Death of a Nag Read online

  "I suppose we're all going home," said Hamish.

  "Oh, yes," began Doris eagerly.

  "Don't interrupt me, Doris," said Andrew severely. "I have just been telling Tracey here it is important that she does not tell either Cheryl or her family of her legacy. Doris and I will take her south with us to Cheltenham and find her a lawyer. You may repay us when you get your legacy, Tracey. Just write to your family saying we have invited you to go with us on an extended holiday."

  "Oh, aye, Ah'll do that," said Tracey eagerly.

  Hamish looked curiously at Doris's face, which when Andrew had admonished her had momentarily had that closed look it had worn when her late husband had been nagging her.

  Heather was playing quietly with her brother and sister in the corner. She looked recovered from her ordeal. Hamish felt very weary and grubby.

  He excused himself and went upstairs and had a bath and changed. He took himself off to Dungarton for dinner, not wanting to go to the dining-room and sit opposite Miss Gunnery's empty chair.

  He noticed when he drove back that it was once more dark at night in the north of Scotland. As he approached Skag, he saw a couple with their arms wrapped about each other walking by the side of the road. His headlamps picked them out—Deacon and Maggie, walking as close as lovers. Well, I never! he thought crossly. That one's determined to get promotion any way she can!

  He parked the police Land Rover outside. He wondered if the others had left. He himself would have one more night's sleep at The Friendly House. He switched off the engine and climbed out.

  And then he heard barking from the beach. His heart gave a jolt. The barking sounded like Towser's. He turned and ran towards the beach, stumbling over the dunes towards the sound of that joyful barking.

  He could make out the dim shape of a large mongrel running along by the edge of the curling waves.

  "Towser!" he shouted.

  And then there was nothing there, nothing at all but the waves curling in the moonlight, the hissing sand, and the empty beach.

  He walked slowly back, realizing he was so very tired, he must have been hallucinating. On the other hand, it would be comfortable to think that somewhere there was another world for dead pets where they were happy and that he had briefly had a glimpse of it.

  He let himself in and went up the stairs, undressed and plunged gratefully into bed, without even bothering to wash or clean his teeth.

  He awoke in the morning to a sunny day, washed and dressed and went down to the dining-room.

  To his surprise they were all still there. "We all decided it would be best to set off after breakfast," said Andrew.

  "Have you got everything packed in the cars, Doris?"

  "Yes, dear."

  "So I'll take Tracey and you follow us."

  "I hope I'll be all right," said Doris timidly. "I've never driven such a long way on my own before."

  "You'll be all right," said Andrew.

  After breakfast, they all shook hands and exchanged addresses, just like any normal holiday-makers. Hamish was the first to leave. They stood in a little group outside, waving goodbye to him.

  He wondered if he would ever see any of them again.

  The hills were ablaze with purple heather as he drove down the heathery track into Lochdubh. Willie, polishing the brass doorknob outside the restaurant, turned and waved. The sun sparkled on the sea loch, the fishing boats rode at anchor, and seagulls sailed overhead against the bluest of skies.

  He was home at last and felt he had been away from Lochdubh for years.

  He opened up the police station, took the sign off the door which referred all inquiries to Sergeant Macgregor at Cnothan, lit the stove, and began to go about the pressing duties of gardening and tending to his livestock. During the day, villagers called round to stand and chat.

  It was only as evening approached that he realized he had not inquired after Priscilla. He was free of that at last and yet he did not know whether to be glad or sorry.

  No Towser, no Priscilla, the start of a new chapter in his life.

  Dr. Brodie and Angela called and took him out for dinner at the Italian restaurant where the servings were back to their normal generous size, the owner having returned from Italy and put an end to Willie Lamont's parsimony. As Hamish told them about the case, the more faraway and unreal it seemed in his head.

  "You're usually so sharp about people," said Angela. "I'm surprised you didn't think there might be something badly wrong in the character of this Miss Gunnery."

  "I've often thought about it," said Hamish. "She seemed that kind, and I was thrown by Towser's death. She must have been quite mad. I tell you, there's something weird about Skag—so flat, all those singing sands." He fell silent. He had been so anxious to leave that he had not even called on old Miss Blane again, as he had promised he would.

  "Do you think this Tracey will really reform? What was left to her by Miss Gunnery?"

  "I don't really know," said Hamish. "Andrew Biggar was going to look into it. A tidy bit, I should guess. Then there would be the flat in Cheltenham. Perhaps, once the euphoria of being home is over, Andrew and Doris will drop her."

  "And do you think Andrew and Doris will live happily ever after?" asked Angela.

  "That I don't know. Doris is one o' those women who can make men into bullies, not that I'm saying that Harris wasn't a rat. And how will Doris cope with Andrew's mother? She's a big, bossy sort of woman. As long as they don't live wi' her, it'll probably muddle along all right."

  At the end of the meal, he thanked them and walked home. Great stars were burning overhead and there was a cold nip in the air.

  He would put the whole Skag experience behind him. He would probably never hear anything about any of them again.

  The following February, Hamish came indoors from shovelling snow away from the police station path to hear the phone in the office ringing.

  Hoping he would not have to go out in such filthy weather to deal with some crime, he answered it. To his surprise, it was the editor of the Worcester newspaper he had phoned the summer before for information about Andrew.

  "I wondered whether you were still working on that case," said the editor.

  "Och, no, that was solved and over last summer," said Hamish, thinking not for the first time that it always came as a bit of a jolt to realize that what appeared world-shattering in the far north of Scotland did not even cause a ripple in the south of England.

  "Oh, well, it was just that a bit of news about that Andrew Biggar arrived on my desk."

  "What's that?"

  "He's getting married."

  "Oh, well, that was on the cards ... to Doris Harris."

  "You know? Wait a bit. That wasn't the name. Where is the damn thing?" There was the sound of an impatient rustling of papers. "Here it is. No, he's marrying someone called Tracey Fink. Still, it's no use to you now."

  "No, no use now," said Hamish slowly. He thanked the editor and replaced the phone.

  It had all been for nothing. Two murders committed so that Romeo and Juliet in the form of Andrew and Doris could enjoy the great love they had for each other. Gentleman Andrew and slaggy Tracey. They would need a board with subtitles at the wedding so that the English guests could make out what she was saying, he thought cynically. What on earth had happened?

  Probably the middle-aged Andrew had found it delightful to act as Pygmalion to the coarse Tracey, the young Tracey, while timid Doris became a bore.

  Perhaps what had sparked the love between Doris and Andrew had been the secrecy of their meetings. The minute the road lay clear to marriage, he might have begun to find her irritating.

  What a waste of life, and all in the name of love!

  I hope there is an afterlife, thought Hamish savagely, and I hope, Miss Gunnery, you're seeing and hearing everything.

  He poured himself a glass of whisky from a drawer in his desk. This year, he should go on holiday somewhere or another. But he would probably stay in Lochdubh
and go fishing.

  The world outside was a wicked place.

  About This Book

  DEATH

  OF A

  NAG

  A new mystery in M. C. Beaton's Constable Hamish Macbeth mystery series—lauded in both Britain and America for its authentic local color and appealing detective, "that laconic lad from Lochdubh" (Christian Science Monitor)—is as delicious a treat as Devon cream and scones. This time out the red-haired, irascible Macbeth has left his tiny Scottish village for a holiday with his dog, Towser. True to form, Macbeth doesn't venture far from the highlands he loves, just a few hours away to Skag, a forgotten North Sea resort town that offers run-down guest houses, a fish-and-chips shop, the haunting sound of its "singing sands," and murder.

  Until his recent demotion from sergeant back to constable and the end of his engagement to the lovely Priscilla Halburton-Smythe, Hamish Macbeth had been a contented man. Now every face he meets in Lochdubh is dour with disapproval at the man "who broke that poor girl's heart."

  Escaping to Skag is meant to raise Macbeth's sagging spirits. Instead, he finds that "Friendly House," described as a charming inn a stone's throw from the sea, is not as advertised. The ambiance is dismal, the food inedible, and his fellow guests an unpromising lot that includes the spinster Miss Gunnery, two tarty girls, a retired military man, a London family, and Bob Harris, who so nags his wife, Doris, that everyone wants to kill him. And then somebody does.

  Unfortunately, Macbeth himself is overheard threatening the man—right before he is seen punching him in the nose. As the leading suspect, Macbeth must now clear his name by finding out who at Friendly House is the real killer. But this vacation taken on the cheap will cost Macbeth dearly. The secrets each of the guests wants to hide will provoke desperate deceptions, and another unexpected death will touch Macbeth's own life with tragedy.

  Before he knows it, our doughty Lochdubh lad is once again ensnared in the entanglements of desire and their inescapable ties to murder. And M. C. Beaton is expertly using the characters gathered at Friendly House to sardonically update the classic English Manor House mystery. The result makes Death Of A Nag superb entertainment, complete with a clever, final twist.

  M. C. Beaton has written eleven books in her popular Hamish Macbeth series, including Death Of A Nag. She is also the author of the Agatha Raisin series. Scottish by birth, M. C. Beaton now lives in England with her husband.

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  About This Book