I found it hard to breathe. Ingrid had been lively and bouncy and foolish and now she was dead. I was already moving as stark thoughts streamed through my mind. I tucked my key folder in the pocket of my slacks, plunged out into the corridor, running lightly. I came around the corner at the cross hall amidships, swerved to avoid a cheerful couple stepping out of the elevator, darted past them to the starboard corridor.
Jimmy was standing by his door, face stricken, body rigid, still wearing the navy blazer and soft-collared shirt and gray slacks he’d worn in the bar, everything the same except he looked unutterably weary.
I skidded to a stop beside him.
“You shouldn’t have come.” His voice was gruff. “Nobody can do anything. She’s dead as hell. God, she was just a kid.” He took a deep breath, looked at me in misery. “I should have gone to Glenn the minute I got that message. Maybe she’d be alive. First Sophia, now this kid.”
I gripped his arm. “Stop it. She must have tried to blackmail—”
Then the corridor was alive with movement, Glenn pounding toward us, his security officer and subordinates following. Suddenly Jimmy and I were surrounded.
“Stand aside.” Glenn gestured for us to move out of the way.
A security officer, hands encased in plastic gloves, poked a key in Jimmy’s lock, pushed the door in.
“You’ll see her. She’s in the closet. I’d opened the closet door…” Jimmy’s voice trailed away.
Glenn nodded toward the two security officers waiting a step behind, the same young people I’d seen outside Sophia’s door on Friday night. “Escort Mr. Lennox to Office 8.” He glanced at me. “It would be helpful, Mrs. Collins, if you returned to your cabin. I will ask you not to reveal any information about this evening to anyone other than ship personnel.”
Time dragged past, the minutes moving as slowly as a funeral cortege. I kept dialing Glenn’s office. The phone rang to no answer. I moved restlessly from my small sofa onto the balcony and back again every few minutes, wild to know where Jimmy was, what was happening, what had happened to Ingrid, berating myself for not asking Jimmy. She’s in the closet… How could Ingrid have been murdered in Jimmy’s cabin?
Finally I got out pen and pad, scrawled desperate conclusions:
Ingrid’s murder proved Sophia was murdered.
Ingrid saw the murderer use Jimmy’s key.
Jimmy’s offer of a reward suggested to Ingrid that the information she possessed might be worth a great deal more than a thousand dollars.
Ingrid approached the murderer. The murderer persuaded Ingrid to call Jimmy, promise to meet him on the sundeck. Then…
I tossed the pen down, walked back out to the balcony, caught the scent of a cigar. Someone nearby was smoking, basking in the beauty of the night while Jimmy faced sharp, hard questions and struggled with the death of a foolish young woman.
I whirled back into the cabin, tried Glenn’s number again. No answer. I poured a glass of water, ignored the throbbing ache in my temples.
Ingrid had contacted the murderer. Had she demanded money? Or was it more innocent than that? Possibly Ingrid said, “I saw you at Mrs. Lennox’s door Friday night and Mr. Lennox has been asking me about that and he’s offered me a thousand dollars and I don’t know what to do.”
The murderer, caught by surprise, must have come up with something to satisfy Ingrid, had somehow gained Ingrid’s trust.
I pressed my fingers against my temples. The murderer must have convinced Ingrid that Jimmy was involved in his wife’s death. That would account for Ingrid’s obvious panic this morning. Maybe the murderer told Ingrid that when she or he opened the door, Jimmy was with Sophia. Obviously, whatever tale had been spun was adequate for the murderer’s purpose, and that purpose was to set Jimmy up to take the blame for Ingrid’s murder.
That had to have been the decision, right from the first: Ingrid must die, but her death had to be linked to Jimmy. Perhaps the murderer suggested the family might offer a substantial reward, more than the thousand offered by Jimmy, if Ingrid would help bring the crime home to Jimmy. Thinking fast, the murderer crafted a clever plan. The murderer instructed Ingrid to call Jimmy and set up a meeting on the sundeck, but when it was time, the murderer persuaded Ingrid to open Jimmy’s cabin—I was willing to bet that her key was used for their entry—and once they were inside, Ingrid was killed. It must have been easy, perhaps the suggestion that it might not be safe for Ingrid to meet Jimmy on the sundeck, that instead they would go to his cabin and wait inside, the murderer perhaps hidden in the bath, ready to step out and face him down.
I called Glenn’s office. This time he answered. It was a quarter to two.
“Mrs. Collins.” His voice was cold.
“Where is Mr. Lennox?” Jimmy had looked so old, so defeated as he waited in the corridor only feet away from Ingrid’s body.
“Mr. Lennox is in custody. He will be turned over to the authorities when we reach London.”
“So you’ve made up your mind. You aren’t going to investigate.” My voice was cold, too.
Glenn’s pause was heavy with anger. I felt his anger without a word being said.
“Mr. Glenn”—I talked fast—“what prevented Mr. Lennox from pushing Ingrid’s body over his balcony into the sea? Had she disappeared without trace as Sophia did, there could have been suspicion of murder but never proof. If Mr. Lennox is the killer you assume him to be, why would he call and inform you that Ingrid’s body was in his cabin?”
The reply was immediate. “Guilt, Mrs. Collins.”
“No. Never.” I held the receiver so tightly my hand ached. I wanted to shout my certainty. I tried to keep my voice even, reasonable. “He called you because he is an innocent man. If he were guilty, no one would ever have known what happened to Ingrid.”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Collins.” Glenn sounded regretful. “I know that you and Mr. Lennox are old friends. I understand that you believe in him. But the facts are incontrovertible. Mr. Lennox’s key was the last used to open the door to his wife’s suite and she was never seen again. Ingrid Shriver—”
Ingrid Shriver. Now I knew her name. Ingrid with her round face and golden curls and blue eyes, a pretty girl who looked seductive and voluptuous even in the sexless stewardess’s uniform. Ingrid who had been promised money and received death instead.
“—was strangled in his cabin with a towel from his bathroom. It appears she was taken by surprise, a rolled towel dropped over her face, twisted at the back of her neck. She apparently went down on her knees. There’s a massive bruise in the small of her back. The murderer jammed a knee there. She never had a chance. There is a message on Mr. Lennox’s telephone. In it, Ingrid asked him to meet her on the sundeck, bring the money he had promised. That’s—”
I interrupted. “She didn’t die on the sundeck. Why not? He’s a strong man. He could have killed her there, thrown her over. No one would ever have known.”
“Perhaps someone else was there.” Glenn was impatient. “You can be assured we’ll try to find out tomorrow. We know that she came down to his cabin with him—”
Again I broke in. “Not with Jimmy. Ingrid never showed up on the sundeck.”
“That’s what he claims.” Glenn’s disbelief was evident.
“Mr. Glenn, please listen. Jimmy came down to his cabin and found Ingrid. Tell me this: What key opened that lock before his was used tonight?”
There was a slight pause. “Ingrid’s.”
“When?”
“Twenty-two ten.”
“Jimmy had just left the bar on his way up to the sundeck. Yet you have suggested that Jimmy met Ingrid on the sundeck and asked her to come down to his cabin. There wasn’t time. And why would her key have been used to open his door?” Surely Glenn would understand this made no sense.
“Mrs. Collins, we may never know the exact circumstances. Perhaps they’d spoken in the hallway, he’d asked her to wait for him in his cabin, explained he needed to meet you—”
“That’s nonsense. Jimmy told me about their appointment on the sundeck. He was excited. When he left me, he went up there. He thought he’d soon know who was in the corridor outside Sophia’s cabin. He hoped he’d have information to bring to you.”
“That’s what he told you.” Glenn spoke with finality.
“Knowing all the while that Ingrid was waiting in his cabin?”
“It’s one possibility. Likely we’ll never know exactly what happened. We certainly have a sound reason to hold him and turn him over to the police. Mrs. Collins, you may make whatever arrangements you wish with a solicitor in London. We will present the authorities with the information we’ve gathered. Until then, Mr. Lennox will remain in our custody.”