Death of a Charming Man hm-10

by M C Beaton

  “My intentions are about evening the score. She asked me out, not the other way round, and since you had gone off to Inverness without even phoning…”

  “I did phone, but you weren’t back. What did you find foot?”

  “It seems the owner of Craigallen is a wife-beater.”

  “And you know that for a fact?”

  “Not exactly.”

  Priscilla sighed. “Let’s just look at this house, Hamish. We want somewhere decent to bring up our children.”

  His eyes gleamed with malice. “Aye, children would be fine. Know anything about how to go about getting some, Priscilla?”

  “Hamish! Are you coming to see this house or not?”

  “On one condition; we call in at Drim on the road back.”

  “Why?”

  “Jock Kennedy’s running an illegal pub at the back of his shop. Now I know about it, I’ve got to put a stop to it.”

  “All right.”

  “I’ll drive, as we’re going on police business sometime today. Down, Towser,” for Towser was standing on his hind legs with his muddy paws on Priaicilla’s skirt.

  “He doesn’t bother me,” said Priscilla. “We’ll take him with us.”

  Hamish felt weak at the knees. It was the occasional contrast between Priscilla’s cool beauty and her lack of concern at being pawed by the smelly and doting Towser that made him fall in love with her all over again. He pushed Towser aside and pulled her into his arms, but she said, “Your neighbour’s watching us.” He felt his spirits plunge again. He could not have given a damn at that moment who was watching them.

  He wished with all his heart that Priscilla would lose her reserve. He had a sudden vivid memory of Willie Lamont when he was engaged to Lucia, hugging and kissing her and then noticing a group of grinning villagers. He had said something to the beautiful Lucia and she had laughed and put an arm about his waist and, with her head on his shoulder, they had gone into the restaurant. He began to become very angry indeed with Priscilla. He deserved someone a bit warmer and less managing. Priscilla sensed his change of mood as she climbed into the Land Rover. She had an impulse to put her hand on his arm, to say, “Let’s forget it,” but she remembered her father’s angry and contemptuous face and remained silent.

  As they were approaching Craigallen, Priscilla said, “Care for another look, Hamish?”

  He shook his head, but as they were driving slowly past, he saw Mrs. Hendry in the garden and slowed to a stop. “Well, maybe, just a quick look around the outside.”

  As soon as Priscilla saw Mrs. Hendry, she realized the reason for Hamish’s odd enthusiasm to see a house he loathed; She wanted to tell him to forget it, but Mrs. Hendry was already rising to her feet from weeding a flower-bed. “How nice to see you again,” she said to Hamish. “Come into the house. I was just about to make a cup of tea.”

  Priscilla opened her mouth to protest but Hamish had leaped forward. “I would chust love the cup of tea,” he chattered, following Mrs. Hendry into the house and not even looking round to see if Priscilla was following them.

  “I was upset at the state of the garden,” said Mrs. Hendry. “You can’t get good workers these days. Is there any hope you will buy the house?” She gave an awkward little laugh.

  “My husband thinks it’s all my fault that we can’t sell the place, but there you are, that’s men for you. Always need someone to blame.”

  “Isn’t that the case?” agreed Hamish, avoiding Priscilla’s eye. “Why, the number o’ cases of wife-beating I’ve seen because the man has to take any bad luck out on the woman.”

  “Really, Mr. Macbeth,” said Mrs. Hendry. “I hope you are not suggesting my husband beats me!”

  Hamish raised his hands in horror. “Did I say such a thing? Och, no, it’s just that I am a policeman, Mrs. Hendry.”

  “Really?” She fiddled noisily with the cups.

  “And the hell some women put up with, you chust wouldna’ believe. And when I’ve said to them, “Take the man to court,” they chust look at me blankly and say, “He’s done nothing wrong. Besides, I’ve got the children.” And there are the children growing up warped and miserable.”

  Mrs. Hendry dropped the kettle. Boiling water spilled all over the kitchen floor.

  Priscilla took a cloth from the draining-board. “No, leave it,” said Mrs. Hendry shrilly. “Leave it! I have not been sleeping well lately and my nerves are bad. I am sorry. But you had better go.”

  “Come along, Hamish,” said Priscilla. “Are you sure you don’t want me to help you clear up this mess, Mrs. Hendry?”

  She shook her head.

  Hamish and Priscilla went silently outside. As they drove off, Hamish cleared his throat and said, “Nothing can be done unless she wishes it done.”

  “Exactly,” agreed Priscilla. “Turn off here to the left, Hamish. The house we want to see is called Haven. A few hundred yards along on the right. The owners are Mr. and Mrs. Peterman.”

  Hamish parked outside. The house was low and square, built, he guessed, sometime in the thirties. The garden was neat with regimented flowers and plants, evenly spaced, as if the distances between them had been measured by a ruler.

  It was a one-storey house, the roof slate, the walls pebble-dashed, and the door had a top pane of stained glass. Priscilla rang the imitation ship’s bell outside the door. A thin, nervous woman answered it. Her shoulders were hunched and her arms were hanging straight down and her head was jutting forward, as if someone had thrust a coat-hanger into her sweater. She had a long fringe down to her eyebrows and slate-coloured eyes stared out from under it. She was wearing skin-tight jeans and baseball boots.

  “Good morning,” said Priscilla. “We have come to see the house. Mrs. Peterman?”

  “Yes.” The woman held out a hand in welcome. The skin was red and glazed and the knuckles swollen.

  “I am Priscilla Halburton-Smythe, and this is Hamish Macbeth, my fiancé.”

  “Pleased to meet you.” She had a slight Yorkshire accent. “I’ll take you around,” she said. “There’s one thing I will say, this house is always clean. You could eat off the floor. We’ll start with the lounge.”

  The lounge, of which she was obviously very proud, contained a mushroom-coloured, three–piece suite which looked as if it had never been sat on. Despite the days of hair oil being long gone, both chairs and sofa were decorated with antimacassars. An electric fire of fake logs decorated the hearth in front of a pink-tiled fireplace. There was a low coffee-table in front of the sofa set about with coasters decorated with flamenco dancers. Against one wall was a hi-fi unit, and over the fireplace, a picture of a mountain scene painted by an amateur, all eye-hurting colours and peculiar perspective. The air was cold and stale. “And now the dining-room,” said Mrs. Peterman, charging out, her shoulders hunched and her arms straight out like a character in a cheap cartoon where the animator had been trying to save on animation.

  Priscilla and Hamish stood together, looking at a long dining-table surrounded by ladder-back chairs with petit-point cushions in such vile colours that Hamish suspected Mrs. Peterman had been responsible for them. There was a sideboard of the kind called Swedish, a depressingly geometric thing. Outside, the wind of Sutherland rose in its usual violent, unheralded way, making this box of a place appear to Hamish a temporary excrescence on the Highland landscape of moorland and mountain which lay beyond the ‘picture windows.’

  “Don’t you have the central heating?” he said, looking around.

  “We have electric-storage heaters,” said Mrs. Peterman, “but we only use the heaters in winter. Too much heat makes you soft. The kitchen’s through here behind the dining-room.”

  The kitchen was full of those gleaming white units bought from a Do-It-Yourself shop. The floor of black-and-white linoleum tiles shone brightly enough to hurt the eyes. A square plastic-topped table and four metal kitchen chairs with plastic seats dominated the centre. “We’ll be taking the fridge and the cooker,” said Mrs
. Peterman. Priscilla was for once at a loss for anything to say. She wanted to escape. But there were still the bedrooms to see, two of them, one single and one double. The double bedroom had twin beds, narrow and rigid, separated by a bedside table which held a large Bible. On the wall above the beds was a text: THOU GOD SEEST ME!

  “The guest bedroom,” said Mrs. Peterman, throwing open another door. They both looked bleakly at a cell of a room.

  “Well, that’s all very nice,” said Priscilla brightly. “We’ll let you know. We have several other places to see.”

  “You’ll not see one better than this,” she said. “We’ve just put it on the market. Not like them at Craigallen. They’ve had that place up for sale for a year.”

  Hamish hesitated on the doorstep. “Charming woman, Mrs. Hendry.”

  “Oh, her? The things that woman puts up with.”

  “What things?”

  Her mouth closed like a trap. “I do not discuss my neighbours.”

  “Well, that’s that,” said Hamish with a sigh of relief as he drove off. “Don’t tell me you want to live in a place like that, Priscilla.”

  “No, it was pretty dire,” she said. “But Craigallen is all right, Hamish.”

  “A bad house,” said Hamish firmly. “Let’s go to Brim.”

  “Do you know,” said Priscilla, “mat in all the time I’ve lived up here, I’ve never been to Drim. I’ve heard it’s a dead-alive sort of place.”

  “Aye, it’s all of that.”

  They drove down towards Drim. Below them they could see the black sheen of water on the loch, that thin sea loch which lay between the towering walls of the mountains where nothing grew in the scree on the flanks except an occasional stunted tree. As they climbed down from the car, the air was heavy and still. Either the wind had suddenly dropped, thought Priscilla, or Drim was so protected from the elements that hardly a breath of air stirred the black waters of the loch.

  “Why would anyone want to live here?” asked Priscilla, looking around.

  Hamish shrugged. “Why would anyone want to live in a place like Strathbane either, Priscilla? You’d best wait here. I’ll see Jock on my own.”

  After Hamish had disappeared into the shop, the women began to emerge from the community hall after their exercise class. They stopped short at the sight of Priscilla standing beside the police Land Rover. She was wearing a short blue skirt of soft wool and a short-sleeved wool sweater. A white cashmere cardigan was draped about her shoulders. Her long legs in sheer stockings ended in low-heeled, tan leather court shoes. The women huddled together and stared at her from the top of her smooth blonde head to the tips of her shoes.

  “What’s someone like that doing here?” asked Betty Baxter harshly.

  “Maybe she’s come tae see Peter,” said Nancy Macleod, voicing all their worries.

  “In a polis car?” demanded the hairdresser, Alice MacQueen.

  Priscilla saw them watching her and smiled tentatively. There were no answering smiles, only eyes as hard as Scottish pebbles.

  Inside the shop, Hamish was confronting Jock Kennedy, who had been summoned from the back premises by his wife, Ailsa. “Look, Jock,” said Hamish, “I know you are running a sort of pub in the back there after hours, and it will chust not do.”

  Jock scowled ferociously. “Who telt ye?”

  “It doesn’t matter. You’ve got to stop it.”

  “You cannae stop me from having a few friends round.”

  “No, and I suggest you make it that. If Strathbane heard about it and crashed in here one night, how would things look for me? I am not booking you, Jock, nor am I asking to have a look-see. Chust make sure you’re doing nothing illegal in future.”

  “You should not be bothering an honest man like me,” said Jock. “It’s that Sassenach you should be after.”

  “What’s he done?”

  “He’s a dirty fighter. He kicked me in the balls.”

  Ailsa gave a shrill laugh. “It wass self-defence. Hear this, Macbeth. It wass at the ceilidh. Himself here gets them to call Peter out fur a dram and as soon as Peter appears, Jock challenges him to a fight. Going to beat him to a pulp, he wass.” Ailsa laughed again. “Well, you got your comeuppance, so leave Peter Hynd alone.”

  “Hiss days here are numbered, wumman.”

  “I’ll leave you both,” said Hamish hurriedly. “Don’t forget what I said, Jock.”

  He went outside. He paused for a moment, studying the scene in front of him. Priscilla had turned to face the loch, trying to look unconcerned. The women of Drim had edged closer to her, as if inspecting some rare wild beast.

  “Shoo!” said Hamish, running up to them and waving his hands.

  Hamish returned to Priscilla, his face grim. “That great fool, Jock Kennedy, challenged Peter Hynd to a fight and Peter kicked him where it hurts the most.”

  “That’s bad,” said Priscilla. “A Highlander won’t ever forget or forgive that until he gets revenge.”

  “They’ll gang up on him one dark night,” said Hamish. “Let’s go and see the minister.”

  “Why?”

  “He’s supposed to be looking after the morals of his flock.”

  They went up to the manse and this time Hamish found Mr. Callum Duncan at home as well as his wife, Annie.

  They were served tea in the manse living-room, the minister and Hamish exchanging general chit-chat until Annie brought in tea and scones. Hamish noticed that Annie’s hair was once more its natural brown colour.

  “So what brings you to Drim?” asked the minister at last.

  “I’m worried about Peter Hynd.”

  “Our newcomer?” said the minister. “A most amiable and intelligent young man. Nothing wrong with him, I hope?”

  “He’s been flirting with the women of your parish.” Hamish felt ridiculously like a Victorian reformer. “He’s stirring up all sorts of emotions. Have you not noticed the way the women are behaving?”

  “Oh, they’ve been getting a bit silly, but that’s women for you,” said the minister indulgently. Hamish glanced at Annie Duncan, but her head was bent over the teapot.

  “It iss more than that,” said Hamish firmly. “There was a fight. Jock Kennedy and Peter Hynd, and Peter…er…kicked him where he shouldn’t have.”

  “As he was up against an ox like Jock, then I suppose he had to protect himself anyway he could,” said Mr. Duncan. “It will all settle down. You know what the Highlands are like. There is always a certain antipathy to the newcomer.”

  “It is because of this silly antipathy that a lot of good people go away from the Highlands and leave the trash behind,” said Hamish bitterly.

  Annie’s voice came, cool and amused. “Peter Hynd does seem capable of rousing jealousy in men and women alike.”

  “I am not jealous of the man,” said Hamish. “This is a serious matter. If that young man does not settle down and stop playing silly games with the locals, then someone will stab him. I am taking this verra seriously. Talk to them on the sabbath, minister, and warn them against bitterness, envy, and lust.”

  “Dear me, and they call poor Callum a Holy Roller,” said Annie, sounding amused.

  “May I point out that the thing that causes most passions to run high,” said the minister, “is strong drink, and we have none of that in Drim.”

  “Havers,” said Hamish. “Every man has his bottle. The fact that isn’t sold openly doesn’t stop them drinking, and I’m willing to bet that there’s more than one illegal still up in the hills.”

  “I am sure your motives are of the best.” Mr. Duncan’s voice was suddenly steely. “You do your job and I will do mine. I am not lax in reminding my flock on Sunday of the virtues of life. Now, may we talk of something more pleasant? Miss Halburton-Smythe, I believe your family home is now a hotel? Does that disturb you, or have you come to accept it?”

  Priscilla talked easily of the difficulties of settling into a hotel life while Hamish sat and brooded. Was he perhaps jealous of
Peter Hynd? But he had been uneasy about the man before Peter had ever taken Priscilla out for dinner.

  When they emerged from the manse, wreaths of mist were stealing down the sides of the mountains, like long, searching fingers.

  At the Land Rover, Priscilla hesitated beside it. “Hamish,” she said, “when I went to the seer looking for you, he said an odd thing.”

  “Aye, what was that?”

  “He said a beautiful young man would come between us.”

  Hamish looked bleakly at the descending mist. “You neffer believed a word that man said before.”

  “And why should I now?” rejoined Priscilla lightly. “You’re quite right Hamish. This place is enough to give anyone the creeps.”

  They climbed into the Rover. Hamish released the handbrake. He saw a little figure moving towards them up the road through the mist. Heather Baxter. Her eyes were blank but tears were streaming down her cheeks. He swore under his breath and jerked the brake on again and climbed down. The girl saw him coming and swerved away off the road and began to run across the peatbog beside the loch, off into the mist. “Heather!” called Hamish sharply. “Heather!” But only silence came back to him.

  “Something must be wrong at the Baxters’,” he said when he rejoined Priscilla. “I’m going over there.”

  But when they got to the Baxters’ cottage, it was closed and silent No smoke rose from the chimney. Hamish wondered whether to go back into the village and look for Betty Baxter. As he was standing there, irresolute, Heather Baxter came round the side of the cottage. She looked calm and composed. “Oh, Mr. Macbeth,” she said. “Can I help you?”

  “I saw you crying,” said Hamish.

  “Me? Och, no, it must haff been a trick o’ the mist.”

  “Where’s your ma?”

  “Edie Aubrey is running the bingo. She’s there.”

  “Not the exercise class?”

  “After it, she sometimes has the bingo.”

  “And your farther?”

  “Up in bed.”

  “Look, Heather, if there is anything you ever want to talk to me about, phone me up.” Hamish scribbled the Lochdubh police-station telephone number on a piece of paper and handed it over.