Deborah Crombie - Duncan Kincaid & Gemma James 09 - Now May You Weep

Chapter Sixteen

And I remember home and the old time, The winding river, the white morning rime, The autumn robin by the riverside, That pipes in the grey eve.

—robert louis stevenson, “The Family”

Kit walked aimlessly for hours, only vaguely aware of his surroundings, his mind playing and replaying the events of the morning. He had been finishing a last-minute piece of toast before school when the phone rang. Wesley had already left with Toby, and he’d assumed it was Wes calling from his mobile phone with a last-minute instruction.

When he’d heard Ian’s voice on the other end of the line he’d whooped with surprise.

“Dad! What are you doing ringing this time of morning? It must be the middle of the night in Canada.” He felt awkward now saying Dad, but what else could he call the man he’d thought of as his father for almost twelve years?

Absently, he tossed the dogs their ball and watched them scramble after it.

“It’s almost two,” said Ian, “a bit late for an old man

like me, I’ll admit.” Kit thought he sounded slightly tipsy.

“But I wanted to catch you before you left for school.”

Kit felt a little clutch of fear, and the last bit of his toast seemed to stick on the way down. “Why? Is something wrong? You know about the letter?”

“Yes, but that’s not why I called, Kit. And nothing’s wrong. In fact, I’ve got some rather good news to share with you. I wanted you to be the first to know.”

Kit’s heart leaped. “You’re coming home? Back to Cambridge?”

“Um, no.” Ian sounded suddenly hesitant. “It looks like I’ll be staying in Toronto permanently. There are two things I had to tell you, actually, Kit. The house in Grantchester finally sold.”

Kit’s throat tightened. It was all he could do to speak.

“That’s . . . good. That’s . . . that’s what you wanted.”

“I know the idea’s going to be a little bit of an adjust-ment for you, but it had to be done. You do understand that, don’t you, Kit?”

“Yeah, of course I do,” Kit said, trying very hard to sound as if he did. The dogs had come back to him, panting, Tess the proud possessor of the ball, but he ignored them.

“I’ve got to make a new life. We both do.” Ian paused again, clearing his throat. “That’s the other thing I was going to tell you. That’s why I was up so late. I’ve been at a party, celebrating my engagement.”

“Engagement?” Kit said blankly. In the moment’s silence, he heard the tick of the kitchen clock, and as he gazed at Gemma’s black and red teapot, the colors swam before his eyes.

“She’s a wonderful girl, Kit. I know you’ll like her.

Melinda—her name’s Melinda—is really looking forward to meeting you. Of course, she is a bit young for me.” Ian gave a chuckle. “But who am I to complain?”

“You’re getting married?”

“That’s what I’ve been telling you.” Ian’s patience sounded forced. “The first of July. Just a small ceremony—”

“How can you be getting married?” Kit shouted, taking it in at last. “Mum’s only been dead a year—”

“Kit! That’s enough,” snapped Ian. “Look,” he went on more gently, “I understand this is a shock, but you know your mother and I hadn’t been on good terms for a while before she . . . died. It’s time for me to move on, concentrate on the living. And this means you’ll have a new home, in Canada, when you come to visit.”

“I don’t want—”

“That’s the other thing, Kit. I know we’d talked about your coming at the end of June, when your term finishes, but Melinda and I will be on our honeymoon. I’m sure we can work something out later in the sum—”

Kit didn’t hear the rest of Ian’s plan because he had, for the first time in his life, hung up on an adult in the middle of a conversation. When the phone rang again, he was walking out the door. It was only after he turned the corner that the insistent burring faded away.

His feet had carried him along the familiar route to school of their own accord, but when he reached the gate he saw that the schoolyard was empty. The bell had rung, and it suddenly seemed to Kit as if walking into an already seated class and explaining his tardiness was a feat as far beyond him as walking on the moon.

He had turned round and gone the other way, back through the quiet streets until he’d reached Notting Hill Gate, and then into Bayswater Road. At some point, he’d taken off his school blazer and stuffed it into his back-pack, for it was warm, and he was aware of the stare of the occasional passerby wondering what a boy his age was doing out of school on a Monday morning.

He kept thinking of some other family living in the cottage in Grantchester, but even though he’d stayed there again with Ian for a few months before moving to London, he couldn’t get a picture in his head that didn’t include his mother.

For an instant, when he’d thought Ian might be coming back, he’d imagined living there again. Not that he wanted to leave Duncan and Gemma and Toby—not at all—but he missed his old school and his friends, especially Colin. He had belonged, and that belonging had been part of him, as were his memories of his life before his mum had died.

Now it seemed Ian meant to take even that away from him. Kit didn’t want another family; he couldn’t bear to see Ian with another woman, a replacement for his mother. Was that why Ian had suggested the paternity test? Did he intend to put the past behind him, so that he could start his new life—his new family—unencumbered by the child he had never thought of as his own?

Kit went on, putting one foot in front of the other automatically, and it was only when he looked up and saw Marble Arch that he realized he’d walked the whole length of Hyde Park. Turning, he looked back at the park, and the sight of the people walking their dogs made him think of Tess with a pang.

But Tess would be all right, he assured himself. Wes would take care of her. He missed her, and Geordie, Gemma’s cocker spaniel, but he could not face going back to the Notting Hill house. He couldn’t sit calmly at the kitchen table and tell Wesley that his dad was getting married again. And what would he say when Duncan called, or Gemma? Even if he didn’t tell them about Ian, he would have to explain why he had missed school, and what sort of excuse could he possibly invent?

A number seventy-three bus barreled by, turning the corner into Oxford Street, on its way to Euston and King’s Cross Station.

King’s Cross. Fumbling in his pocket, Kit pulled out the spending money Duncan had given him for the week and counted it. There was enough—at least for a single ticket, and just now he didn’t care about the return. He wanted only to be someplace familiar, someplace that felt right, someplace where he could think things through.

He set off after the bus at a run.

“It’s our son,” Kincaid explained to Ross. “He seems to have taken advantage of our absence to play truant from school,” he added, trying to make light of it.

“How old is the lad?” Ross asked.

“Twelve.”

“Och, I don’t envy ye, then,” Ross said sympatheti-cally. “It’s a difficult age. Weel, I’ll leave ye to get on with it. I’m sure you’ll turn him up—or he’ll come home of his own accord when he gets hungry.” He got into the car, but as his sergeant began to reverse, he called out to them. “I didna realize the two of you were married. It’s verra confusing these days, what with the women having different names.”

“Of all the—” began Gemma as Ross drove off, then she shook her head. “Never mind. Tell me exactly what Wesley said.”

“He started to get worried when Kit didn’t come home at the usual time. After an hour, he rang one of Kit’s mates at school, the boy he’d been partnering on his science project—his name’s Sean, I think.” He should know this, Kincaid told himself furiously. It was his business to know these things. He forced himself to go on. “Sean told Wes that Kit wasn’t in school today at all.”

“Did he leave a note?”

“Not that Wes could find.”

“What about Tess?” asked Gemma. “Did he take Tess?”

Kit seldom went anywhere without the little terrier he had befriended in the days following his mother’s death.

“No. But his school bag is gone, so he must have started out—”

“Oh, God.” Gemma had gone dead white. “You don’t think—someone—”

“No.” Kincaid pulled her to him in a fierce hug. “No, I don’t think anything’s happened to him. I think he was angry with me, and decided at the last minute to do a runner. I’m going to call Laura Miller.”

Laura Miller had worked with Vic in the university’s English faculty, and Laura’s son, Colin, had been Kit’s best friend at school. Kit had stayed with the Millers for several months after Vic’s death and still visited Colin every few weekends.

“Right.” Gemma gave him a shaky smile. “That’s where he will have gone.”

But when Kincaid got Laura on the phone, she said she hadn’t seen Kit since the last time he’d come to visit. She promised to quiz Colin and to ring back if she learned anything.

When he related this news to Gemma he saw the flare of panic in her eyes. “We’ll have to put out a bulletin,”

she said. “If he’s been gone since first thing this morning, he could be anywhere—”

“No, wait.” Kincaid held up a hand as a thought occurred to him. “Let me try one more thing.” This time he rang a Grantchester number. Nathan Winter had been Vic’s next-door neighbor and, briefly, her lover. A Cambridge biology professor, he had encouraged Kit in his love of science, and the two had become friends.

“Hullo, Nathan? It’s Duncan—”

“It’s all right, Duncan,” came Nathan’s familiar deep rumble. “He’s here. I found him down by the river a half hour ago. I’m just taking some tea and sandwiches out to the garden for him—he was ravenous, poor lad.”

Relief left Kincaid’s muscles weak, but the emotion was quickly replaced by a rush of anger. What the hell had prompted Kit to go to Grantchester without telling them? And how was he going to get the boy home, if he couldn’t trust him? Even if he had Nathan put him on the train, he’d no guarantee that Kit would do as he was told. “Put him on the phone, Nathan. I want to speak to him.”

“Duncan, wait. Let him stay with me for a bit, let me talk to him. He wouldn’t have come just on a whim. He muttered something about Ian having rung him this morning—”

“Ian?”

“That’s all I’ve got out of him, so far. But perhaps I can help him sort it out, whatever’s happened. I’ve a light day for tutorials tomorrow, and he can come with me.”

Kincaid thought of the circumstances that had sent Kit running to Grantchester once before. Then, he’d been escaping from his grandmother’s abuse. What could Ian have said to the boy to induce such a response? And if he had been home, would Kit have confided in him, instead of running away?

“All right,” he said to Nathan at last, feeling as if he’d set the seal on his failure. “Perhaps for a day or two, until I can get back. But you should know what’s been going on.” He told Nathan about Eugenia’s latest maneuver.

“I’ve asked Kit to have DNA testing, to put paid to her once and for all, and Ian’s agreed, but Kit won’t consider it. Maybe you can talk some sense into him.”

“I’ll do my best. Look, I’d better go. He’s coming in from the garden.”

“Okay. Tell him he can stay tomorrow, at the least, and ring me when you’ve had a chance to speak to him. And, Nathan,” Kincaid added, “don’t let him out of your sight.”

Dinner that night was a strained affair. Louise served Gemma, Kincaid, Martin, and Hazel in the dining room, Heather and Pascal having gone to Benvulin for the night.

Everyone seemed preoccupied with his or her own worries. Hazel had at last reached her mother-in-law, Carolyn Cavendish, who had told her that Tim was being questioned by the London police. Louise had not heard anything from John since Chief Inspector Ross had taken him to Aviemore, and both Gemma and Kincaid were concerned about Kit. Since his discussion with Nathan, Kincaid had been trying to ring Ian in Toronto, with no success.

Martin, to his credit, had offered to help Louise in the kitchen, but she’d refused him with a marked lack of gra-ciousness, and he had been glowering at her ever since.

When Louise had set the last bowl of steaming fish stew before them, Hazel said, “Louise, come sit down and join us, please.”

Louise stopped in the doorway, twisting the skirt of her apron in her hands. “Oh, no, thanks. I don’t think I can bear to sit, to tell the truth, not until John’s . . . I’ll just get some more hot bread.” She vanished back into the kitchen.

Gemma felt as if the painted fish swimming round the walls were staring down at her accusingly. With an apologetic nod at the largest trout, she took a bite of her stew and found it much better than she’d anticipated.

“How long can they keep him?” asked Martin, frowning at his soup bowl. “It’s not like they can charge him with anything—can they?” The sudden appeal in his voice made him sound very young.

“I shouldn’t think so,” answered Gemma, “based on what Chief Inspector Ross said.” She leaned forward, catching the fresh green scent of the boughs Louise had placed on the sideboard. “But, Martin, you have to understand that we’re not privy to all the chief inspector’s information.”

“What sort of information?”

“Forensics results, witness reports—”

“You’re saying he may have more evidence against John than he told us? But John can’t have—John wouldn’t—”

“Martin.” Louise had slipped back into the room, un-noticed, a basket of sliced bread in her hand. “Just shut up. You don’t know anything, and you’ll only make things worse by going on about it.”

“Worse?” Martin’s voice rose to a squeak. “How could asking questions possibly make anything worse? Good God, Louise, anyone would think you believed John had done—” He stared at her, his eyes widening. “That is what you think, isn’t it? You actually believe your own husband shot Donald!”

“You’ve no idea what I think.” Louise bit the words off furiously. “And I’m bloody sick and tired of you swan-ning round my house as if you owned it, spouting your opinions, as if anyone actually cared what you thought.

When John gets back—”

“Louise—” began Hazel, but Martin stood, rocking the table and sloshing soup on the tablecloth.

“Right. That’s it. I’m going, and when John gets back, you can explain to him why I left.” Martin brushed by

Louise and stalked out of the room. A moment later they heard his footsteps clattering up the stairs.

“Louise,” said Hazel again, but Louise turned and bolted back into the kitchen.

The other three sat looking at one another for a moment, then Gemma said quietly, “He’s got no place to go.”

“Maybe I should have a friendly word with him.” Kincaid’s offer was given so swiftly that Gemma suspected he’d been looking for an excuse to leave the room and ring Ian again.

When he’d gone out, Hazel dropped her face into her hands. “And I should go talk to Louise,” she said, her voice muffled.

“You’ve enough on your plate just now,” Gemma told her gently. “Give her a minute to cool down and I’ll go in. But in the meantime, I want a word with you.” They hadn’t had a moment alone since Hazel had spoken with Heather in the barn. “Hazel, Heather did tell you—”

“Yes.” Dropping her hands, Hazel looked up at her with red-rimmed eyes. “I still can’t believe it.”

“Have you any idea why Donald left you his shares?”

asked Gemma.

“No.” Hazel shook her head in bewilderment. “Especially considering the way his father felt about me. I’m the last person Bruce Brodie would have wanted in control of his business.”

“Could that have been why Donald chose you?”

“To show his father up? But Bruce has been dead for years.”

“What if he felt his father had ruined his life by driving you away . . . a bit far-fetched, I’ll admit,” Gemma added with a sigh. She thought for a moment. “But what if Donald meant it as a gesture to prove his commitment to your future together? In which case, he must have in-

tended to tell you what he’d done.” Gemma’s heart gave a lurch as she realized where her supposition led. “Hazel, Donald didn’t tell you, did he?”

Hazel looked appalled. “Of course not! You can’t think I knew—”

“No, no. I’m sorry.” Gemma reached across the table and touched Hazel’s hand. “That was stupid of me. But what if Donald told someone else?”

“You think someone murdered him because of it? But why would someone kill Donald because he’d left his shares to me?”

“Is there any way someone could profit from your ownership?” asked Gemma. “What about Heather?”

“No. Heather’s the one who’s lost most over this, after everything she did for him. Only if I—” Hazel looked down at her stew and seemed to focus great concentration on taking a bite.

“What? Tell me what you were going to say,” demanded Gemma.

“Nothing. It was nothing. We should eat,” Hazel added brightly. “The stew’s getting cold.”

“That’s bollocks.” Gemma caught Hazel’s gaze, held it. “If you keep things from me, I can’t help. You do want to find out who killed Donald, don’t you?”

“You know I do.” Hazel shut her eyes, and Gemma saw her shudder, as if she were recalling the sight of Donald’s body. “All right,” she said at last. “It’s just that Heather made me an offer today. She said Pascal’s firm would buy my shares outright, immediately. She said I could just walk away from the whole thing, easy as pie.”

“That’s what she wanted from Donald,” mused Gemma. “But he wouldn’t give it to her. Maybe she thought you’d be an easier mark.”

“I don’t believe that. She’s my cousin, for God’s sake.

I’ve known her since she was a child.”

“You don’t know her now,” Gemma argued. “You haven’t seen her in ten years.”

“That doesn’t matter. I know she couldn’t have shot Donald. She loved him— I don’t mean they were lovers, but they were friends. She was like family to him.”

Too often, Gemma had seen love mutate into violence, but she didn’t have the heart to share that with Hazel. Instead she asked, “What are you going to do? Will you sell Pascal the shares?”

“How could I? That would mean betraying Donald—

and how could I agree to profit from Donald’s death?

That’s—that’s obscene.” Hazel pushed her bowl away abruptly, as if the smell made her ill. Her eyes filled with the tears she’d managed to hold in check for two days.

“This is too much. And then, when I talked to Carolyn tonight . . .”

“Tim’s mum?”

Hazel nodded. “We were friends, Carolyn and I, and now I’ve betrayed her, too. She kept trying to comfort me, telling me it was all some dreadful mistake and that things would be all right. But it’s not going to be all right.

If I’d had the slightest hope that Tim and I could patch things up, Donald giving me those shares put an end to it.

How can I possibly explain this to Tim?”

“Right now it’s more a question of Tim explaining where he was over the weekend,” said Gemma practically. She couldn’t shake the feeling that Tim had been there, perhaps close enough to touch, and yet she knew that was the last thing Hazel would accept.

“I’m sure he just wanted some time on his own. Why are the police talking to him, anyway, if they think Donald was shot with John’s gun?”

“They have to be thorough,” Gemma told her, feeling a twinge of guilt for having insisted that Ross have Tim interviewed.

“Not that I believe for a minute that John would do something like that,” continued Hazel. “I mean, why would he have wanted to hurt Donald?”

Gemma thought of the usual motives for murder. There was jealousy, but John had never met Hazel until that weekend. There was greed, but she couldn’t see how John had benefited from Donald’s death. There was revenge, but as far as she knew, Donald had been a good friend to John. And then there was the desire to protect a secret.

“Hazel, what do you really know about John?” she asked. “You and Louise hadn’t seen each other for years.”

Hazel considered for a moment. “Louise met John after Donald and I split up—after I’d gone back to England—so I never knew him when Louise and I were living in Grantown. I don’t think she ever really dated anyone seriously until she met John, come to think of it.

Um, let’s see.” She chewed her thumbnail. “I know he sold commercial real estate in Edinburgh before they came here, and that he and Louise had a flat in the New Town. I know he always wanted to cook. And then there are the obvious things, of course—he’s married to Louise; he has a much younger brother, Martin, from his mother’s second marriage.”

John did have another connection with Donald, Gemma realized, one she had forgotten. They had both been friends with Callum MacGillivray.

“This is dreadful,” Hazel said suddenly. “These are my friends. How can I be sitting here, speculating about them?” She pushed her bowl aside.

“I’m sorry.” Gemma could have kicked herself for being so insensitive. “You’re right. I shouldn’t have asked

you. This is hard enough for me, and I’ve only known them a few days.”

“No, I’m sorry.” Hazel gave her a tremulous smile.

“You’re trying to help, and I snapped at you. And here you must be worried sick about Kit, and I’ve been no use to you at all.”

“I’m certain he’s all right with Nathan,” said Gemma, reassuring herself as much as Hazel. She wondered what had happened to Duncan, and if he had succeeded in reaching Ian. “Why don’t you go on to bed,” she told Hazel, “and I’ll give Louise a hand in the kitchen.”

Hazel had protested, but without much force, and Gemma soon convinced her to go back to her room for a bath.

“You’re not staying with me, are you?” asked Hazel. “I think Louise meant to put you and Duncan in Pascal’s room.”

“You’re certain you don’t mind?” Gemma still didn’t feel entirely comfortable leaving Hazel alone, but she didn’t want to worry her by saying so.

“Positive.”

“Okay. I’ll just pop in and get my things later on.”

When she had seen Hazel out the front door, she stood in the hall for a moment, listening. There was a low murmur of male voices from upstairs. Duncan and Martin had obviously found something to talk about.

Collecting a stack of dirty dishes from the dining room, she carried them into the kitchen and looked around. There were cooking pots piled in the sink and an unfinished bowl of Cullen Skink on the small table, but there was no sign of Louise. Gemma thought she would have heard if Louise had gone up the stairs, so she stepped out through the scullery to have a look outside.

The garden was quiet, deep in the shadows of the late dusk. From somewhere nearby she caught the faint, pungent scent of tobacco smoke. As her eyes adjusted to the dimness, she noticed a flickering glow of light coming from the garden shed. “Louise?” she called out, crossing the lawn.

When she looked inside the shed’s open door, she saw Louise sitting on a campstool, smoking a cigarette. On the potting bench burned a small spirit lamp. “Do you mind if I come in?” Gemma asked.

“Suit yourself. I had to get out for a bit.” Louise had thrown a cardigan on over her kitchen apron but still hugged herself as if she were cold.

“I didn’t know you smoked,” Gemma said as she took the other stool.

“I don’t, usually. These are John’s. It’s a little game we play. I pretend I don’t know he smokes them, and then occasionally I nick one or two, but he can’t say anything to me without admitting that he bought them in the first place.”

Gemma smiled. “That sounds like one of those things that keep marriage interesting.”

“I suppose you could look at it like that.” Louise took a last drag on the cigarette, ground it out under her foot, then set the fag end carefully on the bench. “But you and Duncan aren’t married, are you? Why not?”

“Oh, um, it’s complicated,” said Gemma, taken by surprise. “I was married before, and so was he, and neither of us was very successful at it. Maybe we’re afraid to jinx what we’ve got.”

“And the son who played truant today, he doesn’t belong to both of you?”

“He’s Duncan’s son from his first marriage. Toby, the four-year-old, is my son from my first marriage.” She

couldn’t help thinking of the child they had lost, the little boy who would have been due any day now, if he had lived.

“It sounds complicated,” said Louise, bringing Gemma back to the present. “Blending a family like that.”

“Sometimes. But no more complicated than most families, I think.” Gemma saw an opportunity. “Louise, speaking of families, why do you dislike Martin so much? He is John’s brother, after all.”

“Half brother,” Louise corrected, “and he presumes on it. He always has some sad story, although I don’t know the whole of it this time. John’s always taken care of himself—why should he feel obliged to bail Martin out of trouble time and again?” she added bitterly.

“I suppose John feels responsible because Martin’s so much younger,” Gemma suggested, privately wondering if it had something to do with the fact that John and Louise had no children of their own. “Louise, are you sure you don’t have any idea where John was yesterday morning? Could it have had something to do with Martin?”

Louise frowned. “I don’t see how. I saw John leave on his own, and Martin was here.”

“You’d have seen Martin go out?”

“Well,” Louise hesitated. “I think so. But I was working in the garden, and I was in and out of the shed, so I can’t be absolutely certain. And I can’t imagine what Martin and John would have been doing together at that time of the morning.”

“Fishing?” Gemma said, remembering her conversation with Callum MacGillivray.

Louise looked at her blankly. “What are you talking about? John doesn’t have time to fish.”

“But Callum MacGillivray told me that he and John and Donald fished together.”

“You’ve talked to Callum?” asked Louise, sounding surprised.

“Earlier this afternoon, after I picked Duncan up at the station. I saw Alison Grant, the woman who came to see Donald on Saturday night, and she said it was Callum who told her Hazel would be here.”

“And what did Callum tell you?”

“He wanted to convince Alison that Donald wasn’t serious about her.” Gemma thought back to her conversation with Hazel in the dining room and saw an angle she hadn’t considered. “Louise, do you know if John knew Alison Grant?”

The shadows from the spirit lamp flickered across Louise’s face, making it difficult for Gemma to read her expression. “If he did,” Louise said carefully, “he never told me.”

Callum had sat through dinner with his aunt and his father in the farmhouse kitchen, picking at his food. From the worktop, Aunt Janet’s old black-and-white television had re-layed the local news, and they had all watched, transfixed by the fuzzy images. The police had released Donald’s name, and the television producers had managed to unearth a tape showing Donald opening the previous year’s local Highland Games. This they had juxtaposed with footage of Benvulin, of the crowd milling about the gate at Innesfree, and of the white mortuary van turning out of Innesfree’s drive.

It had made Callum’s throat tighten with renewed grief, and he thought with horror of Alison and Chrissy watching from their sitting room.

His father, befuddled with gin, kept repeating, “Is that Donald Brodie? I thought you said he was dead.”

“He is dead, Tom,” Janet said patiently. “That’s just a film.”

Callum fought against a rising tide of hysteria, unsure whether he was going to laugh or sob. He forced himself to kiss his aunt’s cheek, and to nod a good night to his father, then he escaped into the stable yard with Murphy at his side.

They had eaten unusually late, having waited for the vet to stop by to see one of the horses, and now the gathering dusk was pooling in the yard’s corners and cran-nies. Callum felt the cool darkness brush against his skin like velvet, and the scent of the river came to him for an instant. A curlew piped as it settled down for the night.

He felt his love for the land, and for this place, as an ache lodged in his chest, and for the first time he saw clearly the futility of his desire to share it with Alison.

How could he have been so stupid? It had to be bred in the bone, in the sinews, in the blood, and he could no more force it on someone else than he could take it out of himself.

Chrissy, now, she was different. He had seen it in her eyes from the first, when Alison brought her to the stables. There was something about the way she stood so still, taking everything in, and in the expression of delight that slowly blossomed on her small, round face. She understood the language of the horses, and of the other animals; she listened when he told her the stories of the land, and of the men who had shaped it.

There was so much he could have taught her, but he had lost that opportunity when he had turned Alison against him.

Beside him, Murphy lifted his nose to the wind, sniffing, and the hackles rose along his back. Callum caught the scent a moment later, the faintest trace of cold metal and brine. The mild, clear evening was a treacherous de-

ception—there was snow coming, and before long, if he was not mistaken.

Snow in May was not unheard of in the Highlands, but always dreaded for the damage it did to plants and animals alike. Callum felt a chill worm its way down his spine, which had nothing to do with the weather, and he was suddenly eager for the close warmth of the cottage.

He made a last circuit of the barn, checking on the horses, before going into the cottage and banking up the stove. He fetched a mug and the distinctive dark green bottle from the shelf above the sink, then settled himself in the worn armchair. This was not mellow, honeyed Benvulin, but Lagavulin from Islay, redolent of peat fires, coal tar, and sea winds. This was a night for a whisky that would scour the soul.

Usually, he allowed himself only a dram in the evening—he had no wish to end up like his father. But tonight he poured an inch in the cup, stared at it, then poured another. The bottle felt unexpectedly light. He shook it experimentally, then upended it once more, splashing the last few drops into the mug.

The first swallow bit into his throat, but after a moment he felt the familiar warmth spreading from his belly, eras-ing the cold as it coursed outwards towards his fingers and toes. He drank steadily, seeking the drowsy oblivion that would blot out thought and feeling.

He had almost drained the cup when he realized something was wrong. A strange, cold numbness filled his mouth, then the room tilted sickeningly. This was not the soft blurring of edges that came with drinking good whisky, even too much good whisky. His heart gave a thump of panic, but it felt oddly separate from him. Placing his hands on the arms of the chair, he pushed himself

up. The room spun, and then he was on his knees, without quite knowing how he had got there.

Help, he thought fuzzily, he had to get help. But his mobile phone, his one concession to modernity, was still in the pocket of his jacket, and his jacket was hanging on a hook by the door.

A wet, black nose pressed against his face. Murphy, thinking this was some sort of new game, had come to investigate. Callum pulled himself up again, carefully, carefully, using the dog and the chair for support. He managed to lurch halfway across the room before a wave of nausea brought him to his knees. He crawled the last few feet. Clutching at the jacket, he pulled it from its hook.

But when he managed to pull the phone from the pocket, he found the numbers a wavering blur. In desperation, he stabbed at the keypad, following the pattern im-printed in his tactile memory.

It was Chrissy who answered. Sickness filled Callum’s throat, but he managed to choke out a few words. “Chrissy . . .

something wrong . . . whisky. Ill. Get your mum.”

Then darkness overtook him, and he remembered nothing else.