Johannes Cabal the Detective

Stormcloud!” He warmed to the name immediately. “Raining death upon our enemies!”

Cabal raised an index finger in mild admonition. “Pardon me,” he said. “I was in mid-exposition.” Marechal made an exasperated face, but waved him on. Cabal checked his watch again, and continued. “It was supposed to look like suicide, but mistakes were made and, from there on in, they multiplied. The attack on me was made in a panic — it would have been far wiser just to leave me to my own devices. I didn’t actually find anything in the ventilation ducting; I was all set to go back to my cabin and forget about it. A murder attempt spoilt all that, and — more important — emphasised that DeGarre’s disappearance was certainly not due to suicide. Now they needed a scapegoat, which Zoruk, with his unseemly display at dinner, was perfectly suited to be.”

“I still don’t understand,” said Miss Ambersleigh, quite bewildered by so much naughtiness in the world. “Who are they? You cannot be referring to this gentleman?” She gestured at the count, although, being a lady by breeding if not entitlement, she was careful not to point. “He has only recently joined us.”

“They?” Cabal looked at her with mild surprise. “I’m very sorry, Miss Ambersleigh. I thought that was evident. They are very nearly everybody on this vessel. All the crew, and several of the passengers. They have all conspired in three murders. They also intend to kill, let’s see, Miss Barrow, myself, and, I’m afraid, you.”

Miss Ambersleigh seemed to shrink into her chair, her eyes wide and her mouth open with shock. This could not be. Ladies need fear only ruffians. Not gentlemen. Never gentlemen. She looked beseechingly at Schten. “Captain?” she said in wavering tones, but he could only look at the floor, his shame apparent.

“You can’t blame the captain,” said Cabal. “Or not completely. The first two killings were carried out under his orders, which is why such a hash was made of them. The captain is not a natural murderer; all this cloak-and- dagger nonsense does not come easily to a military man, does it?”

Captain Schten managed to look Miss Ambersleigh in the eye. “I’m sorry, ma’am. I didn’t want any of this.”

“He was just obeying orders, you see.”

Miss Barrow looked at Count Marechal, but couldn’t bear to speak to him directly. “His orders?” she asked Cabal.

“Yes, but not directly. Marechal here had his cat’s-paw aboard — the ship’s very own Mirkarvian intelligence officer — here to make sure smuggling the Princess Hortense through Senzan skies went according to plan. She was also the one who grew suspicious that Cacon and, I think, myself were not what we seemed. Cacon was the Senzan spy I alluded to earlier. She shadowed me in Parila, was spotted by Cacon, who shadowed her, I shadowed Cacon, and — after a bracing round of ‘Here we go round the mulberry bush’ — she ducked out. Unhappily for Cacon, she took refuge in the very alleyway that led to the safe house where he was supposed to wait to be debriefed. He walked right into her, and she murdered him.”

Lady Ninuka became aware that a lot of eyes were on her. “Me? I’ve never heard such slander!”

“No?” said Cabal, all innocence. “There are probably men’s toilets in Mirkarvia where slanderous comments about you are commonly aired. If you pause to read the walls, you will likely find much that is libellous, too. You remember the difference, yes? Oh, sit down,” he said to the count, who had risen from his barstool to defend his daughter’s honour, such as it was. “You will get your chance to kill me anon. In the meantime” — he turned his attention back to Lady Ninuka — “yes, it would be slander, if I were talking about you. I have had brief but unpleasant dealings with Mirkarvian security. I understand that security and intelligence all fall under the same organisational heading in Mirkarvia — which is unusual — and go by the name of ‘Section A.’ Marechal here is the de facto head of it, but will the Section A field agent please stand up?” Nobody moved. Cabal tutted impatiently. “Oh, come along, Frau Roborovski. We haven’t got all day.”

Frau Roborovski folded her hands in her lap, but she said nothing. Nor did she need to; her lack of surprise and calm demeanour were all the reaction necessary.

“Hold on, Cabal,” said Miss Barrow, “you said the killer was a single woman. Frau Roborovski’s, well, she’s a Frau. She’s married.” She looked sideways at Frau Roborovski, who returned the glance coolly. Miss Barrow’s conviction wavered. “Isn’t she?”

“No,” said Cabal, disappointed at such ignorance. “Of course she isn’t. She’s an intelligence officer. Probably changes her identity six times before breakfast even when she doesn’t need to, just to stay in trim. Incidentally” — Cabal addressed Frau Roborovski directly — “what is your real name? There’s not much point in maintaining your alias now, and I dislike calling you by a nom de guerre.”

“Special Agent Lisabet Satunin,” she said in a clear voice. The fussy hausfrau image had slipped away entirely. Now she sat there, calm and confident as a chess player one move away from victory. “At your service.”

“Not mine, unfortunately,” said Cabal, “or I would already have set you on Marechal. Your ‘husband,’ though — You’re no agent, sir. When we first met, I spoke of dovecote joins when, of course, the term is ‘dovetail.’ I was a little distracted at the time, and I can’t even remember if I said it in jest or in honest error. I do know, however, that a real cabinetmaker — or even a spy passing himself off as such — would surely have reacted in some way. What is your role in all this?”

Herr Roborovski sat in embarrassed silence, unsure whether he was permitted to speak. Fraulein Satunin did it for him. “His name really is Roborovski, but he’s not a cabinetmaker. He is this vessel’s architect. He oversaw its construction and he will be spending some time in Katamenia to assist them in making her ready for war.”

“I like this,” Cabal confided to Schten. “I like being able to ask questions and get the answers without being lied to. I like the truth.”

“You were lying as much as any of us. A necromancer!” replied Schten, with a sulkiness unseemly in a man of his stature, both physically and professionally.

“I lied to save my life. You lied to take the lives of others. If we’re playing moral superiority, Captain, you’ll find even necromancers further up the ladder than you. As it happened, you gave me the single point of data that revealed the whole sordid business to me.”

Captain Schten’s face dropped. He glanced nervously at Marechal, who was lighting up his eighth cigarette. “I did?”

“You did, though you didn’t realise it. Nor, to be brutally frank, did I. Not until I saw those marionettes. You probably won’t be very flattered to hear that the puppet masters were remarkably good at mimicking the actions of Mirkarvian soldiers. Actually, it is probably closer to the truth to say that Mirkarvian soldiers are a gift to puppeteers because they behave like marionettes. A great deal of wheeling on the spot, and walking in lines, and — significantly — clicking of heels. Only military people do that, don’t they? It’s considered ill-mannered and slightly dangerous for civilians to do it. Yet, the very first time I laid eyes upon Captain Schten and his senior officers, they thought they were unobserved, and were busily snapping salutes and clicking heels at one another. The salutes are explicable; the heel-clicking from a crew that pretends to contain no military officers, less so.”

Schten winced, as well he might.

Cabal continued. “Once I was open to the idea that the conspiracy involved the crew, then everything that had happened more or less became self-explanatory. Zoruk never stood a chance. He was injured by having his wrist ‘accidentally’ caught in a door exactly as he claimed, but the steward then stated that Zoruk had engineered the accident, and that the door had closed on him with no great force. Why would we disbelieve the apparently disinterested and uninvolved steward? Well, because he’s an ass, but otherwise there’s no reason not to accept his account. All the time the real culprit, one of the bridge crew or possibly an engineer, is salted safely away on the top deck, he and his injured hand kept out of public sight while the captain continues the charade of checking everyone else.

“Once again, however, the ruse was flawed, the military mind turned to expedience rather than elegance to cover the lies, and Zoruk was hanged in an effort to create another suicide. You would have thought that after one dismal failure at staging a suicide, a different strategy would be attempted, but Mirkarvians seem to be great adherents of ‘If at first you don’t succeed, then repeat your failure until nobody’s left alive to comment.’” Cabal smiled with the benevolence of somebody watching an unlovable toddler walk under a table and bang his head painfully. “My main error was believing that the deaths were attributable to a couple of daring and dastardly spies of some hue, when in fact the malefactors were more akin to a third-string comedic music-hall troupe, led by a psychotic in a plaid skirt. There wasn’t a single bit of cleverness in the whole enterprise, just desperation and