silent reminder to one lonely policeman that even the dog who had loved him was no longer alive. By ten o’clock, he was beginning to feel considerably better because of all the physical exercise. He felt at peace. Deciding to leave the case alone had been a good idea.
The phone in the police station rang. Sarah was the first person he thought of. He thought it was her voice when he answered the phone and it took him a few moments to realise that the caller was Priscilla Halburton- Smythe.
“I’ve been waiting for a call from either you or Sarah,” said Priscilla, “and I’ve been reading accounts of the death of this dentist.”
Hamish sat down at his desk. “It’s like this Priscilla, I’ve given up.”
“That’s not like you. Tell me all about it.”
He began at the beginning with the murder and burglary and went on until he finished with his capture by the Smiley brothers.
“I’m sure you’re feeling rattled, tired and fed up,” said Priscilla sympathetically. “But what you used to do when you were stuck was to dig into the background of all the suspects. The answer, you always said, lay in the past. Also, Gilchrist was in debt and Gilchrist liked money. Could he have been involved with the Smiley brothers?”
“I’d thought of that,” said Hamish slowly, “but I can’t find any connection there.”
“It certainly must have been a magnificent obsession that Maggie Bane had for Gilchrist.”
“She was in love with him, yes, but why do you call it an obsession?”
“She gets a good degree, and by your account, apart from her ugly voice, she is very attractive. It must have been an obsession to make her bury herself alive in a dreary Highland town with a philanderer. Was there some jealous lover she left behind in St. Andrews? Might be worth rinding out. You could start with one of her tutors.”
“It’s a long way to St. Andrews, Priscilla, and in this weather.”
“You could phone.”
He sighed. “No, no, I have always found it better to go in person. I’ll phone Strathbane. I’m supposed to be on leave for a couple of days anyway.”
“Good hunting, Hamish. Phone me back if there’s any result.”
“Aye, I’ll do that. Any hope of you coming back up here?”
“I’ll be home for Christmas.”
He wanted to ask, “Alone?” But what if she said no, she was bringing a friend with her, a male friend. Right at that moment, he didn’t want to hear any more bad news.
Promising to phone, he said goodbye. He decided not to wear his uniform, he was not officially on duty. He phoned Strathbane and told them he was feeling unwell after his experience and would take two days leave. He then phoned Sergeant Macgregor at Cnothan and asked him to cover his beat for him.
He then locked up the police station after pinning a note on the door referring all callers to Cnothan.
As he drove out past the Tommel Castle Hotel, he resisted an impulse to swing the wheel, call at the hotel and see if Sarah would like to go with him.
Although the sky was threatening, no snow fell, and when he finally reached St. Andrews University, a gleam of pale sunlight was gilding the old university buildings.
It took some time to run Maggie Bane’s former physics tutor to earth, but Hamish finally found himself sitting in the living room of a comfortable book-lined home, facing a Mr. James Packer, a surprisingly youthful and cherubic-looking man.
“I read about the case in the newspapers, of course,” said Mr. Packer when Hamish explained the reason for his visit. “Do you know I was not very surprised that he had been killed.”
“You knew him?” Hamish leaned forward eagerly.
“I knew of him. Maggie was a brilliant student. I thought it was that brilliance which isolated her from the other students. She kept herself very much to herself. Didn’t go much to parties and dances, didn’t seem to have any boyfriends. Then right after the exams, I heard a rumour she had gone off to Paris with a middle-aged married man. I was concerned. On her return, I sent for her and told her bluntly I had heard the rumours. She laughed and said it was all respectable and that he was divorced and that they were going to get married, and until the wedding, she would work for him at his practise in Braikie. I counselled her that she was too young to know her own mind and that she was throwing away a brilliant future but she was so obviously very much in love.”
There was a sad little silence. Then Mr. Packer said, “But he did not marry her, did he?”
“No,” said Hamish, “and it appears he was not very faithful to her either. Apart from being a brilliant student, tell me more about Maggie Bane.”
“To tell the truth, I was amazed by her passion for mis dentist. I always thought of her as being rather cold and analytical. I thought she did not mix with the other students because she despised them, rather than out of shyness.”
“What is her background?”
“Doting mother and father, possibly no longer doting. I heard the mother used to call at the university with home-baked cakes and things like that for Maggie, and Maggie was quite dreadfully rude to her. I suppose, you know, I really only saw Maggie’s intellectual brilliance. But looking back, I don’t suppose Maggie Bane was a very nice character.”
“Do you think she could be violent?”
“I do not know. I would not have credited her with violence, but until the advent of Gilchrist, I would not have thought her capable of passion either.”
“I wish I’d known Gilchrist,” said Hamish. “I only saw him dead. He was nothing much to look at – white hair, white face – typical dentist, in fact. There must have been something in his character to attract women. He liked the high life and he left a lot of debt.”
Mr. Packer gave an odd little nod of his head as if Hamish had just confirmed something he had already thought. “Have you noticed, Mr. Macbeth, those ugly little millionaires who usually have some gorgeous blonde hanging on their arm? Women find an ambience of power and money almost irresistible. And before you damn me as being a chauvinist and politically incorrect, I mean some women. This is not Palm Beach, this is the north of Scotland where things are scaled down. A man who drives a large car and offers trips to Paris just like that must have struck Maggie Bane as a rare exotic. I think she is much to be pitied. I think I shall write to her if you would be so good as to furnish me with her address. I think she could channel all that passion and energy into a successful career.”
Hamish took out his notebook, wrote down Maggie’s address, and passed it over.
“There’s something else I want to ask you – about nicotine poison.”
“It’s very easy to make.”
“You will see from the newspapers, an illegal still was raided. I thought that might have been used. I mean anyone with the machinery to manufacture illegal whisky would be able to make nicotine poison.”
“I should think any bright schoolchild might be able to do the same in a school lab.”
Hamish sighed. “Motive, that’s the thing.”
“It’s usually drunkenness, love or money.”
“There was this robbery at The Scotsman Hotel. I kept thinking that Gilchrist with his love of spending and being low on funds might have had something to do with it. I mean, Mrs. Macbean, that’s the manager’s wife, might have let something slip about the money, about the safe having a wooden back.”
“Or,” said Mr. Packer, crossing a neat pair of ankles in Argyll socks, “if he was such a charmer, he could have worked on her. Surely such an enormous sum of money for a bingo prize would be advertised by the hotel in the newspapers.”
“Yes, it was.”
“This is fun,” said the tutor happily. “I feel quite like Dr. Watson. Tell me about this Mrs. Macbean.”
“She isn’t a looker, middle-aged, waspish, hair in curlers from morning till night. Husband is said to beat her up, but she does not seem afraid of him. Told a friend of mine” – oh, Sarah, what happened to us? – “that a woman with a breadknife in her hand didn’t need to be afraid of any man. Said she put laxative in his morning coffee after he had beaten her and threatened it would be poison the next time.”
“Mrs. Macbean sounds a likely candidate.”
