Surprise Party Read online

  Surprise Party

  William Katz

  Copyright © 1984, William Katz

  CONTENTS

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Epilogue

  Prologue

  He looked down at his sixth victim, proud of his work. She lay there, as the others had, utterly still, life taken from her by a combination of two weapons. Her hair, in that bright, wonderful color, was spread out over the grass. She'd be discovered soon, he realized, and the authorities would know that he'd succeeded again. And they would prepare for his next insult.

  He had to do it one more time. That was the compact. That was the act of faith. He knew who his victim would be, he knew everything about her. She wouldn't suspect, any more than the others suspected, nor would she resist. She too would play her role as if rehearsed by some gifted director. It would happen on schedule. All his victims died on schedule.

  And it would be very easy.

  Spencer Cross-Wade looked down at the picture of the sixth victim, baffled. What was the key? What was the formula? What was the motive? Why had this monster eluded him and every other detective on the case? He knew the killer would strike again, and once again Cross-Wade would have to walk up two flights to his superiors and report another dead woman and another fruitless day for the New York Police Department. He was determined that this not happen. It was becoming a passion, an obsession in a career marked by a cool reserve more appropriate for Scotland Yard.

  But it was a passion.

  He had to find him.

  1

  New York, November 198–

  They sat opposite each other at breakfast in their spacious five-room apartment overlooking Central Park West. Samantha was thirty-five, with blue eyes and auburn hair that she wore long and loose, and she was incredibly happy. Her eight-month-old marriage to Marty was sublime, and the thought that anything could convulse it, that any horror could shatter it, was inconceivable. Some marriages were made to last, and she believed passionately that this was one of them.

  "I'm still bowled over," Marty said.

  Samantha smiled, knowing what he meant. "By the party?"

  "Yeah."

  "Marty, honey, it's weeks away."

  "Hey, I've never had my wife throw me a fortieth birthday party before. Let me enjoy it. You making up the list?"

  "Sure. I want everyone who means anything to you."

  "That's a pretty big bunch."

  "I'll get to them early," Samantha said. "I'll bet you don't have a single turn-down."

  "Except Mel Pierce. He spends December in Aspen."

  "So, he'll send a wire." Samantha leaned forward, across the white tablecloth, closer to Marty's eyes, which, as usual, remained fixed intently on her. "Marty," she asked, "are you absolutely sure about the date?"

  "Sure am."

  "December fifth?"

  "That's my birthday, isn't it?"

  "A Thursday."

  Marty sighed. "Sam, we went over this. It means a lot to me to have the party right on my birthday. Thursday, December fifth." Then he lowered those eyes, and fell silent for a few moments. Maybe thinking of the little speech he'd make at his own party, Samantha thought, or some friends from the past he wished he could locate. Samantha gazed at him, momentarily contemplated how her life had changed, and realized once again how lucky she was.

  A year before, Samantha Reardon had been a second-string copywriter in a small advertising agency, barely keeping up with the rent on what she liked to describe as a "junior studio" in a crumbling section of Manhattan. The men she'd met were mostly combat veterans of screwed up marriages—dazed, weary males with war stories to tell, yearning for someone to listen, someone to take their side against bitchy wives, conniving divorce lawyers, or dive-bombing in-laws. Samantha had put in too many evenings as a professional ear, listening and nodding, sometimes sharing the agony of close male friends whose marriages-made-in-heaven had descended to Civil Court, Part B, Matrimonial. No, that wasn't going to happen to her. She desperately wanted to find someone, a man to love her, one she could love. But she wasn't going to settle for any of the walking wounded. She'd wait, as she'd already waited, for the right man, not just the convenient man.

  But she'd tired of waiting, tired of searching, for some ideal who was always just the bend.

  Then, at a party launching an eat-all-you-want diet book, she met Martin Everett Shaw. Marty. Mart. M.E.

  Samantha had grown up on Long Island, her father a lawyer for an airline, her mother a high-school English teacher. She had an instinct for elegance and style, and Marty Shaw had both, as well as some more basic animal magnetism. It wasn't simply his imposing height—he had the build of a fullback—or the unerring talent he had for matching the right shirt with the right suit. It was, rather, his indefinable air of being in charge. Marty could walk across a room, make the floorboards rattle, and make it clear that he was getting to the other side no matter what, or who, was in the way. His voice was firm and resonant, and he never raised it. He radiated power. Samantha felt it, reveled in it. She'd imagined he got up at six in the morning to prepare for the day, and time proved her right. She'd imagined he'd work until eleven at night if need be, and time proved her right again.

  "Got a big lunch today?" she asked him as he finished his breakfast.

  "I don't think so," he replied, placing the napkin neatly back on the table. "But something usually comes up at the last minute. If I'm free I'll wander around a bookstore. There's a new book on corporations I want to pick up."

  "Home on time?"

  "You jest. I tell you, sweet, when you run your own business you own everything but your time. You ought to see the stack of paperwork."

  "Can't someone else…?"

  "No. I've got to be my own man."

  It was the kind of thing Samantha's own father might have said. In fact, Marty reminded her of her father, which may have been the magic ingredient.

  And yet, Marty filled a need that Samantha had felt since childhood. Her home had been cold. Her parents had led independent lives, with little to say to each other, and even less to her. She'd been an only child, but with none of the special attention lavished on her that only children often receive. She'd idolized her father, but only from a distance, and when he died she felt she'd never known him.

  Marty gave her the attention and recognition she craved. Even in expensive restaurants he focused on her, on what she was saying, as if the exquisite meal were only incidental. With her parents, Samantha had felt like an ornament, the required child in the American home. Marty made her feel wanted, for just being Samantha.

  She identified with him, perhaps because she had lost a parent while in her teens, and their similar experiences created an even deeper emotional bond between them. It seemed hard for her to believe that this strong, achieving man had no family at all. She recalled the shock of sympathy she'd felt when he told her how he'd lost both parents in his teens, how he'd worked his way through Northwestern selling magazine subscriptions, how other family members had abandoned and ignored him, how he wished he had a brother or sister. Samantha could imagine him going from town to town after college, getting small jobs in public relations departments of stores and little companies, finally putting some c
ash together to come to New York and launch his own firm.

  Now he had a family, or at least a wife. Now he had someone to talk to, someone who cared about him. Samantha had always imagined herself married to a man with a large family, making visits with him to his old home, having the kind of relationships she'd never had. She abandoned that dream for Marty, and she did so gladly.

  There was only one thing that seemed curious about him—those eyes, which sometimes appeared to shift defensively. They were guarded, watchful eyes, and Samantha wondered why. Maybe it was the reality of business competition. Maybe it was Marty's tough early life, his sense of aloneness, a sense that made Samantha want to take care of him.

  Her energies now were directed toward his party. Samantha had to tell Marty about it because he often went out of town, and she wanted to be sure that the guest of honor would actually be there. But she kept the one great secret. She was sure he'd never suspect. It would highlight the evening, give him an occasion he'd always remember, and make the event what she really wanted it to be—a true surprise party.

  Marty glanced at his watch, got up and kissed Samantha with a kind of concentrated affection rare for a successful and harassed executive. "I'm off," he said.

  He disappeared out the door, and Samantha soon heard the elevator come up, open, close, then descend again.

  She walked across the deep white carpet to the living room window, then gazed down at the winding paths and roadways of Central Park. The last autumn leaves were falling, and she followed one as it floated toward a man of about twenty, his hands stuffed in jacket pockets, walking toward Fifth Avenue. The view of the park and the skyline downtown was sweeping and magnificent, but Samantha knew it wasn't the scenery that gave her, for the first time in her life, such complete peace. She saw Marty rush out the front of the building, then turn and wave up to her. That was it. That was the factor. That was the cake and the frosting as well.

  She gazed around her apartment. They'd designed it in modern—lots of whites, some metal, indirect track lighting throughout. It was a contrast to the brooding presence of the half-century-old building, formal with its gray stone facade, more comfortable in an era when doormen wore white gloves and the upper crust arrived in open touring cars. Samantha grabbed a phone, quickly tapping out a familiar number.

  "Lynne? Sam. Marty just left. Want to sneak over?"

  Lynne was coming. She'd been entrusted with Sam's secret, and it would be a productive day. By this time, Samantha knew, Marty was in a taxi and five or six blocks downtown, heading for his office.

  He had entrusted his secret to no one.

  Lynne Gould was one of those women of endless energy who seemed to get twenty-six hours into every day. She worked for a legion of charities, ran an art gallery, and took care of two young children, all while keeping her short, blond hair absolutely in place. She does it with mirrors, Samantha thought. I'm doing it poorly, Lynne thought. Neither was right. Lynne occupied the apartment across the hall, and had become Samantha's best friend since the Shaws moved in just after their marriage. Samantha was five-three, so Lynne, at five-seven, seemed to tower over her. It would have been intimidating, except Lynne exuded a simple warmth that put the world at ease.

  Lynne charged in a few minutes after Samantha called, pencil and pad in hand. "I'm ready," she announced. "I expect to spend the rest of the morning delving into Marty's sordid past."

  But Samantha served some coffee first. "You have no idea how much Marty is looking forward to this," she said. "He keeps mentioning it. Even this morning…"

  "I'll bet he's never had a party before, at least not as an adult," Lynne replied.

  "Since he has no family, you're probably right."

  "I'll have to have one for Charles," Lynne said, "if I can get him home long enough to cut the cake."

  "I'll do some missionary work," Samantha replied. "I'm sure he'll get the same kick that Marty's getting." Then a slightly troubled look came across Samantha's face. "You're sure this is a good idea?" she asked, looking for encouragement.

  "You kidding?" Lynne shot back. "It's sterling. I mean, going back to the beginning of Marty's life, contacting his teachers and professors and all those types, and having them send messages for his birthday. My God, if anyone did that for me, I'd kiss 'em, or more."

  "I just hope it doesn't bring up any bad memories."

  "Come on, Sam. You know the way Marty talks about his early days. Tough, sure. But he feels nostalgia, like all of us. Look, you're right on target. You're doing This Is Your Life for dear old Martin Shaw."

  Lynne had volunteered to call the information operators in the places where Marty had lived, worked, or gone to school, to track down the numbers of Marty's old contacts and give them to Samantha. Samantha would actually call the people. Lynne would be saving Samantha considerable time, but, more important, she'd be moral support, a buddy to be with during the party planning.

  It wasn't long before Samantha was seated at a small black writing table in the hallway, reaching for her Trimline phone, pressing the 312 area code and a phone number, and waiting, as the clicks brought her closer to her first encounter with Marty's past, the roots he talked about so much.

  Her heart began to beat faster. Yes, Lynne was right. This was a super scheme, a spectacular love feast. Inevitably, her mind flashed back to Marty's tales of his pranks at Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism, where, he never tired of telling her, he learned the craft that eventually would make him a public-relations wizard. She remembered him describing how he and a friend from an advertising class had fanned out through Evanston, going door-to-door soliciting orders for gift-wrapped cans of elbow grease. They had gotten, so Marty claimed, twenty-three orders when the dean found out and ordered them to apologize. Their apologies had been so touching, Marty related, that six people reordered.

  Samantha's phone connection was completed.

  "Medill," an operator said.

  "Yes," Samantha answered, "I wonder if someone could help me with a special request."

  "Yes, ma'am?" the female voice asked.

  "I'd like to get some information about a former student."

  "Are you an employer?"

  "No, a wife. Well, what I mean is, I'm married to someone from your class of '66. I'm having a birthday party for him and I want to collect old stories, maybe remembrances by professors. That sort of thing."

  "That is an unusual request."

  "I know," Samantha replied, with an embarrassed little laugh. "Look, if it's a bother…"

  "Not at all. Give me his name and I'll get out the yearbook. Do you have a copy?"

  "No, Marty misplaced it before we were married. His name is Martin Everett Shaw, and he graduated with honors."

  "Shore? S-h-o-r-e?"

  "No, S-h-a-w."

  "I'll check."

  There was a long pause. Samantha and Lynne smiled at each other, now that the delightful plot was under way. Samantha cupped her hand over the receiver. "She's looking," she whispered to Lynne. She heard the woman moving around at the other end of the line. Oh, Marty was going to love hearing from those Medill people. Samantha could see the glow on his face already.

  The voice came back on the line. "Ma'am, you sure of the class?"

  "Yes. Why?"

  "There's no Martin Shaw listed."

  "That's impossible. Marty always talks about the class of '66."

  "Wait a second. Did he get an M.A. or B.A.?"

  "Bachelor's."

  "Sorry. I had the wrong list. They've got these things all confused here. One moment please."

  Samantha waited, winking at Lynne over the delay and tapping a silver Cross ballpoint pen with her right hand.

  "Ma'am?"

  "Yes."

  "He's not on the baccalaureate list either."

  "There's obviously some mistake," Samantha said.

  "Well, I've checked the yearbook and our own official list of graduates. No Martin Shaw. Is it possible you're con
fusing us with some other journalism school, like Columbia?"

  Samantha felt a little irritation. "I know where my husband went to school," she replied. Then she realized she was being rude to someone trying to help. "I'm sorry. Maybe you've got him listed in the wrong year."

  "I've checked our master list of alumni, ma'am," the voice replied stoically. "And I've just punched up the bursar's records on my terminal. That would show his financial payments. No Martin Shaw. There's a David Shaw in '66, but I see he's British. Maybe he was registered under a different name. Has he changed his name?"

  "No. He's always been a Shaw."

  "I don't know what more we can do," the voice said with a sigh.

  Samantha searched her mind for a way out of the confusion. "Marty was feature editor of the newspaper," she recalled. "Even if the other lists have dropped him—somehow—his byline would be there."

  "I'll check the bound volumes." The voice was getting annoyed.

  "I know I'm asking a lot," Samantha said.

  "It's all right. By the way, does your husband get alumni mail?"

  Samantha thought for a moment. "I haven't seen any. But he's moved quite a bit and…"

  "Our graduates are journalists. They often move, and we follow them." Now the voice was abrupt, delivering a message. But Samantha didn't catch on. She heard the woman leafing through pages…many pages.

  "No," the answer finally came. "I've checked six issues of the paper from '66. Someone else was feature editor."

  "Impossible."

  The voice let out a long, impatient breath. "Ma'am, may I speak frankly?"

  Samantha was startled by the question. "Of course."

  "This happens all the time, ma'am."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Maybe you'd better ask your husband." There was a touch of sympathy now.

  "Why?"

  "Mrs. Shaw, it's obvious that your husband never attended this school, and I hope he isn't using our name to secure employment. If we found out, we would instantly notify…"

  "Thank you very much." Samantha hung up, actually growled at the phone, then pushed her pen aside. "Would you believe that?" she asked Lynne. "Would you believe they can't find Marty's name? An honor graduate? A journalism school? Can you believe the incompetence?"