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

“Hold on a minute,” I interrupted. “If I was as canny as you suggest, then I’d never have put myself in harm's way with the possibility of being killed, would I?”


He shrugged. “Plenty of explanations for that—you work as a team with a male criminal. Crooks fall out all the time. He thought he was killing you in the darkness of the room. Or Rose got the wind up about your little scheme as you approached the Irish coast. She threatened to spill the beans. You had to silence her.”

“As for that,” I said, “I was at the ball all evening. Plenty of witnesses could verify dancing with me and even watching me return to my cabin.”

“Actually nobody could do so.” He smirked. “What any witness would have seen was a powdered wig and a mask and a costume. I asked you myself if anyone recognized you, and you said that nobody did. You have no alibi as far as I can see, Miss Murphy.”

“But that's ridiculous,” I said, my voice rising now. It was hard to tell whether he really suspected me or was merely going through various possible motives in his mind.

He clarified this by saying, quite sharply, “Is there anything more you’d like to tell me? The real reason that you switched cabins with Miss Sheehan? The real reason that you wound up in first-class?”

“It's exactly as I told you. I came onboard. Miss Sheehan sent for me and made this request. She offered me money, and I am not so well-heeled that I could turn it down. Besides, it seemed a bit of a lark, living like a grandee for a while.”

“And you say you’d only met Miss Sheehan once before at a party, I believe, but she singled you out right away to play this part.”

“Supposedly I looked enough like her to be able to get away with the deception. She put one of her wigs on me and made up my face, and there definitely was a likeness.”

“I see,” he said again, then paused and sucked through his teeth. “Now, if you’d just let Jones take your fingerprints, Miss Murphy.”

“My fingerprints?” I tried not to sound startled. Surely he didn’t suspect me? “Of course,” I said breezily, “my fingerprints will be all over the cabin anyway.”

“Naturally.” He nodded. “We need to rule them out.”

I sat in what I hoped was nonchalant indifference while one of the constables pressed each of my fingers onto a felt ink pad and then onto a sheet of paper. “Look, inspector,” I said. “If you want to get to the truth in this matter, then you should be sending a telegraph to Miss Sheehan herself. She can verify my story, and maybe she’ll even give you more insights.”

“It's already been done, Miss Murphy,” he said. “We should hear back from her later today, if we can locate her, that is.” “If you can locate her?”

“We’ve only your word that she was ever on this ship.” He was looking at me innocently enough, but I got the feeling that I was still a very definite suspect in his eyes.

“Of course she was on this ship,” I said angrily. “Somebody booked this cabin in Miss Sheehan's name, and it certainly wasn’t me. I might have done well in New York, but not well enough to travel first class. She’ll tell you the truth, you’ll see.”

“Let's just hope that she does,” he said.

Time to put my own skills to work, I decided.

“You know, I’ve been thinking,” I said carefully, “if Rose and the intruder struggled, thrashing around enough to break that water jug, then isn’t it possible that he’ll have picked up one or more of her hairs on his clothing. Red hairs should be easy to spot, shouldn’t they?”

His eyes narrowed as he stared at me. “How did you say you made your fortune in America?” he asked.

I had to smile. “Actually, I run a private detective agency, but I’ve certainly not made a fortune.”

“Good God,” he muttered, then apologized profusely, of course. Somehow men think that swearing in front of a woman is a mortal sin— often the same men who think nothing of ordering a woman around, demanding to be waited on by a woman, or even giving her a good hiding. Not for the first time in my life I considered what a strange world we live in.

“And how would your detective agency go about solving this particular crime?” the inspector asked.

“Oh, I don’t take on cases of this magnitude,” I said hastily. “I stick to strictly domestic matters.” I decided to keep quiet about certain of my cases of a nondomestic nature. “But I do think the red hair might give you a good start.”

“You propose to round up all the men on this ship and examine their clothing?”

“It's not my place to tell you how to carry out your investigation,” I said.

He was still staring at me. “And may I ask what the nature of your real assignment to Ireland is? I presume it's not just a family visit.”

“It's exactly as I told you previously. An old friend asked me to locate his sister for him. He has lost touch with her and wishes to be reunited. Very simple really.”

“And the name of this friend?”

I saw the well-chewed pencil poised above his notebook. “Tommy Burke, the theater producer.”