Death Takes the Low Road

by Reginald Hill

  ‘What are you doing in that place—Durness, is it?’

  ‘It’s a long, long story. Look, what’s going on down there, what’s all this business about finding pot in my room? I don’t use the stuff, I mean, you know that. They must have planted it. I don’t know who. The police I suppose.’

  The sergeant and constable who had moved discreetly to the far side of the office from which she was telephoning looked at her with hurt expressions and she blushed.

  ‘Not, not you. I don’t mean you. It’s different down there … Hello, Uncle James? Sorry, I was talking to the policemen up here. They’ve been so nice, really, yeah. Great.’

  Somewhat mollified, the policemen returned to staring out of the window.

  ‘Listen, Uncle James. I’m worried about Bill. Bill Hazlitt, that’s right. Yes, I’ve seen him. Up here, just before they arrested me. I think he’s in some kind of trouble. No, I don’t know what. No, I didn’t speak to him either.’

  ‘I think,’ said Professor Nevis, ‘that you must concern yourself with your own problems first, my dear. What Hazlitt is up to, no one knows. I know Stewart Stuart is most perturbed by his behaviour. Apparently there are all kinds of loose ends he left for his office to tie up as best they could. I fear he’s done his chances of replacing Stuart little good.’

  ‘It’s not his career prospects I’m concerned about,’ said Caroline with slight acidity. ‘It’s his physical wellbeing now, this minute. The police here have said they’ll look into it, but I don’t know what they can do.’

  Hurt looks again from the window.

  ‘I’m sure they’ll do their best. But what about you, what arrangements have been made? Shall I come up, do you think?’

  ‘No, don’t do that. They’re planning to send me back. That’s right, isn’t it?’

  Nods from the window.

  ‘Yeah. I think they were going to manacle me behind a train at first, but evidently they’re sending someone for me, to see me safely home. Look, will you see about my legal rights, fix up a lawyer, that kind of thing? Tommy Poulson might be useful. Tell him I’ve been framed. And would you get in touch with the embassy for me? Start some big wheels moving, but ask ’em to play it cool, will you? I don’t want any clever American correspondents sending a little piece about me back home to frighten Mom and Dad. No! Please, Uncle James. You mustn’t ring them, not before you talk with me. It’ll only upset them and I’m sure it’s all going to blow over.’

  ‘All right, my dear. I’m sure you’re right. Everything will blow over. I’ll find out at this end when you’re getting back and see you as soon as I can. Now take care. And remember, say nothing. Goodbye.’

  Poor old James, thought Caroline, replacing the receiver. He’s really worried. What am I saying? I’m really worried!

  ‘What happens now, Sergeant Shiel?’ she asked.

  ‘Well, Constable Craig here is going to drive you over to Thurso where ye’ll spend the night.’

  ‘Thurso! Why can’t I stay here?’

  ‘It’s only a wee place we’ve got here, as ye can see, miss. And the night after the Gathering’s often a very busy night for us. They can look after you better in a decent-sized toon.’

  ‘I see. You want to keep us desperate criminals away from your common drunks, is that it? What about my car?’

  ‘If you leave us your key, we’ll see it’s taken care of till ye can make arrangements for it to be collected.’

  Craig went out and Shiel brought her a cup of coffee which she had to drink despite its heat and muddiness as it was obviously a concession to her nationality. She would have preferred whisky in a cardboard cup.

  ‘I’m sorry to keep you from the Gathering,’ she said.

  ‘Never worry a jot,’ he said reassuringly. ‘I’ve seen too many to miss one. Aye, it’s all for the tourist now, ye ken. And the laddie who goes around winning a’ the big prizes for the hammer and the caber, why he’s an Englishman!’

  ‘You don’t say!’ answered Caroline. ‘Look, Sergeant, okay, as far as you’re concerned, I’m a criminal, under arrest. I say I’ve been framed. Twice no less! You might say I’ve been double-glazed! Now I know there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s something I’ll have to sort out myself back in Lincoln. But this other business about Mr Hazlitt, that’s true, I promise you. It’s not just a line I’m shooting to get me off the hook, if you’ll pardon my metaphors. It’s for real, and I can’t afford to wait till I’m back in Lincoln to start sorting it out.’

  She was trembling with earnestness as she finished her plea, and managed to spill her coffee. At least my words haven’t been entirely in vain, she thought, as the ancient floorboards sucked up the khaki liquid like mother’s milk.

  ‘I’ve put out a call,’ said the sergeant. ‘Though you were far from detailed in your description of the people involved, ’cepting Mr Hazlitt, of course. But even if their car is spotted, which I doubt, as you’re no’ even sure about the colour, there’s nothing we can do unless Mr Hazlitt indicates he would like assistance.’

  ‘No. I suppose not,’ said Caroline. ‘It’s a shit of a world, isn’t it?’

  ‘It sometimes appears so,’ agreed the sergeant, unperturbed by her language. ‘That sounds like young Craig now.’

  A few minutes later Caroline was ushered into a tiny police van. There was no one around to see her departure. The Games were still in full Highland fling and even though the headland was out of sight, a vague rumour of applause and enjoyment was audible. The day was still very hot, but a smokiness had entered the blue of the sky and far away to the north like a mirage of Alps in a desert, vague ridges and peaks of cloud were beginning to emerge from the horizon’s mistiness.

  ‘We’re in for a storm,’ opined Sergeant Shiel. ‘Watch how you go.’

  Whether the instruction was aimed at Craig or herself, Caroline couldn’t say. But she smiled sweetly at the sergeant, glad to have found at least one representative of authority whom she felt able to trust.

  Constable Craig started the engine and the van began to move swiftly along the empty road. Shiel watched for a moment, then went back into the station, shaking his head. Such a nice wee lass.

  ‘You’re quite sure she’s safely out of the way, Durban?’

  ‘Absolutely, sir. A very smooth operation, you’ll be pleased to hear.’

  ‘Smooth! She got within fifty yards of Hazlitt, you realise that? Which means within fifty yards of those three thugs. Thank whatever unhappy gods you worship that we’ve got her out of this safely.’

  ‘Yes, sir. She was very determined, sir. And I would have had her arrested in Ullapool, only I was up so late slashing her tyres, I overslept this morning and …’

  ‘Spare me, Durban, I beg you. Listen. Now you’ve finally got the girl off your hands, you’d better join up with Smithson and Campbell and give them a hand.’

  ‘Yes, sir. Where will I find them?’

  ‘How should I know? I am down here, don’t you recall, while you are up there where it’s all happening. They will be casting around for Hazlitt and the Three Stooges, I hope. Just find them and render whatever assistance you can. I hope they survive.’

  ‘I’d be grateful for your help in this,’ said Professor Nevis.

  ‘Very willing to oblige,’ said Tommy Poulson. ‘And what about Hazlitt now?’

  ‘He must look out for himself. Caroline’s my concern at the moment.’

  ‘Of course. Excuse me just a moment.’

  He picked up his phone and dialled.

  ‘Hello? Stuart? It was Sholto Greig, I wanted. Poulson here.’

  ‘Greig’s not here at the moment,’ answered Stuart. ‘No, he’s not here.’

  ‘Could you give him a message? We had a meeting arranged this evening. I shan’t be able to attend. I have to go away unexpectedly.’

  ‘Yes. I have that, I have that. Nothing unpleasant, I hope?’

  ‘I don’t think so. Just give my apologies, will you?’

 
‘I will. Certainly I will. Goodbye.’

  Poulson replaced the receiver and smiled at Nevis.

  ‘There,’ he said. ‘Now I’m all ready to go.’

  Nevis did not return his smile, but sat with the glum look of one who looks into a future that holds nothing but unpleasantness.

  ‘Haven’t you got any imagination?’ demanded Hazlitt. ‘Surely you’re not going to drown me again?’

  ‘What do you suggest?’ asked the knife man.

  ‘Couldn’t you maroon me on a Pacific Island with a tribe of over-sexed Amazons and let nature take its course.’

  ‘Let’s get it over with,’ snapped the woman.

  The four of them were seated in the car, like a typical English family group on a day’s outing whose high point is eating soggy sandwiches in a seaside car park. The sea was certainly here, about ten feet forward and sixty down. But there the resemblance to an English seaside scene ended. For a start the sun was still hot, the sky bright blue. And theirs was the only car in sight on this grassy headland.

  ‘There’s going to be a storm,’ said aubergine-ear, looking straight ahead to the threatening horizon. Hazlitt explored the remark for concealed threats. Ever since they had turned off the main road and bumped and bounced their way to this present situation, he had been alert to every nuance of every comment. There could only be one reason for stopping and it wasn’t so that the passengers could relieve themselves.

  In the end he had brought up the matter himself by his comment to knife man (whom the others referred to as Sandy while aubergine-ear was Chuff—whether derived from the bird, the engine sound or the naval idiom was not clear). It slowly became apparent that the discussion of the best method of disposing of him was more than just a bit of ghoulish humour. It was a real problem. They wanted an accident, but without their personal involvement as witnesses. As a lonely camper on the shores of Loch Coruisk he had been an ideal subject. But now having made a public appearance at the Games—and also possibly having been seen leaving the Games in his present company—a more subtle solution was called for.

  ‘He’s a very good swimmer,’ commented Cherry dispassionately. ‘You’d need the bandages again.’

  ‘Then you’ve got to pull him out and take them off. It’s a bit risky here, isn’t it?’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  ‘Lots of bird-watchers about on a day like this,’ said Hazlitt. ‘See for miles. Probably a pair of binoculars on us at this minute.’

  ‘Shut up,’ said Sandy equably. He opened the door and got out. The momentary draught was refreshing. Chuff got out also, saying to the woman, ‘Watch him.’ She nodded and fractionally increased the pressure of the muzzle of her automatic against Hazlitt’s rib-cage.

  ‘You wouldn’t really shoot, would you?’ he said testingly. ‘I mean, you don’t want a corpse with lead in it and a car covered with blood.’

  ‘Shut up,’ said the woman. ‘All I want is to get done and get back to my kids before my bloody sister ruins ’em.’

  The continuous revelation that Cherry had a normal humdrum everyday existence bothered Hazlitt.

  ‘You’ve got a family?’ he said, unable to keep all the incredulity out of his voice.

  ‘What do you think I do, spend my life running around dark alleys with a gun?’

  ‘No. Of course not. I’m sorry. I never thought …’

  The two men had strolled to the edge of the headland and were peering down, deep in conversation. Now they returned to the car.

  ‘No,’ said Sandy. ‘It’s not high enough. And the water’s only a few feet. No rocks.’

  ‘Oh hell! Couldn’t we knock his head?’ said Cherry.

  ‘It wouldn’t work.’

  ‘What a bloody waste of time!’ she snarled.

  ‘Look, come and see for yourself. Chuff’ll watch Laughing Boy.’

  Cherry opened her door and slid out as Chuff stood politely by, waiting to take her place. Hazlitt watched, his mind a turmoil of fear. All right, so this place and this time might not suit. So they would go elsewhere. And every minute and every mile took him nearer death.

  Cherry stooped forward in the door prior to standing up. Her backside was offered to him, a tempting target. He reacted like an underprivileged Italian, seized a healthy handful of flesh and squeezed it hard.

  The woman shrieked and staggered forward, lost her footing, stumbled and grasped at Chuff. To attempt to leave the car and run for it was obviously pointless. To sit there and have his face slapped by an indignant Cherry was equally pointless. The only action to take was the one that his subconscious survival mechanisms had decided on seconds earlier, but which his conscious mind refused to contemplate. He gave it no chance.

  He leaned forward and released the handbrake. Instantly the car began to move forward down the gentle grassy slope. Chuff and Cherry disentangled themselves and looked after it, the former with gentle bewilderment, the latter with righteous indignation. Only Sandy was stirred to action and ran alongside the slowly moving vehicle trying to reach in through the open window and put the brake on once more.

  Hazlitt clenched his right hand with the knuckle of the middle finger protruding from the fist (an attacking style much favoured in his dimly remembered schooldays) and drove this sharply into Sandy’s wrist.

  ‘Hell!’ exclaimed the man, withdrawing his arm quickly. He continued to trot alongside the car, peering in at Hazlitt and shouting. Gradually there dawned in his face the suspicion that this was no accident but an attempt at escape. Hazlitt, watching the edge of the cliff approach at a terrifying speed (15 mph, perhaps, but it felt terrifying), could understand the man’s problem. As an escape attempt, it was little short of suicide.

  With a stoicism bred of numbness out of terror, he placed his spectacles in his shirt pocket, lay down on the floor behind the front seats, and awaited the event.

  It all looked quite dramatic to the watchers on the shore. The car ran elegantly over the edge of the headland, seemed to pause there for a moment like a diver balancing himself before he plunges from the board, then the bonnet dipped forward, the boot flipped up, and it was gone.

  Hazlitt had surprisingly little sense of a change of direction. His eyes were tightly shut and he had wedged himself firmly beneath the seats. There was a slight sinking feeling in his stomach, a kind of splodgy crashing noise, an increase of pressure against the front seats. But the first real indication that waiting-time was over and doing-time had arrived was the shock of icy water flooding in through the windows and engulfing his body in a trice.

  It was bone-crackingly cold, despite the heat of the sun. It took more than a couple of fine days to influence these seas. Fortunately, water was an element in which he had always felt perfectly at home and now he reached for the car door without panic and pressed the handle.

  Nothing happened.

  He pressed again. Still nothing. Now he began to feel panic. Oh Christ! Suppose the blasted thing had been buckled by the impact? His lungs were beginning to ache. He tried again without success. He could hold out for only a few seconds more. What was best? Try another door, obviously. But turning round in a car full of water was not the easiest of tasks. Various bits of luggage had slid forward from the rear sill and were hindering his leg movements. He felt it should be some consolation that drowning in this car should make it impossible for Sandy, Chuff and Cherry not to be connected with his death. But it wasn’t. Indeed he felt a sudden urge of affection for the trio, a desire to see them all again.

  He managed to turn, reached the other door, the one through which he had helped Cherry. It must be open, indeed hadn’t been closed after Cherry’s exit. It was open! He pushed. It moved six inches and stopped. It felt like a solid, unarguable stop and a short-sighted glance through the sunshine-filled water told him why. That side of the car was up against a large shell-ornamented boulder.

  I’m going to die, he decided. Without ever having been to Acapulco; without ever having tasted paté de canard en croûte;
without even having told Caroline how much I love and desire her. I’m going to die and there’s nothing I can do to prevent it.

  Except lift the door handle upwards instead of pressing it downwards.

  He turned again, lifted the handle and the door opened slowly through the resisting water.

  A few seconds later he broke the surface, sucked in huge delicious lungfuls of North British air and looked up at the three heads protruding over the edge of the cliff like a display of traitors impaled on London Bridge. Whether the expression on their faces was one of relief or disappointment, his myopic gaze could not make out.

  It made no difference. Here was where he did not want to be.

  He trod water and undid his laces, kicked his boots off, turned on to his stomach and began to swim due north.

  Thirty minutes later he tried to turn for the shore, but found himself in the grip of a current so strong it was pointless wasting his strength by wrestling against it.

  He began to feel faintly worried. He knew he could keep afloat for hours, but it was a rather pointless exercise unless he were actually going somewhere.

  And when the waters gradually started to swell mightily under him, and the blue of the sky was washed over with fast-moving whites and greys, and thunder began to roll from one end of the constricting horizon to the other, he began to suspect that with unintended kindness he had saved his enemies the trouble of arranging their little accident for him.

  10

  To her surprise Caroline had no difficulty in going to sleep in the small, comfortless cell the Thurso police provided for her. Her new guardians were polite but cold in their attitude and she felt with the disappearance of Constable Craig that she had lost a friend.

  She lay down on her bed, thought briefly of the horror with which her mother would view her present plight, wondered what it was that Hazlitt had done to invoke the intervention of forces powerful enough to frame her like this, said a small but fervent prayer for his safe keeping, and fell asleep.

  Not even the terrible storm which had exploded over the sea in the early evening and which raged all night disturbed her rest.