[Mirabelle Bevan 08] - Highland Fling

by Sara Sheridan

  ‘But I thought she left on the spur of the moment,’ Mirabelle said. ‘She only realised the seriousness of the situation when Jinx died. She knew they were trying to kill her after that. Up till then, presumably, she was hoping to just wait it out and trust that Nina’s death wouldn’t be pinned on her, which was a fair assumption. I mean, none of us suspected her – not me or you, Alan.’

  Eddie took an elegant draw from his cigarette. ‘One way or another, she summoned the doctor. On the spur of the moment, it seems. Visiting his aunt, my foot. I don’t know if they were lovers, of course …’

  McGregor cleared his throat. ‘Poor Bruce,’ he said under his breath.

  ‘One way or another,’ Eddie continued, ‘Eleanor thought she could count on the guy’s help. Maybe she thought they were going to run away together. Maybe she thought if she delivered the alexandrite, the Russians would allow her some kind of reprieve. But Dr Dunn was having none of it. He didn’t turn her in to his comrades and, thankfully, he didn’t kill her either, but he took the alexandrite – in the leather briefcase – and left her behind.’

  ‘So he’s out there,’ Mirabelle said. ‘But he knows she’ll be found, right? And he couldn’t possibly trust her to stick to her views, about snitching. I mean, he can’t go back to St Andrews.’

  Eddie shook his head. ‘No.’ He rolled his hand to encourage Mirabelle to continue the line of her logic.

  ‘That’s why you mentioned Burgess and Maclean. You’re worried he’s going to defect, taking the alexandrite. Because that’s his only way out now.’

  ‘Him and his research,’ Eddie said. ‘Don’t forget that. We’re so focused on bloody Oxford, I mean, it’s my own fault.’

  ‘Oxford?’

  ‘Never you mind.’ He stubbed out his cigarette. ‘I have all ports being watched. Airports too. The navy is on alert. But Dunn will know that, besides which we have a long coastline – in that respect the odds are in his favour. So my question for you two is: how’s he going to get out? Can we narrow his window of opportunity? Can we mine your cousin for local knowledge? Or is there anything else here?’ He gestured around the room. ‘And what is the best way to get something out of Eleanor? You know her.’

  Mirabelle pushed back the mahogany carver she’d been sitting on and walked to the window. ‘There is one thing you’ve missed,’ she said. ‘The maid must have had an escape route. She couldn’t expect to get away with killing Eleanor. So how was she going to get out? Maybe these two things are related.’

  Chapter 19

  Goodness is the only investment that never fails

  A phone call to the hospital ascertained that Elizabeth was making no more sense than she had earlier, so, to Mrs Gillies’s chagrin, they cut through the kitchen and up to the servants’ quarters, into the tidy room where the girl had slept. They knew they had to be careful now. Mirabelle laid her hand on McGregor’s arm. It was too easy to destroy evidence. To miss things. He was only a policeman and wasn’t used to this kind of search.

  Elizabeth had been furnished with a convincing amount of possessions as cover – clothes from a selection of shops in Inverness and books from the local library on the bedside. There was something meditative, Mirabelle thought, about a fingertip search. It had rhythm.

  McGregor took a seat in the comfortable chair. ‘All right,’ he said, ‘show me how you do it.’

  They started in one corner and fanned out, touching the walls, checking for loose floorboards or wainscoting, for anything secreted underneath the furniture, in any crevice. Mirabelle ran her fingers along the seams of Elizabeth’s clothes. Eddie took the library books apart and, when he found nothing, searched the bed and opened the tiny sash and case window to see if there was anything secreted in the rope space.

  Mrs Gillies, meanwhile, hovered uncomfortably at the door. ‘What exactly are you looking for?’ she asked after about twenty minutes.

  ‘We don’t know, Mrs Gillies,’ Mirabelle said. ‘But you mustn’t come in.’

  Gillies sighed as Eddie carefully emptied Elizabeth’s work-basket on to the table. A jumble of threads and a few cards studded with pins and needles. Mirabelle sank down next to him. ‘It’s too new,’ she said, indicating the pristine lining paper at the bottom of the box. ‘Bad practice. The rest is very convincing.’

  McGregor picked up yesterday’s newspaper, shoved down the side of the chair. He might as well read it while he waited. Watching the others search was dull after the first few minutes. ‘She took the Telegraph,’ he said. ‘Some Communist!’

  Eddie raised his eyes. ‘Mrs Gillies,’ Mirabelle piped up, ‘did this newspaper belong to Elizabeth? Or did it come from the house?’

  ‘Mr and Mrs Robertson take The Times and the Inverness Courier, miss. Not the Telegraph.’

  ‘Do you read it yourself?’ McGregor asked. ‘Below stairs?’

  Gillies shook her head. ‘No, sir. Miss Bevan is right. It must have belonged to the girl. Mrs Robertson wouldn’t have the Telegraph in the house, as a matter of fact. Mr Robertson used to take it when she first moved here but she objected.’ She sniffed. ‘Mrs Robertson called it insupportable.’ Gillies reported Eleanor’s comment, as if she was trying out the word for size.

  ‘You’re not keen on the Telegraph, Mrs Gillies?’

  ‘Not by choice, sir. No.’

  ‘And Susan MacLeod wasn’t either? Or could this have belonged to her?’

  ‘Susan didn’t take a paper and, even if she had, that’s yesterday’s from what I can see, so she couldn’t have bought it.’

  McGregor smiled. ‘You’re right. And I agree with you,’ he said. ‘The Telegraph is too conservative by far.’

  They crowded round the low table and laid out the paper carefully. Eddie inspected it as if it was a delicate baby and he a doctor charged with diagnosing a potentially fatal illness. He checked each sheet but there was nothing concealed inside. It was, as it appeared to be, a copy of the Telegraph newspaper from the day before. There were thousands exactly like it across the country. He turned to the crossword. Mirabelle smirked. ‘You think the KGB have infiltrated the puzzle section?’ she said.

  ‘Oh they did,’ Eddie replied blithely. ‘We let them. But the notification of it is clear. The same every time. And not in this issue, I see. There’s something else, though. We had one of these before.’

  ‘A Russian assassin?’

  ‘An extraction. And on that occasion,’ Eddie flipped back a few pages, ‘what we needed was in the notifications column. The Telegraph is full of strange notifications. It took a team of three mathematicians, as I recall. We had to send men to several christenings and funerals just to cover all eventualities.’

  ‘You’re not a codebreaker, then?’ McGregor said. Eddie’s nonchalance could be difficult to take.

  ‘Not in the modern sense.’ Eddie grinned. ‘I learned some decryption techniques from my aunt Florence. She was a suffragette. The suffragettes used the classified pages in The Times.’

  Mirabelle giggled. ‘That’s enough, you two.’

  Eddie carefully perused the paper. ‘Catholics are so delicious,’ he said. ‘Apologies Mrs Gillies, but they are.’ Mrs Gillies nodded her assent. They waited for a tense minute as Eddie carefully scanned the notifications, which ranged over two pages. ‘This one,’ he pronounced, getting to his feet. ‘It has to be. Thanks to St Jude for favours rendered. Seal the village at the hour of Christ and his disciples – a cryptic place and a time – not as uncommon as you might expect, but in this particular issue of the paper, it’s the only one that contains both elements. We need to examine the maps again and then I’ll interrogate your cousin.’

  Inside the house, Mrs Gillies peeled off at the stove as the men rushed ahead. She hovered momentarily. ‘Are you all right?’ Mirabelle checked.

  The housekeeper nodded. There was clearly something on her mind. ‘He reminds me of Colonel Blimp,’ she whispered.

  Mirabelle smiled. She knew what Gillies meant. It felt as if Eddie
was gearing up for a Highland dash – very John Buchan. Or very black and white, as Eleanor would have put it.

  ‘The hour of the disciples is in the afternoon. At three.’ Gillies cast her eye towards the clock. It was just coming up to two.

  ‘I’ll tell him,’ Mirabelle said. ‘Thank you.’

  In the drawing room, Eddie pored over the map.

  ‘Where did Bruce get to?’ Mirabelle asked.

  McGregor shrugged. ‘Try his study?’ he suggested, and joined Eddie scouring the coastline on the map for any sign of a sealed village.

  ‘Mrs Gillies says the hour of the disciples is three p.m.’

  Eddie checked his watch and grunted. Mirabelle waited a moment. The house felt deserted after days of feeling claustrophobic. She crossed the hall and opened the study door but Bruce wasn’t there. Then, on a whim, she went to the day room. An officer stood on either side of the door. ‘The gentleman said nobody was allowed inside,’ one said.

  ‘I interrogated Eleanor,’ Mirabelle replied stoutly. Absolute confidence was important in these situations and she had no time to argue. ‘I have more questions and Captain Brandon is busy.’ The policemen looked doubtful. ‘He’s in the drawing room if you want to check,’ she said. ‘I can wait, if you feel you don’t have the authority.’

  The man thought for a moment and stepped aside. ‘We’re here if you need us, miss,’ he said.

  Mirabelle slipped through the door. On the window seat in front of the shutters, Eleanor sat with her husband. They were holding hands. Eleanor’s foot had been bandaged and an ebony Victorian walking stick was propped next to her. ‘You shouldn’t be in here, Bruce,’ Mirabelle objected. ‘Did the men let you in?’ The couple looked at each other. Taking in the rest of the room, Mirabelle noticed a leather bag at Bruce’s feet. It wasn’t the missing briefcase, more the kind of luggage you might pack to go away overnight. ‘What’s going on?’ she demanded.

  Bruce took a deep breath – more of a sigh. ‘It’s family business,’ he said.

  ‘Not so long ago, we thought you were family, Mirabelle.’ Eleanor gave a sarcastic laugh.

  ‘What’s in the bag?’ Mirabelle asked.

  Neither of them answered. Instead, Bruce got to his feet. ‘I love my wife,’ he said, then he turned to Eleanor. ‘I don’t care what you’ve done. You’re my darling. My very own. Please come with me.’

  Eleanor’s eyes fell to the carpet. Streaks of blood obliterated part of the pattern. ‘You’re not cut out to be a fugitive, darling. You can’t leave the house and the estate. You love this place.’

  ‘There are other places,’ Bruce said stoutly. ‘There’s only one you.’

  Mirabelle walked further into the room. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. You can’t go anywhere,’ she said. ‘You’d never get away.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you leave with Alan?’ Bruce asked. ‘Isn’t being together more important than anything?’

  Eleanor laughed again. ‘Look at your face, Belle.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about. There are two officers on the door and two more outside,’ she said. ‘And I have some questions. We think your friend, Dr Dunn, is being extracted, Eleanor. In less than an hour, potentially. Eddie has found some kind of announcement in the newspaper. Do you know anything about it?’

  ‘If I tell you, will you walk out of here and leave Bruce and me to our impossible escape? The flight of two lovers?’

  ‘Where do you think you’re going?’

  ‘Not into the arms of St Jude,’ Eleanor said, with a smile.

  Mirabelle sank on to one of the chairs. So Eleanor knew about it, whatever it was. ‘St Jude?’ Bruce said. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘The patron saint of Lost Causes,’ Eleanor drawled. ‘It’s nothing darling, I was only joking.’

  Bruce cupped his wife’s face in his hands. ‘This is serious, Eleanor. I know you’ve done some foolish things. It’s like some ghastly nightmare. But whatever you’ve done, you were backed into a corner. That woman was trying to blackmail you. I want to spend my life with you. For better or worse, isn’t that what we said? Whatever happens. So this is our way out. Let’s go.’

  Eleanor softened. ‘God, Bruce, doesn’t it bother you that I’m a murderer?’

  ‘Of course it does,’ he whispered. ‘It’s terrible that you killed Nina. I feel awful for Tash apart from anything else. But it’s done. And they’re going to take you and, at best, it’ll be a sentence of years. Worst ways you’ll hang. How could I live without you? Maybe this whole nightmare is just something we’ll tell our grandkids. Let’s make it that.’

  Mirabelle felt unaccountably tearful as Bruce kissed his wife. ‘Bruce,’ Eleanor whispered and indicated her leg. ‘I can’t run now. Besides, what would we live on? Where would we end up?’

  ‘I’ll carry you if I have to, darling. Duncan McKay has a horse in the field at the foot of the hill. There aren’t any officers down there.’

  ‘And then?’ Eleanor asked. Bruce cast a glance at Mirabelle. ‘You didn’t answer his question, Belle,’ Eleanor continued. ‘Are you a Robertson now? Would you forgive Alan anything?’ She appeared to be enjoying this. ‘If he’d killed somebody, would you forgive him. Oh, I forgot. During the war, he did.’

  ‘That’s different and you know it!’ Mirabelle cursed herself for getting riled by Eleanor’s goading. She was wasting time.

  ‘Will you make the deal?’ Eleanor continued. ‘If I tell you about the … what did you call it? Extraction? If you think we’d never make it, there’s no risk, is there? It’s win-win. I begin to understand that you like that.’

  Mirabelle looked round for a clue as to what to do. Eleanor laughed once more. ‘God, you’re lame,’ she said. ‘You’re out of your depth.’

  For a second, a picture of Jack Duggan flashed in front of Mirabelle’s eyes. She’d have run away with Jack in a heartbeat. But he’d never asked her to.

  ‘You’re so black and white,’ Eleanor jeered. ‘It’s like a child’s game. We have a bomb and you’re the bad ones. No, we have a bomb and you’re the bad ones. All that does is keep people in thrall. Don’t you get it?’

  Jack wouldn’t have been black or white, not in the current political crisis, Mirabelle thought. Eleanor was right – what was happening was permissible in wartime perhaps, but not once there was peace. Politics was a performance. If the war had taught them anything, it was that. Black and white was too simple by far. Not that Eddie would see it that way. Mirabelle cast her mind back over Eleanor’s argument – so much of what she had said struck a chord. Churchill was both saint and sinner. The Nazis had studied British history and taken some of its worst excesses to the extreme. It wasn’t that there was no right or wrong. But there was definitely no absolutely good or bad side. She was grey. So were most people. Most nations, if it came to that. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘Tell me and I’ll leave the room for five minutes. Five minutes, do you understand?’ It had been enough time earlier in the day to nearly kill them all.

  Bruce grinned. You’d have thought Mirabelle had offered him a biscuit fresh from the oven.

  ‘Translate it into Gaelic,’ Eleanor said crisply.

  Mirabelle got up. ‘Gaelic?’

  ‘Like Druim a ’Mhadaidh – remember? Wolf Ridge. The day you arrived. Everything has two names here, sometimes more than two. So think of it as a crossword clue.’

  ‘You don’t speak Gaelic.’

  ‘Nobody in the house does. I used to ask the chap who does the gardening to translate for me.’

  Mirabelle burst out of the day room and back down the hall.

  ‘I might ask your cousin,’ Eddie was saying to McGregor. ‘I can’t see it on the map, can you?’

  ‘It’s Gaelic,’ Mirabelle said. ‘It’s a translation. We need someone who speaks Gaelic. The sealed village.’

  Eddie took this in, freezing for a second. Then he grabbed the map and dashed to the phone. The department had language experts. A few seconds later, she
heard him barking down the line, then the click of the bell and him talking to the operator, making another call. She sank on to the sofa.

  ‘Would you like a drink?’ McGregor offered. She shook her head. ‘I think I might.’ He poured himself a whisky.

  ‘Alan, do you love me enough to give up everything?’

  McGregor took a sip. ‘Do you want me to give up everything?’

  Mirabelle shook her head. It sounded ridiculously soppy. She checked the clock and closed her eyes. When she opened them he was in front of her on his knees. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Of course. I’d do anything for you. I’ve always felt that way.’ She started to weep and he took her in his arms. ‘What is it?’ he asked. ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I’m a terrible person,’ she managed to get out. ‘I don’t love you like that. Absolutely. Without reserve.’

  ‘Don’t you?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Would you give up a martini?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I know you love a martini. So would you give up a martini? For me?’

  She nodded. ‘Don’t be silly.’

  ‘A big fat debt to collect? I know how you love those at that agency of yours. Would you give one up, if I asked you?’

  She nodded again.

  ‘A flat on the front in Brighton? Say in favour of a rather nice house further down the coast?’

  She kissed him. ‘You’re ridiculous.’