Death of a Gentle Lady

so sadly through restaurant windows when you are dining with another woman. She phoned you.’
    ‘Yes, what were you thinking?’
    ‘I was merely making an effort to be friendly. How can you think with this wind?’
    ‘I get used to it,’ said Hamish. ‘I suppose people living next to the motorway get used to the sound of traffic. Must be something like that.’
    ‘I am going back to police headquarters to find out their conclusions. The mystery must now be, if Mrs Gentle killed Irena, who then killed Mrs Gentle?’
    ‘Could someone have followed her from Russia?’
    ‘No one had any reason to. She was only a prostitute.’
    ‘What about her protector?’
    ‘An important and influential businessman such as he would not trouble himself over such a creature.’
    For the first time, Hamish felt sorry for Irena.

    After Anna had left, Hamish was next visited by Matthew Campbell, the local reporter for the Highland Times , followed by Elspeth. Matthew was in a truculent mood. ‘You’ve been giving stories to Elspeth here when I’m your local man. I’ve been chasing all over the county trying to catch up with you.’
    ‘Sit down, both of you, and I’ll tell you the latest, but you’ve got to promise to go straight to police headquarters and get it confirmed.’ He told them about the caterers’ evidence and ended by saying, ‘Call them before you go to Strathbane. Don’t tell headquarters I said anything. Off you go. I’m tired. All I want to do is eat and go to bed.’
    They stood to go, but in the doorway Elspeth turned back. Her hair was frizzy again. She had given up straightening it. Her odd silver eyes, gypsy eyes, looked at Hamish. ‘Go up and see Angus, the seer.’
    ‘That auld fraud?’
    ‘He hears a lot of gossip.’
    ‘Maybe in the morning, Elspeth. If I try to go up that hill to his cottage tonight, I’ll get blown back down.’
    Hamish chopped and fried deer liver for Lugs and cooked a trout for Sonsie and then found he was too tired to cook for himself. He had some cold chicken in the fridge. He ate it with two chopped tomatoes before having a shower and going to bed. The wind roared over the house, shrieking and yelling like a demon. He wondered just before he fell asleep why Elspeth had told him to visit Angus. But he had benefitted before from Elspeth’s odd psychic experiences. Angus would want a present. Angus always expected a present. ‘Silly auld moocher,’ murmured Hamish and fell asleep.

    He awoke early the next morning, anxious to get out of the house before Anna should reappear. Her treatment of Blair had made him uneasy. She could easily have killed the man.
    But as he turned round after locking the door, he found her standing behind him.
    ‘Maybe you’d like to go back into Braikie,’ he said. ‘I’m off to visit the seer. Probably a waste of time.’
    ‘What is a seer?’
    ‘It’s a man called Angus Macdonald. He claims to see the future.’
    ‘And you believe him?’
    ‘No, but he picks up an awfy lot o’ gossip.’
    ‘I will come with you. I am interested.’
    Hamish sighed. ‘It’s a bit o’ a walk.’
    ‘Then we will walk. It’s a fine morning.’
    The wind had abruptly died, and although the waters of the loch were still angry and choppy with yellow sunlight gilding the edges of the black waves, the sky above was blue. A gentle breeze wafted the early-morning breakfast smells to his hungry nose. He had been so anxious to escape Anna that he had not breakfasted.
    He led the way up through the back of the village. ‘Why Sutherland ?’ asked Anna. ‘It is as far north as you can go on the British mainland.’
    ‘It was the south land of the Vikings,’ said Hamish. ‘That’s Angus’s cottage up there.’
    The cottage was perched on the top of a hill with a path winding up to it through the heather.
    Angus, looking more than ever like one of the minor prophets with his long grey beard, opened the door as they arrived. ‘I’ve been expecting ye,’ he said. ‘Come ben.’
    ‘What is ben ?’ asked Anna.
    ‘Croft houses had a but and ben. The but was where the animals lived, and the ben was where the family lived,’ said Hamish.
    He and Anna pulled up chairs to the peat fire. Angus sat in his rocking chair, folded his gnarled hands across his chest, and surveyed them. ‘Have you something for me?’ he asked.
    Hamish reluctantly handed over a large packet of homemade shortbread which he had bought at a church sale.
    ‘Ah, petticoat