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about?”
    “Georges
Simenon, the great French author.”
    “I know who
Simenon is,” Shields said, sounding offended.
    “Sorry,” Blue
said. “I just meant that Simenon pulled the same stunt. He’d stop in the middle
of a meeting in his home to schtup one of the help. He claimed to have slept
with 10,000 women.”
    “Simenon’s
wife said it was more like 1,200,” Scarne chimed in.
    “You mean to
tell me that Quimper is in there fucking that girl?”
    As if in
answer to Randolph’s incredulous question, there was a load crash and a grunt,
followed by the unmistakable squeal of woman’s passionate release.
    “She has to be
faking it,” Scarne said, looking at his watch.
    “I don’t
believe it,” Shields said.
    “We should
consider ourselves fortunate,” Blue said. “Simenon once told one of his
assistants that she didn’t have to leave the room when his mistress interrupted
their work.  He merely unzipped and did the mistress right on the floor in
front of the startled girl. Then he went back to dictation.”
    With that, the
door opened and Quimper walked over and sat down. Three sets of eyes went to
his zipper, which was still at half mast. Then, Miss Perkins came out, smoothing
both skirt and hair. Her face was flushed and her eyes were a bit unfocused.
    “Will that be
all, Mr. Quimper?” she said.
    “Yes, Audrey.
Have a nice trip.”
    Blue looked at
Scarne and silently mouthed, “Wasn’t faking.”
    “There goes
another novel,” Quimper said with a leer.
    Scarne knew
the famous Balzac quote, referencing the great French novelist’s belief that a
writer’s creativity suffered after orgasm. Perhaps that was why the priapic
Quimper needed surrogate writers. But, then, how did that explain the endless
literary genius of Simenon?
    “You were
saying something before I left, Randolph,” Quimper continued.
    Shields
rallied. He dropped the phony praise.
    “I said that,
given the importance of the Killerfest convention, an extra layer of protection
for you is not unreasonable. I’m sure nothing will happen, but Scarne stays.
That’s not negotiable.”
    Quimper looked
startled.
    “I don’t need
him here,” he said, trying to regain some high ground. “If you want him to help
out at the conference, I suppose that will be all right.”
    Shields turned
to Scarne, who shrugged.
    “I’m sure his
people can get him to and from the hotel in one piece.”
    Shields looked
relieved.
    “Good. Then
it’s settled. Jake will augment your security at the conference, Sebastian. An
extra set of eyes and ears, so to speak. We can work out the details later,
right Nigel?”
    “Of course,
Mr. Shields.”
    Randolph
reached for a pastry and then stopped.
    “I thought I
saw some cheese Danish,” he said, disappointed.
    Scarne and
Blue merely smiled at each other.
    ***
    On the chopper
ride back to Manhattan, Shields turned to Scarne and said, “Do you think you
will have any trouble with Quimper’s security people?”
    “It depends.
If they are pros, they won’t need much help and they should be willing to take
sound advice. So, if I see something they’ve missed, I won’t hesitate to point
it out. If they are amateurs, I’ll let you and Quimper know and make sure
nothing happens to him until you get good people in there. Quimper should
appreciate that, because he’ll want top men guarding him at home and on the
road. The guys who rode us in on the golf carts looked competent. Ex-military
would be my guess. It should be OK.”
    “Good.
Anything you need, let me know. If you can’t reach me, Nigel will do whatever
you ask. What did you think of Sebastian?”
    “If something
was to happen to him, you wouldn’t run out of suspects. Hell, I might be one of
them.”
    Shields
laughed.
    “Yeah. He’s a
piece of work.”
    “But a quite
valuable piece of work.”
    Shields
flashed a cold smile.
    “Don’t get me
wrong. I don’t want anyone hurt by Muslim fanatics. But I particularly don’t
want Sebastian