“Hamburger?” Randi asked, and Marisue nodded. “I’ll have a hamburger,” Randi continued. “You know how I like them.”
“With fries, potato chips, or steamed vegetables?” Marisue asked.
“French fries this time,” Randi said. “I think I’ve earned them.”
I had to smile at that. After what she’d been through today, Randi should have whatever she wanted in the way of comfort food. While Marisue phoned room service, I pulled one of the armchairs nearer Randi’s bed, making sure I was within an easy line of sight for her so she didn’t have to strain her neck to see me. Diesel, now completely relaxed again, lay stretched out beside Randi on the bed.
“Do you feel up to talking awhile longer?” I asked.
Randi nodded. “At least until my food comes.”
Marisue resumed her seat at the foot of the bed. “They said about twenty minutes. That means anywhere from ten minutes to forty-five, probably, depending on how busy they are.”
“I’m not going anywhere.” Randi grimaced. “What do you want to talk about, Charlie?”
“Gavin’s party,” I replied. “I want you to tell me whatever you can remember, both of you.” I glanced in Marisue’s direction, and she nodded.
“I’ll start,” Marisue said, “and Randi can break in when she has anything to add. We were the last to arrive, except for Lisa Krause who came in for a few minutes and then left, pretty early on.” She paused for a sip of wine. “The whole thing was awkward, of course, because no one really wanted to be there, except Gavin.”
“And Maxine,” Randi added. “You know she stuck by Gavin like a leech most of the time, when he wasn’t yelling at her to leave him alone.”
Marisue shrugged. “They definitely had a weird relationship, cooing and holding hands one minute, and the next spitting at each other like a couple of cats. Sorry, Diesel.” She raised her cup at him and then drained it.
“What mode were they in at the party?” I asked.
“They were hardly speaking to each other,” Randi said. “In fact, most of the time we were there, Maxine never went near him. Instead she and Sylvia sat together, whispering back and forth.”
“Were she and Sylvia really good friends?” I wondered whether Kanesha had found out anything useful from talking to Sylvia O’Callaghan.
“I’m not really sure,” Marisue said. “I think they’d known each other a long time.”
“They worked together about ten years when they were first out of library school,” Randi said. “Sylvia told me that. But then one of them took another job on the other side of the country, and they didn’t see each other except at the occasional convention.”
That was enough about Sylvia for the moment, I thought. “How were the other people there interacting with Gavin?”
Marisue got up to refill her cup. At the rate she was hitting the wine she might soon be a bit squiffy. Not your business. No, it wasn’t.
Marisue rejoined us. “About what you’d expect. No one was interacting with him willingly, as far as I could see. I certainly wasn’t. Gavin, of course, was going around, poking at each one of us, trying to get some reaction.”
Randi giggled. “Not literally poking, you understand, but if he’d had a stick, he probably would have.”
Marisue rolled her eyes at her friend. “Verbal poking. He knew we were all there because we were afraid of what he might do to make our lives uncomfortable.” She frowned. “It was a bit like waiting for a dangerous animal to come after you but hoping he would go after someone else instead.”
“I’m sorry you had to endure that,” I said. “He really was a piece of work, wasn’t he?”
“You’re not going to find anyone wearing black on his account, I can guarantee,” Marisue said.
“No, I guess not,” I replied. “What about the others? Can you give me some specifics about how they were dealing with Gavin?”
“I talked to a couple of the other women,” Marisue said. “Nancy Dunlap and Cathleen Matera. They were trying to avoid talking to Gavin as much as I was. He did come over at one point and make snide remarks about Nancy being a professor now with tenure.”
From my research into everyone’s careers, I remembered that Nancy Dunlap had degrees in biology and was a liaison to the chemistry department at her university. Cathleen Matera had no connection to the sciences that I could recall.
“How did she react to him?” I asked.
Marisue chuckled. “Nancy brushed him off. I guess now that she’s tenured, she’s not too worried about what he could do to her career. She’s pretty much set. When he started in on Cathleen, Nancy told him to back off. Surprised the heck out of me, but he did. I guess he figured he wasn’t going to get anywhere with Cathleen as long as Nancy was there. He glowered, but then he walked away.”
“Did he try getting at you?” I asked.
“Not right then. If Nancy hadn’t been there, he probably would have.” Marisue stared into her cup. “A little later, he caught me by myself. He did the usual things, stood too close, tried to touch my arms, you know the routine.”
“Disgusting,” I said.
“I finally used a few words that would have my grandmother spinning in her grave if she even suspected I knew them.” Marisue smiled grimly. “That pissed him off, and he left me alone after that.”
I decided not to broach the subject of blackmail with them, especially since Kanesha had that spreadsheet and would be working on deciphering it and trying to connect it with Gavin’s victims. That was definitely a task better left to a professional.
“You know, there was another person who didn’t seem all that bothered by Gavin and his remarks.” Randi shifted in the bed, and the pillow bracing her head and shoulders slipped. “Would you mind fixing my pillow?” She looked at Marisue, but I responded first.
“Thanks, Charlie,” she said. “Now, what was I saying? Oh, yes, Harlan Crais. He sat in one corner and watched most of the time. Looked to me like he was smirking. What do you think?” She directed her question at Marisue, who nodded.
“I thought so, too,” she said. “Maybe he’s like Nancy and has tenure. I don’t know, but he didn’t seem all that bothered by Gavin.” She frowned. “And you know, I don’t think I saw Gavin speak to him at all while we were there.”
“Maybe Gavin was avoiding him then but went after him later, once we’d left,” Randi said.
“Could be,” Marisue replied. “Well, let’s see, who was there that we haven’t talked about?”
“The other two men,” Randi said.
“Right, trust you to remember the men,” Marisue said. “I talked to Mitch Handler for a bit, mostly about his writing. I’ve read most of his books and was curious about a few things. He’s a nice guy, but boy, is he shy. It took a little while to get him to say more than four or five words at a time. I guess it’s a good thing he’s a cataloger so he doesn’t have to deal with the public at work.”
Mitch Handler interested me particularly, because he had a degree in organic chemistry. He served as liaison for the science departments at his institution, so he obviously had a connection to a chemistry lab. He was a dark horse, however, when it came to his connections with Gavin. They must have worked together at some point. This was another one Kanesha would have to dig further into, unless Randi and Marisue knew something more about him.
I recalled a remark Randi made during one of our conversations. I reminded her of it. “You said you’d heard something about Gavin and Mitch Handler, but at the time you couldn’t recall it. Can you remember it now?”
“Did I say that?” Randi asked. “If you say so, I guess I did.” She thought for a moment, then shook her head. “Sorry, my brain is too fuzzy right now. If I can recall whatever it was, I’ll tell you.”
That was frustrating, but I knew I couldn’t push her at the moment. Maybe by the time she felt ready to talk to Kanesha, she would have dredged it up out of her memory. I glanced at Marisue, but she shook her head. “Sorry, I don’t know what it was, either.”