Death of a Macho Man

by Beaton, M. C.

  He drove slowly into the large field reserved for parked cars and climbed down feeling stiff and old. It was because he no longer had a dog, he thought sadly. Towser had loved long walks in the hills.

  Priscilla walked over the still-spongy grass to join him. ‘You don’t look exactly confident,’ she said.

  ‘It was a daft idea,’ muttered Hamish in a low voice. ‘I havenae done any training, and there’s an ex-SAS man competing.’

  ‘You could always cancel.’

  ‘What! With the whole village here to see me! Don’t be daft, lassie.’

  ‘Then just think of the money.’

  Unluckily for Hamish, the hill-running was the last event of the day. By the time he had watched the piping championships, caber-tossing, pigeon-plucking, ferret-chasing and all the many other activities, his heart was in his running shoes.

  But at last the loudspeaker called for the competitors in the hill-running race to go to the starting line. Priscilla felt sorry for Hamish as his long lanky figure in a brief pair of shorts and a T-shirt loped up to the starting line, where about fifteen tough and fit-looking men were waiting.

  Hamish took up his position and waited with a dry mouth. ‘All the best, Hamish!’ shouted some Lochdubh-ite and the rest of the village spectators began to cheer. He gave a limp wave and a weak smile.

  They all crouched ready. Silence fell on the crowd. A curlew piped from the hillside. Then the starting pistol fired and they were off. Hamish set himself an easy pace, determined to do his best. He gained a good bit of advantage over the moorland, having run the course years before, knowing which treacherous bogs to avoid. Ben Loss was not a rock climber’s mountain. Family parties often climbed its heathery flanks to picnic on the top. But for men running flat out, it was a gruelling climb. Hamish could feel his breath getting ragged and hear his heart pounding against his ribs, and to each heartbeat a voice cried in his brain, ‘Failure, failure, failure.’ And then, as he reached the summit and started the downward run, he saw the rest were ahead of him, with the powerful man he had earlier identified as Bill French, the water bailiff, leading the pack. All at once, he wanted to give up and sit down in the heather. His pace lagged. Then he decided to give it his best effort. He took a deep breath and prepared to run down that mountain and back across the moor as fast as he could. And then, just as he paused and stooped to retie the lace of one of his running shoes, there was the crack of a rifle from the heather over to his right and a bullet whizzed over his bent head. In a flash he realized that if he stopped any longer to find out who was firing at him, the marksman would take another shot at him.

  He set off, this time running for his life.

  ‘Here they come,’ cried Archie, who had sharp eyes. Priscilla peered through a powerful pair of binoculars and then lowered them and said in a sad voice, ‘Hamish is nowhere in sight.’

  ‘He never did any training, never any training,’ said Jessie Currie. ‘He’s too lazy to run, and that’s a fact.’

  The villagers gloomily watched the runners coming closer, with Bill French at their head.

  Priscilla, worried now that Hamish might have collapsed, raised her binoculars to her eyes again.

  And then she shouted to the villagers, who were turning away in disgust, ‘It’s Hamish! He’s coming! He’s catching up!’

  Startled, they all turned back and stared across the moorland.

  And sure enough, there came Hamish Macbeth, long red-haired legs pumping like pistons. They started to cheer, at first tentatively and then hysterically, as Hamish pounded on.

  ‘My God,’ said Ian Chisholm, ‘I haff neffer seen the like, and my money was on French!’

  Hamish hurtled on. Bill French, hearing the cheering and cries of ‘Hamish’, turned round, stumbled and fell in the heather and Hamish cleared his body in one great leap and went flat out over the finishing line, where he fell on the grass with his hands over his head.

  Priscilla rushed to him. ‘Well done, Hamish.’

  ‘Shot,’ he gasped. ‘Up the Loss. Someone tried to kill me.’

  Priscilla gave a startled exclamation and ran towards the mobile police trailer. When she reported what Hamish had said and brought several policemen back with her, Hamish was sitting with his head in his hands. He quickly told the police what had happened. Soon police could be seen fanning up over the mountainside. Hamish, in a daze, accepted the prize money which, he was vaguely pleased to note, was in cash. A cheque would have disappeared into his overdraft. He then went over to the police trailer and led a second party up the mountain to show them where he had been shot at. But there was no evidence of anything, no spent cartridge cases, no sign anyone had been there, although there was such an expanse to cover, he knew they could well have missed something.

  ‘Probably imagined it, Macbeth,’ said Sergeant Macgregor from Cnothan.

  ‘I didn’t,’ said Hamish stubbornly. ‘And I think it’s tied up with the murder of Randy Duggan. Someone knows I don’t believe Beck did it and someone wants me out of the way.’

  ‘Well, we cannae dae any mair but put in a report,’ said Sergeant Macgregor sourly, thinking of the paperwork and what Strathbane would say about all these policemen charging overtime looking for a supposed murderer.

  Hamish arrived back at the police station at ten that night. The phone in the office was shrilling away and he was tempted not to answer it. At last he reluctantly picked it up.

  Blair’s voice snarled down the line. ‘Look here, pillock, stop trying to screw up my nicely solved case by wasting police time saying someone’s trying to murder you because you know better than me.’

  ‘I don’t think Beck murdered Duggan,’ said Hamish wearily.

  ‘Well, it’s time you did. In fact, I did you a favour. I told Daviot your poor auld brain is a wee bit strained these days and you need a break. Take a week off, he says. I say, do it.’

  Hamish opened his mouth to protest and then closed it again. Here was a perfect chance to go to Glasgow. He had the money and now he had the time.

  ‘All right,’ he said meekly.

  ‘Tell Macgregor over in Cnothan to cover for ye,’ said Blair, and rang off.

  Hamish dialled Sergeant Macgregor’s number. ‘Oh, the hell with it,’ said Macgregor when he heard Hamish’s request. ‘I don’t know why they bother keeping you on the force, and that’s a fact.’

  ‘Anything up?’ asked Hamish, hearing an odd note in the sergeant’s voice.

  Macgregor looked moodily at the shiny surface of his desk, where a single rifle bullet lay. A small boy had picked it up out of the heather at the top of Ben Loss, just where Hamish Macbeth had said he was shot at, and had brought it to Cnothan police station ten minutes before Hamish’s call. But if he told Macbeth, then it would mean more paperwork. And anyway, it was probably from a deer rifle and had been lying there for ages. Besides, Blair had let him know forcibly that he considered the murder case of Randy Duggan solved and closed.

  Macgregor picked up the bullet and then tossed it into the waste-basket. ‘Nothing’s up,’ he said. ‘Good night to you.’

  Hamish wearily ran a hot bath, stripped and climbed into it and promptly fell asleep, waking to find the water stone cold. Cursing, he climbed out, aching in every bone, and towelled himself down. He went through to bed. The last thing he heard before he fell asleep again was a rhythmic pattering on the window.

  Rain had returned to Lochdubh.

  He awoke the following morning, thinking that he should pack up and head south to Glasgow. But there was something nagging at the back of his brain. And why go to Glasgow when the murderer was surely still around Lochdubh? And yet, in Randy’s background lay the vital clue to the identity of the murderer. Then the fact that had been niggling away at him suddenly sprang into his brain and he cursed himself for a fool. Blair had said that Rosie Draly had been married and divorced ten years before. Yet Mrs Beck had given the impression that her sister had never married. Bob Beck had said nothing about any
husband. He scampered through to the police office in his pyjamas and dialled Mrs Beck’s number. With any luck she would be back in London and not yet at work.

  Mrs Beck’s sharp voice answered the phone. ‘This is Police Constable Hamish Macbeth in Lochdubh,’ began Hamish.

  ‘Why don’t you stop persecuting me?’ said Mrs Beck. ‘Haven’t I suffered enough? My husband a double murderer! I’m afraid to face the neighbours.’

  ‘It’s just one wee thing,’ said Hamish soothingly. ‘Your sister was married?’

  ‘That wasn’t a marriage!’

  ‘Well, was she married, or wasn’t she?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Who to? When? Where?’

  ‘Let me see, it would be in nineteen eighty-five. I didn’t go to the wedding. It was in Inverness.’

  Hamish said patiently, although he felt like shouting at her, ‘What was the name of the man she married?’

  ‘It was a Henry Beale. He was a journalist on the Inverness Daily.’

  ‘And when were they divorced?’

  ‘He filed for divorce two days after the wedding.’ Her voice was full of bitter satisfaction. ‘That’s why I never think of Rosie having been married.’

  ‘Have you an address for him?’

  ‘Wait a bit.’

  And so Hamish waited, listening to the far-away sounds of Willesden. The windows must have been open, for he heard traffic passing and children playing. Then she came back on the line. ‘Number 423, Tipsel Road.’

  ‘Thanks,’ said Hamish quickly, after writing down the address. ‘I’ll let you know if there’s anything else.’

  He sat back and studied the address. Going to Inverness would mean precious time taken off his free week. But he could not ignore the fact that Rosie had been married, however briefly. She had managed to drive Bob Beck to murder. It was a long shot, but could this ex still have strong feelings for her, could he have decided she was having an affair with Randy and killed him? It just had to be checked out. Also, there was still the enigma that had been Rosie. Had she really known anything about Randy’s background?

  He packed a suitcase, deciding to drive to Inverness and, if there was nothing interesting there, drive on to Glasgow.

  He wished it would stop raining. Nothing had had a chance to dry out. The air outside, he noticed as he slung his case into the Land Rover, was muggy and close. His bones ached abominably after the hill run. He felt weary in mind and body. He wished the sun would shine again and this wretched case would be solved. He hesitated for just a moment before climbing into the driving seat. How easy it would be to let it go. Beck had murdered Rosie. Why not let him take the rap for the murder of Duggan? But the murderer was still here, polluting the very air of Lochdubh, and he would never be able to find out who it was unless he found out exactly who Randy Duggan had been.

  All the long way down to Inverness he turned over what he knew about the case in his mind. Perhaps the only reason he was really going to Glasgow was in the hope that there would be something in Duggan’s background which meant that the murderer came from outside, that the murderer would not turn out to be someone in the village whom he knew.

  Inverness was busier than ever. Where did they all come from? he marvelled, as he left his Land Rover in the multi-storey by the bus station. Crowds everywhere, shopping, shopping, shopping, while the dingy seagulls screamed overhead. He walked up the Castle Wynd. The statue of Flora Macdonald still stared out blindly looking for the return of Bonnie Prince Charlie.

  The office of the Inverness Daily was to be found up a stone staircase between two shops. It had a small circulation and ran to only two or three pages of mostly local news. A prize sheep, for example, took precedence over any atrocity in Bosnia.

  In a large dusty room were two reporters and two typists, hammering away at computers. Hamish asked for Henry Beale, half expecting to be told the man was either dead or had moved on. A typist with her hair gelled into spikes said laconically, ‘Isnae here. Sheep sales at Lairg.’

  Hamish left quickly and weaved his way through the crowds back to where the Land Rover was parked. Now he had a weary wet drive back to Lairg. He took the Struie Pass after leaving Inverness, through Bonar Bridge, and then up through the heathery hills to Lairg.

  The annual Lairg sheep sale was a huge event, the biggest sheep sale in Europe, and as he approached he realized with a sinking heart that there would be plenty of police on duty. He remembered he had a crofter friend in Lairg called Iain Seaton. He, Hamish, was officially on holiday and if asked, he could say he was looking for Iain. The air was full of the cries of sheep. There was a hectic air, almost of gambling fever, as each crofter hoped for a good price. A lot of them were dressed in the sort of clothes that people often believed only incomers, trying to be Highland, affected: knee-breeches, lovat socks, brogues, kilt jacket and tall stick. Hamish went into the shed where the bidding was going on and scanned the crowd. He did not know what Beale looked like but Hamish usually found reporters easily recognizable, as reporters, however Highland, carried about with them the same raffish air of their counterparts in London. And then he spotted a man at the edge of the ring, staring with weary boredom out of a pair of bloodshot eyes. He had an air of slightly drunken resentment as if he felt he were meant for better things and better places than the Lairg sheep sale. Hamish then spotted other reporter types nearby, but for some reason he could not explain, he felt sure the man with the bloodshot eyes was Henry Beale. He waited patiently until he saw Beale say something to the photographer next to him and then start edging his way out. Hamish was across the ring from him but he felt sure that Beale would make straight for the bar.

  Sure enough, that was where he found him. It was a sort of café-cum-bar, selling coffee, tea, beer, whisky, hamburgers and bacon sandwiches.

  Hamish saw Beale’s broad tweed back and tapped him on the shoulder. ‘What d’ye want?’ demanded Beale, swinging round. Hamish was not in uniform. ‘Mr Beale? I wonder if I might hae a word.’

  ‘Oh, aye, but wait till I get a drink or I’ll never get one, not with this crowd.’ Beale ordered three whiskies and when he was served poured them into the one glass. Hamish ordered one as well and then they shuffled outside into the soft rain, all the tables being taken. ‘I never bother to get water in this,’ said Beale gloomily. ‘There’s enough o’ the stuff falling out the sky.’

  ‘I am PC Hamish Macbeth from Lochdubh,’ began Hamish.

  ‘So why the plain clothes?’

  Hamish thought quickly. ‘I am assigned to the CID for this case.’

  ‘What case? Someone buggering their sheep?’ sneered Beale. He took a gulp of whisky.

  ‘Rosie Draly’ said Hamish quietly.

  ‘You’ve got someone for that,’ he said in a low voice, his drunken pugnacity suddenly leaving him.

  ‘Aye, but we’re just tying up the loose ends.’

  Beale gazed mournfully out at the milling throng. ‘You’ve already questioned me,’ he said. Of course Strathbane would have questioned him, thought Hamish.

  ‘No one seems to have given us a verra clear picture of what Rosie Draly was really like,’ said Hamish. ‘Could you talk about her for a little?’

  He gave a sigh. ‘Come over to my car,’ said Beale. ‘This rain’s getting to me.’

  He led the way across the road to where a rusting old Volvo estate stood with a press sign in its window. He unlocked the doors. Hamish got in the passenger seat. ‘So,’ said Beale, after climbing carefully in the other side so as not to spill any of his drink, ‘what can I tell you that I havenae told the others?’ No use asking him where he had been on the night of the murder. That would have been covered.

  ‘How did you meet her?’

  ‘She was giving a talk to some writers’ circle in Inverness on creative writing. Why do they call fiction creative writing? What’s uncreative writing?’

  ‘Lairg sheep sale?’

  ‘Aye, you could say that.’

  Beale to
ok a sip of his drink before saying, ‘I wanted just a few paragraphs for the paper. We wouldnae normally have touched it but the editor’s wife was a member of the writers’ circle. Rosie talked a load of crud. She went on in Open-University-speak about linear progression. Know what she meant? The plot, man, the bloody plot. I remember thinking, why didn’t the silly bitch say so?

  ‘Anyway, I was all set to escape at the end when the editor’s wife insisted on introducing us and then left me with her over the tea and buns. She smiled at me and said those magic words, “I’ve got a bottle of Scotch back in my hotel room.”

  ‘So of course I went with her. Well, she filled me up with Scotch and then she said, “I want you to marry me.” I got such a fright I nearly sobered up. I wanted to lie, to say that I was married already, but she went on talking. She said she had good contacts in newspapers in London and could advance my career. She said she had a good income. And so on. And the more she talked, the more I realized how lonely I was. I’d been married before but she’d run off and left me. I drank more and thought Rosie really looked a bit of all right. We didn’t go to bed and I said yes, I’d marry her. And three weeks later and only meeting for a few lunches and dinners, we were married. I don’t think I was sober for a moment. She paid for everything. She’d said a honeymoon wasn’t necessary, she’d just move in with me. After the wedding we’d go and get her stuff from Glasgow. I sobered up all right on the wedding night. She wouldnae let me near her. She said it was too soon. Give her time. When she went to sleep, I got up to see if there was any whisky left. I found a letter to her sister she had been writing and hadn’t finished and it was all about, “You thought I couldn’t get married, did you? Well, this is just to let you know . . .” That sort of crap. I sat down and had a long thought. I realized the bitch had coerced me into marriage to get even with this sister. I faced her with it next day and she didn’t say anything, just sat and stared at me. I began to get scared of her. I thought she had a slate loose. I said either she make it a proper marriage, that is sleep with me, or get lost, and she said in a prim little voice – I’ll never forget – “Then you had better file for a divorce.”’