The Chessmen

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
I

Mairead was still wearing her coat as if, perhaps, Marsaili had hoped she wouldn’t stay and hadn’t offered to take it. It was long and black, and concertinaed on the floor around her chair. Her style had not changed in all these years. Years that had treated her kindly. They had pared away some of the flesh from around her face, leaving her almost hawk-like but still beautiful, with clear white skin and only the hint of crow’s feet appearing around the corners of her eyes. Her lips were full and strikingly dark in contrast with the rest of her face. There was a knowing quality in their smile, and an odd fondness in her eyes.

‘Hello, Fin,’ she said, and it was as if that final exchange in the Cul de Sac had happened just the night before.

Fin’s eyes flickered towards Marsaili and back again. ‘Hello, Mairead. I see you’re still going to the same hairdresser.’

She grinned, and ran a hand back through her stubble. There was just a little silver appearing in it now, but it hadn’t concerned her enough to dye it. ‘It’s my trademark. They’ll put me in my coffin with my hair like this. Only, I hope it’ll be pure white by then.’

‘You want a cup of tea, Fin?’ Marsaili’s voice cut in on the exchange like a child with her nose out of joint seeking attention.

‘I’ll have a beer,’ he said, and turned to get a bottle from the fridge.

‘Same old Fin.’ Mairead took a sip at her mug. ‘Always with a beer in his hand.’

Fin twisted the cap off the bottle. ‘What are you doing here, Mairead?’

‘She came looking for you,’ Marsaili said.

‘They told me in town that you were restoring your parents’ crofthouse. I was amazed to hear that you’d come back. Last I heard you were being a cop in Edinburgh.’ And she chuckled. ‘I laughed out loud when I heard that. Fin Macleod. Policeman! Remember chasing the cops through the streets of that resort town in England?’

Fin grinned. ‘I guess we were lucky not to end up in a police cell.’

‘Who’s this we you talk about, Kemo Sabe?’

Marsaili glanced, perplexed, from one to the other as they shared their laughter. ‘Someone want to let me in on the joke?’

Fin waved his hand dismissively. ‘It’s a long story, Marsaili.’ Then paused, as a thought occurred to him. ‘I guess you two know one another from school?’

‘We shared some of the same classes,’ Mairead said. ‘But had different friends.’ She smiled at Marsaili. ‘I would never have recognized you. Except I’d been told that you two were an item these days.’

‘Of course, I knew you straight away.’ Marsaili was smiling, but there was an edge to her voice. ‘Who wouldn’t?’ She turned towards Fin. ‘I saw her from the window. She was standing up there on the shoulder of the hill looking a bit like a lost soul.’

Fin quickly refocused the conversation. ‘I suppose you’re here for the funeral?’

Mairead’s face clouded. ‘Not just for it, Fin. To organize it. There are no relatives that we know of. So it’s up to Roddy’s friends to give him a proper send-off. You’ll both be coming?’

‘I won’t.’ Marsaili pushed herself away from the worktop to empty the last of her tea down the sink and rinse the mug. ‘I never really knew Roddy. And I’ve got the baby to look after.’

Mairead raised an eyebrow in surprise. ‘Baby?’

‘Our granddaughter,’ Fin said. And then felt compelled to explain. ‘We had a son I never knew about till recently.’

Mairead took Marsaili’s cue with the mug and stood up. ‘Never could keep it in the breeks, Fin, could you?’ Fin blushed and she smiled. ‘And still blushing, I see. Always wore your heart on your sleeve, you did.’ She held his gaze for a long moment. ‘They were interesting times we lived in.’

Fin nodded. ‘They were.’ And he took a pull on the neck of his bottle to disguise his discomfort. ‘You’ll let me know when the funeral’s to be?’

‘I will, now that I know where you are. I’m at the Cabarfeidh, in town.’ She paused, which made it sound almost like an invitation. And then she added, ‘Strings and Skins and Rambo are there, too.’

It seemed odd to Fin to hear those teenage nicknames again, as if somehow they should have grown out of them. And yet he still called Whistler, Whistler.

Mairead turned an ersatz smile towards Marsaili. ‘It was lovely to meet you again. Thanks for the tea.’ Fin opened the kitchen door for her and she paused momentarily as she passed him, a strange searching look in her eyes. But all she said was, ‘See you at the funeral,’ and was gone.

There was a long silence in the kitchen after she had left. It was almost as if Marsaili was waiting to hear the sound of her car starting, to be certain that she was away, before she spoke. ‘You two had a relationship, then?’

There was no point in denying it. ‘That obvious?’

‘Oh, yes.’ A long pause. ‘How come you never told me?’

Fin shrugged. ‘Nothing to tell. It was another me, in another place and time.’

‘Seems to me there are a lot of Fin Macleods I don’t know anything about.’ She lifted Mairead’s mug from the table to rinse it in the sink, and caught her reflection in the kitchen window. Fin saw her raise a hand, almost involuntarily, to sweep the hair back from her face. ‘She’s still very beautiful,’ she said, as if the contrast with her own reflection had prompted the thought.

‘She is.’ Fin drank some more of his beer. ‘We had a relationship, yes, Marsaili. But I never liked her very much.’

Marsaili was surprised. ‘No?’

Fin shook his head.

‘Why not?’

‘I knew her too well. She never cared much about anyone or anything, except herself. It was all me, me, me.’

Marsaili dried her hands on the dishtowel and there was a sadness in her smile. ‘A bit like someone else, I know.’ And she walked past him to the living room.