"I'll look into it."

"So you think it was murder, Officer?"

"Chust curious, that's all."

Sean resumed his weeding and Hamish reluctantly got into the Land Rover again, reluctant because he was beginning to think that he would get no further with finding out what had happened to Tommy.

He drove on to Parry's croft and found the crofter at home. "Felicity Maundy in her chalet?" asked Hamish.

"I don't think so. I think herself went out for a walk. Tea? Coffee?"

"Coffee would be fine."

Parry picked up a battered enamel jug from the stove and poured two cups. Both men sat down at the table.

Hamish told Parry about Mr. and Mrs. Jarret's request. "Do you really think there's anything mysterious about his death?" asked Parry.

"On a calm, still day like this, it all seems fantastic. But I won't be easy in my conscience until I've asked around a bit more. Now, this Felicity. She told me she was not that close to Tommy, they were just neighbours. But Miss Black, the woman who runs the village tea shop, she got the impression they were an item."

"I can tell you, they weren't that casual, but I thought, both being young people stuck up here in the wilds, that they were just friends, Hamish. Went for long walks together, things like that. He could have been in her chalet at night, or her in his, and I wouldn't know. I'm dead to the world after ten o'clock at night."

"So she lied, and what else has she been lying about? And then there's the book he was writing. His parents say he was half finished and yet all I could find was chapter one. Then there's the sleeping drug he had taken."

"I didnae hear about that!"

"Aye, they found traces of some sort of sleeping drug. So, far-fetched as it may seem, someone might have laced his coffee and then injected him with heroin."

"Okay, let's go for the far-fetched," said Parry. "In order to let someone into his chalet and, say, offer him coffee, it must have been someone he knew. Say someone he knew was a drug dealer and had mentioned in his book arrived on his doorstep, he'd have been frightened to death."