The Hassle High Mystery Series, Book 3
Cozy Mystery
Date Published: 11-14-2020
Cozy Mystery with Death Romance and twists on a French Cruise with the
Hassle High group. Complete with occult, kidnapping and French
Recipes.
EXCERPT
Cast of Characters (on cruise)
Maria Bruno Cohen, Principal, in charge of the group from Hassle High. Married to Al Cohen but has a passion for Detective Hunky Joe Viola.
Al Cohen, silver curly haired, tall, retired Teacher married to Maria. He is a fish collector and dislikes Joe Viola.
Detective Juliet Smith, A beautiful Amazon and Joe’s partner. She is so beautiful she doesn’t need to hold up a hand to stop traffic.
Detective Joe Viola, He is hunky and dark Italian looking. 30 plus years ago, Viola and Maria were police partners. They were engaged to be married. Joe dumped Maria at the altar and married someone else named Brenda. He divorced her a year later. He now thinks he is in love with Maria and has asked her to marry him and divorce Al.
The Faculty (on cruise)
Fred Kelley, warlock and Science Chair. He was involved in the Summertime Murders at Hassle High. He practices witchcraft. He believes to teaching students how witchcraft relates to science. Well known on TV talk shows. Very charismatic.
Megan Murphy, Math Chair she is a nice woman, but not too swift. Was she really a Fulbright scholar? She has been to South Africa before.
The New Faculty (on cruise)
Tim Leary, Social Studies chair, an aging young hippie who knows his history. A Georgetown graduate. But there are no records of him down at the Board of Education, so who is he really?
Vanna Hayes, science teacher , she is black and looks like an Egyptian Queen. Knows the Naidoo family.
Ben Franklin, Japanese exchange Math teacher. Very quiet and very intelligent. He spent a year in South Africa.
Desiree Cavalier, French teacher, born in Normandy, very pretty.
The French Police ( on and off cruise)
Detective Marcelle, Tall and good looking and smart with excellent English
Detective Jonas, a nice detective.
Detective Krause, a French sidekick of Detective Marcelle, he knows more English then it seems.
Sergeant Treetoe, a French policeman.
The Crew
Captain Brin, a French Cruise Captain. He is not happy about the murder on board his orderly ship.
First Officer Welt, he wants to help solve the crime.
The Captain’s cat, who keeps her own secrets
The Fellow Passengers
Beth and Todd Princeton are from New Jersey in their early fifties. They dislike the students on board the ship. They both wear the same colors every day. They don’t drink, so what are they doing on an eating and drinking cruise? Something isn’t right with these two….
Richard and Roxanna Jones both from Florida they are retired and play golf. They seem pleasant enough, but they knew the Naidoo family from the Diamond District in New York City.
Ed and Maureen Stickley and Nancy and Stewart Riley are neighbors who travel together. They are from Poughkeepsie New York, where Maria, the Principal has relatives. They are in their sixties.
Drs. Beth and Howard Getty met in South Africa and are married. They are in their twenties. They are black surgeons. They work for Doctors without Borders.
Laura and Vincent Connelly owners of a diamond mine, they live in South Africa. They look very waspy and are in their forties. Laura seems to know a lot about African masks. Why are they on this cruise and not their private boat?
Blick, an accountant from London who is not what he seems to be. He is traveling alone, because his wife refused to join him.
Peter and Wanda Naidoo the parents of Brady
Chad Naidoo, Brady’s brother
The Students (Nut Squad)
The Nut Squad is the name of a group of artistic students from Hassle High. They are not scholars. They won this trip to Monte Carlo by presenting Hamlet the Musical. They wrote the play and preformed it. Because it was seen by the President of Tomato Cruises and they were asked on this cruise to perform a show on board. The show is Tartuffe the Musical , their second creation. They have helped Maria and Joe solve murders before. The Squad is made up of Martha, Brady, Tim, Jeff, Rebecca and Laura.
Jeff is the leader of the group. He really likes Maria.
Brady Naidoo, a student with little to say. He is from South Africa
Tim, a student well known for his sleight of hand. He is Spanish.
Maria , smart Spanish student who should have graduated a few years ago.
Rebecca, very good at sports and driving.
Laura, good at math bad at English skills.
A few characters are the nameless crew members.
Chapter One Lyon
Frankly, I couldn’t believe we were on our way to the ship in Lyon for the Tomato River Cruise. I ‘m Maria Bruno Cohen, Principal at Hassle High School in Queens New York. My students, the Nut Squad, had won a cruise for their presentation of the Hamlet the Musical at the school. They have been invited on a free cruise through France in exchange for their performances on board the ship. The owner of Tomato Cruises also gave a free trip to me and my husband Al. The plane trip had been exciting as I tried to keep a lot of liquor out of the Nut Squad’s hands , not an easy thing to do, since quite a few of them were legal age in France.
“No drinking of liquor on this plane. No student drinking. “ I announced clearly as we boarded. The Nut Squad groaned.
They were called the Nut Squad because they were artistic and did crazy things. But a principal can do nothing but try to keep them away from the booze! We all got to Paris tired and sober. At least Al and I were tired and sober.
We piled into the cars sent for us by Tomato Cruise lines and arrived at our hotel near the Opera House. The drive into Paris from the airport was wonderful. One could see the Eiffel Tower and the skyline of Paris in the distance as one got closer and closer.
All the students, fourteen of them, had teachers’ rooms near their rooms, to keep an eye on them. Though personally I wasn’t so sure about the teachers! Maybe a few of them needed looking after too. From the faculty was Fred Kelley tall, thin, dark, a professed warlock, with an edge of something slightly evil about him, with his basic black outfits and maybe some witchcraft items in his suitcases. He had been raised in a coven. He also had no taste in women. His last fiancée turned out to be a murderer. I knew him from summer school. I was keeping an eye on him. I didn’t trust Kelley. Mr. Kane, the superintendent insisted I take Kelley on this trip, “to help him get over his bad experience with his ex-fiancé and summer school.” Kane really liked Kelley. I think it was because Kelley had been a media attraction with his weird warlock ideas.
Megan Murphy, short, cubby grey hair cut short, Megan, was the Math Assistant Principal, not brilliant but sweet I knew from experience the students could run rings around her. Then we had three new teachers sent by the superintendent to join my school when we got back in September. Superintendent Kane insisted I take them with me to France. This was because new teachers were cheaper than older ones.
“Great experience for the new faculty. Gives them a chance to meet you and the students in a natural setting.” He rasped this at me on the phone as I was packing.
“Yes sir!” I replied.
What was I supposed to do, he’s my Boss! So, I had Ms. Vanna Hayes, science teacher, a slim, twentyish something black teacher who really looked like Nefertiti. This was her first teaching job. She was lovely to look at, all the Nut Squad boys were staring at her all the time. I hoped that is all they did to her on this trip.
Then I had Mr. Ben Franklin, yeah, that’s really his name. He was, of all things, from Japan. He was an exchange teacher. The superintendent had promised me he was an excellent math teacher. Megan had promised me to check that out. Though Megan as a math chair was not really noted for her math skills. We would just have to wait and see. He was very quiet and very short. I hoped he liked kids.
Next was Ms. Desiree Cavalier , she was the new French teacher. About twenty-five , with a nice figure and long blonde hair. She was born in Normandy. Her French was very good.
Jeff on the Nut Squad told me. “Hey, Teach, I mean Princey, our French is like okay too!” I nodded. I couldn’t wait to hear it. The thought of hearing it kept me up nights. Anyway, I was glad to have Ms. Desiree. There was one more teacher the superintendent had included for me.
Mr. Tim Leary, yeah, I know, but it is his real name, I checked his passport even. He was thirty with long hair pulled back in a ponytail, and six foot four at least. He was as tall as Kelley. He was going to be my new social studies chairperson.
“He has been teaching five years at Townsend Harris High School and is a wonderful teacher. He just got an Assistant Principal License. He’ll be great at Hassle High.” The superintendent announced in an email to me on my last day at home.
Well, here we all were. We’d spent one night in Paris. Al my husband, and I had gone to bed early. We had a short dinner with his French cousins in a nice restaurant. Al was born in France. I gave instructions to the teachers to keep track of the kids. And I wasn’t woken up except for breakfast! A miracle! And as we ate the continental breakfast in the hotel, no problems were mentioned from the night before in Paris. I didn’t ask for any either. We piled into the cars out front and left our hotel in Paris for the TGV train to Lyon.
The French countryside was beautiful, lots of farmland and trees, it was very green. I loved the white cows. So different from our black or brown cows. There were fields of corn which Al explained was used to the feed the cattle. The French didn’t eat corn like we did.
Suddenly Al and I had company in our seats. Jeff tall blonde and very thin ,and Martha long dark hair and big brown eyes, came and sat next to us.
“ Hey, this is great !” said Martha. “It is really pretty. Princey, do you know where the teens hang in Lyon?”
“Yeah, we would like to meet some French teens you know. Especially the girls?” Jeff winked at Al. Oh boy, I thought.
Al frowned a little at Jeff and the wink. “ No,” he answered. “ And I don’t have any relatives in Lyon to ask about that.”
Well, that was handled with tack I thought. Jeff frowned at Al. “Could you phone a relative and see if they know? Otherwise, we can look it up on social media. Yeah, on second thought that’s what we’ll do!” Jeff stood and smiled at me. Martha stood and followed him to the back of the train car where the teens were sitting together. “Hey! Like who has a working cellphone?” Jeff yelled at them.
When Jeff yelled, a couple dressed in the same style of black clothing, black shirts and shorts, sitting across from Al and me turned to us. Who wore black in ninety-degree heat? I guess they thought I should do something about Jeff. I shrugged back at them. Did they think I could control this group? They were in for a surprise. It would be along train ride if they thought I could do that. Hopefully, they wouldn’t be joining us on the boat.
With no more teenager confabs we arrived in Lyon. I was pleased when Mr. Leary got all the students together with their luggage. We stepped off with our luggage, which was rapidly taken by porters. Mr. Leary was explaining, “Lyon is an UNESCO site. It was once the capitol of Gaul. We will be touring the city quickly on our way to the boat by bus. Please follow your teachers. I will describe what we drive past. The bus is over there.” He pointed to the bus. He headed for the bus. Eleven of the students kind of slowly followed him. They were carrying their luggage to be handed to the porters waiting to load the luggage on the bus.
The second he turned his head, Jeff, Martha and Tim, who was six-foot three , thin and with black hair and tan olive skin, started to walk off in the other direction. I went after them. “Get on that bus. I won’t spend the time searching all of Lyon for you today. If you guys wander off, I will not be happy!”
Martha and Tim looked slightly guilty at getting caught. Jeff didn’t. He smiled at me. “Okay Princey, we’ll do it. We just wanted to look around ya know?”
I nodded my head. I knew alright! Al had come back. He was trying to get me to head for the bus too, I guess. Or maybe he thought I needed help with crowd control. Al had taught for many years too. We all walked together to the bus and boarded it. One emergency search for missing students averted. Leary started the tour on the bus. He knew his material but had a speaking voice that could make you nod off to dreamland. At least there were no further incidents and we got to the boat. As we were leaving the bus for the boat, I made an announcement.
“Remember students you are going to a formal dinner tonight at seven to meet all the other passengers. You are to dress up for dinner. Good behavior is expected.” I concluded. The students all clapped my little speech. Jeff spoke up.
“Yeah, everybody look cool for tonight like Mrs. Bruno says okay?” He turned and looked at me. “Don’t you worry, we got it.”
Why didn’t I believe it?
Anyway, the boat was straight ahead and so was a cat. It was a yellow striped tabby cat, and very big, sitting on the gangplank. The kids all petted it as they went by. We got on board. I had put Ben Franklin in charge of giving out cabin assignments for the kids. The rest of the teachers and Al and I walked up to the reception desk on board. Franklin went first and he started to hand out keys and assign rooms. I observed for a minute, but all looked well. Al was talking to the desk clerk, who gave him a key.
“Mr. Cohen,” he said, “your luggage is in your room.” He smiled.
“Thank you,” replied Al.
The service was wonderful. I turned to the teachers, “see you at seven.” Al and I started walking to our cabin to see what it was like. As I passed Ben Franklin I said, “please give me a copy of the cabin assignments when you are through.”
“Yes, Mrs. Bruno,” he answered softly. I waved at the students who were standing around and walked after Al to our cabin in the middle of the ship.
Al opened the door. There was a nice bowl of fruit and two bottles of wine from Captain Brin on our desk. The cabin was small, especially with all my luggage, but okay. I always over pack. Al used to hate that fact that I overpacked, now he just shakes his head. That’s what over thirty years of marriage does to you. There was a balcony with two chairs on it. A queen size bed, a television on the wall, a safe in a cabinet that had a few dresser drawers in it and a small refrigerator. Everything was compact but very nice and clean. The empty luggage could go under the bed and in the closet. I had a feeling everything would be fine. Al was smiling.
“Nice,” he said, “ and we are alone for a while till dinner.” I smiled at him.
We were trying to work on our rocky marriage this trip. Thirty years ago, I had been engaged to Joe Viola, a NYC detective. We had met again. Hassle High had had a few murders take place and Detective Joe Viola was assigned to the cases. Joe wanted me to divorce Al and marry him, even though, thirty years ago, he had dumped me at the altar. I was thinking about it.
“I plan to unpack a bit. Why don’t you open the wine and pour us a drink? Do you think the cat is on the ship?” I asked. I opened one of my three suitcases. Al had packed only one. I pulled out dresses and hung them on the closet. Just as Al handed me a glass of wine there was a knock at the cabin door. Al opened it.
Ben Franklin was there. He had a list of cabins with assigned students in them. I thanked him and Al softly closed the door. We both kicked off our sneakers and sat on chairs on the balcony. We looked over the river at Lyon before us. It was a pretty site. The Basilica of Notre Dame de Fourviere was in the distance. The sun was setting. Suddenly the boat started to move. We were on our way. I glanced at the clock on the wall of our cabin. At least an hour before I had to dress for dinner. This was great! I sipped the wine which was quite good. Al and I just sat there and watched as the boat moved off from Lyon. It was a nice calm moment. Little did I know, it wouldn’t last. We finished the wine and got showered and dressed for dinner. Al looked great in his jacket and tie. I looked pretty good since I had lost twenty pounds and could finally get into a petite size eighteen gown. We both walked hand and hand to the front of the boat where the restaurant was located. We were both eager to see what the students were wearing and meet the other guests.
Chapter 2
Five Star Dinner
Jeff walked up to me with Tim, Martha and Brady. Brady Naidoo was the black quarterback on the football team and point guard on the basketball team. He was nineteen .He had just finished his senior year and gotten a scholarship to Florida Southern College. He was planning to be a doctor. A nice kid with a beautiful singing voice. In Hamlet the Musical he played Laertes. His father was a South African diplomat at the UN. All the students looked good, I almost didn’t recognize them. Everyone was dressed so nice. Jeff and Tim were in suits and ties as was Brady. Martha had on a lacy cocktail dress.
“ You all look great!” I said.
“Thanks,” Tim replied. Martha smiled at me.
“ You look lovely, Mrs. Bruno,” she said.
“Thank you, Martha,” I replied. What was this? They were practicing good manners.
Al was waving at me from across the room. He had picked out a table with another two couples. I waved back.
“You make sure everyone behaves Jeff, Martha,” I said. Suddenly I had a yellow tabby rubbing my legs. I pet her in the hopes she would move along. She did. She headed for the Captain.
Brady spoke. “You don’t have to worry, everyone’s just so excited to be here.”
I smiled and walked away. I walked to Al. The waiter pulled out a chair for me. I sat. I introduced myself. “ I am Mrs. Maria Cohen. This is my husband Al.”
Al nodded and smiled at the other two couples. One couple about fifty years old was looking at me strangely. I reached up to pat my hair, was it out of place? Nope.
The husband of this couple introduced himself and his wife. “We are Beth and Todd Princeton. We saw you on the train with the noisy students, I guess. They needed to be controlled better.” He wasn’t smiling as he said it. In fact, he was frowning at us. They both looked like Kelley, dark and pale and never in the sun. Both were dressed in black evening wear.
Oh dear. They were the couple that Jeff yelled in front of, guess they don’t have any teenagers at home.
I smiled again, and kind of grit my teeth. “Yes, I’m their Principal, we are going to present the entertainment for part of the trip. They’re quite talented actors. “ I took a great big deep breath. “I ‘m sure you’ll enjoy them. We’ll be presenting in the cocktail lounge in a few days.”
“Oh,” sniffed Beth. “We don’t drink.”
Oh boy. Why did these two book a cruise noted for its food and wine tasting? Beth the wife, was still looking at me as if I was supposed to say something.
“ I’m sure you could come up to see them anyway and have a soda or something.” I replied lamely. I was stumped. What did they want from me? Thank goodness the other couple spoke up.
“We are Richard and Roxanna Jones. Happy to meet you all.” He said. They were our age about sixtyish. They looked like a pair of tennis players or golfers. They both were very fit. Both were bronze with grey short hair. Their haircuts were almost the same and they were both dressed in beige. She was in a beige and lace dress. He was in a beige suit.
Al and I smiled at them.
“We’re happy to meet you all too,” said Al. He even looked relieved . A looked at me. I knew what he was thinking. It was nice to meet a normal couple after Beth and Todd. We were both thinking the same thing.
Thank goodness, the waiter arrived! I order a glass of champagne. To hell with not drinking! The waiter came back quickly with drinks. Everyone had a drink, but the Princeton’s had seltzer. We had a grand dinner, Moules Marinieres for appetizer, steak with small baby green beans ties with ribbons, and the desert was chocolate mousse to die for. I would have to get the recipes from the cook! Everyone enjoyed their meal and the conversations got better as we went on. The Princeton’s were from New Jersey, why am I not surprised? And the Jones’ were from Florida. No surprise there either with those tans. We all walked to the lounge and bar to have a goodnight drink. Even the Princeton’s ordered Shirley Temples! I guessed that was a special treat from the way Todd ordered them, making sure no liquor was involved, please! Anyway, we talked about travel and the guys got on sports, the women talked about children, grandchildren etc. Al and I don’t have children, but we admired the baby pictures of the grandchildren anyway. It was a pleasant hour. We said goodnight and went to our room. The faculty members had not joined us in the bar and thank goodness no students did either!
Moules Marinieres
12 dozen mussels
1 stalk celery
½ cup onions, chopped
Salt pepper
½ pint white wine
Clean mussels and put them in a large pan with celery, onions, salt and pepper. Cover and stream. When mussels open throw out one shell each, leaving mussel in one shell. Place in casserole and cover. Pour liquid from large pan into saucepan. Make sure you strain out the sand. Add the wine, heat and pour over mussels and serve.
Chapter 3 A Wicked Night
About the Author
Constance Meccarello-Gerson was born in Poughkeepsie N.Y. She is a
graduate of Florida Southern College with a BA in Acting. She also attended
the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. HB Studio, Actors Studio, in
NYC. She is a member of SAG, Alpha Gamma Delta, Alpha Si Omega. Her
MFA in Acting is from Brooklyn College. She has appeared on TV, film,
and on stage in NYC. For 20 years she taught as a mentor and teacher of
English and Theatre arts for the New York City Department of Education and
for the University at Santa Cruz. She also taught for ten years as a Speech
Coordinator at Touro College. She was an executive at Bloomingdales. Her
writing as appeared in Musings, also in the Best American Poets
series. Murder at Hassle High is her first cozy mystery.
Summertime Murder at Hassle High is her second and French Cruises Can
Kill You is the third. She wrote Armera a sci fi mystery and her
Snowball the Sherlock Rabbit series, a group of children books.
Currently she lives in NYC with her husband Alain, a parrot named Benji, and
lots of fish. She is currently writing Death In a Dorm, another cozy in the
Hassle High series.
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