Snare (14 page)

‘He was.' Rose came in and bustled along the back of the counter. She glanced at two packets in Alec's hands, and said indulgently, ‘Take them both, son, and go and get your breakfast.' She pushed him towards the living quarters and turned to Miss Pink, smiling brightly. ‘Oh, yes, he was out searching for Ivar –' She grimaced and gestured at Alec's back. All pulling our weight, aren't we?' she went on loudly. ‘Milk, was it, Miss Pink? Anything else?' She leaned over the counter, her face resuming its natural lines, her voice low. ‘I let him out with his father for a wee while. They didn't go out of my sight: walked down the quay a ways, Alec with his dad's field-glasses. Gave him a breath of air, didn't it? Half an hour, I thought, that can't do any harm; half an hour a day, could it now?'

‘Perhaps increasing it each day?' Miss Pink suggested. ‘Or going out more than once?'

‘Well ...' Rose considered, fingering her lips, eyeing Miss Pink uncertainly, ‘the outing yesterday didn't seem to take too much out of him; maybe he can do a little more today, with me or his father. There's no question of allowing him out on his own. I mean –' she caught herself suddenly' – he could do himself an injury: fall off the quay, walk in front of a car. There's no knowing what might happen, is there?'

Miss Pink went home, reflecting that she was only a visitor; it wasn't her place to suggest that protection could go too far. She was eating her breakfast when Alec shuffled jerkily past her window, alone but talking with great animation. Unable to help herself she opened the door and stared after him – and her expression softened. His irregular progress was occasioned by a small round sheepdog puppy which was alternately scampering at his heels and sitting down to worry its scarlet leash. She turned, smiling, to find herself observed by Rose who was standing in her own doorway.

‘A good idea,' Miss Pink said, ‘I'm surprised he's accepted a substitute so quickly – but delighted.'

Rose ignored the gist of this and said quickly, as if she'd been waiting for the chance, ‘Maybe we do protect him too much. I thought I'd take a chance and let him out on his own. He's not to go near the edge of the quay, mind. He'll not be out of the sight of one of us at any time.'

Miss Pink returned to her breakfast and the problem of what she should do on a poor day in a Highland village when one of its residents was missing. She found the inability to reach a decision annoying and something of a bore, but this was to be her last experience of
ennuie
for some considerable time and it was short­lived.

The interruption came when she was drinking her second cup of coffee. She was reading a book review in yesterday's
Observer
when she caught the sound of someone running fast along the road – a woman in high heels. She heard the bell ring on the Post Office door and raised voices, muted as the door swung shut. She sat unmoving, her coffee forgotten. She could still hear a voice, even through the party wall. It moderated a little, there were moments when it ceased altogether; finally she heard the bell again and then, to her amazement, the clack of heels terminated with the banging of a fist on her own door. She opened it to Joan Knox, her hair awry and her eyes anguished.

‘Have you seen my boy, miss? Hamish – did you see him this morning?'

‘Why, no.' Miss Pink stood back. ‘Won't you come in?'

‘No. I got to find him. I can't go to
her ...
' She gestured savagely at the nurse's house.

The police car came out of the Knoxes' drive and roared along the street in low gear. It stopped and Knox got out and came quickly to Miss Pink's door. He took his wife's arm. She shook him off. ‘The boy's gone,' he told Miss Pink, putting an arm round Joan's shoulders. She whirled and punched him in the mouth. They fell apart, Knox holding his jaw, Joan cringing. As the woman opened her mouth for what might well be a shriek, Miss Pink pushed her firmly indoors and into a chair where she collapsed in a paroxysm of sobbing.

‘Shut the door, Mr Knox,' Miss Pink said. ‘Then put the kettle on and pour some brandy.

You'll find everything in that corner cupboard. Take a dram yourself.'

She sat opposite Joan, alert for any renewal of hostilities, but the woman had lost all initiative. Knox busied himself as directed and eventually, with the aid of tissues, the brandy and Miss Pink's stern supervision, she regained control of herself although still shaken by the occasional racking sob. At last, and without a word being said, she looked at Knox with eyes that were still hostile but which seemed to hold a plea. There was fear too; she was terrified, but not – Miss Pink thought – of her husband.

Knox took it upon himself to explain, shifting uneasily under that intent stare. ‘There was a bundle of clothes, a dummy like, in his bed this morning. She went up when he didn't come down to breakfast. His clothes are gone – he's been out all night.'

‘He's sixteen.' Miss Pink was equable, ‘I've no doubt he has friends among other lads: virtually young men. It's not unheard-of for an adolescent boy to stay out all night. It's very thoughtless, but young people aren't always thoughtful.'

‘It's unnatural,' Joan said. ‘He never did this before; he's been set a bad example.'

Knox opened his mouth and closed it again. Miss Pink said, ‘You don't know how many times he's done it and come back without your knowing he ever left his room.'

‘Then what's keeping him?'

Miss Pink looked at Knox, who said wildly, ‘He stole a car and ran out of petrol, or he's with his mates in Morvern. Or someone got drunk and couldn't drive him home.
He
got drunk. Christ! (beg pardon, ma'am) anything could have happened.'

‘That Millar were out yesterday.' Joan made it sound like an accusation.

‘Hamish could run rings round him.'

‘He's mad. He'd kill Hamish.' She stopped, her hand over her mouth.

‘Alec was with his father yesterday,' Miss Pink said firmly. ‘They'd never let him out on his own.'

‘How do you know?' The hostility was turned on Miss Pink. ‘Our boy got out, didn't he? Maybe that Alec Millar was out all night. Maybe they met.' As she envisaged the confrontation, her mouth widened.

‘No!' Miss Pink said, so loudly that the rising hysteria was quenched. She went on, enunciating very clearly. ‘Rose Millar is so concerned about her son that I doubt if she goes to sleep. A mouse couldn't move in that house at night without her hearing it.'

‘He's a powerful man,' Joan said. ‘He could get past his mother.'

‘And his father?'

‘Duncan Millar would egg him on. They always hated us – poachers and thieves, the lot of 'em.'

‘That's enough!' Knox flushed dangerously.

‘You'll have to make allowances, ma'am,' he said, dropping his voice a fraction. ‘She's hysterical; I'll get the doctor to her.'

‘Not the doctor, nor yet that nurse, so-called. I'm all right. I'm frightened, that's all. I want to know where my boy is.'

Miss Pink said, ‘We can't do anything about finding him until you calm down. At the moment you're claiming all the attention for yourself. If you go home with Mr Knox quietly and have Mary MacLeod in for company, the rest of us will start looking for Hamish.'

‘Where will you look?'

‘We shall make enquiries methodically; we know the drill –' Miss Pink stopped, appalled, and Joan responded as if cued.

‘There are two people missing now.'

There was a grim triumph in the statement, as if she felt herself vindicated.

* * *

Anne Wallace received her visitor without surprise. ‘Yes, I know he's missing,' she said calmly. ‘Come in, please.' She ushered Miss Pink into her sitting room. ‘What can I do?' she asked. They both remained standing.

‘Some effort has to be made to find out where Hamish is,' Miss Pink said. ‘Some compromise between reporting him as a missing person and ignoring his absence completely.'

‘So what do you suggest?'

Miss Pink felt at a disadvantage and this annoyed her. ‘Aren't you bothered?' she asked.

Anne nodded as if she'd been expecting that question, ‘I'm not concerned,' she admitted, ‘I'm interested as a neighbour, but not professionally. If I was to get involved every time a teenager stays out all night, I'd have ulcers inside a month.'

‘I see your point. May I ask how you knew about Hamish?'

‘Mr Knox phoned me. He was bothered about his wife. She was hysterical when she found the boy's bed hadn't been slept in; Knox panicked and asked me to bring a sedative.'

‘Did you?'

‘Oh, no. I made him see reason and told him to talk some sense into his wife. So how did you get involved? I'm sorry, that sounds rude.'

‘Not at all.' Miss Pink told her about the Knoxes' visit.

‘And are you really going to look for Hamish?' Anne asked.

‘Knox is ringing the hospitals in Morvern and Inverness. He's contacting his friends in the police without reporting it officially. Since Joan Knox's outburst the affair can't be kept secret, so while he's making his enquiries I intend to ask people if they have any information that might help. It's the least I can do. If all the results prove negative, I expect

Knox will make an official report. Ultimately it's up to him, and he's under pressure from the boy's mother.'

‘No doubt.' The tone was dry.

‘She's hostile to you,' Miss Pink said bluntly. The woman stared at her. ‘Is it a coincidence,' Miss Pink asked, ‘that she should be hostile at this moment, or does she make a connection?'

‘A ... connection between – what?' The woman was white. Her eyes narrowed and she fidgeted, but professional calm had not deserted her. ‘It's not a coincidence,' she said at length. ‘Hamish is spoiled, and only the fact that his father manages to assert some authority keeps the boy straight – and not quite, at that. He's got a nasty line in practical jokes. He played a trick on me last summer which was quite outrageous and I shan't forget it in a hurry. Of course, Joan Knox won't wear it; Hamish is a
good
boy.' It was a spurt of venom that was gone in an instant. ‘Joan and I are not on visiting terms,' she concluded coldly.

‘So,' Miss Pink said with a burst of joviality that clearly startled the nurse, ‘I'll complete my interrogation with the traditional question: When did you last see Hamish?'

Anne seemed undecided as to whether her visitor were mad and harmless, or devious. She answered carefully, ‘I didn't see him yesterday. I don't have many calls to make at a weekend: it's a morning round only on a Sunday. In the afternoon I stayed indoors and I wouldn't see anyone pass the gateway unless I was looking out at that moment. My hedge is pretty high, as you see; it hides the street from this window. I did see him Saturday afternoon. I was coming home from Morvern and he was turning in to the lodge drive. He was on a pony. That would be some time after five, around five-thirty.'

‘And what do you think has happened to him?'

Anne smiled. ‘There are no witnesses to this conversation, so I'd say that either he got into trouble along with the local lads or he's played a trick that's rebounded on him.'

‘Who are his friends?'

‘You'll have to ask his father.'

‘And Campbell? When did you see him last?'

‘At the fire – no, he wasn't there. Friday morning probably; he was out in his boat.'

‘Have you any theories about his disappearance?'

‘I assume that he put out to sea and just kept going until his fuel ran out.'

‘You mean suicide? Why should he kill himself?'

‘I think he went mad – burning his home down like that.'

‘She's wary.' Miss Pink leaned back in her chair and sighed. ‘The nurse is wary, Knox is angry, his wife is terrified. And I'm at a loss. What about you? What's your reaction to this latest development?'

‘Too much is happening; I'm bewildered.' Beatrice suited actions to words, absently moving the coffee things about the table in her sitting room.

‘I came straight here from Anne's house,' Miss Pink said. ‘I couldn't face anyone else for the moment. I needed to talk to someone – not to put too fine a point on it – someone like myself.'

‘You flatter me.'

‘You know what I mean.'

‘Of course. Well, what's to do now?'

‘I'm hoping that shortly Knox will have to do something himself.'

‘He can't expect you to do anything.'

‘It's a peculiar situation. He doesn't want to bring the authorities in officially in case the boy is playing some kind of trick. It's obvious that he knows Hamish does indulge in practical jokes. Anne is in no doubt about it. On the other hand, the boy could have met with an accident. But then there's Campbell's disappearance; can there be a connection? If Hamish
is
up to mischief, he's placed his father in an awful dilemma. He needs all the help he can get.'

‘Let's walk to the lodge and talk to Coline.

By the time we get there either Knox will have news – or he must come to a decision. If his wife doesn't make him, Coline will as soon as she hears what you have to say.'

* * *

The rain had stopped and a stiff breeze was blowing up the loch driving the next shower before it, obscuring the skerries and veiling the sodden slopes. As they turned into the street Miss Pink said, ‘I'm sure Rose Millar knew that Hamish was missing when I was in the shop at breakfast time, but she didn't mention it.'

‘Wait! Can that be a whimbrel?'

They stopped and listened, their eyes on the birds feeding at the edge of the tide. ‘Mostly curlew,' Beatrice murmured. ‘Sorry, you were saying Rose knew Hamish was missing before you did?'