The Blue Hackle by Lillian Stewart Carl Page A

she took—and she was taking more than a few,
trotting to and fro wringing her hands and moaning, poor woman—was
destroying a bit of the crime scene.”
    Yeah, Jean thought, I’d be moaning,
too . “Could she answer any questions? Did she say anything
about Greg meeting with someone at the church?”
    “She blethered on about his genealogy
studies, and how foolish they were, a waste of time, energy, money.
And she was saying how they’d made a gamble coming here.”
    “A gamble?”
    He shook his head. “She was not giving me
context. Their holiday has likely overextended their budget.”
    “He blamed that on her shopping spree in
London.” Jean’s idea of a shopping spree was a bookstore crawl from
the glossy covers at Waterstone’s to the dusty, cracked bindings at
an antiquarian’s. “Do they have children? Other relatives back in
Australia?”
    “A son, I got that much, how he’d not be
coming here to help, not with two small children. And there’s a
brother as well, though I could not make out if he’s hers or
Greg’s. ‘How can I tell Kenneth,’ she kept saying.”
    “Well, there’s someone who needs to be
notified. Is she up to making a call?”
    “Fergie’s saying no, not just now. He’s asked
Irvine to see to her. Kenneth will be hearing the bad news soon
enough, I reckon.”
    As though certain the matter was well in
hand, Dougie lay down his head and dozed off. Jean strolled over to
her favorite feature of the room, a bay window with a padded seat
running along its length. That would be a great place to sit and
read on a sunny afternoon, assuming they had sunny afternoons. Now
Jean could see nothing but, again, her own reflection in the
glass-covered night.
    No. Through her own image, she saw the lights
not of Kinlochroy but of a set of headlamps coming up Dunasheen’s
driveway, past the garden wall. “They made good time.”
    “Who?” Alasdair joined her at the window.
    “The team from Portree, that’s less than an
hour away, but . . . oh. Wait.”
    The headlamps slowed, made a right-angle
turn, and stopped, illuminating the facade of a stone cottage. Then
the lights went out. A shadowy figure moved from car to cottage, a
door opened, and a window lit up.
    “That’s Lionel Pritchard, Fergie’s manager,”
Alasdair said. “Leastways, that’s his cottage.”
    “Fergie said it was his day out. I guess he
hasn’t heard the news or he’d come up to the house.”
    Leaving the curtains open—only a human fly
would be able to see in a third-story window—Jean stepped back into
the warm aura of the heater. “Greg went down to the beach right
after he and Tina got here, and was alone for only twenty minutes.
There’s not much chance he just happened to run into a mortal
enemy. And why would a total stranger kill him? He must have known
his murderer.”
    “Or his murderer knew him.”
    “Whatever. How many people could he have
known so far away from home?”
    “Dozens. More. Maybe he’s traveled here again
and again. Maybe he’s in constant contact with half the folk on
Skye. And just now our list of suspects includes all of them.”
    “Surely you’ll be able to eliminate most of
them.”
    “I’ll not be doing it, that’s Gilnockie’s
job.”
    “Sure it is.” Jean knew full well that once a
detective, always a detective.
    Alasdair’s lopsided smile registered her
point. “I’ll be dialing back the territorial imperative, all
right?”
    “It’s not up to me,” she told him. “Patrick
Gilnockie, isn’t it? He took your position when you retired last
August.”
    “Oh aye. You’ve never met him.”
    “No, I haven’t. You said he was older than
you, which made me wonder why he was lagging behind you in
promotions. If he isn’t as bright as you, though, he wouldn’t have
taken over for you.”
    “He’s sharp as a tack, no worries there, a
grand detective. He was not as committed as me to the police work
is all, but then, he did not burn himself out.” Alasdair