Hooked on Ewe (11 page)

“As they should. Seeing as how they are. Perhaps the real killer will get nervous and start making mistakes,” the inspector said, unapologetic. Then he frowned. “Sean appears tae be missin’ in action. I haven’t seen hide nor hair o’ him. He’s usually nippin’ at my heels and noo I can’t even raise him on his mobile.”

“Earlier you couldn’t wait to get rid of him.”

“Aye, but . . .” He actually stammered, unsure how to defend his changed position. So I helped him out.

“But he should be available when you need him.”

“Exactly. Oh, I almost forgot. I have a few things fer ye.” He rose, headed for his raincoat, and riffled through one pocket after another before finding what he was looking for.

One item was a notebook, exactly like the one he carried.

The other he presented by placing it on the table in front of me. I immediately recognized it as pepper spray, and broke out in a grin. To me it was a sign of confidence and acceptance.

“Ye know how tae use it?”

“Yes, certainly. It’s legal to carry in the States, and I often carried one in my purse.”

“It’s not a toy tae be taken lightly.”

“I’m aware of that.”

He sighed as though exasperated and shook his head as though his next statement was only wishful thinking. “Let’s hope ye never have a reason to use it,” he said.

“Of course,” I agreed, fondling my new canister.

*   *   *

I couldn’t settle down after the inspector left—the problem with taxing my mind and increasing my adrenaline rush in the evening is that it becomes nearly impossible to quiet my thoughts enough to sleep. This was no exception, made worse by all the black tea. It might contain less than half the caffeine of a cup of coffee, but drink enough of it and the effects are the same.

I tossed and turned. Conversations from earlier in the evening played through my head over and over. The bed springs squeaked every time I turned, which happened often. In the early morning light, I gave up, not sure if I’d slept at all.

Monday morning it was still dark when I made a cup of strong instant coffee after a hot shower, popped a piece of shortbread in my mouth, drained the cup and considered having another, but decided to hold off.

Hoping that fresh, cool air might revive me from the exhaustion I felt, I bundled up in layers and left the cottage. My breath whirled in a steamy dance before my face. The sun’s first rays barely peaked over the horizon and the few clouds floating in the sky were soft and white, promising a relief from yesterday’s constant rainy drizzle and dampness.

The main house was steeped in darkness. Sean’s red Renault was parked in the shadows on the far side of the house, offering an explanation for his disappearance last night. My suspicions were confirmed. Vicki and Sean. I smiled at that. Good for them.

A light shone in the barn, and a familiar Jeep
four-by-four was parked outside. I found Charlotte Penn already beginning to set up for a day of shearing sheep. Her penned-in customers sensed something was up, had determined that they wanted no part of it, and were loudly bleating their complaints.

Jasper the barn cat watched calmly from the hayloft as though he enjoyed the spectacle about to commence. His sharp eyes swept my way, but he didn’t come down the steps to greet me as he usually did. There was too much action happening in his territory.

Charlotte wore a pair of jeans, a red top under a dark hoodie, and her standard footgear—moccasins she’d made herself and wore for shearing, with a special grip to keep her from slipping on oily wool clippings.

“I’m happy tae see that John had the good sense tae bring the sheep in before the rain began yesterday,” Charlotte said after we greeted each other, “or I would have come all this way fer nothing. A wet sheep cannae be sheared.”

“Why not?” I asked. “Wouldn’t they be easier to hold on to?”

“’Tis not good fer the sheep, fer one thing. It causes boils on their legs. Fer another, the fleece doesn’t store well if damp.”

“Ah.” I’d already learned something new for the day.

“Isn’t John going to help?” I asked next, although if he wasn’t, I couldn’t offer. I was due at the harbor soon.

“I’m a one-woman show,” Charlotte said, flexing a muscle. “He’d just be in the way.”

The main house door slammed, and a moment later Sean appeared in the doorway to the barn, his mobile
phone clutched in his hand. He was rumpled and bleary-eyed, not at all his usual tidy, uniformed, overly confident self. This morning he wore more casual trousers, a striped pullover shirt, and a befuddled expression.

“Must o’ fallen asleep in front o’ the telly,” he muttered. “It’s naught like it appears, ye can trust me on that.”

“We aren’t gossips,” Charlotte said, plugging shears into a cord running to an electrical outlet. “Yer secret is safe with us.”

Sean blushed to the very roots of the hair on his head. “Nothing secret aboot it. I dozed off is wha’ happened.”

“The inspector was looking for you,” I said, eyeing his phone. “But you know that by now.”

“Aye, he’s gonna be in a snit, is wha’.”

And with that, he turned and practically ran to his car to make his getaway.

Charlotte chuckled.

“He’s trying to protect Vicki’s reputation,” I said, laughing along.

The poor guy really had been disgruntled. He and Vicki had probably assumed he’d be up and gone from the farm before anyone noticed. They hadn’t expected Charlotte to appear at the crack of dawn, or me, either, and their plan hadn’t exactly panned out.

Or was that the romantic in me? Perhaps Sean was telling the truth and really had fallen asleep watching television. I chose to believe otherwise. Those two would make a cute couple.

“I heard about what happened tae Isla Lindsey after I left the farm on Saturday,” Charlotte said, taking off her hoodie and exposing bare arms that were trim and muscular
from handling sheep. She didn’t seem to mind the cool air inside the barn. “It was quite a shock.”

I told Charlotte about my new role in the investigation as a special constable, which hadn’t made the gossip rounds quite yet, and suddenly realized that I had a professional dilemma. How many details of the investigation could I reveal? What insider information did I have that should be kept confidential? I found myself in a quandary. The inspector had shared sensitive information with me. Discussing the sheep-shaped cupcake laced with sleeping-pill frosting was off the conversational table for certain. For the time being, I figured I’d better ask more questions than I answered.

I had a flash of empathy toward the inspector, realizing now why he was so reserved when dealing with the locals. He couldn’t open his mouth without carefully choosing his words in advance, filtering them to make sure he wasn’t giving away classified information. To make matters even more difficult, small talk wasn’t his forte.

Charlotte dug in her backpack on the barn floor and came up with one of the yarn kits I had been charged with retrieving. “I’m thinking the inspector will want all o’ Vicki’s kits accounted fer. I didn’t get a chance to visit Granny, which is just as well, considering.”

“News is traveling fast.”

“Aye, it’s out and aboot that the yarn from the new club was involved. Something like that spreads faster than hill heather, especially with witnesses tae the fact.”

I took the kit Charlotte offered up. “Thank you,” I said, relieved that at least one knitter wasn’t going to give me a hard time about relinquishing it. Charlotte didn’t
seem put out at all. “I’ll see that it’s returned once this is all over with.”

“Are ye having yer sights on anyone in particular?”

“Not yet. Right now, I’m gathering kits for inspection and asking questions.”

“What sort o’ questions?” Charlotte asked.

“Did you see anything suspicious? Did you see Isla? How did she seem? Angry? Upset? Standard questions.”

“That woman always looked a bit on the angry side. Good luck makin’ anything o’ her mood on Saturday. I only saw her fer a brief moment early when she was giving Sean the business about moving the van. Seems he didn’t do it right on his first try.”

“What do you mean?”

“He put it in the car park on the wrong side o’ his own car, according tae herself. On the shop-facing side, and she made him move it tae the far back, behind his. He pulled a face, he did, not liking tae deal with her.”

Sean hadn’t mentioned that incident specifically, but it wasn’t surprising. Isla was a woman of many complaints. I remembered her crabbing about the color of the welcome tent. One more objection wouldn’t have meant much. Although . . . I wondered if she’d had a reason to want the van well hidden. Could Isla have had preexisting plans to meet someone there later?

Unaware of my thoughts, Charlotte went on, “Isla needed tae control everybody around her, and that’s a fact. Some say a body that feels the need tae manage others like she did has problems in that department, and cannae manage their own lives properly.”

Several sheep bleated. Charlotte directed her gaze to
the penned sheep, who were clumped in a mass toward the back of the enclosure, their pink-painted hindquarters crammed together. The MacBride sheep were marked on both hindquarters and ears, like all the sheep in the Highlands, to distinguish one farm’s from another. “Which o’ ye beasts wants tae go first and get it over with?” she asked, addressing them as though she expected a response. Then to me: “They act all pitiful but once they lose all that extra fleece, they are happier fer it.”

I asked another question. “Did Isla have issues in her personal life?”

“Wouldn’t ye, if ye had her personality?”

“What about her marriage? Was it stable?”

“Nothing but meanness is flying around with the busybodies out at the clothesline pole. I try tae avoid that kind o’ talk.” Charlotte turned away.

I put a hand on her arm and said, “I appreciate that you don’t participate in that sort of idle gossip, but in this case, between the two of us and going no farther, I think it’s warranted. Please tell me what you’ve heard.”

“Only that Isla and her husband had quite a row in the Kilt & Thistle last week.”

“What was the fight about?”

Charlotte shrugged. “Nobody really can say fer sure, and some o’ the speculation is just rubbish. I’ll keep my ears open, but only fer you I’d do such a thing.”

She opened the pen’s gate and passed through, closing it behind her, eyeing up the sheep as they eyed her back with trepidation. “Don’t be shy with me, now, ye pretty ewes,” she told them as they hunkered in the very back of the pen.

Before I slid into the driver’s seat of the Peugeot, I opened the kit that Charlotte had returned to verify that the skein of yarn was inside. It was. I stored it in the trunk and headed for Glenkillen, toward the surprise Leith had promised me.

I arrived to find him waiting for me near the docks with a jacket draped over his arm. Kelly had been sniffing around the pier until I approached, then she ran to greet me.

“I forgot tae recommend a warm windbreaker,” Leith said, “so ye can wear one o’ mine. It’ll be a wee bit big, but ye’ll be happy tae have it.”

I accepted the jacket, slipped it on, and we walked down one of the piers. I could smell the salty air and hear gulls beginning to circle above the boats.

Leith’s fishing boat had a royal blue hull and a long white rear deck that housed a motor the size of an airplane engine. A small cabin to the front contained all the bells and whistles for saltwater fishing, most of which I couldn’t begin to identify. The name of his boat was lettered on both sides—
Bragging Rights
.

He helped me aboard, but Kelly made an expert leap and landed effortlessly. We moved to the cabin, where Leith fired up his turbo engine.
Bragging Rights
eased out of the slip, then out of the harbor, and once clear, the front end surged out of the water and we roared through the waves.

It was a good thing I have a strong stomach.

“It’s calm this morn,” Leith pointed out.

This
was calm?

I looked back. The harbor was a tiny dot. Scanning the shore, I realized that at some point we’d turned until we
were traveling parallel to the shoreline. Leith cut the engine and the boat instantly responded.

Before us, the sun had barely risen over the horizon. The rolling hills, covered with dew, glistened, and the sky was painted with streaks of pink.

Neither of us spoke. The moment was too magnificent for words. Even Kelly stared off to the east, watching the day begin.

“It’s beautiful,” I finally said. “Thank you for showing it to me.”

“Ah, but there’s more.”

He powered up and we drove on. I found myself peeking at the man at the helm. He was rugged and strong, made for the outdoors and the open sea. Leith really was perfect inspiration for a romantic hero. I took a mental picture of him and filed it away for my next writing session.

After that, I scanned the sea ahead of us, wondering what was coming next. I didn’t speculate for long. Ahead, I saw the waters part and a sea creature shoot straight up into the air, twirl, and dive back down below.

“What was that?” I shouted. Which made Leith laugh.

He slowed the engine to a crawl and said, “A bottlenose dolphin. Keep watching. They travel in pods, so we’re in fer a treat.”

Sure enough, as we crept along, first one rose, then another shot up. At times several dolphins broke the waves simultaneously, playing.

“I’m hearing them!” I exclaimed. “Clicks and whistles.”

“That’s how they communicate.” Leith had a huge grin on his face, enjoying my reaction as much as the scene before us. He went on to tell me that bottlenose dolphins
can live for up to forty years, and that they are larger and have thicker blubber than most other breeds of dolphins. “They need that tae survive in our cold climate,” he explained. “And they never really shut doon tae sleep. Half o’ their brain stays active while the other side sleeps.”

Too soon, we headed for the harbor. Back on the pier, when I removed and returned his jacket, Leith said, “Might ye have preferred some deep-water fishing?”

I shook my head. “This was better than anything I could have imagined.”

“Isn’t life grand!”

Yes, at times it really was.