“I always keep ma eyes and ears open,” Mary was saying. She had a whining singsong voice. “I hae noticed, Macbeth, you’re apt to turn a blind eye tae too many things.”
“Such as?” asked Hamish while in his mind he picked her up and threw her over the sea wall and then watched her sink slowly beneath the oily surface of the rising tide.
“Two days ago there were these two drunks fighting outside The Glen bar. All you did was separate them and send them off home. I wanted to arrest them and would hae done had I not seen that wee boy acting suspiciously over at the supermarket.”
Hamish sighed. There was no point replying. Mary saw villains everywhere. But her next words nearly roused him to a fury, and it took a great deal to rouse Hamish Macbeth. “I felt it was ma duty to put in a report about you,” she said. “It is cramping my style to have to walk the beat wi’ a Highland layabout. The trouble wi’ you Highlanders is you just want to lie on your backs all day long. You know whit they say,
“That would be nice,” said Hamish.
Mary threw him a startled look. “I’m surprised you’re taking it so well.”
“Of course I am taking it well. Ye dinnae think I enjoy walking along on a fine day wi’ a sour-faced bitch like you,” said Hamish in a light pleasant voice, although Priscilla, for example, would have recognised, by the sudden sibilancy of it, that Hamish was furious. “Wass I not saying chust the other day,” said Hamish dreamily, “that it was sore luck getting landed wi’ you instead of someone like Pat Macleod.” Pat Macleod was a curvaceous brunette of a policewoman who wore sheer stockings instead of tights. Every policeman who had seen her flashing her thighs in the canteen as she deliberately hitched up her short skirt to sit down could bear witness to that.
Mary could hardly believe her ears. She would never for a moment have dreamt that P.C. Macbeth would even think of insulting her. She did not know that her contempt for him was largely based on jealousy. Macbeth, in a short time, had made himself popular on the beat and householders preferred to bring their troubles to him rather than to Mary.
“I have never been so insulted in all my life,” she said.
“Oh, come now, wi’ a face and manner like yours, you must have been,” said Hamish who, like all normally polite and land people, was relishing the rarity of being truly and thoroughly rude.
“You’re jist mad because Blair winkled ye oot o’ your cosy number in Lochdubh,” sneered Mary. “And you claim to have solved them murders! You! You’re no’ a man. I could beat the living daylights oot o’ you any day.”
“Try it,” said Hamish.
She squared up to him. “I warn ye. I’m a black belt in karate.”
“Behave yourself, woman,” said Hamish, suddenly sick to death of her.
With amazing speed, he moved in under her guard, swept her up in his lanky arms, dumped her head first in an enormous plastic rubbish bin, and, deaf to her cries, strolled on.
That’s that, he thought with gloomy satisfaction, I may as well go back to the police station and resign.
The desk sergeant looked up as Hamish ambled in. “Upstairs, Macbeth. The super’s screaming for you.”
“So soon?” said Hamish, surprised. “Did P.C. Graham fly in on her broomstick? Never mind. Better get it over with.”
“Come in, come in, Hamish,” said Superintendent Peter Daviot. “Sit down, man. Tea?”
“Yes, thank you,” said Hamish, sitting down on a chair facing the desk and putting his peaked cap on his knees.
“It seems, Hamish, that there’s been a bit of a crime wave in Lochdubh and Sergeant MacGregor’s being run ragged.”
“Is he now?” asked Hamish with a smile. He did not like MacGregor.
“Milk and sugar? Right. Here you are. Yes, on due consideration, we have decided you should finish up the week here and return to Lochdubh. Here are the keys to the station.”
“Thank you.” Hamish felt suddenly bleak. Why had he risen to that stupid Graham woman’s insults?
The door opened and Detective Chief Inspector Blair heaved his large bulk into the room. “Oh, you’re here, are you?” he said nastily when he saw Hamish.
“Yes,” said Mr. Daviot. “It seems you made a bad mistake in suggesting that Hamish be taken away from Lochdubh. There’s been nothing but crime for the past few days.”
“I know,” said Blair heavily. “I’ve been there on a drugs report. Baking soda, it turned oot tae be.” His Glasgow accent grew stronger in his irritation. “Dae ye know what I think? I think them damp villagers are making up crimes so as tae get this pillock back.”
The superintendent’s face froze. “Mind your language in front of me, Mr. Blair,” he said. “Are you questioning the word of Colonel Halburton-Smythe, for example?”
“No, no,” said Blair hurriedly. “But it did look a bit suspicious, ye ken, considering nothing happens there from the one year’s end tae the other.”
“Except murder,” put in Hamish.
“Do not forget Hamish solved that woman’s murder,” said the superintendent. “I am just telling him he must go back and take up his duties there.”
“Uh-uh!” said Blair, his face creased into an unlovely smile. “Why I came up, Mr. Daviot, is to tell you we might be discussing Macbeth’s dismissal from the force.”
“What! Why?”
“He assaulted P.C. Graham.”
“You assaulted a policewoman, Hamish?”
“It was self-defence, sir.”
“Haw! Haw! Haw!” roared Blair.
“Will you stop cackling, Blair, and give me an outline of the complaint?”
“P. C. Graham has just come into the station. She said she was patrolling the beat when Macbeth here suddenly picked her up and threw her in a rubbish bin.”
“Is this true, Macbeth?” No more ‘Hamish.’
“She said she could beat me up and approached me in a threatening manner,” said Hamish. “I was fed up wi’ her. I chust picked up the lassie and dumped her in wi’ the garbage.”
“I can hardly…this is very serious…very serious indeed. Oh, what is it, Sergeant?”
The desk sergeant had just entered. “It’s three women and a man frae the tower blocks,” he said. “They say they’ve come to defend Macbeth here. They say they saw Graham attacking him and Macbeth being forced to defend himself. They say when they helped Graham out of the bin, she said she was going to get Macbeth charged with assault and they say if that’s the case they will all go to court as witnesses for Macbeth’s defence.”
“We must not let this get into the newspapers,” said the superintendent, horrified. “Get rid of these people, Sergeant, and say that Macbeth is not being charged. Shut Graham up at all costs. Good heavens, just think what the tabloids could make of this. Macbeth, I suggest you go back to your quarters and pack and leave for Lochdubh in the morning. Blair, I am surprised at you! In a situation as potentially explosive and damaging to the police as this you should get your facts right. Macbeth, wipe that smile off your face and get going!”
? Death of a Hussy ?
2
And with the morn those angel faces smile,
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.
—CARDINAL JOHN HENRY NEWMAN
At a new roundabout on the outskirts of Strathbane stood Hamish Macbeth, a suitcase in one hand. In the other, he held a rope as a leash for Towser, whose own had mysteriously disappeared in the kennels. Towser, a yellowish mongrel, was subdued. He had been kennelled with police dogs, large nasty-looking German shepherds, and had lived for a short time in a state of terror.
There was no reason for Hamish to be standing in a fine drizzle trying to hitch a lift. A police car would have
