An Isle of Man Ghostly Cozy Collection - ABC

by Diana Xarissa

  “Oh, Harry, they aren’t at all,” Sherry said. “I mean, really, you can afford it. I don’t understand why you worry so much about every little expense. We’ve oodles of money in the bank.”

  “Thanks to many years of hard work by myself and my dearly departed first wife,” Harry said tartly. “I’d rather not spend every penny of it in the first year of my retirement. It needs to last a good long time, you know.”

  The girl shrugged and then tossed her head. “Yes, dear,” she said patronizingly.

  Charlotte smiled tightly, perhaps beginning to regret ever starting the conversation. “Right, whom haven’t we met?” she asked, looking around the room.

  “I’m Sarah Grasso,” a thirty-something woman who was sitting on her own said. Her brown hair was held back in a clip and her green eyes looked tired. Fenella thought she looked like someone who’d worked hard all of her life.

  “My husband Robert and I are going across on a short holiday,” she continued. “I can’t imagine where he’s disappeared to, though. He was meant to go straight to the ferry after work. He works nights. We were going to meet in our cabin when I arrived, but he wasn’t there yet.” She sighed. “He probably got held up at work and missed the boat. I suppose it doesn’t really matter, as we aren’t sailing anyway.”

  “Why book a cabin, if you don’t mind my asking?” Charlotte said.

  “Oh, we won the holiday in some prize draw at Robert’s work,” Sarah explained. “And the prize included a cabin for the sailing.”

  “How lucky for you,” Charlotte said.

  “Yes, we never win anything,” Sarah said. “We were both thrilled.”

  “I’m Florence March, and this is Stanley, my husband,” the last woman left introduced herself and the man with her. “We’re both retired and our children are long since grown up and flown the nest. We were just taking a short break to do some shopping and dining out, that sort of thing. We always book a cabin. We have since the children were small and we needed to keep them where we could see them.”

  Fenella smiled at the woman. There was something about the pair that whispered “money” to her as she studied them. Maybe it was Florence’s beautifully cut hair or impeccable makeup. Their clothes certainly looked as if they’d been expensive, but in a deliberately inconspicuous way.

  “I suppose that just leaves our American friend,” Charlotte said, turning to Fenella. “Tell us all about yourself,” she urged Fenella.

  Fenella opened her mouth to reply, but was interrupted when the door suddenly swung open.

  “Where are the police?” the man now standing in the doorway demanded. “They can’t do this. I simply won’t allow it.”

  Everyone stared at the man. He was probably sixty, with grey hair that looked as if he’d been running his hands through it vigorously for hours. Fenella studied his uniform, which was that of the ferry company. From the looks of the various ribbons and braids, whoever he was, he was important.

  “The police have simply left us here,” Stanley March said after a long silence. “We haven’t seen anyone for several minutes.”

  The man shook his head. “Unacceptable,” he snapped.

  “And who are you?” Charlotte Masters called out.

  The man glared at her for a moment and then took a deep breath. “I’m so upset, I’m behaving badly,” he said. “I do apologize. I realize none of this is your fault. I am Captain Matthew Howard. I’m in charge of the ferry that we’ve all just been escorted off of, and the police have no right…” he stopped suddenly, as his volume had been increasing dramatically.

  “It certainly isn’t our fault,” Charlotte jumped in. “We’re all suffering, too. I can’t imagine what’s happened to cause the sailing to be cancelled like this. It’s simply appalling behavior by the police.”

  “I’m sorry you feel that way,” Daniel Robinson said from the doorway on the opposite wall. Everyone had been so intent on Captain Howard that they hadn’t noticed his arrival.

  “Oh, I, that is, well,” Charlotte said. “I do hope you’ve come to explain yourself and then let us all back on the ferry so we can get on with our day.”

  Daniel shook his head. “I’m awfully sorry, but that simply isn’t possible yet,” he said. “I will explain everything to you as quickly as I can, but investigations take time. For the moment, I’d like to have a word with Sarah Grosso, please.”

  The young woman blinked a few times and then stood up slowly. “With me?” she asked. “But I haven’t done anything wrong.”

  “No one is suggesting that you have,” Daniel assured her. “If you could come with me, please.”

  The woman nodded and then walked slowly toward Daniel, still looking uncertain. “If you could just tell me where Robert is, I’d feel better,” she said when she reached Daniel’s side. “He must be worried about me. I’ve rung his mobile a dozen times, but he isn’t answering.”

  “If you could just come with me,” Daniel repeated himself. “I’ll try to answer your questions for you.”

  Sarah glanced back at the others in the room before following Daniel out through the door. As the door shut behind them, Fenella blew out a breath. There was no doubt in her mind that the body she’d found was that of the missing Robert Grosso. She didn’t envy Daniel the job of telling poor Sarah that her husband was dead.

  “Well, that was odd,” Charlotte said. “I do hope Sarah isn’t in any trouble.”

  “Do you know her?” Stanley March asked.

  “I just met her now, when she introduced herself,” Charlotte replied. “But she seems like a lovely young woman, so worried about her husband. I suppose, under these strange circumstances, that isn’t surprising.”

  “Captain Howard, does this happen regularly?” Stanley asked.

  “I’ve been sailing for over thirty years and this is the first time the police have had the audacity to interfere with a sailing. I’m not having it. I shall make sure that someone loses their job over this, see if I don’t,” the man replied.

  “That suggests that something serious has happened,” Stanley remarked. “Any idea what it could be?”

  The man frowned. “It doesn’t matter,” he insisted. “We have our own security staff that can handle whatever arises.”

  “Drugs,” Charlotte announced. “We all know the drug situation is getting out of control on the island. No doubt they found a huge stash of drugs on one of the container lorries.”

  “The ferry was leaving the island, not arriving,” Nick Proper pointed out. “Or are you suggesting that someone is growing drugs here and exporting them to Liverpool?”

  “Who knows what they’re getting up to in the north of the island,” Charlotte said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if there were people growing all manner of substances up there. With the prison in Jurby, there’s a steady supply of customers for them, as well.”

  “I hope you aren’t suggesting that the men and women in prison in Jurby are being give access to illegal drugs,” Stanley said.

  “Well, as I understand it…” Charlotte began. She stopped when Stanley held up his hand.

  “If it isn’t drugs, what else might it be?” he asked.

  “People trafficking,” Charlotte suggested. “I was reading an article last week about just that. Young girls are being snatched right off the street and turned into sex slaves for wealthy Russian oligarchs. It’s horrible. One of my friends, Susan, her daughter disappeared and the police didn’t believe her that it was people trafficking. But when Chloe finally managed to get free and come home, she wasn’t the same person at all. Oh, she told her mum that she’d run off with her boyfriend but it hadn’t worked out, but I could tell that she was so traumatized by what had really happened that she’d made that story up.”

  “Did the boyfriend disappear too, at the same time?” Stanley asked.

  Charlotte nodded. “He did. No doubt he was trafficked as well. They take boys, too, you know.” She added the last sentence in a whisper.

 
“How old were they when this happened?” Florence asked.

  “Oh, she was nineteen and he was twenty-two,” Charlotte said.

  “So rather older than the average age for someone trafficked,” Captain Howard said. “I’d suggest her story about running away with her boyfriend was probably more likely.”

  “You seem to know a lot about people trafficking,” Charlotte said, her tone accusatory.

  The man nodded. “It’s part of my job. It’s highly unlikely that anyone is being taken from the Isle of Man to the United Kingdom or vice versa, but I used to sail on the Channel and I learned a lot there, none of it pleasant.”

  “If it wasn’t drugs or people trafficking, what might have stopped the sailing?” Stanley asked.

  “Murder,” Charlotte said dramatically.

  “Murder?” Captain Howard echoed. “I think that’s highly unlikely. Perhaps some sort of accident where someone died is more likely.”

  “Would the police come to investigate an accident like this?” Stanley asked.

  “Maybe,” the captain shrugged. “It depends, I suppose, on what happened and how the police were notified. Whenever anything out of the ordinary happens on board, I’m meant to be notified first. Then I decide how to deal with the matter. I can only assume that whatever happened, someone rang the police directly and dragged them in without giving the proper procedures a single thought.”

  Fenella felt herself blushing at his words. He was absolutely right, of course. She’d never even considered that there were “proper procedures” when finding a dead body on the ferry. If she didn’t know Daniel Robinson personally, she might have reported what she’d found to a member of the ferry’s crew, though, which would have meant that the captain would have been informed. And goodness knows how that would have ended up, she thought. He didn’t seem like the type to want to have the police on his ship. And there was no way she’d want to entrust a murder investigation to whatever security the ferry company offered.

  “Surely you’ve had accidents on board before,” Stanley said. “The police can’t always stop a sailing just because of an accident.”

  The captain shrugged. “I once had a passenger have a heart attack on a sailing across the Channel. There was an investigation when we arrived in Calais, but his wife told us that he’d had heart trouble for years. The police barely spent any time on the boat at all that time.”

  He glanced out the window when he finished speaking. A huge number of police cars were still visible, parked along the road leading to the ferry. Clearly there was still a large police presence on the boat.

  “I don’t suppose there’s any chance the ferry itself is the problem?” Stanley asked. “All of its safety checks are up-to-date, are they?”

  “Of course,” the captain snapped. “I can assure you that the ferry is perfectly safe and was ready to sail as scheduled. You won’t be getting any compensation from Isle of Man Ferries for the delay.”

  “Well, that remains to be seen,” Stanley said.

  “Oh, Stanley, do stop being a bother,” his wife said. “I’m sure everyone is doing their best to sort everything out as quickly as they can. If even the captain doesn’t know what’s going on, the delay certainly can’t be the ferry company’s fault.”

  Stanley opened his mouth to reply, but the door at the back of the room swung open noisily. Daniel Robinson smiled tightly in the doorway as he surveyed the group.

  “Captain Howard, perhaps it would be best if we started with you,” he said after what felt like several long minutes.

  “And it’s about time,” the captain said crossly. “I don’t appreciate the way this has been dealt with at all. You can be quite certain that I will be complaining to the Chief Constable and the Governor about your behavior.”

  “Yes, sir, that’s certainly your right,” Daniel replied calmly.

  “And when will we be able to resume our trip?” Stanley called from his seat. “Florence and I have better places to be than this horrid little room.”

  Daniel nodded. “I do understand,” he said. “I’ll be speaking with each of you in turn and I hope to have everyone’s full cooperation. Once I’ve spoken to you, you’ll be free to go. I understand the ferry company is working on bringing in another ferry to cover while this one is temporarily out of service.”

  “So there is a problem with the ferry,” Stanley said triumphantly.

  “That’s not what I said,” Daniel replied. “At any rate, I believe Isle of Man Ferries is hoping to have everyone who still wants to sail on their way in another four hours or so. It will take that long to get another vessel here, and that gives me plenty of time for my questions.”

  “Four hours?” Stanley repeated. “That’s totally unacceptable.”

  “Now, Stanley,” Florence said, patting his arm. “Stop being silly. It isn’t as if we have a choice. We’ll wait and we’ll be nice and patient, too.” She addressed the last sentence to Daniel, who smiled gratefully at her.

  “Thank you,” he said. “I’ll get started with my interviews, then.”

  He turned and walked out of the room with Captain Howard following behind him. As the door swung shut, Charlotte cleared her throat.

  “I imagine there is something wrong with the ferry,” she said loudly. “No matter what the captain tried to say about drugs and people trafficking, problems with the ferry seems the most likely thing, doesn’t it? My friend Mabel told me that she heard that the safety inspections are only done about half as often as they’re meant to be done. She heard that sometimes ferry captains bribe the inspectors to sign off on their inspections without even coming on board.”

  “I’m surprised you’re prepared to sail with them, if that’s the case,” Justin said.

  “Yes, well, I’m on a fixed income, you know. I can’t afford to fly back and forth when I want to get across,” the woman said stiffly. “But I always make sure I know where the lifeboats are as soon as I get on the vessel. I doubt most people bother. If we ever did have an emergency at sea, I’d probably end up alone a lifeboat while everyone else drowned.”

  Maybe that would be preferable, Fenella thought to herself. She didn’t want to try to imagine what it might be like to be stuck in a small boat adrift at sea with the woman she was finding increasingly unlikable.

  “Oh, but you never told us about yourself,” Charlotte said, turning to Fenella.

  Disliking Charlotte even more, Fenella forced herself to smile. “I’m Fenella Woods,” she said. “After living in the US for many years, I’ve recently taken a very early retirement and settled back in my ancestral homeland.”

  “Why?” Charlotte demanded.

  “Oh, I, er, well, I, that is,” Fenella stammered. She took a deep breath, trying to decide how much she wanted to share with this group of total strangers. “I came into a small inheritance,” she said eventually.

  “Lucky you,” Justin said. “I keep hoping a convenient aunty will drop dead and leave me millions, but I haven’t had any luck so far.”

  “I had no idea I was going to inherit anything,” Fenella replied. “I had a full and happy life in the US before my aunt died.”

  “So why give that all up to come here?” Justin demanded. “I’d love to live in the US. I watch a lot of American telly and it looks amazing.”

  Fenella laughed. “It isn’t all like on television,” she said. “I was a professor at a large university and nothing exciting or glamorous ever happened to me.”

  “Well, I hope you didn’t come over here hoping for excitement or glamor,” Justin told her. “There isn’t a more deadly dull place in the world than the Isle of Man. Nothing ever happens here.”

  “Except today you’re caught up in a police investigation,” Fenella pointed out.

  “Yeah, it’ll turn out to a false alarm or something,” he said dismissively. “Nothing ever happens here.”

  The door at the back of the room swung open again. Constable Hopkins walked into the room and looked around a
t everyone.

  “I’ve been given a list of names for who is in here,” he said loudly. “We’re going to work our way through the list, one person at a time. The inspector would like to start with Harry Hampton, please.”

  Harry looked around, his face flushing. “I can wait, if you’d like to start with someone else,” he said quickly.

  “I’m sorry, sir, but the inspector asked for you first. If it makes you feel any better, I think he’s simply going in alphabetical order,” the constable replied.

  “Oh, well, I mean, of course. I just thought some of the others might like to go first,” Harry said. He stood up and looked down at his wife. “Hang in there, darling,” he told her. “I won’t be far away.”

  Sherry yawned and looked at her fingernails. As Harry walked out, he cast a nervous look back at her, but she was busy touching up her lipstick and didn’t notice.

  As soon as the door shut behind Harry and the constable, Justin moved over to sit next to the very pretty blonde. She frowned at him when he first sat down, but within minutes the two were having what looked like an intense conversation.

  Charlotte sighed deeply, giving the young couple a disapproving look before glancing around the room. Fenella quickly looked out the window to avoid catching Charlotte’s eye. She didn’t approve of Justin’s behavior either, but she wasn’t about to let Charlotte know that.

  “So, from whom did you inherit your fortune?” Charlotte asked after a moment.

  “It’s hardly a fortune,” Fenella protested. “Just enough money to allow me to make a change in my life. I must say, so far I’m really enjoying the island. Castle Rushen is amazing and I’m looking forward to seeing Peel Castle and all of the other incredible historical sites.”

  “Castle Rushen is one of the finest medieval castles in the whole of the British Isles,” Charlotte said. “We’re lucky to have it and fortunate that it’s been kept in such good repair over the years.”

  “It’s a pile of old rocks that takes up far too much space in a crowded town,” Stanley said. “They could flatten it tomorrow and build houses for first-time buyers. That would be a much better use of prime real estate.”