The Hindenburg Murders Read Free Page B

prettiness had congealed into a pixie-ish mask, and her stylish attire bespoke both money and a desire to affect youth—white flannel suit narrowly pin-striped black, black gloves, black soupbowl chapeau with a long sheer shadowy veil designed to serve the same function as Vaseline on a movie lens aimed at a beautiful but aging actress.
    “Would you mind terribly scooting over?” she asked ever so sweetly.
    Charteris had taken the seat nearest the aisle, to obtain proximity to the Viking blonde, leaving the window seat empty.
    “Not at all,” Charteris said, and did so. He thought he caught the barest amused glimpse from the Viking—which was at least an acknowledgment by her that he was alive.
    “Thank you, ever so,” his new neighbor said, settling snugly into her seat. “I’m Margaret Mather—Miss.”
    She extended a ladylike gloved hand, which he took, introducing himself.
    “Oh, the mystery writer! I do so enjoy your novels.”
    “Well, thank you.”
    She beamed beneath the veil. “The villains always receive their just deserts. Would that real life had the decency to perform the same service.”
    He squinted at her. “Are you an American, Miss Mather?”
    “Born in Morristown, New Jersey, of all places. Now I consider myself a resident of the world.”
    “Do tell.”
    “My apartment is at the top of the Spanish Steps in Rome—from the second floor you can see St. Peter’s.”
    “Really.”
    “But I spend most of my time in travel. I do so adore travel, flying in particular. The Hindenburg should suit me perfectly—all the comfort of a luxury liner, and none of the seasickness…. What takes you to America, Mr. Charteris?”
    He was polishing his monocle on his handkerchief. “I’ve been maintaining residences in both England and America, for several years now. Large country estate in the former, a bungalow in Florida… or rather I had a bungalow in Florida.”
    “But no longer?”
    Reinserting his monocle, he replied, “It’s my wife’s, now. My soon-to-be ex-wife.”
    “Oh, you’re getting divorced? How terrible.” But a distinct tinge of “How wonderful” colored her tone. “I do hope this is not too melancholy a time for you.”
    “Not at all, Miss Mather. My wife and I are parting friends. We have a wonderful daughter together, and we’ve agreed not to subject each other to any unnecessary unpleasantness.”
    “How very admirable.” The smile again beamed beneath the veil. “How very civilized.”
    They were in the middle bus, which just now was pulling out behind the lead vehicle. The rumble of the engine joined with the rough music of tires on cobblestone streets, accompanying the drunken folk songs emanating from the rear. None of this racket prevented Miss Mather from filling Charteris in on her life.
    Henry James might have written it. Like most spinsters, Miss Margaret Mather—“a direct descendant of Cotton Mather himself”—had a dead fiancé in her distant past, due to a sailing accident on Cape Cod, near her family’s Quisset summer home. Her man’s-man father had been a successful lawyer in New York who had once gone ’round the world by clipper ship (“So, you see, my seven-league boots come naturally to me”). After her father retired, the family joined her ailing brother in Capri; the brother recovered, became a professor of art at Princeton, while the family stayed behind. Her mother had died in 1920, and Miss Mather had cared for her father until his death in ’29 at the ripe old age of ninety-four.
    “I’m afraid I’m something of the black sheep of the family,” she admitted, “with my two meager years of schooling—but I’ve learned so much in my travels, and I’ve written a bit of poetry.”
    “Ah.”
    “Perhaps I could impose on you, at some point on the voyage, to read some of my work—the opinion of a professional author would mean so much to me.”
    “Perhaps you could.”
    What she really loved to do, as she’d indicated, was