Peril in Paperback: A Bibliophile Mystery

if anyone ever used the room, but I had the strongest urge to lie down on the couch and take a nap.
    And yet there was no way I would sleep in this room, because in one of the corners a full suit of armor was staring at me. I stood next to it, amazed to discover that medieval warriors weren’t very tall. At least the original owner of this fine suit wasn’t, because I towered over it by a full three inches.
    It was silly to feel chilled. There wasn’t anyone hiding inside the armor, right? But then again, there could be spirits lingering. Maybe the suit’s owner died while wearing the armor. Or maybe he killed a bunch of his enemies while he wore it. Those spirits could’ve followed the armor. But even if that was all baloney, I still wouldn’t be able to relax with
him
staring at me.
    I’d had a hard enough time using the powder room downstairs after discovering another suit of armor in there the first time I ever visited Grace.
    “I didn’t know anyone was using this room.”
    I jumped a foot before realizing it wasn’t the suit of armor speaking to me. Spinning, I saw Harrison Crawford standing in the open doorway.
    I patted my chest, catching my breath. “Hello, Mr. Crawford.”
    “Hello, Brooklyn,” he said, sauntering into the room. “Please call me Harrison. I was just looking for a place to watch some TV and take a nap.”
    “I’m not staying, so you’re welcome to use this room. I was just taking a tour and came upon this awesome suit of armor.”
    “There’s a lot that’s awesome around this house,” he said. “It could keep you busy for a long time.”
    “I know. Grace is an amazing collector.” I looked back at the shiny suit of armor. “Do you think you’ll be able to sleep with that guy staring at you?”
    “It shouldn’t be a problem.” He chuckled. “My wife accuses me of being able to fall asleep anywhere.”
    It figured that Madge would hold something as benign as that against him. “Is your wife going to join you in here?”
    “Oh, hell, no,” he said in a rush. “She’s gone off for a walk in the woods. Said she wanted to do some bird watching. She’s perfectly happy trudging about on her own.”
    Harrison was such a nice man. I was still trying to figure out what he saw in his unpleasant wife. I hated to be so negative—I was, after all, still trying to be a beacon of positivity—but I couldn’t seem to help it when it came to Madge. “Well, Harrison, I’ll leave you to your nap.”
    “Ah, I’ll probably just watch the stock market returns.” He plopped on the couch, grabbed the remote control, and spread the newspaper out before him on the coffee table.
    As I headed for the door, I took one last look around the room. That’s when I spied a messy pile of books on a console partially hidden by the open door.
    “Wow,” I whispered. The books were classic noir fiction. “Pulp fiction.” I counted twenty-two of them. They were all paperbacks from the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s, by mystery authors like Agatha Christie, Mickey Spillane, Raymond Chandler, Erle Stanley Gardner, Dashiell Hammett, and others. They had the most fabulous, lurid covers imaginable, with scantily clad blondes and screaming redheads, bulging eyeballs, spilled cocktails, and black dial telephones.
    The titles were wonderful, too, with some more suggestive than others.
Terror on the Train, Kiss Me at Midnight,Blondes Tell No Lies, Her Lips Were Blood Red, Call Me Wanton
.
    One of the Agatha Christies,
4:50 from Paddington
, showed a woman’s body flying from a train. It was so delightfully graphic, I almost giggled aloud. Most of the books were originally priced at twenty-five to thirty-five cents, but now they could be worth hundreds, maybe thousands of dollars. Especially as a collection.
    “What’s that you’ve got?” Harrison said.
    “Some fantastic books.” I carefully scooped up all twenty-two of the little jewels. “I’m taking them to the library for some special attention.”
    “That’s nice,” he said absently, and went back to his paper.
    “See you later.” I left the room and almost rammed into Kiki out in the hall.
    “Have you seen my dad?” she asked.
    “Yes, he’s in there.” I jerked my head toward the sitting room where I’d left Harrison.
    “Oh.” She glanced toward the door of the room. Then she frowned, but didn’t make a move to go in and see her father. “Do you need help with that stack?”
    “That’s okay. I’m perfectly balanced