by M C Beaton
“Your ex-husband?”
“Yes, John. He’s been working so hard. He does need a holiday.”
“Who divorced whom?”
The large eyes opposite shifted away from him slightly. “Oh, we were very civilised about it. A mutual agreement. Well, there you are. What do you think?”
“Are they still there?”
“Oh, yes. After what Mrs. Bannennan saw in the tea-leaves, I felt I had to get away to meditate and heard Priscilla had fallen on hard times and so I thought I would hop over for a couple of nights just to think. What do you think?”
“First of all,” said Hamish, “I believe Eileencraig is a weird enough place to give anyone the jitters. You’re right. They hate incomers. I think the heater and the rock were plain and simple accidents. But when the villagers heard you were going to visit Mrs. Bannennan to get your fortune told, they must have put her up to giving you a fright. That, in my opinion, is all there is to it.”
She leaned forward and the blouse plunged alarmingly again. “Do you know,” said Jane in that breathy, sexy voice of hers, “you are a most intelligent man.” She threw back her head and gave that practised merry laugh of hers again. “I was so edgy that when Priscilla told me about you, I was going to invite you to come back with me for Christmas and bribe you with the promise of an old–fashioned dinner of turkey and mince pies.”
Hamish sat stricken. Then he said carefully, “On the other hand, I cannot help thinking about my Aunt Hannah, her that lives in San Francisco.”
“Yes?”
“She always swore she would neffer set foot in Scotland again, but a wee woman in the Chinese quarter told her fortune and said she would soon be going on a long journey to her native land. She forgot all about it, until one day she found she had booked a plane flight home to Scotland. Then there wass ma cousin Jamie…”
Jane’s mouth fell a little open as she gazed at him.
“Yes, Jamie,” said Hamish in a crooning voice. “He was at this game fair and a gypsy woman had a caravan there. Jamie and his friends had a wee bit too much to drink and they urged Jamie to have his tea-leaves read. Into that black caravan he went, laughing something awful and telling that gypsy woman it was all a load of rubbish. But she read the leaves.”
“And?” urged Jane, who was goggling at him.
“And the gypsy woman said, “Laugh ye may, but look out for your life. Next week, someone is going to try to kill you.” Well, Jamie, he thought she was trying to get revenge because he had laughed at her, but the very next week” – Hamish lowered his voice to a whisper – “he was in Aberdeen, looking for work on the rigs and someone mugged him.”
“No!”
“Oh, yes, and stuck a knife in his side. He’s lucky to be alive.”
“I have never jeered at the paranormal,” said Jane. “You may think me foolish, Hamish, but I am begging you now to come with me. Can you get any leave?”
“I happen to be on leave as from tomorrow,” said Hamish, “but with this cold…”
“I have very good central heating,” said Jane, “and you will be looked after like a king.”
“Seeing as how you are a friend of Priscilla’s, I’ll force myself to go,” said Hamish.
≡≡≡
When Priscilla arrived to pick Jane up, she looked amazed to hear that Hamish intended to travel to Eileencraig with Jane and stay there for Christmas. “I’ll talk to you later,” said Priscilla.
Jane’s eyes fell on Towser. “No dogs,” she said.
“Perhaps I can take Towser.” Priscilla looked doubtful. “But I’ll talk to you later, Hamish.”
After they had gone, Hamish poured himself a celebratory whisky. He had nearly blown it. If he had not invented those tales about his relatives and the tea-leaves, he might not have had a comfortable Christmas to look forward to.
Priscilla arrived that evening, looking cross. “What on earth are you up to, Hamish Macbeth? Jane told me some rubbish about tea-leaves and I was leaving it to you to talk her out of it. Besides, what will your family think?”
“They don’t want me,” said Hamish. “Aunt Hannah’s coming over from the States and that means I have to stay away. She cannae stand me. Och, I forgot the presents for the family. I was supposed to take them over at the end of the week.”
He looked at Priscilla pleadingly.
“All right! All right!” she said impatiently. “I’ll take Towser and the presents over to Rogart. In fact, I’ll do it tomorrow and get it over with. There’s bad weather forecast. The wind’s turned to the east and all that slush is beginning to freeze like mad. I can’t help feeling guilty about letting you trick Jane into that invitation, but seeing as how you’ve got a holiday and nowhere else to go, and seeing as how Jane is simply loaded, I suppose it should be all right.”
“You’re always rushing.” Hamish tried to take her coat. “Sit down for a bit.”
“No, no, I daren’t. We’ve got a party of Spanish aristocrats. They speak perfect English, which is something Daddy refuses to understand, so he shouts at them and thinks if he puts ‘h’ in front of everything, he’s speaking Spanish. You should hear him roaring, ‘H’everything h’okay?’”
She threw her arms about him and gave him an impulsive hug. “Be good, Hamish. Have a merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas,” echoed Hamish as she hurtled out of the door and banged it behind her. He could still feel the warmth of her thin body for a few moments after she had gone, and into his mind came slight, sad, bitter-sweet memories of the days when he had loved her so much.
≡≡≡
The sun came up at ten in the morning to shine over a glittering icy landscape, a glaring yellow sun which forecast high gales to come. True to her promise, Priscilla collected Towser and the presents and set out on the long road to Rogart while Hamish climbed into Jane’s Range Rover and headed down the coast. Jane said that a fishing boat would take them out to the island, as no passenger ferry was due there for another week. She was wearing a short leather jerkin over another short skirt and a pair of black leather thigh-boots. She discoursed at length on her innermost feelings as she drove competently down the winding twisty roads beside the glittering sea. If anyone ever issued a press handout about innermost feelings, it would read rather like Jane’s conversation, reflected Hamish. She suffered, she said, from low self-esteem and a perpetual feeling of insecurity, and Hamish wondered if she really felt anything much at all. She seemed to be reciting something she had read about someone else rather than talking about herself. He wished suddenly he had not taken her up on her invitation. It would have been fun if he could have gone to his parents’ instead with Priscilla. He had not seen much of Priscilla of late. She was always busy, always rushing.
≡≡≡
Priscilla drove under the shadow of the towering Sutherland mountains. Great gusts of wind tore at the car and then the snow began to fall. She switched on her headlights and leaned forward, peering through the driving snow, watching the road in front uneasily as it became whiter and whiter. She heaved a sigh of relief when at last she saw the orange street lights of Lairg ahead. Not far to go.
The road from Lairg to Rogart is quite a good one, although it seemed, that afternoon, to be disappearing rapidly under the snow. Priscilla stopped outside Rogart and studied a map Hamish had drawn for her. The Macbeths’ house was above the village, up on the hills.
She was feeling tired with the strain of driving so long in the howling blizzard. She crawled up the hill road at the back of Rogart, peering anxiously in front of her. And then, with great relief, she saw the telephone-box that Hamish had drawn at a crossroads on his map. The entrance to the croft was a few yards up on the left. The car groaned and chugged its way along. She had almost decided she would need to stop and get out and walk when she dimly saw the low shape of a white croft house. Hoping she was not driving across the front garden, she drew up outside the door and sat for a moment, rubbing her tired eyes.
The
kitchen door opened and the small round figure of Hamish’s mother appeared. “It’s yourself, Priscilla,” she cried in amazement. “And the dog! Where’s Hamish?”
“It’s a long story,” said Priscilla, climbing out of the car and walking with Towser into the welcoming warmth of the house. There seemed to be Macbeths everywhere, both large and small, and all with Hamish’s flaming-red hair.
“I‘ll just leave Towser and the presents from Hamish, and then I’d better get back,” said Priscilla, after explaining where Hamish was.
“Nonsense,” said Mrs. Macbeth. “Sit yourself down, lassie. You’re no’ going anywhere tonight.”
She was hustled into the living-room and pressed down into a battered armchair by the fire. A glass of whisky was put into her hand. Priscilla realised for the first time in months that she was tired, bone-tired. Her eyes began to droop and the empty glass was gently removed from her hand. Soon she was fast asleep.
“Did ye ever see such a mess o’ skin and bone?” said Mrs. Macbeth, looking down at Priscilla. “It’s fattening up that lassie needs. She cannae go anywhere until the roads are clear. And it’s just as well. Hamish said that farther o’ hers was a slave-driver, horrible wee man that he is. I think we’ll keep her here for a bit until she gets some rest.”
Mr. Macbeth smiled at her vaguely and retreated behind his newspaper. He had given up arguing with his wife exactly two weeks after they were married.
≡≡≡
“I do rely on Priscilla for advice,” Jane was saying as she drove competently along a stone jetty. “We’ll just wait in the car until we see the boat coming, Hamish, and then I’ll garage it in that lock-up over there. Yes, Priscilla. So cool. Such a relaxing girl. Oh, there’s the boat.”
Hamish climbed out of the warmth of the Range Rover and shivered on the jetty. Small pellets of snow were beginning to blow through the rising wind. He looked over the sea and experienced a slight feeling of uneasiness, almost dread, and wished he had not come.
∨ Death of a Snob ∧
2
From the lone shieling of the misty island
Mountains divide us, and the waste of seas –
Yet still the blood is strong, the heart is Highland,
And we in dreams behold the Hebrides!
—SIR WALTER SCOTT
The lights of the fishing boat which was to carry them to Eileencraig bobbed closer across the water. Hamish, out of uniform, pulled his tweed-coat collar up against the biting wind. Jane, he noticed, was wearing her jacket open. There might be something to this health-farm business after all, he thought.
The fisherman was a gnarled little man with a sour expression. Jane hailed him gaily, but he jumped nimbly onto the jetty and began to tie the rope around a bollard, ignoring her completely, as did his second in command, a pimply-faced boy with pale eyes, a wet mouth, and an incipient beard.
“Angus is quite a character,” said Jane, meaning the fisherman and giving that merry laugh of hers again. She and Hamish went on board, Hamish carrying her heavy suitcase and his own travelbag. The two-man crew cast off and the boat bucketed out over the rough sea. Hamish went down below to an oily, stinking little engine room furnished with two smelly berths and a dirty table. He sat on one of the berths. The youth scrambled down and went into the galley and put a kettle on the stove, which was lurching about on its gimbals.
“What’s your name?” asked Hamish.
“Joseph Macleod,” said the boy. He began to whistle through his teeth.
“Is Mrs. Wetherby in the wheelhouse?” asked Hamish.
“Naw, herself is oot on the deck.”
“In this weather?”
“Aye, her’s daft. There’s worse coming.” The boat lurched and bucketed but the boy kept his balance, swaying easily with the erratic motion. “Right bad storm inland. Heard it on the radio.”
Hamish thought uneasily of Priscilla. They were on the west coast. The storm had been driven in from the east. He hoped she was safe.
Jane clattered down to join Hamish, her face shining with good health. “Marvellous sea,” she said. “Waves like mountains.”
“I can feel them, and that’s enough.” Hamish, still seated on one of the berths with the raised edge of it digging into his thighs, looked queasily at Jane. “It’s a wonder you got them to bring the boat out in this weather.”
“I pay well.” Jane lay down on the other berth and raised one booted leg in the air to admire it.
Hamish had to hand it to Jane. It was a dreadful crossing and yet she prattled on as if lying on a sofa in her own living-room. The little fishing boat crawled up one wave and plunged down the next and then wallowed about in the choppy trough at the bottom before scaling another watery mountain. The boy left the kettle and started to work the pumps, for sea water was crashing down the companion-way. The air was horrid with the sound of wind and waves and the groanings of the boat as it fought its way to Eileencraig.
Hamish’s cold felt worse. His forehead was hot and there was a ringing in his ears. Jane’s presence was claustrophobic. There was too much of everything about her, thought Hamish dizzily. Too much length of black-booted leg, too much cleavage, and too much of that breathy, sexy voice that rose remorselessly above the storm.
“The reason for the divorce,” Jane was saying, “was that we both needed space. It’s very important to have space in a marriage, don’t you think?”
“I wouldn’t know,” replied Hamish, “not being married myself.”
Jane’s large eyes swivelled round like headlamps turning a corner to focus on him. “Everyone to their own bag,” she said cheerfully. “Have you a lover?”
“I am not a homosexual.”
“Then why aren’t you married? I mean, you’re over thirty, aren’t you? And anyone over thirty who is not married is either a homosexual or emotionally immature.”
“It could be argued that divorce is a sign of emotional immaturity,” said Hamish. “Inability to make a go of things once the first fine careless rapture has died down.”
“Why, Hamish Macbeth, you are straight out of the Dark Ages!”
Hamish got up and clutched at a shelf for support. “Going to get a breath of air,” he said, and scurried up the iron stairs before Jane could volunteer to accompany him.
It was still wild, but the great seas were dying. He went into the wheelhouse. “Nearly there,” grunted the fisherman.
Hamish peered through the spray-blotched window. “Can’t see anything but darkness and water.”
“Ower there.” The fisherman pointed to the middle west. Hamish strained his eyes. He had never been to Eileencraig. Then, all at once, he saw lights in the blackness, lights so low that he seemed to be looking down on them. He was to find out later that a large part of the center of the very flat island was below sea-level. The sea was calming. Somewhere far overhead, the wind was tearing and shrieking, but down below, all was suddenly still, an eerie effect, as if Eileencraig, like a sort of aquatic Brigadoon, had risen from the sea.
Jane appeared on deck, obviously looking for him. He went out to join her. The boat cruised into a wooden jetty. There were little knots of people standing on the jetty.
As they disembarked, Hamish carrying the luggage, he gave them a cheery salute of “Afternoon,” but they all stared back at Hamish and Jane without moving, like sullen villagers in some long-forgotten war watching the arrival of their conquerors. There was something uncanny about their stillness, their watching. Their very clothes seemed to belong to an older age: the women in black shawls, the men in shiny tight suits. They stood immobile, watching, ever watching, not moving an inch, so that Hamish and Jane had to walk around the little groups to get off the jetty.
Hamish had once had a murder case in a Sutherland village called Cnothah. There, the inhabitants were anything but friendly but would have looked like a welcoming committee compared to these islanders.
Jane strode to where an ex-army jeep was parked and swung her long legs in
to it, and Hamish climbed in beside her after slinging the luggage into the back. “Horrible old thing,” commented Jane, “but sheer extravagance to leave anything more expensive lying around. They’d just take it to pieces.”
“Out of spite?” Hamish looked back at the islanders on the jetty, who had all turned around and were now staring at the jeep, their black silhouettes against the jetty lights, like cardboard cut-outs.
Jane drove off. “Oh, no,” she shouted above the noise of the engine. “They’re rather sweet really. Just like naughty children.”
“Why on earth do you stay in such a place?”
“It is part of the health routine to have walks and exercise in such a remote, unspoiled part. My guests love it.”
They probably would, thought Hamish, cushioned as they were from the stark realities of remote island life.
“And just smell that air!”
As the jeep was an open one, there was little else Hamish could do but smell the air. The road wound through the darkness, the headlights picking out acres of bleak bog at every turn.
Jane swerved off the road and drove over a heathery track and then along the hard white sand of a curve of beach. “There it is,” she called. “At the end.”
Floodlit, The Happy Wanderer stood in all its glory, cocking a snoot at the simple grandeur of beach and moorland. It had been built like one of those pseudo-Spanish villas in California with arches and curved wrought-iron balconies, the whole having been painted white. A pink curly sign, “The Happy Wanderer,” shone out into the blackness.
It fronted right on the beach. Jane pulled up at the entrance.
“Home at last,” she said. “Come in, Hamish, and I’ll show you to your room.”
The front door led straight into the main lounge. There was a huge fireplace filled with blazing logs; in front of it stood several chintz-covered sofas and armchairs. The room had a high arched wooden ceiling and fake skin rugs on the floor; a fake leopardskin lay in front of the fire, and nylon sheepskins dotted, like islands, the haircord carpet. Several modern paintings in acid colours swore from the walls. There was no reception desk, no receptionist, no pigeon-holes for keys and letters.