AHMM May 2009 Read online

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  Cover by Fritz Kocher/Shutter

  CONTENTS

  Department: EDITOR'S NOTES: FOUL PLAY by Linda Landrigan

  Department: THE LINEUP

  Fiction: SHANKS GETS KILLED by Robert Lopresti

  Fiction: THE AMERICAN DREAM by J. M. Gregson

  Department: THE MYSTERIOUS CIPHER by by Willie Rose

  Fiction: DIGBY, ATTORNEY AT LAW by Jim Fusilli

  Fiction: HEAVY LIFTING by Jas. R. Petrin

  Fiction: DEATH OF A CONDO COMMANDO by Elaine Viets

  Department: BOOKED & PRINTED by Robert C. Hahn

  Fiction: THE CASE OF THE EXTRA VENTRILOQUIST by Ron Goulart

  Fiction: THE FABRICATOR by Jack Ritchie

  Fiction: EVIL BY DESIGN by Marianne Wilski Strong

  Department: COMING IN JUNE 2009

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  Department: EDITOR'S NOTES: FOUL PLAY by Linda Landrigan

  Word play and a macabre sensibility are the hallmarks of our annual humor issue, and this year's edition features eight delightfully dark tales. In Robert Lopresti's “Shanks Gets Killed,” mystery writer/sleuth Leopold Longshanks has the dubious honor of playing the victim in a “mystery weekend” fundraiser—but things start looking up when a real crime comes along to compete with the staged one. In “Death of a Condo Commando,” Elaine Viets—one of the wryest voices we know—explores the many potential horrors of home ownership. A tomato festival is the unlikely venue in which a willful aunt seeks a private justice in Marianne Wilski Strong's “Evil by Design.” And Ron Goulart, Jim Fusilli, Jas. R. Petrin, and J. M. Gregson also offer offbeat tales of misdeeds and misfortune for your entertainment. A special treat this month is a previously unpublished tale by Jack Ritchie, an AHMM stalwart from our earliest days until his death in 1983; “The Fabricator” shows why he was a favorite with readers.

  LINDA LANDRIGAN, EDITOR

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Department: THE LINEUP

  JIM FUSILLI writes music criticism for the Wall Street Journal. His latest novel, Marley Z and the Bloodstained Violin, a young adult mystery, was published by Dutton in June 2008.

  Comics historian and two-time Edgar Award nominee RON GOULART is the author of Good Girl Art (Hermes, 2008) and a series of mysteries featuring Groucho Marx.

  J. M. GREGSON is the author of the Lambert and Hook series set in northeast England, including A Good Walk Spoiled (Severn House, 2008).

  Booked & Printed columnist ROBERT C. HAHN reviews mysteries for Publishers Weekly and the New York Post and is the former mystery columnist for the Cincinnati Post.

  ROBERT LOPRESTI is a librarian and a Derringer Award winner (2004). His last story for AHMM, “The Hard Case,” appeared in April 2008.

  JAS. R. PETRIN contributes frequently to AHMM. His story “Car Trouble” appeared in The Best American Mystery Stories 2008.

  JACK RITCHIE is the author of more than a hundred stories for AHMM and the novel Tiger Island (University of Wis- consin Press, 1987).

  MARIANNE WILSKI STRONG's last story for AHMM, “A Private Battle,” appeared in the July/August 2008 issue.

  ELAINE VIETS is the author of Murder with All the Trimmings (Signet, November 2008). She lives in Florida.

  [Back to Table of Contents]

  Fiction: SHANKS GETS KILLED by Robert Lopresti

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  Tim Foley

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  Leopold Longshanks hated the whole idea of mystery weekends. He wrote detective fiction for a living, and did so with some skill, if he said so himself. So what made mystery fans think they could create new detective stories and act them out, as if they were the real thing?

  Shakespeare has a fan or two, but they don't dress up as Macbeth and Falstaff and start reciting new soliloquies, do they? If they did, they were at least courteous enough not to invite the Bard himself to participate.

  Nevertheless, Shanks was about to lose a weekend to just such a shindig. He had no choice in the matter, so all he could do was face it with good manners and good grace.

  "This stinks and I hate it,” he announced.

  "Tough,” said Cora. She was driving, having concluded that if he were at the wheel they might accidentally end up in the wrong county.

  His wife was the reason he was doing it, of course. The mystery weekend was the bright idea of the charity dedicated to eliminating the disease that had killed Cora's brother. In her eyes they could do no wrong. If Dixie Traynor, the madwoman who organized these things, decided one year that the charity's celebrity guests should come to some event dressed as frogs, then Shanks would have to get used to green paint or file for divorce.

  "I don't understand why I have to be the victim,” Shanks said.

  "Dixie was just being nice,” said Cora. “She knows you don't enjoy these parlor games, so she arranged for you to get your part done quickly. Then you'll have the weekend to yourself."

  "While everyone else is busy.” Maybe he could get some work done.

  "And besides, the people playing characters have to act, Shanks, and that's not your strong suit."

  Before he could respond to that slander she pointed. “There's the place."

  The sign said MOUNTAIN LORREL INNE. That was something else to get irritated about; people who thought it was cute to misspell words in business names. Probably had an Olde Tyme Kurio Shoppe too.

  The inn, or inne, seemed to have started life as a farmhouse a hundred years ago. Apparently the farmers had done well and added rooms over time. Now it was a determinedly quaint resort for city dwellers looking for a weekend free of traffic jams.

  Cora led Shanks through the lobby—heavily infested with calico and doilies—to where a giant of a man stood behind the counter. He seemed startled to see them, as if it were astonishing that strangers would come up to the check-in desk and expect to check in.

  He introduced himself as Walter Lorrel, which explained the spelling. Shanks wondered if Walter, who was built like a football player, thought of himself as Mountain Lorrel.

  Mountains aren't usually nervous, though, and Walter was. “Leopold Longshanks and Cora Neal,” he repeated, as he tapped on a keyboard. “Let's see. Are you staff or guests?"

  Staff? For a flabbergasted moment Shanks thought he was going to be asked to sweep floors and make beds. Cora figured it out first. “We're among the celebrity performers. I'm guessing that would be staff. The people who are paying to attend would be the guests."

  "Ah,” said Walter Lorrel. “Yes, you're right. Ms. Traynor asked that we put you in the west wing together. She thought—uh, you might like to be kept apart from the guest guests."

  Good thinking. The people who paid to come to this event would mostly be dedicated mystery fans, and God bless ‘em every one, but they could be unnerving. Especially the ones who thought that knowing your books meant they knew you.

  After Walter had given them their keys—big, old-fashioned things, which he managed to drop twice—and pointed them toward the east wing before his internal compass straightened out, they found their room and started unpacking.

  They were interrupted almost immediately by a knock on the door. Dixie Traynor was a bright-eyed little bullet of a woman, with her sho
rt hair dyed bright blonde. “Cora, Shanks! So wonderful of you two to come through for us.” She had just a trace of the accent of Georgia where she was born.

  "We wouldn't miss it for the world,” said Cora.

  Shanks smiled politely and let silence give consent.

  Someone cleared his throat in that artificial here-I-am way and all three of them turned to see a young man who had followed Dixie in.

  "Oh, everyone! You have to meet Chet Chaplin. He's the genius—” Her drawl made the word three syllables long. “—who made all this possible."

  The genius was in his twenties, with curly black hair and a pitiful goatee. He wore narrow, black plastic glasses with very thick lenses. “Pleased to meetcha."

  Dixie began to fill Cora in on the details of the weekend, so Shanks turned to the newcomer. “How exactly did you make this possible?"

  "Oh. I wrote the storyline for the weekend. Death in the Dark."

  "So you're a writer."

  "Me? No. I'm a computer programmer. But my hobby is RPG."

  Shanks's eyebrows rose. “Which is?"

  "Role-playing games. I write ‘em or play ‘em all the time."

  "I didn't know there were that many mystery weekends."

  "Mystery? Nah. This is small stuff. Mostly we do fantasy. Dragon slayers, vampires, and so on.” He frowned at Shanks. “It's a real pain writing plots for characters with no magical powers."

  "It's tough living without them too,” Shanks admitted. “So, have you read a lot of mysteries?"

  "Me? No. Dixie had me read the story lines from a few other mystery weekends. She said that was plenty."

  Shanks sighed.

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  After Dixie and her pet computer geek left they settled down to look at the descriptions of the characters they would be playing. Shanks's part was easy because, as promised, he kicked the bucket almost immediately. But Cora's profile filled many pages.

  She frowned at it. “This is awful."

  Shanks had been approximately one-half of a successful marriage for so long that the words “I told you so” didn't come near his lips, and barely brushed across his cerebellum. “Oh?” was all he said.

  "My character is a romance writer—"

  "Typecasting.” Cora really did write those, although she preferred the term women's fiction.

  "But her life is like the worst romance novel you ever read. No, more like a bad soap opera. Her high school sweetheart disappeared in a plane crash. Her first husband was killed by a hit-and-run driver who was never caught. She makes mysterious visits to a small town in Vermont every year—and I'm supposed to subtly mention that in conversations? How do you slip that in?"

  "I'm sure you'll find a way."

  She shook her head. “That boy Chet has no idea what he's doing. I should have let Dixie go ahead with her first plan."

  "What was that?"

  "Having you write it."

  Shanks decided to be grateful for small blessings.

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  By late afternoon most of the celebrities—mystery writers and their spouses—had arrived and were gathered in the parlor of the west wing for a pep talk from Dixie. Shanks and a few like-minded friends slipped out onto the balcony overlooking the apple trees that grew beyond the inn.

  "How the hell did I get talked into this?” asked Ed Godwen. He wrote techno-thrillers, and made more money than all the others put together.

  "Well,” said his wife Jean, “I think you're here because Shanks saved your fanny when you were arrested for murder."

  "Oh, jeez. That's right.” He turned a baleful eye on his friend. “Well, now we're even."

  "No question,” Shanks said.

  Ed lit a Cuban cigar. The inn forbade smoking, but he had unilaterally decided the balcony didn't count.

  "And why are you here, Ross?” asked Jean.

  Ross Perry—spy fiction—shrugged. “Cora. That woman is a force of nature."

  "This is her charity,” Shanks explained. “She can get quite pushy about it. If I were—"

  "Shanks!” The lady in question was at the door, calling sharply. “Get in here, all of you. They're starting."

  "Time to meet our public,” said Jean.

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  The guests had arrived in large numbers, each paying for a room at the inn, and a sum on top for the charity. Shanks looked around the big library, trying to separate the fans from the fanatics, and the would-be writers from the game-players who would have been just as happy at one of Chet's vampire-slaying parties. Each of them was now clutching a big canvas bag decorated with the charity's logo and containing the paperwork for their part of the weekend.

  Dixie stood up to welcome them. “I'm so glad y'all could be here. As you know, we're expecting a crime to be committed this weekend, and we're gonna need help from each of you to solve it. And the one who does so will win a beautiful prize. Show them, Chet."

  At the far end of the room there was a table loaded with pamphlets from the sponsoring charity. Shanks had noted that they were neatly divided between medical information and pleas for money.

  Chet stood behind that table. Now he dramatically lifted the lid off a silver salver, a gesture that had been repeated by thousands of butlers in thousands of bad movies. He lifted the contents, a small book with no slip cover and badly worn boards.

  "Ladies and gentlemen,” said Dixie, solemnly. “That is a first edition of Dashiell Hammett's masterpiece, The Maltese Falcon."

  There were appropriate oohs and ahs.

  "This rare classic was donated by an anonymous patron of our organization.” Dixie smiled. “Frankly, it's worth a bundle. And to win it, all you have to do is solve the crime."

  She reminded everyone of the rules. The writers-actors would be in character during certain specified periods and the guests could ask them questions only then. At other times, interrogations were strictly forbidden.

  At dinner the authors were under orders to spread out and be charming. Shanks sat at a round table with Cora and four of the civilians, as he found himself thinking of the paying customers.

  Two of them had stumbled in at the last minute. “Our plane was late,” the female member of the pair explained to Shanks. “And would you believe it? They lost our luggage."

  Shanks couldn't believe the plane part. “You flew here? For a mystery weekend?” Most of the guests had only needed to drive the few hours from the city.

  The woman—her name tag said RUTH WAHL—nodded. “It's my husband, Tom. He's a nut for these things. We go to half a dozen around the country every year."

  "Really.” Shanks was always fascinated by the thousands of little worlds that went on around him unnoticed. “Is there a circuit?"

  "Exactly. You'll see the same people at a lot of them. Some of them—” She indicated her husband with a roll of her eyes. He was talking to Cora, and didn't notice. “—get quite competitive. You can expect him to try and squeeze information out of you, even when you aren't in character."

  Shanks's character would soon be dead, but he wasn't supposed to mention that. “Isn't that against the rules?"

  "Tom says a real detective wouldn't care about rules, and wouldn't take breaks."

  "Oh, I think even Miss Marple had to nap, and to wash her antimacassars occasionally. I take it you're not as competitive as Tom?"

  "Not about this nonsense. No offense,” she added hastily.

  "Oh, I'm with you on the nonsense part."

  "I'm a photographer and I suppose I'm competitive about that. But art isn't about prizes, right?"

  "You may be asking the wrong person,” said a cheerful voice on Shanks's other side. He turned and found a smiling man in his thirties. He was wearing a three piece suit, which made him a tad overdressed for the occasion.

  "Shanks here was nominated for a major mystery award last year and didn't win,” said the smiling man. “So he may be a little sensitive on the subject of prizes for art."

  And nice of you to bring it up, th
ought Shanks. The stranger's name tag read PHILIP FALL.

  "It's an honor to be nominated.” Shanks had said it often enough to keep a straight face. “Are you a competitor, Mr. Fall?"

  "Call me Phil, Shanks. Yes, for a lark. The fact is, I'm a mystery writer too."

  Uh-oh. “Is that a fact?"

  "My first book came out last year.” He tugged promotional postcards out of his jacket and handed them to Shanks and Ruth, who had to put down their silverware to cope with them.

  "I don't recognize the publisher's name,” said Shanks.

  "Oh, I published it myself,” said Phil Fall, still smiling. “I got tired of the way the big companies rip off authors like us."

  Like me, thought Shanks. You're still a wannabe.

  He tried to turn back to Ruth, but Phil Fall was determined to talk writer-to-writer, even though half of the pair wasn't interested. Shanks tried not to be a snob, really. He wanted to be polite to aspiring writers—if the next generation was going to insist on arriving, he might as well be able to say he discovered some of them—but there was something about Fall's easy confidence that he had already earned a place at the grown-ups table that got right up Shanks's nose.

  All through dessert and coffee he had to keep reminding himself that this was a charity event and Mr. Fall was a paying customer.

  When Dixie stood up to announce the next phase he had never been so grateful to hear her voice. “It's time for the first act of our little mystery, friends,” she declared. “Please follow Chet into the library."

  This was Shanks's big scene. He sat down at a table at the far end of the room, and the celebrity authors lined up behind him, as per instructions.

  Unfortunately at the other end of the room Chet had decided to dramatically lift the dish cover again to show off The Maltese Falcon to a few of the guests. What a ham.

  Shanks called Dixie over. “Can you get your genius to stop distracting the marks?"

  While she shooed Chet, Shanks reviewed the pages in front of him. He was the only one of the celebrities with a prepared script. This was because he had to set up the plot for the whole weekend.