The Chessmen

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

‘Marsaili said I might find you up here.’

Fin was startled by the voice behind him, and looked up to see George Gunn looking down at him. Beyond him he saw the policeman’s car pulled up at the roadside, a hundred yards or so beyond the house where Fin had grown up. He had not heard Gunn approach over the noise of the wind. He got to his feet and shook the other man’s hand.

Gunn wore a white shirt, dark tie fluttering in the wind beneath a quilted black anorak that hung open. Trousers a little too long for him gathered around highly polished black brogues. His appearance here, crashing into Fin’s reflections, felt ominous.

‘How did the autopsy go?’

Gunn shrugged and pulled a face. ‘It was pretty unpleasant, Mr Macleod. And didn’t really throw any further illumination on the circumstances or cause of death.’ He sucked in a breath. ‘But the brass have arrived from Inverness. And they’re treating it as murder.’

Fin nodded.

‘The advance guard of the fourth estate has arrived, too. On the first flight this morning. God knows how the press gets hold of these things, but given Roddy Mackenzie’s status in the music world, and the manner of his disappearance, we can probably expect a flood of them over the next few days. And I imagine most of them will be wanting a word with you, as the man who found him.’

Fin smiled grimly. ‘Then I’ll make sure to stay out of their way, George.’

‘Aye, that would be a good idea.’ Gunn rubbed his jaw thoughtfully. ‘Did you ever manage to have that word with your friend, Mr Macleod?’ The question seemed almost casual, but Fin knew that it wasn’t.

‘Whistler?’

‘John Angus Macaskill,’ Gunn confirmed.

‘No, I didn’t.’ He hesitated. ‘Is there a problem?’

‘The Detective Inspector would like a word with him.’

‘Why?’

‘As I told you yesterday, we need his statement. About the finding of the plane.’ He paused. ‘Also, he knew the deceased.’

‘So did I.’

‘Yes, sir. But you haven’t disappeared.’

Fin frowned. ‘And Whistler has?’

‘Well, it seems he’s not to be found, or doesn’t want to be. I’m assuming you went looking for him yesterday?’

Fin nodded his affirmation.

‘And we sent the local bobby to go fetch him first thing this morning. But he’s not at his croft, and appears not to have spent the night at the house. You wouldn’t know where he might be?’

‘No idea, George. Whistler’s a free spirit. Goes where the fancy takes him. He probably spent the night in a shieling somewhere, in shock about Roddy.’

Gunn pushed out a thoughtful lower lip. ‘Local intelligence would have us believe that Whistler Macaskill and Roddy Mackenzie were known to have had their differences.’

Fin almost laughed. ‘If anyone thinks that Whistler had anything to do with Roddy’s murder, they’d be barking up the wrong bloody tree, George. And anyway, he was as upset by finding the body in the plane as I was.’

‘That’s as may be, Mr Macleod. But it seems more than a little odd that he should just vanish off the face of the earth, don’t you think?’ He hesitated. ‘At the risk of repeating myself, I’ll ask again. Is there something you’re not telling me?’

Fin felt the first spits of rain in his face as the wind freshened from the west. And he wondered again what it was that Whistler hadn’t told him. ‘No, George. There isn’t.’