by M C Beaton
Those fingers closed on a key. “Now let’s see if I can find out what’s going on,” she muttered.
She unlocked the door, went in and shouted, “Hamish!” at the top of her voice. No answer. She searched through the small station, ending up in the office and looking through the papers and notes on the desk for some clue.
And then all at once she remembered Hamish saying he wanted to find out about the Smiley brothers and saying they could be dangerous.
She then stared at the phone. “I hope I’m doing the right thing,” she said aloud, “or Hamish will never forgive me.” She looked up the phone number of police headquarters at Strathbane and began to dial.
She was put through to a tired Jimmy Anderson, who was on night duty. He listened carefully to her story about the suspected still, the Smiley brothers, and then how two men had driven the Land Rover, parked outside the police station and left.
“I’ll see to it,” said Jimmy. “Why didn’t the silly fool tell us about this?”
“He said that with the noise you lot made arriving from Strathbane, the Smiley brothers would get to hear of it before you even left.”
“Aye, he had a point there,” said Jimmy. “But we’ll be careful.”
“Be quick,” urged Sarah. “He may be in danger.”
♦
Hamish had fallen into an uneasy sleep when he suddenly awoke. Someone was opening the trapdoor. He made a dash for the stairs, A shotgun was being pointed straight at him through the trapdoor.
“Back off, Hamish,” came Stourie’s voice, “or I’ll blast your head off.” He pressed a switch by the stairs and the cellar was flooded with harsh light.
Stourie eased his way down the stairs followed by Pete, “Tie him up and gag him,” Stourie instructed his brother.
“People know I’m here,” said Hamish desperately.
“Aye, well, if they knew you were here, where are they?” sneered Smiley. “We all know you fancy yoursel’ as the Lone Ranger. Tie him up, Pete.”
Hamish was trussed up, and a broad piece of sticking plaster was pasted over his mouth.
“That’s him dealt with,” said Pete. “What do we do now?”
“Wait till the fuss dies down and make sure no one comes here looking for him and then we’ll drop the cratur in the nearest peat bog.”
“Aye, that’ll do fine,” said Pete. He stretched and yawned. “I’m dead tired. Let’s get some sleep.” He gave the trussed Hamish a vicious kick in the ribs.
Then both brothers went up the stairs, switching off the light and leaving Hamish Macbeth lying on the floor, helpless in the darkness.
It was dawn before police and detectives began to spread out over the moors outside the Smileys’ croft.
Blair roused from his bed was in a foul mood. “Close in,” he said. “That girlfriend o’ Macbeth’s said it was that shed he was interested in.”
Inside the croft house, a dog began to bark furiously. “That’s it!” shouted Blair. “Go for it! Fast!”
Men smashed in the door of the shed, just as the Smileys erupted from their house. “What the hell’s going on here?” shouted Stourie.
Blair went up to him. “We believe you are holding a policeman.” And let’s hope these weird-looking buggers have killed him, thought Blair suddenly. A life without Hamish Macbeth. Bloody marvellous.
“Whit policeman?” asked Stourie.
“Call off your dogs,” shouted Blair as two dogs snapped at his ankles.
“Down boys,” growled Stourie. “You’re going to have to pay for the damage to that lock.”
Blair grunted by way of reply and walked into the shed and looked around. “Nothing here,” said Jimmy.
“Ach, I should have known it,” said Blair, his voice heavy with disgust. “Hamish and his hysterical women. And do you know the price o’ this operation? We’ll search the house anyway. Come on then. Nothing here.”
Downstairs, Hamish heard him. In desperation he twisted and wriggled across the floor and kicked out savagely with his bound feet at a row of bottles.
“What was that?” said Jimmy Anderson at the doorway of the shed.
“I heard nothing,” said Stourie.
Silence again.
“Come on!” snapped Blair.
Crash!
“Jesus, it’s coining from under the floor. There’s a basement.”
“There is not.” A film of sweat covered Stourie’s face despite the cold of the dawn.
“Search all over the floor,” howled Blair. He had been so anxious to prove that Hamish Macbeth’s girlfriend had instigated a useless and expensive search that he had called off the search too soon.
“Over here,” called a policeman, scraping aside the straw over the trapdoor.
Blair lumbered over. “Unlock it,” he said over his shoulder to Stourie.
“I dinnae hae a key,” howled Stourie.
Blair nodded to a policeman who came forward with a sledgehammer and brought it down on the lock and smashed it.
The trapdoor was thrown back. Blair went down. Behind him Jimmy Anderson had found the light switch.
Blair looked at the bound and gagged figure of Hamish Macbeth.
He stooped over him and savagely ripped the gag from his mouth. “You’re in deep shit, man,” he said. “You’re going to have to explain why you decided to do this on your own and why you withheld information.”
♦
It was a long, long day for Hamish Macbeth. He had to type out reports to explain why he had decided to investigate on his own. He learned that The Scotsman Hotel had been raided and all the bottles removed from the bar. Macbean had been arrested and charged with supplying illegal liquor to his customers and had been bailed to appear at the sheriff’s court in Strathbane in a month’s time.
Blair tried to make as much trouble for Hamish as possible, but Superintendent Peter Daviot had said with irritating mildness that they would probably have never got on to it were it not for Hamish’s unorthodox investigations. Hamish had not broken into the property. The door of the shed had been unlocked.
So Hamish was finally free to go. Blair’s parting shot was that there was no police car available to take Hamish to Lochdubh and so he could walk. The last buses had gone by the time Hamish left police headquarters. He stood miserably out on the Lochdubh road, trying to hitch a lift. But cars which might have stopped for a policeman in uniform were not going to stop for a tired, unshaven man in black sweater and trousers.
Then just when he had given up hope of ever getting back to Lochdubh that night, the Currie sisters drew up beside him in their battered little Renault.
“You were on the six o’clock news,” said Nessie as she drove off.
“It’s getting like Chicago – Chicago,” put in the repetitive Jessie.
Hamish dozed in the back seat until they drew up outside the police station. He blinked awake. “Someone’s there,” he said. “The lights are burning.”
“It’ll be that girlfriend of yours,” sniffed Nessie.
Hamish walked into the police station. Sarah was sitting at the kitchen table.
“How did you get in?”
“I found the key under the doormat,” said Sarah. “I’m glad you’re safe. I heard about it on the news.”
“I’ll just see to the hens and sheep.”
“The sheep have had their winter feed and the hens are locked up for the night,” said Sarah. She added, seeing the look of surprise on his face, “My father is a farmer in Shropshire.”
“I know little about you.” Hamish sat down wearily at the table. “I gather it was you who called police headquarters. They planned to drop me in a peat bog. They were running a big operation. The police have been raiding hotels and bars all over the place. The owners of The Drouthy Crofter in Braikie have been charged along with a lot of others.”
“Well, now you’re home safe, I’ll be off,” said Sarah.
“Won’t you stay a bit?”
“No, you look e
xhausted. There’s a casserole for you in the oven.”
She stood up. He went to kiss her but she brushed past him, her head ducked.
“Sarah!” he called. But the closing of his kitchen door was the only answer he got.
♦
The next day was as cold as iron. The birds were silent. Hoar frost glittered on the grass and on the branches of trees. Ice glittered in puddles. Outside the police station, the loch lay flat like glass.
It seemed a cold, friendless world where romance had died.
Hamish decided he’d had enough. His ribs hurt where he had been kicked and there was a sore red patch about his mouth from the gag. It was up to Strathbane with all their forensic resources, computers and reports to solve this case. He had been neglecting his domestic duties about the croft. He cleaned the police station thoroughly and then went out and fed his sheep. Towser’s grave lay on the hill above the police station, a sad and silent reminder to one lonely policeman that even the dog who had loved him was no longer alive. By ten o’clock, he was beginning to feel considerably better because of all the physical exercise. He felt at peace. Deciding to leave the case alone had been a good idea.
The phone in the police station rang. Sarah was the first person he thought of. He thought it was her voice when he answered the phone and it took him a few moments to realise that the caller was Priscilla Halburton-Smythe.
“I’ve been waiting for a call from either you or Sarah,” said Priscilla, “and I’ve been reading accounts of the death of this dentist.”
Hamish sat down at his desk. “It’s like this Priscilla, I’ve given up.”
“That’s not like you. Tell me all about it.”
He began at the beginning with the murder and burglary and went on until he finished with his capture by the Smiley brothers.
“I’m sure you’re feeling rattled, tired and fed up,” said Priscilla sympathetically. “But what you used to do when you were stuck was to dig into the background of all the suspects. The answer, you always said, lay in the past. Also, Gilchrist was in debt and Gilchrist liked money. Could he have been involved with the Smiley brothers?”
“I’d thought of that,” said Hamish slowly, “but I can’t find any connection there.”
“It certainly must have been a magnificent obsession that Maggie Bane had for Gilchrist.”
“She was in love with him, yes, but why do you call it an obsession?”
“She gets a good degree, and by your account, apart from her ugly voice, she is very attractive. It must have been an obsession to make her bury herself alive in a dreary Highland town with a philanderer. Was there some jealous lover she left behind in St. Andrews? Might be worth rinding out. You could start with one of her tutors.”
“It’s a long way to St. Andrews, Priscilla, and in this weather.”
“You could phone.”
He sighed. “No, no, I have always found it better to go in person. I’ll phone Strathbane. I’m supposed to be on leave for a couple of days anyway.”
“Good hunting, Hamish. Phone me back if there’s any result.”
“Aye, I’ll do that. Any hope of you coming back up here?”
“I’ll be home for Christmas.”
He wanted to ask, “Alone?” But what if she said no, she was bringing a friend with her, a male friend. Right at that moment, he didn’t want to hear any more bad news.
Promising to phone, he said goodbye. He decided not to wear his uniform, he was not officially on duty. He phoned Strathbane and told them he was feeling unwell after his experience and would take two days leave. He then phoned Sergeant Macgregor at Cnothan and asked him to cover his beat for him.
He then locked up the police station after pinning a note on the door referring all callers to Cnothan.
As he drove out past the Tommel Castle Hotel, he resisted an impulse to swing the wheel, call at the hotel and see if Sarah would like to go with him.
Although the sky was threatening, no snow fell, and when he finally reached St. Andrews University, a gleam of pale sunlight was gilding the old university buildings.
It took some time to run Maggie Bane’s former physics tutor to earth, but Hamish finally found himself sitting in the living room of a comfortable book-lined home, facing a Mr. James Packer, a surprisingly youthful and cherubic-looking man.
“I read about the case in the newspapers, of course,” said Mr. Packer when Hamish explained the reason for his visit. “Do you know I was not very surprised that he had been killed.”
“You knew him?” Hamish leaned forward eagerly.
“I knew of him. Maggie was a brilliant student. I thought it was that brilliance which isolated her from the other students. She kept herself very much to herself. Didn’t go much to parties and dances, didn’t seem to have any boyfriends. Then right after the exams, I heard a rumour she had gone off to Paris with a middle-aged married man. I was concerned. On her return, I sent for her and told her bluntly I had heard the rumours. She laughed and said it was all respectable and that he was divorced and that they were going to get married, and until the wedding, she would work for him at his practise in Braikie. I counselled her that she was too young to know her own mind and that she was throwing away a brilliant future but she was so obviously very much in love.”
There was a sad little silence. Then Mr. Packer said, “But he did not marry her, did he?”
“No,” said Hamish, “and it appears he was not very faithful to her either. Apart from being a brilliant student, tell me more about Maggie Bane.”
“To tell the truth, I was amazed by her passion for mis dentist. I always thought of her as being rather cold and analytical. I thought she did not mix with the other students because she despised them, rather than out of shyness.”
“What is her background?”
“Doting mother and father, possibly no longer doting. I heard the mother used to call at the university with home-baked cakes and things like that for Maggie, and Maggie was quite dreadfully rude to her. I suppose, you know, I really only saw Maggie’s intellectual brilliance. But looking back, I don’t suppose Maggie Bane was a very nice character.”
“Do you think she could be violent?”
“I do not know. I would not have credited her with violence, but until the advent of Gilchrist, I would not have thought her capable of passion either.”
“I wish I’d known Gilchrist,” said Hamish. “I only saw him dead. He was nothing much to look at – white hair, white face – typical dentist, in fact. There must have been something in his character to attract women. He liked the high life and he left a lot of debt.”
Mr. Packer gave an odd little nod of his head as if Hamish had just confirmed something he had already thought. “Have you noticed, Mr. Macbeth, those ugly little millionaires who usually have some gorgeous blonde hanging on their arm? Women find an ambience of power and money almost irresistible. And before you damn me as being a chauvinist and politically incorrect, I mean some women. This is not Palm Beach, this is the north of Scotland where things are scaled down. A man who drives a large car and offers trips to Paris just like that must have struck Maggie Bane as a rare exotic. I think she is much to be pitied. I think I shall write to her if you would be so good as to furnish me with her address. I think she could channel all that passion and energy into a successful career.”
Hamish took out his notebook, wrote down Maggie’s address, and passed it over.
“There’s something else I want to ask you – about nicotine poison.”
“It’s very easy to make.”
“You will see from the newspapers, an illegal still was raided. I thought that might have been used. I mean anyone with the machinery to manufacture illegal whisky would be able to make nicotine poison.”
“I should think any bright schoolchild might be able to do the same in a school lab.”
Hamish sighed. “Motive, that’s the thing.”
“It’s usually drunkenness, love or money.”
“There was this robbery at The Scotsman Hotel. I kept thinking that Gilchrist with his love of spending and being low on funds might have had something to do with it. I mean, Mrs. Macbean, that’s the manager’s wife, might have let something slip about the money, about the safe having a wooden back.”
“Or,” said Mr. Packer, crossing a neat pair of ankles in Argyll socks, “if he was such a charmer, he could have worked on her. Surely such an enormous sum of money for a bingo prize would be advertised by the hotel in the newspapers.”
“Yes, it was.”
“This is fun,” said the tutor happily. “I feel quite like Dr. Watson. Tell me about this Mrs. Macbean.”
“She isn’t a looker, middle-aged, waspish, hair in curlers from morning till night. Husband is said to beat her up, but she does not seem afraid of him. Told a friend of mine” – oh, Sarah, what happened to us? – “that a woman with a breadknife in her hand didn’t need to be afraid of any man. Said she put laxative in his morning coffee after he had beaten her and threatened it would be poison the next time.”
“Mrs. Macbean sounds a likely candidate.”
“But she would need help. Someone with strength and coldness murdered Gilchrist and hoisted him into the dentist’s chair and drilled all his teeth.”
“You came here,” said Mr. Packer, “to find out more about Maggie Bane. I assume this is because there is often something in the person’s past which will highlight some murderous side of their character?”
“That is often the case.”
“Then perhaps you should try to find out a bit more about what Mrs. Macbean is like?”
“You’re right. I might just call down to Leith and see what I can find.”
♦
Blessing the motorways which made travel so easy, Hamish drove down to Edinburgh and so to Leith. He had fortunately a note of Mrs. Macbean’s original address in his notebook. There might be someone living there or living close by who might remember her.
The early Scottish night had fallen when he finally entered a Georgian tenement in Leith. The woman who answered the door to him said that, yes, the police had already been round asking questions but she had never known the woman. Try Mrs. Morton on the ground floor.