Eden Philpotts
* * *
YOUNG Grant accepted a second cup of coffee and in reply to a motherly query from his hostess assured her that he had had his evening meal. No one else spoke until he put down his cup. Then Laura said:
“You have been a chump, you know. Now, what about a first, Christian, or baptismal name? The word ‘Grant’ is getting a bit confusing.”
“Me? Oh, call me Alastair.”
“I will, although I know it isn’t your name.”
“Right, it is not, then. But I’m ganging warily because you don’t seem at all anxious to give me the alibi I’m seeking.”
“I can’t give it you. There’s no proof whatever that the laird was killed when the pipes ceased from skirling. Don’t be silly.”
Grant wagged his head and looked apologetic.
“I don’t wonder you’re mad at me,” he said. “I suppose I’ve made myself a fair nuisance to you.”
“Why have you come here?”
“In answer to your letter. Losh, but the old wife was angry when the postwoman, Maggie McTaggart, handed in your envelope! She always scrutinises the mail, does Maggie, when she collects it out of the box. There’s so little of it, you see, because the people staying at the hotel have their own posting box and Maggie collects there, too, so if there’s half a dozen letters with the postmistress that seems an awful lot.”
“Don’t dodge the issue. Why have you come here?”
“Why, to have a crack with you. Why else?”
“Oh, cut out the witticisms,” said Laura. “We don’t mind trying to help you, but not if you want to be fresh. Now, then, tell us the tale and we’ll do our best to believe you.”
“Very good. I do realise that I’ve made myself a great nuisance to you, but…”
“Cut the cackle, for goodness’ sake, and begin.”
“Yes, well, to cut a long story short…”
“But we don’t want you to cut it short,” said Dame Beatrice, giving Laura the cue to slip out of the ring. “Please give us every possible detail. Begin at the beginning, illuminate and expand the middle and proceed at a decorous pace to the end.”
“Well, Dame Beatrice, the story begins in Edinburgh.”
“Eh?” exclaimed Laura involuntarily.
“The story begins in Edinburgh. I was standing waiting to cross the road when I saw an accident. Well, as you know now, I’m a reporter and, like all reporters, I’m always on the look-out for a story. That day I got one. I saw a man pushed under a car.”
Laura, in spite of her excitement, remained apparently calm.
“You did?” she said. “When would that have been?”
Dame Beatrice intervened before Grant could answer.
“Tell us, please, Mr. Grant, what you were doing in Edinburgh at that time.”
“Doing? Oh, you mean my reason for being there! Why, I was covering your Conference, Dame Beatrice. You may not know it, but all Scotland is interested—ay, intensely interested—in anything to do with education.”
“I was not speaking on education,” said Dame Beatrice mildly.
“Maybe not, but I was sent to cover the Conference and we regard such a gathering as educational.”
“I see. Please continue.”
“I managed to get leave from my editor to be in Edinburgh before the Conference was actually in session. I said I wanted to interview some of the notables in their hotels. What I really wanted—and he knew it, the douce man!—was to have a wee bit of a fling the way you can’t get it in these parts. Oh, nothing I wouldn’t care for my mother to know about—you can’t get that sort of a fling in Edinburgh, anyway—but just to get to a theatre and walk with the crowds along Princes Street and that kind of thing, and maybe, over a dram, hear of a job on the Scotsman. Of course, I did some interviewing, too. I met two or three of the professors and psychologists and persuaded them to give me a few facts and theories that I could send back to Freagair to show that I was on the job, and it was when I was coming away from one of these interviews—with Signor Ginetti it was…”
“Ah, yes. The distinguished Italian alienist who thinks that apes are descended from men and that, in time, there will be no more human beings but a sort of robot world of intelligent but pitiless primates with neither religion nor morals,” said Dame Beatrice, amused.
“That’s the laddie. Speaks very good English, too. I left him at something after six and I was waiting, with others, to cross the road to my bus stop…I was staying a bit out of the city for cheapness…when it happened. A big car came by, and a couple of men hurled another man clean in front of it. He didn’t stand a chance, and neither did the driver of the car.”
“And you would recognise those men again?”
“I couldn’t swear to them, but I think I would recognise them if I saw them. I never have seen them again and, of course, in the general consternation, they vanished. I recognised you, too, Mrs. Gavin, when you turned up at the boat-house on Tannasgan that night. You were in the crowd waiting to cross that road.”
“Yes, I was,” Laura agreed. “It shook me considerably. I didn’t see you, though.”
“Well, you’re more noticeable for a woman, being so tall and well-dressed and carrying yourself so well (if I may say so), than I am for a man. I’m only of average height and I was wearing the run-of-the-mill uniform of flannel trousers and tweed jacket. There was no reason for anybody to notice me.”
“Did you go to the police?” asked Laura.
“No, I did not. There was so little I could tell them and there was no proof of what I’d seen. I doubt whether anybody else was aware of what happened.”
Laura was about to speak, but Dame Beatrice dropped a lace-edged handkerchief, one of the code signs between them that Laura was to be silent. Grant bent and picked it up for her and the moment passed.
“This does not explain what you were doing on Tannasgan that night,” said Dame Beatrice.
“No, but I’m coming to that. It’s all part of the same story. You see, one of the men who did the pushing was employed, as I well knew, by Cù Dubh himself, and I was fool enough to think that at An Tigh Mór I might be able to get a real scoop—an exclusive story good enough to qualify me for promotion to something a whole lot better than the Freagair Advertiser and Recorder.”
“This story to be connected with the murder you had seen committed in Edinburgh?”
“Yes. As I knew that this man was in the laird’s employ, I thought a bit of blackmail might get me what I was after. I was, as Mrs. Gavin has pointed out, every kind of a fool to think I could dent the hide of a man like that.”
“So what did you do, Mr. Grant?”
“I did my job in Edinburgh and then, in the evenings, I went on my motor-cycle to the edge of Loch na Gréine to see what the chances were of getting into An Tigh Mór.”
“Not a difficult matter if you know what to do,” said Laura.
“Quite, Mrs. Gavin. Well, I had no luck at all, to begin with. I turned the lantern; I rang the bell. Nothing doing, except that some old fellow cursed me across the water from the island bank and said that they were not expecting anybody and that I was to gang awa’. Which I did. But the following night was different. That would have been the night Mrs. Gavin turned up.”
“Yes, possibly, but you must have got there later than I did,” said Laura. “You weren’t on the island when they brought me across to Tannasgan.”
“In the rain?”
“In the rain? I should say so!”
“I left Edinburgh at five, when the Conference rose—perhaps Dame Beatrice remembers?—and rode straight up to Inverness and on to Freagair and Tannasgan. I had turned the lantern and clanged the bell when I realised that the boat was tied up at the jetty, so I parked my motor-cycle and rowed myself across. Goodness knows why the boat was there. I suppose I pulled a fast one, taking it over like that, but I didn’t hear any shouting, so perhaps the guest didn’t turn up.”
“And when you l
anded on the island?” asked Dame Beatrice.
“Yes, well, thereby hangs a tale.”
“Aha!” said Laura. “Give us a summary.”
“That’s not so easy. I walked up to the house and reconnoitred. An old wife—well, not so old, really—came out of the door and speired at me to know what I wanted. I said I wished speech with the laird and, with that, she said I should call again on the morrow, as he always saw reporters the morn’s morn.”
“How did she know you were a reporter?” asked Laura.
“I dinna ken.” He grinned. “Maybe we carry the mark of the beast on us.”
“Well, what happened then?”
“It was then I heard the pipes. The sound came from a room, I think, which faced the loch.”
“Was there a light in it?”
“Never a light.”
“At what time would that have been?”
“Now, now, Mrs. Gavin! You don’t catch me like that.”
“So you never encountered the laird?”
“I did not. The only person I encountered, apart from the old wife, was yourself, when you were leaving.”
“Then why do you deduce that, when the piping ceased, the laird died?”
“It’s the only thing to believe.”
“Is that so? I can’t see the connection.”
“Can you not?” His expression was enigmatic. “There is only one thing on which we ought to be agreed, Mrs. Gavin. If I’m right, and the laird was murdered when the piping ceased, neither you nor I can have murdered the laird, can we? I seem to have said this before.”
“There’s no proof about the piping, and there’s nothing to show that the laird was on Tannasgan that night. I certainly didn’t see anybody except the red-haired man, the servants, and you.”
“Well, well! As I say, I did not see the laird either, but what does that prove?”
“I don’t know, but I’m going to find out,” said Laura.
“And we’re sticking together over all this?”
“Time will show,” said Dame Beatrice, before Laura could answer.
CHAPTER TEN
Loch Na Gréine
“Deep asleep, deep asleep,
Deep asleep it lies,
The still lake of Semmerwater
Under the still skies.”
Sir William Watson
* * *
“AND what are we supposed to make of that tale?” asked Laura, when young Grant had gone.
“What are your own reactions?” asked Dame Beatrice.
“Those of Sherlock Holmes and the dog.”
“Yes, I noticed that point. I suppose you would have been bound to hear the bell if he had rung for the boat to be brought over?”
“Absolutely. It’s a fine big bell and rings out like the knell of doom and, whatever my shortcomings, I’m not hard of hearing. So the bell, like the dog, did nothing in the night. You know, we shall need to check that whole story with the Corries.”
“You would regard them as reliable witnesses?”
“I don’t really know. She struck me very favourably, but one can’t go by that. The point is whether their story fits young Grant’s and, if it doesn’t, we’ve got a platform from which to question him. Anyway, now that I know he’s a reporter, I shall give up suspecting him of being the murderer.”
“Why should you do that? Did you not notice that there was another point on which his account of the evening differed from yours?”
“Was there? Let’s see, now. Ah, I’ve got it! The piping. According to him—let’s see—he left Edinburgh at five, when the Conference rose, and went to Loch na Gréine on his motor-bike. It’s—good gracious me!—it’s a sheer stark impossibility!”
“Did you not realise that, while he was talking?”
“No, I didn’t. I believe I was thinking of Inverness, not Edinburgh. So he actually had the crust to think he could persuade us that on two successive evenings he rode from Edinburgh at five and got to Loch na Gréine and across to Tannasgan before I left at about half-past ten. He must be crazy to think we’d swallow it.”
“But you did swallow it,” Dame Beatrice pointed out. She cackled harshly and Mrs. Stewart, who had been a silent, interested listener while her fingers had been busy on the never-ending knitting of the Scotswoman, joined in with an appreciative chuckle.
Laura grinned and acknowledged the palpable hit, protesting, however, that she had spotted the lie about the time he had heard the piping and that when she had thought over young Grant’s story she would have seen the light about the journeys from Edinburgh.
“What do you think happened, then?” she asked.
“He did ride to Loch na Gréine, that is certain,” said Dame Beatrice. “My guess, for what it is worth, is that he spent the night somewhere en route and came to the island on the same night as you did. It will be interesting to find out why he told such an obvious lie, and we must interview the Corries, as you say.”
“If the police have been questioning them—and they must have done so—they may not be in much of a mood to confide in us,” said Laura. “Mrs. Corrie was a sweet soul so far as I was concerned, but I wouldn’t put it past her to be very, very sticky if she felt like it. As for Corrie, I didn’t hear him utter a word. All he did was to bring in the dishes at dinner and collect up as we finished each course. He might have been a deaf mute for all that I could tell.”
“Well, you assert, on no evidence at all (so far as I can see), that young Grant is not the murderer,” said Dame Beatrice, “so who is your candidate? I gather you do not suspect the Corries?”
“Well, I don’t know about him. And, somehow, I can’t see my eccentric red-beard in the rôle. What do you think?”
“I have no idea, but I look forward to meeting him. Let us hope that he is still at An Tigh Mór.”
The following two days passed pleasantly and talk of the murder was shelved. Dame Beatrice sat on Mrs. Stewart’s broad terrace above the rock gardens and gazed at the sea and the mass of Ben Garaid, or read Professor John Dover Wilson on What Happens in Hamlet. Laura was carted round the gardens, again in remorseless and systematic fashion, by her hostess, and heard a great many more Latin names than she expected to be able to remember, but the sea and the mountains which surrounded the gardens were satisfying and soothing, and her hostess’s gentle voice and Edinburgh speech were music in the ears of one who had lived long in southern England.
The murder of the laird of Tannasgan was not mentioned again until they were ready to leave Gàradh. Then Mrs. Stewart said:
“I suppose, Beatrice, nothing will satisfy you until you’ve had a finger in the Tannasgan pie, but, if you’ll take my advice, which, from a lifetime of knowledge of you, I am perfectly sure you will not, you will keep away from An Tigh Mór. Everybody knows there’s a curse on the place, and although, the Dear kens, I am not a superstitious body, there are things better not meddled with, and what has gone on in The Big House will be one of them, I’m thinking.”
“If I took your advice, Laura wouldn’t,” stated Dame Beatrice. “She regards herself as a heaven-sent investigator of crime and thinks that Tannasgan is her especial province.”
“Well, well, if you’ll not take my advice, at least have a care of yourselves.”
“We always do that,” said Laura. “I take care of Mrs. Croc, and she takes care of me. Besides, she always totes a small gat on these little expeditions of ours. It scares me stiff. I can’t abide firearms, but I suppose it would be a very present help in time of trouble.”
They did not call in at the post office, but at Crioch Laura swam. Miraculously the weather still held up. There was a clear, almost Greek, light over the beautiful bay and a shimmer on the level, wet sands. The water, to Laura’s powerful, vigorous body, did not even strike cold. When she was dressed they had coffee in the hotel lounge before they took the turning for the Loch called Cóig Eich, the Five Horses, and the winding hilly road to Tigh-Òsda and Tannasgan.
&nbs
p; This time they did not follow the rough path to the bridge and the level-crossing which led to Mrs. Grant’s house, but continued on the single-track road to Loch na Gréine, the Loch of the Sun, the Tom Tiddler’s Ground on which the island of Tannasgan formed a base. It was the second time that Dame Beatrice had seen the loch since the murder, for they had been obliged to pass very close to it on their way from Freagair to Coinneamh Lodge, but on that first occasion she had obtained only the most cursory view of the waters of Gréine as the car carried her past the little stone jetty from which Laura had embarked for the island.
George drew up on the verge to take the car off the road, and Dame Beatrice and Laura got out and walked to the jetty. Dame Beatrice looked at the iron ring in the stone-work and then walked to the end of the tiny pier and gazed across the loch to the island and its house.
“Nothing much doing, by the look of things,” said Laura, joining her. “Have you seen the apparatus for summoning a boat?”
“We might make use of it, I think,” said her employer. “Will you operate it?”
Laura did this and then rang the bell. They waited for five minutes by Laura’s wristwatch and then she tried again, but again there was no response from the island. They could see two rowing-boats in the boathouse and this was too much for Laura. She went back to the car, retrieved her wet swimming costume, sheltered behind a convenient bush, and, a couple of minutes later, was in the water.
George also had left the car, deeming it his duty to act as bodyguard, and he and Dame Beatrice stood on the bank and watched Laura’s progress. As usual, she swam fast, on a powerful freestyle, and they saw her scramble out and then get into the smaller of the boats.
“I’ll just immobilise the car, madam. Mrs. Gavin took her towel out,” said George. “I hope she isn’t being rash,” he added.
“So, indeed, do I. I realised her intention, but she is a law unto herself, of course. Do you wish to visit the island, George?”
“I have studied such accounts of the murder as have come my way, madam, and have listened to the conversations in public houses, and I feel a certain amount of curiosity about the affair. It is a little bizarre, madam, don’t you think? We have never been involved in anything quite like it.”
My Bones Will Keep (Mrs. Bradley) Page 9
