Set For Murder (Showbiz Is Murder Book 1)

by Jolie Beaumont

  Then the work began.

  The person, once vibrant and a distinct personality, was transformed into a body. The cause of its demise overshadowed all else. For a few minutes it no longer mattered if the person was rich or impoverished, happy or depressed, loved or despised—although all that would come back into focus after the medical examiner had determined the cause and approximate time of death.

  Since the knife was still firmly implanted in the duchess’s heart, it wasn’t hard to determine the cause of death and the weapon used.

  “I’d say she’s been dead not more than three hours,” said the ship’s physician, Dr. Wallace, answering the unasked question after a preliminary examination. “Rigor mortis hasn’t set in.”

  “Can you be more specific?”

  “I’ll know more after it does set in. If I had to guess right now, taking into account body color and temperature, I’d say death occurred sometime between nine and eleven this evening.”

  “There doesn’t appear to be any sign of struggle,” said Inspector Travers, shifting his gaze from the duchess’s peaceful face to her wrists and hands.

  “No. I don’t see any cuts or bruises. She might have been sleeping when the attack occurred.”

  “Or drugged beforehand?”

  “It’s possible.”

  They both glanced over at the nightstand. Perhaps there was a glass that held the last of a sleeping potion, or the wrapping of a torn-open sachet. There wasn’t.

  “We’ll know more after the autopsy,” said the physician. He was a dapper little man, with a still-full head of graying hair, neatly manicured hands, and a soothing voice—all of which made him popular with rich women who reveled in their medical complaints and sought sympathy more than cures. But his eyes were intelligent and alert, and the Scotland Yard inspector was relieved to have a competent medical expert at his side.

  “What about the knife?” Travers asked, returning his gaze to the dead body.

  The physician removed the knife with gloved hands with one quick movement. He showed the knife to the chief steward, who was still looking green.

  “It’s one of our steak knives,” the chief steward managed to get out.

  Travers went over to a tea table, where a tray was sitting. A silver serving dish for the entrée was still covered with a domed top, which was engraved with the name of the ship. Also on the tray was an unused crystal goblet, an unopened bottle of mineral water, and silver salt and pepper shakers. Only the folded linen napkin holding the cutlery had been disturbed.

  “I assume there is someone among the crew who can take fingerprints.”

  “Yes, Inspector,” replied the chief steward.

  “Where the devil is Rogers?” asked Dr. Wallace, suddenly realizing that the ship’s house detective wasn’t with them.

  “We tried to find him.”

  “He’s probably playing poker in third class,” the physician muttered, as he began to return his medical instruments to his black bag.

  “Tell the fingerprint man to come here at once,” said Travers, who was just as happy to take control of the case himself. “And I shall need a room where I can question the passengers.”

  The chief steward seemed relieved to return to something that resembled his usual duties. “There is a small office off the library that can be placed at your service, Inspector. Will you need it tonight?”

  Travers glanced at his watch. It was already almost midnight. There were only a few people he wanted to talk to right away. The rest could wait until the morning. Since they were on a ship in the middle of the ocean, he didn’t have to worry about the murderer slipping away. “I’ll begin after breakfast.”

  “Everything will be ready.” The chief steward hesitated. “Is there anything else?”

  Travers turned to the physician, who said, “We’ll take care of removing the body.”

  Dr. Wallace and the chief steward left. It would take several minutes until someone returned with the stretcher and the fingerprint equipment. Although Inspector Travers hadn’t said anything yet to the person who was sitting on the loveseat in the bedroom’s alcove, which was nearly in darkness, he turned to her now.

  “Would you like a drink, Lady Lambton-Keene? Or tea?”

  She shook her head.

  “Was it you who alerted the chief steward?”

  “I believe it was the steward on duty who went to find him. I stayed in the cabin.” She paused and smiled grimly. “I didn’t touch anything. I’m a fan of mystery stories, and so I know about fingerprints.”

  She then stood up and came into the light. “I also know that the person who finds the body is a chief suspect. So don’t feel awkward, Inspector Travers. Ask me whatever you like.”

  “Thank you.”

  And Inspector Travers was grateful. This was going to take delicate work, and not just because the victim was a peeress of the realm. He had to suspect everyone who had a connection with the duchess. Therefore, Sir William and Lady Lambton-Keene also had to be considered, and it would make his job much easier if they submitted to questioning readily, rather than tried to desist by pulling rank.

  “But you don’t need to be a stoic, you know,” he told her. He had noted that her normally deep voice was even more gravelly than usual, a sure sign of exhaustion and stress. “I need to wait here until the fingerprints have been taken. I can meet you in the bar later. I’m sure you do need that drink, and Sir William is probably wondering where you are.”

  “My husband is playing bridge. When he’s playing bridge, he thinks of nothing else.”

  “All right, then, let’s begin. But do at least sit down.”

  Lady Lambton-Keene returned to the loveseat. Inspector Travers turned on the light switch, so that the alcove was illuminated and he could see her face. “Was the duchess not feeling well today? I noticed she wasn’t at lunch, or tea, or dinner.”

  “She seemed fine at breakfast—and at tennis.”

  They exchanged glances. For both of them that conversation on deck about tennis partners seemed like it belonged to another world.

  “Jeffrey Baird worked out, then?”

  “Oh, yes. He’s an excellent player.”

  “What happened after the game?”

  “The duchess left after the first set. I believe she went back to her cabin. Mr. Baird and I played another set, while Sir William watched. Then we went back to our cabins to change for lunch. I stopped by the duchess’s cabin on my way to the dining room. She said she had a headache and wanted to rest.”

  “Did you see her, or did she speak through the closed door?”

  “She came to the door. I was surprised to see she was still in her tennis clothes.”

  “Did she say why?”

  “I didn’t ask. I suggested she take a bath and lie down for a rest. I also told her I would have a tray sent to her room.”

  “Did the duchess often have headaches?”

  Lady Lambton-Keene had avoided looking at the body lying on the bed. Now she looked over at the immobile face of the dead woman.

  “Would it be easier if I rephrased the question?” asked Travers. “Was it a happy marriage?”

  Lady Lambton-Keene let out a sigh. “It’s times like these I wished I smoked. I could think of a good answer while I fiddled with the match and my cigarette holder.”

  “Then it was an unhappy marriage?”

  “Is any marriage ever so black and white? But, please, do sit down, Inspector. I wouldn’t feel so guilty rambling on, if you were sitting too.”

  Inspector Travers brought over the chair from the writing table and sat down.

  “The duke had a rough time three years ago,” said Lady Lambton-Keene. “First his wife died of cancer—it happened all so suddenly, the poor thing—and just five months later their son, James, died in a boating accident. Gerald ... You don’t mind if I call the duke by his Christian name, do you? This isn’t for the official record, is it, Inspector?”

  “Anything you say will be
taken into consideration, Lady Lambton-Keene. But if the duke doesn’t mind your calling him Gerald, I certainly don’t.”

  “Well, Gerald was shattered, as I’m sure you can imagine. Of course, he still had Margaret. But ... Don’t get me wrong, Margaret is a charming girl.”

  “But a daughter is not a wife, or an heir?”

  “You’re very understanding, Inspector. That makes it easier.”

  Inspector Travers didn’t mention that it was his job to size up people quickly, and get to the point. “When did the duke decide to remarry?”

  “After two years of seeing him mope about, I couldn’t bear it any more. I insisted he come with me and Sir William to Juan-les-Pins. Everyone was talking about the new hotel that had opened a few years ago, Le Provencal, and I thought the sun and sea would do Gerald good. There was also a decent tennis court. And, of course, pretty girls.”

  Lady Lambton-Keene didn’t linger over what came next: Meeting Honey Lynde, as she was called then. Walks along the beach at sunset. Midnight dances on the hotel terrace. Champagne-flavored kisses at dawn.

  “If I had known Gerald was going to fall head over heels for a girl that no one knew a thing about, I never would have suggested we go. But he did. And Gerald being Gerald, he proposed marriage.”

  “And she accepted?”

  “Most girls would. Gerald isn’t bad looking, and he’s got loads of money. Even without a title, he’d be quite a catch.”

  Inspector Travers didn’t know the Duke of Tarrington personally, but his photo was sometimes in the newspapers, on the society pages. Although His Grace was certainly no movie star, Travers could see why an ambitious woman without a fortune of her own would snap him up.

  “How long did the honeymoon last?”

  Lady Lambton-Keene gave him a knowing look. “About as long as you’d think. They weren’t suited. It didn’t take long for them to realize that. Honey was marvelous on the dance floor—and in the boudoir, I suppose. But there’s more to being a duchess than being beautiful and bewitching. Gerald takes his responsibilities very seriously. He’s interested in his tenant farmers and what goes on in the village. He’s always present at the charity events. Life at the ancestral pile can be rather dull, if you don’t find planning the latest charitable fete enthralling.”

  “Did she have love affairs?”

  Lady Lambton-Keene raised an eyebrow. “Are you assuming she would tell me, if she did?”

  “You’re a woman. A woman usually knows.”

  “There were flirtations; nothing serious. Gerald ...” She paused as she searched for the right words. “You see, Gerald may not have loved Honey, but like most men he didn’t like being made a fool of. And he didn’t approve of the class of man she seemed to enjoy dallying with. So he kept an eye on Honey, after he saw she was getting restless. She didn’t like it, the feeling of being watched. She went through lady’s maids the way some women go through silk stockings. She was always accusing them of spying on her.”

  “Rightly so, it seems.”

  “Yes, but if she hadn’t been so blatant! You saw her on the dance floor last night. When she did that ridiculous backward dip, Freddie was mortified. Perhaps you didn’t notice, but his face turned pink with embarrassment.”

  “She didn’t play the game?”

  “I suppose you think I’m a cat, talking about Honey and doing it while her body is still in the room. The truth is I felt sorry for her. It wasn’t her fault she wasn’t pukka sahib.”

  “Did the duke consider a divorce?”

  “He’s a Catholic. The family got its title and lands from the Stuarts.”

  Inspector Travers was silent. It was much too early to start forming theories, especially when the theory that first came to mind had more in common with a cheap mystery novel than real life. Yet it was too tempting to totally ignore: A duke desperate to rid himself of a wife he didn’t love, yet couldn’t divorce because of his religious principles, asks his loyal and devoted cousin to take the hated wife on a trip and have her murdered on the voyage home. The beauty of it was that Sir William and Lady Lambton-Keene were so eminently respectable, so beyond reproach, so very pukka sahib.

  “We’ve strayed rather far from today, haven’t we?”

  “You’ve helped me understand the duchess better,” replied Inspector Travers. “But you’re right. Let’s go back to today. You said you were going to order a lunch tray for the duchess. Did you, in fact, order one?”

  “Yes, I asked the maître d’ to take care of it.”

  “Do you know if a tray was delivered?”

  Lady Lambton-Keene considered the question. “I know I checked on Honey in the afternoon. I wanted to write some letters, and so I went to the library after lunch. They have a good supply of stationery there and several writing tables. Then I thought I would take just a peek at some of the shops. But I didn’t stay long, because I had to change before afternoon tea was served.”

  “Then you would have checked on the duchess before four o’clock?”

  “Yes, I suppose I knocked on her cabin door at around three-thirty.”

  “Did she answer?”

  “Oh, yes. She had rested, she said. But she still had a beastly headache. And now I remember—she asked me to have the lunch tray taken away. She hadn’t eaten a thing. I wasn’t worried, though. Sir William also suffers from headaches. When they’re very bad, he’ll miss a meal. Of course, you’re not interested in Sir William and it’s getting late, so let me try to be brief. Honey said she was going to try to go back to sleep. When I dropped by before dinner, she still wasn’t feeling well and I said I would have another tray sent up, in case she got hungry later. Then I went to the dining room. After dinner, I went to the ballroom to see those young dancers perform, while Sir William went to the card room to play bridge. When the waters started to get choppy, I began to worry about Honey. I hoped the rolling of the ship wasn’t going to make her feel even worse. So I left the performance early and returned to our corridor. Along the way I passed Lady Margaret’s cabin and stopped in for a few minutes. She’s not much of a sailor, poor thing, and I wanted to see if she needed anything. She was in bed, reading one of her political pamphlets, and said she felt reasonably well. So I left her and continued on to the duchess’s cabin. And then ...”

  Inspector Travers recognized the symptoms, the narrowing of the eyes, the stiffening of the lips, the beads of perspiration that formed on the forehead; it wasn’t easy recalling the moment when you stumbled upon a dead body unexpectedly. He allowed her to regain her composure before he asked, “Was the cabin door unlocked?”

  Lady Lambton-Keene shook her head. “I knocked several times. When there was no answer, I became alarmed. I went back down the hall, to the stewards’ station. The steward on duty had a key to all the cabins. He unlocked the door and allowed me to go in first. I’m not one hundred percent sure what happened next. I didn’t faint. I do know that. But everything began to seem very unreal. People came into the cabin. That chief steward was one of them. And then a woman, I suppose it was one of the female stewards, led me over to this alcove and helped me to sit down. After that, you arrived and the doctor. I saw you. I heard you speak. But it all seemed like I was watching a play.” She glanced back at the bed and the silent figure lying upon it. “It still doesn’t seem real.”

  “That’s the shock. Try to get some sleep tonight.”

  Lady Lambton-Keene rose from the loveseat. Instead of walking to the door, she went over to the bed. A strand of hair had fallen on the duchess’s forehead, and she gently pushed it away.

  “Who could have done this, Inspector?”

  “Perhaps you can help me with that. Did she say anything about any of the passengers on board the ship? Did she seem afraid of anyone?”

  Lady Lambton-Keene shook her head. “She was usually self-absorbed, unless there was a good-looking man in the vicinity. As for being afraid, I don’t think she would have confided in me. I don’t know if she had anyone she
could confide in.”

  “If you do think of something, let me know.”

  Although there was no official police department on board, the ship employed a detective, George Rogers, a cigar-smoking former chief of security for a swank New York City hotel, who managed a small but efficient staff. The detective had not been engaged in a poker game at the crucial moment, as the ship’s physician had hinted. He was playing craps with some of the off-duty sailors in their quarters.

  After he was finally found and apprised of the situation, the detective seemed relieved when he was introduced to Detective Inspector Travers and learned that Scotland Yard would take charge. Jewel thieves, card sharks, and the occasional pet that had gone astray was his usual bill of fare, the detective explained. Murder—especially the murder of a peeress of the realm—was above his ken.

  The ship’s fingerprint expert had already arrived and was checking for fingerprints in the cabin. Once Travers saw the man was a professional and doing a careful and thorough job, he left him to do his work. That was how Travers preferred to work back on land, with the team of trusted subordinates he had built over the years. In fact, he was waxing nostalgic for his sergeant at the Yard, who would have already taken over many of the details that were a necessary part of the routine work that formed the basis of a murder investigation. His sergeant was a good sounding board as well, and Travers had already decided that Rogers was no substitute.

  By the time the fingerprint man finished, the body of the Duchess of Tarrington had been removed from the cabin. One thing that hadn’t been found was the key to the cabin. Travers wasn’t unduly worried. His guess was that the key was sitting at the bottom of the ocean, miles behind them. He knew that’s what he would have done, if he had been the criminal leaving the scene of the crime: locked the door and thrown the key overboard as soon as possible.

  The hour was late, but there was one last thing that needed to be done that night. Inspector Travers therefore asked the physician and the ship’s detective to remain in the cabin while he checked the contents of the safe.