Contrapasso

Part 3

Chapter 3: The second night

Heather's question had everyone looking around now. The man was hard to miss with his disposition. All the other guests were here in the lobby except for Johann.

"You don't think something happened to him, do you?" Dagur asked with a frown.

"Maybe he fell asleep?" Astrid suggested but Heather shook her head.

"I went back to my room on the 8th floor after the whole garden episode and he stepped into the lift after I got out." Heather recounted. "He didn't look pleased to see me."

"Well sis, you did threaten to drop him like a sack of potatoes." Dagur shot back. "Your Jiu Jitsu is scary."

"What was I supposed to do?!" Heather retorted. "He might be a family friend but we're also his bosses! Johann was totally out of line."

"You guys can argue after we locate him," Ruffnut cut in. "Did you notice which floor he got off on?" She then asked Heather.

"I saw that he pressed up so I'm guessing the 9th floor?" Heather responded.

"The heated indoor pool," Ruffnut nodded. "Let's go. We need to check if he's alright."

It took longer than Astrid thought to reach the 9th floor. With the power still out everyone had to take the stairs. Her employers, Quintin and Abigail, were nearly out of breath by the time they reached the floor. So much for spending money on professional trainers. Going down flights of stairs had indeed been a lot easier.

Ruffnut opened the fire exit door and everyone entered what appeared to be a beige hallway. To the right were the locker rooms as well as restrooms. Both Fishlegs and Ruffnut checked those first but came up empty. To the left were the double doors leading to the pool area.

"Oh shiitake mushrooms!" Ruffnut exclaimed as she opened the double doors and stopped dead in her tracks. Astrid nearly crashed into the concierge. The pool was beautiful. It looked more like a Turkish bath than a pool actually. Also the view was stunning as it was so high up that the island was visible in its entirety. Astrid would have stopped to admire the view if it wasn't for the face down body of Johann floating in the middle of the pool. Not so far from Johann's body was what appeared to be a submerged radio.

"Well we know what tripped the breakers now," Tuffnut commented as he peered into the room.

Astrid looked back to where Heather and Dagur were standing. Both siblings seemed to be frozen yet Astrid sensed something odd about their reaction. True, anyone might be in shock after seeing this scene but it seemed more like both Heather and Dagur were frozen due to a sudden realization. Astrid had seen a lot of cases where people's emotions surfaced later but she would have thought one of the siblings would have looked away from the scene. Yet both were staring straight forward.

"It looks like we have a murderer on the island," Astrid commented to see everyone's reaction. The twins and Fishlegs whipped their heads towards her, Mala looked at her critically, her employers were staring incredulously at her and the siblings blinked for a moment as if they didn't know what to say.

"How can you be certain?" Mala asked. "Sorry, but I have to be critical here. If you are going to be accusing anyone of murder then you need to explain."

"The scene says it all actually," Astrid commented.

"Wait, can't this just have been an accident?" Heather now questioned. "The radio might have just fallen in if Johann was swimming and listening to music."

"That's highly unlikely," Astrid replied. "Johann is floating in the middle of the pool. It's most probably the exact location he died since there are no currents. Also look at where the radio is."