08 - The Highland Fling Murders (17 page)

His eyes opened wide as he sipped his drink and smiled knowingly.

“Ah, yes, the black witch. Black witches make their covenant with the Devil himself. Satan. They agree to inject evil into everything they can, to hurt and destroy all that is good. They sign what might be considered a legal agreement with Satan—sign it in their own blood—and surrender their body and souls to him. This occurs when Satan comes to earth as an ordinary man dressed in black. The witch signs her agreement with him, and he gives her a coin to seal the deal, as it were. The witch is also given a living symbol of her newfound power, usually a black cat, whose function is to aid her in spreading evil on earth. The cat’s basic nourishment is to draw and drink blood from its mistress.”

I forced a laugh to cover my increasing nervousness. “An interesting fable,” I said.

“Fable? Hardly, Mrs. Fletcher. Witchcraft is not a fable. No, far from it. It is as real as you and I standing here talking. Do you know what I think?”

“I’m almost afraid to ask.”

“I think the cross was carved, and outlined in blood, by someone who thought you were a witch whose powers had to be curtailed.”

I looked for George, who wasn’t there at the time. The others were engaged in happy conversation in other parts of the large room.

“Dr. Symington, you don’t really believe that, do you?”

“I do not disbelieve it, Mrs. Fletcher.”

“Well, I can assure you that I have never cut a deal with the Devil, nor do I own a black cat.”

“Never?”

“Well—years ago. A stray black cat I rescued and kept. But if you think that means—”

“Mrs. Fletcher, as with vampires, the Christian cross, especially when traced with blood, has always been considered an effective way of warding off a witch’s curse.”

“Excuse me, Doctor. I have to tell—something to—someone—over there.”

I went to where Pete Walters and Seth Hazlitt were engaged in a spirited political debate. “Mind if I join you?” I asked.

“ ‘Course not, Jessica,” Seth said. “Feelin’ okay? You look white as a ghost.”

“A witch, according to Dr. Symington. But a good witch.”

“What are you talking about?” Pete said.

“A lecture on witches I just received from Dr. Symington.”

Pete Walters leaned close to me and said, “The guy’s nutty as a fruitcake. So’s his wife. A pair of whackos.”

“Speakin’ of folks tetched in the head, where’s that Peterman couple?” Seth asked. “Haven’t seen them around.”

“Oh, Inspector Sutherland told me just a little while ago that they’ve gone to Glasgow. On business, he said.”

“Don’t miss ‘em in the least,” said Seth. “Disagreeable chap. Feel a little sorry for his wife. Hate to be married to someone like that.”

“Don’t worry about it, Seth,” Pete said. “Unlikely you ever will be.”

They slipped back into their debate—it turned out to be a running argument they’d been having for years over whether Cabot Cove should establish a commission to bring industry to the town; our new mayor, Jim Shevlin, was all for it, as was Pete Walters. Seth didn’t like change of any sort—and I left the room in search of George.

I found him in his office, feet up on his desk, attention focused on the window and what lay beyond it

“Mind if I interrupt your reverie?” I asked.

“Not at all, Jessica.” He removed his feet from the desk and leaned his elbows on it.

“Something wrong?” I asked.

He laughed as though he’d just been asked the most ludicrous question in the world: “Wouldn’t you say something was wrong?”

“Because I fell in the stream?”

“Because someone
coused
you to fall. I just got off the phone with a man in London who’s been trying to buy Sutherland Castle for the past few years.”

“You told me there were interested buyers.”

“And he’s one of the most interested. Heads a business consortium with millions of pounds to spend. I think much of it comes from foreign investors. Arabs. The Japanese.”

“Why are you telling me this, George?”

“Because I mink I’ll take him up on his offer.”

“That’s quite a serious decision to make. Sure you aren’t overreacting to what happened today?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t want to make such a decision based upon emotion. And I’m sure you can understand why I’m not keen on having foreigners buy the castle. I’d like to see it, and Wick, remain in Scottish hands. But—”

“May I make a suggestion?”

“You know you can always do that.”

“Sleep on it. Give it a few days. Don’t act impetuously.”

“A good thought, Jessica, but—”

“For me, George. I would hate to see you give up something so dear to you because of a series of silly mishaps to me and my friends. Wait until we’re gone. You’ll be able to think more clearly then.”

“Sage advice, as might be expected from you.”

“If it’s sage advice, take it. I think dinner is ready. You are joining us?”

“Yes. Of course. Don’t mind me, Jess. Just a momentary lapse in confidence. Come. Mrs. Gower has cooked up haggis -for us. She makes the best in Wick.”

Haggis?
I thought as we went to announce to the others that dinner was about to be served. That traditional Scottish concoction whose ingredients, coupled with how it’s prepared, strikes fear in the hearts of almost everyone visiting Scotland.

I stopped him just before we entered the drawing room. “George,” I said, “I’m sure Mrs. Gower makes the best haggis in the world. But I’m afraid my friends from Maine might not—no, let me be honest—I’m afraid
I
might not like it.”

It was the biggest laugh of the day from him, and I loved hearing it “Jessica,” he said, “I learned years ago that haggis is not to the liking of most visitors. Mrs. Gower serves it up once a week for those adventurous enough to want to taste our national culinary treasure. But I always insist that she have ready plenty of plain roasted chicken. Just in case.”

Robert Bums, the revered Scottish poet, once called haggis “great chieftain o’ the pudding race.”

I’m not sure I would wax as poetic about Scotland’s national dish as Mr. Bums. It’s an off-putting culinary concoction (unless you were brought up with it as Mr. Bums was), falling into the pudding category but like no other pudding I’ve ever experienced.

Our gourmet chef, Charlene Sassi, told us at dinner that there were many different variations on the basic theme. But, in general, haggis consists of the liver, heart, and tongue of a sheep, combined with suet, onions, and lots of oatmeal, wrapped in the sheep’s paunch, its stomach lining. It’s boiled for about three hours and served whole on the plate, usually accompanied by mashed potatoes and vegetables.

Mrs. Gower personally, and with pride, served her version of haggis, plopping down each plate before us with conviction. After the last of us had been served, she departed the dining room, leaving us to look at our meal, and at each other.

“It’s really very good,” Charlene said. “Don’t let appearances deceive you.”

“It’s not the appearance,” Seth Hazlitt said. “It’s knowin’
what
I’m lookin’ at that matters.”

George sat at the head of the long table, a bemused smile on his lips.

“Do you like haggis, Inspector?” Susan Shevlin asked.

“Ay.
I don’t make a habit of it, but I enjoy a hearty haggis on occasion.”

“Well, I’m not going to let it get cold,” Charlene said. With that, she cut into the paunch, allowing the juices to burst forth onto her plate. She raised her fork, said, “Bon
appétit,”
and put the food in her mouth.

We watched her the way people fixate on a sword swallower, or fire-eater. She chiewed, swallowed, smiled, and said, “Excellent. My compliments to the chef.”

Jim Shevlin said, “I think I’ll try it. Hate to be accused of not being adventurous when it comes to food.” He took his first bite and closed his eyes while swallowing.

“How is it?” his wife, Susan, asked.

“Different. Obviously an acquired taste.”

“Jess?” Roberta Walters said. “.Are you going to try it?”

Mort Metzger saved me from having to answer. “Anything else on the menu tonight?” he asked George Sutherland.

“Roast chicken.”

“Sounds good to me,” Seth said. “Maybe heat this haggis up and have it another day.”

“Mrs. Gower will be disappointed,” said Charlene as she continued to dig in.

“She’ll understand,” George said. “You’re not the first group to request chicken.” He went to the kitchen to tell Mrs. Gower to heat up chicken for all except himself, Charlene Sassi, and Jim Shevlin.

We enjoyed salad until the chicken was served by an especially dour Mrs. Gower, who said nothing in response to our feeble attempts to explain away our decision.

Unlike previous evenings, we didn’t retire en masse to the drawing room for after-dinner cocktails. Everyone seemed to have other things to do, including me. I decided to use the evening to finish reading Malcolm James’s manuscript, Who Killed Evelyn
Gowdie?,
and to try to sort out the events of that day on the river. That I’d almost drowned had been pushed to the back of my mind by the ensuing activities. But now, as I excused myself and went to my room, its impact seeped back into my consciousness. It wasn’t an especially welcome feeling.

George Sutherland asked whether I wanted anything brought to my room. Tea sounded appealing; he said he’d have Fiona bring it to me after she’d finished helping Mrs. Gower clean the kitchen.

I opened one of the windows and looked down onto the front courtyard. The weather had changed again, no surprise, based upon northern Scotland’s reputation. It felt as though a blanket of warm, humid air had settled in over Wick and the castle, a summerlike evening back home. I didn’t especially like it. I was getting used to brisk, wet weather, and preferred that it stay that way for the duration of our visit to Sutherland Castle.

Any apprehension I experienced was mitigated by the pleasant contemplation of spending the next day alone with George. It seemed that the only periods of calm were when he was around, his large presence and low-key manner a welcome contrast to the series of upsetting incidents occurring since our arrival.

It was good to have electricity again. I pulled up a small stuffed chair next to a floor lamp by the open window, opened Malcolm James’s manuscript on my lap, and started reading Chapter Two. While the first chapter had been a straightforward exposition of the bare facts of Evelyn Gowdie’s death by pitchfork twenty years ago, the book now shifted into a fiction mode, in which Malcolm’s detective character comes on the scene and begins investigating the murder.

I found myself engrossed as I read. Malcolm showed considerable promise as a novelist. He drew his characters with care into three-dimensional people. He set scenes nicely, giving just enough detail to place the reader in the action without abusing his descriptive powers.

Because I quickly became lost in my reading, I didn’t hear the knock on my door at first. I did the second time, and went to it. Fiona stood in the hallway holding a tray with a teapot, cup and saucer, and a small plate of fudge.

“Come in,” I said. “The fudge looks yummy.”

“The what?” she asked as she brought the tray to the table next to my chair.

“The fudge.” I pointed to it

“Oh,” she said with a gay laugh. “The
tablet
.”

“That’s what you call it?”

“Ay. And fudge, too. Homemade. Mrs. Gower herself.”

“I suppose I’ll have to succumb to my sweet tooth. Help yourself, Fiona. I’ll only be having a piece or two.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Fletcher. My sweet tooth is a very large one.”

“And you have the slim figure to indulge it.”

She curtsied, holding the hem of her pretty knee-length yellow-and-white-flowered dress out to the sides, which made me smile. I liked this girl.

“This is my favorite room in the whole castle,” she said. “I like coming here to make the bed and such.”

“You sound like you enjoy working at Sutherland Castle.”

“Oh, I do. Some chores I dislike, but you can’t always choose which ones you’ll do, not when you’re being paid to do them. Mrs. Gower keeps us running, that she does.”

“Do you report to her?”

“
Ay
. And to Forbes sometimes.”

“And to Malcolm?” I asked, eyebrows raised, levity in my voice.

Her giggle was infectious. “He told me he talked to you about us.”

“That’s right,” I said. “He seems like a very nice young man. And a good writer, I might add. I’m reading his novel.”

“You like it? You really do?”

“So far.”

“We’re so excited. He has a publisher.”

“He does?”

“Yes. We just heard about it last night.”

“That’s wonderful,” I said. “Would you like to sit down, Fiona?”

“Oh, I think I’d better get downstairs. Mrs. Gower will be looking for me.”

“You work day and night?”

“Some days. Depends. I have to work tonight because Forbes took the rest of the evening off.”

“He seems like a—how shall I say it?—he seems—”

“Crazy? Dilapidated?”

“Dilapidated?”

“Crazy.”

“Oh. I hadn’t heard that term used quite that way before.” I thought back to Mort Metzger’s comment before we left home about Americans and British speaking the same language, yet not always seeming to.

“I don’t want to keep you from your work, Fiona, but Malcolm told me about the problems he’s having with your mother because of all the talk of curses and witches in Wick, and at this castle.”

She laughed. “Mum is superstitious, Mrs. Fletcher. Believes in all this nonsense that’s been going on for years. Malcolm, too. He believes it. I think.”