Everyone on This Train Is a Suspect

By the time the last bus had disembarked and we’d both showered (the Ghan started moving in the middle of my shower, with a jolt that almost made me slip and break my neck) and dressed for dinner in the Queen Adelaide carriage, night had crept up and the flickering film reel outside our window had turned a deep navy blue, the shrubbery now only shadows as it passed. Neither of us was sure how formal dinner was expected to be: Juliette wore an orange-and-brown checked dress that she said felt “desert-y” and I’d brought a dinner jacket. We needn’t have worried, as there was a mix of suits and shorts in the restaurant. My theory is that the less wealthy you are, the better you tend to dress for expensive events—meals, the theater—as your effort in dressing matches your effort in expenditure. A week’s wage: better pop on a tie. One billable six-minute increment: I’ll wear boardies to the opera, no worries.

We both had crocodile dumplings for appetizers, which tasted like chicken, and kangaroo fillet for mains, which tasted like beef, and shared a table with a retired book-loving couple from rural Queensland who had taken the trip to celebrate their fiftieth wedding anniversary. They’d been saving up for quite some time, which they didn’t tell me, but she was wearing a vibrant floral dress, and he, believe it or not, a tuxedo. I won’t describe what they looked like, because they’re not important to the murders. There are plenty of guests on board who are simply that—guests—and I worry if I give them too much descriptive detail it may start you thinking that they are more relevant to the plot than they are. Just like there are many more staff than I’ve named, but I’ve got a tally to consider here. Imagine your grandparents: our dinner companions looked like them.

Dining was in three sessions; we were the second. Lisa Fulton was also there, eating with Jasper and Harriet Murdoch. Douglas, the Texan, sat across from S. F. Majors and Alan Royce, though it seemed a designated seating as Douglas and Majors were urgently whispering to each other, not including Royce. Wyatt and Wolfgang were at a different table, with Wolfgang doing the talking and Wyatt listening intently, a pointer finger on each temple. I didn’t want to make too much of it, but it looked like he was receiving very bad news indeed. McTavish and Simone were absent, though a waiter with a silver cloche returned from the engine-side rooms a couple of times, which meant someone was getting room service.

Your grandparents decided to retire, and Juliette and I stayed for a nightcap of red wine, for which we were joined by two women who worked as museum curators, one in London and one in Tasmania, and who had skipped dinner but come for dessert. The navy blue outside had disappeared, and while I had anticipated some kind of beautiful twilight desert-scape, it was instead, with no cities near or lights on the outside of the train, completely black.

“So you haven’t even mentioned the panel . . .” Juliette waded in.

“Not much to say.” I shrugged. “Wolfgang adamantly thinks I’m a bad writer. The only person who seems to be on my side is bloody one-star McTavish.”

“Hey.” She grabbed my uninjured hand and stroked it with her thumb. “Everyone’s just on edge. Traveling yesterday, early start today. Plus the heat and the grog—that’d make anyone a bit snappy.”

I sighed. “You’re right. It wasn’t just me anyway. Majors and McTavish had a tiff. Oh, and get this, you should have seen Royce’s face when they revealed that McTavish had blurbed Lisa’s new book: it could have boiled a kettle.”

“McTavish blurbed Lisa?” She frowned thoughtfully. “That’s awfully generous. It could really broaden her audience.”

“They set it up as a surprise: she was shocked. On the verge of tears.”

“I can imagine. Well,” Juliette said, swirling her wine in an evil pantomime, “also no harm in sticking one up to Royce. See? Everyone’s at each other’s throats.”

We turned at the sound of a bang and the clatter of cutlery. Wyatt had smacked the table, causing the spoons to bounce. He was half out of his seat. “You can’t do that,” he was hissing over the table at Wolfgang, who was cradling his red wine, a smug and stained smile on his lips. “It’ll ruin—” Wyatt realized everyone was watching and course-corrected. “Sorry,” he yelled overenthusiastically, the way a kidnapper talks at a random police stop, body in the trunk. “Sorry! Got caught up in the excitement.” He pointed at Wolfgang. “New book. Sounds amazing.” He lowered himself back into his chair, still flapping his hand apologetically at the rest of the carriage.

“I didn’t think Gemini published Wolfgang.” Juliette frowned.

I pulled my hand from Juliette’s and rubbed my eyes. “I just can’t help feeling I don’t . . .” The words I’d found difficult to say before ran up against my teeth and rattled them, begging to get out. This time I let them. “I don’t deserve to be here.”