stages projected out into the channel between Travemünde and a forested shore a. short distance away. Tweed pointed at the forest.
`And that will be Priwall Island.'
`I know. I came here once to interview Dr Berlin...'
`And the small car ferry takes no more than a few minutes to cross from here to Priwall...' Tweed hardly seemed to hear a word. Newman said. He was like a dog which has picked up the scent. `... When you leave the ferry you walk straight into the Mecklenburger-strasse. There are houses — including Berlin's mansion — on the right. They face the forest laced with a network of paths — the forest where that poor Swedish girl was found almost at the edge of the water. What was her name? Helena Andersen. That :was it. They say the murderer must have been disturbed. He was going to throw her into the channel — there was a trail of blood where he'd dragged her through the undergrowth.'
`How do you know all this?' Newman enquired. 'You couldn't pick that detail up from a map...'
He was watching a sleek white liner approaching from the Baltic. It cruised through the channel where there didn't seem to be room, blanking out the island briefly, but it made safe passage and sailed on towards the docks.
'A combination of listening to Diana,' Tweed said. 'Asking the odd question. Then linking up what she said with the map. Let's explore the marina so you can do your stuff.'
`And you seem to' know a lot more about the Helena Andersen killing,' Newman probed as they strolled through the crowds towards the marina.
`Kuhlmann phoned me while I was shaving before breakfast. He called from the local police station here. He'd been over every inch of the ground himself early this morning. Otto never sleeps as far as I can see. Here we are. After you...'
`Thanks a bundle.'
Newman surveyed the marina, the various craft moored hull to hull. You could step from one craft to another. He walked down a landing stage towards a large sloop, a sixty-footer, he estimated. A slim woman in her sixties sat in a captain's chair, a pair of rimless glasses perched on her nose as she sat reading a hardback. Gone With the Wind . This was probably a good place to start. She looked up as Newman approached, removed the glasses and laid the book in her lap.
Slim, she had dark hair, thick and silky, cut short, and aristocratic features. A handsome woman, there was a cynical twist to her mouth, an air of competence, increased when she spoke in an upper crust accent.
`Robert Newman? I am right? Recognize you from pictures in the papers. Welcome aboard. Take a pew. Your friend can come, too. Come to hear all the gory details? So you can write up a really lurid story? Blood on Priwall Island. There, I've given you your headline...'
`I might use it.' Newman settled himself in a canvas chair while Tweed lowered himself gingerly into its twin facing the waterfront. 'This is my friend, Tweed...'
`And I don't think you miss much either — not with those eyes.' She stared hard at Tweed who smiled faintly. 'Care for some coffee? Ben, the hired help, will provide...'
`Ben will provide coffee — but he's not the bloody hired help.'
A white-haired man with a weather-beaten face appeared at the top of a companionway. Six foot tall, he was thin and wiry and stooped in the way Newman had noticed tall sailors were apt to. Blue eyes studied the new arrivals above a great beak of a nose.
`Coffee for three?' Ben asked. 'Make up your minds, do... `Yes, please,' Tweed said promptly. 'No milk or sugar for either of us.'
`Black as sin? And there's plenty of that on Priwall.'
The head disappeared and Tweed slipped a Dramamine in his mouth. The damned boat wouldn't keep still, which made the mainland seem to move. The water was only choppy but he knew he'd feel queasy if he didn't take precautions.
`Sin on Priwall?' Tweed enquired.
`And walking over there along the waterfront,' the aristocratic woman commented.
Tweed had already seen Diana Chadwick
`And that will be Priwall Island.'
`I know. I came here once to interview Dr Berlin...'
`And the small car ferry takes no more than a few minutes to cross from here to Priwall...' Tweed hardly seemed to hear a word. Newman said. He was like a dog which has picked up the scent. `... When you leave the ferry you walk straight into the Mecklenburger-strasse. There are houses — including Berlin's mansion — on the right. They face the forest laced with a network of paths — the forest where that poor Swedish girl was found almost at the edge of the water. What was her name? Helena Andersen. That :was it. They say the murderer must have been disturbed. He was going to throw her into the channel — there was a trail of blood where he'd dragged her through the undergrowth.'
`How do you know all this?' Newman enquired. 'You couldn't pick that detail up from a map...'
He was watching a sleek white liner approaching from the Baltic. It cruised through the channel where there didn't seem to be room, blanking out the island briefly, but it made safe passage and sailed on towards the docks.
'A combination of listening to Diana,' Tweed said. 'Asking the odd question. Then linking up what she said with the map. Let's explore the marina so you can do your stuff.'
`And you seem to' know a lot more about the Helena Andersen killing,' Newman probed as they strolled through the crowds towards the marina.
`Kuhlmann phoned me while I was shaving before breakfast. He called from the local police station here. He'd been over every inch of the ground himself early this morning. Otto never sleeps as far as I can see. Here we are. After you...'
`Thanks a bundle.'
Newman surveyed the marina, the various craft moored hull to hull. You could step from one craft to another. He walked down a landing stage towards a large sloop, a sixty-footer, he estimated. A slim woman in her sixties sat in a captain's chair, a pair of rimless glasses perched on her nose as she sat reading a hardback. Gone With the Wind . This was probably a good place to start. She looked up as Newman approached, removed the glasses and laid the book in her lap.
Slim, she had dark hair, thick and silky, cut short, and aristocratic features. A handsome woman, there was a cynical twist to her mouth, an air of competence, increased when she spoke in an upper crust accent.
`Robert Newman? I am right? Recognize you from pictures in the papers. Welcome aboard. Take a pew. Your friend can come, too. Come to hear all the gory details? So you can write up a really lurid story? Blood on Priwall Island. There, I've given you your headline...'
`I might use it.' Newman settled himself in a canvas chair while Tweed lowered himself gingerly into its twin facing the waterfront. 'This is my friend, Tweed...'
`And I don't think you miss much either — not with those eyes.' She stared hard at Tweed who smiled faintly. 'Care for some coffee? Ben, the hired help, will provide...'
`Ben will provide coffee — but he's not the bloody hired help.'
A white-haired man with a weather-beaten face appeared at the top of a companionway. Six foot tall, he was thin and wiry and stooped in the way Newman had noticed tall sailors were apt to. Blue eyes studied the new arrivals above a great beak of a nose.
`Coffee for three?' Ben asked. 'Make up your minds, do... `Yes, please,' Tweed said promptly. 'No milk or sugar for either of us.'
`Black as sin? And there's plenty of that on Priwall.'
The head disappeared and Tweed slipped a Dramamine in his mouth. The damned boat wouldn't keep still, which made the mainland seem to move. The water was only choppy but he knew he'd feel queasy if he didn't take precautions.
`Sin on Priwall?' Tweed enquired.
`And walking over there along the waterfront,' the aristocratic woman commented.
Tweed had already seen Diana Chadwick
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