Home to Roost

by Gerald Hammond

  Any suggestion that I should see her would have implied that a crime had been committed, yet the suggestion seemed to be implicit. (Later, I recognised it as a cry for help.) But Mr Kerr could have been in hospital following a mishap. He could have gone off to make a new life elsewhere and in other, more delicate, company. Or, as had been suggested by almost everybody who knew him, he might simply be sleeping it off somewhere. On the other hand there was the alternative possibility that he had either committed suicide or been the victim of a crime. I decided to see the lady.

  When I met her in a small and bare interview room, I was soon inclined towards the view that her husband could have departed of his own accord. In addition to being large, Mrs Kerr was also both shrill and verbose. Her husband had been adrift for more than thirty-six hours and she wanted to know what was going to be done about it. She agreed that he had stayed away overnight on two or three previous occasions, but never beyond the middle of the succeeding day. He had a fondness for the drink but had never, she was sure, looked at another woman. This was the sum total of her information, but it took her more than an hour to disgorge it. Anxiety takes some people that way.

  I tried to explain that there was little that we could do, at so early a date, beyond circulating his name and description. But this was not good enough for the grass widow. She became more voluble and more shrill. In the end, I got rid of her by promising that a search would be carried out. I may have promised that the entire Lothian and Borders Constabulary would combine to comb every pub, ditch and outbuilding in the Region. I would have promised to find him anywhere in the world and to carry him home piggy-back if only that would have induced her to get out of my life for ever.

  When I was free at last, I made the necessary report for circulation and then put a more detailed report on our newly acquired fax machine to Edinburgh. A copy would automatically be laid on Chief Superintendent Munro’s desk.

  I was out of the building for the next couple of hours. An application for a shotgun certificate had been received from a widow who had retained her late husband’s gun out of sentiment and as a wall ornament. The 1988 Firearms (Amendment) Act made it clear that no certificate was to be issued if the Chief Constable was satisfied that the applicant had no good reason for possessing a shotgun; on the other hand, it went on to state that ‘an application shall not be refused merely because an applicant intends neither to use the gun himself nor lend it for another to use.’

  The widow’s application seemed to fall into the crack between those two provisions, so I went to visit her. She seemed unimpressed by my argument that a shotgun hanging on two hooks and visible through the nearest window violated the safekeeping requirement in the Act. I had no wish to use my powers under Section 52(3) of the 1968 Act against a well-meaning though misguided widow and confiscate a gun which had been in her husband’s family since it was first made. With her permission, I phoned Keith. He listened to my description of the gun and came straight out, bearing a roll of banknotes.

  Money talks louder than I do. When we left, Keith was carrying the gun. ‘A Churchill “Premier” in almost mint condition,’ he said happily. ‘I know a man who’s been looking for one for years.’

  ‘You’ll be able to make his day, and a penny or two for yourself. Mrs Kerr’s reported her husband missing,’ I told him.

  He locked the gun carefully into the back of his jeep. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘Word travels fast in a small area like this. Rumour has it that he’s dallying with his fancy woman, but rumour, for once, is mistaken.’

  I goggled at him. ‘How do you know that?’ I asked. ‘No, don’t tell me,’ I added quickly.

  ‘I wasn’t going to,’ he said. I could tell that he was laughing at me.

  ‘His wife swore blind that he didn’t look at other women.’

  Keith looked round, but the street was empty. ‘He looks damned hard at a waitress in the Quality Café every market day.’

  ‘Do you think the wife doesn’t know?’

  ‘She knows all right. She just doesn’t want to admit it.’

  I leaned back against my car and thought about it. ‘If he went off with her, he slipped away from the pigeon-shoot very slickly. Why did you look so hard at the trench? It wasn’t to look for dead birds or drunken farmers, because I’d already searched there. And you aren’t fascinated by water mains.’

  Again Keith looked amused. ‘Why do you think?’

  ‘You being you, and Mr Kerr having vanished mysteriously, you probably wondered if somebody hadn’t killed him and buried him in the bottom of the trench. But I’d remind you that we saw him shooting after the departure of the last person to be there with him.’

  ‘The last to be seen there,’ Keith said. ‘Allan Brindle was quite right. You don’t see much at ground level while you’re waiting for the birds to come in. And it was growing dark soon after that. But the marks of the digger blade’s teeth were clear to be seen along the whole length of the open trench. You couldn’t fake them.’

  My mind caught up and then went a step further. ‘But somebody could have used the digger during the night,’ I pointed out. ‘I don’t think that the noise would have reached either of the farmhouses.’

  ‘Then where was he when you went down to look for him?’

  ‘He could have been roughly buried. We wouldn’t have noticed in the dark. We weren’t looking for the marks of the digger. Somebody used the digger later.’

  Keith shook his head. ‘Uh-uh. The cab and the ignition were locked.’

  ‘But . . .’ I was about to mention lock-picking and hot-wiring.

  ‘And,’ he said, ‘somebody, presumably the driver, had taken the injectors away for cleaning over the weekend.’

  That seemed to be that. ‘So he definitely left the area,’ I said.

  ‘Leaving a mystery behind him.’ Keith thought about it and then shrugged. ‘The ground was too hard to accept ordinary footprints. And by now the area will be hopping with pipe-fitters and labourers, with all their vehicles, not to mention the digger churning up the area. If Ian Kerr doesn’t turn up alive, you’re going to have a problem.’

  ‘He’ll be sleeping it off in his girlfriend’s bed.’

  ‘If you say so.’ He took a neatly tabulated printout from his pocket and gave it to me. ‘I put Brindle’s list on to the word processor together with such data as Wallace and Molly and I could remember between us. He’s going to ask Janet – she has a memory like an elephant – and take a look through the shop records. We may come up with some more.’

  I glanced at the list. About eight of those listed had bought airgun pellets and there were some notations about boot purchases, but against most of the names there was still nothing. ‘I hope so,’ I said. ‘I’d like to show Allan Brindle that the police can be on his side, but there are a hell of a lot of suspects.’

  ‘Potential suspects,’ Keith corrected me. ‘I wish you joy of them.’

  I could guess at his meaning. A long list of suspects remained. Most of them were local characters of the rougher sort, who could be expected to lie to keep each other out of trouble; the remainder were, or should have been, above suspicion.

  I called in at the Reaper Hotel and drove on again to the Canal Bar, a lowly pub where they do a surprisingly good bar lunch. Ian Kerr was well known at both, but at neither did the staff or such regulars as were present remember seeing him on the Saturday night.

  There was a note on my desk directing me to phone Superintendent McHarg forthwith if not sooner. But the phone rang before I could lift it. I picked it up irritably. Mr McHarg had a maddening habit of ordering you to do something and then doing it himself.

  But it was Chief Superintendent Munro on the line. ‘About this morning’s report,’ he said without preamble. He never announced his identity. He had no need to do so. His lisping, lilting, Hebridean voice was enough identification. ‘I didn’t know that we had an outbreak of poaching.’

  ‘Nor did I, sir,’ I said. This seemed to be
a propitious moment for the grinding of axes. ‘It hadn’t been reported. Some of the landowners have stopped bothering. Too many officers treat poaching as a prank or as a justifiable gesture against grasping landlords. I’m trying to change their attitude.’

  ‘Quite right. Poaching is for the police to deal with. The last thing we need is an affray between poachers and keepers. This is a matter of crime prevention if ever there was one. Concentrate on it. If anything relevant to the farmer Kerr should turn up, we can think again. Until then, put him on the shelf. The man’s a notorious drinker. He’ll very likely turn up in due course, just as he has in the past, very ashamed of himself and apologetic that his wife bothered us.’

  Which was all very well, but when I phoned Superintendent McHarg his view was diametrically opposite. ‘Poaching with an airgun,’ he said disgustedly. ‘Boy’s mischief! Time enough to worry about it when the keeper catches the culprit. If then. The keeper can give him a hot arse and we mustn’t. The disappearance of a man of property under the nose of one of my officers is much more serious. A farmer doesn’t drop out of sight for nearly forty-eight hours because he’s had a few drinks. Not unless he’s collapsed in a ditch. You’ve checked the local hospital?’

  ‘Not yet, sir,’ I admitted.

  ‘Do it right away. He may have had an attack, felt it coming on and wandered off in search of help. Make some enquiries. Be ready to show that we made an effort, just in case he’s found dead of hypothermia. Get on with it.’

  He hung up on me before I could agree or disagree.

  A minute’s thought satisfied me that Mr Munro had every right to tell me to tackle the poaching and none to instruct me to forget about the disappearance of Ian Kerr. Of Mr McHarg, the reverse was true. But, because the two cases covered the same territory and some of the same people, they could be handled in parallel; and if either of my superiors objected they could argue with each other and leave me out of it. Not that they would, but they could.

  I phoned the local hospital and the two others within easy reach. For once Superintendent McHarg had not beaten me to it. None of them had admitted Ian Kerr nor anybody of his description. The only dead body so far unidentified, a road accident victim, was female.

  A starting point common to both cases would be the laird, Mr Youngson. (In Scotland, the owner of the land and the biggest house may be known as ‘the laird’, whether duke or commoner.) I phoned McKimber House, expecting an argument with a butler at least, but the phone was answered by a surprisingly young voice which identified itself as belonging to Mr Youngson. He agreed to see me later in the afternoon without showing the least curiosity as to what I wanted of him.

  Another loose end was the lady friend. I called in at the Quality Café. The only waitress visible was dark and Keith had said that the subject of Ian Kerr’s interest was blonde. The manageress was dealing with invoices in a tiny cubbyhole. When she invited me inside there was no room for either of us to sit but she seemed to enjoy the propinquity – more than I did, for her perfume would have made a good shark repellent.

  Deirdre Watson, the blonde waitress, was off duty until six. The news of Ian Kerr’s disappearance had already done the rounds. As tactfully as I could, I explained that Deirdre Watson might be able to help me with my enquiries. The manageress seemed amused, doubtful, reluctant and not unpleasantly scandalised, but after a little persuasion she gave me Ms Watson’s address. This was in a block of old, tenement flats in the least salubrious corner of Newton Lauder.

  I climbed a stone stair between walls which showed signs of damp, and knocked on a panelled door badly painted in a dark brown. I could hear soft sounds from beyond the door but there was no answer. I knocked again.

  ‘Who’s yon?’ demanded a woman’s voice throatily.

  ‘Detective Sergeant Fellowes.’

  There was a pause. I could hear whispering. For some reason, I thought that one of the whisperers was a man. ‘How do I know you’re who you say?’

  ‘If you’ll open the door I’ll show you my identification.’

  The door opened a crack and a brown eye, heavily made up, examined my card, flicking to and fro between the photograph and my face. A waft of overheated air came out to meet me.

  ‘But what the de’il are you needing me for?’ she asked irritably. Evidently she had detected some resemblance between my face and the passport-type photograph. I was less than flattered.

  I had come to ask rather than to answer, but her question seemed a fair one. ‘I’m looking for Ian Kerr.’

  ‘He’s no’ here. I’ve no’ seen him for a week or mair.’

  ‘I want to see for myself.’

  ‘You can bugger off,’ she said elegantly and tried to close the door.

  I decided that Deirdre Watson was not the type to bother with the formalities of the Complaints Procedure. We each had a foot against the door, but mine was in a heavy shoe while hers, as I discovered, was bare. I got my arm into the gap and levered. She resisted while calling me some names which had definitely not figured on my identification and then gave up the unequal struggle.

  The door swung open.

  Ms Watson, clad only in some scraps of cheap nylon, was framed in an untidy room. In the background Ronnie, Molly Calder’s brother, was struggling hastily into a pair of grey longjohns. An awesome sight.

  ‘I telled you Mr Kerr wasna’ here,’ Ms Watson screeched.

  Ronnie was less angry than he was anxious. ‘You’ll not tell Molly?’ he said.

  Backing out, I said that I would not. As I went to the car with my ears burning, I decided that I had learned one thing. I now knew why Keith had been so sure that Ian Kerr was not recovering from his excesses in the arms of Deirdre Watson.

  *

  Whoever built McKimber House in the late eighteenth or early nineteenth century had avoided the worst excesses of Scottish Baronialism and had even restrained himself in the matter of size. The result was a pleasant country-house no larger than a medium-sized hotel. The weathered stone would be fuzzy with Virginia creeper in summer and blazing with it in autumn, but in late winter the bare stems looked like wandering cracks. The sash and case windows were in need of paint – one of these days, the laird was going to be faced with the cost of new sills.

  The maid who admitted me was the same middle-aged and very plain woman who had directed me to Allan Brindle’s house. She wore a thick cardigan over her uniform. The reason for this departure from strict form was obvious as soon as I realised that the house, which had seemed hot when I came in from the bitter outdoors, was not even warm. The rooms were well provided with radiators, but these were doing no more than protecting the house against damage by frost. Presumably the thermostat was turned well down. The cost of heating such a place in such weather would have crippled most purses.

  Mr Youngson was waiting in a library which was only half filled with books and which smelled of must. A log fire in the grate was doing little more than pull a draught across the room.

  Despite his voice, the laird was a man in his sixties, thin and spry but with grey-white hair thinning at the back. His face was lined but was both tanned and ruddy, as though he spent most of his days in the open air. He seemed rather bulky for his build and his tweed suit fitted tightly. This, I realised, was not because he had put on weight; he could be seen to have dragged his jacket on over several thick sweaters.

  A large coffee-pot was murmuring to itself on a corner table. This turned out to contain soup. He offered me some but I declined. He selected a large mug from among several others and helped himself, taking a stand in front of the fireplace and cupping the mug in his hands. ‘You won’t mind,’ he said. It was not a question. ‘Only way to keep warm in this barrack of a place. You’d better keep your coat on. If I turn the thermostat any higher, the boiler can go through a tankful of oil before the fabric of the building has begun to heat. The best I can do is to try to survive until spring. What did you want to see me about?’

  The chair which he offe
red me was a huge, leather affair and very cold. I went and stood beside the radiator, which was at least faintly warm. ‘You know that Mr Kerr, of Miscally Farm, has disappeared,’ I began.

  ‘No,’ he said, ‘I didn’t. Nobody tells me a damn thing. I’m a long way off the main stem of the grapevine. Done a bunk, has he?’

  My stance by the radiator was in the downdraught from a window. I joined him at the fireplace. ‘Not that we know of,’ I said. ‘Why would you think that?’

  ‘He’s an abrasive character at times,’ Mr Youngson said slowly, ‘and he can put people’s backs up. Don’t mistake me,’ he went on more briskly, ‘if he likes you, or if things are going his way, he can be good company. I get on well with him. A bottle to him at New Year and a favour in return, that sort of thing. But that didn’t make him any other friends.’

  ‘How was that?’ I asked. Any background information can prove useful in the end – or a total waste of time.

  ‘When I held my own shoot . . . Would you believe that I’m only allowed to shoot over my own land once a year, maximum a hundred birds and under Jeffries’ keeper’s directions?’ For the first time his voice, which had been almost jocular while he was speaking of his tribulations, became indignant. He sighed. ‘But that was the nature of the agreement and I suppose I have to abide by it. Anyway, Ian Kerr gave me permission for my guest Guns to be placed on his land, below the highest part of my ground. We made it the last drive and showed them some splendid birds,’ he said with animation, ‘real archangels. But Ian never let Jeffries do the same for his paying Guns and that got right up Allan Brindle’s nose.’ The laird sounded not displeased.

  ‘That doesn’t explain why you thought that he might have “done a bunk”,’ I pointed out.

  He frowned. ‘No, it doesn’t. But I had the impression that Ian was getting fed up with his life. Money problems – the bottom’s dropped out of farming lately and don’t I know it? I’m just squatting here and waiting for my son to make his pile and come home to take over. Not that Ian’s as badly off as some of them around here. He owns Miscally and he’s a thrifty farmer. But to add to money trouble, they have a mentally handicapped son. Mrs Kerr manages to cope with him, but she won’t let Ian say a harsh word to the boy, not even when he set fire to the barn. It gets on top of Ian at times and then he takes to the bottle. Do we know what happened to him? I suppose not, or you wouldn’t be here.’