Murder out of the Blue (Maliha Anderson Book 1) Read online

  “Can I help you?” The steward behind the bar was not the one she needed. He was English and sported the thin moustache favoured by the lower middle classes.

  She turned to face him. “Yes. I need to speak to one particular steward. Indian by birth, I believe he came aboard at Khartoum, and his uniform is too large for him. Do you know him?”

  The man’s look was difficult to decipher but after a short pause he turned and went through a door into the back. Moments later he returned, followed by a nervous-looking man, the very steward she required. Maliha glanced at the library door. The lamps inside were still lit.

  “Come with me.” She opened the door and entered. “Don’t shut the door.”

  “Can I help, Sahiba?” He was sweating.

  “What’s your name?”

  “Pravangkar Modi, Sahiba.”

  “You are family to Lochana?”

  “Lochan was my brother, Sahiba.”

  Maliha removed the letter from her reticule and offered it. “Here.”

  He took it. “It is open.”

  “What does it say?”

  “It tells that our father is dead. Lochan should help the family. He should send money.”

  “Nothing else?”

  He shook his head. “Will you tell the captain about me, Sahiba?”

  “Were you on duty here yesterday evening?”

  He nodded. “I deliver orders to rooms.”

  “Did you see anything?”

  He shook his head and looked towards the door. “Why do you ask me these questions, Sahiba? Only bad things can happen.”

  “Do you want the murderer to go unpunished?”

  He frowned. “The general?”

  “Nonsense. Whatever you may think of his nature, or the nature of your brother, I saw them together. They loved each other. Besides, the times are all wrong. So what did you see?”

  He did not answer.

  “If you do not tell me, then I will tell the captain of your connection to Lochana. What will they think then?”

  Maliha was not proud of the shiver of terror that shook him as the thought sank in. After all, how much more convenient for the police to have an Indian as the murderer?

  “Please do not, Sahiba. I beg you.” He dropped his head and pressed his palms together fingers pointing towards her.

  “Then tell me what you saw.”

  “I saw nothing of value, Sahiba. The engineer and his wife returning to their cabin.”

  “You mean the Spencers?”

  He nodded.

  “That is not unusual; they did not come to the lounge that evening. They said they were retiring.” He shuffled his feet.

  “What else?”

  “Please, Sahiba…”

  “Very well,” she said, and took a step towards the door, he instantly looked relieved. “I will go straight to the captain.”

  The relief turned to terror. “They went to their cabin!”

  “But?”

  “They went to another place first.”

  “Where?”

  “I do not know—”

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake,” she took another step towards the door. His arm snaked out, his hand gripping her forearm.

  “They came from the passageway with your cabin, with the general’s cabin, with Lochan’s cabin. They were not coming from the salon.”

  She stopped, and his fingers fell from her arm. “What time was this?”

  “Between nine and ten o’clock.”

  “How many minutes after nine?”

  He thought for a moment. “Perhaps thirty or forty.”

  “Very good.”

  Chapter 6

  i

  Maliha hesitated at the door to Mrs Makepeace-Flynn’s cabin. She was a formidable and unpleasant woman at the best of times, and this was not the best of times. However there was no alternative; the ship was only an hour from Bombay. She knocked firmly then took a step back.

  A few moments later the door was opened by a maid. Maliha recognised her as one of the ship’s crew. She was not Indian. “Can I help, Miss?” She spoke with an over-emphasised “h” as if being particularly careful not to drop it.

  “Miss Anderson to see Mrs Makepeace-Flynn.” She spoke loudly enough that the general’s wife would be able to hear her.

  “Let her in,” said the harsh voice from within. “And leave us. Come back in the morning to pack.” The maid stepped aside to allow Maliha in, and then left, shutting the door firmly.

  The cabin barely differed from the others: same furnishings, same rug, and no windows as this was an interior room similar to the one Temperance had. Barbara Makepeace-Flynn rose to her feet from the armchair.

  “What do you want?” she said. “Have you come to gloat?”

  “It must be difficult.”

  “What?”

  “Can I offer my sincere condolences, Mrs Makepeace-Flynn?”

  She seemed taken aback, as if the fire in her had been extinguished. She sat down.

  Maliha noticed that tea had been brought but not served. She splashed a small amount of milk from the delicate jug, poured the tea, and passed it to the older woman, who took it almost without noticing. Maliha did not pour any for herself but perched on the edge of the sofa.

  “It’s a terrible thing to happen.”

  The general’s widow ran her finger delicately around the rim of the teacup. Maliha could see her hand shaking.

  “Forty-three years we were married,” she said, almost talking to herself. “In all that time he never even held my hand. The last time he touched me was at the wedding ceremony when he put this ring on my finger.” She held out her left hand and looked at it as if it did not belong to her. “Do you understand what I am saying?” She jerked her head up at Maliha who met her eye but only trusted herself enough to give a slight nod.

  “I had no idea what he was really like. I was naive. We travelled so much: the soldier’s life, y’know. I did what any good wife would do. I kept his house, and I waited for him.”

  She brushed her fingers against her cheek leaving a trail of dampness. “Then came the stories. You think I am harsh and cold, Miss Anderson, do you not? Don’t deny it. That may be so, but among officers’ wives there is seldom great friendship. We do not remain in one place more than a year, and always there is the competition and the cutting tongue. So I came to hear the stories about my husband and his … preferences. And they laughed behind their false sympathy.

  “But then, finally, after all those years of torture he succumbed to the wheelchair. Judge me how you may, Miss Anderson, but I was glad when he was shot because he would be mine at last.” She went silent and took a sip from her cup.

  Maliha wanted the whole story. “But that was not to be—”

  “No! That was not to be, as you say.” Her voice was acidic with anger and pain. “No, because he brought that woman … that nurse. Lochana Modi. And it was she that tended him. She who spent her hours looking after him. She who was with him day and night.”

  She looked up into Maliha’s eyes again. “I hated her.”

  “But your husband loved her.”

  “Yes!” she hissed. “That much was obvious. I tried to console myself at first with the thought that, after all the stories and innuendo, at least he now loved someone of our sex.” She gave a humourless laugh. “But that was false. She was a man after all. I did not kill that pervert, Miss Anderson, but I assure you I would have happily wrung her neck.”

  “I can’t imagine how you felt.”

  “No. I doubt you can,” she said. “When I was informed of her true nature, I felt as if I would break. And to have my husband enter at that very moment. To make a public scene.”

  “I am truly sorry.”

  The general’s wife looked her in the eye. “I believe you are.” She gave another half laugh, as lacking in humour as the other. “You are a surprising young woman, Miss Anderson. Most extraordinary.” She paused to drain the teacup in an undignified way, then qui
ckly dug out a kerchief to dab her eyes.

  Maliha smiled gently. “Would you like more tea?”

  ii

  Through the port-side panorama of the Observation deck, Maliha watched the lights of Bombay glittering through the rain and the dark. It wasn’t monsoon yet; if it had been she probably wouldn’t have been able to see a thing.

  Laid out before them was the rectangular landing dock, lit with the dazzling brilliance of dozens of electric lamps. Landing at night, and in the rain, would be nearly impossible without the lights. The rotors along the side of the ship had pivoted into their upright hover position; the ship drifted into place through its momentum and the guidance of smaller rotors located strategically around the ship’s hull.

  As they moved over the landing field, she had to lean farther out to see below. The ship continued to descend. Whenever it drifted off station the sure hand of the captain easily brought it back into position.

  Below them, she knew that hatches were being opened, and sure enough the ground crew ran out through the torrent of rain and under the ship. She contemplated for a moment what would happen to a man if he were crushed by 35,000 tons of Sky Liner, but then they reappeared, running back from the ship holding the hawsers that had been thrown from the open hatches. These were rapidly attached to winches firmly anchored to the dock. The winches turned under steam power, gathering up the slack in the lines.

  Now began a battle the vessel did not intend to win. While the rotors were kept up to speed, the winches pulled the ship down towards the dock. The brilliant lights gleamed off the wings, turbine housings, and rotors. Finally, when the Observation deck was no higher than the surrounding buildings, the power to the rotors was finally reduced, and the ship settled the final few yards to the ground with barely a bump.

  The ship’s klaxon sounded three times in quick succession. Maliha grasped her walking stick firmly by its end and braced herself against it. On the bridge, the captain gave the order and the Faraday device was deactivated. Maliha felt her full weight return; the pressure on her leg made it ache. The iron and steel of the ship groaned in sympathy as its weight settled.

  Bombay. The seven islands of the archipelago had been subject to extensive land reclamation through the last two hundred years and were now almost all connected by broad land bridges. The port where the ship now rested, to the north-east of the city, had been swamp a few years before, and sea only a little before that.

  She looked out into the city streets, lines of darkness delineated by dim gaslights. While in the distance, the frontages of the larger buildings were illuminated by electric lights. At first glance one might believe it was London or any other city in Britain with the grand Victorian buildings rising above the streets lined with lower three and four story structures. The railway station, not far away, was a slab of gothic architecture dwarfing the buildings around it.

  But then you looked closer and saw the pillars and towers of the Jain temples that would never be seen in England, and the curiously garbed people passing occasionally under the street lights.

  Under normal circumstances, those disembarking would leave the ship almost immediately, but not this time. Once the vessel was secured, perhaps twenty Indian police officers emerged from a building marked Immigration. They deployed at a fast trot around the ship facing inward, clearly to prevent anyone attempting to leave without permission.

  After them came another group of men: one in the uniform of the P&O line, another in a brown suit, and the remaining six being uniformed police. They crossed the distance to the ship and disappeared beneath it. Little doubt this was the inspector and his men.

  “An unpleasant night, Miss Anderson.”

  She turned. “Just a night like any other, Mr Crier.”

  He leaned on the rail and looked down at the loose circle of policemen, already dripping wet in the rain. “I fear those who are planning to leave are in for a long night, unless they managed to get to the front of the queue.”

  “Interviewing them is a waste of time and energy,” she said following his gaze.

  “Because you know who the murderer is?”

  “Because they don’t.”

  iii

  It was six o’clock in the morning, Bombay time, when the Macedonia once more took to the air. Maliha remained asleep. She had not watched the slow trickle of passengers leaving the ship as each was interviewed briefly and allowed off. She was not aware of the fraying tempers and stern words.

  An hour later she woke, dressed, breakfasted in the near-empty salon and—grateful for the reduced gravity once more—emerged for a short constitutional around the deck. She took her walking stick with her, even though she did not need it.

  The view from the Promenade deck revealed the Indian Ocean to the starboard dotted with fishing vessels and the occasional sea-bound steamer. To port and ahead, the ragged strip of the wide Indian coastal landscape was crisscrossed by rivers that mixed and separated in a great confusion while punctuated by villages and towns. Further inland was the mountain range that paralleled the coast and ran all the way to Kerala.

  The Reading Room was thankfully quite deserted. She was expecting a summons from the inspector quite soon, so there would be little point getting tied up in Shakespeare just now. However, as she had hoped, there were a dozen copies of the latest edition of The Times of India on a table.

  She took a copy to a reading desk, her back to the window but facing the door.

  She glanced at the front page. There was an article about the proposed Indian Press Act to limit what stories the native newspapers would be permitted to print. She was familiar with the story and The Times spoke in a similar way to the newspapers back in Britain: the natives were restless and could not be trusted; cut their ability to speak to the ignorant populace, and their talk of revolution will be similarly suppressed.

  She moved on. She read quickly, a talent that had earned her even more scorn at school from the teachers as well as her fellow pupils. She rapidly absorbed the local Bombay stories and those having wider importance. She reached page five and stopped.

  TRAGIC ACCIDENT IN PONDICHERRY

  Her mother and father’s names leapt from the page as the words of the article burned into her mind. Fire … all dead. A cold hand reached out and clutched her heart. She could not move and stared at the words. The only image in her mind was her home with fire ripping through the wooden walls and floors.

  “Miss Anderson?”

  She jerked her head up. She had not noticed the three men enter. The moment of outrage at them entering the women’s domain passed. This was not the zenana of an Indian household where a man could not enter.

  “Yes.” She blinked twice. She recognised the inspector from last night. There were dark circles round his eyes, he was insufficiently shaven and his cheeks seemed to droop. “Inspector.” She realised the man next to him was Mr Crier, which was somewhat surprising; then again perhaps it was not, as Mr Crier was most certainly not an accountant. The man behind was one of the policemen, a sergeant by his stripes, and he looked equally tired.

  She looked down at the newspaper article again, hoping vainly it had been nothing but a fancy. The words still sat on the page. She inhaled deeply, held it for a moment and breathed out.

  She took hold of herself, forced herself to stand and held out her hand to shake. The action took the inspector aback, but he rallied and took hers in a loose grip. She could feel calluses on his hand; he had seen hard manual labour in his time.

  “Inspector Forsyth, miss. I’d like to ask you a few questions.”

  His Glaswegian accent was a further shock. He sounded just like her father.

  “Yes, of course.”

  He led the way to a group of leather settees. They arranged themselves at an appropriate distance from one another. The sergeant remained standing.

  Forsyth’s questions were the standard sort one came to expect from the police: times, places, what was seen, questions about relationships. Normal, of c
ourse, if one had come into contact with the police before, which she had. Then came the one she was expecting.

  “Mr Crier here tells me you’re the young lady behind the Jordan case.”

  She found herself warming to the inspector. He did not use the sensationalist title the press had attached to the event in Brighton.

  “Yes.”

  “You’re a little young, aren’t you?”

  “I am 19, Inspector. I did not have a particularly demanding social life at my school, as you may imagine. Thus I had much free time and I read a great deal. I believe this gave me a suitable grounding.”

  “And you have been investigating this case?”

  No point in denying it with Mr Crier sitting there. “Yes.”

  “And what conclusion have you reached?”

  “That General Makepeace-Flynn did not kill Lochana Modi, and if we reach the Fortress without apprehending the real murderer, they will escape scot-free.”

  “Can you prove he did not do it?”

  “There was no motive; no sign of a murder weapon, let alone any idea what it might have been; and the opportunity aspect is uncertain.”

  “But you cannot prove he did not do it.”

  “No one can prove a negative, Inspector.”

  “So do you know who did it?”

  “I think so. But I cannot prove that either, yet.”

  “So who do you think it is?”

  “I’m sorry, Inspector. I can’t tell you.”

  He frowned. “And why not, Miss Anderson?”

  “You won’t believe me,” she replied. “However, you may find it useful to ask the Spencers what they were doing lurking around our cabins the night Lochana was killed.”

  “You think they did it?”

  “I doubt it. But you can be sure they have something interesting to tell you.”