Hamish’s heart was beating hard. After that business on Clacham Mohr, he had hoped never to be the butt of a practical joke again, but he found he was praying that this would turn out to be one. But the sky was dark and windy and his Highland soul felt menace in the very air.
He took out his notebook and began to make rapid shorthand notes.
Then he was approached by a group of men and women – reporters from the Northern Times, Highland Times, Moray Firth Radio, and the Ross-shire Journal, all clamouring to know about witchcraft in Cnothan.
His heart sank. It was like a bad dream. He knew that the Glasgow and Edinburgh newspapers would soon follow, then the television teams, then the London newspaper and television reporters. But, worst of all – once more he would be working for Detective Chief Inspector Blair of Strathbane.
Ian Gibb had found his scoop at last.
∨ Death of an Outsider ∧
5
What makes life dreary is the want of motive.
—George Eliot
The circus came to town. All of it. The television crews with cables twisting like black snakes, the reporters, the feature writers, the photographers, the forensic team, squads of policemen to search for clues, and the fat, pompous figure of Chief Detective Inspector Blair among the lot.
Blair was determined to solve this case all on his own, without his thunder being stolen by that lanky village idiot, Hamish Macbeth, and so he told Hamish to ‘run along’ and keep the gentlemen of the press in order.
Hamish derived much bitter amusement from the spectacle of the press trying to winkle a comment out of the taciturn locals. It was Diarmuid Sinclair of all people who broke the ice. Driven out of Cnothan in the search of a friendlier interviewee, Grampian Television had come across Diarmuid in his fields. Since he had started to talk to Hamish Macbeth, there was no stopping Diarmuid. He talked and talked. He told fantastic Highland stories of witchcraft in Cnothan. He even said he believed there was a coven of witches in the town.
Diarmuid burst upon the six o’clock news and caused emerald-green jealousy in Cnothan. By evening the press were almost besieged by locals dying to be interviewed.
Hamish felt restless. Blair and his sidekicks, detectives Jimmy Anderson and Harry MacNab, were cluttering up the police station, and one of the forensic team had commandeered the Land Rover. Hamish put Towser on the leash and ambled down to The Clachan. He felt if he could find the whereabouts of Sandy Carmichael, he might find the whereabouts of William Mainwaring and the identity of the skeleton. Mrs. Mainwaring had tearfully confirmed her husband had false teeth, but it was hard to think of the means by which Mainwaring could have been reduced to bare bones so quickly.
It was pitch-black although it was only four in the afternoon, and the endless screaming wind of Sutherland was tearing at his clothes. The bar was closed but he could see a light inside and hammered on the door. After a wait of a few minutes, it was opened by Hector Gunn. “Mair questions,” he groaned when he saw Hamish. “If it isnae the press, it’s the polis. Come in.” Hamish went into the bar, which smelled of stale beer and strong disinfectant, with Towser at his heels.
“I want to know what happened when Sandy Carmichael was in here on Saturday evening,” said Hamish.
“Nothing happened. He drank himself stupid, that’s all.”
“The man is a known alcoholic. Didn’t you think buying him drinks was a form o’ murder?” said Hamish.
“Och, I wouldnae say he was an alcoholic. Jist ower-fond o’ his dram.”
Hamish looked at Hector Gunn in silence. Was there any point in saying that a man who had the DTs with remarkable regularity was obviously not a social drinker? He decided it would be a waste of time.
“Well,” said Hamish, “Let’s put it another way. Who was the keenest to buy Sandy drinks?”
“I wasnae watching, and I’ve got mair to dae with ma time,” said Hector huffily. “It was your job tae be doon here, seeing that none of them tried to drive when they had mair than enough. It was a noisy evening. Alistair Gunn, ma cousin, was in, and Dougie Macdonald. Something Mainwaring had said to Alistair was fair making him mad, although he wouldnae say what it was. He wanted a crowd of them to debag Mainwaring and throw him in the loch. They were all as fierce as lions and saying what they were going to do to Mainwaring when in he walks and they all fall silent and become sheepish and shuffle their feet and not a word is said to the man. John Sinclair and his wife, Mary, came in and Mainwaring joined them, although they didn’t want him to. Then that reporter, Ian Gibb, him from Dornoch, he was in, noisy and drunk, and Mainwaring leaves the Sinclairs and says something to him, and Gibb tries to punch him but falls on the floor. Then thae two crofters, Alec Birrell and Davey Macdonald, start shouting at Mainwaring that he’s stealing good croft land from the crofters and Mainwaring tells them to get stuffed. Then Harry Mackay puts his oar in and says Mainwaring bought those houses and left them empty out o’ spite, and Mainwaring says Mackay couldn’t get a fuck in a brothel, he was that weak. Mackay walks off in a temper. I had a lot of customers to serve but I was just about to go around the bar and stop the noise when Mainwaring left and everything quietened down after that and they were all laughing at Sandy, who was standing on his chair and trying to do an impersonation of Frank Sinatra. I asked him for his car keys but he said he didnae have his Land Rover with him.”
Hamish asked a few more questions and then went off into the blackness of late afternoon. He decided to go out to the Cnothan Game and Fish Company to see if Jamie had heard any news of Sandy. He let Towser off the leash as soon as he was clear of the town traffic, and then he ambled along, whistling in a kind of dreary way.
Towser plunged into the fields on either side of the road, looking for rabbits. Hamish kept calling him back, shining his powerful torch across the fields. It was just when Towser had been gone some time and Hamish was wondering whether the dog had been caught in a rabbit trap, that he at last saw Towser loping back towards the road, his eyes gleaming in the long beam thrown by the torch.
“It’s no use grinning at me like that,” grumbled Hamish, “I’ve had enough. Back on the leash you go.”
And then Towser’s absurd grin slipped and fell to the grass. Wondering, Hamish bent down and shone his torch on a set of false teeth. He took out a clean handkerchief and picked them up.
“Where did you get this, boy?” he whispered. “Over there? Come on. Show me!”
Towser obediently trotted off, stopping and turning every few yards to make sure his master was following him. “Fetch!” called Hamish when Towser finally stopped and pawed the ground. Towser scoured around, bringing back everything he could find, from rusty tin cans to old shoes. Hamish turned and looked back. There was a car going along the road, not far away. As he watched, the car window opened and something came hurtling out. He walked forward and looked. It was a crushed beer can.
He stood in the darkness, shivering in the wind, and thinking hard.
He shone his torch on the false teeth. They were stained with nicotine.
He wrapped them carefully in his handkerchief again and began to make his way back to the road. He put Towser back on the leash and headed on towards the Game and Fish Company.
As he reached the yard, Jamie cruised in in his white Mercedes with his wife. The floodlights in the yard were switched on and so Hamish was able to view Jamie’s wife clearly. She was a tall, slim Highland beauty with masses of jet-black hair, a creamy skin, and a luscious mouth. She was wearing a mink coat open over a white shirt blouse and jeans and black leather boots with very high stiletto heels.