by M C Beaton
“Haven’t you got a mobile?” asked Milly.
“It’s downstairs in my handbag.”
“Mine, too, and the phone’s in the hall. What are we going to do?”
Hanging on to each other, they crept down the stairs. Milly grabbed the phone in the hall and called the police.
Hamish Macbeth was awakened by the shrill sound of the telephone. He struggled out of bed, ran to the office, and listened in alarm when he was told there was something bad happening at the Davenport house in Drim.
When he got there, the small figure of Tolly was being carried into an ambulance. Police Inspector Mary Benson was in charge of operations. She was a matronly looking woman whose grey hair and rosy cheeks belied a ruthless efficiency.
“What on earth happened to the wee man?” asked Hamish.
“Someone bashed him on the head,” said Mary. “He was just shouting something into his phone about an intruder when it happened.”
“Is he bad?”
“Looks bad. We can only hope for the best. You should have done the job yourself, Macbeth. His police radio was blaring away, enough to alert anybody that the house was watched.”
“Whose fault is it that I was sent a dangerously inept policeman, ma’am?”
“Don’t get cheeky with me. Join the search.”
“Yes, ma’am,” said Hamish gloomily.
“We’d best get these women off to a safe house for a bit.”
Hamish went up the drive and round to the kitchen door, shining his torch on the ground, searching for footprints. But the ground was hard and dry, and a lot of the path was covered by weeds and heather. The captain, thought Hamish, must have had something that the murderer desperately wanted. And how had the man arrived? Had he left a car somewhere and walked over the hills?
He would need to return as soon as it was daylight and search again.
Milly had always wondered how any human being could take the life of another. But after a week in the safe house in Strathbane with Philomena, she felt she understood. The “safe house” was actually a small flat. She had to share a bedroom with her sister-in-law. At first, Philomena would not let her go out at all, saying it was not safe. Milly waited until she had fallen asleep one afternoon and waited until the policewoman on guard outside in her car had fallen asleep as well and walked down into the centre of the town.
The body of her husband was to be released the following week, and she would be returning home then to prepare for the funeral. She had given Hamish Macbeth the names and addresses of any of her husband’s old army friends that she could find after writing off to them herself and inviting them to the funeral. So far, not one had replied, even with a letter of condolence. Philomena had said that her brother had been very popular and that the police were probably intercepting the mail for security reasons, which police headquarters denied. “Well, they would say that,” said Philomena, who felt she was always right about everything.
Milly was just wondering whether to buy herself the first pair of high heels she had had in ages—the captain had not approved of her wearing high heels—when a voice behind her asked, “Mrs. Davenport?”
She swung round and backed nervously against a shop window. The man facing her looked like a large pig. “Yes, I’m one o’ thae dreadful reporters,” he said cheerily. “My name’s Tam Tamworth. Fancy a drink?”
“I mustn’t speak to the press,” said Milly primly.
“Och, it’s just the wee dram and I’ll gie ye a piece o’ paper saying I won’t print anything you say.”
Milly wavered. Then she thought of going back to that nasty little flat and being cooped up with Philomena. “All right,” she said.
“We’ll go to the Grand Hotel bar,” said Tam. “Nice and posh. It’s just a few steps away.”
The cocktail bar of the Grand Hotel was a veritable symphony to Scottish bad taste. The walls were draped in tartan cloth and hung with plastic claymores and targes. There was a huge badly executed portrait of Bonnie Prince Charlie behind the bar. The plastic tables were made to look like tree trunks and covered in tartan coasters.
“What’ll it be?” asked Tam.
“Just an orange juice.”
“An orange juice after what you’ve been through? Have a Tartan Blaster.”
“What’s that?”
“Jist a mild cocktail.”
“All right,” said Milly boldly.
The Tartan Blaster arrived. It was a bright red drink decorated with two tartan umbrellas.
Tam had a double whisky. “What do you think of Strathbane?” he asked.
“It’s a bit, well, run-down,” said Milly shyly.
“Didn’t use tae be. Before the European Union got its claws into the fishing industry, this used to be a lively place. Now everyone’s on the dole. I’ll be covering your man’s funeral if that’s all right wi’ you.”
“I don’t suppose I can stop you,” said Milly. The liquor in the cocktail was sending a warm glow right down to her stomach. “And I can’t discuss anything with you, about the murders I mean.”
“I’ll tell you one thing. It’s just come through. Trust Hamish Macbeth to get it right. Poor wee Pete Ray was murdered and by the same chap who did in your husband.”
Milly shuddered and took a large gulp of her drink. “That’s awful. Am I in danger?”
“I would say that whoever tried to get into the house the other day will be too frightened to come back.”
“I’m in a safe house,” said Milly. “Well, it’s rather a safe flat—me and my sister-in-law. I don’t think I can take much more of it. We’re under each other’s feet all day long.”
“Then just go back to Drim. They can’t stop you.”
The police were searching for Milly, alerted by a frantic Philomena screaming down the phone. Like practically every town in Britain, Strathbane was well served by CCTV cameras. A quick scan soon picked up the slight form of Milly being joined by Tam Tamworth and followed them to the Grand Hotel.
Just as Milly was finishing her drink, two policemen and a policewoman came hurrying into the bar. Said the leading policeman, “You must return to the safe house, Mrs. Davenport, and you should not be talking to the press. Come with us. Your sister-in-law is worried frantic about you.”
Milly cracked. She shouted, “I am not going back to that grubby flat. I am going home and you can’t stop me!”
“Attagirl,” said Tam. “You tell ’em.”
“I must remind you, Mrs. Davenport…”
Milly got to her feet. “And I must say that if I am cooped up in that small flat with Philomena for one more day, I will murder her!”
The bar had filled up since Milly had first entered it. Everyone was listening avidly. “Mr. Tamworth,” said Milly, “would you please take me back to the flat and then escort me to Drim?”
“Glad to.”
“You can’t do that!” protested the policeman.
“Oh, yes I can,” said the normally mild Milly full of Tartan Blaster.
“You’ve never seen such a change in anyone,” chortled Jimmy Anderson when he met up with Hamish outside the house in Drim. “Tam’s got his foot in the door there and he’s not leaving. Philomena is ranting and raving. Have you found anything?”
“Not a thing. I’ve been searching around since early light. Well, there is one thing. Five miles away, up on the Lairg road, there’s a Forestry Commission road going up through the trees. There’s a muddy bit at the entrance with tyre tracks. They’ve taken a cast off to the lab. Someone could have parked there and then walked over the moors. Have you managed to get rid of Tam?”
“Finally. But he’ll be back. Mrs. Davenport seems to have taken a shine to the pig, mostly because Tam is so deliciously rude to Philomena.”
“Have you checked up on the old family friends?”
“Surrey police are on to it. Stonewalling all around. Either that or don’t speak ill of the dead. You’d think headquarters would all be pleased that you turne
d out to be right and there are two murders but the way Blair is going on, you’d think you’d done them yourself. Have you considered the locals, Hamish?”
“Not for a moment. Why?”
“They’re all a bit weird up here.”
“As far as I know, the captain never had anything to do with any of them apart from Hugh Mackenzie who supplies the peat.”
“And what does he say?”
“Says he had no quarrel with the captain. Says the captain paid him by letting him take as much peat as he wanted for himself.”
Inside the house Tam, who had shut Philomena outside the kitchen, was saying earnestly to Milly, “I promise you this. I won’t write a word until after the murderer is caught. I have great faith in Macbeth. Background stuff, exclusively to me. And that’ll keep the rest of the press away from you.”
“All right,” said Milly. “And will you do something for me?”
“What?”
Milly looked at him shyly. “Will you take me to see a movie next week?”
“Sure. Which one?”
“Anything will do. I want a bit of escape. I feel I’ve been cooped up in here like a prisoner ever since Henry moved us here.”
Tam’s large ears turned a bit pink with gratification. He noticed for the first time that Milly had a sort of old-fashioned prettiness about her.
“Now,” he said, “the police have taken away all the papers. Is there anything in this big place they might have missed?”
“I shouldn’t think so. The search was very thorough.”
Philomena moved quietly away from the kitchen door. Suppose there was some evidence in the house and she found it. The village women had been up in the attics, getting pieces of furniture. Maybe there was something now uncovered that they and the police had missed.
She went quietly up the stairs. A wind had risen outside, moaning and screaming around the house. The village women had been thorough. The attics were clean and dusted. Philomena began to search, avoiding places like old trunks and suitcases that the police had surely thoroughly rummaged through.
There were three attics. One had obviously been a nursery in the old days. A soldier’s campaign chest stood against the wall by a small barred window. She stared at it thoughtfully. She suddenly remembered their father having bought it at an auction, saying it had belonged to an officer in the Crimean War. And, she remembered with excitement, it had a secret drawer.
She found it by opening a top drawer and taking the drawer out. Behind it was another little drawer. She opened it and found a bundle of letters—and the letters looked fairly new.
She sat down on an old nursing chair and began to read. The letters were from lawyers, angrily demanding money back that Henry owed their clients. But there was one from the man himself. “Pay up, Henry, or I’ll kill you, you damn cheat,” it said.
Philomena had felt humiliated by the arrival of Tam in Milly’s life. She had not liked the way Hamish Macbeth had treated her, either. She was consumed by a desire to show them all up; to show that she, Philomena, could find a murderer. Her mind worked fast. She would contact this man and arrange to meet him in a public place, and she would take a powerful tape recorder with her and see if she could get enough evidence before she went to the police. She put the lawyers’ letters back in the drawer, dusted off any prints she might have left in the room, and went quietly down the stairs.
There was no police guard outside. Headquarters had decreed that if Mrs. Davenport was foolish enough to leave the “safe house,” then she would just have to take the consequences.
Philomena walked outside and into the shelter of the shrubbery. Far above her, the monkey puzzle tree groaned and creaked and swayed in the gale while ragged clouds raced across a small moon. With a little smile on her face, Philomena took out her mobile phone.
Tam left and Philomena said curtly after supper that she was going to have an early night and planned to go to Inverness shopping on the following day.
No sooner had she gone to bed than the doorbell rang. “Who is it?” called Milly through the letter box.
“It’s me, Hamish Macbeth. Mind if I come in for a moment?”
Milly opened the door. “Has anything happened?”
“No, no,” said Hamish soothingly. “I was just wondering, is there anywhere the captain might have hidden anything, like papers?”
“I think the house has been searched from top to bottom.” They walked into the kitchen together.
“I spend most of the time in here now,” said Milly. “It’s warmer, and here I’m not haunted by the vision of poor Henry up the chimney.”
The kitchen was old-fashioned with a stone floor: Belfast sinks and a large dresser holding Willow-pattern plates against one wall and a Raeburn cooker against another.
“You haven’t really had time,” said Hamish, “to have a proper think. Anything anywhere? The attics?”
“I left the search to the police.”
“Mind if I go upstairs and have a look?”
“Go ahead. At least there’s electric light in the attics. You’ll be able to see all right.”
Hamish checked around the attics looking for hiding places such as loose floorboards. He was about to give up as he was standing in the nursery when his eyes fell on the campaign chest. Although the village women had cleaned well, the attics were not at all insulated, and scurrying draughts had begun to cover objects already with a thin coating of dust. The campaign chest against the wall was the one object free of dust.
He went back down to the kitchen. “Mrs. Davenport,” he said, “there’s a chest up in the old nursery against the wall. Know anything about it?”
“I don’t think so. I’ll come back up with you and have a look.”
In the nursery, Milly surveyed the chest. “Oh, that. Henry was proud of that. It belonged to his father.”
“I ’member an auctioneer in Inverness telling me these old chests often had a secret drawer.”
“Henry didn’t mention anything.”
“Well, someone’s been having a look. Let me see if I can remember. It’s maybe at the back of one of the drawers. He said you aye look for a shorter drawer. Here we are! Right at the top.” He took a pair of latex gloves out of his pocket and put them on. His nimble fingers found the secret drawer. Hamish scanned the lawyers’ letters and let out a low whistle.
“What is it?” asked Milly.
“These are letters from four lawyers all demanding money for their clients, money they say that Henry borrowed and was refusing to pay back. I’ll need tae rush these ower tae Strathbane,” said Hamish, his accent getting broader in his excitement. “This place is cleaner than the other attics. Has anyone else been up here? Your sister-in-law? Tam?”
“Tam certainly hasn’t. Philomena might have been up here.”
“I’m afraid I’ll have to ask you to get her and ask her.”
“But she’s gone to bed! And she’ll be so angry at being woken up.”
“Just show me her bedroom door and I’ll do the rest.”
Philomena was furiously haughty in her denials. Was she not going to be allowed to sleep?
Hamish carefully examined the front door and kitchen door but could see no signs of any type of break-in. But perhaps the captain had his house keys on his dead body and the killer had taken them away.
“I’ll get a locksmith along in the morning to change the locks,” he said, “and get a deadbolt put on the kitchen door. I’ll give you a receipt for these letters and then get over to Strathbane and hand them in as evidence.”
In his Land Rover, he switched off the overhead light and, taking out his notebook, made a careful note of the lawyers’ names and addresses and the names of their clients. They were all down in Surrey. He wished he could go there himself. It would mean he would not have to wait until a report came back from the Surrey police. But one of them might have come north and stayed locally before contacting the captain.
He studied the clients’ na
mes: Ferdinand Castle, Thomas Bromley, John Sanders, and Charles Prosser. Then he set off for Strathbane.
He preferred to deal with Jimmy, but Jimmy had gone home. He telephoned him. Jimmy groaned and said he’d be back at the office in a few moments.
When he arrived, he exclaimed over the letters, “Now we might get somewhere. A secret drawer! It’s like something out o’ Enid Blyton.”
“It’s like something out o’ the Antiques Roadshow,” said Hamish. “I mind being amazed at the number of old pieces o’ furniture wi’ secret drawers. But forensics had better go back and have a go at that attic. Someone’s been in there, and I would think that someone was there after the village women did a’ the cleaning.”
Jimmy leaned back in his chair, yawned, and put his battered brogues up on the desk. “Don’t you think sweet little Milly or that great bullying sister-in-law might have found something they’re not telling us about?”
“I hope not,” said Hamish. “Surely neither woman would want to go after a ruthless killer on her own.”
Philomena arrived in the bar of a Dancing Scotsman Hotel on the banks of the River Ness at one o’clock the following day. Her heart was beating hard. For one little moment, a grain of common sense was telling her that she was putting herself at risk. But she banished it. She would show them that she was sharper and brighter than anyone in the police force, particularly Hamish Macbeth. And the bar was crowded. She had nothing to fear.
By quarter past one, she was beginning to feel like a fool. Of course the murderer would not come. But he might be waiting outside to follow her and accost her on a quiet stretch of the road home.
With a sinking heart, Philomena realised that, for her own safety, she would need to go straight to Inverness police. What could she say that would not make her look like the dangerous idiot she now felt?
A woman sat down opposite her. “Do you mind?” she asked. “All the other seats seem to be full.”
“I’m waiting for someone,” said Philomena harshly. But the woman was middle-aged and respectable, plump and motherly and wearing a large hat. “Oh, well, just until my companion turns up.” Philomena decided to give it another fifteen minutes. She could not bear to fail.
