Death of a Witch

by M C Beaton

  The afternoon was quiet. He sat behind the counter, lulled by the warmth from a paraffin heater behind him. He was awakened by a terrible scream. He sat up with a jerk. Mrs. Wellington was facing him, her face grey with shock. “Get an ambulance!” she shrieked. “Get the police.”

  “What is it?” he cried, reaching for the phone.

  “It’s poor Ina Braid . . . blood all over her back. I think she’s dead!”

  Hamish received the call about Ina’s murder just as he was about to head for his meeting with Timmy. He rang Timmy and told him what had happened, said he would phone him later, and rang off.

  He raced towards Lochdubh, wondering who on earth would want to kill the inoffensive Ina Braid.

  A small crowd, looking like ghostly wraiths in the thick mist, had gathered outside the shop when he drove up. Mr. Patel was standing on the doorstep. “Dr. Brodie’s with the body,” he said.

  Sirens could be heard approaching from the direction of Strathbane. “Who was in the shop?” asked Hamish.

  “I wasnae aware of anyone,” said Mr. Patel. “I was tired and I must ha’ nodded off. First thing I hear is this scream and Mrs. Wellington shouting at me to call the ambulance and police. Och, Hamish, I feel sick.”

  Before Hamish could ask any more questions, a car drove up and Blair got out. “Another murder right under your nose, laddie?”

  “I was out on my beat,” said Hamish.

  “Out on my beat, what?”

  “Out on my beat, sir.”

  Blair pushed his way past Mr. Patel and went into the shop. Hamish followed. Looking very small and crumpled in death, Ina Braid lay face down on the shop floor in one of the two small aisles.

  Dr. Brodie straightened up. “I suppose the pathologist will be here soon,” he said. “Stabbed right in the back with something long and sharp. You know, sometimes when people have been stabbed, they just go on walking. She could have been stabbed somewhere else.”

  “But she’d feel one hell of a sharp pain, not to mention the strength required to deliver the blow.”

  “Not necessarily. It doesn’t take much force to stab someone provided the point of the weapon is sharp enough. Just slides in, like stabbing a melon. Oh, here’s Dr. Forsythe.”

  “I thought you had resigned,” said Hamish.

  Before the pathologist could reply, Blair howled, “Get outside and dinnae stand here gossiping. Someone must have seen someone going in to the shop.”

  But there was trouble waiting for both of them when they exited the shop to find a furious Daviot staring at them. “You pair! You went into the crime scene without any protective clothing.”

  Blair cringed. “Awfy sorry, sir. I had to get in there fast to make sure Macbeth wasn’t messing up the crime scene.”

  “I was outside the shop when you arrived,” protested Hamish.

  “Don’t just stand there, Macbeth,” said Daviot. “Find out as quickly as you can who was in the shop with her.”

  Hamish turned and addressed the crowd. “Step forward anyone who saw Mrs. Braid in the shop, saw her going into the shop, or saw her at all near the shop.”

  Everyone began to edge away except a woman Hamish recognised as Tilly Framont. “I saw her, Hamish,” she said.

  Hamish led her away from the shop and took out his notebook. “Where and when was this?”

  She frowned with the effort of remembering. “It would ha’ been about five or ten minutes afore I heard the screaming. I didn’t speak to her. Just nodded. She had a basket ower her arm and was hurrying towards the shop.”

  “Was anyone else around?”

  Tilly was a very small woman wearing a tight old-fashioned tweed coat with square shoulders. Her face had a sort of faded prettiness. She had a woollen hat pulled right down over her head.

  “Let me see, Mrs. Wellington was there talking to the Currie sisters. Archie Maclean was heading for the pub. There must have been other folks around but I couldn’t really see, the mist was that thick.”

  Hamish saw the Currie sisters retreating along the waterfront in the direction of their cottage. He excused himself, saying he would take a full statement from Tilly later, and hurried off after the sisters.

  They heard him coming and swung round.

  “You’re not doing your job,” said Nessie.

  “Doing your job,” echoed Jessie mournfully.

  Hamish found it easier to shut out Jessie’s constant echo of her sister’s last words when he was talking to the twins. Their identical glasses were so thick as they looked up at him that he flinched a bit before two pairs of magnified eyes.

  “Tilly Framont said she saw the pair of you on the waterfront just before Ina went into the shop.”

  “That right,” said Nessie. “Oh, man, the pity o’ it! There was herself as large as life. She gave us a cheery wave as she went past. Who did it? Must be that husband o’ hers. He aye had a shifty look.”

  “Did you see anyone following her?”

  “No, it’s right cold, you see, and the mist’s awfy bad. Just the few of us, I think, but with the mist there could have been more people about. I saw Mrs. Wellington. This is what they get for taking their mobile police unit away so soon. Let me see, there was that Archie Maclean going into the pub. Clarry Graham, the cook, was just standing there looking at the water, but I didn’t really remark anyone in particular.”

  Hamish thanked them and said he would talk to them later. He decided to go up to the Tommel Castle Hotel, where Clarry was a chef. In his brief glory days when Clarry had been Hamish’s policeman, he’d been very inept—but maybe he had noticed something.

  Clarry was just getting out of his battered old car when Hamish arrived at the hotel.

  “What brings you, Hamish?” he hailed him. “Priscilla’s no’ here.”

  “I didn’t come to see Priscilla,” snapped Hamish. “Haven’t you heard about the murder?”

  “Aye, the wicked witch is dead.”

  “No, not her! Just now. Ina Braid.”

  “What’s happened to this place?” said Clarry, his round face creased up like a baby about to cry. “Such a nice wee body. It can’t be that man o’ hers. He’d never hurt a fly.”

  “We’ll see. I’m sure they’ve gone to pick him up. Clarry, you were seen down on the waterfront near Patel’s. Who did you see?”

  “I saw the Currie sisters and then Mrs. Wellington. I wasn’t really paying attention. Then the fog was so bad. I was thinking up a new recipe and I went for a wee walk to think better. I remember now that witch woman came up to the hotel one night for dinner.”

  “Was she on her own?”

  “Yes, she drank a lot and then began to complain about the food. She shut up when Johnson told her to pay her bill and get out or he’d call you.”

  “What are the guests like? Anyone suspicious?”

  “We’ve only got about six guests. It’s quiet there now. But why don’t you ask the boss?”

  Mr. Johnson was in the hotel office. “What’s all this I hear, Hamish?” he said. “Ina Braid murdered!”

  “It looks like that.”

  “How was she killed?”

  “It looks like a stab in the back.”

  “It’s that wretched Beldame woman. Somehow she’s stirred up a lot of decent people.”

  “I just hope it isnae someone in the village,” said Hamish. “What about your guests?”

  “They’re all middle-aged to elderly and very respectable.”

  “Could you print me out a list of their names and addresses?”

  “Help yourself to coffee and I’ll get it ready.”

  Hamish left a few minutes later, studying the names and addresses. He would run them all through the police computer, but he hadn’t much hope of finding a villain amongst the lot of them.

  He drove back to Lochdubh, parked on the waterfront, walked up to the builder’s house, and then slowly began to walk back the way Ina would have taken on her road to the shop.

  The way le
d down a narrow lane between the cottages, bordered by fences and hedges. He looked to right and left. Someone could easily have stood in the narrow lane, waiting for Ina. Say the weapon was thin and sharp. But surely she would have felt something—turned around and seen her assailant. And would she just have gone on walking, determined to do her shopping? The fog was dense in the lane. Maybe she felt the stab, turned around and saw no one, and kept on walking. He began to call at the cottages whose gardens bordered on the lane, but no one had seen or heard anything.

  When he got back to the waterfront, the police mobile unit was back in place. Hamish blessed his wild cat. Had Blair not been so terrified of the cat then he would have commandeered the police station.

  He saw Jimmy Anderson outside the unit and went to speak to him. “They’re bringing Fergus in, Hamish,” said Jimmy.

  “From the paper mill?”

  “No, the man was out fishing. He had the day off. Blair all but charged him with murdering his wife but then fell into a passion when the water bailiff turns up and says he was talking to Fergus and sharing a sandwich with him all around the time they estimate his wife was being murdered.”

  “How long until the pathology report?” asked Hamish.

  “Dr. Forsythe’s working on it. I don’t know. These things take time.”

  “If she was stabbed and went on walking,” said Hamish, “then it probably happened in the lane down from her house to the waterfront, but, och, surely she would have turned round and screamed or something. Not just gone ahead to the shop.”

  “Patel says he dozed off. Someone may have nipped into the shop and stabbed her.”

  “I hate that idea,” said Hamish moodily. “That might mean it was someone from the village that people were so used to seeing, it didn’t really register. Then with this damn fog, it could have been anyone.”

  “Blair’s got coppers going from door to door. But you know these people. What sort of a person was Ina Braid?”

  “Quiet sort of woman. Just one of the village women I occasionally spoke to. I barely knew her because there was never any trouble either with her or Fergus. No children.”

  “Who’s the biggest gossip in the village?”

  “Gossips,” corrected Hamish. “The Currie twins. I’ve already spoken to them. Nothing there. Wait a bit. I’ve had an idea. There’s a back way into the shop!”

  “I’ll get along there and tell forensics. That lassie you’ve been romancing, Lesley Seaton, is working there.”

  Hamish blushed. “I have not been romancing Lesley Seaton!”

  “Well, you were seen having dinner with her up at the Glen Lodge Hotel.”

  “Isn’t that chust typical?” said Hamish furiously. “No one sees a damn thing when a wee woman is being murdered under their noses but I take a colleague out for dinner in an empty dining room miles outside the village and immediately everyone knows about it.”

  “You’re Lochdubh’s famous bachelor, Hamish. Anytime you’re seen with a woman, it’s a first-class piece o’ gossip.”

  Hamish suddenly remembered Timmy Teviot. He wondered what the forestry worker had wanted to tell him that was so secret he had to meet him outside the village.

  “I’ve got someone to see,” said Hamish. “Look, Jimmy, do me a favour. The minute you get anything from Dr. Forsythe, let me know.”

  “I’ll do that if I can with Blair breathing down my neck.” Behind him, the mobile unit dipped and swayed. “Here he comes. You’d better be off.”

  Hamish hurried back along the waterfront. Timmy, he knew, shared lodgings with several other forestry workers in caravans on the other side of the loch. He got into his Land Rover and drove off.

  He located Timmy’s caravan by dint of knocking on other caravan doors and asking where Timmy lived.

  Timmy answered the door, and his face fell when he saw Hamish.

  “I’m right sorry I brought ye all the way here on such a cold night,” said Timmy.

  “Yes, it is cold, so ask me in?”

  “I’ve got company,” said Timmy, looking nervously behind him.

  “And who would that be?”

  “It’s just a lassie who minds the bar in Braikie.”

  “All right. Step outside and talk to me.”

  Timmy reluctantly came down the caravan steps. “I feel a fool, Hamish. It’s really nothing now I think of it. I saw a couple of deer poachers up on the hill.”

  “So what was so private about that?”

  “Thae deer poachers can be vicious. I didn’t want any of them to see me going to the station. They saw me watching them.”

  Hamish took out his notebook. “Where?”

  “Up on Brechie moor. Two big fellows, one with a beard, a short grey beard. Must ha’ been middle-aged. The other was young. Could ha’ been his son. Tall thin laddie wearing a wool cap like the older one. They had dark green shooting jackets and both were carrying deer rifles.”

  Hamish studied Timmy’s face in the light shining from the caravan window. “And did one of them have a scar on his face?” he asked.

  “Now you come to mention it . . .”

  “Timmy, you’re telling me a bunch o’ lies. What was it you really wanted to tell me?”

  “I’m telling you the truth, I swear.”

  “Your eyes tell me you’re lying.”

  “That would make a good song, Hamish,” said Timmy. “Got to get back to business.” He nipped quickly into his caravan and slammed the door.

  Hamish remembered that Colin Framont and his wife, Tilly, lived next door to the Braids. Perhaps they could give him some details about Ina Braid’s life and whether she had made any enemies.

  Tilly answered the door to him. “Come ben, Hamish,” she cried. “Isn’t it awful. Poor Ina who wouldn’t hurt a fly.”

  Hamish removed his peaked cap and followed her into the living room, where her husband was watching television. He rose when he saw Hamish and switched the television off.

  The living room was neat and clean. Almost too uncomfortably clean, thought Hamish.

  “I wonder if you, Tilly, could tell me what sort of a person Ina was,” began Hamish. “I never really knew her that well.”

  “Very quiet,” said Tilly.

  “Did she and her husband ever quarrel?”

  “Never a cross word.”

  “That’s going a bit far, Tilly. All married couples surely quarrel sometimes.”

  “Yes, but not violent. I mean I never heard any shouting or yelling. Besides, if there had been anything like that, Ina would have told me.”

  “I keep wondering whether it had anything to do with the death of the woman who called herself Catriona Beldame.”

  “It could be,” said Tilly. “I mean, there could be some maniac on the loose. The police have been in her house, searching it from end to end. Poor Fergus. He must be heartbroken. They took him away for questioning. They must be mad.”

  “He should be back soon,” said Hamish. “It seems he has an alibi.”

  “Oh, that’s grand, isn’t it, Colin?”

  “Aye,” said Colin. “I’ll give him a knock and get him in here for a drink.”

  Hamish asked more questions, but they did not seem to have anything interesting to say.

  When Hamish began to walk down the lane, he saw a tall figure silhouetted by the lights from the waterfront. The fog had thinned to a slight haze.

  “Is that yourself, Fergus?” he called.

  “Yes, it’s me, Hamish.” His voice broke on a sob. “That bastard Blair. I could kill him!”

  “Hush, now. Don’t let anyone hear you saying things like that. I’ll walk you back to your house. Do you want me to go and get you a dram?”

  “I’ve got a bottle in the house. Come back wi’ me, Hamish. I feel a wreck.”

  Housekeeping in Lochdubh, thought Hamish as he looked around the living room in Fergus’s cottage, was not a chore but a religion. It was so clean, it looked sterile.

  He took off his cap and
sat down as Fergus took a bottle of whisky from the sideboard along with two glasses and poured a couple of drinks.

  Fergus settled back in an armchair and looked moodily at the fireplace. He took out a packet of cigarettes and lit one. “Who on earth would kill Ina?” he said. “I can’t get it into my head that she’s dead. I keep expecting her to walk into this room any moment.”

  “Your ash is about to drop on the carpet,” said Hamish. “Can I get you an ashtray?”

  “None in the house,” said Fergus, flicking the ash into the fireplace. “Ina was allergic to cigarette smoke.”

  “I have to ask you this, Fergus. Could she have been seeing another man?”

  “What? Ina? Man, who’d even look at her?”

  “That’s a wee bit harsh.”

  “Well, she wasn’t a beauty, that’s for sure.”

  The doorbell rang. “I know who that is,” said Fergus. “It’s them next door. Could you go and tell them that after I answer police questions I’m going straight to bed?”

  Sure enough, Tilly was standing on the doorstep holding a casserole. She listened to Hamish making his excuses for Fergus and then handed him the casserole. “It’s a good lamb stew,” she said. “You tell him I’ll be round first thing in the morning to pick up his laundry and do his cleaning.”

  Hamish took the casserole in and placed it in the gleaming kitchen. “I heard what she said,” said Fergus when Hamish joined him. “I won’t answer the door.”

  “So, Fergus,” said Hamish patiently, “rack your brains. Did Ina have any enemies?”

  “No.”

  “Did she have anything to do with Catriona Beldame?”

  “No, I mean she wouldn’t.”

  “She might have gone there for something like a love potion.”

  “What for? Me? Ah, well, you’re not married, are you?”

  Hamish continued to question him. He asked if there were any letters he could see but Fergus shook his head and said they hadn’t a computer, either.