M.C. Beaton - Death of a Dentist

“Let’s chust go into the living room,” said Hamish. “There’s something we want you to listen to.”

He led the way. The two detectives and Hamish followed. The policemen waited in the hall.

Hamish solemnly cautioned the pharmacist and charged him with the murders of Gilchrist and Sutherland. A sheen of sweat covered the pharmacist’s face. Mrs. Cody could be heard out in the hall demanding to know why she could not join her husband.

Hamish placed the tape recorder on the table. Gody buried his face in his hands as the tape began to turn and Kylie’s voice sounded out loud and clear.

When it finished, he said in a dull voice, “You tricked her, Macbeth, you bastard. There was no proof. I remembered the dog taking a leak at the foot of the stairs and went and scrubbed it clean, just in case. You bastard. She called me a perv! I thought she loved me.” His voice broke. He wailed, “She loved me! She said she loved me!” Then he began to sob.

♦

They led him out to the car. Lights were on in all the neighbouring houses, people stood out on their steps, staring at the police, at the small figure of Cody being taken to the cars. Mrs. Cody joined her husband. As she got in the car, she said, “If by any chance you get off, Charles’, I’ll kill you myself. We were always so respectable.”

“Weren’t we just,” he said savagely. “You with your ugly body and your respectable knickers. You make me sick.”

♦

“Are they bringing in Kylie?” asked Hamish when they reached Strathbane.

Jimmy nodded. “And she’s in for a shock when she hears that tape. We’ll need to wait for that lawyer. Cody insists on that. Want a cup of tea afore he arrives? They’ve gone to get him out of bed.”

“Aye, that would be grand,” said Hamish.

They went up to the canteen. “Good work, Hamish,” said Jimmy. “You did well and no cowboy tactics. This’ll mean promotion for you.”

Hamish looked at him thoughtfully. “Unless you say the whole thing was your idea.”

“What?”

“Think about it, Jimmy. A feather in your cap. Promotion would mean Strathbane for me.”

“I don’t want to do a Blair on you, Hamish, but I’d be right glad to take the credit. What do you want?”

Hamish grinned. “Peace and quiet.”

“Well, here’s to you,” said Jimmy, raising his teacup.

Hamish suddenly stiffened. “They’d get Cody to turn out his pockets, wouldn’t they?”

“Aye, that’s the form. What are you thinking of, Hamish?”

“I’m thinking of poison. I hope they took any pills off him.”

Jimmy stared at Hamish wide-eyed. “Unless the bugger said they were heart pills or something and being a pharmacist, whatever would be in the right bottle.”

They both ran for the door.

“Of course we got him to turn out his pockets,” said the desk sergeant contemptuously. Cody had been allowed to dress before they had taken him from his home. “He had nothing on him but a handkerchief and his house keys and car keys.”

“No medicine?”

“He had his asthma pills.”

“But you kept them?”

“No. It seemed all right to – ”

“Which cell is he in?” shouted Jimmy.

“Number five. But – ”

“Open it now!”

Looking sulky, the desk sergeant went and unlocked cell number five. Mr. Charles Cody lay as dead as a doornail on the floor.

♦

“So it all ended up a right mess,” said Hamish on the phone to Priscilla the following day. “Of course Blair arrived in the morning and tried to sabotage Jimmy’s catch by saying if he’d have been called out, Cody would still have been alive.”

“So what happens to Kylie?”

“She’ll appear in court charged with accessory to murder and incitement to murder and impeding the police in their enquiries. But that expensive lawyer’s probably going to defend her for free. He likes the publicity. He’ll make mincemeat of me at the trial and Kylie will probably walk free and sell her story to the newspaper that pays the most and live a happy selfish life forever after.” There was a little silence and then Hamish said with affected casualness, “I didn’t know Sarah was married.”

“Yes, she had a bust-up with her husband. Didn’t I tell you? Oh, no, I remember, we didn’t mention Sarah.”

“She might have told me,” said Hamish.

“Why should she?” demanded Priscilla sharply.

“Well, we had dinner a few times. I thought she might have mentioned it.”

“If she was hurting,” said Priscilla, her voice now heavy with suspicion, “she would hardly tell a village policeman she barely knew.”

Hamish decided it was time to change the subject. “The only thing that puzzles me is that hour that Maggie Bane took the morning of the murder. I think I’ll go and ask her before she leaves.”

“I must say all this ferocious murder and passion in a place like Braikie comes as a surprise.”

“I suppose any passion would come as a surprise to you, Priscilla.”

“Goodbye, Hamish.”

There was a click as she rang off. Hamish swore furiously. Why had he said that? It wasn’t as if he cared for Priscilla anymore.

Did he?

Maggie Bane answered the door to him, looking relaxed and cheerful for the first time. “Come in,” she said. “I was just about to have a cup of coffee. Join me?”

Hamish nodded.

“You’ll need to sit on the floor. The furniture’s gone off to storage.”

Hamish sat down on the floor and looked around the empty room. After a few minutes, Maggie came in with a tray with two mugs of coffee on it. She placed it on the floor between them.

“The nightmare’s over,” she said.

“Did you suspect Cody?”

“No, and that’s the funny thing. He called in to the surgery a week before the murder and Mr. Gilchrist put his head round the surgery door and ordered me to go for a walk. Said they had something private to discuss.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” demanded Hamish.

“He was the pharmacist. He supplied our drugs. I didn’t think anything of it.”

“Clear up one other thing for me,” said Hamish. “That hour off you took on the day of the murder. Was there more to that than you told me?”

She looked at him for a long time in silence and then gave a little shrug. “The fact is we’d had a blazing row the night before. I went in at ten and gave him his coffee. He usually left it until it got nearly cold. I suppose that’s what gave Cody the opportunity to put poison in it. I told him I was leaving him. I was putting on my coat and just walking out. He could find another receptionist. I went round the shops, did all those things I’d told you I did, and then I thought I may as well go back and pick up the few things I’d left in the surgery.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“I thought if I did you’d suspect me of the murder. But surely Cody took a great risk. I could have just walked in. Anyone could have seen him going up the stairs to the surgery.”

“We got it out of Kylie during the night when she finally broke. He had told her he was so mad with rage and passion, he didn’t care if anyone found him. At first he just meant to poison Gilchrist and walk away. He’d been up at the surgery before and knew when Gilchrist had his coffee and how he left it to get nearly cold. He said when he was finally dead, his rage would not go away and that’s why he hauled him into the chair and drilled his teeth. It was only afterwards when he realised how lucky he had been, that he began to relax. Besides Kylie said it gave him an extra hold over her. She was frightened if she told anyone, he would kill her. And with him dead, there’s no one to contradict her story. Her lawyer will get her dressed up like an innocent schoolgirl for the trial and she’ll sob and say he threatened her into silence and everyone will believe her. You obviously know Cody’s dead.”