Bell, Book, and Scandal

She took over the largest table, forcing two women who were eating there to find other seats, and unfurled a couple of large blueprints. Gaylord found some canned drinks to hold down the corners. 'Come on, y'all. Don't be shy,' Vernetta bellowed.

A few obedient people eased their way toward the table.

'See? Here's the second floor,' Vernetta said. 'Ten bedrooms. The biggest for Gaylord and I, and one for each of the three kids. And six more for guests.'

'Gaylord and me,' Shelley muttered, turning her back on the scene Vernetta was making. 'Just imagine the absolutely spine-chilling horror of being their guests!'

Jane scooted her chair so she wouldn't have to watch, though they were forced to listen.

'This here room on the ground floor is a ballroom,' Vernetta went on. 'But we're gettin' lots of tables and chairs for when I set up giving writing lessons.'

Jane was hard-pressed not to put her face in her plate and weep.

'Finish your desserts and we'll replace our plates and round up some of the stragglers to sit at our table and mingle,' Shelley said. 'Maybe we can talk loudly enough to drown her out.'

Corwin, Sophie Smith's assistant, came into the dessert room, picked up two little pieces of bread pudding, and sat down at a corner table, first putting the other three chairs against the table as if he was saving them for someone else.

Vernetta dragged Gaylord across the room and grabbed two chairs, setting them upright and settling in. 'How swell of you to have kept chairs for Gaylord and I.'

Gaylord grabbed her arm again and whispered. Vernetta lowered her voice to his command, leaning forward and resting her enormous breasts on her crossed arms on the table while chatting to Corwin, asking him pointed questions about how Sophie was doing. In a few moments Corwin rose and leaned over Vernetta and said something to her.

Vernetta and Gaylord rose and left the table. The young man tilted the chairs back toward the table to finish his desserts. 'Toodle-loo, Corwin!' Vernetta said in a little girl voice as they drifted away.

'I wonder what he told them?' Shelley said. 'They don't look angry about being dismissed.' Jane said, 'He probably said they could talk

with her editor later in private, or some such tactful remark. I'm amazed it sunk into the Strausmanns' brains — such as they are.'

The two minglers Shelley and Jane had hijacked were trying to convince Shelley to buy a book by their favorite author. He apparently wrote very blunt and hard-boiled police novels, a type of literature Shelley didn't like.

Their new tablemates finally rose and left, giving one last order that Shelley buy the book they liked. As they departed, Jane looked around the room and realized the crowd was thinning a little. She and Shelley went for their third course of desserts, but there wasn't anything left that they hadn't already tried. They went back to the booksellers' room. Unfortunately, it was shut down for the night, so they had no choice but to either keep mingling in the lobby or go upstairs to the suite.

'I'm mingled out,' Jane said. 'And I want to have a good night's sleep so I don't look half dead in the morning. My first appointment is at nine o'clock.'

Eight

Sophie Smith had endured what were probably the three worst hours of her life. She'd had her stomach pumped because the first resident to see her thought she'd been poisoned. The full-fledged doctor who saw her next put it down to a virus and took blood samples. Between and after these ministrations, Sophie had spent two and a half disgusting hours in the hospital room bathroom. She was afraid of leaving the tiny tiled room for fear of disgracing herself.

By seven o'clock in the evening, she was finally able to crawl into the extremely uncomfortable bed.

She rang the hotel and gave her own room number. 'Corwin?'

'Yes?' her assistant said. 'Who's calling?' 'It's Sophie, you ass.'

'Sorry. You don't sound like yourself.'

'Of course I don't, Corwin. I've been through a wringer.'

'I've called the hospital three times and nobody

would tell me anything about your condition,' Corwin complained.

'They're insisting on keeping me in here overnight for observation. No point, really. I'm feeling better already.'

'Do they know what was wrong?'

'They have half a dozen theories. But I'm tempted to find where they've hidden my clothes and make a break for it. Whatever it was, I'm nearly over it.'

'Sophie, you must stay there. What if you have a relapse of whatever it was?'

She'd actually considered this and said, as if she were graciously taking his advice, 'I guess I might as well stay until morning, though I fear these horrible sheets will take a layer of skin off me. Meanwhile, Corwin, bring me that book bag, would you? And my purse. I need to show these people my health insurance card. Both are in the bottom of the closet. Make sure that thing Zac Zebra handed me is still in the book bag.'

'Let me look right now,' Corwin said.

He came back in a moment. 'Are we talking about the paperback book?'

'Yes.'

'It isn't in the book bag. Could you have put it somewhere else?'

Sophie, for all her bravado, knew she still wasn't quite up to par mentally.

'I may have taken it out of the book bag. I don't remember doing so. Perhaps I set it aside some-where. Take a good look around the suite and bring the bag and my purse,' she said, knowing she was whining.

'If you don't find it,' she went on, 'ask Zac Zebra to find another copy. I simply can't imagine being stuck here without something to read, and since I don't know where my clothes are, I can't even walk down to the gift shop. My hospital gown gaps in the back. Come over as soon as you can. And bring along a small bottle of Merlot. Carefully hidden, of course.'

Early Friday morning, while Jane was drying her hair, she was astonished when a phone rang in the bathroom. She hadn't even noticed it was there.

'Hello?'

'Mom,' Mike said, 'I've been told that you, Katie, and Todd all have cell phones. Why don't I have one?'

Jane laughed. 'Because you were in college instead of home the day I went haywire and bought them.'

'Are you still haywire?'

'Yes, but for different reasons. I'm at this mystery conference, as you obviously know because you have the telephone number to my room. I have appointments with two agents and one editor today.'

'I know. Katie told me. Congratulations. But about the cell phone…?'

'You'll be out for summer vacation soon. I'll buy you one then. Okay?'