Scotch Mist (11 page)

‘Which could only be settled with Eva's death?'

‘That seems to be a possible case, until we delve deeper into their lives and discover an alternative scenario. A suicide note would clarify the situation and maybe tell us why she felt she had no reason to live.'

George hesitated in the doorway. ‘Funny way to commit suicide, watching a firework display. Most pill swallowers do it at home; in bed, in the bath, on the fireside rug – even sitting in the car in the garage, the point being that they can be sure of not being found before life's extinct. Doing it in a public arena would surely result in help being summoned too soon.'

‘Exactly why I have to keep an open mind. As you say, it's a curious venue to choose. We may find it was just a cry for help on her part. Being injured scuppered her plan to collapse amid a helpful crowd, and that very injury delayed recognition of the fatal symptoms in the one place where resuscitation would have been swift. Sod's Law, George.'

Max first opened the no-nonsense handbag. It contained all the essentials, but none of the clutter many women carry around. The leather purse held fifty euros, a credit card, half a dozen postage stamps and a slip of paper on which was written Jean Greene's address. A pair of spectacles were in a black leather case. There was also an old-fashioned gilt powder compact, a pale pink lipstick, a handkerchief with an embroidered thistle in one corner, and a plastic folder containing a faded photograph of a very young man in the dress uniform of the Drumdorran Fusiliers. Written in red ink on the back was the name Tammy. A nickname? Never having met Hector, Max was unable to tell if this was an image of him on joining the regiment. He could be a brother or a cousin. Or lover.

Max soon dismissed the idea of a lover. This handbag had clearly been owned by a very unadventurous woman. A doormat, according to Jean Greene. What he found in the suitcases bore out that description. The skirts, jumpers, trousers and blouses were more suited to a sixty-year-old than to a woman in her late thirties. A swift glance at the underwear explained why Hector McTavish had his mind more on music when they went to bed than on exciting his wife.

The first things Max saw on unzipping the holdall were two brown bottles crammed with pills. They told him nothing. The labels had been mutilated. Someone had tried to soak them off, then scratched at them with a sharp point so even the name of the dispensing pharmacy was effectively removed. An analysis of the contents would soon identify the medication. Two full bottles? Had Eva been a recreational pill-popper, or had she suffered from a condition that had to be controlled daily? Clare had made no mention of it on the hospital report, and she surely would have done.

Apart from a polished box which held Eva's passport, birth and marriage certificates, a folder stuffed with bills, invoices and bank statements, and two bunches of keys, all the bag contained was a thick plastic sleeve protecting a cream brocade dress, matching shoes and a folded plaid on which was pinned a Celtic brooch. Eva's Burns' Night finery. All-in-all two things were surely missing. A mobile phone. And a suicide note.

As he placed everything back on the shelf Max wondered how best to progress this unwelcome complication. McTavish would have been told of the true cause of his wife's death by the hospital doctors. Had the news come as a further blow, or had it been no surprise? Was it possible that Eva had met him that evening, and had he made her ingest the fatal mixture? Easy enough to overpower a woman, tie her down, then cram pills in her mouth and force her to swallow them with large quantities of vodka. Messy though. And where would McTavish have done the deed?

There was a small copse with picnic tables and stone barbecues used by families during the summer, and all year round for dog walking. That would be ideal. The only snag with that was that McTavish had not been on base long enough to know of it.

Brushing that aside, Max continued to pursue the theory by imagining McTavish then bundling his semi-comatose wife into his car, driving the short distance to the Sports Ground where he deposited her on a seat in the stand, before hotfooting it to join colleagues who would doubtless swear he had been with them the entire evening during the settling-in activity. He nodded thoughtfully. It
was
possible. The priority must be to search for a suicide note.

Returning to his car, Max headed for the married sergeants' quarters. Jean Greene was fairly certain to be at home giving her dolly-like daughter her lunch. She was, and greeted him like an old friend.

‘Max! I didn't expect to see you again,' she said with the attractive smile he remembered from yesterday. ‘You've come at the right time to have a sandwich and a glass of wine with me. Come you in. Come you in,' she repeated warmly, leading the way to the room brightened by her colourful throws.

For a woman who had seen Billy Greene and known at once that he was the one, Jean was very welcoming to little-known male visitors in his absence, Max reflected as he followed her to where Jenny was sitting in a child's chair before the coffee table to tackle a meal of fish fingers and mashed potatoes. Also there was a plate of sandwiches and a large glass half-filled with Chardonnay from the bottle beside it.

Waving a negative as Jean raised the bottle invitingly, Max said, ‘This isn't a social call. I need to talk to you about Eva.'

‘Surely we can do that in a civilized fashion over a glass of wine,' she coaxed, still smiling. ‘And a small ham sandwich. Even policemen have to eat.'

Irritated by this woman's extraneous bonhomie, he repeated that it was not a social occasion. ‘The situation has become more complicated and there's a need for further details of Mrs McTavish's time with you. Perhaps we could talk in another room while Jenny eats her lunch.'

‘I don't want it,' Jenny said immediately, making signs of leaving her chair. ‘I want to go with Max.'

‘No, darling, we're staying here,' Jean hastened to tell her. ‘You must eat it before it grows cold. You can watch Paddington Bear while I talk to Max over here. The
new
Paddington Daddy left for you when he went away,' she added persuasively, going to the TV and taking up a DVD to insert in the player.

Watching this activity, and Jenny's complete change of focus, Max realized just how much a child can monopolize parents' lives. Would he ever experience that first hand? The TV screen came alive with images of a teddy bear wearing a mackintosh and wellington boots, which took all Jenny's attention. Jean then crossed to the far corner where Max had taken up position beside the door leading to the hallway, a direct sign that a cosy chat over wine and sandwiches was not on the cards. The lack of a smile suggested Jean had got the message.

‘I told you all I know about Eva yesterday. If it's about the funeral on Saturday you're out of luck. The Drumdorrans will take that on. Because she's just a wife it'll no be a regimental ceremony, thank God. I'll attend the service but have no desire to participate in the rigmarole afterwards.' She rolled her eyes. ‘I'm a Scottish lass, but I have no time for Celtic grieving. I live in the twenty-first century, not in some legendary mists of time.'

‘The funeral is likely to be postponed,' he said quietly.

‘Why?' Then, as if recollecting his earlier words, she asked, ‘How has the situation become more complicated?'

Max avoided that for the moment. ‘Do you know if Eva needed medication for an ongoing condition, or for a short term infection? Were you aware of her taking pills during the week that she was with you?'

‘Och, she was forever swallowing this and that. For her nerves, she said, but she spent too much time fancying that she had everything under the sun. A sneeze, and she had the flu. A crick in the neck, and she had dislocated her spine. A tiny blemish, and she had terminal skin cancer. Over the years, of course,' Jean inserted with a faint grin. ‘Not just during last week. She's been like it from way, way back. She had a miscarriage six months after they wed, and reckoned the gynaecologist told her another pregnancy would kill her. It continued from then, I guess. She felt she was doomed to die.'

‘Did her husband bear that statement out?'

She tutted. ‘That's no something he'd discuss with any
woman
! Hector's as full of pride as any Drumdorran.'

‘So Eva was prone to take some kind of medication fairly often?' At Jean's nod, Max then asked, ‘How about alcohol? Was she fond of a glass or two?'

She stared at him. ‘What's this all about? Eva was killed by something piercing her chest, wasn't she? Are you suggesting it was because she was an alcoholic?'

‘She set out for the Sports Ground from this house, didn't she?' he riposted. ‘Did she seem perfectly sober to you?'

‘Yes, of course,' she said indignantly. ‘A glass of wine taken at lunchtime doesn't mean it flows freely all day in this house.'

‘I'm not suggesting it does. You misread my question.'

Jean continued to glare at him while jolly music emanated from the TV where Paddington was walking jauntily along a country lane. Max waited until Jean had calmed down; waited until she gave a response to his question. She then confessed that she had not actually seen Eva leave.

‘The truth is we'd had a spat in the morning when she said she'd have to stay with me for a few more days, until Hector had sorted their accommodation. She didn't ask if she could, just told me very firmly that that was how it would have to be. I was highly annoyed. I had expected to be rid of her that day. We had words but, apart from pushing her out the door with her baggage, I had to accept it. I did try to contact Hector, but you know how it is when a regiment is settling in a new base. Total organized chaos.'

‘She actually mentioned staying here for
a few more days?
' Max asked, reading significance in such a statement from a woman who might have been planning to commit suicide within the next few hours.

‘Her exact words were “a wee while longer”, which certainly indicated to me not the next day or the one after that. I suspected she was in no hurry to leave. This was a safe haven, wasn't it?'

‘Safe from her husband?'

She waved her hands expressively. ‘Och, I don't know. Hector had no reason to hurt her; she did everything he wanted without argument. Safe from acting the doormat, mebbe.'

Over Jean's shoulder Max's attention was half taken by flickering colours on the TV screen as Paddington appeared to be choosing a tablecloth at a village stall, and a narrator spoke above another jolly tune. Only then did he grow aware that Jenny was no longer watching. In fact, she was lying face down across the coffee table.

Max moved forward, saying urgently, ‘
Jenny
!'

Jean actually chuckled as she crossed the room beside him. ‘She's just fallen asleep. It's the TV. It somehow mesmerizes her.'

‘But her face is in the food,' he protested. ‘She can't breathe.'

Raising the little girl, Jean began wiping mashed potato from her nose and chin. Down her left cheek was a streak of red, but it was only ketchup, Max realized, as Paddington expressed his delight with his new tablecloth and the titles came up on the screen. At that point, Jenny woke up and began to cry, holding up her arms to Max for a comforting cuddle.

‘No, no, darling, Max is just leaving,' said Jean, picking her up. ‘We'll sit together and eat some sandwiches while we watch Paddington again.' She cast a glance at Max. ‘I told you she does this, which is why we couldn't go elsewhere to talk.' She nodded towards the hall door. ‘Please let yourself out.'

Strangely shaken by the sight of the child comatose over the table, Max voiced his thanks and headed to the front door. Then he returned to the doorway of the sitting room. Jean was re-starting the DVD with Jenny still in her arms. The child's eyes looked extra large and unfocussed as she stared in his direction over her mother's shoulder.

‘Just one more question,' he said. ‘When Corporal Turvey came for Eva's luggage and personal items, did she take everything? There's nothing still here?'

The jolly music was starting again as Jean glanced across, wine glass in hand. ‘I had nothing to do with it. She told me to leave everything to her. I was glad. When Hector called me yesterday morning I went up to her room to see if there was anything I should put away for safety, and seeing her things scattered there upset me so much I left everything just as it was. Except a letter addressed to Hector. Thinking it mebbe was something important, I sent it across to him.'

SIX

D
rum Major Andrew Lennox proved to be a hurdle to leap before gaining access to Hector McTavish. The band of the Drumdorran Fusiliers had moved into the headquarters vacated by the band of the Royal Cumberland Rifles, which had returned to the UK. This consisted of a large rehearsal hall, a series of small individual practice rooms, and living quarters for the musicians.

The Bandmaster, Captain Rory Staines, was away from his office discussing with Major Carnegie the final details of Eva McTavish's funeral so Max, who had recruited Connie to accompany him on this sensitive mission, was confronted by Andrew Lennox on entering the large complex. Coming from an office which already bore his name on the door, the barrel-chested, sandy-haired man stood four-square demanding the business of the man and woman wearing dark business suits.

Max had not seen the band march in with this man at its head, dextrously twirling the mace as he moved with a proud swagger in his impressive dress uniform. What he presently saw was a khaki-clad sergeant major of the old school, ready to make intruders about turn and exit with all speed. He swiftly identified himself and Connie.