'I doubt the Martian one,' Jane said with smile. 'I can't imagine Sophie Smith paying a for tune for a science fiction book.'
Seventeen
'It's odd about this page Zac was holding,'
'What's odd?'
'Many books these days have a heading on each page. You know, the author's name at th top of one page and the title of the book on th opposite page.'
Shelley checked some of the books she'd pux chased. 'You're right. I never noticed that. Bu this page doesn't,' she said, looking over Jane' shoulder.
'If we can't hunt down Zac or if he doesn't re member what the book was, we'll never know.'
'Will we care?' Shelley asked. ·
'I think so. I don't think that Sophie Smith's ill ness was natural, nor was the attack on Zac. Ei ther one could have died.'
'You amaze me. You don't think they were jus pranks? And Sophie could have just eaten a bad egg with her breakfast.'
Jane said, 'If you were eating a bad egg, you'd know it right away.'
'I just meant it as an example,' Shelley said grumpily.
'I think these two 'unfortunate' events are connected. Remember that Zac handed Sophie a book at the reservation desk. It must be the connection.'
'Did she then give it back to him and he was looking it over when he was attacked?'
'Maybe,' Jane claimed. 'Or it was another copy.'
Jane suddenly slapped her head. 'I know who might be able to identify it!'
'Identify what?'
'The page from the book Zac was reading. Or at least holding.' She went on to explain about the contest Chester Griffith had conducted, and the woman who won the prize. 'She's a teacher at a local college and teaches about the mystery and science fiction genres. Her name is…'
Jane screwed up her eyes and tried to bring the woman's name up. 'Mr. Griffith will remember,' she finally said. 'I'm going down to the desk and have copies of the page made. Maybe if they lighten it up a bit, the words at the end will be easier to decipher.'
'I'll come with you,' Shelley said, somewhat to Jane's surprise. It was the first hint that Shelley was accepting Jane's wobbly theory that the page meant something.'Make me a copy,' Shelley said when they ar-
rived at the front desk.
'why?”
'I'm not telling,' Shelley replied.
Jane went to find Chester Griffith. He was still at his book booth and was engaged with a collector who was arguing over the price of a rare book. Jane had to wait impatiently for the conversation to end, which it did with the customer accepting Griffith's choice of cost.
'I'm sorry to bother you…'
'You're not a bother. You're a good customer,' Chester said with a smile.
'I'm trying to remember the name of the young woman who won the contest, and I know your memory is better than mine,' Jane said with a smile
'She's LaLane Jones.'
'Of course,' Jane said. 'All I could recall was that the first name had two 'L' sounds. Do you think she's still in the hotel somewhere?'
'I should think so. She's on the list of attendees on the back of the program.'
'I've lost my program,' Jane admitted.
Chester leaned down and pulled an extra program from a hidden shelf. 'I always receive a cou- ple of extra ones.'
'Thank you so much,' she said. She headed foi the closest house phone and asked to be connected to guest LaLane Jones.
The phone rang twice and a woman's voice said, 'Hello?'
'Is this Ms. LaLane Jones?'
'Yes, it is.'
'I'm Jane Jeffry, one of the people attending the conference. I admired how much you knew about mysteries. I need to pick your brain, which I know to be an amazing storehouse. I was hoping you'd meet me somewhere, in a location of your choice.'
'How about the book room? Give me about ten minutes.'
'This is so mysterious,' Ms. Jones said when Jane snagged her and introduced herself. 'What do you need to know and why?'
'Let's sit down somewhere quiet,' Jane said, indicating a sofa in the corner of the room that was currently not in use by other readers. She handed the copies of the front and back of the page to LaLane Jones.
'I'm hoping you'll recognize these two pages. I'll keep as quiet as a mouse while you read them. And then I'll tell you why I need to learn who wrote it.'
Jane sat, as she promised, silently. She didn't look at LaLane for fear of making her nervous. Instead she studied the other shoppers. They were all fully engaged in looking for new or old books and handling them gently and respectfully. Jane wondered if some of them were like her, and once having purchased a book they felt they could treat it as their own. Breaking the spine so they could spread it and read while eating, holding the page open with a knife with a touch of mayonnaise on it.
'I have a very vague memory of reading this,' LaLane finally said. It's good that it's page 25 and 26. I think that's about as far as I read. It bored me senseless.'
'Me, too,' Jane said. 'Do you know who wrote it?'
'I might. It was a man, of course. That was back in the days when only men wrote science fiction. Or at least sold it. I've always suspected that some of the writers were women pretending to be men. Now it's different. Some women are at the top of the heap. I keep a book list that's always with me. I may have a record.'
'For a book you didn't even want to read clear through?' Jane asked.
LaLane smiled. 'Those are sometimes the most important ones to jot down, so you don't pick up another one by the same writer. Come up to my room and let's see if I can figure it out.'
As LaLane opened the small case containing the records of her reading, Jane realized how truly obsessive the woman was.
'I think I read this when I'd broken my right wrist and couldn't write very well.' She picked up the relevant notebook and started flipping pages. 'Yes, here we are. I can hardly read my own handwriting. It was titled something like
'Do you know who James Cuttler is?'
'I could make a guess, I suppose. It must have been one of about six or seven who kept changing names. There were a lot of hack writers back then turning books out under a great many pseudonyms.'
