by Ann Cleeves
Chapter Seventeen
Perez stood at the South Light and watched the helicopter circle to land. He’d wondered, when the coastguard had first phoned, if his sergeant Sandy Wilson would travel in with it, but the helicopter had come from Sumburgh and the flight had been too quickly arranged to allow for passengers. At least Angela’s body would be off the island. The forensic examination would begin. The plane should make it the following day. As the helicopter took off again and he closed his eyes tight against the wind from the rotor blades, Perez wished for a moment he was going with it. He had a sudden desperate desire to leave Fair Isle and the complications of this particular case behind.
On the way back to the community hall, he noticed that the weather was changing. The wind was still there but it was intermittent, dropping at times almost to nothing, and the sky was brighter behind the cloud. In the hall he had to wait twenty minutes for Sarah Fowler. She’d arrived at her appointed time, but after hearing the helicopter overhead when he was interviewing Dougie, Perez had sent her back to the field centre.
‘Have a coffee. I don’t know how long I’ll be. I’m sorry.’ He hadn’t wanted sightseers when Angela’s body was being lifted into the aircraft.
Now she hurried in with a tight little smile of apology for keeping him waiting.
‘We got a lift back down the island. The lighthouse is such a long way from everything else, isn’t it?’ Her husband stood at the door of the hall looking in and she turned and gave him a wave as if to say she was fine. Perez thought the man would have liked to come in with her, to sit beside her holding her hand while the questions were being asked, but Fowler turned and shut the hall door behind him. Throughout the interview, Perez caught glimpses of him waiting outside. He stood there patient and still, occasionally raising his binoculars to his eyes.
Inside, Perez sat opposite Sarah Fowler and tried to find a way to make her relax. He felt constrained; perhaps it was the name, but she reminded him too much of his first wife to push her for answers about Angela Moore’s death. It wasn’t her physical appearance – his Sarah had been softer and rounder – but the air of anxiety, unhappiness even, that she carried around her. Her tension was contagious and when he took up a pen to make notes he saw his own hand was trembling slightly.
‘I’m sorry to have disrupted your holiday like this.’
She looked up sharply. It wasn’t what she’d been expecting.
‘You didn’t commit the murder, Inspector. You’re just doing your job.’ The words sounded brusque but he thought she was abrupt only because she was so nervous. He understood why her husband felt the need to protect her.
‘Has it been very awkward for you to extend your stay? I presume you too have work to get back to. Or are you involved in your husband’s business?’ To Perez, this felt less like a formal interview than an attempt to make small talk with a reluctant stranger.
‘Good lord, no! He hardly earns enough from selling books to keep himself.’ She paused. ‘I manage a Sure Start children’s centre on a council estate in Bristol. Challenging but I enjoy it.’ She paused. ‘At least until recently, when things got on top of me. The management thing is rather stressful, though the children make up for the bureaucratic hassle. I have great staff. They’ll cope without me.’
He stumbled to find something to say. The loss of a baby must have been almost unbearable for a woman who so much enjoyed the company of children. He found it hard to imagine this shy woman in charge of a bustling, noisy centre.
As if she was reading his mind she continued. ‘They’re used to managing without me. I’ve had a couple of months off work sick this year. Depression.’
‘I’m sorry.’
‘My husband and I have been under a lot of pressure recently, Inspector. This holiday was an attempt to mend the relationship, bring us back together. I wasn’t sure coming to Fair Isle was a good idea. John’s rather a figure of fun in the birdwatching world. He made a couple of highly publicized mistakes. Embarrassing when previously he had such a high profile. I know I shouldn’t care what people think but I find all that more awkward than he does. But we’d enjoyed our stay very much until Angela died.’
She looked up at him. He saw she was waiting for the real questions to begin. Perez would have liked to know more about the events that had brought the couple to the island, but of course he should move on.
‘Did you know Angela Moore before you came to Fair Isle?’
‘I’d never met her,’ Sarah said. ‘I’d heard of her of course, seen her on the television.’ She paused. ‘I read her book.’
‘What did you make of it?’
‘It was interesting.’ She paused again. ‘If somewhat egocentric.’
‘And Fair Isle,’ he said. ‘What do you make of that?’
She gave a sudden smile so unexpected that it changed the character of her face. ‘It’s beautiful now the sun’s shining. You’re very lucky to have been born here.’ The sudden switch of mood disturbed him. He found it impossible to pin her down. How would he describe her to Fran, for example?
‘Tell me what you thought of Angela Moore.’
The smile disappeared as she considered the question, frowning. Precision mattered to her. He wondered what her background was. Health? Teaching? Social work? ‘She didn’t take much notice of us. She was obviously involved in her work. Very charismatic, of course, as you’d expect from the television performance, but she wasn’t very kind. I’d guess she could be a bit of a bully to the people who worked for her.’
‘Did you realize she’d gone into the bird room to work after the party?’
‘No. It was a lovely party and we felt honoured to be invited, but I did sense we were intruding on a private celebration. We went to bed straight after supper was served.’
‘Do you have any idea who might have killed her?’ Perez thought that of all the guests, this woman might have an idea. Her business was about watching people and understanding them. She wouldn’t participate. She’d have sat in a corner throughout the dancing, watching the dynamics of the group playing out.
‘As Hugh said, I suppose the most obvious suspect is Angela’s stepdaughter. I could see her throwing an adolescent tantrum and lashing out with whatever was at hand. She seems rather unhappy, unpredictable.’
Perez said nothing. He thought it would suit all the adults if Poppy were found to be responsible. Most have them had disliked Angela Moore and that would be making them feel guilt as well as shock and sadness in their response to her death. A speedy resolution to the case would allow them to move on and feel better about themselves. He had nothing else to ask the woman and watching her walk away he felt the interview had been a failure. He wanted to call her back and start again, to ask her all the irrelevant questions that were rattling around in his mind. To understand her better.
Hugh Shaw had been waiting outside, smoking a cigarette. He must have seen Sarah Fowler leave the hall, but although he knew it was his turn to be questioned next he still waited to be summoned. Perez saw him through the open door and felt a sudden impatience. Was the young man’s indolence, his leaning against the wall and finishing his cigarette although he knew the detective was waiting for him, an attempt to make a point? Or had the pose become so much of a habit that he couldn’t help himself? Perez couldn’t face sitting here, prising answers from this arrogant youngster who acted as if he owned the place. He grabbed his coat and rucksack and went outside.
‘Come on. Show me this rare swan. We can talk as we go.’
Perez felt better just in the physical activity of walking. After the rain, the colours of the landscape – the grass and the muddy bog water and the lichen on the walls – seemed very sharp and bright. He led Hugh away from the road and towards the airstrip. He didn’t want to meet anyone else from the field centre and he also wanted to prove to the man that this was his place. If Hugh came here every autumn for the rest of his life he wouldn’t understand the island as well as Perez. Hugh wasn’t at all dis
concerted by the unusual interview technique. He seemed perfectly at ease as they made their way north over the hill and kept up with Perez stride for stride over the heather.
‘Were you sleeping with Angela Moore?’
Again, perhaps he’d hoped to shock the boy, to jolt him from the self-assured confidence that Perez found such a barrier. It didn’t work.
‘Well, we didn’t do a lot of sleeping.’ Hugh stopped and looked down over the island. They could see each of the croft houses, set out like a child’s drawing. The clarity of the light made the perspective look wrong. Everything was flat and too close. Hugh took out another cigarette, the only sign that he might be nervous. ‘How did you know?’
‘Someone told me Angela liked pretty boys.’
‘She picked me up the first night I was here.’ Hugh had a smile, wide and welcoming, but fixed; there was somehow, even when he was talking, a shadow behind the words. It gave Perez the sense that he would take nothing seriously. ‘I was last up in the common room. I’d been drinking all evening. I’d wanted to visit since I first heard about the Fair Isle field centre; it was so cool to be there finally. I felt like celebrating. And Angela wandered through from the flat and found me there. “Let me give you a tour of the island.” It was a clear, still night, just before the westerlies started. Cold. There was ice on the windscreen. Unusual so early in the year, apparently. She took me up to the west cliffs and pointed out the lights of Foula right in the distance.’
‘You had sex?’
‘Twice that night. Once in the back of the Land Rover, parked on the airstrip, and once in an empty room in the North Light when we got back. It was three in the morning when she left me.’ He paused, added with admiration: ‘She was up at dawn to do the trap round.’
‘And on other occasions?’
‘Not every night. She’d made it quite clear we met up on her terms. She’d come and find me when she wanted me.’ Hugh spoke without apparent resentment. He wasn’t like Perez with his first lover; it seemed Hugh had no interest in forming a permanent relationship. The smile remained in place.
They’d reached the peak of a ridge and now had a view north. The only sign of habitation from here was the lighthouse and that was almost obscured by a fold in the land; only the tower and the lens were visible. Perez remembered when the lighthouse was manned: there’d been a Glaswegian couple with a little boy who’d come to the island school, a bluff retired merchant seaman as senior keeper and they’d all lived in the whitewashed buildings at the foot of the tower. Then the field centre trust had taken it over, raised the money to convert it. From this position he became aware again of how isolated it was.
‘Did she come to find you?’ Perez asked.
‘Oh, yes. At odd times. Once in the middle of the day when everyone else was having lunch. We were in the dorm. Dougie could have come in at any time. But that was what she liked. The excitement. The danger.’
And you? Perez wanted to ask. Did you like it too?
But he could see that Hugh would have found the question ridiculous. Of course he liked it. Sex without complications. Wasn’t that the dream of every young man? And why shouldn’t a woman enjoy it too? Perez would have liked to discuss Angela’s attitude to men with Fran. He suspected Fran would accept it without question. Very little shocked her. He found Angela’s need for pretty boys not so much shocking as depressing. What did it say about her marriage? That it bored her? That she had to find her excitement elsewhere? Did that make Perez boring too, with his plans for marriage, a settled family? Would Fran think him tedious after a couple of years?
Now they were both out of breath and they stopped. Perez took a flask of coffee from a small backpack and handed Hugh a slice of the sticky chocolate concoction that the islanders called peat. His mother had made a batch the evening before. They sat on a flat rock that stuck out of the heather, looked down on the bright blue sea and the wild white waves.
‘Did Angela talk to you?’ Perez asked.
‘Of course we talked.’ Hugh regarded Perez with patronizing amusement. ‘We got on. We were good mates.’
‘You didn’t seem very upset by her death.’
Hugh shrugged. ‘To be honest, it was never going to be a long-term thing, was it? I mean, I can’t imagine we’d have kept in touch once I’d left the Isle. I’m sorry she’s dead, but I can’t pretend to be devastated. I can’t bear shallow sentimentality.’
Perez wondered if that was what he was. Sentimental and shallow. A brief affair followed by no contact didn’t fit his definition of being a good mate.
‘Did she seem anxious about anything? Concerned for her own safety?’
Perez had expected an immediate flip remark, but Hugh considered the question. ‘Something was bugging her,’ he said eventually. ‘The last couple of days she’d seemed tense, not her usual self.’
‘What was the problem?’
‘She wouldn’t talk about it,’ Hugh said. ‘Told me it was none of my business. That was OK with me. I didn’t want to pry. I thought the weather was getting her down. The lack of good birds. Or Poppy. The girl really got under her skin.’
‘Did she discuss her husband with you?’ Perez looked out over the blustery water. The air was so clear that he could see Shetland mainland, the outline quite sharp on the horizon, the first time it had been visible since they’d arrived on the island. He found the sight reassuring, a connection at last with the outside world. The next day the boat would go out and Vicki Hewitt and Sandy Wilson would come back in with it. He would no longer be working alone.
‘Oh, Maurice wasn’t bothering her,’ Hugh said with a little laugh. ‘Maurice would let her do whatever she wanted as long as she stayed married to him.’
‘He knew about her affairs?’
‘Probably. Or didn’t look too hard at what she was doing because he didn’t want to know. As I said, she resented Poppy being here. I think it was the first time Maurice had ever stood up to her. Angela had said the autumn was a bad time for the girl to visit – after the seabird ringing it was her busiest time. He’d insisted, said his daughter had to come first for a change. Angela was shocked. She usually got her way. But I’m not sure that was what was worrying her. It was only temporary, after all. Eventually the wind would change and the girl would get out.’
Hugh stood up and brushed the crumbs from his jacket. ‘I thought you wanted to see this swan.’ He turned on the inevitable smile and walked very quickly down the bank towards Golden Water. Perez had almost to run to catch up with him.
The swan was on a shingle beach at the side of the pool. It looked to Perez like any of the swans that came into the island in long skeins in the winter. ‘Show me what all the fuss is about,’ he said again.
Hugh set up his telescope on a tripod and let Perez look. ‘It’s the black beak that’s important. That and the American ring, which proves it hasn’t escaped from a collection somewhere.’ He straightened. ‘There’ll be hundreds of birders in Shetland mainland waiting to come here to see it.’
Perez had a sudden image of an invading army preparing for battle. How would a sudden influx of visitors affect the investigation into Angela Moore’s murder? And was there anything he could do to prevent it?
‘Will folk really go to all that effort?’
‘Believe me,’ Hugh said. ‘People would kill to get that bird on their list.’
Chapter Eighteen
Fran found Poppy in her bedroom, plugged into her iPod. She was lying on the bed, still in pyjamas, staring up at the ceiling. The curtains were drawn, so there was little light, but Fran saw a pile of dirty clothes in the corner, a dressing table covered with girlie debris – make-up and bangles, long strings of black beads. When she saw Fran come in, Poppy took the plugs from her ears and sat up, but she didn’t speak.
‘How do you feel about getting away from here?’ Fran stood close to the door. She didn’t want the girl to feel crowded.
‘Is the plane coming in?’ The urgency of the quest
ion made Fran realize how miserable Poppy was. She was hiding out in the bedroom, just waiting to make her escape from the island.
‘Not today. Tomorrow maybe. And the boat will certainly go in the morning. I meant getting away from the centre. I wondered if you’d like to spend the day with Mary and me.’
There was a hesitation. It took Poppy a moment to work through the disappointment that she wouldn’t be leaving Fair Isle immediately. ‘Sure,’ she said at last. ‘Why not?’
‘I’ll give you a minute to grab a shower, shall I?’ The girl could certainly do with a good scrub. ‘I’ll wait in the kitchen with Jane.’
When Poppy emerged she was wearing jeans one size too small and a long grey sweater. Her hair was still wet from the shower but she didn’t look very much cleaner. She hadn’t bothered with make-up and looked very young – an overweight child with an unhealthy pallor and poor skin. But we all looked like that when we were growing up, Fran thought. Or we believed we did.
She found herself thinking of Poppy as a slightly older version of Cassie. She needs some fresh air, a bit of exercise. ‘We’ll walk, shall we?’ she said. ‘We can meet up with Mary at Springfield for lunch. I need to stop off in the post office to buy some stamps.’ And perhaps Poppy was too tired to object or perhaps she was glad for someone else to take decisions for her, because she followed Fran out of the lighthouse without speaking.
They walked for a while in silence. Poppy was hunched in her jacket, her hands in her pockets.
‘What’s it like going out with the filth?’ The question came out of nowhere just as they were approaching the turn in the road by the North Haven, Poppy’s attempt to reassert herself or to provoke a reaction.
‘I don’t think of him as the filth. He’s a good man doing a hard job.’ Fran kept her voice easy. After all, some of her London friends had asked her the question in almost the same words. They lapsed again into silence.
Further south, Fran’s attention kept returning to Sheep Rock to the east. It had been painted and photographed many times, but something about the shape, the sloping green plane at the top of the cliffs, the way it dominated that side of the island, attracted her to it nevertheless. When Perez was a boy, they’d grazed sheep there; the men had gone over in a small boat and climbed a chain to get on to it. Would she be able to bring something fresh to the image? She’d asked Perez what she should give Mary and James as a gift. ‘Do a painting for them,’ he’d said. ‘They’d value that more than anything.’ She’d found nothing suitable to bring. Now she thought she’d draw something that would give her take on Fair Isle, on the iconic Sheep Rock. It would have to be in this light, she thought. Very clear, after rain.