Death on Tour - Janice Hamrick [91]
The Petersons, with their two teenage sons, were already in their seats midway down the aisle. I considered and dismissed them. They were excited, happy, and just so normal. Besides, I liked the boys, and their parents had their hands full just trying to keep up with their kids. No time for smuggling.
Dawn and Keith Kim climbed up next. Keith was busy with his digital camera, trying to reattach the huge lens as he followed his wife down the aisle. She glanced over her shoulder at him, half exasperated, half amused. I wouldn’t give very good odds on their marriage lasting, but they seemed like ordinary tourists, just along for the ride.
Jerry and Kathy Morrison followed. Kathy looked like a jackal about to bite the head off a meerkat, and Jerry’s expression was sour. Maybe he was the meerkat. She was still limping a little from her fall at Abu Simbel, and I noticed she now wore a pair of flat espadrilles below her ACE bandage. They sat in the seat right behind Anni’s, taking advantage of injury to claim a front seat even when it wasn’t their turn. None of us would have begrudged it or even given it a second thought if Jerry hadn’t pounced on it with a smug proprietary air as though daring one of us to challenge him.
The Carpenters followed, Lydia, then Jane, then Ben. They moved quickly to the very back seat, which stretched across the aisle so that all three of them could sit side by side. Jane looked pinched and, well … frightened. And the way Lydia and Ben always flanked her like bodyguards seemed strange. Were they being supportive or were they actually protecting her? And from what? If she was really just their niece from Australia, then their behavior made no sense. On the other hand, if she was an impostor on the run from the Egyptian authorities, then their actions made sense, but hardly explained who she was and why they were helping her. The fact that Ben and Lydia were so nice and so ordinary made it that much harder to believe that anything criminal was going on.
DJ and Nimmi boarded next, DJ in full flow about the wonders that Nimmi could expect to see at Karnak. To give her credit, Nimmi was responding enthusiastically. In fact, I had never seen her respond to her big husband with less than amused affection. I thought about her shoplifting attempt in the ship’s gift shop and of his constant haggling and buying sprees. Was Kyla right? Was there more to it than just exuberant fun? How easy would it be to hide a real antiquity inside a suitcase full of plaster junk? Their kindness and generosity did not necessarily preclude a little smuggling on the side. But violence and murder? I didn’t think so.
As usual, Fiona and Flora arrived late and last. Mohammad had to help Flora up the stairs, although Fiona jerked away from him and refused his assistance. She looked as though she’d like to spit on his feet, and I wondered how he’d offended her. We were all tired after seven days of constant sightseeing, but the fatigue of travel had really caught up with the poor ditz duo. Flora’s polyester shirt was right-side out for a change, but she’d misaligned the buttons and one hem hung lower than the other. She had an odd manic gleam in her eyes behind the Coke-bottle glasses, and she was muttering to herself under her breath as she tottered down the aisle. On the other hand, she seemed cheerful about it. Fiona seemed less senile, but her black wispy hair stood at all angles as though she’d been pulling on it, and she seemed more stooped and beaten than I’d seen her before. It couldn’t be easy trying to keep her sister in line, I thought, feeling suddenly sympathetic. Looking at her, I imagined that she must have been tall and athletic in her youth. Actually, both of them must have been. Contrary to first impressions, they were not