White Nights

Chapter Twenty-one

It was the apparent lack of urgency around the investigation that got under Roy Taylor’s skin, made him fidget and itch. There was so much to do and these local guys seemed to think there was all the time in the world. In his own patch he’d have shouted and ranted and soon got his staff moving. And he’d have felt better for letting off steam. Here he knew he had to contain his temper, and that added to the tension and the impatience.

He arrived at Biddista a quarter of an hour before he’d arranged to meet Perez, but still he felt irritated because the man wasn’t there. At the jetty the scene tape had been removed and any of the locals could get in now to fetch out their gear for fishing. Waiting for Perez to arrive, Taylor thought fishing would be like torture to him. Being on the sea in a small boat. Not being able to move. Having to remain quiet. Wanting to throw up as soon as they left dry land. He knew he wouldn’t be able to bear it. He’d end up diving into the water to escape, just to be moving. Then he realized that Perez’s car had pulled up beside him. Five minutes early. He had a moment of disappointment; he would have liked an excuse to criticize, even inside his head. He had to be so pleasant to Perez that it hurt.

They sat for a moment on the low wall that bordered the road.

‘Got anything for me?’ Again, as Taylor asked the question he hoped, in a perverse way, that there was nothing. Every relationship for him was a sort of competition and he liked winning, even here when it was part of the job to be cooperative. The last Shetland case had ended with Perez as a local hero. Taylor would never let it show, but it still rankled. That wasn’t how events should have played out. He should have been the one to make the difference, to reach the conclusion. The stranger coming in to clean up town, like in all those cowboy films he watched on the telly when he was a lad. He knew it was pathetic and childish, but he couldn’t help it. The fact that his work had been recognized more widely within the force helped, but each case was a challenge. He needed to succeed every time.

‘A couple of things,’ Perez said.

‘Great,’ Taylor said, shaking his head up and down to prove how pleased he was. ‘Great.’

‘I’ve found a witness who thinks she might have seen the victim being dropped off here. I’ve got Sandy tracing the driver. And the same woman says that the plastic mask over the victim’s face could have been bought at the Middleton Sunday teas last week.’

‘Sunday teas?’

Perez considered. ‘I suppose the English equivalent would be a village fête.’

‘We didn’t have many of those in Liverpool.’ Taylor wasn’t sure where he’d feel more alien – here, miles from anywhere, surrounded by sea, or in an English village with a vicarage, spinsters on bicycles, duck ponds. He thought he didn’t really feel at home anywhere. Perhaps he should go back to Merseyside. Just for a long weekend. See how it felt. He still wasn’t sure he could contemplate a permanent move.

‘How do you want to play it today?’ he said. He had to ask. Whatever he felt about being the boss, this was always going to be Perez’s show. His patch. Besides, by now Taylor didn’t really care who they saw first, he just wanted to make something happen.

Perez hesitated and Taylor made the decision for him, couldn’t help himself.

‘Let’s go and see the artist. Bella Sinclair.’ From everything he’d heard, Taylor saw her right at the centre of the case, a fat spider in her web. The victim had been at her party just before he’d died. He’d been involved in some sort of campaign to persuade people not to turn up. Taylor couldn’t believe the dead man was really a stranger to her.

He looked at Perez, wanting some sort of response. Maybe his approval. That’s what he expected from his own team. Great idea, boss. But again, he thought, you could never really tell what Perez was thinking. In the end the Shetlander looked at his watch and smiled. ‘Why not?’ he said. ‘She should just about be out of her bed by now. Another hour or so and you might be able to speak to the boy too.’

If he’d been on his own Taylor would have taken the car, just to get there faster, but Perez started walking up the road and he followed. Perez gave a slow running commentary as they moved.

‘This is the post office and shop. Run by Aggie Williamson. She was a Watt before she was married, grew up in Biddista. Her son Martin was working at the Herring House the night of the party. It was his wife Dawn who thinks she might have seen the victim climb out of a car.’

Taylor listened intently, tried to fix the details in his head. This was the stuff he had to digest if he was to have any chance of getting on top of what was going on here. He’d make notes later, but the concentration needed to memorize them made the players in this game seem more real to him. He needed to know these people better than he knew his own friends and family. They had to become a part of his life. Perez had the advantage of understanding them already.

The commentary continued. ‘The end house has been rented by an English writer called Wilding. Peter Wilding. He was at the party too. I spoke to him. He claims not to have seen or heard anything, though he seems to spend most of his life staring out of the window.’

Perez paused.

‘You don’t believe him?’ Taylor asked.

‘I don’t know. There was something weird about him. Maybe I just didn’t take to the man. He’s sort of intense.’

‘What sort of stuff does he write?’

‘Fantasy, he says.’

‘Stories, then. Made-up stuff.’ Taylor had never seen the point of stories. When he read, it was history or biography. He liked to feel he was learning. It wasn’t just time wasted. As he walked past he turned his head up to the window and saw the upper body and face of a man. The man, dark and good-looking if you were into thin and moody, was sitting at the desk which faced the view, but he wasn’t looking out. He seemed lost in concentration. Taylor realized that he hadn’t noticed them. Hardly an ideal witness, then. He wondered if the same point had occurred to Perez and turned his head surreptitiously to check. But Perez was looking the other way, out to the sea.

‘That’s Kenny Thomson’s boat,’ he said. ‘You’ll not be able to talk to him until later.’

Taylor was impressed by Bella Sinclair’s house. He tried not to let himself be affected by shows of wealth and comfort, told himself he despised them, but deep down he was jealous. He would have loved this space, this view. Sometimes he even caught himself watching those shows about houses on the television. Not the embarrassing ones, the makeovers, all tacky décor and quick fixes, the home-made furniture you could tell would fall apart within days. He liked the programmes about grand building projects, the chateaux in France brought lovingly back to life, the mills and warehouses turned into breathtaking apartments. If ever he went back to Liverpool, he’d like one of those terraced houses near the cathedrals. One time the streets had been the scene of the Toxteth riots, but even then he’d been impressed by their elegance.

Perez rang the bell and they stood for a moment to be let in. Perez had his hands in his pockets, a bit of a slouch. Taylor consciously straightened his back. He wouldn’t have been surprised to be greeted by some kind of servant, but he saw as soon as the door was opened that this must be the house’s owner. She had the style to carry it off.

‘Jimmy,’ she said. ‘What do you want now? I was just about to start work.’ She was wearing jeans and a loose blue smock, which was spattered with paint. She had a thick silver band around her neck and matching earrings.

Perez didn’t answer directly. Taylor sensed that Perez didn’t like her, but couldn’t work out how he could tell the antipathy was there. Certainly Perez was perfectly polite.

‘This is Roy Taylor from Inverness,’ he said. ‘He’s in charge of the investigation.’

She looked at Taylor, held him in her gaze. She stared at him as children stare at very fat people, or at people with a deformity, with a look that was at once frank and curious.

‘Come up to the studio. We can talk while I get on with the prep.’

It was one of the corner bedrooms, not a huge, clear space as Taylor had imagined, but rather cluttered. There were two windows, one looking north on to the hill and the other west over the sea. There was a tall Victorian chest of drawers which reached almost to the ceiling. One of the lower drawers was half open and revealed a pile of white paper. An easel leaned unused against one wall; on another was a stainless-steel sink which looked as if it had been installed recently. Although she made a show of preparing to work, Taylor thought her heart wasn’t in it. She wanted to impress them, to let them know how valuable was her time, but really she was desperate to know what they were there for.

‘Is there any news?’ she asked. ‘Do we know yet who that poor man was?’

The only place to sit in the room was a Shetland chair, made of driftwood, a rough drawer built under the seat. On it was curled a black and white cat. They all remained standing and it made the conversation seem awkward, hurried, as if they’d just met on the street and were about to move on in opposite directions.

‘We think he was involved in spreading the word that your exhibition had been cancelled,’ Taylor said. ‘Seems a weird thing for a stranger to do.’

Bella looked at him with the same curious gaze.

‘I’ve already explained to Jimmy that I didn’t know who he was.’

‘So why would he do it?’ Taylor was persistent. ‘Sounds to me like someone with a grudge.’

‘If he had a grudge, I don’t think it was against me.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It wasn’t only my exhibition. It was a shared project. I was working with a new artist – Fran Hunter.’ Taylor noticed that she didn’t look at Perez during this conversation. He was meant to notice.

Bella continued. ‘Fran’s English. It seems the stranger was English. More likely, surely, that she knew him than I did.’

At that point Perez interrupted. ‘Did Fran give any indication that she recognized the man?’

‘I’m not sure she noticed him. She was too busy talking to Peter Wilding.’

There was a silence. Taylor couldn’t understand what might have caused the awkwardness. What was Perez keeping from him?

‘Is Roddy around?’ Perez asked. ‘I think DCI Taylor would like to talk to him too.’

‘Roddy’s leaving today,’ she said. ‘This was only going to be a flying visit. He’s off to Australia next week.’

‘You’ll miss him.’ Taylor couldn’t tell if Perez meant the words. It sounded almost as if he was mocking her. But Bella answered without question.

‘I will. And I’m not sure when he’ll be back. Each time he comes he seems less at home here. Maybe it’s easier for him to be a Shetlander when he’s away from the islands.’

‘Where will we find him?’ Perez asked.

‘He was packing, but I think I heard him go out.’ She paused. ‘You might find him in the graveyard. He goes there sometimes, usually just before he leaves, to say goodbye to his father.’