M.C. Beaton - Death of a Dreamer

“I’ve still to make up the bed for you.”

“I’ll come and help you.”

In the cell, Hamish said, “The bed’s awfy hard. I’ll put a quilt under you, if you like.”

“No, I’m so tired and relieved, I’ll fall straight asleep. Where are your beasties?”

“Gone to bed.” He straightened up. “Well, that’s that. I’ll give you first use of the bathroom.”

Elspeth looked up at him and suddenly clutched his arm. Her grey eyes had turned silver. “What is it?” asked Hamish.

“Something bad, something evil. Quite near.”

“You’re tired, Elspeth. We all get fancies when we’re tired. Let’s go back to the kitchen and have a dram. I hope Jimmy’s left me some.”

They sat back at the kitchen table with glasses of whisky.

“Look at the cat!” said Elspeth.

Sonsie was standing at the entrance to the kitchen, fur straight on end, eyes blazing.

“What’s up with the beast?” said Hamish. He half rose from the table just as the kitchen door crashed open and Betty Barnard stood there, a gun in her hand, her eyes glittering with anger.

She had dyed her hair blonde and cut it short and was wearing a pair of dark glasses, but Hamish knew it was Betty.

“You bastard,” she spat at Hamish. “I’m taking you with me.”

“Where?”

“The grave.”

She levelled the pistol and took aim.

With one fluid motion, the cat sprang straight at her face. The cat was heavy, and the force of the spring knocked Betty backwards. Lugs came running in and sank his teeth into her leg. Hamish stamped on Betty’s wrist and bent down and grabbed the gun.

“Off, Sonsie,” said Hamish.

“Get it away from me!” screamed Betty. Sonsie was crouched on Betty’s chest, staring into her eyes. The cat drew back her lips in a long hiss.

Hamish bent down and moved the cat. He twisted Betty round and, grabbing a pair of handcuffs from the dresser, handcuffed her hands behind her back.

She was now babbling with fear. “Keep the cat away from me. Keep it away!”

Hamish took off his belt and bound her ankles. He went through to the office and phoned Strathbane.

When he came back, he hoisted Betty upright and placed her on a chair. Elspeth left the room, muttering, “Got to phone.”

Hamish looked at Betty sadly. “Why?”

“Mind your own business,” she snarled, and refused to say another word.

♦

It was half an hour before Hamish heard the welcome sound of sirens in the distance. The wait had felt like days.

Elspeth had come back into the kitchen. She stood in a corner, staring at Betty.

Just as Hamish heard the police cars draw up outside, the phone in the office rang. He went through and answered it. It was Liddesdale. “Mr. Macbeth, Elspeth has filed an extraordinary story about Betty Barnard trying to kill you.”

“It’s all true,” snapped Hamish. “Print the damn thing.”

He went back just as Jimmy came into the kitchen.

“She was going to kill us,” said Hamish. “That’s the gun on the table.”

Jimmy charged Betty and told the police to take her to Strathbane. “You two had better come along as well,” said Jimmy. “I’ll need your statements. I’d think you’d want to be in on the questioning, Hamish.”

♦

At Strathbane, Jimmy sat in an interview room, flanked by Daviot himself. Hamish sat quietly in one corner. Once the interview tape was put into the machine, Jimmy began the questioning.

“We have you for the murder of Hal Addenfest and the attempted murder of PC Hamish Macbeth and Miss Elspeth Grant, so you may as well start by telling us why you killed Effie Garrard.”

There was a long silence. Then she said harshly, “May I smoke?”

Jimmy nodded and slid a packet of cigarettes and lighter over to her. She lit one, blew smoke, and leaned back. “Funny,” she said, “I gave these cancer sticks up years ago. Oh, why not?”

“Jock and I had an affair. He said he loved me, and at that time, he was telling the truth. Then he began to cool. I told him unless he divorced Dora, I wouldn’t represent him any more. Furthermore, I had lent him money for his gambling debts, and I said I would demand repayment. So he divorced Dora, but he kept making excuses. But the affair continued.” Her voice suddenly trembled. “I was so terribly in love with him.

“Then I heard that Effie Garrard had flipped and was saying that Jock was going to marry her. I went to see her. I told her he wanted nothing to do with her. She told me he loved her and he’d had an affair with her. I knew Jock had passing affairs, but it was when she said she was pregnant that I believed her. I knew she was a bit long in the tooth to get pregnant, but these days women have babies even in their fifties. I’d an awful feeling it might be true and Jock might feel obliged to marry her.

“I had a spare bottle of antifreeze in my car. I went into the hotel bar. It was empty that evening. I asked the barman to help me see if I had dropped my car keys in the car park. When he started to go towards the door, I took a bottle of sweet wine from the bar and put it behind a chair. Then I ran after him and said I’d found the keys. I went back to the bar with him and ordered a martini. While he was busy mixing it, I got the bottle, took off my jacket, and covered the bottle with it. I drank that martini in one gulp.

“I ran into Jock on the road out. He said he’d spoken to Effie and told her he was off to Geordie’s Cleft in the morning. I asked him where it was, and he told me. I said did Effie know where it was? He said sheepishly that he’d told her and no doubt she’d be climbing up the mountain in the morning to haunt him.

“I wrote a note supposed to come from Jock saying he loved her and asking her to bring the wine up to Geordie’s Cleft at midnight and they’d celebrate their engagement. ‘You can start without me,’ I wrote. ‘I’ve already had a swig of it.’ I opened the wine and poured most of it out and then poured in the antifreeze and screwed the cork back in. I left the bottle and note outside her door. Then on the road back to the hotel, I threw the antifreeze into the River Anstey.

“I climbed up to Geordie’s Cleft the next night. I almost hoped to find she wasn’t there, but she was dead and wearing that engagement ring. I took out my penknife and sawed it off and threw the ring in the heather on my way back. I put the suicide note in her pocket. I felt nothing. I felt I had really had nothing to do with it. Then that American came up to me with his notebook. ‘I have it all here,’ he said. ‘I was looking in the window of the bar, and I saw you steal that bottle of wine. I think the police would be very interested.’

“I asked him what he wanted. He amazed me by saying he wanted to get married, that he was tired of living alone. He said he was lonely and he couldn’t understand why nobody liked him.

“I said I’d meet him on the beach the following night at midnight and let him know my decision. I never thought he’d fall for it, but he did. Maybe because I said I was lonely, too, and that I’d like him to be a bit more romantic and the beach at midnight would be romantic.

“I flew down to Glasgow and got my diving gear, came back up, and hid it in the boot of my car. I drove over to the forest on the far side of the loch. I dived in and swam underwater across the loch.

“I saw him standing there like a bloody garden gnome staring up at the road. I crept up, picking up a rock as I went, and hammered him on the head. He fell backwards. I took the notebook. I dragged him by the ankles. I was going to take him with me into the loch. There’s a sort of shelf down there, and I was going to lodge the body under it. Then I heard those two schoolboys. So I left him, waded in, and dived. I knew the police would be searching the rooms, and I thought of filling my diving suit with stones and sinking it down into the loch, but it was expensive gear. I knew about the storeroom because the porter had told me about the people who hadn’t paid their bill and how their luggage was down there. I searched around the outside of the hotel with a torch until I found the right window. I shone the torch on that notebook and went through it. There was nothing about me stealing the wine.”