card but, fortunately, the tradition of not signing cards was a blessing and so she had told her father she hadn’t a clue.
But there was one she was longing for. A disco club in Strathbane had started lunchtime sessions. It was there that Annie had met Jake Cullen, he of the black leather outfit and supply of Ecstasy pills. In all her restricted life, she had never met someone more exciting. The drinks he plied her with and the drugs he gave her made her feel strong and confident.
She parked in a back lane in Braikie that afforded a view down to the main road. She waited until she saw her father with her mother in the passenger seat drive past and then drove home again and waited eagerly for the post. She knew her bosses were down in Edinburgh and that she was supposed to open up the wildlife park, but she persuaded herself that she would not be very late.
The doorbell rang. Annie swore under her breath. She had not wanted the postman to know she was at home. But there could be a really big valentine for her that could not fit into the letter box. She opened the door.
“Grand morning, Annie,” said the postman, Bill Comrie. “Aren’t you at work?”
“I think I’m coming down with something,” said Annie.
“I’ve a rare bit o’ post for you, and a package. You’re popular wi’ the fellows.”
“Thanks.” Annie snatched the post from him and shut the door firmly in his face.
The package was addressed to her. It looked exciting somehow. She decided to leave it until last. She had six valentines. Five were the usual soppy kind, but the sixth held a peculiar typewritten rhyme.
Roses are red, violets are blue
You’ll get in the face,
Just what’s coming to you.
Nutcase, thought Annie, putting it down with the others beside that mysterious package. Before she opened it, she went to the sideboard in the living room and took out a bottle of gin. She poured a stiff measure into a glass, carried the gin bottle into the kitchen, topped it up with water, and returned it to the sideboard. Back in the kitchen, she unpicked a little of the hem at the bottom of her jacket and picked out an Ecstasy pill. She swallowed the pill down with a gulp of gin.
Now for that parcel.
There was a tab at the side to rip to get the parcel open. She tore it across. A terrific explosion tore apart the kitchen. Ball bearings and nails, the latter viciously sharpened, tore into her face and body as flames engulfed her. Perhaps it was a mercy that one of the nails pierced her brain, killing her outright, before the flames really took hold.
Mrs. McGirty, an elderly lady who lived in the next cottage, heard the loud explosion just as she was about to enter her own home. She seized a fire extinguisher she kept in her car and ran to the Flemings’ house and round to the back where she knew the kitchen was. She thought it was a gas explosion. The kitchen door was lying on its hinges. Screaming with fear, she plied the fire extinguisher over the horrible mess that had once been the beauty of the Highlands and over the flaming kitchen table. Then, white as paper, on shaking legs, she went to her own home and phoned Hamish Macbeth.
Hamish phoned Josie before setting out for Braikie. He did not expect her to arrive until later because she was supposed to be up in the northwest of the county. But Josie had become weary of home visits and so she had been parked quite near Lochdubh, up on a hilltop, reading a romance, when she received the call.
Hamish stood in the doorway of the kitchen and grimly surveyed the body. He heard a car driving outside and went out. Josie had arrived. “A murder!” she cried excitedly. “Where’s the body?”
“In the kitchen.”
“Can I have a look?”
“Go to the kitchen doorway but don’t go in and don’t touch anything. Suit up before you go in.” Hamish was wearing blue plastic coveralls with blue plastic covering his boots.
Josie went back to her car and eagerly climbed into a similar outfit. Hamish stared after her, his eyes hard, as Josie went into the house. She was back out a minute later and vomited into a flower bed.
“Go and sit in your car,” ordered Hamish, “and pull yourself together. I’m going to see Mrs. McGirty next door. It’s thanks to her the place didn’t burn down.”
Mrs. McGirty answered the door. Her old eyes had the blind look of shock.
“I’ll phone the doctor for you,” said Hamish. “Go in and sit down and I’ll make you a cup of tea.”
He found his way to the kitchen, made a cup of milky tea with a lot of sugar, and took it to her. “Now you be drinking that,” he said gently. “What’s the name and number of your doctor?” When she told him, Hamish phoned her doctor and asked him to come along immediately. Then he said, “Tell me what happened.”
In a quavering voice, Mrs. McGirty told how she had heard a bang and then seen smoke pouring out from next door. The kitchen was at the back of the house but the smoke was curling up over the roof. She had run in and plied the fire extinguisher.
“You are a verra brave woman,” said Hamish. “If it hadn’t been for you, possibly a lot of useful forensic evidence would have been lost.”
There was a ring at the doorbell. Hamish answered it. He recognised another neighbour, Cora Baxter, wife of Councillor Jamie Baxter.
“Is she all right?” asked Cora. “Ruby? Mrs. McGirty?”
“She’s in there. Could you sit with her until the doctor arrives?”
“I’ll do that. Poor, poor Annie.”
“How did you learn it was her?”
“Thon wee policewoman outside.”
Josie should not be gossiping, thought Hamish.
When he went outside, the area had been cordoned off. The army bomb squad were just going into the house. The scenes of crimes operatives were suiting up. Jimmy Anderson approached Hamish. “They’re saying it was Annie.”
“From what was left o’ the body, it looked like her,” said Hamish.
“Who on earth could ha’ done this?” said Jimmy. “I was talking to some folk at the edge of the crowd and by all accounts, they’re a churchgoing, God-fearing family and Annie is prim and proper and a right innocent. And why wasn’t she at work? The parents have been phoned. The mother works with the father. They said at first it couldn’t be their daughter because she left this morning for work, but we got on to the postie on his mobile and he said he delivered the post to Annie. Said there were valentines and a package, all addressed to Annie.”
“That’s why she waited for the post,” said Hamish. “She wanted to see her cards. Now, if she was that keen, there must have been a card she was really hoping for. Look, Jimmy, she worked over at that wildlife centre. I’ll get over there and find out what I can. There’s nothing I can do here until all the bomb and forensic evidence is collected. Where’s Blair?”
“Got the flu. What about your sidekick?”
“I’d better take her with me.”
If Josie had been a friend, thought Hamish, he could have sent her back to the police station to look after his dog and cat. Angela had rebelled at taking care of them any more. Certainly there was a large cat flap in the kitchen door, large enough to allow both of them to come and go, but left to their own devises they were apt to go along to the kitchen door of the Italian restaurant and beg. Then they got fat and he had to put both on a diet and then they both sulked.
“Are you all right now?” he asked Josie as he drove her out onto the Strathbane Road in the police Land Rover. He had told her to leave her car behind.
“It was a horrible sight,” said Josie with a shudder.
“What did you expect? She was blown to bits.”
“I’ve never seen a dead body before,” said Josie.
