Death Of A Hussy Part 8

"Now," said Hamish quickly, "let's get to the house guests. The tall one who came down that night to the police station with ye, that's Peter Jenkins. What do you know about him?"

"He's an advertising executive in his own company," said Alison. "He knew Maggie about twenty years ago, I think, or did he say eighteen? Anyway, he was in love with her and then he got her letter. You see, she wanted to get married and so she had chosen four of her old lovers. You don't seem surprised?"

"I'm surprised at her odd way of courting but not that she had a lot of lovers. Go on."

"He told me she'd changed. He wasn't in love with her anymore although I heard..."

Alison bit her lip. She had been about to tell Hamish about overhearing Peter begging for money, but Peter had held Alison and comforted her and she felt she had to protect him.

"What were you about to say?" demanded Hamish sharply.

Alison looked mutinous. He sighed and said, "I'll return to that. Tell me about the others."

"The smallish man in the yellow pyjamas is Crispin Witherington. He owns a car salesroom in Finchley in North London. He took me out driving. He wanted me to put a good word in for him with Maggie."

"Now why would he suggest that? You said yourself Maggie hated you."

"He thought Maggie was fond of me to leave me everything in her will...." Alison looked at Hamish with dilated eyes.

"Don't be in a taking," said Hamish quickly, frightened that Alison would start another scene. "The fact the woman left you her money doesn't mean you killed her for it."

"It's not that," said Alison. "How did he know? I mean, how did he know that Maggie had left me her money? And how did Steel Ironside know?"

"Maybe she told them."

"She simply wrote to them all inviting them," said Alison, "and then she told them on the first night that whoever married her would get her money and that she had a weak heart."

"But she didn't tell them she had left it to you?"

"Not that I know of. She may have said it in her letters. She told me that when she decided on one of them, she would change her will and cut me out. Maybe they overheard that. It's very easy to hear things in this house. Oh, Hamish, only yesterday she apologised for being so rude to me and she said she wouldn't cut me out of her will. Everyone will think I did it. But it can't be murder."

"Maybe it isn't. Go on about Mr. Witherington."

"I don't know any more except that he was one of Maggie's old flames. She made a profession of it."

"Getting money from men?"

"Yes."

"All right. Now let's move to James Frame."

"He runs a gambling club in London. He wanted me to put in a word with Maggie as well. He seems harmless enough. I didn't have much of a chance to speak to him."

"And Steel Ironside?"

"He's a failed pop singer. He told me he needed money to get started again. He seems nice. Oh, Hamish, I've just remembered. I asked Maggie why she was sure that one of these four would want to marry her and she said she'd had a private detective to check up on them and they all need money."

"Good. I'll have a look through her papers and see if I can find the name of the detective agency. Send in your friend, Peter."

Alison was soon replaced by Peter Jenkins. Hamish looked at him curiously. But he seemed just the same as he had done when Hamish had first met him: a pleasant, if weak, man, slightly effeminate. He looked at Hamish with dislike. "You're making a fuss over nothing," said Peter, "and causing a great deal of unnecessary distress. The sooner someone higher up arrives, the better. It's a clear case of accident."

"So you say. Let's get down to business. Full name...?"

In his slow drawling voice, Peter outlined the bare facts. He had been in love with Maggie twenty years ago and had only really fallen out of love with her when he arrived and found her changed. She had invited him for two weeks and he had taken leave from his firm. He needed a holiday and so he had decided to stay.

And all the time he was talking, Hamish was thinking, He's been carrying the torch for years for a prost.i.tute. He must be awfully immature. I wonder how he manages to ran a company.

"How did you manage to set up this company?" he asked when Peter fell silent.

"I had been working for Sandford and Jones," said Peter, naming one of the biggest advertising agencies. "I was thirty when a rich uncle died and left me quite a bit so I decided to go into business for myself. My firm is Jenkins a.s.sociates."

"Doing well?"

"Very well. We've got the Barker Baby Food account, for example."

"Barker was bought over by a j.a.panese company last year. Do they still retain your services?"

"Of course. Didn't I just say so?"

Hamish sat back and surveyed Peter in silence.

Peter stared at him and then suddenly shrugged and said boyishly, "I shouldn't lie. A vice of advertising men. Fact is, I had this friend working with me right from the beginning and he recently quit and took that account with him. I hope the j.a.panese dump him."

"And what were you doing last night and this morning?"

"I was asleep the whole time. I heard Alison scream and rushed out."

"And did you hear any explosion, any loud bang?"

"No, nothing, but there could have been one before Alison woke me with her screams. It was an accident."

"Very well, Mr. Jenkins. That will be all for now. Send in Mr. Witherington."

Crispin Witherington was very jovial and hearty. Then he obviously decided that jollity was out of place and became pompous.

He outlined the facts about his relationship with Maggie, where he was during the night and morning-in bed-his business, and his home address in a way that led Hamish to believe he had had dealings with the police before. Then he launched into a diatribe about the pub in Fern Bay and the attack on him.

"Why didn't you report it?" asked Hamish.

"What's the point," said Crispin rudely. "You local yokels stick together."

"Don't be cheeky," said Hamish mildly. "Did you want to marry Mrs. Baird?"

"Hadn't made my mind up. I only came up for a giggle."

"And yet you asked Miss Kerr for help?"

"That sneaky little drip would say anything. Look, if it is murder, you only have to look in that direction."

"Are you saying you didn't ask Miss Kerr for help?"

"I can't remember every blasted word I've said."

"I'll be getting back to you. I'll hae a word with Mr. Frame next."

James Frame sidled in, smoothing down his already smooth hair with a nervous hand. Without prompting and with many "don't you knows" and "I says," he launched into his tale of how he had been asleep the whole time.

He had almost perfected the silly-a.s.s manner, thought Hamish, but the man's eyes behind a glaze of helpful and innocent goodwill were hard and watchful as if a smaller, meaner man were staring from behind thick gla.s.s. When he had met Maggie, he said, oh-so-long-ago, he had been doing a bit of this and a bit of that. Money in the family, don't you know. All the while, Hamish made mental notes. Lower middle cla.s.s. Accent a.s.sumed. Probably was a small-time crook.

"I believe Mrs. Baird was very expensive," said Hamish.

"She wasn't a wh.o.r.e," said James indignantly. "We were very much in love. Of course, a chap helps out a bit with the rent and things like that, but a chap would do that for any girl."

"What is the name of the gambling club where you work?"

"The Dinosaur in Half Moon Street. That's Mayfair."

"Yes, I know where Half Moon Street is. Do you own The Dinosaur?"

"Well, not exactly. Run it for a chap."

"And the chap's name?"

"Harry Fry."

"Champagne Harry. Out of prison is he?"

James looked sulky.

Even Hamish had heard of Harry Fry. He was a con-artist. His last fling had been to ingratiate himself into the graces of a colonel who was a close friend of the royal family and who lived in a grace and favour house in Windsor, that is a rent-free house given by the Crown. The colonel had gone to the Middle East to raise money for one of his favourite charities, Save the Donkeys, and had left Harry alone in his house. Harry had sold the house for a vast sum to an Arab and had been caught just as he was about to board a plane to Brazil at London airport.

His sentence had been surprisingly lenient. He had great charm and had used it to good effect in court. He had paid back all the money he had gained for the house. Harry was reputed to be worth millions. He tricked and conned only because it was the breath of life to him.

At last Hamish sent James off and Steel Ironside took his place.

"Real name?" asked Hamish.

"Victor Plummer," said the pop singer in a sulky voice. But asked about his previous relationship with Maggie, he perked up and grew almost lyrical. He might have been describing a teenage romance: Maggie's arrival on the scene, their first meeting at a party where she had shown no interest in him, the long tours, the sleazy hotels and theatrical digs, the sudden fame, the just-as-sudden falling in love and the start of the affair with Maggie, the walks in the park, the dog they had bought, the plans they had made.

"And why did she leave you?" asked Hamish.

Steel's face darkened. "Someone else came along," he said in his flat, nasal tw.a.n.g.

"Another pop singer?"

"No, Sir Benjamin Silver, head of Metropolitan Foods."

"The multimillionaire?"

"Yes."

"I see."

"I didn't at the time," said Steel. "That was the thing about Maggie. She went through a mint of my money but I never thought of it as paying her. I mean, she wasn't the kind you left the money on the bedside table for. I was in love and I thought she was. I thought she would come back to me."

"Are you married?"

"Separated."

"So how could you have married Mrs. Baird?"

"I'd have got a divorce. Never got around to it before."

What a weak bunch of men, thought Hamish. He took some more notes and then braced himself to interview Mrs. Todd.

He took down Mrs. Todd's account of her arrival on the scene of Maggie's death and then began to ask questions. Why had Mrs. Todd not rushed to see if she could help instead of going straight to the house and dialling 999? What had led her to believe no one had yet dialled?

"I do not know," she said primly. "It all happened that quick. They're a useless bunch and wouldnae think o' doing anything sensible."

"Very well. Where were you last night and this morning?"

"I was at a meeting of the Women's Rural Inst.i.tute at the school hall, went tae my bed, and then collected some groceries in the village and drove up here."

"Do you know where Mrs. Baird meant to go?"

"I don't know. Herself usually didn't move till the afternoon. Let me tell you this, Mr. Macbeth, you are making a lot of trouble over a mere accident. You are causing poor little Miss Kerr a lot o' strain."

Hamish ignored that and ploughed patiently on with his questions.

In the sitting room, Alison sat on the sofa with Peter Jenkins beside her. His arm was around her shoulders.

"So much for that helpful copper of yours," said Peter. "I'll have his guts for giving us all this trouble."

"He wasn't at all sympathetic," sniffed Alison. "Sitting there like the Gestapo. I don't know what's come over him."

"Power, that's what. These local hick types love a chance to push their betters around."

Alison leaned back and closed her eyes. She thought about her recent interview with Hamish. She and Hamish had been friends and yet he had asked her questions as if he had never known her. G.o.d! How she hated that study. She would have it turned into a breakfast room or a library. She hated the functional desk where she had typed so much filth.

She sat up a little, frowning.

"What's the matter?" asked Peter.

"The ma.n.u.script," said Alison. "Maggie's book. I don't remember seeing it on the desk. I'd better tell Hamish about it."

"She was in there last night," said Peter. "She probably either took it to her room or put it in one of the drawers. But tell that dreary bobby if you like."

The four guests had been looking forward to the arrival of Hamish Macbeth's superior, and when he did arrive, Detective Chief Inspector Blair from Strathbane did not let them down. It was, he said, a clear case of accident. There was no need to use a squad of policemen to comb the area for clues. The car would be towed away to Strathbane and examined there. He was sure the wiring would prove to be faulty. He was so delighted at putting Hamish down before an audience that he was even nice to Steel Ironside, despite the fact that he remembered clearly that one of the pop singer's. .h.i.ts in the early seventies had been "Burn the Fuzz." Mrs. Todd served him coffee with cream and some of her scones. His two detectives, Jimmy Anderson and Harry MacNab, stood respectfully behind his chair. Alison, who told him about Maggie's vicious treatment of the car, thought Blair a nice fatherly man. He was heavyset and spoke with a thick Glasgow accent and when not being nice to the company treated Hamish like a moron. And Hamish deserved it all, thought Alison fiercely. After all, Hamish was a Highlander and the Highlanders were another race entirely, sly and malicious and devious.