Bitter Water (35 page)

We called
pull
and let rip. The loch echoed to the crashing of our guns. Whether it was the excitement of firing or the fresh air and autumn sunshine, I didn’t know, but Sam’s face glowed. This was what she needed.

Annoyingly, for the first dozen clays she was the better shot. Her gun came up smoothly, tight into her shoulder, her right leg well planted back, her left bent at the knee and braced. Time after time her pellets erupted in deadly accuracy. She looked like a kid, pink-cheeked and laughing, her eyes bright with the light of competition. I tried to rise to the occasion, but even with fine guns like these it took me a few shots to get my eye in. Eventually the recoil was taking its toll on my shoulder. When we seemed to be honours even, I spoke up.

‘Enough. I’m out of practice. You win. Your father taught you well, Sam.’

‘I felt him on my shoulder, saying, “Squeeze, don’t jerk. Keep it smooth.” It still works.’

We cleaned and stowed the guns, and passed the rest of the afternoon walking, interspersed with afternoon tea. We dressed more soberly for dinner. It was then I noticed her hand.

‘You’re wearing a ring.’

‘Mrs Carnegie would, don’t you think?’

‘Where did you get it?’

‘My mother’s.’

It was a smart move. Sam must have planned it as we were packing. It left me feeling strange.

Later, in post-prandial satiety, we loitered with whiskies in armchairs in front of the picture window in our room. Outside, the loch lay sullen dark except where the moonlight tore a silver rag from its surface.

Sam’s ring picked up the same light. If things had turned out differently she’d have been wearing her own today. And I wouldn’t be here.

‘What was he like? Your sailor?’

‘Lieutenant David Reid, RN? And sometime lawyer?’

‘Do you mind? Not if you don’t want . . .’

‘No, it’s fine. We were at university together, same law courses. I loved it. He hated it. David was planning to retrain as a medic before he got called up. Just wasn’t cut out for law. Family tradition.’ She held up her hand. ‘Yes, like mine. But I
wanted
a law career. It wasn’t to please my dad. Remind me when all this is over, Brodie. It’s time I got properly back to work, instead of all this part-time stuff lately.’

‘Good. I will.’

‘David was a good man. You’re a good man too, Douglas, but different. David hated violence.’

‘Meaning I
love
it? I thought you wanted me to fight?’

‘No. That’s not it. David would turn the other cheek if someone hit him. You’d knock his head off. It doesn’t mean David was a coward. He expected to die on convoy duty, but went anyway. He just never thought violence solved anything.’

‘Whereas I do?’

‘I wish I could have sat and listened to the pair of you arguing your case.’

‘Lately, I would have been more on his side than you think.’

‘I’m sure that’s true. And David would have made an exception for Charlie Maxwell.’

‘I’d have liked your man. He had good taste.’

She smiled. ‘David could see that Charlie . . .’ She waved her hand.

‘Could see what?’

‘That he was interested in me. For years. I couldn’t shake him off. He was used to getting his own way. He couldn’t stand it when David came on the scene. He knew David was the better man.’ She suddenly got up and walked to the window, and stared out into the night.

‘Sorry, Sam. I didn’t meant to open old wounds.’

‘It’s all right. I don’t mind talking about David. It’s Maxwell.’

‘He hit dogs, you said.’ I tried to make it light.

She turned and looked hard at me. ‘I haven’t told anyone this. David was lost in ’42. About a year later I was invited out to Inverard. To stay for a couple of days. Shooting and so on. Like we used to. The invitation had Colin’s name on it. But only Charlie was there. It was too late to turn round and leave but I decided I’d go home the next day. I came down to dinner and it was like a seduction scene from some B movie. Chandeliers, candles, big fire and Charlie in a kilt.’ She stopped and smiled ruefully.

‘Bad knees?’

She laughed. ‘No, the kilt was fine. But I think he slipped something into the wine. Charlie was always one for cocaine. A habit he picked up in London and Paris. I don’t remember much about the evening. But I woke up in my room with him on top of me.’

‘The bastard! He raped you?’

A smile drew across her face. ‘He tried. But he couldn’t.’ She raised her pinkie and waggled it, pointing down. ‘The spirit was willing, but . . .’

‘You must hate him.’

‘Not as much as he hates me.’

When dark finally settled across the loch, we separated with a chaste peck on the cheek, Sam to the bedroom, me to the couch with the spare blankets. We exchanged a last rueful smile and closed the door. I sat for a time smoking in the dark, until my eyes adjusted and the dull expanse of water and the treeline took on definition against the black mound of Ben Lomond.

I spent a little time thinking about Sam and me. But it was a track too well worn to walk again. Still, no wonder the girl was wary of men if she kept running into sods like Maxwell. What did that say about me?

I forced my mind to switch tracks, to think what the morn would bring. There were so many threads snapping and tangling in the wind. I found myself worrying about the Marshals, this ragtag platoon of lost souls led by a demented ex-officer with poison in his soul. The months after demob I’d spent in London pickling myself in alcohol had taught me how close the line was between disappointment and despair, melancholy and desolation. There were still moments – when I wasn’t engaged with life, when I wasn’t in pursuit of something outside myself – that I caught the black dog out of the corner of my eyes. It was never far away.

Lying at three in the morning staring into the dark. Or waking each morning and thinking about the first drink that night. I knew it had a grip, but I was certain it wasn’t a stranglehold. That I could go a day without it. Sam had a problem, but not all the time, and we only really drank to be sociable with each other. Yet I knew that when the morning’s nausea cleared and the thudding behind the eyes lifted, the cycle began again, and by evening it was a case of why not? But that was tomorrow’s problem. I took another sip and focused on Sir Kenneth Rankin.

We were determined to drive to his house on the hillside above Helensburgh by mid-morning. We’d give no warning, and hope to beard Kenny and Moira in their den and put them to the question.

What could we hope to gain? And why would Rankin play ball? We were gambling on Rankin wanting to disassociate himself from Maxwell’s extreme actions. Rankin might have loose morals when it came to making and keeping piles of money, but Sam was certain he’d draw the line at conspiracy to commit murder.

I wasn’t so persuaded it would be his moral code that stopped him. No matter how much they had, the rich always wanted more. But I was pretty sure that the risk of a stretched neck would have a penitential influence. Could we get him to admit it publicly? Could we get a confession out of him that would nail Charlie Maxwell? Sam’s revelation had convinced me were talking about Maxwell the Younger. He had the right set of standards. She was sure old Colin was being used by his noxious offspring.

I stubbed out my cigarette and made up my bed on the couch. I looked at her door and hoped she at least felt safe from me. I took heart from her sneaking into my bed the other night to shield her from her demons. Some anyway.

FORTY-EIGHT

B
y 9.30 a.m. Thursday morning we were driving south on the road that wound along Loch Long. The kippers and mountain of toast were healing the damage of the last nightcap or two. We’d dressed in dark suit and cashmere twin-set as befitted calling on a knight and lady of the realm. Even Sam’s pearls were getting an outing. I drove while Sam named the peaks rising up from the far bank of the loch. In a gap in her recital, I asked, ‘What happens if Rankin just throws us out? If he denies everything, we have no proof and the
Gazette
won’t run it.’

She shrugged. ‘Then we’re in bother.’

We swung through Garelochhead and down towards Helensburgh. I was reminded how pretty a town it was, with the best houses cascading down the steep hillside to the promenade and seafront. We started to wend our way up the switchback rough roads until we were near the top. The houses were solid, light sandstone. They varied from big to huge. This was Bearsden by Sea. We turned right so we were running across the sloping hillside.

The houses on either side of the road sat in their own grounds. High walls or lines of trees and shrubs separated them from the road and their neighbours. Down to our right the tops of the houses staggered down to the town centre. The eye was drawn across the glistening Firth of Clyde away to the west and south, to the nearby Rosneath peninsula, then Gourock on the far bank of the estuary and on down to Dunoon on the distant hills of the Cowal peninsula. I wished we had time to admire the view. We paused at the entrance to a driveway on our left.

‘So this is what money gets you?’ I asked.

‘And it’s why they don’t want to lose it.’

We drove in over the crunching gravel and stopped outside a small mansion-house that ought to have its own moat. By the time we’d clambered out, a flunky in tartan trews and waistcoat had materialised and was bidding us welcome in that sort of
I can see you might, just might, be the sort that my lord and lady would know, but no bugger told me you were coming
.

‘Good morning, ma’am. Good morning, sir. Is Sir Kenneth expecting you? Whom shall I say?’

‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, Calumn, do you not remember me?’ asked Sam.

Calumn’s eyes screwed up – I bet he only wore his glasses to sift the post – before a smile stole across his face.

‘Och, Miss Campbell. I’m sorry, it’s been a while. It’s very good to see you again. Please come in. I’ll just tell Sir Kenneth and Lady Rankin you’re here. They will be pleased. And the gentleman is . . .?’

‘A friend of mine. Major Douglas Brodie. We met Sir Kenny at the gallery opening last week.’

All this while, Calumn was holding open the front door and ushering us into a bright lounge at the front of the house. He left us after summoning a maid to get us tea.

‘Nice,’ I said, looking around the airy room. There seemed to be more soft furnishings than in Fraser’s.

We’d barely sat down when we heard heels clicking fast across the parquet flooring of the hallway, and the door burst open. Moira Rankin sailed in, all swept-up blonde streaks and belted frock, as though she was on her way to high tea at Balmoral.

‘Samantha, you should have phoned. Naughty girl. We’d have delayed breakfast and had it all together. Major Brodie, how nice to see you again.’ She bustled between us with embraces and handshakes. ‘Kenny will be through in a minute. He’ll be so pleased.’

I doubted it.

Sir Kenneth Rankin joined us and was gruffly effusive in his welcome. Pleasantries were exchanged, tea and biscuits were brought and we cut to the point.

Kenny asked us, ‘Were you just passing?’

Sam shook her head. ‘No, Kenny. We needed to speak to you. You’ll have heard about Jimmie Sheridan?’

Rankin’s face hardly changed. ‘A terrible business. I assume his brakes failed or something.’

Moira cut in: ‘They said it was suicide. But he just didn’t seem the type.’

I edged forward on my chair. ‘It wasn’t an accident, or suicide, I’m afraid.’

Rankin’s eyes had hardened. ‘Oh, and how are you so sure? And if it wasn’t, what was it, pray?’ Suddenly I could hear the deal-maker, the industrial magnate in the rumbling voice.

‘Sir Kenneth, it was murder. A double murder. Sheridan and his friend were chloroformed and pushed into the loch.’ I let the words sink in to see what effect they had. Moira looked suitably shocked. Rankin looked – well – annoyed. As though something irksome had been said.

‘There was no mention of that in the
Herald
this morning.’

‘Do you get the
Gazette
?’ If Eddie had done his job, the column I’d dictated yesterday to Morag should have been plastered over the front page. Assuming Morag hadn’t binned it in pique.

Rankin shook his head as though I’d asked him if he took Iron Brew in his whisky.

‘I bet Calumn does,’ said Sam.

Moira gave us a long look and got up and pulled the bell-rope. Calumn appeared as if he’d been standing outside the lounge door. Maybe he had.

‘Calumn, do you read the
Gazette
?’

He looked panicked as though he’d been caught flogging the Royal Doulton. ‘Why, yes, ma’am.’

‘Do you have today’s? And if so, might we borrow it?’

Calumn shot a glance at me and disappeared. He was back in a trice, smoothing out a copy of Thursday’s edition, clearly wishing he’d had time to iron it. I caught the headlines. It looked like Eddie’s lust for a scoop had overcome his fears of upsetting the Chief Constable.

Moira pulled out a pair of specs from the drawer of her side table, glanced at the headlines, skim-read the article and handed it to her husband without a word. She stared at Sam, and then me. Her face was pale. Anger or fear? Did she see what was coming?