Everyone on this train i.., p.9
Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect, page 9
“McTavish blurbed Lisa?” She frowned thoughtfully. “That’s awfully generous. It could really broaden her audience.”
“They set it up as a surprise: she was shocked. On the verge of tears.”
“I can imagine. Well,” Juliette said, swirling her wine in an evil pantomime, “also no harm in sticking one up to Royce. See? Everyone’s at each other’s throats.”
We turned at the sound of a bang and the clatter of cutlery. Wyatt had smacked the table, causing the spoons to bounce. He was half out of his seat. “You can’t do that,” he was hissing over the table at Wolfgang, who was cradling his red wine, a smug and stained smile on his lips. “It’ll ruin—” Wyatt realized everyone was watching and course-corrected. “Sorry,” he yelled overenthusiastically, the way a kidnapper talks at a random police stop, body in the trunk. “Sorry! Got caught up in the excitement.” He pointed at Wolfgang. “New book. Sounds amazing.” He lowered himself back into his chair, still flapping his hand apologetically at the rest of the carriage.
“I didn’t think Gemini published Wolfgang.” Juliette frowned.
I pulled my hand from Juliette’s and rubbed my eyes. “I just can’t help feeling I don’t . . .” The words I’d found difficult to say before ran up against my teeth and rattled them, begging to get out. This time I let them. “I don’t deserve to be here.”
“You do. No one here’s any better than you are. You’re a good writer. You deserve to be here just as much as—”
“No. Jules. It’s not just here. I’m saying it feels like I don’t deserve any of this. Anywhere.”
She blinked in confusion and leaned forward. I had no choice but to keep talking, but I couldn’t look at her, so instead I stared out into the ink dark.
“Everyone who died . . . They didn’t do anything wrong. And I didn’t do anything special. So why am I here and they aren’t? I don’t deserve it over them. To sit on this train, to cash the royalty checks . . . I don’t deserve even—even this ridiculously expensive wine. It shouldn’t be me. Why is it me?”
“Oh, Ern.” Juliette didn’t say anything more, just sat in understanding, for which I was grateful, as I’d run out of words.
Writing it out now, I know why I felt so personally attacked by the other writers. We all have imposter syndrome sometimes, it’s not unique to novelists. No one is immune from trying to prove something to themselves. But here at the festival were five people who were trying to prove their worth creatively. And though it may seem like I was motivated by the same vanity, I was trying to prove something else: that when fate had decided that some in my family should die while I should live it hadn’t gotten it wrong.
My therapist gave me a name for it: survivor’s guilt. You don’t really see it that much in Golden Age mystery novels. The protagonists finish one book and then live in stasis before it all just starts again on page one of the next. There’s no cumulative impact of the sheer volume of death and violence they see; every crime doesn’t embed in their psyche, eat away at them at night. For all my wishes to be like those famous fictional detectives, I am haunted in a way they aren’t, asleep between when their authors pick up a pen. Miss Marple doesn’t have nightmares, is what I’m trying to say.
Having finally told Juliette, I felt a little better. The gentle rocking of the train helped lull me further, and our silence was comfortable. Most people had filtered out of the carriage, though Wyatt and Wolfgang were still there. Wyatt had what looked like a checkbook on the table and was tapping a pen on it. I couldn’t hear what they were talking about, but judging by Wyatt’s other hand curling the tablecloth and the pen not moving to create many zeroes, Wolfgang was not to be bought.
At last Juliette yawned. “I think I might pack it in. I want to get up early and catch the sunrise—Aaron says it’s once-in-a-lifetime stuff.” She nodded down the carriage. “Shall we?”
“I wish.” I grimaced. “I was hoping to bump into Simone in the bar. It’ll be quick.”
“Shit!” Juliette started patting herself down, despite the fact that what she was looking for would hardly fit in her pockets. “Her scarf! I left it behind at breakfast, completely forgot to give it back to her. Oh, damn. I’ll check if they have a lost and found in the morning, or maybe someone picked it up. Would you mind not mentioning it when you see her? Say I’m still using it. Not that I’ve lost it.”
I did mention Juliette’s forgetfulness would be a plot point. Here it is: a blue scarf changing hands. This grim pass-the-parcel ends in a corpse.
“So you are scared of her,” I gloated. She shot me a look that said, If you’re not going to help . . . , so I backpedaled. “At least it’s not going to go far. I won’t mention it. And I’ll try to be quick.”
“Not too late.” She kissed me. “And for what it’s worth, I’m glad you’re here. Right here. With me.”
The froth from an espresso martini sailed off Simone’s top lip and onto my cheek as she spoke. “It’s not that big a deal, Ernie. Let it go.”
“It is to me.”
“What do you want me to do? If you had a problem with it, you shouldn’t have accepted Wyatt’s apology.”
“I didn’t know what it was for!”
“Then why’d you accept it?”
I huffed. “I was being polite.”
“And the polite thing to do now is to drop this whole thing before you embarrass yourself.”
I exhaled heavily through my nose, counted three breaths in and out. Simone was like cobblestones: I very rarely put my foot down firmly around her. But it had been a hard day and espresso martinis aren’t known for their defusing properties. If we served them at political summits, there’d be a world war every three months.
I straightened my posture and cleared my throat. “All right. I’m your client. I hired you. And I am asking you to act on my behalf on an issue that I believe will have a negative effect on my career. Okay?”
Simone took a second to weigh up the seriousness in my expression, then snorted. “If I’d known you had a backbone, Ernest, our friendship might have blossomed earlier.” She put a flat hand on my chest and gave it a condescending pat. “I’m not going to talk to Wyatt about it, no way, but I am proud of you.”
“But you did talk to him—a guest heard you arguing. So what you’re saying is not that you wouldn’t do it, but that it’s too hard and you’re giving up?”
“Okay, fine. I raised it with him, like your pal heard. Trust me on this, though, Ern: no author wants to hear every conversation their team has about them. I tell you what you need to know.”
I deflated. “Do you even care about my career?”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Well, you seemed awfully chummy with McTavish and Wyatt this morning. After the review went up.”
Simone finished her drink and looked around the bar. Given the dawn start and the blackness outside, it was easy to think it was later than it was. Harriet and Jasper were having a drink in a booth opposite us. The president of the Mongrels, Brooke, was reading in the far corner. The only part of McTavish that had changed in the last hour was, repeatedly, the angle of his elbow. The three older women, two of whom had shared dessert with Juliette and me, were acting like it was a bachelorette party, sloshing drinks. Each had a copy of the same book out on the table, as if it were a book club, although the title wasn’t by any of the festival guests: The Eleven Orgasms of Deborah Winstock by Erica Mathison.
I knew that book. It had been a viral phenomenon. Too much sex to be mainstream, not enough to be considered outright pornographic, tittered about in enough salons and high teas to have sold well into the millions. If the established writers hated me, they’d surely despise Erica Mathison. The book had taken off on TikTok, which was both a social media app and the sound people like Royce must hear when new writers find new audiences in new mediums. The one I hadn’t met, hair twisted up in a silver beehive, was showing off her signed copy (To V!) with gold-bangles-jangling glee. It had the logo for Gemini Publishing on the spine and a sticker on the front from a Darwin bookshop—I knew the logo because I’d gone in there to shuffle my books to the front of the shelves, only to find none.
McTavish drew my attention with a thump of his cane. He slid off the seat and propped himself into a standing position. “Right! Off ter bed with this one.” He thumbed at his own chest as he called across the bar to Cynthia. A guest took the opportunity to dart up and cut him off, a copy of The Night Comes folded open, pen at the ready. I thought Brooke might follow suit, but Jasper was next to join the mini-queue. He didn’t have a book on him, so when it was his turn he stuck out a hand too early and then had to walk several steps with it out like a ship’s rudder until it landed awkwardly in front of McTavish’s belt.
“Jasper,” Jasper said.
McTavish gave him a murmured hello, but Jasper’s hand remained unshook.
Jasper coughed lightly. “Jasper Murdoch.”
“Yeah. All right. Hang on,” McTavish said. He fished a pen from his coat pocket and then took a cardboard beer coaster from the bar, scribbled on it and handed it to Jasper. “There you go.”
Jasper stood there a second, flipping the coaster over in his hand, then made his way back to his table and handed the coaster to his wife as he took a seat and a long sip of his drink. He looked like someone who’s just crossed the schoolyard to ask out a crush and depleted all their reserves of shame and energy simultaneously.
“To Jasper Murdoch,” Harriet read out from the coaster, then put it in her handbag. “Wow. That’s a keeper.”
McTavish ambled down the corridor toward the restaurant and his cabin further up the train, the heavy thump of his cane carrying through the thin floor with each step.
“Okay,” Simone said, after McTavish was out of sight and the rhythmic clunk of his cane was fading away. She spoke firmly, with a hiss, but in more of an I’m going to tell you something you need to hear tone than an admonishment. “Just so you know, we’re a partnership. You don’t get to tell me what to do. We’re supposed to trust each other.”
“I was just—”
She held up a finger. “I’m not finished. I know you’re upset. I get it. But I don’t need you involving yourself with McTavish, okay? I heard there’s a bit of tension between Wyatt and Henry. They’ve been in business directly for a long time—Wyatt snapped him up before any agent even got a sniff, and he still doesn’t have one. So friction between a certain author and a certain publisher might lead to opportunities for someone like me to work with someone like our Scottish friend. No offense, but I don’t come on a trip like this to watch the panels. If I get Henry on board, it increases the profile of my business. It increases your profile, by virtue of being a part of my business, like it does all my authors. And that’s when backs get scratched, and how someone like you might wind up with a blurb.”
“You’re trying to sign McTavish?” I thought aloud. “And of course Wyatt would hate that, because he’s probably got the Morbund books tied to a shit deal for McTavish. Or you could threaten to take him somewhere else, I suppose.”
She shushed me, scanning the bar to see if anyone had heard. “Could you be a bit more discreet about it? Jesus.”
“So you don’t want to make a scene about McTavish’s reviews because, what, it will ruin your chances of signing him if it gets back around? And I’m supposed to think that’s you doing me a favor?”
“No. I’m doing it for me. Of course I’m doing it for me. Ever heard of capitalism?” She looked at me like I was a moron. “But I’m saying it might benefit you as well. Long term.”
“Jeez, does everybody just steal everyone else these days?”
“Not from me they don’t. Don’t get any ideas.”
A thought struck me. “Who publishes Wolfgang?”
“Ah.” She ran through her mental Rolodex. “Brett Davis. At HarperCollins. Why?”
“Wyatt’s trying to buy him.”
“Really?” She snorted. “Didn’t think that was his style. Humph. Trying to add a bit of class to his list, I suppose. Balance out that crap.” She nodded to the book club table behind us, whose occupants were discussing Erica Mathison’s book with unbridled glee. I raised my voice to speak over them.
“Another thing: you said McTavish didn’t blurb.” I put a defensive hand out. “This bit isn’t about me, I swear. It’s just interesting.”
“He doesn’t,” Simone said. “I was just as surprised by that as you were. Either Lisa or her publisher has got some serious dirt on him, or he did it just for the look on Royce’s face.”
“Worth it,” I said cruelly. This was rewarded with a wry smile from Simone, which I took as a standing ovation.
The discussion of the soft-porn book had started to bleed over to our chairs.
“It’s . . . honestly, it’s . . . genius!” Silver Beehive said.
“There are so many layers,” her friend agreed. “Just true vision.”
The third kissed her fingers. “It’s a revelation!”
“Excuse me.” Simone leaned over the back of her chair to interrupt. “You’re not talking about that book, are you? The Erica Mathison?”
“Perhaps.” Beehive wriggled her neck, preening and offended. “Have you read it?”
“I haven’t,” Simone said, in a way that meant I wouldn’t.
“Well, it’s people like you who could learn a lot from this book,” Beehive said, to a chorus of sniggering from her friends.
Simone gave a tight smile. “Thanks for the recommendation.”
“Come on, ladies, I think we should finish our drinks on the smoking deck,” Beehive said, deliberately loud enough for Simone to hear. She stood and the rest followed suit, clutching their precious books. It was less of a dramatic exit than planned, given they had to gather their bags, books and beverages, but Silver Beehive still made the pretense of striding out of the carriage.
“Gee, the word genius is worn to threadbare these days,” Simone said when they were gone. “Veronica should know better.”
“Veronica? You know that woman? Is she another publisher?”
Simone gave me one of those I don’t know why I bother looks. “Blythe? Chief books critic for the Herald?”
I stared back blankly.
“She wouldn’t have reviewed you. Up a level—or so I thought. I wonder who she was with just now. Not critics.”
“They work in museums,” I said. “I met them earlier.”
“No wonder they need the raunchy stuff.” Simone slapped her knees. “Right. I’m off. Early start and all.”
“One more quick thing. Promise I’m done complaining.”
“Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Ernest.”
“Archibald Bench? Mean anything to you?”
She shook her head, sucking her teeth in a clueless fashion. “I mean, I assume it’s some kind of puzzle. That’s how you have to talk to Henry. To get his attention, to impress him, you have to use his own tricks. He loves codes and riddles and wordplay and all that Golden Age stuff. That girl seemed pretty desperate . . .” She spun a finger in the air, hunting a name.
“Brooke.”
“Brooke! The superfan. She seemed pretty desperate to impress, so she’d come ready to play his own game. It’ll be some kind of in-joke. A clue in the book or something. But I have no idea what it is. Now”—she stood up—“I’m off to bed. I hear the sunrise is to die for.”
Like all good mistakes, which are often made quickly and in volume, I careered through my next three before I’d even recognized I’d made the first. These came in the order of: ruminating in the bar until I was the last one there; having another martini while I did so; and deciding to confront McTavish.
I hadn’t quite decided on the last mistake until I’d stood up to leave the bar and gone in the complete wrong direction, finding myself in the empty restaurant carriage. That was enough of an omen that I decided my feet knew more than my head and continued into the next batch of accommodation, across the rattling gap where the carriages latched together, and through a door marked Platinum. The first set of cabins was on the opposite side of the train to mine, so the passenger windows would get the sunrise. The second was marked Staff with a small sign, and suffered the inferior western view, like my own. I could hear a loud banging sound, which I assumed came from the tracks or the restaurant’s kitchen, accompanying my steps. I soon came to another set of double doors and crossed the gap into the final carriage of our section. But instead of another hallway, I found myself in front of a closed door with the sign Chairman’s Carriage. It was the end of the line.
I wasn’t surprised that McTavish had the stateliest cabin, as close to the penthouse suite as you could get on a train, I suppose.
But I was surprised that I wasn’t the only one there.
Royce had his back to me. He was leaning into the door with his shoulder and banging a raised fist repeatedly against the wood. He looked like an unfaithful husband begging to be let back inside the family home. The smell of stale breath and beer wafted over me as I stepped between the carriages. The clatter of the tracks was louder at these joining points, where the floor was only gently overlaid and not sealed. A blur of gray stony earth was visible through the gaps, lit up every few seconds by the sparks from the wheels on the tracks.
“Henry!” Royce yelled, not noticing me. Thump-thump-thump. “Henry!”
The thumping was the sound I’d heard through the last car. I put my hand on Royce’s shoulder, and something like an electric shock passed through him. He whipped around and scowled. His eyes were bloodshot. He had a red mark above one eye, where he’d been leaning on the door.
“Pissssss off,” he said, spending S’s like he’d robbed a bank of them.
He lumbered at me, and I took a step back in case he took a swing, but he just stood there, swaying. He looked dejected, pitiful. Was that how I seemed to Simone? Grasping at dignity? This pathetic vision knocked some sense into me. I vowed to be more professional tomorrow.
