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“I’ll phone her.”
He rang Elspeth’s room and said, “Policewoman McSween is downstairs and wants a word with you. No, it’s not police business.”
He put down the phone and said, “You can go up. Room twenty-one.”
Elspeth answered the door and looked curiously at Josie. “What is it?” she asked. “Is Hamish all right?”
“I just wanted to ask your advice.”
“Come in.”
Josie sat down on the bed and looked up earnestly with her big brown eyes at Elspeth.
“You are a woman of the world,” began Josie.
A line from a Gilbert and Sullivan operetta flashed into Elspeth’s brain: “Uttering platitudes / In stained glass attitudes.”
“What’s that got to do with anything?” she asked.
“I’m old-fashioned,” said Josie piously. “Not like you. If a man sleeps with me, do you think he ought to marry me?”
“Are we talking about Hamish?” asked Elspeth.
“I didn’t say that.”
“Well, these days, women must take responsibility as well as men. Unless you’ve been raped, you haven’t a hope in hell if it was only a one-night stand.” Elspeth’s face hardened. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have packing to do. I suggest you consult a professional.”
She went and held open the door.
Josie left, burning up with fury. What did she know about anything? But Josie hoped that Elspeth would think that she had meant Hamish.
Hamish lay in bed that night, reading a detective story. He sighed as he finally put the book down. Fictional detectives never seemed to be hit with long days and weeks of not having a clue. “I’d give anything for even a red herring,” he said to his pets before he switched out the light. His last gloomy thought before he went to sleep was that Blair would hound and hound until he found any suspect.
Josie craved a drink. She had been frightened to hide any more in her room in case Mrs. Wellington found the bottles. Without a drink, she felt she could not go through with the plan of trapping Hamish.
She had a bottle of vodka hidden under the roots of a rowan tree in the garden. Josie waited and waited until she was sure her hosts would be safely asleep. She crept along the corridors. So many rooms and the Wellingtons childless! The manse had been built in the days of enormous families. Down the stairs, treading carefully over the second one from the bottom that creaked, out into the blustery cold, taking out a pencil torch and heading rapidly for the rowan went Josie. She scrabbled in the roots of the tree until her fingers closed over the vodka bottle.
Holding it to her chest, she scurried back to the manse. As she got to the foot of the stairs, she noticed that the light was on in the landing. Glad she was still in uniform, she stuffed the bottle into an inside pocket of her coat. Mrs. Wellington was coming out of the bathroom. “I forgot to take my sleeping pill,” she said. “Goodness, you’re late.”
“I went for coffee with some people after the meeting,” said Josie.
“Oh, good girl! Night, night.”
“Good night,” said Josie, scuttling down the corridor to her room.
She was just about to unscrew the top of the bottle when she heard footsteps approaching along the corridor outside. Josie thrust the bottle under the mattress, whipped off her coat, and began to pull her regulation sweater over her head as the door opened.
“Oh, sorry,” said Mrs. Wellington. “I just came to ask you if you’d like a hot-water bag.”
“No thanks,” said Josie. “I’m fine.”
“Right. See you in the morning.”
Josie waited again until she heard the door of Mrs. Wellington’s room shut. Her hands were shaking. She seized the bottle from under the mattress and twisted off the top. She drank a great mouthful, feeling the spirit burn down to her stomach and a glow begi
Josie sat down by the fire that Mrs. Wellington had lit earlier and began to drink steadily.
Chapter Ten
Life is just one damned thing after another.
– Elbert Hubbard
Josie awoke the next day and felt she had not thought the drugging of Hamish through properly. If she used laudanum or Mandrax then he might remember clearly what happened before he went to sleep. Rohypnol, that date-rape drug, was the answer. But how could she get hold of some? There had been a case of a girl claiming she had been drugged and raped. What had been her name? Grace something or other. Think!
She phoned Hamish and said she had some shopping to do in Strathbane. “Go ahead,” said Hamish. “There’s nothing more we can do at the moment. But keep away from police headquarters!”
Josie drove to the library at Strathbane and by trawling through the back numbers of the Strathbane Journal on the library computer, she found the name she was looking for-Grace Chalmers.
Now the problem was how to get the Chalmers evidence box without signing for it. Somehow, she would have to try to con her way into where the evidence was kept.
She knew old Joe Macdonald, in charge of the evidence room, had a soft spot for her.
But when she made her way downstairs, she saw to her dismay that the man on the other side of the counter was Charlie, the greeter from the AA meeting.
“Why, Josie,” he said. “I didnae know we were both in the same business. How are you getting on?”
“Where’s Joe?”
“Oh, he’s retired.”
Josie thought quickly. “Can I come through and talk to you?”
“I shouldnae, really, but och, I’m supposed to help a fellow sufferer. Come on through.”
He buzzed her in. “Having trouble wi’ John Barleycorn?” he asked.
“Just a bit.”
“Which meetings do you…Damn, there’s someone coming. Hide yourself.”
Josie darted behind the shelves of evidence boxes and began to search desperately. At last she found the box she was looking for and opened it up. There was a bottle of Rohypnol in its evidence bag, all neatly labelled. She stuffed it quickly in her pocket. She heard Charlie calling her and went back to the desk.
“Josie,” he said urgently, “get back outside. You have my number. Give me a ring.”
“Will do,” said Josie.
Once she was back outside, he asked, “Now what was it you wanted?”
“I wanted to look at evidence from the Percy Stane murder.”
“Then you’ll need to go over to forensics. It’s all still there.”
Josie thanked him and made her escape.
Her head was full of plans as she drove back to Lochdubh. No more booze. She was not an alcoholic. She would need a clear head. She must get into the police station just before the wedding reception and drug those wretched animals. Some laudanum in their drinking bowls should do the trick. Then she’d better put the Rohypnol in Hamish’s drink at the wedding reception. Maybe make sure it was a soft drink. It could be lethal in alcohol.
Saturday dawned bright and su
The wedding service went well but Hamish wasn’t there. Outside the church, Josie phoned Hamish’s mobile. He said he was over in Braikie but would be back for the dance and told her to enjoy herself.
Carrying a packet of fish and a packet of venison, Josie let herself into the police station at six o’clock. She fed the dog and the cat and then poured laudanum into their drinking bowls and made her way back to the manse to change for the party.
She decided to wear a conservative black dress with a choker of pearls. She meant to look as respectable as possible.