Death of a Gentle Lady hm-24

by M C Beaton

  “Aye, me and Annie Chisholm.”

  “When did you finish?”

  “We finished about three in the afternoon. She’d been hustling us along because she was paying by the hour. We started at nine in the morning.”

  “And she was there when you left?”

  “No. The phone rang. She looked quite cheerful but said she had to go out for a breath of fresh air.”

  “What time would this be?”

  “It would be just about after you left. I saw you drive off. That would be around eleven o’clock. She asked us how long it would take and as she wanted the bedrooms and the like cleaned as well, we told her it would be around three in the afternoon. She’d been complaining about the price since the minute we arrived but she paid up the money without a murmur. I asked her if she wouldn’t be back before we finished, and she said, “Maybe not. Here’s the spare key. Lock the door behind you and put the key through the letter box.””

  “And how did she seem?”

  “Quite happy, not excited. Poor woman. Who would kill her? Is your lassie still missing, Hamish?”

  “Yes.”

  Bessie’s round country face creased in sympathy. “It’s a right shame.”

  “Where does Annie Chisholm live?”

  “Round the corner. Broom Close, number ten.”

  “If you can remember any little thing, let me know.”

  ♦

  Annie Chisholm was a short, burly woman. When she heard Hamish explain the reason for his visit, she exclaimed, “I didnae like the woman. But this is awfy. She started off being a slave driver. The only break we got was when you arrived and then she was back, following us around. When she got that phone call, she changed. She was just too happy to pay us the money and get out.”

  “No member of her family around?”

  “Not a soul. She was on her own when we were there. I tried at one point to speak to her, saying it was a shame you’d been stood up on your wedding day, and she said that it couldnae have happened to a nicer fellow, sneering, like. I could hardly believe my ears because everyone in Braikie thought she was some kind of a saint, what with paying for the wedding and all.”

  “She didn’t say anything about the missing girl?”

  “Not a word. She still missing?”

  “Aye.”

  “She get on well wi’ Mrs. Gentle?”

  “As far as I know,” said Hamish abruptly.

  When he left, he realised that Ayesha, or whoever she was, might turn out to be the prime suspect.

  He drove back to the police station, where he filed a long report of the finding of the body and of his interviews with the two cleaners. When he finally got to bed with his cat at his side and his dog at his feet, he somehow became more and more convinced that his fiancée was dead.

  ♦

  In the morning, Superintendent Daviot gave a press conference. Only a few of the local papers turned up. But as soon as he described the murder of Mrs. Gentle and the missing Russian girl who had been using someone else’s passport, the news flew out around the country.

  Soon the press dug up the story of Hamish’s failed wedding, and Hamish fled the police station with flashes going off in his face to escape their questions. Earlier that morning, Jimmy had turned up with a forensic team who had gone over the luggage and then taken it away. Before leaving, Jimmy had said the family were travelling up to the castle.

  Hamish did not fear being hounded by Blair because Blair was jealous of him and would want the whole case to himself. He felt sure that if ‘Ayesha’ were safe somewhere, then someone in the Highlands must have seen her. She was too tall and beautiful to escape attention.

  When he reached Braikie, Jimmy phoned him. “Got the news over from Istanbul police,” he said. “Your girl was called Irena Selakov from Moscow. Top hooker. Protector was a Russian businessman, runs a chain of restaurants in Moscow, name of Grigori Antonov. They were visiting Istanbul on business for a week when Irena did a bunk. Russian police so far uncooperative. Say of course they’ll help and then probably hope we’ll forget about it. But Grigori is definitely in Moscow.”

  Hamish thanked him and rang off. Most of that morning, he walked in and out of shops in Braikie, asking if anyone had seen Irena but meeting up with a blank wall everywhere, although everyone he spoke to was anxious to help, regarding him as a desperate lovelorn man, looking for his fiancée.

  He drove up to the castle. The coal-mine owner who had built it had wished to copy Balmoral on a very small scale for his summer holidays. It had stood empty for some time. Hamish wondered if anyone would buy it. Who on earth would want to live in such a wild, remote spot on the edge of the cliffs, particularly with the British coastline crumbling bit by bit each year?

  The rain had gone but the wind still blew and the air was full of the smell of salt. The castle door stood open. The forensic van stood outside. There was no proper fencing around the acreage belonging to the castle, only a crumbling dry-stone wall. But there were police on duty at the entrance to the drive leading up to the castle, and for the moment they were keeping the press at bay.

  Hamish struggled into the coverall blue plastic suit which was now regulation for policemen visiting a possible crime scene. He walked in and stood in the hall. He wondered if they had looked in the cellars yet. He could hear them moving about upstairs. He went into the kitchen. There was a rack inside the door holding keys. Putting on a pair of latex gloves, he selected one marked CELLAR and then searched around the hall until he saw the cellar door.

  He unlocked the door and groped around at the top of the stairs until he found a light switch. He went down into the cellar. Down here, he could hear the boom, boom, boom of the waves.

  There were a few racks of wine in dusty bottles. In the centre of the cellar was a wooden table which held a bottle and two glasses, one clean and one dirty. He sniffed at them and then sniffed the air. There was a faint smell of vomit. He looked down at the stone floor. It was clean.

  He turned and looked back at the stairs; they looked clean as well. He walked around the wine racks. Several large trunks were piled against the wall. He turned and climbed up the stairs, searching the rooms until he found the chief forensic officer, Bruce Murray.

  “Look, Bruce,” said Hamish. “I’ve been down in the cellar. I swear it’s been cleaned recently, and there’s a faint smell of vomit. Now, there are some old trunks there, and I don’t want to get into trouble for compromising a crime scene. Would you mind taking your team down there and opening up those trunks?”

  “Why?”

  “There might be a body in one of them.”

  “You’ve been looking at too many horror movies.”

  “Okay. If I find anything and get a rocket, I’ll say you refused to search.”

  “Oh, all right! But I’ll do it myself.”

  He followed Hamish down to the cellar. The first trunk was empty, the second held fusty old clothes, a third, children’s toys and books, and the fourth old accounts and letters. The fifth at the bottom, a huge old steamer trunk, was pulled out, Bruce grumbling all the time. Hamish undid the old leather straps and threw back the lid.

  “Will ye look at that,” marvelled Bruce. “You’re psychic.”

  “That’ was the dead body of Irena, doubled up and crushed into the trunk. Her blonde hair was matted with blood. Hamish took out his phone. “Can’t get a signal down here,” he said. “I’ll go upstairs.”

  “I’ll wait for the pathologist and then get the boys down here,” said Bruce. “Do you know Dr. Forsythe is leaving the force?”

  “Why?”

  “She wants to retire. Besides, she says that a forensic pathologist here only earns a third of what they do in England. Don’t know where we’ll find another. Probably need to get someone all the way from Aberdeen.”

  Hamish went upstairs. He felt numb. He phoned Jimmy, not wanting to hear Blair’s bullying voice. Then he walked outside the castle and stood waiting. He suddenly craved
a cigarette. He had stopped smoking some time ago, but occasionally the longing would come back.

  Was there a serial killer on the loose? Had some maniac come to the Highlands?

  He discounted any Russian connection. Whoever had phoned Mrs. Gentle had been someone she knew. She had happily gone out to meet whoever called her. Perhaps Irena had just got in the way. But wait a bit – Irena had been killed before Mrs. Gentle was strangled and thrown over. He was sure of it.

  ♦

  The gale blew the sound of approaching sirens. Jimmy arrived with Detective Constable Andy MacNab. In the following car came more detectives, a vanload of police after them.

  “Where’s Blair?” asked Hamish.

  “In the hospital with alcohol poisoning. How that man can keep on going is beyond me. So what have we got?”

  Hamish told him briefly about finding the body. “The press are going to have a field day,” said Jimmy when Hamish had finished. “Here comes Dr. Forsythe. I’ll hae a look at the body when she’s finished. How do you feel?”

  “I don’t know,” said Hamish. “Stunned, I guess.” Dr. Forsythe got out of her car. “Where’s the body?”

  “Down in the cellar. I’ll take you there,” said Hamish. “Did she have any scratches on her face?”

  “Too much blood,” said Hamish. “Why?”

  “Despite being in the water, Mrs. Gentle had fragments of skin under her fingernails. I’m working on the DNA.”

  “Do you think Irena killed her and then struck herself on the head with a hammer in a fit of remorse?”

  “Don’t be cheeky, Hamish. I only meant that there’s hope the person who killed her might be on the DNA database.”

  “Here’s the cellar,” said Hamish. “You’ll find Bruce down there.”

  “Sober, I hope.”

  “For the moment.”

  ♦

  Hamish went back and joined Jimmy. “What’s odd,” he said, “is that on a table in the cellar is a bottle with two glasses. Almost as if someone had lured Irena down there, given her a drugged drink, and then bashed her head in.”

  “What? On the morning of her wedding? Mrs. Gentle said she went out for a walk.”

  “Have you checked the phone records?”

  “Yes. That phone call to Mrs. Gentle came from a call box in Lochdubh. Any strangers in Lochdubh?”

  “I suppose there are visitors up at the Tommel Castle Hotel.”

  “Her family are due to arrive today,” said Jimmy. “What a mess. You’d best get down to Lochdubh and ask around. Put a sign on that phone box and some police tape around it until the forensic people see if they can get anything off the receiver. Then check who’s staying at the hotel.”

  “Can’t I wait for the pathologist’s report? You’re not Blair.”

  “Well, just till then.”

  ♦

  They waited a long time while the sky grew darker and sheets of rain began to sweep across the landscape.

  At last Dr. Forsythe came up from the cellar. “She was struck a heavy blow to the head with a blunt object. I’ll have a better idea of what sort of object when I get the body back to the lab. I can’t tell the time of death until then, either, but from the state of the corpse it does look as if she was killed on the day of her wedding.”

  “But the only person in the castle then was Mrs. Gentle,” exclaimed Hamish. “Could a wee woman like that have had the strength to get that body in the trunk?”

  “I’ll need to check the toxicology. There were traces of vomit in her mouth. Whoever put the body in the trunk then jumped up and down on it to cram it in. Her ribs are broken. At the moment, mind you, that’s just a guess.”

  “Off you go, Hamish,” said Jimmy.

  Hamish turned to go and then stopped, poised on one foot like a heron.

  “What now?” asked Jimmy.

  “Can you let me know what Mrs. Gentle’s background is?” asked Hamish. “I mean, her maiden name, who she was married to, all that?”

  “Look, I’ll drop in on you later.”

  ♦

  As Hamish hung a sign on the phone box saying it was not to be used, he noticed that the light inside the old-fashioned red box had been smashed. He put police tape around it. When he started, there hadn’t been a soul on the waterfront, but when he finished he found that a small crowd had gathered. Archie Maclean, the fisherman, was there. “We’re right sorry to hear about your poor fiancée,” he said.

  “How did you find out?”

  “Gamekeeper Diarmuid heard it frae his cousin in Braikie who got it frae Ellen, the cousin’s sister, who got it frae – ”

  “Oh, all right, Archie. It’s a sad business. Did any of you see any strangers in the village yesterday?”

  Mrs. Wellington, the minister’s wife, volunteered that several guests from the hotel had been seen in the village buying postcards. “Would you like my husband to have a word with you, Hamish? You must be grieving. The police should have more sensitivity than to put you on this case.”

  “I’m better working,” said Hamish.

  “We felt a bit mean, taking all our presents back,” said Mrs. Guthrie, one of the villagers. “So Mrs. Wellington told us to put them on display in the church hall and you can pick out what you need for the station.”

  Hamish looked at the kind, concerned faces and turned abruptly away, a lump in his throat. “Very kind,” he said hoarsely, and hurried off to the police station.

  “Near tears, the poor soul, poor soul,” said Jessie Currie. There was a murmur of sympathy.

  Hamish got into the Land Rover. He felt very low. He had a guilty feeling of relief that Irena was dead and could not come back into his life to threaten him. He also felt guilty over the villagers’ warmhearted sympathy.

  ♦

  Priscilla Halburton-Smythe received another phone call from her father. “You’ve had a lucky escape, my girl,” said the colonel. “Hamish Macbeth has murdered that fiancée of his.”

  “What?”

  “Some reporter’s just told me. She’s been found dead in a trunk in the cellar of that folly the other woman was living in, the one who ended up at the bottom of the cliffs. Who else would want rid of her but Hamish? Folks say he looked relieved when she didn’t turn up on his wedding day.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous. Hamish wouldn’t hurt a fly. If everyone is saying what you’re saying, he’ll need some support. See you soon.” And, deaf to her father’s protests, she rang off.

  ♦

  Elspeth Grant was summoned to the newsroom. “Get yourself up to Lochdubh fastest,” said the news editor. “Bodies all over the place. One at the foot of the cliffs and now the fiancée of that copper has been found murdered.”

  “Hamish Macbeth?”

  “That’s the man.”

  ♦

  Mr. Johnson, the hotel manager, welcomed Hamish cautiously. “I’ll give you a cup of coffee before you start questioning the guests. But don’t go upsetting them, mind? And do you have to bring those weird animals with you? Go and put them back in your vehicle. That cat of yours is enough to scare a man to death.”

  “She’s just a pussycat,” said Hamish crossly, but he put the dog and cat in the police Land Rover, leaving the engine running and the heater on.

  He was just about to sit down in the manager’s office when Mr. Johnson said, “I’d better go out to the car park. Someone’s running their engine. Maybe I’ll wait a minute and see if they drive off.”

  “That’s mine,” said Hamish sulkily.

  “Whatever for? Oh, I know. The beasties have to be kept warm. Hamish, they are animals. They come supplied by the good Lord with coats. Go and turn that damn engine off.”

  Hamish stalked out and returned shortly. “You’re a hard man,” he said, picking up his cup of coffee.

  “And you’re a softie. I’ve got news for you.”

  “About the murders?”

  “Not them. Wait a bit, murders! I thought there was only the one.”

>   “My fiancée who turns out to have been a Russian has been found in the cellar of the castle in a trunk with her head bashed.”

  “I am so sorry. You must be feeling awful. Did you love her very much?”

  “Something like that,” said Hamish hurriedly. “What news?”

  “Priscilla phoned to say she’s coming up, and your friend Elspeth Grant has booked a room. She’s lucky we had one left. The press are booking in as hard as they can.”

  “It’ll be grand to see them,” lied Hamish, who did not wish any more complications in his already complicated life. It would soon come out that Irena had been a hooker, and he knew that would shock the villagers.

  “I thought your fiancée was Turkish.”

  “So did I,” said Hamish. “I’m afraid she tricked me.”

  “You can’t have been very close then. You’re usually awfully sharp.”

  “There was the rush getting the necessary permission to marry her,” said Hamish.

  “I saw her,” said Mr. Johnson. “She was stunning. I can’t blame you for being swept off your feet.”

  “It seems that all she wanted was British nationality.”

  “So that’s why you don’t seem to be grieving.”

  Hamish finished his coffee. “I’d better start with the guests.”

  “The trouble is,” said the manager, “a lot of them have left. The press are apt to get very drunk and noisy. There are a couple of hotels up Braikie way, as you know, and plenty of bed-and-breakfasts, but the press always want to choose the most expensive hotel.”

  “Any of them seem suspicious? I mean, the guests?”

  “No, all very quiet and respectable. Mostly fishing types. We’ve got a writer. Harold Jury. Quite well known. His last book, Depths of Darkness, was nominated for the Booker Prize.”

  “I’d like to start with him. Writers are supposed to observe life more than ordinary people.”

  “Maybe. But this one’s head is so far up his own arse, he could clean his teeth from the inside.”

  “I’ll try him anyway. Where is he at the moment?”

  “He’s probably in the lounge. He sits there with his laptop, showing off.”

  ♦