Herring on the Nile E-Book

L.C. Tyler

• Herausgeber: Allison & Busby
• Kategorie: Krimi
• Serie: The Herring Mysteries
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 341

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2015

Beschreibung

In an effort to rejuvenate his flagging career, crime novelist Ethelred Tressider decides to set his new book in Egypt and embarks on a 'research trip' with his literary agent, Elsie Thirkettle, in tow. No sooner has their cruise on the Nile begun, however, than an attempt is made on Ethelred's life. When the boat's engine explodes and a passenger is found bloodily murdered, suspicion falls on everyone aboard including a third-rate private eye, two individuals who may or may not be undercover police, and Ethelred himself. As the boat drifts out of control, though, it seems that events are being controlled by a party far more radical than anyone could have guessed. Herring on the Nile is an ingenious mystery, and a darkly funny tribute to Agatha Christie and the golden age of crime fiction.

Leseprobe

The Herring on the Nile

L. C. TYLER

To Will and to the MNWers, past, present and future

Contents

Title PageDedicationEpigraphCHAPTER ONECHAPTER TWOCHAPTER THREECHAPTER FOURCHAPTER FIVECHAPTER SIXCHAPTER SEVENCHAPTER EIGHTCHAPTER NINECHAPTER TENCHAPTER ELEVENCHAPTER TWELVECHAPTER THIRTEENCHAPTER FOURTEENCHAPTER FIFTEENCHAPTER SIXTEENCHAPTER SEVENTEENCHAPTER EIGHTEENCHAPTER NINETEENCHAPTER TWENTYCHAPTER TWENTY-ONECHAPTER TWENTY-TWOCHAPTER TWENTY-THREECHAPTER TWENTY-FOURCHAPTER TWENTY-FIVECHAPTER TWENTY-SIXCHAPTER TWENTY-SEVENCHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHTCHAPTER TWENTY-NINETHE ENDPOSTSCRIPTACKNOWLEDGEMENTSAbout the AuthorBy L. C. TylerCopyright

The Truth is rarely pure and never simple.

Oscar Wilde

CHAPTER ONE

Q: What’s the worst possible way to begin a detective novel?

A: Tedious scene-setting stuff. Explaining basic things for people who haven’t read the earlier books in the series.

Q: You write under several names, don’t you?

A: Yes, I write crime as Peter Fielding and J. R. Elliot. I also write romantic fiction as Amanda Collins. None of those is my real name.

Q: What would you see as the main influences on your writing style?

A: I’ve always admired the crime writers of the Golden Age – Christie and Sayers in particular. For some reason I never have got to grips with dear old Margery Allingham. She’s useful if you want to know how the English upper class in the 1950s thought the English working classes spoke – I mean, cawdblimeah, guv! – and she does quite a nice line in endearing cockneys, but I couldn’t recommend her otherwise.

Q: Our readers are always interested in how writers work. Describe the room you are writing in now.

A: I’m at work on the dining table of my flat. The table bears the remains of this morning’s breakfast. From where I’m sitting, I can just see out through the bow window and down to the village square below. The winter’s first flakes of snow have started to settle; but, here inside, my ancient radiator is pumping out heat. The room is not large, but it’s enough for me and for my books, which are pretty much everywhere. Occasionally books get mixed up with slices of toast, but that’s fine.

Q: What do you like most about Sunderland?

A: I’m sure it’s a very fine city, but I’ve never visited it.

Q: What is your favourite restaurant in Sunderland?

A: Sadly, I’ve never had the pleasure of dining in Sunderland.

Q: Where would you go for a great day out in Sunderland?

A:

‘The Elsie Thirkettle Literary Agency. How can I help you?’

‘Elsie,’ I said, clutching the phone in one hand and scrolling down the screen with the other. ‘Those interview questions you emailed me. Why are they asking me about Sunderland?’

‘Which interview is that, Ethelred?’

‘The Sunderland Herald, strangely. They seem to think I’m some sort of expert on eating out on Wearside. They want to know my favourite restaurant.’

‘Could be a trick question. Hold on while I Google it … no, there really are restaurants in Sunderland.’

‘Yes. What I meant was: Why are they asking me?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Yes, you do.’

‘Fair enough,’ said Elsie, who only lied properly to people she respected. ‘I thought they’d be more likely to run the interview if I told them you were a local lad. It’s only bending the truth a tiny bit, Ethelred. You are a local lad, just not local to Sunderland. What have you said so far?’

I read out my answers while Elsie made the disapproving noises that she has spent much of her life perfecting.

‘You can’t say that about Margery Allingham,’ said Elsie. ‘Unlike you, she has a lot of admirers out there. Your professed contempt for Allingham implies that anyone who enjoys her books won’t enjoy yours. So that’s a few thousand sales you’ve just thrown away quite unnecessarily. It’s much better, Ethelred, if people get to decide they don’t like you after they’ve paid for the book. Conversely, when you think about it, each writer you mention favourably is money in the bank. You can’t claim too many influences – drop in all the names you can. And don’t forget to plug the other writers at this agency and mention their books, because one day—’

‘Yes, yes, I do get the picture,’ I sighed. ‘So I like Margery Allingham, do I?’

‘You’ve adored Margery Allingham ever since you read The Tiger in the Smoke with a torch, under the bedclothes in the dorm.’

‘In which part of your imagination did I go to a boarding school? Was it in Sunderland, by the way?’

Elsie’s appreciation of irony is strictly limited to her own.

‘As a writer of crime fiction,’ she said, enunciating her words with more than usual care, ‘you should be able to manage the odd fib or two if it will boost sales. Saying-the-thing-that-is-not is your job. I’m only a literary agent. Do you hear me complaining about having to lie? I described you as a “much-respected author” the other day. I may have even called you a “bestselling author”. There are whole weeks, Ethelred, when I scarcely get to tell the truth from the moment I wake up to the moment I go to bed.’

‘Is that true?’

‘Don’t try to get clever with me, Ethelred.’

‘And the question about which football team I support?’ I asked, looking further down the list.

‘Wait, I’ll Google that one for you too.’ There was a pause and the sound of a biscuit being munched in far-away Hampstead. ‘OK … it looks as though Sunderland is up near Newcastle, so I’d tell them you support Newcastle United if I were you. That should go down well. How are the other interviews that I emailed to you? I promised we’d turn them round in a few days.’

‘We?’

‘You.’

‘I’ll try to finish them all in Egypt and email the answers back to you.’

‘Egypt? Who said you had permission to go to Egypt?’

‘I’m doing some research. I did tell you.’

‘Did you? Well, if you really must put pleasure before duty, at least take your laptop along to the pyramids.’

‘I shall most certainly have my computer with me. I said, “it’s research;” it’s not a holiday. I shall be working hard the whole time.’

‘I see – “research” is it?’ said Elsie.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘It’s research. But without the inverted commas you just put it into.’

‘Yeah, right.’

‘And not the pyramids either, as it happens. I’m going on a cruise down the Nile – or possibly up the Nile. I wasn’t paying much attention when I booked it. It’s the boat that is the great attraction.’

‘You’re travelling alone, I hope?’

‘I’m going with Annabelle,’ was treated to another outward and audible sign of Elsie’s disapproval.

‘She’s keeping a close eye on you, now you’re engaged.’

‘We’re not engaged,’ I said.

The resulting snort of derision was intended to convey a number of things to me:

1. I was, though perhaps not formally engaged, nevertheless subject in all respects to Annabelle’s whims.

2. Whether Annabelle and I became engaged would be a decision made solely by Annabelle, who would inform me when she considered the time was right.

3. I, uniquely amongst the male population of West Sussex, was incautious enough to have allowed such a situation to develop.

4. Annabelle was, contrary to anything I might have been told, not a natural blonde.

‘I wish you would try to like Annabelle,’ I said.

‘I like her as much as I need to.’

‘She says she likes you.’

‘She’ll be able to coach you in telling fibs then.’

‘I really wish—’

‘My boredom threshold is pretty low this morning, Ethelred. I’m putting the phone down before you mention that woman again. Have a nice day, now.’

‘—you’d try to get on with Annabelle.’

‘Piss off, Ethelred. It’s almost lunchtime and, if I’m going to sell your Latvian rights to Nordik, I’ll need to take this afternoon’s mendacity to previously unexplored levels.’

‘The Elsie Thirkettle Literary Agency. Ka es varu jums palidzet?’

‘It’s me, Elsie, not Nordik.’

‘Ethelred, I’ve been practising that for the past half hour. You’ve just made me waste my best attempt to ask a Latvian if I can help them. You are a total plonker. Go away.’

‘Sorry. Elsie, just a thought. You don’t fancy coming to Egypt, do you?’

‘No, Ethelred. My first rule in life is not to share a rusty old boat with gold-diggers sporting fake tits. I’ve stuck to it since I was a girl and it’s made me what I am today. You’d do well to try it yourself sometime. In the meantime, you and Annabelle have fun.’

‘Annabelle may not be coming.’

‘May not, in what sense?’

‘Isn’t.’

‘So – let’s pause for a moment and get this absolutely right – Annabelle isn’t coming and therefore, as a poor second choice, you’re now inviting me at a week’s notice? Thanks a bunch.’

‘Eight days’ notice.’

‘Eight days? Why didn’t you say so? That really does make all the difference.’

‘Does it?’

‘That was irony, Ethelred. Look it up in Fowler’s Modern English Usage. Now, as I may have observed before: Piss off.’

‘Sorry.’

‘Don’t keep saying “sorry”.’

‘Sor – I was offering to pay for the whole trip, of course …’

‘I’m busy,’ said Elsie. ‘I can scarcely drop the entire work of an important literary agency, like this one for example, and clear off up the Nile on some three-legged paddle steamer you’ve booked yourself on. You’ll have picked the oldest, slowest and most uncomfortable boat in Egypt as a matter of principle. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.’

‘The Khedive is actually quite well appointed,’ I said, ‘though it is a paddle steamer, of course.’

There was a pause in the conversation during which a literary agent in Hampstead wrestled with a minor problem that had nothing to do with her.

‘Why exactly has Annabelle dropped out?’ Elsie asked, shelving for one moment the work of an important literary agency.

‘She changed her mind.’

‘Why?’

‘She just did. Maybe she’d just had enough of my company for a while,’ I added, jokingly.

‘Fair enough. I can see that,’ said Elsie. ‘Even so, I don’t change my mind. And I never play second fiddle to women who don’t realise they are too old to wear short skirts. Check your contract – it’s in para 23.2.’

‘Sor—’ I said again.

‘Nothing would induce me to go on that boat, whatever it’s called.’

‘The Khedive,’ I sighed. ‘It’s called the Khedive.’

‘Ethelred Tressider speaking.’

‘Elsie here. I’ve just Googled this brilliant boat we’re going on. Have I explained Google, by the way? Somebody like you might think of it as this magic librarian that can tell you—’

‘Elsie, I use Google all the time. As far as Egypt is concerned, don’t worry. I’m not going now. I’m about to phone up and cancel the trip. I’ll set the next book in Pembrokeshire or somewhere instead. Pembrokeshire is quite interesting in late November.’

‘I don’t think so, Ethelred. Sadly, there’s no market for books about Pembrokeshire these days. More to the point, you didn’t tell me that the word “luxury” featured twenty-seven times in the description of the Khedive. There seem to be staff whose sole duty is to top up the ice in your drink. The general picture I’m getting here is the Ritz with a paddle attached to the back. This trip must cost a fortune.’

‘Possibly.’

‘You haven’t checked the cost down to the last penny? Does that mean you’ve finally sold the Big House?’

‘I’ve found a buyer for it and I think we’re about to exchange contracts. It has all happened a bit suddenly, but I really have to take any serious offer that comes along. Houses that size don’t sell easily at the moment and the running costs are hideous. The gardens alone require somebody full-time.’

I paused, aware that a simple ‘yes’ would have been a better answer if I wanted the whole thing to sound routine and uncontroversial. Mentioning the gardens was almost certainly a step too far. But I was perfectly entitled to sell the house if I chose, whatever Annabelle had said.

‘So, you’re back in your old flat?’ asked Elsie, pleased, it would seem, by all aspects of my answer. ‘On your own? No unnatural blondes?’

‘Wasn’t that clear from my interview answers?’

‘I thought that was just building up a background, creating a nice picture for the sort of readers you have – lonely, bored, a bit insecure, semi-literate.’

‘No, Elsie, it was the truth. I never really moved out of the old flat. Technically, the house has been mine only since probate was granted. Annabelle had every right to remain there in the meantime.’

I was doing it again. I had to stop sounding defensive all the time.

‘And now?’ asked Elsie.

‘We’ll have to work something out,’ I said, summarising in six words a discussion with Annabelle that had occupied most of the previous evening plus a short and abruptly terminated phone call this morning. ‘But, to answer your question, yes, the house is as good as sold and money isn’t so much of an issue now.’

‘Even so, I wouldn’t want you to lose your deposit on the trip.’

‘That’s kind of you, but it’s not your problem.’

‘Ethelred – my authors’ problems are my problems, you know that. Do I get a really enormous cabin? On the top deck?’

‘The boat was pretty empty. I’m sure that could have been arranged – but you don’t want to go.’

There was a crunching noise in Hampstead as somebody ate another restorative chocolate digestive. In the background I thought I heard an empty packet hit the wastepaper bin.

‘You deserve a holiday, Ethelred. I should hate to see you cancel just because I wasn’t there for you. I like to support my authors every way possible. Are we flying first class?’

‘The quickest way of getting there is a charter flight straight to Luxor from Gatwick. And it’s research, not a holiday.’

This time, I noticed, she didn’t say ‘yeah, right’. Elsie did not take unnecessary risks.

‘I’ll put up with a charter flight if I have to,’ she said. I couldn’t see her at the other end of the phone line, of course; but I knew that, just as soon as she had finished her biscuit, her expression would be one of noble self-sacrifice, probably modelled on the statue of Nurse Edith Cavell outside the National Portrait Gallery.

Five minutes later I was ringing the travel agent to say that I would now be accompanied by Ms Elsie Thirkettle rather than by Lady (Annabelle) Muntham, and that a cabin on the top deck would most certainly be required. As I paid the additional charges I felt a momentary pang of guilt that I was, in a sense, spending Annabelle’s money.

But it had – I reminded myself – been Annabelle’s decision not to come. Even she, surely, would have conceded that much? And, had I been able to see into the future as I read out the three numbers printed on the back of my card, I might have felt that she had made a very wise decision indeed. But of course, you never do see into the future. If I’d noticed any references in the tour brochure to a dead body floating in the Nile or to the cold barrel of a gun pointing at a spot precisely midway between my eyes, I might have decided South Wales in a blizzard was in fact the much better option. But perhaps they’d hidden that sort of stuff in the small print, along with the fuel surcharges. They often do, I find.

CHAPTER TWO

Q: Our readers are always interested in how authors work. Describe the room you are writing in now.

A: Actually I am on a plane. It’s quite crowded, and I think only one toilet is still working. Otherwise it’s fine. My computer is balanced on top of an unopened meal that I didn’t ask for. It has ‘CHK’ written on the lid. It’s chicken I think.

Q: Which crime writers do you most admire?

A: I’ve always admired the crime writers of the Golden Age – Christie and Sayers, of course, but especially the inimitable Margery Allingham, whose work I first read by the light of a torch under the bedclothes at my boarding school in Sunderland. She had an ear for the speech of the ordinary working man. Of the present-day writers, I enjoy Colin Dexter, Ian Rankin, Val McDermid, Donald Westlake, Martin Edwards, Sue Grafton, Simon Brett, M. C. Beaton, C. J. Sansom, Chris Ewan, Henning Mankell, Hakan Nesser, P. D. James, Kate Atkinson, Brian McGilloway, Colin Bateman, Peter James, James McCreet, Colin Cotterill, N. J. Cooper, Louise Penny, Mike Ripley, Laura Wilson, R. J. Ellory and Malcolm Pryce. My work is strongly influenced by all of them in approximately equal measure.

Q: What is your writing schedule like?

A: I tend to be very organised. I like to write at least a thousand words a day – including when I am travelling. I always take my laptop with me, even on holiday (though this trip is research, obviously).

Q: Where would you go to boogie in Dunstable?

A:

‘Elsie,’ I said. ‘Though I fear I may already know the answer to this question, why do they think I know anything about partying in Dunstable?’

The plump, slumbering figure in the seat beside mine stirred and opened one eye.

‘Are we there yet?’ It is a common misconception amongst those who doze off in a public place that nobody else has noticed. Elsie was now trying unsuccessfully to sell me the idea that she had been alert since take-off and, for all I knew, that it was normal to snore when wide awake. She was also, when she noticed it, going to have big problems explaining the dribble.

‘We’re somewhere over Italy, I think. I’m working on the next interview. A paper in Dunstable this time. I don’t know what you told them, but I can’t have grown up there and in Sunderland.’

‘I may have said that you had an elderly aunt living there or something.’

‘Who boogies on a regular basis?’

Elsie’s expression quickly squashed any idea I might have had that I was qualified to mock other people’s boogying. ‘Maybe the aunt was in Salford,’ she said dismissively. She leant back and closed her eyes again. ‘Just say something vague about the exciting buzz there is in Dunstable these days.’

‘Nobody’s going to believe that.’

‘They will in Dunstable. They don’t get out much.’

‘Maybe I’ll just skip that question,’ I said.

Elsie yawned and stretched. The lack of legroom on the charter flight was not a problem for anyone her size. My own joints, conversely, were beginning to ache from being forced into unnatural positions. I checked my watch again.

‘Remind me – why exactly did Annabelle decide not to come?’ asked Elsie, suddenly opening her eyes.

‘She just changed her mind,’ I said. I thought we’d dealt with that question already and my answer was true – well, after a fashion. And, if I had missed one or two small details, why should I be completely candid with Elsie, who regarded honesty much as she would an expensive pair of shoes: something to be cherished, admired even, but to be used only occasionally and not without some discomfort.

‘Isn’t she going to get jealous if you go off with some other woman?’

‘But I’m going with you,’ I said, laughing. ‘Yes, fair enough, you are a woman, but Annabelle’s hardly going to get jealous … I obviously don’t mean that you are unattractive in any way, only that you and I … Of course, I wouldn’t wish to imply that …’

‘Shall I stop you there?’ asked Elsie. ‘Or do you think you can dig yourself in any deeper?’

‘You’re my agent,’ I pointed out. ‘It’s a purely professional relationship.’

‘With a one-month notice period.’

‘Your joining me in Egypt does not affect my relationship with Annabelle in any way at all.’

‘You are choosing your words very carefully, Ethelred. What does affect your relationship with Annabelle? The sale of Muntham Court? You can tell me. If she’s given you the push because you’ve sold the ancestral home that she was hoping to live in for the rest of her days, then I may be forced to order champagne at your expense, but there is no other downside that I can see to your admitting you’ve been dumped.’

‘She just didn’t want to come to Egypt,’ I said. ‘And it’s not an ancestral home – hers or mine.’ Was that another point I’d made to Annabelle? It sounded familiar.

‘Fine – just so long as she doesn’t book herself a cabin at the last minute and join us on the Khedive,’ said Elsie.

‘That’s very unlikely, though there are plenty of spare cabins apparently. It’s a quiet time of year.’

‘Suits me if it is a bit quiet. I too have work to be getting on with once we are back in touch with the world.’

Elsie produced a flashy mobile phone and would, no doubt, have explained in some detail how it worked, had I not produced the identical model from my jacket.

‘Snap,’ I said. ‘I’ve got the same one.’

She took my phone dubiously, and then held hers and mine side by side, trying to identify any minute differences in functionality that would make hers cooler. There were clearly fewer than she had hoped.

‘I bet I’ve got more apps,’ she concluded lamely.

‘We’re just passing over Naples,’ I said, unscrewing the top of the small bottle of wine that had accompanied the unrequested CHK.

‘Don’t change the subject,’ said Elsie. ‘My phone is cool. Your phone sucks.’

She took a paperback out of the seat pocket in front of her – Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile.

‘I didn’t know you were a Christie fan,’ I said.

‘It’s rubbish basically,’ said Elsie, though this was her default position on any work of literature that was not actually under contract to her.

‘It’s generally reckoned to be one of her best,’ I said.

‘So, how likely is it that you’ll get a bunch of murderers, spies, writers and other disreputable people on board one small boat? And, if you did, why would you choose to shoot somebody in a place you couldn’t make a decent getaway from? The problem with a small boat is that almost every move you make is observed by somebody else.’

‘But the killer’s movements are observed – that’s why they have to kill again.’

‘Precisely – it’s a crap way to carry out a murder. The whole plot is too complicated. You shouldn’t mix detectives and spies – they’re different genres. And the incident with the boulder seems a complete red herring, which is just brushed away at the end.’

‘Well, that’s what you get in detective stories. Lots of red herrings – even on the Nile.’ I smiled to show that I knew that herrings are limited to the temperate waters of the North Atlantic and North Pacific.

‘You get crocodiles in the Nile,’ said Elsie.

‘Not below the Aswan Dam,’ I said. ‘Not any more.’

‘Just get on with the interview questions, Tressider. You’re starting to get pedantic and irritating. And lay off the duty-free wine – it just makes you maudlin and pessimistic, which is even worse.’

‘No, it doesn’t. And I’m not pedantic.’

‘Yes, it does. And being pedantic is like snoring – the person who is doing it can’t tell. Right now I need you upbeat and positive for those interviews. Screw that top back on. You can wake me when we’re in Luxor, so I can look at the nice crocodiles. And not a moment before.’

Elsie’s snores recommenced, proving at least one of her points was true. As a preliminary to disproving her other points, I poured my wine and watched it splash, warm and red, into the cheap plastic cup. I took a sip or two and reflected on Life. It seemed OK. Not fantastic, but as good as it was ever likely to get. I took another few sips, then swallowed the rest of the wine in a single gulp. I reached decisively for my computer and began to type again.

CHAPTER THREE

Q: Many of the readers of our magazine are budding authors. There are so many genres to explore. What started you writing crime novels?

A: I wish I could remember. There must have been a point at which I thought it would be fun.

Q: You write under several names. Why is this?

A: See above. Like so many things, it just seemed a good idea at the time. As Peter Fielding I write the Sergeant Fairfax books. I also write historical crime as J. R. Elliot and romantic fiction under yet another name. Occasionally people confuse me with Paul Fielder – the former secret service man who writes thrillers – but he’s obviously a lot better known than I am.

Q: What books are currently on your bedside table?

A: It’s funny you should ask that. I did take a glance at my bedside table before I left home. There’s quite a stack of them. Some are books that I feel I ought to read because everyone else is reading them, though deep down I despise both the books and the people who read them. There are also the books I’ve started reading but never got round to finishing – A l’ombre des jeunes filles en fleurs to name just one, though technically it is currently under rather than on the bedside table. And there are a number of copies of History Today in which I have vainly sought inspiration. My bedside table is, when you think about it, an allegory of blighted hope. Sometimes I simply want to weep.

Q: Great! Have you started writing another book? Is it a sequel to the one being published now?

A: I’m doing research for a new historical series – set in Egypt. Crime writers have to produce series. There’s no escape. Do you know – all I wanted was to write one great work of literary fiction. Just one. Was that really too much to ask?

Q: Which contemporary writer do you think peoplewill still be reading in a hundred years’ time?

A: Dan Brown. I bought The Da Vinci Code last year and I’m still only on page seven.

Q: And finally, what advice would you have for anyone wanting to write fiction themselves?

A: Write it by all means, but do not expect it will make you rich or especially happy – and above all, do not expect that it will make you more attractive to the opposite sex or you will be very disappointed indeed. On the plus side, you don’t need to buy many ties.

Q: I’m sure all budding authors will find that tremendously encouraging. Thank you, Paul Fielder!

‘Are we there yet?’

‘We are flying down, or possibly up, the Nile. Up, I guess, since it flows from south to north and we are flying almost exactly due south.’

‘Have you finished those interview questions?’ asked Elsie, looking suspiciously at the two empty wine bottles.

‘Three sets so far.’

‘I hope you’re being cheerful and upbeat?’

‘Of course.’

‘You’re not being cynical and tedious?’

‘No.’

‘You’re not going on and on about wanting to write great literary fiction?’

‘I just ask one very short question about it.’

‘And you are being very complimentary about other writers?’

‘Yes. I even gave a plug to Dan Brown.’

‘There’s a good boy.’

‘I thought we had the boat to ourselves,’ said Elsie, as we joined a small queue to be allocated our cabins. ‘I hope I am not going to be made to share my ice waiter with somebody else?’

‘Evidently there were some last-minute bookings,’ I said.

Ahead of us a middle-aged lady, who had clearly arrived a short while before, was returning a key to the desk. She was wearing the practical, loose, dust-coloured dress of the habitual traveller, and a hat with a large floppy brim covered much of her greying hair. Her wrist carried several substantial silver bracelets, bought quite possibly in the suq in Luxor that morning. They clinked happily as she handed over the key.

‘Thank you,’ she said in the clear precise way the English speak to foreigners, as an alternative to learning their language. ‘I thought an upper cabin would be better, but on reflection I am very pleased with the one originally allocated to me. The other cabin is too close to the dining room. Tell the porter that my cases may remain where they are. I have locked the cabin door.’

It was not unlike listening to a passage from a phrase book in which a number of eventualities for booking a cabin are envisaged and set down for the traveller to use as necessary. For a moment I thought she might go on to ask for a telegram to be sent to her head office in Oldham about a shipment of cotton samples, or whatever scenario the book’s author had next seen fit to cover. But she simply nodded once and smiled. The purser returned her smile weakly and dropped the key into a wooden box beside him without a further glance at it. The lady however showed no sign of being in a hurry to return to her original cabin. She was on holiday and had plenty of time to display old-world good manners, no matter how much inconvenience and irritation it might cause.

‘It was however very kind of you. I appreciate your allowing me to inspect it,’ she continued, as though she had just remembered a further optional piece of dialogue, illustrative of the gerund.

The phrase book should, undoubtedly, have had the purser reply that he was honoured and delighted to have been of service, but he seemed not to have read that section. The lady, therefore, received another weak smile in return. The queue of passengers, including one literary agent who had hoped to have the boat largely to herself, was growing impatient.

‘Thank you for locking the cabin and returning the key,’ said the purser. ‘Perhaps, madam, you would now permit me to check in the other guests?’

‘But of course,’ she said, turning to the rest of us in the most leisurely manner I could recall ever having seen. ‘I do apologise for having delayed you all. It is very rude of me. I shall not hold you up for another second.’

For a moment I could have sworn she was about to drop a curtsey, but then she turned sharply and swept away towards the lower deck.

‘Next,’ said the purser, raising his eyebrows in rather unprofessional mock despair.

‘Professor Campion,’ snapped a tall, bald man who had managed to position himself at the front of the queue by means of a rapid exit from the coach and an agile pair of elbows. He slapped his ticket on the desk. He clearly resented having been made to wait and resented it even more when, in spite of being a professor, he was asked for his passport, the search for which encompassed his jacket, his rucksack and finally (with much greater success) the back pocket of his trousers. He fiddled with a pair of reading glasses while his documents were being checked and his key located, though in the end he found nothing to read with them and finally made great play of folding the glasses away again into a small tubular case. He did this slowly and precisely. It was as if delaying the rest of us somehow evened up the score with the lady with the floppy hat. He too disappeared, but towards the upper deck, following a porter who had swooped lightly onto his small suitcase.

‘I’m Sky Benson. I think you’ll find I have a lower-deck cabin.’ The next passenger was a young woman whom, had I been looking for a quiet, efficient secretary, I might have shortlisted on the spot. She was quite pretty, but her lack of make-up was so conspicuous as to amount to a statement of intent. She had on a fairly simple necklace of blue stones and what seemed to be a matching bangle. Propped coquettishly on her small nose was a pair of surprisingly heavy and old-fashioned glasses – surprising because the lenses did not appear to be very strong, and she might have disposed of them completely had she been at all concerned about her appearance. The spectacles too seemed a statement of some kind – a suitable accompaniment to the plain skirt, high-necked blouse and the absence of make-up. It struck me that sometimes the ultimate vanity is a desire not to appear vain.

She retrieved her ticket and passport from a well-organised plastic folder, then chatted inconsequentially to the purser as he ticked her name off the list. She appeared slightly tense and awkward, and kept looking over her shoulder as if she feared additional passengers might join the queue and delay us further. Once or twice she gave a short nervous laugh in response to her own jokes. Perhaps it was being in a strange country or perhaps she was always like that. Doubtless I would find out in due course, as all of the passengers would in due course find out about each other. For the moment we were still a collection of strangers, eyeing each other with varying degrees of trepidation and disdain.

Eventually a porter was summoned and Miss Benson too was dispatched on her way.

Another young woman travelling alone was quickly dealt with. She gave her name as Lizzi Hull, tipping her peaked cap back on her head as she said it. While her booking was checked, she rolled up her sleeves, revealing a fashionable selection of tattoos. She must have noticed me looking at them, because she gave me a quick wink before turning back to the purser.

‘Shukran,’ she said, as she pocketed the key. She declined any assistance with her rucksack, which she hoisted onto a shoulder before striding off towards her cabin.

Two Americans in their mid-twenties were now all that separated us from our own keys.

‘I wonder why they were pretending not to know each other,’ said Elsie.

‘Who?’

‘Professor Campion and Miss Benson. They were sitting together on the plane, but pointedly took seats at opposite ends of the coach for the drive from the airport. They didn’t exchange a single word here on the boat – not even to say what a pain the floppy-hat bitch was being in the queue.’

‘Maybe they’d said everything they had to say to each other on the plane,’ I suggested. ‘They didn’t look as if they had much in common.’

‘I’m surprised she could afford a trip like this, if her cheap jewellery is anything to go by.’

‘Was it cheap?’

‘Oh yes. New but very disposable. I wouldn’t go to her hairdresser either.’

‘No?’

‘You might, but I wouldn’t.’

‘Maybe she inherited some money recently. It happens.’

‘Yes, but the first thing you do if you inherit money is go out and have your hair done and buy the most expensive shoes you can find.’

‘Not a rich heiress then?’

‘She doesn’t really fit in at all. Think about it – Campion and the floppy-hat lady, both spending their early-retirement lump sums by the look of them. And then the two American boys …’ They had fortunately also moved on, though their presence would probably not have prevented Elsie from continuing as she did. ‘East coast old money. Ivy League. Probably both taking a year out between graduate school and joining Goldman Sachs.’ It seemed quite possible – or, at least, no more unlikely than any other scenario. They had the perfect teeth and untroubled countenances that only the very best sort of money buys.

‘And the young lady with the tattoos?’

‘Bristol or Durham history of art graduate on a gap year. Decorating her arms in a way that she hopes will gladden the hearts of her parents on her return to Guildford.’

What Elsie’s snap judgements lacked in accuracy, they invariably made up in detail.

‘So there are eight passengers on the boat?’ I said to the purser, as much to make conversation as anything.

‘There are thirteen,’ he said, checking the list. ‘No, twelve. We had thirteen bookings but the final number is confirmed as twelve. In addition to Miss Watson and the seven of you who have just arrived, there are also two gentlemen sharing a cabin on the lower deck and two gentlemen in single cabins. They are already here. So, once we have everyone accommodated to their entire satisfaction, I shall inform Captain Bashir that he may set sail for Esna.’

I was handed my key and Elsie hers. The box with the remaining keys in it was shut with a flourish and the box itself was then locked away. I too might have swung my small bag over my shoulder and set off unaided, but the purser had no intention of allowing such a breach in etiquette to occur twice on his watch. I accordingly followed my uniformed porter to the upper deck, where my cabin had been eagerly awaiting me for some hours.

My luggage took only a short time to unpack, unlike Elsie’s large suitcase, the contents of which seemed designed to cater not only for all social occasions but also for extreme and as yet unpredicted climate change. I was therefore alone on the sun deck of the boat, watching the deceptively clear waters of the Nile oozing by, when I spotted a familiar face on the far side of the boat. Even at a distance the crookedness of his teeth was all too apparent as he broke into an insincere smile. In return I nodded as briefly as politeness allowed, but that was not enough to discourage him from ambling slowly in my direction. It was rather as if the Nile had just spewed up a surplus crocodile onto the deck – a rather scrawny crocodile in bright pink Bermudas, but authentically scaly. I suppose I knew deep down that I would run into Herbie Proctor again one of these days – I’d just hoped it would be later rather than sooner. I know very few private detectives – too few certainly to be able to say whether duplicity, parsimony and an ingratiating manner are essential qualities for a good private eye. Not that Proctor had ever, to my knowledge, been a good private eye.

‘Ethelred! I thought I’d probably find you here – out in the midday sun.’

‘Indeed,’ I said, ignoring his outstretched hand.

‘As in “mad dogs and Englishmen”,’ he added. His grin served only as an unfortunate reminder of some cheap dental work.

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I did get the allusion.’

‘One of Flanders and Swann’s,’ said Proctor, with more confidence than accuracy. ‘Well, we’re two mad dogs out here together, eh, Ethelred? What were the chances of our turning up in the same joint again?’

‘Greater than I had hoped, clearly. What exactly brings you here, Mr Proctor?’ I asked. ‘Isn’t this a little expensive for your tastes?’

‘Not quite my usual holiday destination,’ he said. Herbie Proctor had the ability to make most things sound disparaging, though he rarely had the chance to dismiss an entire civilisation in six words. He scanned the far bank of the river and was not impressed. ‘Load of smashed-up old stones in the desert. Great blocks of useless masonry.’

I wondered whether to quote ‘Ozymandias’ to him, but decided not to waste my time. Proctor had in any case now taken out a very old mobile phone and was playing around with it unhappily.

‘Can’t seem to get a connection,’ he said.

‘The older ones don’t always work overseas,’ I said, surprised to be ahead, for once, of anyone on technical matters. ‘Or not outside Europe at least.’

‘Don’t they?’ asked Proctor, looking rather mournfully at the unresponsive device in his hand.

‘Are you expecting somebody to contact you?’

‘It’s not important,’ said Proctor, replacing the phone in his pocket, where it made an impressive bulge.

‘I take it that this is a working visit?’ I asked.

He gave me a conspiratorial wink, then looked around theatrically before whispering: ‘Very perspicacious as ever, Ethelred. I do have a little job on, as it happens. Maybe you can help me. Can I talk to you in confidence?’

‘That depends entirely on what you have to say.’

‘I’m here to prevent a murder, Ethelred.’

‘That’s very decent of you.’

‘Yes, isn’t it? My client has been kindly alerted to the fact that somebody wants to kill him. He thinks that the person threatening him may be on board this boat.’

‘Then he would do well to move to another boat entirely. That would leave you free to do the same.’

Proctor eyed me, an irritating smile on his lips.

‘My client doesn’t frighten easy, Ethelred. A bit like me,