Death of a Travelling Man

by Beaton, M. C.

  ‘They’re all white and shaken,’ said Anderson, ‘but that could be because of the shock. I mean, you’ve known all these women for some time now, Hamish, and you can hardly say that any one of them have shown criminal tendencies.’

  ‘Forget about the women; what about the minister?’

  ‘Nice old boy, but odd, really odd. He said something about the hammer of God.’

  ‘He was probably quoting Chesterton,’ said Hamish, who had read the Father Brown stories.

  ‘Whoever he was quoting, he seemed smug. He said he’d called on the Lord for help and the Lord had helped, that sort of thing. Was he always that daft?’

  ‘Not that I ever guessed,’ said Hamish bleakly. ‘Did you tell the Currie sisters they would have to stay in the village until the investigation was over?’

  ‘Why? I thought a trip to Inverness was a big adventure for that pair.’

  ‘Their house is up for sale.’

  ‘Not now, it isn’t,’ said Anderson.

  ‘So,’ said Hamish, ‘they were going to leave, Sean gets murdered, and they change their minds. Why?’

  ‘Look, Hamish, I know you like these people, but you know more about them than anyone else, and you’re going to have to ask some questions yourself.’ Anderson was lying back in a chair in the police station office, with his feet on the desk. Willie came in with a tray of coffee cups, clucked in disapproval, put down the tray, picked up a newspaper and slid it under Anderson’s feet.

  ‘That’s mair like a houseboy than a policeman,’ snorted MacNab when Willie had left the room, ‘but he makes a grand cup o’ coffee.’

  ‘And there was nothing in the bus,’ pursued Hamish, ‘nothing at all.’

  ‘Not a clue,’ said Anderson. ‘No morphine, no hundred pounds, no letters.’

  ‘So what happens to the bus now?’

  ‘Sean’s mither phoned Mr Wellington and said she was too distressed over her son’s death to do anything about it at the moment, and so Mr Wellington said the bus could stay where it was until she felt fit enough to come up and take it away, or any of his belongings. There’ll be no trouble about it. Sean left a will, all right and proper, leaving everything to his mither.’

  ‘Odd,’ muttered Hamish. ‘Any more on his background?’

  ‘Oh, aye, this’ll set you back. He was in the Hong Kong police for about six months but got the push.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Downright laziness. Should ha’ been a man after your own heart, Hamish.’

  ‘But this lassie, Cheryl,’ pursued Hamish. ‘Is there any way o’ shaking her alibi?’

  ‘Not with about forty witnesses to say she was in Mullen’s the whole evening.’

  ‘Damn, I’d like a word with her myself.’

  ‘That’d be stepping out of your parish. You cannae shake that alibi.’

  ‘Maybe. But I’d like to try all the same.’

  Anderson sighed and poured more coffee. ‘I think this is one case you’re never going to solve, Hamish Macbeth. I feel it in ma bones.’

  And so it seemed, as the days dragged into weeks. The file on Sean Gourlay was not closed, but it might just as well have been. The bus remained up on the field at the back of the manse, a daily mute reminder to Hamish of failure. He had interviewed the Wellingtons, Angela Brodie and the Currie sisters several times, but there was no change in their statements. They had gone out of their way to welcome Sean and Cheryl to the village and then had ceased to see them. They had been nowhere near the bus on the night of the murder.

  He decided in despair to risk the wrath of Strathbane and go over on his day off and see if he could talk to Cheryl.

  He went to Mullen’s first. A sprawling red brick building with a huge car park, it was open twenty-four hours. A poster advertising various groups that neither Hamish nor possibly anyone else had ever heard of was pasted up on one of the windows.

  Hamish pushed open the door and went in. It was a monument to the age of plastic: plastic plants trailed plastic fronds from plastic flower-boxes; plastic-covered chairs crouched beside low plastic tables. Even the long bar was made of plastic painted to look like wood. Hamish asked the barman for an orange juice and was mildly surprised to receive it in a glass tumbler instead of a plastic beaker. It was ten in the morning. A few couples were seated at the tables eating Mullen’s Breakfast Special. Perhaps, thought Hamish, it was livelier in the evenings, with bands and crowds.

  ‘Have you got Johnny Rankin and the Stotters playing here?’ asked Hamish. ‘I don’t see them on the bill.’

  ‘No’ this month,’ said the barman. ‘Maybe next.’

  ‘I’ve never heard of any of the groups you’ve got advertised,’ said Hamish.

  ‘Aye, weel, the manager books the cheap acts, that’s why. Some of them are chronic.’

  ‘Could I hae a word with the manager?’

  ‘Who’s asking?’

  ‘Police,’ said Hamish patiently, pointing to his uniform.

  ‘Whit, again? Hang on a minute and I’ll see if Mr Mullen’s aboot.’

  Hamish waited patiently. One customer shuffled over to the juke-box and dropped in some coins. Soon a pleasant tenor voice filled the room, singing ‘Over the Sea to Skye’, conjuring up Jacobite romance, far from the reality of this plastic road-house.

  A small squat hairy man appeared behind the bar. He had very black eyes, like stones, and odd tufts of hair on his face, and hair sprouting from his nostrils and ears. He looked like a troglodyte squeezed into twentieth-century clothing.

  ‘Mullen,’ he said curtly to Hamish by way of introduction. ‘What d’ye want?’

  ‘I want to talk to you about Cheryl Higgins,’ said Hamish.

  ‘Oh, her! What can I tell you that I’ve no’ said a’ready? She was here all right from nine till one in the morning, caterwauling away.’

  ‘And you’re sure it was her?’

  ‘If you can find another lassie in the Highlands wi’ thon orange hair, it’ll be a miracle. No, it was her all right. Foul-mouthed creature, but then a lot of them are.’

  ‘And she didn’t leave the room at any time during the show?’

  ‘Naw, that lot are like camels. Once they’ve got an audience, they can go on for hours and hours.’

  Hamish thanked him and left, feeling depressed.

  But he got into the police Land Rover and drove off in the direction of the travellers’ campsite.

  As he parked outside the field, he noticed the flurry of activity the sight of him caused. Weird figures were seen scuttling here and there, doors banged shut as children were scooped up and carried inside. It was as if a monster had arrived, but Hamish guessed they were probably hiding drugs or items of petty theft.

  Only one woman stayed where she was, stirring something in a cooking pot over an open fire.

  Hamish approached her. ‘Where are the Stoddarts?’ he asked. She was a thin, fantastically dressed creature, wearing a heather coronet on her tangled locks. A long Indian cotton dress hung about with beads and brooches was wrapped around her body. She turned pale dim eyes up to him and frowned as if he had asked her to expound Einstein’s Theory of Relativity. ‘The Stoddarts,’ he prompted.

  ‘Ower there,’ she said, pointing in the direction of a small caravan painted bright blue.

  Hamish walked up to it and knocked on the door. A vague-looking bearded man answered it.

  ‘Mr Stoddart,’ said Hamish, ‘is Cheryl Higgin’s here?’

  ‘Come in,’ he said and retreated back into the dimness of the caravan, which still had its curtains drawn closed. The confined space smelled of unwashed bodies. The bearded man joined a slattern of a girl, no doubt his wife, at a table at one end. Both were watching television on a small black-and-white set placed on the table. Hamish looked round. At the other end of the caravan was a bunk with a flaming-orange head poking above the pile of bedclothes. He went over.

  ‘Cheryl,’ he said.

  She twisted round and looked up at him. Then
her mouth opened and a stream of abuse poured out. Hamish waited patiently until she had run dry, guessing correctly that Cheryl’s outpourings were part of a long-established pattern.

  When she fell silent, he perched on the end of the bed and said quietly, ‘Now you’ve got that out of your system, I want to ask questions about you and Sean, not the usual ones.’

  She gazed at him sullenly.

  ‘Why did you leave Sean?’ asked Hamish.

  ‘It wasnae any kind o’ life,’ she said bitterly. ‘I think he wus screwed in the heid. He would get visits from thae awful old women frae the village and ask me to take a walk and sometimes I couldnae get back to ma bed till after midnight.’

  Hamish felt suddenly miserable. He did not want to ask any further questions but knew he had to.

  ‘Who were these women?’

  As if she sensed that he didn’t really want to know, Cheryl brightened visibly and something like a look of satisfaction came into her eyes. ‘Well, there was that fat Wellington cow, for one. “Dear Sean, I’ve just baked this cake specially for you.” Ugh. Then there was a wee wumman wi’ glasses who sounded like a jammed record.’ Jessie Currie, thought Hamish. ‘Aye, and the doctor’s wife, too.’

  ‘Anyone else?’

  ‘Isn’t that enough?’

  ‘How often did Sean beat you?’

  She sat up in bed and hugged her thin arms about her body. ‘Get oot o’ here,’ she muttered.

  ‘All right, I’ll leave that question aside for the moment. Have you any idea what the relationship between Sean and these women was?’

  ‘It couldnae hae been sex,’ she jeered. ‘He strung them along so he could get presents o’ food and cakes.’

  ‘Money?’ asked Hamish sharply, remembering the missing hundred pounds.

  ‘No,’ she mumbled, her head going down again.

  He tried and tried but Cheryl said she had nothing more to tell. As far as she knew, Sean enjoyed causing a flutter among the middle-aged women of the village, and yet Sean must have done something wrong, for after his death no one had a good word to say for him.

  Hamish finally gave up and left. He stood outside the caravan and looked slowly around at the other caravans and ancient buses which were dotted about the field. He felt sad and weary and so had a sudden understanding of why these unlovely people stepped out of society and took to the road. No responsibilities, no rent, no jobs, unless playing the occasional gig could be called a job. No hard drugs; drink, glue, or hashish when they could get it. They helped each other out, romanticized their life-style, and often got other people to believe in that romance. Let other people pay the taxes to supply them with dole money, let other people build and maintain the roads they drove on, let other people clean up the mess they left behind; they were the Peter Pans who had found a way of never growing out of adolescence, and the rest of the world was one indulgent parent to see to their needs.

  A small fine rain was scudding in on a warm west wind. The woman was still stirring that pot, although the fire had blown out. Hamish gave himself a mental shake. It was unlike him to stand moralizing in the middle of a damp field when he himself was hardly one of the world’s exemplary workers.

  So what had Sean done with the women? he wondered as he drove north again. Had he talked them into some sort of mental crisis, like the one he had inflicted on the minister? He had undoubtedly possessed a certain magnetism. But what had he done to drive someone to bashing his face and head in? It had been a murder done in pure hatred.

  Mrs Wellington, Angela Brodie, and Jessie Currie would have to be questioned again, and this time without their minders: Mrs Wellington without the minister, Angela without Dr Brodie and Jessie without Nessie.

  Evening was settling down on Lochdubh as he drove down the hill in the heathery twilight. The fishing boats were setting out to sea. Smoke rose lazily from chimneys and a group of children were playing on the beach, their cries as shrill as the calls of sea-birds. But the blackness, the malignancy that lay under it all would never go away unless he found out who had murdered Sean.

  He went into the police station, thinking wryly that for all his impatience with Willie, he was becoming spoilt by being perpetually waited on.

  But Willie was in the living room slumped in front of a television set. ‘Where did that come from?’ asked Hamish.

  ‘Mr Ferrari,’ said Willie dully. ‘It’s an auld one o’ his. He’s got one of the new ones. This one disnae have the remote control.’

  ‘That’s grand,’ said Hamish. ‘What’s on?’

  ‘I dinnae know and I dinnae care. I don’t like television.’

  Hamish sat down opposite him, first turning off the set.

  ‘Out with it, Willie.’

  ‘It’s a serious matter and I don’t want tae have to put up with your usual levitation.’

  ‘No levity, I promise.’

  ‘I was at the restaurant,’ began Willie.

  ‘You’re always at that restaurant,’ said Hamish impatiently.

  Willie threw him a hurt look.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Hamish quickly. ‘What happened? Was it anything to do with Lucia?’

  Willie nodded.

  ‘Did you make a pass at her and get your face slapped?’

  Willie sat up straight. ‘I would never lay a finger on that lassie if she didnae want it.’

  ‘So, what’s the problem?’

  ‘I shouldnae hae been listening,’ said Willie. ‘Lucia said there was a new dish the cook, Luigi, wanted me to try. It was this morning and the restaurant wasn’t opened yet. So I was sitting at the table over by that auld fireplace and I could hear Mr Ferrari quite clearly. He was talking to someone in the room above, a man. I heard the name Sean Gourlay and that’s when I started to listen.

  ‘Mr Ferrari said, “Thon bastard’s dead and gone, thank goodness. I’m glad I was saved from killing him myself.” The other man said something I couldnae hear and then Mr Ferrari said, “After what he did to Lucia …” And then I couldnae hear any mair.’

  ‘So did you ask him about it?’

  ‘I couldnae,’ wailed Willie. ‘If there was something between her and thon monster, I don’t want tae know.’

  ‘I’m beginning to think not knowing iss worse than anything else,’ said Hamish, half to himself. ‘Help yourself to a whisky, Willie. I’ll ask Ferrari.’

  ‘He’ll know I was listening!’ cried Willie.

  ‘True, but I’ll tell him you couldn’t help it.’

  As Hamish walked along to the restaurant, he turned over the names of the staff in his mind. There was old Mr Ferrari, and Lucia, who acted as waitress. Conchita Gibson, another distant relative who had married a Scotsman who had died of cancer the year before; Luigi, the cook; Giovanni, the undercook; and Mrs Maclean, Archie the fisherman’s wife, who came in daily to clean, made up the rest of the staff.

  The restaurant was fairly busy, for its reputation had grown so much that many of the customers motored long distances to eat there and the prices were still low enough to tempt the locals.

  Lucia welcomed Hamish with a dazzling smile. She really is a stunner, thought Hamish. Poor Willie. Not a hope in hell.

  He asked for Mr Ferrari. Lucia disappeared and then returned and led him through the back of the restaurant and up a flight of stairs to the flat over the shop.

  ‘Come in, Sergeant,’ cried Mr Ferrari. ‘Have a drink, but don’t stay too long, because I’ve a lot to attend to.’

  ‘No drink,’ said Hamish, ‘chust a few questions. Willie was here this morning.’

  ‘Grand lad, that. Should be in the restaurant trade.’

  ‘Maybe. The fact is he wass sitting next to the fireplace and he could hear something of what you were saying upstairs.’

  All the wrinkles on Mr Ferrari’s old face settled into a sort of hard mask from behind which his eyes peered warily out.

  ‘All he could gather,’ went on Hamish, ‘wass that you were glad someone had killed Sean or you m
ight have done it yourself after what he did to Lucia. Now who were you talking to and what did Sean Gourlay do to Lucia?’

  ‘Like the television set?’ asked Mr Ferrari.

  ‘If that wass meant as a bribe, then you can be having it back!’ exclaimed Hamish. Mr Ferrari looked at Hamish steadily.

  ‘Don’t you see you are making matters worse for yourself?’ said Hamish. ‘Tell me the truth.’

  ‘And you will not tell anyone?’ Mr Ferrari demanded.

  ‘Not unless it’s necessary, no.’

  ‘It’s not a nice story. Lucia does not go out walking with any man without my permission. Sean asked her to go for a walk with him, she asked me and I refused. I did not want her tied to anyone who showed no signs of wanting to work. But he was a regular customer, although where he got the money from, I don’t know, and so he managed to speak to her … a lot. He was very handsome. So Lucia begged and begged to be allowed to go out with him, so I at last said she could on her day off, in the afternoon, but she was to be back at six o’clock. I sent Giovanni after them to keep watch. I tell you, Hamish,’ he went on, ‘I’ve met a lot of bad people in my long life, and I had Sean marked down as a real bad one. But I couldn’t be sure. I kept wishing that wee lassie, Cheryl, had still been with him. Lucia wouldnae have dreamt of going out with him then.

  ‘So off they went and Giovanni set out after them. All excited he was, dodging in and out of doorways with a cap down over his eyes and a scarf over his mouth, and then creeping up the hillside. I thought Sean was bound to notice the idiot, but as it turned out, he did not.