‘What kind of things did they buy?’ asked Laura.
‘Och, what you would expect. Rhoda had a tweed for a skirt, Patsy bought Todd a wee present of a knife and Tansy, also fu’ of improper thoughts about Todd, I’m thinking, purchased, at an awfu’ lang price — but, of course, she earned money in her job — she bought him a knife, too. It was a genuine antique. Patsy’s knife was an imitation of a sgian dubh.’
‘A sgian dubh, eh?’ said Laura.
‘Ye’ll be thinking on the murder,’ said Perth, ‘but gin ye think yon man Todd would stab a fellow creature in the back, as I am telled was done tae Carbridge, ye hae Todd summed up wrangly, Mistress Gavin.’
‘The stabbing, as I understand it, was only a coup de grâce in case the strangling hadn’t done the job completely,’ I reminded the company.
‘Oo, aye, verra like,’ agreed Perth. ‘I hae to tell ye, mistress,’ he added, addressing Laura again, ‘as I hae been speired at tae mention purchases, that Jane Minch made purchase of some beautiful notepaper wi’ headings o’ the Loch Ness monster and various flowers and birds and knights on horseback — verra fine indeed.’
‘From the Malin Workshop in Claggan Road,’ I said. ‘Hera bought some, too. Beautiful drawings. Hedderwick, I remember, is the artist’s name. Did anybody else purchase anything in the nature of a weapon?’
‘The maist o’ them made a purchase,‘ said Perth,’but naebody else bought a knife. There was the fake sgian dubh and the knife bought by the woman Tansy Parks. She had it frae a shop which sold antiques. I was wi’ her when she bought it and I wrestled vairbally wi’ the proprietor on her behalf tae hae the price reduced. “Ye’ll ne’er get your money for that bauble,” I was telling him. “A’ the visitors are requiring are souvenirs. Not by ony length is that knife a souvenir o’ a trip to Fort William. It’s no even o’ Scottish manufacture.” ’
‘So what sort of dagger was it?’ asked Laura.
‘I am not convairsant wi’ the history o’ dirks, but, according tae the man, it was Spanish-made in about 1878, and to my mind there was naething so verra special aboot it. It was not what I would ca’ an object o’ distinction, but the lassie fancied it. It was broadish and the blade would ha’ been, in my reckoning, aboot seven inches in length and the knife overall aboot fifteen inches, but there wasna a sheath wi’ it. He had anither, a verra superior specimen, wi’ a tortoiseshell and mother o’ pearl handle, but the price was quite inordinate, so she took the first ane.’
‘What made her choose such an object?’ asked Dame Beatrice.
‘She said she wanted to mak’ a gift of it, but she didna then say to whom. As I telled ye, my thought upon it was that she intended to gift it to Todd.’
‘What you tell us is of the greatest interest,’ said Dame Beatrice. ‘Do the police know about all this?’
‘I dinna ken.’
We learned later what had happened to Patsy’s knife. Chagrined to find her gift redundant when she discovered the destination of Tansy’s purchase, she had raffled it when the students got back and it had been won by Freddie Brown.
15: Talking Things Over
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The warden had the address of the women students’ hall of residence and Dame Beatrice obtained it from him before she left. He would be glad, he said, to have the mystery of Carbridge’s death cleared up before the new term began, if that were possible. He added that the police were making heavy weather of their investigations and that it was very hard on those students who had done such good work in Scotland during their summer vacation that they should be under harassment when they were all completely innocent.
Privately, I think, Dame Beatrice was keeping an open mind about their guilt or innocence, but she could hardly tell this to anybody in the warden’s position. I walked round to Hera’s flat when the goodnights had been said and found her, as I had expected, awaiting me and alone. Whether Todd had been quite as good as his word I did not know, but, at any rate, he was not in her flat when I arrived.
‘Well,’ she said, ‘how did things go? Did Dame Beatrice extort a confession of guilt from anybody?’
‘As you would expect, some useful information emerged. Perth was particularly enlightening.’
‘That man has eyes and ears everywhere. I suppose both were necessary in the job he had to do on the tour. It can’t have been easy with that little horror Patsy Carlow in the party.’
‘He made two interesting disclosures which may or may not have some bearing on Carbridge’s death and he also let a few other cats out of bags which, so far as I can see, have nothing to do with murder, but which highlight what I may call the love interest.’
‘Oh, Lord!’
‘Yes, indeed.’
‘Well, out with it, if you’ve come here to make a scene.’
‘Why should I do that?’
‘Oh, that’s all right, then. What happened? What was said?’
‘It’s getting late. Let’s leave it until tomorrow. It may turn out to be a long story.’
So we arranged that I should take her out to dinner the next evening and then that we should return to her flat for our talk. When the appointed time arrived, she came straight to the point which concerned the two of us most closely.
‘I suppose Perth told you about Todd and me,’ she said.
It staggered me that she should refer to Todd so openly and in so calm a manner. I was nonplussed by her frankness and said feebly, ‘Well, yes, sort of, yes, he did.’
‘The snooping old cub-leader! What did he tell you?’
‘That Todd slept at the Inverbeg hotel on the same night as we did.’
‘Yes, he did. He pushed on ahead of the others and, although you didn’t see him, he crossed on the ferry when we did, but if Perth told you I slept with him, it’s not true.’
‘No?’
‘No. I didn’t mean for this to come out just yet, Comrie, but I would have told you all about it later, when things were settled.’
‘What about Glasgow?’
‘Perth couldn’t have told you about Glasgow. He knew nothing about what happened at the airport hotel. Oh, dear! I wish he hadn’t taken the bull by the horns, the wretched man! Anyway, he did, so I must make the best of it. You had the impression, when I met Todd on the train and again at the airport hotel, that he was a stranger to me. I tried to give you a hint that this was not the case, but you were too thick to catch on.’
‘Oh, was I? But I have a trusting nature, you see.’
‘Don’t you remember that crack of mine about people with two left feet?’
‘Vividly. I have seldom felt more embarrassed.’
‘You surely didn’t think I would say a thing like that to somebody I had only just met?’
‘It seemed out of character, I admit, but I thought you were annoyed by his attempting to pick you up.’
‘You always have been a myopic old soul where I am concerned. Don’t you remember my calling him Sweeney Todd later? That would have been another frightful liberty if we hadn’t known one another very well. Anyway, thanks to that idiotic Carbridge and your own fixations, Glasgow and Inverbeg were the only chances Barney and I had to get together and talk over our plans for a divorce.’
‘What!’
‘Yes. I married him when I was — well, a whole lot younger than I am now. It didn’t work out very well, and we separated, but nothing legal was involved. It wasn’t even a judicial separation. We agreed to go our separate ways and then, when the legal period of irreparable breakdown of the marriage was over, to arrange for a divorce.’
‘What didn’t you like about him?’