Death Of A Scriptwriter Part 8

Jock phoned Strathbane police and then sat down on a chair behind the counter. He fished out a bottle of whisky from under the counter and took a strong pull from it.

"What's this about him having no eyes?" asked Harry, shouldering his way up to the counter.

Recovering from his shock and beginning to enjoy the drama, Jock gave them a gruesome picture of the dead body.

"He knew about this," said Sheila to Fiona.

"Who? What?" demanded Fiona sharply.

"Hamish Macbeth, the policeman. I went to ask his help to suggest some bar Jamie might be found drunk in. He got very serious about it all and said he would set out for where we were filming yesterday right away. He knew something was probably wrong."

Fiona turned white and fainted and had it not been for the press of people about her would have fallen to the floor of the shop.

Up on the mountain, Hamish Macbeth peered at the dead body of Jamie. He hoped against hope that the man had died of alcohol poisoning. He eased down the springy heather which was pillowing the dead head and drew back with a little exclamation of dismay. The back of the head was crushed. He longed to turn the body over and inspect it thoroughly but knew he should not touch it.

He sat back on his heels and looked around. If Jamie had been struck down with some sort of blunt instrument, struck down from behind, why had he fallen on his back? Perhaps the killer had turned him over to make sure he was really dead.

The trouble with heather was that there would be no footprints. And who could have done it? Where had Angus Harris been the night before? Or Fiona? Or Patricia?

It was ironic it should be such a perfect day. Tourists travelled up as far as Sutherland to admire the scenery, but often the mountains were shrouded in mist and the villages drenched and grey in lashing rain. It was a day for holiday, for picnics, for lazing around, not for sitting on the top of the mountain with a dead man whose eyes had been pecked out by the crows.

Then he heard the distant wail of police sirens and the faraway clatter of a helicopter. The bane of his life, Detective Chief Inspector Blair of Strathbane, had been on holiday. With any luck he might still be away. But as a helicopter suddenly soared over the top of the mountain and began to descend onto the heathery plateau, Hamish saw Blair's fat and unlovely features peering down.

The helicopter landed, and Blair, with his sidekicks, Detectives Harry Macnab and Jimmy Anderson, scuttled forward from the helicopter under the slowly revolving blades. Behind them came the pathologist, Mr. Sinclair, tall, thin and sour, as if years of viewing dead bodies had curdled his nature.

"Whit's all this?" shouted Blair above the dying noise of the helicopter engine.

"The dead man is Jamie Gallagher, scriptwriter for a detective television series which is being shot here by Strathclyde Television," said Hamish. He described finding the body.

"s.a.d.i.s.tic murder," said Blair. "Someone poked his eyes out."

"Crows," said Hamish. "Crows got at the body."

"So it might not be murder?"

"The back of his head is crushed."

"Oh, aye, and how did you find that out and him lying on his back?"

"I did not touch the body. I pressed down the heather his head's lying on."

Blair grunted. Another helicopter roared in to land and disgorged a forensic team.

A tent was being erected over the body. Blair, who had turned away, swung back. "You'd best get back tae your village duties, Macbeth. There's enough o' us experts here."

"There's a lot of suspects," said Hamish sharply.

"Aye, well, list them when you're typing up your report. I'll send Jimmy Anderson along to see you later."

Hamish went wearily off down the mountain just as another helicopter bearing Chief Superintendent Peter Daviot arrived on the scene. The cost of all these helicopters, thought Hamish. There would be cuts in everyone's expenses for the rest of the year.

Daviot strode up to Blair and listened to his account. " Where's Macbeth?" he asked when Blair had finished.

"He's got duties tae attend to and we don't need him here."

"Does he know of any suspects?"

"Aye, he did say something about that."

"Good heavens, man, he probably has a d.a.m.n good idea who did it. I have often thought, Blair, that you let your jealousy of that village bobby get in the way of an investigation. I'll see Macbeth myself."

Daviot strode back to his helicopter. Blair swore under his breath. He hoped Hamish Macbeth had nothing to say but a load of Highland rubbish.

Hamish reached the police station to find Daviot waiting for him.

"Let's go inside," said Daviot, "and let's hear what you know."

Hamish led him into the police office, wiping dust from the desk with his sleeve.

"Now, let's begin at the beginning. Who wanted this man dead?"

So Hamish outlined what had happened, starting with his own recommendation of Drim.

"Why Drim?" interrupted the superintendent. "It's a difficult place to get to and not the prettiest around."

Hamish gave him a limpid look. "When I heard it was a detective series, I thought they might want somewhere a bit stark."

He then described Patricia Martyn-Broyd's distress at the savaging of her work, Fiona's sacking and Angus Harris's accusation that Jamie had stolen his friend's script. He finished by saying, "Jamie Gallagher was a nasty sort of drunk. He seemed to go around annoying everyone."

"Was anyone actually heard to threaten Jamie's life?"

"Well, the writer woman, for one," said Hamish reluctantly.

"We'd better get her in. Type up your report. And try to work with Blair."

"I try, I try"-Hamish sighed-"but he doesnae seem to want to work with me."

"He's a good man and a hard worker."

When he's not drunk, thought Hamish.

"I know he's a bit jealous of you. Heard from Miss Halburton-Smythe?"

Hamish flushed. He had once been engaged to Priscilla Halburton-Smythe, a fact which had put him in high favour with Daviot, particularly Mrs. Daviot, who was a dreadful sn.o.b.

"Priscilla's down in London," said Hamish.

"Not helping her father run the Tommel Castle Hotel anymore?"

"There was no call for it, sir. The manager does an excellent job."

Daviot gave a little laugh. "It's a pity that didn't work out for you. Mrs. Daviot was most disappointed. But then, one cannot imagine Priscilla Halburton-Smythe as the wife of a village policeman."

"Quite," said Hamish, trying to block out a bright image of Priscilla with her calm features and smooth blond hair.

"Anyway, type up your report. Blair will be with you later."

The phone rang shrilly. Hamish picked it up. Blair's truculent voice asked for Daviot, and Hamish pa.s.sed the receiver over.

Daviot listened and then gave an exclamation and said, "That's great. Good work. It looks as if we've got our man. We'll have this wrapped up today."

Daviot rang off. "Blair's had a call from the police in Glasgow. Two policemen heard Josh Gates, the husband of Penelope Gates, who stars in the series, shouting in the middle of St. Vincent Street, "I'll kill him." It turns out he was well-known in the business for blowing his top over his wife's various s.e.xy roles. He'd been in Smith's bookshop and asked to see the catalogue of forthcoming books. Then he shouted, "s.l.u.t," and bought an ordnance survey map of this section of Sutherland. The bookseller's a.s.sistant said the catalogue was left open at a book ill.u.s.tration of The Case of the Rising Tides The Case of the Rising Tides, showing his wife naked on the cover. We'll find him."

Hamish typed up his report, feeling irritated and isolated. He itched to know what was going on. Had Josh Gates really committed the murder? If he had, he was probably in hiding somewhere.

He wondered if Patricia had heard the news. Surely she was bound to have heard about the murder by now. And where was Angus Harris?

It was eight o'clock in the evening by the time Jimmy An-derson called. His long nose was red with sunburn.

"Filed your report?" asked Jimmy, sitting down wearily.

"Sent it to Strathbane ages ago," said Hamish. "The wonder o' computers."

"Well, this case is nicely wrapped up. Got a dram?"

They were in the kitchen. Hamish went to the cupboard and brought down a bottle of cheap whisky. He knew Jimmy of old and was not going to waste good malt on him. "So was it Josh Gates after all?"

"Yes, it was him."

"Confessed?"

"No, dead as a doornail when they got him."

"So how do they know he did it? What did he die of?"

"We're waiting for the pathology report, but it looks as if he got drunk and choked on his own vomit. He was lying up on the hill a little bit beside the road outside Drim. One of the locals found him."

"So how do they know it was him?" asked Hamish impatiently.

"He had blood on his hands. They'll need to check the DNA. But we're pretty sure it'll turn out to be Jamie's blood."

"What's the wife saying to this?"

"She says he had a violent temper and that after the series was over, she was going to leave him."

"It's all too convenient," muttered Hamish. "What happens now with the TV series? Cancelled?"

"No, I gather Harry Frame considers it all wonderful publicity. They're all returning briefly to Glasgow to recoup, get another scriptwriter."

"Why another? Hadn't Jamie written all the scripts?"

"He'd written the first two and the bible-that's the casting, story line, setting, all that-but they'll need someone or several to work out the remaining scripts, or maybe change the first ones. That Fiona King says Jamie's work was c.r.a.p."

"So she's still got her job?"

"Didn't know she had been fired."

"Aye, Jamie got her fired. An ambitious woman, I think."

"Och, we don't need to worry about her or anyone else. Thank G.o.d it's all tied up. Thon place, Drim, gies me the creeps."

Hamish looked at him thoughtfully. He had an uneasy feeling it was all too pat. Yet Josh had been found dead with blood on his hands. But why should he have blood on his hands? If he had struck Jamie on the back of the head with a rock or a bottle or anything else and he were close enough, blood might have spurted on his clothes, but not his hands.

"Just supposing," said Hamish slowly, "Josh came across Jamie's body when the man was already dead. You'd think with that wound in the back of the head that he would be lying facedown in the heather. Josh wants to make sure he's dead, so he turns him over on his back and that's how he got the blood on his hands."

"Who cares?" Jimmy finished his whisky and put the gla.s.s down and rose to his feet. "It's all over."

Soon Drim was emptied of television crew and actors and press. As if to mark their departure, the weather changed and a warm gust of wind blew rain in from the Atlantic and up the long sea loch of Drim. The tops of the mountains were shrouded in mist. Damp penetrated everything, and tempers in the village were frayed.

Excitement and glamour had gone. Only two determined women attended Edie's exercise cla.s.s, and Alice's front parlour, which she used as a hair salon, stood empty.

Mr. Jessop, the minister, thought he should feel glad that the 'foreign invasion' had left, but he felt uneasy. Everyone seemed to be squabbling and discontented.

He felt his wife was not much help in running the parish. Eileen Jessop, a small, faded woman, never interested herself in village affairs. It was her Christian duty, he thought sternly as he watched her knitting something lumpy in magenta wool, to do something to give the women of the village an interest.

"What can I do?" asked Eileen, blinking at him myopically in the dim light of the manse living room. Mr. Jessop insisted she put only 40-watt bulbs in the sockets to save money.

"You could organise some activity for them," said the minister crossly. "Weaving or something."

"Why would they want to weave anything?" asked Eileen. "The women buy their clothes from Marks and Spencer. And I don't know how to weave."

"Think of something. You never talk to any of the women except to say good morning and good evening. Get to know them."

Eileen stifled a sigh. "I'll see what I can do."

It started more as a venture to keep her husband quiet. The next day Eileen plucked up her courage and went down to the general store, where Ailsa was leaning on the counter and filing her nails.

"What can I do for you, Mrs. Jessop?" asked Ailsa.

"I was wondering whether I could organize anything for the village women," said Eileen timidly. "Perhaps Scottish country dancing, something like that."

"We all know fine how to dance," said Ailsa. She gave a rueful laugh. "They were all hoping for parts in the fillum, that they were, and now they all feel flat."

And then Eileen found herself saying, "It's a pity we couldn't make a film of our own."

"A grand idea, Mrs. Jessop, but-"

"Eileen."