“This is a bad business,” said Perry. “I saw him on the news. Do you think that’s what did it?”
“I hope not,” said Hamish, thinking that if John had really committed suicide, he might become some sort of literary martyr crucified by wicked villagers.
Hamish searched for the kit he always carried with him in the Land Rover and drew out a tongue depressor. He went back in and knelt down again and felt the body. Rigor had not yet set in. He might have died recently. But Hamish knew that rapid cooling of a body could delay rigor.
He gently slid the tongue depressor between John’s dead lips and opened the mouth a little. He could see that the tongue was black. He withdrew the depressor and looked around again. There was something nagging at the back of his mind. He got up and went to the fire. He noticed the peat was gleaming damply. He leaned into the fireplace and touched it. Then he stood up and frowned. He could swear water had been thrown on that fire to put it out.
Hamish could hear sirens in the distance. He removed his gloves, slid the tongue depressor into his pocket, and walked outside. The great oak tree growing over the cottage groaned in a rising north wind, and as one old branch rubbed against another, making a creaking sound, Hamish shivered and thought that a gibbet with a body on it would have sounded like that in the old days.
He hoped Detective Chief Inspector Blair was drunk or on leave or anywhere that would stop him from coming. His thickheaded, bullying ways had impeded many of Hamish’s investigations. But his heart sank as the first police car arrived and Blair’s heavy body heaved itself out of the backseat.
“Whit do we have?” he demanded in his heavy, truculent Glasgow accent.
“John Heppel is dead. He’s left an apparent suicide note, but I think – ”
“What you think, laddie, doesnae matter. We’ll wait for the pathologist. She’s on her way.”
“She?”
“Aye, they would go and appoint some damn woman. That’s the trouble these days. They want to look all modern, so they shove some lassie into a job that should ha’ gone to a man.”
“Who is she?”
“Professor Jane Forsyth. Here she comes.”
A little Ford drew up, and a stocky middle-aged woman got out. “Where’s the body?” she asked.
“It’s in the living room,” said Hamish.
Hamish made to follow her, but Blair growled, “Stay where you are.”
So Hamish stayed and looked up at the stars and shivered in the wind and wondered what it was that was nagging somewhere at the back of his brain. And suddenly he had it. John had signed the book for him with an old–fashioned fountain pen, the kind you refilled from a bottle of ink. There had been a bottle of ink on his desk.
He was sure that someone had either poured ink into John’s mouth or made him drink it. That smacked of revenge. That smacked of murder. But he had somehow to get to the pathologist without Blair listening.
Detective Jimmy Anderson arrived. Hamish went to meet him. “Jimmy, don’t ask at the moment. Just get Blair out of there so I can have a sneaky word with the pathologist.”
“Cost you a bottle o’ whisky. I’ll need to lie. I’ll need to say that Superintendent Daviot is particularly interested and wants him to phone right away.”
“What happens to you when Daviot says he doesn’t know what Blair’s talking about?”
“Daviot’s attending the Freemasons tonight. Let’s hope by the time he hears about this, he’s really interested.”
Jimmy went into the house. I hope Blair doesn’t take out his mobile or use John’s phone, thought Hamish, but a minute later Blair shot out and went to the police car.
Hamish slid into the house and approached the pathologist. “There are two things you ought to know,” he said, bending over her as she worked on the body. “His tongue is black and I think it’s ink.”
“Ink!” She stared up at him in surprise. “What makes you say that?”
“I put a tongue depressor in his mouth to see if I could find out if he had taken anything. His tongue was black. He used an old–fashioned fountain pen.” Hamish looked across at the desk. “There’s an empty bottle of ink there. It was full the other night. Also, water’s been thrown on the fire to put it out and delay rigor. Someone was trying to cover up the time of death. Don’t tell Blair I looked in his mouth.”
They heard Blair lumbering back towards the cottage. Professor Forsyth quickly opened John’s mouth just as Blair came in.
“How you getting on, lassie?” said Blair.
“My name is Professor Forsyth, and I hope you will remember that in future. This man’s tongue is black. Your intelligent officer here has just pointed out it looks like ink, and the ink bottle on the desk is empty. The fire has been put out, as if someone wanted to delay the onset of rigor. It could well be murder.”
“I told you to wait outside,” yelled Blair.
“Just as well he didn’t,” said the pathologist.
“What about the suicide note?” demanded Blair.
“Anyone could have written that. I’ll need to get this body removed to the lab for a proper autopsy, I shall send a report of my findings to the procurator fiscal.”
“If there are no prints on that ink bottle,” said Hamish, “or on the keyboard of the computer, then that will definitely be suspicious.”
“Just get the hell out of here!” roared Blair. “Go and look at your sheep or whatever it is you usually do.”
The professor gave a click of annoyance.
Hamish retreated. He decided to go back to the police station. Jimmy, lured by whisky, would visit him as soon as he could. As he left, he noticed the forensic team had arrived and were putting on their blue suits with tight-fitting hoods and bags drawn tightly over their shoes so that no trace of their own DNA should mess up a possible murder scene.
♦
In the police station Hamish made himself a cup of coffee after giving Lugs a bowl of water and sat down to think before he typed up his report. It looked to him as if someone, somehow, had murdered John, maybe forcing him to drink the ink first. Then the murderer may have panicked and tried to fake a suicide, possibly wiping John’s dead face to remove any external traces of ink.
Who had reason to hate John so much? There were the village members of the writing class. He had humiliated all of them.
“I hope it’s not one of them,” said Hamish to Lugs. “I knew that man would bring evil here.”
He sighed and went through to his computer in the police office, typed his report, and sent it off to headquarters. He had just finished when Jimmy Anderson called from the kitchen door, “Anyone at home?”
“Aye, come ben,” shouted Hamish.
He closed down the computer and said over his shoulder to Jimmy, “This is a bad business. How did it go after I left?”
“Give me a dram and I’ll tell you.”
They went into the kitchen, where Hamish got down the whisky bottle and two glasses.
“I’ll pour my own,” said Jimmy, seizing the bottle. They both sat down at the kitchen table.
“It’s cold in here,” complained Jimmy.
Hamish rose and went to the stove. He raked down the ashes, put in kindling, and threw a lighted match in. When it was all burning, he added several slices of peat and replaced the lid of the stove. He sat down again.
He looked steadily at Jimmy.
“Well, was it murder?”
∨ Death of a Bore ∧
4
Like the dew on the mountain,
Like the foam on the river,
Like the bubble on the fountain,
Thou art gone, and for ever!