However, I was so thoroughly rattled by the time I arrived at the clearing that on seeing someone emerge around the corner of the Dudgeons’ cottage six feet away from me as I came at the building from the side, I jumped clear off the ground and shrieked. The other person shrieked too, even louder, and it took each of us a moment to register who it was who had so alarmed the other. At last, though, I recognized Miss Joey Brown the barmaid, round-eyed and with her hand pressed to her heart, shrinking back against the cottage wall and staring, whereupon I gave a fluttering laugh to excuse myself and cover my embarrassment. Much to my surprise, however, although Miss Brown soon recovered from her initial fright, she grew no more calm; she nodded to me politely enough and murmured a greeting, but she kept making darting glances back the way she had come, and when I followed her looks with my own, she grew even more flustered, standing square before me blocking the path, as though I would want to go around to the back of the cottage and it was her duty to stop me. Then, seeming to realize how foolish she was being, she gave it up and attempted to look casual as she strolled towards the front door, only ruining it with one more fearful look over her shoulder. I stood my ground for a moment, but I knew I could not go squirrelling about the back regions of Mrs Dudgeon’s house, not with the place full of mourners as it was, so I met Miss Brown’s backward glance with a frank smile and followed her around the path to the front. She disappeared inside without knocking and went into the room on the left where the coffin lay, but I rapped on the open door and waited.
‘Ye ’ve missed her, madam,’ said the woman I thought was called Tina, who came to admit me. ‘Chrissie’s away to the Rosebery Hall wi’ Izzy and Mr de Cassilis.’
‘Yes, so I believe,’ I said, sitting and accepting the inevitable teacup. ‘But to tell the truth I wanted to come while Mrs Dudgeon was out, to ask how you think she is today. Yesterday…’ I shook my head and was met with matching head-shakes from all around. There was, as I had hoped, an air of greater ease around the place without Mrs Dudgeon there, despite the fact that the body of Dudgeon himself still lay in the next room.
‘I wish I had some good news for you, madam,’ said one of the older ladies. ‘But if anything she’s worse. Tell her, Margaret.’
‘I was here last night, madam,’ said Margaret. ‘Donald was sitting with Rubbert, but we thought somebody should be here for Chrissie too, and were we ever right! She would not go to her bed, never mind she was fit to cowp over she was that tired. She jist sat here, telling me I needed to lie down, I needed to get my sleep. Well, of course, I did shut my eyes in the end.’
‘Of course you did.’
‘You’re only mortal.’
I nodded my agreement with this, and loath as I was to interrupt the flow I took the chance while I had it of backtracking a little to check up on something puzzling.
‘Is Donald there now?’
‘Eh?’
‘Next door with Joey.’
‘Oh, you ken Miss Josephine Broon, do you, madam?’
There was something in her voice which hinted that if she had had her way, Joey Brown would not have been awarded her role as mourner. I decided to probe a little.
‘Is she a relative?’ I asked. ‘Miss Brown?’
‘Not exactly,’ said another of the sisters.
‘She should hae been.’
‘It would nivver have come to nothing.’
‘Och, Margaret,’ said Bet. ‘We’re all Jock Tamson’s bairns.’
‘Aye, but a barmaid,’ said Margaret.
‘We can hardly turn up wur noses at her for workin’ behind the taps,’ said Tina and there was a little gentle laughter. I smiled along with them in a vacant kind of way, but hoped that someone would take pity on me and explain. At length, Bet volunteered.
‘She was walking out with young Bobby,’ she said with a nod towards the photograph on mantelpiece. ‘They hadn’t named the day but they were getting there.’
‘Aye, only Billy – that was Joey’s brother – he joined up the minute he turned eighteen and whatever Billy Broon did, Bobby Dudgeon did too. Ever since bairns this was. Bobby would never have left his mammy if he hadn’t been hanging on to Billy Broon’s coat-tails and here if it didnae end in heartache all round for everyone.’
‘Most distressing,’ I said. This snippet of news at least explained why Joey Brown’s father had felt she had to be here, and perhaps if she felt some residual responsibility over young Bobby’s death – since it was her brother who encouraged him to join up – that might even go some way to explain her grief and guilt when Mr Dudgeon died. I decided not to pursue it any further, but to try to get back to the main thread.
‘I’m sorry, Mrs… Margaret,’ I said. ‘You were saying, before I interrupted, about having no good news of Mrs Dudgeon this morning.’
‘Aye richt. Well, as I wis tellin’ ye, I fell to sleep and when I woke again, it was gettin’ light, near four o’clock and Chrissie was nowhere to be seen. I thocht she had gone through and lain doon at last and I jist cracked the door to have a wee keek at her, to see that she was restin’ peaceful… but she wisnae there! I went through to Rubbert. She wisnae there either. Donald had dropped off – well, he’s a long day at his work to be sittin’ up the nicht – and he hadnae heard a thing. So oot we went. Quiet-like, no’ wantin’ to stir all they bairns, and we went lookin’ for her. A good hour we looked and we were near ready to come up to the house and get Mr de Cassilis to phone to the police and start raisin’ some men, when we saw her at last.’
‘And?’ I said.
‘She was wanderin’ home from wherever she had been. Cold as a dab o’ ice, she must have been oot for hours. Fit to drop, she was.’
‘But where had she been?’ I said. ‘Did she tell you?’
‘She… well, she wisnae herself, madam, and that’s the truth,’ said Margaret. ‘At first we thocht she had gone away to do herself harm – ye ken what I’m sayin’? – cos she had a wee bottle in her hand. “Oh Chrissie,” I says, “Chrissie, hen? If you would only jist get the doctor or get the minister, or jist even lie down and rest. You’ll get through, hen. Didn’t I get through when Jock was taken?” Mind you, I hadnae had my only boy go off to the war and no’ come hame again.’
‘Dear God,’ I said. ‘Thank heaven you found her in time.’
‘But it wisnae that after all, madam,’ said Margaret. ‘Thon wee bottle was nothing evil after all. It was ink.’
‘Jist a bottle o’ ink,’ said one of the others.
‘Ink?’ I said, frowning around the ring of faces, puzzled. ‘A bottle of ink?’
‘And she hadnae drunk none o’ it,’ said Margaret. ‘It’s not like you could miss it if she had.’
‘Aye well,’ said Bet, ‘she’s no’ hersel’ right enough.’ And she seemed content to leave it at that.
There was a time when I might have been too, but in my short detective career one of the lessons I had learned, the hard way, was never to abandon the attempt to make sense of things; random anomaly is an explanation of the very last resort. So, if Mrs Dudgeon had been wandering around in the night with a bottle of ink in her hand, it must have been for a reason.
‘Did she have a pen with her?’ I asked. They shook their heads.
‘Did she have paper?’ More shakes.
‘And do you have any idea what she might have been doing?’ I said. Nothing but blank looks greeted this; if the ink was not a suicide draught, it seemed, they had nothing more to offer.