Husbands And Lap Dogs Breathe Their Last (27 page)

The last time Cummings heard from Mandrake, he and Otto had moved to Minnesota. They were accessible only by email and a post office box. A winter wedding was anticipated after Otto’s divorce from Sebastian was finalized. Otto was working on a new book, set just prior to the Russian Revolution. The working title was
The Menshevik Caress
.

In Maine Elektra was awaiting trial. Deuteronomy mourned the loss of Elektra and had turned to Ernestine for support. Although she hadn’t said as much, Cummings suspected something romantic might be brewing between them.

Deuteronomy began to write again. He asked Cummings for his permission to use him as a character in a true crime novel about Chess’s and Therese’s murders. The title was
To Hive and Hive Not
.

A few months later Deuteronomy sent Cummings a draft. Cummings eagerly turned to the first page.

Chapter One

“Where’s the body, Bob?” Detective Wanamaker asked, shaking the rain from his L.L. Bean raincoat. It was a cold, drizzly morning in early June, the kind you sometimes get in Maine when spring doesn’t end, and summer doesn’t come.

“In the boat,” Officer Robert Bernier answered. Bob was a man who knew everything and said nothing — the kind of man you could trust.

“How’d the victim get it?” Cummings asked. He pulled back the plastic covering that had wrapped the sailboat during the winter and studied the corpse within. Sure enough, it was a dead body. Its shriveled and desiccated state suggested it had been there a long time.

“We’ll have to wait for the coroner on that,” Bob said, “but the body’s in bad shape. Truthfully, we might never know what happened.”

Cummings nodded. It was going to be that kind of murder.

David Steven Rappoport is the author of two plays produced Off-Broadway,
Cave Life
and
The Upper Depths
, and has also written for radio and television.

His short story, “Leftovers,” was a winner of the Mystery Times 2015 competition and is featured in an anthology of winning stories from Buddhapuss Ink.

He is a graduate of the Master of Fine Arts: Creative Writing Program at Goddard College. He currently lives in Chicago.

David’s website is
www.davidstevenrappoport.com
.