The Chessmen

CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
I

There were only a handful of cars in the parking area at the Cabarfeidh. As he turned his jeep nose-first into a slot in front of the main entrance, Fin cast a glance over the other vehicles. There was no sign of Mairead’s rental car. He hurried into the lobby and crossed to reception. The girl behind the desk gave him a practised smile, but in spite of the Americanized greeting, there was no disguising her Stornoway accent. ‘Good morning. How may I help you?’ He saw her eyes flicker towards his bandaged head.

‘Is Mairead Morrison in or out?’

The girl looked surprised. ‘Miss Morrison checked out this morning, sir. Lewis Car Rental just picked up her car. She took a taxi to the airport.’

Fin glanced at his watch. ‘What time’s her flight?’

‘The Glasgow flight leaves at 12.20.’

It was 11.45.

Fin reached the airport in just over ten minutes. As he drove up the road from Oliver’s Brae towards the roundabout, he could see the small, prop-engined aircraft sitting out on the tarmac, the luggage trailer being towed out to the hold.

Rain still spat on his windscreen, smeared across the glass by well-worn wipers. There was no time to find a parking place, and he bypassed the car park to pull up in front of the sliding doors that opened into the tiny terminal building. He abandoned his Suzuki, engine idling, and ran inside. There was just a handful of people sitting around in the waiting area, silhouettes against panoramic windows looking out on to the airfield. The final stragglers in the queue to pass through security and into the departure lounge were patiently awaiting their turn.

He saw Mairead in her distinctive long black coat. She was showing her ticket to the security officer.

‘Mairead!’ His voice reverberated around the little airport, and heads turned from every direction. Mairead’s was one of them. He was almost shocked by the whiteness of her face. So marked in contrast to her favourite black, and the dark auburn of her cropped hair.

The security officer stood holding her ticket, waiting to return it. But she was like a rabbit caught in the headlights, staring at Fin with saucer eyes. He started across the concourse towards her, his voice still raised. ‘I need to talk to you.’

Finally she found hers. ‘There’s no time. My flight’s just about to leave.’ She turned to retrieve her ticket.

‘Get the next one.’

The remaining faces in the queue glanced from Mairead to Fin and back again, fascinated by the unfolding drama. Not only was the singer Mairead Morrison on their flight, but she was engaged in some kind of row with a wild-eyed man whose head was bandaged and bloody.

‘I can’t.’

‘If you get on that plane I’m going straight back to the police station in Stornoway to tell the cops what I know.’ He could see the anxiety and uncertainty in her eyes, not knowing what it was he knew.

‘Have to hurry you, madam,’ the security officer said.

Fin stopped and held her gaze for a long moment before he saw her resistance crumbling, surrendering to the inevitable. She took a deep breath and pushed back through the remaining passengers to walk boldly up to Fin, clutching her ticket, her demeanour unmistakably hostile. She lowered her voice to little more than a hiss, her face just six inches from his. ‘Tell me.’

‘I know it wasn’t Roddy in that plane.’

Her blue eyes grew cold, and there was a moment when he could almost see the calculation behind them. She made a decision, took his arm and steered him quickly away towards the seating area in front of the windows. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘I’m talking about the operation Roddy had to repair his shattered femur after the accident on the Road to Nowhere. They put in plates and screws to hold it together. Strangely missing from the body we found in the cockpit.’ She couldn’t hold his eye, and looked away through the glass towards the plane, silent and thoughtful. Wishing perhaps that she was already on it. ‘Who did we bury the other day, Mairead?’

Her eyes darted towards him and then quickly away again.

‘Whistler knew that wasn’t Roddy. I don’t know how, but he did. He was never the same from the moment we found that plane. What did he know, Mairead?’ And when she said nothing, he gripped her arm above the elbow, fingers sinking into soft flesh, and saw her wince from the pain of it. ‘Come on! Someone killed Whistler to shut him up, didn’t they?’

Her head whipped round, eyes filled with a strange mix of anger and hurt. ‘No!’ She was breathing hard. ‘I have no idea who killed Whistler. Or why.’

‘I don’t believe you.’ He glared at her. ‘There was something going on between you two. You both knew that wasn’t Roddy.’ He was almost shocked to see her eyes fill up.

‘Poor Whistler.’ And tears spilled down the porcelain white of her cheeks.

Fin was unmoved. ‘If I didn’t know you, Mairead, I might almost believe they were real.’ And he saw genuine hurt in the look she turned on him. ‘Tell me about Roddy. Is he alive, is he dead? The truth, Mairead.’ Hesitation was evident in her eyes, in her face, in her whole body language. ‘I’m not letting this go. You can either tell me or you can tell the police. It’s up to you.’

She turned away, gazing through the window again as if looking for help, or maybe divine intervention. And Fin saw passengers, heads bowed against the wind and rain, making their way hurriedly across the tarmac to the steps of the plane. Among them, staring into the light that shone out from the terminal building, the pale faces of Strings, Skins and Rambo. It was clear that they had seen Fin with Mairead. There was an exchange of words among them. But it was too late to turn back.

Mairead said suddenly, ‘I need to make a phone call.’ She pulled her arm free of Fin’s grasp and walked off across the concourse, fishing her mobile phone from her coat pocket. She selected a number from its memory then put it to her ear.

Fin watched from a distance as she spoke rapidly to someone at the other end. For a moment he wondered if it might even be Strings, or Skins or Rambo as they boarded the plane. She seemed to be arguing. Gesturing into space with her free hand, and briefly he heard her voice raised in protest. And then she hung up. She stood for several seconds, as if replaying the conversation in her head, then turned back towards Fin and thrust her phone in her pocket as she approached.

There was something hard now in her eyes. Emotionless. She said, ‘You want the truth?’ She paused for what was clearly a long, painful moment. ‘Meet me the day after tomorrow. In Malaga.’