by Alan Hunter
What I wanted to know but didn’t was how long after Earle Alex had left. Pitlochry was seventy miles on from Stirling, but that was only an hour-and-a-half’s driving time.
‘How soon were you on the road the next morning?’
‘Around nine a.m. I overslept.’
‘Then you drove straight through. By Lairg.’
‘It was another couple of hundred miles.’
‘But no sign of Alex.’
‘I told you, fella. And I surely would have seen him. You can see that road for miles and there was damn-all traffic. Alex drives a white MGB.’
I nodded and sipped coffee. But I made a note to get a precise timetable from Alex. When the journey times had run each other so close I wanted a very clear picture of what had happened. Another point occurred to me. On his way north Alex would have passed Blockford. He could very well have picked up his mother and taken her with him to this critical confrontation. Why didn’t he? Was it so important that he overtook Earle, or arrived along with him?
‘What time did you get to Kyleness?’
‘I’m not sure. That goddamn road seems to go on for ever. It was around three or four p.m. You have to drive slowly over the last part.’
‘You went straight to James Mackenzie’s house.’
Earle nodded. It’s a big stone house looking over the bay. I guess I went in there like a madman. I don’t feel proud of the way I behaved. The old man opened the door. He’s a hell of a character. I shoved him aside and bawled for Anne. Then his wife and his daughter-in-law came out, and the old man poked me one on the jaw. Then Anne came. She was paler than a ghost. We stood there staring at each other.’
Earle drew hard on the Manikin.
‘But you did get to talk to her.’
He nodded again. ‘We got round to it. I guess the old man could see how things were, he shoved the lot of us into the parlour. Anne was crying. The two women were comforting her. The old man was taking it all in. I was carrying on that I loved her and that I was going to marry her and that I wouldn’t shift from there until she said yes. But she wouldn’t say yes. She just cried. Then she said she couldn’t and I knew why. And I said I loved her and I didn’t care why and I knew she loved me. She went on crying.’ He stabbed the Manikin in Sinclair’s ashtray. ‘But she did, she did love me. I knew it as soon as we set eyes on each other. Nothing had changed. Anne loved me.
‘Then what makes you think it has changed since?’
His head sank. ‘What happened on the cliff.’
‘She’d forgive you that.’
‘I wouldn’t want her to forgive me. That would mean she still thought I was guilty.’
‘Listen, Earle,’ I said. ‘You must give her a chance. I’m told she was hysterical after it happened. You wouldn’t have been so very coherent yourself. You can’t insist on Anne’s being superhuman.’
‘She didn’t believe in me.’
‘You had better stop blaming her.’
He gave me a quick, wounded look. Then he shrugged weakly. ‘I guess you’re right. Me being unfair isn’t going to help any.’
‘Get on with what happened at the Mackenzies’.’
He reached for his cup with a sulky expression. He took a couple of slow mouthfuls, his eyes distant and resenting.
‘She ran out of the room.’
‘That doesn’t surprise me.’
‘The daughter-in-law went with her. Then the grandmother began to scold me. She was laying it on hot and strong. But the old boy suddenly turned on her like a devil out of hell. He ordered her out too. She didn’t say another word.’
‘James Mackenzie is a man of decision.’
‘You don’t have to tell me that. After she’d gone he stood staring at me as though he could see clear through my skull. Then he went to a cupboard in the wall and poured a couple of noggins of Scotch. He gave me one. We touched glasses. He came out with something fierce in what I took to be Gaelic.’
‘I think you were being honoured.’
Earle grimaced. ‘It sounded more like a curse to me. But I’ll tell you this, it fetched me up short. I was as quiet as a lamb after that. “So you’re the Canadian laddie,” he said. “The young man that Anne has set her heart on. Well, you have left it a bit late, my mannie” – I can’t do his crazy accent. I told him that I hadn’t known where Anne was, that her people had kept it from me. “Aye, it will be that Verna,” he said, and it surely sounded like he thought she should drop dead. He frowned and grumbled for a while. “So what will you be doing about it?” he said. “You’re Anne’s man, that’s certain, but you have not been acting very clever.” I told him that I was going to marry her and that nothing would stop me. “Aye, but the lassie may stop you,” he said. “She has got the pride of the family in her, and she will not thole bringing you another man’s bairn. More like she will listen to yon cunning fellow, and that in despite of herself and you. So if you are her man you had best behave like it and take the old way with the matter.” I must have gaped at him. “What’s the old way?” “Ach, laddie,” he said. “Can you be so thick? You will just be for running this Fortuny out of town, and making dooms certain that he never comes back.” ’
Earle paused, his brows knitting and his bruised hands slowly opening and closing. He glanced at me. I guessed what he was thinking: that he was opening up rather naively to a man who was also a policeman. I smiled faintly.
‘It can’t be hid that you thumped him. Your motive for doing it was never in doubt. If you didn’t kill him you had better tell me everything. That’s the only way I can be of help.’
He nodded doubtfully. ‘It’s a hell of a good case. I’m not being bright to make it a better one.’
‘It rests with you. You know what happened.’
He drew a long breath and jutted out his lips.
‘Well, you can take it how you like. But that’s what old Mackenzie said to me. And I guess it doesn’t make any odds because I was going to bash that louse anyway. But somehow it gave me a good feeling to have the old man on my side. He’s a great lad. It wasn’t his fault that things turned out the way they did.’ Earle sent me another look.
‘Did James Mackenzie help you to set up this encounter with Fortuny?’
Earle hunched a shoulder. ‘Maybe he did. He didn’t want the ruckus going on at the family hotel.’
‘This is important, Earle. Did James Mackenzie choose the place where you were to meet?’
‘All right, he did. But he wasn’t there. It was just Fortuny and myself.’
‘How did he do it?’
‘He rang Fortuny. Told him Anne was ready to make a decision. Told him to walk down to the house. Told him that someone was coming to meet him. Then he sent me up the road and told me to wait in the bend. There was room there to have it out and nobody would see us or interrupt us.’
‘I take it that the hotel is outside the village.’
‘You pass the hotel coming in. The road runs along beside a big sea loch, then it takes this turn down to the village. The Mackenzie house is up on a slope a few hundred yards from the bend. I had plenty of time to get there after the old man had made his call.’
‘Did you pass anyone on the way.’
‘No. There may have been someone at the quay.’
‘Is that far away?’
‘It’s right down below there. About half a mile, if you follow the road.’
‘Do you pass any houses or buildings?’
‘The ground slopes straight down to the quay. You’re climbing up a gradient towards the bend and the road there is cut through the rock.’
‘So nobody saw you going there.’
‘I guess they didn’t, unless they watched me from the house.’
I nodded. ‘Go on from there. You were first to arrive at the bend.’
Earle shifted position a little. ‘Well, I had to wait for about five minutes. It’s a queer sort of place. They’ve blasted a lot of rock to give room for two vehicles to pass each other.
On the seaward side there are big splinter pillars, then further round a low wall. Down below the sea is pounding the rocks and all the time it echoes in the bend.’
‘Didn’t that seem a dangerous spot for a fight?’
He shook his head. ‘I’m describing it badly. It’s on a gradient. The wide part is down in the rocks, away from the cliff edge.’
‘And that’s where you waited – down there.’
His eyes were steady. ‘That’s where.’
‘You didn’t go further up, anticipating Fortuny?’
‘I didn’t do that. I waited below.’
‘Carry on.’
‘I heard him whistling. I guess he was thinking he had it made. He was whistling Bonnie Dundee – Fortuny was that sort of a ham. Then he came round the shoulder of the rock. He was prancing along like a Boy Scout. He was grinning all over his face. A moment later he saw me.’
‘Where was he when he saw you?’
‘About thirty yards off.’
‘Did you start towards him?’
‘I swear I didn’t. I just kept standing down there in the bend. We were never near the cliff edge at any time.’
Now there was a gleam of sweat on his forehead and his eyes were not on me. That didn’t mean he was lying. A liar will often stare at you, trying to compel you to believe what he says. But a man who is telling truth that he thinks you won’t credit finds it difficult to meet your eye. The disbelief he expects to find there is too crushing. He would sooner not witness your condemnation.
‘He came down to you.’
‘He stopped. He went on whistling a few bars. He kept grinning. He was acting like he was amused to find me there. I didn’t know what to do about it. You can’t walk up to a man who is grinning at you and take a poke at him. And suddenly it struck me like hell that I might have got it wrong, that he really loved Anne, and she him. That’s all balls, and I know it now. But it was what came over me at the time.’ He jerked a hand across his moist brow. ‘He came on down. He was smiling as though he were meeting his best friend. He said something like “Fancy meeting you here”.’ Earle touched his bruised cheek. ‘Then the bloody skunk hit me.’
‘He hit you?’
‘He hit me. He just smiled in my face and hit me. Like he was doing me the biggest favour. He bloody near knocked my head off.’
His eyes jumped to mine now and there was no questioning the sincerity of their indignation. Fortuny had played it dirty to the last; which slotted into the character I had of him.
‘And then the knife came out,’ I suggested casually.
Earle’s eyes widened. ‘But there never was one.’
‘After he hit you he drew a knife. Fortuny didn’t want to tangle with you.’
‘But he didn’t have a knife.’
‘Then it was your knife.’ I said. ‘It jerked out of your pocket when he hit you and Fortuny snatched it up.’
Earle’s eyes were rimmed with white. ‘That’s – crazy nonsense!’
‘You had better tell me which way it was. There’s no doubt about the knife. Fortuny had stab wounds. It’s simply a question of how the knife came into it.’
Earle jumped to his feet. ‘Fella, I’m telling you—!’
‘Sit down,’ I said coolly. ‘Don’t get excited. A knife was used, that’s on the record. All we have to do is to explain it.’
‘But I’m telling you for ever, there wasn’t—!’
‘Denying it is simply holding us up. We can’t change the facts. But we can try to understand them. We must know if the knife was his or yours.’
Earle leaned on his fists on the desk, panting. ‘Christ, I thought you were my friend!’ he burst out. ‘You’re not. You’re just another rotten policeman. You’ve come to nail me with the knife like all the rest. You’re a bloody Judas, that’s what you are. You’re lower even than Sinclair. Nobody can have a policeman for a friend. It’s like trying to chum up with a rattlesnake.’
I smiled up at him. ‘No knife.’
‘For the umpteenth bloody time – no!’
‘Then we seem to have settled that.’
He dropped back on his chair. ‘You bastard,’ he said ‘You unspeakable bastard.’
I let him glare at me for a while. I thought I had the truth about the knife. And the truth about the knife was, by corollary, the truth about Earle’s story. If Earle hadn’t stabbed Fortuny then it was unlikely that he had thrown him over the cliff; the way was clear for a third person hypothesis. That was what the knife was telling us now. Earle gave a snort.
‘You look so damned complacent. You’re like a kid who’s swiped some candy.’
‘I was thinking that if Fortuny had been sensible he would have gone on his way after landing that punch.’
‘Well, he didn’t. And do you know why?’
‘He wanted to put paid to you, too. If he thrashed the daylights out of you, you’d be in no shape to interfere.’
Earle scowled. ‘He came in after me. I’d gone down among the rocks. I guess he was trying to do that fool flop-act that fight-arrangers teach these mugs. So I stuck my knee in his guts. That kept him quiet till my head had cleared. Then when I got up he tried to wrestle me and hit me inside. That was hurting. He was a strong monkey. I had to break out of the clinch. I poked my fingers into his eyes and made him let go. That’s when I had him.’
‘I take it that Fortuny wasn’t a boxer.’
‘He was just a rough-houser. Once I stood off I could hit him. And fella, I hit him. I put together punches that I never knew I had. He kept rushing me with roundhouse swings and trying to poke his skull in my face, but I was never there, I was all round him, I was picking him off from all the angles.’
‘It was just you and him.’
Earle broke off to stare. ‘What are you getting at now?’
‘While this was going on you were quite alone. Nobody was watching you from round the corner.’
He hesitated. ‘Are you saying they were?’
‘I am asking for your impressions.’
He looked blank. ‘I’m giving you my impressions. They were all tied up with busting Fortuny.’
‘Carry on then.’
He paused again, to continue with less bravado. ‘I punched that louse around and he scarcely laid a fist on me. I guess it went on for five minutes. He was getting blown and punched out. He was coming in with his hands lower and his chin hanging out like a line of washing. So I hit it; a right hook. He was cold before he reached the deck.’
‘Which way did he fall?’
‘He fell against the rocks and rolled over on to his face.’
‘Did you touch him after that?’
‘Like hell I did. By then I needed a breather myself. But he was alive, I can tell you that. He was out cold but he was breathing. And he was yards away from the cliff edge, so he couldn’t have come to and rolled himself over.’
‘How long did you remain there after the knock-out?’
‘I stood a minute getting my breath.’
‘You heard or saw nothing that suggested a witness.’
Earle shook his head. ‘It was just me and him.’
‘You realize how important that is.’
‘I surely realize it. If it wasn’t me then it was someone else.’
‘Fortuny was unlikely to have been unconscious for very long.’
‘I’m sorry, fella. I saw nobody.’
Which was provoking. It would have been a significant step if I could have established my third person’s presence. I tried to visualize all that Earle had told me about the configuration of the spot. The time element was critical. It was a fair hypothesis that the killer had arrived while Fortuny was unconscious. He would have come upon him as Earle described and plunged his knife into Fortuny’s exposed back. Then, with Fortuny still unconscious, and perhaps seemingly dead, he had hauled him to the parapet and dumped him over. The killer must have been very close during the fight. But until I had actually seen the place I could get no furth
er.
‘When you talk of a minute is that about what you mean?’
Earle shrugged. ‘I didn’t put a stopwatch on it. But I guess it wasn’t any more. I just got my wind back and left.’
‘You returned directly to the Mackenzie house.’
‘Sure.’
‘Did you meet or see anyone on the way?’
‘Not that I remember. But you can see a long way, so there may have been people who I didn’t notice. I met old Mackenzie standing at his gate. I guess he was keen to know how I’d made out. He looked me over, weighing up the damage, then he slapped me on the back and said I’d do brawly.’
‘Who else was watching out for you?’
‘His wife was in the porch. Anne and the daughter-in-law stood at a window.’
‘Those were all the people you had seen at the house.’
‘Well, there was the maid. I saw her later.’
‘But no other men.’
Earle’s shoulder twitched. ‘Not till the son came in with the news.’
‘How soon was that?’
He frowned. ‘It couldn’t have been more than half an hour afterwards. They took me into the parlour and gave me whisky and the old lady and the maid bathed my bruises. I was shaky. The old man was bubbling over. Anne just sat looking pale and staring at me. I wanted to talk to her, but I couldn’t. I guess I was somehow feeling ashamed. I wanted to grab her and hold her tight but I just couldn’t get out a word. I felt that what I’d done had altered everything and that I could only wait till she made her move.’ He wet his lips. ‘The son came in. He gave me a queer look. He said: “There’s a body down the cliff. I’ve got the men going after it. It looks like Fortuny.” Nobody said anything for a moment.’ Earle turned his face aside. ‘Anne jumped up. She shouted: “Oh lord, you’ve killed him!” They all looked at me. And I couldn’t speak.’
‘That was a natural reaction.’
‘They believed I’d done it, fella. Especially Anne.’
‘But you would have thought the same if you had been one of them. It’s the first conclusion you would have jumped to. The news was a shock. These people feared for you. Anne’s fear was stronger than the rest.’
‘I wanted the ground to open.’
