The Second Richard Deming Mystery MEGAPACK™: 23 Classic Mystery Stories

Honeymoon Cruise

Originally published in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, October 1966.

When the employment office sent me down to the Miami Yacht Club to be interviewed by the owner of the Princess II, I had no idea she was tin heiress Peggy Matthews. I was told to ask for a Mrs. Arden Trader.

The Princess II was moored in the third slip. It was only about a thirty-five footer, but it was a sleek, sturdy-looking craft which appeared as though it could weather any kind of seas. No one was on deck or in the wheelhouse.

I climbed on deck, stuck my head down the single hatch behind the wheelhouse and yelled, “Anyone aboard?”

A feminine voice from below called. “Be right up.”

A moment later, a slim brunette of about twenty-five came up the ladder. She wore white Capris and a clinging white blouse that showed off a lithe, extremely feminine figure, thong sandals that exposed shapely feet with carmine toenails, and a white sailor hat. Her features were slightly irregular, her nose being a trifle aquiline and her chin line being a little short, but her face was so full of vitality and there was such an aura of femininity about her that she was beautiful, anyway. Lovely dark eyes, a suggestion of sensuality about her mouth, and a creamy suntan probably helped the general effect.

I recognized her at once from news photos I had seen. Only a few months before, on her birthday, she had come into full control of an estimated fortune of twenty million dollars, which had been left to her in trust until she was twenty-five by her widower father, tin magnate Abel Matthews. Matthews had been dead about ten years, but until Peggy’s last birthday the terms of the trust fund had required her to struggle along on the piddling sum of about a hundred thousand a year. Now she was one of the richest women in the world.

“Aren’t you Peggy Matthews?” I asked.

“I was,” she said with a smile which exposed perfect white teeth. “I’ve been Mrs. Arden Trader for the last couple of days. Are you from the employment agency?”

“Yes, ma’am. My names Dan Jackson.”

She looked me up and down, and suddenly a peculiar expression formed on her face. Even now I can’t quite describe it, but if you can imagine a mixture of surprise and gladness and apprehension, that comes close.

I think there must have been a similar expression on my face, except for the apprehension, because I was having an odd emotional reaction, too. Just like that, on first meeting, static electricity passed between us so strongly, it seemed to crackle like twin bolts of lightning.

I still don’t believe there can be such a thing as love at first sight, but I learned at that instant that there can be an almost overpowering physical attraction between a man and a woman the first moment they look at each other. I had experienced it a few times in much milder form but never with this sort of thunderous impact.

We stood staring at each other in mutual dismay, hers probably from guilt, mine because she was already married. It was incredible that this should happen with a bride of only two days, but it was happening. There was no question in my mind that my impact on her was as strong as hers on me.

We gazed at each other for a long time without speaking. Finally, she said in a shaken voice, “Did the employment agency explain the job, Mr. Jackson?”

I took my eyes from her face so that I could untangle my tongue. “I understand you need someone with navigational and marine engine experience to pilot the Princess II on a Caribbean cruise and also double as a cook.”

She turned and looked out over the water. “Yes,” she said in a low voice. “It’s to be a honeymoon cruise. My husband can pilot the boat all right, but he’s not a navigator and knows nothing about engines. Neither of us is a very good cook, either. Incidentally, our marriage is to remain a secret until after the honeymoon because we don’t want to be met by reporters at every port.”

“All right,” I agreed, still not looking at her.

I did risk a glance at her left hand, however. She was wearing both a diamond and a wedding band. I wondered how she expected to keep it a secret when people were bound to recognize her at every port of call. But that was none of my business.

She suddenly became brisk and businesslike. “May I have your qualifications and vital statistics, Mr. Jackson?”

“In that order?”

“As you please.”

“I’ll give you the vital statistics first,” I said. “Age thirty, height six-one, weight one ninety; single. Two years at Miami U. in liberal arts with a B average, then I ran out of money. My hobbies are all connected with water: swimming, boating, fishing, and as a chaser for rye whiskey. No current romantic entanglements.”

“I’m surprised at the last,” she said. “You’re a very handsome man.”

I decided to ignore that. It didn’t seem a good idea to involve myself as a third party on a honeymoon cruise if the situation were going to become explosive. I wanted to know right now if we were going to be able to suppress whatever it was that had sparked between us at the instant of meeting and keep our relationship on a strictly employer-employee basis.

“Now for qualifications,” I said. “I did two years in the navy, the second one as chief engineer on a destroyer. I took an extension course in navigation and chart reading, intending to buck for a reserve commission, but changed my mind before my hitch was up. I finished the course, though, and am a pretty good navigator. I’m also an excellent marine mechanic. I had my own charter boat out of Miami Beach for two years. I lost it in moorage when Betsy hit, and there was only enough insurance to cover my debts, so I’ve been unable to finance another. Since then I’ve been odd-jobbing at any sea job I could get.”

I looked directly into her face as I spoke, and she gazed back at me levelly. Whatever had caused the lightning to crackle between us was gone now, I was both disappointed and relieved to find. Her manner remained the brisk, almost brittle one of a businesswoman conducting a personnel interview. She still held an immense physical attraction for me, but now that she wasn’t sending out rays of static electricity, I wasn’t responding by sending them back.

She asked, “How about your cooking ability?”

“I’m no chef, but I’ve been cooking for myself for some years and have managed to remain healthy.”

“That’s not too important so long as you’re adequate,” she said. “We’ll probably dine either with friends or in restaurants at our ports of call. You can furnish references, I presume?”

“They’re on file at the employment office, which has already checked them. All you have to do is phone.”

“Very well,” she said. “I think you’ll do, Mr. Jackson. The salary is five hundred dollars plus your keep for a one-month voyage. Is that satisfactory?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“We’ll leave tomorrow morning about ten. Our first port will be Southwest Point in the Bahamas, which should only take about four hours because the Princess II cruises at twenty-one knots. I’ll outline the rest of the voyage after we’re under way. Now, would you like to look over the boat?”

“Sure. Where’s Mr. Trader?”

“Shopping for some last-minute supplies. We’ll start below with the engine.”

I judged the boat to be a couple of years old, but it was in excellent shape. I started the engine and listened to it for a time, and it seemed to be in top condition. There was a separate generator engine for the lights when we were in port, and the main engine was idle.

The galley was clean and shipshape, with an electric range and electric refrigerator, the latter well stocked with food. The food cabinet was well stocked with canned goods, also. There was a bunk room that slept four, and off it was a small head and a saltwater shower.

Just she and her husband would occupy the bunk room, Peggy Trader explained. There was a leather-covered bench in the pilothouse which folded out into a fifth bunk, and I would sleep there.

Her manner was entirely impersonal as she conducted the tour. Once, as we were moving from the bunk room into the galley, she accidentally crowded against me in the close quarters, but I sensed no reaction from her at the physical contact.

She merely said politely, “Excuse me,” and continued through the hatch.

I knew the instantaneous physical attraction between us hadn’t been just my imagination, but apparently she had decided, after her one brief lapse, to bring the matter to a screeching halt. I couldn’t help feeling a bit rueful, but at the same time I was relieved. I needed the money badly enough so that I probably would have risked taking the job even if she had thrown herself into my arms, but I preferred not to break up a marriage before it was even fairly under way. If she could restrain herself, I knew I could.

I reported aboard at nine the next morning. Peggy’s husband was present this time. Arden Trader was a lean, handsome man of thirty-five with dark, curly hair and a thin mustache. He had an Oxford accent and treated his bride with the fawning indulgence of a gigolo.

Later, I learned he had been the penniless younger son of an equally penniless English duke and had been existing as one of those curious parasites of the international set who move from villa to villa of the rich as perennial house guests.

I knew he was a fortune hunter the moment he flashed his white teeth and gave me a man-to-man handshake. I wondered why Peggy had allowed herself to be suckered into marrying him. I learned that afternoon.

The plan for the cruise was to sail east to Southwest Point the first day, a distance of about a hundred miles. After a two-day layover, we would head for Nassau, and after a similar layover there, we would cruise to Governor’s Harbor. From there we would island hop to Puerto Rico, then hit the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Point Morant on the east tip of Jamaica, then head back northeast through Windward Passage to Port-de-Paix on the northern coast of Haiti.

The last would be our longest single jump, a distance of about two hundred and fifty miles. With a cruising speed of twenty-one knots, we could make it in about ten hours, however, so no night sailing would be required during the whole voyage.

After Port-de-Paix, we would touch at the island of Great Inagua, island hop from there back to Governor’s Harbor, then cruise nonstop back to Miami. With all our scheduled stops, ranging from one-day layovers to two or three days, we would spend more time in port than at sea during the one-month voyage.

At noon the first day out, I called Arden Trader to take over the wheel while I went below to prepare lunch. When it was ready, as we were in no hurry, we cut the engine, threw out the sea anchor, and all lunched together.

After lunch, I pulled in the sea anchor and got under way again. The sea was rolling a little, but it wasn’t rough, and the sun was shining brightly. We were clipping along at cruising speed when Peggy came into the wheelhouse wearing a red bikini swimsuit.

“Arden wants to try a little fishing,” she said. “Will you cut to trolling speed for a while?”

Obediently, I throttled down until we were barely moving. Glancing aft, I saw Arden Trader seated at the stern rail with a sea rod in his hands. Peggy made no move to go back and join him after delivering the message.

“He probably won’t troll more than fifteen minutes if he doesn’t get a strike,” she said. “He bores rather easily.”

I didn’t say anything.

She moved over next to me in order to look at the chart book lying open on the little ledge between the wheel and the pilothouse window. The nearness of her scantily clad body made my pulse start to hammer so hard I was afraid she could hear it.

“Where are we?” she asked.

I pointed silently to a spot a little more than halfway between Miami and Southwest Point.

She said. “We should be in by cocktail time, then, even if Arden decides to fish as long as an hour, shouldn’t we?”

“Oh, yes.”

There was no reason for her to remain where she was now that she had seen the chart, but she continued to stand so close that our arms nearly touched. I didn’t have on a shirt. In fact, I was wearing nothing but a pair of my old Navy dungarees and a visored yachting cap, not even shoes. She was so close I could feel the warmth of her body on my bare arm.

Although the sea was fairly calm, our decreased headway caused the boat to roll slightly. One swell a little larger than the rest caused a heavier roll to port. Instinctively, I leaned into it, and at the same moment she lost her balance.

She half turned as she fell against me. My right arm went around her waist to steady her as she grabbed for my shoulders. Her full bosom, covered only by the thin strip of the bikini halter, crushed against my bare chest. The bolts of lightning that crackled between us made that of yesterday morning seem like summer lightning. We remained rigid for several seconds, staring into each other’s faces. Her lips parted, and her eyes reflected the same mixture of surprise and gladness and dismay I had caught when we first glimpsed each other. Then she straightened away from me and glanced out the aft pilothouse window. I looked over my shoulder, too. Her husband was fishing with his back to us.

“I shouldn’t have hired you,” she said quietly.

I faced forward and gripped the wheel with both hands.

“I knew I shouldn’t have when I did it,” she said. “Don’t pretend you don’t know what I’m talking about.”

“We’ll head back for Miami tomorrow,” I said. “You can have the employment agency send you another man.”

“No, I don’t want to. It’s too late.”

With her gaze still on her husband, she readied out and gently squeezed my bicep. I tingled clear to my toes.

“It’s ridiculous,” I said tightly. “You’re a bride of three days. You must be in love with him.”

Her hand continued to caress my bicep. “I’m not going to try to explain it, Dan. I was in love with him until you came aboard yesterday. I took one look at you, and everything turned topsy-turvy. It did for you, too. I could see it in your eyes. I can feel it in your muscles right now.”

“Stop it,” I said, keeping my gaze rigidly fixed ahead. “It’s impossible. Why did you marry him?”

“Because I hadn’t met you,” she said simply.

“That’s no answer. You must have been in love.”

Her hand left my arm and dropped to her side. “I went into it with my eyes wide open,” she said. “I’ve had a hundred offers of marriage — women with money always do — but I’d given up ever finding the man I dreamed of. The rich ones were all fearfully dull, the charmers all fortune hunters. I’m twenty-five and tired of being single. I hardly needed a rich husband, so I decided to settle for a charmer. Arden has been pursuing me for a year. Last week at a house party in Mexico City, I gave in. We were married there, then flew to Miami to pick up my boat for a honeymoon cruise. On my second day as a new bride, I had, finally, to meet the man I’ve been looking for all my life.”

I continued to grip the wheel and stare straight ahead. The whole situation was incredible. A series of wild thoughts ran through my mind.

I’d always considered myself a confirmed bachelor, but suddenly the thought of having Peggy for a wife was so appealing, I’ve never wanted anything more. Her money had nothing to do with it, either. I would never marry for money because it had been my observation that men who do usually earn it. It had never occurred to me that I might fall in love with a rich woman.

I wasn’t sure this was love, but no woman had ever held as strong a physical attraction for me, and I was sure I wanted to many her. And it was hardly a disadvantage that she was one of the richest women in the world. Would it be sensible to turn her down merely because a few villas scattered around the world, a few yachts and foreign cars went with the deal?

Then the bubble popped. She already had a husband.

“Aren’t you going to say anything?” she asked.

“Uh-huh. Do you plan an annulment?”

“From Arden? Impossible. He would hold me up for a half million dollars.”

“Can’t you afford it?”

From the periphery of my vision, I could see her frown. “Nobody can afford to throw half a million dollars down a hole. My father spent too many years building his fortune for any of it to be tossed away capriciously. It’s not a matter of being able to afford it; it’s a matter of principle.”

“Then I guess you’ll just have to stay married to him,” I said.

There was a yell from the stern. “Strike!”

I cut the engine and looked over my shoulder. Trader was straining back in his seat, and a hundred yards behind the boat a sailfish broke water.

Peggy said, “We’ll postpone discussion until later,” and hurried aft to stand by with the gaff.

There was no opportunity to resume discussion that day, however. Trader lost his fish, and it discouraged him from further fishing. He devoted his attention to his bride for the rest of the day.

About five p.m. we berthed at Southwest Point. Trader and Peggy dressed and decided to go into the settlement for dinner. Trader invited me to go along, but I knew the invitation was only politeness, so I refused.

I had a lonely meal and afterward sat on the stern rail smoking a cigarette. The night was warm enough so that I didn’t bother to put on any more than I had worn during the day. I had finished my cigarette but was still seated there bare-chested and barefooted when they returned about nine.

Arden Trader had donned a white linen suit to go to dinner. Peggy had put on a dress but hadn’t bothered with stockings. She wore thong sandals on her bare feet.

There were two inflated rubber mats with removable canvas back rests on the stern deck. Without the back rests you could lie full length on them for sunbathing. With the back rests in place, they made deck-level lounging chairs. Peggy sank onto the one right in front of me, leaned against the back rest, and kicked off her sandals.

“Let’s enjoy the moonlight for a while,” she said to her husband. “How about a cigarette?”

He knelt beside her with his back to me, placed a cigarette in her mouth, and lit it. After taking one draw, she took it from her mouth, put her arms about his neck, and drew him to her.

Ever since she had left the wheelhouse that afternoon, I had been stewing about what transpired there. I had finally decided that if she wasn’t going to leave her husband, we were not going to have just an affair.

I still wanted her as a wife more than I’ve ever wanted anything, and maybe if she had been married ten years, I might have settled for having her just as a mistress. But I wasn’t quite rat enough to cuckold a groom on his honeymoon.

Apparently, my soul-searching had been for nothing. I could think of no reason for her deliberate show of affection in front of me other than that she had decided to let me know in definite terms that the scene in the wheelhouse had been a mistake. I looked away, not wanting to see her kissed by Trader.

I felt something touch my left foot and glanced down. My pulse started to pound when I saw her right foot rubbing against my instep. Her carmine-tipped toes waggled in urgent demand for some response.

With her arms wrapped around her husband, the gesture seemed more likely to be an invitation for a clandestine affair than a signal that she wanted a more permanent relationship. Since I had already decided against settling for that, my conscience told me to withdraw my foot.

My desire for her was stronger than my conscience. I raised my foot and pressed its sole against hers. Her toes worked against mine and along the sole of my foot in a lascivious caress, all the time her arms tightening around her husband’s neck until finally it was he who broke the kiss.

As he started to rise, her foot drew away from mine, and I dropped mine back flat on the deck. Trader sank onto the other mat and lit a cigarette.

“I’m beginning to like this married life,” he said to me with a grin. “You ought to try it, Dan.”

“I may if I ever meet the right girl,” I said, getting to my feet. “Think I’ll turn in. It’s been a long day.”

“Good night, Dan,” Peggy said softly.

“Night,” I said without looking at her, and headed for the wheelhouse.

The following morning when I climbed down on deck, Arden Trader was screwing some kind of bracket to the timber immediately right of the hatchway which led below.

“Morning,” I said. “What’s that?”

“Morning, Dan,” he said affably. “I’m installing an outside shaving mirror I picked up in town last night. The head’s too small and too poorly lighted to get a decent shave.”

He lifted a round shaving mirror from a paper bag and slipped the two small vertical shafts at its back into holes in the top of the bracket. Then he moved the bottom of the mirror in and out to demonstrate that it could be adjusted to suit the height of anyone using it.

“Now all I need is a basin of hot water and my shaving equipment,” he said as he started below. “You can use it when I’m finished if you want.”

I did use it from then on.

I had no opportunity to be alone with Peggy during the two days we were in port because Trader was playing the attentive groom. By the second day, I couldn’t stand his constant little attentions to her and, since I wasn’t needed aboard because they were taking their meals in town, took the day off and spent it on the beach by myself.

On the third day, we pulled out for Nassau. As the trip would take six hours, we got under way at eight a.m. About ten, Peggy came into the pilothouse, again wearing a bikini.

“He’s taking a nap,” she said, and with no more preamble moved into my arms.

I spiked the wheel so as to have both arms free. Hers went about my neck, and her body pressed against mine as our lips met. We were both trembling when she finally struggled from my arms and stepped back. It was none too soon.

She backed clear to the pilothouse door. We were both so out of control, if her husband had walked in at that moment, neither of us could have concealed our naked emotion from him.

“What are we going to do?” she whispered.

My good resolutions lay in shreds. I didn’t care what we did so long as it meant being together in some way. If she wanted to shed Trader and marry me, I would be happiest. But now I was willing to settle for just an affair if she wanted that. If she had suggested solving our problem by holding hands and jumping over the rail, I would have at least considered it.

I jerked out the spike and gripped the wheel with both hands in an effort to control my trembling. “What do you want to do?”

“Do you love me?”

“Do you have to ask?” I demanded.

“I want to hear you say it.”

I took a deep breath. “I love you. I’m absolutely nuts about you.”

She closed her eyes. “I love you, too,” she said almost inaudibly. “I’ve never felt such overwhelming love. Do you want to many me? Answer me truly, Dan.”

“There’s nothing I want more,” I said in a husky voice.

Her eyes opened, and she seemed to get a little control of herself. In a more normal tone, she said, “I couldn’t just have an affair, Dan. Despite my behavior, I’m really a quite moral person. I’m not a prude. If I were single, and we were alone out here and planned to get married when we reached port, I wouldn’t insist we wait until the proper words were spoken. But there’s some Puritan strain deep within me that makes it impossible for me to violate my marriage vows.”

“We aren’t going to have an affair,” I told her. “I’ve already told you I want you for my wife.”

“But I have a husband.”

“You shouldn’t have any trouble getting an annulment after this short a marriage. Why do you think it would cost you a half million?”

“Because I know Arden. I know him so well, I made him sign a premarital agreement waiving all claim to my estate except whatever I decided to leave him in my will. I didn’t think it wise to put him in a position where he could become rich if I died.”

I turned to stare at her. “If you thought him capable of murdering you, why in the devil did you marry him? What possessed you?”

“Oh. I really didn’t think he might try to kill me. But he’s a fortune hunter, and you don’t place temptation in the hands of men such as Arden. Because he is a fortune hunter, I know he’ll hold me up if I ask for an annulment. My guess that his price for cooperating will be a half million is based on sound experience. That’s exactly what it cost each of two women friends of mine to shed fortune-hunting husbands.”

“Wouldn’t your premarital agreement cover that?”

“That only applies in case of my death,” she said. “Actually, I could get out of paying him a red cent if I wanted a legal battle. No court would grant him any kind of settlement. But there’s a pattern of blackmail men such as Arden use. If I refuse to pay him off, Arden will fight me in court with every dirty tactic he knows. He’ll drag my reputation through the mud by filing countersuit for divorce and accusing me of infidelity with a dozen men. The tabloids will have a field day.”

I said sourly, “You knew all this in advance of marrying him. How the hell did you bring yourself to do it?”

“I assumed it was going to last, Dan. How was I to know you would come along?”

I took my gaze from her and looked ahead again. “If you don’t get rid of him, how are we going to marry?”

“Oh, I intend to get rid of him,” she said softly.

“By paying him off?”

“There’s a much simpler way, Dan. Who would suspect anything if a brand-new groom fell overboard and was lost at sea on his honeymoon? The wife might be suspected after a ten-year marriage or even after a year — but not after just a week. Dan.”

A sudden chill doused the warmth I still felt from having her in my arms. “Murder?” I said shakily.

“There wouldn’t be a chance of suspicion. Who could suspect a love triangle when I’m on my honeymoon and you and I have only known each other a few days? It’s even incredible to me that we’re in love. How could the thought ever enter the heads of the police?”

The logic of what she said was penetrating my mind even as I was rejecting the thought. Under the circumstances, who could possibly suspect? My throat was suddenly so dry I had to clear it.

“There would be some suspicion after we announced our marriage.”

“Why? No one knows you’re only a temporary employee. I’ll simply keep you on in some permanent capacity — say as my social secretary. I’m the only woman in my set who has never had one, and it’s about time I acquired one. You’ll show sympathy for my bereavement, and I’ll show appreciation for your sympathy. Gradually, your sympathy and my appreciation can ripen into love. It won’t be the first time a sympathetic male friend has ended up marrying a grieving widow. I think it would be safe at the end of as little as two months.”

Again her argument was so logical I had no answer, except that it takes more than mere certainty that you won’t be caught to condition your mind to murder.

“It has to be that way or not at all,” she said in a suddenly definite tone. “I’ll leave you to think it over.” She turned and left the pilothouse.

I was still thinking it over when it came time for the noon mess. By then, we were passing through Northwest Providence Channel. I had deliberately kept to the center of the channel, and land was barely visible on the horizon on both sides. The water was calm, with only a slight roll, and the sun was shining brightly. There wasn’t another vessel in sight.

Arden Trader had emerged from below in swim trunks about eleven o’clock, and both he and Peggy were lying on the inflated mats at the stern, deepening their already rich tans. I yelled for Trader to come take the wheel while I prepared mess. He rolled off his mat, leaned over Peggy, and gave her a long kiss. Jealousy raged through me so hotly I had to turn my back to get control of myself. When he came into the wheelhouse, it was an effort to keep my voice calm while I gave him his bearing.

The sight of his kissing Peggy had brought me to a decision. Peggy came into the galley only a moment after I got there and stood looking at me expressionlessly. “All right,” I said.

Her nostrils flared. “When?”

“Right now if you want.”

“How?”

“Why don’t you go out and suggest a swim before lunch? The water’s calm enough. I’ll do the rest.”

Without a word, she turned and left the galley. I waited a moment, then followed, pausing astern while she climbed to the pilothouse. A moment after she entered, Trader cut the engine, then they both emerged.

“Okay, Dan,” Peggy called. “You can throw out the sea anchor.”

I was already standing next to it. I tossed it over-board and let down the wooden-runged ladder strung with rope so that swimmers could more easily get back aboard ship. “Think I’ll have a dip with you,” I said. “I’ll put on my trunks.”

When I came back out on deck, Trader and Peggy were already in the water. Trader was floating on his back about four feet from the boat, his arms outstretched and his eyes closed. Peggy was treading water near the rope ladder. I motioned her aboard. Quietly, she climbed up on deck. Trader opened his eyes and looked up at her.

“Be right back, honey,” she said, and ran below.

Trader closed his eyes again.

It had been my intention to swim up behind him and give him a judo chop, but his outstretched position made him vulnerable to a safer form of attack. Taking a running jump, I launched myself feet first at his stomach, bringing my knees to my chest and snapping them straight again with terrific force just as I landed. The air whooshed out of him, and he was driven deeply under water in a doubled-up position.

I must have caught him in the solar plexus with one heel, temporarily paralyzing him, because when I reversed myself and dove after him to grab his shoulders and push him even deeper, he barely struggled. I forced him down and down until my own lungs were nearly bursting, then reversed again, got my feet against him, and gave a final shove which drove him deeper and shot me toward the surface.

I made it only a microsecond before I would have had to breathe in water myself. Starting under with no air in him, I was sure Trader couldn’t possibly survive. But when I recovered my breath and had climbed aboard, I crouched at the rail and studied the water for a good ten minutes just to make absolutely certain. Then I called Peggy from below.

When she came up, her face pale beneath its tan, I said tonelessly, “There’s been an accident. I think he had a cramp. I was on deck with my back turned and didn’t see him struggling until I happened to glance around. I tried to reach him, but he went under before I got there. I kept diving for nearly an hour in an attempt to spot him, but he must have sunk straight to the bottom. That’s my story for the record. Yours is simply that you were below when it happened.”

She stared at the gentle swell of water in fascination. “Will he come up?” she whispered.

“Eventually, if something doesn’t eat him first, which is more likely. Not for days, probably.”

She gave a little shudder. “Let’s get away from here.”

“We have to stick around for at least an hour,” I said. “I spent an hour futilely diving for him, remember? If we head straight on, somebody just might check to see when we left Southwest Point and when we arrived at Nassau. It would look fishy if there weren’t enough of a time gap to allow for our hour of waiting around.”

“Why say we waited an hour?” she asked. “We’d know after ten minutes he wasn’t coming up.”

“You’re a brand-new bride,” I said. “You wouldn’t give up hope after ten minutes. We’ll do it my way.”

“Do we have to kill the time right here?” she asked nervously. “There’s no mark on the water where he went clown. Run a few miles and throw out the sea anchor again.”

With a shrug, I hauled in the sea anchor, pulled up the rope-strung ladder, and went tops to start the engine. Peggy went along with me and stood right next to me, with our arms touching, as I drove the boat through the water at full throttle for about five miles. Then I reduced speed until we were barely making headway, scanned the horizon in all directions to make sure no other vessel was in sight, and finally cut the engine altogether. I went aft, tossed out the sea anchor, and lowered the ladder again, just in case another vessel came along during the next hour and I actually had to start diving.

Peggy followed me from the pilothouse. She emitted a deep breath of relief and threw herself into my arms, clinging shakily. We were only about two hours out of Nassau. We arrived about three-thirty p.m.

No one showed the slightest suspicion of our story. As Peggy had surmised, it didn’t even occur to the police that it might be a love-triangle murder when they learned she had been a bride for less than a week and she had never seen me until two days after her marriage. Their only reaction was sympathy.

Since we said we had waited in the area for a full hour after Trader went down, they didn’t even bother to send ships to look for the missing man. A couple of helicopters scanned the general area for a couple of days in the hope of spotting the floating body, but it was never spotted, and Arden Trader was finally listed as missing at sea, presumed dead.

Since Peggy’s secret marriage wasn’t revealed to the press until the drowning of the groom was simultaneously announced, both got wide news coverage. But again there wasn’t the slightest intimation that it could have been anything but a tragic accident.

Peggy owned a half-dozen villas in various parts of the world, and one of them was at San Juan. When the police at Nassau released us, we continued on to Puerto Rico, where the grieving widow went into seclusion. News reports said that the only people accompanying her to the villa were a female companion and her personal secretary, neither of whose names were reported.

The “female companion” was a middle-aged housekeeper who spoke nothing but Spanish. I, of course, was the personal secretary.

The villa had its own private beach, and we spent an idyllic two months on a sort of premarital honeymoon. Long before it was over, there was no question in my mind about being in love. The physical attraction was just as strong, but that wasn’t Peggy’s only attraction anymore. I was as ludicrously in love as the hero of some mid-Victorian love novel.

At the end of two months, Peggy thought it safe to emerge back into the world and for us to be quietly married. She had been in correspondence with one of her several lawyers meantime, and the day before the ceremony was to be performed, she presented me with a legal document to sign, a waiver of all rights to her estate except what she voluntarily left me in her will.

“You think I might murder you for your money?” I growled after examining it.

“It’s my lawyer’s idea,” she said apologetically. “While I’m not legally bound to follow my father’s re-quest, it was his expressed wish in his will that if I had no heirs, I leave most of my estate to set up a research foundation. If we have children, naturally the bulk of the estate will go to them, and of course I’ll see that you’re well taken care of. But just suppose I died the day after we married? I have no other living relatives, so you would inherit everything. Would it be fair for my father’s dream of a Matthews Foundation to go down the drain?”

“I’m not marrying you for your money,” I told her.

“If you died the day after we married, I’d probably kill myself, too. But it’s not worth arguing about.” I signed the document.

The ceremony was performed before a civil judge in San Juan, with our housekeeper and the court clerk as witnesses. Peggy wanted only a plain gold band, and it cost me only twenty-five dollars. The diamond she wore, I discovered, had not been given her by Arden Trader but had been her mother’s engagement ring. She said she preferred to continue to wear it instead of having me pick out another.

As in the case of her previous marriage, Peggy didn’t want the news released to the press until we had completed a honeymoon cruise so we wouldn’t be besieged by reporters at every port of call. I pointed out that she was too well known to escape all publicity, and unless she wanted to pretend deep gloom at each stop, people were bound to guess we were on a honeymoon. She said she didn’t plan to withhold the news from friends and acquaintances but was going to request them not to relay it to any reporters, so there was a good chance we could keep the secret from the general public until we completed the cruise.

“It won’t be a tragedy if reporters find out,” she said. “I just want a chance for us to be alone as long as possible.”

For our cruise we decided to complete the circuit of the Caribbean we had already started. This time there would be only two of us aboard, however.

We got as far as the island of Great Inagua when we ran over a floating log in the harbor, broke a propeller shaft, and lost the prop. The spare parts weren’t available anywhere on the island, but I knew I wouldn’t have any trouble finding them back at our previous stop, Port-de-Paix.

A packet ship plied every other day from Great Inagua to Haiti, then on to the Dominican Republic and finally to Puerto Rico. I checked the schedule and discovered that if I caught the one on Friday, I could catch the return ship from Port-de-Paix to Great Inagua on Saturday.

Peggy knew some people named Jordan on the small island where we were laid up, and as they were having a house party on Friday night, she decided not to accompany me.

I got back with the new propeller shaft and propeller about four o’clock Saturday afternoon. The private boat slips were only about fifty yards from the main dock, and I could see the Princess II as we pulled in. A slim feminine figure in a red bikini was on the bow waving to the ship. I doubted that she could make me out at that distance from among the other passengers lining the rail, but I waved back, anyway.

When I lugged my packages aboard the Princess II, Peggy was no longer on the bow. She was leaning back into the canvas back rest on one of the air-inflated mats on the afterdeck. A tanned and muscular young man of about twenty-five, wearing white swim trunks, was seated on the stern rail.

As I set down my packages, Peggy said, “Honey, this is Bob Colvin, one of Max and Susie Jordan’s house guests. My husband Dan, Bob.”

The young man rose, and we shook hands. He inquired how I was, and I said I was glad to meet him.

“Bob was planning to take the Monday packet ship up to Governor’s Harbor, then fly from there to Miami,” Peggy said. “I told him if he wasn’t in a hurry, he might as well leave with us tomorrow and sail all the way home. He can sleep in the pilothouse.”

Counting our two months in seclusion at San Juan, our honeymoon had now lasted long enough so that the urgency to be completely alone had abated somewhat for both of us. I don’t mean that my love for Peggy had abated. It was just that both of us were ready to emerge from our pink cloud back into the world of people. My only reaction was that it would be nice to have someone to spell me at the wheel from time to time.

“Sure,” I said, and knelt beside my wife to give her a kiss.

She kissed me soundly, then forced me to a seated position next to her and pressed my head onto her shoulder. Smiling down into my face, she began to stroke my hair.

With my face in its upturned position, I could look right over her shoulder into the shaving mirror attached to the timber alongside the hatch leading below. By pure accident it was slanted slightly downward to reflect the deck area immediately in front of the inflated mat.

In the mirror I could see Bob Colvin’s raised bare foot. Peggy’s bare toes were working lasciviously against his and along the sole of his foot.