A glaring red dawn was turning the frost on the heather to rubies as Hamish wearily drove back to Lochdubh. He let himself into the police station. Too tired to make breakfast, he went into his bedroom where his pets lay sleeping in his bed, tore off his uniform, crawled in beside them, and immediately fell asleep, down and down into a nightmare where Malky clung screaming to the disintegrating fire escape.
He was awakened five hours later by the sound of a large crash from the kitchen. He struggled out of bed and hurried through to find Charlie gazing miserably at a shattered milk jug on the floor.
“I’m right sorry, Hamish. I heard ye had a rough night so I thought I’d make you breakfast.”
“It’s all right,” said Hamish, scrubbing the sleep from his eyes. “I never use that milk jug anyway. I aye just put the bottle on the table.”
“I gather the case is solved,” said Charlie. “Malky Hartford of all people.”
Charlie stooped and shovelled up pieces of china into a dustpan, put them in the bin, and then mopped up the floor.
“I’ll shower and shave,” said Hamish, “and we’ll talk about it. Where’s the inspector?”
Charlie blushed. “Herself gone to consult wi’ Daviot and the procurator fiscal and then she’s off to Inverness.”
Hamish eyed Charlie and thought, I hope he hasn’t been seduced.
He washed and dressed and went back to the kitchen, where Charlie was frying up a large pan of venison sausage. “I put a bit extra on for Lugs and Sonsie,” said Charlie. “They’re right partial to a bit o’ venison. One egg or two?”
“Two, please.”
“It’s like the nightmare is over,” said Charlie. “Mind you, I’d never ha’ believed it o’ Malky.”
“You knew him?”
“Aye. A wee druggie. Do anything for a fix. But a handsome lad for all that. But murdering people! I cannae believe that. Now it turns out that lassie up in Kinlochbervie was poisoned wi’ antifreeze. That’s a slow, vicious death. Still, drugs can change folks’ characters. Just as well for Andrew and his missus. They werenae in Somerset.”
Hamish sat down at the table. “Where were they?”
“In Edinburgh.”
“What were they doing?”
“It’s a high-class wife-swopping club. Most of them English.”
“Crivens!” said Hamish, a picture of Andrew’s angular wife appearing in his mind. “Talk about Anglo-Saxon attitudes!”
“The inspector was going to charge both of them wi’ perverting the course of justice, or defeating the ends of justice as we say in Scotland, when she got the news that the murders were solved. She was so delighted that she let them off with a caution.”
Charlie put four sausages and two eggs on a plate and put it on the table along with a pot of tea.
“I cannae believe it’s all over. Did you and herself celebrate?”
Charlie bent over to put sausages into the animals’ bowls. “No time for that,” he mumbled.
I do believe they’ve been and gone and done it, thought Hamish. Damn the woman. What now? Will she get a divorce? Will I lose this decent copper who suits me just fine?
Instead, he said, “I put my report in. Do they want anything more from me?”
“I shouldnae think so,” said Charlie, easing his great height down onto a kitchen chair and helping himself to tea. “Daviot is holding a press conference and taking all the credit, no doubt. If you don’t want me for anything today, I thought maybe me and George, I mean the colonel, might take the rods out.”
“Fishing season’s over, Charlie.”
“I meant, take the boat out and maybe get some fresh mackerel.”
“Go ahead. I’ll eat this and take Sonsie and Lugs for a walk. It looks like a grand day.”
When he walked along the waterfront, dressed in comfortable old clothes, having decided to give himself the day off, Hamish looked at the little white houses of the village and wondered why he could not experience any feeling of relief.
He saw the Currie sisters approaching. Had he not had the dog and cat with him, he would probably have jumped over the wall onto the beach to escape them. He always thought of the spinster twins as the Greek chorus of Lochdubh. Doom and gloom from the pair of them.
“I see that clever Mr. Daviot solved the case for you,” said Nessie.
“Solved,” intoned her sister.
“It is just as well someone was on the job and not lazing around with a dog and cat,” said Nessie.
“Dog and cat,” moaned her sister.
“Oh, shove off, the pair of you,” said Hamish. They stared up at him, shocked eyes behind thick spectacles, rigidly permed white hair, and crumpled white faces, the skin like tissue paper.
They marched off.
“Sorry!” shouted Hamish after them. “I’m so sorry.”
He scratched his fiery hair in distress. What had come over him?
He saw the fisherman Archie Maclean sitting on the wall outside his little cottage at the harbour and went to join him.