Hamish Macbeth 17 (2001) - Death of a Dustman

by M C Beaton

“I’ll just be having a word with him.”

  “That might be a good idea,” said Priscilla coldly, “instead of talking to me. Unless you think I’m a suspect.”

  “No need to get snappy. I’m off.”

  “I’ll come with you.”

  They walked across to the hotel after Priscilla had locked up the gift shop. “Things quiet?” asked Hamish.

  “I’m afraid so. Twelve people from an engineering company had booked in for the fishing, and they cancelled at the last minute. Didn’t give any reason. You won’t find Daddy in the best of moods.”

  “I thought he’d given up bothering about the hotel. I thought he left it all to Mr. Johnston.”

  “Oh, he gets periods when he swoops down on everyone. Doesn’t last long.”

  They walked into the reception. “Is the colonel about?” Priscilla asked the girl behind the reception desk.

  “Colonel Halburton-Smythe’s round at the back, talking to the gardener.”

  They walked through the hotel lounge and through the open French windows to the garden. It was not a flower lover’s garden. A huge lawn dipped down to the river, and under the windows were beds with laurel bushes and forsythia and ornamental heather.

  “I don’t care how wet it’s been,” the colonel was shouting. “I want that lawn mowed now!”

  “Daddy!” called Priscilla. The colonel swung round, his angry face relaxing at the sight of his daughter. Then he saw Hamish Macbeth behind her, and his scowl returned.

  He walked up to them. “What is it?”

  “Around the time Fergus Macleod disappeared, you were heard down by the river having a row with him.”

  The colonel goggled at Hamish, and then he half turned away and stared down the lawn. “Oh, that? I caught him poaching and sent him off with a flea in his ear.”

  Hamish looked at the set of the colonel’s shoulders and noticed the way he would not turn directly round to face them, and was sure the colonel was lying.

  “It was on the radio and in the newspapers that we were appealing for anyone who had seen or talked to Fergus around the time he went missing, and yet you did not come forward,” said Hamish.

  “I’d dealt with the man. I didn’t want to get him into trouble over poaching.”

  Hamish reflected that the colonel reported every poacher he could catch to the police. “But Fergus was dead when we made that appeal.”

  “It had nothing to do with me!” shouted the colonel. “If you go on like this, I will report you for police harassment.”

  “And if you go on like this,” said Hamish evenly, “then Detective Chief Inspector Blair will be along to see you.”

  “There’s no need to make such a to-do about it,” said the colonel, his manner becoming suddenly conciliatory. “Priscilla, why don’t you take Hamish into the bar and get him a drink?”

  “I don’t need a drink. I’ll check with Mrs. Macleod as to whether Fergus was in the habit of poaching, and if he wasn’t, I’ll be back.”

  Hamish walked off followed by Priscilla. She caught up with him and said soothingly, “Don’t worry. Whatever it is, I’ll get it out of him.”

  “Give me a ring right away. I’m sure it’s really nothing, but I wish people wouldn’t lie to us. They often do over small matters, and all it does is muddy the waters.”

  He drove back to Lochdubh, thinking about Priscilla, wishing she would go away again, back to London, and stop this haunting little feeling of something valuable lost.

  §

  When Hamish drove up to Martha’s cottage, he was glad to see the children playing in the garden. Children were so resilient. If only this murder could be solved and the shadow lifted from Lochdubh. Johnny volunteered the information that his mother was in the kitchen. The door was open, so Hamish walked in. The place looked brighter and lighter already, he thought, and there was a vase of wildflowers on the kitchen table.

  “What is it?” asked Martha anxiously when she saw him.

  “It is just a little thing, Martha. Was Fergus a poacher?”

  “No. I mean he couldn’t have been. He never cooked anything for himself, and if he’d caught a fish, he would have had me cook it. And he didn’t like fish at all. He was a meat and potatoes man. What’s this about?”

  “Fergus was seen up at the Anstey on the colonel’s estate. I wondered what he would be doing up there.”

  “He often took his bottle off somewhere quiet when he planned to get drunk.”

  “Aye, that could be it. How are you getting on?”

  “We’re doing fine.” She turned a rosy colour. “Did Clarry tell you…?”

  “Yes, but I’d keep it quiet at the moment, Martha. You know what folks are like. They might think it odd you getting engaged so soon after your husband’s death.”

  “I haven’t said a word. And I told the children not to say anything.”

  “But you’re doing fine?”

  “As well as can be expected. Everyone’s been awfully kind. Angela gave me a red carpet for the bedroom, but it was so nice, I put it in the living room. Brightens things up no end.”

  “Take care of yourselves, then. Fergus didn’t have any dealing of any kind with the colonel up at Tommel Castle?”

  “No, only that the colonel phoned when Fergus was missing and complained about the garbage not being picked up.”

  Hamish left with a heavy heart. The colonel was involved in some way, but Hamish certainly did not feel he could possibly be guilty of murder. Certainly not of double murder. He must work harder, question and question and question, or he would need to turn those letters over to Strathbane. In all his worry, he forgot about the impending visit on the following Wednesday of Mrs. Fleming and her dignitaries.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Now, thieving Time, take what you must —

  Quickness to hear, to move, to see;

  When dust is drawing near to dust

  Such dimunitions needs must be.

  Yet leave, O leave exempt from plunder

  My curiosity, my wonder!

  —Mark Antony DeWolfe Howe

  Jimmy Anderson called in to the police station that evening. He was unshaven and looked tired.

  “Anything?” asked Hamish.

  “Just it’s beginning to look as if it was done by someone who knew what they were doing. I mean, it was planned.”

  “How do you make that out?”

  “Any whisky?”

  Hamish went to the cupboard and took down the whisky bottle and set it and a glass in front of the detective.

  Jimmy poured a glass and leaned back in his chair. “All the surfaces in that kitchen and the doorknob had been wiped, and he or they, on the road out, wiped the floor behind them as they went.”

  “There’s something I’d better tell you,” said Hamish. “The new schoolteacher. It might be important. I think it’s nothing. Her name’s Moira Cartwright. She was married to a criminal, but a long time ago. She worked in Dingwall and while in Dingwall, she was blackmailed. The police set up a trap but never got the man.”

  “So it could have been Fergus?”

  “Could have been. Just before he left Dingwall.”

  “So why haven’t we seen a report on this?”

  “Because I couldn’t see a motive.” Because, thought Hamish wearily, I’m still protecting the blackmailed of the village. And I promised myself I would only hold on to that information for one day, and now there’s been another murder.

  “I can see a motive,” said Jimmy. “You’re slipping. She wants a nice wee job up here and comes up afore-hand. Bound to have. Got to see the schoolhouse. See where all her stuff will go. Fergus recognises her. Says if you don’t pay up, I’ll tell the village about your evil husband.”

  “I thought of all that. If she went to the police in Dingwall, then she would have come straight to me.”

  “Still, I’d have a word with her.”

  “Why isn’t Blair here annoying me?”

  “He’s got to walk o
n eggshells. That Annie Robinson stuff. Our man didn’t find that. You did. Daviot’s singing your praises. You aren’t holding anything back?”

  Hamish longed to tell him about the letters, but once again he promised himself, just one more day.

  He shook his head. “All I can think of is asking and asking. Often there’s something that people have seen or heard that didn’t seem important at the time. What about that Greek at the hotel? What do we know of him?”

  “I’ve been to see him. So has Blair. Wealthy man. Owns four hotels in Scotland. Makes them pay all right.”

  “Any good? His hotels, I mean. Will the new one be competition for the Tommel Castle Hotel?”

  Jimmy gave his foxy grin. “I know you, Hamish Macbeth, and I know the way that Highland brain of yours is working. You’re praying it’s some outsider. Nasty foreign hotel owner plans to ruin the Tommel Castle, so Fergus finds out and blackmails owner and owner hires goons to bump him off.”

  Hamish gave a reluctant grin. “Aye, that would suit me just fine. I’m beat. Is there any hope of getting any sleep tonight?”

  “If the press leave you alone. But they’re mostly badgering headquarters in Strathbane. That Fleming woman got herself on television at last. She turned up at the press briefing and made a speech. Daviot was furious.”

  “Wish it would turn out to be her,” said Hamish gloomily.

  “Where’s your man?”

  “Clarry’s gone out to interview more people. He’s wasted in the police force. He’s such a grand cook. He’s left my dinner in the oven.”

  “What is it?”

  “Coq au vin.”

  “Enough for two?”

  “Knowing Clarry, I should think there’s enough for a regiment. Want some?”

  “Aye. Got any wine to go with it?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll nip along to Patel’s and get us something.”

  When Jimmy returned, Hamish gave them each two large helpings from the casserole. “This is magic,” said Jimmy. “Is Clarry still courting the widow?”

  “Who said anything about that?” demanded Hamish sharply.

  “Everyone in the village, that’s who.”

  “They’re just friends.”

  “Listen tae me, Hamish Macbeth, you keep going on as if you’re a sheriff in a Wild West movie, a one-man law officer. But one day you’ll hold back stuff and someone will get hurt.”

  Hamish’s conscience smote him. Maybe if he had told them about the letters, Angus would be alive. But then, he was sure Angus had been blackmailing someone, someone Fergus had told him about. Then it could be argued that if the blackmailing had been out in the open, then Angus would not have even tried. Suddenly, with a forkful of food halfway to his mouth, he remembered that tiny thread of pink he had found in the Curries’ fence. Damn, he would ask them about it first and then send it to Strathbane.

  §

  After Jimmy had left, Hamish ignored Lugs’s pleading. “No coq au vin for you,” he said severely. “The bones are too soft for ye and the food’s too rich, and you’ve had your dinner. Bed for us.”

  He left a note on the table thanking Clarry for the dinner, washed, undressed and got into bed. Lugs leapt up beside him. Hamish stroked the dog’s rough fur. He would need to see the Curries in the morning and then the colonel again. He fell straight down into a nightmare that he was in Chief Superintendent Daviot’s office being asked why it was that he had held back vital information from the police. “If it had not been for this,” said Daviot, “then that crofter might still have been alive.”

  Hamish awoke, feeling as if he had not slept at all. He wearily washed and dressed and then selected a new toothbrush from the whole packet of them that he had bought, and scrubbed his teeth. This definitely was the very last day, he told himself. Just one more day and then those letters would go to Strathbane.

  He and Clarry had a silent breakfast. Hamish was worried about the case and Clarry was worrying that the murder would never be solved, and if it were not, he feared that Martha would not marry him. “I don’t like this shadow hanging over us,” she had told him. “I feel I can’t even be seen with you until the murderer is found.”

  Hamish took Lugs for a walk along the waterfront. It was still August, but there was already a chill in the air, a harbinger of the long dark northern winter to come.

  He took Lugs back to the police station, collected the envelope with the little bit of pink thread in it and then approached the Curries’ cottage. He saw the curtains twitching as he walked up the garden path, and Nessie opened the door to him before he could ring the bell.

  “What is it now?” she asked.

  Hamish took out the envelope and showed her the little scrap of thread. “I found this caught in that fence of yours at the side. Could it have come from any of your clothes?”

  “No, we have nothing pink. Wouldn’t be seen dead wearing pink at our age.”

  “What about blankets or sheets or towels?”

  She shook her head. “Nothing pink at all.”

  “And you haven’t remembered anything that might be of help?”

  “Not a thing. All the gossip’s about Josie cancelling the wedding. Jilted that fiancé of hers at the last minute! I don’t know what girls these days can be thinking about.”

  “She jilted him?”

  “That’s what she’s saying. Her mother came round to return our present. I said to Jessie, I said, we’ll just put it away safe and keep it for the next wedding, but I don’t know when that’ll be. Nobody gets married these days, not even you, Hamish Macbeth.”

  Hamish made his escape. He collected the Land Rover and drove up to the Tommel Castle Hotel. Every time he arrived at the hotel, he could not help remembering the days when it had been a private house, the days before the colonel had invested wildly and badly and lost everything. Although he had suggested to the colonel that he might consider the idea of turning his home into a hotel, the colonel had never given him any credit for the suggestion.

  Priscilla was crossing the entrance hall with a sheaf of papers in her hands when he walked in. “Your father around?” asked Hamish.

  “Oh, Hamish, he’s gone off to stay with friends. He didn’t say where he was going.”

  “What about your mother?”

  “She’s gone with him.”

  Hamish clucked his tongue in annoyance. “I’ve got to find him. Did you get anything out of him?”

  “No, he says Fergus was poaching.”

  “Fergus didn’t even like fish, Priscilla. Your father’s lying.”

  “So you say.”

  “Oh, Priscilla, this is important. If he phones, find out where he is. I’ve got to talk to him.”

  “I can’t think he would have anything to do with this. Have you considered that Fergus might have been at the river to find a quiet place to get drunk? And that Daddy might just have assumed he was poaching? He thinks that everyone near that river is poaching. He once bawled out an innocent family of picnickers.”

  “Could be. But I’d still like to speak to him.”

  Priscilla’s face took on a closed look. Hamish surveyed her for a moment and then said gently, “You know something’s wrong, Priscilla. Please try to help me on this one. Two men are dead.”

  “I’ll do my best,” she said stiffly. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, Hamish, we’ve just had new bookings to replace the ones we lost, so I’ve got to get on.”

  Hamish left and then wondered what to do next. He rang Jimmy Anderson’s mobile. “Is Kirsty Ettrik ready to see anyone yet?”

  “No, she’s still heavily sedated, and the doctors won’t let anyone near her. I’m up at Angus’s croft. We’re still looking for clues. I think you should still keep going round the village from door to door, Hamish. Someone must have seen or heard something.”

  Hamish rang off. He decided to call on Josie Darling again.

  Josie answered the door to him. Her face was blotchy with tears. “It’s you,”
she said in a bleak voice. “I heard about Angus.”

  He followed her in. “I gather you’ve been telling everyone that you jilted Murdo.”

  “I wasn’t going to let everyone know the rat had jilted me,” she said. “It was going to be such a beautiful wedding.”

  “Josie, I want you to think about Fergus’s visits to you. Didn’t you threaten to go to the police?”

  “I didn’t. I was too ashamed. It’s all Darleen McPhee’s fault.”

  “Who’s Darleen McPhee?”

  “She’s a girl I work with in the bank.”

  “So what’s she got to do with it?”

  “She was always bragging about her boyfriends and hinting that I’d never get a man. The day I walked in with my engagement ring and flashed it in front o’ her stupid face was the best day o’ my life. I couldn’t let her know I’d been jilted. Now I’ve got to go back to work and tell her the wedding’s off.”

  Fergus must have been acute enough to guess at such desperate vanity, thought Hamish.

  “Tell me about Fergus,” he said. “What was his manner when you last saw him?”

  She sank down in a chair and scrubbed at her eyes with a grimy handkerchief. “He was different,” she said at last.

  “What d’ye mean, ‘different’?”

  “Well, joking, excited. Funny, that was the only time he didn’t ask for the money.”

  Hamish’s hazel eyes sharpened. That could only mean one thing. Fergus was blackmailing someone with real money. His heart sank as he thought of the colonel. But then he reflected that there was no way the colonel would kill anyone. Somehow he believed that the murders had been planned. Dumping Fergus’s body in the bin, he was sure, smacked more of revenge than any effort at concealment. Whoever put the body there could not know that the Currie sisters rarely put rubbish in the bin, that they recycled what they could.

  He thanked Josie and left and drove to Callum McSween’s croft. Callum was out in the fields with his sheep. Hamish waved to him, vaulted a fence and walked across the springy turf to join him. There is very little arable farming in Sutherland. The land is mostly used for sheep rearing because the hard old rock which makes up most of Sutherland is only covered with a thin layer of soil.