cooking oil. I’ve only traces of things, mind you. Oil had been poured under the bed. The flames must have shot through the kitchen wall into the bedroom. There was a paraffin heater in the kitchen. That would add to the blaze, and then there was one in the bedroom as well.”
“Any idea when she was killed?”
“I’ll need to wait for a report from the procurator fiscal,” said Lesley. “It’ll be hard to tell with the body being so badly burnt. But evidently there were two days’ uncollected milk on the step, so maybe she was killed two days ago.”
“What I cannae understand,” said Hamish, “is why then did the murderer wait so long to torch the place?”
“Maybe the murderer is some amateur who, once having murdered the woman, panicked. People see so many forensic programmes these days that they think someone will hold up a bit of hair a day later and say, “Aha, that’s the DNA of Jock McHaggis,” or whatever.” She sighed. “Little do they know.”
“Where are the rest of your team?”
Her face hardened. “They’re playing Braikie at rugby tonight so they’ve all gone off to get ready. I’ve got most of my samples so I think I’ll pack it in for tonight.” Her blue eyes twinkled. “Am I wrong in thinking that Mr. Blair is going to hate me when I produce evidence for this fuse? He’s chortling and rubbing his hands and telling everyone who’ll listen how Hamish Macbeth let a murderer get away from under his nose.”
“No, you’re not wrong. I hope it was a long fuse.”
“Not very long. With this springy heather, it’s hard to tell where it started but fortunately the back here is sheltered a bit from the wind. But farther away, the wind’s whipped off any traces and I can’t find anymore scorched heather roots.”
“Let me go back and see if I can see anything.” Hamish got down on his knees and, starting at the point where she said she had found the ash, began to crawl off through the heather. To his relief, the wind suddenly dropped in that erratic way it has in Sutherland. He crawled past the markers she had laid out to map the track of the fuse and carried on after the markers had run out. The clouds were still racing across the sky. A fitful gleam of sunshine sparkled on something ahead of him in the heather. He crawled forwards and gently parted the heather. He found himself looking at two metal clothes pegs and a squashed glue stick. “Come ower here and look at this,” he called.
She joined him. “I didn’t look far enough back. But I’ve an idea how the fuse could have been made.”
“How?”
“The recipe is one tablespoon of potassium nitrate, two to three spoonfuls of sugar, one glue stick, scissors, paper, and a plastic zip-lock bag. You mix the sugar and the potassium nitrate in the bag, fold a long length of paper into a V, smear the valley of the V with the glue, clip the corner of the bag, and pour the contents into the V. Pinch together and twist and fasten either end with a clip until it all sticks.”
“So we’re not looking for an amateur?”
“We still could be,” said Lesley.
“So where would an amateur buy potassium nitrate?”
“Off the Internet.”
“That’s hopeful.” Hamish brightened. “Anyone ordering the stuff would need to give a credit card number. They’d need to have a computer as well.”
“I shouldn’t think a place like Lochdubh has many computers,” said Lesley.
“Oh, a whiles back, there were these writing classes and a lot of folks got one. Mind you, I think most of them will be gathering dust, but it’s a start.”
Lesley gathered up the new evidence and put it in bags. “It would be wonderful if I could get a print off any of this,” she said. “I would also like the suggestion of a fuse leaked to the press.”
“Why?”
“Because a lot of your superstitious villagers think that either the fire was God’s retribution or the devil had come to claim his own.”
“Why should we leak it to the press?”
“Because, if I am not mistaken, Blair will try to sit on this evidence. He still wants you as prime suspect.”
Hamish grinned. “I know just the person. Would you be free for dinner tonight?”
“No, of course not. I’ve got to get this stuff back to the lab.”
“Oh, well…”
“But I’m free on Saturday.”
“Grand. Do you want to come here or Strathbane?”
“Just somewhere away from my gossipy colleagues.”
“There’s the Glen Lodge Hotel, just north of Braikie. I could meet you there at eight.”
“Fine,” said Lesley. “Now go and leak.”
¦
Hamish felt guiltily that he should really give the story to the local reporter, Matthew Campbell. But there was his other reporter friend, Elspeth Grant, who worked for a newspaper in Glasgow. Hamish had often thought of marrying Elspeth but something had always stopped him from proposing. He would not admit to himself that the something was the real love of his life, Priscilla Halburton-Smythe, daughter of the owner of the Tommel Castle Hotel, now working in London.
As he returned to the police station and phoned the newspaper in Glasgow, he half expected to be told that Elspeth was already on her way to Lochdubh, but the news desk told him she was off sick.
He phoned her home number and a croaky voice he barely recognised as Elspeth’s answered the phone. She said she had a fearsome cold and had missed out on the assignment to Lochdubh. Hamish wished her well and said he would phone again. He decided to ease his conscience and give the story to Matthew instead.
“And who do I say this came from?” asked Matthew when Hamish had finished telling him about the fuse.
“Chust say a source,” said Hamish, the sudden sibi-lance of his accent showing that he was feeling guilty.
“Right! This is great stuff,” said Matthew. “I’ll get it out to the nationals and TV.”
¦
Blair hated Hamish Macbeth with a passion. He had previously enlisted the help of a prostitute to kidnap Hamish, hoping that in the policeman’s unexplained absence he could persuade his bosses to put the Lochdubh police station up for sale. But Hamish had not only ruined his plot but also managed to get the prostitute into blackmailing him, Chief Detective Inspector Blair, to marry her. Not that any of his colleagues ever even guessed at his wife’s rough background. After a few false starts, Mary Blair had modelled herself on Peter Daviot’s wife, and there was no longer any trace of the prostitute in her manner or dress. Daviot was fond of telling Blair what a lucky man he was to have found such an excellent wife.
Before he switched on the television that evening, Blair was feeling quite kindly towards his wife. A glass of whisky had been waiting for him when he got home from work, his flat was clean and shining, and she had cooked him an excellent supper.
He switched on the television news, hoping to see film of himself because he had held an impromptu press conference on the waterfront. But when the news item about the murder of the witch came up on the screen, he saw it was not a picture of himself, but of Daviot, speaking to the press outside police headquarters.
He turned up the sound and Daviot’s genteel accents filled the room. “Yes,” he was saying, “I have just received a report from the laboratory that the fire was set off by a fuse, which explains why the constable who found the body did not find anyone in the house.”
Mary looked over her knitting and saw her husband’s face turn a nasty purplish colour with rage.
“Blood pressure!” she cautioned.
¦
Jimmy Anderson called to see Hamish later that evening. “Were you behind that leak to the papers?” he demanded.
“Would I dae a thing like that?” asked Hamish. “Want a drink?”
“Aye. Blair is furious. But that local reporter insists he was up by the cottage and heard you talking to the
