“Oh, right,” Dad said. “Keep it discreet. Check.”
He nodded repeatedly, looked around to see who might be listening, put his finger to his lips, winked, and slipped away in a conspicuously furtive manner.
“Good grief,” I muttered.
“You’re some kind of detective?” Steele asked.
“Dad wishes,” I said. “He’s a big mystery buff. I wish I was the brilliant amateur sleuth he imagines me.”
“So you could get the glory of solving Porfiria’s murder,” he said.
“The hell with the glory,” I said. “I just want the cops to solve this as soon as possible. If I could help them, I would. All this notoriety isn’t good for Michael’s career.”
“I should think an actor would welcome the publicity. Especially when he’s cleared of any suspicion, as I assume he will be,” Steele added, with a half bow.
“I’m not sure even an actor benefits from the publicity of being a suspect in a famous homicide,” I said. “But I didn’t mean the acting; I mean his career at the college. In the real world, Michael’s an assistant professor of drama at Caerphilly College. The administration’s already a little dubious about offering tenure to someone who runs around on TV every week in a pointy hat and a black velvet bathrobe. A star turn on Court TV might finish his academic career.”
If this weekend’s notoriety hadn’t already, I thought, feeling a queasy sensation in my stomach. Or maybe I was just hungry.
“Are you hungry?” I asked. “I could raid the buffet in the green room.”
“I had breakfast just now, thanks,” he said. “But you go ahead. And if you need to lie down or something, feel free; you had a long night. It’s not like we’re swamped or anything.”
No, and it wasn’t because there were any particularly exciting panels, either. I poked my head in the main ballroom where a woman was presenting a slide show on Porfirian costumes to a sparse and apathetic crowd.
I checked my program. Yes, she was one of the twelve unlucky invited guests.
Then I realized that this wasn’t my program—I’d given that to Detective Foley. It was Eric’s.
He’d gotten signatures from seven out of the twelve invited guests—including the QB’s, which no one would be able to get from now on. I could use the program as an excuse to talk to the remaining five, several of whom I didn’t actually know. Not that I needed an excuse but this would put them off their guard. And I knew I could find a chance to talk to the rest, no problem. And then—
Of course, before I started interrogating people, I would need some idea what to ask.
I shook my head, and continued toward the green room.
At least I’d solved the mystery of where all the fans had gone. Most of them were milling about in the hallway and the lobby, trading misinformation about the murder and gaping at the news crews that had appeared, overnight, to besiege the hotel. Salome’s keeper loitered with the rest—the lure of staring at the media must be irresistible if he’d leave her so he could do it.
A blond reporter for one of the local network affiliates was talking earnestly at a camera in front of the main entrance and, out in the parking lot, a petite Asian woman was interviewing several costumed fans. The three red-clad musicians were singing a parody of “Car 54, Where Are You?” in the overly cheerful manner performers use when pretending not to mind the lack of an audience. Near the front desk, where the “Welcome to Amblyopia!” sign marked the entrance to the convention itself, another blond reporter was arguing with three Amazon security guards, while her cameraman stood nearby, holding his equipment at the ready. And, of course, several monkeys hovered overhead, watching intently. They seemed intrigued by any conflict or argument.
“This is a public place!” the reporter was saying.
“Not this weekend,” the senior Amazon said. “If you don’t have a ticket for the convention, you can’t come in.”
“Then I’ll buy a ticket!” the reporter said.
“Sorry,” the Amazon said, crossing her arms. “We’re sold out.”
“Sold out!” the reporter exclaimed.
The other two Amazons crossed their arms, too, as did the monkey perched on the shoulder of the taller one.
The reporter took a deep breath and was opening her mouth to protest when she suddenly began batting at her head and shrieking. Apparently one of the hovering monkeys had become fascinated with the wire leading to her head and made a grab for it, ripping the earpiece out of her ear and the lavaliere microphone from her lapel.
The reporter retreated from the lobby, shouting something rather incoherent about lawyers, rabies, and the First Amendment. One of the Amazons tried to retrieve the microphone and earpiece from the monkey, resulting in a lively game of tug of war, while the cameraman had begun filming some nut who’d shinnied up a pillar in the lobby and was doing something to one of the parrots.
I moved to where I could get a better angle and saw that it was Dad, teetering just below the lobby ceiling, his legs locked around the pillar. With one hand, he was waggling a piece of fruit, trying to catch the parrot’s eye, while the other hand held Michael’s cassette recorder as close to the parrot as possible.
“I don’t even want to know,” I said.
Chapter 23
In the green room, I scanned the occupants covertly while filling a plate with bacon and hash browns. Yes, several suspects were available for questioning, if I could think of anything to ask.
I scored another autograph for Eric and eliminated one suspect immediately. The mild-mannered elderly actor who played Porfiria’s chief counselor had only just come from the airport, and was all agog to hear about the QB’s death. I was a little worried that I’d get stuck answering his questions, but the bearded professor I’d seen lecturing several times Friday interrupted his monologue about the similarities between the modern TV series and Chaucer and barged into our conversation. After also signing Eric’s program, he began telling Porfiria’s counselor all about the murder with endless details. Though not, I quickly noticed, much accuracy.
A convention volunteer standing nearby saw the expression on my face and ambled over.
“Pretty amazing, isn’t it?” he murmured. “Just wind him up, give him a topic, and he can go on for hours.”
“Amazing, yes,” I said. “You’d think by now he’d have accidentally gotten one fact right, but so far he’s batting zero.”
“Well, what do you expect?” the volunteer said. “Last night we decided, for the good of the convention, to take him out for dinner and keep him away as long as possible. So we all drew straws and I was one of the ones who lost. We collected him at four, after his last panel, and we didn’t manage to dump him off again until two in the morning. He missed the whole thing.”
“So anything he knows about the murder is secondhand.”
“And probably wrong,” the volunteer grumbled. “Even if someone told him what really happened, there’s no way he’d stop talking long enough to hear it. His mouth doesn’t have an off switch, or even a pause button. God, what a night.”
“Your valiant service to fandom shall not pass unnoticed,” I said. “For that matter, the police might be mildly grateful that at least you’ve given one possible suspect a good alibi.”
“We could be persuaded to frame him, if you’d like,” the volunteer said. “We could suddenly recall that he made a very long trip to the bathroom, and came back covered with blood, complaining about a broken paper towel dispenser.”
“Sounds suspicious,” I said. I couldn’t decide whether or not to laugh—I wasn’t entirely sure he was joking.