“Twenty-seven.”
“Where’s your father now?”
“At the movie set.”
“Movie set?”
“They’re making a film of one of his books, shooting it at the Circle Y Movie Ranch south of town.”
“When will he be home?”
She looked at her watch. “Any time now. So what’s this about?”
Gideon made an effort to relax, smile. Guilt was starting to creep over him. He just wasn’t cut out to be a cop. “We’re trying to find out more about Reed Chalker, the man involved in the terrorist plot.”
“Oh, so that’sit. Wow. But what in the world does that have to do with us?” He sensed her anger starting to morph into curiosity. She crossed her arms, slid open a drawer in a side table, removed a pack of cigarettes. She lit one, exhaled.
Gideon thought of bumming, decided that would not be a cool move. She really was beautiful, and he was having trouble maintaining the cool demeanor. He forced himself back to the business at hand. “We think your father knew Reed Chalker.”
“I doubt it. I keep my father’s schedule. I’d never heard that man’s name until I read it in the newspaper.”
“Chalker had a complete collection of your father’s books. All signed.”
“So?”
“It was the way they were signed. To Reed, with affectionate regards. Simon.The wording suggested they might know each other.”
At this, Alida leaned back and laughed harshly, exhaling smoke. “Oh man, are you guys barking up the wrong tree! He signs all his books like that. Thousands of them. Tens of thousands.”
“With his first name?”
“It saves time. It’s also why he only uses the first names of the people he’s signing for. When you’ve got five hundred people in line, each with several books in hand, you can’t be signing your full name. This guy Chalker, he worked up at Los Alamos, right? That’s what the papers are saying.”
“That’s right.”
“So it wouldn’t have been a big deal for him to get to my father’s signings.”
Gideon felt a creeping sense of failure. Fordyce had been right: this was a dead end, and he was making a royal fool of himself.
“Do you have evidence of that?” he asked as gamely as he could.
“Go ask down at the bookstore. He does a local signing there every year, they’ll confirm it. He signs all his books Simonor Simon B.and writes either With Affectionor Warmest Regards.To every Tom, Dick, and Harry in line. It has nothing to do with friendship.”
“I see.”
“Is this the kind of half-assed investigation you people are running?” she said, all hostility gone now, leaving amusement and scorn in their place. “And you’re up against terrorists with a nuke? That scares the shit out of me.”
“We have to follow up every lead,” said Gideon. He took out Chalker’s picture. “If you could just look at this and see if you recognize it?”
She looked at it, squinted, then looked more closely. Her whole face changed. “What do you know. I do recognize him. He used to come to all my father’s book signings in town. Kind of a groupie, buttonholed him, tried to engage him in conversation with a hundred people in line behind him. My father humored him because that’s his job, really, and he would never be rude to a reader.” She handed the picture back. “But I can tell you my father was notthis man’s friend.”
“Is there anything else you can tell me about him?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“What did they talk about?”
“I really don’t recall. Probably the usual stuff. Why don’t you ask my father?”
As if on cue, the door slammed and a man walked into the room. For a famous author, Simon Blaine was disarmingly small, with a head of white curls and a smiling, pixie-like face, as smooth and unlined as a boy’s, with a button nose, ruddy cheeks, and friendly, dancing eyes. A large smile broke out when he saw his daughter. He went over, gave her a hug as she rose—she was several inches taller than him—and then turned to Gideon as he rose in turn, extending his hand. “Simon Blaine,” he said, as if Gideon wouldn’t know who he was. He wore an ill-fitting suit a size too large for his slender frame, and it flapped as he shook Gideon’s hand with enthusiasm. “Who is your new friend, MD?” His voice, incongruously, was deep and compelling—although it held traces of a Liverpudlian accent, making the man sound ever so faintly like a baritone Ringo Starr.
“I’m Gideon Crew.” He glanced from father to daughter and back again. “MD? She’s a doctor?”
“No, no, that’s my nickname for her. Miracle Daughter.” And Blaine looked at Alida with evident affection.
“Crew’s not a friend of mine,” said Alida hastily, stubbing out the cigarette. “He’s an investigator for the FBI. Looking into the nuclear terrorist business in New York.”
Blaine’s eyes widened in surprise. They were a deep hazel-brown, flecked with bits of gold: a most unusual color. “Well, well, now. How interesting!” He took Gideon’s ID, examined it, returned it. “How can I be of help?”
“I have a few questions, if you don’t mind.”
“Not at all. Please, sit down.”
They all sat down. Alida spoke first. “Daddy, the nuclear terrorist who died in New York, Reed Chalker, collected your books. He came to all your book signings. You remember him?” She shook another cigarette out of the pack, tapped it on the table, lit up.
Blaine frowned. “Can’t say I do.”
Gideon handed him the picture and Blaine examined it. He looked almost like a leprechaun, his lower lip protruding in concentration, his white curls sticking out in tufts from either side of his head.
“You remember, he was the guy who used to bring a whole bagful of books, came to every signing, always at the front of the line.”
The lower lip suddenly retracted and the bushy eyebrows went up. “Yes, yes, I do! Good Lord, that was Reed Chalker, the terrorist from Los Alamos?” He handed the photo back. “To think he was a reader of mine!” He did not seem displeased.
“What did you talk about with Chalker?” Gideon asked.
“It’s hard to say. I do a book signing every year at Collected Works in Santa Fe, and we often get four, five hundred people. They go by in a sort of blur, really. Mostly they talk about how much they love the books, who their favorite characters are—and sometimes they want me to read a manuscript or they ask questions about how to break into writing.”
“And they often talk about what a shame it was that Daddy didn’t win that Nobel,” said Alida forcefully. “Which I happen to agree with.”
“Oh, bosh,” said Blaine, making a dismissive gesture. “National Book Award, Man Booker—I’ve gotten more awards than I deserve.”
“Did he ever ask you to read anything of his? He was an aspiring writer.”
“I’ve got a question for you,” said Alida, staring at Gideon. “You’re a physicist working for the FBI?”
“Yes, but that’s irrelevant—”
“Do you also work at Los Alamos?”
Gideon was floored at her insight. Not that it mattered; it was no secret. “One of the reasons I was asked to join the investigation,” he said in measured tones, “is that I worked in the same department with him at Los Alamos.”
“I knew it.” She sat back, crossing her arms and smiling triumphantly.
Gideon turned back to Blaine, once again trying to get the conversation off himself. “Do you recall if he ever showed you anything he’d written?”
Blaine thought for a moment, then shook his head. “No, he didn’t. And anyway, I have a firm policy against reading other people’s work. Really, all I remember of him is an eager, fawning sort of young man. But I haven’t seen him in some time. I don’t believe he came to any of my recent signings—did he, MD?”
“I don’t think so.”
“Did he ever mention his conversion to Islam?” Gideon asked.
Blaine looked surprised. “Never. And I wouldhave remembered something like that. No, he must have talked about the usual things. The only thing I really remember about him was that he was persistent and, as I recall, he always held up the line.”