Hamish Macbeth 06; Death of a Snob hm-6

by M C Beaton

  The detectives stolidly watched Hamish Macbeth hurtle into a hairdressing salon called ‘Binty’s Beauty Parlour’.

  “Whit’s he daein’?” asked one laconically. “How should I know?” retorted the other. “Them Highlanders are all daft. Ye cannae figure oot the way their minds work. Maybe it’s the mountains. Something tae do wi’ the altitude. It affects their brains. Maybe he wants tae look nice for the arrest and is getting his hair cut.”

  Hamish emerged carrying a paper bag and climbed back info the police car. The detective, driving, said with heavy sarcasm, “Any mair shopping you would like to do?”

  “No,” said Hamish. “Chust make it quick.”

  The detective put on the siren and off they went again. Harriet clutched Hamish’s hand hard as houses streamed past under the winking lights of the Christmas decorations. At one point, they had to swerve wildly to avoid a drunk weaving across the road. Glasgow had obviously started the New Year’s celebrations early.

  Hamish gave the detectives an outline of his investigations and Harriet could practically feel disbelief emanating from the square shoulders of the detectives in the front seat, detectives who were used to drunken murders, savage gang fights on the housing estates, but not to sophisticated rigmaroles about books.

  Fortunately, it was only a short trip to Glasgow Airport. Harriet blinked in the lights as the detectives, who obviously knew where they were going, led them along a corridor away from the staring passengers and into a room marked ‘Security’.

  And there was Jessie Maclean with a tall, weedy man sitting beside her. On a long table in front of them were their suitcases.

  Jessie turned white at the sight of Hamish, but she said nothing. “Open the suitcases,” ordered Hamish. Jessie slowly produced the keys. Hamish searched one of Jessie’s pale-blue suitcases carefully after examining the passports. Their passports, which showed they were married, had been issued only a few weeks before.

  Then he found the contract for the book and sheets of headed paper, “Jessie Maclean, Literary Agent.” He silently took Jessie’s handbag from her and tipped out the contents. In it was a banker’s draft for the money.

  Jessie glared up at him after stuffing everything back into her bag and clutching it tight. “That money’s mine,” she said. “I earned it. I wrote the book.”

  Hamish put both hands on the other side of the table and leaned forward.

  “What were you doing on Eileencraig the day Heather Todd was murdered?”

  “You’re daft!” screamed Jessie. “You all saw me arrive. You can’t keep me. Let me out of here…”

  Hamish smiled and slowly straightened up. He turned round and took the bag he had brought out of the hairdressers’ from Harriet. He turned back and opened it and edged out of the bag a handful of red hair, a wig.

  Harriet reflected dizzily that she had read of people turning green but had never seen it before that moment. Jessie’s face was an awful colour under the harsh glare of the strip lighting overhead.

  She rounded on her husband. “You stupid bastard!” she screamed. “You told me you’d burnt it.” She tried to rake his face with her nails and was dragged off, still screaming, by the detectives to a corner of the room, where she suddenly subsided into noisy sobs.

  “Well, Willie Macdonald?” demanded Hamish. “You’d better tell all or you’ll find yourself on a murder charge as well.”

  “Don’t tell him,” gulped Jessie between sobs.

  “It wisnae anything to do wi’ me,” said Willie, looking down at the table. “Jessie told me the auld bag had written a book but didnae want anyone to know about it in case it got rejected, so she asked Jessie tae type it oot and put her name down as literary agent. Jessie thought it was a right load o’ rubbish. Then she got a phone call frae New York offering her a half a million on behalf of her client. She thought the whole thing up herself. Naethin’ tae dae wi’ me. She telt’ me she killed her. She hid ootside that health farm and watched for the opportunity.”

  His thin, weak face suddenly looked up at Hamish in puzzlement. “But how did ye find the wig? I burnt it, like she said, in a bin in the garden at the back o’ her flat.”

  “And so you probably did,” said Hamish pleasantly. “This is a wig I bought at a hairdressers’ on the road here.”

  “You bastard,” whispered Jessie suddenly. “I could have got away with it.”

  One of the detectives read the charges. “We’ll take them back to headquarters and get their statements. We’d better get your statement as well, Macbeth.” He held out his hand. “Detective Sergeant Peter Sinclair, Macbeth. It’s been a pleasure watching ye work. But man, man, ye took a chance buying that wig.”

  Hamish shook hands with-him, and then, putting an arm around Harriet’s shoulders, he followed police and prisoners outside to the car.

  ≡≡≡

  When they finally emerged from police headquarters, all the city bells were ringing. A drunk reeled past, red-eyed under the street lights. “Happy New Year,” he shouted.

  “And so it is,” said Hamish. He put his arms around Harriet and held her close and bent his head to kiss her. He finally raised his head and looked down at her curiously. She was stiff in his arms and she had only endured that kiss.

  “I think,” said Harriet breathlessly, “that we should call on Diarmuid.”

  “Why?” demanded Hamish, made cross by rejection.

  “The police’ll have phoned him.”

  “Well, it’s New Year’s Eve and I have a feeling he’ll be all alone. Did you notice the times we were there that the phone did not ring once? No one calling to offer their condolences?”

  “Very well, then,” said Hamish sulkily. “But I can tell you this, Harriet. I wish he had done it.”

  They couldn’t get a cab, so Hamish went back into the police station and begged a lift in a squad car.

  As he rang Diarmuid’s doorbell and waited, hoping that the man wouldn’t answer, he wondered why Harriet had disliked that kiss. She was attracted to him, he was sure of that. He was just about to turn away, relieved, when the hall light went on and then Diarmuid answered the door. He was wearing pale-blue silk pyjamas and a white satin dressing-gown with his initials monogrammed in gold on one pocket.

  “Hamish and Harriet,” he exclaimed. “How good of you to come. This is a terrible business. A terrible business. The police told me about it.”

  “Have you no one with you?” asked Harriet as they followed him up the stairs and into the sitting-room. Diarmuid litthe gas fire. “No,” he said. “It’s with it being New Year’s Eve. I phoned a few people but they were all busy. Can you tell me about it, Hamish? All I got from the police was that Jessie had murdered my wife and that they would be calling on me in the morning to take a statement.”

  Hamish sat down. He looked curiously at Harriet, a question in his eyes. She flushed slightly and looked away.

  “It’s like this,” said Hamish in a flat voice. “Your wife wrote a steamy romance…”

  “Heather? She never would!”

  “I don’t think she thought of it as popular writing,” said Harriet. “She probably set out to write a literary novel and that’s the way it came out. She must have read an awful lot of that kind of book, and with enjoyment, too. You can’t really write what you don’t like to read.” – Diarmuid put a finger to his brow and frowned. Does the man never stop acting? thought Hamish angrily.

  “She did read a lot of them,” he volunteered, “but it was because she said she was writing a speech to give to the Workers’ Party on decadence and the decline of moral standards in popular fiction.”

  What had Heather really been like under all that political pose? wondered Harriet. She must have needed a fantasy life to read and enjoy and absorb so many sexy romances.

  “Anyway,” said Hamish, anxious to get this visit over with quickly, “the police telephoned the owner of The Highland Comfort this evening. Jessie, padded out and wearing a red wig, just walked in a
bout two weeks before the murder. She said she wanted a working holiday and he was glad to get her. No, he didn’t ask for her employment card. He told the police that Jessie had told him her employment card was being sent on. He said Jane had spoiled things for him by paying high wages. He paid abysmal wages, as it turned out, so the island women who used to work for him preferred to wait until the season started and work for Jane.”

  “What name did Jessie use when she was working there?” asked Harriet.

  “That’s where I could kick myself,” said Hamish ruefully. “She went under the name of Fiona Stuart, Heather’s pseudonym.

  “She said she didn’t mean to murder Heather. She had some idea that if she told Heather, they could split the proceeds fifty-fifty, and she meant to suggest to her that they didn’t let Diarmuid know. On her afternoon off, she hid behind that pillbox and saw us all coming out. Then she saw Heather and you, Diarmuid, having that row and Heather stalking off on her own. She followed her and when she considered they were both far enough away from the health farm, she caught up with her. Heather was amazed to see the efficient secretary, rising, it seemed, out of the moorland, wearing a red wig and with her cheeks and figure padded out.

  “They walked together towards the west coast and that crag, and as they went, Jessie told Heather about her plan to split the proceeds. Heather was very excited, elated. She said her book was a literary work of art. She babbled on about possible lecture tours in the States. Jessie interrupted at last by asking her if they had a deal. Heather looked at her in surprise and said of course they hadn’t a deal.

  “Jessie then asked bitterly if she could at least depend on her agent’s fee of fifteen per cent. Heather sneered that Jessie was nothing but a little secretary and was paid well for her duties and there was no need for her to get greedy. By this time she was standing on that crag. She looked out to sea and began to talk again about how famous she would be.

  “Jessie said she suddenly thought of all the drudgery, all the work she had done for Heather, and she saw red. She saw a large, sharp rock lying on the ground at her feet. She picked it up and smashed it into the side of Heather’s neck. Heather fell down on that little beach and lay still. Jessie threw the rock into the sea and ran all the way back to the hotel and waited until she heard the news next day that Heather’s body had been found. She phoned you, Diarmuid, saying she was in Glasgow and you told her about Heather and she offered to come up. She was working in the bar that night and that was where you phoned to Angus Macleod to ask him to go and pick up Jessie. Jessie then approached Angus and said she was fed up with the hotel and wanted to leave, and as he was going to Oban anyway, he could take her.

  “Once in Oban, she went to lodgings she had already hired and packed up the wig and the padding. Now the thing is, I do not think the murder was unpremeditated, because she had all the business papers and copies of Heather’s will and insurance in a case already with her. All she had to do was travel back with Angus and then act the part of perfect secretary.”

  “Did her husband put her up to it?” asked Harriet.

  “Husband? What husband?” demanded Diarmuid.

  “She had married a criminal, Willie Macdonald,” said Hamish. “He had just got out of prison after serving a sentence for defrauding the company he had worked for as an accountant. He would know about cashing bank drafts and everything like that. But no, Jessie was the sole planner of the whole thing.”

  “Goodness,” said Diarmuid weakly, “and to think I have had a murderess working for me!”

  Suddenly he leaned forward and said eagerly, “Heather left me everything in her will. Of course, up till now ‘everything’ was nothing but debts. Will I get the money for the book?”

  Hamish looked at him with distaste. “Oh, yes,” he said.

  “And although all this publicity will be very painful,” put in Harriet, “it should help sales immensely.”

  Diarmuid rubbed his hands. “Just wait till I tell my friends.”

  “Yes, now you’ve money, you’ll probably see them all again,” said Hamish cynically, but Diarmuid wasn’t listening.

  He crossed to the bar. “Well,” he said cheerfully, “this does call for a celebration.”

  Hamish felt he had had enough. “No, we must go. Coming, Harriet?”

  Harriet stood up reluctantly. Hamish was going to ask her questions she didn’t want to answer.

  They walked silently together to their hotel. This time, Hamish followed Harriet into her room and looked down at her seriously. “I am not in the way of making passes when I think they will not be welcome,” said Hamish. “So what happened?”

  “Sit down, Hamish,” said Harriet. Hamish sat on the edge of the bed and she sat beside him and took one of his hands in hers.

  “I’m to blame.” Harriet looked up at him and there was the glitter of tears in her large grey eyes. “I was…I am attracted to you. I should have let you know before, but it, was all so exciting, the murder investigation, I mean.”

  “Let me know what?”

  “I am engaged to be married, My future husband, Neil, is an officer in the British Army. He’s due back from Hong Kong.”

  Hamish removed his hand. “When?”

  “In London, tomorrow. I’m travelling down on the morning plane.”

  “You might have let me know,” said Hamish stiffly. “Oh, Hamish…”

  He rose. “I, too, will leave in the morning,” he said without looking at her. “Thank you for all your generosity and help.”

  “Hamish…”

  But he walked out and closed the door behind him.

  He went to his room and set the alarm in case he slept in. He would catch the train to Edinburgh in the morning and from there take the train to Inverness. He lay down on the bed, fully dressed, and tried not to feel like a fool.

  And then the phone beside his ear rang sharp and insistent. He reached out and picked it up.

  “Hamish!” came Priscilla Halburton-Smythe’s voice.

  “Priscilla.” He sat up.

  “I’ve been phoning and phoning,” cried Priscilla. “Where have you been?”

  “Out. It’s a long story. What’s wrong?”

  “I just wanted to wish you a Happy New Year.”

  “Oh, aye, Happy New Year, Priscilla. Still with my folks?”

  “No, back at the hotel. Towser’s here. He’s fine but missing you. I had the best Christmas ever. When do you get back?”

  “I’m catching the Inverness train from Edinburgh tomorrow. I’ll be in Inverness just after eight. I’ll probably stay the night with my friends, Iain and Biddy, out at Torgormack, and then catch the sprinter in the morning.”

  There was a silence and then Priscilla said, “I’ll come and fetch you if you like. Tomorrow. At Inverness station.”

  “That would be grand, Priscilla.”

  There was another silence.

  Then Priscilla’s voice, sharp and anxious. “What’s up, Hamish?”

  “It wass the end of a murder inquiry,” said Hamish. “I feel flat. I’ll tell you all about it when I see you.”

  “How come you are staying at such an expensive hotel? Glasgow police being generous?”

  “No, I’ll tell you about that as well. I’d better get some sleep.”

  “All right, Hamish. Goodbye.”

  Priscilla slowly replaced the receiver. Something had happened to Hamish Macbeth and she was sure it was nothing to do with the murder case he had been on.

  ∨ Death of a Snob ∧

  8

  Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person.

  —MARK TWAIN

  The tinny alarm bell shrilled in Hamish’s ear and he started up. He had fallen asleep still dressed, and he felt hot and dirty. He had a shower and changed and then went along to Harriet’s room and tapped on the door.

  He felt he had behaved very badly. She had not thrown herself at him. He had read too much
into simple friendliness and he had no right to be angry with her.

  There was no reply to his knock and all at once he knew she had left. He looked at his watch. Seven in the morning.

  He went down to the reception desk. The night porter, still on duty, answered his query by saying that, yes, she had left. There was a letter for him. Hamish glanced at it. He could not bear to read it and shoved it into his pocket.

  He had breakfast and then packed and made his way to the station to catch the Edinburgh train, stopping off on the way to buy a bottle of perfume for Priscilla. He felt he should have gone to visit his relatives and stayed with them in Glasgow for another night, but could not bring himself to do so. Before boarding the train, he bought the morning papers.

  The news of the arrest of Jessie and her husband had occurred too late for the first editions. He wondered if he would be mentioned in the later editions and then decided, probably not. Glasgow police would take the credit, not out of vanity, but simply to avoid long-winded explanations to the press about how some holidaying Highland copper came to solve the mystery.

  He had had very little sleep and nodded off, only waking when a shout of ‘Waverly, next stop!’ heralded his arrival in Edinburgh.

  A group raising money for famine relief were singing Christmas carols in a corner of the station. It seemed almost indecent to hear Christmas carols in the new year.

  Hamish lugged his travelling-bag to the Inverness train. Every seat was taken and he had to stand as far as Stirling. When he was finally seated, he remembered Harriet’s letter and reluctantly pulled it out.

  Dear Hamish,

  ≡

  Do not think too badly of me. I should have told you at the beginning that I was engaged. It was all my fault. I am sorry our great adventure had to end this way and please don’t feel too badly rejected. Think of me sometimes. I shall certainly never forget you.

  Love, Harriet.

  He shrugged and put the letter back in his pocket. As the towns slid past on the road to the north, Perth, Blair Atholl, Dalwhinnie, Kingussie, Aviemore, he felt the whole business receding. Eileencraig with Jane and her health farm, Geordie and his truck seemed a million miles away. He wondered briefly if Jane and John Wetherby would remarry.