thole.”
Hamish drew Harriet aside. “It’ll save us a walk,” he said. “I’m sure the wee man is harmless. Probably been at the methylated spirits.”
Hamish climbed into the driving-seat, Geordie sat next to him, and Harriet on the other side. It was an old– fashioned bench seat, and so it could take the three of them comfortably.
Hamish turned the key in the ignition. The engine gave a cough and remained silent. “Ye’ve got to tell himself it’s no’ me that’s driving.” Geordie had recovered from his grief and seemed almost proud of demonstrating the bloody-mindedness of his vehicle.
Harriet stifled a giggle. “All right,” said Hamish amiably. “Does he have a name?”
“He’s an agent o’ the deil, no’ a pet.”
“Why he?” asked Harriet. “I mean boats and planes and things like that are she.”
“I jist ken,” said Geordie, folding his arms and glaring through the windscreen.
“Oh, Fiat truck,” said Hamish Macbeth, “this is your friend speaking. This is not your master, Geordie Mason. We’re going to Skulag, so be a nice truck and get a move on.”
He grinned as he turned the key in the ignition, a grin that faded as the old engine roared into life.
“I bid ye so, but would yis listen?” demanded Geordie with gloomy satisfaction.
Hamish drove steadily down the road, reflecting that he should be taking better care of Harriet. Perhaps Geordie would start seeing green snakes or spiders before they reached the village. And yet the man did not smell of drink.
“Is there a pub of some kind?” he asked.
“Aye,” said Geordie. “Down at the hotel, The Highland Comfort, next tae the jetty.”
The village of Skulag was a small cluster of low houses standing end-on to the sea, some of them thatched in the old manner with heather. There was no one to be seen as they rattled down the cobbled main street. Hamish parked neatly in front of the hotel, which was on a small rise above the jetty. It was a two-storeyed white-washed building, originally built in the Victorian era as a holiday home for some misguided Glasgow merchant who had survived only one holiday summer before putting the place up for sale. It had been an hotel ever since.
Inside, apart from a hutch of a reception desk, the rooms leading off the hall still bore their Victorian legends of ‘Drawing-Room’, ‘Smoking-Room’, and ‘Billiard Room’.
Hamish, who had been in such hotels before, opened the door marked ‘Drawing-Room’ and there, sure enough, was the bar along one wall. Along the other wall was a line of glass-and-steel windows overlooking the jetty.
“What are you having?” asked Hamish. “I’d sit at a table over at the window, Harriet. I doubt if the natives are friendly.” He nodded towards the line of small men in caps who were propping up the bar. They looked back at him with sullen hostility.
“A whisky and water,” said Harriet.
Hamish ordered two whiskies and water and then carried them over to a table at the window.
“There’s that poor mad truck-driver,” said Harriet.
Hamish looked out. The truck was where he’d left it, parked on the rise. A little below, at the entrance to the jetty, stood Geordie, leaning forward against the force of the wind and trying to light a cigarette.
And then, in front of Hamish’s horrified eyes, the truck began to creep forward and Geordie was standing in a direct line of its approach.
Hamish struggled with the rusty catch of the window and swung it open. “Geordie!” he yelled desperately. “Look out!”
Geordie looked up, startled. The truck stopped dead.
“Wait a minute,” said Hamish to Harriet. He ran outside the hotel and straight up to Geordie. “You’d ‘better have the brakes on that truck of yours checked,” he shouted against the screaming of the wind.
Geordie shrugged. “What’s the point? Anyway, himself stopped when he heard you.”
Hamish went back to the truck and climbed inside the cabin. The keys were still in the ignition. He switched on the engine and put his foot gently on the accelerator. Nothing happened. The brakes held firm.
He switched off the engine and got down and walked to the front of the truck. There was no explanation why the thing had suddenly stopped. It was parked on a slope, it had started moving, and it had stopped when he called.
He shrugged and went back into the bar to join Harriet.
“Odd,” he said. “Did you see that?”
“He should get it checked,” said Harriet. “A good mechanic would sort the trouble out in no time.”
The men at the bar were staring at both of them and talking rapidly in Gaelic. “What are they saying?” asked Harriet.
“My Gaelic’s a bit rusty,” said Hamish, “but they are saying, I gather, some pretty nasty things about Jane. That wee man there with the black hair is saying she should be driven off the island and the other one is saying someone should kill the bitch.”
“How awful! Why are they so nasty about her? Jane’s harmless.”
“I think it’s just because they are nasty people,” said Hamish. He shouted something in Gaelic in a sharp voice and the men relapsed into sulky silence.
The door to the bar opened and a large policeman lumbered in. He had a huge round fiery-red face and small watery eyes. Those eyes rested briefly on Hamish and then sharpened. He marched up to their table.
“Whit are you doing here?” Harriet looked from Hamish to the policeman in surprise.
“Holiday, Sandy,” said Hamish briefly.
“At The Happy Wanderer?”
Hamish nodded.
“You need to pit on weight, man, no’ lose it.” Sandy looked cynically down at Hamish’s thin and lanky form. “Wait a minute. The place is closed. She’s got her friends there.”
“One of which is me,” said Hamish equably.
“You’re up tae something.” Sandy looked mulish. “And if I find you’re poaching on my territory, I’ll phone Strathbane and have ye sent home.”
“Do that.” Hamish gazed up at him blandly.
Sandy muttered something, turned and threw a longing look at the bar, and then slouched out.
“What was all that about?” asked Harriet. “Have you a criminal record?”
Hamish shook his head. “I’ll tell you the truth if you promise to keep it to yourself. I am the local copper in a village called Lochdubh on the west coast of Sutherland. Jane asked me to come because she was afraid someone was trying to kill her.”
“Oh, the bathroom heater. But that was an accident. But of course I won’t tell anyone who you are.”
“Jane herself thought it an accident but she went to a Mrs. Bannerman in this village and got her fortune told. This Mrs. Bannennan told her that someone from far away was trying to kill her. Jane had also just missed being hit by a falling rock. She was worried it might be one of you. I plan to see Mrs. Bannerman this morning. Would you like to come along?”
Harriet grinned. “Lead on, Sherlock. This is all very exciting.”
“Now that you know the truth about me,” said Hamish, “tell me what you think of the other guests. Let’s start with the horrible Heather.”
“I’ve met types like Heather on visits to Glasgow,” said Harriet. “She seems to spend an awful lot on entertaining any visiting celebrity she can, running a sort of Glaswegian salon. She’s a fairly rich, old–fashioned Communist, looking for another totalitarian regime to worship now that Stalinism has been finally discredited. Says she was brought up in the Gorbals when it was a really horrible slum and tells very colourful stories and I am not sure I believe any of them. Quotes Sartre in very bad French. Refers to celebrities by their first names, Rudi being Rudolph Nureyev, things like that. Adores Jane and is jealous of her at the same time. Jane has no political affiliations that I know of, but she hails from an old county family, and that’s enough for a snob like Heather. Jane’s maiden name is Bellingham. Her pa owns a minor stately home in Wiltshire and Heather keeps hinting she’d like an invitation. Heather is the kind who hangs around the private section of stately homes on view to the public in the hope that one of the family will emerge and recognise one of their own kind.”
“I don’t get it,” said Hamish. “And her a Communist!”
