Hamish Macbeth 14 (1999) - Death of a Scriptwriter

by M C Beaton

  “Look here,” said Fiona wrathfully, advancing on Penelope. “If you do not do what you are paid to do and keep making trouble, we’ll find someone else.”

  “You can’t afford to,” said Penelope, looking at her with dislike. “I hate being pushed around by people. I’ve been pushed around all my life, and I’m not going to take any more of it. Get rid of me? It’d be cheaper to get rid of you. Harry Frame’ll be here later. Let’s see what he has to say about it.”

  Fiona tried to laugh it all off. It certainly would be easier to get rid of her than Penelope. “Come on, Penelope,” she coaxed. “Let’s just get the scene done.”

  “I’ve a headache now,” said Penelope mulishly. “Tell Harry to come and see me when he arrives.”

  She swept out.

  “She’s costing us money,” said Hal Forsyth, the production manager. “Who does she think she is? Liz Taylor?”

  “Tell Harry to see me before he sees her,” said Fiona.

  Sheila followed her out. “I want a word with you, Fiona.”

  “Not you, too.”

  “I’ve got something to tell you which might help. I was down in Lochdubh visiting that policeman. He said something about Penelope being on uppers, and I said then I didn’t think so, but now I’m beginning to wonder.”

  Fiona swung round. “You mean, find proof and get her arrested?”

  “I think Hamish would just give her a warning. No, I was thinking, she’ll leave her caravan for lunch. I could go in there, search around, and if I find them, confiscate the lot. I think that’s maybe what’s been turning her into an aggressive bitch. It’s worth a try.”

  “Do it.”

  Sheila hung around Penelope’s trailer until she saw her stepping down and making her way to the temporary restaurant.

  She had a spare key. She let herself in. Penelope’s handbag was lying on the dressing table. She went through the contents until she came upon two bottles of pills. One was marked Lib-rium and had a chemist’s name on it. The other bottle did not carry any label. Sheila decided to take what she thought might be the uppers and leave the tranquillisers. She hoped that the unlabelled bottle did not carry heart pills or anything important and legal. But then if it did, Penelope would raise a fuss.

  The first person Penelope saw when she entered the trailer which housed the restaurant was Gervase. She collected her food and went to join him.

  “I am not happy with you,” she said, fixing the actor with a cold blue stare.

  “You’re not happy with me?” spluttered Gervase. “You’ve ruined a morning’s shoot with your silly behaviour. What’s come over you, Penelope? You’re like a spoilt brat.”

  “I didn’t ruin the morning’s shoot. It was you, I gather, who got drunk and spilled the beans so that writer and that minister got to hear of it. I’m going to have a word with Harry. I can’t act with you.”

  “You’re mad,” said Gervase, but suddenly frightened. He had been finding it harder and harder to get parts of late. “I’ll kill you. You’ll be as dead as Jamie if you spoil my career.”

  “I’m not frightened of you.” Penelope tossed her long blond hair.

  Gervase picked up his plate of food and, ignoring the startled looks from the others in the restaurant, sat down at a table as far away from her as possible.

  It was unfortunate for Fiona that she was called to the phone to speak to the drama director of BBC Scotland just as Harry Frame arrived. Penelope hailed him as she left the restaurant. “Come to my caravan, Harry,” she called.

  He followed her in and sat down.

  Penelope outlined what had happened that morning, ending up by saying she could not work with Gervase or Fiona or Sheila.

  Harry fought down a rising feeling of panic. “Look here,” he said. “I can’t go around firing everyone.”

  “You were prepared to fire Fiona when Jamie asked you.”

  Harry rose, his large bulk looming over her. “And look what happened to him,” he said. “I’ve taken enough. Get on with it, luv. Because it would be easier to replace you than either Fiona, Gervase or Sheila. There’s plenty of little totties with good bodies and thin talent prepared to take your place.”

  “Are you saying I can’t act?”

  He shrugged. “You’re no great shakes. Think about it.”

  After he had gone, Penelope scrabbled in her handbag. Her pills had gone!

  One of them must have taken them, but she couldn’t very well complain. She swallowed a couple of tranquillisers. They couldn’t really fire her. They wouldn’t dare.

  To everyone’s relief, Penelope performed her part during the rest of the day without any awkward scenes. Her acting was a little wooden, but Giles decided to let it go for the sake of harmony.

  By evening Penelope’s tranquillisers had worn off, and she was feeling cross and irritable and hard done by.

  Fiona was the one she hated the most. She wanted revenge. She had demanded that Fiona be fired, and that demand had been refused.

  When she arrived in the dining room of the Tommel Castle Hotel that evening, she pointedly did not join the others but took a table on her own in a corner. She ordered trout and a bottle of champagne. After the others had left, she stayed in the dining room, finishing the bottle.

  And then she heard a high, fluting English voice, saying, “I am a trifle late, but I do not feel like cooking for myself tonight.”

  Penelope looked up. Patricia Martyn-Broyd was being escorted to a table. Suddenly Penelope, elated and angry with champagne, thought she saw a way to get even with Fiona. She rose a trifle unsteadily to her feet and weaved between the tables in Patricia’s direction, and came to a stop in front of her.

  She leaned one hand on the table for support and said, “You surely weren’t taken in by that farce this morning, Patricia.”

  “Well, at first it did look a little bit shocking, but after Fiona had explained it, I just had to accept that I am a bit behind the times.”

  “You silly old cow,” said Penelope contemptuously, “that scene with the nightwear was laid on for your benefit. The real scene, the screwing one, is the one that will be shown.”

  “You must be lying!”

  “Why should I bother? Instead of constantly complaining and interfering, you should be kissing our feet that your dreary books have got some recognition.”

  “I shall get a lawyer tomorrow,” said Patricia, “and get it stopped.”

  Penelope shrugged. “You can try. The reason you are shocked at the thought of naked bodies is because of the horrible one you’ve got yourself. I bet you have to hang a towel over the bathroom mirror.”

  Patricia looked wildly around and saw the manager. “Mr. Johnson,” she called. “Remove this person.”

  “I’m going,” said Penelope, feeling all powerful. “But I tell you this,” she said over her shoulder. “You should save your money. You signed the contract and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

  After she had gone, Patricia sat at her table like a stone. The maître d’ came up with the menu.

  “What?” said Patricia in a dazed way.

  “Are you ready to order, madam?”

  “Yes…no…no, I am going home…home.” Patricia stood up. She knocked her handbag to the floor, and the contents scattered over the carpet. She knelt and began to pick them up. Jenkins, the maître d’, stooped to help her.

  He remembered afterwards, when questioned by the police, that Miss Martyn-Broyd had been weeping.

  To Fiona’s relief, it was a very subdued Penelope who reported for work at seven the following morning. The scene of the chase across the mountain was to be reshot. The sun had gone and the day was misty, all colours bleached out of the landscape.

  “Won’t the mist be too thick up on the mountain?” Fiona asked the director.

  “It’s supposed to lift later,” said Giles, “and we might get some good atmospheric shots.”

  Once the helicopters had everyone up on the heathery plateau,
they all climbed out. Sheila felt there was something wrong in being in the same place where Jamie had been murdered. Mist swirled around. Sometimes it lifted and she could see everyone clearly, and then it closed down again.

  “We’ll just do the running shot,” said the director when everything was set up. “Perhaps it won’t work with this mist. You start from here, Penelope, and run over to the edge and stop short.”

  “Isn’t that where Jamie was murdered?” asked Penelope.

  “No, he was murdered over there. Sheila, go over to that crag and show her where to stand.”

  Sheila obediently trotted off. The mist lifted again like a curtain being raised, and they could see Sheila standing on an outcrop of rock.

  “You’ll come to a stop right here, Penelope,” Sheila called back. “Then you stand and shield your eyes and look down the mountain.”

  “Wait there a minute,” Giles called.

  Sheila stood where she was. A shaft of sunlight suddenly lit up the village of Drim, standing beside the black loch. The air was pure and clean and scented with wild thyme.

  “All right,” she heard Giles shout. “You can come back now.”

  Sheila walked back. “So, Penelope, in your own time,” said Giles, “start running and then stop just where Sheila was.”

  “Mist’s closing down again,” said Fiona.

  “I know,” said Giles. “But I just want to try one shot and see what she looks like disappearing into the mist.”

  Penelope was wearing a long scarlet dress which floated about her excellent body.

  They all took up their positions. “Right,” said Giles softly, “when you’re ready, Penelope. Quiet, everyone. And…action!”

  Penelope ran off into the mist as fleet as a deer. She disappeared into the thickening mist. There was a silence.

  Then suddenly there was a high, wailing, descending scream.

  “She’s fallen!” screamed Sheila.

  “Not her,” said Giles dryly. “Just playing silly games. Go and get her, Sheila. Fiona!…Where’s Fiona?”

  Sheila ran forward. She reached the outcrop. There was no sign of Penelope.

  “Penelope!” she shouted.

  At first there was no sound at all, and then she heard a faint moan coming from far below her.

  Then the mist lifted again and she saw Penelope spread out on a rock a dizzying distance below the outcrop.

  “Oh, God, she has fallen!” she screamed. “Get help! Phone Hamish Macbeth!”

  As if in mockery, the mist lifted entirely and the sun blazed down.

  Harry Frame, Fiona, Giles and the production manager, Hal Forsyth, sat huddled in Fiona’s office in Drim Castle.

  “Her family are going to sue the life out of us,” muttered Harry Frame.

  The phone rang, making them all jump. Fiona picked it up and listened. Then she said in a bleak voice after she had replaced the receiver. “That was Sheila from the hospital in Inverness. Penelope’s dead. She died on arrival.”

  “Shit!” said Harry Frame bitterly. “Time’s running out. We’ll need to get a new actress, coach her. Winter comes here early.”

  Major Neal put his head round the door. “Police,” he announced.

  Startled faces turned in the direction of the door.

  Detective Chief Inspector Blair lumbered in, followed by Macnab and Anderson.

  “Penelope Gates is dead,” he said.

  “We know,” said Fiona. “We’ve just heard the news from the hospital.”

  “P. C. Hamish Macbeth went down to the hospital in the helicopter with her. She said something to him afore she died. She said, “Someone caught my ankle and pulled me over.” So we’re looking at a case of murder!”

  “We’d better talk about this,” said Hamish as he left Raigmore Hospital in Inverness with Sheila. “Let’s have a quick meal before we go back.”

  They took a taxi to a small restaurant in the centre of Inverness which was self-service. When they had collected their food and found a table, Hamish asked, “Who wanted her dead?”

  “Everyone,” said Sheila. Her eyes filled with tears. “It was such a dreadful day yesterday.” She slowly began to tell him everything that had happened. “Fiona said she had a good mind to tell you about her suspicions that Penelope was on uppers so you could arrest her.”

  “I probably wouldn’t have, not having arrested Fiona herself for smoking pot,” said Hamish. “I sometimes wonder why they have laws banning soft drugs when we’re supposed to turn a blind eye to them. Look at New York. They started this zero tolerance business, clearing up all the lesser crimes like mugging and graffiti, and it’s been a big success. They feel if they began at the bottom and started clearing up the soft drugs, the harder ones might become less common. A businessman can be in bad trouble if he’s been drinking and he’s only a little over the limit, but anyone can smoke themselves silly with pot. But, my God, mention arresting anyone for smoking pot, and you’ll have every liberal in the country down on your neck. Arrest a man for having drunk a little bit over the limit, and it’s ‘Well done. Officer.”

  “So she threatened, or so you heard, to get rid of you, Fiona and Gervase. What had Harry Frame to say about that?”

  “We don’t know,” said Sheila. “He just said he didn’t want to talk about it.”

  “So as far as Fiona and the rest of you were concerned, he may have been thinking of sacking you?”

  “Yes…well, no. He couldn’t have got rid of three people.” Her eyes again filled with tears. “I think I’ll hear that scream of Penelope’s as she went over until the day I die.”

  “And Patricia? She believed that silly explanation about the nude scene?”

  “Oh, yes, she was all soothed down and happy when she left.”

  “The trouble is,” said Hamish, “in the Highlands everything gets out sooner or later. You say something to someone in private, and before you know it, the whole village has heard about it the next day.”

  She wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and tried to smile. “In that case, murders should be easy to solve.”

  “That’s a different thing. When there’s a murder, everyone feels guilty and clams up. It’s odd, but all the innocent people start getting shifty about where they were and what they were doing.”

  Sheila turned a trifle pale. “I must be the number one suspect. I could have pushed her over and then pretended she fell.”

  “But Penelope herself said someone caught hold of her ankle and pulled her over. Someone must have been lurking around in the mist, waiting for an opportunity. Where was Fiona?”

  “She was with Giles Brown, the director, and then she disappeared in the mist for a bit.”

  “At least Gervase wasn’t about.”

  “But he was,” said Sheila.

  “Why?”

  “Because the chief inspector is the murderer.”

  “How do they work that out?”

  “He’s obsessed with Lady Harriet and murders her butler so that he can get her up from England to investigate.”

  “But he gets into bed with her.”

  “Well, she’s supposed to seduce him to find out what he knows.”

  “And where does the rising tide come in?”

  “The butler’s body is found on the beach, and Lady Harriet judges the time of death from the high tide mark.”

  “I believe Patricia’s book got quite good reviews.”

  “When you read it, it’s all convoluted and sounds convincing, although her style is a bit wordy and precious for me. What does ‘pathic’ mean?”

  “Don’t know. Give me a sentence.”

  “‘She gave him a pathic smile.’ I looked it up. It said victim, catamite, passive. Could mean she smiled like a victim or gave a passive smile. Can’t be a catamite smile, surely? I agree with Orwell: if you have to look up words in the dictionary, don’t use them.”

  “Maybe Patricia didn’t have to look it up in the dictionary.”

  “Maybe. W
hat happens now?”

  “I drive you back to Drim, where the police will interrogate you. The press tonight will be followed tomorrow by the world’s press: “Beautiful Actress Murdered.” Blair will be under intense pressure. Remember that and just answer calmly.”

  “How do we get back? They’ll hardly fly us there in a helicopter.”

  Hamish took out a mobile telephone. “Inverness police’ll get us back.”

  They were driven straight back to Drim Castle. Major Neal had the fire lit in the main hall because although the weather was warm outside, and still light because it was at the time of the year when it hardly ever got dark, the castle was cold and gloomy.

  Jimmy Anderson came out to meet Hamish and Sheila. “Follow me,” he said to Sheila. “Mr. Blair wants a word with ye.”

  Hamish would have liked to accompany her but was sure that Blair would order him away. He joined the party round the fire. Most of the television crew seemed to be there.

  Harry Frame scowled at Hamish. Then he said, “I say we go on. We can’t let all this publicity go for nothing. We’ll raise money selling that last shot of Penelope to every television company from here to Moscow.”

  “Aren’t the police hanging on to that?” asked Hamish.

  “Got several copies,” said Harry. He turned to Fiona. “What about Mary Hoyle?”

  “She’s a fine actress, but no tottie, nor will she shed her clothes.”

  “I’m fed up with totties. I want a good, solid actress to pull us through this. You know her reputation. She’s got a photographic memory. Also, she’s not doing anything at the moment.”

  “I’d settle for anyone who would keep their mouth shut and just work. But can we really go on?”

  “Of course we go on,” said Harry. “With all this publicity, by the time it goes out, we’ll have a huge audience.”

  The door of the castle opened and a woman police officer led Patricia in. She looked white and tired and had lost all her usual confidence. “Wait here until they’re ready for you,” ordered the policewoman.

  Patricia sat down at the edge of the group, clutching her large handbag.

  A silence fell. Patricia was a writer and not one of them. Hamish took his chair round and sat next to her.