The Hellfire Club: A Novel by Peter Straub

Author:Peter Straub
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Fiction, Thrillers, Suspense, Psychological, Action & Adventure
Publisher: Random House Publishing Group
Published: 2004-09-28T03:41:04+00:00

61

NORA’S BLOOD SEEMED to slow. “Are you saying that he stole other writers’ work?”

“Oh, they all do that, starting with Shakespeare. I’m talking about real theft. Unless you’re saying that Driver actually plagiarized Night Journey. But if that was your story, I hardly suppose Chancel would be backing you.” He grinned. “Instead of giving you a contract, they’d be more likely to put one out on you, Merle Marvell or no Merle Marvell.”

Harwich chuckled, and Nora silenced him with a murderous glance. “Are you saying that Creeley Monk saw him steal things from the other guests?”

“Not just Creeley, thank goodness. You’re interested in all of them, aren’t you? In everything that went on that summer?”

She nodded.

“This is what I’m prepared to do.” He gestured with the book. “I’ll describe some of the contents of this journal. You continue your research while Andrew and I are on Cape Cod. When I get back, I’ll talk to Merle Marvell and hear what he has to say about you and your project. I’d do that now, but we have limited time this morning. You have the most—ah, colorful—neurosurgeon in the state vouching for you, so I’m willing to go farther than I normally would, but I want to be as cautious as is reasonably possible. You have no objections, I assume?”

She thought hard for a moment while both men looked at her, Harwich shooting sparks of wrath and indignation, Foil calmly. “Why don’t I send you the chapters after they’re written? If you let me borrow the journal, I could have more time to sort through all the information, and I can get it back to you at the end of the summer.”

He was already shaking his head. “I hold Creeley’s papers in trust.” Seeing that Nora was about to object, he raised an index finger. “However! When Merle tells me that you are indeed what you say you are, as I’m sure he will, I’ll give you a copy of all the relevant pages from this diary. Do we have an agreement?”

Harwich gave her a grim, unhappy glance. Nora said, “I think that will be fine.”

“Okay, then.” A suppressed vitality came into his features, and Nora saw how eager he had been all along to do justice to his dead lover. “Let me tell you something about his background, so you’ll be able to appreciate what sort of person Creeley was.” He paused to gather his thoughts. “He was a year behind me at the Garand Academy, on a scholarship. We were all alike—except Creeley. Creeley was as conspicuous as a peacock in a field of geese.

“Creeley’s father was a bartender, and his mother was an Irish immigrant. They lived in a little apartment above the bar, and he had to take two buses to get to school. Creeley turned up wearing big black work shoes, a hideous striped suit far too big for him, and a Buster Brown collar with a velvet bow tie. Of course, the older boys beat him up, and that was that for the Buster Brown collars, but he kept the velvet bow tie.

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