How long had he lived like this? wondered Olivia. His face was seamed and wrinkled and his eyes small and watery. The stink rising from his rags was choking.
"We wondered if you might have picked up a Bible," said Hamish. He and Olivia stood. There was nowhere to sit down. There was a filthy mattress in one corner and one kitchen chair on which Joey now sat, staring up at Hamish, whose bright hair brushed the ceiling.
Joey shook his head. "No Bible. And if I saw one, I wouldnae take it. Bad luck."
His voice was faint and singsong.
Olivia went over and crouched down beside Joey's chair. "We're really anxious to locate a certain Bible which was thrown away two days ago. We'd pay you for your help."
He looked at her and smiled, exposing a mouthful of white false teeth. "My, what a bonny lassie you are," he crooned. "How much?"
"A tenner."
He struggled out of the chair and Olivia stood up and backed off. "I can take you to where the latest stuff would be."
"That's grand," said Hamish.
Joey took up an old hurricane lantern and lit it with one of the candles which were stuck in wine bottles. Then he blew out the candles.
Unlike some council tips, this one was not locked, nor did it have a fence around it. With surprising agility, Joey trotted ahead with his lantern and soon they were stumbling over piles of garbage. The moon shone down and the seagulls screamed and dived. Frost was beginning to glitter on the piles of garbage. Olivia shivered and wished she had put on warmer clothes.
They reached a sort of road between the rubbish where the council trucks drove in. After about a mile of walking, Joey said, "It'll be ower here, a bittie. And probably up on top."
The latest truckloads had obviously run up a path and dumped their loads on top of the mountains of garbage already there.
Flashing their torches, Olivia and Hamish and Joey began to search. After an hour, freezing with cold, and utterly miserable, Olivia could only admire the energy of Joey, who scrabbled away, humming under his breath. She had a sudden sharp longing for the busy streets of Glasgow, the buses, the shops, all familiar territory and, above all, where she was always in control, always in charge. Ever since the drug case began, she reflected, she had felt as if she were only some sort of female sidekick to Hamish Macbeth.
Another hour. Her clothes stank and her nostrils reeked with the smell of the tip. A seagull swooped down and screamed in her ear and she let out a startled cry, lost her footing and fell backwards into a pile of kitchen waste.
"Olivia!" called Hamish. "Why don't you go back to the Land Rover and warm up?"
But the feeling that she might not be as strong or as tough as any man drove Olivia on. "I'll be all right," she said.
Her nose was beginning to run. Her eyes were beginning to run with the cold. And then she saw an edge of black leather binding. Laying the torch on the ground, she got down on her knees and scraped away the debris. It was a Bible.
Her voice croaking with cold and excitement, she shouted, "I've got a Bible."
Hamish scampered down from the top of a pile of rubbish. "I'll hold your torch. Open it."
With stiff red hands Olivia opened the Bible. "Bingo," she said. For on the flyleaf was written "Tommy Jarret."
"Let's go home and get changed," said Hamish. "We'll look at it properly at the station."
They thanked Joey and Hamish handed him a ten-pound note, which Joey tucked inside his rags and scuttled off. "Look at him go," said Hamish. "Maybe that's the secret of a long life, all day out in the open air, never ruin your skin with a bath, keep your muscles supple by running up and down piles of rubbish. I wish I'd worn my own clothes. This lot's for the cleaners. Come on. Let's get out of here."
When they returned to the police station, Olivia stripped off her clothes and put them in a canvas bag supplied by Hamish and soaked in a bath. After Hamish had a shower and dressed in fresh clothes, they went into the kitchen and stared at the Bible on the table.
"I'm almost frightened to look at it," said Hamish.
They sat down and he opened it.
Tucked between the leaves of India paper was a folded piece of A4 typing paper. Hamish carefully spread it open on the table. His face grew grim as he read it. Olivia moved her chair round next to his and looked at it as well.
"I'm keeping this for the end of my book," Tommy had written, "in case Parry looks at my computer. He's in it somewhere, this drug business. Billy, a chap I used to share a flat with, met me one day in Strathbane. I told him I had given up drugs and just wanted to get away from it all. He told me about Parry, just said he'd happened to hear of this man out of Glenanstey who had chalets to rent. Parry seemed just a simple crofter. I'd suspected something might have been going on at the Church of the Rising Sun, but they were just a lot of daft folk talking about sex. I was at a loose end and wanted to take a break from writing, so I decided to follow Parry. I didn't think there would be anything there. I was just playing at detectives. Then one day, I saw him go into Lachie's. Nobody like Parry would have gone to Lachie's for any innocent reason. The next day when he was out on the croft, I looked in his cottage. There was an admiralty map of the area and there was a circle around the entrance to Loch Drim. Then two nights later, a car arrived. I saw Lachie get out with another man and they went into Parry's cottage. I went out and crouched down and peered over the window. Parry was showing them the map. I wanted to keep all this for the book but it's too heavy. I think they were plotting the landing of drugs. Everyone knows Lachie deals drugs. That's where I got the stuff anyway. It's too scary now. I'd better go to the police. But I feel bad. Parry's been kind to me. I'll tip him a warning. He probably just recommends safe locations along the coast."
"Parry," hissed Hamish. "The bastard. Why did he do it?"
"Let's arrest the bugger and find out," said Olivia.
Parry's cottage was in darkness. Hamish hammered at the door. After a few minutes, the lights went on. The door opened.
"Parry McSporran," said Hamish. "I am arresting you for the murder of Thomas Jarret. I must caution you that…"
"You're talking rubbish," howled Parry. "This is me, your friend."
"We found the Bible at the tip."
"So? I told you I threw it out."
"There was a piece of typescript inside where Tommy described the visit you had from Lachie and, I assume, Jimmy White, and about Loch Drim circled on the admiralty chart and that he was going to the police but going to warn you first."
Parry turned white. "I neffer thought to look inside."
At headquarters in Strathbane, the whole story came out in the interrogation room as the tape whizzed.
Parry had borrowed heavily from the bank to build the chalets and the bank was demanding he pay back the loan. He was in danger of losing his croft house. He had run into an old school friend, Hughie Grant, who was looking very prosperous. They had a drink and Parry had told Hughie about his troubles. Hughie said he could put Parry in the way of big money. When he heard it had to do with drugs, he refused. But the bank became even more pressing. He panicked. He went to see Hughie. At first it was storing drugs for them at the croft house and delivering them to certain locations. Then it was helping them to suss out locations to land the drugs. The bank loan was paid off. He told them he wouldn't be having any more to do with them but they told him the only way to retire from the trade was to die.
Then Tommy had come to him and told him he had found out about him and was going to the police but giving Parry time to make a break for it.
"It would have meant it wass all for nothing," said Parry. "I would lose my sheep, my house, my croft, everything. So I told Lachie. 'Sit tight,' he said, 'and don't interfere.' "
Parry said that two young men had called at Tommy's cottage on the day of his death. One was small, with a tattoo of a snake round one arm, and the other was tall and with his hair in a ponytail. Tommy's flatmates, thought Harnish. He had done nothing, as instructed. After a time, they left, and he went in and found Tommy dead. He had phoned Lachie. "Call the cops," Lachie had said. "He's taken an overdose."