Mignon G. Eberhart - Five Passengers from Lisbon

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Text originally published in 1946 under the same title.

Pickle Partners Publishing 2016, all rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted by any means, electrical, mechanical or otherwise without the written permission of the copyright holder.

Publishers Note

Although in most cases we have retained the Authors original spelling and grammar to authentically reproduce the work of the Author and the original intent of such material, some additional notes and clarifications have been added for the modern readers benefit.

We have also made every effort to include all maps and illustrations of the original edition the limitations of formatting do not allow of including larger maps, we will upload as many of these maps as possible.

FIVE PASSENGERS FROM LISBON

A MYSTERY BY

MIGNON G. EBERHART

Contents

Once in a while a writer wishes to add a few words of facts to a story of fiction; such is the case in this story of fictional romance and fictional murder placed in a factual setting.

Not that the U.S.A.H.S. Magnolia is, or ever was, a real ship, for she is not. She is an imaginary composite of a number of ships which, however, are very real and very magnificentstaffed by men and women whose courage and devotion are equally real and magnificent. If this novel had a serious dedication it would be, humbly, To them! The nurses and doctors, the ships officers and men, the Army Transportation Corps, whose combined and tireless effort brought thousands of our sick and wounded soldiers safely home. But no words can properly express the debt of gratitude we owe them.

Neither can I adequately thank the many people who gave me so helpfully and so very kindly of their precious time and energy, and also gave me without knowing it more stories of heroism and humor, of mercy and fortitude than there is space for in this book or many books.

They and the Mercy Fleet are real.

This story is fiction, and there are differences! For one thing, while men and women are men and women (Army nurses are very pretty, too!) I cant help thinking that there could have been, in fact, very little time for romance and practically none for murder. Besides, the Colonel and the Captain wouldnt have permitted it for one minute!

But, fictionally, there might have been a storm, there might have been a lifeboat. There might have been five passengers, unexpected and unwanted, bringing their own past and present aboard.

M. G. E.

The three women sat miserably in the cramped stateroom and waited for orders to abandon ship. The stateroom creaked and the ship creaked and strained and came down in the trough of a wave with a shaking, trembling series of shudders so strong that Marcia held her breath, listening, thinking: Nownow the ship will be torn apart; this time it will go. Its rotten timbers cannot hold together; its long-worn and rusted bolts must pull apart.

Miraculously they didnt; at least so far as the three women in the stateroom could tell. Marcia knew that the others had shared her thought. Daisy Belles thin, fine-drawn, over-civilized face wore a taut and listening look too; and Gilis enormous green eyes slanted to one side, warily, like a cat which senses a danger creeping up on it.

They were three days and two nights out from Lisbon. They had passed the Azores with all the windmills whirling. They were on the broad, dark Atlantic and there was no help anywhere.

The ship gave a plunge and lurch ahead; Gilis long yellow hair hung over her face as she looked down again at the coat she was wearing; she was hunched together in the upper berth, her handsome legs drawn up to her chin. Marcia and Daisy Belle shared the lower berth, which was a trifle wider. The stateroom was very small and in frantic disorder; the few bags and boxes they had managed to bring as far as Lisbon and on board the little ship were open with clothing strewn about; theyd had to select quickly such small articles as they could take on the lifeboat with them, when and if they had to take to the boats. Nobody had taken much, naturallypassports, such money as they had...Daisy Belle had pinned a chamois bag full of jewels under her sweater and brassiere and now sat in slacks and a mink coat, her thin hair tied up in a woolen scarf, smoking a small cigar coolly andalwayslistening. She had put brandy in the pocket of her mink coat, and some morphine and more cigars. Gili had given her own battered box one contemptuous look and taken nothing from it; she too wore slacks and a fur coat which Daisy Belle had given heranother mink coat. Only Daisy Belle Cates, thought Marcia a little wryly, could emerge from five years of warring Europe with two mink coats. And only Daisy Belle would have presented one, casually like that, to Gili.

You may as well take it, shed said ten minutes ago. Itll go down with the ship.

Even in that moment Gili was delighted. She gave Daisy Belle one of her avid, darting looks, as if questioning the offer, and then snatched the coat and put it on, looking down at herself and stroking the fur, greedily. Suppose the ship doesnt go down. Suppose somebody picks us up. Will you want it back?

A queer expression flickered over Daisy Belles face. Then you can keep it, she said, her long thin fingers with their broken nails working at the enormous safety pin with which she was pinning the bag of jewels inside her brassiere.

Oh, said Gili, stroking the fur and twisting around to get a glimpse of herself in the small fuzzy mirror over the washbasin. Good, then. Of course, if we ever get out of this, youll have all the fur coats you want.

Daisy Belles mouth tightened. I doubt it.

Gili, exactly like a cat at an unexpectedly yielding garbage can seemed almost to lick her full lips. But then you couldnt really blame her, thought Marcia wearily. In all probability Gili had actually scavenged for food, literally in garbage cans. Gili had not talked of her past during that short, now interrupted voyage; she never made an allusion or said a word that could indicate even that she had a past. She might have sprung into being just as she appeared at the dock there at Lisbonbrightly blonde, luxuriantly curved, with a heavily handsome face and full round chin and long, bright-green eyes. Her blonde hair had been dyed and was getting rapidly darker at the part; her eyebrows and lashes were darkened. She had a certain strength that was rather attractive in a queer way, for it went with the frank predatoriness of some small, harried and hunted animal. Nobody could enjoy food or warmth or clothing as Gili obviously did, who had not had to go without them.

But then Daisy Belle Cates, with all her money and her internationally famous and social name, probably had had to scrounge for food too, while France was occupied.

What happened when you were adrift on the Atlantic in a lifeboat? Nothing about the Lerida , the tiny Portuguese cargo ship in which they had finally set out from Lisbon, led Marcia to think that the lifeboats would be either adequate or in good condition.

Marcia, like the other women, wore slacks and two sweaters and heavy seamans shoes. Even at that time of year, it was cold on the water at night. She felt bulky and stuffed with clothing; if the lifeboat swamped she wouldnt have a chance with all that clothing. But there wasnt a chance to keep afloat, swimming, in a sea like that anyway.