by M C Beaton
“You what? This isn’t the Wild West with a lone sheriff. Do as you’re told and give Mackenzie all the help she needs.”
After Daviot left, Hamish felt quite low. The case was difficult enough without being saddled with some pushy woman detective. He assumed first thing in the morning meant around nine o’clock. He set the alarm for eight and went to bed, feeling mildly hungry because he’d only eaten the first course before Daviot had taken him away, but felt too tired to cook anything.
♦
Hamish was awakened at six in the morning by a banging on the front door. He struggled out of bed, went to the door, and shouted, “Come round to the kitchen.”
He put on a dressing gown and went and opened the kitchen door.
“I’m Robin Mackenzie,” said his visitor.
“Come ben. What time d’ye call this?”
“I was instructed to report early.”
Robin Mackenzie was a fairly small woman with dark brown hair worn in a French pleat. She had small dark brown eyes, a long straight nose, and a wide mouth. She was wearing a white blouse, suede jacket, and tweed skirt. Her black patent leather shoes had low heels.
“You are not what I expected,” she said, looking up at the tall, unshaven figure of Hamish with his flaming red hair tousled from sleep.
“What did you expect?” asked Hamish.
“Someone fully dressed and in uniform, for a start.”
“I’ll make you some coffee and get dressed.”
The dog and the cat wandered in. She looked at them but made no comment, and thank goodness for that, thought Hamish.
When the coffee was ready, he served her a mug of it and took himself off to the bathroom to shower and shave.
Robin looked around the kitchen. She had grown up in South Uist in the Outer Hebrides and had left as soon as she could to fulfil her ambition of becoming a detective. She had heard reports of Hamish’s brilliance and how he always managed to avoid promotion, and she had wondered why. Being stuck in a highland police station out in the wilds, she thought, would be as bad as being back in South Uist.
She thought Hamish was probably some eccentric and the stories about him had been wild exaggerations. Hadn’t Blair often told her that Macbeth was some highland idiot who just occasionally got lucky?
Hamish came back, dressed in his uniform, and said, “Just a minute. I’ve got to let my hens out.”
Robin suppressed an exclamation of irritation.
When he returned, Hamish then fussed about filling up the animals’ water bowls. When he finished, Robin said impatiently, “Can we get started?”
“I’ve got to walk my beasts. Come with me, and we can talk as we go along.”
I should have brought a camera, thought Robin. No one would ever believe this.
As they strolled along the waterfront, Hamish told her everything he had found out.
After he had finished, he said, “I thought we might go up and see the sister, Caro Garrard. You question her, and I’ll see if there is any variation in her statement. Then we’ll try some of the others. It’s ower early. We’ll need to wait a bit until folks wake up.”
Nessie and Jessie Currie peered through their net curtains. “He’s got a lassie with him,” said Nessie. “Oh, my, she must have spent the night. She should be warned.”
“Warned,” echoed Jessie.
Robin noticed that two small women were approaching them. Hairnets covered their tightly permed hair, and they were wearing identical dressing gowns over flannel men’s pyjamas. On their feet, each wore a pair of Snoopy slippers. The morning sun glinted off their glasses.
Hamish saw them and said hurriedly, “Let’s get back to the police station.”
“Not so fast!” shouted Nessie.
“So fast,” echoed her sister.
Hamish groaned and stopped. “Young woman,” said Nessie, “they may have loose morals in the cities, but in Lochdubh, we are decent, God-fearing people.”
“I am Detective Robin Mackenzie,” said Robin, her fluting South Uist accent cutting through Jessies usual echo. “I arrived at the police station at six o’clock this morning to begin work. Now, what can I do for you?”
“Just came out to say welcome,” mumbled Nessie, and the twins bolted back towards their cottage.
“If the rest of the inhabitants are as deranged as that pair, I’m not surprised there have been two murders up here,” said Robin.
“They’re very nice women,” said Hamish defensively. He hated any of the inhabitants being criticised by outsiders.
They walked back to the police station. “I’ll fix us an omelette for breakfast,” said Hamish.
In the kitchen, Robin noticed that the cat and dog stared at each other for a long moment and then slouched out. “Where are they going?” she asked.
“Who?”
“Your cat and dog.”
“I don’t know,” said Hamish crossly, lifting the lid of the stove and dropping in slices of brown peat. He knew exactly where they had gone. They had gone back to his bed to continue sleeping, but he did not want to tell her that.
“I’m chust going out to get some eggs,” he said.
Bloody women, thought Hamish as he collected fresh eggs from the hen house. I’m surrounded by them.
He returned to the kitchen and began to beat up the eggs for an omelette.
Robin watched him. Her heart was sinking rapidly. She should be out there with the experts, not stuck in this kitchen with this lanky policeman and his weird cat and weirder dog.
The omelette was excellent but the coffee dreadful. She edged her cup aside.
“I’ll make us some tea,” said Hamish. “That coffee’s a disgrace, and so I shall tell Patel.”
“Is it instant?”
“Yes, it’s called High Mountain Blue. It was on special offer. I think it’s made from the sweepings on the floor after they’ve processed the real stuff. After we see Caro, the sister, I think we should pay a visit to the seer, Angus Macdonald.”
This is truly awful, thought Robin. I’m stuck with a copper who believes in clairvoyants.
Hamish saw the expression on her face and grinned. “Angus is an old fraud, but he bases his so-called predictions and insights on listening closely to gossip.”
Caro Garrard looked at them wearily when they arrived on her doorstep. “More questions?”
“Just a few,” said Hamish amiably. “May we come in? This is Detective Mackenzie.”
“Don’t be long,” Caro said. “I slept badly last night, and I was planning to go back to bed.”
They sat down round the work table. Hamish removed his cap. A sunbeam shone on the rich red of his hair. I wonder if he dyes it, thought Robin. She cleared her throat and took out her notebook.
She took Caro over everything she had told Hamish. Caro wearily replied to her questions. Then Robin asked, “Just how furious were you when you discovered she had been passing your art off as her own?”
“I was very angry,” said Caro. “Oh, it wasn’t just that. It was an accumulation of all her other troubles I’d had to put up with. I sometimes think I would be married now if she hadn’t messed things up for me. No, I didn’t kill her. That murder wasn’t done by someone in a hot rage. It was cold and calculating.”
♦
“I think she did it,” said Robin as they got back into the Land Rover.
“Why?” asked Hamish.
“She was calculating enough to initially hide the fact that she was not in Brighton but up here, having it out with Effie.”
“We’ll see.” Hamish drove in the direction of the seer’s cottage. He stopped the car at the foot of a hill and said, “We’ll need to get out and walk. His cottage is up there.”
Angus’s cottage was perched on the top of a hill with a winding path leading up to it.
The seer opened the door to them just as they arrived on his doorstep. “Come ben,” he said. “What have you brought me?”
Hamish had forgotten that
Angus always expected a present. “I haven’t had time,” he said. “We’re in the middle of an investigation. Look, I’ll get you a salmon later.”
“A real one out o’ the river,” ordered Angus, “and not one o’ thae ones out o’ the fish farm.”
Robin looked around the living room curiously. It was a low-ceiling room with an armchair on one side of the fire and two ladder-back Orkney chairs on the other. There was a table covered with the remains of breakfast by the small window set deep into the thick stone wall. The air was scented with peat smoke from the smouldering fire. Angus put an old blackened kettle on a hook over the fire. Hamish knew the seer had a perfectly good electric kettle in the kitchen but used the old·fashioned way of boiling water to impress visitors.
Angus sat down in the armchair, and Robin and Hamish took the chairs on the other side of the fire. “And who is this young lady?” asked Angus, stroking his long grey beard.
“I am Robin Mackenzie,” she said. “I am a detective who has been sent up here to work closely with Constable Macbeth.”
“And hating every minute of it,” said Angus. “Poor wee lassie sitting there thinking, what am I doing stuck here with this loon?”
Robin’s face flamed. “Nothing of the kind.”
Angus heaved himself to his feet. “Kettle’s boiled. I’ll just get the cups and an ashtray for you, Miss Mackenzie.”
“I don’t smoke!”
“Yes, you do,” said Angus, disappearing into the kitchen.
Hamish looked amused. “Is he right?”
“I’m trying to give up,” said Robin. “Oh, what the hell.” She took offher jacket and, rolling up the sleeve of her blouse, ripped off a nicotine patch and threw it on the fire. She replaced her jacket, opened her handbag, and took out a packet of Bensons. Hamish watched hungrily as she lit one up. He had given up smoking a long time ago, but the craving for a cigarette had never quite left him.
Angus made tea and poured cups and then, when they were served, sat down again. “You’ve come about the murder of that artist,” he said.
Robin started. “So you think that was murder?”
“Oh, aye.”
“So who did it?”
Angus closed his eyes. “I see four people circling around her like the buzzards. I see…”
Robin leaned forward expectantly but the seer only emitted a gentle snore.
“Come on,” said Hamish. “We won’t be getting any more out of him today.”
♦
“Where now?” asked Robin.
Hamish stared down the hill to the village. “I see a mobile police unit has been set up. Time to visit Jimmy and see what he’s found out.”
As the Land Rover bumped over the heathery hill tracks towards the village, Robin wondered uneasily what Hamish had thought of the seer’s accurate reading of her thoughts. She was beginning to sense a sharp intelligence behind Hamish’s laconic manner and feared she had misjudged him.
“That remark of Angus’s about me thinking you stupid was not correct,” she said.
“Oh, it probably was,” said Hamish. “Don’t worry about it.”
He drove along the waterfront and parked in front of the mobile unit.
He and Robin mounted the shallow steps and went in. Jimmy Anderson was sitting behind a desk studying a computer. “You’re just in time, Hamish. What are you doing here, Robin?”
“Superintendent Daviot has asked me to work with Hamish.”
“He has, has he? Both of you come and look at this.” He handed them a computer printout.
It was a statement about Jock Fleming. On two occasions, he had been charged with assault and drunk and disorderly. One of the charges concerned his wife. She had used as grounds for divorce his attack on her where he has broken two of her ribs.
“I’m slipping,” mourned Hamish. “I thought that man was just an ordinary cheerful chap. Will we go and see him?”
“No, I’ll do that,” Jimmy said.
“Any other horrible news?”
“The ex-wife used to be a hooker and a drug addict.”
“Michty me! Anything else?”
“Caro Garrard had a nervous breakdown, but it was a long time ago, just after she left art school. I’d like you both to go and see Dora Fleming. Find out why she was lying. Find out why she is pursuing a violent ex-husband.”
“Where does this woman live?” asked Robin as they left the mobile unit.
“A boarding house, just along the waterfront here.”
“What’s she like?”
“Defiant, coarse, sometimes a really broad Glasgow accent and sometimes it’s modified.”
“Who’s this bulldog in tweed bearing down on us?” asked Robin.
“Mrs. Wellington, the minister’s wife.”
“Hamish Macbeth,” boomed Mrs. Wellington, “just who is this female?”
“Manners,” chided Hamish. “Robin, may I present Mrs. Wellington. Mrs. Wellington, Detective Constable Mackenzie.”
“That’s all right, then,” said Mrs. Wellington. “I thought for a moment you were playing fast and loose with another female.”
“Are they all like that in this village?” asked Robin. “I mean, is it inbreeding or something?”
“Chust bloody-minded nosiness, that’s all.”
“Hamish!” called a voice.
Hamish swung round. Elspeth came hurrying along the waterfront. She was wearing jeans and a faded T·shirt. “We should get together soon,” said Elspeth.
Hamish introduced Robin and then said, “I honestly don’t know when I’ll be free.”
“You owe me some of your time,” said Elspeth.
“Call round at the police station at nine this evening,” said Hamish. “I should be through by then.”
Elspeth’s odd silver eyes surveyed him. “Enjoy your dinner?”
“Yes, thank you. Now, if you don’t mind…”
“Enjoy it while supplies last,” said Elspeth. “There’s misery coming from that quarter.”
Hamish made a sound of disgust and walked on rapidly. Robin hurried to keep up with him.
“What on earth was she talking about?”
“Oh, she thinks she’s psychic.”
“Really? I hope we’re nearly at this boarding house. I’ve had enough of nutters for one day.”
But at the boarding house, Mrs. Dunne said Mrs. Fleming had decided to walk up to the Tommel Castle Hotel to see her ex-husband.
“Why, I wonder?” said Hamish. “We’d better drive up there, Robin.”
♦
When they reached the hotel, Hamish said, “I’ll get Mr. Johnson to send someone up to fetch her down here. I don’t want to end up stepping on Jimmy’s toes.”
Mr. Johnson told them to wait in the lounge. There was no sign of Bessie, the maid. Hamish decided to interview her later.
Dora Fleming came in and slumped down in an armchair opposite them.
“You lied to me,” said Hamish.
“Whit?”
“You got a divorce from Jock because he had been beating you.”
“So I didnae like to tell folks that while he’s paying alimony.”
“And why did you really come up here?”
“He was behind a bit wi’ the payments. It’s all right now.”
“Why are you still here and visiting him, too?” asked Robin.
“He’s the father o’ ma weans.”
“How did you meet him?” asked Hamish.
The heavy accent dropped from her voice as she said, with a toss of her head, “It was at a gallery opening in Glasgow.”
“So it was not while you were working as a prostitute?” asked Robin.
Hamish had heard of people’s eyes turning red with rage and had put that description down to poetic license, but now he could swear he saw red glints of fury in Dora’s eyes.
“You bastards!” she howled. “You never let a body alone to lead a decent life.”
“How did you meet Jock?” asked Ham
ish patiently.
“It was at a gallery opening,” she said sulkily. “A man friend – okay, a client – was a bit drunk, and when we was finished, he said he’d take me to a party. That’s where I met Jock at the gallery. He said he’d like to do a portrait of me.”
Hamish surveyed her. “I thought Jock only painted landscapes and that this portrait of Miss Halburton-Smythe was a one-off.”
Dora gave a contemptuous sniff. “That agent o’ his told him to stick to landscapes because portraits werenae his thing, but Jock said it was a good chat-up line.”
I must see Priscilla, thought Hamish anxiously. If Angela is right and jealousy was behind the murder of Effie, then she could be at risk. Or if Jock did it, she’ll still be at risk.
He got to his feet. “Could you carry on with the questioning, Robin?”
Robin looked at him severely. “And just where do you think you are going?”
“I’ve got to pee,” said Hamish.
He headed toward the door. Now for Priscilla.
∨ Death of a Dreamer ∧
8
She may very well pass for forty-three
In the dusk with a light behind her!
—W. S. Gilbert
Priscilla was crossing the reception area when Hamish stopped her. “It’s urgent,” he said.
“All right. Let’s go into the lounge.”
“No, not there. Robin’s interviewing Jock’s wife.”
“Who’s he?”
“She. A detective.”
“Let’s use the office, then. Mr. Johnsons gone out shopping.” Priscilla selected a key from a whole bunch of them on a chain fastened around her slim waist.
“You look like the chatelaine of the castle. Do you have to work? Where are your parents?”
“They’ve gone to visit the Derwents over in Caithness. I don’t mind.”
She unlocked the door. “Help yourself to coffee and tell me what it’s all about.”
Hamish poured himself a mug from the coffee machine in the corner and turned and raised an eyebrow. “Not for me,” said Priscilla.
“Its like this,” said Hamish. “We were interviewing Jock’s ex-wife. She says Jock only offers to paint a woman’s portrait as a way of chatting her up.”