Free Murder on the QE2 by Jessica Fletcher

the pattern established early in the lunch—complaints from Carlo Di Giovanni and Judge Solon about the weather and literary agents, and tales of mountain climbing from Troy Radcliff. I kept waiting for Elaine Ananthous to change her mind and join us. I was relieved that she didn’t, although I couldn’t come up with any rational reason for worrying about the news of Marla Tralaine’s murder becoming public. It certainly wasn’t my responsibility, beyond not personally spreading it.
    I glanced often at Mary Ward, who slowly ate her salad and listened to what the others said. What was going through her mind about having found the famous actress’s body? If it had upset her, she didn’t show it.
    “No dessert, thank you,” I told Jacques. To the others I said, “Well, everyone ready to take the stage?”
    “Is it that time already?” Radcliff asked.
    “One-thirty,” I said. “The curtain goes up at two.”
    “There is no curtain,” Solon muttered.
    “Just a figure of speech,” I said. “And I won’t ask any of you to break a leg.”
    “I’ll have the raspberries,” Di Giovanni told the waiter. “And cappuccino.”
    “Chocolate mousse cake for me,” Solon said.
    “The assorted sorbets,” said Radcliff. “But no pineapple.”
    “Why no pineapple?” Judge Solon asked as though Radcliff’s request was worthy of a life sentence.
    “Because I don’t like pineapple,” Radcliff said. Solon grunted and took a cookie from a tray Jacques had set on the table.
    “I’m leaving,” I said. “See you in the Grand Lounge.”
    “I’ll come with you,” said Mary Ward.
    After we’d passed through the Queens Lounge, she said, “Would you have time for a brief detour, Jessica?”
    “I think so. Where?”
    “The Boat Deck.”
    “Do you really think—?”
    “I stopped up there before coming to lunch. Everything is quite normal.”
    “All right,” I said. “Let’s go to the scene of the crime.”
    “Exactly,” she said, setting a brisk pace.
    The weather was still foul, although the wind seemed to have abated. A few hearty souls walked off their lunch, oblivious to what had occurred earlier that day.
    We went to the lifeboat where Mary had first spotted Marla Tralaine’s bare foot sticking out. The tarpaulin had been refastened securely to the lifeboat’s gunwale.
    “How high do you think it is from the deck to the boat?” Mrs. Ward asked.
    “I’m bad at judging distances,” I said. “Six feet? Eight?”
    “About,” she said, her eyes narrowed as she came up with her own estimate. “It would take a strong person to lift a body up there, wouldn’t it?”
    “Yes, it would,” I replied. “But of course, that’s assuming she was killed elsewhere and brought here. It seems more likely to me she was killed right up there in the boat.”
    “A distinct possibility,” she said. “But if she wasn’t killed in the boat, it would mean someone with considerable strength brought her here. A man.”
    I thought for a moment, then said, “If she was murdered elsewhere, Mary, it could have been a woman who killed her, but who had a male accomplice to help dispose of the body.”
    “I thought of that, too, Jessica. Well, I just wanted to come up here and run my thoughts by you. I suppose it’s time to get to the Grand Lounge.”
    It was after we’d taken seats at a front table in the crowded lounge, and Rip Nestor was about to come out to welcome the audience, that Mary Ward leaned close to my ear and said, “Mr. Radcliff doesn’t like pineapple.”
    I turned to her. “That’s what he said.”
    “Marla Tralaine didn’t like pineapple, either.”
    “She didn’t?”
    “No. I read an interview with her years ago. The interviewer asked about her preferences in food, what she liked to cook, things like that.” She laughed. “I remember Ms. Tralaine saying that she never cooks. I suppose when you’re a big star, other people cook for you. I would never want to be in that situation. I