There was a sharp intake of breath from the circle of suspects. I lavished a rare but genuine expression of unbridled admiration upon Harry's triumphant form. I wasn't sure how he'd reached his conclusions but it probably had a lot to do with his passion for cryptic crossword puzzles and Angela Lansbury. Seldom passing up an opportunity to perform in a melodrama, I struck a glamorous bimbo assistant pose, all wide eyes and bright smile. My husband shot me a brief glare, then slowly began to unwrap the package. Two familiar objects emerged from the folds of the oilskin and Mrs. Goldfinkel cried out in dismay.
'Why, those are the fetishes I gave to Harry and Jay as a wedding gift! How could you, Mrs. Boner? Purloining a pair of valuable antiques – not to mention defiling the sanctity of matrimonial bliss!'
Frippery stamped her latex booted foot.
'I didn't purloin anything. They were on the deck outthide the Neptune's cabin. Pothethon is nine tenths of the law.'
The Black Widow wagged a plump little forefinger at Harry and me.
'Now, really, my dears! That's no way to treat a nuptial gift! Get a little carried away in the heat of the moment, did we, so they popped out of your porthole?'
Harry frowned.
'You could say that, Mrs. Goldfinkel. Mrs. Neptune and I were remiss enough to leave our porthole ajar and fell foul of a stiff front from the Antilles. Rest assured that no disrespect was intended. Perhaps you would be kind enough to examine the fetishes carefully and ensure that no damage has been done.'
Mrs. Goldfinkel shot Harry a rather sharp look then swiftly segued into simpering benefactress mode. She took the two pieces of finely carved and polished wood. There was a faint buzzing sound, not unlike an approaching swarm of honeybees, and her bleached blonde coiffure floated upwards. Miss Larry Swat giggled.
'Y'all need some serious styling gel, Mizz Goldfinkel! Oh my! Ah never did see…'
The Flyswat's amusement was rudely interrupted by a sudden rather violent outburst from Gigi Goldfinkel, who held the fetishes as tightly as a starlet on Oscar night.
'Dontcha Mizz Goldfinkel me, honey. Lily May Scroggins don't take no crapola from no one!'
There was another group intake of breath. Miss Swat gaped. The Black Widow's prim Happachappabunket tones had been replaced by pure Noo Joisy with more than a hint of the Bronx added for extra gritty texture. Knowingly, Harry stepped forwards and addressed the trembling figure in pink. The buzzing sound was intensifying, Mrs. Goldfinkel/Scroggin's hair swiftly unwound from its tightly permed curls and attained vertical status. Harry looked his victim in the eye. The tension was palpable.
'Tell me about Raoul, Lily May. The boy done you wrong – didn't he?'
The Black Widow screeched in a harpy-esque cackle.
'Done me wrong? Done me wrong! The little black-eyed, snake-hipped, two-timing blackmailing son of a bitch. He got what was comin' to him. No more. No less. No one tries to put one over on Lily May Scroggins, whose dear old daddy was One-Eye Olaf of the Greasegun Gang. Little squirt tried to blackmail me when he found out my Family connections, so I shot the fucker.'
'Oh no, you didn't!'
There was a chorus of gasps and everyone turned to look at Captain Ahab. He smiled, a little apologetically.
'I'm afraid, dear lady, that you are very much mistaken. You may well have tried to plant a fatal bullet in the young man's chest but the winning shot was fired by none other than yours truly, Captain Herman Melville Ahab. I cannot allow you to take the blame for my action – or, if you'll pardon my immodesty, the credit for a damned good aim. I dispatched the Dago. He was blackmailing me in regard to some complex legal issues concerning my marital status.'
'Ach, ah canna hold it in any longer! Ah killed the laddie too.'
Everyone turned to stare at Dr. Dunnett, who shrugged and took a fortifying slug from his hip flask. Miss Swat kicked him on the shin but he continued regardless.
'The wee bugger found out that ah was struck off the medical register for malpractice in cosmetic surgery before ah took this job on board the Caribbean Conch. In fact, ah'm no a medical man at all, ah'm a plumber. The toe-rag was also blackmailing mah wee chum Loretta here, on accounts that she used to go by the name of Larry before she had some major reconstruction circa 1983. Alas, mah surgical craft was in its infancy and she willna forgive me. Loretta was counter-blackmailing me to pay off the slimy Latino. We bribed one of the other band members to shoot a wee poison dart in the back of the bugger's neck when he was shaking his maracas. Ah'm no sayin' which one did it. That'll stay a secret 'til the day ah die.'
Harry nodded, sagely.
'And, to the put the final twist on the S-bend, my dear doctor plumber, you and Miss Swat tracked down and appropriated Raoul's ill-gotten gains.'
'What???!!'
Everyone turned to glare at the doctor, who shrank down into his chair. Miss Swat looked furious. Frippery's thin, sharp voice piped up.
'We're none of us guilt-free. Will wath thticking pinth in a voodoo doll of Raoul. In fact, it wath probably the voodoo that weakened him enough for the bullet wound to prove fatal. Raoul wath blackmailing us too. He dithcovered that I write fem-dom ficthion. Not the done thing for a Puker Prize winner. And he knew that Will likes to dreth up in a frock.'
Harry grinned.
'Not the done thing for a pseudo Dominant who's trying to launch a macho pulp fiction career.'
Boner's face went red, then quite white with anger but he remained silent. There was a faint sound of grinding dentures.
Harry carefully took the fetishes from a thoroughly frizzed-up Black Widow and gently laid them at his feet.
'So. You all done it. Will and Frip cast a black magic curse. Dunnett and Swat bribed an assassin to shoot a poison dart. Lily May might have had her way, if her little bullet hadn't ricocheted off the bongos and ended up embedded in one leg of the dessert trolley. But the Captain it was that really cracked him. It's always the quiet ones.'
Captain Ahab bowed modestly, an enigmatic smile playing about his lips.
Inspector Parrott finally broke his silence, reaching into his shirt pocket for a cell ''phone.
'All we need is Charles Aznavour and we've got a remake of Murder On The Orient Express. They'll never believe this back at headquarters. Never in a million years…'
'Plenty of spare handcuffs down in the basement, Inspector.'
I couldn't resist a quip. Inspector Parrott grinned and winked.
'Don't worry, Miss Lawrence. The gang isn't going anywhere. I have had Henryk's surrounded for the last half-hour. Mr. Neptune, I take my hat off to you, but I will confess that I wasn't too far behind the game.'
Harry bowed in an egalitarian fashion.
'Elementary, my dear Parrott. Elementary.'
I looked at the circle of guilty parties, their faces showing assorted degrees of resignation and/or anger. All was not yet over. I had my own personal retribution to achieve. I whispered my desire in Parrott's ear and watched him smirk briefly then nod in assent. Slowly, meaningfully, I walked over to Boner. My ex lover stared up at me with a mixture of curiosity and acrimony, as I stood before him, hands on hips. I chose my words carefully.
'So, you don't like pussy, eh?'
Will flushed, then began to look really annoyed.
'What are you going on about? This is hardly the time…'
I interrupted him, placing one foot upon his scrawny thigh.
'Oh, but it is, Wilberforce, my dear. There is no time like the present for a little, shall we say, initiation.'
I smiled enigmatically as I overheard Harry calling for the Boobsy Twins. To be totally truthful, I really didn't care to do this little job myself, but I would set the ball rolling. As it were. Boner shrank back into his chair as Bambi and Botti swayed towards him, all endless bronzed thighs and heroic cleavage. Quick as a flash, Botti
