Death on the Diversion

by Patricia McLinn

  “Wait,” I ordered before either of the ship officials — more likely Henri — could jump in to agree. “Your turn, Pyorte. Tell her why you were out all night.”

  He hesitated.

  “C’mon. You and Badar. Can’t you both see it’s way past time to tell the truth. You’ve got Constantine tied up in this, while Anya and Imka are terrified for you two. There’s been a murder. Badar is a suspect, now Pyorte will be too — if you don’t tell the truth. This is not the time to worry about breaking a cruise line rule.”

  Badar broke in. “We didn’t. It wasn’t—”

  “Pyorte?” Anya’s eyebrows tipped up at the inner corners in pleading.

  He slapped his hands on his thighs. “For the rings.” Disappointment vibrated in the short words. “For our rings.” He took her hand, his thumb rubbing over the ringless finger on her left hand. “To show the world.”

  “That you’re married,” I filled in.

  He nodded, looking into Anya’s eyes.

  “But we agreed,” she said, “our money, we save it.”

  “Not our money. My money I earn extra. I teach. Teach music.”

  She sucked in a breath. “The rules—”

  “It’s my fault. I asked him,” Badar said. “I’ve been paying him to teach me to play the guitar and…” He looked toward Imka, then ground to a halt.

  “Forget the surprise, forget breaking rules. Tell ’em.” Constantine said. “Murder.”

  “All right, all right. Yes. I wrote a song for your birthday.” He threw the words at Imka. “A stupid song. And I got Pyorte to break the rules about extra jobs to teach me how to play it.”

  “Oh, Badar.” She popped up and threw her arms around his neck and kissed him on the cheek. “A beautiful song.”

  “You haven’t heard it.”

  “That is so,” Pyorte said. “Song okay. Guitar not. Still.”

  “Hey—”

  “I will love it. I do love it. My Badar.” She half sat on Bob, who gently transferred her to Badar’s lap.

  So far, he was taking the brunt of this.

  “Before you do any more kissing, let’s get back to the murder. Though you should love that song, because it explains why Badar wouldn’t give his alibi. He wouldn’t expose Pyorte. How late were those two at it?” I directed that at Constantine.

  “All night.” He didn’t sound happy. “It wasn’t the first time. And there are some noises headphones don’t cancel. Besides, try sleeping in headphones.”

  “He must practice. All time,” Pyorte said.

  “Imka’s birthday is tomorrow.” Badar’s reward for knowing that was a huge, warm smile from her.

  Then she turned it on me. “You know all this — how?”

  I shrugged modestly. “Putting together a clue or two.”

  She regarded me with something like awe.

  This wasn’t awe for a book I hadn’t written. This was for fashioning bits and scraps of looks and comments and timing to produce a conjecture. Not all that amazing, but mine, all mine.

  Cutting across the warm fuzzies, the Valkyrie leader said, “You’re tossing out names, then saying why they couldn’t do it. If you know who the murderer is, just say so.”

  So much for awe.

  She’d zeroed in on the weak point.

  Because I didn’t know. Not one hundred percent.

  “It’s called the process of elimination.” And I needed these people to eliminate themselves. I didn’t have enough information or time to do it for them. “Constantine, would you swear to it in court that Badar and Pyorte were in your cabin all that night.”

  “I would and so would the guys next to us. There, all night, playing that song over and over and over. Until Badar and I reported for work.”

  Why hadn’t Edgars checked with the crew in nearby cabins? Or had he and already knew all this?

  I pushed on.

  “By that time security footage showed her body there for some time, when she would have been expected to be tucked up in her cabin sound asleep.” I pivoted toward the widower. “But you say she wasn’t.”

  “What? Oh … Not in the cabin… No, she wasn’t. Not when they came pounding on the door. I don’t know about earlier. She could have come in, then left.”

  “Why would she?”

  “She was an early riser.”

  “As early as four a.m.?”

  “Well, uh, not usually. But she liked to get up, get things done, clear out the day.” He sounded half asleep. Residual shock? How shocked could he be when he’d spent the night with Odette?

  “What could she have been trying to clear out that day, Wardham?”

  “I don’t know. But with the longer days, she was getting up very early.”

  I looked to Maya and Ralph, then to Odette. “Did you know of anything she was doing that morning?”

  They shook their heads.

  “Anything that would draw her out of the cabin at that hour?”

  More head shakes.

  I looked at the Valkyrie leader. “You said she went for a walk.”

  “Hell, I don’t know. I was just saying.”

  “She’d want her cane for a walk. But it can’t be found now. Having the cane with her was her habit. True?”

  This time, nods from Wardham, Odette, Ralph, and Maya.

  “Let’s consider other habits of hers.”

  “Like what?” Maya asked. Ralph touched her hand, perhaps in warning.

  “She liked to know things about people.”

  Surprisingly, the response came from Wardham. “She did. She’s been tracking some guy all over social media the past year. She said it made her a better bridge player to notice things about people. Especially their weaknesses.”

  Ralph and Maya shifted in their seats.

  “Your group’s cruised together for a long time. Until four years ago, when Maya was widowed by the death of her first husband, Bruce, during one of these transatlantic cruises.”

  That drew interested stares from the gathering except Wardham, Odette, and of course, Ralph, who covered her hand with his.

  “I don’t know what my first husband’s death could possibly have to do with this horrible situation.”

  “That’s what we’re trying to find out. Leah and Ralph broke up on that same cruise. Leah and Wardham immediately became a couple. Then—” I looked around the room. “—Maya and Ralph got together.”

  They murmured, including something from the redhead about not knowing they had it in them.

  I looked at Odette. “You likened it to a set of dominoes going down. But you were reluctant to say who toppled the first domino.”

  “My, you do remember things, Sheila Mackey.” Her lips seemed to crackle with irritation even as they drew into a semblance of her smile. “And raise irrelevancies at the most inopportune time.”

  “It’s a murder, Odette. Nothing is irrelevant. Inopportune is unimportant.” I waited. She said nothing. “What started the chain of events on that cruise four years ago? Was it Bruce Froster’s death? Did someone cause his death in order to bring about some part of that chain?”

  Maya sucked in a breath. “Bruce?”

  “No,” Odette snapped, all astringent, no sweetness. “He died of natural causes. You want to hear this? Of course, Leah knocked over the first domino. I watched her. Tried to block her. But she held all the cards and full freedom to implement her strategy, since she had a dummy as a partner.” In case that wasn’t clear enough, she specified. “Wardham.”

  He winced. “But Odette…”

  She turned on him. “But Odette, what, Wardham?”

  “I thought you loved me. You invited me to your cabin. You slept with me. I mean…” He looked around without making eye contact, his cheeks growing ruddier, but a kind of pride there, too. “We had sex.”

  “We did have sex. I—”

  “Wait a minute,” I interrupted. “To be clear, you’re talking about the night after Leah’s body was found? Wardham did not spend
that night in the cabin assigned to him while his was thoroughly searched and examined? Instead, he spent that night in your cabin?”

  The Valkyries weren’t bored now. Nobody was.

  “Yes, he spent it with me. In my cabin.” She said it like it was a technicality to get past. “I wanted to see if my memory was accurate. It was.”

  “Oh, Odette. You’ve missed me that much? I knew it. I broke your heart. I never should have left.”

  She stared at him a moment. “No, you shouldn’t have. For your sake. I did love you. For decades. But I haven’t loved you for years. Probably before you trotted off after Leah, certainly since. Having sex with you — and sleeping with you — confirmed my memory that it wasn’t much to write home about. I’ve had better since we divorced. Much better.”

  “Odette! … but then why?” he wailed.

  She clicked her tongue and looked away from him.

  “Yes, why?” I asked.

  “To spit in Leah’s eye one last time, of course. Even if she was dead, it was entirely satisfying. The night she died, the first night he was released from her bondage he came running back—” She smiled triumphantly. “—to me.”

  * * * *

  “Wouldn’t it have been more satisfying if she’d been alive?”

  “Perhaps, but I couldn’t be the cause of Wardham’s murder.” She made a sound, as if making a discovery. “I suppose I couldn’t do it to Leah, either.”

  “Because you considered Leah a friend.”

  “Yes, yes, I did.” She smiled slightly. “And didn’t want to lose a good bridge partner.”

  “Odette, have you inherited a lot of money since you and Wardham divorced?”

  “Me? No.”

  Her genuine surprise persuaded me.

  Apparently it persuaded Petronella, too.

  “You mean she didn’t—? She’s not the murderer? But then who…?” Hers cheeks turned dark red at letting it slip she’d thought Odette was the murderer.

  I swung around to Maya.

  “Maya, I, uh, happened to overhear you in town — in Santa Cruz — saying you knew about Leah’s activities as Dee North. You were talking to Ralph about it in a little gift shop. I was back in a corner and couldn’t help hearing you say you wanted her to know you knew.” She looked blank. Not shock. Confusion. “That afternoon you did let her know, remember? You told her you knew she’d been posting nasty reviews as Dee North. But do you think anyone else knew or guessed or—?”

  Lightning struck Maya, dispelling her confusion. I saw the flash the instant it happened.

  “Oh, no, not Dee North. No, no, no.” She shook her head and kept shaking it.

  “But you did confront her. You told us all—” I tactfully skipped mentioning the dozens of other people at the pool she’d also informed. “—about Leah posting reviews as Dee North.”

  “Yes, then. But not earlier. In town I was talking to Ralph about something else entirely. Leah thought she was the only one who remembered, but I did, too.”

  “Remembered what?” I asked.

  “The woman from two years ago.” Maya turned to Imka. “Your friend, the girl who did my nails, told me what happened last year.”

  “What happened?” My heart hammered. Was this the break I’d told Edgars we might get?

  “She’d been on this cruise two years ago with her husband, and he died during the cruise last year.” She blinked suddenly teary eyes. Ralph put his arm around her. “Just like Bruce. Though not really like Bruce, because they were touring on land when he—”

  “Another husband died?” Petronella interrupted, aghast.

  “Two years ago?” I demanded at the same time. Then, more pertinently, “Which woman?”

  But I knew.

  “That woman.” Maya pointed.

  “Coral?” the Valkyrie leader asked.

  “No. The woman now calling herself Piper.” Without looking away, I asked Imka, “She called herself Laura another time, didn’t she? Did she threaten you if you mentioned it?”

  Imka nodded. “She was on the other ship where I worked, before I came here.”

  “Before she hooked up with a partner who made things so much easier for her to find prey for her black widow act. I heard someone talking about them a week before the murder, but only sorted it out today. Jason, who— Security!”

  I might have intended to use Gerard Edgars’ entire title, but there wasn’t time. Jason jerked around, upsetting the drinks cart, jumping between two chairs and charging across the oval.

  Petronella stood and flung out her arm, her elbow connecting with his nose, unbalancing him. He went over backward with a chair and Edgars scooped him up off the floor.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  Jason would have been better off remaining where he was and trying to tough it out, as Piper did.

  Where was he going? Even if he’d escaped the room, he couldn’t get off the ship.

  Blocked, he fell apart, crying and shouting it was all Piper. She’d killed the old woman. He’d known nothing about it until later.

  What could Piper do except say, “I have no idea what you’re talking about. He’s lying. This is a big mistake. My husband will sue you all.”

  Henri Lipke led her out with a firm hold on her arm, nonetheless.

  “What the hell? What the hell?” the Valkyrie leader said.

  I faced the remaining four. “Did her husband’s first wife recently inherit a lot of money?”

  “Yeah, but… What the hell?” the leader repeated.

  Turning to the redhead, I asked, “How did you know about the security cameras having gaps.”

  Piper’s gasped No in response to the redhead saying there were cameras everywhere — and gaps in their coverage — had rung false. That might have been when she edged into my subconscious radar.

  “Huh? Oh. From—” She bit it off.

  No way was I letting that go. “Jason.”

  “That’s not a crime. We talked. So what.”

  “I never liked her. Never.” Coral’s triumph was complete and oblivious to anything else. “But you said any one of us could’ve been the murderer. Not me. I can’t take my cast off. You can’t blame me.”

  “She already fingered Piper, you idiot,” the Other One said.

  With no hint of dismay, the redhead said, “Her husband’s going to have a heart attack.” Her expression changed. “Hey. She tried to hook me up with that Jason guy. A little fun, she said. Why that little—”

  “Blackmail,” the leader said with satisfaction.

  The redhead lost all color. “I didn’t do anything he could blackmail me for. Nothing. Ever.”

  * * * *

  “Actually,” I told Catherine, Bob, and Petronella after the others finally left, “I wouldn’t be surprised if catching them now didn’t prevent Piper’s husband from having a heart attack in the near future, so Piper would inherit everything before he could dump her to go back to his previous wife.”

  Piper and Jason lived the crime I’d theorized for Maya and Ralph.

  “But how did you know?”

  “Imka’s slip started it. Also her fellow nail tech said something about the cruise being cursed because, in addition to Leah, she’s back, too. At first I thought she meant the Valkyrie leader.” At their blank looks, I supplied, “Merilee. But I checked back with Bennie today and discovered Piper was on this cruise a year ago and she and Leah exchanged words. That might be what caught Leah’s attention. She made sure to get the name of Piper’s target a year ago, the man now Piper’s husband.”

  “The social media Wardham mentioned?” Catherine asked.

  “I suspect so. I’m sure the authorities will investigate. If so, it could easily have led her to Piper. I’d guess this year was supposed to be the payoff — Piper’s downfall.”

  “Then why did she trip Coral?” Petronella asked.

  “I’d bet she was trying to trip Piper. They were walking together. Coral stepped on the cane first. From Leah’s viewpoint, i
t delivered the message she was someone for Piper to fear. But Piper ignored her — a smart reaction. That drove Leah nuts. She forgot caution in her zeal to make Piper see she knew what was going on and had the upper hand.

  “Piper’s current husband’s good fortune was to be on the same cruises with Leah. A few frequent cruisers recognized Piper from other trips, including Maya. But none were interested enough — nosy enough — to put the pieces together.”

  “Or foolish enough to confront her,” Bob said.

  “True.”

  “How did you put this together?” Catherine asked.

  “So many pieces. A lot of them eliminating other people. But one pointing to Piper was Imka referring to her as Laura the first day and Piper being far angrier at Imka than at Coral, who’d pushed her into the windows. All out of proportion. Plus, her overly shocked reaction to hearing one of the others say there were security cameras all over was off. Made me think she did know, which raised the question of how, which led to—”

  “Jason,” Catherine said.

  “Exactly. Speaking of proportion, I almost eliminated her because I thought she was too tall to be the figure in the video. But that was wearing heels. She didn’t wear them to carry Leah’s body. No wonder she didn’t look as tall. Without them she’d be about my height. Being out of her usual shoes also changed her walk.

  “But the real clincher was Odette’s friend — or acquaintance — Vance Reesha. I’d heard him gossiping with someone early on about a passenger who died in Rome last year. Then the widow picked up this cruise, trolled in the bars, and had a new one by the end of the cruise … with some help. His listener asked something and he replied, T-bar and errand chase sonar you and me theme and Cheese Mary now?

  “Oh, that clears it up,” Bob said.

  I grinned. “That’s what I heard because of the wind and because I was falling asleep. Aunt Kit got me to take away the words and just listen to the sounds my memory stashed away. In other words, I’d mis-heard words and rather than record them as sounds, I’d created different words. When I went back to just the sounds, I finally could reconstruct the right words.”

  I did not tell them how the story in The Fields of Athenry got me thinking about couples and criminals. First, I connected Anya and Pyorte to the characters in the song. Then I took it another step and wondered about a couple committing far, far more serious crimes.