“Vera’s all right,” said Priscilla. “For all her nonsense, she really does care for Freddy. Can’t you keep the press away?”
“Until I see a contract for the film rights and make sure a secondary company has taken
Priscilla looked at the note in her hand. She walked up to the front of the police station. She stared at the letter-box. Then she raised the flap and let it bang and walked back to the car with the note still crumpled up in her hand.
“Ready to go?” said Henry.
“Yes, ready,” said Priscilla evenly.
Hamish returned to the police station at six. He switched on his answering machine. A Gaelic voice wailed out the beauties of Lochnagar. He switched it off. He must really find out how it worked one day.
He phoned Strathbane again and this time got through to Chalmers.
“He’s given us a full confession,” said Chalmers. “Seems quite cocky about it all now. Says he knew Bartlett had had an affair with Vera and so bumped him off. The lab’s still working on the gloves. They were the ones used in the murder, all right.”
“But can’t they tell from the swabs they originally took from Freddy’s hands and the inside of the gloves whether he actually wore them?”
“Don’t know. One of the boffins has come up with a theory that Freddy actually used fine surgical gloves under the heavy leather ones.”
“And what does Mr Forbes-Grant say to that?”
“Says he can’t remember. Says we’ve got our murderer, so why are we wasting time with a lot of damn-fool questions.”
“And Vera Forbes-Grant – she was about to tell you something at the fair. What was it?” asked Hamish.
“She says she just wanted to tell us that her husband couldn’t have harmed anyone. But she seems to have changed her tune. She’s actually
“Aye, in a way,” said Hamish cautiously. “I’m no’ easy in my mind about this. I cannae think Freddy would have been cold-blooded enough. The murder may have been done on the spur of the moment, but it was done by someone who didn’t lose his head and thought of everything. I don’t like those gloves turning up conveniently like that.”
“I’m under a lot of pressure,” said Chalmers. “I
“Now, now,” said Hamish soothingly. “It is of no use wishing a section of the population to die a terrible death just to get the press off your back.”
“Everyone will be on my back tomorrow,” sighed Chalmers. “I’m going back to that castle and I’m going to take them all through their statements again, and I’m going to have as many men as can be spared combing the moors for more clues.”
“Have you told the colonel yet?”
“That’s my next call,” said Chalmers gloomily. “I’ll expect you at Tommel Castle at nine in the morning. Where will you be if anything crops up?”
“The Laughing Trout.”
“Dear God.”
“It’s a new restaurant, up on the Crask road.”
165
“Personally, I wouldn’t go near any place with a twee name like that. Enjoy yourself.”
Chalmers rang off.
Hamish rushed to wash and change. It looked as if Priscilla was going to keep the date after all.
? Death of a Cad ?
11
I maintain that though you would often in the fifteenth century have heard the snobbish Roman say, in a would-be off-hand tone, “I am dining with the Borgias tonight,” no Roman ever was able to say,
“I dined last night with the Borgias.”
—max beerbohm.
No, Hamish,” said Priscilla Halburton-Smythe severely. “You cannot keep Uncle Harry’s clothes.”
Hamish stood sheepishly in front of her in all the splendour of Uncle Harry’s dinner jacket and trousers.
“I’ll take them off,” he said. “You are only wearing a sweater and trousers, so I’ll look a bit odd.”
“Keep it on for the evening,” said Priscilla. “I’ve got a dress and high heels in this plastic bag. I had to climb out the back way.”
“I suppose the press were all there,” said Hamish sympathetically.
“They were all inside, being entertained by Henry. He felt it would be better to get it all over with rather than being pestered by them when we tried to go out of the castle gates. But I’m afraid I couldn’t face them myself. You know how it is. Mummy would never even begin to understand why I wanted to go out for dinner, so I climbed out of the window of that little upstairs drawing room that nobody ever uses and slid down the roof. No-one saw me leave, not even the servants. I’d left my car down the side road.”
“Won’t Henry be upset when he finds you missing?”
“He won’t. I’ll climb back in the way I climbed out. I told him I was going to bed and I locked my door on the outside when I left. I’ll only be a minute changing.”
She disappeared into the bathroom and Hamish sat down to wait. This must be what it’s like when you have an affair with a married woman, he thought. I wish Henry didn’t exist. I wish we could go out for an evening without all this secrecy.
Priscilla emerged in record time wearing a filmy red chiffon dress and high-heeled black patent leather sandals.
“You’d better hide your car in the garage and we’ll take the police car,” said Hamish.
While she put her car away, he locked up the police station and then stood holding open the door of his car for Priscilla. She got in with a flurry of chiffon skirts and black-nyloned leg just as Mrs Wellington walked past.
“Evening,” said Mrs Wellington, her eyes bulging with curiosity.
Hamish slammed the car door before Priscilla could say anything, jumped into the driving seat and drove off with a roar.
“That’s torn it,” said Priscilla. “She’ll tell Daddy.”
“He would be bound to hear sooner or later,” said Hamish. “You cannae keep anything quiet around here.”
“I know that,” said Priscilla. “I was just hoping it would be later rather than sooner.”
The Laughing Trout, previously called The Caledonian Arms, had reopened under the new name only recently. The first sinister sign of a possibly indifferent kitchen to meet Hamish’s eye was a row of painted cart-wheels against the fence of the parking area. People who went in for painted cart-wheels, reflected Hamish gloomily, often had peculiar ideas about food.
A harassed woman answered the bell in the small reception and told them they were lucky there was a table free, and to go and wait in the bar.
Hamish ushered Priscilla into the bar and they sat down in two mock leather armchairs in front of an electric log fire.
The harassed woman handed them enormous menus and rushed off.
“What would you like to drink?” asked Hamish.
