by Connie Berry
Guthrie took a key chain from his pocket, unlocked the cabinet, and lifted out the dirk. “This is our most important piece. It’s quite remarkable.” He ran a finger along the edge of the blade. “Hand-forged steel, still sharp enough to cut meat. We had an expert on Highland weaponry here last year. In the right hands and within range, it’s as deadly as a gun.”
I shuddered, picturing the dagger lodged in poor Gowyn Campbell’s back.
He must have read my mind. “One just like this was used to kill Flora’s companion. Not a nice way to go.” Guthrie replaced the dagger, locked the cabinet, and returned the key chain to his pocket. “This is the gun I mentioned, the one that was stolen and returned.” He drew my attention to another glass case featuring a modern-looking handgun. The label read WEBLEY MK III .38/200 CALIBER SERVICE REVOLVER, 1943. Next to it, an open box held copper bullets packed in tight formation. “The gun belonged to Doc Arnott.”
“Army Medical Corps. Korean War.” Penny stabbed the air twice with her duster for emphasis.
The bell on the front door rang. “Anybody home?” Jackie MacDonald strolled through from the schoolhouse. “Put me to work, people. No task too menial, no challenge too great.”
Penny shoved the duster at him. “I’m off. Time for tea.” She glared at me. “Coming?”
“I’d love to.” I still hadn’t asked Guthrie about Elenor’s trip to the Historical Society the night she died, but this might be my only chance to learn if the twins had seen or heard anything other than what they’d already told the police.
I thanked Guthrie and ran for the door.
* * *
I practically had to jog to keep up with Penny. “I didn’t meet Bill until he was in his thirties. What was he like as a boy?”
“Nice lad. Never cared for her.”
“Elenor? Why not?”
“Stuck up. Thought she was queen of the island.”
She probably did. Usurping the rightful twin queens?
We’d reached the Arnott’s crumbling concrete path. The house was the type built after the Second World War, cinder blocks clad with rough cast and trimmed with wood. Everything screamed for paint. Quite a comedown from Glenroth House.
In the parlor, Cilla Arnott sat on a threadbare velvet sofa like a life-sized doll, her feet propped on a needlepoint stool. She and Penny were dressed alike again, in matching pleated skirts and white blouses with Peter Pan collars. “I wasn’t expecting company,” Cilla said. “Delightful surprise, of course.”
I chose an armchair upholstered in dingy, rose-sprigged needlepoint. Penny pulled up a hassock covered in wedges of burgundy and beige leatherette held together by electrical tape.
Cilla beamed at me. “Pen and I have tea and biscuits every afternoon.” She scooted forward until her small feet touched the floor.
“Did you bake them?” I realized with horror I’d unconsciously adopted the tone one might use with a child, but neither Cilla nor Penny appeared to notice.
“Oh no,” Cilla said. “I’m hopeless in the kitchen. Penny’s the domestic one.”
Man, that was hard to picture.
Cilla left the room, and I prayed she wouldn’t take long.
“Our parents,” Penny said, indicating a framed studio portrait on a side table.
From the clothing and hairstyles, I guessed the photograph had been taken in the early 1960s. The twins resembled their parents, but not in the way I’d have guessed. Mrs. Arnott was square jawed, at least a head taller than her husband, and except for a pair of black cat’s-eye spectacles, the spitting image of Penny. Cilla, on the other hand, had clearly inherited her father’s genes. Doc Arnott was short and plump with Cilla’s vacant blue eyes and a dimpled chin.
Cilla returned with a tray holding a blue flowered teapot, three mismatched cups and saucers, and a plate of cookies with burnt edges. “Molasses biscuits, our favorite,” she said. The tray wobbled.
Penny jumped to her feet. “Let me take that, dear. Too heavy for you.”
Everyone has a redeeming quality. Penny’s was a rather touching concern for her sister.
While Cilla poured, I examined the room. Several framed medical certificates hung on the wall left of the fireplace. Opposite, on the right, a shadow-box frame displayed what looked like instruments of torture but were probably medical tools.
The twins didn’t mind clutter. Every surface in the room was occupied by curios. Porcelain ladies twirled in lace-trimmed ball gowns. Ceramic kittens tumbled with balls of yarn. A clutch of birds huddled around a marble birdbath. Glass bowls brimmed with artificial fruit. And clowns. Some misguided Arnott had started a clown collection.
I took a bite of my cookie, tasting charred flour.
“You can see the value of our heritage,” Penny said, “you being an antiques dealer.”
“Penny and I are the caretakers now,” Cilla said. “Sadly, the last of the line.”
“The last of a line,” Penny said, sweeping her arm perilously close to a pressed-glass pitcher, “running back to ancient Scotland. Cilla and I are the direct descendants of—”
“Robert the Bruce.” Cilla completed the sentence.
I tried to look impressed. On their mother’s side, no doubt. If the photograph was any indication, Mrs. Arnott could have led the charge against England and been home by tea time.
“Our ancestor, Colonel Abraham Arnott,” Penny told the ceiling, “had the courage to support the clans in their battle for the Succession. Joined up with Lord Drummond.”
I followed Penny’s gaze to the ceiling, where a large crack snaked from one corner toward the central light fixture. I hoped no one sneezed. The whole thing might come down.
“Such a handsome man, the colonel,” Cilla said dreamily. “We have his portrait here somewhere. Or is it across the street, Pen?”
“Mmm.”
“How fortunate that you live so near the Historical Society,” I said, cleverly turning the conversation to the night of the murder. “I bet you notice everything that goes on over there.”
“We don’t spy,” Cilla said primly.
“But you can’t help seeing things, can you?” I began to sweat. “Lights going on and off, people coming and going. The police were grateful for your sharp eyes the night of the murder.”
“’Twasn’t me,” Cilla said. “I was sound asleep. Penny got up to—well, she got up and just happened to take a wee peek outside. That’s when you saw lights, right, Pen?”
“What?” Penny was scrabbling through a drawer in a china cabinet.
“Lights at the Historical Society.”
“Mmm.”
“Did you see anything else?” I asked.
“Like what?”
“I don’t know. Like a person or a car?”
“Nope. Ah, here it is.” Penny shoved a folded newspaper in my hand. A copy of The Islander, a daily paper specializing in local events and Tesco coupons. The headline read ARNOTT TWINS CARRY ON FAMILY TRADITION.
“My goodness,” I said. “You were in the newspaper.”
“On telly, too,” Cilla added. “With Dr. Guthrie, when the book was published. Such a charming man, the presenter. Scottish, naturally.”
Penny swiveled in my direction. “Did you know Scotsmen played key roles in world history? American presidents like Alexander Hamilton and James Monroe. Captains of industry like Andrew Carnegie and Andrew Mellon. Writers like Robert Burns and Sir Walter Scott. Scientists and inventors like Alexander Graham Bell. The conservationist John Muir and—”
“Sean Connery.” Cilla again. “What a dreamboat.” She was on her feet, prowling the room like a child on a scavenger hunt. She removed a shaving brush from its brass-and-porcelain stand. “This brush was used by our grandfather every day of his adult life.”
“Except the day he died,” Penny corrected her. “Didn’t bother to shave the day he died.”
I tried to think of an admiring remark, but Cilla’s attention had already drifted to the china cabinet. “Grandmot
her Arnott served tea on—Pen, what happened to the—”
Penny ignored her. She was stuck on the subject of Great Scotsmen. “Our finest British heroes were born in Scotland. We should insist on memorials.”
Cilla clasped her hands under her chin. “I can hardly wait to see the statue of Captain Arnott. Should he be standing or sitting, Pen?”
“Standing, naturally,” Penny said. “Man of action.”
“Do you think they’ll show him in informal dress?” Cilla’s cheeks had gone pink. “His shirt open? Maybe his gun broken over his arm?” She picked up a lace doily on the china cabinet and frowned at a large brownish stain.
I’ve fallen down the rabbit hole. “I almost forgot,” I said, trying to make it sound like an afterthought. “You were looking for something the other day in Elenor’s flat, and I—”
“What about it?” Penny demanded.
“I just thought if I knew what you were looking for, I could return it to you.”
Penny arranged her face in an approximation of a smile. “I overheard what you were telling Dr. Guthrie about the theft at the hotel. What was taken?” She cocked her head to one side like an intelligent spaniel.
“A small chest.” Since DI Devlin had mentioned it to Dr. Guthrie, I figured it was no longer a secret.
“Interesting,” Penny said.
“I think Elenor was going to sell it.”
“Fascinating.”
I was beginning to lose the thread of the conversation. “Nothing of yours was taken.”
“The whole estate is ours,” Penny growled. “Or should be,”
Cilla waved her little hand. “We don’t blame your husband, Kate—of course not—but when our father sold the house, he was in a bit of pickle, moneywise. The Hamiltons took advantage of him. They stole our inheritance.”
The conversation had veered into treacherous waters. “That must have been difficult for you.” I meant that. Over the years I’d helped plenty of families dispose of treasured heirlooms to pay for college tuition or a staggering medical debt. No wonder the proposed statue of their ancestor was so important to the twins. No wonder they cherished shaving brushes and tooth powders. Their dignity and these small artifacts of the past were all they had left. “Agnes MacLeod said you were in your early teens at the time.”
Penny scowled. “Agnes should mind her own business.”
“She’s the one the police should question about Elenor’s death,” Cilla said. “I heard them arguing, Agnes and Elenor. A real shouting match. Elenor kind of shoved her, and Agnes said, ‘That’s the final straw’—something like that, anyway—and ‘You’ll be sorry.’ ”
“When was this?” I didn’t like what I was hearing at all.
“A few days ago.”
“Did you tell the police?”
Cilla pressed the stained doily to her cheek. “I just remembered.”
“Never mind about that now.” Penny snatched the newspaper out of my hand. “I’m sure you’d like to see the media clippings about Dr. Guthrie’s novel.”
“I’ll get the scrapbooks,” Cilla said.
I’d all but abandoned hope of ever being allowed to leave the Arnott house when deliverance arrived like the deus ex machina of Greek drama. My cell phone pinged—a text from Tom: WHERE ARE YOU? EVERYTHING OKAY?
“Oh dear.” I turned the corners of my mouth down. “I’m needed at the hotel.”
“No,” Cilla pouted. “Can’t you even stay to see us on Good Morning Inverness? We’ve got the DVD.”
“Not today. But thanks for the tea and biscuits. I hope I’ll see you again.”
“Bound to,” Penny said. “Funeral.”
Outside I took a deep breath. First the Guthries, then the Arnotts. The Glenroth islanders were obviously the victims of chronic inbreeding.
I replied to the text: BACK IN 20 MIN. HAVE THEY FOUND THE CASKET?
NO, came the immediate reply.
NEWS ABOUT BO?
HEARING STILL SET FOR THURS.
My heart sank. Somehow I had to talk to Bo. I had to convince him to confide in me, and to do that, I’d have to go through his sister, Brenda. Would she appreciate the help or resent my intrusion? Would she even agree to talk with me?
I pressed my lips together and picked up my pace. I couldn’t wait any longer for her to call me.
If you can’t get the bull’s attention, wave your red cape and get ready to run.
Chapter Twenty-Four
I stopped at Applegarth to freshen up and grab a slice of Nancy’s whole-grain bread with raspberry jam. It was almost two PM, and all I’d had to eat since breakfast was a cup of weak tea and half a burnt molasses cookie.
My plan was to drive to the Munroe Clinic. If Brenda was busy, I’d wait. As long as it took. This time when I called the clinic, I got the woman I’d spoken to before, the nice one. “I did give Mr. Duff’s sister your information,” she said, lowering her voice. “Listen, she’s meeting with the psychiatrists at four. If you want to catch her, come around four thirty.”
I checked my watch. Two fifteen.
I was locking the cottage door when I saw Tom walking up the flagged path. He looked sheepish, a new look for him.
“Hullo, Kate. I thought I might drive into Inverness this afternoon. Care to keep me company? We could have dinner there and be back by nine.”
“I can’t. I’m sorry.” I dropped the key in my handbag and stepped off the porch. “I need to find Bo’s sister.”
“You’re driving to the clinic?”
“It’s just half an hour beyond Mallaig on the A830.”
“Well, then, how about driving into Inverness tomorrow?” He looked at the sky. “They say it will be a fine day.”
I tried not to look astonished. Was he asking me for a date?
“I’ve been meaning to see Inverness while I’m here. The river, the castle, maybe do some shopping.” He shifted his weight.
“I have an appointment with Elenor’s solicitor in Inverness tomorrow. Twelve thirty.”
“Brilliant. We’ll have to get an early start if we want lunch. Meet you at the hotel at seven fifteen?”
I hadn’t actually agreed. “I want to stop at the jewelry store where Dr. Guthrie bought the engagement ring. In case I need an appraisal. You might not want to wait.”
“I don’t mind. In fact, is it all right if I tag along today? I won’t interfere, I promise.”
He wasn’t making it easy to refuse, but then I really didn’t want to refuse. I clicked open the car doors and grinned at him. “Come on, then.”
Maybe Tom was like me. When I’m swamped at the antique shop, I fantasize about a lake, a recliner, and a good book. When I’m actually at the lake, in the recliner, I can read for about a half hour. Then I’m done. I need to move.
We drove north toward the village. Where the road forked, a sign pointed left: GLENROTH ADVENTURE CENTRE & CAMP. ONE MILE.
“Let’s drive in,” I said. “We have time.”
The birch-framed sign read GLENROTH CAMP. HIGH ADVENTURE SINCE 1924. We passed a tennis court, a series of soccer fields, and an archery range. Beyond that, the road divided around a massive signpost. Cabins to the right and left. Visitor parking straight ahead.
“Do you have summer camps in England?” I asked.
“I suppose so. I spent summers with my Uncle Nigel in Devon. Summer camp in a castle.”
“A castle? Your uncle lives in a castle?”
“A small one.” He shot me that half smile and his eyes crinkled.
What an attractive man. A pebble of guilt dropped in my heart and lay there accusingly. I’d hardly thought about Bill all day.
We pulled into a circular parking area. Directly ahead was a massive wood-and-glass structure, identified by another birch-framed sign as the dining hall. Farther down, along the lakeshore, a boathouse rested on a foundation of dark Hebridean stone. A young man, blond with a crew cut, strode toward the boathouse, hefting a red kayak on his broad shoulder. He stoppe
d, lowering his burden as Tom and I approached him across the expanse of lawn.
“Do you mind if we look around?” I asked.
“Reporters?” He gave us a wary look.
“No, just curious. My husband was a camper here years ago.”
He grinned. “I’m the facilities manager. If you wait till I unload the kayak, I’ll unlock the dining hall for you. It’s worth a look.”
“Let me help.” Tom grabbed the kayak’s handle at the stern.
I followed them down the gentle slope. The lower level of the boathouse was a storage area for sporting equipment, much of it relating to archery. Bows, canvas quivers, and armguards hung from the walls on wooden dowels. Ventilated metal bins held arrows, all with the distinctive red-and-yellow fletching. I felt faintly queasy.
“Archery is the main sport here.” The young man slotted the kayak into a rack with several others. As we left, he threaded a padlock through the door hasp and clicked it shut.
“You keep the archery equipment locked up?” I asked.
“I thought you weren’t reporters.”
“We’re not,” Tom said. “She knew the woman who was murdered.”
“Then I’m sorry. But if you think the arrow that killed your friend came from camp, you’re wrong. The sport shop in the village sells them by the hundreds. I told the police this morning. It’s an island thing, not a camp thing.”
We’d arrived at the dining hall. The young man unlocked the double doors.
The structure was huge with a vaulted ceiling and shiplap paneling. Picnic-style tables lined up in rows beneath tartan banners emblazoned with the names of Highland clans. A bucket and sponge sat on one of the tables.