M.C. Beaton: Death of a Prankster

“I wanted to see you,” said Hamish, remembering briefly the time when he had been so much in love with her that he would have been unable to say anything as honest as that. “Besides, I’ve got a murder. Arrat House. I’ve been there all day. It was the thought o’ going back to that freezing police station, apart from wanting to see you, that brought me here.”

“Where’s Towser?” asked Priscilla. Towser was Hamish’s dog.

“At the station, but Priscilla, that animal doesn’t feel the cold.”

“Hamish, you are so lazy! A fire takes no time to get going. Drink up and we’ll both go to the station and warm that poor dog and feed it.”

“Towser can look after himself,” pleaded Hamish, but Priscilla replied that she was going to fetch her coat.

Proof that the mongrel could indeed take care of itself was discovered when they found Towser snuggled down under the blankets on Hamish’s bed. Hamish wanted to tell her about the case but had to wait until she had lit the kitchen stove and prepared food for Towser.

“Now,” she said, “that’s better,” and Hamish wondered again how it was that someone so elegant and with such a pampered upbringing should have turned out to be such an efficient housekeeper.

He told her all about the murder and she listened intently. “You see,” finished Hamish, “there’s one thing I’m sure of. Not one of them knew what was in that will. If just one of them looked or sounded as if they knew and if that someone turned out to be the beneficiary, then I think I would find the murderer.”

“You mean, his millions are the reason for the murder?”

“What else?”

“Well, his jokes, Hamish. You’ve forgotten something. He played jokes on people in the village as well. They hated him like poison. Everyone knows that.”

Hamish’s stomach rumbled and he coughed to conceal the noise. He was hungry, but if Priscilla knew that, she would start clattering pots and pans to make him a meal and he wanted to discuss the case.

“Aye, that’s right,” he said slowly. “Mind you, someone would need to be a lunatic to kill him over a joke.”

“There are jokes and jokes,” said Priscilla. “He might have humiliated someone quite dreadfully and you Highlanders are a terribly touchy lot.”

“I’ll go over to the village in the morning,” said Hamish.

“Is Blair allowing you in on this case?”

“For the moment. I’m covering MacGregor’s patch, so I have every right to be there.”

Priscilla leaned forward. “Is it any use pointing out to you that promotion would mean more comfort? If you like it so much here, why didn’t you rush back to feed your dog instead of coming to the hotel?”

“I told you,” said Hamish stiffly, “I wanted tae see you. Iss there anything wrong in that, Miss Halburton-Smythe?”

She studied him thoughtfully and then gave a rueful smile. “I should be flattered, Hamish Macbeth, but I happen to know you are a moocher.”

“Well, if you want to think I wass after the free drink and the free heat, that iss your damned business.”

Priscilla stared at him in amazement. He coloured but turned his head away and sat with his arms folded.

“I’m off,” she said suddenly. “It’s a good thing I brought my own car. Call on me again when you’re over your sulks.”

Hamish felt like a fool when she had gone. What on earth had possessed him to snap at her like that? His stomach gave another rumble. That was it. He was hungry. It was not as if he were still in love with Priscilla and sensitive to her every remark. But he shouldn’t have left Towser behind in the freezing cold. He would take the dog with him in the morning.

♦

Titchy Gold and Charles Trent were snuggled up in bed, his bedroom, Titchy’s being still sealed off. “So you didn’t mean that about leaving me,” said Charles.

“Silly,” she giggled. “I was out of my mind with all those hellish jokes.”

Charles clasped his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling. “I just hope you aren’t pinning your hopes on that will. I’m not.”

“Oh, yes, you are,” said Titchy. “You’ve been strung up all day.”

Charles gave a reluctant laugh. “Terrible, isn’t it? But I am his son and so he’s got to leave me the bulk of it.”

And at that remark, Titchy ended the conversation by becoming very amorous indeed.

♦

Along the corridor in their room, Betty and Angela Trent lay awake. Betty kept snivelling dismally and the tip of her nose was pink.

“I don’t know why you’re so upset,” complained Angela. “I mean, we were both shocked at first, but it’s good in a way to be rid of him and it’s no use pretending otherwise.”

Betty shivered. “That’s a sinful thought. Do you believe there is a hell, Angela?”

“No, but then I don’t believe in heaven either.”

Betty shifted restlessly. “I suppose Charles will get the bulk of the money and then he’ll marry that little tart and she’ll get her claws into it.”

“Just hope he’s left me something,” said Angela, “or we’ll be in real trouble.”

♦

Jeffrey was striding up and down his bedroom, berating his wife, an odd state of affairs, for in their marriage it was usually the other way around. “What on earth possessed you to get the servants to take the body away and clean up?” he kept asking. “You dote on that boy of yours and yet you’ve landed him in terrible trouble and all because you were frightened he had done it. You must be mad. That wimp couldn’t kill anyone.”

Jan found her voice. “Don’t you dare criticize my son,” she said in a thin voice. “At least he earns decent money, which is more than I can say for you.”

“I was earning very good money when you married me,” pointed out Jeffrey acidly. “I am not responsible for the recession in this country.”

“You’re responsible for a lot of hare-brained deals. Pinky told me.” Pinky was a colleague’s wife.

“So that’s your idea of loyalty? Gossiping about me behind my back? Poking into my affairs? I could wring your scrawny neck.”

“Try it,” she jeered. “Just try it.”

“Oh, shut up, you bitch,” he muttered, suddenly weary. He climbed into the double bed beside her and both lay as stiff as boards, not touching, each plotting ways on how best to hurt the other. I’ve still got my looks, thought Jan, to whom extreme thinness was beauty. If he doesn’t get any money in that will, then I’ll find someone else.

Jeffrey thought, if I don’t get any money, I’ll take everything we’ve got left and disappear to Spain. That’d serve the bitch right. She might even have to find out what it’s like to work for a living. In the last few years, failure and frustration had taught him to hate. He now hated his wife every bit as much as he had hated his brother. He forced himself to relax. In his mind’s eye, he lay on a Spanish beach in the blazing sunshine while a buxom Spanish girl with bobbing breasts and not one anorexic bone showing brought him a long cool drink.

♦

Melissa was sick for the second time that evening. Sweating and shivering, she climbed into bed. She would never, even in her left-wing days, have believed the police could be such pigs. She could still see Blair’s face, bloated with rage as he hurled questions at her and Paul. And a fat lot of good Paul had been. He had cringed before Blair, apologized for his very existence on this planet, thought Melissa savagely.

Blair had turned over her whole life, her family, her career, and he had obviously regarded her pink hair as a sure sign she took drugs. Good God! He had even got that thin policewoman from Inverness to examine her arms for needle marks. And she had been so happy just that morning, so free, planning a life with Paul. A fat tear rolled down her nose and plopped on the sheet.