Death of a Hussy

∨ Death of a Hussy ∧

5

O Death, where is thy sting-a-ling-a-ling

O Grave, thy victoree?

The bells of Hell go ting-a-ling-a-ling,

For you but not for me.

—BRITISH ARMY SONG

Alison had often had that very common nightmare where one opens one’s mouth to scream and no sound comes out. But the scream that was wrenched from her filled the air with dreadful sound, rushing away to the high hills, sending a taunting far-off mockery of a scream echoing back.

Peter Jenkins came running out in his dressing gown and slippers to where Alison stood with scream after scream pouring from her contorted face. He ran to the blazing car, flapping his hands ineffectually.

Steel Ironside erupted onto the scene with the kitchen fire extinguisher which he directed at the blazing car. “Help me, you faggot!” he shouted at Peter Jenkins. He ran to the car door and wrenched it open, cursing as he did so.

He grabbed Maggie and dragged her out onto the garage floor, beating at the flames on her clothes, panting and sobbing.

Mrs. Todd drove up. Her face was as white as paper as she ran for the house. She seized the phone in the kitchen and dialled 999 and demanded the fire brigade, the ambulance, and the police,

Then she went out and struck the still-screaming Alison across the face. Alison hiccupped and then ran to Peter Jenkins who gathered her into his arms.

Mrs. Todd then crouched down by Maggie. “She’s dead,” said Steel in a flat voice. “Her clothes had just started to catch fire when I pulled her out. She must have had a heart attack. She killed herself. I’ve never known anyone to mangle a car the way she did.”

Crispin and James arrived on the scene, both in pyjamas.

While Peter Jenkins, still holding Alison, explained in a hushed voice what had happened, Steel said, half to himself, “It’ll take hours for anything to reach us in this wilderness.” The wind of Sutherland howled across the sudden hush but far away came the sound of a siren.

It came nearer, ever nearer, until the Lochdubh Volunteer Fire Brigade rolled into the drive. Close behind came Hamish Macbeth.

“Nothing for us to do now,” said the fire chief, taking off his helmet and revealing himself to be Mr. Johnson, the hotel manager. He looked at the car. Smoke was still rising from the bonnet. The front of the car was burnt black.

“Don’t touch anything,” said Hamish Macbeth sharply. “A forensic team will have to look at that car.”

“No need for that,” said Crispin, marching up in all the glory of primrose-yellow silk pyjamas. “We all know Maggie wrecked that car. Something’s gone in the engine and it burst into flames and gave her a heart attack. She could have got clear if she hadn’t had an attack. The doors weren’t locked. You policemen always complicate matters.”

“Indeed? Then I’m going to complicate them further,” said Hamish quietly. “The minute the ambulance has been and gone, I’ll start taking statements.”

Hostile eyes looked at him. Even Alison, despite her distress, thought he was being overofficious.

Hamish went back to the Land Rover. He did not believe the car had just burst into flames through some fault. Dr. Brodie had arrived and was examining the body. Hamish called Strathbane and reported a suspected murder.

When the ambulance rolled up, Hamish said in a flat voice, “Leave the body where it is.” Everyone looked at him: Alison, Mrs. Todd, the four guests, the fire brigade, the doctor, and the ambulance men.

“What’s up with you, Hamish?” snapped Dr. Brodie. “It’s a clear case of a heart attack. I know you’ve solved murders in the past, but don’t let it go to your head, laddie.”

“I’ve reported a suspected murder attempt,” said Hamish. The silence that followed that statement almost hummed in the ears. Then Hamish said sharply, “Who raised the bonnet of the car?”

“Och, we only lifted it up to make sure there was no flames left underneath,” said Mr. Johnson crossly.

“You shouldnae hae touched anything,” said Hamish. “Mrs. Todd, I think if you take Miss Kerr and the guests into the house, I’ll come with you and start taking statements. We’ll need to wait until the team arrives from Strathbane.”

“I’ll have a word to say to your superiors,” raged Mrs. Todd. “You cannae see a straightforward death when you come across it. When my man died, you was ferreting around my cupboards looking for poison.”

“Had you told me your husband drank to excess, I wouldnae have had to bother,” pointed out Hamish. “I was acting under orders from the procurator fiscal.” The late Mr. Todd had choked to death on his vomit and poisoning had been suspected. It had indeed turned out to be poisoning, but alcohol poisoning. Mrs. Todd always maintained her husband had died of a heart attack.

Mrs. Todd went grimly into the house and began to make preparations for a breakfast-cum-lunch while the others shuffled silently into the sitting room. “Is there a room I can use?” Hamish asked Alison.

“What? Oh, yes. The study. Through there.”

“Perhaps you would like to come through first, Miss Kerr. No, there is no need for you,” he said to Peter, who rose at the same time as Alison and showed every sign of accompanying her.

Hamish sat down at the desk in the study. Alison had stopped crying. She looked ill.

“Just tell me what you were doing this morning,” said Hamish.

“I heard the car start, or rather I heard the garage doors being opened,” said Alison in a shaky voice. “She…Maggie…had been kind to me the day before, so I thought I would ask her if I could drive the car. I ran down and out and just as I got to her, the car burst into flames.”

“Was there any sort of bang? Any sort of explosion?”

Alison tried to concentrate. “No,” she said at last. “One minute I saw her face quite clearly through the windscreen, and then it had vanished and there was nothing but flame.” She showed every sign of being about to cry again.

“Now,” said Hamish quickly, “let’s get to the house guests. The tall one who came down that night to the police station with ye, that’s Peter Jenkins. What do you know about him?”

“He’s an advertising executive in his own company,” said Alison. “He knew Maggie about twenty years ago, I think, or did he say eighteen? Anyway, he was in love with her and then he got her letter. You see, she wanted to get married and so she had chosen four of her old lovers. You don’t seem surprised?”

“I’m surprised at her odd way of courting but not that she had a lot of lovers. Go on.”

“He told me she’d changed. He wasn’t in love with her anymore although I heard…”

Alison bit her lip. She had been about to tell Hamish about overhearing Peter begging for money, but Peter had held Alison and comforted her and she felt she had to protect him.

“What were you about to say?” demanded Hamish sharply.

Alison looked mutinous. He sighed and said, “I’ll return to that. Tell me about the others.”

“The smallish man in the yellow pyjamas is Crispin Witherington. He owns a car salesroom in Finchley in North London. He took me out driving. He wanted me to put a good word in for him with Maggie.”

“Now why would he suggest that? You said yourself Maggie hated you.”

“He thought Maggie was fond of me to leave me everything in her will.…” Alison looked at Hamish with dilated eyes.

“Don’t be in a taking,” said Hamish quickly, frightened that Alison would start another scene. “The fact the woman left you her money doesn’t mean you killed her for it.”

“It’s not that,” said Alison. “How did he know? I mean, how did he know that Maggie had left me her money? And how did Steel Ironside know?”

“Maybe she told them.”

“She simply wrote to them all inviting them,” said Alison, “and then she told them on the first night that whoever married her would get her money and that she had a weak heart.”

“But she didn’t tell them she had left it to you?”

“Not that I know of. She may have said it in her letters. She told me that when she decided on one of them, she would change her will and cut me out. Maybe they overheard that. It’s very easy to hear things in this house. Oh, Hamish, only yesterday she apologised for being so rude to me and she said she wouldn’t cut me out of her will. Everyone will think I did it. But it can’t be murder.”

“Maybe it isn’t. Go on about Mr. Witherington.”

“I don’t know any more except that he was one of Maggie’s old flames. She made a profession of it.”

“Getting money from men?”

“Yes.”

“All right. Now let’s move to James Frame.”

“He runs a gambling club in London. He wanted me to put in a word with Maggie as well. He seems harmless enough. I didn’t have much of a chance to speak to him.”

“And Steel Ironside?”

“He’s a failed pop singer. He told me he needed money to get started again. He seems nice. Oh, Hamish, I’ve just remembered. I asked Maggie why she was sure that one of these four would want to marry her and she said she’d had a private detective to check up on them and they all need money.”

“Good. I’ll have a look through her papers and see if I can find the name of the detective agency. Send in your friend, Peter.”

Alison was soon replaced by Peter Jenkins. Hamish looked at him curiously. But he seemed just the same as he had done when Hamish had first met him: a pleasant, if weak, man, slightly effeminate. He looked at Hamish with dislike. “You’re making a fuss over nothing,” said Peter, “and causing a great deal of unnecessary distress. The sooner someone higher up arrives, the better. It’s a clear case of accident.”

“So you say. Let’s get down to business. Full name…?”

In his slow drawling voice, Peter outlined the bare facts. He had been in love with Maggie twenty years ago and had only really fallen out of love with her when he arrived and found her changed. She had invited him for two weeks and he had taken leave from his firm. He needed a holiday and so he had decided to stay.

And all the time he was talking, Hamish was thinking, He’s been carrying the torch for years for a prostitute. He must be awfully immature. I wonder how he manages to ran a company.

“How did you manage to set up this company?” he asked when Peter fell silent.

“I had been working for Sandford and Jones,” said Peter, naming one of the biggest advertising agencies. “I was thirty when a rich uncle died and left me quite a bit so I decided to go into business for myself. My firm is Jenkins Associates.”

“Doing well?”

“Very well. We’ve got the Barker Baby Food account, for example.”

“Barker was bought over by a Japanese company last year. Do they still retain your services?”

“Of course. Didn’t I just say so?”

Hamish sat back and surveyed Peter in silence.

Peter stared at him and then suddenly shrugged and said boyishly, “I shouldn’t lie. A vice of advertising men. Fact is, I had this friend working with me right from the beginning and he recently quit and took that account with him. I hope the Japanese dump him.”

“And what were you doing last night and this morning?”

“I was asleep the whole time. I heard Alison scream and rushed out.”

“And did you hear any explosion, any loud bang?”

“No, nothing, but there could have been one before Alison woke me with her screams. It was an accident.”

“Very well, Mr. Jenkins. That will be all for now. Send in Mr. Witherington.”

Crispin Witherington was very jovial and hearty. Then he obviously decided that jollity was out of place and became pompous.

He outlined the facts about his relationship with Maggie, where he was during the night and morning – in bed – his business, and his home address in a way that led Hamish to believe he had had dealings with the police before. Then he launched into a diatribe about the pub in Fern Bay and the attack on him.

“Why didn’t you report it?” asked Hamish.

“What’s the point,” said Crispin rudely. “You local yokels stick together.”

“Don’t be cheeky,” said Hamish mildly. “Did you want to marry Mrs. Baird?”

“Hadn’t made my mind up. I only came up for a giggle.”

“And yet you asked Miss Kerr for help?”

“That sneaky little drip would say anything. Look, if it is murder, you only have to look in that direction.”

“Are you saying you didn’t ask Miss Kerr for help?”

“I can’t remember every blasted word I’ve said.”

“I’ll be getting back to you. I’ll hae a word with Mr. Frame next.”

James Frame sidled in, smoothing down his already smooth hair with a nervous hand. Without prompting and with many “don’t you knows” and “I says,” he launched into his tale of how he had been asleep the whole time.

He had almost perfected the silly-ass manner, thought Hamish, but the man’s eyes behind a glaze of helpful and innocent goodwill were hard and watchful as if a smaller, meaner man were staring from behind thick glass. When he had met Maggie, he said, oh-so-long-ago, he had been doing a bit of this and a bit of that. Money in the family, don’t you know. All the while, Hamish made mental notes. Lower middle class. Accent assumed. Probably was a small-time crook.

“I believe Mrs. Baird was very expensive,” said Hamish.

“She wasn’t a whore,” said James indignantly. “We were very much in love. Of course, a chap helps out a bit with the rent and things like that, but a chap would do that for any girl.”

“What is the name of the gambling club where you work?”

“The Dinosaur in Half Moon Street. That’s Mayfair.”

“Yes, I know where Half Moon Street is. Do you own The Dinosaur?”

“Well, not exactly. Run it for a chap.”

“And the chap’s name?”

“Harry Fry.”

“Champagne Harry. Out of prison is he?”

James looked sulky.

Even Hamish had heard of Harry Fry. He was a con-artist. His last fling had been to ingratiate himself into the graces of a colonel who was a close friend of the royal family and who lived in a grace and favour house in Windsor, that is a rent-free house given by the Crown. The colonel had gone to the Middle East to raise money for one of his favourite charities, Save the Donkeys, and had left Harry alone in his house. Harry had sold the house for a vast sum to an Arab and had been caught just as he was about to board a plane to Brazil at London airport.

His sentence had been surprisingly lenient. He had great charm and had used it to good effect in court. He had paid back all the money he had gained for the house. Harry was reputed to be worth millions. He tricked and conned only because it was the breath of life to him.

At last Hamish sent James off and Steel Ironside took his place.

“Real name?” asked Hamish.

“Victor Plummer,” said the pop singer in a sulky voice. But asked about his previous relationship with Maggie, he perked up and grew almost lyrical. He might have been describing a teenage romance: Maggie’s arrival on the scene, their first meeting at a party where she had shown no interest in him, the long tours, the sleazy hotels and theatrical digs, the sudden fame, the just-as-sudden falling in love and the start of the affair with Maggie, the walks in the park, the dog they had bought, the plans they had made.

“And why did she leave you?” asked Hamish.

Steel’s face darkened. “Someone else came along,” he said in his flat, nasal twang.

“Another pop singer?”

“No, Sir Benjamin Silver, head of Metropolitan Foods.”

“The multimillionaire?”

“Yes.”

“I see.”

“I didn’t at the time,” said Steel. “That was the thing about Maggie. She went through a mint of my money but I never thought of it as paying her. I mean, she wasn’t the kind you left the money on the bedside table for. I was in love and I thought she was. I thought she would come back to me.”

“Are you married?”

“Separated.”

“So how could you have married Mrs. Baird?”

“I’d have got a divorce. Never got around to it before.”

What a weak bunch of men, thought Hamish. He took some more notes and then braced himself to interview Mrs. Todd.

He took down Mrs. Todd’s account of her arrival on the scene of Maggie’s death and then began to ask questions. Why had Mrs. Todd not rushed to see if she could help instead of going straight to the house and dialling 999? What had led her to believe no one had yet dialled?

“I do not know,” she said primly. “It all happened that quick. They’re a useless bunch and wouldnae think o’ doing anything sensible.”

“Very well. Where were you last night and this morning?”

“I was at a meeting of the Women’s Rural Institute at the school hall, went tae my bed, and then collected some groceries in the village and drove up here.”

“Do you know where Mrs. Baird meant to go?”

“I don’t know. Herself usually didn’t move till the afternoon. Let me tell you this, Mr. Macbeth, you are making a lot of trouble over a mere accident. You are causing poor little Miss Kerr a lot o’ strain.”

Hamish ignored that and ploughed patiently on with his questions.

In the sitting room, Alison sat on the sofa with Peter Jenkins beside her. His arm was around her shoulders.

“So much for that helpful copper of yours,” said Peter. “I’ll have his guts for giving us all this trouble.”

“He wasn’t at all sympathetic,” sniffed Alison. “Sitting there like the Gestapo. I don’t know what’s come over him.”

“Power, that’s what. These local hick types love a chance to push their betters around.”

Alison leaned back and closed her eyes. She thought about her recent interview with Hamish. She and Hamish had been friends and yet he had asked her questions as if he had never known her. God! How she hated that study. She would have it turned into a breakfast room or a library. She hated the functional desk where she had typed so much filth.

She sat up a little, frowning.

“What’s the matter?” asked Peter.

“The manuscript,” said Alison. “Maggie’s book. I don’t remember seeing it on the desk. I’d better tell Hamish about it.”

“She was in there last night,” said Peter. “She probably either took it to her room or put it in one of the drawers. But tell that dreary bobby if you like.”

The four guests had been looking forward to the arrival of Hamish Macbeth’s superior, and when he did arrive, Detective Chief Inspector Blair from Strathbane did not let them down. It was, he said, a clear case of accident. There was no need to use a squad of policemen to comb the area for clues. The car would be towed away to Strathbane and examined there. He was sure the wiring would prove to be faulty. He was so delighted at putting Hamish down before an audience that he was even nice to Steel Ironside, despite the fact that he remembered clearly that one of the pop singer’s hits in the early seventies had been “Burn the Fuzz.” Mrs. Todd served him coffee with cream and some of her scones. His two detectives, Jimmy Anderson and Harry MacNab, stood respectfully behind his chair. Alison, who told him about Maggie’s vicious treatment of the car, thought Blair a nice fatherly man. He was heavyset and spoke with a thick Glasgow accent and when not being nice to the company treated Hamish like a moron. And Hamish deserved it all, thought Alison fiercely. After all, Hamish was a Highlander and the Highlanders were another race entirely, sly and malicious and devious.

But as if remembering at last that he, too, was a policeman, Blair became mindful of his dudes and told the four men to stay at the bungalow until the forensic report came through. In a quiet voice, Hamish told him of the missing manuscript and its contents. “Hot stuff, hey?” said Blair with a salacious leer. “I may as well hae a gander at it. Go and find it, Macbeth, and dae something useful fur a change.”

Hamish went off. He searched Maggie’s desk and then moved quietly upstairs to her bedroom and went carefully through all the drawers. But there was no sign of the manuscript and no sign either of any report from a detective agency.

At last Blair left, and the shaken guests and Alison settled down to have lunch in the kitchen.

James looked out of the window and muttered something and then got to his feet and went over and stared out. “Someone had better get onto Strathbane,” he said. “That local bobby’s making trouble.”

The others joined him at the window.

The rain had started to fall quite heavily, but Hamish Macbeth, accompanied by a large mongrel dog, was down on his hands and knees on the gravel in front of the garage, slowly going over every inch of ground.

“Oh, let him get on with it,” said Peter Jenkins impatiently. “He’s better out there than in here bothering us with a lot of questions.”

They all returned to the table but no one seemed to feel much like eating and at last with a clucking noise of impatience, Mrs. Todd removed the plates of unfinished food.

Hamish, oblivious to the rain, slowly edged backwards over the gravel, his nose almost on the ground. Then he moved over to the narrow strip of grass that bordered the right-hand side of the drive. He worked his way along, backing towards the two gateposts.

And then at the bottom of one of the gateposts he found a blackened piece of metal. He looked at it thoughtfully and then fished in his pocket for tweezers and plastic bag and popped it in.

He worked his way forward again while Towser let out a little whimper of dismay and shook himself violently, sending out a spray of water over Hamish’s back. Hamish was just about to give up his search when close by where the car had stood in the garage he found a tiny piece of charred material like felt. He put that in the bag with the metal and then decided to go and see Ian Chisholm.

“Bad business up at the bungalow,” said Ian. “Mind you, that car was a wreck. I hadnae seen it since I did the last repairs but it wisnae in very good shape then and that lassie, Alison, well, herself must hae driven it thousands o’ miles. I suppose it just all blew.”

“Maybe,” shivered Hamish, steaming gently in front of the black cylindrical wood-burning stove in a corner of the garage. “But just suppose, Ian, just suppose you wanted a car tae burst into flames, would this mean anything tae ye?” He extracted the piece of blackened metal and the little bit of cloth from the plastic bag, holding each item up by the tweezers.

Ian scratched his grey hair. “My, my, ye’re after another murder,” he said. “Well, let me hae a think, but it’ll cost ye.”

“Come on, Ian, I’m not asking a favour, I am asking ye to help the forces of law and order solve a murder.”

“A murder that Blair has decided is an accident?”

“Now how did you hear that?”

“Angie Burnside, him that did the garden for Mrs. Baird from time tae time, him was up at the house for he heard the siren and went for a look-see. He was still there when Blair and two fellows come out and he hears Blair say, ‘I’ll hae that Macbeth’s balls fur trying to call an accident murder.’”

“I forgot about Angie,” said Hamish. “I’d better hae a wee word with him. Anyway, use your brain, Ian.”

“I hae a Renault, same age as hers, over here,” said Ian. He went over to a corner of the garage where a battered Renault with a crushed side stood. He raised the bonnet and peered at the engine. Then he called Hamish over. “Let’s see that bit o’ metal again,” said Ian. Hamish took it out with a pair of tweezers and held it up. “Don’t touch!” he warned.

“Aye, that’s a sparking plug,” said Ian. “Look, it could just be done, Hamish, and here’s how.”

“Now, if someone removed the high-tension lead from a sparking plug, and stuck this lead onto another sparking plug and laid it on top of the engine, immediately someone tried to start the engine, a spark would ignite the fumes which could be coming from, say, a petrol-soaked that of felt resting on the engine, and, man, you’d get a bonny fire. But it still cannae be murder.”

“Why not?”

“Well, although the engine would burst into flames, herself would still hae time to open the door and get clear. She’d only get a fright.”

“And if that someone knew she had a bad heart?” “Aye, man, well in that case you’d have a murder.”