by M C Beaton
“I’ll take the transfer,” mumbled Blair. Mary brightened. Glasgow! Shops! Theatres! Now if her husband would just go back to being a nasty drunk. That, she could handle.
* * *
Peregrine Wimple was impressed but determined not to show it. He liked to keep a faint sneer on his face to frighten restaurateurs waiting for his lordly verdict. It takes a snob to know one. So George Halburton-Smythe, coached by his daughter, leaned over Peregrine and said confidentially, “I can see you appreciate good food. You can always tell one of those lower-class pseuds. Always poking at stuff on their plate and sneering.”
He then moved out of the dining room and said to his daughter, “I hope I memorised all you told me to say.”
“He’s actually smiling, the little ponce. What are we to do about Freddy? He hates the police.”
“Can’t afford two chefs.”
“Hamish will think of something. He always does,” said Priscilla. “Oh, where is Hamish?”
* * *
Hamish had spent the day just outside the reserve at Ardnamurchan. He had cooked venison sausages, Sonsie’s favourite. It was only a faint hope, he thought with a sigh, as he packed up the sausages for Lugs. He had left the dog at the station.
He decided to call at Braikie hospital before going home to see how Clarry was getting on. The ex-policeman looked wanly at Hamish. “I’ve never been so sick of water in ma life,” he said. “Fine goings-on at the hotel.”
“What’s going on?” asked Hamish and then listened in amazement to the tale of Blair’s attack.
When Clarry had finished, Hamish said, “Well, you’ve still got your job. I thought for a moment I was going to lose another copper to food.”
“I’ve a wee bittie o’ a problem,” said Clarry, fishing a letter out from under his pillow. “This is from Acme Television. One o’ the producers spotted me when he was on holiday. They want me to be a TV chef. The pay’s great. I’ve got the wife and kids to think of. They think the highland accent’ll go down well.”
“I’ll talk to Freddy,” said Hamish. “He doesnae like policing any more.”
* * *
Hamish drove slowly home. A happy Freddy would not talk. But if he continued to be a policeman and there was another gruesome case, then he might snap.
All I need, thought Hamish, is a wee bit o’ luck.
He parked the Land Rover at the side of the police station. Lugs came hurtling through the flap, barking excitedly and jumping up and down.
“I’d like to think the welcome was for me,” said Hamish, “but you smell the sausages.”
He opened the back of the Land Rover and a wild cat leapt to the ground and then up into Hamish’s arms. He stared at the creature in wonder. “Sonsie!” he said.
He carried the large cat indoors, marvelling that he could ever have mistaken that creature from hell as Sonsie.
* * *
To her irritation, Priscilla, about to call on Hamish later that evening, found she was joined by Elspeth Grant. The rumour in the village was that Hamish had proposed marriage to Elspeth but that Elspeth refused to leave Glasgow. Freddy was cleaning up at the hotel and Priscilla wanted to talk over his problem with Hamish, because Freddy had said he would rather work at the hotel than be a policeman. Priscilla found herself wishing that Elspeth would go away.
The kitchen door was open. The sound of the television came from the living room.
Together they looked into the room.
Hamish Macbeth lay stretched out on the sofa, Sonsie draped over his chest and Lugs at his feet. He had a half smile on his face.
Both women turned and walked silently outside, over to the waterfront, and leaned on the wall.
“That’s that, then,” said Elspeth. “No woman alive is ever going to compete with that cat!”
* * *
One last fine day before the very end of summer and Archie Maclean was dreading his latest passengers. He had been contracted to take a party of primary school children on a trip round the loch, children from the tower blocks of Strathbane, children with feral faces, old before their time. Evil, that’s what they are, thought Archie, just like that damn cat. Then he had an idea. He cut the engine, remembering the boat was now right over where Hamish had told him he had got rid of the cat.
He fished up an old loud-hailer and yelled into it. “If yis’ll gaither round, I’ll tell you about the Mooley Cat what came from hell and is right under us the noo. Ice cream for the ones that stay quiet. None for the ones who cannae listen.”
They all fell quiet, to his amazement. And so Archie began, “Once upon a time…” He had the true highlander’s gift of the gab. Why he’d decided to call it the Mooley Cat, he never knew. He had just got to the bit where that brave policeman, Hamish Macbeth, had shot the beast from hell with a silver bullet when, from the suddenly dark sky above, lightning stabbed down into the loch and the children clutched each other and screamed.
Word spread far and wide and Archie found he had to extend his season as people clambered aboard, searching for places and waiting to hear the story.
To the villagers, the cat began to seem like a bad dream, something thought up by Archie. And with his new wealth, no more was Mrs. Archie allowed to boil his clothes in the copper. He bought her the latest in washing machines and himself a new skipper’s cap and a denim jacket and jeans.
Only Freddy sometimes thought he heard a cat howl at night and put the pillows over his head and lay there shaking.
* * *
Hamish Macbeth made a trip to Glasgow and proposed marriage to Elspeth Grant. But she looked at him sadly and said he had a wife already called Sonsie.
Returning to his station and feeling low, Hamish suddenly saw a policewoman standing outside. Her figure in her smart uniform was perfect. The glossy waves of her black hair showed under her cap. Her eyes were large and blue in a perfect oval of a face.
“Constable Dorothy McIver reporting for duty,” she said.
Hamish grinned. He had a feeling that something good had come his way at last.
About the Author
M. C. Beaton has won international acclaim for her New York Times bestselling Hamish Macbeth mysteries, and the BBC has aired twenty-four episodes based on the series. Beaton is also the author of the bestselling Agatha Raisin novels, which aired as an eight-episode dramatic series on PBS, starring Ashley Jensen. M. C. Beaton’s books have been translated into seventeen languages. She lives in the Cotswolds. For more information, you can visit MCBeaton.com.
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