A Dark and Stormy Murder (A Writer's Apprentice Mystery) Read Online Free

thought I’d bring you a bottle so you can see if you like it.” He set it on a sideboard in a shadowy corner.
    “Well, that’s most generous of you. Thank you so much indeed.”
    He petted her dogs some more; they now looked almost puppyish in their devotion. Camilla smiled down at them. “Well, Adam, I have some work to do. Lena here has beenhired on to be my invaluable assistant, and we must sit down and evaluate the state of things.”
    “Of course, of course,” Rayburn said briskly. “I have to run anyway. Martin Jonas never showed up today, so we’re short a server. Well, I hope we’ll see you down at the restaurant soon.”
    “I daresay you will,” Camilla said regally, and Rayburn took the hint, saying his good-byes and making a quick exit. I watched him for a moment through a lead-paned window next to the door. He descended the steps in what seemed a dejected manner. Had we somehow disappointed him?
    “Are you ready to have our meeting, then?” Camilla asked me.
    I turned and nodded. With a strong sense of the surreal, I followed her through the dark hallway and into the sitting room with its crackling fire. At the far end of the room were some tall glass sliding doors, out of which was a view similar to the one from my bedroom window. The sky had grown a tinge darker. The other walls were lined with books, and a huge desk dominated one side of the space. Camilla went to sit behind this, and I sat in a purple armchair facing the desk.
    My hostess smiled briefly. “I trust you had a pleasant ride up to Blue Lake?”
    “It was quite nice, yes, although cloudy and gray. The last part of the drive was scenic. Leaving Chicago, not so much. Lots of trucks and expressway traffic.”
    “Ugh. I could never live in a big city for long.”
    “Did you live in London once? I thought I read that on a book jacket.”
    “Yes. For a few years, when my husband was living.” She was sorting papers as she spoke. She seemed to have piles and piles of paper; I wondered if she printed out all of her books for editing, or if she did some of it on the computer.
    “I always thought it would be very glamorous, living there.”
    “Hmmm.”
    She had made direct eye contact with me a couple of times when I first arrived, but now she seemed to be receding into deep thoughts and only peripherally aware of me.
    “What, uh—what’s the name of the book you’re working on? I always love your titles.”
    “I labor over them. The title of the work in progress will probably change many times, but it is currently being called
The Salzburg Train
. I’m struggling with it, though.” She frowned down at the paper. “It’s not right, somehow. I don’t know if the setting is wrong, or the character, or the premise. That’s the first thing I’ll need from you. I’ll want you to read this.”
    She pushed a thick manuscript toward me.
    One of the shepherds—Heathcliff, I decided—came and laid his big jaw on my lap. “Geez!” I yelled, startled.
    “What’s that? Oh, is he bothering you? He’s such a big baby. He’ll be sitting in your lap next if you’re not careful,” Camilla said.
    I tried to push him gently away, but suddenly the dog seemed to love me as much as he had hated me earlier. He leaned against my thigh, heavily, and let out a sigh. I tentatively began to scratch his ears. They were very soft.
    Camilla suddenly came out of her reverie. “So.” She clapped her hands. “Here’s a schedule—let’s see if you canlive with it. I’ll need you to start the book today. Or tonight. I assume you’ll want to see the town, so arrange things to your satisfaction, but try to finish reading some or all of the book so that we can meet in the morning. At that point I’ll need your notes: what works, what doesn’t, which characters jump off the page, as you said Colin did in
The Lost Child
.” Her face softened when she said it.
    I was tempted to ask her why that one question had been important enough to get me