He took his bag of dog treats out of his pocket.
“I’ll bet Sir Reginald has lots of tricks in his repertoire,” he said, unsnapping the dog’s leash from his collar and handing it to London.
As the other customers watched attentively, Bryce took four glasses off an unoccupied table and set them in a row in the aisle of the eating area, placing them about a foot and a half apart from one another. He coaxed Sir Reginald to sit at one end of the row of glasses, then stood himself at the other end.
He held out a treat in one hand and snapped his fingers with his other.
Sure enough, Sir Reginald deftly wove his way back and forth, snaking his way through the row of glasses, and receiving a treat from Bryce at the end. Then Bryce and Reggie switched places and repeated the trick again. This time several customers did applaud.
Then Bryce stood with his legs apart, and Sir Reginald wove back and forth between them.
“How did you teach him to do that so fast?” one of the customers asked.
“I didn’t,” Bryce said. “Those are pretty standard tricks, and somebody may have taught them to him already.”
“Or maybe he’s just smart,” Elsie suggested.
“Maybe,” London agreed.
She’d been struck by his uncanny intelligence during the last few days—especially how he’d led her along the path Mrs. Klimowski had walked through Gyor just before her death. He’d done more than his share to solve the mystery. If it weren’t for him, maybe they’d still be stuck in Gyor while the police looked in vain for the killer.
“It looks like we’ve got a new ship’s mascot,” remarked Elsie.
“Yeah, and he’ll have the run of the ship soon,” London said. “The maintenance guys are installing a doggie door in my room.”
“So he’ll be able to come and go exactly as he pleases,” Elsie said. “How does that make you feel?”
“What do you mean?” London asked, a little surprised at the question.
“Well, he’s a high-spirited, independent little animal. He’s not going to want to go following you around all the time anymore. He’ll have things to do, places to explore, people to meet and entertain.”
London felt an unexpected twinge of melancholy at the thought.
“I guess I won’t be needing this,” she said, putting the leash in her handbag.
Finally Bryce and Sir Reggie finished up their little impromptu performance, and they both took bows as the nearby customers applauded. Bryce headed back to the kitchen, and Sir Reggie hopped back onto the chair next to London.
“So how’s your apple strudel?” Elsie asked London.
“Beyond perfect,” London told her. “You should try it.”
She offered Elsie a taste with her fork. At the taste, Elsie’s eyes rolled back in ecstasy.
“Mmmm,” she purred. “I wonder if we’ll get strudel this good even in Vienna.”
London wondered that too—although it seemed almost a blasphemous thought, considering Vienna’s reputation as one of the pastry centers of Western civilization.
“I’m starting to see what you see in Bryce,” Elsie added. “I mean, it’s one thing that he’s easy on the eyes. If he keeps making desserts like this, I’m liable to develop a crush on him too. I hope you don’t mind having a rival.”
London shook her head with an embarrassed smile.
“You’re just impossible,” she said.
“Yeah, I get that a lot,” Elsie said, getting up from the table. “Well, I’d better get back to the lounge. What are you going to do about Mr. Oswinkle’s temperature problem?”
London suppressed a sigh.
“Check in on him, of course. I guess he’s already called Archie Behnke about it. But Archie told me there’s nothing to be done. If Archie can’t fix it, I sure can’t.”
“I hope you can work something out,” Elsie said.
“Me too.”
“Good luck.”
“Thanks.”
Elsie walked on out of the restaurant.
London quietly enjoyed the last bites of her strudel and finished her coffee before getting up from her chair. She looked down at Sir Reggie, who was still sitting in the chair next to her.
“I’m on my way to deal with a grumpy passenger,” she said to the dog. “You can come along if you like, but I’m afraid it won’t be much fun. It’s entirely up to you.”
She was a bit relieved that Sir Reggie hopped down from his chair, apparently happy to join her on this errand.
As she and the dog walked out of the restaurant together, London said to him, “Maybe you can help me deal with Mr. Oswinkle. I sure don’t know what to do about him. But still …”
She paused for a moment, then said, “At least it’s not like solving another murder.”
Sir Reggie let out a little, uncertain-sounding yap.
“I know what you mean,” London replied as they took the stairs down to the Menuetto deck. “At least a murder can be solved. Maybe there’s no way to solve a problem like Mr. Oswinkle.”
It irritated her more than she wanted to admit to herself. This seemed like such a mundane issue to have to handle after the excitement, mental challenges, and even danger of the last couple of days. Now that she’d gotten a taste of detective work, was it possible she actually missed “the chase”?
As London mulled that question over, she and Sir Reggie reached Oswinkle’s room on the Menuetto deck. Oddly enough, the door to the suite was standing wide open.
Even stranger were the words she could hear from out in the hallway.
“What you want me to do is against the law.”
CHAPTER FIVE
London recognized the voice as Archie Behnke’s.
But what on earth does he mean by “against the law”? she wondered.
As she hurried to the doorway, Archie’s voice went on, “You see, a stateroom can be thought of as a thermodynamic system. Which means we’re up against the second law of thermodynamics …”
London stopped and leaned against the doorway, trying not to laugh out loud.
Archie was standing inside the room pointing to the thermostat. He was delivering what sounded like some kind of scientific lecture to Kirby Oswinkle, whose eyes were glazed with perplexity.
“Are you following me so far?” Archie asked Mr. Oswinkle.
Oswinkle nodded uncertainly, and Archie continued.
“The second law tells us that entropy takes over any system sooner or later. That means that your room temperature is always going to get cooler if it’s truly isolated from any other system—that is, if it doesn’t interact with anything that changes its temperature one way or the other.”
Oswinkle scratched his chin. He was beginning to look a bit like a trapped animal, but London didn’t feel inclined to interrupt Archie’s lecture.
Since neither man seemed to have noticed her, she took the opportunity to glance around the Bartok suite, which she’d never visited before. Like all the suites on the Nachtmusik, it was named and themed after a Danube-related composer. A large portrait of the twentieth-century composer Bela Bartok, looking serious and a bit sad, hung over the bed.