Death of an Aegean Queen

by Maria Hudgins

  I turned left and walked toward the back end of the ship. A few wooden lounge chairs were still out, the rest stowed away for the night. In the daytime, the bulkhead was lined with cushioned chairs. Most of the ship’s outside lighting was directed toward the water, leaving the deck itself in dim shadow. I stepped carefully to avoid tripping over a chair.

  As I turned the corner, the churning water from the engines glowing green and white in the floodlights, I heard a voice behind me. I turned. It was Brittany Benson, alone now, and she was on a cell phone. Her voice shook as she almost shouted, “I know someone went through my room! I put those boxes in my closet with the arrows pointing toward the wall, and when I came back, they were pointing the other way!”

  I froze.

  “Sophie says she knows nothing about it.”

  I slipped back a little, into the deep shadow at the corner of the bulkhead. From here I could actually see Brittany if I moved my head a bit forward, but remain hidden from her as long as I stayed plastered to the wall. I prepared to hold my breath and pray as she walked past me. I might, I thought, pretend to be having a dizzy spell if she saw me. I’m afraid I’ve used my diabetes more than once to get me out of tight spots. I grab my head, wobble around, and call out for orange juice. Call it the “juice excuse.”

  Luck was with me. Brittany stopped before she rounded the corner, spun around as if the person on the other end of the conversation had said something outrageous, and plopped down on a deck chair. She turned, her back to the wind, facing my direction. Ideal, as long as she didn’t see me. I decided to risk it and hang around, even though the longer I lurked in the shadow the harder it would be to explain if she caught me.

  “No, nothing’s been taken . . . I have my suspicions . . . This woman I’ve seen talking to Dr. Girard and Sophie. She’s from Virginia . . . No, I haven’t. I talked to her for one minute before we went ashore in Mykonos. Why? Because she’s friends with the Carabinieri captain from Italy, and because she’s been checking out the stuff in the display cases. She’s got some sort of book . . . and she’s the one who hooked Sophie up with Girard. Sophie’s his assistant now.”

  There followed a long silence before she said, “Yeah, okay. She’s an older woman, salt-and-pepper sort-of hair. Kind of short, but not too short.”

  To whom was she describing me and why? I felt a sudden need to go to the bathroom. My heart pounded so loudly I could hardly hear Brittany. There was another long pause.

  “Well, I’m sooorrry! My God! Please forgive me for getting a little upset when the FBI accuses me of murdering the slime-ball!” I peeked. She had jumped up and was waving her free hand at the sky. “Oh, Sophie backed me up . . . His name is Bondurant. He’s stationed at the U.S. embassy in Athens, but he’s staying on the ship until . . . well, I really can’t control that, now, can I? . . . Sophie told them I came out here to make a call and said she was with me the whole time . . . I don’t know . . . I don’t think so . . . They showed me the boarding photo of Gaskill and his wife . . . I’d never have recognized him but she hasn’t changed a bit . . . So what are you saying? What am I supposed to do now?”

  Brittany snapped her cell phone closed, yelled “Shit!” to the sea, and tramped back the way she had come. After she had disappeared, I allowed myself a deep breath. Marco might not be my biggest problem now.

  Back in my room, the phone’s message light was dark. I tried Marco’s room again. Still no answer and it was after one a.m.

  * * * * *

  I saw my travel clock’s hour hand creep past every numeral from two through seven. I hashed over the George Gaskill situation and tried to tune in to the intuitive side of my brain for guidance. I don’t really believe in that left-brain–right-brain stuff they talk about, but if I tell myself to look at the big picture and forget the details, I often get a sensible answer to my question. The answer I got this time was strange. My intuition said, “Kathryn Gaskill knows more than she’s telling.” Kathryn was doing a fine job of playing the bereaved widow. She’d packed plenty of black clothes, hadn’t she? Had she known Brittany Benson was on the ship when they’d planned the trip? It was possible. Was George a card shark? Ollie said George didn’t seem to be very familiar with the game of Texas Hold’em, but he did take Malcolm, Willem, and Ollie for about two grand apiece in a game Ollie said was primarily psychological. In Texas Hold’em, no player has any choice in the cards from which he makes his hand. Ollie said it was all a matter of estimating odds, psyching out your opponents, and maintaining your own “game face.” Had George cheated? Did any of the other three men find him out?

  What about Brittany Benson? The cell phone conversation I’d overheard sounded threatening to me. Why had she given the caller a physical description of me? Was I on a hit list now? She knew somebody had snooped through her stuff and she suspected me. Being friends with the Italian Carabinieri made me suspect. I could understand that. But how did she know I’d been checking out the antiquities in the display cases and referring to that LAMBDA book? Did she know Dr. Girard?

  Who killed Papadakos? I tried to recall him to my memory and got a picture of a friendly, round-faced man. Rather nice-looking, always chiming, “Say tsatziki!” instead of “Say cheese.” He’d most likely been killed by someone from the ship because the knife had been bought by a man in a tourist-type shirt shortly after we docked. That didn’t mean the killer was necessarily one of the passengers, though. The ship’s staff, those not required for domestic or navigational duties, had been free to wander around Mykonos wearing whatever they wanted. I recalled seeing Brittany Benson in her capri pants and skimpy shirt. Was Papadakos tied up in smuggling? Did he discover something about the smuggling that made it necessary for someone to whack him? He was, it occurred to me, always stationed with his camera wherever folks were embarking or disembarking, ideally positioned to see everything as it came and went.

  What was I going to say to Marco tomorrow? I could: a) give him hell for leaving me alone at the dance, b) beg forgiveness for leaving him alone too long while I danced with other men, c) bare my soul to him, d) act flippant and say, “Can I help it if everyone wants to dance with me?”, e) play it off and act like I assumed he’d left for some sensible reason or other. He hadn’t responded to the message I’d left him, so option e was pretty weak.

  At five-thirty a.m., I decided to handle it by saying, “Good morning, Marco,” and let him take it from there. I got up, washed my hair, tried to pay attention to the closed-circuit TV that ran the same stuff all day and all night with captions in the language of your choice, turned the TV off, and reviewed the info in my guidebook about Rhodes, today’s destination. At seven, I power-walked three loops around the promenade deck, worked up a sweat, and went back to my room to repair my face.

  My phone light was blinking.

  But the message was from Lettie, saying she and Ollie were going to breakfast at seven-thirty and asking if I would join them. It was still too early to call Marco, so I traipsed up to the dining hall alone.

  Ollie, looking quite recovered from his hangover, stood as our waiter seated me. “We had an interesting visit last night. About nine, wasn’t it, Lettie?”

  “Nine-fifteen,” Lettie answered. “Brittany Benson. She came to our room and tapped on our door shortly after I got back from dinner. Ollie was lying on the bed. Dressed, fortunately.”

  “That’s because I was incapable of undressing myself when you and Lettie dumped me there,” Ollie said, pressing his sausage-like fingers to his chest. “Dotsy, for whatever I may have said or done yesterday, I humbly apologize.”

  “No apology needed. I didn’t even talk to you yesterday. Now, go on with your story.”

  “Brittany suggested she and I are now brothers-in-arms. Compadres, don’cha know, because we’ve both been accused of killing George Gaskill. She told me she had been raped by Gaskill when she was in high school and he’d been convicted of the lesser offense of sexual abuse of a minor.”

  “She cried
a lot,” Lettie said.

  “Told us she had almost put the nightmare behind her, and here it comes again. When they called her into the security office, they made her go over the whole thing again and it brought it all back. Then Bondurant, the FBI man, asked her if she’d had a little peek at the passenger list before the trip.” Ollie leaned over his omelet and lowered his voice. “Asked her when, exactly, she found out Gaskill was on the ship.”

  Lettie took over. “So Brittany told us, she said, ‘I told them I didn’t know George Gaskill was on the ship at all.’ And Bondurant said, ‘Then you must be the only one on the ship who didn’t. He was paged numerous times on the speaker and everyone on the ship was talking about nothing else all day.’ Brittany said she felt like they were trying to trap her because what she meant was, she didn’t know he was on the ship until she heard about the murder and even then she didn’t know it was the same George Gaskill.”

  I ordered an omelet with feta cheese because Ollie’s looked good and grabbed a roll to nibble on until the omelet arrived. I glanced around the dining hall to see if Marco was there, but avoiding me. Bright morning sun poured through the plate-glass windows.

  “Then, about midnight, guess who else came to visit us?” Lettie wiggled in her seat and fluttered both hands. “Marco!”

  I sucked a mouthful of coffee down my windpipe and grabbed my napkin, catching the coffee spray as it came out of my mouth and nose.

  “Marco called first. Said he needed to talk to Ollie. So I woke him up and …”

  “No you didn’t. I was already awake.”

  “I woke him up, and put him on the phone. He told Marco to come ahead, so I grabbed a bathrobe and washed the overnight rejuvenation cream . . .”

  “Green goo.”

  “. . . off my face. When Marco got there, it was a little after twelve.”

  “He asked me what I knew about Malcolm Stone.” Ollie said. “Wanted to know how he’d been acting the night we played poker. Wanted to know if George Gaskill had ever mentioned Brittany Benson to me.”

  Lettie touched my hand and whispered, “Wanted to know if you were dating anyone back home.”

  “You’re kidding.”

  “Now, Lettie, we promised we wouldn’t tell that,” Ollie said.

  “Oh, I forgot. Forget I said that, Dotsy.” She winked at me and added, “I told him you’ve been going out with the governor of Virginia. And George Clooney.”

  Ollie cleared his throat and glared a warning at Lettie. He turned, looked at a spot behind and above me, and said, “Good morning, Marco.”

  Marco had slipped up behind me. He walked around behind Lettie and took the chair opposite me. “Buon giorno, all.” He looked at me, “Good morning, Dotsy.”

  He’d stolen my opening line so I just nodded. He asked the waiter to bring fresh fruit and another basket of rolls and snapped his napkin across one knee.

  “We told Dotsy about seeing you last night,” Ollie said, omitting the fact that Lettie had spilled the beans about his inquiry into my life on the western side of the Atlantic.

  “What happened to you last night, Marco? I came back to our table and you were gone.”

  “I looked at my watch and remembered I needed to talk to Ollie, so I left. Sorry, I did not leave word and let you know where I had gone.”

  “At least I knew you hadn’t gone off with the squash-shaped woman. She was still there with her daughter when I left.”

  Lettie and Ollie laughed.

  Marco said, “Do not be ridiculous.”

  “What do you want to do in Rhodes today?” I asked him.

  “Oh.” Marco’s face reddened. “I forgot to tell you. I am not going to tour Rhodes today. I am returning to Italy. I have booked a flight from Rhodes to Milano.”

  “Oh, no!” Tears rushed out and spilled over. I couldn’t help it. “I’m so sorry, Marco! Please don’t go.”

  Marco ripped open a hard roll. “It is not you, Dotsy. I am taking the blood sample I collected from the deck to our forensic laboratory. I want to know for certain if it is George Gaskill’s blood, and I also need to meet with the team that has been investigating the smuggling of antiquities. I have an idea, but I cannot discuss it with them on the phone.”

  “Isn’t the FBI doing DNA tests?”

  “Yes, but who knows how long it will take? I can at least get preliminary results quickly.”

  I turned to see what my three breakfast companions were looking at, and found Kathryn Gaskill behind me, looking rather more chipper today in a little yellow head scarf, tied behind her neck, and a yellow shirt. “Don’t get up,” she said. “I see you have a full table. I’ll sit somewhere else.”

  “No, no, Kathryn,” Lettie said. “I’ll move around to Ollie’s side. We’ve already eaten. We’re just having our coffee.” Lettie vacated her chair and dragged another from a nearby table to the corner between Ollie and Marco.

  “Kathryn, do you happen to know George’s blood type?” Marco asked.

  “Why, yes.” Kathryn seemed baffled by the question. “It’s type AB positive. I know this because of the bloodwork they did a couple of weeks ago to get him ready for bypass surgery. I told you about his surgery, didn’t I?”

  We all nodded. Kathryn explained it was a fairly rare blood type and asked Marco why he wanted to know. Without mentioning he’d surreptitiously collected his own sample, Marco explained that, while the DNA tests would be definitive proof of whether or not the blood on the deck had been George’s, it took a while to get those results, and a quick-and-easy blood type test could at least tell us if the blood wasn’t his. If the type proved to be A, B, O, or Rh negative, they wouldn’t know whose blood it was, but George would be eliminated and another scenario for what happened on that deck would have to be proposed.

  “I see,” said Kathryn. “Would you tell me as soon as they do the test? I mean, I know it was George’s blood. I knew it the minute I walked out on that deck. Dotsy will tell you.” She turned to me. “Didn’t I tell you, Dotsy?”

  “You did, indeed.”

  “And the sooner we know for certain, the better.” Kathryn paused and sighed. “Mr. Bondurant told me that if they can’t prove George is dead, I’ll have to wait seven years before they officially declare him dead! Seven years! Of course, I’d give anything to see George walk in here, right now.” Kathryn raised her eyebrows and looked toward the ceiling. “That would be the most wonderful thing in the world, but, realistically, it’s not going to happen, and if I have to wait seven years for George’s life insurance to pay out, I don’t know how I’ll live. My job doesn’t pay enough to even cover the mortgage.” She lowered her eyes. “I may have to sell the house, anyway.”

  Lettie reached around the bread basket and touched Kathryn’s hand.

  Marco swiped his napkin across his mouth and pushed back from the table. “You will all excuse me, please? I have to go to the purser’s office and I have to pick up my passport before we dock.”

  I jumped up, too, and dashed out beside him. “Marco, please. Do you have to go? I don’t want you to go! Are you mad at me?”

  Shoving through the dining room doors, he turned and growled, “Am I mad at you? Mad at you? I am not a child. I do not buy a plane ticket to Milano just to get away from you. No! I am going home because there is something important going on on this ship and the information I need is in Italy.”

  “What information?” I asked, walking sideways so as to keep facing him.

  The elevator doors opened, unbidden by either of us, and Marco hopped in, but I was right behind him. He punched the button for the Poseidon deck. “I talked to Dr. Girard,” he said, his eyes trained on the blinking buttons. “They have identified four stolen items in various display cases around the ship. Most of the other items they can find no records for. The Carabinieri have a database that should help us.”

  The elevator doors opened. I intended to follow Marco, begging all along the way, but I was hijacked by a voice from down the hall.


  “Mrs. Lamb?” It was the woman who ran the Internet café. “I have an email message for you.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The Internet attendant had caught me while she herself was in the process of unlocking the door to the computer room, opening up for the day. She flicked on the overhead lights and slipped around the room, hitting buttons. As computers booted, one by one, they sounded like an orchestra tuning up. “It came in last night, but it was too late to call you.” A minute later, she brought up my message on one of the screens and pointed to the line below the subject with a crimson-nailed finger. “There’s an attachment. If you need to print it out, let me know. There’s a one-euro charge for printing.”

  “A euro per page?” I asked and got an indifferent nod in answer. That was highway robbery, but on a ship like this, they didn’t deal in loose change. Almost everything was covered in the price of the cruise, but anything that wasn’t, I had observed, was priced at a round number.

  The mail was from my son Charlie, responding to the message I’d sent him yesterday morning. He certainly hadn’t worked very long at the task I’d given him. I clicked on the appropriate inbox line, expecting nothing much.

  Dear Mom,

  What kind of unsavory people are you hanging around with? A pervert and a pole dancer? I may have to fly to Greece and drag you home by your ears! George Gaskill, as you said, is a registered sex offender, who lives at 8108 Lonesome Pine Rd. Elkhart, Indiana. He’s married to Kathryn Peterson Gaskill of the same address. Employed by the Altoona, PA school system from 1989 through 2001. Principal of Mann High School from September 1998 to May 2001. They are members of Gethsemane United Methodist Church in Elkhart, and I managed to find their church pictures online. I’ve attached a photo of George and Kathryn, taken in February of this year. George is not involved in any community activities other than church, because I found nothing about him in the Elkhart local news. I got several articles from April 2001, describing the rather juicy trial in which Mr. and Mrs. Benson, parents of Brittany Benson, charged him with child abuse, rape, sexual abuse of a minor, etc. I’ve attached a photocopy of one article. Let me know if you want more.