order a blood test.
At the manse, Mrs. Wellington was heaved upstairs and laid on her bed. “I think I know what the matter must be,” said the minister. “My wife sometimes takes a sleeping pill and she takes high blood pressure medicine as well. She must have mixed up her pills.”
Josie felt a wave of relief. “If you think she’ll be all right, I’ll just go back to the dance.”
But when she returned to the hall, it was to find that Hamish had left. “Where’s Hamish gone?” Josie asked Archie Maclean.
“Och, when you werenae here, herself, Miss Halburton-Smythe, turned up and she and Hamish went off together.”
Josie felt outraged. How dare he! But there was still time to put her plan into action. She had Mandrax pills left. If she let herself into the police station and doctored a glass of whisky and left it on the kitchen table, with any luck Hamish might have a nightcap. If by any chance Hamish and Priscilla were there, well, she had an excuse. She could say she was calling to find out why he had left the dance so early.
Hamish was seated in the bar of the Tommel Castle Hotel, looking gloomily at Priscilla.
“Why Australia?” he asked.
“I’m a computer programmer, Hamish,” said Priscilla patiently. “The firm I was contracted to outsourced all the work to India and it’s happening all over London. I’ve got a chance of this job in Sydney. I love Sydney.”
“It’s awfy far away,” said Hamish miserably. “The hotel’s doing great. It’s not as if you have to work.”
“Hamish, ever since Daddy lost all his money and we had to turn our home into this hotel, I’ve liked to make my own money just in case Daddy decides to play the stock market again. I’m lucky to get such a good job in the middle of a recession. Didn’t you go to the dance with your policewoman?”
“I was bullied into it by Mrs. Wellington. I wish Josie McSween would just pack up and go back to Strathbane.”
“Why? She seems a nice enough girl.”
“There’s something clingy about her and she’s a rotten officer. She should never ha’ joined the police force.”
“So where are you in the case?”
“Nowhere-except for an idea of Angela’s. I’ve been checking up on all the men in the case. She suggests it might have been some woman.”
“I can see the wisdom of that. A jealous woman will go to any lengths.”
“Could you put me up for the night, Priscilla? I’ve a feeling if I go back home, Josie will be waiting for me.”
“I’ll find you something.”
Josie put the crushed tablets in a glass of whisky and placed it on the kitchen table. She stirred the contents with a spoon. Now, she thought, let’s hope he drinks it. I’ll come back around two in the morning and hope he’s asleep. She thought it a rare bit of luck that Hamish’s pets were away somewhere. She made her way back to the manse over the fields at the back so that no one would see her. At one point, she stopped and listened. She had an odd feeling of being watched. The night was still and cold. She hurried on, anxious to get to her room and to a bracing glass of whisky.
Roger Burton, crouched behind a dry-stone wall, watched her go. He had returned to finish the job of getting rid of Hamish. He felt his reputation was at stake. It had got around the criminal fraternity in Glasgow that the hard man, Roger, had been attacked by a cat.
Now he was primed and ready to kill not only Hamish but those wretched animals of his as well.
He eased his way down the back slope to the station. It was in darkness. He tried the door and then grinned. It was unlocked. He threw it open, rifle at the ready.
Silence.
He fumbled for the light and switched it on. He rapidly searched the small station. No Hamish. No animals.
He sat down at the kitchen table, facing the door, rifle at the ready. He saw the glass of whisky in front of him. Just the thing. He usually never drank until the job was over, but one wouldn’t hurt. He drank it down, wrinkling his nose at the taste and wondering whether it was moonshine from one of the illegal stills he believed to be up in the hills.
Then Roger began to feel so very sleepy. The hallucinatory effect of the drug began to take over. He felt he was back in his own flat in East Glasgow. He stumbled through to the bedroom, stripped off his clothes, crawled into Hamish’s bed, and fell asleep.
At two in the morning, Josie quietly made her way back to the police station. She frowned when she found the door unlocked. She should have remembered to lock it. She let herself in and switched on the light. The first thing she saw was the empty whisky glass on the table. Josie picked it up and scowled down at the remnants of white powder at the bottom of the glass. If Hamish saw that, he’d get it analysed. She rinsed it out, dried it, and put it up on the shelf with the others.
Now for action!
She went quietly into the bedroom. Her foot struck something on the floor. She looked down and found herself staring at a rifle. She switched on the bedroom light. Josie did not recognise Roger although after the murder of Barry his photograph had been in all the papers and he was lying with his face half buried in the pillow. She only knew it was not Hamish and let out a gasp of dismay.
Josie ran from the police station as if the hounds of hell were after her.
In the morning, Angela stopped outside the police station and said to Sonsie and Lugs, “Off you go.”
She watched until they had both disappeared through the large cat flap and then turned and walked away along the waterfront.
A sharp bark awoke Roger. He groggily struggled awake. The there was a menacing hiss. His startled eyes saw that damn cat staring at him, fur raised.
With a cry of terror, he leapt for the bed and straight for the kitchen door. The cat leapt on his back, digging her claws in. He howled and shook her off and, with blood running down his naked back, he fled along the waterfront to the alarm and amazement of the villagers out doing their morning shopping.
Nessie Currie was just about to get into her old Ford when a naked Roger dragged her from the car and dumped her on the road. Then he drove off, leaving her screaming.
Hamish was enjoying a leisurely breakfast at the hotel when he heard the news. He jumped in the Land Rover and set off in pursuit. He called Strathbane for backup. Roadblocks were hurriedly set up. All day long the search went on but Roger appeared to have disappeared into thin air.
How on earth could a bloody naked man just vanish?
It was only by evening when Nessie was coherent enough to be interviewed and the sedative Dr. Brodie had given her had worn off that she revealed she had been about to take a bundle of secondhand clothes from the village to a charity shop in Strathbane. When the report then came in from a man outside Inverness that a large woman had stolen his van, they realised that Roger had stopped to put on women’s clothes and a big felt hat, formerly the property of Mrs. Wellington. The van had a full tank of petrol and two spare tanks in the back. Nessie’s car was found dumped in a back street in Inverness.
The story was in all the newspapers the next morning. The comic side of it was fully exposed.
Here was a dreaded hit man who had gone to sleep in a police station, been attacked by a cat, run through the village naked, and escaped dressed as a woman.
Only Josie knew what had happened. She thanked her stars she had been wearing gloves when she had left the whisky.
