by John Burke
‘And had it been a right of way?’
‘Apparently not. The Pitcairns had simply let people use it. Chet wouldn’t. But the Pitcairn family had been here so long that they felt all their ways ought to be preserved, even when they had been banished, you might say.’
‘Yes, I see. And yet the young man is invited to join this house party here, and he comes. Must have known what to expect.’
‘Bit of bravado on both sides, maybe.’
McAdam thought for a few minutes before deciding whether to continue this interview or to switch to another witness. Chisholm’s story seemed straightforward. She wondered whether she ought to have asked him what was on the radio during the time he was in the car. It was the sort of trick question that could trip people up. But she couldn’t see that, even if he had forgotten or didn’t get it right, it would give much of a lead in any significant direction.
Sergeant Brodie came into the room. ‘Yes, the widow’s identified the body. Made a big scene.’
‘But?’
‘I think she rather enjoyed it.’
Alec Chisholm smiled wryly. ‘Jilly-Jo’s an actress. Of sorts. They do know exactly how to react to any dramatic challenge.’
‘The body has now been removed,’ said Brodie formally, ‘for detailed forensic examination.’ Meaning that Brunner’s corpse had been zipped up into a bag and carted off.
McAdam glanced at her watch. ‘I think we’d better see Mrs Chisholm next. And then maybe that resentful young man. Or Mrs Brunner, when she’s recovered.’
‘I don’t think that’ll take her long.’
‘Mr Chisholm, will you ask your wife to come in?’
‘You won’t be too tough on her? She’s very nervy, I wouldn’t want her to be subjected to —’
‘We’re not the KGB, Mr Chisholm.’
As Queenie Chisholm swept into the room, she looked even more distraught than before. Obviously she, too, had been in the acting profession and was now busily conveying distress at the thought of a grisly murder together with the demanding chores of providing food and making soothing noises to the guests.
‘Do sit down, Mrs Chisholm.’ McAdam indicated the chair vacated by Queenie’s husband, and pulled her own chair a few inches closer. ‘Think carefully, and I’m sure you’ll be able to sort out all my questions in no time.’
‘I don’t know. It’s all so confusing. I simply can’t take it in.’ Her gaze wandered round a room that must have been perfectly familiar to her but which she seemed to be seeing as a strange, unaccountable place. Her glances became more and more apprehensive as they went to and fro across the tall, solid figure of Sergeant Brodie, perched on the end of the table beside a VDU. ‘And I wish I’d never . . . we’d never . . .’
‘Never what, Mrs Chisholm?’
‘Oh, just that . . . I mean, that we’d never got involved with all this murder game nonsense. And let the wrong people into the . . . on to the premises.’
‘Let’s take it step by step. You were here all yesterday evening?’
‘Yes.’
‘In the main rooms with the guests, taking part in whatever was going on at the time? Or just supervising the food and drinks?’
‘Well, not much was going on. There was that awful thunderstorm, and no way of going out. And he . . . Chet . . . Mr Brunner . . . he seemed to have lost interest. And then there was the business of Jilly-Jo wrecking the car, and Alec having to go to the station to meet her, and being kept waiting. So after a while I went back to our quarters to wait for Alec to come home. Watched the telly.’ Unexpectedly she smiled a broad, eager smile. ‘Came in on the middle of the drama programme. It was the . . .’ She paused, and smiled roguishly. ‘What we have to call ‘the Scottish play’, you know. Bad luck to give it its real title. I’ve always wished I could have played Lady Macbeth, but it wasn’t my forte. Once you’ve been type-cast, you know, they never give you a chance to —’
‘Mrs Chisholm,’ said McAdam, ‘What time did your husband get back?’
‘Mm? Oh, I suppose it must have been about half ten.’
‘A bit late, wasn’t it?’
‘Yes, it was.’ Queenie switched to indignation. ‘Having to hang about there, just because of that stupid woman. Not even as if Chet really cared twopence about her any more. I’ve learned to know the signs. Ready to ditch her and go on to the next one. If you ask me —’
A phone rang. Sergeant Brodie looked round in search of the source, and finally found it a few yards away. The two women were silent until he nodded, said ‘Will do’, and put the phone back into its slot.
McAdam raised an eyebrow and waited.
‘A little technical matter,’ he said, using his own right eyebrow as a means of communication. ‘We can fit it in later.’
She turned back to Queenie Chisholm. ‘How long would it have taken your husband to get back from the station?’
‘You’d have to ask him what time the last train went. But it must have been an awful drive in that weather. You can go over the edge on some of those roads, the way they twist. He did say that he’d pulled in for a while and listened to the radio until the rain slackened off.’
McAdam tried an abrupt new tack. ‘How did Mr Brunner come to go out into the grounds on a night like that?’
‘Goodness knows. Oh, I couldn’t say.’
‘What time was he last seen?’
‘I don’t know. I mean, not by me. I must have been talking to him about nine o’clock, but —’
‘About what?’
‘I . . . er . . . oh, it must have been about the video he’d insisted on showing earlier.’
‘Insisted? What was so important about it?’
‘Oh, it was one of those true crime investigations. Did a lot of those programmes for telly, way back. You know the sort of thing.’
Yes, thought McAdam sourly, she did know that sort of thing. Amateur meddling.
‘You can’t think why he should have gone out into the grounds on a night like that?’
‘I must have been back in our sitting-room when he did it. Whatever.’ She looked at Brodie again, then looked away, but did not look back at McAdam. ‘Poor Anna,’ she rushed on. ‘It won’t be good for trade, will it?’
‘Trade?’
‘My daughter-in-law runs those two holiday lets down by the Mains. This sort of publicity’s bound to put people off.’
‘She might be surprised,’ said Brodie. ‘Some people have gruesome tastes. Might even be a selling point.’
‘Oh, how dreadful. How could anybody . . .?’
McAdam said: ‘You can’t think of anything else, Mrs Chisholm? About Mr Brunner’s movements, his general demeanour — anything that would give us a clue to his murder? Or anybody else behaving oddly, or going missing at the same time as Mr Brunner?’
She expected Queenie to remind her that she had already said she had gone back to her own quarters before Brunner disappeared. Instead, Queenie’s eyes widened and she looked like an eager bird about to pounce. ‘Oh, there was Stuart. He did go off somewhere. I mean, after he’d come up with Anna he somehow drifted away again, and . . . but no, I really oughtn’t to make trouble when I can’t be sure.’
‘Please, Mrs Chisholm. Who is Stuart?’
‘He was a friend of my son. My late son. Or made out he was a friend. And now he’s hanging round Peter’s wife. His widow, that is. I never did trust him. Never believed he was ever a real friend. And he did do a spell in prison, and then heaped blame on my poor Peter for something between him and his wife.’
‘Please, Mrs Chisholm. Could we take it just a bit more slowly? Your son’s wife — Anna that would be . . .?’
‘No, I was talking about Stuart Morgan’s wife. And him telling such lies about her and my Peter. But I don’t see that it’s got anything to do with Chet and his death.’
‘No,’ sighed McAdam. ‘Neither do I. Not offhand, anyway.’ She was about to ask whether Queenie had any other suspicious movements to report, but
restrained herself. It could take up more time than was justified. ‘Very well. Thanks for your help, Mrs Chisholm.’ When Queenie had gone, the rustle of her loose flowered dress sounding almost like a gasp of relief, she turned to Brodie. ‘Now, what was that phone call about?’
‘The search of the ground has shown up something interesting.’
‘OK, let’s have it?’
‘Footprints. Two lots of them.’
‘Brunner and his killer?’
‘No, guv. Two extra, according to SOCO. Pretty heavily dug in, and blurred by that damn downpour. But the signs are that one lot comes from a woman’s shoes. What’s more, they could have come from part way down the hill.’
‘Could have?’
‘There are too many other marks around the place. Some of them muddled by the rain. But this pair — a man and a woman, if that’s the way it was — could have come up together and taken the victim by surprise.’
‘Pretty exposed setting for a surprise, isn’t it?’
‘True. And anyway, it’s difficult to decide whether they were made at the same time, or whether they could have been part of these cockeyed murder games they seem to have been playing.’
‘Mm. Murder games and one murder for real — somehow those have to be separated.’ She stood up. ‘I think we’d better go and have a look for ourselves. And then maybe some words with this prickly Mr Pitcairn. Unless we can think of a man and woman who worked together to dispose of this charming Mr Brunner.’
Chapter Nine
After the rain, the sky was cloudless and innocent, but runnels of water still made patterns like erratic snail tracks across the road. They had left just before eight-thirty, and even when approaching Ayr there was still a feeling of freshness, a grateful awakening of a new, cleansed day after a tempestuous night.
Stuart had hardly said a word on the drive over the hills. He looked either tired or sullen, or both. It was only as they came over the final crest and the town was spread out ahead, with a shimmer of the sea beyond, that he said: ‘I’ve had about enough, dancing attendance on that lout. If I have to do weird things for him, why not do them for myself and pocket the whole profit?’
‘What weird things?’
‘Oh, all that reproduction stuff, copying things that take his fancy, cutting corners fine.’
‘What else did you have in mind?’
‘Like I said, the two of us. And maybe your pa-in-law will find himself at a loose end soon. Get him to come up with some capital —’
‘He did that way back. Setting us up with the cottages, and then you and Peter.’
‘Right. Maybe now’s the time for him to play a more active part. He’s a good organizer. Let him run the business side of it, give him a cut, and give me scope to produce the goods. With you in the team as well. A lot better than having that thumping great shadow looming over us all the time. I’ve made quite a few contacts of my own this last year.’
The note of peevishness jarred on her. She dodged answering by making a show of concentrating on the traffic at road junctions in the town.
‘All right if I drop you on the corner of Sandgate?’
‘Fine. And where shall we meet? That café in the arcade, at . . . what’s the time now?’
‘Meet you there at eleven?’
‘Make it eleven-thirty.’
Anna wondered why he needed so much time just to pick up some art materials; but it suited her to have enough leeway to thrash things out with Mr Ritchie and then do some casual shopping.
Below the florid, gilded names of Haining & Ritchie, Solicitors & Estate Agents, wide windows were filled with colour photographs of desirable properties, with one side section devoted to self-catering holiday cottages. Anna noticed that the Balmuir Mains picture was fading in the sunlight, and needed updating. The outer office was staffed by one middle-aged lady with steel-rimmed glasses and a younger woman who would probably be here for no more than six months before finding herself a job with some livelier organization such as a travel and holiday firm.
Mr Ritchie came out to meet Anna, looked warily between the two women as if afraid they might overhear something he had no wish for them to hear, and hastily ushered her into a dark little side room. He was not a tall man, yet he had the stoop of one who was continually trying to avoid banging his head on a low lintel, so that his eyes were always peering upwards from his lowered head.
‘Guid of ye to come all this way, Mrs Chisholm.’ He fussed her towards a small armchair which creaked as she sat down. ‘It’s a gey long time since we last had the pleasure of a wee talk, aye?’
‘And high time for one.’
‘Och, aye, indeed. Now, we’ve been thinking that maybe it’s time to consider adjusting our commission right across the board.’ He had a reedy, constricted voice combining a frog in the throat with pinched vowel sounds. ‘There’s a rather unfortunate matter concerning a recent booking which I’ll have to be having out with ye, and some adjustment —’
‘Before we go into anything of that kind,’ Anna interrupted forcefully, ‘there are one or two matters concerning the recent let of Stables Cottage. The outgoing tenants caused a certain amount of damage.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that. What was the extent of it?’
‘There was marmalade smeared everywhere. I had to have the curtains cleaned, and I’ll need to have new copies of the policies leaflet. And two pages of the visitors’ book are stuck permanently together.’
‘Och, marmalade. Is that all?’
‘Is that all? Do you know the mess it can make? We shall have to consider whether to accept small children at all.’
‘We canna be expected to vet every tenant, Mrs Chisholm.’
‘And,’ said Anna, ‘they stole a painting. Took it down from the wall and took it away with them.’
‘Now that’s serious, I’ll grant you.’
‘Good. You must have their address. So chase them up.’
‘It may be difficult to prove that they actually stole it. Very difficult to find a way of searching their home and —’
‘Find it. Or else sort out the insurance. We do have insurance cover from you, don’t we?’
‘Och, aye. Of course. I’ll look into it.’ He sounded reluctant, and switched abruptly into something which might counter the need to consider action on her complaint. ‘But now there’s an awkward matter ye’ll need to deal with. Your present tenants — name of Maxwell.’
‘What about them?’
‘I fear they have misled us. I have just this very morning had a call from a credit card protection agency. The card the Maxwells used to make the booking was a stolen card. The real owner has only just realized it was missing and reported it.’
Anna thought of the shifty, cowering appearance of the man and his evasive wife. And what Stuart had said about the prison aura.
‘They may not be called Maxwell at all?’
‘Indeed not.’
‘I’m afraid that’s another headache for you, Mr Ritchie.’
‘Well, now, I’d be thinking you might face them with this yourself.’
‘Me? I’d have thought it was up to you. You’re the agent who makes the bookings. You’re the one to sort out any problems.’
‘But then, I — that is, our firm, Mr Haining being very particular about balancing our books — I’d have to take time off from here and charge accordingly, and with you on the spot, it would be easier for you to put the matter to them.’
‘Mr Ritchie, this is outrageous.’
‘After all, I’m thinking that if you went along with your Mr Brunner, they’d not be inclined to argue, Mr Brunner being . . . would ye not be saying impressive?’
Anna kept her voice down. This hushed room was not suited to loud argument. ‘I’ll certainly put it to them when I get back,’ she said. ‘But I think it’s up to you to back me up quickly with some legal restraints. And I shall expect you to find some way of paying me what you owe me. As well as taking action against th
e thieving marmalade spreaders.’
Five minutes after leaving the office, she was angry with herself. Of course it was not up to her to confront guests who had cheated on their payments. She was tempted to turn back and tell Mr Ritchie that the whole point of paying commission to an agent was to have somebody carrying all the financial problems and coping with upsets.
Instead, she went into a large store set back from the river and bought herself a crisp daffodil-coloured blouse. At half-past eleven she found Stuart waiting for her in the arcade café. Propped against the wall was a large plastic bag bulging with his purchases.
‘Got everything you needed?’ she said.
‘Pretty well.’
He bought her a coffee and a pastry, and she poured out her exasperation about Mr Ritchie and his choice of tenants for the cottages.
Stuart whistled faintly. ‘Well, well. Better be extra careful about fixtures and fittings when that couple leave. And maybe we ought to warn the big house. They may be planning a little bit of burglary.’
There was a sudden blast of pop music from a speaker pointing towards them from the end of the counter. Anna winced. The girl by the till turned the noise down slightly, but had no intention of switching it off altogether. Her dangling strands of red-tinted hair twitched to the nodding of her head.
As they finished their snack and Stuart was getting up to pay, the moaning vocal faded and a short news bulletin began. There was a hurried summary of a speech by a local MP about essential road improvements which he was urging upon the government, and then a more excited announcement blurted out news just coming in of a sudden death in the Carrick region. ‘The police have been called to Balmuir Lodge, where the dead body of well-known film producer and landowner, Mr Chet Brunner, has been discovered. Mr Brunner has been a colourful personality who brought many well-known screen personalities to the region for a number of his film and television projects. No reason has yet been advanced for his death. A statement will be issued later in the day when the police have concluded a preliminary investigation. And now, back to Jason Jarvie for a round-up of the latest sizzling singles . . .’