Blue Lightning

by Ann Cleeves

  They came almost immediately to the whitewashed walls surrounding the lighthouse. Although it wasn’t dark, the lights were on in most of the rooms but the curtains hadn’t been drawn. Perez sat for a moment in the car looking in, allowed himself a moment of relief when he saw Fran in the kitchen. There was Dougie Barr standing in the common room drinking something soft and sweet from a can. In the flat Maurice was sitting at his desk reading through a pile of papers. Perhaps the routine of running the centre was helping him come to terms with the death – and the life – of his wife. Upstairs, Ben Catchpole looked out from his bedroom, apparently deep in thought. The lives of the field centre residents were spread out before him and watching them as a voyeur, Perez understood why Jane might have been killed. Again he saw a motive of a sort. It was all about what she knew about the first murder. Now he had to replay in his head the events running up to her death. It was the day the gale had begun to blow itself out, the day he’d interviewed the residents in the community hall. The coastguard helicopter had come in to carry out Angela’s body. He forced himself to concentrate on the detail; the timings were important. But Angela? He still couldn’t pin down the motive there.

  ‘Are we staying here all night then?’ Sandy opened the door. ‘I don’t know about you but I could use a beer.’

  Perez sat for a little longer, looking up at the symmetrical squares of light on the first floor of the building, and then he followed Sandy in.

  Perez went to the kitchen first. He wanted to see Fran. Perhaps because he knew she’d be back in Ravenswick the following day he was desperate to hold her, to feel her body against his, a lust that reminded him again of his passion for Beata, the German student. What was happening to him? Usually so controlled and measured in his emotions, within ten minutes he’d experienced dislike and desire with equal intensity.

  She had her back to him, bending to lift a tray into the oven. She was wearing a thin scarlet scarf to hold her hair away from her face and her neck, frayed jeans. No apron. As she leaned forward, her jersey rode up her back and he could see her bare skin. He waited until she’d set the dish – some sort of sponge pudding – on the middle shelf and closed the door, then he came up behind her and kissed her neck, put his hand inside her clothes. She turned and kissed him on the mouth. Her hands were useless, still wrapped in oven gloves.

  ‘Jimmy Perez, you’ll get me sacked.’

  ‘Where’s Sarah?’

  ‘She’s gone up to grab a shower before it gets too busy.’

  ‘Why don’t you go home? You can take my car. I’ll get a lift later. Mother will be expecting you home for supper.’

  ‘She’ll be expecting us,’ Fran said. ‘I know what you’re like, Jimmy Perez. If I leave you here, I won’t see you for the rest of the evening. Besides,’ she frowned. ‘We should talk. Not here. Sarah will be down in a minute.’

  ‘Has she said anything to you?’

  ‘Nothing specific. I think she’s scared.’

  ‘Who’s she scared of?’ Everyone, he thought immediately, then wondered if he’d got that quite wrong. Perhaps she wasn’t as timid as she seemed. After all, she’d managed to hold down a responsible job until she became ill. He thought that of all the field centre residents he understood Sarah Fowler the least.

  Fran paused. ‘I’m not sure. They all know I’m engaged to you and they suspect I’m here as your spy. Everything’s guesswork and innuendo. None of them will tell me directly what’s worrying them.’

  ‘I saw you with Hugh.’ He tried not to let her see how he felt about the young man. He wanted her perspective, untainted by his prejudice.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘He makes out he has secrets of his own. You should speak to him. But he’s such a show-off. It’s hard to know how much is real and what he makes up for effect.’

  There was an unexpected noise in the common room. Thuds and bangs, then Sandy’s voice raised in irritation: ‘What the shit do you think you’re playing at?’ Another crash. Perez hurried in and found a scene like a playground fight. Sandy was holding Ben Catch-pole by both arms and Hugh had blood streaming from a cut above his eye. It ran down his cheek and on to the carpet. The other residents stood around watching, fascinated, enjoying the drama. Despite the cut, Hugh seemed immensely pleased with himself.

  Sarah Fowler walked in as Ben tried to break free from Sandy’s grasp. She’d changed into neat cord trousers and a white shirt, an old lady’s navy cardigan. Her voice was shrill and loud.

  ‘Please. Don’t do this. Hasn’t there been enough violence? I can’t stand it!’ And she began to sob. The sound unbearable, like nails down a blackboard, tearing again at their nerves. She turned towards John, who took her into his arms, stroked her hair and murmured reassurance as if she was his child.

  Perez thought he couldn’t keep these people here any longer. The tension was getting to all of them. He’d have to let them out on the next day’s boat, even if it meant sending the murderer away too.

  They took Hugh Shaw into the bird room to interview him. As they walked along the corridor Maurice appeared from the flat.

  ‘Jimmy, I need to talk to you!’

  Perez turned round just for a moment. ‘Sorry, not now. Give me a few minutes.’

  ‘Jimmy, it’s important.’

  For a moment Perez hesitated. Despite himself he always felt sorry for Maurice. ‘Really,’ he said. ‘This won’t take long. Wait in the flat and I’ll be along as soon as I’ve finished here.’ And he turned his back so he didn’t have to look at the man’s sad, pleading eyes.

  In the bird room, he made it formal, as if this was an interview room at the police station. Perez asked all the questions. Sandy sat in a corner, a notebook on his knee.

  Despite the bloody nose, Hugh still managed a grin. ‘Shouldn’t you caution me, Inspector? Have a tape recorder running so there’s no misunderstanding? I doubt Sandy could run to shorthand.’

  ‘This is just an informal chat,’ Perez said. ‘But we can ship you out in the boat tomorrow if you prefer. Talk to you in Lerwick. That way you could have a solicitor present. I’m not quite sure what the horde of reporters still very interested in the case would make of that. They might just misinterpret helping the police with their inquiries. Your parents might not be too pleased to have your name all over the tabloids.’

  ‘No need for that,’ Hugh said quickly. ‘Of course I’m only too pleased to help.’ He dabbed at his nose with what looked like a tea towel.

  ‘I’ve always wanted to travel,’ Perez said. ‘Never really had the chance.’

  ‘You should!’ Hugh’s face lit up. Here he was on safe ground. The eccentric Englishman abroad, the charmer, the storyteller. ‘My favourite part was coming back along the old silk route. Most of those places, they don’t see a European from one year to the next. There’s something about a desert—’

  ‘But expensive,’ Perez interrupted. ‘Even roughing it, you have to eat. And you’d want the occasional beer.’ He got up and switched on the light. Outside, it was almost dark, the time of day Shetlanders called ‘the darkenin’’.

  ‘Hey, my parents were glad to get me out of their hair. They thought it would be educational. Money well spent, they thought.’

  ‘Until recently,’ Perez said. ‘Recently, I understand, they’ve been less obliging. You’ve had to look elsewhere to fund your adventurous lifestyle.’

  There was a moment of silence.

  ‘Why did Angela Moore give you two thousand five hundred pounds?’

  Another moment of silence, then a return of the practised grin. Perez thought he would always be a con man. In the past he’d have been one of those quacks selling snake oil and charms to delusional and desperate people.

  ‘Hey, she fancied me,’ Hugh said. ‘What can I say? She didn’t want me to leave so she offered me money to stay on. Was I going to turn it down?’

  ‘No, Angela wasn’t paying for sexual favours,’ Perez said. ‘You didn’t have any sort of physical relationship w
ith her, did you? She took her regular lovers to the Pund and you knew nothing about that. Your encounters were purely business.’

  Hugh stared at the detective. He seemed unable to speak.

  ‘What was it?’ Perez asked. ‘Blackmail?’

  ‘The money was a gift,’ Hugh said at last. ‘At least, a loan. Angela knew I’d pay her back. We might not have been lovers but we were good mates. She trusted me.’

  ‘You weren’t friends,’ Perez said. ‘And Angela wasn’t known for her generosity of spirit or her ability to trust her fellow man. She would only have paid up if she had no choice.’

  ‘You have no proof.’ The inevitable smile, forced, more of a grimace.

  Perez continued as if Hugh hadn’t spoken. ‘And she would have hated it. No one made Angela do what she didn’t want to. She’d have been determined to find a way to stop you from bothering her further. Is that why you killed her? Because she’d started to fight back? Had she begun to threaten you? It wouldn’t be pleasant to be known as a blackmailer.’

  ‘I don’t have to listen to this.’ Hugh got to his feet. ‘I’ll be happy to talk to you again, Inspector, when you have some proof.’ He sauntered from the room, a parody of the old cockiness. Sandy stood up too, and seemed prepared to stop Hugh leaving, but Perez gestured for him to let the boy go.

  ‘What could he possibly be blackmailing Angela about?’ Sandy asked.

  Perez was saved from answering because his mobile rang. ‘Yes?’

  It was Vicki Hewitt. ‘We’ve had the results on the DNA analysis on the feathers you found in Angela Moore’s hair.’

  ‘Go on.’

  He listened to her words and he knew who had killed the two women. A strange intuitive leap that had little to do with logic. A confirmation and at last a motive. He walked quickly out of the bird room to pull Hugh back in. There were more questions that needed answering now. But the boy seemed to have disappeared.

  Chapter Thirty-six

  Fran was making custard. She was tantalized by the noises coming from the common room, but good custard, even from a packet, took concentration. Although the numbers of residents had declined, she was still cooking for more people than she was used to. She stirred and listened, distracted again by the raised men’s voices. The milk started to burn on the bottom of the pan: there was a brown skin on the tip of the spoon when she lifted it out of the yellow liquid. Quickly she reduced the heat. It thickened at last in a satisfactory if slightly lumpy way and she switched off the stove. She would warm it through later.

  She’d heard Sarah’s screamed plea for the men to stop the fighting and decided dinner was down to her now. No way would the woman be in any state to cook, her nerves were in shreds. As she prepared vegetables, Fran’s thoughts turned to Cassie: she wondered if the girl was excited at the prospect of her mother coming home or if Duncan with his treats and his spoiling had seduced her. Will she love her father more than me? Knowing it was pathetic, but unable to prevent it. She’d phone Duncan later and make sure he’d bring Cassie down to Grutness to meet the Good Shepherd. Next time they came into Fair Isle she’d bring Cassie with her. Mary would enjoy playing grandmother.

  There was a sound behind her and she looked round, expecting to see Perez. Hoping to see Perez. It was Sarah Fowler, very pale. Her skin looked blue and translucent as if she was frozen and she seemed to be trembling.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Fran said easily. ‘I can cope here. Maybe you should have a rest.’ Or a whisky. Do the Fowlers drink?

  The woman didn’t answer. It seemed to Fran that she had the frailty of an old woman, that she’d lost weight even in the past few days. Fran went up to her and took her into her arms, felt the bone close to the skin under the clothes. ‘What is it? Look, it’s been a terrible time. But I’m sure Jimmy will let you go soon. And if he doesn’t, you should go anyway. You’ll make yourself ill. Come out with me in the boat tomorrow morning. I’ll clear it with the police.’

  Sarah was still tense and Fran pulled away, realizing that the physical contact wasn’t helping, that Sarah was disturbed by it. ‘Tea,’ she said. ‘We both need tea.’

  She filled the kettle and set it to boil, hoping the familiar domestic movements would calm the woman down. When she turned back, Sarah was standing just where Fran had left her.

  ‘I’m scared.’

  The words were so melodramatic that Fran thought: She’s acting. Putting it on. ‘What about?’ Then, with a flash of intuition, remembering the conversation from earlier in the day, she added: ‘Is it Hugh? Look, Jimmy’s back in the lighthouse now. You’re quite safe. Don’t worry about him anyway. He’s all bluster and showing off.’

  ‘Angela’s mother shouldn’t have come here,’ Sarah said. ‘If she hadn’t come here everything would have been all right.’

  ‘What’s Angela’s mother got to do with this? What’s going on? Sarah, you must tell me.’

  ‘He’ll kill me,’ Sarah choked and put the back of her hand to her mouth.

  At first Fran thought she’d misheard. Then again thought this was all nonsense, the hysteria of a woman on the edge of a breakdown: ‘Sarah, what is this about? You must tell Jimmy what you know.’ She felt impatient, wanted to take Sarah by the shoulders and shake some sense into her.

  ‘No!’ And the woman repeated more loudly, though still hardly more than a whisper: ‘He’ll kill me.’

  ‘Then talk to me.’

  A door banged. The door from the flat to the public area of the field centre. Sarah started, like an animal at a sudden noise, and ran away, through the lobby and out into the dusk.

  Fran stood in the middle of the kitchen. In this domestic setting, with the smell of treacle pudding and steak pie, the theatrical quality of the situation seemed ridiculous. Again she found herself irritated. It was like dealing with an irrational, nervy child. Two women had already been killed but surely Sarah was safer in here, surrounded by people, than wandering around outside in the dark. The cliffs north and west of the lighthouse were as steep as anywhere on the island. There were jagged splits in the land that let in the sea. Fran could still hear heated voices in the common room.

  She went to the door intending to find Jimmy – he needed to know what Sarah had told her and that she was outside playing the stupid female. But Perez’s attention was on Hugh and as she watched he marched the younger man towards the bird room. Then Maurice appeared and insisted with a persistence quite unlike him that they should talk. She saw the field centre administrator through the open door; he was standing in front of the others in the corridor and she noticed the hole in the elbow of his sweater, the beads of sweat on his forehead. What was his problem? Didn’t he realize Jimmy was busy? She was tempted to call Maurice to ask him to help her search for Sarah, but he walked away towards the flat.

  The bird room door closed. Jimmy wouldn’t forgive her for interrupting now. It occurred to her that he was about to arrest Hugh for the murders. Fran looked at her watch. Half an hour until supper and everything in the kitchen was ready. She’d left her coat and boots in the cupboard next to the larder. She pulled them on and followed Sarah outside.

  Now it was quite dark. The wind was deceptive, blowing in gusts and swirls around the lighthouse. It was hard to tell exactly which direction it was coming from, but it was cold, so probably from the north-west. Sarah had come out with just the cardigan and soft shoes. Fran swore at her under her breath. I bet she was spoiled as a child. Above her the lighthouse beam swung, regular as a metronome. Three short flashes and a long one. It lit the outcrops of rock and reflected on the pools of water.

  She found Sarah sitting by Golden Water. This was where the trumpeter swan had come to roost, where the birdwatchers from the mainland had gathered. Now the pond was empty. In a dip in the land and sheltered from the gusting wind the water was calm. Fran spotted Sarah first as the lighthouse beam moved slowly across the landscape, saw her in the flashing light like a primitive cartoon, sheets of paper flicked to bring a character t
o life. But here there was no movement. Sarah sat quite still. As Fran walked towards her, wellingtons squelching in the sodden ground, the clouds broke and a thin moon partly lit her way. She took off her waxed jacket and put it over Sarah’s shoulders. ‘Come back inside. You’ll freeze to death.’ And for a moment she imagined that the woman was another victim and that she’d been killed too, because she seemed quite rigid. Fran remembered the body of Angela Moore, stiff with rigor mortis. Her skin had been blue.

  ‘Come back inside,’ Fran said again. ‘It’s all over. Jimmy knows what happened. He’s making an arrest now.’ Stretching the truth perhaps, but she was freezing and just wanted to get back to the warm kitchen.

  Then the woman turned her face to Fran and with the brown clouds rushing across the moon, and to the beat of the lighthouse beam, she began to speak. The words spilled from her mouth, the whole story told right from the beginning. Fran shivered and tried to lift Sarah again to her feet. ‘Come inside. We’ll sort it all out. We’ll help.’ And along with the cold, she felt almost excited because Sarah had confessed to her and not to Jimmy. Who’s the detective now, Jimmy Perez? This was her own moment of triumph.

  Chapter Thirty-seven

  Perez ran through the common room, but it was empty. He thought everyone had been embarrassed by the earlier scene and had scattered to their rooms. He stood at the foot of the stairs. The building was quiet. He couldn’t bear the thought of marching around the building, dragging them all back like recalcitrant children. After all, there’s no hurry, he thought. Where will they go? There’s no escape. They’ll come down eventually.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jimmy,’ Maurice said. ‘I really have to speak to you.’ It seemed he’d lost patience and had refused to wait in the flat any longer. Though looking at his watch, Perez saw it had only been a quarter of an hour since they’d spoken. This evening, time seemed to have stretched. So much had happened since they’d returned to the North Light with the murder weapon that it appeared that days had passed.