Page 38 of Death at a Scottish Halloween

He and Abigail were in the kitchen. They both gave me a nod but didn’t say anything. I wasn’t much fun before that first sip, and they knew me well enough to understand that.

Ewan handed me a cup. I nodded my thanks. Then I sat down in the booth and took that first wonderful sip. I closed my eyes and let the warmth infuse me. It might be fall in Scotland, but the mornings were chilly, even with the new central heat. I took another sip and then opened my eyes.

“OK. Hit me with it. What’s going on this morning?”

“Abigail brought cranberry scones,” Ewan put the plate of baked goods in front of me, along with some jam.

“That was kind of you,” I said. ” Thank you.”

“I woke up early this morning, and Tommy asked for them.”

I slathered the scone with jam. Sometimes we had clotted cream, other times just jam. I was equally OK with a plain one. Hers were that good.

“Ewan was telling me we have some bottles to test,” she said.

“They were positive for foreign substances. They could have come from an old apothecary. There is no telling what trace elements you might find. But if we’re looking for poisons, they seem a good place to start.”

“At least you found his vehicle,” she said. “Maybe forensics will help us figure out what happened.”

“He was staying at the bothie up the way,” Ewan said. “But we didn’t find much there. That said, the team has done a sweep of both and impounded the car. I’ll be speaking with some of the first Duncan’s workmates today. I’ll let you know how it goes.”

“Any chance I could listen in?”

“Also, the jeweler returned my text. I’m taking the ring to be authenticated, but he thinks, if it’s real, it’s worth at least thirty-thousand pounds.”

I was aware he deflected my question about listening to his interviews. “That’s a number someone might kill over,” I said.

“I’ll know more later, but you’re right. And if he knew it was worth that much, why wouldn’t he keep it on his person? That ring could have been stolen by anyone stopping by the bothie. I like to think people hiking the Highlands are honest, but you never know.”

“Yeah. That doesn’t make sense. Unless, maybe he didn’t know it was in the puzzle box.”

“Or he could have figured no one would find it in the puzzle box, and we don’t have many hikers this time of year.”

“There is that.”

“The team is checking the estate sales again today. Hopefully, we’ll be able to track his movements this past week.” He glanced at his watch. “I need to go. Thanks for these.” He picked up a box with what I assumed was more of Abigail’s scones, probably meant for Henry and the rest of the team. She was thoughtful like that. He waved goodbye.

By the time I showered and dressed, Abigail was well on the way to swabbing the bottles we’d found. We didn’t have any patients scheduled until after noon. We’d been doing half days on Monday and Fridays so that Abigail had time for her studies. That was at my insistence. I didn’t like the idea of her working twelve-hour days and then studying most of the night.

It didn’t always work out that we could take the time off, but we did our best. I was determined when I moved to Scotland to have a better work–life balance. The stress had been slowly killing me back in Seattle.

While we had our busy days, for the most part, life here was much easier. I had time for friends, and I’d tried out a variety of activities. My Scooby crew tended to do things together. We’d taken classes in everything from knitting to lamb yoga. Those lambs were cute, but smelly. I liked knitting, but I was still on simple patterns.

An hour later, Abigail came into my office, where I’d been writing up the reports on the two autopsies.

“You were right about the hemlock,” she said. “The purple bottle was full of what looked like dust. It must have been crushed up and stored in there for some reason. There’s lore about Scottish witches using it hundreds of years ago, but I do not understand why someone would keep it around in an apothecary. I also found aconite in one of the other bottles.”

“If one hadn’t caused hallucinations, the other would have. I’ve gone over the other tests several times. It isn’t common but I’m certain we’re looking at alcohol idiosyncratic intoxication syndrome mixed with the dust from the hemlock. He could have been hallucinating and scared himself to death. His heart had been weakened by the diabetes, which wasn’t being treated.”

“Do you think he did it to himself, accidentally?”

“That I’m not so certain about,” I said.

“What do you mean?”

“He could have been scared by hallucinations, but usually there is a trigger of some kind. And we can’t explain the ligature marks on his wrists. Did you find any particulates?”

“No. Though I’m still waiting on DNA. It will be a bit.”