The Clairvoyant Curse (33 page)

“I’m sure you’re not. Never
sell yourself short. Where are the cameras being stored?”

“They’re all in the billiard
room because Mr Ffrench and Reverend Blackadder have been testing
out the new slides. The ghostly images are quite good if you ask
me. It’s a crying shame the show might…might…” She turned away and
began to sob quietly into her pillow.

The ship was suddenly battered
by a monster wave side-on. It almost tipped the Countess off her
feet. She fell against the dressing table, bracing herself with her
arms, and aimed a terrified glance at the porthole window where
massive waves lashed the glass.

“This morning, when you saw the
bluebird of happiness, was it flying sideways from bow to stern, or
was it going the other way?”

Miss Morningstar lifted her
face and sniffed back some tears. “It was, er, it was going, oh,
no! It was not going sideways! It was going down! It was not the
bluebird of happiness after all! It was an omen of doom! We are all
going down!” she wailed hysterically.

“You mean it was diving
straight into the water?”

“Yes! That is exactly what I
mean! Down, down, down!”

The Countess returned to her
cabin to find a cold cup of tea and a plate of pastries waiting. If
she were her father she would have pulled out a violin and tortured
her ears. But she was not her father and she had no violin so she
did the next best thing. She had a cup of cold tea and a good lie
down.

The wind was howling and the
ship was being battered by every wave it met.

What did she have so far: a
ghost from the grave, a bluebird, some spirit writing, Elodie,
Sissy, five camera obscuras, someone in the billiard room, a
missing blue dart, three missing glass slides, a pinprick of blood,
acupuncture needles, a wig, a thistle brooch, poison arrows,
mirrors and doors, sleepwalking, Dr Watson in his tweed suit… the
scenes in her mind’s eye rolled one after another like glass slides
being put through a magic lantern viewed through fog.

What was she not seeing?

The rolling images were coming
thick and fast now but they were all mixed up. One obscure scene
was overlaid on top of another: a ghost in the mirror, an arrow
like a bird, a bird like a dart, Death wearing a white wig, Sissy
floating on the water with ghost hair, a planchette spelling LOVE,
a blue water dragon with silver wings, the number 4, a green fairy,
a dream-catcher, a pocket watch for hypnotizing, a grave that was a
guillotine, seven stars, a scrying glass like a dirty moon, the
Empress, the Hanged Man, a ship like a coffin, a coffin like a
camera, a shroud like a ghost bird, a bath full of thistles, Dr
Watson sleepwalking on the water, Dr Watson with needles through
his eyes, Dr Watson naked…Dr Watson dead!

The Countess sat bolt
upright.

Someone was screaming.

“Man overboard!”

Fearing the worst, the Countess
raced out of her cabin. Dr Watson’s cabin door was wide open and
the sentry was nowhere to be seen. All the strange images that had
been crowding her brain were supplanted by one vivid impression -
Dr Watson ending it all!

She spotted Captain Lanfranc
leaning desperately over the rail. With her heart in her throat she
rushed to his side. He had just tossed a life buoy into the water
where a darkish figure bobbed up and down in the huge swell.
Visibility was poor. The encroaching darkness and the constant
salt-spray that came from every pounding wave made it impossible to
see more than a dozen yards.

Her heart sank and she cursed
herself for ever suggesting this voyage. She blamed herself for
cajoling him into coming. He had been dead set against it from the
start. Perhaps he intuited no good would come of it. He had his
reasons for disliking Madame Moghra and she should have accepted
that. The past was the past and could not be changed!

Suddenly Monsieur Bresant and
the sentry rushed out of Dr Watson’s cabin. They crowded at the
captain’s side and the look that passed between the trio of men
said it all – whoever had gone overboard didn’t stand a chance in
the freezing cold, unforgiving sea.

“Who was it?” shouted the
steward, cupping his hands around his mouth, trying to be heard
above the angry wind. But the ferocious wind was having none of it
and whipped his words away. The captain simply shrugged and shook
his head despairingly.

If Monsieur Bresant didn’t know
who it was then it couldn’t have been Dr Watson! The Countess
almost cried and surely would have except the young seaman with red
hair burst out of the telegraphic room and ran frantically up and
down the rail, crying out piteously, “Claudette! Claudette!”

By the time Dr Hu arrived on
the scene the young seaman was tearing at his hair and looking
helplessly into the maelstrom where waves churned and boiled and
nothing was visible but a blue-black seething mass.

“Who’s Claudette?” Dr Hu
shouted into the ear of the Countess.

“It must be his
petite-amie
,” she said sadly.

Dr Hu nodded understandingly as
the steward led the distressed seaman back into the telegraphic
room. The sentry returned to his post, closing but not locking the
door to Dr Watson’s cabin. The Countess caught a glimpse of her
dear friend. He had not even stirred off the bed. He looked like a
corpse laid out on a catafalque, ready for burial at sea.

News spread quickly. Mrs Merle
appeared on deck like a huge hulking lighthouse, her twin
searchlights scanning the rolling waves. Soon came Croquemort,
Blackadder, and the rest. But they came too late. There was nothing
to see. The watery abyss had claimed whoever it was. They avoided
eye contact and retreated to their respective cabins without
speaking. It was time to dress for dinner. The banality of the task
helped take their minds off the senseless tragedy. They could try
to make sense of it later, they could offer comfort to each other,
they could thank their lucky stars it wasn’t them…

It was while the Countess was
having an exquisite emerald hairpin artfully arranged in her hair
that she recalled the blue dart. Madame Sosostras said it had been
inside the wig the night she hid the brooch, but by the time the
body had been found the next morning it had not been there. That
meant it had not been inside the wig when she first handled it. So
where did it go? Who removed it? And when?

She slid into her emerald green
velvet gown, adjusted the huge shawl collar with the low
décolletage to accommodate her breasts, and made her way speedily
to the public rooms before any of the others arrived for cocktails.
She wanted to thoroughly check the billiard room, including the
table behind the green baize screen, and take one last look in the
library.

“Have you heard?”

The Countess was examining one
of the cardboard camera obscuras when she whirled round to find Mr
Ffrench leaning against the door jamb, an errant lock of hair
covering his eyes, moodily puffing on a pungent cigarette that was
stuffed with more than mere tobacco.

“Heard what?” she replied
shortly, annoyed at being interrupted.

“The seaman who works the
wireless device has been placed in the brig. He was having a tryst
with someone called Claudette in the telegraphic room whilst on
duty. It was she who went into the drink. She must have been
scurrying back to kitchen duties when a rogue wave washed her
overboard. Captain Lanfranc is furious. I just heard him tearing
strips off the hapless beau.”

Her hackles rose. He appeared
to be making light of what was a terrible tragedy. An innocent girl
had drowned. His own personal loss did not excuse his lack of
concern. “And so he should,” she returned testily. First a murder
and now a tragic accident - this inaugural voyage was turning into
a disaster for the captain. If she could nail the murderer before
they reached Biarritz she might save the good captain a good deal
of trouble and perhaps spare the SS Pleiades being christened the
ship of doom, condemning it to some backwater for the rest of its
days. “I understand three glass slides disappeared from this table
the day we set sail?”

“So says Blackadder. But he’s a
clumsy ass. He probably shoved them into the bottom of his bag and
broke them during transport.”

“You made these three cardboard
camera obscuras?”

“Yes.”

“They work in the same way as
the proper ones?”

“Yes, of course, the image can
be a bit fuzzier, but they are easier to handle – especially for
amateurs. Blackadder is finally getting the hang of it.”

“Does anyone else know how to
use the camera obscura?”

“Well, there’s Croquemort of
course, but any man who can handle a rudimentary scientific
instrument can work it out for himself.”

“By that you mean something
like a telescope or wireless device?”

“Yes, that sort of thing. Why
do you ask? A camera obscura cannot be adapted to shoot needles or
poison gas!”

She was still laughing at this
absurdity when a jangle of jewellery coming down the stairs claimed
her attention.

“Madame Sosostras!” she called,
catching up to the gypsy. “When you retrieved the brooch from the
wig this morning, did you notice if the dart was still inside?”

The gypsy looked back
surreptitiously over her shoulder. “I did,” she whispered, relieved
that the untidy anarchist had disappeared to join his ilk in the
grand saloon. “And the answer is no, it was not.”

“Thank you,” said the Countess,
feeling more than pleased with that response, “shall we join the
others for pre-dinner drinks and canapés?”

Captain Lanfranc arrived
looking grim, but his swarthy face lost its dark stain when he
informed them the worst of the storm had passed. In a few hours, by
midnight at most, they would be entering the Bay of Biscay, where
the wind would drop considerably. In other words, a decent night’s
sleep should be had by all. The strain in his voice seemed to melt
away and he seemed to breathe a sigh of relief that he, his
half-crew, and the SS Pleiades had weathered the worst of the storm
and survived. By morning the mopping up would be done by the
Surete.

The popping of corks of the
finest French champagne signalled the start of less troubled
waters. He waved away his steward and personally filled the
champagne glasses, leaving the Countess till last, for a reason
that soon became obvious.

“It has come to my attention
that you have been conducting an investigation of your own?” he
challenged in a tone that sounded amused more than affronted.

“You didn’t expect me to occupy
myself with Solitaire and deck shuffleboard while my innocent
friend was confined to his cabin under a cloud of suspicion?”

He cocked a bemused brow. “Have
you made any headway?”

“Some,” she admitted vaguely,
wondering whether to share what she had discovered so far – but the
images and impressions were all too fuzzy and she didn’t know where
to start.

His brow darkened. “You play a
dangerous game, Countess Volodymyrovna, if your friend really is
innocent it means a murderer is at large on my ship.”

She gulped her champagne, not
because she feared a murderer at large, but because she feared not
being able to catch him, or worse, that the murderer might even be
her dearest friend. She held out her glass for a refill. “Chateau
Latour – an excellent choice, Captain.”

He obliged her thirst. “Beware
false courage, Countess. If you have any idea who might be
responsible -”

Monsieur Bresant interrupted
them with a tactful cough.

“Captain, you are wanted at
once in the wheelhouse.”

Captain Lanfranc picked up on
the terse phrase and commanded his steward to take over as ship’s
host.

The Countess had a moment to
herself. She allowed her eyes to drift across the luxurious saloon
with its sumptuous velvet
fauteuils
, glittering Waterford
chandeliers and floral axminster
moquette
like a floating
garden, gazing from one to another of her fellow passengers. Who
wanted Madame Moghra dead more than anyone? Who hated Dr Watson
enough to frame him? Who was the most audacious? Who was the most
desperate? Who was the best liar? Who was the biggest fraud? Who
could throw a veil of deceit over every action, every word and
every happenstance? Who shuffled the cards, who interpreted the
stars, who directed the energy of the universe? Who was playing
with their lives? Who was Death?

The halcyon bird laid her eggs
on the water, on the sea conceiving them – hence the term halcyon
days – meaning days and nights of calm. The Countess slept as
peacefully as a halcyon bird. The gentle rocking of the ship was
like the rocking of a cradle.

Come morning, she dispatched
Fedir to assist Dr Watson with his toilette. She would not have him
emerge from his cabin looking like a homeless tramp with untrimmed
beard and crumpled clothes. She wanted him to look his best when he
came face to face with the Surete. Likewise, she dressed with
deliberation, instructing Xenia to take particular care with her
rich rococo mane, but to spare the ornamentation. She wanted to
dazzle the inspector with her intellect not her costly glitter.

The French coast was within
sight, a thin line running like a silver thread across the horizon.
Inspector de Guise boarded early while the passengers were still in
their beds. He commandeered a fishing trawler and sailed out to
meet the SS Pleiades. He was a man who left nothing to chance. If
there was a murderer on board he wanted to apprehend the villain
before the ship dropped anchor. Contact had been re-established
several hours ago and he was now fully apprised of the incident in
the library. Since boarding he had spent the time going over the
events leading up to and following the death of Madame Moghra,
listening first to Captain Lanfranc and then Monsieur Bresant.