Death of a Chimney Sweep

Book 26: A Hamish Macbeth Mystery

by M.C. Beaton

Genres: Mystery

Synopsis

In the isolated villages in the north of Scotland, the villagers rely on the services of the chimney sweep, Pete Ray, and his old-fashioned brushes. Pete is always able to find work in the Scottish highlands, until the day that Police Constable Hamish Macbeth notices blood dripping onto the floor of a villager's fireplace, and a dead body stuffed inside the chimney. The entire town of Lochdubh is certain Pete is the culprit, but Hamish doesn't believe that the affable chimney sweep is capable of committing murder. Then Pete's body is found on the Scottish moors, and the mystery deepens. It's up to Hamish to discover who's responsible for the dirty deed—and this time, the murderer may be closer than he realizes.

Release date: February 25, 2011

Publisher: Grand Central Publishing

Print pages: 256

Sample

Golden lads and girls all must,

As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.

—William Shakespeare

The village of Drim in the county of Sutherland at the northwest of Scotland was rarely visited by outsiders. Not even the
most romantic member of the tartan lunatic fringe of the lowland cities could claim it to be a place of either interest or
beauty.


It was a small village situated at the end of the long arm of a sea loch where towering mountains dropped down sheer into
the water so that the loch looked black and sinister even on a fine day. It consisted of a huddle of whitewashed cottages
and one general store. There had been a murder committed there some time ago, temporarily bringing in the outside world, but
since then Drim had settled back into its usual torpor.


There was no longer a resident minister, although the church was served every three Sundays by a visiting preacher. The old
manse stood empty, and no one showed any signs of buying it. Furthermore, it was said to be haunted because the last minister
had hanged himself after his wife had run off and left him.


The nearest policeman, Police Sergeant Hamish Macbeth, was some miles away across mountain and moorland in the village of
Lochdubh, and although Drim was on his beat, he rarely had any reason to visit the place.


There was, however, a brief burst of excitement when newcomers bought an old Georgian mansion up on the brae above the village.
It had lain empty for some time, the previous owner having been an eccentric old lady. The house had been on the market for
five years before it was bought by a Captain Henry Davenport and his wife, Milly.


It was a square three-storeyed building in red sandstone, as unprepossessing and as grim as the village. It would have commanded
a good view of the surrounding landscape had not the house been surrounded by laurels, Douglas firs, stands of birch, and
one giant monkey puzzle.


A few of the villagers had called on the English couple when they first moved in four months before with presents of cake
but were repelled by the pompous manner of the captain and the faded timidity of his wife. They drove down to the nearest
town, Strathbane, to do all their shopping, and so Milly Davenport did not even visit the local store.


Captain Henry Davenport had retired from the army, slightly bitter at not having risen higher in the ranks, but determined to be still addressed by his military title. Nowhere
else in the country could he have afforded to buy such a large house, and it suited his grandiose ideas.


Milly, his wife, also English, still showed signs of having once been pretty. She would have liked to employ one of the women
in the village to help her with the cleaning, but her husband said acidly that she had nothing else to do with her time and
it would be a waste of money.


The captain had discovered that a peat bank belonged to the house, and so he employed a local man, Hugh Mackenzie, to keep
him supplied with peat. But the fire smoked dreadfully. One evening, the captain received a rare phone call. He came back
from the phone, which was still located in the draughty hall where it had stood since the days when it was first installed,
his face flushed and worried.


“Who was on the phone, dear?” asked Milly.

“Just an old army friend. Look, do something useful. I’m going out for a walk tomorrow. Get some exercise. Get the sweep in
and get the damn chimney cleaned! If anyone calls, tell them I’ve gone abroad.”


In less remote parts of Scotland, people had their chimneys vacuum-cleaned. But in Drim, villagers relied on the services
of the itinerant sweep, Peter Ray, with his old-fashioned brushes.


Chimney sweeps are still regarded as lucky at weddings, especially if they kiss the bride. Pete made extra money from being hired to kiss brides even though people swore he had only two baths a year: one at Christmas and the other at Easter.
Mostly he was as black as the soot he took from the chimneys. He lived in a hut high up on the moors between Lochdubh and
Drim. He drove an old-fashioned motorcycle with a sidecar to carry his brushes.


Milly obtained his phone number by calling the local store. Just before he arrived, the captain said mysteriously that he
planned to be out for some time and repeated that if anyone asked for him, she should say he had gone abroad.


The sweep arrived just after he had left. Milly took one look at his soot-covered appearance, gave him a mug of tea, and then
rushed to spread newspapers and old sheets over the drawing room carpet. She then said she was going to walk down to the village
to get some groceries. She asked Pete how much it would cost and then gave him the money, saying if she was not back by the
time he had finished to leave by the kitchen door, lock the door behind him, and put the key through the letter box. She had
a spare key. Milly was determined to be out of the house for as long as possible in case whoever it was her husband wanted
to avoid should come calling. Milly knew herself to be incapable of lying without giving herself away.


Also, she had had little chance of meeting any of the women from the village and was longing to talk to someone, anyone, who
was not her husband. She spent very little in the local shop, knowing that her husband took a malicious delight in not giving
the locals any custom, but she chatted to several of the women and a Mrs. Mackay invited her back for tea.


Happy for the first time in ages, Milly returned home after several hours. She was annoyed to find the kitchen door standing
open, and then assumed that either the sweep had forgotten to lock it or her husband had come back. Milly picked up the sheets
from the floor and put them in the laundry room. There were still crumpled newspapers in the hearth where she had left them
to catch any fall of soot. She decided to have a glass of whisky before she did any more cleaning. She took one of her husband’s
precious bottles of malt whisky from the sideboard and poured herself a generous measure. Her husband would not approve, but
he was often so drunk in the evenings that she was sure he would assume he had drunk the whisky himself.


She sat down in the drawing room, sipping her drink and staring at the large stone fireplace. She had enjoyed her little bit
of freedom. If only her husband would go away more often! If only, whispered a nasty little voice in her head, he were dead.

Feeling guilty, Milly took another sip of her drink, listening all the while for her husband’s return. The wind had got up
and was blowing around the house.


Plop! Plop! Plop! Milly stiffened. What was that noise? A leaky tap in the kitchen? No, the noise seemed to be coming from the fireplace. Darkness
was falling. She got up and switched on all the lights.


Plop!

The noise was coming from the fireplace. She walked over to it and stared. Something dark was falling in drips onto the paper. The chimney was old. If you bent down and looked
up it, you could see the sky. Perhaps it was rain.


She caught a drop on the back of her hand and then held her hand under a lamp on a table by the fireside.

Milly let out a whimper of fear. Blood!

By the time Police Sergeant Hamish Macbeth arrived from Lochdubh, Milly had shut herself in the kitchen. “It’s blood dripping
down the chimney,” she cried when she opened the door to the tall policeman.


“Now, then,” said Hamish soothingly. “It may be a bird or animal stuck up there.”

“But the sweep was here and cleaned the chimney.”

“When was that?”

“This morning.”

“And where is your husband?”

“He went out for a walk. He’s not back yet.”

“In the drawing room, you said?”

“Yes, let me show you.” Milly led the way. The drawing room was sparsely furnished with Swedish assemble-it-yourself furniture,
unsuited to what had once been an elegant room.


Hamish took out a powerful torch, crouched down, and shone it up the chimney. The torchlight fell on a dangling pair of highly
polished brogues.


He sat back on his heels. “I’m afraid there’s a body stuck in the chimney.”

“Oh, that poor sweep!” gasped Milly.

Hamish did not like to tell her that Pete had never worn anything on his feet but dirty cracked old boots. He telephoned police
headquarters and demanded the lot—ambulance, fire department, Scenes of Crimes Operatives, and police.


He turned to Milly and said gently, “Chust you be going ben to the kitchen. This iss not the place for you.”

While he waited, Hamish fretted. What if the man up the chimney was not dead? But if he pulled the body down, he would be
accused of having ruined a possible crime scene.


To his relief, he heard the wail of sirens approaching. Hamish stood back to let the white-suited SOCO men into the room first
and then went into the kitchen to join Detective Chief Inspector Blair, a thickset Glaswegian who hated him, and Blair’s sidekick,
Jimmy Anderson.


Hamish reported what he had found. “I think it’s Captain Davenport,” he said. “And we’d better find that sweep.”

“Then get to it,” snapped Blair, “and leave this to the experts.”

There was a short drive at the front of the house, shadowed by trees and bushes. Tyre marks at the side in the gravel showed
that the sweep had ridden round to the kitchen door at the side.


Hamish went to the general store first where Jock Kennedy and his wife, Ailsa, served behind the counter. He told them what
had happened and then appealed to Ailsa, “I think Mrs. Davenport could do wi’ a bit of female company.”


“I’ll get up there right away,” said Ailsa.

Hamish then headed up over the moors to the hut in which Pete Ray lived. He knocked, but there was no reply. He walked around
the hut amongst bits of old rusting machinery but could not see the motorbike. He tried the door of the hut and found it unlocked.
He entered flashing his torch this way and that because he knew the hut did not have any electricity. It consisted of one
room with a calor gas stove in one corner, a dirty unmade bed against one wall, an old iron stove, and a jumble of magazines
heaped on the floor beside the bed. A curtained recess contained one good suit and, lying underneath the suit on the floor,
a heap of underwear and dirty sweaters.


He went back outside, experiencing a feeling of dread. He could not see Pete committing such a pointless and elaborate murder.
Hamish took out his phone and called Jimmy Anderson. “Can’t see Pete anywhere,” he said.


“Blair’s got an all-points out on him,” said Jimmy, “although I don’t see how a sweep on an old-fashioned bike should suddenly
become invisible.”


“I can,” said Hamish gloomily.

“What?”

“What if the murderer was interrupted by the sweep, killed him, drove his bike off to the nearest peat bog, and made the lot
disappear?”


“Trust you to go complicating things.”

But the next day, Pete was found dead up on the moors. It appeared his motorcycle had struck a hollow hidden in the heather
and had catapulted him onto a sharp rock. His neck was broken. He was clutching a tyre iron matted with hair and blood. In the sidecar were found silver candlesticks, the captain’s
wallet, and Milly’s jewellery. Case closed. Pete had been caught by the captain and had killed him.


The following evening when Jimmy called at the police station in Lochdubh, he found Hamish Macbeth in a truculent mood.

“I dinnae believe it,” exclaimed Hamish. “Not Pete. He was a gentle soul and he loved his chimneys. He was a bit simple in
a way. But vicious? Neffer!”


“Oh, calm down and give me a dram,” said Jimmy.

Hamish poured him a measure of whisky. “It’s like this,” he said. “Davenport tells the wife that he is going out for a walk
and if anyone asks for him to say he’s gone abroad.”


“You’ve been hacking into the police computers again,” accused Jimmy.

Hamish ignored that remark and went on: “So say this person meets him and they walk back to the house. This person quarrels
with Davenport and bashes his head in wi’ a tyre iron, and then like a bad elf, down the chimney, out pops Pete. It’s one
of thae old-fashioned chimneys with climbing rungs inside from the days when the sweep sent a boy up. Pete could get up there
himself. He was all skin and bone. The murderer kills him, takes a few objects to make it look as if Peter was a robber as
well, gets him in the sidecar, and goes off over the moors to fake the whole thing. Returns to the house and searches for
something he wants, can’t find it, and in a rage he stuffs the captain up the chimney, the captain himself being pretty skinny, hoping it’ll be some time before the body is found.”


“Oh, come on, Hamish. Let it go.”

“No! I bet forensics never examined that sidecar properly. I want to see it.”

“It’s eight o’clock, laddie.”

“Come on, Jimmy. Let’s go.”

“All right. Leave your beasts behind. They give me the shivers.”

Hamish’s “beasts” were a dog called Lugs and a wild cat called Sonsie. Jimmy should have known that Hamish would no more consider
leaving them behind than he would a pair of small children.


Hamish set off driving his Land Rover while Jimmy followed in his unmarked police car.

There was a mildness in the evening air as if winter were at last releasing its grip on Sutherland. Great stars blazed above,
with the towering mountains black silhouettes against the bright sky.


The head of SOCO was a beefy truculent man called Angus Forrest. “I’m packing up for the night,” he growled.

“We just want a wee look at that sweep’s sidecar,” said Jimmy.

“I was going to go over it tomorrow. Doesn’t seem much point. Open-and-shut case.”

“Won’t take us long,” said Jimmy stubbornly.

The motorcycle and sidecar were parked in a garage at the side of police headquarters. Angus switched on the overhead lights. “I’m off to the pub,” he said. “Phone me when you’ve finished.
But suit up and get your gloves on.”


Jimmy and Hamish struggled into their blue forensic suits and boots. “Now,” said Hamish, his hazel eyes gleaming, “let’s see
what we can find. I suppose the tyre iron and the jewellery and wallet have all been bagged up, but it’s that sidecar that
interests me. We need luminol.”


“What do you think this is?” grumbled Jimmy. “The telly? Got a fingerprint kit?”

“Got it with me.”

“Okay, dust away. I. . .