“You’re joking.”
“Not a bit of it.”
“But why? It’s not as if we’re an item.”
“Don’t have to be. I hate taking holidays on my own.”
“Never been married?”
“Twice. Didn’t work out. Mind you, I was lucky. Both women were rich and were so glad to get rid of me, they didn’t want any money.”
“Why were they glad to get rid of you?”
“You know what reporting’s like, Elspeth. I was hardly ever home. Come on. Let’s go together. It would be fun. I could do with some clean air to fumigate my lungs.”
“How many do you smoke?”
“Sixty a day.”
“You could stop, stay in Glasgow, and get clean lungs that way.”
“Think about it. You could at least have company on that long drive.”
Elspeth thought about Hamish. It would be rather pleasant to turn up accompanied by Luke and show him she really didn’t care.
“All right,” she said. “You’re on.”
♦
Hamish set out for Braikie the following morning. Braikie was not Hamish’s favourite town, although it was miles better than Strathbane, and much smaller. The posher locals referred to it as ‘the village.’ It had some fine Victorian villas at the north end, a depressing housing estate of grey houses all looking the same at the south end, and a main street of small dark shops with flats above them stretching out on either side of the town hall and library. A few brave souls lived in bungalows on the shore road facing the Atlantic. They often had to be rescued when November gales sent giant waves crashing into their homes. The main town, however, was huddled several damp fields away, out of the sight and sound of the sea.
Mrs. Gillespie lived in the housing estate. When Hamish called at her home, he noticed to his surprise that she had bought her house. He could see this because she had had picture windows installed, and householders who rented their homes from the council were not allowed to change the buildings. House prices, even this far north, were rising steeply, and he wondered how she could have afforded the purchase price.
Now that he was actually on her doorstep, he could feel his courage waning. He reminded himself sharply that it was high time someone put Mrs. Gillespie in her place.
He rang the bell. The door was answered by a little gnome of a man wearing a cardigan. He had a bald, freckled scalp. “Mr. Gillespie?” ventured Hamish. He had always assumed Mrs. Gillespie to be a widow.
“Aye, that’s me.”
“Is your wife at home?”
“No, she’s up at the professor’s. What’s up?”
“Nothing important. I just want a wee word with her. I’ll be off to the professor’s.”
Professor Sander was retired. He lived in a large Victorian villa in the better part of town. It was isolated from its neighbours at the end of a cul-de-sac. Hamish could see Mrs. Gillespie’s car parked on the road outside. He parked as well and walked to the garden entrance, which was flanked on one side by a magnificent rowan tree, weighed down with red berries, and on the other by an old·fashioned pump.
He was about to walk up the short drive when he stopped. There had been something he had seen out of the corner of his eye.
He turned and looked.
Mavis Gillespie lay huddled at the foot of the pump. He went up to her and bent down and felt for a pulse. There was none. Her bucket and mop lay beside her. Blood flowed from a wound on her head, and he noticed a stain of blood on the bucket.
He stood up and took out his telephone and called police headquarters. Then he went to his Land Rover and found a pair of latex gloves and put them on. Mrs. Gillespie’s handbag was lying beside her on the ground. It looked as if she had been struck down just as she was leaving.
He opened the handbag and looked inside.
The first thing he saw was that crumpled letter from Elspeth. He gingerly took it out and put it in his pocket.
Then he waited for reinforcements to arrive.
∨ Death of a Maid ∧
2
That bucket down, and full of tears am I.
—William Shakespeare
A fussy little man came down the drive. He had a shock of white hair and was dressed in a Harris tweed suit. He was wearing a blue and white polka-dot bow tie. Hamish guessed he was probably in his late seventies. He had a chubby face with a small pursed mouth. He looked like an elderly baby.
“Why are the police here?” he said, then saw the crumpled body on the ground. In death, Mrs. Gillespie seemed much smaller, more a heap of clothes than what had so recently been a living person.
“There appears to have been an accident,” said Hamish. “Are you Professor Sander?”
“Yes, yes. How unfortunate. If you want me, I’ll be up at the house.”
He turned away.
“Wait a minute,” said Hamish, “did you see anyone outside your house this morning?”
“No, why? It’s not as if it’s murder, is it?”
“I’ll need to wait and see. There’s blood on the bucket. Someone may have hit her over the head. Was she leaving, and when?”
“About half an hour ago. Really, Officer, I don’t notice the comings and goings of the home help.”
“But you couldn’t avoid hearing the comings and goings of Mrs. Gillespie,” Hamish pointed out. “She made one hell of a noise.”
“I am writing a history of Napoleon’s Russian campaign, and when this brain of mine is absorbed in writing, I am not aware of anything else.”
“There must already be an awful lot of books about Napoleon in Russia,” commented Hamish.
“What would you know about history, young man?”
With relief, Hamish heard the approaching sirens. He was beginning to dislike the professor.
Blair and Detective Jimmy Anderson arrived in the first car. In the second car was the pathologist, Dr. Forsythe. Following that was a people carrier full of the forensic team and in the last car, the small excited figure of Shona Fraser.
“What have we here, Macbeth?” demanded Blair.
“It looks as if someone might have brained her with her bucket,” said Hamish.
While the pathologist got out her kit, Blair bent over the body. Then he straightened up, his alcohol-wet eyes gleaming with triumph. “That’s where you’re wrong, laddie,” he said loudly, casting a look in Shona’s direction. “There’s blood on the stone at the foot o’ that auld pump. She must ha’ tripped and given her head a sore dunt.”
“If you will allow me,” said the pathologist. She pushed Blair aside and bent over the body.
There was a long silence while she investigated. The day was dry, but a mist was coming down, turning the landscape into a uniform grey.
A seagull wheeled and screeched overhead. Rowan berries, bright as blood, fell down from the tree.
At last, Dr. Forsythe straightened up. “I can tell you more when I make a proper examination, but, yes, it seems someone struck her a murderous blow on the back of her head with her own bucket. She fell forward and struck her forehead on the stone in front of the pump.”
“There might have been a struggle,” said Hamish. “You can see where the gravel at the foot of the drive has been all scraped.”
Blair rounded on him in a fury. “You,” he snarled, “had she any relatives?”
“There’s a husband.”
“Well, get over there and break the news to him and let the experts get on with their job.”
Hamish touched his cap and walked over to his Land Rover. The forensic team were getting kitted out. A strong smell of stale booze emanated from the lot of them. Hamish remembered there had been a rugby match the night before. No doubt they had all been celebrating as usual.
Shona ran after him. “You got it right. He didn’t,” she said.