Michael Innes - Lament for a Maker

‘The dogs, Mrs Hardcastle?’

‘The rats.’

And Mrs Hardcastle, concealing her parcels beneath her shawl, hurried away. I turned to Gylby. ‘That is Hardcastle over by the kennels? It occurs to me to have a word with him before we go in.’

I crossed the court. The late laird’s factor was giving the dogs a more than meagre meal and cursing them heartily the while. ‘Down, Caesar,’ I heard him call as I came up, ‘down, you tink cur!’

My approach in the snow had been quite unheard. I said pleasantly in his ear: ‘Bonny beasts, Mr Hardcastle.’

He swung round and glared at me suspiciously – not, I fancy, merely because of the obvious irony of my remark. His villainy as sketched by Gylby was apparent enough. But it was not an assured villainy; he seemed, indeed, woefully lacking in confidence. He said now with a sort of surly uncertainty: ‘Maybe so.’

‘And this is Caesar? I should be inclined to give him a powder and follow it up with a little red meat. Now pray, Mr Hardcastle, which is Doctor?’

Rather weakly, Hardcastle pointed at a recumbent animal. ‘That’s him.’

‘Is it indeed? Let’s have a look at him. Doctor! Hey, Doctor! You know, Mr Hardcastle, I think Doctor must be deaf.’

Hardcastle positively brightened. ‘He is deaf.’

‘Really now? That is a little unusual in so young a dog. I wonder, can you be mistaken? It should be easy to devise a test.’

‘Damn’t to hell!’ cried Hardcastle. ‘Will you leave the beast alone?’

‘Certainly if you wish it; I believe my interest in the animal is exhausted. A dumb – and deaf – witness, is he not? I am solicitor to Miss Guthrie, the incoming proprietor. I should be obliged if you would take me to her.’

Gylby’s estimate of the factor, I reflected, had been remarkably accurate. A cunning ruffian, but one whose cunning was soon exhausted. I was not displeased to find him fitting neatly enough into the picture that was forming in my mind of the events of Christmas Eve. This picture was as yet far from complete; only the cardinal pieces – if I may use an image suggested by what I had heard of Ranald Guthrie’s jigsaws – were as yet in place. But these gave me – unless I was greatly mistaken – the first outlines of a very curious situation. Inevitably, there was a great deal that was still obscure and invited the most careful and cautious investigation. I pause on this word. I had come to Erchany in my professional character as a solicitor; it will be not without amusement that the reader perceives me, while yet standing but on the threshold of the castle, as lured into the undignified role of a private detective agent!

As I entered the great hall of the castle a uniformed police officer stepped forward, introduced himself as Inspector Speight, and invited me into a small and bare room in which he had apparently established his headquarters. I might properly have insisted on being conducted to my client before assisting at any conference with the police; there seemed, however, to be no necessity for this and I accepted the invitation. I found Inspector Speight a civil and intelligent officer and judged it might be useful to show him I already had some grip of the situation. After a few preliminary remarks I therefore said: ‘I suppose you’ve found Gamley?’

‘Yes, there was no difficulty in that. We have a line on him for this afternoon.’

‘And you have no doubt traced the young people who were packed off by the late Mr Guthrie?’

‘Packed off? I don’t know about that.’

‘A point that will emerge, inspector. I think it will be found to be of some importance. And where had they got to?’

The inspector shook his head. ‘Strangely enough, Mr Wedderburn, we’ve had no word of them yet. But then they had good reason to lie pretty low.’

‘I wonder, inspector, I wonder. It is possible that now Mr Guthrie is dead the necessity for their departing unobtrusively is over. I venture to think it is very possible.’

‘If I may say so, Mr Wedderburn, that seems a singularly wrong-headed way of looking at it.’

‘That depends entirely on the point from which one looks, does it not? Perhaps you have grounds for believing that the young Mr Lindsay has committed some crime?’

I had reckoned accurately in counting on a streak of irritation latent in Inspector Speight. My bland manner drew him at once. He said abruptly: ‘The lad pitched Guthrie to his death. I haven’t a doubt of it.’

‘Perhaps so, inspector. I would say myself it is a little early to cherish convictions. And I think there may be some evidence in direct rebuttal?’

‘To be sure, there’s Miss Guthrie.’

So Miss Guthrie had already told the police her story. I rose. ‘I think, inspector, I must now seek my client.’

Inspector Speight made a protesting gesture. ‘You mustn’t be taking it, sir, I think it necessary to discredit what the young lady has told us entirely. But she was scared and confused out there in the storm and she wanted to see as little ill in the business up there as might be.’ The inspector paused. ‘Perhaps she’ll come to a clearer recollection, though, on thinking it over.’

I was again aware that Inspector Speight was an intelligent man. And for a moment I wondered if he might not be positively guileful. Miss Guthrie, who had been mysteriously on the very battlement from which the dead man had fallen, was, it appeared, that dead man’s heir. Of the delicacy of this position Speight had given no hint.

‘So you think, inspector, that it’s either Lindsay or nothing?’ Speight nodded emphatically. ‘An old feud, a new quarrel, a witness that he was in blazing passion, the gold broken into, him and the girl gone. One could hardly ask for more.’

‘Unless, perhaps, the chopping of the fingers from the corpse.’ The inspector stared. ‘You’ve heard that? It but shows the daft and dirty gossip that country folk will seize on. Never heed their foolish claik, Mr Wedderburn. You and I are concerned with facts.’

‘A healthy reminder, inspector. It frequently falls from my friend Lord Clanclacket on the bench. And you think there is no other direction in which the facts can point?’

Almost happily, Speight smiled. ‘Mr Wedderburn, I’ll give you something away. The American lassie didn’t do it. There’s such a thing as experience in the ways of crime. And thirty years of that tells me not to waste time that way. The lassie’s real nice.’

‘I need hardly say that your impression is a most welcome one. Of course Neil Lindsay may prove real nice too.’

Speight chuckled. ‘Time enough to decide that when we lay hands on him. I say it’s Lindsay or nothing. And I think you really agree with me, sir.’

‘No, inspector, I don’t agree. I cannot claim your experience of crime. But I have another opinion.’

‘Mr Wedderburn, it would be a real privilege to have it.’

‘If, as I hope, it turns to conviction you shall have it before the sheriff this afternoon. But – as I said – it’s early for convictions yet.’

4

I was received by Miss Guthrie in what is referred to throughout these narratives as the schoolroom. She struck me at once as possessing that blend of elegance and‚ élan which gives many of her cultivated countrywomen their slightly baffling charm; I was inclined to think that Inspector Speight, in finding her ‘nice’ had displayed at once an accurate and unexpectedly sophisticated taste. She was evidently determined to be businesslike. I judged her to be a person familiar with the elementary proprieties of legal business; nevertheless I thought it proper to say a few words on the relations generally presumed to exist between solicitor and clients in these Islands. She listened with a very becoming attention – the readers must not think me unaware of a slight tendency in myself to what might be unkindly termed pomposity on such occasions – and presently we were seated comfortably together on a sofa. Miss Guthrie, indeed, was so kind as to give me permission to smoke a pipe.