Cruel Capers on the Caribbean: A Kate on Vacation Mystery (The Kate on Vacation mysteries) (5 page)

The captain stepped forward. “Thank you, sir, for your willingness to help out, but I believe we have the situation under control.” He escorted the man from the cabin.

The ship’s doctor gently turned Cora’s arm back over to the position it was in before Hudson arrived. “Anybody have a camera handy?”

“I’ll get mine,” Rob said.

The doctor walked over to Skip and Kate, his hand extended. “Ted Madigan.” He was the first crew member they’d met who sounded like he was from the U.S.

Skip shook the man’s hand. “Skip Canfield. This is my wife, Kate.”

The doctor glanced back at the bed. “How long have you known Ms. Beall?”

“We just met her, the first day of the cruise,” Kate answered him. “Doctor, she didn’t use drugs. That’s what she fought with her boyfriend about. Not that he uses them either, but his friends do. She’d told him he had to chose between them or her.”

Doctor Madigan nodded.

“What happens now?” Skip asked.

The doctor shrugged. “We’re out in the middle of the Gulf of Mexico, so the captain is king at the moment. It’s up to him.”

“We dock in New Orleans in the morning.” Kate said. “Won’t he tell the police there what happened?”

The doctor shrugged again. “Why don’t you folks go back to your cabin? The captain will come find you if he needs more information tonight.”

~~~~~~~~

K
ate awoke with a start. Morning light filtered through the curtains that fluttered lazily over the half-open balcony door. Skip snored softly beside her.

She’d been dreaming–an odd dream, a jumble of images and sounds. Cora and Clem arguing at the
bon voyage
party, Cora’s pale face above her burgundy robe, a teenaged girl crying. Kate realized the latter was her mind imagining the daughter’s reaction to the news of her mother’s death. Her heart ached for the poor child she had never met. The girl had endured multiple parental divorces, and now she was essentially an orphan.

Kate glanced at the bedside clock. Six-ten. They were due to get up in another fifty minutes for breakfast and sight-seeing in New Orleans.

She suspected she wouldn’t be able to get back to sleep so she decided to take a walk. Getting up quietly, she slipped on shorts and a T-shirt, then scribbled a note for Skip.

Out on deck, she shivered in the morning air. She’d forgotten that they were no longer in the tropics, and it was only April. She paused to ponder what her children, on spring break from their elementary school, were doing at the moment. No doubt harassing their grandmother into fixing them her signature blueberry pancakes for breakfast.

Ignoring her growling stomach, Kate walked briskly once around the perimeter of the deck. As she neared the area with the breakfast buffet, she spotted Clem sitting at a small table, a cup of coffee in front of him.

Stifling the desire to cut and run, she approached him and offered her condolences.

He looked at her with hollow, red-rimmed eyes. “She didn’t kill herself.” His voice was hoarse.

It was an odd response to Kate’s “so sorry for your loss,” but she was used to witnessing grief. It often wiped away social graces and temporarily made people irrational. She debated whether to try to comfort the man or simply repeat her condolences and then leave him alone. Her compassionate side won out over the selfish part of her that just wanted to get on with her own vacation.

“May I sit down?”

Clem nodded toward the chair across from him. “She didn’t kill herself,” he repeated.

Kate wasn’t sure what to say. Cora had seemed depressed up until yesterday, but telling Clem that would only make him feel guilty. Or
guiltier
, most likely.

And she realized she had her own doubts. As she’d told the ship’s doctor, it seemed out of character for Cora to overdose on drugs, at least on injectable ones. Swallowing a handful of sleeping pills, maybe. But heroin or cocaine? Unlikely.

“She told us she was afraid to be around drugs, for fear her husband would use it against her to try to get her daughter away from her.”

“It was more than that. Her older brother overdosed in college. Her mother committed suicide a couple years later. Cora hated drugs, even marijuana. And she would never kill herself anyway, knowing what that does to loved ones left behind. She wouldn’t do that to her daughter.”

Again Kate kept her first thought to herself. Statistically, having a mother who’d committed suicide increased the risk that Cora would go that route as well when despondent.

“Did you talk to her at all yesterday?” she asked.

“No. She called and left a message on my voicemail, asked if I wanted to go out with you guys after dinner last night. But when I went by her cabin, she didn’t answer. I tried to call her while I was getting ready for dinner but it went to voicemail. That’s when I got worried and came looking for you.”

“You called her cabin, or her cell phone?”

“Her cell. I knew she’d have it on, in case Carrie called her.”

“Carrie’s her daughter, right?”

Clem nodded, then picked up his coffee cup and downed the remains of its contents. He grimaced. His hand tightened around the china mug, his knuckles going white.

Kate suspected he was fighting the urge to throw it. Anger would be the next stage in his grief.

“Who the hell would kill her?” His words ended on a stifled sob as he dropped his gaze to the table.

The question jolted Kate for a moment. But then, if Cora didn’t kill herself that meant someone had committed murder. She blurted out the first answer that came to mind.

“Her soon-to-be-ex husband?”

Clem looked up at her, his eyes wide.

“How long ago did you all decide to go on this cruise?”

“It was kinda last minute. About ten days before we sailed. Why?”

“Did you have any trouble getting the tickets?”

“Cora made the arrangements. She said something about having to pay extra to get the suite she wanted. Where are you going with this?”

“I was wondering if he’d have time to get a ticket and follow you all on board.”

Wait, the daughter was staying with her stepfather, according to the phone conversation Kate had witnessed two days ago. “Or could he have hired someone to come on the cruise?”

Clem’s mouth dropped open. “A hit man?”

Kate shrugged. “If you’re sure she didn’t kill herself, then someone else did.”

He clenched his jaw and nodded.

Kate sat back in her chair as a new thought struck her. “Clem, I know you want justice for Cora, but you might not want to push the idea of murder with the authorities.”

“Why not?”

“Because you will be their prime suspect.”

~~~~~~~~

A
s Kate hurried back to her cabin to get showered and dressed for the day, she passed Dr. Hudson and his wife in a corridor. The latter was carrying a bulging straw bag that looked new–no doubt bought in one of the shops at Cozumel. She looked downright jittery.

Dr. Hudson smiled pleasantly. “Good morning.”

Anger surged in Kate’s chest, threatening to overwhelm her manners. She shoved a “Good morning” through gritted teeth and hustled past the couple. Then her churning emotions shifted to guilt. It wasn’t the man’s fault that Cora was dead. She was projecting the anger coming from her own grief onto him.

Over breakfast, she told Skip and the Franklins about her conversation with Clem.

Skip held his hands out in front of him, palms out. “Whoa, darlin’. We’re on vacation. We’re not investigating this.”

Kate pursed her lips in irritation. “I wasn’t suggesting that we should.”

Rob jumped in to smooth the waters. “I’m sure the captain is reporting her death to the New Orleans authorities as we speak.”

Kate shook her head. “I doubt that, not after what the ship’s doctor said.”

Rob gave her a blank look.

“Oh, yeah, you’d left to get the camera. He said that at sea, the captain was king, and when we asked about turning the case over to the New Orleans police, he just shrugged.”

Liz pulled a tablet out of her over-sized purse.

“Does that work onboard?” Kate asked.

“Yeah, the ship has a satellite dish,” Liz said without looking up. She was poking at the tablet’s screen.

The others ate while Liz muttered under her breath, poked some more at the tablet, then finally set it down on the table and picked up her fork again. “Looks like you’re right, Kate. Crimes on cruise ships are not always reported. It’s a little fuzzy even who they should report them to. The next port of call or the country they’re registered in?”

“Which is Panama in this case,” Skip said.

Kate digested that as she finished her eggs and toast. She hated the idea of someone getting away with murder, but if they made a fuss, Clem would then be the most likely suspect. She was fairly sure his grief was genuine, and he didn’t kill Cora.

What about the socialite’s husband? Would he inherit her money, or had she already changed her will? If the latter was the case, she was worth more to him alive than dead. Estates couldn’t be sued for alimony, although there might be a trust fund involved for the daughter.

Kate shook her head slightly. If it turned out that Cora’s husband had killed her, then her daughter would be left with no parent at all. Was that better or worse than being raised by your mother’s murderer?

Skip’s hand covered hers on the table. “Try to let it go, darlin’. At least for today. We can check on the status of things when we get back on board this afternoon.”

Kate nodded and mustered a smile for him.

S
ince they only had a day, they’d decided to stick to the French Quarter. There were very few reminders of Hurricane Katrina here. Kate doubted that would be the case if they traveled to some of the other sections of New Orleans.

The day remained on the cool side. She was glad she’d thought to pack a light jacket.

They started with St. Louis Cathedral, with its white facade and steeples gleaming against the blue sky. Inside, they stared open-mouthed at the elaborate altar and vaulted ceilings.

They strolled awhile around Jackson Square, poking their noses into the occasional gift shop or bookstore. The flowering trees and bushes were in full bloom, a riot of lush colors and delicate scents. They took pictures of each other in front of the statue in the center of the square, of Andrew Jackson astride a rearing horse.

Vendors and street entertainers were everywhere. Mimes and jazz musicians, some of them playing makeshift instruments such as old washboards, were particularly abundant. The atmosphere was carnival-like, even though Mardi Gras had been over a month ago.

Then Kate remembered it was the week after Easter. Almost as good. Mardi Gras was the last hurrah before Lent, a time of self-denial. Easter marked its end, a time for celebration.

The brick and stucco townhouses, with their asymmetrical archways and intricate iron railings around upper-level balconies, fueled her imagination. She squinted her eyes and envisioned sleek-coated horses pulling buggies of fashionably-dressed young people, headed for some lavish, eighteenth-century ball.

Imagining the social elite of past generations reminded her of poor Cora. Her throat closed. She struggled to push aside the feelings, not wanting to put a damper on her travel companions’ good time.

Liz glanced at her watch. “Where shall we have lunch, folks?” As if on cue, the fragrance of steaming shrimp and Cajun spices wafted over them. They followed their noses to the source of the mouth-watering smells, the Café Pontalba on St. Peter Street.

By three o-clock they felt they had done the French Quarter justice and headed back to the ship. Once again, an abundance of fresh air, sunshine and exercise sent them to their cabins for an afternoon nap.

~~~~~~~~

K
ate drifted toward consciousness. Had she been dreaming? She couldn’t remember. But the subject that hadn’t been far from her mind all day had once again pushed its way front and center.

Some inconsistencies regarding Cora’s death were nagging at her. She got out of bed carefully so as not to disturb Skip. In the tiny desk’s drawer, she found a pen and a pad of note paper, with the Carousel Cruises logo in one corner. She sat down on the loveseat in the small sitting area and wrote
Cora
at the top of the first sheet of paper.

By the time Skip began to stir, Kate had a list of all the things they knew, or thought they knew, about Cora Beall and her death.

Skip gave her a dreamy look and patted the empty bed beside him.

Kate shook her head but softened the refusal with a smile. “Let’s find Rob and Liz. We should be leaving port soon to head back down to the Gulf. I’ve heard the views along the Mississippi are spectacular.”

She tore the list off of the pad, stood up and crammed it into her pocket, determined once again to put Cora’s death aside and enjoy their vacation.

Twenty minutes later, the foursome was sitting at a small table next to a floor-to-ceiling window, enjoying the view of the river shore sliding past. The ship’s PA system crackled to life. “Would Dr. and Mrs. Hudson please report to the passenger relations desk? Dr. and Mrs. Hudson, please come to the passenger relations desk right away.”

Kate was mildly surprised. The Hudsons had missed the boat? The doctor didn’t seem the type who’d let time get away from him. Maybe their romantic vacation had backfired on them. From what little she’d seen of them, she suspected their relationship was not on the most solid ground. Being in such close quarters could have dealt the final blow. Maybe they’d flown home to file for divorce.

Or maybe they
did
just lose track of time. And I’m on vacation
, she reminded the part of her brain that loved to figure out what was going on with people.

As if the thought of one doctor had conjured up another, the ship’s doctor appeared beside their table. Skip introduced him to Liz.

“I just wanted to let you know what’s happening,” Dr. Madigan said after hands had been shaken all around. “The captain has decided we should take the body back with us to Tampa, where Ms. Beall and her companion boarded the boat. We’re assuming she has family near there.”