"Like I said, I'm all for giving folks a chance. He seems a nice fellow to me. Come on, Parry. Strathbane s become a sink o' iniquity. I've seen a lot of good young people wrecked. This one seems to have pulled himself together."

"I s'pose," said Parry. "He's no trouble. Let's hope your judgement is right, Hamish Macbeth."

"Och, I am never wrong," said Hamish with simple Highland vanity.

But when he had returned to Lochdubh and locked his hens away for the night, Hamish went into the police station office and phoned Detective Jimmy Anderson.

"Tommy Jarret?" said Jimmy in answer to Hamish's query. "I mind him. Got away with possession and up in front of a lenient sheriff. Got nothing more than a stay in a rehab and a hundred days' community service."

"Wait a bit," said Hamish. "He was a heroin addict?"

"Aye."

"That's a pretty expensive drug to be taking in the Highlands of Scotland. Where did he get the money?"

"Some aunt of his left him money, seems to be true. Respectable parents. Well off. Father a bank manager. Neat bungalow outside Strathbane, member of the Rotary Club, polishes the car on Sunday, get the picture? So he can afford heroin. I tell you another thing that made me mad. Couldn't get out of him where he got his supply from. I mean, he's lucky to be alive."

"Why's that?"

"I believe there's a lot of adulterated stuff around and some bastard at the Three Bells pub down at the old docks was pushing talcum powder. The street price of heroin in Aberdeen was a hundred pounds per gram. Why are you asking about Tommy Jarret?"

"The name cropped up," said Hamish.

"Meaning the wee bastards in your parish. I don't trust any o' thae junkies."

"Lot of drugs in Strathbane?" asked Hamish.

"Aye, it's a plague. It's the new motorways. We're no longer cut off up here so they zoom up the motorways from Glasgow and Manchester. The drug barons make money and more young people die every year."