A Highland Christmas

by M C Beaton

  “There’s some come and go for the forestry. It’s all the fault of that awful man, Sinclair. You know the reason he forced through the collection for the lights? Because he sold them.”

  “But if there was enough in the collection for the lights,” said Hamish, “it follows that some of the people here want them.”

  “I blame the incomers,” she snapped. “Godless lot.”

  Hamish did not bother asking who the incomers were. She probably meant people who had settled in Cnothan during the last twenty years. Once a newcomer, always a newcomer. That’s the way things were in Cnothan. And you never really got to know anyone in Cnothan. In other villages, he called in at houses on his beat for a chat. He had never dared make an unofficial call on anyone in Cnothan. He surmised that such a respectable house-proud matron would not have anything to do with a theft. He was suddenly anxious to take his leave. But Mrs. Ward pressed him to stay for tea and he weakly agreed.

  After he left, he took in great gulps of fresh air outside. He felt he had been trapped in that glittering living room forever. He decided to go back to Lochdubh.

  In friendly Lochdubh where everyone gossiped freely, he would have more chance of picking up news of any strangers in the area. He was sure it was the work of strangers. Surely even the most rabid Calvinist would not stoop to crime.

  Back in Lochdubh, he parked the Land Rover and walked along to the doctor’s cottage. Angela Brodie, the doctor’s wife, answered the door to him. “Come in, Hamish,” she said, putting a wisp of hair back from her thin face. “I’m just decorating the Christmas tree.”

  “I’m glad someone in Lochdubh has a Christmas tree,” remarked Hamish.

  “Come on, Hamish, you know a lot of us have them behind closed doors.” She led the way into the cluttered sitting room. The tree was half decorated and Angela’s cats were having a great game swiping at the brightly colored glass balls with their paws. Angela gave a cluck of annoyance and scooped up the cats and carried them out to the kitchen.

  “So what have you been up to?” she asked when she returned.

  Hamish told her about the theft of the Cnothan lights.

  “There was a lot of feeling against having the lights by some of the older residents,” said Angela. “Might not one of them have taken them?”

  “No, I don’t think so. You see a large Christmas tree was taken as well. If someone wanted to stop the lights and tree being put up for religious reasons, then they’d probably have smashed the lights and chopped up the tree. Someone’s probably down in the streets of Inverness or somewhere like that trying to sell them. In fact, when I get back to the police station, I’ll phone the police in Inverness and Strathbane and ask them to keep a lookout for the missing lights.”

  Hamish passed a pleasant hour helping Angela with the decorations and then went back to the police station. He went into the office and played back the messages on the answering machine. There was a curt one from the bane of his life, Detective Chief Inspector Blair, asking him to phone immediately on his return.

  Hamish rang police headquarters and was put through to Blair.

  “Listen, pillock,” said Blair with all his usual truculence, “there’s some auld biddie in your neck o’ the woods, a Mrs. Gallagher.”

  “What about her? She’s only missing a cat.”

  “Well, find the damn animal. She’s complained about you, right to Superintendent Daviot. Says you’re lazy and neglecting your duties. Says you’re a disgrace to community policing.”

  Hamish sighed. Community policing were the current buzzwords at Strathbane.

  “So you get out there and find that cat, dead or alive.”

  “Yes.”

  “Yes, what?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Hamish rang off. He decided to eat first and then tackle the horrible Mrs. Gallagher again.

  • • •

  An hour and a half later, he knocked once more at Mrs. Gallagher’s cottage. Frost was glittering on the grass round about and his breath came out in white puffs.

  He waited patiently while the locks were unlocked and the bolts were drawn back.

  She let him in. He was about to give her a row for having made trouble for him at headquarters, but he noticed she had been crying and his face softened.

  “Look, Mrs. Gallagher,” he said gently, “I was not neglecting my duties. But you must know what it’s like. The cat could be anywhere. And why would anyone break in and steal a cat? And how could anyone break in with all the locks and bolts you have? You even have bolts on the windows.”

  “Someone did,” she said stubbornly.

  “Have you ever been burgled afore?”

  “No, never.”

  “So why all the locks and bolts?”

  “There’s a lot of evil people around. And unintelligent ones, too. If you had any intelligence, you wouldn’t still be a policeman.”

  “I choose to stay a policeman,” said Hamish, “and if you expected that remark to hurt, it didn’t.” It was amazing how little anyone knew of Mrs. Gallagher, he reflected, even though she had been in Lochdubh longer than himself. But then she was damned as a nasty old woman and that was that. It must be a lonely life and she had been crying over the loss of her cat.

  “Let’s start again, Mrs. Gallagher,” he said firmly, “and stop the insults or we won’t get anywhere. The mystery here, and it iss where I would like to start, is why you bar and bolt yourself in and why you should immediately think that someone had broken in.”

  She sat very still, her red work-worn hands folded on her aproned lap. “Can’t you just find Smoky?” she pleaded at last.

  “I’m giving a talk at the school tomorrow and I’ll ask the children if they’ll help me to look for Smoky. School’s nearly finished. But you have not yet answered my question.” He looked at her shrewdly. “Who iss it you are afraid of, Mrs. Gallagher?”

  She studied him fora long moment with those odd silvereyes of hers. Then she said abruptly, “Will you be taking a dram with me?”

  “Aye, that would be grand.”

  A flash of humor lit her eyes. “I thought you didn’t drink on duty.”

  “Only on a cold winter’s night,” said Hamish.

  She went to a handsome dresser against the wall and took out two glasses and a bottle of malt whisky. She poured two generous measures, gave him one and then sat back down in her chair, cradling her glass.

  “Slainte!” said Hamish, raising his glass with the Gallic toast.

  “Slainte,” she echoed.

  The peat fire sent out a puff of aromatic smoke and an old clock on the mantel gave an asthmatic wheeze before chiming out the hour.

  “So,” said Hamish curiously, “what brought you up here?”

  “My father was a farmer. I was brought up on a farm.”

  “Where?”

  “Over near Oban. I knew I could make a go of it myself.”

  “You must know country people and country ways. Why all the security?”

  A little sigh escaped her. “I always thought one day he would come back.”

  “He?”

  “My husband.”

  “I thought you were a widow.”

  “I hope I am. It’s been a long time.”

  “Was he violent?”

  Again that sigh. “There you have it. Yes.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “No, it’s my business. Finish your drink and go.”

  Hamish studied her. “Was he in prison?”

  “Get out of here, you tiresome man. I’m weary.”

  Hamish finished his drink and stood up.

  “Think about it,” he said. “There’s no use asking the police for help and then withholding information.”

  But she did not reply or rise from her chair. He stood looking down at her for a few moments and then he put on his cap and let himself out.

  His Highland curiosity was rampant. Why had he never stopped before to wonder about Mrs. Gallagher? She would ap
pear in the village from time to time to stock up on groceries. If someone tried to speak to her she would be so cutting and rude that gradually she had come to be left alone. In the morning he would visit one of the older residents and see if he could find out some facts about her mysterious husband.

  Chapter Two

  The following day, before he was due to talk to the local schoolchildren, he set out to call on Angus Macdonald. Angus was the local seer, credited with having the gift of second sight. Hamish was cynical about the seer’s alleged powers, guessing that Angus relied on a fund of local gossip to fuel his predictions.

  He went out to the freezer in the shed at the back of the house and took out two trout he had poached in the summer. The seer always expected a present.

  The day was cold and crisp and so he decided to walk up the hill at the back of the village to where Angus lived. Hamish thought cynically that Angus kept the interior of his cottage deliberately old-fashioned, from the oil lamps to the blackened kettle on its chain over the peat fire. His fame had spread far and wide. The dark, old-fashioned living room, Hamish was sure, added to the legends about Angus’s gifts.

  “It’s yourself, Hamish,” said Angus, looking more than ever like one of the minor prophets with his shaggy grey hair and long beard.

  “Brought you some trout for your tea, Angus.”

  “Fine, fine. Chust put them down on the counter there. A dram?”

  “Better not, Angus. I’m going to give a talk to the schoolchildren and I don’t want the smell o’ whisky on my breath.”

  “Sit yourself down and tell me what brings ye.”

  “Now, now,” mocked Hamish, “I thought the grand seer like yourself wouldnae even have to ask.”

  Angus leaned back and half closed his eyes. “She isnae coming back this Christmas.”

  Hamish scowled horribly. He knew Angus was referring to the once love of his life, Priscilla Halburton-Smythe.

  “I didn’t come about that,” said Hamish crossly. “Mrs. Gallagher’s cat is missing.” He opened his notebook, took out the black-and-white photograph of Smoky and handed it to the seer.

  “It iss grey and white, that cat,” said the seer.

  “You’ve seen it?”

  “No, I chust know.”

  “So tell me about Mrs. Gallagher. I wasn’t around when she came to Lochdubh. There’s something about her husband. Know anything about that?”

  “I thought she was a widow.”

  “So you don’t know everything, Angus.”

  “No one can know everything,” said Angus huffily. “You will need to give me a bittie o’ time to consult the spirits.”

  “Aye, you do that,” said Hamish, heading for the door.

  The seer’s voice followed him. “I find a bit o’ steak does wonders for the memory.”

  Hamish swung round. “I gave you two trout!”

  “Aye, but there’s nothing like a bit of steak for helping an auld man’s memory.”

  “Aren’t you frightened of the mad cow’s disease?”

  “Not me,” said Angus with a grin.

  “Aye, you’ve probably got it already,” muttered Hamish as he walked down the frosty hill.

  The village school only catered for young children. The older ones were bused to the high school in Strathbane. There was a new schoolteacher, a Miss Maisie Pease, and it was she who had suggested that Hamish talk to the children. She was a small, neat woman with shiny black hair, a rather large prominent nose and fine brown eyes like peaty water. Hamish judged her to be in her thirties.

  “Now, Officer,” she began.

  “Hamish.”

  “Well, Hamish it is, and I’m Maisie. I feel that children are never too young to learn about the perils of drugs, as well as all the usual cautions about not talking to strangers.”

  “Right. Are the children ready for me?”

  “They’re all in the main classroom.”

  Hamish walked with her along a corridor to the classroom. As he neared it, he could hear the row of unsupervised children. When he pushed open the door, there came a frantic scrabbling of small pupils rushing back to their desks. Maisie followed him in.

  “This is P. C. Macbeth, children,” she said. “I want you to sit quietly and pay attention.”

  Hamish looked round the faces of twenty-four children, ranging in ages from five to eleven years old, rosy-cheeked Highland faces with bright eyes.

  He started off by talking about the evils of bullying and of stealing. He warned them against talking to strangers or accepting lifts from strangers and then moved on to the subject of drugs. Not so very long ago, he reflected, such a talk would have been unnecessary. But drugs had found their way even up into the Highlands of Scotland. He then asked for questions.

  After a polite silence, one little boy put up his hand. “Is wacky baccie bad?”

  Hamish, identifying “wacky baccie” as pot, said, “Yes, it is. It’s against the law. But a lot of people will tell you there’s nothing to it. It’s better than booze. But it’s not. You can get sicker quicker and it destroys short-term memory. Just say no.”

  Another boy put up his hand. “My brither wants to know where he can get Viagra.”

  “Ask Dr. Brodie,” said Hamish. The boy relapsed, sniggering with his friends. So much for the innocence of youth, thought Hamish.

  He then asked them what Santa Claus was bringing them. He was answered by a chorus of voices calling out that they wanted dolls or mountain bikes or dogs or cats. Hamish was glad that the children were not going to be denied Christmas, however Calvinistic the parents, although in the Lochdubh way, it would probably be celebrated behind closed doors.

  “I’m going to talk to you now about pets,” said Hamish. He thought briefly of his own dog, Towser, long dead, and felt a pang of sadness. “Don’t ask your parents for a dog or a cat unless you’re very sure what looking after an animal entails. A dog, for instance, has to be housetrained, walked and fed, possibly for the next fifteen years of your life. A cat even longer. It’s cruel to want an animal as a sort of toy. If I were you, I’d wait until you’re a bit older. Dogs have to be properly trained up here or you’ll have some animal worrying the sheep.

  “While I remember,” he said, “someone or some people have stolen the Christmas lights that were meant to decorate the street in Cnothan. I want you to let me know if you hear anything about strangers in the Cnothan area. There’s a bit o’ detective work for you. Ask your older brothers or sisters or your parents and if there’s anything at all, let me know. Also, Mrs. Gallagher has lost a cat. I’m going to pass round a photograph of the cat and I want you all to study it carefully and then search for this cat. There’ll be a reward.”

  Schoolteacher Maisie then showed him out. “I see you don’t have the classroom decorated,” said Hamish.

  “We were going to make some paper decorations but you know how it is. Some of the parents objected. They said they didn’t mind giving their children a present, but that they were against what they call pagan celebrations. It’s hard on the children because they all watch television and they are all in love with the idea of a Christmas tree and lights and all those things. Oh, well, it’s only at Christmas that they get stroppy. Other times, this must be the nicest place in the Highlands.”

  “It is that,” said Hamish. “Maybe you’d like to have a bite of dinner with me one night?”

  She looked startled and then smiled. “Are you asking me out on a date?”

  Hamish thought gloomily about his unlucky love life and said quickly, “Chust a friendly meal.”

  “Then that would be nice.”

  “What about tomorrow evening? At the Italian restaurant? About eight?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  “Grand,” said Hamish, giving her a dazzling smile.

  Mrs. Wellington, the minister’s wife, was just arriving and heard the exchange. She waited until Hamish had left and then said in her booming voice, “I feel I should warn you against t
hat man, Miss Pease.”

  “Oh, why?” asked the schoolteacher. “He’s not married, is he?”

  “No, more’s the pity. He is a philanderer.”

  “Dear me.”

  “He was engaged to Priscilla Halburton-Smythe, daughter of Colonel Halburton-Smythe who owns the Tommel Castle Hotel. He broke off the engagement and broke her heart.”

  Miss Pease had already heard quite a lot of Lochdubh gossip, and the gossips had it the other way round, that Priscilla had broken Hamish’s heart.