Murder.com (4 page)

Seven

News

Reuben was right about the storm that broke in the city's newspapers Friday morning.
HEIRESS STRANGLED
the front-page headline in the
Post
screamed.
RICH GIRL'S VIOLENT END
was the
News
's take.
COURTLAND DAUGHTER FOUND SLAIN
was the
Times
's more sedate reaction. None of the coverage contained any speculation about the probable killer or a motive.

All three publications pointed out that the body had been in its resting place for several days and that the dead woman was the daughter of Daniel Courtland, “the reclusive Midwestern billionaire” and “well-known conservative” (the
Post
) and “right-wing biggie” (the
News
). The
News
also mentioned the earlier suicide of Daniel's wife, noting that “this is the second time the tragedy of violent death has come to the billionaire's doorstep.”

The
Times
focused on the victim herself, quoting John Sommers of Gramercy House to the effect that she had been a “brilliant young editor who would be much missed by the publishing house” and whose death came “as a total shock.”

No account mentioned the initial Hallie Miller puzzle that Daniel Courtland's identification had solved; the police had withheld that information.

“Dan's going to be fit to be tied,” Cynthia Frost told her husband as they ate breakfast and read the news accounts.

“It could be worse,” Reuben observed. “If the papers hadn't been so preoccupied with Dan, there could have been tiresome discussions about rape, the inherent unhappiness of the rich, and God knows what other nonsense.”

Daniel himself called before they had finished eating.

“I've checked with that Bautista fellow and they are through with me,” he explained to Reuben. “I'm going back to Indianapolis. Somehow the press jackals have found I'm at the St. Regis and have been hounding me. I've had the operator cut off their calls to my suite, but now there's a TV crew downstairs. Fortunately, they didn't recognize me when I went out for breakfast or when I came back. This is no place for a sane person.”

“I can't say I blame you,” Reuben replied.

“It's worse than the feeding frenzy back in Indiana when Gretchen killed herself.”

Courtland asked for Reuben's cell phone number so he could keep in closest touch.

“Can't help you,” Reuben grumbled. “I refuse to have one of those things.” He was going to call cell phones “the work of the devil,” but then checked himself because he might offend his straitlaced religious friend.

“Good for you. I only use mine in emergencies.”

Reuben sighed to himself. How many cell users excused themselves by saying they used them “only in emergencies”? Walking down any New York street seemed to indicate the existence of many, too many, “emergencies.”

“Do you think I can ask Eskill Lander to supervise getting Marina's body back to Indianapolis? I understand it may be a couple of days before the medical examiner's office releases it.”

“Of course. You want to call him or should I?”

“I'll do it. My daughter, after all.”

Daniel added a final admonition to be notified “immediately” if Reuben heard anything new. “I'll be running around a lot the next few days—getting ready for the 500—but you can always reach me on my cell. And for heaven's sake, Reuben, don't give out my number to any of those press people.”

That afternoon, Luis Bautista called.

“The computer guru here has been playing with Marina Courtland's laptop. He's found some pretty interesting emails. Can I come over?”

“Of course.”

The two men sat down in the Frost living room an hour later.

“Our guy's still working on her machine, but what do you think of this?” He produced several sheets of printed-out material and handed them to Reuben. The first was an email from Marina to John Sommer.

“He was her boss, I believe,” Reuben observed. “Or at least a colleague.” The message, dated ten days earlier, read:

John:

I'm sorry to have to resort to email to call your attention to the Darcy Watson plagiarism problem. But since you refuse to discuss the matter in person, I have no choice but to put my position in writing. As I have now told you three times, Darcy Watson is a plagiarist. I know she is the house's leading author (and moneymaker)—and the biggest diamond in your crown—but Gramercy simply cannot publish a work that contains lifted material. (I have no idea about plagiarism in Watson's earlier bestsellers, so I'm only speaking about the new novel,
Carry Me Back
, where I, frankly, have caught her dead to rights.)

As you know, since you hired me, though you may not remember it, I wrote a senior paper at Brown on the 1930s magazine fiction of some of our more famous writers, including Faulkner, Hemingway, and Fitzgerald. In my research, I went through dozens of back issues of
The Saturday Evening Post
and
Collier's
. When I read the proofs of Watson's new novel, something struck a bell in her homey chapter on a country Christmas during a blizzard. I went back and found a story by one Gere Dexter in a 1938 issue of
Collier's
; it's almost word for word the same as the episode in Watson's book. I've sent you a Xerox, but you seem to have ignored it.

I know you said the “coincidence” was a “detail” and one no one without my special knowledge was likely to pick up. But that's a dangerous game and, even though I'm a relative newcomer here, I can't let Gramercy's reputation be endangered in this way. You have to confront Watson. As I told you, there are other “folksy” chapters in the book that sound like 1930s magazine fiction but which I have not been able to trace. She may be the favorite novelist out there west of the Hudson, and the firm's biggest helping of bread and butter, but you can't let her get away with dishonesty.

Since you refuse to talk with me any further about this, let me (and I'm most unhappy to have to do this) give you an ultimatum: either confront, or at least agree to confront, Watson by the end of the day Friday or I will take this matter right to the top, to Ray Greene. Understood?

Marina

“Hmmm. Pretty damned interesting. Was there any reply?”

“No.”

“Further messages from her?”

“Just one, dated Friday, just a week ago, that reminded Sommers he had until the end of the day to comply with her request.”

“That's some timing. A message like that from Marina and hours later she's dead. What's the next move?”

“Looks like we need to have a talk with Mr. Sommers. You want to come along?”

“I don't see how I appropriately can.”

“We'll just say you're the late woman's lawyer.”

“Stretching things a bit, but all right. I certainly want to.”

“Let's end Mr. Sommers's week with a bang. I'll try to set it up for first thing tomorrow morning.”

“Should be interesting.”

“Interesting and maybe dispositive,” Luis replied.

Eight

John Sommers

Before meeting Luis on Friday, Reuben Googled John Sommers, marveling once again, as he did each time he connected to the search engine, how extraordinary it was to have all that information at his fingertips.

The entries for “John Sommers” were numerous. Reuben learned that he had been the subject of a recent
Publishers Weekly
profile of the “four hottest editors in American publishing.” The article linked him to another concerning the bestselling Darcy Watson, incredibly described in
PW
as the “post-modern Booth Tarkington,” whatever that meant. It also listed Sommers's comfortable stable of other authors, novelists, and a poet or two, several of them well known.

Google also served up a biographical entry that told Reuben that Sommers was forty-two; born in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; educated at Johns Hopkins and Dartmouth (PhD in literature); and married and divorced before he was thirty.

A couple of calls to friends in publishing informed him that Sommers was well known in book circles as an energetic ladies' man and seducer. He was rumored to have been spared harassment lawsuits at Gramercy House in at least two instances only by making cash payments. And close involvement with Darcy Watson, although she was at least ten years his senior, was also a topic of gossip.

Reuben relayed his findings to Luis when they met at four o'clock outside the Gramercy House headquarters in the new but unsightly building in the reconstructed Times Square.

“Times Square used to be the home of obscenity in the form of pornography,” Reuben observed as they entered the building. “Now it's obscenity in the form of new architecture.”

The reception area of the publisher, which more resembled the interior of a trendy airport terminal than a corporate headquarters, had a commanding eastward view of midtown. They were shown to Sommers's large corner office, where the view was even more spectacular, looking both east and south.

A police detail had already visited the offices that morning, but had not seen Sommers. The policemen's task had been to inspect the cubicle where Marina Courtland had worked. The police operatives had carried off the contents of her desk and her modest files, though they had not had time to examine what they had taken away.

“This is getting to be a popular stop for you fellows,” Sommers said to Bautista. “I hope, by the way, I can get out of here in time to get the 7:11 train to the Hamptons. I was going to take the 3:58, but so be it.” He was not happy. Then, focusing on Reuben for the first time, he glanced quizzically at him.

“This is Reuben Frost, a partner in the Chase & Ward law firm and an attorney for Miss Courtland's family.”

Reuben did not elaborate on—or correct—the description.

“Pleased to meet you, Mr. Frost,” Sommers said, without giving much evidence that he was indeed pleased.

“I'm a bystander. Just here to listen,” Reuben said. Sommers did not look convinced.

“I can't tell you, Mr. Frost, how shocked and sorry we are about Marina. Everybody here adored her—kind, smart, funny. I'm still not able to believe that she was murdered. Horrible. Just horrible.

“She wasn't here on Monday,” he added. “We didn't think anything of that, since she often worked at home. We did begin to worry on Tuesday when she didn't show up or answer her phone.”

“You didn't call the police?” Bautista asked.

“No, no. We didn't have any reason to suspect trouble.”

“Except that she'd been missing for at least two days?”

“She was a grown woman, Detective Bautista,” Sommers said testily.

“Let me ask a few more questions if you don't mind,” Bautista continued, pulling out his notebook for the first time. “Anything else you can tell us about her?”

Sommers heaped even more praise on the dead woman. In addition to the many virtues recited, she apparently had real promise as an editor.

“Let me give you one anecdote. New assistants here are always stuck with the slush pile. You know what I mean by the slush pile?”

Reuben nodded affirmatively. Luis did not, so Sommers turned to him and explained that the slush pile consisted of manuscripts sent unsolicited through the mail or arriving “over the transom, so to speak.”

“Marina found this wonderful manuscript in the slush pile—by a new novelist, Genny Josephs, called
Weatherman
, about the troubles of 1968.”

“I've heard of it,” Reuben said. “But haven't read it.” He didn't add that it was hardly the type of fiction that might tempt him.

“Big success, as you may know, Mr. Frost. It made her reputation here. Going to be a movie, too.”

“About Marina,” Bautista interrupted. “You say everybody liked her. She didn't have any enemies here?'

“None that I know of. Certainly none that would be likely to kill her.”

“How about male friends?

“I'm sure she had them. But I never met one. Our relationship was strictly professional.”

“You never were involved with her socially?” Luis asked, armed with the insight Reuben had given him about the man's dalliances.

“No, nothing out of the ordinary.”

Knowing that “ordinary” might have a special meaning for Sommers, Bautista asked specifically, but in a soft voice, if he had ever had any sexual involvement with Marina.

“That's a very personal question, Detective, and I rather resent it. But the answer is a very firm and definite no.”

But not for want of trying?
thought Luis, but discreetly refrained from saying so.

“How about disgruntled authors? Angry agents? Anything like that?” Reuben asked.

“Sounds like you know something about the publishing business, Mr. Frost. But the answer is no.”

“Let me ask a question about you, Mr. Sommers,” Bautista continued. “Where were you last Friday evening when Miss Courtland was murdered? April twenty-seventh? Exactly a week ago?”

Sommers once more looked nervous at the query, but again quickly recovered.

“As I nearly always do, I took the 3:58 train to Bridgehampton, where I have a little place, and stopped for an early dinner at Almond, a local restaurant on the Montauk Highway, just after six o'clock. Then I went home, probably about eight or eight thirty and, being the workaholic I am, read a manuscript until bedtime.”

“Did you eat alone?”

“Yes, as I often do on Friday evening. Just me and my martini.”

“And then you went straight to your house afterward?”

“You mean, did I leave the restaurant, drive two hours to New York and murder Marina Courtland, take her body to the East River, and dump it before driving back to Bridgehampton and settling in for the night? Really, Detective, you're wasting my time.”

“I'm sorry. But you were in Bridgehampton that whole evening?”

“Yes.”

“Can anyone verify that?”

“Of course. Call Jacob Weiner at the restaurant. Or the taxi service that took me home after dinner.”

After writing down the name and number of the taxi service, Luis thanked Sommers, closed his notebook, and made a motion as if to get up and leave. Then he produced a copy of the Courtland-Sommers email and said he had “just one more question.”

“What can you tell us about this?” he asked, handing the copy to Sommers.

Sommers looked stunned.

“I'm sorry you found this. I guess there's no such thing as privacy these days.”

Reuben and Luis waited while Sommers formulated a response, which he delivered in deliberate tones.

“I said I was sorry you found this, because it reflects badly on Miss Courtland. I tried to paint a positive picture of her for you and basically that portrait is a correct and accurate one. She did, however, have a stubborn streak. Often when she got an idea, she couldn't be persuaded to change it, no matter how convincing the arguments against it. Her charge of plagiarism against Darcy Watson was absolutely without merit. She's a totally honest woman I've known personally and professionally for many years. A completely upright lady, as you might guess from the type of books she writes.

“Marina took it into her head that Watson had lifted a chapter on Christmas in a rural snowstorm from some trivial magazine fiction written decades ago. Snow at Christmas, even heavy snow, is not exactly a copyrightable idea. But Marina got it into her head that Darcy was a plagiarist. And she was just plain wrong.”

“Did you ever discuss this with Ms. Watson?” Reuben asked.

Sommers gave him a look as if to say he should leave questions to the police.

“In general terms, yes. I told her there had been a far-out accusation against her, but that she should not worry about it. I didn't mention Marina's name.”

“Why not?” Bautista inquired.

“You may not know this, but Marina's father had taken up with Darcy Watson. I didn't want Darcy to think Marina was exacting some sort of revenge on her. I simply told her I would take care of the situation.”

“Not by getting rid of Marina Courtland, I hope,” Bautista said.

“Only in the sense that I was prepared to fire her. I trust, sir, when you said ‘get rid of' you were not insinuating that I had anything to do with her murder?”

Bautista did not respond to Sommers's question. Instead, he asked if there was an indication of how the girl felt about her father's new romance.

“It wasn't a subject she talked to me about. As far as I knew, she was approving, or at least not disapproving. Very possibly that changed when the plagiarism issue arose, but I really don't know.”

“Do you have a copy of the
Collier's
story Miss Courtland referred to?” Reuben probed.

Sommers again shot him a mind-your-own-business look.

“She showed it to me, yes. But if I had it, I threw it away.”

Bautista broke the tension by giving Sommers his card, with instructions to call him if any new thoughts about the murder occurred to him. Sommers was barely civil as they left his office.

“I think we caused some emotional distress in there,” Luis said when they were back on the street. “And thanks for your help.”

“I'm not sure Mr. Sommers would thank me. You think we'll see more of him?”

“Wouldn't surprise me,” Luis said. “Meanwhile, I'll have the Bridgehampton types checked out. And also try to find Mr. Facini. Two leads are better than one, right, Reuben?”

“If you say so, Detective Bautista.”

Back at the law firm, Reuben went to see Eskill Lander to recheck what information he had on Daniel Courtland's stepson.

“As I understand it, the only contact you've had with him was when he came to see you that time you told me about. When he wanted to crack the trust Dan Courtland had set up,” Reuben said.

“That's right.”

“And you have no address, no phone number, no way to locate him?”

“The best I can do is to find the address of the bank account where JPMorgan Chase wired his last payment.”

“Where is the bank?”

“I'd have to look in the file. I assume this has something to do with his sister's murder.”

“Yes,” Reuben replied. “I'm afraid I've become a bit involved.”

“Is that a good idea, Reuben?” Eskill asked, the tone of his voice indicating perhaps that he thought his colleague too old for meddling in such things.

“The homicide detective working on the case is a fellow I've known ever since Graham Donovan's murder here at the firm. And I really owe it to Dan to do what I can to help out.”

“Have it your way,” Eskill said, and then asked his secretary to bring in the Facini file.

“Here it is. The Bank of New York branch at Eighth Street and Second Avenue.”

“And you're sure you have no other information, Eskill?”

“Wish I could help you, but no, that's it.”

“Nothing about his so-called acting career?”

“Nothing, except his stepfather once said that's what he was supposed to be doing.” Then he asked if Reuben really thought Gino had killed his half-sister.

“Who knows? But given his feelings toward her and the nice increase in his net worth that occurs if she's out of the way, he certainly can't be ruled out.”

“Well, good luck. I guess we'd all be relieved if you and your detective friend can pin the crime on him. And I don't think Dan Courtland would be displeased, either.”

Back at his own desk, Reuben checked the Manhattan telephone directory and information for a Facini listing. There was none. With his newly acquired computer skills, he also checked a website that searched out telephone numbers. Again, no success. And nothing on Google, either.

Then he called his wife to tell her that he had nothing to report except that Gino Facini had a bank account in a Lower East Side branch of the Bank of New York Mellon.

“I'm a jump ahead of you,” Cynthia told him. She reported that both a boy and a girl in her office had a lead on Gino. If he had ever had success as an actor, neither they nor their friends had heard of it. But he seemed to be fairly well known as a performance artist with a pretty stable company called the Dockers, who appeared regularly in a loft on the West Side, overlooking the Hudson River. Further inquiry had determined that they were performing that very weekend, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

“You think we should go?” Cynthia asked.

Reuben groaned. “Well, we can't go tomorrow, with the damn firm dinner dance. But I suppose we could go Sunday. Not my idea of getting out more, but, yes, let's do it.”