Murder on the Minneapolis (25 page)

F
LORA HOBBLED ALONG
the deck at Bunny’s side, her coat buttoned to her neck, one arm tucked through his. The
Minneapolis
would dock at Tilbury the next afternoon, and she found herself counting each hour before she would have to say goodbye to him.

‘I’m sorry to drag you out into the cold, but I needed some air after being in the cabin most of the day. Taking meals in the suite may sound like an unheard of luxury, but it palls after a while.’

‘Cabin fever, I believe they call it.’ He pressed her elbow into his side. ‘I don’t feel at all dragged. Should whoever attacked you reappear, I intend to be on hand to protect you.’

‘I take it Dr Fletcher still insists he didn’t push me, or that he killed Eloise?’

‘He will only admit to battering Marlon van Elder, who, incidentally, used his real name for that land fraud.’

Flora bit her lip. The thought that whoever tried to hurt her still roamed the ship remained an uncomfortable one.

‘That idea of yours for hot and cold compresses on my ankle worked well.’ She brushed a strand of hair from her face and huddled into him, determined to relish every
moment of their last evening together. ‘The pain is little more than a dull ache now.’

Bunny didn’t appear to hear her. ‘I wonder what’s going on over there?’

Flora followed his gaze to where Mr Hersch stood with the captain and two crewmen beside an open door.

‘Isn’t that Mrs Penry-Jones’s suite?’ Bunny shifted his hold on her arm, pulling her in the reverse direction. ‘Perhaps they wouldn’t want us listening to their private conversation. Shall we go back?’

‘Not on your life.’ Flora carried on walking, though it was more of a hop and stagger. ‘I want to know what’s going on.’

He capitulated with a sigh, though Flora suspected he was not as reluctant as he pretended.

As they came level, Mr Hersch greeted them with a tilt of his head. ‘Good evening, Flora. How nice to see you out and about again.’

‘Thank you. We were just getting some air.’ She tried to peer round him but his bulk effectively blocked the door. ‘Is something wrong?’

‘Do feel free to make a party of it!’ Mrs Penry-Jones’ harsh laugh drifted out from the interior room. ‘Come in, come in, the governess and her
inamorato
may as well witness my downfall.’

Flora directed an astonished look at Bunny, who blinked behind his glasses.

Mr Hersch stepped to one side, a hand extended as an invitation for them to enter.

Flora risked a glance at Captain Gates, prepared for his dismissal, but he didn’t react.

Needing no further urging, Flora pulled Bunny behind her and limped into the suite.

Mrs Penry-Jones dominated the room, her complexion pale but for two spots of red on her sharp cheeks; her back held straight, though her head wobbled on her thin neck. With one hand, she gripped her silver-topped cane propped beside her right knee, the other folded and refolded a pleat of her skirt.

Max acknowledged Flora from his chair against the wall, the plaster on his forehead reduced to the size of a half crown, his injured arm still strapped to his chest.

Cynthia paced the room, chewing a thumbnail, her dark-blue gown matching her troubled eyes.

‘Do sit down, Cynthia,’ Max snapped, apparently at the end of his patience.

Cynthia broke off her restless pacing to glare at Flora, but made no attempt to sit. ‘Are we a public spectacle now?’

‘Where’s Miss Smith?’ the detective asked, ignoring Cynthia’s question.

‘I sent her to fetch me some tea to help calm my nerves at this dreadful intrusion,’ Mrs Penry-Jones said, then clamped her lips in a hard line.

‘I shan’t intrude long,’ the detective said archly. ‘I merely wished to ask if anyone here has seen this before?’ From an inside pocket he withdrew the knife Eddy had found, slid the blade from its wooden sheath and held it up. ‘I shall ask Miss Smith the same question when she returns.’

Flora may have imagined it, but though no one spoke, backs stiffened perceptively.

‘It belongs to me,’ Mrs Penry-Jones said after a moment. ‘My first husband brought it back from Korea thirty years ago.’

‘I suspect it’s considerably older than that.’ Hersch
returned the blade to its sheath. ‘May I ask why you brought it with you on this voyage?’

She gave a mild shrug, her gaze sliding to Cynthia.

‘Don’t look at
me!
’ Cynthia squeaked. ‘The last time I saw that – that thing,’ she waved her hand in Hersch’s direction, ‘it was in Grandmamma’s vanity case. I swear I never touched it.’

Flora bit her lip to prevent a smile. Cynthia’s jutted chin, the superior gaze and the wagging finger were all Mrs Penry-Jones, but in a younger body.

‘She’s her grandmother?’ Bunny whispered beside Flora’s ear, though he did not require a response.

‘I keep that dagger for protection,’ Mrs Penry-Jones continued as if Cynthia hadn’t spoken. ‘However, I swear to you, I never used it to kill anyone. I didn’t even know it was missing.’

‘Mrs Cavendish,’ Hersch said. ‘Is it possible you used the knife to stab Estelle van Elder?’

‘How could you, Cynthia?’ Mrs Penry-Jones released a horrified gasp. ‘We agreed! We sought justice, not bloody revenge. Why couldn’t you simply wait?’

‘Grandmamma! How could you think such a thing?’ Cynthia enunciated each word, her furious gaze on the old lady.

‘Would someone care to explain?’ Captain Gates asked, bemused.

‘I wish they would too,’ Bunny muttered, evidently confused.

‘Of course, it all makes sense now,’ Flora said, a finger to her lips when Bunny started to speak. ‘I wonder if Mr Hersch is about to blow the family’s story apart or give them all alibis?’

‘What do you mean, how—?’

Flora shushed him. ‘Just listen.’

‘It was all
her
idea.’ Cynthia cocked her chin at Mrs Penry-Jones. ‘No one was supposed to die!’

‘We’re every bit as responsible, Cyn,’ Max began. ‘If only we had let the authorities—’

‘Shut up, Max!’ Mrs Penry-Jones snapped. ‘You don’t have to say anything. You cannot be compelled to give evidence against her anyway. She’s your wife.’

A look of patient sympathy crossed Max’s face, before he reverted to silence.

‘For the benefit of Miss Maguire and Mr Harrington, allow me to return to the beginning.’ Hersch set the knife on the low table in front of him with a sharp click. ‘Earlier this year, Mr Theodore van Elder took, as his second wife, Estelle Montgomery, a woman considerably younger than himself.’

The old lady straightened slowly, as if gathering her dignity around her like a cape. ‘Theodore van Elder was my son.’ She paused for effect, adding, ‘That girl was nothing more than a scheming trollop!’

‘However,’ Hersch drew out the word in warning, ‘a week after the wedding, Mr van Elder died.’

‘I thought that sounded suspicious when I read the clipping,’ Bunny said with a snort.

‘Exactly!’ Mrs Penry-Jones pinned the detective with a triumphant glare.

The detective shook his head. ‘The coroner’s report stated he succumbed to a bout of gastro enteritis. There was nothing suspicious about his death.’

‘Fiddlesticks!’ Mrs Penry-Jones sniffed. ‘Theodore was only forty-two. No, Estelle, or Eloise or whatever she called herself, persuaded him into a hole-in-the-wall wedding, only to murder him for his money.’

‘That makes no sense,’ Flora said. ‘They were married, so she already had his money. Why would she kill him?’

‘Well,
I
didn’t do it,’ Cynthia insisted, two spots of red bloomed on her porcelain cheeks.

‘No, Mrs Cavendish,’ Hersch said. ‘I don’t believe you did. After the stewardess helped you dress for the bridge tournament that afternoon, you called at Mrs van Elder’s cabin with the tea you promised her, but you received no answer because she was already dead.’

‘There, you see, Grandmamma!’ Cynthia flung in triumph. ‘Now do you believe me?’

Mrs Penry-Jones snorted, but did not reply.

‘Is that why you all came on board together?’ Flora asked. ‘To accuse Eloise of murder?’

‘And why ever not!’ Mrs Penry-Jones narrowed her eyes at Flora. ‘I wanted her exposed. That was Marlon’s job, but he fluffed it. Marlon was my nephew by marriage, estranged from the family due to some disreputable behaviour I won’t go into here.’ She closed her eyes briefly as if the embarrassment was too much. ‘After Theodore’s death, he came crawling to me, asking for a chance to redeem himself. I charged him with befriending Theodore’s widow in order to discover how to make her pay for what she had done.’

‘Then why engage Pinkerton’s?’ The term, belt-andbraces, jumped into Flora’s head.

‘Insurance.’ Mrs Penry-Jones glared at her. ‘When Marlon told me Eloise had booked passage for England, I couldn’t risk her getting away before I could expose her. I had no idea he was working for them.’ She waved her stick at Mr Hersch before bringing it down on the floor again with a thump. ‘The agency operates beneath a cloud of secrecy.’

‘That’s quite true,’ Hersch said. ‘I was engaged to keep Miss Lane, er – Mrs van Elder under surveillance, I had no idea Mrs Penry-Jones or her granddaughter were on board.’

‘You weren’t meant to know!’ Mrs Penry-Jones snapped, then her eyes glinted. ‘You also work for me, so I won’t tolerate being questioned in this way.’

‘The young lady’s death ended our agreement, Mrs Penry-Jones.’ Hersch’s voice brooked no argument. ‘At which I offered my services to Captain Gates.’

Mrs Penry-Jones merely grunted, and continued kneading the top of her walking stick with both hands.

‘Now if you don’t mind, I’ll continue,’ Hersch said. ‘For the benefit of you, Flora, and Mr Harrington, how did you become involved in all this, Mrs Cavendish, when you reside in England?’

Cynthia sighed, as if whatever fight remained drained out of her. ‘Max and I were about to leave for Rome on our honeymoon when a telegram arrived saying Daddy had been murdered.’ Her eyes filled with tears, making them more vivid. ‘I didn’t know him that well, but he was still my father. We changed our booking and sailed here instead. Grandmamma told me what she suspected and Max and I agreed to help.’

Max gave a snort but no one took any notice.

‘On that first night,’ Mrs Penry-Jones took up the story, ‘Marlon told me he had obtained the evidence I needed. He was supposed to bring it to me the next morning but he never arrived. When I was told he had been found dead, I thought—’

‘That Eloise had killed him to prevent him doing so?’ Hersch finished for her.

She nodded stiffly.

‘I’m afraid he deceived you, dear lady.’ The detective sighed. ‘Marlon possessed no such evidence. We cannot know exactly what happened between him and Miss Lane, but we believe,’ he said, turning to Flora, ‘that he convinced Miss Lane to part with her money in exchange for a pardon from you.’

‘Why would Eloise agree to that when she wasn’t guilty?’ Flora recalled the argument she had heard through the bulkhead on the first night.

‘Perhaps she imagined she would never be rid of a family prepared to hound her across the Atlantic.’ Hersch turned to glare at the old lady. ‘Maybe she was simply desperate?’

‘Oh, dear.’ Mrs Penry-Jones brought a wrinkled hand to her chest, blinking rapidly.

Max groaned and pressed a thumb and forefinger into the fleshy part above his nose.

‘If you believed that your stepmother killed your father, Mrs Cavendish,’ Hersch broke the oppressive silence that had descended, ‘it’s understandable you would wish her dead.’

‘I did wish her dead,’ Cynthia spat. ‘Stepmother, indeed! She was a year younger than me.’

‘Are you accusing my wife of murder?’ Max’s furious gaze raked the detective in challenge.

‘I’m quite capable of answering for myself, Max.’ Cynthia waved him away and turned on Mrs Penry-Jones. ‘How could you think I would do such a thing?’ Her breath hitched and close to tears, she dragged her bottom lip through her teeth.

Flora forced down belated sympathy for Eloise, who had found herself caught up in this twisted family. Recently widowed and with no one else to turn to, she
had fled for a new life in another country. Then Parnell, a man who had pretended to be a friend, revealed that her husband’s vengeful mother was on board issuing threats. Being offered a lifeline in exchange for money must have seemed not only attractive, but her only hope. That she had overheard Crowe’s argument with Seaman Crofts and turning it to her advantage was an act borne of desperation.

‘And you, Mrs Penry-Jones, could you bring yourself to plunge a dagger into a young woman’s chest?’ Hersch asked.

‘Most assuredly.’ The old lady’s eyes fluttered closed for a second. ‘In my head I did so several times. But no, I didn’t kill the girl. I wanted her to suffer for the rest of her life, and for the world to know what she had done. Dead, she provides me with no satisfaction.’

‘Then who did kill Eloise?’ Flora demanded.

H
ESTER NUDGED THE
suite door open with a hip and manhandled a tray inside that Flora could tell at a glance held a good deal more than a solitary cup of tea.

‘I’m sorry I was so long, Mrs Penry-Jones, but the kitchen didn’t have any cucumber sandwiches left.’

She took in the now silent room with a slow sweeping glance, then with a dismayed cry, the tray of sandwiches, plate of cakes crockery flew from her hands.

Mrs Penry-Jones let out a horrified shriek as the lid separated from the teapot, spraying her skirt with scalding liquid.

Sandwiches and cakes went in one direction, the milk jug and crockery in another. A slice of smoked salmon splattered onto Cynthia’s arm, eliciting a howl of protest, while Bunny backed against the wall, avoiding the trajectory of the hot water jug.

The sugar bowl tipped its contents over the floor, bounced once on the carpet before it rolled to a halt against the fireplace; the scene reminding Flora of a farce in a West End play. Surely Hester didn’t need to throw the tray across the room? She could have simply let it fall to the floor.

The mounting laugh which worked its way into Flora’s chest was short-lived when she realized the one person who had made no effort to help bring order to the chaos was Hester herself. She had backed away before the tray did its devastating work and disappeared.

Flora rose unsteadily to her feet, and approached Mr Hersch, who was that moment occupied with collecting debris from the floor.

‘Mr Hersch,’ Flora laid a hand on his shoulder. ‘Hester’s gone.’

Uttering a curse under his breath, the detective beckoned the captain who was busy wiping cream from his coat and they lunged for the door.

Cynthia picked her way over the scattered sandwiches and squashed cakes that littered the floor, and ran outside.

‘Now what?’ Max muttered, heaving himself awkwardly from his chair and looked about to follow, when Mrs Penry-Jones caught him on the shin with her stick.

‘Where do you think you’re going?’ she snarled, raising both arms. ‘Help me up. I’m coming too.’

Sighing, Max did as he was told, though with one useable arm, the process was seriously protracted.

‘I take it you wish to go too?’ Bunny looked up from removing chocolate icing from his trouser leg with a linen napkin.

‘Absolutely.’ Flora limped onto the promenade deck, gazing frantically around to see which direction the captain and Hersch had gone. There was no sign of Hester, but the clatter of heavy shoes on metal steps drew her towards the companionway to the boat deck.

Flora grasped the rail but Bunny gripped her elbow from behind, halting her. ‘Oh no, you don’t. You’ll slip. Let me help you.’ He wrapped his arm round her waist, slid
the other beneath her knees and swept her into his arms.

‘What happened in there exactly?’ Bunny asked as he carried her down to the bottom of the companionway.

Behind them, Max struggled with Mrs Penry-Jones, who kept up a constant stream of fractious complaints.

‘Hester saw the knife,’ Flora said. ‘I knew it sounded wrong when I heard her at the dining table. I just didn’t put it together until now.’

‘Put what together?’ He set her gently onto the boat deck.

‘She said,’ Flora continued, trying to concentrate, ‘
If a man is ruthless enough to bludgeon another to death with an ashtray, he’s hardly likely to baulk at stabbing a woman
. Bunny, no one knew Eloise had been stabbed.’

‘Good grief! You mean Hester stabbed Eloise?’

They reached the deck where the detective and the captain had halted.

Hester stood at the aft rail, her features in profile and both elbows hooked over the top, her full skirt billowing in the wind.

Several crewmen held back a group of spectators, forming a wide semi-circle around the woman at the rail.

Max released an anguished, ‘Oh, Lord,’ as he joined Cynthia, who, white-faced, leaned against his uninjured shoulder.

Hester swivelled her head a quarter turn, raking them all with a dispassionate look, as if she didn’t recognize them, or had dismissed them all from her mind as irrelevant.

Then her gaze snagged on Flora and held. ‘What’s
she
doing here?’

‘She’s concerned for you, Miss Smith, as we all are.’ Hersch eased Flora backwards with an outstretched arm.
‘You know that Eloise didn’t kill Theodore van Elder, don’t you, Hester?’ His tone conciliatory, as if persuading a child. ‘I may call you Hester, mayn’t I?’

‘What does it matter? Nothing does.’ Hester’s low voice competed with the whoosh of the sea beneath the hull, while above them the wind rattled the winch lines.

Hersch took a step closer, but Hester spotted him, stiffened and leaned back, her upper body balanced precariously on the rail. He paused, hands held up in surrender.

‘What are you doing, Hester?’ Mrs Penry-Jones demanded, her stick tapping a rhythm on the boards as she drew closer. ‘Come away from there at once!’

Hersch frantically signalled her back, but she ignored him.

Hester’s head whipped round to face her, eyes narrowed. ‘Go away, you awful old dragon. If you hadn’t demanded so much of him, he wouldn’t have failed.’

‘Who wouldn’t?’ Bunny said at Flora’s shoulder.

‘I think she means Marlon,’ Flora replied.

‘Of course I mean Marlon!’ Hester shouted. ‘He was my husband.’

‘You’re lying!’ Mrs Penry-Jones said, indignant. ‘Marlon was never married.’

‘Of course,’ Flora whispered. ‘That would explain it.’

‘Not to me, it doesn’t,’ Bunny said. ‘What’s she talking about?’

Flora stilled him with a finger to her lips, her head angled into his shoulder. ‘Don’t you males ever understand affairs of the heart? Listen, I think she’ll tell us.’

‘We had it all planned,’ Hester began, responding to her own inner voice. ‘I would take the position as his aunt’s companion.’ Her world weary look told Flora that
had she known what a trial the exercise would become, she might have chosen to stab the old lady instead. ‘Then, once Marlon was accepted back into the family, we would pretend to elope.’

‘Ah, now I see,’ Bunny said into Flora’s hair. ‘Parnell was her husband. Sorry, I got him muddled with this Marlon chap.’

‘Marlon
was
Parnell. Oh, do listen.’ Flora shushed him.

‘But Marlon wasn’t as clever as you, was he, Hester?’ Hersch took half a step towards her, but Hester was sharper than he had anticipated.

‘Get away from me!’ She scooted backwards until her rear end protruded over the rail, her feet hooked into the metal bars.

‘Why don’t we discuss this rationally, inside, Hester?’ his tone softened.

‘No!’ Hester screamed. ‘You’re trying to trick me.’

Captain Gates whispered an instruction to a crewman Flora had to strain to hear. ‘Tell the chief engineer to slow all engines.’

The crewman slipped away and Flora looked up at Bunny, who shook his head. ‘It won’t help if she jumps. We must be doing sixteen knots and it’s getting dark.’

Flora winced and swallowed, but kept silent.

‘He was weak,’ Hester screamed, bringing Flora’s attention back to her. ‘Eloise convinced him she hadn’t killed Theodore. I knew the old woman wouldn’t accept that. She would never let him back into the family.’

‘What did you do, Hester?’ Hersch made no further attempt to close the gap between them, which appeared to reassure her, so she continued to talk.

‘I told him that we could at least get the money Eloise took from Theo’s safe. It would help us start again back in
New York. But I thought she had killed him rather than hand it over.’

‘Why did you think that?’ Hersch asked.

‘I hung around Eloise’s cabin the morning after he died, and heard that governess say she had heard them arguing.’ She cocked her chin in Flora’s direction. ‘Eloise was the last person to see him alive. I thought she
must
have killed him.’

‘Hester.’ The detective kept his voice low, almost hypnotic. ‘Tell us what happened on Wednesday.’

The ship dipped as a wave ran below the hull, causing Hester to tilt. A collective gasp ran round the small group before Hester regained her balance. She adjusted her grip, though by now the wind had loosened the bun at her neck and her honey-coloured hair streamed behind her.

She looked graceful sitting there, almost calm when she started to speak again.

‘When the officer told us all to go inside during the storm, I told Mrs Penry-Jones I was seasick and needed to lie down. Instead, I went to Eloise’s stateroom.’ A sly smile tugged at her mouth at the memory. ‘The silly madam ordered me out. She had no idea who I was and I didn’t bother to explain, I just plunged that knife into her chest.’ Her gaze clouded, as if she was unsure about the next part of her story. ‘I think I did it more than once. She didn’t even cry out, just stared at me as she slid to the floor.’

‘What did you do then?’ Hersch asked.

Hester blinked and shook her head. ‘I knew I had to get the knife back to Mrs Penry-Jones jewel case before it was missed, but I could hear her talking to someone through the door. Cynthia probably.

‘I could barely stand up in that wind, but I had to get rid of the knife, so I went to the lower deck and hid it
in that motor car. I was soaked to the skin by then and couldn’t go to the dining room like that or everyone would have noticed. So I went to my cabin and pretended I had been there all the time. When I went back to the motor car for the knife later, those brats were playing in it.’ Hester glared at Flora again as if she were solely responsible for her ruined plans. ‘I tried to get it from her suite but—’

Flora gasped. ‘It was
you
who pushed me down the companionway!’

Hester curled her lip and turned her face away in contempt, but said nothing.

A salt-tinged gust of wind swept the open deck, biting through Flora’s coat. She released Bunny’s arm and took a hesitant step forwards.

‘Flora? What do you think you’re doing?’ Bunny made a grab for her but missed.

‘You can’t stay there forever, Hester,’ Flora wheedled. ‘It’s getting dark and you must be cold in that thin dress.’

‘Why should you care?’ Hester snarled. ‘If you hadn’t asked all those questions, he—’ She bit her lip, inhaling on a choked sob.

‘Marlon would still be alive?’ Flora finished for her. ‘Dr Fletcher killed him, Hester. Not Eloise.’

‘I know that – now!’ The wind pushed Hester’s hair into her face. She took one hand off the rail to brush it back, unbalanced slightly, and for a heart-stopping second, rocked on the rail.

Cynthia gasped and Flora held her breath, but somehow Hester hung on.

‘Even if you aren’t cold, I am.’ Flora held out her hand, her palm upwards in invitation. ‘Now why don’t we do what Mr Hersch suggested and talk about this inside?’

Hester’s gaze swivelled to meet Flora’s, her thin
lips quirked into a parody of a smile, like a cat who has spotted a friendly bird. Slowly, her hand lifted so that no more than a foot lay between their outstretched fingers.

Hester’s gaze swept the row of spectators before coming to rest on Mrs Penry-Jones.

For a long second, Flora was convinced Hester would take her hand, but then something entered her eyes which made Flora’s breath catch. In an instant, she knew what was about to happen, knowing she was helpless to prevent it.

A triumphant smile spread slowly across Hester’s face, and without another word, she withdrew her hand, leaned backwards, and floated over the rail.

Mrs Penry-Jones’s mouth opened in silent horror.

Hersch groaned in frustration, while Bunny issued a loud curse. Max wrapped his arms around Cynthia, who buried her face in his shoulder.

A low murmur of dismay went up among the watchers, some of whom made sudden, but useless rush towards the rail. A line of crewmen spread out along the deck, bent over the rail and frantically searched the waves below.

Flora’s coat flapped around her, buffeted by the rising wind. She stood frozen, her hand dropping nerveless to her side. She swivelled her head to where the captain stood and threw him a pleading look. His brief head shake reiterated what Bunny had already said. They were travelling too fast and it was almost dark. If Hester had managed to survive the fall, there was the shock of the freezing water that would likely stop her heart. By the time the ship manoeuvred around and went back for her, she would most certainly have drowned.

Despite that, Flora hoped they might try.