Corpus de Crossword (32 page)

“And you buried her there?”

“I didn't know what to do; and I just panicked, I guess. I was only a kid. A kid in trouble. And I'd killed the one person I …” Milt stifled a sob. “The Quigleys didn't come back. Later, I found out they'd gone up to Maine to visit family. Their garden had been freshly tilled. Nothing showed. I took all Katie's things out of the room upstairs … After that, everyone assumed she'd gone to Hollywood, just like she'd promised to do.”

“And then Paula Flynn began to appear in movies.”

“If I hadn't known the truth, I would have sworn it was Katie—they looked that much alike.”

Another sob shook Milt's frame while Rosco placed his hand softly on the old man's shoulder. “You're going to have to be charged, you know that, don't you, Milt? There'll be a trial.”

“I know. It's been a long wait, but what I feel now is relief … the pure and simple truth is finally …” The words died away.

“Do you want me to call Lonnie? Or can I count on you to turn yourself in?”

Milt sat quietly and said nothing. After a few minutes, Rosco said, “Milt?”

“I'd like to tell May first. And Tree. I want them to hear it from me.” He stood, stepped off the porch, then turned back to Rosco. “I'm going to go talk to May … then I'll call Lonnie.”

Milt walked slowly down the street and disappeared around the corner. Rosco remained on the bench for another ten minutes, sitting quietly with his arms folded across his chest and pondering the situation. After a while Belle pulled up. He stood, walked down to the car, and dropped wearily into the passenger's seat.

“What was Milt's reaction to the news about Jacques Bazinne?” she asked.

He didn't answer right away, so she said, “Are you all right?”

He put an arm around her shoulders, then gave her a long and loving kiss. “I think it's time we went home.”

POST SCRIPT

Across

  1.  Trail

  5.  Echolocation device

 10.   Work with

 14.  Sore

 15.  Senseless

 16.  Rescue

 17.  A thought; part 1

 19.  Leg joint

 20.  Up and___, as a starlet

 21.  Bovine pacifiers

 23.  Explosive; abbr.

 24.  Garden tool

 25.  A thought; part 2

 29.  Lose one's luster

 30.  Was once

 31.  Broadway hit of '68

 34.  Boy

 36.  Ties up

 40.  A thought; part 3

 44.  Mold

 45.  Continental divide?

 46.  Regrets

 47.  Sch. grp.

 49.  Like some excuses

 51.  A thought; part 4

 56.  “Our Town” subdivision?

 59.  Chihuahua cheer

 60.  Greek peak

 61.  Gawker

 63.  Hibernia

 65.  Thinker of the thought

 68.  “___Is a Doggone Good Thing”

 69.  “Married to the Mob” star

 70.  Ruby and Sandra

 71.  British gun

 72.  Belonging to a certain Hardy heroine

 73.  Finishes

Down

  1.  Repair

  2.  Allergic response?

  3.  Topic

  4.  Blow up

  5.  Letter opener?

  6.  Billfold item

  7.  Civil rights grp.

  8.  Void

  9.  Turn scarlet

 10.  Question

 11.  Swahili, Kikuyu, Zulu, et al.

 12.  Shindig

 13.  Canine and wisdom

 18.  Bear in the sky

 22.  Take the helm

 26.  At ease

 27.  Breakfast, lunch, or dinner

 28.  Horseman of 1775

 29.  Shaved ice drink

 31.  Towel word

 32.  Damper dust

 33.  Playwright Levin

 35.  Turn scarlet

 37.  The Seine, basically

 38.  Compass point

 39.  '60's grp.

 41.  Active lead-in

 42.  Wood product

 43.  Russian range

 48.  Classify

 50.  Cat call?

 51.  Cowardly namesakes?

 52.  “The Radical” writer

 53.  Enthusiasm

 54.  It's often in dispute

 55.  Clubs

 56.  One of the Woodys

 57.  Surrendered

 58.  Lock

 62.  “Travels in the Congo” author

 64.  Dusk to Donne

 66.  Sighs of relief

 67.  Literary monogram

To download a PDF of this puzzle, please visit
openroadmedia.com/nero-blanc-crosswords

Turn the page to continue reading from the Crossword Mysteries

CHAPTER 1

To use the old Hollywood vernacular: Back in April, Chick Darlessen “couldn't get arrested.” Of the six pilot scripts he'd submitted to various television studios the previous fall, each and every one had been “shot down” by some twenty-eight year old “suit,” a person literally half Chick's age, with comments that had ranged from insensitive to downright abusive.

“… Chick, baby, honey, nobody's doing Westerns anymore. Who knows from horses these days? Horses-smorshes. They shoot them, don't they? Har. Har … We're thinking fresh, here, innovative. You want animals, they gotta be
cute
animals … Small animals … A talking weasel. Now
that
might be something
new
… And remember, it's the gal-pal market we're selling to. Maybe a
mother
weasel … A nag, yes, but no horses. Please.”

“… Darlessen, sweetheart, extraterrestrials in the Nevada desert? Been there, done that. Everyone has. Give us something that'll grab the viewers and won't let go. I'm talking figuratively, of course …”

“… The concept? Too pricey, Darlessen. It's also a big fat downer. You want a mature audience, you don't peddle death. No one likes a hero who croaks. No one needs a history lesson … Who's this Patrick Henry guy, anyway? ‘Give me liberty, or give me death.' Who talks like that? Nobody. Think interactive, Chick. We're selling corn flakes here. Oat squares. Fiber for a healthy diet. Give us something we can put in a box and you're gold, baby …!”

And so the litany had gone, all winter long and well into spring. Every studio “pitch” meeting Chick Darlessen's agent had arranged ended with a brush-off more callous than the last, sending the screenwriter further and further into the depths of depression, and deeper and deeper into debt. He needed work so desperately, and was so broke, he'd taken a part-time job with a phone-sales bank—a job at which he was spectacularly ill-equipped. While he watched his fellow “marketing consultants” sweet-talk their way into endless sales and commissions, Chick only heard the angry click of receivers dropping back into their cradles. Often he didn't even get a chance to name the product, and by the Fourth of July he was three months late on his rent.

But then, on August 19, something just short of miraculous had happened—his uncle, Bartann Welner, unexpectedly dropped dead. Chick was Uncle Bart's sole surviving heir; and although Bart had just turned ninety, they'd been close, living only a few block from one another for the past twenty years and taking lengthy walks into the Hollywood Hills on an almost daily basis. Until his sudden demise, Uncle Bart had been as healthy as an ox. In fact, the joke between uncle and nephew was that the old man might well outlive the younger.

Initially, the thought of financial gain from Bartann Welner's estate seemed slim. Uncle Bart had been no more affluent than Chick, living on Social Security and a modest Screen Actors Guild pension he received from doing film stunt work in the 1940s and 1950s. The funeral costs alone could have put Chick in the poorhouse, but two weeks prior to his untimely death, Bart had been the Grand-Slam Winner of one million dollars on the TV program
Down & Across
, a crossword puzzle-themed evening game show.

Uncle Bart had been a crossword “junkie” for as long as Chick could remember. He was born on the same day the first puzzle appeared in a newspaper: December 21, 1913, and could complete the Sunday
Times
puzzle in less then fifteen minutes—in ink. Bart was born to be the Grand-Slam Winner, and as Gerry Orso, the host of
Down & Across
, had said at the show's close, “Let's hear it, folks—despite his age, Bart Welner has kicked butt here tonight!”

The check for the million dollars had yet to arrive, but Stan McKenet, the producer of
Down & Across
, had informed Chick that it was “in the works”, and “not to worry. As soon as that show airs, the check is in the mail.”

And Chick wasn't worried. The payment would appear; an estate lawyer would perform his magical legal mumbo jumbo, and Chick would would have the lucre in his hands. But the real pot of gold, as far as Chick was concerned, wasn't the promised inheritance; instead, it lay inside a manila envelope he had found while clearing out his uncle's refrigerator. At first he'd assumed the envelope had been placed there to prevent something from leaking into a half-eaten bowl of moldy peanuts. But there were no apparent stains on the paper, and when Chick turned it over, he was intrigued by what Uncle Bart had handwritten on the outside:
ANATOMY OF A CROSSWORD
. Inside the envelope, Chick had discovered a neatly typed treatment for a TV movie of the week, and accompanying crossword puzzle, and a handful of articles clipped from newspapers published in Massachusetts and Vermont.

Chick never had any use for crosswords. He'd once tried to tackle one in the back of
TV Guide
but found he'd had no flare for word games. He was only able to wrangle two answers after studying the thing for forty-five solid minutes—and if he hadn't been a Larry Hagman fan, he wouldn't have solved the
Genie
clue. His mind just didn't move in a lateral direction. It had always been full steam ahead. But, after perusing Uncle Bart's treatment, Chick realized he'd hit the jackpot.

Less than a minute later, he was on the phone, punching in the numbers to his agent, Lee Rennegor. Given the screenwriter's current deplorable status, however, he was asked to “hold” for a considerable period of time before the great Rennegor himself got on the line. And even then, Chick wasn't permitted to speak.

“No more animals, Darlessen … No more monsters. No more messages. No more dead people—”

“Lee, this is good. This is the money concept. I'm talking possible series here. No, make that a
definite
.”

There was an audible sigh on the other end of the line. “You've never heard the term, ‘six strikes and you're out'? It's over. I can't get you in another door. The Chick Darlessen keys have been thrown away.”

Chick's lie number one:
“Lee, I've come up with a fabulous story concept. Movie of the week—or pilot … you call it. Get me into FOX, ABC, CBS, I don't care. A cable network? Showtime? That's all I'm asking, and I'll sell this baby in twenty minutes. Ten … Five, even.”

“It's over, Chick.”

“Lee, Lee, Lee, what are you saying?”

“I'm saying it's over.”

“I don't believe I heard you say that.”

“If you were listening closely, you would've heard me say it three times.”

“Lee, I can wrap this up in one word:
Crossword … Puzzle
.”

Lee groaned; no one said writers could count. Counting was the agent's job. “This doesn't have anything to do with your dearly departed uncle, does it?”

Lie number two:
“Nothing. Nothing at all. I came up with this completely on my own.” Chick silently nudged Bart's handiwork under the couch with his foot, somehow suspecting that Lee might be able to spot the envelope through the phone line. “This is hot, Lee. Just what the studios have been asking for. Interactive, smart, a cast you can identify with, people you can
feel
for … sexy, even … It's the whole nine yards.”