[Inspector de Silva 06] - Passage From Nuala

by Harriet Steel

  ‘I see Charles Pashley’s joined the younger set this evening,’ said Petrie dryly.

  ‘Oh dear, I hope they aren’t being too indiscreet.’ Lady Caroline’s smile was impish.

  ‘Charles Pashley’s a writer,’ Petrie explained. ‘He’s the author of a few novels, but he writes mainly for the newspapers as a gossip columnist. Some people call him the wittiest man in London, but he has a sharp tongue. If one doesn’t want one’s private business discussed and lampooned all over town, it’s wise to keep well clear of him.’

  ‘I don’t suppose the young people would mind that too much, but I expect their parents would see the matter differently,’ added Lady Caroline.

  A well-stocked cheeseboard arrived, and when that had been cleared away, the waiter brought coffee served in delicate cups and saucers patterned with red and gold Chinese dragons. As he drank his, de Silva thought about the young people’s behaviour. Perhaps it was accounted for by their wealth and privilege, but it was not something he had noticed among the young people of his own country. He wondered whether those young Britishers would abandon their frivolity when it was their turn to take up the reins of Empire, or would they turn out to be part of a new world where the great edifice started to crumble?

  A world without the Empire: it was hard to imagine it. He’d known nothing but British rule in his country, so had his father and mother. He wished, as he had on many previous occasions, that he had talked more to his father about his views on Ceylon’s British masters. Was such a regret something many people experienced as they grew older themselves? This feeling that one had lost a store of knowledge and opinion that would remain forever a mystery? When he was young, he had respected his parents, but also longed to leave home and stand on his own feet. Now he had reached a time in his life when he was inclined to look back and wish he had not been so impatient.

  He turned his attention back to the conversation, relieved to find that his moment of distraction had not been noticed. Jane and the Petries were chatting about England and the Petries’ plans when they arrived there.

  The meal ended and there was dancing. Not in a lounge cleared for the occasion as in Tourist Class but in a proper ballroom, where gilt-framed mirrors reflected the panorama of whirling couples. Breathless, de Silva and Jane sat out after a few dances to watch.

  ‘I’m glad the sea’s calm this evening,’ said Jane. ‘I feel giddy enough as it is.’

  He grinned. ‘We’re not used to having to share the floor with so many other dancers. It tests one’s skill when one has to avoid colliding with moving objects.’

  Jane leant closer. ‘When you get to know them,’ she whispered, ‘the Petries aren’t quite what I expected, particularly Lady Caroline.’ She paused, watching them as they glided around the dance floor. ‘William Petrie’s nimble on his feet for a tall man too. I enjoyed our dance.’

  ‘You’re right. Neither of them appears to be too badly afflicted by the British stiff chin.’

  Jane gave him a little punch in the ribs. ‘You know perfectly well that the correct expression is “stiff upper lip”.’

  He chuckled. ‘Yes.’

  ‘I hope you didn’t tread on Lady Caroline’s toes when you danced with her.’

  ‘Certainly not.’

  One o’clock struck before the orchestra played the last dance. When it was over, de Silva and Jane thanked their hosts and headed to their cabin. ‘What a lovely evening,’ said Jane as she sat at the dressing table, brushing out her hair.

  De Silva yawned. ‘But a very late one. I expect I shall sleep in.’

  ‘Why not? We’ve nothing to hurry up for.’

  He put a hand on her shoulder, and she reached up and squeezed it. ‘Thank you again, dear. It was such a marvellous idea to come on this cruise. I’ll always remember it.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re happy. I know, why don’t we put out a note telling the steward to serve us breakfast in here?’

  ‘Wonderful.’

  ‘Is half past nine too late?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Excellent. I’ll do it now.’

  Soon, de Silva slipped into a deep sleep. He would probably have stayed there until breakfast arrived, but the sun hadn’t long been up when there was an insistent knocking at their cabin door. He opened a bleary eye. ‘What’s this about?’ he muttered. ‘Can’t that steward read?’

  The knocking continued, and Jane stirred. ‘Shanti? What’s going on?’

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll see to it.’

  Reluctantly, he climbed out of bed, pulled on his dressing gown and went to the door. He opened it a crack and frowned at the uniformed ship’s officer standing outside. Then something in the man’s face shook away the remains of de Silva’s drowsiness.

  ‘I’m sorry to disturb you, sir,’ the officer said solemnly. ‘I have a message for you from Mr William Petrie.’

  De Silva took the envelope the officer held out to him and opened it; the note inside it read: My apologies for the interruption to your holiday, but your professional assistance is needed immediately.

  ‘Where is Mr Petrie?’ de Silva asked, folding the note and replacing it in the envelope.

  ‘With Captain McDowell, sir. Shall I wait and show you the way?’

  De Silva frowned. ‘What’s going on?’

  ‘I’m not at liberty to say, sir. I was just instructed to fetch you.’

  ‘Oh, very well. I’ll get dressed.’

  He closed the door and went to find some clothes.

  Jane sat up in bed. ‘What is it, dear?’

  ‘I don’t know, but it sounds serious.’

  She sighed. ‘And everything was going so well.’

  ‘I know.’

  He finished buttoning the shirt he had hastily found and pulled on a pair of trousers.

  ‘Shanti! That shirt won’t do, it’s waiting to go to the laundry.’

  ‘If whatever this is warrants dragging me out of bed, I doubt that William Petrie or the captain will be looking at my shirt.’

  He sat down on the side of the bed, put on socks and shoes and quickly laced them up. ‘I’ll try not to be too long,’ he said, as he headed for the door.

  It closed behind him, and Jane lay back on the pillow with another sigh. She feared that their peaceful holiday was about to become anything but.

  Chapter 6

  ‘Who found the body?’

  ‘The steward allocated to Pashley’s cabin,’ said Petrie. ‘He knocked on the door at six o’clock. Apparently, no matter how late Pashley went to bed, he always wanted to be woken early. The steward couldn’t get an answer, so he used his pass key to look in to make sure Pashley was alright. The fellow said Pashley was so regular in his habits that he was concerned for him.’

  De Silva studied the inert form sprawled on the bed. Pashley’s dinner jacket was unbuttoned and his bow tie askew, but his immaculate white dress shirt was unsullied. His sightless, bloodshot eyes were burning pools in an otherwise grey face. His mouth gaped, forced open by the soggy, bilious-yellow mass of newspaper that had been rammed into it. There was a smell of whisky, ink, and vomit.

  ‘The ship’s doctor is on his way,’ said the captain in a strong Scottish accent.

  ‘Do you have any idea how many people know about this, sir?’ asked de Silva.

  ‘The steward who found him, obviously, and the officer I sent to fetch you. I wouldn’t have involved him, but the steward was in too agitated a state to be trusted with a message. Otherwise only us three and Brady, the ship’s doctor.’

  The captain flashed de Silva a grim look. ‘And it’s to stay that way, do you understand? I won’t have this getting out and causing panic on my ship. Everything will proceed normally. Even when this villain has been apprehended, it’s much better for the passengers, and the crew, to remain in blissful ignorance.’

  De Silva weighed up the situation and decided not to argue, at least for the time being. There were bound to be people he needed to question,
but the murderer had to be on the ship, so until they reached Port Said, his or her only escape would be into the sea: not an enticing option for most people. Returning to port at Bombay might well make it easier for them to evade capture. He nodded. ‘I understand, sir.’

  ‘How long will it take you to find the culprit?’

  The sharpness with which the captain delivered the question took de Silva aback. Then he realised that, despite his seniority, the man was rattled. Many of his passengers were wealthy and distinguished. A serious crime on board would reflect badly on the reputation of the ship. He wanted to put the matter behind him as soon as possible.

  ‘It’s hard to say, sir.’

  The captain’s brow furrowed. He grunted, but de Silva resolved to keep his own irritation to himself. It would do no good to fall out with the man.

  ‘Very early days to answer that question, McDowell,’ interjected William Petrie. ‘But I have tremendous faith in Inspector de Silva. As I told you, we’re lucky to have him on board.’

  McDowell’s voice took on a more emollient tone. ‘Do your best, Inspector. If anyone asks, I’ll have it put about that Pashley died of natural causes. A heart attack: that shouldn’t cause alarm.’

  There was a knock at the door and Doctor Brady came in. He was an elderly man, short and rotund with thinning grey hair. ‘I see you don’t need me to tell you that the gentleman’s dead,’ he observed wryly. He spoke with an Irish brogue. ‘At what time was he found?’

  ‘Six o’clock,’ said Captain McDowell. ‘He was found by the night steward who was due to go off duty an hour later.’

  ‘A strange time to enter a passenger’s cabin, to be sure. What was the reason for such an early call? Was the deceased merely keen, like Orpheus, to greet the dawn?’

  ‘I understand from the steward that Pashley filed daily articles for the society column of The Monocle,’ put in William Petrie. ‘It’s a London paper he wrote for. He composed the articles during the day then later liked to spend half an hour or so polishing his work. The steward collected each dispatch in the early morning and took it the radio room. From there, it was radioed to London, arriving ready for publication in the next edition. I believe a tip usually changed hands, perhaps explaining the steward’s conscientiousness.’

  ‘Who was the last person to see him alive?’ asked de Silva.

  ‘Apart from the murderer? Probably the steward. He saw Pashley go to his cabin at around one o’clock in the morning.’

  That was interesting, thought de Silva. The occupants of the noisy table where Pashley had been sitting at dinner had been conspicuous on the dance floor, but now he came to think of it, he hadn’t noticed Pashley among them after the meal had ended.

  ‘He may have gone to the bar,’ said William Petrie when he mentioned it. ‘That’s easily checked. The steward mentioned something about Pashley seeming to have had a lot to drink. He’d lost his key and the steward had to let him into his cabin.’

  Doctor Brady approached the bed and examined the corpse.

  ‘Rigor mortis is minimal,’ he murmured. He straightened up. ‘I estimate that the time of death was around four o’clock this morning.’

  Gently, he pulled at the newspaper jutting from Pashley’s mouth. ‘This was pretty firmly jammed into the windpipe.’ He tugged a little harder and a wedge of paper came out. He laid it on the bed then bent down and peered more closely at Pashley’s face. ‘The nostrils have been sealed off too. A classic case of asphyxiation, albeit by somewhat unorthodox means. But as there’s no sign of a struggle, I deduce that Pashley was sedated before the attack.’

  ‘Can you tell us more?’ asked Petrie.

  Brady shrugged. ‘From the smell, he drank a good deal of whisky not long before he died, but I can’t say for sure whether it would have been enough to make him dead drunk. It’s possible his drink was spiked as well.’

  ‘With what?’

  ‘There are several possibilities, but I suspect the most likely is chloral hydrate. It takes between twenty and sixty minutes to incapacitate a man, so that would give time for him to return to his cabin. Some people say the substance gives off the smell of oranges, but I’ve never noticed it myself.’

  De Silva recalled a book of true crimes he had once read on Jane’s recommendation. In one that had occurred about twenty years previously, several bar owners and over a hundred waiters had been arrested in the city of Chicago in America. They were convicted of spiking the drinks of customers who didn’t tip generously enough, then robbing them. The spiked drink used was named after the bar owner who had invented the trick, but de Silva couldn’t recall his name.

  ‘Would there be any other signs that it’s been ingested?’ he asked Brady.

  ‘Prior to loss of consciousness? Slurred speech; difficulty walking—’

  ‘But then a casual observer might simply assume Pashley was drunk,’ said Petrie.

  ‘Indeed.’

  ‘Can this chloral hydrate be detected in the body?’

  ‘No. That’s why I believe it may have been the method the killer chose.’

  Captain McDowell donned the cap he had removed out of respect for the dead man. ‘I must return to the bridge before my absence causes comment. My apologies for leaving you with this problem, Petrie.’ He delved in his pocket and handed over two keys. ‘The steward’s pass key and a spare. You may need them.’

  De Silva wondered whether he imagined that Petrie threw a wry glance at the captain’s retreating figure. Doubtless he didn’t relish the prospect of this interruption to his holiday. The door closed, and Petrie turned to Doctor Brady. ‘May I rely on you to make arrangements to remove the body to a more suitable place until we decide how best to bury it?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  ‘As Captain McDowell says, the matter needs handling very discreetly to avoid alarming the passengers. If there’s suitable space available, he may prefer to hold the body in cold storage until it can be quietly handed over to the authorities at Port Said for them to deal with. Otherwise, Pashley will have to be buried as sea which may invite more attention. I recall from my naval days that there are formalities to be observed, including stopping the ship while the burial takes place.’

  ‘Leave it to me.’

  ‘Good man. Here, take one of these keys so you can come and go as you need.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  When Brady had gone, William Petrie flopped down in the armchair by the bed. His coolness in proximity to the dead man made de Silva wonder how often he had faced death in his life.

  ‘Once again, my apologies for involving you, de Silva, but I’m going to need help with this one.’

  ‘That’s quite alright, sir. I’m happy to do anything I can to assist.’

  ‘Excellent. Well, where do you recommend that we start?’

  ‘I’d like to make a thorough search of the body and the cabin before we do anything else. After that, the steward needs to be questioned again.’

  ‘And the bar steward on duty that evening in the Cabin Class bar, if Pashley was there,’ Petrie said. ‘He mustn’t be told the whole story, of course. We’ll only tell him that we need to piece together the events leading to Pashley’s heart attack.’

  Pausing, he threw de Silva a sideways glance. ‘McDowell’s a good man at heart. I’ve known him many years. We served together in the Navy in the Great War. He chose to make the seafaring life his career afterwards, while I opted for the Colonial Service. My family have a long history of service in it.’

  He took a gold cigarette case out of his pocket. ‘D’you smoke?’

  ‘No, thank you, sir.’

  Petrie lit up. ‘I find it helps the concentration. Tell me, did you believe the good doctor when he said there’s no method for detecting chloral hydrate?’

  ‘I wasn’t absolutely convinced. To my mind, he was rather too quick to dismiss the idea. I’ve had many conversations with one of the senior medical men at Kandy, a Doctor Van Bruyn.’

  ‘Henr
y Van Bruyn? I think I know him. Highly respected in his field.’

  ‘Yes. I understand from him that great strides are being made in the detection of many drugs.’

  ‘In other words, a less trenchant denial would have inspired more confidence in you.’

  ‘It would, but I may be wrong.’

  ‘I believe Brady has qualifications from the best medical schools in Dublin, but I imagine he obtained those many years ago. Nowadays, he may be behind the times. In any case, we’re on a ship, not in a laboratory. In this heat, if there’s no suitable place to keep it, the body will have to be disposed of before we reach Port Said. Do you think your investigation will be compromised?’

  De Silva shook his head. ‘Not especially. It’s very likely something was administered, but it may not be relevant to know exactly what it was.’ The name of the criminal bartender in Chicago came back to him: Mickey Finn.

  Petrie reached for an ashtray and stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette. ‘Only time will tell, and time’s something we don’t have a great deal of. We’d better get on with searching the body.’

  The pockets of Pashley’s jacket and trousers revealed only a few items, and they were what might be expected – a cigarette case, a gold lighter, a wallet, a handful of loose change, and a spotless linen handkerchief.

  When they had finished, Petrie folded Pashley’s hands on his chest and pulled up the sheet to cover his face. ‘The poor chap is entitled to some respect,’ he said. ‘I’m afraid it’s unlikely he’ll be buried on home soil.’

  They started to go through the cabin. Clearly, the dead man hadn’t stinted on his clothing. The cupboards contained numerous elegant suits; some of them cut from cream or fawn linen. Others were made of herringbone tweed. There were also a dove-grey barathea overlaid with a fine red stripe, a Lovat green wool, and a navy Prince of Wales check. There were cream Oxford bags, dress shirts and soft shirts in white or pastel colours, cashmere jumpers, formal ties and paisley cravats, leather gloves, silk socks and underwear, and several hats. On the lowest shelf, two-tone and plain black or navy leather brogues were precisely aligned in rows.