Coffin Road

Chapter twenty-seven

In spite of best intentions, sleep had stolen her away sometime in the small hours, and she woke now with a start, sitting suddenly upright and hearing the sounds of someone moving around outside her door. She rubbed her eyes and blinked hard to clear them of sleep, and swivelled on the bed to put her feet on the floor.

All her fear and misgivings from the previous night returned. How was Billy going to be with her this morning? Would he still be prepared to take her to see Sam? If not, she had no idea what she was going to do. She was stuck here, miles from anywhere, with no transport, completely at the mercy of an unpredictable young man who might or might not have tried to rape her last night. Just how much resentment would he still be nursing after her violent rejection of his advances, and the biting of his lower lip?

Tense and stiff from a night braced on the sagging mattress of her damp bed, she eased herself across the room to the door and turned the key very gingerly in the lock. She wasn’t sure quite why, but she didn’t want him to know that she had locked herself in. She opened the door abruptly and stepped out into the sitting room.

Her first reaction was surprise at seeing sunlight flooding in through windows and a wide open front door, where a startled hen cast a long shadow towards her before clucking away across the clearing. The sun was still low in the sky, and it reached right across the room to the far wall. Her second reaction was pleasure at the perfume of freshly brewed coffee and the sound of cooking that came from the kitchen. Something spitting and hissing in a frying pan, and good smells issuing from the open door. Bacon.

Billy turned as she appeared in the kitchen doorway. He was standing over the stove, breaking eggs into bacon fat. Cooked rashers sat on a plate next to the gas rings. He managed what seemed to Karen an almost cheery smile. ‘The big advantage of keeping hens is the freshest of eggs every morning. You want to grab a couple of plates?’ He nodded towards one of the kitchen cupboards.

Karen retrieved plates and found cutlery, and he served up two eggs on each, along with half a dozen rashers of bacon. She carried them through to the table, and he followed her with the coffee pot and a couple of mugs. The milk and sugar were already out. She looked at him carefully as he sat down opposite. ‘How’s the mouth?’

He shrugged. ‘A bit sore, but I’ll live.’

‘I’m sorry.’ She repeated her apology of the previous night. ‘Don’t be. It’s me that should apologise. I was out of order.’ He nodded towards her plate. ‘Tuck in. Who knows when we’ll get to eat again.’

She almost held her breath. ‘We’re still going to see Sam, then?’

‘Of course. The sooner we get on the road the better.’

It was a stunning morning, cloudless and clear, the dark purple peaks of mountain ranges east and west rising up around them and reflecting on the still waters of Loch Carron as they headed south through Stromeferry and Plockton towards the Kyle of Lochalsh. Across the Sound of Raasay they saw the jagged outline of the Cuillins piercing the blue that framed the Isle of Skye, and the water of the Inner Hebrides lay flat and still in the windless silence.

They drove for a long while without a word passing between them, then out of the blue Billy said, ‘Amazing things, bees.’

Karen looked at him. ‘Did you know much about them before you worked on this experiment?’

He shook his head. ‘Nothing. It was a steep learning curve. But, you know, totally fucking fascinating. The hive, the colony, it’s completely run by women.’ He turned to grin at her, but winced in pain and raised a rueful hand to his mouth. ‘Shit,’ he muttered. Then, with both hands back on the wheel, ‘After all, it’s a queen bee, not a king. And the women do everything. They clean the hive, they nurse the young, they guard the entrance, and when they’re old enough they go out and do the foraging, bringing back the pollen and the nectar for storage.’ He chuckled. ‘That’s why they’re called the workers. The poor bitches only live for about a month, and never have any sex.’

‘That doesn’t sound fair. What about the men?’

‘Ah, well, the guys really have it cushy. Drones, they’re called. They just hang around doing fuck all, eating and making a lot of noise.’

Karen laughed. ‘Sounds like most guys I know. So what’s the point of them?’

‘Same as the male of any species. To get the females pregnant. Or, in the case of bees, one female. The queen. She goes on a week-long fuckfest when she’s still a pretty young thing. It’s the only time she leaves the hive. Flies off looking for drones, who usually hang around high spots like church towers so they can see her coming. Imagine their excitement. Finally going to get their end away.’ He laughed. ‘Almost literally. Cos what they don’t know is that they only get to do it once. Their tackle is barbed, you see, and gets stuck inside the queen, ripping away their insides as she flies off. She’ll screw a dozen or more of these daft drones, and you’ll often see her flying around with their remains dangling from her doodah.’

Karen wrinkled her nose. ‘That sounds vile.’

‘Yeah, but what a way to go!’ He glanced at her, eyes shining. ‘Don’t you think?’

‘I think I’d rather be the queen.’

‘Nah, I doubt if you would. She has a pretty tough life, as well. After a week of screwing around, she has enough sperm inside her to lay fertilised eggs for two or three years. And that’s all she does. Goes back to the hive and lays eggs. And when she starts running out, the other women kill her and feed up one of their own with royal jelly to make a new queen.’

‘And the men?’

‘Like I said, they just hang around the hive, feasting and spitballing until the end of the season, when the women figure they have served their purpose and kick them out to die.’

Karen blew air through her lips. ‘That’s pretty brutal. Don’t think I much fancy being a bee, of either sex.’

He grinned. ‘You’re never alone, though. There’s anything up to sixty thousand bees in a hive. And all of them your relatives. Imagine writing the Christmas cards for that lot!’

Karen laughed out loud.

There was very little traffic on the Skye bridge as they swept down to cruise across the first stretch of it, before seeing it rise ahead of them in a perfect arch over the waters below. Mountains shimmered darkly against a distant blue sky as they looped down through Breakish and Broadford, turning north then and heading for Portree.

They had driven for perhaps another twenty minutes in silence before Karen glanced at Billy. ‘How can you afford a big four-wheel drive like this?’ she said.

‘Needed a big beast to get up and down to the cottage,’ he said. ‘Especially in the wet and the snow. Our sponsor covers the costs.’

‘Sponsor?’

‘Well, we couldn’t have done it without one, could we? I mean, financing the three of us for two years apiece, never mind the equipment we had to fork out for, and the lab tests in Edinburgh... It’s all cost a bloody fortune.’ He glanced at her. ‘We get our funding from an environmental campaign organisation.’

She nodded. ‘OneWorld.’

‘Bet Deloit was not best pleased when you turned up threatening to blow the whole thing.’

‘I wasn’t threatening to blow anything!’ Karen said, indignant. ‘I was looking for my dad.’

‘Aye, who everyone thinks is dead, and who wants to stay dead till this is over.’

She threw him a look.

‘I mean, see it from their point of view, Karen. They’ve put out a small fortune on this. If Ergo cottoned on to what was happening, and where, it would be a total disaster. They could wreck the whole thing in any number of ways. Not least by exposing your dad as a liar and a fraud.’

‘I’m not going to blow anything,’ Karen said huffily. ‘No one even knows I’m here. All I want to do is see him.’

‘Well... we’ll see what Sam says.’

At Borve they turned off the main A87 on to the road for Dunvegan, winding through rolling, treeless green countryside, across the River Snizort, then heading west until they reached the turn-off for Waternish. The island was dazzling in the late September sun, still purple with heather, but mixed now with the golds and browns of autumn. The road north along the west side of the Waternish peninsula rapidly turned into single-track with passing places. But they only had to pull in a couple of times to let oncoming cars past.

After a while, they saw sunlight coruscating across the clear blue waters of Loch Bay, off to their left, passing the tiny communities of Waternish and Lusta and Stein. A single whitesailed yacht cut a straight line through the sea loch, leaving a spreading white wash in its wake. Billy slowed down, glanced several times beyond Karen to the waters below. ‘Perfect day to be out sailing,’ he said. ‘Wish it was me.’

She looked at him, surprised. ‘You sail?’

He turned resentful eyes on her. ‘Why? You think sailing’s too middle class for a boy from Balornock? That’s a bit elitist, isn’t it?’

Karen was startled by his sudden umbrage. ‘No, I didn’t mean it like that. I just didn’t think you were the type, that’s all. My dad was a great sailor.’

‘I know. He ran the sailing club at the Geddes. That’s how I got into it. There were only about a dozen of us, but your dad got an instructor in from the Scottish RYA to coach us. Out on the firth almost every weekend. A really nice guy, Neal Maclean. Poor bugger died not long before your dad got kicked out. Heart attack. You’d never believe it, a guy that fit.’ And he fell into what felt to Karen like a sulky silence.

The road dipped down, mid-peninsula, and they passed the homes that incomers had made in pristine whitewashed cottages nestling in anonymity behind shrubs and small trees splashed autumn red and yellow. Billy slowed down and took a tight right turn towards a place called Geary, or Gearràidh as it was signposted in the Gaelic, and the road climbed steeply uphill across virgin moor tinted mauve with heather in bloom. As they crested the hill, and passed a sign for schoolchildren crossing, a spectacular view across Uig Bay fell away below them towards the Trotternish Peninsula and the village of Uig itself. It was from there that the ferries left for Harris and South Uist, and the islands of the Outer Hebrides could be seen clearly, simmering darkly along the horizon. A little white schoolhouse sat on their left, and Karen marvelled at the thought of going to a school with such a view. She would never have paid the least attention to any of her lessons.

Beyond the school they turned right, descending steeply then to pass through and leave behind them the small settlement of Gillen, houses hiding discreetly behind trees and tall shrubs. Less than half a mile later, Billy took a sharp, unexpected right turn on to what was little more than a dirt track, leading them up through a scattering of Scots pines into the shadow of hills rising steeply to the west. They bumped over ruts and potholes, and a crude wooden bridge across a tiny gushing stream, cresting a rise then and dropping suddenly into a small hidden valley where an old shepherd’s cottage stood among a clutch of trees, glowing white in the sunlight that washed down from the peaks.

‘Et voilà,’ Billy said, and pulled the Mitsubishi to a sudden stop on the grass in front of the cottage.

As she climbed down from the four-by-four, Karen saw how run-down the place was. A wooden fence around an overgrown garden was rotten and had collapsed in several places. The slate roof was almost green with moss, and the trees that crowded the flaking whitewashed walls cast their gloom all around it. A stream splashed and tumbled over the rocks behind the house, catching the sunlight and cascading down the hill beyond, before losing itself among the gorse and heather.

The rest of the valley was a shambles of rock spoil from the hills above, and thick tangling heather that grew abundantly in wet, black, peaty soil.

Billy stood scratching his head. ‘He’s not at home.’

Karen rounded the SUV, disappointment clouding this sunny morning. ‘How do you know?’

‘His Land Rover’s not here.’

She followed him up an overgrown path to the front door and he pushed it open into a gloomy interior. It breathed dampness and old woodsmoke into their faces. A tiny square hall stood at the foot of narrow stairs that rose steeply to dormer rooms in the attic. On their left, old, overstuffed furniture gathered itself around a long-dead open fire in a small sitting room. On their right, a kitchen smelled of stale cooking, and on a scarred wooden table the remains of an abandoned meal had turned mouldy.

Billy’s voice was hushed and barely audible. ‘I don’t like this.’

He turned and almost ran out of the house. ‘What? What is it?’ Karen called, then hurried after him as he started purposefully away through the heather and rocks, following what looked like a deer path. By the time she caught him up, they had reached the summit of a small rise and found themselves looking down into a sheltered hollow. Eighteen beehives lay smashed and scattered among the rocks.

Billy stopped abruptly. ‘Jesus,’ he whispered through breathless lips. And he ran on down into the hollow, moving among the remains of the hives, pulling out long-abandoned frames where honey and wax exposed to the weather had turned hard and black. Karen watched him with a growing sense of trepidation as she saw his panic mushroom. All the bees were gone, the hives destroyed by some hand determined to make them unserviceable. He looked up at her, and she saw how pale he had grown, his tan looking yellow now, like jaundice.

He strode up the hill, passing her without a word and barely a glance. She turned and followed him back to the cottage, struggling to keep up. By the time she got to the front door he was on the landing at the top of the stairs. He vanished into the room on his left and she ran up after him. The door to the right stood ajar. Through it she saw an unmade bed, and smelled the sour odour of bodies and feet. Straight ahead, a door opened into a small, dirty toilet and shower room. The room to the left had clearly once been Sam’s laboratory. Billy stood in the middle of it looking helplessly around him at the chaos of smashed equipment. The floor was littered with broken glass. Shelves had been pulled off the walls. A small freezer lay on its side with the door open. ‘His laptop’s gone,’ he said.

He turned to push past Karen and run down the stairs. She heard him banging about the house, opening cupboards, pulling open drawers, and she walked slowly back down to the hall and out into the garden. On the surface, it was still a beautiful day. But somehow, now, it had turned ugly and she felt a chill in her bones. Something dreadful had happened here, and Sam was gone. And, along with him, the last chance of finding her father.

She swivelled around as she heard Billy coming out behind her. He was out of breath, his face taut with tension. ‘Everything’s been taken,’ he said. ‘Everything. All his records, his diary, his computer.’

He gazed at her without seeing her for several long moments, lost in thought, then half-turned to look up at the cottage.

When he turned back he said, ‘Could you get my rucksack from the back of the Mits? It’s got my iPhone in it. I want to take some pics of this.’

‘Sure.’ Karen felt glad to be useful, more than just a bystander. She walked briskly to the Mitsubishi and lifted the tailgate. The rucksack was right at the back of the boot space, and she leaned in to retrieve it. As she pulled it towards her, a sound behind her made her turn. In time to see a shadow cross the sun before light and pain exploded in her head. Darkness subsumed her before she even hit the ground.

It was still dark when consciousness returned, bringing with it a headache like none she had ever known. She screwed up her eyes tightly, hoping it would pass, but it didn’t. It felt as if someone were hitting her repeatedly with a mallet. They say you can get used to anything, even pain, and after a few minutes, sensations beyond that pain began slowly to impinge on Karen’s awareness.

She was curled up in a foetal position, hands bound behind her back, legs tied together at the ankles. Her mouth was full of something soft and wet. Something else was stretched taut across her lips, preventing her from opening them. She gagged, and fear of choking or drowning in her own vomit only just prevented her from being sick.

She realised there was daylight beyond the darkness, that there was something pulled over her head and tied at the neck. She could feel it against her face. Soft, caressing. And the air it contained was hot, rich in her own carbon dioxide. Almost suffocating.

For several minutes she struggled against whatever bound her wrists and ankles, but there was no give at all, and she quickly gave up, exhausted. Desperately, she tried to draw more air through nostrils that had begun to stream. She felt tears burning her eyes and cheeks, and was overcome by an abject sense of helplessness.

The sound, very close, of a car door opening suddenly brought with it a rush of fresh air, and momentary hope. Strong hands grabbed her arms and pulled her into a semi-upright position, leaning back against something solid. Fingers at her neck loosened whatever it was that covered her head, and a hand tugged her hair as it grasped the cover to pull it away.

She had not thought it possible for the pain in her head to get worse, but the sudden exposure to bright sunlight seared her brain like a branding iron. She wanted to cry out, but her voice was muffled and choked by whatever was stuffed in her mouth. Tears coursed from her eyes and she blinked furiously, to see Billy standing beneath the open tailgate of the Mitsubishi, looking in at her. His face was devoid of expression, his eyes cold and dead, and he regarded her dispassionately, as if examining some inanimate object.

She tried hard to speak, to beg him to let her go, but heard only the pathetic muffled sounds that issued from her throat and nose. He paid her not the least attention, taking his iPhone from his pocket and examining it for some moments, tapping and swiping the screen, before holding it in front of him, in landscape mode, and taking several photographs of her. She heard its faux, electronic shutter-click five or six times before he switched it off and slipped it back in his pocket.

Without meeting her eye, he leaned in to retrieve her head cover and pulled it roughly over her head again, plunging her once more into suffocating darkness. She tried to struggle as he secured it at the neck, but it was pointless. He took her by the shoulders, half-turning her and tipping her over on to her side. The vehicle shook as he slammed the tailgate shut.

For some time, she struggled furiously, trying to kick out with her bound feet, but quickly running out of air and hope, and falling finally into a bottomless well of black despair.

The vehicle lurched as she heard him open the door and climb into the driver’s seat. He pulled the door shut and started the motor, turning the SUV in three swift movements that threw her from one side of the boot to the other, then accelerating back down the track towards the road, bumping through potholes and over ruts, tossing her around in the back like some rag doll.

She fought hard not to throw up, and it was with some relief finally that she felt them turn on to the smooth tarmac of the road. Drawing breath through her panic was like trying to breathe through straws. She prayed she wouldn’t pass out and vomit into her mouth, for if she did, she would be dead long before they got to wherever it was he was taking her.