by M C Beaton
“What are the reports on Alice Brett?” he asked. “I was thinking about her. I mean, is she as hysterical as Dermott made her sound? He seemed to think she might kill herself if he asked for a divorce.”
“She’s here.”
“What? In Skag?”
“We brought her up for questioning. If you want a wee look at her, we’ll hae her in after we’ve spoken tae these two.”
The door opened. Maggie Donald put a tray with paper cups of coffee and a plate of jam doughnuts on the table. Hamish rose and helped himself, ignoring a fulminating glare from Maggie. He knew the fact that he was being allowed to sit in on the interviewing when he was only an ordinary police constable like herself had infuriated her more than being ordered to fetch doughnuts.
But when she had left, he couldn’t help asking mildly, “Doesn’t it ever get up Maggie’s nose, being treated like a skivvy? I mean, what about equal opportunities and no sex discrimination?”
“When that one stops trying to get favours by batting her eyelids and wiggling her bum, we’ll maybe take her a bit more seriously,” said Deacon. “And address me as ‘sir’, when you talk to me, Macbeth.”
“Yes, sir.”
The door opened again and Doris and Andrew were ushered in. Andrew’s face appeared strained and Doris looked even more buttoned down than ever, mouth tucked in at the corners, hair rigidly set, neat little blouse and straight skirt and low-heeled shoes.
“You cannot keep questioning and questioning us like this,” protested Andrew. “We’ve told you all we know.”
Clay switched on the tape. “Beginning interview with Mrs Doris Harris and Mr Andrew Biggar,” he intoned. “Nine-fifteen, July thirtieth. Interview by Detective Chief Inspector Deacon. Also present, Detective Sergeant Clay and Constable Hamish Macbeth.”
Andrew threw Hamish a look of reproach.
“Now,” began Deacon, “we would like to know why the pair of you omitted the fact that you both knew each other before you came up here.”
“But that’s not true,” wailed Doris.
“Stop lying,” snapped Deacon. “Look, we’ve gone easy on you, Mrs Harris, because of your being newly widowed and all. We have here a statement from a waiter who works in a Chinese restaurant in Evesham. He identified you from your photographs. Your fault, for being such a generous tipper, Mr Biggar. He remembered you all right. And the pair of you were seen there on two occasions. What have you to say about it?”
Doris began to cry quietly. Deacon glared at her impatiently. Andrew took Doris’s hand.
“We did not lie to you,” he said quietly. “The fact that we had met before had nothing to do with the murder investigation.”
“It seems to me it might have quite a lot to do with it,” said Deacon.
Clay leaned forward. “So you knew each other before. So you knew, Mr Biggar, that Mr and Mrs Harris were to be here on holiday and you came along as well. Why? To put it bluntly, you could hardly have expected any romantic interludes with her husband around.” His voice hardened. “Could it be that you came up with murder in mind?”
“I just wanted to be near her, that’s all,” mumbled Andrew, looking the picture of gentlemanly embarrassment.
“We’ll start again,” said Deacon. “Were you having an affair?”
“No,” said Doris. “Never!”
Deacon gave them both a look of patent disbelief but he said in a milder tone to Andrew, “How did you first meet?”
“I was judging a dog show,” said Andrew. “Afterwards I went to the refreshment tent to get a beer. When I started to leave, it was coming down in buckets. Doris was standing at the entrance to the tent. She didn’t have a coat. She said something about having to wait or she would get soaked trying to reach the car park. My judging was over, so I suggested we have another drink and see if the rain eased off. We began to talk. I found her very easy to talk to.”
“Have you ever been married, Mr Biggar?” Hamish’s quiet Highland lilt came from the corner of the room.
“Yes, I was married over ten years ago. She left me when I was posted to Northern Ireland. She is married again. Her married name is Hester Glad-Jones. She now lives in Cambridge. She will testify that I was never violent or abusive to her. I am not the sort to murder.”
“But you were a professional soldier until recently. You must have known how to kill men.”
“Yes, but not by hitting them on the head and pushing them in the water and leaving them to die.”
“So when did you first meet Mrs Harris?”
“I told you…at the dog show.”
“Yes, I know, but I want month and year.”
“It was two years ago, in August.”
“And you have been seeing each other ever since?”
“Yes, on and off. Just the occasional drink or meal. We enjoyed each other’s company. There seemed no harm in it. We did not fall in love until recently.”
“You seem a sensible man to me,” said Deacon. “Okay, I can understand you not wanting us to know that you and Mrs Harris had been seeing each other before you came up here. But for heaven’s sake, man, what did you think you were doing coming up to a seedy boarding-house to watch the woman you loved being bullied by her husband? What did you think when you heard him going on at her? It drove Macbeth over there to punch Harris on the nose, although he will insist it was self-defence.”
Andrew said evenly, “The reason I stayed was to try to persuade her to leave with me, just leave him.”
Deacon transferred his attention to Doris. “And why didn’t you?” he asked.
“I was afraid Bob would kill me.”
“But if you just went off with him, how could he find you?”
She shivered and hugged herself. “He would have found us. I just hadn’t the strength.”
Again the voice of Hamish Macbeth. “You live with your mother, Mr Biggar. Did she know about Mrs Harris?”
He hesitated and then gave a curt “Yes.”
“And what did she think about it? I know you are a middle-aged man, but to mothers, sons never grow up. Had she met Mrs Harris?”
“No.”
“But she knew. What did she think?”
“I do not know. I refused to discuss the matter with her.”
“You must have seen an end to this. What did you envisage?”
Andrew sighed. “I lived from day to day. I hoped Doris would sooner or later get up the courage to leave him.”
The questioning continued. Where had they gone, apart from the Chinese restaurant, and when? At last, they were released. Maggie came in to clear away the empty cups as Deacon said to Hamish, “Well, I think they’re both mad. Why didn’t they just hop into bed and have a fling?”
“You’re looking at two old–fashioned people,” said Hamish. “It struck me for the first time looking at them both that they love with the intensity of a Romeo and Juliet. They had everything against them: disapproving mother, bullying husband. But this is the real thing, this is the stuff the poets wrote about, and that’s why Andrew Biggar followed her up here.”
“Havers. You’re a romantic.”
“I am the realist. Some surprising people are capable of the finer feelings,” said Hamish huffily.
Maggie went out with the tray. Could Hamish Macbeth love like that? Was he right? Did that sort of love still exist when everything these days was sex, sex, sex? Perhaps she would see if he was free for dinner. That new short black skirt with the slit up the side hadn’t been worn yet.
She hung about outside the interviewing room.
But Hamish was waiting inside to see Alice Brett.
∨ Death of a Nag ∧
9
Love’s like the measles – all the worse when it comes late in life.
—Douglas William Jerrold
Hamish, who had been studying his notes, looked up curiously as Alice Brett was ushered in. He had expected a legal secretary to turn out to be somewhat like Doris Harris in appearance, prim an
d neat. But Alice Brett was fleshy. She had a loose, floppy bosom and rather big loose arms, as if they had once been muscled and the muscle had gone into flab. Her heavily painted mouth was very thick and full, and she wore an orange lipstick which had the ‘wet’ look, so that it was hard to look anywhere else but at that huge glistening mouth. Her eyes were large and rather fixed. She was wearing a short-sleeved summer dress. She had large plump feet in white high-heeled shoes.
Clay switched on the tape again. Deacon consulted some notes and then began. “Mrs Brett, you say you came up here after the murder, and yet you checked out on holiday the week before. You will be interested to know that your neighbour, Mrs Dibb, now stands by her original story and has made a statement. She said you told her a week before the murder of Mr Harris that you had received a letter saying that your husband was cheating on you, and that you were going up to Scotland. Was that letter from Harris?”
“I want a lawyer,” said Mrs Brett.
“You’ll get one. But try to co-operate. If you did not murder Mr Harris, then you have nothing to fear.”
Hamish spoke suddenly, “The thing that is bothering me,” he said, “was that there was hardly time for Harris to have written to Mrs Brett here. We had all been here only a few days when the murder took place.”
Deacon looked at him in surprise. Then he glared at Alice Brett. “Out wi’ it. Who told you about June?”
“I’m saying nothing until a lawyer gets here.” Alice folded her baggy arms over her baggy bosom and faced them mutinously.
And then Hamish Macbeth had one of his flashes of Highland insight.
“I know who wrote to you,” he said.
“How? Who?” asked Deacon.
“It was June,” said Hamish flatly. He looked straight at Alice Brett. “June wrote to you, didn’t she?”
She stared back and then sneered, “Oh, well, if the silly trollop has told you, there’s no point in me denying it. The bitch. Let my man go and all that crap.”
“So why didn’t you approach them when you came up here?” asked Hamish. “You weren’t staying in Skag. I’m sure of that.”
“I stayed a bit away,” she said sulkily. “I stayed in Forres. I drove over one day. You were all on the beach. It was the children. I can’t have any. It made me sick. But I suddenly didn’t want him any more. I went to tell him so. Of course June and the children weren’t anywhere around. You know how I got my revenge? Not by murdering Harris. Why should I? I didn’t know the man. I got my revenge by saying he could have had a divorce any time he wanted, and then I saw the look on his face. He was mad with fury, thinking of all the wasted years.”
“And you let him believe that you had found out about him and June through the newspapers?”
“I didn’t tell him who had written to me. It didn’t seem important any more.”
A possessive, ugly leech of a woman, and with another flash of insight he realized why such a woman would be prepared to let a husband go.
“You didn’t much care one way or the other,” said Hamish, “you having a new man of your own.”
“I’ll kill that Dibb woman,” she shouted. “Some friend. Can’t she keep her bloody mouth shut?”
“Who is this man?” asked Deacon.
Her eyes flashed hatred in the direction of Hamish Macbeth.
“A Mr John Trant. He lives in Grays. He’s a builder.”
Deacon settled down then to take her over all her movements since receiving the letter from June. She no longer said she needed a lawyer but answered in a dull, flat voice.
When they had finished with her and she had left the room, Deacon turned on Hamish. “You might have told me all you knew about her, Macbeth,” he said. “I’ve got no time for ye if you’re going to be secretive.”
“I didn’t know,” said Hamish mildly. “It just came to me. Harris wouldn’t know her address, and the only person I could think of who might have an interest in letting Alice know the truth was June. Also, about the other man, a creature like Alice Brett wouldn’t have even considered letting Dermott have his freedom unless she had another man lined up.”
“It could be,” said Deacon slowly, “that Brett thought Harris had written the letter.”
“But Alice arrived after the murder,” Clay pointed out.
“Unless, of course,” said Hamish, “Alice met Dermott secretly before the murder. Perhaps her visit to the boarding-house was to finalize things.”
“We’d better have June and Dermott Brett in again.” Deacon rose, put his head round the door and shouted at the desk sergeant to get someone to collect them.
“Is that how you go about cases?” he asked Hamish. “Guesswork? That can be a dangerous thing. Whit if you were wrong?”
“Then all she had to do was deny it. Seemed worth a try.”
“Aye, that’s all very well, but me, I prefer solid police work and hard evidence. Just look how you came a cropper over the wrong body over at Drim.”
“But I found out the murderer,” protested Hamish. “Look, I’ve been meaning to ask you. For the next few days, is there a possibility of a room in the police house at Dungarton? I don’t want to go on staying at that boarding-house.”
“Why?” demanded Clay. “You can watch them.”
“I find it a bit o’ a strain,” said Hamish.
“You’re a policeman, dammit.”
“But a policeman usually doesn’t hae to live with the suspects.”
“You stay where you are, laddie,” said Deacon. “Clay, give Maggie a shout and get her to make some tea and sandwiches. We’ll hae a wee bit o’ something while we’re waiting.”
Poor Maggie, thought Hamish. If Deacon isn’t careful she’ll be putting in a complaint about him.
When the tea and sandwiches arrived, Hamish ate without really tasting anything, his mind on the people back at the boarding-house. He was not looking forward to the arrival of Dermott and June. He had hated being present at the interviewing of Andrew and Doris. He liked them. Why couldn’t it be Cheryl or Tracey? he thought. But whoever this murderer was, it was someone cool and unemotional, or someone driven to the edge by fear. To walk into the boat-shed and kill Jamie MacPherson just like that did not seem like a premeditated crime any more than the death of Harris did. A murderer who planned things would have waited until a quieter time of the day, not marched in boldly in broad daylight, when anyone could have seen him or her. His thoughts began to wander. It could be a murderess rather than a murderer. Or was that not going to be used any more in these politically correct days? Would it soon become murderperson? Amazing that political correctness should start in a democratic society like America. One always thought of it as being the curse of a totalitarian society and coming from the top, not the bottom. Then there was therapyspeak or psychobabble to cover a multitude of emotions. People said, for example, “I am chemically dependent on so-and-so, I am obsessed, I am emotionally dependent, I have been taken hostage.” The old–fashioned words wouldn’t do any more. To go down to the basement of one’s emotions, switch on the light, stare the monster in the face and say ‘I am in love’ was not on, because that meant giving up control, that meant being vulnerable. Had he really been in love with Priscilla? His mind shied away from the thought with all the fright of the people he had been mentally damning and he was relieved when Dermott and June were ushered in.
“Who’s looking after the children?” asked Hamish and got a glare from Deacon for not knowing his place.
“Miss Gunnery,” said June.
The couple sat down uneasily and faced Deacon.
“Now,” said Deacon, “we’ll start with you, Mrs Brett. Do you mind if I call you June? I get confused with the real Mrs Brett.”
“Call me what you like,” said June wearily.
“Well, June, why didn’t you tell us you had written to Mrs Brett, telling her of your affair with Dermott here?”
Dermott’s face turned a muddy colour and he stared at June as if he couldn’t belie
ve his ears. “You WHAT?” he shouted at her.
“Quietly now,” admonished Deacon. “I am speaking to June, not you, Dermott. June?”
“I meant to tell you,” she said, speaking to Dermott. “I couldn’t take it any longer. Eight years now we’ve been together. I’m sick of having you part-time. Heather was beginning to ask questions about why you had to be away so much, why you always missed Christmas, when you couldn’t be working, and things like that. I thought that one day she’d find out she was a bastard and I couldn’t bear that. You kept saying that Alice would never give you a divorce, but I thought she might if she knew about the children. Yes, I wrote to her. I’m not sorry. It worked out fine.”
“Except that Harris got killed and now MacPherson,” interposed Clay.
“That was nothing to do with me.”
“Wait a bit, wait a bit,” said Dermott, shaking his head as if to clear it. “Why didn’t you tell me about writing to Alice?”
“Because it would have been the same old thing,” said June. “Look at the way you buckled and were prepared to pay that rat Rogers to keep his mouth shut.”
“But you should never have done such a thing. You don’t know what you’ve done, woman!”
June’s face turned the same horrible colour as Dermott’s. “What have I done?” she screamed at him. And then, in a low voice, she repeated wretchedly, “Oh, what have I done?”
“Yes, what has she done?” Deacon’s voice was brutal. “Do you mean murdering Harris was a waste of time, Dermott Brett?”
“No,” said Dermott. “I never touched him. Never! I had that row with him. He was threatening to tell Alice. I was so upset, I didn’t stop to think that he couldn’t possibly have the address. They don’t have a visitors’ book at the boarding-house.”
“Did Rogers know your home address?” asked Hamish.
“No.” Dermott quietened. “No. June made the booking.”
“So why wass it that you told the police and us that you didn’t know the boarding-house wass under the new management?”
“I lied about a few little things,” said Dermott wearily. “I was terrified you would suspect me because I’d had that row with Harris.”