by M C Beaton
"Why aren't you married?" asked Olivia.
"The right girl, the wrong time, the wrong place, that sort of thing. What about you?"
"I'm married to my job."
"No yearning for romance, a home, children?"
"No," she said curtly.
They drove the rest of the way towards Strathbane in silence. The companionship that had grown up between them on the drive had evaporated.
When they got back to the hotel room, Hamish asked, "Should we have dinner before we go?"
"I feel too strung up to eat anything. Why don't we just order a sandwich from room service?"
"Anything in particular?"
"Ham and salad."
Hamish picked up the phone and ordered the sandwiches and a pot of coffee. Olivia had switched on the television and was watching the news.
Then her mobile phone rang, making them both jump. She listened intently. Then Olivia said, "That's a much more sensible idea. I never liked Macbeth's plan in the first place. Too risky. I think they'll go for this." She listened some more and then rang off.
"The new plan is this," she said briskly. "We could be in trouble if they think you're some new drug dealer muscling in on their territory. Before I tell you what it is, they did not find any drugs at the Owens place. Now, here is what you are supposed to be. You have a shipment of heroin, prime stuff, all the way from the East and through Amsterdam. Originally out of the Highlands, you nonetheless operate mostly from Istanbul. You mostly sell to France, Spain and Belgium, but now you want to expand and sell some here. But where do you land it? That's what you want to get out of them. Glasgow still has that load of drugs they seized. We can use that as bait. Once they take the bait and say they'll buy, then they'll tell us where and when, and we'll have them. Offer them four kilos of heroin to start with."
"And how much is that?" asked Hamish. "I mean, it can be as much as a hundred pounds per gram on the streets, but a dealer is going to pay less for the raw stuff."
"You'll be selling it at twenty thousand a kilo."
"This means entrapment?" said Hamish. "I don't like it. I'd rather have caught them with their own stuff and get some of that off the market."
"You'll do as you're told," said Olivia sharply.
An actor must feel like this just before going onstage, thought Hamish as he and Olivia with Kevin and Barry close behind walked into Lachie's disco at nine that evening.
The place was full of gyrating couples. The music pounded and beat upon the smoky air and strobe lights stabbed down from the ceiling.
They made their way to the long bar which ran along the far side of the room.
Hamish wondered, before making his order, whether a drug baron would order something showy with an umbrella stuck in it, but Olivia asked for a whisky so he ordered two.
Olivia was wearing a slinky flame-coloured dress with thin shoulder straps and carrying a black cashmere shawl over one arm. Her dress was more like a petticoat than a dress, thought Hamish. It was even edged with flame-coloured lace at the short hemline.
Her hair was worn loose on her shoulders. Her scarlet lips, which had been painted to look fuller and more pouting, gave her a vulgar, sultry look. "What a place," she shouted to Hamish above the din, and then gave a loud, empty raucous laugh. May as well get into the part as well, thought Hamish. He put an arm about Olivia's shoulders and, bending down, kissed her on the mouth. Olivia gazed up at him adoringly and said in a low voice, "Don't do that again."
"Just acting," said Hamish. His eyes scanned the room. He could see no sign of either Bob or Angus. His heart began to sink. He had caused this highly expensive operation on the word of a couple of layabouts who probably did not know anyone in the drug trade.
Ten minutes passed. "If they were serious," said Kevin, "they'd have been here on time."
"I knew there was something stupid about this whole thing," said Olivia, not bothering to lower her voice.
Hamish scanned the room. The music thudded, the strobe lights flashed, couples gyrated round each other as if performing some ritual tribal dance.
And then he glimpsed Bob. He appeared to be searching.
It was then that Hamish realised that despite his red hair, Bob probably wouldn't recognise him in his Armani suit, camel coat draped about his shoulders and wraparound sunglasses.
Hamish said to Barry and Kevin, "There's a fat, little fellow looking for me. I'll try to point him out to you and then I think you should both fetch him over."
His eyes raked over the dancers. "There!" he said. "Chust to the left. The one with the snake tattooed around his arm."
Kevin and Barry moved forward. Hamish saw them speaking to Bob. As Bob was led forward, he did not look nearly so pugnacious. He gave Hamish a sort of smirk. "Didnae recognise you," he said.
"Am I wasting my time?" asked Hamish.
"No, no," grovelled Bob, although his eyes devoured Olivias cleavage. "I'll be right back."
He disappeared into the swirl of dancers. "Things are moving," hissed Olivia.
After a few minutes, a tall, thin lugubrious man like an undertaker materialised in front of them. He was even wearing a black suit and black tie.
"Come with me," he said.
They followed him to a door next to the far end of the bar. He opened the door and ushered them into an office. "Just call me Lachie," said the man behind the desk, getting to his feet. He was middle-aged, going thin on top, fat creased babyish face, little rosebud mouth, expensively cut dark suit but worn over a shirt embroidered with silver bells. No tie.
Behind him stood two goons, a sort of mirror image of Kevin and Barry.
A small dapper man with a lot of gold jewellery lounged in an armchair in a shadowy corner of the room.
Hamish suddenly sensed Olivias acute nervousness and wondered why. Olivia, unknown to Hamish, had recognised the man in the corner of the room as Jimmy White from Glasgow. She was beginning to fear Hamish would not be able to pull off this scam.
"Sit down," said Lachie expansively. "Drink?"
"No," said Hamish, swinging his coat off his shoulders and handing it to Kevin. "You've kept me waiting and I want to get down to business."
"That idiot Bob spent too long looking for you," said Lachie. "You could have chosen a brighter contact. Who put you onto Bob?"
Hamish sat down and leaned back in his chair. "Mind your own business," he said insolently.
"So what's your business?" demanded Lachie. "Interested in buying?"
"No, I only said that for the sake of the idiot Bob. I'm selling."
"Oh, aye. Selling what?"
"Shipment of heroin."
"How much?"
"Four kilos for starters."
"Four… where have you got this stuff?"
The little man in the corner spoke for the first time. "I think you should all get out o' here and let me have a word wi…?"
"George. Hamish George."
"We stay," said Kevin.
Lachie looked at Jimmy. The two goons behind him crowded in closer to the desk.
"Why not?" said Hamish easily. "Look after my beautiful wife."
Kevin and Barry instinctively looked to Olivia for guidance. She stood up, draping her cashmere stole over her arm. "Oh, come along. I need a drink," she pouted. She leaned over Hamish and kissed him full on the mouth, and then said, "It's Jimmy White," in a breath of a voice.
They all went out and Jimmy White moved round and sat behind the desk.
Apart from his gold identity bracelet, gold watch and thick gold chain around his neck, Jimmy White could pass for an ordinary Scottish businessman, thought Hamish, if it were not for the stone-hard look of his small black eyes.
"I'm Jimmy White," he said. "This is all a bit sudden, as the actress said to the bishop. Nobody's ever heard of you and you stroll in here with this damn offer."
"I work out of Istanbul," said Hamish. He suddenly remembered a name he had heard when one of his investigations had taken him to London an
d he had overheard some detectives in Scotland Yard gossiping. "Heard of Cherokee Jim?"
"Aye. But he's cocaine."
"And I'm heroin. This is beginning to sound a bit like 'me Tarzan, you Jane.' Are you interested or not?"
"Maybe. Why come up here?"
"Because I was born here. I need someplace safe to land the stuff. I haven't been back here since I was a boy so I don't know the places that will escape the investigations of Customs and Excise."
"How did you get started?"
Hamish stared at him for a long moment. "I don't see why the fuck I should waste time answering stupid questions about my background." Hamish, who hardly ever swore, hoped he wasn't blushing. "You either want the stuff or you don't."
"Oh, I want it. Those bastards in Glasgow seized a haul. Look, mac, how can I trust you?"
"You can't. You have to take my word for it, tell me where to land it, come with me, bring as much muscle as you like." Hamish stifled a yawn.
"You're a cool bugger. When Lachie told me that idiot Bob had been blabbing to someone he knew nothing about, I could have killed him. But I'll tell you one thing you're not. You're not an undercover cop. When I heard from Lachie, I was sure you were."
"And what would you have done? Killed me?"
"You know we don't go around killing coppers unless they're bent," sneered Jimmy. "The minute I clapped eyes on you and that wife of yours, I knew I was looking at one of my own kind. You know what's kept me on top? Brains."
"Well, we can sit here all night talking about your brilliance," said Hamish, "or we can get down to business. Do we have a deal?"
"Yes, but you'll need to wait a week. How much are you asking?"
"Twenty thousand a kilo."
"Right. Where are you staying?"
"The Grand. Why a week?"
"I'll need to discuss this with my associates. You know how it is."
"Okay. But don't make it any longer."
"It's funny, mind," said Jimmy, "that I haven't heard of you."
"I usually keep in the background. Only fools get themselves too well known."
"Right. What about some dinner?"
"Had it, thanks," said Hamish, who had no wish to prolong the agony of his act a moment longer than necessary.
"When I get back, then. Your wife's a real smasher. Funny, I've got a feeling I've seen her somewhere before. Was she on the films?"
"She doesn't do that anymore and she knows I'd cut her face if she did," said Hamish harshly.
"Oh, those sort of films."
"Aye, but we will not be talking about that."
"Sure, sure."
Hamish stood up and slung his coat around his shoulders. He put on his dark glasses.
"See you," he said laconically, and strolled out, resisting a strong impulse to run.
A flicker of relief darted through Olivia's eyes when she saw him.
Hamish put an arm around her shoulders. "Come on, babe, let's get out of here."
Back in the hotel room, Hamish told them about how he had got on. He finished by saying, "He thought he had seen you somewhere before, Olivia. Is that possible?"
"When I was made chief inspector," said Olivia, "my photo was in the Glasgow papers."
"You should have told me that," said Hamish impatiently. "Anyway, I managed to convince him that he had seen you in a blue movie."
Kevin gave a great laugh. "The first time I heard of anyone looking at their faces."
"Show a bit of respect," snapped Olivia. "What do we do for a week?"
"We wait," said Hamish. "Lounge about. Spend the state's money."
"Won't do. They'll be watching us and they'll probably search the hotel room. Wait a minute. I've a phone call to make."
She picked up the mobile and went into the bedroom.
"That's one for the book," said Barry. "Imagine anyone thinking old concrete knickers had been in a blue movie. You have the fair gift o' the gab, Hamish."
Hamish found he was about to protest strongly at anyone calling Olivia concrete knickers but decided against it. She was only a pretend wife and he had heard senior male officers dubbed with much ruder names.
"I think we could all do with a drink," said Kevin. "What's your poison, Hamish?" He opened the minibar.
"I'll stick to whisky."
The two detectives had beer.
"So what's a bright lad like you doing as a village copper?" asked Barry when they were seated around with their drinks.
Hamish sighed. "I'm sick o' explaining. I like the job, I like Lochdubh."
"But where's the life, the excitement?" asked Kevin.
"I've found happiness has got little to do with thrills and spills," said Hamish patiently.
"Oh, you'll grow up one day if it's not too late and get into the real world."
"And one day you'll find you're the children and I'm the grown-up," said Hamish. "Oh, shut up about it. I'm tired."
"You must have done a grand job," said Kevin. "Jimmy White's the worst of criminals. He's got brains."
Hamish took a sip of whisky. "Not as much as he thinks he has and that's his weakness."
Olivia came in. She had changed into trousers and a shirt blouse and had scrubbed her face clean of makeup. Her hair was pulled back into a severe knot. Both detectives, who had been lounging in their chairs, straightened up.
"This is what we have decided," said Olivia briskly. "If we hang around here for a week, we will be followed. They'll be checking up on us. So tomorrow, we are going to Amsterdam. That is supposed to be your last port of operation outside the U.K., Hamish, so that's where we'll go. Someone will contact us while we are there." She looked at Kevin and Barry. "There will be no need for you to join us. I do not think we will be in any danger until the action starts."
"Do we drive there?" asked Hamish.
"No, we leave the car at Inverness Airport, fly down to London and catch a plane from there. They will send round our tickets and money in the morning."
"I hope nobody around at police headquarters is gossiping," said Hamish anxiously.
"Only a few of the top brass are in the know," said Olivia. "Surely you trust your senior officers, Hamish."
The answer to that one was no, not at all. But Hamish did not think it would be politic to say so.
* * *
"So the jammy bastard's got hisself a trip tae Amsterdam," growled Blair over a glass of whisky as he looked across the barroom table at Jimmy Anderson.
"Aye, and he's pretending to be husband to that chief inspector from Glasgow and she's a looker by all accounts."
Jealousy like bile rose up in Blair's throat. If only he could get rid of Hamish Macbeth for once and for all.
CHAPTER SIX
'Twas for the good of my country that I should, be
abroad-Anything for the good of one's country.
– George Farquhar
Hamish sat on a British Airways flight to Amsterdam and wished he could thaw the atmosphere between himself and Olivia.
They had shared the hotel bed the night before, each lying chastely as far away from the other as possible. But somehow during the night he had, in his sleep, put an arm around her and gathered her close and Olivia had awoken first to find her head pillowed on his chest and herself held fast in his embrace.
She had woken him, demanded to know what the hell he was about, taking advantage of the situation. In vain he had protested that it must have happened in his sleep.
They had been tailed by the man Hamish had dubbed the Undertaker to Inverness Airport but as far as he knew, they were no longer being followed. Of course, the Undertaker could have found out they were on the plane and a tail could pick them up in Amsterdam.
So here he was bound for his first foreign trip with a pretty woman who was just about as much company as Chief Inspector Blair would have been.
Hamish thought of the now silly dreams he had nourished while falling asleep beside her, how they would walk along the canals, see the museums, and ju
st perhaps, just perhaps, something might happen between them.
The plane began its descent to Schiphol Airport. "Where are we staying?" asked Hamish, breaking the heavy silence.
"The Hilton."
More silence. Hamish sighed. Come into the twentieth century, he chided himself. If she were a man and your senior officer, you would be quiet and respectful. She must be used to men coming on to her.
Hamish nonetheless could not help feeling excited as the taxi bore them the eighteen kilometres into Amsterdam. He was abroad. If only he had a camera. So that when this was all over, he could show the folks in Lochdubh that he, Hamish Macbeth, had actually been abroad. Of course, he could probably buy one of those disposable ones. He could see Anne Franks house, take a trip by boat along the canals, buy some souvenirs. He must buy a present for Angela.
They arrived at the Hilton, which overlooked the Amstel. He was relieved to see their room had twin beds.
"Did you notice if we were followed from the airport?" asked Olivia briskly.
"No, ma'am. But they might send someone over."
Hamish unpacked his suitcase and then looked hopefully out of the window. There were lights glittering along the canal.
"Would you care to go for a walk before dinner?" he asked.
"No, we will wait. We are to be contacted."
Hamish sighed, picked up a paperback and slumped down in an armchair by the window.
He would have liked a cup of coffee, but Olivia was exuding such a terrifying air of chilly authority that somehow he did not dare, and he resented her at the same time. Damn all women. Why couldn't he forget she was a woman?
The phone rang. She answered it, listened and said, "Send him up."
Hamish looked up at her enquiringly, but obviously he was still in the doghouse and expected to wait until she chose to tell him.
He stifled another sigh. Here he was in this exciting city with a pretty woman and he was trapped in this hotel room, rather as if he was some foreign dignitary under house arrest.
There was a knock at the door. Olivia opened it. A small dapper man entered. He was balding, had a round smooth face and gold-rimmed glasses.
