don’t like him are prepared. And consider this, only a few people even know or care who he is!”
Annie brightened and began to enjoy her second cup of coffee. Max had a good point. She ticked off one by one the people who obviously didn’t like Bledsoe. The editor with the stiff brush of graying black hair, Nathan Hillman. The sandy-haired, snub-nosed young man, Derek Davis. Both from Hillman House Publishers. Was that important, or a coincidence? The imposing, porcelain-pale agent, Margo Wright. The reserved and somehow pathetic author’s widow, Victoria Shaw. And, of course, Fleur Calloway. Funny, she looked like she’d seen a ghost at the fête yesterday. But she had known Bledsoe was on the island, even if she hadn’t acknowledged his presence at the bookstore. Something awfully grim there, from Emma Clyde’s viewpoint. But, Emma wrote mysteries. Perhaps she exaggerated the circumstances in her mind because of her fondness for Fleur.
Sunday afternoon during the fête, each of them had seemed linked to Bledsoe. But the linkage could simply be in Annie’s overactive imagination.
“We won’t let anything sabotage The Christie Caper,” Max insisted stalwartly, once again reading her mind.
Annie was all over the hotel in the next couple of hours: the gritty depths of the heating-cooling area of the basement because the air-conditioning was malfunctioning in Meeting Rooms A and B, the controlled hysteria of the catering offices for a last-minute check on that night’s dinner à la Lucy Eyelesbarrow, who functioned both as Miss Marple’s agent and as first-class cook in What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw!; the mob scene that was the registration table (Ingrid and her good friend and neighbor Duane Webb had the situation under control); the idyllic holiday atmosphere of the Palmetto Court where many conference-goers had elected to enjoy leisurely tea and crumpets while awaiting the opening session, when Lady Gwendolyn would speak on “Christie—Her Life, Her World, Her Work.”
Annie trotted happily from task to task. Everything was perfect—and perfectly ordinary. No evil under the sun here. And, glory be, Laurel had apparently switched allegiances. In odd locations, Annie discovered oddments of information about Christie executed in exquisite calligraphy. Taped to the paper towel dispenser in the ladies’ room: Christie began Death Comes as the End in response to a challenge from Professor Stephen Glanville, a University of London archaeology