Gently with Love

by Alan Hunter

  ‘She was terrified for you. You might have put yourself in deadly jeopardy. And she was conscious of being in part to blame. Her first reaction was inevitable.’

  He sat hunched over the chair. ‘That was the worst moment. I never, never want to live it again. I don’t care who believes what now. She believed it then. She’ll never be certain.’

  I gave up. The experience was probably still too close for Earle to begin to see it objectively. It was perhaps just as well that his arrest had prevented him from attempting an éclaircissement with Anne. Clearly he was shaping a grudge against her. He needed time to understand that it was unjust. Her cry had come from her fear; she had not been disloyal. She would find bitter enough censure in her own thoughts.

  ‘You would have been too absorbed in your own emotions to notice the reactions of the others in greater detail.’

  He chewed his lip. ‘So maybe I didn’t. I guess you’ve never been accused of murder.’

  ‘What was James Mackenzie’s attitude?’

  ‘The devil knows.’

  ‘Did he express regret at getting you into a jam?’

  ‘He said something about it being no canny and that we’d best watch out what we said to the pollis.’

  ‘And Iain Mackenzie?’

  ‘He said he’d rung the police. He said he’d warned the men to keep their mouths shut.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About me, I guess. Everyone seemed to know what had happened.’

  ‘Iain Mackenzie knew it.’

  ‘He acted like he did. Nobody had to give him any explanations. When he came in he was looking round for me. I guess they have bush-telegraph up there.’

  They would also have the common, everyday telephone: I made a note to check if there was one on the quay.

  ‘What happened then?’

  ‘Well, Iain Mackenzie bolted out again, and the rest of us followed him. A lot of other people were running up the road from the village. At the top of the cliff there was a crowd. The fishermen had set up a tripod with a block. They had lowered a man down to the rocks and he was fixing a bowline round the body.’

  ‘They were Mackenzie’s men?’

  ‘I guess so. The trawler was moored down at the quay. Iain Mackenzie was giving orders and leaning over shouting to the man below. They attached a steadying line to the body to stop it swinging as it came up. They were just pulling it over the wall when the police car arrived.’

  ‘Where were you?’

  ‘I was leaning against the rocks, looking green.’

  ‘Who spoke to the policeman?’

  ‘The old man principally, with the son putting in a word. And Alex, of course.’

  I paused. ‘Alex?’

  ‘He was up there on the cliff. I guess he had just arrived. He would have seen the crowd and left his car along the road.’

  ‘Did he speak to you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘What was he saying to the police?’

  ‘I didn’t hear. Perhaps about Fortuny. He could tell them more about him than anyone.’

  ‘Anne was with Alex?’

  ‘She was near him. She was crying and carrying on about it being her fault. So of course the policemen began to take an interest. I guess Alex had filled them in on the situation.’ He drew one of his deep sighs. ‘I hadn’t dared to go over to her, I could feel it would only provoke an outburst, but suddenly that seemed just crazy, I had to be there, to be beside Anne, to stand up with her. And when that red-haired copper started to bully her something clicked. I couldn’t help it.’

  ‘You went across and hit him.’

  Earle hung his head. ‘That was the end. They took me in.’

  ‘You did knock his tooth out.’

  He nodded. ‘I heard the next morning in the Sheriff’s Court. But fella, that was nothing. They were on to me directly. I don’t know who spilled the dirt. It didn’t seem to matter, not with Anne turned against me. So I just told them what they wanted to know.’

  I made a face. ‘Did you have legal advice?’

  ‘I saw the duty solicitor when I went to court.’

  ‘But that would have been after you’d made your statement.’

  ‘What’s the difference? I was going to get if off my chest anyway.’

  I was silent. We had talked it to a standstill, and yet still there seemed something to be asked, some seminal question the answer to which would produce a glint of illumination. But I could not devise it. I had, I was sure, as clear a picture as Earle could give me. I believed he had withheld nothing from me, or nothing I had asked, or that his common sense had prompted. And yet my instinct was uneasy. I felt I had not got to grips with the problem. I was seeing more and more of the surface but I was not convinced that I had got far beneath it. I have learned to respect premonitions of this kind because I have often found them to be preludes to a breakthrough, but though I tinkered with the present one it yielded no inspiration and I was left merely to acknowledge it in my mental notes. I threw out a last feeler.

  ‘Is there anything else you think I should know?’

  His grey eyes met mine uncertainly; there was a flush on his bruised face. ‘You’ll be talking to Anne, won’t you?’

  I had tensed slightly; now I relaxed. ‘We shall be in Kyleness this evening. I will be happy to take a message.’

  ‘Do you think I killed him?’

  ‘No.’

  His eyes dropped. ‘Thanks. You had better forget how I sounded off. I’m goddamn lucky to have you bother with me.

  ‘I don’t think Anne will need to be told.’

  ‘But you’ll tell her, George – you will tell her.’

  I nodded. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘I’m not worth her old boots. But tell her I love her.’

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  I RANG THE bell and the constable entered to escort Earle back to his cell. When Sinclair reappeared he was carrying a fresh tray on which was a pot of tea. I made to vacate the comfortable chair, but he nodded me to keep seated. He poured the tea, sat, and lit his pipe; there was a lurking gleam in his eye.

  ‘That was a most perceptive session you just had.’

  I sipped my tea and said nothing. It had never occurred to me that my interview with Earle would not be eavesdropped. Between the office and reception there was a hatch; I had watched it silently, imperceptibly open. It had remained ajar about half an inch and I thought that once I had heard the scuffle of a pencil. Then it had as silently closed again when I pressed the button on the desk. The next thing that happened to Earle after I left would be a rigorous amending of his statement.

  ‘Aye,’ Sinclair mused. ‘A Judas he calls you. That was an unkind thing to be saying. And you twisting his arm out of pure benevolence. I fear the laddie has an uncharitable nature.’

  ‘I trust your monitoring arrangement was adequate.’

  ‘I heard every word.’ Sinclair drew on his pipe. ‘And may I say it was an object lesson. It deserved to be recorded for the edification of the ignorant. But your theory’s gone, man. You could not fetch in the knife. We are no further forward than when I last sat here. I will allow that you drew out more detail, but that’s just embroidery without the knife.’

  I sipped tea. ‘The knife came in later.’

  ‘Aye, I was certain you would say so. But there again we have a hypothesis in no way supported by a fact.’

  ‘You still believe that Sambrooke is lying?’

  His eyes twinkled. ‘I have not said that. And if you will have the precise truth of the matter, I have not much doubted the laddie from the start.’

  I stared. ‘You didn’t give that impression.’

  His big mouth hoisted into a grin. ‘I was not exactly for putting my cards on the table – not till I had seen what the Englishman was up to.’

  I sipped more tea. ‘And now you know it?’

  ‘Now I know it I’m placed in a queer sort of quandary. I have a notion that you could be a great help to me.
But I’m not that sure of the wisdom of asking you.’

  ‘You mean you don’t trust me.’

  ‘Ach no, I would not put it just like that!’

  ‘But I do have bias.’

  ‘I ken you’re a policeman. I can count upon you on the article of duty.’

  He puffed solemnly, and I sipped. I thought I could guess what he was after. He removed his pipe a couple of times, but then replaced it and continued smoking. At last he reached for his neglected cup and took a long, cautious sip.

  ‘How well do you know these Mackenzies? I’m thinking you will not have seen so much of them.’

  ‘I knew the son, Colin. I met the others at his wedding.’

  ‘You have not visited Kyleness before?’

  ‘I have never been further north than Edinburgh.’

  ‘That’s a sad thing to be admitting, man.’

  ‘I must confess to a narrow education.’

  He drew a few more wary puffs. ‘You will not be exactly close to them, then. In fact, if the downright truth is spoken, you are a stranger both to them and the country.’

  I allowed a nod.

  ‘But you’ll be welcome, I’m thinking. A man like you at a time like this. And they’ll not forget you were a friend of the son’s, and stood his man when he was wed.’

  ‘They impressed me as warm-hearted people.’

  ‘Aye, they are, and none more so. But a good friend can be a bad enemy, and that’s a lesson you may learn hereaways. Where you are going is a far country. There was never coach or train seen there. It is a place at the end of a chancy road and a long twenty miles from the next habitation. On Tuesdays and Fridays there is a mail-bus, but it ceases to run with the first snow. After that it’s by boat or helicopter that folks come and go from Kyleness. And this you ken. The Mackenzies have lived there since the days of the Union and before. There is not a fisherman or crofter in Kyleness that is not a Mackenzie or calls them cousin. They own the land, they own the Biggins, they own a braw new modern trawler. It is Mackenzie’s Kingdom out there, man, down to the last tile of peat.’

  He drew hard on his pipe: his eyes behind it were assessing me. I helped myself to some more of the tea and kept my face a complete blank. Sinclair whirled his large hand.

  ‘Take it from our point of view, now. We get this phone call from Iain Mackenzie to say there is a body at the foot of the cliff. We send a car, and what do we find? We find Iain Mackenzie along with his crew – they are hauling the body up the cliff – it’s hot, it has not been dead for an hour. And who should have found it? Just this same Iain, coming up alone from his boat in the harbour – though it might well have waited there for the hoodies if he had not strayed a little from the path. And who is the culprit? Nobody kens that has the surname of Mackenzie. It was but the greeting of the lassie that put our hands on Sambrooke’s shoulder.’

  ‘Then you think they knew.’

  ‘You heard the laddie. It was a point you were bringing out yourself. Iain kent him, who had never seen him, and kent he was back from a punch-up with Fortuny. It was all round the town – aye, and before Sambrooke ever threw a punch. There was not a soul that day in Kyleness who kentna a fight was going on in the turn.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Now listen to this. I have not been backward in making inquiries. I can tell you that Fortuny was gravely misliked for what he was doing up in Kyleness. He was the father of the child – fine. He had a right to seek to do the honest thing. He had a right to be admitted to the house and to represent himself to the lassie. But the lassie could not stand him, and he took no heed of it. He took no heed of hints from the family. And he gave a deal of deadly offence with his speak-me-fair-stab-my-back southron manners.’ Sinclair took an emphatic puff. ‘And this is what is going through my mind. I am thinking that whether Sambrooke came here or stayed in London, Fortuny might have finished up at the foot of a cliff.’

  He stared at me fiercely, with smoke trickling from his nostrils. I conceded the compliment of a shrug. I could sense that it required no small resolution to broach such a theory to one like myself.

  It had come to that stage.’

  ‘Aye, so I read it. And mark this – the trawler was back there that day. It had been away fishing the whole week before and was lying at Ullapool the previous night.’

  ‘James Mackenzie recalled it.’

  ‘Doesna that fit, man? If there was anything afoot it called for Iain. And just that afternoon he tied up there, him and his close-mouthed, hard-drinking crew. And if you’re looking for knives you need go no further – you ken of your own knowledge how it is with fishermen.’

  ‘But meanwhile Sambrooke had arrived.’

  ‘And you heard how the old man handled that. If Jack Solomons himself had been biding at Kyleness he could not have promoted a fight better. And I have a passable notion why, apart from Fortuny getting a drubbing. It was that if anything unco should happen to Fortuny, Sambrooke for one would be keeping his mouth shut. Well, it did not work out quite so. We nabbed Sambrooke and took him hostage. I have no doubt that they wish to see the laddie cleared, but bear in mind that it will not be at any price. First the Mackenzies look after their own – that’s the way of the world at Kyleness.’

  I kept every expression out of my face. ‘And this is where you think I can help you.’

  Sinclair’s head weaved. ‘You have a privileged position there. And you are not the man to let it slip.’

  ‘With me they won’t be so close-mouthed.’

  ‘Aye, it’s a credible proposition.’

  ‘They will take me for a friend.’

  ‘You’ll pass fine.’

  ‘But meanwhile, I shall be reporting to you.’

  He gave me a long, long look; then rose abruptly and went to the window. For a while he stood stiffly, with his back to me, staring out at the rainswept street. He turned suddenly.

  ‘Well – very well. You’re still for playing it like a careful mannie. And no doubt you are right. Putting other things aside, it is not a reasonable matter for me to be asking. And yet . . .’, he came back to his chair, and there was a twinkle in his eye, ‘and yet I am thinking that you may not entirely have got a grip of what I’m after.’

  I continued wooden. ‘You want me to inform on them.’

  He shook his head. ‘That’s not just the way of it. But I am for sewing this business up on the easiest terms that come to hand.’ He leaned closer. ‘You want Sambrooke out of it. That is precisely for what I am asking. Just a shred of reasonable doubt, and we’ll let it hang at Mackay’s tooth.’

  I held his eyes. ‘You won’t press charges?’

  ‘Man, do I have to spell it out for you? If this affair is Mackenzie business we shall never get near to pressing charges. We have no evidence and there will be no confessions. It will just stay comfortable and circumstantial. We can maybe hazard a canny guess, but nothing the Sheriff will take two looks at.’

  ‘What about the press?’

  ‘Never fear the press. The press about here are douce bodies. There’s a rumour going round that the death was an accident – I kenna exactly how it took the air.’

  I couldn’t help smiling a little at that. Sinclair seized on my change of expression.

  ‘Then you’ll do it?’

  ‘I think Sambrooke is innocent. I’m willing to pass on any findings that support him.’

  ‘Ach, you will need to be canny.’

  ‘I shall certainly be canny. The Mackenzies are still by way of being my friends. Also I’m not sure that I share your suspicions. They don’t altogether square with what I heard from Sambrooke.’

  Sinclair looked doubtful for a moment, but the next he was grabbing my hand. ‘You will do your best,’ he said. ‘I ken that. And you have shown yourself a person with a rare capacity.’

  ‘Have you a man at Kyleness?’

  ‘Aye, Robertson. You will find him at the hotel. I shall ring to let him know you are coming.’

  ‘Just that and no more,’ I said
.

  Sinclair nodded.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  AND SO IT was that I left the police station at Dornoch in a more sanguine frame of mind than when I had entered it. I had gone up the steps as an interfering Englishman and I was coming down them again as an accredited auxiliary. Not that I was uncritically elated by that. I suspected the wisdom of trusting Sinclair unconditionally. I was flattered to find him agreeing with me that Earle was innocent but I felt obliged to consider what advantages it was bringing him. It meant, in brief, that he had got me on his side. I was going to interfere, so he proposed to have the benefit. I was friendly with the Mackenzies: they might not implicate themselves but they might well drop some damaging hints about Earle. And I was a policeman; I would feel constrained to pass on what I had learned. Certainly, if I happened on evidence of Earle’s guilt I would at least reveal a change in my attitude towards him. That would be enough. Though I shut my mouth tight Sinclair would know he was safe to go ahead, and even though the evidence never came to hand I imagined that he was good enough to get a conviction. The Mackenzies were his lure. He had judged rightly that my first sympathies lay with Earle. He had played on this, and had drawn me a picture of circumstantial evidence against the former. I grinned: I didn’t blame him. Rather, I admired his handling of the cards. A man less adroit would have tried to choke me off and perhaps have antagonized me by using threats. Sinclair was canny, he was a good policeman, but I couldn’t rely on him to show favour to Earle.

  Nor did I feel it would be wise, on the other hand, to discount his insinuations against the Mackenzies. Sinclair had loaded them, but he had revealed some interesting circumstances by the way. The arrival of the trawler would bear looking into, and so would the movements of her crew. It would be pertinent to know why Iain Mackenzie was walking up from the quay alone. The body had indeed been found very promptly and its recovery had proceeded with surprising dispatch. When the arrival of the patrol car was imminent one would have expected the body to have been undisturbed. If the Mackenzie house was in communication with the quay that would explain Iain’s knowledge of the fight, but why had Iain remained at the quay until, or after, he had received the intelligence? Sinclair of course would have covered this ground and might have information that he had not given me; but when the country appeared so fertile I would be a fool not to plough my own furrow. In all, I felt I was primed for a profitable descent on Kyleness, and I braved the rain again with eagerness to be on my way.