Dolly And The Cookie Bird - Dorothy Dunnett - Johnson Johnson 03 by Unknown Page A

I said. I had seen out of the corner of my eye an odd erection, behind the high netted fence of the boatyard: a thing like a miniature bullring, built of thick white cement. Chains ran from it into the water.
    “That’s the winch,” said Johnson. He didn’t miss much.
    “Who found him? My father?” I said. I saw Clem look at Johnson briefly, then turn to me. “The night watchman at the yacht club saw him,” he said. “First, that is. Then he roused the rest of us sleeping on board.
Dolly
wasn’t here then, of course: I had a temporary job looking after another ketch called
Firefly
while the owner had gone back to London. I slept aboard most times, but that night I was a few boats along, on
Sheila
, whose chargehand was an old pal of mine. We talked so late, I just kipped down on
Sheila
and didn’t know a thing till Pepe started howling blue murder.”
    “It was
Firefly
, you see, that was winched up,” said Johnson. The sun was glaring its last above the buildings behind us, and his bifocals had turned each a hot, glittering red. “A bunch of whizz kids from your friend Janey’s party came rolling along from Santa Eulalia, saw
Firefly
lying all darkened, and thought they’d give Clem here a call. When they found he wasn’t aboard, they had an even brighter idea. They roused the man with the horse, paid him a fortune in British cigarettes and dollars and probably pot, and got him to move
Firefly
round and winch her up to the shore. Based on the old Boy Scout princiole of removing your sleeping pal’s tent, only not quite so innocuous because when Clem had come back from his presumed bender and finally found his missing boat, he’d have to stump up pretty handsomely to get his boat run down again. At any rate, the freak-out departed, leaving the horse to finish the winching, and Lord Forsey presumably passed by—resolved, it seems, on self-destruction—and with a fine sense of the macabre, climbed aboard. The only thing we don’t know, but presumably you do, is his reason for killing himself.”
    I should have kept my mouth shut. It’s one thing being dramatic with Janey, but another letting all the town know. It must have been the martini. “I think he was murdered,” I said.
    This time, it came off. They sat staring at me, their drinks in their hands, and Clem’s mouth had come a little bit open. Then Johnson said, “Why?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “Who by?”—Clem.
    “I don’t know.”
    “Then why…” Johnson broke off, and straightening up off the rail, looked at his watch and said, “Wait. Let’s go back to the cockpit and make ourselves comfortable. Clem, see if Spry could cough up more drinks and some tapas, and then come back yourself. Sarah…” He stopped, his eyebrows lifted over the glass.
    “I don’t mind,” I said. “I’ve known Clem for ages.”
    “My name,” said Johnson sorrowfully, “is Johnson Johnson. Fore and aft exactly the same. All my life it has prevented an intimate atmosphere. Try and ignore it. Americans call me J.J.”
    We walked back along deck to the cockpit, which had its awning drawn back. The cushions were stunning. “I don’t see you as J.J.,” I said, settling. “I don’t see you as Johnny either.”
    “Nor does anyone else,” said Johnson. “It worries me sometimes.” He didn’t look worried. “Now, what made you suspect that your father was murdered?”
    As the sun sank, I told the story of the letter Janey posted from Daddy, the letter which turned up so late and which I didn’t believe was from Daddy at all.
    Clem said, “But why send you a fake letter?”
    “Well, to set my mind at rest, I suppose. To stop me thinking any further. There was certainly nothing worrying in it. It couldn’t have been more harmless.”
    “You’ll need to think again about that,” Johnson said. “If the murderer sent you a letter to stop you investigating a murder, he’d have made your father hint about suicide.”
    “Unless he wasn’t