The Riverboat Mystery (Jenny Starling #3)(40)

But both policemen ignored him. They were staring at the cook as if at a rather unusual specimen in a zoo.

‘So you’re Jenny Starling,’ Rycroft said, his voice flat and yet very much aggrieved.

‘Yes,’ she agreed flatly. ‘I’m Miss Starling.’

‘And you’re at it again,’ Rycroft sighed. ‘In my patch, this time.’

‘I’ve not been at anything again,’ Jenny denied hotly. ‘All I do is mind my own business and cook good food. If people around me will go around kill—’ She abruptly bit off her angry words as Jasmine Olney suddenly raised her dark head and looked at her speculatively.

What Rycroft might have said to that they never knew, for at that moment one of the forensics boys came running in, his cherubic face flushed with excitement. ‘Sir! Sir, come and see this.’

Naturally, after that, everybody rushed outside to the port deck, where the second forensics man waited. He was in more or less in the exact same spot that Lucas had been standing in just a short while before.

Jenny saw again the same wet planking as everyone — the Leighs, Jasmine, the captain, Lucas and Brian — jostled around her. What she hadn’t noticed before was the piece of rope that was tied from the bottom of the railings, and that disappeared over the side to dangle in the river below.

As Rycroft walked carefully around the wet decking, the forensics man pulled up on the rope.

And at the other end, sopping wet and dripping river water, was Gabriel Olney’s missing boot.





CHAPTER NINE

For a while, Inspector Rycroft simply stared at the boot, a totally unreadable expression on his remarkable face. He had not, of course, missed the fact that Gabriel Olney’s corpse had been minus one of its boots, but until now he hadn’t really come to any significant conclusion to account for its absence. Murder victims, in his experience, were apt to struggle, and in a struggle, all kinds of things could go astray, including items of clothing. Now, though, the salutary sight brought an obvious implication with it, and one that made his blood run cold.

He leaned over the rail and glanced down into the river below. The rope was thick and sturdy, and ropes, he imagined, were probably plentiful in the storeroom of a boat such as the Stillwater Swan. So, no mystery as to where the murderer might have acquired the murder weapon then. For now there could be no doubt that it was murder they were dealing with.

He examined the knot closely and hopefully, but it looked simple enough. Not a complicated nautical knot certainly. Which meant that if Tobias Lester was in any way involved, then he’d been clever enough — and cool-headed enough — to remember to tie a knot that any other landlubber might have used.

He glanced down the side of the boat once more, his brow furrowed in thought. The river surface was nearly two feet from the bottom of the railing, where the rope had been securely tied.

So if someone had knocked out Olney, tied the rope round his foot and then hefted him over the side to watch him drown, it would have taken a person of considerable strength to pull him back up again. The victim was far from fat, it was true, but still, he was an adult male. And would have been — literally — a dead weight.

He certainly couldn’t see any of the ladies involved being capable of such physical manoeuvrings. Except for Jenny Starling, perhaps. She looked big enough to throw anybody around. But then again, a generously curvaceous hourglass figure didn’t necessarily mean that she had superior upper-arm strength or muscles like Jean-Claude Van Damme.

And in any case, he thought with an inner wince, Jenny Starling, as everyone on the local force knew only too well, had a reputation for solving murders. Not for committing them.

Worse luck.

Rycroft would have been delighted to be the copper to rid the force of the pesky presence of the successful but strictly amateur sleuth, but no matter how tempting the thought, Rycroft just couldn’t see the phlegmatic cook suddenly turning into a deranged killer.

No, he had to be looking for a man to have done a job like this. Although why the murderer would pull Mr Olney up again to present in the galley cupboard rather than cutting him loose into the river was anybody’s guess.

He nodded to the forensics team, knowing without having to tell them that they’d give the rope, boot and the rest of the boat a meticulous going-over, and turned to observe the faces of the others.

Lucas Finch was staring at the rope as if it were a snake. The parrot, perhaps out of instinct or simply because of avian loyalty, snuggled closer to Lucas’s neck and suddenly began to croak/croon a swing-time rendition of ‘Stranger on the Shore.’

It made everybody feel abruptly uncomfortable.

The handsome young couple, the Leighs, were furthest away, and he noticed them begin to back off, the pretty blonde whispering something into her husband’s ear. The pair then rapidly disappeared back into the games room. Brian O’Keefe looked implacable. If he recognized the rope specifically, he gave no indication of it. But he shot the skipper a quick, thoughtful look that was more puzzled than anything else.

Jasmine was still staring at her husband’s boot as if spellbound.

‘I’ll have to ask you all to assemble in the salon and give me an account of your individual movements for this afternoon,’ Rycroft began crisply, ushering them backwards like a farmer’s wife shooing a flock of recalcitrant chickens.