“Don’t worry,” she said reassuringly. “You’re not the sort to be pathologically jealous.”
“Of course not,” he said, too hurriedly, she thought. Then he added, “Where can one read about it? Have you read something about it?”
“There’s a book in my library,” said Isabel. “It’s called
“And others?”
“The syndrome where you imagine that you recognise people.
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You think you know them, but you don’t. It’s neurological. That couple over there, for example, I’m sure I know them, but I probably don’t. Maybe I’ve got it.” She laughed.
“Paul Hogg’s got that too,” said Jamie. “He said he’d seen me.
It was the first thing he said.”
“But he probably had. People notice you.”
“I don’t think they do. Why would they?”
Isabel looked at him. How charming it was that he did not know. And perhaps it was best that he should not. That might spoil him. So she said nothing, but smiled. Misguided Cat!
“So what has Lady Macbeth got to do with it?” asked Jamie.
Isabel leaned forward in her chair.
“Murderess,” she whispered. “A cunning, manipulative murderess.”
Jamie sat quite still. The light, bantering tone of the conversation had come to an abrupt end. He felt cold. “Her?”
Isabel did not smile. Her tone was serious. “I realised pretty quickly that the paintings in that room were not his, but hers.
The invitations from the galleries were for her. He knew nothing about the paintings. She was the one who was buying all those expensive daubs.”
“So? She may have money.”
“Yes, she has money, all right. But don’t you see, if you have large amounts of money which you may not want to leave lying about the place in bank accounts, then buying pictures is a very good way of investing. You can pay cash, if you like, and then you have an appreciating, very portable asset. As long as you know what you’re doing, which she does.”
“But I don’t see what this has got to do with Mark Fraser.
Paul Hogg is the one who worked with him, not Minty.”
“Minty Auchterlonie is a hard-faced cow—as you so percep-1 5 6
A l e x a n d e r M c C a l l S m i t h tively call her—who works in corporate finance in a merchant bank. Paul Hogg comes home from work and she says: ‘What are you doing at the office today, Paul?’ Paul says this and that, and tells her, because she’s in the same line as he is. Some of this information is pretty sensitive, but pillow talk, you know, has to be frank if it’s to be at all interesting, and she picks it all up. She goes off and buys the shares in her name—or possibly using some sort of front—and lo and behold the large profit is made, all on the basis of inside information. She takes the profit and puts it into pictures, which leave less of a trail. Or alternatively, she has an arrangement with an art dealer. He gets the information from her and makes the purchase. There’s no way of linking him to her.
He pays her in paintings, taking his cut, one assumes, and the paintings are simply not officially sold, so there’s no record in his books of a taxable profit being made.”
Jamie sat openmouthed. “You worked all this out this evening? On the way up here?”
Isabel laughed. “It’s nothing elaborate. Once I realised it was not him, and once we had actually met her, then it all fell into place. Of course it’s only a hypothesis, but I think it might be true.”
It may have been clear thus far to Jamie, but it was not clear to him why Minty should have tried to get rid of Mark. Isabel now explained this. Minty was ambitious. Marriage to Paul Hogg, who was clearly going somewhere in McDowell’s, would suit her well. He was a pleasant, compliant man, and she probably felt lucky to have him as her fiance. Stronger, more dominating men would have found Minty too difficult to take, too much competi-tion. So Paul Hogg suited her very well. But if it came out that Paul Hogg had passed on information to her—even if innocently— then that would cost him his job. He would not have been the insider trader, but she would. And if it came out that she T H E S U N D A Y P H I L O S O P H Y C L U B
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had done this, then not only would she lose her own job, but she would be unemployable in corporate finance. It would be the end of her world, and if such an outcome could be averted only by arranging for something tragic to happen, then so be it. People like Minty Auchterlonie had no particular conscience. They had no idea of a life beyond this one, of any assessment, and without that, the only thing that stood between her and murder was an internal sense of right and wrong. And in that respect, Isabel said, one did not have to look particularly closely to realise that Minty Auchterlonie was deficient.
“Our friend Minty,” said Isabel at length, “has a personality disorder. Most people would not recognise it, but it’s very definitely there.”
“This Lady Macbeth syndrome?” asked Jamie.
