It's Murder, On a Galapagos Cruise: An Amateur Female Sleuth Historical Cozy Mystery (Miss Riddell C by P.C. James (easy novels to read txt) 📕

19

At Sea. Maria’s Story

“Why are we meeting Maria at this time of night?” Freda asked, as they made their way along the narrow corridor servicing the cabins.

“Because I want to speak to her privately,” Pauline said, “but not on my own.”

“Well, I hope you’re not going to tell her off or give her motherly advice,” Freda said, a little crossly. They were walking more quickly than she liked and she was bumping her sides on the walls and handrails, which was painful.

“Nothing like that,” Pauline said, as she opened the door to the outside deck where a stiff breeze fluttered her loose jacket. They climbed the steps up to the top deck and walked into the darkest, shadowy part.

“Hello, Maria,” Pauline said.

Maria was standing at the rail, looking down to the deck below. She turned and said, “Hello.”

“I’m sure you know why I asked you to meet me here,” Pauline said.

“Do I?”

Pauline smiled grimly. “I have said nothing because I believe you’re a good person who was driven beyond what was reasonable. Tell me what happened and why and, if I agree, it ends here tonight.”

Maria met her gaze steadily, assessing this speech and its implications.

“You wish me to take the blame for this accident?” she said.

“We both know it wasn’t an accident. What I want to know is, was it justice?”

Maria frowned. “Why should I trust you? You worked with that awful detective.”

Pauline said, “Let me tell you what I think happened. Then you can decide if you want to let me tell anyone else.” She waited to see Maria’s reaction. There was none.

“Very well,” Pauline said. “I’ll tell you what I’m going to tell the police when we dock tomorrow. You and your boyfriend, Jose, managed to get jobs on the ship. He told you it was so you could be together. You discovered it was actually to steal from the passengers and he expected you to help him. You confronted Jose here at this spot. He was angry and you were frightened. There was a struggle, he fell. That frightened you even more and you have kept quiet since. The law may believe you, if you tell them it was an accident. Maybe you will escape jail.” She paused and watched Maria, seeing the rising anger, maybe panic, in her eyes. Pauline added, “Do they have the reduced charge of manslaughter in Ecuador or will it be murder with extenuating circumstances?”

“You know nothing!”

“I think I know more than you imagine, Maria, and, as I said, if you convince me I’m right, we dock tomorrow and nothing will be said by me.”

“All right. I’ll tell you and it’s nothing like you said.”

“I know that, but the police won’t.”

“He was a monster,” Maria cried. “He and others like him killed my parents and molested me – isn’t that what you called it? – but with sticks and guns. I can’t make love. I can’t have children. I have no chance of a normal life with anyone. He deserved to die for what he did.”

Pauline nodded. “It was to do with the wars, I believe.”

“The Shining Path, they called themselves. They are evil. There’s no ‘path’ and nothing about them is ‘shining’. God, Jesus and all the saints with the best will in their sacred beings could never forgive those creatures of darkness.”

“Are you still a Catholic?” Pauline asked.

Maria shook her head. “I have heard too many in the Church excuse these demons to trust a priest anymore.”

“God isn’t the Church, though,” Pauline said.

“The Church would have us believe otherwise,” Maria said. “I believed. I attended. But neither God nor his Church were there when these animals descended on our village. I cannot forgive either of them, any more than I can forgive the monsters who massacred everyone I knew and loved.”

Freda stepped forward and put her arm around Maria’s shoulders to steady her for she seemed likely to fall or jump to her death.

“How did he come to be here?” Pauline asked.

Maria came out of her anguished trance and said, “I don’t know. The company try so hard to screen out bad people. He told everyone he was a refugee and he got through. Then, there he was in front of me, laughing at my terror on seeing him again.”

“Convince me what you say is true. Tell me what happened.”

Maria frowned. “Very well,” she said. “Many years ago, a couple in our small village took in a boy whose parents had been killed by Government soldiers, or at least that’s what they told us. This boy, his name was not Jose, though that’s the name he was going by when he arrived on this ship, was about a year older than me, maybe thirteen or fourteen. His behavior wasn’t friendly and his adopted parents said it was because of what he’d seen and what happened to his parents. That seemed sensible to me and made me want to help. I wasn’t the only one. Most of the children in the village tried to play with him and have him play with us but he was always angry so people began to avoid him.

“Then we got older. I got what you call a ‘crush’ on him. He was good looking and that moody sullen look was alluring. My parents forbade me to meet with him so I would sneak out to see him. He wasn’t any better as a boyfriend than as a friend. Then one day he hit me. You won’t believe it but even that didn’t put me off, at least not right away.

“But it got worse and I told my parents. They were furious; you can imagine. My father talked to his adoptive parents and he was ordered to keep away from me. And I was ordered to keep away from him, though by now I understood why my parents said he wasn’t bad, he was evil and I didn’t need to be commanded to avoid him. I was terrified of