In Dublin's Fair City (Molly Murphy Mysteries, #6)

Another loud clanking noise, accompanied by shouts from below. I suspected that gangways were being raised to the ship. By tilting my head to one side, I could see the little town beyond the docks, rising in tiers up a steep hillside, with a fine-looking church spire right in the middle. So this was Queenstown, the port from which so many of my countrymen had sailed to a new life during the Great Famine.

If gangplanks had already been raised to the ship, then it was possible that the local police had already come on board. I could be summoned at any moment. I dressed hastily in Oona Sheehan's least flamboyant outfit, one of the few things I had brought down with me from her cabin the night before. It was a black-and-white-striped two-piece costume and a jaunty little black hat with an ostrich feather. I couldn’t see myself wearing the hat, however. In fact, I felt strange putting on her clothing, now that I knew the truth of the situation and more disturbing questions entered my head. What if she denied ever making the pact with me? What if she accused me of stealing her clothes, or even worse? Then I remembered something—she had given me a check for a hundred dollars. I had it safely in my traveling case with her signature quite legible on it. At least I could prove she had hired me to do something for her!

Feeling slightly better now, I brushed out my own hair and tied it back, glad that I wasn’t going to have to wear that hateful wig again, then went in search of some breakfast. I got strange looks when I had to ask my way to the second-class dining room and then find a place that wasn’t assigned to another passenger, but I ate a surprisingly hearty breakfast of eggs and bacon, toast and marmalade, and frankly enjoyed it all the more after a week of dainty invalid delicacies from the first-class kitchen.

As I made my way back to my cabin, I saw Wally, the steward who had been summoned to the meeting last night, standing outside my cabin door talking with a big, stocky man in a tweed overcoat.

“Were you wanting me?” I asked, as I approached.

“Oh, there you are, miss.” The steward looked decidedly relieved. “We thought for a moment that you’d done a bunk.”

“‘Done a bunk’?” I demanded. “And why would I want to do that? And what did you think I’d done—dived out through the porthole?”

I saw just the hint of a smile twitch on the big man's face. He was middle aged, with impressive muttonchop whiskers, a ruddy complexion that hinted at a life in the outdoors, and perhaps the love of a good whisky.

“So you’re the young lady, are you? Miss Murphy?” he asked. His accent was English, with a just a touch of an Irish lilt to it. “How do you do.” He stuck out a big, meaty hand. “Inspector Harris. I’ve just got here by train from Dublin, and I gather you’re the only one who can throw any light onto this whole strange, sordid business.”

“I don’t know about that,” I said.

“Well, to start with, I’ve been told you’ve been impersonating the famous actress, Miss Oona Sheehan, for the entire voyage. Is that correct?”

“It is,” I said, and started to tell him how that had come about.

Raised voices could be heard coming in our direction. “Where is the damned purser? I’d like to know. Why aren’t we being allowed ashore? The gangways are clearly in place.”

Inspector Harris glanced down the hallway then opened my cabin door. “Right. Let's go into your cabin and talk then, shall we?”

“It's not very big,” I warned. “I can scarcely turn around in it myself.”

I opened the door. He took a look inside and retreated again. “I see what you mean. Not enough room to swing a cat, as they say. Okay, why don’t we go up to the cabin you’ve been occupying all week? I’ve got men going over it as we speak and maybe you can answer some of their questions. Will you show us the way, my man?”

Wally nodded and led us back along the hall. I followed reluctantly. I had no wish to see Rose's dead face in daylight. Our feet resonated as we climbed the steep steps back to Oona Sheehan's cabin and the opulence of the first-class quarters. A police constable was standing guard at the entrance to Miss Sheehan's passage, and there were two more policemen in the cabin itself.

“We haven’t found anything so far, sir.” One of them looked up from his hands and knees beside the bed as Inspector Harris stood aside to usher me into the cabin. “No signs of a struggle. I think we shouldprobably call in the police surgeon to verify the ship doctor's diagnosis. Isn’t it possible she died of natural causes, and this is all a flap over nothing? She looks peaceful enough.”

Rose's body had obviously been covered in a sheet all night, but this had now been pulled back. I stole a hurried look at her in spite of myself. Luckily someone had now closed her eyes so she was no longer staring at me. She looked very peaceful, lying there as if asleep, and I felt tears well up into my eyes.