Free A Romantic Way to Die by Bill Crider Page B

the gunshots.”
    “Maybe he can use it in his novel,” Rhodes said.

11
    V ERNELL LINDSEY DIDN’T WANT TO TALK TO RHODES IN THE least. She told him that there was one more session, and she was going to attend it.
    “It’s about writing a screenplay,” she told Rhodes. “I can’t miss it.”
    Rhodes said he thought she could.
    “It’s about murder,” he said.
    “I don’t care if it is. I have to be at that session. It could be important to my career.”
    “Your career doesn’t matter right now,” Rhodes said. “Henrietta does.”
    “Henrietta’s dead.”
    They were standing in the big hallway of the main building, where most of the people attending the conference were loitering, waiting for the next session. Vernell’s voice was shrill, and people turned to look at them.
    “That’s why she matters,” Rhodes said. “Let’s go outside where we can talk without everyone looking over our shoulders.”
    Vernell seemed to realize for the first time that Rhodes meant what he said and that he wasn’t going away.
    “Oh, all right,” she said sulkily.
    They went out onto the porch. Chatterton took a look at Rhodes’s face and stood up.
    “I think I’ll go check the dormitory,” he said, and left.
    “Let’s get it over with,” Vernell said. “What do you want?”
    Rhodes wanted a lot of things, but he didn’t think Vernell would be much help with most of them. He said, “I want to ask you about a book.”
    “A book? Are you joking?”
    “I wish I was,” Rhodes said. “It’s not a published book. It’s a manuscript called A Romantic Way to Die .”
    “Never heard of it,” Vernell said, not very convincingly.
    “I think you have,” Rhodes said. “You might as well tell the truth because I’m going to be asking a lot of other people about it.”
    Vernell thought about that for a full minute. Then she said, “All right. I’ve heard of it, but I’ve never seen it. For all I know, it doesn’t even exist.”
    “It exists all right,” Rhodes told her. “Where’d you hear about it?”
    “From Henrietta,” Vernell said. “She took great pleasure in telling me all about it. She said that before long, everybody in Clearview and the whole world was going to know what kind of bitch I am.”
    “What did she mean by that?”
    “I assume she thought the book would be published. She always did have a high opinion of her own writing. Much too high an opinion, I might add. She couldn’t write a publishable page, much less a publishable book.”
    “It’s not that bad.”
    “You’ve read it?”
    “Yes.”
    “Well, you’re not the only one. I heard about it from other people, too.”
    “Who?”
    “Lorene Winslow, for one. She was practically Henrietta’s only friend. She’d read it. She thought it was funny.”
    Rhodes hadn’t thought so, but he could see how Lorene might get that impression.
    “Has Jeanne Arnot read it?”
    “I don’t know. Why?”
    “I just wondered. If Henrietta was planning to sell it, she’d need an agent.”
    “Not Jeanne. She turned down three of Henrietta’s manuscripts. Henrietta hated her.”
    Somehow that didn’t come as much of a surprise to Rhodes.
    “What did Henrietta have against Terry Don?” he asked.
    “You mean you don’t know?”
    “If I knew, I wouldn’t ask.”
    “You don’t have to get huffy. I guess I just took it for granted that the sheriff knew everything that went on in the county.”
    “Not this sheriff,” Rhodes said.
    “There’s no real reason why you should have known,” Vernell said. “It was all a long time ago. Henrietta and Terry Don dated in high school. And she got the idea that he was going to marry her when they graduated. It was sort of like her idea that she was going to be a writer, I guess, something that was mostly in her head.”
    All that was news to Rhodes, and it slightly changed the way he’d been looking at things.
    “Serena Thayer’s in the book, too,” he said.
    “Oh, my God. What does it