I'll Keep You Safe

by Peter May

  Braque looked at him with something like envy. How wonderful, she thought, to have such a clear vision of life. To cut through all the fog and obfuscation to make unequivocal choices. Maybe only proximity to death can force such focus. She said, “I’ll go home after the funeral. Day after tomorrow.”

  He nodded. “I think that’s a good idea, Ma’am.”

  When he was gone, she was tempted to order yet another glass of wine, but in the end decided against it and climbed wearily back to her room. She stood for a long time at the window gazing out over the inner harbour, seeing how the early-evening sunshine cast long shadows on the water. Gilles was right. She was a bad mother. And wife. There had only ever been one real focus in her life, and that had been her job. Other people sacrificed personal ambition for family. Not Braque. She had always put herself first. And now, as she found her life slipping away only too quickly and easily towards single middle age, here she stood, lonely and alone, in some strange hotel room far from home with no one to turn to but an island policeman she had just met. And herself. They both had damaged hearts. And she came up wanting.

  The trill of her mobile phone drilled into her consciousness, dispelling introspection, and she fumbled in her bag to find it.

  “Lieutenant, it’s Marc Bouquand.”

  It took Braque a moment to place him, before remembering that he was the ANSSI computer expert on attachment to her department. He had briefed her on the Dark Web, and found deleted emails on Georgy Vetrov’s hard disk.

  “I got that email you forwarded to me. From well wisher to Ruairidh Macfarlane. Interesting, when you start looking at the e-trail all these phoney IP addresses leave in the ether.”

  “It helped?”

  “Oh yes. With three different paths to follow you start to come up with points of correlation, which in the end lead you to the source.”

  Braque felt her heart skip a beat. “You mean you know who sent them?”

  “Not who sent them, no. But it would seem you are in the best place to find that out. I know where they were sent from.”

  “The Isle of Lewis?”

  “More specifically, Lieutenant, from two different computers in the public library in the town of Stornoway. Two from one, one from the other.”

  Braque felt her jaw go slack. She had walked past the library during a stroll through town the previous night. It was just around the corner in a rust-painted building next to the Argos store. “I’ll get back to you,” she said quickly and hung up. She slipped her phone into her pocket and ran down the stairs, out into Castle Street and down to the harbour, hoping that she might catch Gunn before he drove off. But he was long gone.

  She dialled his number and hurried back into the hotel. It was still ringing as she climbed the steps, then switched to voice mail when she went into the bar. “The emails were sent from the public library right here in Stornoway, Monsieur Gunn,” she whispered into the phone. “Call me back.” She hung up and found the barman looking at her curiously. “Do you know what time the library closes?”

  The barman checked his watch. “You’ve missed it, I’m afraid,” he said. “It closes at five on a Tuesday.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  The light summer nights lingered for a while in autumn. Or fall as the Americans would call it. A nice way, Niamh thought, to describe a season when leaves turn the colour of gold and fall from the trees. But not a word that anyone on these islands would ever think to use. There were no trees outside of Stornoway, and no leaves to fall.

  As she stood on the clifftops and gazed across the moor, nothing grew more than a few inches for as far as the eye could see. Grasses burned and bowed by the wind. A wind that somehow characterized everything about this place. Blowing weather in, then ushering it away. In from the sea, out to the sea. The only constant in an ever-changing skyscape.

  Niamh drew her parka around her, protection from the chill blowing now from the north. There was a change in the air. She could feel it. Something different, almost indefinable. Summer was finally gone and autumn, ephemeral and capricious, had turned its face towards winter. There was a quality, too, about the light, that was different. It slanted across the land, clear-eyed and cold, and even where the sun set in the west it lacked strength, an insipid yellow against the washed-out blue of the sky.

  She had walked some way from the house, and stood now where the cliffs crumbled and fell away through a jumble of rock spoil to a tiny beach far below. Mostly shingle. But hidden from view, just to the right of it, a small patch of fine silver sand hugged the foot of the cliffs. Ringed by black rock, it remained, in clement weather, impervious to the incoming tide, a tiny oasis of calm, where she and Ruairidh had sometimes made love on warm summer evenings in the early days of their marriage. Today, with the heavy swell coming in off the Minch, it would become, at high tide, a foaming treacherous pool of turbulent white seawater dashed against the cliff face. But the tide was still a good way out, and she decided to climb down and revisit precious memories before they vanished for ever.

  She jumped from a ring of crumbling peat on to a gentle slope descending to the shelf where she and Ruairidh had built their bothy from the stones of John Nicholson’s first house. It always, somehow, came as a surprise to her. Stone the same colour as the cliff, heaped around the face of it in a low round building that seemed almost subsumed by it. Perfectly camouflaged. She knew, from walkers who had come knocking at their door, just how difficult it was to find if you did not know exactly where it was.

  A wall curved around one side of it, protecting and leading to a stout wooden door jammed shut by a boulder. She pushed the stone aside with her foot and unlatched the door to step inside.

  She was struck at once by the warmth of the air, and the smell of peat smoke. There were two windows in the curve of the outside walls, and two triangular skylights in the roof, and so there was plenty of light to see by. She stooped and stepped down into the circular floor area, where a stout central wooden beam held up the roof.

  A wooden bench sat below the far window, and to her left a wooden platform at waist height served as a table, or a bed for anyone with a sleeping bag who wished to stay overnight.

  In the opposite corner they had built a tiny fireplace against the wall, with tin cowling to prevent smoke from seeping into the room. Niamh knelt now by the fireplace and felt the warmth that resided still among the ashes. She turned to look across the interior of the bothy. Beneath the bed lay a plastic bag that Ruairidh usually kept full of dried peat slabs. It lay on its side, most of the peat gone. All that remained of it, black crumbs and dust, strewn across the flagstones.

  It was an inescapable conclusion. Someone had been here. Very recently. Maybe even earlier today. And perhaps for a day or two before that. Ruairidh’s peat was almost exhausted.

  Niamh stood up and looked around for other clues. But there was nothing alien to be seen. No litter or belongings left behind. No cigarette ends. Had it not been for the burning of the peat, you would never have known that the bothy had been occupied.

  She felt the first stirrings of disquiet, remembering the footfalls behind her in that dark Paris street. Then waking in the night to the sounds of what she thought was someone moving around the house. She had seen nobody since returning to Taigh ’an Fiosaich. Not a soul, except for the visitors who had arrived by car. And yet it was perfectly possible that some late-season walker had sought refuge here for a night or two without her being aware of it. That, after all, was its purpose. And she could not see the bothy from the house.

  For some time, then, she sat on the bench by the window and marvelled at how effective this little stone hut really was at shutting out the weather and the sound of it. Perched here, beneath the lip of the cliff, its tiny windows looking out on to the mercurial Minch, a miniature protective bubble to keep you safe. I’ll keep you safe, Ruairidh had told her. But he hadn’t. Unlike the bothy they had built. That was still there, and probably would be long after she too was gone.


  She got stiffly to her feet and made her way back outside, to be met by a blast of cold air, and the roar of the sea breaking over rocks far below. She fought to shut and latch the door, then push the boulder back against it, before setting off on the narrow path that led along the broken exterior of the cliff face before turning down in a steeply zigzagging natural stairway to the hidden beach at the foot of it.

  The sand was wet and firm, and strewn with shells. The force of the sea against the cliff behind it had hollowed out a space that might one day, eons from now, become a cave. Niamh kicked off her wellies and rolled her jeans up to the knee, to walk barefoot across the sand, feeling it fill all the spaces between her toes. And then clamber carefully over slabs of gneiss worn smooth by time and water. She found a favourite perch and sat there, dangling her feet in the crystal-clear water of a rock pool. It was icy cold, and she could only hold her feet in it for a short time before pain forced her to withdraw. Still, it felt good. Cleansing, somehow.

  The sea broke against shell-crusted outcrops of rock just feet away, to send rivulets of foaming salt water among all the crevices. She felt the spray of it on her face in the wind.

  It was hard to believe now that she and Ruairidh could ever have made love here. And yet on a fine summer’s day this little hidden beach would bask for hours in sunshine, and in the evening, sheltered from the westerlies by the cliffs, the sand would still be warm, and the water almost tempting. But within half an hour, she knew, the tide being swept in by a heavy swell from the Minch would break across these rocks and swamp the beach.

  She sat for as long as she dared, holding on to every elusive memory, with the very real fear that they might all soon be swept away by time and false recollection, and lost in the incoming tide of an uncertain future.

  By the time the first waves were breaking over her feet, the light was starting to fade, and would quickly be gone. She had left it too late to climb back to the top in daylight, and it was panic that propelled her across the beach to retrieve her wellies, and clamber upwards over the rocks.

  Twilight was the worst of all lights. Car headlamps seemed to make little impression in it, and the human eye coped almost better with illuminated darkness. She was only halfway up when she found herself having to peer carefully through the gloom to find her next footing. She fumbled in a pocket for her phone. She had a torch app that would light her way. But the beam of light it cast was not much better than the little natural light that remained, and she picked her way carefully along the ledge that overhung the beach and the rocks now thirty or forty feet below.

  The wind had increased in strength, and whistled around her as she eased her way towards the scree slope that would allow her to scramble upwards to the safety of the bothy and the cliff tops beyond. She felt it tugging at her jacket, and then a noise immediately above caused her to look up, startled. The shadow of a figure silhouetted against the sky seemed to extend a helping hand. She reached up and felt the hand make contact with hers, before it grabbed her collar and pushed her violently away from the cliff face.

  It was with a dreadful sense of disbelief that she found herself falling, all sense of orientation lost, her phone and the light it cast whipped away in the wind. And realization dawned that she was going to die. Her shoulder struck some protruding rock where a tiny patch of grass grew and seabirds nested. The pain of it jarred through her body, and she felt herself propelled out into the void, dropping helplessly into the breaking spray of incoming water.

  She closed her eyes tight shut and braced herself for impact. She surely would die quickly on the rocks. But it was water she struck, hard and cold, expelling all breath from her body as it sucked her down and pulled her out into the Minch.

  It felt as if her whole being were in the grip of a giant hand that she was powerless to fight against, dragging her under, spinning and twisting her amidst a turmoil of conflicting currents. All she could think was, “Don’t breathe! Don’t even try to draw breath. Or it will be your last.” Lungs filled with water, darkness drowning consciousness. Life slipping hopelessly through fingers incapable of retaining their hold on it.

  She opened her eyes and sought the light. Only to find darkness. She had no idea which way to the surface. Except that her wellies had filled with water and were pulling her down. Bubbles of spent air escaping her lips and nostrils were going up. She fought to divest herself of her wellies, and the leaden weight of her sodden parka, and kicked hard with her feet, thanking God now for the swimming lessons her parents had forced her to attend in Stornoway.

  Suddenly, unexpectedly, she broke the surface and saw light in the sky above her. For the first time she understood the absolute dread that Anndra must have felt as he was sucked under for the last time and gave up the unequal fight to stop water rushing into his lungs. She sucked air into her own lungs now, desperate for oxygen, before a wave broke over her and she found herself thrown towards the rocks.

  The cliffs rose up black and formidable, tilting overhead, and she braced herself for impact on all those jagged outcrops and their razor-sharp crusting of shells.

  But the expected pain of impact never came. Instead she felt something soft and warm. Another body in the water. Hands grasping her and suddenly, unexpectedly, lifting her up over the rocks.

  The next impact was hard, but giving, and she found herself sprawling on the little patch of silver sand, her footsteps still visible and filling with water. Only there was another set of footprints now. Bigger. The treads of stout walking boots pressed into the softness. Coughing the water from her lungs, half choking, and shivering with the cold, she had only the vaguest impression of her rescuer leaning over her, before a heavy warm jacket seemed somehow to wrap itself around her, and the shadow of whoever had pulled her from the water was gone.

  Niamh managed to haul herself to her knees and looked up. But caught only the fleeting glimpse of movement above her on the rocks. Whoever it was had vanished, leaving her their jacket. But she was still barefoot, and knew that somehow she had to get back to the house before hypothermia took her.

  The climb back up the cliff without footwear was treacherous, and she was thankful for all the years of running barefoot along the shore as a child. Still, she moved carefully. Some of these rocks were sharp-edged and could slice open the tender soles of her feet with a single slip. Obversely and unexpectedly, bare feet and flexible toes gave her a better grip. She was more sure-footed. And it was, finally, with great relief that she pulled herself up on to the soft bog grass along the top of the cliff.

  She lay on her back breathing hard for several minutes, her rescuer’s thermal jacket wrapped around her. Her feet ached, from the cold and the pain of the climb, and above her she saw twilight wash itself darker across the sky, the first stars twinkling faintly beyond fast-moving broken cloud.

  Eventually she summoned the strength to pull herself back to her feet and went hobbling off across the moor towards the house, where lights on a timer lit up its interior against the night. All the way, peaty black mud oozed between her toes, and she fought to understand what had just happened.

  Someone had climbed down to push her off the cliff. Someone intent on killing her. Only the fortuitous collision with a grassy outcrop had sent her spinning beyond the reach of the rocks below, and certain death. But, then, the sea too had been set to claim her, to drag her down and drown her, or smash her against the rocks. Before strong hands had plucked her free of it and dumped her unceremoniously on the beach. Leaving no trace, except for footprints in the sand, and this weatherproof jacket that she wrapped tightly around her now.

  Once inside the house, she slammed the door shut and leaned back against it, fumbling with the latch to do what she never did, and lock it. The warm air in the hall made her realize just how cold she was. Her first instinct was to go and stand below a hot shower to raise her core temperature. But first she went through all the pockets of this jacket she had been gifted. They were empty, and the jacket itself seemed ne
w, barely worn.

  She hung it up where she normally hung her parka and ran through the bedroom to the bathroom, wriggling out of her sodden jeans and T-shirt, discarding her underwear, to stand finally beneath the spray of hot water in the shower. Eyes closed. Breathing slowly and deeply. Still shivering, but more from shock than cold. She opened her eyes and turned her head to look at the bruising that already blackened her shoulder. The skin was grazed and broken, but not bleeding. Her parka had protected her from worse injury. She revolved her arm on the axis of her shoulder, and although it was painful she was pretty sure it was not broken.

  The full realization of just how lucky she had been broke over her like the water from the shower, and her legs very nearly buckled beneath her.

  She staggered from below its powerful spray to wrap a thick towelling robe around her and return to the bedroom, where she sat on the edge of the bed and examined her feet, each in turn. They were bruised and grazed, and she rubbed antiseptic cream into the broken skin before wrapping several of her toes in fine bandaging. She would live.

  A tiny burst of ironic laughter escaped her lips. Aye, you’ll live, her mother used to say to her when she cut a knee or skinned an elbow. Right now she was only alive because someone’s attempt to kill her had failed. Because someone else had pulled her from the Minch and saved her from drowning, or worse.

  Why had one not seen the other? Or were they both one and the same person? If so, why try to kill her with one hand, and then save her with the other? None of it made sense.