M.C. Beaton - Death of a Charming Man

She kissed Rory on the cheek and then sat down and looked at Hamish. “Screw all news editors,” she said. “Who’s this?”

“My cousin Hamish, down from the Highlands. He’s just leaving.”

“Why?”

“Because this is our date.”

“You can’t send your cousin away,” said Mandy, delighted at the prospect of having two men beside her for dinner. “Let’s all eat together.”

“I really must be going,” said Hamish, receiving the full blast of a fulminating glare from Rory.

Mandy smiled into his eyes. “My treat.”

Hamish was very hungry. There were delicious smells of food all about him. Avoiding Rory’s eyes, he said, “Maybe I’ll just stay for a little.”

Rory tried to talk newspaper shop and so exclude Hamish from the conversation, but Mandy plied Hamish with questions about his work in Scotland. It was only half-way through the meal that he realized she had the newspaper reporter’s off-duty trick of asking a lot of questions and not really listening to the answers. “Look, I am a reporter and I ask incisive questions,” she seemed to be saying. Whatever Hamish replied to those questions was of little interest compared to Mandy’s interest in her own personality – or rather the one she had knitted for herself. His appetite satisfied, he wished he had not stayed. Mandy’s main intention was to make Rory jealous and she had initially succeeded in doing just that. But by the time the pudding was served, Hamish could see Rory was growing bored.

He glanced at his watch and manufactured a look of shock. “I’d quite forgotten, I’ve got to meet a fellow,” he said, pushing his plate away and getting to his feet. Rory followed him to the restaurant door. “Look, you great pillock,” he said. “Don’t balls up any more of this evening. Wander the streets, do anything, but don’t turn up at the flat until I’ve got this one safely into bed.”

“I’m sorry, Rory, but I was hungry.”

“Make up for it. Don’t come home until the small hours.”

Hamish left the restaurant and set out towards the West End. He went to the late show of a movie and then went to an all-night café and drank coffee and watched the clock until he thought it was safe to return.

He crept into the flat and made his way to his room. He undressed and washed and climbed into bed. Sounds of noisy activity were coming from the next room. He pulled the blankets over his head and wished he were back in the police station in Lochdubh.

♦

In the morning he went down to Westminster School. He marvelled that such a quiet backwater could exist in the heart of London. The various school houses were grouped around a quadrangle, Little Dean’s. Virginia creeper flamed on the old walls of Ashburnham House. Boys in the school uniform of charcoal-grey suit and plain blue tie crossed and recrossed Little Dean’s on their way to and from classes. One of them directed him to the registrar’s office.

He patiently explained to the registrar his name, profession, and interest in Peter Hynd. Files were checked and then the registrar said, “The best thing you can do is to pay a visit on Peter’s old housemaster. He left two years ago and is living in Madingley Road in Cambridge. Here’s the address. His name is Mr. James Heath.”

Cambridge! Hamish was tempted to forget about the whole thing and return to Lochdubh. Still…

“How do I get there?” he asked.

Armed with instructions, he took the tube from St. James’s to Liverpool Street Station and caught the Cambridge train. With the aid of a map drawn for him by the registrar, he walked from the station at Cambridge to Madingley Road. He began to worry that he should have phoned first. In fact, he could probably just have interviewed this Mr. Heath on the phone. He found the address, a big Victorian building divided into flats, and pressed the bell over a neat card marked J. Heath .

To his relief, a buzzer sounded and he went into a large dark hall checkered with coloured light from the stained-glass panel on the door. An authoritative voice called, “Up here. First landing.”

Hamish went up the stairs. Mr. Heath was waiting for him. He was a thin, spare man with a clever, humorous face. Hamish rapidly explained he was from the Sutherland police and wanted to make certain inquiries about Peter Hynd. Mr. Heath threw him a quizzical look but said, “Come in. Sit yourself down. Tea or coffee?”

“Tea,” said Hamish, thinking he had drunk enough coffee the night before to last him a lifetime.

While the ex-housemaster made tea, Hamish crossed the book-lined room and stood by the window and looked across to the spires of Cambridge. The rattling of teacups made him turn round as Mr. Heath came in, carrying a loaded tray which contained not only teapot and cups but fruit-cake and sandwiches.

“Now,” said Mr. Heath when they were comfortably settled by the fire, “what’s all this about Peter?”

Hamish said briefly that Peter had been resident in the village of Drim and had left, he felt, under suspicious circumstances. “I mean, it’s the Highlands of Scotland,” said Hamish. “You would think someone would have seen him leave. What did you make of his character?”

A slightly guarded took came into the housemaster’s eyes. “He was a boarder. Westminster takes day boys as well. I always thought he had been sent to the wrong school.”

“In what way?”

“The boys who come to us are usually very bright. The fees are high and people who do not know Westminster assume it is a school like Eton, for the privileged, but a lot of our pupils are very gifted and there is not much emphasis on sport. I think Peter felt out of place.”

“Was he very manipulative?” asked Hamish.

“An odd question.”

“Well, was he?” There was a long silence and then Mr. Heath said, “It’s not as if you are from the newspapers. Yes, he was. At first he seemed quite bright, but I found he had got a hold of some kind over some of the boys and was making them do his homework for him. He craved attention and admiration. One teacher who gave him a hard time immediately became the butt of scurrilous gossip. I thought Peter was behind it but could prove nothing. The worst thing he did was with the girls.”

“How? This is important.”

“We have girls in the final years. He was a remarkably beautiful boy. He enjoyed setting one girl against the other. One of our most brilliant girls failed her exams because she was so besotted with him.”

Hamish drew a long breath. “Peter Hynd moved into the village of Drim,” he said. “The young people have mostly left for the cities, but the middle-aged women fell hook, line, and sinker for Peter. He made sure that’s exactly what they would do. The atmosphere in the village was terrible, full of hate and menace. Recently, one of the women, Betty Baxter, was found dead on the beach, her neck broken, diagnosed as accident, but I’m not so sure. Now, would you say he could engender enough hate for someone to murder him?”

“Oh, yes,” said Mr. Heath calmly. “I felt like murdering him myself.”

“Does he have a family? Where does the money come from?”

“The parents are both dead. The fees were paid by a family trust. He has a sister, an elder sister. She used to come on parents’ day. Now what was her name? Beth, that was it, Beth Hynd. She may have married by now. Lived in Richmond. Peter spent his school holidays with her. I am afraid I cannot remember the address.”

As he left, Hamish groaned inwardly. Back to London and then Richmond. He had meant to stay and look around Cambridge, but the desire to prove to himself that he was not on a wild-goose chase, that he had not wasted his holidays, drove him on. He was fortunate in catching a fast train and an hour later was back in London and on the tube to Richmond.