“Does your analysis of the records confirm what we were told Scriptor?”

“Yes my Lord, as far as possible. There is no central security system, and the locks do not record when they were used. The billing record do show a charge for Ouzo on the first two nights. There is very little other information.”

“These petty cases of passion are such a waste of time and lives,” said the Inquisitor, partly to himself, partly to Scriptor Karpus. The Ecclesiarchy preached that only through the constant resistance to temptation is all its forms could you and your soul be guaranteed union with the Ever-living Emperor. The Inquisitor wondered often why the Emperor made it so very hard.

Salvation through Adversity was the official Cult position.

“You can have him put under arrest, confined to his cabin and arrange to have him handed over to the Department of Safety when we get to Pleasant Hill. This is clearly not a matter for either the Inquisition or the Adeptus Arbites.”

“Who my Lord? Who do we arrest?” said Scriptor Karpus, letting none of the frustration and puzzlement that he felt color his voice.

“Steward Alexander. He’s the murderer,” replied the Inquisitor.

“Citizen Anhalt and Citizen Karl would not have been let in to Citizen Trude’s cabin. Any attempt to force their way in would have been heard. The sound proofing isn’t very good, so the murder must have been quiet, besides, Citizen Karl doesn’t have the courage or self-assurance necessary to hide his guilt.”

“The key clue is the glass of milk, Ouzo and oxoblast. Last night we encountered a severe up-draft. It caused my Ikon to fall off my console. It is impossible that a glass of milk would have remained unspilled. This means that the milk in the valet compartment was put there afterwards. The only reason I can see for this was to conceal the identity of the murderer.

Steward Alexander is a handsome young man, and Citizen Trude was behaving very flirtatiously. I suspect that Steward Alexander was used to advances by female passengers. I have noted the looks that Citizen Marte gave him. This time he read the signals wrong. Last night his final delivery was the special oxoblast to Citizen Trude. She invited him to bring it in, or he talked his way in. He made some sort of unwelcome advance, she threatened to scream or report him or perhaps it was just all an accident. Whatever happened, Steward Alexander was forced to kill her to prevent his own death and disgrace. He pushed the body through the porthole, dead or unconscious. During the struggle, the milk was spilled on the floor at the foot of the bed. Milk is very hard to clean out of a carpet, and the Steward did the best that he could. It was not good enough, so he disguised the stain by spilling the perfume onto it, and probably threw the bottle out of the porthole too. He then went back to his own cabin.

I suspect that he reset the time on the console, so that when he conveniently slipped on the rug, his cabin-mate could swear to the time that he went to bed. He reset the time again while the Under-Chef was dealing with the passengers who rang about the updraft, or he could even have done it when he was going through his devotions. In the morning he replaced the milk in the valet compartment when he made the morning oxoblast to make it appear that Citizen Trude had never drank it, and to suggest that the murder took place when he could prove that he was doing something else. None of the other suspects, not even Purser Grunwald would have bothered with the milk, and it is likely that none of them would have known to put the Ouzo into it to make it appear to be the evening delivery.

You can summon the Officer of the Watch now and tell him that you have solved the case. Congratulations Senior Arbitrator-Investigator Abraxes.”