“You can’t walk in here and order me around,” said the colonel.
“Please, George,” said Charlie quietly. “It’s important.”
“Oh, very well. Push me along, Greta.”
“It’s all right. I can manage,” said Hamish, seizing the wheelchair.
The office was lit with a shaded green lamp on the desk. Hamish took out a powerful tape recorder and laid it down on the desk.
“What’s up with you?” snarled Harrison.
“Mr. Percy Harrison,” said Hamish. “I am charging you with the wilful murder of Helen Mackenzie.”
“Why on earth would I kill the bitch?”
“Grief,” said Hamish. “She killed your son. You overheard me accusing her of the murder of Andrew and of Gloria and Miss McGowan. Andrew was your only son. Somehow, you shook a confession out of her and then you strangled her. You can walk. I know that. I saw you once. You’re a powerful man. You waited until the middle of the night, maybe slung the dead body over your knees in the wheelchair, and took the body out to her car and dumped it in the boot. You had strangled her with her scarf. You took the body to the dump, shoved it in an old trolley, and piled the trolley up with cans and bottles. You put the car back, knowing Juris would find it and clean it. You hated her so much, you didn’t even bother to hide anything. You could have cleared out her room and made it look as if she had fled.
“But you had murdered her and got your revenge and that was all you wanted.”
“You gormless idiot,” roared Harrison. “What proof do you have?”
“Your DNA is on the scarf that strangled her,” lied Hamish. He knew it would take ages for any results to come in. “Forensics took the DNA of everyone at the hunting box ages ago.”
Harrison sat for a long time, staring at the lamp on the desk as if hypnotised. Then he said, “Yes, I did hear you. Andrew might be pompous but he was my son. I told Helen to wheel me over to the garage because I wanted to look for something. Then I got her by the throat. I said if she confessed, I would let her escape. If she said nothing, I would kill her. I took a gun and jammed it in her mouth until she nodded. She went on about how she thought I loved her. Rubbish. She said Gloria had always been scoring off her in the past and had taken her boyfriend away. One day, Gloria had called on her and shown her that diamond pendant I gave her. Helen wailed it just wasn’t fair. She started pleading and babbling that she had done it all for me. That she had killed Gloria to protect me. I could have shot her then and there. But I put the gun in my pocket. I told her I would let her go if she came back into the house and typed out a confession.
“It seemed to take hours with her breaking off to try to justify herself and begging and weeping. She was the one who sent that filthy anonymous letter so that my last memory of poor Gloria was shouting at her. At last she was finished and I got her to sign it. She even confessed to wearing the scarf with which she had strangled Gloria. I made her fetch it.
“I stood behind her with the scarf around her neck and strangled her. It seemed right that she should die by the very scarf with which she killed my Gloria. I got into my wheelchair, slung her dead body over my knees, and went out to the garage. Why didn’t I take one of my own cars? I didn’t want to muck them with her filthy body. I crammed her in the boot. I had to break her legs with a tyre iron so that she would fit.
“I was going to dump her on the moors but her wee car couldn’t cope with going off-road, and then I remembered the recycling place and thought it fitting she should end up with all the other rubbish.”
He fell silent.
“I will type out a statement for you to sign,” said Hamish. “You will now be locked in your room until reinforcements arrive from Strathbane. Charlie, go ahead and search for that gun.”
“He won’t find it,” said Harrison. “I left it in the safe in the hunting box.”
To Hamish’s relief, they made their way to Harrison’s room without encountering anyone. Harrison gave Hamish the statement from Helen. Hamish locked him in, pocketed the key, then went back to the office and called Jimmy.
The colonel wondered what was going on. He went to the office and peered through the glass panels. He could see Hamish and Charlie sitting there. He asked the night porter where Mr. Harrison was, and was told he was in his room.
He knocked at the door and called, “Percy! Have you gone to bed?”
There was a silence and then Harrison’s voice came from just behind the door. “The door’s locked,” he said, “and I could murder a whisky and soda.”
“I’ll have it open in a minute,” called the colonel. “We use that room for friends. I keep a key under this big vase outside the door. People are always losing that key.”
He opened the door. “I’ll get you a drink from the bar. Won’t take a moment.”