A Handful of Ash Page 19

  Gavin shook his head. ‘She died, and he panicked? I’m not sure. There are still factors that don’t make sense. Why was she searched?’

  ‘Maybe she died before she’d taken the ash out. That would have linked her to him – no, not to him, but to witches, so he had to find it.’ Enlightenment flashed on me. ‘No, he was looking for her keys.’ I remembered Peter fishing them out of his pocket, with that blank look. ‘Peter found them in the wrong pocket. The next day. Nate didn’t want Annette’s death to be associated with witches, so he hid the ash, and returned the keys. A pocket would be a safe place to put them. Everyone does it. You’ve got something to carry, so you shove the keys in a pocket, and forget to put them on their usual hook. You wouldn’t be suspicious.’

  I had a horrid picture of Nate sliding into the dark garden, making his way round past the lit kitchen where Kate and Peter were being comforted by the police, to the darkness of the front door. He’d ease the door open, drop the keys into the first jacket hanging on the row, and slip out again.

  Gavin’s grey eyes met mine; he nodded, then rose to wash the cup, and spoke over his shoulder. ‘So he was involved in Annette’s death. He was the werewolf who made the claw marks. If there was another person involved – this demon he met last night – then he’d have known who it was. There’s the motive for silencing him. We’d seen the claws on the suit, we were going to question him about it. To get himself off the hook, he’d have told us who.’

  ‘Lawrence knew I’d seen the claws,’ I said slowly, ‘and Rachel told me the suit was Nate’s. She might have told him I’d asked.’

  ‘Or there’s a different scenario,’ Gavin said. ‘We’ve only Rachel’s word for that. The parents wouldn’t know, and Nate’s dead. Maybe we’re being given a scapegoat.’

  Rachel, then, or Lawrence.

  ‘The last thing,’ Gavin said, ‘was that Mrs Halcrow thought she heard Nate coming back in. Well, if your Shaela’s story is true, that couldn’t have been Nate. Perhaps the man dressed as a demon returned.’ He stood up, rinsed his cup, dried it, slotted it back into its place, and sat down again. ‘We took prints in the room, of course. The analysis has to come back, but we found a couple on the door that might be Annette’s. As for the witchcraft things, well, they’d been wiped clean. All of them – the candlesticks, the chalice, the books. It looked as if the person wiping them had worn gloves, for extra security. There were just traces of a mark round the rims, as if someone had put them back with gloved hands.’

  ‘So somebody was searching for something?’

  ‘Perhaps. Or perhaps – well, as you said, it was all a bit stagey. Either he was trying to impress his visitors – though according to his mother he rarely had any – or someone else was trying to impress me. Maybe it usually lived in a box in the wardrobe, and someone set it all out.’

  ‘Would Rachel know what his room normally looked like?’

  ‘She said she didn’t go into his room.’

  Five knots on the cord that had been left on my berth: the three hoodies, Rachel, Lawrence. Scalloway’s little coven, that excluded Nate. He’d kept his end up by showing off, and that had brought Annette to him. Rachel had reason to dislike Nate personally; if Lawrence was Shaela’s demon, he’d resent Nate trying to usurp his lordship.

  There had been a persistent, distant noise in my ear for the last few minutes, a motorboat coming from across from the other marina, at the other side of the castle. From the engine sound, it was a lightweight thing, maybe twelve or fifteen feet. Now, as it came to within a hundred metres of us, someone gunned the throttle and the hum rose to a whine. Khalida rocked to the wash as it curved around the corner, then there was a thud in the cockpit, as if something heavy had been thrown in, another, a third, and with each thump was a hissing noise, like hot iron being plunged in a bucket of water. I dived along the centre passage of Khalida into the forepeak and flung open the forrard hatch. I was out of it while the motorboat was still turning. It was a fibreglass dinghy with a small cuddy. It was too dark to see the face of the person driving it, but he – she – seemed tall, and dark hair whipped like tentacles around the face. Two other people huddled in the back. A voice shouted, ‘Witch!’ and a second cried, ‘You were warned!’ The voices were female.

  There was the smell of burning peat, and a cloud of smoke swirling in the cockpit. I swung along Khalida’s side. Gavin had the washboards out, was standing on the steps.

  ‘The fire blanket, quick!’ I said. ‘Above the cooker.’ Already, I could smell the acrid smoke of scorched fibreglass. A glass boat would go up like a torch. Gavin turned and reached behind him. Oh, God … quick, quick. There were three dark lumps in the well, rectangular-shaped, glowing orange in the breeze, too hot for me to pick up, although my fingers were curving towards the nearest, not caring about the pain. Then I heard Gavin behind me, and reached my hand back, and the metallic blanket pressed into it. I lunged for the first shape. It was twice the size of my hands, glowing, trailing sparks. I didn’t wait to watch it fall. I was already saying to Gavin, ‘There’s a bucket in the heads’ as I grabbed the second, and the third, and threw them overboard too. The water hissed, and gave a plume of steam. Gavin had dipped the bucket overboard for water by the time I’d dealt with the third. When I turned around, ribs heaving, heart thumping, he was pouring water over the cockpit floor. I ran my hands over where the peats had been, and felt the rough indentation where the hot peat had begun to melt the fibreglass.

  ‘If I catch them,’ I said, between my teeth, ‘they’ll be sorry they tried that.’

  ‘You know who they are?’ Gavin asked softly.

  ‘The demon’s little followers. The hooded crows.’ My left palm was stinging where I’d reached out to the burning peat. ‘ Fuck.’ I went back below and pumped cold water over it, then reached for the lavender oil. ‘Trying to set fire to Khalida.’

  Gavin stowed the bucket and sat down again. ‘Lavender?’

  ‘Great for burns.’ I was so angry that my hands were trembling. ‘If I catch them anywhere near me again – ’

  ‘You tried to pick it up with your hand?’ He said it calmly.

  ‘A fibreglass boat can go up so fast you wouldn’t believe it.’ I wound some cling film around my smarting hand. ‘I saw one once, in a marina. An electrical fault, they said later. There was a trickle of smoke, then suddenly the whole boat was ablaze. It was burned to the waterline in less than two minutes. There was nothing anyone could do.’

  ‘When you get done for grevious bodily harm,’ Gavin said, ‘the victim’s lawyer will suggest that the way fibreglass boats burn isn’t common knowledge.’

  ‘The victim,’ I said, through gritted teeth, ‘will be represented by her heirs if she puts so much as a finger on my boat again.’

  ‘And speaking as a policeman,’ Gavin continued, ‘I’ll be very happy to tell them how grieved I was to be aboard tonight and witness such an attempt at arson, and possibly manslaughter, and how very much more upset I’ll be if you have any more harm done to you.’

  I stopped scowling. ‘Tempting.’

  He leaned forward, grey eyes on mine. ‘It was peats they used to burn the witches.’

  I tilted my chin at him. ‘I’m not a witch. You know that.’

  ‘But they think you are, and the child said it the other night too. Where’s the idea coming from?’

  I shook my head. ‘In the old days, the only reason they needed was that you were different. I’ve got black hair, I’ve got a scar, my cat follows me. Black Patie’s ministers would have burned me for those.’

  Gavin shook his head, unconvinced. ‘We’re not talking primitive villagers here. Someone’s spreading rumours.’

  ‘But who? Why? I’m a stranger here.’ My hands had stopped trembling now. I began to unwrap the clingfilm. ‘Look, don’t have a word with them. That’ll just make things worse. I’ll promise not to wreak vengeance, if that will make you happier.’

  He frowned. His hands sketched a per
plexed curve in the air. ‘Cass – ’ His soft voice was suddenly jagged, shallow water over sharp stones. I couldn’t look at him, felt Khalida rock as he stood. ‘Cass, I don’t want to change you, not even a little. I don’t want you to feel like the policeman’s girlfriend.’ He laughed, but there was no joy in the sound. His voice was like blood flowing over broken glass. ‘The Cass I’m getting to know would go like a tigress for someone who laid a finger on her boat. I can’t tell you not to. I don’t have the right even to hope you won’t, because of me.’

  I turned then. ‘I hope my own sense and principles will stop me going for her.’ I looked him in the eye. ‘I wouldn’t expect you not to arrest me, if I did.’

  He put his hand out towards me then. We stood there for a long moment in the flickering gold light. I felt myself beginning to sway towards him. The cabin was so quiet I could hear the flicker of the candle in its brass lantern. Seized with a sudden panic, I stepped back, rocking the boat in her berth. My heart was thumping in my throat, and I didn’t want to think what he could read in my face. His hand drew back to his body. He turned to pick up his carrier bag. ‘I’ll leave you the rest of the biscuits.’

  I wanted to say that I’d save them for his next visit, but it would have sounded crass, as if I was blowing hot and cold. I wanted to explain, but I couldn’t think how to begin. ‘Thanks.’

  ‘Thanks for the chocolate.’ He motioned me forwards up the steps. I lifted the washboards and slotted them into their stand, went out on deck before him. It was still raining, a sullen drizzle slanted in the orange circles of the streetlights. ‘Don’t get wet,’ he said.

  ‘I need to let you out.’ Stiff, stupid words. ‘It’s not that bad.’

  We walked along the pontoon in silence. At the gate he said, ‘Phone me if they come back,’ and I said, ‘They’ll not come back tonight, I don’t suppose,’ and let him out of the gate. He stood for a moment after I’d closed it, with the mesh between us, then nodded goodnight, turned, and strode off.

  I went back to Khalida and sat down at the table. I must have sat there for a good half hour, gazing at the lantern swinging gently from its hook, before I roused myself enough to put the kettle on for my hot water bottle. I don’t want to change you, not even a little. Bed felt like the best place for me … but it was a long time before I slept.

  Monday 31st October

  Low Water Scalloway 02:19 GMT 0.6m

  High Water 08:37 1.7 m

  Low Water 14:34 0.6m

  High Water 20:50 1.7m

  Moon waxing gibbous

  Moonset 07:02, 292 degrees

  Sunrise 07:22

  Moonrise 15:49, 59 degrees

  Sunset 16:14

  Auld Clootie, Auld Nick (n): Shetland names for the Devil

  Chapter Sixteen

  For a moment I wasn’t sure what had woken me. The soft tapping of the rain on the cabin roof had given way to watery moonlight slanting in through the long windows. It was still, except for long ripples running along Khalida’s hull, and the purr of an engine breaking the silence. Then I felt Khalida sway to the wash of an approaching boat. I was alert instantly. I wriggled out of bed, hauled my mid-layer suit and boots over my sleeping thermals, and eased up the forrard hatch, shadow-silent, enough for me to see out, but not so much that they could see I was looking.

  It wan’t yet dawn, but there was the first hint of light to come silhouetting the hills on the eastern side, and it felt as though I’d slept just about enough. Five, half five. I reached for my thick jacket and slid my arms into it. I swung my feet on to the berth so that I was ready to spring out.

  It was coming slowly around the corner of the pontoon, a sizeable motorboat with a tall cabin, railed around the top for sea-fishing. The dark water rippled away from the flared bow to rattle against Khalida’s sides. I couldn’t see the person in the shadow of the wheelhouse, but there was someone on the foredeck, arms stretched as if it was holding something. My hand clenched around the long boathook.

  The motorboat crept along my side of the pontoon. The figure at the front seemed to be looking for something. One arm came up, pointing at Khalida. My grip tightened on the boathook. But the arm remained extended as the motorboat slid past me, and fell as she turned into one of the vacant berths. ‘Slow – slow –’ a voice called in Norwegian, and the boat slid smoothly into position, the bow-thrusters creating a swirl of water that came to lap against Khalida’s bow.

  I knew that voice. I swung myself out of the hatch and went along to the berth. The figure in the motorboat’s bows flung back his hood to show short hair, silvered by the marina lights, and a neat Elizabethan beard. White teeth flashed as he grinned.

  ‘Anders!’ I said, and held out a hand for their bow line. ‘Welcome to Scalloway.’

  Anders jumped lightly down to the pontoon, and put a bight around the cleat before embracing me. ‘Cass! I told Reidar you would be awake the moment we put in.’ His arms closed around me. The familiar smell of engine oil and cinnamon shower gel stung my eyes. I clung to him for a moment, then stepped back, and he released me. ‘Rat will be pleased to see you. Come on board.’

  We fastened the motorboat up, lines fore and aft, with a bow spring for good measure, before I joined the skipper in the cockpit. ‘Welcome,’ he said, in Danish, in a bass rumble of a voice. ‘Go below, it’s breakfast time.’

  Cat had slipped out after me, a grey shadow on the edge of the pontoon. I whistled to him. ‘Come on, Cat, you’ve an old friend here.’ He slid warily towards the boat and I picked him up and carried him below.

  The motorboat was a third longer than Khalida, and twice her width, with a double settee and table facing the galley. Everything in the cabin was secured for sea: sleeping bags shoved into the locker ovals, the chart under an elastic net, a thermos held by bungee clips. There were two mugs and two plates in the sink. Anders hung his life-jacket and oilskins up and slid behind the table to reach the hanging lantern. It was an LED which bathed the cabin in silvery light, bleaching his hair and fair eyelashes, and casting sharp shadows on his hollowed cheekbones. There were no signs of injury now. His brown hands went confidently up to the lantern, one holding, the other adjusting, with no sign of stiffness. ‘How’s the shoulder?’ I asked.

  He swirled his hands extravagantly and smiled at me. ‘As good as new. You’re a sight for sore eyes, belle Cassandre. Rat, come out, look who is here.’

  ‘You spoil that animal,’ the skipper said, following us below. He was a great untidy bear of a man, forty maybe, and more like a Norwegian than a Dane, with a tumble of tawny hair above a square forehead, blue eyes below bushy brows, a wedge of a nose, and a beard that would have done for Up Helly Aa. He held out a hand the size of a keelboat rudder. ‘Reidar. Are you hungry?’

  ‘Cass is always hungry,’ Anders said. Reidar nodded and reached for the kettle. The boat had some sort of power system for the taps, I noticed enviously, with hot water as well as cold, and a draining board beside the rectangular sink.

  There was a scuffling noise in the berth forrard. Rat swarmed out of the forepeak and came forward to join us, whiskers forward inquisitively. He was still larger than Cat, nearly sixty centimetres from nose to tail-tip, and blotched black and white, with a glossy coat. He knew me, of course; rats are very intelligent animals. He leapt on my shoulder by way of greeting, whiffled round my neck, and slid down again, tail hooked, to touch noses with Cat, who stiffened warily as if he didn’t quite remember, then jumped to the ground and turned to pounce. Within a minute they were chasing around the forepeak just as they used to on board Khalida, along the perimeter of the berth, round the back of the toilet, in through the chain locker, and up on the berth again. Anders nodded in satisfaction. ‘I knew Rat would remember. Cat has grown, he’s twice the size.’

  ‘Rats on board a boat,’ Reidar grumbled to himself. He put half a pat of butter in a frying pan whose weight would have made Khalida list to port, then began chopping onions so fast the knife blade blurred. ‘U
na tortilla.’ He tipped the onions into the pan and began on potatoes. ‘And hot chocolate, a special recipe from Andreas Viestad. You will like it.’

  ‘I will,’ I assured him.The hands chopping potatoes and whisking egg were delicate in motion as Cat picking his way through puddles.

  ‘So,’ he said, ‘you are Anders’ damsel in distress.’

  I flashed a look at Anders.

  ‘It sounded like trouble to me,’ Anders defended himself, ‘and my mother was beginning to drive me crazy, and the young man replacing me in the yard was doing well, so I decided to come and see what was happening. Life in Norway was very quiet after all the excitement we have had here in Shetland, these last months.’

  Reidar turned to give me a long look. ‘She is not distressed, no,’ he rumbled, ‘but she is worried.’ He handed me a tall mug entirely hidden by a swirl of cream, with what looked like two marmalade strands for decoration. ‘This will help.’

  ‘It will,’ I agreed. My nose tip touched the cream as I tried to drink from the cup. I gave up, and resorted to a spoon. It was delicious, chocolate with a tangy hint of orange, frothed to a smooth cream. A mug of this, and I’d take on a dozen covens single-handed. Warmed plates appeared from the oven, and Reidar slid a triangular wedge of tortilla onto each.

  ‘Now,’ he said, sliding in beside me at the table, ‘we eat this, and then afterwards you tell us.’