Gregory, faintly red of eye and uneasy of manner, said, “Let’s have ’em. I’ll present my bill for expert advice later.” He was obviously keeping it light.
Leroy said, “First problem: I want to show some color slides in my cabin. May I borrow your movie screen?”
Gregory shook his head regretfully. “I’m sorry, but it’s broken, Mr. Leroy. Fell over during the rough seas last night and got a tear in it.”
“Oh? A bad one?”
“Pretty bad. Too big a tear to be of much use, I’m afraid. Look, I’ll show you.” Gregory stooped and pulled a rolled-up screen from under the bunk. “I had it set up in here last night to run through a few of my own slides,” he explained, “and a big wave tipped it over.” He pulled the screen out of its cylindrical metal housing. “See?”
There was a long rough-edged slit near the center of the unrolled screen.
Leroy said, “Some of the reflective coating has even been knocked off.” He pointed to the tear in the screen. “See that smooth spot?” He stood up as though to leave. “Well, thanks anyway, Greg.”
“Wait a minute, Mart,” said Danforth. “I want to ask about that picture.”
Leroy sat down again. Gregory moved his feet restlessly on the carpet. “What picture?” Gregory inquired.
Danforth said, “I want to order a print of picture number 432, Greg. From the prom deck bulletin board.”
With a brusque movement Gregory pushed himself away from the door against which he was leaning. His ruddy face lost some of its color. With a visible effort he said, “What number was that, Mr. Danforth?”
“432.”
“432? What do you want with that one? My whole 430 series just shows the Borneo blowgun man with various passengers, that’s all. You weren’t in any of them.”
Danforth said slowly, “I want a picture of Calvin Speaker, Greg. He was a very nice chap, we all thought.” Very slightly he emphasized the past tense.
Gregory slumped against the door bonelessly and closed his eyes for a moment. Leroy and Danforth watched him in silence. At length the photographer said, “I should have had better sense. When I saw you two at the door I had a feeling you knew. But damn it, I didn’t kill him!”
“Didn’t you?” Leroy asked softly.
“No! But who’ll believe me?”
“Maybe we will. Why’d you fake the accident if you didn’t kill him — the falling-down-the-stairs bit?”
Gregory licked his lips. “Why? Isn’t it obvious? What do you think my job on this ship would be worth if I naively reported to the Captain that one of his passengers was lying dead of a fractured skull on the floor of my cabin? I’d be blacklisted forever as a ship’s photographer, even if they didn’t charge me with murder, for God’s sake! Don’t you realize that on a cruise the passenger is always right, the staff member never?” He rubbed a hand over his eyes, a gesture that emphasized his youth and vulnerability, “How’d you find out about the screen and picture number 432?”
Danforth told him. At the end Gregory said. “It would be my luck that you found the body. You, of all people. A detective-story writer, for God’s sake!”
Danforth said grimly, “If you didn’t kill Speaker, who did?”
“He killed himself, you might say.” Gregory told the story in a monotone. At midnight the previous night, needing fresh film to photograph a birthday party in the bar, he had returned to his cabin and met Speaker just leaving it with one of Gregory’s negatives in his hand. Quite naturally Gregory asked him what the hell he was doing in his cabin, meanwhile snatching the negative from him, pushing him back into the cabin, and closing the door.
Speaker had tried to apologize. Then, getting no encouragement from Gregory, he had surprisingly tried to buy the negative, offering Gregory one hundred dollars for it. This sum was so large that suspicion was immediately added to Gregory’s anger, and he refused to sell. Whereupon Speaker, in a sudden fury, lunged across the narrow stateroom, intent, Gregory thought, on taking the negative from Gregory by force. His movement happened to coincide with a violent lurch of the ship in the heavy seas that were running, with the result that he was catapulted across the room, his head striking first against the movie screen erected at the foot of Gregory’s bunk, and then, with sickening force, against the edge of the bunk.
“That’s the God’s truth,” Gregory finished. “So help me. Do you believe me?”
Danforth answered obliquely. “Why’d you wait until dawn to dump him at the foot of the steps? His dinner jacket was what made me suspicious in the first place.”
“Oh, lord!” Gregory said, stricken. “I never thought of the dinner jacket! The night steward was polishing passengers’ shoes across from my door nearly all night long. I couldn’t carry Speaker’s body out of here until the steward went away.”
“Where’s the negative that Speaker was so anxious to get hold of?” Leroy asked. “Picture number 432, I suppose?”
“Yeah. Here it is.” The photographer reached into a file beside the door. “Along with a print I made of it while I was waiting for the steward to leave last night. I thought it might explain Speaker’s interest in it, but it’s not much help. Just shows Speaker with the Borneo blowgun man.”
Danforth stood up. “Let us have it for a while, will you?”
“Sure, take it.” Gregory handed the print to Leroy. “You going to report me to the Captain? I suppose you have to.”
“Not right away,” Leroy answered after a glance at Danforth. “What do you say, King? Speaker’s dead. And Greg can’t go anywhere till we get to our next port, anyway. Personally I’m inclined to believe him about Speaker’s death.”
With Gregory’s thanks echoing in their ears they went to their deck chairs on the lee side of the boat deck. Here, while Danforth told the girls about their talk with Gregory, Leroy studied Gregory’s candid picture of Calvin Speaker and the naked blowgun marksman.
When Danforth finished his account he turned to his partner. “Does the photo give us anything?”
Leroy handed the print to Carol. “Just another tourist picture. Calvin Speaker buying one of those blowguns from the Murut.”
Carol looked at the picture, passed it on to Helen. After a moment Helen said, “Speaker isn’t looking at the Murut or his blowgun, really. He’s looking over his shoulder, as if to see whether or not anyone’s watching him.”
“And smoothing back his hair with one hand,” Danforth added.
“He looks sort of uneasy to me,” Carol remarked.
“Why, for Pete’s sake, would he be uneasy?” Danforth asked. “Buying a blowgun from a native isn’t that shameful.”
“The native is naked,” pointed out Carol primly.
“Let me have a look,” Danforth said. He took the print from Helen. After examining it he said, “Speaker not only looks uneasy he looks different somehow.”
“Different?” asked Leroy.
“Yeah. Different from the way he looked this morning when I found him at the foot of the steps.”
“He was dead this morning,” Carol reminded him. “And he was alive in that picture. There’s a pretty big difference, if you ask me.”
“I don’t mean that. I mean Speaker’s appearance is different in this picture.”
“Let me have another look,” Helen said. “I’m the only one of us who seems to have noticed poor Mr. Speaker before today.”
Danforth handed her the photograph. She looked at it in silence. Then she turned to Danforth. “His forehead is too high,” she said.
Danforth snatched the picture. “That’s it — that’s what’s different. A higher forehead. His face seems too thin and long between those sideburns.”