Hamish MacBeth 01 (1985) - Death of a Gossip

by M C Beaton

  Everyone who was anyone, Alice gathered, went to Scotland in August to kill things. If you weren’t slaughtering grouse, you were gaffing salmon.

  So Alice had read an article about the fishing school in The Field and had promptly decided to go. She imagined the startled admiration on her boss’s face when she casually described landing a twenty-pounder after a brutal fight.

  Alice was nineteen years of age. She had fluffy fine brown hair and wide-spaced brown eyes. Her slim, almost boyish figure was her private despair.

  She had once seen Mr Patterson-James arm in arm with a busty blonde and wondered if the blonde were Mrs Patterson-James.

  It was not like being in the British Isles at all, thought Alice, looking out at the sun sparkling on the loch. The village was so tiny and the tracts of heather-covered moorland and weird twisted mountains so savage and primitive and vast.

  Perhaps she would give it one more day and then go home. Would she get a refund? Alice’s timid soul quailed at the idea of asking for money back. Surely only very common people did that.

  Mr Patterson-James was always describing people as common.

  Suddenly she heard raised voices from the terrace below. Then loud and clear she heard Mr Marvin Roth say savagely, “If she doesn’t shut that goddamn mouth of hers, I’ll shut it for her.”

  There was the sound of a door slamming and then silence.

  Alice sat down on the bed, one leg in her trousers and one out. Her ideas of American men had been pretty much based on the works of P. G. Wodehouse. Men who looked like Marvin were supposed to be sweet and deferential to their wives, although they might belong to the class of Sing-Sing ‘45. Was everyone on this holiday going to be nasty? And whose mouth was going to be shut? Lady Jane’s?

  Jeremy Blythe seemed sweet. But the Daphnes of this world were always waiting around the corner to take away the nice men. Did Mrs Patterson-James look like Daphne?

  Alice gloomily surveyed her appearance in the glass when she had finished dressing. The corduroys fitted her slim hips snugly, and the bulky army sweater hid the deficiency of her bosom. Her Wellington boots were…well, just Wellington boots.

  Carefully setting a brand-new fishing hat of brown wool on top of her fluffy brown hair, Alice stuck her tongue out at her reflection and went out of her room and down the stairs, muttering, “I won’t stay if I can’t stand it.”

  To her surprise, everyone was dressed much the same as she was, with the exception of Lady Jane, who had simply changed her brogues for Wellingtons and was still wearing the breeches and blouse she had worn at the morning lecture.

  “We’ll all walk up to the Marag,” said John Cartwright. “Heather will go ahead in the estate car with the rods and packed lunches.”

  Loch Marag, or the Marag as it was called by the locals, was John’s favorite training ground. It was a circular loch surrounded by pretty sylvan woodland. At one end it flowed out and down to the sea loch of Lochdubh in a series of waterfalls. It was amply stocked with trout and a fair number of salmon.

  The major took himself cheerfully off to fish in the pool above the waterfall while the rest of the class gathered with their newly acquired rods at the shallow side of the loch to await instruction. Instead of a hook, a small piece of cotton wool was placed on the end of each leader.

  It was then that the class discovered that Lady Jane was not only rude and aggressive, she was also incredibly clumsy.

  Although the loch was only a short walk from the hotel, she had insisted on bringing her car and parking it at the edge of the loch. She backed it off the road on to the grass and right over the pile of packed lunches.

  She refused to listen to John’s careful instructions and whipped her line savagely back and forth, finally winding it around Marvin Roth’s neck and nearly strangling him. She then strode into the water, failing to see small Charlie Baxter and sending him flying face down in the mud.

  Charlie burst into tears and kicked Lady Jane in the shins before Heather could scoop him up and drag him off.

  “I’ll kill her,” muttered John. “She’s ruining the holiday for everyone.”

  “Now, now,” said Heather. “I’ll deal with her while you look after the others.”

  Alice listened carefully as John Cartwright’s now slightly shaking voice repeated the instructions.

  “With the line in front of you, take a foot or so of the line from the reel with your left hand. Raise the rod, holding the wrist at a slight down slant. Bring the line off the water with a smooth motion but with enough power to send it behind you, stopping the rod at the twelve o’clock position. Your left hand holding the line pulls downwards. When the line has straightened out behind you, bring the rod forward smartly. As the line comes forward, follow through to the ten o’clock position, letting the line fall gently to the water. Oh, very good, Alice.”

  Alice flushed with pleasure. Heather had said something to Lady Jane, and Lady Jane had stalked off. Without her overbearing presence, the day seemed to take on light and colour. Heather shouted she was returning to the hotel to bring back more packed lunches.

  A buzzard sailed above in the light blue sky. Enormous clumps of purple heather studied their reflections in the mirror surface of the loch. The peaty water danced as Alice waded dreamily in the red and gold shallows, which sparkled and glittered like marcasite. She cast, and cast, and cast again until her arms ached. Heather came back with new lunches, and they all gathered around the estate car, with the exception of Lady Jane and the major.

  Suddenly, it was a holiday. A damp and scrubbed Charlie had been brought back by Heather. He sat with his back against the estate car’s wheel contentedly munching a sandwich.

  All at once he said in his clear treble, “That is quite a frightful woman, you know.”

  No one said, “Who?”

  Although no one added their criticism to Charlie’s, they were all bonded together in a common resentment against Lady Jane and an equally common determination that she was not going to spoil things.

  “Oh, there’s Constable Macbeth,” said Alice.

  The lanky figure of the policeman had materialized behind the group.

  “Those sandwiches look very good,” he said, studying the sky.

  “Help yourself,” said Heather, rather crossly. “Packed lunches are not all that expensive, Mr Macbeth.”

  “Is that a fact,” said the constable pleasantly. “I’m right glad to hear it. I would not want to be taking away food that cost a lot.”

  To Alice’s amusement, he produced a small collapsible plastic cup from the inside of his tunic and held it out to Heather, who muttered something under her breath as she filled it up with tea.

  “You obviously don’t get much crime in this area, Officer,” said Daphne caustically.

  “I wouldnae say that,” said Hamish between bites of ham sandwich. “People are awfy wicked. The drunkenness on a Saturday night is a fair disgrace.”

  “Have you made any major arrests?” pursued Daphne, catching Jeremy Blythe’s eye and inviting him to share in the baiting of Hamish.

  “No, I hivnae bagged any majors. A few sodjers sometimes.”

  Amy Roth let out a trill of laughter, and Daphne said crossly to Hamish, “Are you being deliberately stupid?”

  Hamish looked horrified. “I would no more dream of being deliberately stupid, miss, than you yourself would dream of being deliberately bitchy.”

  “Fun’s over,” whispered Jeremy to Alice. “Back comes Lady Jane.”

  She came crashing through the undergrowth. Her broad face was flushed, and she had a scratch down one cheek. But her eyes held a triumphant, satisfied gleam.

  John ï�½ Cartwright hurriedly began to make arrangements to move his school on to further fishing grounds for the afternoon. Boxes of hooks were distributed. More knots demonstrated—a towel knot and a figure of eight.

  This time even Lady Jane struggled away in silence to master the slippery nylon. The fever of catching fish was upon t
he little party.

  “Now,” said Heather, “we’ll issue you each with knotted leaders, but have your own leaders knotted and ready for tomorrow morning. We have the Anstey River for the afternoon. Carry this fishing permit—I’ll give you each one—in your pockets in case you are stopped by the water bailiffs. Marvin and Amy, I believe you have done some fly fishing in the States. We’ll start you off on the upper beats. We suggest you keep moving. Never fish in one spot for too long. If you come back to the hotel before we set out, then we’ll issue you with waders. John and I will show each of you what to do as soon as we’re on the river. We’ll need to take the cars. John and I will take Alice and Charlie. Daphne can go with Jeremy, and I believe the rest of you have your own cars. Has anyone seen the major?”

  Lady Jane spoke up. “He was fishing about on the other side of the loch, pretending to be an angler. At least it makes a change from pretending to be an officer and a gentleman.”

  “The rest of you go on to the hotel,” said John hurriedly. “I’ll go and look for the major.”

  “I wish you were coming with me,” said Jeremy to Alice.

  She looked at him in surprise. She had been so obsessed with Mr Patterson-James that she had never really stopped to think any other man might find her attractive.

  As Jeremy moved off with Daphne, Alice studied him covertly. He really was a very attractive man. His voice was pleasant and slightly husky. He did not seem to have to strangle and chew his words as Mr Patterson-James did. Her heart gave a little lift, and she unconsciously smiled at Jeremy’s retreating back.

  “No use,” said Lady Jane, appearing at Alice’s elbow. “He’s one of the Somerset Blythes. Quite above your touch, wouldn’t you say? Daphne’s more his sort.”

  Alice was consumed by such a wave of bitter hatred that she thought she would suffocate. “Fook off!” she said, in a broad Liverpool accent.

  “Attagirl!” remarked Marvin cheerfully.

  Lady Jane muttered something. Alice thought she said, “I’ll make you sorry you said that,” but she must have been imagining things.

  Alice was prepared to find herself cut off from Jeremy for the rest of the day. But when they reached the river Anstey, which broadened out at one part into a large loch, Heather arranged that Jeremy and Alice should take out the rowing boat and fish from there while the rest were distributed up and down the banks several miles apart.

  Before she allowed Alice to go out in the boat, Heather gave her a gruelling half-hour lesson in casting. Alice caught her hat, caught the bushes behind, wrapped her leader around the branches of a tree, and then quite suddenly found she had mastered the knack of it.

  “Don’t keep worrying about all that line racing out behind you,” said Heather. “Just concentrate on what you’ve been told. Now you’re ready to go. Jeremy, you’ve obviously done this before.”

  “Yes, but very clumsily,” said Jeremy.

  “Take the boat and row upstream and then drift slowly back down,” said Heather. “You may not catch a salmon but you should get some trout.”

  He rowed them swiftly up the stream while Alice nervously held her rod upright and wondered what on earth she would do if she caught a fish. The day was warm and sunny, and she felt laden down with equipment. Her long green waders were clumsy and heavy. She had a fishing knife in one pocket and mosquito repellent in the other, since clouds of Scottish midges were apt to descend towards dusk.

  She had a fishing net hanging from a string around her neck, and from another string a pair of small sharp scissors.

  On top of her wool fishing hat, kept back from her face by the thin brim, was a sort of beekeeper mosquito net which could be pulled down over her face if the flies got too bad.

  Jeremy rested the oars. “Pooh, it’s hot. Let’s take some clothes off.”

  Alice blushed painfully. Of course he meant they should remove some of their outer woollens, but Alice was at an age when everything seemed to sound sexy. She wondered feverishly whether she had a dirty mind.

  Thank goodness she had had the foresight to put a thin cotton blouse under her army sweater. Alice took off her hat and then her sweater after unslinging the fishing net and laying it in the bottom of the boat. She kept her scissors around her neck. Heather had been most insistent that they keep a pair of scissors handy for cutting lines and snipping free hooks.

  “Well,” said Jeremy, “here goes!”

  The water was very still and golden in the sun. A hot smell of pine drifted on the air mixed with the smell of wild thyme. Alice felt herself gripped by a desire to catch something -anything.

  She cast and cast again until her arms ached. And then…

  “I’ve got something,” she whispered. “It’s a salmon. It feels enormous.”

  Jeremy quickly reeled in his line and picked up his net. “Don’t reel in too fast,” he said. He picked up the oars and moved the boat gently. Alice’s rod began to bend.

  “Reel in a bit more,” he said.

  “Oh, Jeremy,” said Alice, pink with excitement, “what am I going to do?”

  “Take it easy…easy.”

  Alice could not wait. She reeled in frantically. Suddenly the line came clear, and she jerked it out of me water.

  On the end of her hook dangled a long piece of green weed.

  “And I thought I had a twenty-pound salmon,” mourned Alice. “Do you know, Jeremy, I’m still shaking with excitement. Do you think I’m very primitive, really? I mean, I wouldn’t normally hurt a fly, and there I was, ready to kill anything that came up on the end of that hook.”

  “I don’t think you’re all that quiet and timid,” said Jeremy, casting again. “Only look at the way you put down Lady Jane. I heard all about that.”

  “I can’t believe I did that,” said Alice thoughtfully. “I’ve never used that sort of language to anyone in my life. But it was all so beautiful when we were having lunch, I wanted it to go on forever. Then suddenly she was there, bitching and making trouble. She drops hints, you know. Almost as if she had checked up on us all before she came. She…she told me you belonged to the Somerset Blythes.” Alice bit her lip. She had been on the point of telling him the rest.

  “She did, did she? Probably one of those women with little else to do with their time. I hope she doesn’t make life too hard for the village constable. She probably will complain to his superiors.”

  “Poor Hamish.”

  “I think Hamish is well able to take care of himself. And what policeman, do you think, would rush in to take his place? Hardly the spot for an ambitious man.”

  “What do you do for a living?” asked Alice.

  “I’m a barrister.”

  Alice felt a pang of disappointment. She had been secretly hoping he did something as undistinguished as she did.

  “What do you do?” she heard Jeremy asking.

  He was wearing a short-sleeved check shirt and a baggy pair of old flannels, but there was a polished air about him, an air of social ease and money. All at once Alice wanted to pretend she was someone different, someone more important.

  “I’m chief accountant at Baxter and Berry in the City.” She gave a self-conscious laugh. “An odd job for a woman.”

  “Certainly for someone as young as yourself,” said Jeremy. “I didn’t think such a fuddy-duddy firm would be so go-ahead.”

  “You know Baxter and Berry?” queried Alice nervously.

  “I know old man Baxter,” said Jeremy easily. “He’s a friend of my father. I must tease him about his pretty chief accountant.”

  Alice turned her face away. That’s where telling lies got you. Futureless. Now she wouldn’t dare even see Jeremy again after this holiday.

  “When I was your age, which was probably all of ten years ago,” said Jeremy gently, “I told a perfectly smashing-looking girl that I was a jet pilot…”

  “Oh, Jeremy,” said Alice miserably, “I’m only the chief accountant’s secretary.”

  “Thank you for the compliment.”
He grinned. “It’s a long time since anyone’s tried to impress me.”

  “You’re not angry I lied to you?”

  “No. Hey, I think you’ve caught something.”

  “Probably weed.” Alice felt young and free and lighthearted. Mr Patterson-James’s saturnine face swam around in her mind, faded and disappeared like Scotch mist.

  She reeled in her line, amused at the tugs, thinking how like a fish floating weed felt.

  There was a flash and sparkle in the peaty brown and gold water.

  “A trout!” said Jeremy. He held out his net and brought the fish in.

  “Too small,” he said, shaking his head. “We’ve got to throw it back.”

  “Don’t hurt it!” cried Alice as he worked the fly free from the fish’s mouth.

  “No, it’s gone back to Mum,” he said, throwing it in the water. “What fly were you using?”

  “A Kenny’s Killer.”

  He took out his box of fishing flies. “Maybe I’ll try one of those.”

  A companionable silence settled between them. The light began to fade behind the jumbled, twisted crags of the Two Sisters. A little breeze sent ripples lazily fanning out over the loch.

  And then out of the heather came the midges, those small Scottish mosquitoes. Alice’s face was black with them. She screamed and clawed for her mosquito net while Jeremy rowed quickly for the shore.

  “Quick—let’s just bundle everything in the car and drive away from the beasts,” he said.

  Alice scrambled into the bucket seat of something long and low. They shot off down the road, not stopping until they were well clear of the loch. Jeremy handed Alice a towel to wipe her face.

  Alice smiled at him gratefully. “What about Daphne? I’d forgotten all about her.”

  “So had I.” Jeremy was shadowed by a stand of trees beside the car. He seemed to be watching her mouth. Alice’s heart began to hammer.

  “Did…did you buy this car in Scotland?” she asked. “I mean, I thought you and Daphne came up by train.”

  “We did. My father had been using the car. He knew I was coming up this way and so he left it in Inverness for me to collect.”

  “You’ve known Daphne a long time?”