BOOK EXCERPT: Murder in The Duty Free by Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger

A Charlie “Stillman” Stillmanberger Mystery

“Lock the gates of this Duty Free Shop!” bellowed the security officer. He then turned, fidgeting nervously, to ask of the man behind him, “Right?”

Retired airline pilot Charles “Stillman” Stillmanberger nodded. He was the man the Security Officer was addressing in the nervous fashion previously described. Stillman looked around at the motley assemblage before him, lurking in perfume aisles, partially obscured by giant triangular Swiss chocolates, trying to blend in with displays of expensive and impossibly chunky watches. “What a bunch of true murder suspects they are,” he thought internally. He appraised each one of them coolly, not unlike an appraiser on the popular television program “Antiques Roadshow.” Except these people were not brought to him by simple country folk hoping to profit from a departed relative’s hoarding sickness– no, these people were brought before him by the crime of murder.

First he looked at Mrs. Fortescue, the elderly widow taking one last trip around the world in honor of her late husband. They were avid travelers, until Mr. Fortescue died under mysterious circumstances involving an onion.

“Mrs. Fortescue,” Stillman said gently. “My condolences on your husband’s unfortunate onioncide.”

Mrs. Fortescue gasped in that sickening wet way old ladies do. “But Captain Stillmanberger,” she burbled agedly, “how did you know my husband killed himself attempting to swallow an entire onion?”

Stillman smiled in a non-patronizing way. “In flight school we were trained to recognize every different variety of grief, for the purposes of flight safety. Some griefs, like losing a spouse to a car-crusher, can cause the sad person to rush the cockpit. But you? You’re not going to hurt anyone. You’re too busy fearing it was your fault your husband misjudged the width of his throat.”

The withered husk broke into tears. “I was always complimenting him on his wide throat hole!”

Stillman spoke a little louder to be heard over the sad noise. “And so, you could not be the murderer.”

The retired pilot then cast his gaze upon the man in the tweed suit. Professor Grady Fallows was perspiring profusely, whether out of nervousness or an ill-advised sartorial selection. Or both. Stillman advanced on the damp academic.

“Professor, you hated the deceased for taking too long at the water fountain.”

The mousy school man’s eyes darted about crazily. “Well, he was taking forever to fill up his blasted reusable bottle, and all I needed was a simple mouthful of water to take my nerve pill!”

Stillman smiled a smile as thin as his patience for the impatient. Characters like the professor reminded him of the stories he’d hear of people hovering by the belt barrier pre-flight, standing in the way well before their boarding zone had been called. He could sometimes see them through the cockpit’s windshield if the parked plane were angled in such a way that afforded a glimpse into the airport.

“You’re no killer,” Stillman sighed. “You’re impatient, but cowardly. You’d never have the nerve to kill a man in a public place, much less safely land 200 passengers on the surface of the lava pooled in the mouth of an active volcano.”

All assembled forgave Stillman this self-congratulatory reference. Stillman then wheeled on the final suspect, a large Canadian goose.

“J'accuse!” Stilllman barked, pointing a steady finger at the filthy creature. The guilty bird honked out some protestation of innocence in its offensively cacophonous tongue, but it was too late. The murder had been solved. Another case closed by retired airline pilot Charlie “Stillman” Stillmanberger, who was a hero pilot who now solved murders that take place exclusively in airports.