The Murder Hole Read Online Free PDF Page B

stop at Culloden, the 1746 battlefield, to pay her respects
to Bonnie Prince Charlie’s lost cause, scour the visitor center
bookstore, and eat lunch. Her cup of tea and sandwich had been
spiced by the presence at the next table of three re-enactors, a
Highlander, a redcoat, and a woman wearing an apron splattered with
red. Jean had driven away thinking that here time didn’t heal, it
only numbed.
    The main road ran along the northwestern bank
of Loch Ness, the most scenic of scenic routes, especially on a
sunny day. To her left, the water had glowed an opaque indigo below
the green banks and braes of its far shore. To her right, steep
hills patched with yellow fields had climbed toward craggy heights
skimmed by clouds. But except for quick glances, all Jean had seen
was the tailpipe of a bus and its back window stacked with
knapsacks.
    Now she sighed in appreciation of a gust of
fresh air and followed the long driveway as it wound up the hill,
toward several trees from which sprouted a square tower and the
peak of a roof. The former displayed a satellite dish and the
latter a set of intricate Tudor-twist brick chimneys. Parking her
car, Jean collected her things, turned toward the house, and
thought, Cool!
    Pitclachie House might have been built in the
nineteenth-century neo-Gothic style beloved of horror movies, but
in the afternoon sunshine Jean found the place enchanting, every
mullioned window, half-timbered gable, and decorative spire of it.
The same reddish stone as that of Urquhart Castle peered cheerily
from between swags of ivy. The castellations of the tower were so
crisply defined, Jean suspected it wasn’t part of the original
1830's house, but was part of the renovations and improvements
program Ambrose had put into effect after marrying his heiress.
    A path led across the corner of a lawn smooth
enough for the genteel arts of lawn bowling and croquet, and
skirted a slate terrace edged by rose bushes thick with large
blooms and broom thick with small blossoms. Jean made a point of
stopping to smell a rose, which was blood-red, of course . . .
Something rustled in the underbrush. She spun around. A cat was
watching her, its fur so aggressively calico it looked as though it
had been painted by Picasso. “Hello there,” she said, and grinned
as much at herself as at the cat.
    It whisked away, like most of its species
unimpressed by mere humanity. Jean walked across a courtyard, past
a cottage whose door was set into a circular turret, and up to an
arched porch hollowed into the facade of the main house. The door
inside was equipped with a knocker shaped like a dragon dangling a
brass ring from its teeth. Tapping the ring against the door, she
produced a sound that was less a sepulchral thud than a comedian’s
rim shot. Jean’s grin widened.
    The door opened silently, on oiled hinges, to
reveal a young woman. Her silky brown hair was swept in an Art
Nouveau swirl back from a delicate face. White jeans and a
lime-green blouse suggested rather than revealed a lissome figure.
She gulped, probably less in awe of Jean than in swallowing her
chewing gum, and smiled a well-rehearsed smile, just dignified
enough to set the tone of the establishment, just friendly enough
to be welcoming. “Good afternoon.”
    “Hello. I’m Jean Fairbairn. Miranda Capaldi
booked a room for me for four nights. And she set up an interview
with Miss Mackintosh.”
    “Oh aye. Kirsty Wotherspoon here. Please come
through.” The girl—she could hardly be twenty—waved Jean and her
baggage into the house.
    In the moment it took her eyes to adjust from
sunlight to shadow, Jean saw the after-image of the scene on her TV
screen last night, the young woman standing with Dempsey’s
assistants and then ducking aside when the camera turned in her
direction. “Did I see you on television, Kirsty? The ITN piece on
Operation Water Horse last night?”
    Jean’s vision cleared in time for her to see
Kirsty’s peaches-and-cream complexion redden