“It’ll take ages, Hamish. That’s the one for the shop and the way I check out what’s needing to be replaced. Why the sudden interest?”
“I need to hae a look at someone’s word processor and I want to know how to load the discs and read what’s on them.”
“What make?”
“A Harbley.”
“That’s the cheapest on the market. Did you see any number on it?”
“PCW921.”
“That’s their bottom-of-the-range model. I have one upstairs. It was the first one I got I used it for business letters and simple accounts.”
“Could you show me?”
Priscilla straightened some goods on the counter. “The only time I’ve got free is from eight o’clock this evening ”
“All right.”
“What about your date with Betty?”
“That can wait. I’ll tell her I’m off on police business.”
“Then I’ll see you at eight. What’s it for? I mean, whose word processor?”
“I’ll tell you later,” said Hamish quickly, frightened she would refuse if he told her the truth.
He left a message for Betty at the reception desk of the hotel and drove back to Lochdubh and up to Randy’s cottage. A few local reporters were standing around, the ones from the nationals having given up and gone home.
Blair came out of one of the mobile units and went to join Hamish as he climbed down from the Land Rover.
“Well?” he demanded. “Get anything?”
Hamish decided to improvise. “For a start she said to tell you she’s off to London tomorrow to see her agent.” He showed Blair the card Rosie had given him. “That’s the agent’s address and phone number. She’ll only be gone four days.”
“I don’t like it,” growled Blair.
“There’s nothing for us to keep her. But there’s a wee bit o’ hope,” said Hamish, looking at his superior and radiating honesty. “She’s taken a bit o’ a fancy to me and she said she would think of everything Randy had told her and give me a typewritten statement when she got back. She said if she had a few days to think about it, she might remember something useful.”
Blair’s face cleared. “Good work,” he said reluctantly.
“So can I see some of the background?”
Blair looked for a moment as if he was going to refuse. But then he shouted, “Anderson, come here!”
Jimmy Anderson came slouching up. “Show Macbeth here the statements and background.”
“Sure thing, Chief.” Blair looked at him sharply for signs of insolence but Jimmy’s watery blue eyes only showed respect.
Jimmy led Hamish into one of the mobile units where two policewomen and two policemen were working in the makeshift office. “Take a seat, Hamish,” said Jimmy. “You’ve got a lot to go through.”
After a long day, Hamish was disappointed. The bare facts were these. Time of death could not be pinpointed, but then it rarely could. The warmth of the body due to the central heating plus the two-bar electric fire put death at any time from five in the evening until after ten at night. Chloral hydrate had been found. The contents of the stomach revealed that he had lunch of hamburgers and then tea and coffee but no dinner. The chloral hydrate could have been given to him in a drink, but all glasses and cups in the kitchen were clean. Hamish frowned. He could not imagine such as Randy keeping a clean kitchen, or a sink free of dirty dishes. He had a shadowy picture of a murderer who could calmly kill and then take his or her time about cleaning up, for there had been no fingerprints at all, apart from Archie’s. Everyone knew about fingerprints, but usually only the very cold-blooded managed to get rid of every trace. He thought of Rosie Draly. But surely this was no crime of passion, no outburst of rage. This had been a cold and calculated murder. But a scorned woman would have had time to think and brood and plot and plan. The statements revealed as little as possible, with the exception of the retired school-teacher, Geordie Mackenzie, who had bragged that he could have well killed Duggan because he, Geordie, “was a lion when roused.”
“Silly wee man,” grumbled Hamish, rising and stretching. He glanced at his watch. Just time now to eat and visit Priscilla.
♦
“Pay attention,” admonished Priscilla that evening. “I’ll go through it again. You put in the Logoscript disc and when it is loaded, take it out and put in the disc you want to read.”
“Stop flicking your fingers over these damn keys. I cannae see what you’re doing,” complained Hamish, who was feeling stupid and backward and resenting it. “Okay, now you’ve taken your programming disc out, put in that one, with the side you want to the left…the left, Hamish! Now press ‘e’ for edit and then press ‘enter’. There you are. Simple.”
But somehow Hamish could not get the hang of it. “You’re suffering from technofear,” said Priscilla. “I’ll type out a simple list of instructions and leave you to it. You’ll learn easier if you do it yourself.”
She switched off the word processor after she had typed out a list of instructions. “Now start at the beginning.”
Left to his own devices, Hamish stared gloomily at the blank monitor. It was all the fault of modern society, he reflected, where people credited computers with independent brains. He couldn’t, say, get the seat he wanted on a Glasgow-bound bus at the Strathbane bus station because the girl in the booking office said The Computer had allocated him another seat entirely. A cheque for a prize he had won for hill-running at one of the Highland Games took ages to arrive, and it was at a time when he needed the money badly.
But every time he phoned the Games Committee, some official would say, “It’s in the computer,” as if only the computer could decide when one Hamish Macbeth would get paid?
He straightened the monitor with a vicious pull, pulled forward his chair, and switched it on. Nothing happened.
He looked at the macnine in a panic and then struck the top of the monitor. The black screen stared back at him, reflecting his worried features. He tried switching it on and off. He found be was sweating slightly and marvelled that a mere machine could upset him so much. He did not want to call Priscilla. He was frightened that she would come and do something childishly simple and make him feel even more of a fool man ever. Time passed as he tried again switching it on and off. At last the door opened behind him and Priscilla came in. “How are you getting on?” she asked.
“Fine. Chust fine,” said Hamish through gritted teem.
“If I could make a suggestion…”
“No, I’m telling you, I’m getting the hang o’ this thing chust great.”
“Suit yourself. But, my darling, I think you would get on chust fine if you put the plug back in at the wall which you have pulled out.”
She smiled at the back of his rigid neck and went out again.
Hamish plugged in the machine, which had become disconnected when he had jerked the monitor, and switched it on. The monitor shone greenly. Painstakingly following Priscilla’s instructions, he worked away until he began to master it, and when she finally returned, he felt quite triumphant.
“You’re not finished yet,” she said to his dismay. “If you want to print something off, you’ll need to learn to do that.” Hamish groaned. It was half past eleven at night before he finally rose and stretched, thanked Priscilla and made to take his leave.
“Sit down, Hamish,” she said quietly. “Now tell me why this sudden interest in the workings of a word processor?”
“Oh,” he said shiftily, “the police force is all computerized these days. Got to keep abreast of the times.”
Priscilla looked at him thoughtfully, at the open, honest expression on his face, and said, “You’re lying. You’re up to something. Out with it.”
“Oh, all right. That writer, Rosie Draly, is off to London tomorrow and I want to get a look at what she’s been writing.”