Coffin Road

Chapter thirty

DS George Gunn sat at his desk, leaning back in his chair and staring at the cursor blinking on a blank document on his computer screen. Progress on the case seemed to have ground to a standstill, and he had no idea what to write in his daily report to the CIO.

Circulating the photograph of the dead man in the media had produced nothing more than the usual crank calls, wasting a lot of man-hours in chasing them down. There was nothing back from the lab yet regarding the scrapings taken by the pathologist from beneath the victim’s nails. Gunn was beginning to think they would have to ask the suspect’s permission to circulate his photograph, in the hope that they could at least establish who he was.

He could feel the CIO’s impatience reaching along the corridor to the open door of his office. Chisholm did not want to be here any longer than necessary, and would not be pleased to have Gunn’s failure to close the case reflect on him. As it surely would, back in Inverness.

Gunn sighed and looked at the time. His shift would come to an end soon, when he would escape back to real life. His wife, he knew, would right now be poaching the salmon he had acquired for her yesterday, and in a few short hours Fin and Marsaili would arrive, finally, to have that long-awaited dinner with them. Gunn licked his lips. He could almost taste the rich firm flesh of the fish, and the subtly flavoured garlic potatoes that his wife would serve with it. He sighed again, and swivelled in his chair as a shadow fell across the doorway. DC Smith stood, almost stooping to avoid the lintel, clutching a note in his hand.

‘This might just be the one, sir.’

Gunn cocked an eyebrow. ‘Tell me.’

‘Boat owner at Callanish. Says the man in our photo hired him to take him out to the Flannan Isles a week or so ago. And his vehicle’s still parked where he left it. A Land Rover.’

Gunn knew immediately that he would have to drive down to Callanish. And the chances were he wouldn’t make it back in time for dinner.

He saw the standing stones from a long way off, clustered together on the rise, with their commanding view over the coast of south-west Lewis. Fingers of gneiss pointed at a darkening sky, contours sculpted by weather and geology and time. There was something primordial about them. Older than Stonehenge, and raised by Man for who knew what purpose. Although they were cruciform in shape, they pre-dated Christ by thousands of years, and Gunn had been fascinated by them from childhood. He remembered his father bringing him here for the first time. A day out, a family picnic, but something about the stones had spooked the young George, and nightmares had kept him awake most of that night, and for several more thereafter. He had never lost the sense of awe that they inspired in him.

These days, they were a tourist attraction more than anything else, and coaches rumbled daily to the visitor centre along the single-track road that Gunn now took to the tiny jetty that nestled at the foot of the peninsula, well beyond the stones.

The machair was relatively flat here, dipping down to the seaweed-strewn rocks along the loch side, and Loch Ròg An Ear itself was slate-grey and contoured by the rising wind. As it stretched west, out into the ocean, the waters of the loch were broken only by the low-lying islands of Chearstaidh and Ceabhaigh and the much larger mass of Great Bernera.

Iain Maciver was waiting for Gunn at the old stone jetty, standing at the end of it, leaning against the railing, smoking a cigarette and looking out across the water to a landscape dotted by sheep and the occasional croft. He looked round as Gunn drove up, and, because there was no place to turn here, Gunn realised he was going to have to reverse all the way back to the parking area at the top of the hill, where he had passed a beaten-up old Land Rover sitting back from the tarmac.

He got out and met Maciver halfway along the jetty. The two men shook hands. The fisherman had a leathery, weathered face very nearly the colour of tar, and big-knuckled hands that crushed the one of Gunn’s that he shook. There were a couple of small boats tied up along the right-hand side of the quay, and a narrow slipway on the left below a rusted old railing.

‘Which boat’s yours?’ Gunn asked him, and Maciver nodded towards a garishly painted old door of a fishing boat anchored in the bay. ‘Bloody hell!’ Gunn said. ‘You take that out to the Flannans?’

Maciver shrugged and grinned. ‘She’s game for anything, that old girl.’

Gunn looked at her, and couldn’t imagine a trip he would less like to make. He took out the original photograph of the murdered man from Eilean Mòr and held it out.

Maciver looked at it and nodded. ‘Aye, that’s him alright. Sam Waltman, he said his name was. Don’t know why that stuck. Except I remember thinking Waltman, Walt Disney.’ He grinned to reveal a mouthful of bad teeth. ‘And Sam’s not a name you hear much around here.’

‘How did he contact you?’

‘He didn’t. I got a call from a fella down in Harris. Neal something. Asked if I would take his friend out. A one-way trip. I wouldn’t need to bring him back, he said, because he would be meeting him out there, and would give him a lift back himself.’ He took a long pull on his cigarette, then let the wind whip it away from his open mouth. ‘Dunno what happened, but he parked his Land Rover up the road yonder, and it’s still there.’

Maciver followed him slowly up the road on foot as Gunn reversed back to the parking area. He swung into it and got out, to feel the wind picking up as it whipped in off the water. The Land Rover was parked on the grass just beyond the square of tarmac. It was an old beast, an off-road warrior, scraped and dented by the years, wheels caked with mud. The windscreen was opaque except where it had been smeared by the wipers in two blurred arcs. Gunn tried the doors and tailgate. All locked. He shaded the driver’s window from reflection and peered inside. It was littered with cigarette packs and chocolate wrappers. A well-thumbed road atlas of Scotland lay on the passenger seat next to what looked like the return half of a ferry ticket.

He walked around to the front of it and took a note of the registration number, then turned to Maciver. ‘I’m obliged to you, Mr Maciver. We’ll need to take a statement. Tomorrow’ll be fine. If you can’t come to Stornoway, I’ll send someone to the house. Excuse me.’

He turned away then and checked the signal on his mobile before calling the office, the phone pressed to one ear, a finger in the other.

‘Hector, it’s George. I’m pretty sure he’s our man. Sam Waltman’s his name. I’ve got the registration number of his Land Rover. Let’s run it through the DVLA and see who owns it.’ He reeled off the number from his notebook. ‘And we’ll need a tow-truck down here to get it back to Stornoway, and a mechanic to open her up for us.’

The signal was breaking up and DC Smith’s response was inaudible.

‘Sorry, Hector, I’m on one bar here. Say again?’

After a couple of crackles, Smith’s voice came through loud and clear. ‘We just got feedback from the Manchester police on the Harrisons, sir,’ he said. ‘I suppose it shouldn’t be any surprise to us that the man’s not in concrete at all.’ And Gunn kissed goodbye to even the remotest possibility of making it back in time for dinner.

On the single-track heading west towards Luskentyre beach, Gunn could see the storm gathering itself out at sea. Gone was the blue overhead, to be replaced by low grey skeins of cloud that cast their shadow over the bay. Two, maybe three miles offshore, the rain was already falling in intermittent patches of darker grey, curiously backlit in fleeting moments of dazzling sunlight that broke through the cloud bubbling along the horizon.

As he drove past the cemetery, he reflected that its permanent residents must have seen many a storm come and go. The white Highland pony that habitually fed on the beach grasses that grew among the dunes would have seen a few, too. He was grazing near the fence below Dune Cottage, and Gunn noted with a grim sense of premonition that the suspect’s car was gone. At the top of the hill, Sergeant Morrison from Tarbert was leaning against his car, which he had parked across the gate of the Harrisons’ house. Gunn drew up in front of him and got out to shake his hand.

‘Donnie.’

‘George.’

‘Well?’

‘Nobody here. Car’s gone.’

Gunn nodded down the hill towards Dune Cottage. ‘And our man?’

‘Not there either, and no sign of a vehicle.’

‘Shit.’ Gunn’s involuntary curse, barely whispered, was lost in the wind. It was Gunn who had told the CIO that they had no reason to detain the suspect, but now they knew that it was Mr No Memory who had arranged for Sam Waltman to be taken out to Eilean Mòr, where the two men had a rendezvous. A one-way trip was what he had ordered, as if he knew that Waltman wouldn’t be coming back. And now he was gone. He looked up at the glass front of the Harrison house wondering what, if any, connection the Harrisons had with this. In his experience innocent people did not usually lie. So why had Jon Harrison lied to him about what he did for a living? ‘Let’s talk to Mrs Macdonald,’ he said.

They walked down the road to her house, and Mrs Macdonald opened the door to a cacophony of barking dogs. Her yappy little dog growled and snapped at them from behind the safety of her legs, while Bran greeted Gunn like a long-lost friend, paws up on his chest, almost knocking him over.

‘Bran!’ Her reprimand brought the Labrador back down to all fours, and she stood glaring at the policemen. ‘I don’t pretend to know what’s going on here, officers, but I think we’ve all had just about enough of it.’

‘I couldn’t agree with you more, Mrs Macdonald,’ Gunn said. ‘I’m surprised to see that you have — ’ he hesitated only momentarily — ‘Mr Maclean’s dog.’

She tutted and raised her eyes to the ceiling. ‘Well, I wouldn’t normally take him, but it’s hardly the dog’s fault that his owner’s a crook and a liar.’ Gunn wondered what exactly it was she had heard about him. ‘And they were off together, all three of them. In both cars.’

‘Mr Maclean and the Harrisons?’

‘That’s right. It was Mrs Harrison that came to the door with Bran. He wouldn’t dare! Normally, she would take Bran. But since they were all going off together, she begged me to keep him. Just for a few hours, she said.’

‘And did she say where they were going?’

‘Rodel, apparently. Looking for a boat.’ She glanced beyond the two policemen at the darkening sky blowing in across the bay. ‘But I can’t imagine they’d be going out anywhere in that.’

‘How long ago did they leave?’

‘About half an hour.’ She tipped her head towards the tall sergeant. ‘Mr Morrison could only have missed them by ten minutes or so.’

The light was fading fast as Gunn drove down into the shadow of St Clement’s Church and the shelter of the tiny harbour at Rodel. Sergeant Morrison, in his too small police car, drew in behind him and jackknifed himself out into the first spits of rain. He walked stiffly over to where the Detective Sergeant was standing on the quayside gazing helplessly out over the boats that rose and fell in the incoming swell, complaining and straining against the restraint of their ropes. There was nobody here, just a red SUV parked on the far quay.

‘That looks like their cars over there,’ Morrison said, and Gunn swivelled his head to see two vehicles parked up on the grass below the Rodel Hotel. Lights from the hotel itself shone into the dusk, casting feeble shadows towards the harbour.

‘Maybe they’re in the hotel. Or someone there might have seen them.’ He turned to look at the cloud and rain blowing in through the Sound. ‘Nobody in their right mind would take a boat out in this.’ He started off towards the hotel, but Sergeant Morrison grabbed his arm.

‘What was that, George?’

Gunn turned. ‘What was what?’

‘Something banging.’

‘The wind, probably.’

‘No, there it is again.’

And this time Gunn heard it too. It seemed to be coming from the nearest of the boats. The two men walked along the quay and stood listening intently. There were three sharp bangs from inside the white motor launch tied up below them. A blue canvas awning was stretched tightly over the driver’s console, and the banging came from beneath it.

‘Give me a hand,’ Gunn said, and the old sergeant grasped his hand to support him as he clambered down on to the rise and fall of the vessel. Morrison jumped down behind him, and together they began releasing the poppers that held the awning in place. When they peeled it back, they saw Coinneach Macrae lying curled up in the bottom of the boat, ankles and wrists bound by duct tape, a strip of it stuck across his mouth to stop him from calling out.

‘Jesus Christ!’ Morrison said, and he fished in his pocket for a Swiss Army knife, selecting a blade to open and cut through Macrae’s bindings.

Gunn eased the duct tape away from the man’s face, and saw the blood that had dried among his thinning hair from a gash in his head. ‘What the hell happened to you, man?’ And he turned to Morrison. ‘Better radio for medical assistance.’

Macrae took a moment to regain his composure, breathing deeply, straightening and stretching stiffened limbs. ‘The fucking wee bastard!’ he said finally.

‘Who?’ Gunn heard the crackle of Morrison’s radio behind him, and the sergeant’s voice requesting an ambulance.

Macrae pulled himself up into the driver’s seat and fought for a breath. ‘Carr. That’s his name. I remember it from his boat licence. Hired a boat from me a week or so ago. Had all the right paperwork, so I’d no reason to doubt him.’ He fumbled in his pockets for cigarettes and lighter, and lit one with trembling hands. ‘Said he was going to spend a few days exploring the east coast. Do the Golden Road, but from the sea, going ashore to camp at night. Paid up front. But he was back the next day. Said the weather was too bad.’ He shrugged. ‘Didn’t even ask for a refund.’

‘I take it he showed up again today, then?’ Gunn said.

Macrae sucked on his cigarette, then curled a lip in anger as he blew out the smoke. ‘Aye, damn right he did. This afternoon, wanting to hire another boat. I told him there was a storm on the way, but he said he’d be safely berthed somewhere sheltered before it came. Wanted the same boat he had last time, with an inflatable tender for getting him ashore. But it’s out on a hire, so I showed him another one.’ He howked phlegm up into his mouth and spat over the side into the water. ‘He’s taking a look over it when I hear this thumping coming from inside his motor.’ He nodded towards the far quay. ‘That’s it, over there. The red Mitsubishi.’

Gunn glanced up and saw the SUV he had spotted when they first arrived.

‘So I go over to take a look. There’s definitely something alive in the back of it, kicking and rocking the bloody thing. I’m peering through the smoked glass, and I see this... I don’t know, kid, a girl or something. All tied up, a bag over her head, kicking shit out the tailgate. I’m turning to go and open it up, when, wham, that bugger goes and cracks me on the bloody head.’ He lifts a rueful hand to the gash in it. ‘Don’t know what he hit me with, but he just about split my skull.’ Another drag on his cigarette. ‘Next thing I know, I’m lying in the dark, trussed up like a bloody chicken. Not even the first idea how long I’d been there. Started kicking the side of the boat like mad when I heard your voices.’

Gunn held out a hand to him. ‘Come on, let’s get you back on dry land. Can you stand up okay?’

‘Aye.’ But still he staggered as he stood, and it took both policemen to help him up on to the quayside.

Gunn said, ‘I take it he took the boat?’

Macrae cast his eyes over the boats in the harbour. ‘Aye, it’s gone alright.’

‘Any other boats missing?’

Macrae seemed surprised, glancing at Gunn, then passing his gaze over the harbour again. ‘Aye, there is,’ he said. ‘Harrison’s boat’s gone.’

Gunn said, ‘You never mentioned that he had a boat here.’

Macrae gave him a look. ‘You never asked, Mr Gunn. And why would I even think to mention it? He’s been berthing a boat at Rodel for about a year. Don’t know why, though. He’s hardly ever out in it.’ He thought about it for a moment. ‘I suppose I must still have been unconscious when it left. Never heard a thing.’

‘There’s an ambulance on the way, George,’ Morrison said.

Gunn nodded and turned back to Macrae with the heaviest of hearts. He heard himself sigh before he said, ‘Is there anyone, sir, who could take us out to the Flannan Isles?’

‘What, now?’ Macrae seemed incredulous.

‘Aye.’

‘You think that’s where they’ve gone?’

‘I’m pretty sure it is, sir. Both boats.’

Macrae shook his head, then winced from the pain of it. ‘You’ll not get anyone to take you out there on a night like this, Mr Gunn. Yon folk might have reached the Flannans before the storm broke, but they’ll not get back tonight, and the only way anyone else is going to get out there now is by helicopter.’

Gunn couldn’t help feeling something like relief.