Wanting Sheila Dead(19)
“That’s not true,” Bennis said. “And you know it.”
“Nobody suitable is interested in hiring me at the moment,” Gregor said. “I consult for police departments. There’s a reason I consult for police departments.”
“You don’t always insist on police departments,” Bennis said. “And I think this would be good for you. Good for you in every way. And it would get you out of your shell.”
“I’m not in a shell, and you just want a chance to go snooping around that television show.”
“What television show?” Tibor asked.
“I never snoop around,” Bennis said, “and if that’s all I wanted, I could get my brother Christopher to do my snooping for me. It would be good for you. And they asked.”
Tibor had a three-egg double-cheese omelet, two sausage patties, hash browns, and bacon. Gregor would have killed for any of it.
Linda Melajian came back one more time and leaned over to whisper. “They just asked me to warn them when it looked like you were about to leave. So you’re warned, if you get my drift.”
“At least it isn’t a reality show,” Gregor said.
“What reality show?” Tibor asked.
Bennis leaned across the table. “America’s Next Superstar has rented Engine House from my brother Bobby—”
“But I thought he’d lost the house,” Tibor said. “There was some settlement about securities law—”
“Well, yes, there was,” Bennis said. “But you know about Bobby. He’s—”
“A world-class con man,” Gregor put in.
“That, too,” Bennis said, “but he’s especially good at conning the government. Anyway, he’s had Engine House back for at least a year and a half now but he doesn’t live in it because, really, who could? It’s thirty thousand square feet and it was built before anybody knew anything about insulation.”
“Robber barons didn’t need to know about insulation,” Gregor said.
“Yes, I know,” Bennis said. “My great-grandfather was a robber baron. Whoopee. This is not news. Anyway, it’s sitting out there in Bryn Mawr, empty, and it’s huge and just the kind of thing for reality shows—you know, a ‘palatial estate’ as they put it—and so America’s Next Superstar rented the house. You know, to be the house where the girls all live and there are eliminations. I don’t know. I’ve only watched the thing once or twice—”
“Me, too,” Tibor said. “I prefer America’s Next Top Model. I don’t like the woman on America’s Next Superstar so much. She’s, she’s—”
“A dyed in-the-wool bitch,” Bennis said. “Yes, I know. I actually met her once, before she was reduced to doing reality shows. She used to interview for the Today show. Then she asked Katie Couric—on the air, I’m not making this up—she asked Katie Couric if the stress of being married to her was the reason her husband died of cancer. And that was that.”
“I think I heard about that,” Tibor said.
“Everybody heard about it,” Bennis said.
“So there has been another murder in your house in Bryn Mawr?” Tibor said.
“It’s not my house,” Bennis said. “It’s the family house, and Bobby got it in my father’s will. No, there hasn’t been a murder, or anything else in the house. It was before that, when they were doing the final auditions. They held them in this place in Merion, and somebody shot at Sheila Dunham.”
“Just shot at her?” Tibor asked.
“Well, in front of a crowd of people,” Bennis said. “Just stood up and shot at her. One of the girls who hadn’t been eliminated, I think. Oh, I don’t know. I really don’t. They arrested the girl, and she’s sitting in jail somewhere. She’s just been sitting there. She doesn’t ever talk, apparently. And she didn’t have any ID on her, so they don’t know who she is, and she isn’t saying. And that’s where it stands, I think. So the show asked Bobby to ask me to ask Gregor—”
“To do God only knows what,” Gregor said, “since there’s no murder here, and I’m not the kind of detective who tracks down missing identities. The police will figure out who this young woman is, eventually. They’re good at that kind of thing. And they have resources I don’t. There’s absolutely no point in my going around doing nothing particularly sensible—”
It was the tip of old Mrs. Vardanian’s walking stick that Gregor noticed first. All the Very Old Ladies used walking sticks, although most of them didn’t seem to need them to walk.