Death of a Travelling Man by M. C. Beaton

Author:M. C. Beaton
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Mystery & Detective - General, Detective, Hamish (Fictitious character), Police, Suspense, Mystery & Detective, Mystery, Fiction - Mystery, MacBeth, General, Mystery fiction, Traditional British, Fiction, Mystery & Detective - Traditional British, Highlands (Scotland)
ISBN: 9780804112116
Publisher: Random House
Published: 1996-06-01T03:53:16.647000+00:00

Chapter Six

Suspicion all our lives shall be stuck full of eyes.

—Shakespeare

Despite Blair’s lack of interest, the police were doing a thorough job. The forensic team came back to go over the bus again, inch by inch. The sledgehammer was identified as belonging to the manse, but the bus was also full of items which Sean had borrowed from the Wellingtons. Mr Wellington said the sledgehammer was normally lodged in a shed at the end of his garden. He was not aware that Sean had borrowed it at any time. Hamish had had high hopes for that hidey-hole under the bus, but it turned out to be full of the same bits of rubbish as before. In a neutral voice, he told Harry MacNab and Jimmy Anderson of the women who had been friendly with Sean, relieved in a way that the detectives would be questioning them and not himself. Never before had he been so reluctant to investigate any case. Still, he could not resist asking them at the end of the day how they had got on.

“They’re all white and shaken,” said Anderson, “but that could be because of the shock. I mean, you’ve known all these women for some time now, Hamish, and you can hardly say that any one of them have shown criminal tendencies.”

“Forget about the women; what about the minister?”

“Nice old boy, but odd, really odd. He said something about the hammer of God.”

“He was probably quoting Chesterton,” said Hamish, who had read the Father Brown stories.

“Whoever he was quoting, he seemed smug. He said he’d called on the Lord for help and the Lord had helped, that sort of thing. Was he always that daft?”

“Not that I ever guessed,” said Hamish bleakly. “Did you tell the Currie sisters they would have to stay in the village until the investigation was over?”

“Why? I thought a trip to Inverness was a big adventure for that pair.”

“Their house is up for sale.”

“Not now, it isn’t,” said Anderson.

“So,” said Hamish, “they were going to leave, Sean gets murdered, and they change their minds. Why?”

“Look, Hamish, I know you like these people, but you know more about them than anyone else, and you’re going to have to ask some questions yourself.” Anderson was lying back in a chair in the police station office, with his feet on the desk. Willie came in with a tray of coffee cups, clucked in disapproval, put down the tray, picked up a newspaper and slid it under Anderson’s feet.

“That’s mair like a houseboy than a policeman,” snorted MacNab when Willie had left the room, “but he makes a grand cup o’ coffee.”

“And there was nothing in the bus,” pursued Hamish, “nothing at all.”

“Not a clue,” said Anderson. “No morphine, no hundred pounds, no letters.”

“So what happens to the bus now?”

“Sean’s mither phoned Mr Wellington and said she was too distressed over her son’s death to do anything about it at the moment, and so Mr Wellington said the bus could stay where it was until she felt fit enough to come up and take it away, or any of his belongings.

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