by Barbara Ross
Chapter 20
Flynn’s call woke me up the next morning. Once again the other side of the bed was empty and there was a text from Chris. OFF TO WORK. CALL ME LATER. I shook off sleep to answer my phone.
“You and I are meeting Rick Enrique for breakfast at Blount’s,” Flynn said as soon I answered. “Then Ian Cowen, followed by Doug Merriman.”
“You’ve been busy.”
He sped right on. “Lieutenant Binder’s allowing the crew to go onto the Garbo to collect their personal belongings at eleven. I figure we’ll roll right into that. Give Genevieve a hand with her things.”
“And not incidentally get another look at the crime scene.”
“Let’s hope, though I’m sure we’ll be closely supervised. See you in thirty minutes.”
I was showered, dressed, and headed for the door when my cell buzzed.
“Hi, Mom.”
“Julia, I’m glad I caught you.” Mom sounded rushed and slightly breathless.
“Everything okay?”
“Yes, yes. I’m driving to the market. I just hung up the phone after talking to Wyatt. She’s having a memorial gathering for Geoffrey Bower at four o’clock today at Foreman’s. I’m going and I said I’d tell you about it.”
That seemed impossibly soon. “Why on earth today?”
“She wants to do something before the crew leaves town. They’re being allowed to take their personal things off the yacht today, and she expects some of them to leave as soon as they can.”
That made sense. None of the crew had ties to the harbor. They’d have to move on, get other jobs. Binder couldn’t hold any of them without an arrest.
“All right. I’m jogging past your house right now. I have to be at Blount’s in seven minutes.”
“Meet me at the house at three forty-five,” Mom said. “We’ll walk to Foreman’s together.”
* * *
Flynn was seated with Rick in a booth in Blount’s coffee shop when I arrived. I waved the hostess off, indicating I’d located my party across the room. I fast-walked to their table, concerned that Flynn had started without me. The room was crowded with people eating breakfast, though I didn’t see any other members of the Garbo’s crew.
It turned out Flynn and the steward were ordering. Their conversation hadn’t gone beyond the introductions.
“You remember Julia Snowden,” Flynn said to Rick as I sat down.
“Certainly. Her party was aboard the Garbo the night before Mr. Bower was killed. The first of many extraordinary events of the week.” Rick said this in a neutral way, but I took his words to mean that somehow Chris, Quentin, and I had started a chain that led to Geoffrey Bower’s death. I didn’t see how that was possible.
“I understand you wish to talk,” Rick said to Flynn in his soft French accent, “because the magnificent Chef Genevieve, your girlfriend, is upset her food was used to poison Mr. Bower.” He pronounced Genevieve’s name in the French way, making it sound even prettier and more musical than it was in English. He turned to me. “But, Ms. Snowden, what is your interest in the conversation?”
“Julia has helped the police with her inquiries in the past,” Flynn interjected before I could speak. I worked to keep my eyebrows down. Always before, Flynn had characterized my contributions as “helping,” the air quotes so pronounced you could practically see them hanging above his head. Not this time.
“And you are also a friend of Ms. Wyatt Jayne,” Rick added, his mouth downturned.
“You’re not a fan?” I asked.
Rick shrugged. His face was long and lean, his goateed chin prominent. “I do not dislike Ms. Jayne. Life was good before she came. Then it was different. Change can be good, but not always.”
“We understand you worked on the Garbo the second longest of the crew, over six years. Describe your relationship with Mr. Bower,” Flynn said.
Rick rubbed his goatee. It was such an open-ended question, I wondered if it would produce any results. Finally, he spoke. “Mr. Bower is . . . was a very nice man. Wonderful boss. Easy to work for.”
“Would you say you were confidants, friends?”
“I would say I was closer to him than most of the rest of the crew, except Emil, who has also been with him a long time. And because Mr. Bower and I have a special relationship, he sometimes asked me to do things of a personal nature.”
“We understand he recently asked you to do one of those sorts of things. He asked you to go to Gordon’s Jewelry and pick something up.”
Rick’s forehead creased in surprise. “How did you know?” Then his face settled. “You have spoken to the jeweler.”
“Yes,” I confirmed. “He told us he gave you a large purple case to take back to the ship, and he showed you the contents.”
The waitress picked that moment to take our orders, a miracle of bad timing. Rick took his time responding to her, providing exacting requirements, how dark his toast should be, how hard the yolk of his egg. I sensed he was stalling. Finally, after filling our coffee cups and delivering the cream and sweeteners, she left us.
“Julia asked you about the purple case you picked up from Gordon’s Jewelry,” Flynn reminded him.
Rick took a long swallow of coffee. A plume of steam still rose from my cup and I wondered that he didn’t burn his mouth. “The purple case,” he said, setting down his cup. “Yes, I collected it from the jeweler.”
“And then?” Flynn prompted.
“Why, I brought it immediately to the yacht. It will not do to be strolling through the town with something so valuable.”
“And once you arrived at the Garbo what did you do with it?” I asked.
“I put it on the desk in Mr. Bower’s office, which is a part of his stateroom, for him to later put it in the safe.”
“How long did it sit there?” I asked.
“I don’t know. Probably until much later that night. That is when Mr. Bower usually put things in the safe.”
If the case sat there all day, any member of the crew might have seen it. “Mr. Gordon had showed you the necklace. You knew the contents of the case were extremely valuable. Why would you have left it out in the open?”
“This is what I always do when Mr. Bower is not in his office and I have possession of something that must go in the safe.” Rick slapped his hand on the wooden table so hard I jumped in my chair. “Are you suggesting I am not good at my job? I have done everything I have been asked.”
“Whoa, it’s okay.” Flynn tried to calm him. “We’re trying to understand what happened. That’s it.”
But that wasn’t good enough for me. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to imply you weren’t doing a good job. Mr. Gordon told us he showed you the necklace. You must have guessed how valuable it was. Perhaps it needed better handling than one of Mr. Bower’s business documents?”
“Mr. Bower’s business documents are sometimes more valuable than those gems,” Rick pointed out. “Millions of dollars, hundreds of millions, ride on his transactions. We had no visitors on the boat. No one was going to steal from Mr. Bower. He would have known immediately it was one of us.”
“When Mr. Gordon showed you the necklace, he also showed you the ring he had made to match it?” I asked.
The waitress came with our plates, more bad timing. Rick stabbed the yolk of his egg with his fork and sent it back to be recooked, repeating his specifications. “I will keep the toast,” he added, so it must have met his standard for doneness.
I stared down at the oatmeal I’d ordered. It looked thoroughly unappetizing, though I couldn’t decide if that was a function of the food or my mood. “The ring,” I reminded Rick.
“Ah yes, the ring. Yes, I did see it.”
“It looked like an engagement ring. What did you take from that?” I pressed.
“At first, nothing. Mr. Bower is a rich man. He can buy gems.”
“But then?”
The waitress returned with his eggs. She waited while he cut into each of the yolks with his fo
rk. The bright yellow insides ran out. “Perfection,” he told her. “Merci.” She breathed a sigh of relief, exiting quickly.
“The ring,” I reminded him for a second time.
Flynn was nonchalantly cutting his egg white omelet into bite-sized pieces. If I hadn’t known better, I would have thought he wasn’t paying attention.
“All day as I am doing my chores, I got more and more curious about that ring. At night, when he put the purple case into the safe, I asked Mr. Bower about it.”
I sat so far forward I almost dipped my chest in the oatmeal. “And?”
“He said he intended to give the ring to Ms. Jayne and ask her to marry him. It was then he told me about his plan for Friday evening. He wanted all the staff to leave the boat and Chef Genevieve to prepare a special meal.”
“What did you think?”
Rick chewed a forkful of eggs slowly before he answered. “I told him I was unsure of the plan. He had not spent a lot of time with Ms. Jayne. I thought he might be rushing things. He told me the two of them had been corresponding and talking on the telephone for months. This was true. I had heard them once in a great while laughing and chatting as I cleaned his stateroom.” Rick looked up toward the ceiling. “I am not sure I have ever heard him laugh, except on those phone calls. He was not a man of humor.”
“Really?” The chatty, easy man I’d met seemed to have a normal sense of humor.
Rick backtracked. “Perhaps I exaggerate. Anyway, he was determined, so I wished him luck and said I would notify the staff of his wishes.”
“Did Mr. Bower open the purple case before he put it in the safe?” Flynn asked.
“He did. He looked at the necklace and the ring, said the jeweler had done an artful job, opened the safe, and put the case in it.”
The men finished their eggs. My oatmeal looked less and less appealing. Finally, Rick excused himself. “I have much to do before we go on the yacht to gather our things. It has been my home for six years and I have much there, even though my quarters are small.”
Flynn and I stayed at the table after he left. “What did you think?” he asked.
“He’s lying,” I answered. “I’m not sure about what.”
Flynn signaled the waitress to refill our coffees. “That’s what I think too.”
* * *
Ian Cowen appeared in the archway to the coffee room just after nine o’clock.
“I’ll get him.” Flynn stood, smoothing his cotton shirt over his jeans. At that moment, Doug Merriman arrived and greeted Ian.
“I thought you said we were meeting with them separately,” I said.
“We were.” Flynn didn’t look happy. He returned to the table with the mate and the engineer.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Ian said with his broad Aussie accent. “Doug and I were chatting earlier and realized we were both scheduled to talk to you, so we came along together.”
We did mind, especially since they were one of the pairs who alibied each other, but we also had no standing to compel either one to talk to us. We had to take what we got.
They were an odd pair. Ian was tanned, tall, and loose limbed, his blond hair always a mess. He slouched in his chair, to all appearances a laid-back Aussie. Doug was short, dark, and pale, well-proportioned, a miniature man. His movements were economical, his posture erect.
They ordered coffee and Flynn and I requested refills. I asked the waitress to take the congealing oatmeal away.
“I gather you want to talk about Bower’s murder,” Ian said “We’ve already spoken to the state police.”
“Julia and I are helping our friends Genevieve and Wyatt gain a better understanding of what happened. That’s all,” Flynn reassured them.
“I can’t think what we can tell you.” Doug crossed his arms across his chest. Ian, on the other hand, leaned back in his chair, arms loose at his sides, apparently open to anything.
“I get that,” Flynn said. “Bear with us. You left the Garbo together on Friday.”
“Aye, aye,” Ian said, grinning.
“At twelve oh five,” Doug confirmed, demonstrating the engineer’s love of precision, or a liar trying to get the smallest detail right.
Flynn pushed on. “And you were together from then until you were summoned to the Garbo Friday evening.”
“We’ve been over this with the cops, minute by minute—where we were, what we did. We gave them receipts.” Doug shifted forward in his chair. Was he going to leave? I could see the questions were aggravating. At the same time, Lieutenant Binder had said the police could account for only a portion of Ian and Doug’s time away from the Garbo. Same with Emil and Marius. Same with Rick. Thanks to Quentin’s revelations of the night before, I now knew where Wyatt had been for the whole period.
“How long have you been with Mr. Bower?” I asked Doug, easing us away from the discussion that had annoyed him.
“Three years.”
“And before that?”
“Big yacht in the Mediterranean. Royalty on board. I’m not telling who. Before that, US Navy.” He provided the answers at a “just the facts” clip.
The waitress brought their coffees and refilled Flynn’s and my cup.
“How did you come to work on the Garbo?” Flynn followed up with Doug.
“A yacht staffing agent contacted me with the opportunity and I jumped. She’s a beauty.” He hung his head. “She was going to be even more so when Herndon’s got done with her, but now I guess that won’t be.”
“And you, Ian?” I prompted.
“Just joined in Portofino this year.”
“Did you get your job the same way as Doug, through a yacht staffing agent?”
“Not exactly. Douglas and I worked together before, on our last boat. He rang me and said there was a crew job going begging. Recommended me for it.”
So Doug and Ian had a prior connection.
“A lot of the crew left when they heard we’d be in some awful little town in Maine all summer—no offense,” Doug added.
I was offended.
“The local cops are barking up the wrong tree talking to us crew all the time,” Ian said. “If I was them, I’d be talking to that protester. The tall one.”
“Cliff Munroe?” I asked. “Why him?”
“Is that his name? Why, aside from the fact that he hated Mr. Bower, there’s him following the Garbo all over the world.”
“All over the world?” Flynn confirmed.
“Yeah. I saw him in Capri when I picked up Ms. Jayne in the launch. And I swear I saw him standing on the quay in Sardinia behind Genevieve when I picked her up.”
“Was he protesting against Geoffrey?” I asked.
“In Capri, yes, but in Sardinia, no. No signs or anything. He was just standing there,” Ian said.
“You’re sure?” Flynn asked, his voice eager. Ian nodded. “Did you tell this to Lieutenant Binder?”
“No, why would we have?” Ian was still slouched in the chair, but his voice was like steel. “He made it clear he was asking the questions.”
Through the archway into the lobby, we could see the Garbo’s crew gathering. Doug looked anxiously at Ian.
“We’ve got to go,” Ian said, standing up. “We don’t want to miss our chance to get our stuff.” Doug stood too.
“We’re coming too.” Flynn signaled to the waitress.
Doug and Ian walked out to Blount’s lobby while I waited with Flynn as he paid the bill. “I talked to that protester,” I said. “He told me his beef with Bower was personal.”
“Why didn’t you mention this before?”
“I was so focused on telling you my theory, I forgot about Cliff Munroe.” He didn’t fit a robbery motive. No wonder he was the professional detective and I wasn’t.
Flynn threw two twenties on the table and stood. “We need to tell the lieutenant about this. And about the Black Widow. Hurry up.”
Chapter 21
We joined the others in the lobby at Blount’s and proceede
d down to the dock as directed. All the crew members were there, along with Wyatt, Flynn, Quentin, and me. Quentin gave me an awkward smile, which I returned. Our discussion of the night before had taken some of the armor off each of us, exposing the tender skin beneath. We’d have to adjust to seeing each other in this new way.
Lieutenant Binder appeared ten minutes late, scowling as he hurried down the steps toward us. Jamie and Officer Howland were behind him, along with several state cops I didn’t recognize.
“I apologize for keeping you waiting.” Binder was composed, but cold. He didn’t acknowledge anyone individually, not even Flynn. “Here’s how this is going to work. You’ll go straight to your quarters. An officer will accompany you. You will retrieve your personal items and your personal items only. The officer will inspect them and then escort you back to the dock.”
“What if I don’t agree to have my items inspected?” Doug asked.
“Then you can wait to get them until the Garbo has been through probate and has a rightful owner who can give you permission to go aboard.” Binder was gruff, his patience thin to nonexistent. “Understood? Other questions.”
Genevieve raised her hand. “I have personal belongings in the galley as well as in my cabin.”
Binder looked at her for a moment, assessing. “Fine. Officer Dawes will escort you to the galley and to your quarters. Are your cooking items marked?”
“They have my initials on them,” Genevieve answered.
“Very well.”
Two of the state cops went up the gangway and slid back the hatch. We clustered at the bottom; the police moved to the top and stood on the open deck. “Go ahead,” Binder said. One by one the crew started up. At the top, each crew member was paired with a state cop and then disappeared below deck, until Wyatt, Quentin, Genevieve, Flynn, and I remained on the dock, and only Jamie, Officer Howland, and Lieutenant Binder waited at the top of the gangway. Wyatt started up with Quentin behind her. “Why is Mr. Tupper here?” Binder asked. His voice was curious, not hostile.