To Kill a Queen (3 page)

Vince and Faro exchanged glances. How exceedingly fortunate that Mary Faro had insisted that her visit with the children remain a surprise, otherwise the disappointment would have been doubly hard to bear.

As Faro sat down at the kitchen table, the atmosphere overwhelmed him. He was ten years old again and nothing had changed. Walls steeped in a hundred years of peat smoke, sheep's wool for weaving, the daily baking of bread and bannocks, all combined to open a Pandora's box of memories, happy and sad.

'What happened to Auntie?' he asked Tibbie. 'Was she on steps cleaning out the cupboards again?'

'No, indeed she wasna'. Worse this time. She went plunging into Nessie's cottage. Ye'll have seen it as ye came by. Or what's left of it. Bella saw the fire from the window here and awa' she went, fast as her legs would carry her, to rescue poor Nessie.'

'I presume she succeeded.'

'Aye, she did that,' said Tibbie proudly.

'At ninety,' said Vince in shocked tones, 'she should have known better.'

Tibbie turned a bitter look on him. 'She doesna' think she's ninety, ma laddie. She's that spry onyways, it's hard to credit. Why, I mind well—'

'Just tell us what happened,' Faro asked with desperate patience.

'She got Nessie out but a beam fell, mostly missed her, the Lord be thanked. Flying sparks gave her one or two burns and she got a few bruises. Nothing serious, as I've told ye, but her breathing was bad.'

'Shock, of course,' said Vince firmly.

'Aye, like enough. Onyways, the doctor thought she was better in the hospital considering her age and the like...'

'And Nessie?'

'Och, she's in the hospital. There's the pair of them in beds next to each other. Nessie's getting on fine. Nothing more than a dunt on her puir head. But she has a bad heart, ye ken. Bella's fair desperate to be home for her birthday. But there's no telling whether they'll let her out in time.'

She looked at them sadly. 'I doubt ye've come all this way for nothing though. If only ye'd got ma letter—'

'Not at all. We would have come anyway,' said Faro hastily. 'Vince has business here.'

'Business? What like business?'

'I'm going to work at the hospital. Help Dr Elgin.'

Tibbie greeted this news with delight. 'She'll be right glad to see the both of ye. She's that proud of Vince here. Always telling everybody what brains ye've got. And as for ye, Jeremy Faro,' she added turning to him. 'Ye were aye her favourite.'

And nodding vigorously, 'Aye, it's providence ye came. For she needs a wee bittie cheering. The nurses are having a hard time of it, I hear, she's that energetic. Having to keep to her bed is a sore trial.'

As Tibbie bustled about setting the table with remarkable speed for one so lame, she carried on a breathless non-stop monologue, one that neither Faro nor Vince had any possibility of turning into the remotest semblance of a conversation.

'—and what sort of a journey had ye? What like in Edinburgh?' Before Faro could do more than open his mouth to reply she had shot off again, answering the question for him.

By the time soup and bannocks appeared on the table, Tibbie was forced by the necessity of feeding her guests to let a few words pass their lips. Her occasional comments on their journey allowed their narrative to reach as far as Ballater.

'And we met the Queen on the low road,' Vince interposed smartly, thereby receiving an admiring look from his stepfather.

'The Queen, was it? Well, well.'

When he mentioned Princess Beatrice, Tibbie sighed. 'Bless her dear heart, she's that shy although she's past seventeen. Never has a word to say for herself when she comes visiting with her ma. The Queen still calls her Baby. I hear tell she doesna' want her to get married. Wants to keep her at home for company.'

'There was a ghillie with them, tall fellow with reddish hair and a beard?'

'That would be Johnnie Brown.'

Tibbie's attention was momentarily diverted by the need to remove bannocks from the oven and Faro, consoled that his aunt was in no danger, asked, 'What about this murder, Tibbie?'

'Och, I was just coming to that. Ye should have been here, Jeremy. Morag Brodie, niece to puir Nessie. Or so she claimed. Stabbed, she was—'

A sound from outside and Tibbie turned towards the window.

'There's Johnnie Brown now. The verra man himself,' she said excitedly. 'Goodness gracious, he's coming here.' Darting a fleeting glance in the one mirror to see that her mutch was tidy, straightening her apron and staring wide-eyed from Faro to Vince and back again, she prepared to open the door.

'What on earth can he be wanting? The Queen was in for her visit and a cup of tea just before the accident.'

The visitor who entered seemed to fill the whole room. Brown was a splendid figure of a man, in the Highland dress of kilt and sporran-purse (bearing the head of some fierce beady-eyed animal), with great strong legs in hose and brogans, and a plaid thrown carelessly across his shoulder to serve as robe or bed, where necessity arose. Perched on his red-gold hair was a Balmoral bonnet.

Gazing from John Brown to his stepfather, Vince decided that even in a much larger gathering, these two men could easily overshadow everyone else by their presence.

He recognised not only a physical similarity but felt as if the giants of old had materialised as they solemnly shook hands and took stock of each other. Both men, he guessed, had in common that rare quality of being shrewd observers of character. Perhaps both knew or had been brought up to the old adage, 'Look well on the face of thy friend, and thine enemy, at first meeting, for that is the last time thou shalt see him as he really is.'

Vince was surprised to see that Brown had been followed into the room by a young man of his own age. Black-haired and blue-eyed, he would have been handsome but for the look of disquiet on his features.

'No, not disquiet,' Faro was to remark later, for it was a look he recognised. 'He reminded me of a sullen guilty schoolboy, grown-up but defiant still. And afraid.'

Introduced as Lachlan Brown, as they shook hands, Faro presumed the lad was kin to the newcomer. Was he John Brown's son, despite there being little resemblance between them?

Perhaps aware of their thoughts, Brown explained. 'Ma ghillie. Ye're no needed here, lad,' he added.

And Lachlan Brown, thought Faro, was very relieved indeed to take his departure. Throughout the visit as Brown accepted a dram from Tibbie and answered her bombardment of questions, Faro found himself intrigued by the identity of that oddly unhappy and watchful young man.

He had encountered many like him in his long career: those who, guilty or innocent, are made extremely uncomfortable and often rendered inarticulate by the presence of the law.

Why was Lachlan like that, Faro wondered? Certain that they had not met before, Faro felt there was nevertheless a haunting familiarity in Lachlan's appearance, an attitude, a gesture he seemed to recognise from a long way off. As if he was watching someone he knew well, distorted by a fairground's 'house of mirrors'.

Disturbed by the futile attempt to remember, he turned again to John Brown. Meanwhile his own lack of attention had been noted by his stepson who was busily comparing the two men.

Studying Faro critically, Vince again noticed his lack of sartorial elegance. The detective had deplorably little interest in clothes; they were to him at best a necessary covering rather than a prideful luxury.

Vince knew from his duties among the Edinburgh poor, that all they could afford or ever hope to possess was one set of clothes, and that probably fourth- or fifth-hand. But why Faro should wish to emulate such unfortunates was beyond him. In a vain bid to fit his stepfather into the manner of life his position in society demanded, Vince had taken it upon himself to offer advice, which was accepted with good-humoured resignation and a complete lack of application.

Take the matter of boots. Faro failed to recognise that in his profession, which entailed an extraordinary amount of walking, a second pair was almost a necessity of survival. But Faro loved his old boots; the older they were the more he loved them, and the less willing was he to part with them.

Suddenly Vince realised why Faro had remained standing, partly hidden by the table. He was in his stocking feet. The new boots which Vince, ashamed of him, had insisted he 'break in' for the Deeside holiday had been removed and thrust aside, aching toes and a blistered heel thus relieved.

Vince now watched with interest and amusement what must happen next. Faro could not with politeness remain standing while John Brown was about to accept a seat and the refreshing of his dram. He must step forward and reveal all.

But even parted from his boots which lay accusingly distant, Faro was in command of the situation.

'You must excuse me.' He pointed. 'New boots, you know. Confoundedly painful.'

John Brown laughed, held up a hand. 'Man, think nothing of it. I ken fine the feeling. See these auld brogues o' mine. Ten year, I've had them. I love them like a lassie,' he chuckled. 'Man, the agonies I suffered breaking in yon new pair I must wear in Her Majesty's presence chamber and in her blasted drawing-room. Wummin, wi' their dainty feet and their dainty ways, they canna ken what we men suffer.' With a loud guffaw he slapped his bare leg delightedly.

And that was that. Suddenly, all embarrassment gone, both men were grinning at each other like apes, thought Vince.

Chortling happily, touching dram glasses, bound by common recollections, vying with each other on the matter of uncomfortable and abominable footwear, they stretched out their feet to the blaze.

Vince felt his presence was superfluous although John Brown tried politely to draw him into the conversation, putting him at his ease by talking softly and carefully, as if yon puir young Edinburgh laddie didna' understand the Highland speech.

Faro listened with some amusement, realising that they had the advantage since the Gaelic and not Lowland Scots was John Brown's native language.

As for Vince, he merely sighed. This was an all-too-familiar sore point, recalling the manner in which his Dundee patients treated him: as if he was still a wee school laddie and unaware of the ways of the world. If only they knew.

The next moment, Brown seemed to remember the reason for his visit. All jollity was suddenly wiped from his countenance, and he slammed down the empty glass on the table, refusing a refill.

'Inspector Faro, Dr Laurie,' he said, 'ye are doubtless wondering what has brought me to your doorstep with all haste the minute ye've arrived.' Pausing dramatically he looked from one to the other. 'Gentlemen, I am here on the Queen's business.'

Finding himself included, Vince sprang to the immediate and happy conclusion that there was in the offing an invitation to lunch or dine at the Castle. For Her Majesty's benevolence to the tenantry was well known. She was ever eager to dispense good works of a religious nature and for those unable to read, flannel petticoats and plentiful practical advice on child-rearing, a subject on which she was undeniably an authority. The statesmen and aristocrats of her realm would have been shocked to be present and to hear their monarch addressed thus informally:

'Sit yeself down, Queen Victoria,' or 'Ye'll tak one o' ma' bannocks and a wee bittee crowdie cheese, Mistress Queen.'

In humble thatched cottages, the Royal gifts were received with no more awe or reverence than had the Queen been fulfilling the role in which she liked to cast herself, a laird of Balmoral.

While Vince and Faro waited for Brown to continue, Tibbie was hovering by the table, listening intently. She was the first to break the silence.

'And how is your mistress the day, Johnnie? She was verra gracious just afore the accident. We had a wee visit, ye ken, and Mistress Bella gave her a jar o' pickles to take back home to the Castle wi' her. She had admired them that much.' And with a shake of the head, 'The Queen will be that upset to ken Mistress Bella's in the hospital the now.'

'A sad business, Tibbie. But she's on the mend—'

'Aye, she is that, but—'

Faro listened helplessly. His curiosity about Brown's visit thoroughly aroused, he longed to get to the point. But unable to stem the tide of conversation by which Tibbie had diverted her visitor's attention he occupied himself with some minor observations.

The timing of Brown's visit suggested urgency since after setting down his Royal mistress at the Castle he must have picked up the lad Lachlan and set off immediately for Easter Balmoral.

The inescapable conclusion was that 'the Queen's business' was vitally important. Faro also suspected—if their earlier encounters were anything to go by—that it was likely to prove both uncomfortable and unpleasant.

He was right. Brown finally managed to extract himself from Tibbie's well-meaning chatter by standing up abruptly and snatching his bonnet from the table.

'I have words for your ears, Inspector. Perhaps you'd be good enough to step outside a minute.'

Thrusting feet hastily into boots, Faro followed Brown into the tiny garden. Before Brown carefully closed the door behind them, Faro had a glimpse of Vince's startled and rather crestfallen expression as Tibbie declared: 'Good gracious, lad. I hope everything's all right up at the Castle and that no one's been pilfering the silver—'