Right up until the moment a dead body fell out of the upper berth in our sleeping compartment, I was actually having a pretty good time.
We were laughing, breathless, as I pushed open the heavy mahogany door and we stumbled inside. The door closed with a snick, and PM reached back to slide the bolt. I reached for him, and I didn’t have to reach far before I was in his arms. I liked his quiet laugh, I liked the taste of his mouth—whisky and all those words, those earnest, educated words—I liked that he was no longer talking, I liked his hot, hungry kisses.
The air was a little stale, scented of old fabric and oiled wood and more pleasantly, P.M.
In the silvery dandelion fuzz of moonlight, I could make out the curve of the wall lamp, the gleam of the brass washstand fittings, the shapeless lump of the corner chair. The rest of the compartment was only shadows; the largest shadow was the berth hanging like a dark shelf above the sofa.
That sofa was my target and I backed P.M. toward it.
“Are we really doing this?” he whispered shakily. The shakiness was laughter because the question was rhetorical. Of course we were doing this. This, that, and maybe even the other. A guy could hope.
We backed, bumped into the upholstered face of the berth. Dimly I heard…a squeak, creak as if the latch was giving way. There was a groaning sound.
As the berth dropped with a loud complaining groan, I fluted, “Too on the nose?” in my best hoity toity literary critic voice.
P.M.’s laugh broke off as at the thud that followed as a heavy shape hit the sofa and toppled onto the floor at our feet.
A weird voice said, “What the hell?”
My first disbelieving thought was…luggage? Right. The porter had tossed our coats onto the berth, closed the berth… But even as the vague thought formed, came the realization that the weight was wrong, the shape was wrong, and the moonlight illuminated a pale hand, limp fingers half-curled around nothing.
