The Titanic Murders - By Max Allan Collins Page 0,55

these gentlemen, and the one lady, did have something in their past or present that Crafton conceivably could attempt to blackmail them over, none of these people seemed agitated enough to kill, none of their skeletons-in-the-closet seemed worthy of murdering the man over.”

“Any one of them could have been lying,” Ismay pointed out. “Any one of them could have withheld the true nature of the blackmail, substituting something else, something more trivial.”

Futrelle removed his glasses and polished them on a handkerchief. “That’s certainly true. But I am an experienced newspaperman, Mr. Ismay, and while I do not claim infallibility, I feel I know when an interview subject is evading the truth or outright lying to me.” He snugged his glasses back on. “These men—and again, the one lady—seem to me to be telling the truth. None of them, in my at least somewhat informed opinion, had sufficient motive to kill the man.”

“But someone did,” Ismay said.

Futrelle cast another sharp look at Captain Smith, whose expression was unreadable. Then to Ismay, the mystery writer said, “You seem to have changed your opinion about Mr. Crafton dying of natural causes.”

“You have no suspicions, then, sir,” Ismay said, without addressing Futrelle’s statement.

“I asked each of them if they’d seen Crafton aboard the ship yesterday—knowing, of course, that he was already dead, and hoping to catch the killer in a lie, or at least get some indication, some nervous flash in the eyes, some tic or gesture that might indicate I’d touched a raw nerve.” He shrugged. “Nothing.”

“You said, ‘with the exception of one man,’” the captain pointed out.

Nodding, Futrelle said, “Yes, Mr. Rood wasn’t very forthcoming. His reaction was the most consistent with someone who had something to hide—perhaps Crafton was blackmailing Rood over something worth killing for. And I suppose, if pressed, for the sake of argument, I would have to say our leading suspect is Mr. Rood.”

“I would say that’s highly unlikely,” Ismay said, dryly.

“And why is that?”

The captain sighed heavily. “Mr. Rood was murdered last night.”

“The devil you say!” In a quick chilling flash, the mummy’s curse Stead had recounted filled his mind, but Futrelle still managed to ask, “What are the circumstances? Another bedroom entry, and smothering—”

“No,” Ismay said. “He was struck a blow to the back of the head.”

Nodding toward the outside, Captain Smith said, “He may have been shoved hard, backward, into the side of one of the lifeboats, here on the boat deck.”

“What makes you think that?”

Ismay said, “His body was discovered, having been stuffed rather rudely into lifeboat seven… not terribly far from where we sit right now.”

“A hasty, clumsy job of concealment,” Captain Smith said. “One of Mr. Rood’s arms, dangling from the side of the tarp-covered craft, caught the attention of a deckhand.”

Futrelle sat forward. “My God, gentlemen. Has the word gotten out? This will cast a terrible pall across the ship.”

“Mr. Rood’s body was discovered before dawn,” Ismay said, “and, after Dr. O’Loughlin approved it—the good doctor believes the murder took place sometime between midnight and five A.M.—the body was moved into the cold cargo hold, where Mr. Crafton’s remains also currently reside.”

“The lid, as they say, is still on,” Captain Smith said. “Only a handful of crew know about this, including the master-at-arms, and all have been given strict orders to speak to no one of the affair, at peril of loss of their jobs.”

“The lifeboat in question has been tidied up,” Ismay said.

“Maybe so,” Futrelle said, “and I would also like to see the ‘lid’ kept on, at least for the time being… but we’ve gone well beyond a death in a stateroom that could possibly have been written off as a heart attack. We have a murderer aboard, gentlemen… a violent one.”

“You’re correct, sir,” Captain Smith said. “We have a new set of concerns, now, for the safety of our passengers.”

Futrelle stood, and began to pace. “We understand why John Crafton, in all probability, was killed; he was a damned blackmailer. But why Rood?”

Ismay said nothing, but shot a telling look at Captain Smith, who was also mute and expressionless.

“Gentlemen,” Futrelle said, sensing something was up, “did you conduct a complete search of Mr. Crafton’s room, yesterday?”

After a few moments, Ismay nodded.

“Did you turn up anything of interest? Any documents pertaining to our late friend’s blackmail victims, perhaps?”

“No,” Ismay said.

“All right. Has Rood’s cabin been searched?”

Again, Ismay paused but finally said, “Yes.”

“And?”

“We found a room key that was not Rood’s own.”

“Really? Whose room key was it?”

“… Crafton’s.”

Futrelle’s eyebrows climbed