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  Praise and critical acclaim

  for Death and the Lit Chick

  *“[In] her superior second cozy, Malliet’s satirical take on the mystery scene is spot-on.”—Publishers Weekly (starred review)

  *“Malliet excels at stylish writing very reminiscent of the golden age of British mysteries. A real find for old-school mystery fans.”—Booklist (starred review)

  “An absolutely delicious skewering of the world of mystery publishing and its none-too-savory denizens, Death and the Lit Chick is even wittier and more skillfully constructed than her Agatha Award-winning Death of a Cozy Writer.”—Denver Post

  “Delicious. Malliet is laugh-out-loud funny in describing the cadre of crime writers encountered by the sometimes-flustered St. Just.”—Mystery Scene

  “A good choice for readers who enjoy intelligent cozies and traditional mysteries.”—Library Journal

  “An entertaining diversion”—Kirkus Reviews

  “Readers who enjoy all things British, as well as a good whodunit, will find these novels just the ticket.” —Free Lance-Star (Fredericksburg, VA)

  “The writing is A+—smooth, clever (in the good sense) and a pleasure to read.”—Cozy Library

  “Death and the Lit Chick shows why classics never go out of style … Malliet belongs on your bookshelf.”—ReviewingThe

  Evidence.com

  Death and the Lit Chick: A St. Just Mystery © 2009 by G. M. Malliet.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any matter whatsoever, including Internet usage, without written permission from Midnight Ink, except in the form of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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  Any unauthorized usage of the text without express written permission of the publisher is a violation of the author’s copyright and is illegal and punishable by law.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  First e-book edition © 2010

  E-book ISBN: 978-07387-2015-9

  Book design byDonna Burch

  Cover design by Gavin Dayton Duffy

  Cover art © Lipstick/Radius Images/PunchStock, other elements © Comstock, Brand X, PhotoDisc, & Stockbyte

  Editing by Connie Hill

  Interior map by the Lewellyn art department

  Midnight Ink is an imprint of Llewellyn Worldwide Ltd.

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  Midnight Ink

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  Manufactured in the United States of America

  For my mother.

  Contents

  Acknowledgments

  Author’s Note

  Cast of Characters

  Map of Castle

  Part I: England

  PART II: UNITED STATES

  PART III: SCOTLAND

  Book People

  Alive on Arrival

  WALKABOUT

  DARKNESS FALLS

  AT THIRD SIGHT

  STIRRINGS

  A SIGHT TO SEE

  IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT

  DEATH’S DOOR

  THE GAME’S AFOOT

  PRACTICING TO DECEIVE

  SEARCH ME

  OUTCAST

  IN THE LIBRARY

  IN THE GARDEN

  IN THE PRESENCE

  JUST THE FACTS

  FEMME FATALE

  FIT FOR A KING

  DON’T BE A STRANGER

  THIS JUST IN

  I KNOW WHY THE

  JAYBIRD SINGS

  RUMOR MILL

  PURPLE PROSE

  DAUGHTER OF TIME

  AND THEN THERE WERE FEWER

  WITNESS FOR

  THE PROSECUTION

  SOMETHING WICKED

  EPILOGUE

  Acknowledgments

  My continued thanks to the staff of Midnight Ink for its thoughtful and inspired oversight.

  Thanks also to Muir Ainsley and Scott Hockett, for reasoned and considered answers to preposterous questions. Any mistakes in this novel are entirely my own.

  Author’s Note

  If you are familiar with Edinburgh and its surrounds, you may think you recognize Dalhousie Castle as the setting for this novel. While the stunning Dalhousie does exist, and shares certain features with my fictional Dalmorton Castle, it has not for centuries been, to the best of my knowledge, the scene of any murders. I have likewise altered many of Dalhousie’s striking architectural features and its layout to suit my purposes.

  The staff and guests of Dalmorton Castle live entirely in my imagination.

  Cast of Characters

  Kimberlee Kalder—Young, beautiful, and undisputed queen of the “chick lit” genre, she courted trouble wherever she went.

  Jay Fforde—A literary agent, Jay wanted to acquire Kimberlee as a hot new property—a property that might prove too hot to handle.

  Laurie—Jay’s assistant.

  Ninette Thomson—Like Jay Fforde, a literary agent. Her client Kimberlee’s success paid the bills; Kimberlee’s defection to Jay would not fill the bill for Ninette.

  Winston Chatley—A craggy writer of dark, brooding thrillers, but the thrill was gone: The anguished author was plagued with writer’s block.

  Mrs. Joan Elksworthy—an ex-pat transplanted to New Mexico in the United States, where she wrote mysteries set in Scotland. Like many others, she was baffled and chagrined by Kimberlee’s success—and more than a little jealous.

  Rachel Twalley—Organizer for the Dead on Arrival crime conference in Scotland, she said she never volunteered for murder.

  Lord Easterbrook—A publisher who, like agent Ninette Thomson, had put all his eggs in the basket of Kimberlee Kalder’s success.

  Magretta Sincock—A flamboyant, once-successful author. As she angled for a comeback, she viewed Kimberlee as both obstacle and threat.

  Detective Chief Inspector Arthur St. Just—Dragooned by his Chief to appear at the Dead on Arrival conference, the shrewd detective found himself co-opted into solving a nonfictional crime.

  Portia De’Ath—A mysterious beauty, both criminologist and crime writer. St. Just struggled to maintain his professional detachment in the face of his growing attraction to her.

  B. A. King—A publicist and firm believer in the maxim credited to P. T. Barnum: “There’s a sucker born every minute.”

  Annabelle Pace—B. A. King’s disgruntled client. A writer of forensic mysteries, she’d like to dissect B. A. King.

  Tom Brackett—An American spy thriller writer with a mean streak and a covert past.

  Edith Brackett—Tom’s downtrodden wife. The other attendees agree: The real mystery was why she put up with her ill-tempered husband.

  Donna Doone—Aspiring author and event coordinator for Dalmorton Castle and Spa, she may have been sharper than her prose would indi
cate.

  Florie Macintosh—A hotel maid, Florie had seen it all. Had she seen too much?

  Quentin Swope—A reporter with several tales to tell.

  DCI Ian Moor—From the Lothian and Borders police, an elfin man whose jolly demeanor belied a quick acumen.

  Sergeant Kittle—Moor’s gloomy sidekick.

  Sergeant Garwin Fear—St. Just’s usual partner in crime solving. His thatching course in Shropshire is interrupted by murder.

  Randolph—Dalmorton Castle’s bartender, and keeper of its secrets.

  Desmond Rumer—Earnest and attractive, he told the detectives about the real Kimberlee Kalder.

  Robert and Rob Roy—St. Just’s old-fashioned fail-safe.

  Elsbeth Dowell—Her tenure as maid at Dalmorton Castle was mysteriously cut short.

  “God, protector of innocence and virtue, since you have led

  me among evil men it is surely to unmask them!”

  —Saint-Just

  “Where both deliberate, the love is slight,

  Who ever lov’d, that lov’d not at first sight?”

  —Marlowe

  “A sad tale’s best for winter; I have one

  Of sprites and goblins.”

  —Shakespeare

  Part I: England

  I

  “What do you think? Poisoned Pink, or Pink Menace?”

  The young blonde woman of whom this question was asked adopted a pose of deep concentration, weighing the matter with all the deliberation of King Solomon presented with two feuding mothers. That the colors under discussion were nearly identical to the naked eye seemed to escape the notice of both women. The manicurist held the two small bottles aloft in the late winter sunlight streaming through the window of the trendy Knightsbridge beauty salon.

  “The Poisoned Pink, I think, Suzie,” the blonde said at last. “The other is so, like, totally last year. Positively no one in New York would be caught dead wearing it any more. Besides, Poisoned Pink sounds perfect for a crime writers’ conference, don’t you think?”

  Suzie nodded, bending to her task and laying about with an emery board. Give me an old-fashioned romance book any time, she thought. Barbara Cartland, now: There was a woman who knew which way was up with men and all. Lovely hair she had, too.

  “I’m getting an award from my publisher during this conference, you see. Did I tell you?”

  Only three times.

  Kimberlee Kalder, the blonde, paddled the fingers of one elegant, narrow hand in a bowl of soapy water as she lifted one elegant, narrow foot to examine the hand-woven gold brocade of her £900 ballet flats. “And for that and, well, other reasons, I want to look, like, to die for.”

  So there’s another man at the end of all this effort, then, thought Suzie. Thought so.

  “Not that I don’t always strive to look, like, really hot,” Kimberlee went on. “Image is, like, everything in this business, my agent says.”

  “I’m certain he’s right, Miss.”

  “She, actually. At least, for the moment.”

  Not really interested, Suzie asked politely, “When’s the conference, then?”

  “This weekend. I head to Scotland tomorrow. My publisher is treating his most successful—well, in some cases, just his longest-lived—authors to a few days at Dalmorton Castle and Spa during Dead on Arrival.”

  Seeing Suzie’s look of mystification, Kimberlee said, “That’s a crime writers’ conference held in Edinburgh every year. And, as I say, he’ll be handing out a special award to his most successful writer: Me.”

  “Me,” as Suzie well knew, was a favorite word in Kimberlee Kalder’s vocabulary. That and “I.” She was a big tipper, though—writing must pay bloody well.

  “I always wanted to write a book,” said Suzie wistfully. “Maybe I will one day when I have time. I’d write about me gran, during the war—”

  Kimberlee just managed to stifle a snort of derision, although she didn’t bother to hide the contempt that lifted her beautiful, chiseled mouth in a smirk. If she had a pound for everyone who was going to write a book when they could find the time—like they were going to pick up the dry cleaning or something when they got around to it. Really, people had no idea.

  Cutting off the flow of wartime reminiscence, Kimberlee said: “No one cares about that old crap anymore. Don’t forget—I want two solid coats of the topcoat. Last time my manicure only lasted two days. And watch what you’re doing. You’ve missed a spot.”

  “Must be all that typing you do,” Suzie said quietly. Kimberlee was her least favorite customer and there always came a point in their conversations when Suzie remembered why.

  “What, me? Type?” said Kimberlee, as if to say, I? Slaughter my own cattle? “I guess you’ve been looking at my publicity stills. ‘The Famous Writer at home, fingers poised over her laptop.’ But I have people who do all that. I mostly just dictate.”

  Really? thought Suzie. So what else was new?

  II

  News item from the Edinburgh Herald, by Quentin Swope:

  Book lovers wait in thrilled anticipation of this week’s Dead on Arrival conference, where fans and would-be authors gather to meet their favorite crime writers—in the flesh. Said writers will also be signing their books “by the hundreds,” conference chair Rachel Twalley tells this reporter.

  Among conference highlights is the anticipated appearance of hot young newcomer Kimberlee Kalder, who burst onto the crime-writing scene last year, quickly climbing the charts with her runaway “chick-lit” hit, Dying for a Latte. Kimberlee will be fêted before and during the conference by her Deadly Dagger Press publisher, Lord Julius Easterbrook, who must be thanking his lucky stars for leading him to Kimberlee. She may single-handedly have revived his moribund family publishing house.

  Other Dagger authors invited to push out the boat at Easterbrook’s exclusive gathering at Dalmorton Castle include Magretta Sincock, Annabelle Pace, and Winston Chatley—the stars of yesteryear. Rumor has it top agents Jay Fforde and Ninette Thomson, and American publicist B. A. King, are also on the guest list, along with ex-pat Joan Elksworthy, author of a detective series set in Scotland, and American spy-thriller novelist Tom Brackett. Also look out for newcomer Vyvyan Nankervis—a little bird tells me she’s really Portia De’Ath, a Cambridge don, and the author of a delightful series of Cornish crime novels.

  But it’s our little Kimberlee who is stealing the other crime writers’ thunder. Definitely, a publishing force to reckon with!

  III

  Jay Fforde had come to the conclusion that the invention of e-mail signaled the imminent demise of mankind. Even though his agency Web site stated explicitly “No E-mail Queries or Submissions,” every day his network server was nearly shut down by some berk trying to send him a 150,000-page manuscript by attachment. The ones that made it through went straight into his little electronic trash bin, unread. Even after fifteen years in the business, Jay was amazed at the number of people out there tapping away at manuscripts—each one, of course, a potential best-seller, according to its creator.

  The phone rang. A carefully screened call had been allowed through the bottleneck by Jay’s assistant. Jay picked up the instrument, first pausing to fling back a strand of the longish, sun-streaked fair hair that flopped in accepted head-boy style from a center part on his patrician skull. Many thought his wide-set eyes, high cheekbones, and sulky expression held a suggestion of Byronic decadence, a thought Jay liked to cultivate.

  “Jay,” came a confidant, female voice. A trace of an American accent flattened what would once have been called BBC English, before regional accents became the new Received Pronunciation. Immediately Jay sat up a little straighter. The voice of a beautiful young woman who happened to be a wildly successful, selling-in-the-millions author was a potent combination for any agent.

  “Kimberlee?” he said. Frightful name; it must come from her American side. Well, no one was perfect, although Kimberlee came close. “What a delight to hear from you. How wa
s the rest of the holiday?”

  His assistant appeared in the doorway, carrying a sheaf of manuscript pages. Jay impatiently waved her away, miming for her to close the door behind her.

  “… Bahamas are not what they were, but still—you should see my tan,” Kimberlee Kalder chirped on. “I just heard you’ll be at Dalmorton. How wonderful of Julius to include you. Of course, you rep what’s-her-name, don’t you?”

  “Magretta Sincock? Yes. For a short while longer, at least.”

  “Oh really?”

  “Yes. Damned shame about her books and all, but tastes change, and poor Magretta will keep turning out the same old thing. I mean, seriously, how many women can there be out there married to some guy who—surprise!—turns out to have shoved his three previous wives overboard during their honeymoon cruise? Anyway, Easterbrook thought it would be a good opportunity to mix business with a little pleasure.”

  “Good,” she said, lowering her silky voice to a purr. “I do think it’s time you and I had a serious discussion, too, don’t you?”

  Jay’s heart took flight at the words. If he could land Kimberlee Kalder as a client, well … He’d be running the agency in a year. The Troy, Lewis, Bunter, and Hastings Agency would become the Fforde Agency at last. And he could ditch his other clients, beginning with Magretta. Who would need them?

  Reluctantly, he tore his mind away from empire building. Kimberlee was saying something about train connections and reservations at the castle.

  “You’ll have to call today if you want to get near the castle spa,” she told him. “They’ll be booked solid from the moment this crowd of scribblers arrives.”

  “I’ll tell you what, Kimberlee. Why don’t I book a massage for you while I’m at it? My little treat, courtesy of the agency. I insist. What’s that you say?” He picked up a pen and jotted notes as she talked. “All right. So that’s a black mud envelopment treatment, an Aromapure Facial, a hydro pool session, and a sun shower treatment.” Feeling like a waiter, he asked, “Will there be anything else?”