“I could kill her.”
It all started when those words floated up to us as Petronella and I walked onto the cruise ship in Barcelona in early November, ten days before I found the woman who’d stopped breathing.
I need to explain about Petronella. Possibly about me, a single woman in her mid-thirties, taking a two-week transatlantic cruise, too.
Aunt Kit explains both.
Petronella was the daughter of Kit’s long-dead fiancé’s cousin from his mother’s side. Welcome to Kit’s world. I got to the point where I referred to everyone as Kit’s relative. It made it easier. Though it did confuse our Guatemalan housekeeper at the brownstone when I introduced her as Kit’s relative to a visiting acquaintance.
Aunt Kit took me on my first cruise shortly after the Abandon All auction and then at least once a year since. Always transatlantic, always from Europe back to the United States, as they moved the ships into place for winter cruises to the Caribbean. (Yes, you can take more than one a year that fit those requirements…with planning.)
“They’re long. They’re frequently out of range of the internet. Low percentage of the passengers attempt to stay as drunk as possible for the duration. You gain an hour about every two and a half days,” was her explanation for choosing those cruises.
I agreed with each point. Also, the author of Abandon All went largely unnoticed on these cruises. A major bonus.
Kit booked this cruise as my transition, and here I was.
But I lied.
Or, more accurately, I was an unreliable narrator in saying it started when Petronella and I boarded the ship. (And notice I didn’t mention Aunt Kit boarding the ship. Yes, she abandoned me on this trip. More — much more — on that later.)
It — the dead woman in the deck chair — started well before I found her body.
If I were Sam Spade, I’d say it started when the dame walked onto the ship. And that would be true — from my POV. POV is author talk for point of view — which character is steering the bus for that part of the story, so the reader experiences it through his or her mind and senses.
From the point of view of the woman dead in the deck chair, it started much earlier. At some point in her life when seeds took root that grew into someone killing her.
For me, it started with that voice carried on an air current up the boxy zigzag of the gangplank.
“I could kill her.”
I looked over the railing to the series of switchback ramps below us that created easygoing boarding for the Diversion. Fellow passengers strung out behind us among the early arrivals that Sunday afternoon. A daisy chain of gray heads interspersed with determinedly not gray heads and sunhats, male and female.
No telling where the words came from. Not even a hundred percent a woman spoke them. More like sixty percent. Maybe fifty-five.
And what did it matter? We’ve all said the same thing how many times in our lives?
Except something in the voice made me look.
Then I forgot about it, because it was our turn to be welcomed onto the Diversion.
In the background stood a young woman dressed in a crisp white shirt with insignia and nametag over navy slacks, holding balloons and a sign bearing Petronella’s name.
I nudged Petronella with a smile. “Look.”
She clasped a hand to her throat. “Oh, God. Someone’s died.”
“I doubt they’d carry yellow and red balloons to notify you of a death.”
The tears in her eyes apparently blocked her hearing, because she didn’t relinquish her panicked horror as I dragged her toward the smiling young crew member.
“This is Petronella,” I told her.
The young woman’s smile flickered, but she handed an envelope and the red balloon to Petronella. “Hope you enjoy your treat, miss.” She looked at me more shyly. “And I believe this is for you? We were asked not to use your name publicly because… because of who you are.”
Or were.
I didn’t say that aloud. I thanked her for both of us, took the envelope and yellow balloon, and dragged Petronella out of the mainstream of boarding passengers.
I ripped my envelope open. She shook, tears sliding down.
“It’s from Kit,” I said brightly.
“Oh, my God. Kit’s dead!”
“Not unless she’s writing to us from heaven.” Or elsewhere. I loved Kit dearly, but I didn’t see her getting a direct ticket through the pearly gates. “She’s booked manicures for us—” I checked the clock. “—in ten minutes. To get us in the mood and pass some of the time before we can settle in our cabins.”
When you embark on a cruise, your main luggage is whisked away to appear outside your cabin door at some point in the future. All very nice, but that point in the future frequently ends up being unpredictable.
Kit taught me to carry a go-bag to make waiting for the magic more pleasurable.
The go-bag held all the necessities for several hours of relaxation, from sunscreen and sunglasses to reading material and headphones to a few munchies and a thermos of cold water Petronella insisted on filling for me. Today wasn’t hot, but quite warm in the sun.
November on a cruise from eastern Spain to Gulf Course, Florida can be variable. But it’s not November in the Midwest, where I grew up, or Manhattan, where I’d spent the past fifteen years.
In those places you’re more likely to need gloves, hats, scarves, boots, and hot chocolate than sunscreen, sunglasses, and cold water.
But my summery-here supplies were on hold, thanks to Kit arranging for these manicures.
“Are you sure? Maybe my envelope isn’t the same…”
Petronella brought out the worst in me. I so wanted to say, Yeah, you’re right. Kit sent me a balloon and a manicure, but you she sent a balloon and the news that one of your nearest and dearest has died.
With more determination than grace, I said, “I’m sure. Open your envelope.”
While she did, I attached both our balloons to a nearby railing — railings are nearby almost everywhere on a cruise ship.
With still-shaking hands she removed the card.
“Oh. It’s for a manicure,” she said in astonishment.