Death in the Middle Watch (7 page)

“Yes. You might. I have work to do this morning. Have a good time ashore.”

The headmaster seemed distinctly put out when Carolus left him, but this passed, for a few moments later Mr Gorringer could be seen greeting several other passengers heartily, as they made their way towards the dock gates.

Meanwhile Carolus was just in time to catch Sir Charles and Lady Spittals dressed ready to go ashore but delayed by the unwillingness of Sir Charles to leave the saloon.

“You go, dear,” the ex-Lord Mayor said after they had both greeted Carolus.

“Isn't that just like him?” Lady Spittals demanded of Carolus, or of the world in general. “We've booked a nice expedition with some of the cruisers and he says ‘you go' as though I wanted to get off with someone. It's always ‘you go' with him. I don't know why he bothers to get up in the morning at all.”

“I was going to ask you whether you would be so good as to answer a few questions,” Carolus said tentatively. “About last night.”

“That poor thing!” said Lady Spittals. She at once sat down and seemed to forget the expedition ashore, attracted by this new and exciting topic. “It's true, then? She was murdered?”

“True or not,” said Carolus evasively, “I think you're more likely to know what happened than anyone.”

“Me? I don't know what you mean.”

“Mr Deene is reminding us that we were in the cabin next door,” said Sir Charles. “Wasn't that it, Mr Deene?”

“Yes. I thought you were bound to hear something.”

“Not a sound,” said Lady Spittals. “That's why we couldn't believe it when we heard this morning what had happened.”

“What did you hear?”

“About these men coming out in a yacht and murdering Mrs Darwin. At least that's what we were told. It seems they were some kind of Arabs.”

“Cypriots, didn't the lady say?” suggested Sir Charles.

“Or was it the I.R.A.? One of those lots anyhow. But they must have been silent doing it because we never heard a murmur. Why should they have picked on her, I wonder? She seemed quite a harmless sort of woman. Not what you'd call a ball of fire but not one you'd think would get her throat cut like that.”

“I thought we were told she was smothered?” said Sir Charles.

“What does it matter? She was murdered, anyway. And to think we slept right through it all.”

“You didn't hear any voices?”

“No. Of course the engines make some noise. Perhaps that's what drowned it.”

Just then another woman hurried up to them.

“Come along, you two!” she said excitedly. “We're all waiting!”

“He doesn't want to come,” said Lady Spittals, not bitterly but apparently with amusement. “He says, ‘You go,
dear'”—and just then Sir Charles said it. Indeed, what else was there to say?

“All right, I will!” said Lady Spittals defiantly. “And I hope you enjoy yourself sitting there all day. Come on, Mrs Popple.”

The two hurried out, leaving Sir Charles with a look of something like contentment on his face.

“Steward!” he called with unexpected vigour, and to Carolus, “Will you have a drink? I know it's a bit early, but I could do with one.”

Carolus agreed.

It was while the steward was bringing their drinks that Carolus became aware of a curious sniffing noise behind him and, turning round, saw Miss Berry, with red eyes and a sodden handkerchief. He swallowed his whisky and went across to her. He was not very good at situations like this. Did one say “Now, now” or “This won't do, will it?” He went for a simple question.

“What's the matter?” he asked.

She shook her head.

“Have a drink?” tried Carolus.

“A whisky, please. Without ice and just a splash of soda.”

The “splash” was too much for her, it seemed, and after giving these precise instructions she started to weep again, rather noisily.

“Upset about Mrs Darwin?” Carolus asked.

Miss Berry looked at him with astonishment.

“Mrs Darwin?” she spluttered. “What's she done? It's not
her
.”

“There is a story going round the ship,” said Carolus with literal truth but far from candid intent, “that she was murdered.”

Miss Berry digested that. But it did nothing to calm her tears.

“I don't care if she was. She said last night I looked off-colour and offered me some liver salts. I could have murdered her myself.”

“But you didn't? Then why are you crying?”

“It's not Mrs Darwin. It's Gavin Ritchie.”

Carolus recognized the name of the good-looking but rather sullen young man he had seen coming aboard.

“What's he done?”

“He was all right yesterday. We were together nearly all the evening. He promised to take me ashore today to see …” Miss Berry broke down again. “To see the fish market.” she said finally.

Well, that's a new one, thought Carolus, but did not say it.

“What do you care about a lot of old fish?” He knew it was no good as soon as he said it. Miss Berry cried again.

“Not the fish.” she explained. “It's the women. They carry the baskets on their heads. Gavin wanted to see that. He's in artist, you know. Now he's gone ashore with the Assistant Purser who looks like a girl.”

“Surely you don't care about that?”

“I do. I care terribly. I thought at last, when I met Gavin, that this was going to be a wonderful cruise.”

“Perhaps it is. I want to ask you something. Miss Berry …”

“Susan.”

“I wanted to ask you, Susan, whether you heard anything unusual in the night. Your cabin's opposite to Mrs Darwin's.”

“I don't know what you mean by unusual,” said Susan, who had grown suddenly sour. “I suppose it's not unusual on this ship to hear knocking on the cabin door of a woman passenger when she's supposed to be alone.”

“Yours?” asked Carolus, unable to suppress a suggestion of incredulity.

“No. Not mine. I wouldn't have it. On Mrs Darwin's door.”

“You heard that? At what time?”

“Some time after one, it must have been, because I didn't go to bed till nearly one and was reading for a long time.”

“If I may ask you, Susan, where were you between say midnight and one o'clock?”

“Of course you may. I don't care any more. I was with Gavin.”

“Did you see a launch come alongside?”

“Some kind of a boat yes. I didn't really notice much about it. I wasn't particularly interested, to tell the truth. Anyway. It was just before I went to bed because Gavin said we had to be up early in the morning to see the …”

“Yes. I know. The fish market. So you didn't wait to see whether anyone came aboard from the launch?”

“No. I went to my cabin.”

“And some time afterwards you heard someone knocking at Mrs Darwin's door?”

“Yes. But before that I heard a noise in the passage. The young Dunlearys were laughing and running about.”

“You didn't look out to see who it was who knocked?”

Susan Berry hesitated, then said, “Well, I did just want to see that it wasn't anyone I knew. So I peeped out. But whoever it was had gone into Mrs Darwin's cabin and shut the door. So I went to bed. I didn't think anything more about it.”

“And you didn't hear any more?”

“No. The first thing I heard was in the morning when I went into breakfast. Someone was saying there had been a murder, but I was waiting for Gavin to come down. He sits at the same table and he's usually pretty cheerful at breakfast. But when he came, he scarcely spoke a word for a long time. Then he told me he had to do some shopping ashore so he was
going with the Assistant Purser who knew all the ropes. That was all he said and I watched them going off the ship together. Then you came up and started asking me questions.”

“I'm sorry if I annoyed you.”

“Oh, no. You didn't. It was just that I thought Gavin was going to be a real friend …”

“Just one question more,” Carolus said. “Had you ever heard anyone knock at Mrs Darwin's door in the night before last night?”

“Well, there may have been. You know what this ship is—”

“But you hadn't heard it?”

“Not to be certain of.”

“You think you may have?”

“Oh, I don't know,” cried Susan, losing all patience. “No one knocked on my door, I know that.”

Carolus called the steward and ordered two more drinks.

“Who is the young officer who has just come in?” he asked Susan.

She seemed to recover at once.

“Which? Where?” she asked.

“I think it's the Second Engineer.”

Susan appeared transfixed.

“Yes,” she said. “I thought he'd gone ashore, too. Do you mind if I go out on deck? It's rather stuffy in here.”

As she left him Carolus caught a glimpse of Leacock with a broad and meaningful grin on his face peering in from the deck. He remembered what the man had said and felt just a little embarrassed.

Sir Charles Spittals was signalling to him to rejoin him.

“Just time for another,” he said. “They're coming back for lunch, you see. The ship sails at two. What's it going to be?”

Carolus refused, and went out on deck. He was anxious to know whether Mrs Darwin's, the
late
Mrs Darwin's, husband had arrived as promised.

Susan Berry's mention of the young Dunlearys had reminded him of the fact, so disturbing to Mr Porteous. that the family from County Dublin were very much in evidence at times. Perhaps because they, like most Irish families, had a clutch of children, he had simply put them out of his mind. He admitted this was illogical, but he found it impossible to connect them with anything more sinister than singing “The Wearing of the Green” at a ship's concert.

A
FTER LUNCH
M
RS
S
TICK
called Carolus into the Sun Lounge with an air of urgency.

“You've got your murder all right then, sir,” she whispered, though there seemed to be no one within earshot. “I told you, you would have. That poor thing whose husband died on this very ship last year.”

“Are you sure about it, Mrs Stick?

“Sure? Of course I'm sure. The lady at the table where we sit knew all about it at breakfast time this morning, only I couldn't find you to tell you.”

“I thought perhaps she might. Did she say how she heard?”

“There's not much she doesn't hear, if you ask me,” said Mrs Stick. “She was told it was two of the crew done it, battering the poor lady something cruel. It just shows you, doesn't it? What can happen when you come on a cruise like this. As I said this morning, I said, ‘They're all smiles when they see you walking about but you never know what they're planning among themselves,' Look at what happened to her, I mean.”

This was altogether too allusive for Carolus.

“To whom?” he asked politely.

“The lady at the table where we sit. I told you how one of the stewards tried to get into her cabin.”

“You told me nothing of the sort. You expressly said the man who came to her cabin at night was not a steward. He had grey flannel trousers.”

“It's all the same when you're in bed and they come in after you. Anyway, this time it happened to poor Mrs Darwin and she's not alive to tell the tale.”

“But her husband is,” said Carolus. “And I rather think he will tell it with some force. He's due on board any minute now. His plane must have come down nearly an hour ago.”

Mrs Stick looked rather awed and said nothing.

“Didn't the lady at the table where you sit know that?” Carolus asked with a touch of banter.

“She didn't happen to mention it at lunch,” replied Mrs Stick airily. “She was talking about the young lady who was taken to the fish market this morning, Miss Berry her name is, and got left there, trying to find her way out, and was shouted at by all the Portuguese women walking about with fish on their heads. They say poor Miss Berry came on board smelling something dreadful of fish. and I suppose you can't wonder, really.”

Carolus was stung into a retort.

“That whole story is untrue,” he said. “Miss Berry was left on board this morning and was talking to me. She wanted to see the fish market but never got there.”

Mrs Stick sniffed. It was evident that she preferred her own authority to Carolus's.

“That's what the lady at the table where we sit said, anyway,” she stated with finality.

The steward in charge of the Sun Lounge approached and told Carolus that the Captain would like to see him in his cabin, so he left Mrs Stick and followed the steward's directions.

He found Captain Scorer with Mr Porteous and the Purser, but this time there was a stranger with them, a clean and spruce-looking man in his early fifties.

“Let me introduce Mr Deene. Mr Darwin,” said the Captain.

Darwin seemed calm, though Carolus thought at once that it was the habitual manner of a man who did not exhibit his emotions, though he might be feeling great distress. He nodded to Carolus and, after an awkward silence, Porteous, addressing Carolus, said, “We have been breaking our tragic news to Mr Darwin.”

“I hope you have told him the truth,” said Carolus.

“What truth?” Darwin almost shouted.

“The truth that last night, Mr Darwin, your wife was murdered.”

A cry broke from Darwin but he did not speak.

“I wished to break this as gently as possible to Mr Darwin,” said Porteous reproachfully.

“No purpose can be served by leaving Mr Darwin to discover for himself from ship's gossip. I'm sure we all express our deepest sympathy, Mr Darwin, but you had better know the truth.”

Then Darwin turned to Porteous and asked in a quiet strained voice, “When you received these threatening letters, just what precautions did you take?”