Dame Beatrice, who missed nothing, had noticed him, however.
“So there was one more person on Tannasgan than we realised,” she said. “I wonder whether the manservant Corrie was in the house after all?”
“That isn’t Corrie,” said Laura. “Corrie is older and shorter than that. No, that’s the young man I told you about—the one who met me in the rain and rather—well, it was a nerve, really—insisted on sending me over to Tannasgan. He was on the mainland side then, of course, and worked the signal and rang the bell to bring the boat over. I had no notion that he was actually connected with the place, though. I assumed he was out for a walk and had been caught in the storm, like me. In fact, I think, looking back, that I imagined he was going to cross the loch, too, and try to get shelter, but, when he walked off, I suppose I concluded he had a place of his own near at hand, or else was so wet that he couldn’t get any wetter.”
“I wonder what, if any, his part is in the drama? Everything in this little adventure seems more than a little odd.”
“Absolutely off-beat.”
“This new friend, I must say, intrigues me. I wonder whether it was chivalry, or something much less admirable, which caused him to expedite your first visit to An Tigh Mór?”
“Goodness knows! Anyway, there doesn’t seem any doubt that he believed I would be received and warmed and fed—unless he expected me to take shelter in the boathouse. However, old Macbeth took care of all that. You know, in spite of the battiness and the guile, I believe that old man possesses a sense of humour.”
“Indeed? It may be a macabre one, though, don’t you think?”
“Oh, you’re thinking of the body in the barrel, but there’s no evidence yet that he put it there.”
“I agree.” There was silence while both stared ahead, engaged in thought and surmise, then Dame Beatrice added, “This furtive young man we’ve just seen interests me very strangely. He is quite a new factor in the case.”
“The nigger in the woodpile, you mean? We’ve nothing whatever to go on in suspecting that, though, have we?”
“No. All the same, I am glad I caught a glimpse of him.”
“Would you know him again, do you think?”
“Certainly I should. I saw him quite distinctly.”
“You know, Mrs. Croc, the more I think about it, the more certain I am that he had some ulterior motive in sending me over to Tannasgan that evening. By the way, where are we going next?”
“Back to Mrs. Grant. There are points which she must clear up.”
“Such as which island really is Tannasgan?”
Dame Beatrice did not reply, but gave George directions. George eased the car on to the single-track road and they went westwards, and slightly north, on the way to Mrs. Grant’s lonely and cut-off house. Nobody was at home.
Laura ceased hammering on the front door and tried the handle, but the door was locked.
“Stymied,” she observed. “Now what do we do?”
Dame Beatrice was saved from the necessity of replying by the arrival of a station wagon driven by a man whom Laura recognised as the passenger to Inverness whom she had met in the rain at the station. It seemed at least three months since she had seen him. He pulled up behind George, who was still in the driving-seat of Dame Beatrice’s car, and got out, raising his tweed hat with a smile of recognition.
“Hullo,” said Laura. “We came along hoping for a chat with your wife, but she seems to have gone shopping or something.”
“No, no, she’s away to her mother in Dingwall. Did you want her for anything in particular? I have to thank you for driving her home that bad night.”
“I was the lucky one. She put me up,” said Laura. She glanced at Dame Beatrice. “This is Mr. Grant. Mr. Grant, Dame Beatrice Lestrange Bradley, my boss.”
They acknowledged the introduction and Laura received a slight nod from her employer which she interpreted as an indication that she was to carry on the conversation. Before she could do so, Grant spoke, producing, as he did so, a latch-key.
“Do please come in,” he said, and opened the door. “I hope my wife has left us a fire.”
This, it appeared, was the case. A good fire was glowing red in the dining-room and a basket of peats and a scuttle of coal stood one on either side of it. Grant tossed his hat and driving-gloves on to a chair, advanced to the fire and put coal on it.
“And now, do you sit down while I find the whisky,” he said. He produced whisky, a syphon, and a decanter. “Maybe ladies would prefer sherry?”
Laura accepted the whisky, Dame Beatrice the sherry. Their host joined Laura and solemnly wished them good health.
“And now,” said Laura, “we came to ask a question of Mrs. Grant, but I expect you can answer it. You’ll have heard of the death of the laird of Tannasgan?”
“I have that. Nothing else is talked of around these parts. We get little excitement hereabouts as a rule.”
“Well, I’ve been mixed up in it all.”
“You don’t tell me!”
“I have, in a way.” Briefly she told the story of her adventures after she had left Mrs. Grant for the first time. She concluded by saying, “So, you see, we’re wondering whether the island we’ve just left is Tannasgan, or whether the dead laird used to live somewhere else and was murdered on his cousin’s estate.”
“That,” said Grant, “is very easily settled. There is nothing I need attend to at the moment, so why don’t we go along and see? From your description I would say that you have certainly been across Loch na Gréine and on Tannasgan, but there’s nothing like making sure. Shall we go in your car? Then your man can show me where it is you want to take me.”
“Certainly,” said Dame Beatrice. “George knows the way.”
Grant nodded and then asked:
“What did you say yon man calls himself?”
“Malcolm Donalbain Macbeth.”
“Oh, ay. That will be a pseudonym, no doubt.”
“It seems rather more than likely.”
“A red-headed, red-bearded man?”
“Yes, and of pretty hefty build and about five foot ten in height,” said Laura. “An odd bod in many respects, but likeable, I thought. Drinks whisky, sometimes to excess, and has a fixation on fabulous beasts.”
Grant finished his drink and poured himself another.
“I don’t know him,” he said. “Let me give you a wee drop more whisky.”
“No, thanks.”
“Then some more sherry for you, ma’am?”
“No, thank you.”
“Right. Then let us be on our way. It’s curious I am to see this island of yours.” He drank off the dram he had poured for himself and heaved himself out of his chair. “I’ll not trouble to fasten the door, although the lassie who’s to look to me has a key.”
A point occurred to Laura. The servant was no longer afraid to be left with her master while the wife was away from home. So much was clear, but the significance of it, if any, eluded her. She led the way to Dame Beatrice’s car and addressed the stocky chauffeur.
“Back to that island, George. We’re taking Mr. Grant to vet it for us, to make sure it really is Tannasgan.”
“I shall have to move my bus,” said Grant. “It’s blocking your man’s way out.” He climbed into the station wagon and backed it as far as the bridge. In the ooze of the river bank he brought it out of the way of the other car. George reversed until he found room to turn, picked up Grant and drove cautiously on to the narrow, winding road.
They were soon at the landing-stage opposite Tannasgan. Here Grant leaned back.
“Yon’s Tannasgan and this is Loch na Gréine,” he said. “You were not deceived. And the Black One was found chained to the jetty, his body in the water, was he not? Well, well. It’s a strange thing, that.”
Laura turned round.
“Not in the water. In a barrel in the water,” she said. “By the way, what were you doing in Inverness? And why didn’t you come home when you
were supposed to? Your wife seemed terribly worried about you.”
If she expected to surprise or discomfit Grant, she was disappointed. He half-closed his eyes and answered:
“Well, do you see, I was kidnapped.”
Laura found this incredible.
“But Inverness isn’t Chicago,” she protested.
“No, no, Inverness isn’t Chicago,” he agreed, “but kidnapped I was, although not held to ransom. I was released in Tomnahurich Street after being blindfolded before we left the hotel!”
“What hotel would that have been, I wonder? I know Inverness pretty well, you see, so I’m interested.”
“The one I always use when my business takes me to Inverness. Maybe you wouldn’t dignify it by the name of hotel, but it’s a most respectable place, or so I always thought. That has been my reason for staying there. However, after I had had my dinner that night, three gentlemen came up as I was drinking my coffee and asked me, with civility, would I make a fourth at bridge. I was willing and went with them to a private sitting-room they’d hired.”
“In the hotel?”
“Certainly. It was a room on the second floor, but I did not take note of the number. Well, we played for a couple of hours and I won a few shillings—the stakes were very low, otherwise I would not have played—and then they sent down for drinks and the drinks came up with a bit of a sour face on the waiter because it was late, and the next thing I knew was that I woke up in broad daylight with a splitting headache and a bad taste in my mouth, to find one of the villains at my bedside with a gun in his fist.
“‘You’ll stay in this room and we’ll have your meals sent up,’ he said.
“‘Like hell,’ I told him.
“‘Keep your good health,’ he said, fingering the gun in a meaningful kind of way. ‘We don’t want to hurt you.’
“‘But what’s the idea?’ I asked. He shook his head and said he’d be hanged if he knew, but he had his orders. I thought it was something of a shady deal connected with my work and I was to be kept out of the way until it was through. That gave me something to think about. I asked him what was contemplated. He didn’t know, or, if he knew, he wouldn’t say. I asked him whether it had anything to do with the hydro-electrical work I was engaged on. He said it might have, and then, again, it might not. He was only a hired gun and did as he was told and didn’t ask questions.”
“Didn’t you ‒ couldn’t you reach a bell or anything?” asked Laura.
“I could not, without the risk of having a hole blown in me. The fellow seemed amiable enough, but he had an eye like that of a very dead fish and a mouth like a bit of steel cable. I wasn’t prepared to take chances. He must have known that the thought of trying to escape had crossed my mind, though, for he advised me not to try any funny business—those were his words—because the hotel people knew I’d been carried up to bed dead drunk the night before, and had been told that I’d had a nasty knock on the head at work and wasn’t fully responsible for anything I did or said.”
“He didn’t mention that the laird of Tannasgan had been murdered?”
“He did not. Anyway, how could he have known? Inverness is a long way from Tannasgan.”
“No,” said Laura thoughtfully, “he did not know, and the chief reason, apart from what you say, is that it hadn’t happened as soon as that. What did you do when they released you?”
“Nothing. They escorted me down the stairs and I paid my score at the desk and then all three of them came with the car into which they pushed me and when the car stopped they just told me to get out. I did that, and waited until the car had turned the corner into Ardross Street and then I went to our Inverness office to transact the business I’d come to see about and told them the tale. I could see that they didn’t believe a word of it.”
“Not surprising, I suppose,” said Laura, who did not believe a word of it either. “Well, if this is Loch na Gréine and that’s Tannasgan, we might as well drive you home.”
“Which is your own way?”
“Oh, we shall go back to Crioch. Our plans were uncertain,” said Dame Beatrice with deliberate vagueness.
“Drop me there, if you please. I have business to see to in Gàradh. I can get a lift from people I know in Crioch.”
“He wanted to know where we were staying, I think,” said Laura, when they had parted from him at double gates which opened on to a gravel slope leading up to the terrace of the hotel. “What did you make of his kidnapping tale?”
“Enough to feel inclined to go to Inverness tomorrow. I wonder whether he has told the police of his experiences?”
“His alleged experiences. It remains to be discovered what he actually did do after I left him at the station that first wet night. I suppose he did go to Inverness? If you ask me, he’s a pretty fishy customer and I don’t like him very much, at that. Did you notice that he referred to the hydro-electric works again, as though he really has got a job there, whereas we jolly well know he hasn’t?”
“Yes, I did notice it. Very significant, child.”
“Can we believe that the island we showed him is Tannasgan?”
“No, but we can purchase a map in Inverness.”
“Have to be one of those six-inch things, then, to show anything so small. That is, they’ll show it but will they name it? I don’t know about roses by any other name, but islands are a different matter, and the motoring maps don’t show Tannasgan at all. They don’t even show Loch na Gréine, because I’ve looked. And I’ll tell you what,” added Laura. “I’m beginning to think that there may have been more people on Tannasgan, the first time I was there, than we wot of.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
Discoveries and Theories
“My virtue, wit, and heaven-help’d counsels set
Their freedoms open.”
George Chapman
* * *
IN Inverness, two days later (for they did not leave Crioch until the late afternoon, which left no time except for dinner when they arrived in the capital of the Highlands), Dame Beatrice and Laura began their search for the guesthouse in which Grant claimed to have been held prisoner. His story, on the face of it, was farcical, but, as Laura pointed out, if he had not been held by the three men, he must have been engaged in some activity of which his wife (presumably) knew nothing.
Laura had formed her own opinion of Mrs. Grant, however, and observed darkly to Dame Beatrice that she jolly well betted that, if Grant had been up to n.b.g., then Mrs. Grant knew all about it.
“As I sum her up,” she added, “she isn’t the woman to have the wool pulled over her eyes. She was clever enough with her smooth words when she had borrowed my car without leave. She’s as deep as Loch Ness, if you ask me.”
“Well, now,” said Dame Beatrice, as they crossed one of the suspension bridges which linked the islands of the River Ness, “after this pleasant constitutional (which it was a very good idea of yours that we should take), where do you suggest that we begin work?”
“You first,” said Laura. “I bet you’ve got a cut-and-dried plan.”
“Well, I thought we might try working back from the railway station to Tomnahurich Street and then rely on rule-of-thumb, so to say.”
“Fine! I can’t pretend it was just what I was going to suggest myself, because I hadn’t got further than exploring the possibilities of Ardross Street, into which he claimed that the car turned after the men had booted him out of it. Of course, I have to keep reminding myself that he may not have been speaking a word of truth all the way through. So—the station, by all means. Let’s get back to the east bank and pick up George and the car.”
At the railway station, Dame Beatrice’s first move was to purchase a copy of British Railways’ holiday guide to Scotland. She observed, as she sat in the car and turned over the pages, that it was remarkably good value for the money. Having admired the volume, she looked up in the index the list of hotels and boarding-houses in the city. Laura peered over her shoulder and
observed that it would take them “weeks to inquire into that lot.”
“We can reduce the number we need to inquire into,” Dame Beatrice pointed out. “I shall begin by supposing that Mr. Grant’s story is substantially true.”
“How can we reduce the number? I mean, obviously we can knock out the big hotels, but that still leaves an awful number of places where he might have stayed.”
“Not so many as you seem to think. The three men were staying in the house; so was Mr. Grant; so were the proprietor and, possibly, his family.”
“Ah! I get it! Number of bedrooms is of the first importance. What’s the minimum number we should look for, do you suppose?”
“I am inclined to begin with the maximum number (as given in this excellent publication), and work downwards to ray minimum number, which is three, for the proprietor would not advertise the accommodation he reserves for himself, his family, and any domestic helpers. I am, in fact, more inclined to plump for a minimum of four, as men have a prejudice against sharing a room, except with a woman. Then we can leave out any establishment which offers a service technically known to the advertisers as B.B., for, if Mr. Grant was telling the truth, all his meals were sent up to him.”
“In other words,” said Laura, “Grant was lying, so all we shall be doing is wasting our time.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Dame Beatrice. “Something may transpire. What we propose to do is really no business of ours, anyway, and it is always interesting to behave abominably.”
“Yes, so it is. Well, we seem to have ironed out quite a number of these establishments, and that’s a comfort. Where shall we begin?”
They began and ended at the first boarding-house to which they applied. Grant was well known there, was well spoken of, and had stayed for three days (unusual, this) during the dates in question. He had business interests in Leith and used the boarding-house as a pied-à-terre before setting off by rail for the Edinburgh seaport.
It was impossible to doubt the sincerity and good faith of the landlady; neither did she appear to take it amiss that she was questioned. Dame Beatrice’s story of a favourite nephew was accepted without difficulty or comment, and Grant’s home address was readily supplied and proved to be the correct one. Anything less like the haunt of thugs it was impossible to imagine, and, apart from his wild story, Grant appeared to be a respectable citizen.
My Bones Will Keep (Mrs. Bradley) Page 11
