by Harper Lin
We stood at the railing not far from the chained-off area. The guard didn’t even look at us.
The railing at the tip of the prow was no higher than it was everywhere else. I gauged the height of the railing compared to myself. I’m five foot five, and the railing was at chest level. With Maggie being a foot taller than me, the railing would have been at her midriff, still above her center of gravity. It would have taken quite a force to tip her over the edge. Perhaps one person pushing while the other grabbed Maggie’s legs and lifted?
That would have required some strength. Maggie looked pretty heavy, and they would have had to catch her by surprise, or they would have had a fight on their hands, a fight I couldn’t picture Georgina or any of her followers winning. Plus that crowd of witnesses had been so close they would have heard a struggle.
So they had a concrete plan, cooperation, and more importantly, the resolution to carry it out.
This final element is one most people overlook. We can all sit there and think up clever ways to kill people, but getting the will to carry it through with no hesitation and no panicking is the tough part. Summoning that inner evil is a difficult thing, and getting more than one person to do it is even harder. This is what boot camp is for, to train groups of young people to obey orders to kill without thinking about it. Civilians do not have that training and need a lot of motivation to cross that line.
Or the proper leader.
Georgina certainly had a hold on these women.
“Do you suppose they’ve arranged to sit with us at breakfast too?” I asked.
“Most likely. We’ll have to keep our eyes and ears open.”
I nodded. It was sure going to be an interesting breakfast.
Octavian and I arranged to meet outside our cabins at nine the following morning. I figured a late breakfast would be a good idea, considering how much that crowd had been knocking back at dinner. And they had probably been up late. No one commits a brazen murder and then turns in early for a good night’s sleep.
Well, professional killers did, but I didn’t think they were in that category. They didn’t have that reptilian look in their eyes.
When Octavian and I met in the hall, none of the other cabin doors were open, and we hadn’t heard them come out. After checking the coast was clear, we listened at each cabin door but heard nothing. The doors were pretty thick, so we wouldn’t catch anything but loud noises. At least no one was getting murdered in the cabins at that moment. I can’t handle murder before breakfast. Shrugging our shoulders, we headed to the restaurant.
An announcement had been posted in all the public rooms. Bordered in black, it regretted to inform us that Margaret Underwood had apparently committed suicide by jumping from the prow last night. An extensive search by the ship’s crew and the Coast Guard had failed to find her. Anyone with any information should inform a member of staff immediately. The entire crew of the Silver Siren and all the staff and management of Surf n’ Sun Cruise Line expressed their heartfelt sympathies, blah blah blah.
It didn’t tell us anything we didn’t already know.
Even getting there late, we didn’t see Georgina and her followers. We took a slow pass around the extensive restaurant. At least two hundred people were eating there, mostly by the floor-to-ceiling windows that gave a splendid view of the sea. I noticed the ship was moving again.
There were no reserved tables for breakfast, so we got a table near the entrance to catch them when they came in. We ate slowly, scanning the aged crowd. Many looked like they were sporting hangovers. Others were already sunburned. Everyone was talking about their own affairs. I didn’t hear a single mention of Maggie.
After sitting there an hour, we were about to give up when we saw them come in.
Georgina came in first, leading the pack, as usual. She was perfectly done up, not a single bottle-blond hair out of place. I did notice a bit of strain around her eyes and a bit of stiffness in her movements. Hungover or feeling guilty? Hard to say. Although given the amount she had drunk at dinner, she must be hungover no matter what else she might be feeling.
The others looked fairly hungover too. They were all perfectly done up, though. Everyone wore bright sundresses like nothing had gone wrong on their holiday at all.
“There are the lovebirds!” Georgina cried when she spotted us. Her face lit up, and she gave us a broad smile. Her followers smiled, too, as if on cue.
They sat down. Georgina fixed me with a sly look and said, “I bet you’re wondering about Maggie.”
Six
It took a moment to recover from such a direct statement. I had expected the need to be subtle and slowly bring the conversation around to what had happened the night before. Instead, she had come right out and invited us to talk with her about it.
Before I could respond, she flagged down a waiter and ordered a Bloody Mary. Her followers did too.
“Best thing for a hangover,” she said when she turned to us again. “Want one?”
“No thank you. So, what happened last night?” I asked, trying to play the clueless innocent.
Georgina shook her head sadly. Or at least she did a good imitation of sadness. It was hard to tell with her since she was such a show-woman. “Maggie has always been a bit unstable. We all live in the same neighborhood in Schenectady. Of course everyone in the neighborhood socializes with everyone else. That’s the kind of community Schenectady is. Unfortunately, that means sometimes you have to deal with people who don’t quite fit in.”
“Maggie was one of those,” Charlotte said.
A flicker of anger passed over Georgina’s features, as if she was annoyed by the interruption. Georgina went on. “She never got married, and while I don’t generally approve of marriage, it might have done her some good. She worked as a librarian for the Schenectady Municipal Library, shushing everyone who so much as flipped a page loudly. Nobody at work liked her, neither the patrons nor her coworkers, and she was foul tempered and bossy outside of work too.”
“Bossiness is a terrible personality trait,” Octavian said. I could have kicked him, but Georgina was not the kind of person who caught on to irony.
“It is indeed,” she said. “She made enemies all through the neighborhood by sticking her nose into everyone’s business. She always thought she knew what was best for everyone and tried to organize everything to her standard.”
I stifled a smile. Georgina reminded me of a saying by Benjamin Franklin: “The proud hate pride—in others.”
Georgina continued talking. I had only known her a day, and I had already realized that talking was what she did best. “But I’m a charitable sort, and I took her under my wing. It wasn’t easy, I tell you, but I invited her along when we had tea at a cafe or we went bowling.”
“Bowling?” I had a hard time imagining these people bowling.
“Oh yes, we decided to form our own bowling team last year. Did you know they have bowling lanes right here on board the ship? We’ll be bowling later today, once we’re feeling a bit better. You should come along.”
“But why would she throw herself off the boat?” I asked, still playing the innocent. As I asked this, I glanced around the table and felt like I was in a poker game. Everyone had suddenly gone expressionless. I made a mental note to stay well away from any railings if I was on deck with these people.
Georgina was the only one showing emotion, even if it was fake.
“It’s so terrible, isn’t it?” she said in a fair imitation of anguish. “What a wasted life. No friends, no lovers. If only she had tried to reach out …”
“The way she accosted you, it sounded like you used to be in the same social circle,” Octavian said.
“Oh, Schenectady is such a small community there really is only one social circle, at least only one worth being in.” Her followers tittered. “But Maggie wasn’t ever able to fit in. We tried. Lord knows we tried. There’s just no helping some people. She made quite a few enemies.”
Oh, did she now? That was an odd thin
g for a suspect to admit.
“Enemies?” I asked. “She seemed harmless enough.”
“She held grudges,” Lauren said with some heat.
For once, Georgina didn’t seem angered at the interruption. She nodded to her and said, “That she did. When she was passed over for promotion at the library in favor of one of her coworkers, she badmouthed the other woman relentlessly. For years! And then there was the bowling fiasco.”
“The bowling Armageddon!” Fiona chirped, and the other women tittered.
“Indeed,” Georgina said. “As I said, we had invited her along for a couple of our practice sessions, just to be friendly. Well, she was a disaster. She practically threw the ball into the gutter. When we tried to give her advice, she got all snappy. We tried to be patient and even gave her encouragement. That turned out to be a mistake.”
“She got it into her head that she was on the team,” Fiona said. “We explained to her that the team was already full, but it didn’t sink in.”
“Then came our tournament,” Charlotte cut in. “We had made it to the finals of the Schenectady Senior Bowling League Golden Trophy Tournament, when I fell ill with a case of malaria.”
“Malaria?” Octavian asked, looking at her with astonishment. “I didn’t realize Schenectady was in a malarial zone.”
I almost kicked him. I didn’t want them to get off topic.
“My late husband and I were missionaries in Bangladesh for a few years. I contracted malaria there. You recover, but it stays in your system. Every now and then it comes back. Terrible affliction. I was laid out in bed, sweating gallons of water every hour, just when my team needed me the most!”
Georgina shook her head sadly. “We went to the tournament and pled our case, but the rules were quite strict that we had to have a full team to compete. We got desperate and searched around the bowling center for a pickup player, but everyone was either in another team or rooting for another team. We were at our wits’ end. And then Maggie showed up and volunteered. Well, we certainly weren’t going to have her on our team. It’s one thing to forfeit. Humiliating yourself in front of half of Schenectady is another thing entirely.”
“So you refused her?” I asked.
Georgina raised her eyes heavenward. “She was beside herself with rage. She said she had been practicing day and night and that we should give her another chance. Perhaps she had been practicing, but it would have taken three miracles and an executive order from the president to have made her a decent bowler, let alone one who could compete in the Schenectady Senior Bowling League Golden Trophy Tournament.”
“A high point in bowling history, to be sure,” Octavian said.
This time I did kick him. He let out a little grunt.
“So we said no,” Georgina went on, oblivious. “We went up to the judge to announce that we had to forfeit. Just then Charlotte flew in and saved the day.”
“More like stumbled in and moaned that she could play,” Charlotte corrected.
“And play you did,” Georgina said with a smile. “Of course you weren’t up to your usual level, but the rest of the team took up the slack, and we got the gold!”
“One for all and all for one, the Six Mouseyketeers!” they said in unison, bringing their hands together over the table in a communal high five.
Good Lord.
Just then the waiter arrived with the Bloody Marys, and they began to drink in earnest. I decided it was time to withdraw and confer with Octavian.
“So, what do you think?” Octavian asked once we got into the corridor and out of earshot.
“I think we need to get these people alone and talk to them one by one.”
“Easier said than done. Georgina rules the roost, and they all follow her wherever she goes.”
“True, but I have a hard time believing Maggie killed herself because she was a failure at bowling.”
“Bowling is quite important to some people. You’re right, though, it’s not something to take a swim over. How about we … what’s going on?”
The drone of the engine, a regular background noise all day and night, had shifted. Since the engine was always on, we didn’t even notice it most of the time, but now it had changed tone, getting softer, deeper.
“We’re slowing down,” I said. I’d been on enough Navy ships to know these things.
“But we’re in the middle of the sea.”
“Let’s go on deck and see what’s happening.”
“Maybe they found Maggie’s body.”
“That would be a stroke of luck.”
We came up on deck to see something unexpected. Not far off the port bow was another cruise ship, smaller than ours. Both it and our own had stopped. Squinting, I could make out the name as the Poseidon Party, and beneath the name was Surf n’ Sun Cruise Line’s logo.
A small crowd had gathered to stare.
“What’s going on?” a gray-haired gentleman asked as a sailor passed by.
“Engine trouble with the other ship, sir. We’re going to transfer their guests onto our ship and continue the cruise.”
“Another delay!” the man exclaimed. “Are we going to get to the islands at all?”
“We’ll make it to the islands on schedule, sir,” the sailor said, turning and leaving before the gentleman could start griping again.
We watched as the crew of the Poseidon Party lowered their lifeboats and motored on over to us. Each boat was piled high with passengers and their luggage. Thudding electronic music preceded them over the water. Our ship lowered a gangway, and the passengers started coming aboard.
As one lifeboat after another emptied their passengers onto our ship, I noticed a couple of things.
First, most of the passengers were young, tanned, and in great shape.
Secondly, every single one of them was a man.
One particularly tanned and muscular young man, stripped to the waist to show off his impressive pectorals, which gleamed with oil in the Caribbean sun, lowered his sunglasses and surveyed the deck.
“Antoine,” he said to the European-looking man standing next to him, who was equally muscular and oiled. “Are we on a … seniors’ cruise?”
“Oh. My. God. I do believe you’re right.”
The first man looked at Antoine and got a mischievous look in his eye. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?” he asked.
Antoine gave him a sultry smile. “I do believe I am. Let’s cause some heart attacks.”
They embraced and locked lips. One of the old women shrieked. The elderly gentleman who had been complaining about the delay shouted, “Good Lord!” and stomped off the deck.
Another muscled and oiled twentysomething came on deck, pumped his fist in the air, and shouted. “Come on, girls. It’s time to parteeeeey!”
Octavian looked on, aghast. “Did we just get invaded by a … gay cruise?”
“Yes,” I said as the deck began to fill with dancing, flirting, and singing young men. “Yes, we did.”
Seven
It’s times like these where you really get to know people. As the senior citizens left the deck in droves, Octavian surveyed the new crowd, shrugged his shoulders, and said, “Oh well, I didn’t really want to go to the disco anyway. So how are we going to handle the investigation?”
“We have to break up Georgina’s group somehow and isolate each person,” I said, relieved Octavian wasn’t going into conniptions over our new shipmates like some of the senior citizens on deck. In fact, they were fleeing en masse. So were the sailors. The new passengers found their uniforms fetching and were trying to fetch the men inside them. Within moments we were alone on deck with a rapidly growing crowd of gay men a third our age.
“Let’s check out that bowling alley,” Octavian said. “Maybe they’ll be there already.”
It turned out they were. The bowling alley was on one of the lowest decks and was fitted out with six lanes. We had to check our shoes and each rent a pair of those embarrassingly ugly shoes bowling alleys
always give out. Once inside, we spotted them at one of the lanes. Only one other lane was taken, by a husband and wife who were keeping to themselves.
Georgina and her gang were all drunk again, their hangovers forgotten in a pleasant alcoholic fog of Bloody Marys. And I must say that the Six Mouseyketeers lived up to their boasts. One by one, in rapid succession, they went up and got strikes or at least spares. Bowling pins flew in all directions.
The accuracy and force with which they launched their bowling balls was frightening. Looking for comparison at the husband and wife a couple of lanes away, who struggled up to the line to practically drop their balls to send them sedately toward the pins, I could see just how skilled the Six Mouseyketeers were. No wonder they had won the gold. They were shooting their personalized bowling balls down that lane like they were firing them from a cannon.
And that got me thinking. I hadn’t quite formulated my thoughts when they spotted us.
“Octavian! Barbara! Glad you could join us!” Georgina said, slurring her words slightly. The alcohol content in her blood didn’t stop her from turning and making a perfect strike.
“I don’t think we’re at your level,” Octavian said. “We’ll get our own lane next to yours. Would you be so kind as to send over one of the Six Mouseyketeers to give us a few tips?”
What a helpful man. He’d figured out the perfect way to isolate a member of the team. They sent over Lauren, the retired bookkeeper whose retirement they had taken a cruise to celebrate. I had noticed her giving Octavian the eye earlier. I didn’t think he noticed, which was just fine by me. He was not supposed to notice such things. I suspected her being chosen as our teacher wasn’t a coincidence.
Octavian picked up a bowling ball and approached the line.
“Oh, wait! That’s not the way,” Lauren said. “Here, let me help with your form.”
As I watched, she adjusted his hips, her hands far lower than they needed to be.
“That’s right. Now square your shoulders like so.” Her hands ran up his chest to move his shoulders into position.
