The Case of the Fickle Mermaid (30 page)

NINETEEN

I
t was only two days later, as Gretel sat in her cabin while Everard worked his magic on her hair, that she felt fully able to relax and congratulate herself on a job well done. Hoffman had wriggled and squirmed, of course, but the game was up. With Cat's Tongue, and indeed Pustule, keen as mustard to testify against him in the hope of saving their own necks, Hoffman's unreliable alibi in the shape of Bo'sun Brandt—who was also arrested—and the damning evidence of Frenchie's knife in his cabin, the quartermaster could not escape justice.

Everard held up the looking glass. “Now then, madam, what do you think?” he asked, showing her the elegant and pleasingly complex hairdo he had created for her.

Gretel smiled. “I think that if there is one souvenir I should like to take home with me from these silvery Frisian waters, it is you, Everard. I shall miss your skills. Here.” She took a small roll of notes from beneath her corset and handed them to him. “You have more than earned this.”

“Why, madam! This is too much!”

“Nonsense. You have made this ship tolerable. I have been well paid. I am happy to share a little of my good fortune with you. I hope you will put it to good use.”

Everard stared at the money. “Indeed I shall! I have been harboring a notion to leave this ship and try my luck as a master of coiffure in one of the larger cities. Now I have sufficient funds for my journey!”

“Splendid idea. Where will you choose?”

“I thought Paris.”

“Oh! An excellent plan. Let me know when you are established there and I promise one day I shall visit. You can maintain my locks and wigs in the most fashionable of styles while I take in the delights of the city.”

Everard gripped his hairbrush excitedly. “It will be a dream come true, madam. Though I shall be sorry to leave the
Arabella
. This curious little ship has come to feel like home. And who would ever have thought it? Captain Ziegler going into partnership with none other than Thorsten Sommer? I do declare, nothing could have surprised me more.”

“I confess, had you suggested such an alliance a few short weeks ago, I would have thought you quite mad. It seemed the captain had such a loathing of his rival. But I came to see that his attitude stemmed from his own frustrated desires, and that the two need not be at odds. The arrangement they have come to will benefit them both. Herr Sommer will continue to run his luxury cruises, and Captain Ziegler will offer an optional package of days aboard the
Arabella
for those desirous
of the Authentic Sailing Experience, as it is to be called. The baroness will spread the word of her own exhilarating and singular experience.”

“Oh, my goodness, my gracious, madam, let us hope such cruises do not always involve anyone as sour and dour as Herr Hoffman.”

“His presence will not be missed.”

“What I do not understand,” Everard mused, gazing at the ceiling, gesturing with the hairbrush to underline his point, “is why Hoffman had it in for Herr Sommer. I mean to say, I understand he wished to make money with his smuggling, but putting poor Frenchie's body on the
Fair Fortune
. . . it was as if he sought to ruin the man.”

“Hoffman saw an opportunity to turn the cook's death to his advantage. Another man might have panicked—a man dies at his hand on board a small ship—but not Hoffman. His chief reason for putting the body on that ship was to distance it from himself, and throw me off the scent, no doubt. The fact that the discovery of a murder victim on the
Fair Fortune
might damage Sommer's business was a bonus. It must have been what made him choose that course rather than tipping the body into the sea. It transpires that Hoffman used to work as first mate to Herr Sommer. He had his heart—wherever he kept the stony thing—set upon captaincy proper, and saw the Sommer fleet as the way to get it. But Herr Sommer must have seen something rotten at the man's core and found a reason to dismiss him.”

“Ooh, that cannot have sat well with our quartermaster.”

“It did not. His plan was to earn enough money from smuggling to purchase his own ship one day. If, when that day came, there were no rival cruise ships operating in the area, so much the better for him.”

Gretel got to her feet, patting lightly at her hair. “I shall go up on deck now. I believe we are about to make port.”

Everard bobbed a bow. “I wish you good-bye and safe journey home, madam,” he told her.

Outside, the day was pretty in the pale and whispery sort of way that the region did so well. Most of the passengers were on deck to see the
Arabella
come into the harbor at Bremerhaven. The crew worked hard to bring her safely to her moorings, apparently happy to do so under Captain Ziegler's flamboyant instructions rather than being barked at by Herr Hoffman. The
Fair Fortune
had docked but moments earlier, so that the quayside was filled with a small but well-dressed crowd who cheered and threw streamers and rice in a rather delightful way. In fact, Gretel was finding most things delightful. This was her moment; a case solved, a client happy, a payment—plus healthy bonus—received; hers was a triumphant return.

She found Hans making a meal of managing the luggage.

“Dash it all, Gretel,” he puffed, “I swear these things have got heavier during the voyage. You didn't sneak off to do any shopping, perchance?”

“Alas, Hans, I had no need of thatching shears, wooden clogs, fish embalmed in salt, or cheese from which all flavor has been thoughtfully removed to save us the trouble of tasting it. No, the trunks are not heavier, but it is possible that you are.”

“What? Do you think so?” He patted his belly as if pleased with the idea. “Well, all that time spent in the kitchen . . . a chef has to test and taste, you know. Wouldn't do otherwise. Test and taste, that's the work of a good cook.”

Gretel noticed Birgit standing a little way off and making no attempt to approach. She looked subdued, and yet she still wore the wistful countenance of a person in love.

“Whatever did you say to That Woman to convince her you were neither interested nor available?”

“Ah, yes.” Hans seemed reluctant to explain further. His expression was all too familiar to Gretel. It was the one she
saw when he had spent the housekeeping at the inn, or finished the last slice of gateau, or washed his lederhosen with her Moroccan cotton petticoats, turning them all brown. It was the expression that said
you're not going to like this.

“Let's have it,” she insisted.

“Well, she was so very persistent, so very excitable, she simply would not listen when I told her I did not share her amorous feelings, and such. I had to find a way to convince her, to make her see that I would not, no never, not ever be hers.”

“So . . .”

Hans cleared his throat. “So I told her that, however capable you might appear, you couldn't do without me. I told her that you were
mostly
perfectly fine and normal and able to do your work really quite well, given your regrettable condition . . .”

“Which is?”

“A . . . feebleness of the mind. A weakness of the nerves. A delicacy of the emotional constitution that means you simply cannot be left alone, cannot be abandoned to the mercy of your own fragile mind and irregular but debilitating febrile imaginings.” Hans took a tiny step back.

Gretel ground her teeth. “Let me get this straight, Hans. You found yourself incapable of being man enough to tell That Woman to go away and leave you alone, so instead you made out that your responsibilities and obligations tied you to me forever because I am, on a part-time basis, a feeble-minded lunatic?”

“Um . . . yes.”

To her own surprise, and very much to Hans's astonishment, Gretel found herself laughing loudly. Loudly enough to draw pitying glances from Birgit and her companions. “Ha! Well, Hans, I must congratulate you. You are your sister's brother after all, and I am impressed by your cunning. Now go and fetch the rest of the luggage. I still have a valise in my cabin, and I am, apparently, too flimsy of brain to find it myself.”

It was then that she noticed the noble party disembarking from the
Fair Fortune
. She moved forward to the ship's rail for a better view. Baroness Schleswig-Holstein was descending the beribboned gangway, accompanied by her small but stylish entourage, waving and smiling as if she were someone considerably more important than a mere baroness. Two steps behind her, in his smartest uniform, the one with the burgundy cape with the gold lining that Gretel found so devilishly attractive, walked Uber General Ferdinand von Ferdinand. Her heart skipped lightly at the sight of him.

“Silly woman,” she told herself.

Ferdinand, as if sensing he was being watched, paused and turned. Seeing her, he smiled. Gretel's heart twirled about in a fuzzy little spin. He raised his hand as if to salute or wave, but then changed his mind and instead blew her a silent kiss. Gretel's heart performed two backflips and a double somersault.

“Silly woman,” she told herself again, as she forced herself to merely smile in acknowledgment, however much she might have felt like responding more exuberantly. There would be a time and a place, and this was not it. The baroness could not keep him indefinitely. Soon he would return to his post at King Julian's side at the Summer Schloss, where he would be only a short gallop from Gesternstadt.

“Fraulein Gretel!” Captain Ziegler's voice brought her quickly back to her present reality. “The good doctor here is about to leave us and wished to bid you farewell before departing.”

“Dr. Becker.” She nodded at him. “I trust you are satisfied with the alterations to the
Arabella
's sailing routes?”

“I am indeed, fraulein. The captain has been most accommodating, particularly when one considers all the trouble I caused him.”

“We will not mention that again,” the captain assured him, slapping the older man so heartily on the back that he
stumbled forward. “We have studied the charts together and I have given Dr. Becker my word that we will sail nowhere near the islands the birds use during the breeding season.”

“I have supplied Captain Ziegler with the information he needs regarding their habits.”

“Particularly those of the pigeon-toed yellow necked speckled wader, I presume,” said Gretel.

“Aye!” laughed the captain. “He has supplied me with drawings of that mysterious fowl to boot, just to be sure I don't bag a brace for my supper, ain't that so, Doctor?”

The doctor, by now accustomed to the captain's little ways, was not in the least alarmed. He told Gretel, “We have a new plan, fraulein. On certain cruises I am to sail aboard the
Arabella
as an ornithological consultant.”

Captain Ziegler looked especially pleased with himself. “A plan of my own invention. Seems those folk with a passion for birds will pay good money to see 'em. The doctor will be their tour guide, with evening talks on the matter, so insatiable is their appetite for details of the feathery things.”

“You are turning into quite the entrepreneur, captain. I applaud your business acumen.”

At this the captain turned quite pink with pride.

Dr. Becker took his leave, carrying only one small case, his ever-present binoculars still around his neck.

“So, captain, when do you set sail for the Caribbean?” Gretel asked.

“Four days' time. The mermaid would have had it sooner, but we must take on more supplies and several new crewmembers.”

“Ah, yes, your number has been somewhat depleted.”

“Most are replaced easily, though some will not sail with our special . . . passenger,” he said, remembering not to refer to the sea creature as cargo. “I confess we shall feel the lack of your brother the most. His skills in the kitchen were much appreciated.”

“He tells me you sought to persuade him to stay on.”

“I hesitated to part you from your family, fraulein, but, well, I am a man of business now.”

“Thankfully, he declined, so your conscience need not be troubled further.”

“He said a life at sea would not suit him.”

“I suspect he would pine for his own kitchen. And his own inn.”

The captain shook his head. “Newer and better versions of both can be found: it is the companionship of a beloved sister that is irreplaceable.”

Now it was Gretel's turn to blush.

Captain Ziegler begged her to excuse him as there were many matters demanding his attention. He left her with his customarily low bow, his tricorn sweeping the deck as he backed away.

“I bid you
adieu
, fraulein,” he called after her. “I shall call on you for your assistance, should I ever again encounter an unsolvable puzzle.”

“I have yet to find such a thing, captain,” she assured him. His dashing grin was filled with genuine fondness, she felt, but in truth her warmth toward him was due largely to the generous payment, with the sizeable bonus, that he had so willingly handed over to her.

At that moment, Hans appeared, trailing the mer-hund on its lead.

“He doesn't want to move,” he told her. “He knows I'm leaving him and he's sulking.” Hans knelt down beside the panting animal and ruffled its fur as he spoke to it. “You can't come home with us. There isn't any sea. You wouldn't like it.”

“You are doing the right thing, Hans. Mer-hunds are bred for the ocean. He would find Bavaria altogether too dry.”

“But he might pine when I go. He might not eat.”

Gretel knew her brother was talking about himself as much as his hound, although she was fairly certain his appetite
would recover at the first sight of a little weisswurst with grainy mustard.

“He will be treated exceptionally well,” she reminded him. “He is to be one of the star attractions for the passengers—a genuine mer-hund.”

The animal hung its head low and looked moribund and pathetic and very un-starlike.