“There, now. We have to examine everything, and there iss no reason why anyone should come after you.”
“But it was all over,” she wailed. “After the funeral, I had to try to put my grief behind me.”
Hamish said quietly, “I’ll need to ask you if he said anything at all that might be of help. Now, I know you were in shock right after the murder. But you said that Angus had said your troubles were over. And he had a phone call from the same box on the waterfront that Fergus got his last call from. Now, he was, I gather, fairly friendly with Fergus. Fergus was attempting to blackmail Ionides. He may have told Angus what he had. And after his death, Angus, desperate not to lose his croft, might have tried the same trick.”
“If he did, he said nothing to me,” said Kirsty.
“I cannae myself believe yet it was anyone else. There’s that phone call. That’s what bothers me.”
“I’m tired of all this.” Kirsty leaned her head on her hand. “I just want to put it all behind me.”
“I’m asking you, however, to think and think hard,” said Hamish. She stayed where she was, silent, and after a few moments, he let himself out.
He then drove to Elspeth MacRae’s croft. “Come in, Hamish,” she said happily. “I was just about to have a cup of tea.”
How relaxed everyone was now that they thought the murders were solved. Hamish went into the stone-flagged kitchen. A peat fire burned in the hearth and an old clock ticked noisily on the wall, the chintz curtains fluttered at the open window: a scene of Highland tranquillity, far removed from murder and mayhem.
“It iss not really the social call,” said Hamish awkwardly to Elspeth’s back as she busied herself pouring boiling water into a teapot. Her back stiffened. She carefully put the lid on the teapot, placed it on a tray along with two mugs, milk, sugar and biscuits, and carried it to the kitchen table.
“I don’t see what it can be,” said Elspeth. “You have my sheep dip papers. Help yourself to sugar and milk.”
“It’s like this,” said Hamish. “It seems there’s a possibility that Angus was murdered by someone else.”
“How can that be?”
“The pilot swears blind that neither he nor Ionides was responsible for that murder. And yet it’s strange. For Angus got that call before he went out, and we traced it to that call box on the waterfront.”
She lowered her eyes quickly. Hamish eyed her sharply. “What iss it? You’ve got to tell me.”
She clasped her hands and said in a low voice, “You’ve known me a long time, Hamish.”
“Yes.”
“You know I’d never hurt a fly.”
“What have you been keeping from me, Elspeth?”
A sheep bleated nearby and a gust of wind blew around the cottage. The clock ticked away, marking out the seconds of her silence.
“Angus was going to sell me his croft house,” she finally said, “and then, having the house, I was going to apply to the Crofting Commission for the tenancy of the land. He had been saying one day he would do it, then the other that he had changed his mind. I was down in the village, and I saw the phone box and decided to call him before I got home and see if he had come to any decision. He sounded excited, happy, said something had come up. He said he would drive over and tell me. I said I was phoning from the village, and I would see him at my place. I went home and waited and waited. And then I heard he’d been murdered.”
“So why didn’t you tell me or any policeman that it wass you that made the call?”
“I was shocked. I didn’t know the call was important. I was shocked, Hamish,” she repeated.
Hamish sighed. “I may need to take a statement from you, Elspeth. You should neffer have held back information like this.”
“But I had nothing to do with the poor man’s murder!”
“Someone did. It looks as if it was you he was going out to see. Wait a minute, I remember Kirsry saying he had told I her to go away somewhere and leave him for a bit. I mean, why would he do that if he was the one that was going out? I’m sorry, but there’s no way I can keep this bit of evidence quiet.”
“Then you can take yourself off,” said Elspeth. “Just get out of my house. If it’s a choice between your friends and the police, you’ll always stick to the police. You’re a fascist!”
“I’m off,” said Hamish. “But I want you down at the police station at ten o’ clock tomorrow morning.”
As he left, he damned the secretiveness of the locals. What other bits of evidence were some of them keeping from him?
He went back to Kirsty. “What is this?” she demanded angrily. “Haven’t you upset me enough for one day?”
“Kirsty, you never told me Angus was thinking of selling to Elspeth.”
“Oh, that. He changed his mind from day to day.”
“But Elspeth was the one who phoned him, and he told her he was going to drive over and see her. He sounded happy. He said something had come up.”
“I didn’t hear any of that. I’m telling you, he told me to make myself scarce. What did Elspeth phone him about? And why did she call from that box?”
“She happened to be in Lochdubh. Evidently Angus was dithering about selling the house to her.”
“He didn’t mean anything by it. He would get frightened by the debt and then say he was going to sell the place, but he could never make up his mind.”
“Kirsty, a lot of people seem to have been holding back bits of information from me that might help. Are you sure there’s nothing you’re not telling me?”
“What else can I tell you?” demanded Kirsty. “My husband’s been murdered. I’ve been coming to terms with my loss, and now you tell me the murderer is still out there! Oh, go away and leave me in peace.”
Hamish looked down at her and shuffled his large police boots. “I’ll be off now. But I’ll be calling on you again.”
He went back to the Land Rover. “It was that dog of yours,” Kirsty shouted after him. “It’s brought evil.”
Hamish drove off. He realised with a heavy heart that he would need to do the rounds of the people Fergus had been blackmailing in case Angus had taken up his role.
♦
Josie would be at work in Strathbane, so he headed for the banker’s house. Mrs. McClellan answered the door to him. How welcoming everyone was now and how much fear he was going to bring back into their lives.
“Come in,” she said. “I want to thank you so much for keeping that matter quiet. I can sleep at nights now.” He followed her through to the kitchen at the back. “Take a seat. Coffee?”
“Maybe not now,” said Hamish. “I’ve bad news.”
She stood very still.
“It’s Angus’s murder. It seems there’s a good chance he might have been murdered by someone else.”
She sat down abruptly. “But you have that cutting?”
“You’re safe there, for the moment. I still haven’t reported it. You see, Ionides’s pilot, he says his boss had nothing to do with Angus’s murder, and he’s sticking to it. As you’ve probably read in the papers, it was Ionides who killed Fergus, and the pilot helped him dump the body. But there’s still a big question mark hanging over Angus’s death.”
“And I’m a suspect?”
“I just have to start going over all the old ground. Did you know Angus?”
“Only by sight. Angus and Kirsty. I saw them at socials at the church, that sort of thing. I knew both of them to say hullo, but never anything more than that.”
“And Angus never approached you after Fergus’s death?”
“No.”
He looked at her intently. He was sure she was telling the truth.
“Look, a lot of people in this village know things, but they haven’t been telling me because they don’t want to get involved with the police, or because they think they’re protecting each other. If you can remember anything, or hear anything…”