A Monodrama for Carolyn August - Chapter 92

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 92.
‘No, there’s no need to hang a dead body there.’
He could have simply thrown it into the sea—so why leave a corpse in such a place? It wasn’t as though he wanted someone to witness it. Even if they did, he’d have hoped they’d find it strange and move on. Hadn’t the Baron and Auction Agent done exactly that?
‘He was hung while still alive.’
Caroline arrived at a conclusion worthy of Aiden. The most likely scenario was that he’d been suspended from the Deck while still breathing, left to die.
Battered by waves that bit like needles, his blood washed away by the cold water.
Caroline consulted her Notebook once more. The Napkin, the Arrow, the Countess’s Sleeping Drug and the Engine Room, what two people had witnessed, the Circus Master’s absence.
A story began to take shape in her mind.
‘He must have fired the Arrow from the Engine Room. Then he moved the Circus Master—pierced by the Arrow—to the Deck and hung him there. Even as he was dying from the Arrow’s wound, he’d been positioned to stand upright in others’ eyes.’
And the Napkin would have been used there.
Placed in the Circus Master’s mouth, silencing his pleas for help. Preventing him from answering when others called.
Left in complete isolation, suffering and dying slowly—Caroline knew how deeply Aiden’s hatred of this man ran.
‘But something doesn’t add up.’
Caroline withdrew the Mirror from the bloodstained spot and surveyed her surroundings.
Aiden calling the Circus Master to the Engine Room to kill him was a perfectly logical decision. The Engine Room, corresponding to the First Floor of the cruise ship, was nearly deserted. Whatever happened there would go unwitnessed, and even if the crew member responsible arrived, the murder would be complete and all traces covered by then.
Moreover, the Dining Room and Cocktail Bar—corresponding to the Second and Third Floors—were crowded, so he needed a place away from prying eyes. Yet how had he transported the murdered man from the Engine Room to the Deck without passing through those areas?
It simply didn’t make sense.
“The clown Aiden? He never left his post, mixing drinks the whole time. Didn’t even use the restroom, it seems. Oh, actually he did go out once—said he’d run out of Ice and would refill it quickly. He was back in less than five minutes.”
“I thought he was slacking off, so I followed him upstairs, and he came back out carrying Ice and Syrup. His hands looked full, so I offered to help, but he thanked me and handed them over instead.”
He’d returned in five minutes. The notion that during that span he’d wrapped the Circus Master in something inconspicuous, timed it when no one was passing, climbed to the Third Floor, and secured him on the Deck was simply impossible.
Caroline had no choice but to retrace her steps back to the Second Floor from the Engine Room. Her feet dragged, but she had to search for clues elsewhere.
She began visiting the rooms again in the same order as before.
Back to the Dining Room.
Passing a table set without two Napkins, she pressed deeper into the Dining Room’s interior—toward the hidden Kitchen.
At the boundary between Kitchen and dining area, a simple beverage bar and finger foods remained, and Caroline noticed several items scattered as if hastily disturbed.
A few glasses of what looked like Tomato Juice, apparently grabbed in haste.
‘Why didn’t I notice this before? Is information being handed to me in sequence?’
As she approached with wide eyes, a familiar Yellow Exclamation Mark came to mind.
[!]
When she picked up one half-empty glass of Tomato Juice with its sweet, honey-like scent, this time a sharp, acerbic woman’s voice delivered testimony.
“When did I get old enough to fade so quickly? But thank goodness I woke up partway through the party. Everyone else was having such a grand time, weren’t they? And how suddenly—the bartender Aiden appeared with new Wines filling both his hands. He must have been in a hurry; he had several Golden Threads clinging to his sleeves.”
Caroline blinked.
[Time Remaining: 3 hours 10 minutes 08 seconds]
Three hours had already passed. She’d skipped dinner and spent the time wracking her brain, so it wasn’t working well now. What did that testimony mean?
‘Golden Threads?’
Yet this alone wasn’t substantial information. The Golden Threads either came from the Circus Master’s clothing or were fibers from the cord used to secure him on the Deck—one or the other.
Caroline stood with a disgruntled expression, then picked up a piece of finger food and ate it.
The Dining Room on the Second Floor of the cruise ship where she now stood corresponded to the First Floor Dining Room in the Mansion’s original layout. So what appeared as finger food now would be part of the meals set out in the Dining Room then.
Aiden had always lived this way—converting what was actually given into theatrical elements.
Caroline pulled out a chair in the Dining Room and sat down completely. Then she began eating the remaining food.
‘Dinner with Aiden and questions have become difficult.’
But one must eat.
Still, with three hours remaining, she had more than enough time to solve it. Caroline filled her stomach while thinking this.
Then she began to examine her written notes again.
‘I need to explain how Aiden completed the crime in five minutes.’
Did he not kill him then?
Was the Circus Master’s departure outside mere coincidence, and did Aiden attempt to kill him after everyone had fallen asleep?
Caroline began to dismantle even her own previous deductions.
Then it struck her.
“I thought he was slacking off, so I followed him upstairs, and he came back out carrying Ice and Syrup.”
The person who saw Aiden return to the Cocktail Bar in five minutes said he’d brought Ice and Syrup.
Yet the Countess, who had awoken from the Sleeping Drug’s effects, said he appeared with armfuls of Wine bottles.
Ice and Syrup, multiple bottles of Wine—these were not objects one could confuse through mere oversight.
“Ah!”
Caroline clapped her hand over her mouth and shot to her feet.
Aiden hadn’t completed the crime in five minutes. He’d finished the First Murder, returned to the Cocktail Bar with Ice and Syrup in hand, then slipped out again at a moment when no one would notice.
And there he completed the Second Murder. The Countess’s sighting—with Golden Threads clinging to his sleeves—must have been that moment.
‘If that’s the case.’
Caroline swallowed hard and organized her thoughts.
If the Countess awoke from the Sleeping Drug at the moment she consumed the remaining liquor, the Circus Master would have woken similarly. Then in the first stage, Aiden would have pierced the sleeping Circus Master’s body with the Arrow.
Since he used an arrow, he must have fired from a distance—there wouldn’t be blood on his body. And however he moved the Circus Master, he’d placed him on the Deck.
In the Second Murder stage, he would have tied the Circus Master to the Deck railing.
‘Though I can’t be certain he was tied.’
Still, to make him appear to be standing, that seemed like the only way.
“But how did he move him? To the Deck.”
Caroline furrowed her brow and clutched at her own hair. This point remained unsolved. The Circus Master was shorter than Aiden, but his weight was comparable.
Even if Will was a man of exceptional physical prowess, he couldn’t have hauled him up in five minutes.
“Again. Let me go back again.”
Caroline exhaled heavily and made her way back to the Engine Room.
[Remaining Time: 2 hours 03 minutes 57 seconds]
“……Sigh.”
Time was draining fast, yet Caroline saw nothing different in the Engine Room than before, and she let out a frustrated breath.
The Engine Room was utterly packed with machinery. She could spot no hidden passage that might help move a person, no transport mechanism to reduce the burden. Nothing of the sort appeared anywhere.
“Even if Will is some brilliant illusionist, he couldn’t just make a person move……”
Standing before the machine nearest the wall—the one that had borne blood stains—Caroline protested into the empty air.
Unable to contain her frustration, she drove her head against the side wall with a dull thud.
“Huh?”
And she tumbled sideways.
When her senses returned, Caroline found her upper body suspended over the lip of a small Cargo Elevator that had swung open to the side.

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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