Before I'd even opened the door to the old school hall I knew that Bessie Sinclair was on her high horse again. Again? Was she ever off it? I tell you, that woman has done more miles on that horse than ever Ghengis Khan did on his. A greetin', girnin', miserable auld besom if ever there was one. Aye, and loud with it. Feeling too cold to hang about outside, I reluctantly pushed open the door and went to join the rest of the Writers Group in the main hall. 

Bessie was still ranting on, not that I had expected her to have stopped, she's got better lungs than an Olympic athlete when it comes to speaking. She's the most successful member of our select little group, not that that's saying much, in the literary stakes every one of us is a dead loss. But she did have a half page story accepted by The People's Friend eight years ago. It was never actually published, but it was accepted and that was a lot nearer to becoming a literary giant than any of the rest of us had ever managed. 

I shut the door without a sound, hoping I might be able to sit down and pretend I'd been there all along. That way I might escape hearing the whole rigmarole from the start. But no such luck, she must have felt the draught or something. Whatever took her attention, her great beak of a nose swung towards me like a battleship's gun. 

"Ah, there you are Maister Jamison. I was just saying that both my manuscripts for 'Splendid Love' have disappeared - vanished - been lost - been stolen!" 

Ye Gods, the daft besom was still trying to act like a walking Thesaurus to demonstrate her intellectual capacity. And her prim and prosy accent was enough to set your teeth on edge. She was originally from Edinburgh, but as common as muck. Years ago, when some damned idiot had suggested to her that she become an authoress, she had decided that she was an Edinburgh lady and should speak like Jean Brodie. Since then she had sounded as if she was eating a gobstopper - if she could ever have got one past her grippit lips and buck teeth. When she saw I wasn't going to ask any questions she snorted and went on as if it was all my fault. 

"If you had been here on time I wouldn't have to repeat it all again. I'm sure it's all just too painful to relate." She was gobbling now, her great hooked nose, scrawny frame and short red hair making her look for all the world like an old hen. Her head was even narrow and flattened looking, just like a hen's. And as she gobbled, her head nodded vigorously up and down like a hen pecking. I sat down, nodding to the others as I did so, but I was obviously not going to get to remain in blissful ignorance for much longer so I put on my most unenthusiastic expression and did the decent thing. "I'm sorry about that, Missus Sinclair, but the minister had young Jessie Murray and Alan Wilson in to see him about getting the Banns called, so I couldn't get away. But I'm here now, so what's the problem? If your manuscripts have gone missing you needn't look at me, for as you well know I never read your romances." I ventured what I hoped was a regretful smile. "The minister would have a fit if he thought his Beadle was reading such risque stuff." She liked to think her romantic novels trod the very limits of modern sexual innuendo. The one of hers I'd had a sly read of had nothing in it that I couldn't have done myself - and I'm not a scone of yesterday's baking. 

Her answering smile had as much humour as a chicken opening its beak to squawk. "Oh, of course, Mr Jamison, I know the difficulty you labour under, and I must say that we all regret that we can't have the benefit of your advice and constructive criticism. No, no, I wasn't for a moment suggesting that you had my manuscripts, but perhaps your police-trained mind can solve the mystery." Again the beak gaped.

"Oh, a mystery is it?" 

"Yes it is. You know how I always run off three copies of my manuscripts, two for here so that people can get them quicker and keep them longer, and one to keep in a safe place." 

I nodded, saying nothing but feeling the other half dozen pairs of eyes on me daring me to tell her just what a bane on all their lives her turgid novels were.

"Well, they've all gone!" 

"Gone? What do you mean, gone?" Despite myself I could feel myself being drawn into this intrigue. 

She pecked triumphantly. "Yes, gone. When I brought them in last month I gave one to Mary and the other to Dotty. And they've

both gone." 

"Gone?" This was daft, I was beginning to sound like a gramophone with a stuck needle. I turned to look at Mary Simmers and Dotty Laing. "What happened to them?" 

Bessie started to speak but, without looking at her, I held up a hand. "Hang on a minute, let me hear it at first hand." 

Mary Simmers taught the infants in our two-teacher school - her husband taught the older children. She was a small, plump woman, by no means a dragon, but with the sure authority of all teachers dealing with kids small enough to pick up and spank. Now, though, she looked just a wee bit uncomfortable. "I don't know what happened to it. I took it with me to school so that I could ... could enjoy a good read at playtimes." She was so used to adjuring children to be honest that she blushed at her little fib. "I finished reading it a fortnight or so ago and left it in my desk. When I went to get it to take it with me tonight it wasn't there. I thought at first that perhaps I'd taken it home, but it wasn't there either." She looked so ashamed that I thought for a minute she might burst into tears, but she turned to Bessie instead. "Oh, Mrs Sinclair, I'm so sorry. I just can't understand what can have happened to it." 

I turned to Dotty Laing, we'd been at school together, and had even had a cuddle in the back seat of the bus returning from the

Christmas Pantomime when we were twelve. "Well, Dot, what happened to your copy?" 

"I'm not sure. I finished it about a week after I got it and was going to pass it on to Gladys Cran. I put it in an envelope and gave it to Sandy Gunn the butcher to drop off to Gladys at Windy Ha' when he went out that way on the Tuesday. I saw Gladys when I was shopping in Thompson's at Larich Stump on Saturday and asked her if she'd got it okay. When she said she hadn't we both thought that Sandy had forgotten - you know what his memory's like." 

She stopped so I prodded her on a bit. "And ...?" 

"Well, I called in at Sandy's when I got back from Larich Stump and asked if he still had it. He had a look in the van and couldn't find it. Well, you know what his memory is like, but I don't see how he could have missed it. It's only a little van and it was set on the wee counter at the back so he couldn't have missed it. Even if he had, the envelope had Gladys's name on it in big writing in Magic Marker on both sides so Gladys would have seen it when she went out to the van. Even if it had been pushed into a corner, Sandy would have found it when he scrubbed out the van at night. He may be auld and absent-minded but that van gets scrubbed from top to bottom every night." 

I nodded, then turned back to Bessie. "Most peculiar, I grant you, but you've still got your own copy, haven't you?" If chickens could cry I'd swear that Bessie was near to tears. 

"No I haven't. I had it out last Saturday night, just reading it through and blue-pencilling here and there, and when I went to bed I left it lying on the kitchen table. Henry was up before me the next morning - he's always an early riser and likes to get the beasts seen to at the same time every day. Well, the Rayburn had gone out - it was a windy night and it must have drawn so well it had burnt itself out - and he had to clean and light it. Of course, being a man he has no patience, so instead of lighting it properly he used paraffin to get it going. He got it going alright - but with such a whoof that it burnt his eyebrows and made him knock over the paraffin which - just like a man - he'd left standing on the table. Well, my manuscript was soaked." She looked around the other women, milking the wise nods of sympathy. "Well, of course he knew better than to leave my kitchen in that state so he cleaned it up - as well cleaned as you can expect for a man - and put my manuscript out to the shed with the paraffin." She was really getting into her stride now. I'll bet she gave poor Henry a rare tonguing that morning, Sunday or no Sunday. "When I got up, the place still stank of paraffin so I soon had the truth out of him. The manuscript was fair saturated with paraffin and all the biro I'd been using to blue-pencil it had run and, oh, it was just an awful mess." 

Dammit, she was near to tears. I'd never have believed that she ever experienced any emotions but bad temper and self-satisfaction, but there she was, strung up tight enough to snap. I nodded sympathetically. "But you've still got it?" 

She had the grace to look shamefaced. "Well, no, I made him get rid of it and he used it to light the parlour fire. He even had the nerve to tell me that it burned so well that it must have been hot stuff! Of course, he never reads my books - he hasn't got a romantic turn of mind." 

By now I'd forgotten that we were supposed to be carrying out a constructive criticism of our literary endeavours - or more likely trying to kid on we'd read things by uttering such learned phrases as 'The characterisation was particularly strong in the third chapter', or 'The dialogue in the first chapter could be expanded a lot, it's got such potential'. But this was much more interesting, even allowing for Bessie's histrionics - it was at least unusual, and in the middle of winter unusual is about as near as you are going to get to excitement in Cauldbrae. I just didn't know what to make of it all, but bearing in mind that Bessie's manuscripts had always had the durability of gravestones it was pushing the laws of probability and chance a fair bit to have three copies vanish just like that. 

I realised with a start that everybody was looking expectantly at me. I cleared my throat and said the only thing I could think of. "Ha humph, very odd. Three copies going just like that. Very odd." I thought I'd done my bit but they were still looking at me, in fact, if anything, they were looking even more expectant. "Well. Ha humph. That was a real run of bad luck you had there, Mrs Sinclair." I could see they were disappointed and shrugged. "Well, surely you're not suggesting it was anything but bad luck, are you?" 

Again I was surprised at the uncharacteristic reaction from Bessie. To say she was apoplectic was like saying that Hitler was sometimes a trifle querulous with the Jews. "Bad luck! Bad luck! Ooh, Mr Jaminson, how can you say that? It was my very best novel! A whole year's work! Somebody has stolen it so that they can publish it under their own name!"

Hell's teeth! If there was anybody that daft wandering around Cauldbrae none of us could sleep easy in our beds. "But why would they steal two copies?" I was trying to be soothing. 

"Why? so that I wouldn't have a copy to prove that I had written it. That's why." 

"Ha humph, but how would the thief know that you didn't have another copy at home?" 

It was like a red rag to a bull. "How? You ask me how? I'll tell you how! That stupid husband of mine went around telling people that he'd destroyed my copy, that's how!" 

I pondered that. Henry was a garrulous character, that was true, but I just couldn't see him dashing around shouting the news like a Town Crier. He was a cheery character and often told funny stories against himself, so it was just possible that he'd told the story to show how daft he'd been. But Henry's funny stories had a habit of going the rounds and I hadn't heard this one. I looked at Bessie and tried to hide my incredulity. "Are you saying that some ... some person with ... with literary acumen heard Henry and decided that this was a golden opportunity to steal all the remaining copies of your book so that he, or she, could pass them off as his own?" I heard young Jimmy Younger snicker from round to my right. 

"And why not? If it was somebody who knew me he - or it might be a she - could have been waiting for just such an opportunity for years. People do that you know, crimes of opportunity they call them." 

I shook my head. "Well, maybe you're right but I doubt it. Dammit, Bessie, you know as well as I do that getting even the most brilliant book published is just a lottery. You've often said so yourself." By God she had too - ad infinitum. But she wasn't to be deflected. 

"Well, and why not? He didn't have the year of soul-searing torture to write it so it was all gain for little risk. Besides, he might have had contacts in the publishing world. We all know that if you know someone in the publishing world you can get stuff published just like that." She snapped her fingers like a howitzer, adding, "That's how all that rubbish you find in the Library gets published." 

I shook my head doubtfully. "Well, I'm sure I don't know. You may be right but I don't think we've got enough evidence here to help us get any further forward." I turned to Mary Simmers. "Mary, are you sure it really is gone? Did you have time for a really good look?" 

"I was in a wee bit of a hurry, but I did look quite carefully." 

"But a school and a teacher's house must be full of papers, could you have mislaid it among them?" 

"Well, yes, of course I could. But I always put manuscripts back in their envelopes when I stop reading, and we don't have many two inch-thick brown envelopes lying around. I'll have a good lok at the weekend of course." 

I nodded encouragingly. "Of course. But tell me, Mary, how sure are you that you left it in the school?" 

"Oh, very sure. I always read manuscripts there and I always leave them in my desk until the day of our meeting. Then I take them home with me at four o'clock." 

"I suppose the school is often unlocked - for cleaning and that - but do you lock your desk?" 

"Yes I do, always. I keep all sorts of things in my desk and it would be putting temptation in the way of the children to leave it unlocked." 

"And there was no sign of the desk being broken into?" 

"No, certainly not." 

"And the lock itself, is it a common one, or simple enough to pick?" 

"How would I know?" She was beginning to sound exasperated. "It's an ordinary school desk lock, intended to keep out children not burglars." 

This was getting ridiculous, here was I asking questions like a TV detective, and the rest of their heads were going back and forth between me and my victim as if they were at Wimbledon centre court. I tried to shrug the whole thing off. "Well, it's all very interesting but if you really think a crime has been committed you should call in the police." 

Bessie snapped back like lightning. "And what good would that do? In this weather nothing less than a murder would get constable Sutherland over from Larich Stump - and I doubt that he could read a book, never mind detect the theft of one! It would have to be the CID from Perth, and if they ever ventured outside the town they'd likely get lost." 

By God, she did have a fine line in vituperative sarcasm did our Bessie. The others were all nodding in agreement, in this part of the world the police force is judged by its attitude to after-hours drinking and sheep dipping. 

Dot spoke up. "But how could anybody have got the copy from Sandy Gunn's van? He puts the van round behind the shop when he goes home, and their kitchen window overlooks it. And when he's out on the road he's always either in the van or standing at the back of it - except when he's in somewhere for a cup of tea, but he only does that out in the country and Gladys' house was the first one in the country he'd visit on that round." 

We wrangled on for ages, then had a cup of tea and a biscuit before going out to brave the drifting snow to go home. It had been an interesting evening and I turned the whole business over in my mind as I walked. I'd seen some bizarre crimes in my time in the Police but I couldn't bring to mind any as daft as this. When I arrived home Sarah, my wife, had the milk on for the cocoa before I'd got my boots off. As we sat in front of the dying fire I told her about the night's excitement. She's no gossip is Sarah but there's little that happens around Cauldbrae that doesn't find its way to her ears. I think its because we're in the unusual position of having been born, brought up and married in the area, then having spent twenty five years in Hong Kong before returning and retiring to Sarah's old family home in Cauldbrae. We were locals with all the web of relatives, friends and acquaintances that a local has, but our time away had separated us from the cliques that are endemic in any close-knit country community. We could never be as close to anybody as if we had never been away, but there was nobody that we didn't get on with. Sarah especially was that quiet sort of listening woman that everybody tells their story to, knowing that nothing important will ever go any further. I too was accorded confidences. As an ex-Hong Kong policeman I knew how to keep my own council and, for some reason I've never understood, most people seem to have a compulsion to tell their non-criminal secrets to a policeman. 

Sarah sat with her empty cocoa cup in her hands and stared at the fire for so long that when she did speak I was jerked out of a doze. "Mmmm. Well, whatever happened to those manuscripts, I think we can discount Bessie's theory that they were stolen for literary gain. Dotty gave me a a glance through her copy just after she got it. It was only a glance over a cup of tea but it was as awful as all her others. There was no story and the standard of English was deplorable. If somebody stole it for gain you're looking for a raving lunatic." 

Over the years I've developed a great respect for Sarah's judgement, she seems to have that rare knack of knowing where to draw the line and stop wandering into endless improbabilities. If she said that no sane person would steal the manuscripts for gain, she was probably right. "Well, as far as we can tell, they've gone, and they didn't just vanish of their own accord." 

"No, but if they were stolen it's more likely to have been for spite - or maybe for a joke. No," she corrected herself, "Bessie's not the sort anybody would play a joke on. There'd be no fun in it unless you could spread it around, and if you did that she'd be so unpleasant there'd be no fun in it." 

"Well, if it's somebody with a spite against her you're looking for you can count in nearly everybody within ten miles of Cauldbrae. It's not just that she's such an unpleasant old besom to everybody, it's the way she treats poor Henry. He's such a decent chap that it's hard to understand how anybody could treat him like Bessie does." 

"Yes, he is a nice man - but I think he can be pretty exasperating too. Bessie nags at him the whole time and all he ever does is smile in that quiet way of his and let it all slide off him like water off a duck's back. I'll bet that drives Bessie up the wall. She likes her words to hurt, and as far as I can see Henry is just too easy going for anything to hurt him." 

The fire was just about out and I was having difficulty keeping my eyes open so we went off to bed and said no more about it that night. Next morning the mystery was still nagging at my mind. I suppose that's the price you pay for twenty five years of police work. Every odd happening has to be sifted and dissected to try to determine its cause and effect. The kettle had just boiled and I'd gone to the bottom of the stairs to shout for Sarah when I heard the postman's feet on the path so I opened the door to get the paper. He was obviously glad to see me and his face had that earnest, anticipating look of someone bearing bad news that he just can't wait to pass on.

"Good morning, Sam. Wasn't that a terrible business with Bessie Sinclair last night?" 

I was taken aback at that, I hadn't thought that Bessie's missing manuscripts would be important enough to be gossip for the postie. 

"Oh, her missing manuscripts, you mean?" 

He looked at me blankly for a moment, then chose to ignore my comment. "You mean you haven't heard she died last night?" 

I was thunderstruck. "Died? Are you telling me that Bessie Sinclair is dead?" 

"Yes, she was found dead in her bed at about 8 o'clock this morning. They were using Eddie Sutherland's long-wheelbase Landrover as an ambulance to take her away for a post-mortem when I arrived there an hour ago. Henry found her when he went to take her a cup of tea after feeding the kye."

I couldn't believe it. "But I saw her last night, she was as right as rain at 10 o'clock." I stopped myself blethering, anything I said would be mixed in with whatever fact and fiction he had collected already and spread around the whole district by lunch time. I broke the news to Sarah when she came downstairs and we discussed it in a shocked way as we ate our breakfast. Later I went out to see Henry and ask if he would like me to look after the stock whilst he arranged the funeral and things. But he refused in that quiet way of his. 

"Thank you, Sam, but the work will keep my mind off things." He was a Northeaster and his Doric ways and accent had never quite submitted to Bessie's polishing. 

Eventually the word came back from the pathologist that Bessie had died from hypothermia after having taken a sleeping pill and a toddy before going to bed. She had been so mad that night that she'd taken herself off to the spare bedroom to sleep and, perhaps sweating from the whisky, had opened the window and thrown back the covers. The night had been bitterly cold and she had slept into hypothermia and death. 

The whole area turned out for the funeral, more because of their liking for Henry than for any feeling for the departed Bessie. She was laid to rest in Cauldbrae kirkyard and as far as I know Henry has never visited her grave from that day to this. He was very withdrawn for a while but once the lambing started he fell back into the routine of farming and thereafter seemed perfectly happy with his lot. He had a local woman in twice a week to clean and bake but, from what she said, she was hardly needed, he was that neat and tidy. But all that was many years ago, more than twenty in fact. And all that time Henry was quiet, cheerful and hardworking. Never really going out of his way to meet people but always pleased to see them when they chanced by. 

I was a fairly keen birdwatcher and, being retired but still relatively young and fit, I'd often stroll out by Henry's place on my way up into the hills. And usually on the way back I'd come across Henry and we'd have a bit gossip and, if I timed it right, a cup of tea and a biscuit. Over the years the other farmers in the area had got bigger and better machinery, but not Henry. He kept his old Ferguson tractor and its implements in tip top condition, just as he kept the rest of the small farm. He was always busy but it was never a burden to him. He looked on every animal and bird with a kindly eye and never seemed to tire of watching them. His needs were few, and though he was always neatly enough dressed his only concession to modern living was an expensive pair of binoculars he bought when Bessie's money came to him, and which he treasured and used daily.

If I close my eyes now I can see him still, an anachronism on his little Fergie, snoring quietly up and down his little fields, stopping every now and then to gather a nest of Peewits eggs into his old bunnet to move them to a safer place. Yes, if ever a man was content with his lot it was Henry. Then, six months ago, he took ill and had to go into hospital. The diagnosis was terrible, he had cancer and had only a few months to live. Undaunted, he returned to the farm and continued, with the aid of his pills and a bit of help from myself and other neighbours. Then, with the harvest in he set about selling the farm. He could have been excused for feeling bitter or sorry for himself, but not Henry. 

"Sam," he said. "Farming goes in yearly cycles and I won't have time to do another cycle. So it's time for me to sell up and give somebody else the chance for the same sort of grand life I've had. I'm going to sell, but I'm going to choose my successor carefully. I'm not going to turn the place over to a get-rich-quick merchant, it's going to be somebody who will appreciate it - even if he can't afford to pay much. I've got no kin so if I just leave enough to bury me that will be enough." I remember his words to this day, and tears still come to my eyes when I think of his quiet faith. 

Well, Henry found his successor, or rather successors. A young Aberdeenshire couple with hardly a penny to their name but with a passion for the land as strong as Henry's own. I was out there with him when they turned up in their rusty old Mini. The first round of would-be buyers had been and gone, and Henry hadn't liked any of them, so the place had been re-advertised. This pair of youngsters, both from farming stock and married only a few months, were painfully apologetic as they explained that they couldn't possibly afford to buy the place but they hoped that some day they'd be able to get a place just like it. It turned out that they'd taken a gamble and had left the land to take jobs in Aberdeen to try to earn money as fast as they could to buy a wee place of their own. They hated the city life but it was the only way they could earn enough to fulfil their dream. 

Henry showed them round, as proud as if it had been a vast modern farm. He was white with fatigue when they helped him back from the top field, and they sat him down at the kitchen table whilst I poured us all tea. I could see that he was in high spirits but I was stunned when he turned to me and said. "Well, Sam. What do you think? Will this young couple do to look after Burn Neuk?" 

The youngsters looked bewildered as I hummed and hawed, not wanting to get drawn into what had to be Henry's personal decision. His little black eyes twinkled as he watched my discomfort. 

"Well, would you say they were if it was your place and not mine?" 

I nodded and made to qualify it with words, but he was satisfied and turned back to the couple. "Look, I know you haven't enough money to buy this place on the open market, but you would like it wouldn't you?" 

Their eyes shone with yearning and it was the girl who replied. "Oh yes! Yes, it would be just perfect." 

Henry clapped his hands in delight. "Right! It's all yours!" 

The young man smiled warily. "What do you mean? We'd love the place but it will be years before we can afford to even rent one, never mind buy one." 

Henry chuckled with what I can only describe as pure contentment. "I'm not selling it to you, lad, I'm giving it to you." He held up a hand to forestall them. "Wait, hear me out. I've got terminal cancer and have only a few weeks left to live. I've got no kin to leave the place to and I'll have no need for money where I'm going. What I want is to leave the place in good hands. I've watched you since you arrived, and I've asked what probably seemed like a lot of daft questions about wild things. You obviously love everything about the countryside, just as I do. So I'd like to sign the whole place, lock stock and barrel, over to you, and throw in some money to get you over the first while." 

The two sat like statues, looking at him as if unsure whether to cry or run for their lives. Eventually the girl broke the silence. "Do you really mean that? Would you really give us this place for nothing?" 

Henry nodded, smiling his gap-toothed smile. The boy - he seemed scarcely more than that - shook his head. "We couldn't accept that, but we'd be willing to come and work the place for you for just our keep for as long as you like." 

Henry was still smiling as he wagged his head gently from side to side. "Well spoken, lad, but there'd be no point. You want a place of your own, and where I'm going I won't have much need for money so, what do you say? Will you accept?" 

The youngsters looked at each other with eyes alight with a mixture of yearning and disbelief. They sat like that for what seemed like a long time and some sort of communication must have passed between them because they suddenly turned their eyes on me. They both opened their mouths to speak but neither appeared to be able to find the words. Eventually the girl spoke. "Mister, would it be alright to accept?" 

I looked at Henry, with his gap-toothed grin and shining eyes and couldn't help smiling as I answered. "Yes. Yes, it would be alright." Then with a great surge of affection for this tough little man. "I know it all seems a bit daft but I assure you he is quite sane and means every word he says. If you accept you will make him very happy." 

So they accepted and that very afternoon we all crammed into the old Mini and went into Larich Stump to see Henry's solicitor. He was a dry old stick who seemed to like Henry, but was obviously unsure whether to do as he was told or ring for a doctor to take Henry away. I think it was only my presence that tipped the scales. Anyway, an hour later we were driving back towards Burn Neuk with the farm and a substantial sum of money signed over to the youngsters. After that had been arranged, Henry had sent them out whilst he drew up a Will and had me witness it. It left everything, and it was substantial, to the youngsters. 

As he got painfully to his feet he made just one cryptic remark. "These bairns want that place as much as I did, but at least they won't have to do what I did to get it." I thought at the time he meant marrying Bessie. 

The youngsters moved in that weekend and Henry stayed with them for another week, introducing them to every animal individually, describing the special characteristics of every bit of land, and introducing them to all their new neighbours. Then his strength ran out and he fell ill again. He was taken to the hospital but there was nothing more they could do and he was lonely and unhappy at being cooped up in a city. So Sarah and I picked him up in the car and took him home with us so that he could see the hills from his bed and die among friends. 

Over the next week he went downhill fast and by the end of the week Sarah and I were taking turns to be by his bedside day and night. He was weak and in pain and the drugs made him dozy, but he never complained and never lost his sense of humour. On the last night of Henry's life I took over the vigil at just after eleven o'clock. He had slept most of the day but now the drugs were wearing off and my melancholy thoughts were interrupted by the realisation that his eyes were open and watching me. For once the pain in his eyes seemed to be less but I reached for the bottle of pills. "Well, hello there. You've had a good sleep today, I was just beginning to think I'd have to wake you to give you your sleeping pills." It was a weak joke but he smiled anyway. 

"Not yet, Sam. I think I'm just about beyond pain now. Just let's talk a wee while, I've got something to tell you." 

I started to tell him to save his strength, but what for? Instead I said, "That suits me just fine, so what's this you have to tell me?"

"It's about Bessie, Sam." 

"Oh God!" I thought. "I hope he's not going to start rambling on about being reunited on the Other Side." 

He seemed to read my thoughts and grinned the gap-toothed grin that tugged at my heart strings every time I saw it. "Don't worry, Sam, I'm not going to go all nostalgic, I'm just going to clear up a mystery for you. You remember about Bessie's disappearing manuscripts, don't you?" 

"Indeed I do! I've often wondered what happened to them." 

"Well, I'm going to tell you. They were stolen alright - by me!" His grin widened further at my astonishment and he continued. "Just let me tell you the whole story." Without waiting for a reply he gathered up his strength and started talking. "I've always worked on the land, like my father and grandfather before me - maybe even further back than that, I don't know. Not as owners mind, just farm labourers. When I met Bessie I was working on a big farm in Aberdeenshire, and I was finding little to like about it. Mechanisation, factory farming, artificial fertilisers, herbicides - they were all rampant at that time. People were being thrown off the land they'd worked on all their lives, and them that were left were just factory workers and machine minders. So I wanted to get out and get a wee place of my own so I could do things the old way, caring for the land so that it would care for me." 

"Anyway, I was down in Edinburgh at the Highland Show - we were showing a couple of heifers and some sheep - and I was staying at a boarding house in Edinburgh. Well, the landlady was an aunt of Bessie's and that's where I met her. She'd just recently been widowed and was looking for a man. She somehow took to me and became a convert to country life. I wasn't keen - until I found out that she'd been left a fair bit of money when her husband died. So I got to thinking that maybe we could both get what we wanted if we got together. Oh, we never put it into words but there was never anything like love between us." 

"To cut a long story short, I hummed and hawed about wanting a place of my own, and she was quite taken with the idea of being a landowner. I took her with me to see Burn Neuk when it came up for sale and the upshot was that we got married and bought the place. At least, Bessie bought the place, it was never mine until I inherited it after her death." 

I hadn't known that, but it was typical of Bessie that she'd never give anything away, even to a new husband. 

"Well, we settled in and things were fine that first summer - the weather was the best for years and it was all new to her - but come the winter, with the muck and cold and isolation, and she started showing her true colours." He shook his head slightly as if he still couldn't believe that Bessie could bring disharmony to what he regarded as Paradise. "We've all joked about nagging women but by God, Sam, you can't imagine what Bessie was like. She used words like knives, cutting with every one. I really believe that she was a sadist in the real sense of the word. She just couldn't be happy unless she had someone to torture." 

He lay silent for a while and his grim look slowly dissolved into a cherubic smile that spread over his face like the rising sun flooding a glen. "But she had chosen the wrong man in me! It wasn't that I did anything deliberately, it was just that as long as I had the land and the beasts and the wildlife, her words could never bother me. And, of course, she knew she wasn't really getting to me and that made her even worse." 

A shadow flitted briefly across his face. "Aye, maybe my indifference was more cruel to Bessie than her nagging was to me." He was tiring and the pause was longer this time. "Then her auntie in Edinburgh took ill - she was an old woman and obviously didn't have long to go - and Bessie knew that she'd inherit the Guest House. A couple of days after she got the news she suddenly stopped nagging and was quite friendly - I just thought she was looking forward to inheriting a fair bit of money - but it wasn't that. On the third day she was chatting away about maybe having a run into Edinburgh to see auntie Phobe, when suddenly she asked if I thought she should sell the Guest House, or take it over and run it. Well, like an idiot I said to sell it because I could never bear to live in a city. The minute the words were out I could see that I'd played right into her hands. At last she had something to hurt me with." His face had a dark, closed expression as if contemplating the ultimate betrayal. 

Then he sighed and continued. "Auntie Phobe hung on another couple of months, and in all that time Bessie never missed a chance to turn the knife. Then Phobe died and Bessie was immediately for selling the farm. I'd come to my senses by this time and pretended that I'd reconsidered things and that living in Edinburgh maybe wasn't as bad as I'd first thought. But she wasn't fooled and was all for putting Burn Neuk up for sale. Well, I delayed her by explaining how much less she'd get if she sold in the winter than if she waited 'till the Spring. She was always greedy was Bessie, and she knew that by hanging on she could keep on twisting the knife." 

"I was fair desperate, I can tell you. Then we went to Edinburgh one day to clear up some of the legal details about Phobe's estate and I got to chatting with an old pal of Phobe's. She hated Bessie's guts, I could see that, and she didn't waste any time in filling me in on Bessie's past. It was true that Bessie had been widowed, but what she hadn't told me was that her first husband had committed suicide. I knew exactly what the old woman meant when she said that Bessie's tongue had driven the poor man to his death. The way I felt at that time I could see me going the same way." 

The weary despair in his voice, and the sight of him dying in front of my eyes, made me suddenly shiver. Then I saw that his eyes were on me and that they were twinkling again. "But you know us old country folk, Sam, thrawn to the very marrow. Well, I decided that I wasn't going to give up the farm without a fight. So I set about getting my own back. I knew what she was like about her manuscripts so I deliberately spilled paraffin on the first copy. Then I got her so worked up about it that she stood over me and made me burn it. God knows why she thought that would be a punishment to me but she did." 

"Anyway, that was one copy gone. The next one was in Mary Simmers' school desk. Everybody knew that she always kept them there so I just nipped in one evening before the cleaner arrived and took it. I even had a key, I bought a desk just like hers when Sitertry school closed down and all the keys are the same." 

I was intrigued now. "I can see that getting that one would be easy, but how did you manage to get Dotty's copy from Sandy Gunn's van?" 

He smiled with childish delight. "Nothing easier. I was speaking to Dotty in the grocers on the Monday and she mentioned that she'd be sending Bessie's manuscript out to Windy Ha' with Sandy the next day. Sandy is always on the go early on a Tuesday and he calls on a few early risers like Dotty first, then he stops at the bakers to get a hot buttery for his breakfast before starting his country round. It wasn't long after the shortest day so I was able to see to the beasts then walk over the hill to Cauldbrae and wait for Sandy in the lane opposite the bakers before it was light. When Sandy went into the bakers I just nipped across the road, opened the van door and took the envelope. It still wasn't light when I got back home." He finished triumphantly. 

I shook my head in wonder. "My God, Henry, you're a deep one and no mistake. But why did you steal them? Just to annoy Bessie?" 

He grinned with delight and shook his head. "Not at all, not at all! I knew that Bessie would go to the Writers Group on the Friday and that the disappearance would come out then. Losing all the copies would have been bad enough, but Bessie absolutely hated a mystery. I knew that by the time she got home she'd have worked herself up into a right state. She'd done that sort of thing before and I knew she'd have a splitting migraine and wouldn't be able to sleep. When she was like that she took a couple of sleeping pills and a hot toddy, then went to sleep in the spare bedroom. And that's exactly what she did that night." He lay there grinning mischievously until I could stand it no longer. 

"Well, so what?" 

"So, she died of hypothermia didn't she?" 

"Of course she did! That's what the post-mortem said."

I was becoming exasperated by this charade. He still grinned slyly as he shook his head. "Tut tut, Sam, did nothing ever strike you as strange about that?"

"No. Should it have done?" I hesitated. "Actually, now you come to ask, there did seem to be something odd about it but I could never put my finger on it." I looked at him sharply. "Why? Are you saying that she didn't die of hypothermia?" I was beginning to feel uneasy.

"Oh, she died of hypothermia all right - after all, it was the middle of winter and we were having a real cold spell."

"So, what's the mystery?"

"Well, Sam, you know Burn Neuk and how warm Bessie always kept it - after we put in central heating from the Rayburn, Bessie always kept the place too warm for my liking."

I nodded, still not seeing what he was leading up to.

"Sam, Sam, I thought you would have realised that it wasn't cold that night."

"Not cold? When I came home from the Writers Group it was perishing!"

"Aye, but by midnight the wind had died down and it had clouded over. It even started to thaw a wee bit. She could never have died from hypothermia that night, even with the window open and the covers off."

"My God, you're right. I remember getting up to go to the toilet in the early hours and hearing the water dripping off the icicles on the dormer window!" I suddenly sat up straight. "That's what's been bothering me all these years! There was always something that didn't seem right about Bessie's death but I could never put my finger on it. By God, I've teased at it I don't know how many times over the years and never hit on it!" I stopped suddenly, my elation at having a mystery solved giving way to a dawning horror. "But if she didn't die from that, what did she die from?"

"Well, Sam, you'll remember that we had a great big commercial size freezer in the lobby just outside the bedroom doors. When she was at the Writers Group I turned it down as far as it would go to get it really cold. Then, after Bessie went to bed I emptied the freezer."

I was mystified now. "For God's sake, Henry, what's the freezer got to do with all this?" But the hairs on the back of my

neck were beginning to prickle.

"Everything, Sam, everything. When I'd got the freezer empty I went into Bessie's room, lifted her out of her bed and laid her in the freezer - it was just the right size. I knew that after her pills and toddy there wasn't much risk of waking her so I just put her in the freezer and shut the lid. Then I opened her bedroom window and instead of stoking up the Rayburn for the night I let it go out. After that I checked the freezer every half hour and on the third check I found she'd died from hypothermia." He said it so matter-of-factly that I could hardly stop myself from casting a fearful glance over my shoulder.

He was grinning at my obvious discomfort. "Then I lifted her out of the freezer and put her back on the bed exactly as I'd found her - except that I let the Downie slip off the bed to leave her uncovered. After that I washed out the freezer in case somebody got suspicious and the forensic folk were able to make something of her breath being frozen on the inside of the freezer. Then I put everything back in the freezer and went to bed. And you know the rest."

I was utterly appalled, not so much by the murder, I'd seen enough of those in my career, but at this cheery, kindly man doing such a thing.

His eyes were still twinkling. "Surprised eh, Sam? You never thought of me as a murderer, did you? Well, to tell the truth I don't think I am one. I think I'm just an executioner who put paid to a miserable old bitch who was responsible for the death of one man and came damned close to doing the same for another. Maybe I'll have to pay for it when I'm dead - but I've never regretted it for an instant up to now. Just the opposite in fact. I suppose that getting away with something like that makes every day the sweeter - and, believe me, the days I spent at Burn Neuk after that were the best that any man could wish for!"

The expression never really left his face, the grin of cheeky devilment just smoothed into a smile of cherubic contentment as if death had brushed a gently forgiving hand across his face. And I forgave him too.

The End