Snare (15 page)

‘She was too concerned to impress on me that Alec went out only once yesterday, and that with his father. But he was out alone this morning. So then she implied that today was the first time he was unaccompanied. None of that cuts any ice with Joan Knox, who says Alec could even have been out last night. If Hamish comes to grief, it's obvious who she'll hold responsible.'

‘A foregone conclusion.' Beatrice turned away from the birds. ‘They're all curlew. Oh dear, can this be more trouble?'

Esme Dunlop was bearing down on them.

‘How are you?' she called. ‘Lovely soft day – we need the rain. Seen anything?'

‘Nothing,' Miss Pink said. ‘But one keeps looking: for wreckage, clothing, anything. And you?'

‘Hell! You think he's in the loch?' She swung round, taking in the woods and the escarpment. ‘I hadn't got that far – wondering whether he was on land or in the sea. He's gone and that's it as far as I'm concerned. Good riddance.'

‘You didn't like him,' Miss Pink observed lightly.

‘You can say that again. If you ask me, he was behind all the mischief in this village from the word go: car thefts, the police car, the heavy breather, anonymous letters – particularly letters.'

‘Campbell sent you that?'

‘Who's talking about Campbell?'

‘I was.'

‘Oh.' There was a long silence, then she laughed. ‘I was talking about Hamish.'

Miss Pink looked mildly interested. ‘So you had phone calls in addition to the anonymous letter. May one ask what was said?'

‘Nothing. It was a heavy breather – giggling too, but no words.'

‘What time did he call?'

‘After midnight.'

‘You answered the phone.'

‘Once. Why? Someone else was getting calls, or everybody? I see, you're not talking. Well, take my word for it; there won't be any more telephone calls.'

‘He could start again, unless he's had a bad fright.'

‘He won't be coming back.' It was said smugly but, as if the words had been too much for her own equilibrium, Esme's face fell. ‘Or is that wishful thinking?' she asked.

‘Gay as a puppy,' Beatrice remarked when they'd parted from Esme and were walking up the Lamentation Road.

‘Jolly,' Miss Pink corrected absently. ‘How I detest this corruption of the language. So she got heavy breather calls too. She was subdued, now she's back to normal – and Hamish is missing. How much does she know about his disappearance?'

‘Nothing,' Beatrice said promptly. ‘She's far too frank about her relief.'

‘Have you never heard of double-bluff?' Beatrice shrugged. ‘She's wrong. The business with the police car could have involved Hamish conniving with local boys, but anonymous letters and phone calls and car thefts – never. That wasn't him; he's just ... well... naughty.'

At the lodge Coline had learned something of the village gossip, but by no means all. ‘It's scarcely enough to have hysterics about,' she said, serving sherry: ‘A sixteen-year-old not coming home at night.'

‘Who told you?' Miss Pink asked.

‘Rose Millar. Joan Knox didn't turn up for work – we employ her full-time now that Debbie's left – and I called the police house. I couldn't get through, so I rang the Post Office to ask if Joan were ill. I got a pretty cool reception there, I can tell you. Apparently Joan accused Rose of nameless horrors in respect of Hamish.'

‘Alec, actually; she's accusing Alec,' Miss Pink said. ‘You couldn't get through to Knox because he was calling the hospitals and various friends in the police. And Hamish was home during the evening; he left a dummy in his bed. So there was an intention to deceive his parents should they look in on him.'

That's a different kettle of fish. Now why would he do that?'

‘Do what?' Ranald entered in his stocking feet. ‘Excuse me, ladies; we've been battening down the hatches, or rather I have. I miss Campbell. We'll have to get Sinclair and Millar to give us a hand, m'dear. First storms after a long drought always find all the weak places.'

‘Melinda says Hamish was out all night and left a dummy in his bed.'

‘Was he now! Why did he do that?'

‘That's what we're wondering. He's missing.'

‘What! Like Campbell? Why wasn't I told?'

‘Sweetie, I've known since ten o'clock, but I didn't think it important.'

‘Two people missing? It's dead serious. What's Knox doing about it?'

Miss Pink told him. Beatrice said, ‘I wonder if Knox has thought to get in touch with Hamish's friends. There are a number of lads on the crofts along the lighthouse road.'

‘I think we should find out.' Coline rose and left the room.

Ranald stared after her, then turned to Beatrice. ‘What do you think? You know him.'

‘Not well; I don't employ him. You'd have seen more of him.'

‘True. He's a nice enough lad. Flora was a bit impatient with him. Of course, she can ride. She had to teach him ... Wonder what Knox has discovered.' He made to rise, remembered his manners and sank back in his chair.

‘Was Hamish out yesterday when everyone else was searching for Campbell?' Miss Pink asked. ‘After we returned from the islands and told you about the meal in the tent?'

‘He was on the moor behind Fair Point, on horseback. I saw him once or twice. I went out to the light again in the Land Rover.'

‘Did you see him when he brought the pony back?'

‘No, there would be no need. He'd put the tack away and turn the pony out himself. He knows what to do.'

‘I suppose all your ponies are accounted for?'

‘What? You think he's gone off with a pony like Campbell took a boat? Impossible. The ponies are all there anyway – I gave them some hay this morning. I'm the dogsbody now.'

Coline returned, looking concerned. ‘Knox has drawn a blank,' she said. ‘He's mystified and unhappy. Joan's giving him no peace. He says Hamish had no close friends among the local lads, but he's spoken to several of the fathers; no one else is missing, and no other boy who's available at the moment can help. I told Knox he must report the business to the superintendent at Morvern and let him take it from there. Any other parent would do that; Knox has to stop thinking of appearances.'

‘You're thinking of the police car in Anne's drive,' Beatrice said.

‘Well, that, and worse.' Seeing Miss Pink's raised eyebrows, Coline added, ‘One always wondered about the car thefts, you know.'

‘That was Hell's Angels,' Ranald spluttered, I'd never have employed Hamish if I'd thought he was a thief.'

‘You didn't,' Coline said. I did. Why am I talking in the past tense? Hamish
is
employed by us, when he's here. That reminds me: Flora will have to come home and look after those ponies. I haven't the time or the inclination to exercise them, and we'll have to start feeding soon. You shouldn't have given them hay today, sweetie; there's enough grass.' She clutched her temples, ‘I'm getting distracted – and I should be working on a book! I'm going to call Flora; she won't like it, but she's got to think of her responsibilities. I don't hold with children persuading their parents to buy animals and then leaving Mum to do the chores when it suits – particularly when Mum is by way of being the breadwinner.' Venom had crept into her voice and Ranald shifted uncomfortably.

‘What's the next step, once the authorities at Morvern have been informed?' Beatrice asked.

‘If they think he's in this locality, they'll bring in a search party,' Miss Pink said, picking up her cue. ‘But it's more likely that they'll look in amusement arcades and cafés – anywhere that youngsters hang out in Morvern and Inverness. You can't search meticulously unless there's some indication that the missing person is in that area, as we thought Campbell was.'

‘I still think he's here,' Ranald said. ‘Campbell, I mean. They'll find his boat or his body in the sea. It's obvious; he went mad and drowned himself.'

* * *

They stayed to lunch at the lodge and afterwards Beatrice walked home across the park while Miss Pink, pleading the need for exercise, strolled along the drive to the highway. A few yards down the Lamentation Road she came to a gate at the back of the terrace where Esme lived. Only the upper windows of the houses were visible, the lower ones hidden by walled yards. Along the field side of the wall a path, muddied by small hooves, looked as if it would run past the back of the hotel towards the shore of the loch.

It was a nasty slimy little path on a slope, but Miss Pink was in boots and she took her time. The slope was wooded and there were still enough leaves on the trees to obscure all but a grey glimmer of the hotel and its outbuildings as she traversed behind them. Her boots left clear prints in the mud, superimposed on sheep tracks. There were no other human prints, but before the rain came yesterday no one could have left prints except where the burn crossed the path.

She reached that place and found an appreciable increase in the volume of water coming down. Another heavy shower was approaching, heralded by a gusty wind that sent white horses running over the surface of the loch. Spray burst on the rocks and she wondered if Campbell's tent was still standing. Looking towards the islands, the furthest of which was now obscured, something caught her eye – something close to the mainland shore – but when she studied the heaving water the object had disappeared.

She scrambled down to the beach and found an overhanging corner where she could shelter from the shower. From here the point on the far side of the cove was in full view. Two oystercatchers were standing on the weed, facing into the wind, their shoulders hunched. There wasn't much wrong with her eyes; she could distinguish their scarlet bills and legs.

The tide was lower than she'd thought. Kelp bobbed up, branched at the top, and vanished below the next wave. She hadn't seen kelp since California, and then there'd been sea otters diving through it. She'd thought that this kind of weed was a Pacific species; surely Atlantic kelp was only exposed at the lowest tides, and this tide had two hours to go before the turn. Dry and sheltered in her rock corner, she stared out at the water and pondered her ignorance. After a while her gaze became fixed and she emerged to move along the beach. The oystercatchers took off with wild calls. She ignored them.

She walked into the water until she was wading. When the waves were slapping her thighs she climbed on to the rocks and, stumbling across the bladderweed, reached the point she had been aiming for: within twenty feet of the kelp that now, with the falling tide, was regularly revealed in each trough of the waves.

It was no kelp but a human arm.

Sgoradale was suddenly a centre of activity, intensifying from the moment when Knox saw the thing in the water. Miss Pink had stressed that it had been immersed for a while and, when they drew near, coming in by sea, she was glad that she'd taken that precaution. The water was lower now and, in the heaving sea, a more or less globular object appeared at the end of the arm, all colour washed out: dark hair plastered to a splintered skull. The arm was no longer projecting but floating limply on the surface.

They went back to the village, Knox informed his superiors at Morvern and was told to guard the cove. Miss Pink told him to take a gun. ‘For the birds,' she said, when he looked puzzled. He raised no objection when she accompanied him to the boat.

The weather was worsening and the sea rising but, once in the lee of the islands, they were sheltered from the wind. They landed in the cove. Gulls were swooping at the head and he fired at them wildly – a useless gesture. From cracked white bone, empty sockets regarded the shore, the head swaying on the stalk of a neck. The damage had been done already by crabs; gulls could do little more, ‘It's been there days,' he said.

She calculated. ‘A day and a half. Miss Swan saw him on Saturday night.'

‘He must have tied something round himself and jumped in.'

Questions crowded her mind but they were technical; she was appalled at the questions that he must be asking himself, had been ever since she told him of her grisly discovery. For him the body itself could have little importance compared with Hamish's present whereabouts.

Their enforced intimacy did not last long. The shoulders of that dreadful form had just appeared when a boat emerged from the islands with four people aboard, ‘It's the Chief Inspector,' Knox said, and walked down to the water.

The men came ashore and pulled the boat up. The boatman was old Sinclair. He studied the partially exposed body without surprise; he wouldn't be unfamiliar with the appearance of a body recovered from the sea. Knox introduced Miss Pink and she found herself scrutinised by pale blue eyes in a pale face. Detective Chief Inspector Pagan belied his name: short ginger hair under a flat cap, a smart trench-coat and dark tie implied conformity. His sergeant had the blunt features, the alert bearing of a bright Gorbals youth, but he wasn't a youth, and the creases in his tanned cheeks spoke of the kind of wasting that goes with hard training. His name was Steer and he moved like a boxer. Pagan regarded the body without expression, but Steer had the look of a boy presented with his first bicycle. The fourth man was the diver.

There was no need to use a boat. The diver approached the body from the rocks and seemed scarcely out of his depth when his head submerged, giving the impression of a monster nosing its prey. He was gone only a short time before returning to the rocks and the other officers. From the beach Miss Pink and Sinclair watched in silence.

After a short exchange the diver went back to the body, submerged a second time and suddenly the torso gave a little jump before keeling over on the surface. The diver's head appeared, then the rest of him as he waded shoreward dragging the corpse. He pulled it from the water and it lay on the wet sand, rope trailing behind it. The rope was tied round the ankles.