Princess Charming

by Jane Heller

  I kept asking myself: Why would anyone want to murder Pat, Jackie, or me? We weren’t perfect, God knows, but we didn’t deserve to be cold-bloodedly, premeditatedly killed either. Particularly not while we were on vacation, which would be the ultimate in nastiness, in my opinion.

  Still, at about five o’clock that morning, I almost ran down the hall, pounded on my friends’ cabin doors, and woke them up to warn them of the possible threat to their lives. And then two things stopped me. First, I reminded myself that Jackie and Pat already thought me a hysteric. The minute I’d open my mouth to tell them the tale of the two men on the phone, Jackie would roll her eyes and say in that husky, tough-girl voice of hers, “Elaine, give it a rest,” and then dismiss whatever I said as paranoid bullshit. And Pat would put her hand to her mouth and start to giggle, thinking I was just being incorrigible, like a wayward child. The whole thing would be reduced to yet another game of Cry Wolf; I had spoken of so many plots and intrigues and conspiracies over the years that they no longer took anything I said seriously.

  No, they’d never believe me.

  And why ruin their vacation? Particularly when there wasn’t a shred of evidence that any of us was the intended target of the hit man’s hit. There were dozens of ex-wives on the ship, judging by the large group of desperate-looking single women in the disco the previous night. Maybe the two men were plotting to kill one of them.

  I decided that the very least I could do was report the crossed-wires situation to the Purser’s Office.

  I picked up the phone at six-forty. The line was perfectly clear. I dialed the appropriate extension and got the same British woman I’d spoken to on my first day of the cruise. When I told her what had happened the night before (leaving out the murder plot), she confirmed that the ship-to-shore connections had been affected by the bad weather, as had the television satellite reception, but that everything was fine now.

  Not exactly, I wanted to say but didn’t.

  I was supposed to meet Sam on the Promenade Deck at seven-thirty, and although I was exhausted beyond belief, I wasn’t about to pass up a chance to go running with him and eat breakfast together. But it was only six forty-five. There was still time to take action regarding the murder plot, and I knew exactly which action I would take: I would speak to Captain Solberg himself—discreetly, of course.

  I washed, ran a comb through my hair, threw on my running clothes, and climbed the stairwell up to the Bridge Deck instead of waiting for the elevator.

  The Bridge Deck was the level just under the Sun Deck, where the pools and the Glass Slipper café were located. The officers’ area was at the bow of the ship, was surrounded by immense glass portholes (I guessed it was more important for the captain to be able to see the sea than it was for me), and contained all the Princess Charming’s navigation equipment. In other words, the Bridge Deck was the helm, the place from which the ship was kept on course, a sort of very large and cushy cockpit. There were modular sofas and framed lithographs on the walls and high-pile carpeting in a shipshape oceanic blue. But mostly, there were men standing around in crisp white uniforms, the gold stripes on their shoulders indicating their rank. One of them asked me what I was doing there at such an early hour of the morning. The Bridge Deck, it turned out, was off limits to passengers except during specially scheduled tours.

  “I’m sorry to just barge in here like this,” I said, “but it’s urgent that I speak to the captain.”

  “Urgent?” asked the man, who introduced himself as the ship’s first officer but didn’t look a day over eighteen. He was Scandinavian, like Captain Solberg, and just as remote.

  “Yes, very urgent,” I said, unwilling to be deterred.

  First Officer Nilsen shrugged and went in search of the captain.

  While he searched, I paced, glancing at the radar equipment, the navigation charts, the framed plaques commemorating the awards bestowed upon the Princess Charming by the cruise line industry. Eventually, Captain Solberg arrived.

  “Yes? How can I help?” he asked.

  He was big and blond and craggy-faced, a Nordic Superman. Or maybe he just seemed larger-than-life because I’d seen him on television and heard his voice on the PA system.

  “Is there someplace where we could speak privately?” I asked.

  He arched his bushy golden eyebrows in what was, for him, a showy display of emotion.

  “I won’t take up too much of your time,” I assured him. “But it is important. Urgent, as I told First Officer Nilsen.”

  Captain Solberg looked skeptical, but resigned himself to escorting me back to his private office, a rather messy place littered with faxes, charts, and Styrofoam coffee cups. He pointed to the visitor’s chair. I sat in it.

  “Now, vat is da trouble?” he asked, while he sorted through some of the papers on his desk.

  I recounted the whole sorry story. Captain Solberg did not look up from his desk until I mentioned the word “murder.”

  “You are traveling alone?” was his response to my tale of intrigue.

  “With my two best friends,” I said. “Oh. I see what you’re getting at. No, I’m not at all certain that one of us is the target of the hit man. We could be, of course. All three of us are divorced. But no matter who the intended victim is, she’s a passenger on your ship and so is the man who is out to murder her. He must be stopped! Right away!”

  In response, Captain Solberg didn’t exactly jump up, sound the ship’s whistle, and summon the passengers to our mustering stations. He remained seated and remarkably calm and asked, “Is dis your first cruise, Mrs.—”

  “Zimmerman,” I said. “Yes, it is.”

  “And you are feeling a little qveasy?”

  “Queasy? No. I feel fine.”

  “Vat about da ex-husband? Miss him a little now dat you are at sea?”

  “Miss Eric? Yeah, like I’d miss a migraine,” I said.

  “So you get headaches, Mrs. Zimmerman? Have maybe been in da hospital for da headaches?”

  “No, no. I was just making a…Never mind.”

  “You know, Mrs. Zimmerman, I have been a ship’s captain for over tventy-seven years, and I have seen many women who come aboard da ship and feel sad, suddenly. Afraid. It’s nothing to be ashamed of. Dat’s vy ve have so many vonderful activities to keep you busy and happy. So you von’t be lonely.”

  “Hey, vait a minute. I mean, wait a minute.” I couldn’t believe it. Captain Solberg wasn’t buying a word I said! He thought I was just another lonely divorcée, a nervous Nellie, a hysterical female. Well, all right. So maybe I was all of those things. But that had nothing to do with the two men who were plotting to kill a woman on the ship! “I’m telling you the truth,” I said, sitting up very straight in my chair. “I know what I heard, and a game of bingo isn’t going to change that.”

  “So you don’t care for bingo,” the captain mused. “Vell den, ve have a lovely casino. It might be fun for you and your friends to gamble a little. Forget da troubles back home.”

  “I’m already gambling, Captain Solberg,” I said hotly. “I’m risking my life by being a passenger on this ship. There’s a killer on board and you don’t seem the least bit concerned.”

  “Oh, I am very concerned,” he said, looking about as concerned as a person relaxing in a hammock. “Vould you like something to drink? Some coffee? Or a little fruit juice?”

  Jesus. This guy actually thinks I’m nuts, I thought. Or thirsty.

  “Captain, you’re in charge of the Princess Charming. Isn’t that right?” I asked, starting over.

  “Of course. And she is da finest ship on da seas, vith four main engines and six—”

  “Yes, yes. I know,” I said, cutting him off before he delivered his entire televised speech. “What I’m trying to confirm is that passenger security is your responsibility. Correct?”

  “Correct.”

  “And you care deeply about your passengers’ welfare. Correct?”

  “Correct.”

&nbs
p; “And if one of your male passengers was about to murder one of your female passengers, you would have the authority to arrest the man and have him taken into custody. Correct?” I felt like Marcia Clark, for God’s sake.

  “No.”

  “No?”

  “No. I cannot arrest one of my passengers for a murder dat has not taken place, Mrs. Zimmerman. If da crime were actually committed, den I could do something. Not before.”

  “But if you can’t do anything until the crime has been committed, it’ll be too late,” I insisted. “A woman will have been killed.”

  Captain Solberg rose from his chair, looming above me in his white uniform like a huge glass of milk. He lumbered over to my chair and helped me up. Then he opened one of his desk drawers, reached inside, and handed me a small package, pre-wrapped in cellophane and stamped with the Princess Charming’s charming logo.

  “Here, here,” he said in a soothing tone. I assumed he meant: There, there. “Ve hope you enjoy da cruise.”

  I studied the see-through package he had bestowed upon me. A parting gift. It contained several discount coupons to any of the ship’s nine lounges, a free week’s use of the health spa’s StairMaster, a pass to the movie of my choice, and a packet of Dramamine.

  “Try not to vorry so much,” said Captain Solberg as he ushered me out of his office. He was not the first person to tell me not to worry so much, but he was the first person to tell me from a cruise ship on which a potential murderer was running around loose.

  “I’ll try,” I said, clutching the package to my chest.

  Emotionally and physically spent, yet looking forward to meeting Sam and going for a run, I walked to the elevator and pressed the down button. When the elevator arrived, there was Skip Jamison standing inside. Again.

  He was wearing another in his collection of colorful Hawaiian shirts, along with white shorts and a pair of Reeboks, and he was very involved with the music that echoed through the headphones of his Sony Walkman. In fact, he was so busy humming and nodding his head and snapping his fingers to the beat that he seemed not to notice me at first.

  “Hey, it’s Elaine. Cool,” he said finally as we were descending, and lifted the headphones off his ears.

  “Oh, hi, Skip,” I said, still consumed with thoughts of hit men and ex-wives. “What are you up to?”

  “Just getting in touch with my music on my way down to breakfast,” he said cheerfully, tapping his feet to whatever song he’d been listening to.

  “Well, don’t let me interrupt,” I said. “I’m not really awake yet, so I won’t be very good company.”

  “I get it. You need your space. That’s cool,” he said. “I’ll go back to my tunes.” He placed the headphones over his ears and turned the volume up.

  I smiled, wishing I could be so carefree. Then Skip shouted something at me, the way people always do when they forget they’re wearing headphones and don’t realize they’re shouting.

  “Great song,” he yelled as he gave me the thumbs-up sign. “Eric Clapton’s unplugged version of ‘Layla.’”

  I nodded absentmindedly.

  “A classic rock ’n’ roll tune,” he roared over the guitar riff ringing in his ears. “But then, I love ’em all. All the really cool songs, especially the up-tempo ones.”

  That’s nice, I thought, wishing Skip would shut up already.

  “A lot of my friends think I’m way too top-forty in my taste,” he went on.

  “But you told me you liked the more mellow, New Age artists,” I said, making conversation, reluctantly.

  “What?” he yelled.

  “I said, you told me you liked the New Age artists,” I replied, much louder, thinking they could probably hear us in San Juan.

  “Yeah, I like them too,” Skip shouted. “I’m pretty much across the board when it comes to music. Classics. New Age. Top-forty. All the hits.”

  “Cool,” I said.

  “I guess you could call me a hit man,” he said. “A fucking hit man.”

  I spun around to look at him. Was it possible that Skip was the man who was plotting to kill the woman on the ship? Dear sweet, laid-back Skip? He couldn’t have needed the money to do the hit—he was an art director at a major ad agency, an agency known for its bloated salaries. Still…

  “Skip?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Were you by any chance in your stateroom last night? At about ten o’clock?”

  “Yeah, I was reading. Why?”

  “Just curious,” I said.

  The very instant the elevator arrived at the Promenade Deck, I mumbled a tight “goodbye” to Skip and hightailed it out of there.

  10

  “Hey, hey, slow down,” Sam cautioned as he saw me rushing out of the ship, onto the Promenade Deck. “The deck’s still slick from last night’s rain. You could fall and break one of those stilts of yours.”

  Stilts. The boy who lived next door to us when I was growing up always called my legs stilts, and I would cry myself to sleep over it. Now, Sam had just referred to them in the very same way, and I was thrilled.

  He was stretched out in one of the loungers, his own stilts hanging over the end of the chair. He’d been waiting for me, as I was the one who was late for a change.

  I stopped, caught my breath, and relaxed. “You’re right. I was in a hurry. I just didn’t want to be late for our date.”

  I rarely used the word “date,” first, because I rarely had dates, and second, because I’d always equated dating with bungee jumping in terms of risk level. But its goofy, adolescent connotation felt appropriate somehow, especially after Sam and I had practically kissed on the lips the previous night—if not for the arrival of the elevator. With that near-kiss under our belts, we had moved our relationship up a notch, taken it to the “dating” level, acknowledged that, since the cruise lasted only seven days, we’d better get going if we wanted anything to happen in the romance department. That’s one of the odd aspects of vacations; they last a finite period of time, and if you meet someone you like, you have to do away with some of the rules of the road and accelerate the getting-to-know-you process.

  My fears about The Phone Call faded, at least temporarily. Sam looked so handsome sitting there, so benign in his T-shirt and running shoes, so un-murderer-ish.

  Still, before he and I went running together, before things advanced any further between us, I had to ask him the question I had just asked Skip. I had to know if there was any chance that he could have been the one that made the call.

  I inquired casually, “I was wondering, did you spend the rest of last night in your cabin? After we left each other?”

  He peered at me over his eyeglasses, a wry expression on his face.

  “No. I partied with the nuns we met in the elevator,” he replied. “They were a wild bunch, let me tell you.”

  “Come on. I’m curious,” I said.

  “A couple of dances at the disco and you’re keeping tabs on me already?” he teased.

  “Of course not. I just want to know if you tried to watch TV in your stateroom last night and got the same awful reception I did.”

  “Oh. No, I didn’t even turn the TV on. As a matter of fact, I didn’t go back to my cabin until eleven-thirty or so.”

  “You didn’t?” I sighed with relief. Not that I’d really suspected Sam of being the hit man.

  “No. When I got off the elevator, I realized I wasn’t ready to go to bed. I felt restless, excited, like a kid.”

  “I know. Me too.”

  “So instead of going to my cabin, I turned around and came back out here.”

  “To the Promenade Deck?”

  He nodded. “I thought maybe I could calm down a little, sort things out.”

  “Oh, you mean, about the career change you’ve been wrestling with?”

  “That was part of what was bothering me.”

  “What was the other part?”

  He smiled.

  “Wait. I know,” I grinned, full of myself. �
��You were trying to decide whether I’m a pain in the ass or the ‘find’ of the century. Wasn’t that the other dilemma?”

  “It was.”

  “And did you come to any conclusions?”

  “I already told you, Slim. You require further study. Much further study.”

  “I see. And the career change? Did you sort that out?”

  He shrugged. “Not entirely. The problem is, my heart’s just not in my work anymore. Ever since my fiancée…” He stopped, as if debating whether to say more, reveal more.

  “Go on, Sam. Please,” I urged. I wanted to hear about her, wanted to know what had happened to her, wanted to know if Sam was still in love with her.

  He adjusted his eyeglasses, pushing them back toward his head with his index finger. “My career hasn’t meant as much to me since Jillian died,” he said. Jillian. A lovely name. “I’m not as driven now. I don’t feel it’s the end of the world if I’m not on time for things, if I don’t show up in the city where they send me. I don’t care as much about any of it since she’s gone.”

  I nodded, picturing Sam trying to cope with the death of his fiancée, particularly with such a demanding travel schedule.

  “Would you really feel differently if you went into a field other than insurance?” I asked. “When you lose someone you love, the emptiness is with you no matter how you earn your living.”

  “True.” He looked at me, his eyes such a deep, intense blue behind the glasses. Then he said, as if in response to a question,

  “I’m over her. I really am. It’s the experience I’m having trouble…” He stopped again.

  “The experience?” I asked. “You mean, that Jillian died only a few days before you two were to be married?”

  He nodded solemnly. “That and the fact that I—”

  “You what?”

  He shook me off this time. There would be no more questions, I sensed. Sam wasn’t like the people who spill their guts to the complete strangers they meet on vacation; he was more reserved about his personal history. He had a story to tell, that much was obvious, but he wasn’t ready to tell it. Not to me, anyway. Not yet.