Murder at Midnight (14 page)

Not an easy task, he anticipated.

1
5
conclusions

When Rex returned from
the Gleneagle Arms, having thanked Alistair for lunch and seen him off, he went straight to his library, which he had asked Mrs. Kerr to clean first. He could hear the hum of the vacuum cleaner upstairs. The wood exuded an aroma of beeswax furniture polish and a hint of lavender, and he spent a few moments putting objects back in their proper place and straightening pictures, lest they provide a distraction. The important task he was about to undertake would require all his concentration.

He had stuck to one pint of Guinness at the pub to keep a clear head, though he had been sorely tempted to have two. He longed for a smoke of his pipe but resisted.

Sitting behind his desk and stretching his fingers, he prepared to commit to paper his conclusions for the benefit of Chief Inspector Dalgerry. He drew his Gleneagle Lodge notepaper toward him, able to write in longhand with more fluidity than when he typed on a keyboard, and began with the date, that of January first. The letter continued thus:

Dear Chief Inspector,

Upon considerable thought, and based on the informa
tion available to me, I feel I am now able to offer a possible hypothesis with regard to the perpetration of the murders
here at Gleneagle Lodge and at The Brambles hotel. I have to
say it pains me in no small measure to finger the individual, but as an instrument of the law I am duty bound to voice my suspicions. Let me start with the first clue that set me on the
path to my final deduction, and which was also, curiously
enough, the last clue to occur to me as such. I make reference to the matches in the ashtray by the living room fireplace.

Since the beginning of the night, Margarita Delacruz
was smoking a cigarette in her elegant black lacquer holder. She was using the box of matches on the mantelpiece. However, at the juncture where Alistair and I were conducting a search of the guests’ handbags and pockets, she was offered a light from a lighter monogramed in gold with her initials.

It occurred to me that if someone had fetched her lighter for her from her evening bag, that person would have
had an
opportunity to plant or hide the dart used on Ken Fraser,
and even substitute methadone for the aspirin. As for what could have happened to the aspirin, it could have been swallowed without serious detriment to the killer. When it was
Margarita’s turn to be searched, we found her pill box. We took her word for it that the pills inside were aspirin, but
by that point they might, unbeknownst to her, have been methadone.

Why switch mode of death from a poison to a drug?

My theory is that the killer came with a contingency plan. AND THAT PERSON HAD TO HAVE KNOWN ABOUT MARGARITA’S ‘WEE CURE’. The problem with methadone is that it requires a while to take effect, whereas
curare immediately incapacitates the victim, rendering
them unable to react or request assistance and, finally, to breathe, even as the heart continues to beat.

I further submit that the third murder might not have been planned to take place so soon. I believe the killer saw
an opportunity and acted upon it. I refer to the mix-up with
the New Year resolution cards. Margarita’s is missing. She might have decided not to put hers with the others, but I
failed to find any logical reason why. Her resolution was not
personal in nature, nor did it commit her to a resolution
she felt unequal to fulfill. And yet, another guest wrote two, claiming the first was inappropriate. In that event, it would be only natural to take back the discarded card so no one could see it. This did not happen. The person “mistakenly” picked up Margarita’s.

Again, why?

What if Margarita had put her signature on the back of
her card, as had Alistair Frazer? A lady as formal in man
ner as Se
ñora Delacruz might well have signed her name in full.
Her signature might have value for someone. She was now the only surviving member of the Red Dougal clan of Fraser. Old French gold had been proven to exist at
Gleneagle Castle, thanks to Jason Short’s metal detector. A poem translated from the Gaelic by Professor Cleverly pointed
to its burial there, as did a diary entry written by a priest in 1786.

The professor was also able to inform us that the poison used on Ken and Catriona Fraser was curare, and even how this fatal poison was typically administered. He was, in fact, so helpful one might never suspect him of being the killer.
And yet, ‘The longer the pipe, the greater the velocity,’ he said, or words to that effect, never suggesting a short tube
might do the trick, and thereby seeking to mislead.

Since he was standing nearest the hall, he had offered to answer the door when a knock was heard shortly after midnight. He might have seen Ken leave the living room
and, with the power out, have again seized his opportunity.
The knock at the door could have been branches tapping on
wood, or it could have been Ken bumping into the door in his inebriated state. Here is how I envision the scene:

After Cleverly was in the hall and out of sight, he set
down his candle and, aiming the party tube, struck at Ken with the dart from several paces away, an easy enough shot.
No struggle was involved, and therefore no noise except for the sound of Ken slumping to the floor, which might
have been construed as the door opening. Cleverly quietly opened the door at that point, as suggested by the draught, and dragged Ken into the broom cupboard. These sounds were covered by the storm and by conversation going on
inside the living room. During this time he said he was
searching outside. He may have observed the overgrown
vine hitting the door when he arrived at the party. By the
time Jason went to the cloakroom, Ken Fraser was nowhere to be seen.

The professor then took advantage of the dark, while
most of the men were searching for Ken, and Helen and the other guests were either in the kitchen or seated around the coffee table, to approach Catriona in her armchair and insert poison in her thumb. A prick in the existing cut would have sufficed and, in her deep sleep, she did not react loud enough for anyone to hear.

Luck was with Cleverly even though he had no doubt anticipated more people at the party. The lack of light compensated for the diminished number of guests as potential suspects, although he would have counted upon dimmed lighting and the blowing of party horns to carry out his plan. Had the dart used on Catriona not been found, he
may well not have revealed his knowledge of curare. He no
doubt intended to dispose of both darts. His luck, fortu
nately for us, did not extend this far, since he must have dropped the one dart and been unable to retrieve it in the dark.

Later, as he said goodbye to Margarita, he advised her to take adequate “aspirin” for her hangover headache and get a good night’s rest, secure in the knowledge that, with her dead, she could not incriminate him if she remembered his having fetched her lighter from her bag, where he had hidden Ken’s dart. It might even be supposed she committed suicide out of remorse for murdering her relatives. If ever he had feelings for Margarita, they were overridden by fear and greed. Perhaps she had spurned him, adding fuel to the fire?

The professor asserted that his first resolution was
sentimental and he had second thoughts about presenting it. I came to doubt his story. Humphrey is not a man prone to spontaneous declarations of love, to the point of putting such a declaration in writing. This was a ruse for the
purpose of substituting it for Margarita’s presumably signed
piece of paper, and not so he could secure a keepsake.

Perhaps a search of his flat or university rooms will provide further answers and reveal a motive for all three murders, for I am convinced Margarita Delacruz did not die from suicide. At one point I wondered if she was in on the plot with Cleverly, who subsequently eliminated her out of fear of discovery, but I concluded her involvement was unlikely. She had not appeared interested in exploiting any gold hidden at the castle, believing it cursed, and superstitious of its power to destroy the Red Dougal clan.

I strongly suspect the murders have something to do
with
this Jacobite gold and Professor Cleverly’s keen interest in
it, regardless of any direct monetary value it might have for
him. He appeared last night heavily invested in its history,
indeed passionate. I would look to ambition as motive.

In the hope that these observations serve to be of some small assistance to you in your investigation,…

_____

Rex signed off with the usual formalities after reading over his letter, and folded the sheets of notepaper into the matching envelope with the intention of delivering the missive in person.

There remained some unresolved aspects to the case. For instance, had Margarita forgotten she had asked Cleverly to fetch her lighter? The act of forgetting such minutiae had happened to Rex numerous times. Only the other day he could have sworn he had taken a chicken out of the freezer to thaw, only to find approaching the dinner hour that he had not in fact done so. Helen had been furious. Well, as furious as she ever got. And then she had laughed and called him a senile old git. He smiled and glanced at his watch. She and Julie would be in Edinburgh by now, all being well.

Or had Margarita thought the lighter incident irrelevant to the investigation? In any case, her friend had betrayed and used her for his own ends. Ends that had yet to be fully exposed and proven.

The matter was now out of his hands. He would close up the house and return to Edinburgh after putting the letter in Dalgerry’s possession, and then salvage what remaining time he had left with Helen.

Cleverly would get his comeuppance—or not.

16
auld lang syne

OLD AND NEW MYSTERY SOLVED?

Professor Humphrey Cleverly, a lecturer of history at the University of Edinburgh is charged with murdering the heirs to Gleneagle Castle in Inverness-shire. His motive: To garner glory for recovering part of the lost Jacobite gold rumoured still to be buried at Loch Arkaig in Lochaber, Scotland…

Rex set aside the
Sun
tablo
id, which Helen had picked up at the Derby train station when she saw the story, and pondered the events of the p
ast fortnight. Cleverly’s DNA on the plastic mouthpiece of a tube missing its paper blowout and containing a microscopic feather fiber had substantiated Rex’s hypothesis and had served as grounds for the search of the professor’s flat. This in turn had revealed a typed document taped behind the back of a drawer, and which read:

In the event of my demise, I, Maighread Rose Delacruz,
née Fraser, being of sound mind, do
bequeath my Scottish estate, if such should come into my possession, in its entirety, to my dear friend Humphrey L. Cleverly in gratitude for his help and kindness. (Signed) Margarita R. Delacruz

The significance of Margarita’s missing, and now recovered, resolution was at present abundantly clear. Cleverly had pretended to have taken it in error, but in actuality he had stolen it because Margarita had written her signature on the back, and in those moments at the party the professor had seen a way to acquire the castle and, more importantly, the historic treasure. Rex mentally applauded Cleverly’s cunning.

A document expert had compared the signature on the will, which was pre-dated a week before her death, to the one in her passport and in the hotel register, and to samples sent from Venezuela, and had found it t
o be a passable forgery. In addition, a container of methadone among discarded letters and other refuse belonging
to the professor had been found in a dumpster in the vicinity of his
flat.

Cleverly had confessed when confronted with the evidence
against him. He had asked Chief Inspector Dalgerry during a final interview if Rex had solved the case. The chief inspector had conceded that Mr. Graves had indeed done so, “for the most part.” The professor seemed to derive pleasure from that, and reportedly said, “Tell Rex I take my hat off to him. He often got the better of me in debates. He has a very sharp mind behind that placid exterior.” Dalgerry had said he was forced to agree.

“What are you chuckling at?” Helen asked as she cleared the breakfast table.

“My phone conversation with the chief inspector.”

“Thanks to you, once again, he caught the murderer.” She glanced
through the window. “Well, the weather’s finally cleared up. Do you still fancy a walk up to the castle?”

“I do. I want to see the old place again now that the case is closed
. And I’m truly glad you were able to visit this weekend so you can go with me.”

Dressed in hiking boots and warm waterproof clothing, they trudged up the wooded slope, sliding and slipping in the mud. The deer trail they followed was a continuation of the one Jason had admitted to taking when his scarf snagged on the tree branch back in the autumn. Another false lead in the first two Fraser murders had been the tire marks on the road, which had been traced to a utility vehicle sent to mend the power line, and whose driver had stepped out briefly.

A cold wind seared Rex’s lungs as he ascended the hill, although the sun shone wanly through the dense clouds. The rain and sleet had held off but left evidence of their recent force in the sodden undergrowth and brimming streams rushing down to the loch. By the time the couple reached the top, they were panting and leg sore. Helen leaned against the gnarled trunk of an oak tree to catch her breath, her cheeks a bright pink. After a short break, they set off again to cover the final stretch to the castle.

Assailed by wind gusts, the sixteenth-century ruin stood gray and forlorn on its vantage point overlooking bracken-brown glens and hills patched with the last of the snow. White-capped mountain peaks sparkled in the distance. Rex attempted to picture Gleneagle Castle standing proud and intact all those centuries ago, the high stone walls, stepped at the roofline, culminating in two tall chimneys billowing smoke either side of the tower.

Margarita Delacruz would no doubt have inherited the castle by virtue of being the sole surviving heir of the disfavored branch of Clan Fraser. Perhaps now it would be put up for auction or claimed for conservation by the National Trust for Scotland, or even condemned in the interest of public safety. The stairway spiraling to the top of the tower had crumbled and made climbing hazardous. Whatever the outcome, Rex hoped he would be able to enjoy the tranquility of his country retreat a while longer, or at least until reporters and treasure hunters descended upon the valley.

The ruin was a disappointment up close, both in size and grandeur, lacking the perspective of the setting. He bowed his head beneath the low arched doorway leading into the cobblestone courtyard crowned with dilapidated battlements. Inside the narrow keep the enclosed air felt chill and damp, but at least he and Helen were sheltered from the frigid breeze.

“We could be standing on a fortune,” she said, stamping her booted foot on the large worn flagstones. “I still can’t understand why Humphrey resorted to murder,” she mused aloud, staring at the ground, as though mesmerized by bags of gold coin and bullion. “He would still have managed to get his name in the history books.”

“He wanted to get full credit for finding the gold. According to a letter discovered among Humphrey’s rubbish, Ken and Catriona planned to write a book aboot Gleneagle Castle’s colourful history and the gold supposedly buried here. They’d already found a publisher. Ken was seeking to solicit Humphrey’s permission to use his translations of the Gaelic poem and relevant passages from the priest’s diary that were written in Latin. But there was no mention of a share in the proceeds from the book or joint authorship with Humphrey.”

“And yet it was Humphrey who authenticated the documents and solved the riddle,” Helen pointed out. “Why didn’t he write a book himself ?”

“Ken and Catriona would have beaten him to the punch. They’d already done the research on their ancestors. The Frasers’ account would have had wider appeal. It was their own blood line that was the subject, and they had a direct and personal connection to the famous treasure.”

Helen sighed, her breath visible in the cold air. “Obviously the letter was not well received.”

“Spite got the better of my old friend. As for Margarita, I expect he could have persuaded her to lay claim to the castle and then let him take care of the excavation and publicity while she returned to her adopted home. But he must have thought it was too great a risk to let her live, in case she ever guessed his role in the first two murders and denounced him.”

“But committing the murders right on your doorstep!”

“Where else would he have had the opportunity to murder the Frasers among a large group of people, diluting suspicion on himself ? But for the storm, there would have been more guests at the party. Framing Margarita only adds to the cowardly and despicable nature of his actions. And then to kill her too … It all goes to show how desperate he must have been, or deranged.” Professor Cleverly would likely serve the rest of his days in prison or in a psychiatric ward.

Rex cast his mind back to his student days and shrugged dispiritedly. “I lost contact with Humphrey over the years. I imagine he became bitter, being passed over within the history department and never achieving the recognition he craved. Sad, really. He had no family or real interests ootside his scholarly pursuits. His academic standing was everything and once again he saw his hopes dashed.”

Driven by ambition, Cleverly had wanted to leave his indelible footnote in history. Now he would be remembered more for his heinous crimes than for his valuable contribution. The West Highland Museum in Fort William had acquired the priest’s written collection, including the diary and poem.

“Oh, don’t feel too sorry for him,” Helen said. “You were at university together and had an equal chance at success. You took silk and are now a Queen’s Counsel. He could have made head of department or dean. Well, look at him now. Even obscurity would have been better than notoriety.”

“Aye. Some things are better left alone.”

With a final glance at the weathered flagstones concealing who
knew what, they turned their backs on the ill-fated castle and headed
home to the lodge.

the end