Well of the Winds

by Denzil Meyrick

  He picked up his briefcase and walked through to the lounge, pausing at the big bay window. Sure enough, he could see that the loch had taken on the green-grey colour that so often presaged bad weather. The sky was dark over Kinloch and the rain was heavier than ever. He placed his briefcase on the table and took out the leather-covered journal, which was nestled amongst some files and court documents that required his attention. He looked at his predecessor’s entry for Monday, 7 May, 1945: I have collected the belongings of the crew of the U-boat that sank on the causeway. The most interesting articles are these . . .

  Daley peered at a tiny pencil sketch. The years had taken their toll, and, unlike the still-legible handwriting, it was almost invisible. He took a pair of reading glasses from his jacket pocket and looked closer. The drawing was rectangular in shape, showing two sides of what Urquhart described as a cigarette lighter. It took Daley back to the sketches of crime scenes and road traffic accidents he would make in his notebook in his early days as a police officer. With the advent of mobile phones and body cams, these were now things of the past. Instantly, he felt an affinity with the man. The police force Urquhart had worked in almost had more in common with the one Daley had joined than it had with the modern service.

  He read on: These lighters are distinctive. I have a feeling that, judging by the quality and the fact that they both work, despite immersion in seawater, they cannot possibly be general issue. The silver casing and Nazi regalia speak to me of something different.

  Daley could almost hear Urquhart speaking. Certainly, he could follow the inspector’s logic. It was the product of a mind trained to be curious; one of a natural detective.

  He flicked idly to the final words in the journal. If my suspicions are correct, then I have come upon something that is as spectacular as it is bizarre and terrifying. I meet with my informants in person for the first time tonight. I have decided not to take McColl, though this has displeased him.

  Daley reached into his bag. The file he withdrew was new but its contents were not. He stared at the faded sepia photograph. The man was wearing a black suit and tie and a white shirt. He had a square face, with high cheekbones and a broad forehead. His hair looked dark in the image, short and slicked back, parted on one side. To Daley, Inspector William Urquhart looked like a man to be reckoned with, though he thought he detected a certain world-weariness, perhaps even melancholy, in his soulful eyes. He was living through tough times, Daley reasoned.

  He read the biographical details. Son of a veterinarian, Urquhart was born in Edinburgh and attended the Royal Academy on the outskirts of the city. An unremarkable student, instead of undertaking further education, he had joined the King’s Own Scottish Borderers Regiment as a subaltern. Served in the First World War then rose to the rank of captain in the military police. While marshalling troops during the evacuation of Dunkirk, he had suffered a shrapnel wound to his leg, which left him unfit to continue in the army.

  Daley padded through to the kitchen, collected a bottle of malt whisky that was almost half full and a squat crystal glass, and returned to the table in the lounge where he poured himself a large measure.

  Given his injury, he wondered how Urquhart had been passed fit to join the police, and then reasoned that during the war normal medical requirements would have been less rigorous. Urquhart had investigative experience, albeit in a military capacity. As Daley read on, he discovered that his predecessor was highly competent and well respected by his superiors, despite being thought of as rather aloof and ‘not one of the boys’.

  ‘Join the club,’ he muttered to himself as he took a gulp of his whisky.

  The inspector had been posted to Kinloch in 1944, taking lodgings in a flat in the upmarket Craighardy building, on the edge of town. He was a bachelor, and appeared to have little in the way of personal ties – so opined the superintendent who had written the report, at any rate.

  The one black mark that Urquhart had against him stemmed from his time serving as a detective sergeant in Perth, where he had seen fit to punch a senior officer. However, the incident hadn’t impeded his promotional prospects – or recurred – and within months of moving to the Argyll Constabulary he had been promoted to the rank of detective inspector.

  Daley looked at the photograph again and wondered if anyone would spend time poring over his file in years to come. He doubted it.

  ‘Good luck to you.’ He drained his glass and poured himself another whisky.

  Dusk was descending over Kinloch now. He watched the red tail lights of a car meandering along the coast road out of town, in the direction of the island at the head of the loch. A murmuration of starlings dipped and soared, seemingly as one, before settling in the swaying trees above the graveyard.

  A small fishing boat was making its way to the safety of the harbour, being tossed up and down by the dark, restless waters of the loch.

  For an instant he saw Mary disappearing over the edge of the RIB, recalling how he and Scott had desperately clutched at her hands and dragged her from the depths of the broiling whirlpool of Corryvreckan.

  Little in the way of personal ties. As these words had applied to Inspector William Urquhart, so they applied to him now.

  He turned the page and was surprised to note that large sections of Urquhart’s files had been redacted. Page after page, in fact, was blacked out in thick lines. This was highly unusual. Too many years had elapsed for the life of Inspector William Urquhart in Kinloch to remain an official secret. Unless, there was something else entirely . . .

  In a darkened room at the heart of the Ministry of Defence building in Whitehall, Timothy Gissing was pointing at a huge screen. Beside him, Naval Commander Parsons was fidgeting.

  ‘Let’s go over this again,’ Gissing said wearily. ‘The body was discovered here, and the Irish Coastguard have picked up wreckage here and here.’

  ‘Yes, sir. They’re currently looking through a list of vessels that could be considered as missing – you know, late back to port and so on. It could take some time, I’m afraid.’

  ‘What do we have in the area?’

  Parsons bent over his laptop and keyed in some details, then addressed the question. ‘We have a minesweeper, The Devonian, in the North Channel. Do you want me to ask them to join the search?’

  ‘Yes. Yes, please do that. I need to know as much about this incident as possible – and as quickly as possible. Contact The Devonian yourself.’

  ‘We’ll have to go through official channels, offer our services to the Irish Republic. I doubt they’ll knock back the offer of assistance, mind you.’

  ‘See that they don’t. If you have problems, contact me, no matter the hour.’ Gissing handed him his card with a sigh. ‘What about the weather on the coast of Kintyre?’

  ‘I have the latest forecast here.’ Parsons clicked more keys on his computer. ‘Looks pretty rough for the next forty-eight hours, at least. It’s the tail end of that storm that hit the eastern seaboard of the United States a couple of days ago. I can’t remember its bloody name . . .’

  ‘I don’t give a damn what its name is. Are you seriously telling me it’s beyond our capabilities to land anyone on Gairsay until this clears? I can hardly believe it.’

  ‘Difficult harbour in this type of weather, sir. The wind is coming from south-southeast. Unless it blows round a bit, we’re on a hiding to nothing. We do have units on standby with your personnel aboard. As soon as it’s practically possible, we’ll get over there.’

  ‘What about a helicopter?’ asked Gissing, with little confidence.

  ‘Not a chance. There is a small airfield on the island, but it would need a ‘‘Winkle’’ Brown to land anything on it in this weather.’

  Gissing snorted. ‘Well, keep me up to speed. When do you finish, Commander?’

  ‘I’ll be relieved at seven by Childs, sir. I’m yours all night, so to speak.’

  Gissing bid Parsons goodnight and trudged down the long corridors to his own office.
/>   ‘Herr Neyermeyer has been on for you, sir,’ said his secretary with a smile.

  ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘That you were with the chiefs of staff.’

  ‘Good.’ He walked into his office and closed the door. He stared for a few moments at his wife’s photograph before picking up the phone.

  ‘Hello, my darling. Bad news, I’m afraid. It’s going to be an all-nighter, by the looks of things. Sorry about supper.’ He listened to his wife’s complaints for a while, apologised again, then said goodbye.

  He opened the bottom right-hand drawer of his desk. A bottle of brandy rolled to and fro, colliding gently with a glass tumbler. He poured himself a measure, took a gulp of the spirit, and called his secretary.

  ‘Angie, darling, are you busy?’

  ‘No, sir. I’ll be in directly.’

  He watched as she locked the door behind her. She stood in front of his desk, slowly unbuttoning her crisp white blouse, a strand of dark hair slipping over her right eye as she gazed at him seductively.

  In a few moments she had straddled him and was pushing herself up and down, on tiptoes, her hands gripping the back of his chair on either side of his head, skirt pulled up over her thighs, as he clutched her backside.

  His tongue licked her brown nipple as it danced in front of him, leaving it slick with saliva. He pulled her down hard by her shoulders as he groaned with the release of his climax.

  As the young woman’s movement slowed and she rested her head on his shoulder, he glanced at the photograph of his wife on the desk before him. He turned his head away.

  ‘Now, be a good girl and get me a coffee, would you?’ said Gissing, as she eased herself off him and reached between her thighs with a tissue.

  Symington’s mood had lightened in inverse proportion to the severity of the storm. She was in the incident room, reading some of the hasty translations of the German files found in the Bremners’ basement while taking frequent sips from a large glass of wine.

  Stürmbahnfurher Hermann Schneider. Hanover, 1973. She scanned the document, discovering that Herr Schneider had lived a quiet life after the war, working as a director of a wallpaper factory. In late 1972, a young female reporter from an Israeli newspaper had turned up at his office, asking questions about his time in the Waffen-SS. The document was straightforward and concise, making no attempt to create a narrative around plain facts.

  Symington furrowed her brow as she read on.

  It emerged that this file had been written up by Mr Bremner senior. He mentioned a delivery, and then the processing of a parcel.

  At first the superintendent couldn’t make the connection between the few lines about Herr Schneider and the mention of the parcel. She wondered – given his profession – if this man had sent the Bremner family wallpaper, that this was the parcel mentioned. Perhaps swatches?

  Soon, though, it dawned on her that Schneider and the parcel were one and the same and that Mr Bremner’s function had been to arrange the clandestine removal of this man from Germany.

  Herr Schneider arrived on Gairsay, and three days later, Mr Lawrence W— was picked up by motor cruiser (H.H.) for transportation to Destination A.

  Symington re-read the sentence. The man referred to as Lawrence W. had not been mentioned earlier in the document, so she wondered where he had sprung from. Then there was the question of why either man would have made the journey to the quiet island of Gairsay. Also, what was ‘H.H.’, and just where was ‘Destination A’?

  The door swung open to reveal Scott, dressed in a thick Arran jumper and a pair of jeans. ‘Good evening, ma’am. Is it no’ time you called it a day?’

  ‘Yes, you’re probably right. I’m a bit peckish, come to think of it.’

  ‘Come on, and we’ll get some scran before the chef buggers off.’ Scott rubbed his hands together.

  ‘Are you cold, Brian?’

  ‘Aye, a wee bit. The weather’s atrocious.’ He nodded towards the window, streaked with rain blown in gusts by the gale-force wind.

  ‘Still, it’s quite cosy in here.’

  ‘My old mother was right. I mind her telling my faither, “If you’re a heavy drinker, you’ll never be cold”.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Och, you know what I mean. Since I cut oot the bevy, ma’am, I’ve been bloody freezing. The doctor says it’s quite natural, and my body is adjusting back tae normal. Trouble is, I cannae mind just what normal was like.’

  ‘You’re in a much better place, Brian. I’m proud of you – we all are.’ She smiled.

  ‘I’m no’ accustomed tae hearing that kind of thing, neither. The last time anyone telt me they were proud o’ me was when I passed my cycling proficiency test in primary seven.’

  ‘What test?’

  ‘It was a long time ago, ma’am. You’re too young tae remember that, likely.’

  She closed the file she’d been reading and went to the filing cabinet the hotel had provided. After placing the file in a drawer, she locked the cabinet and looked about for her handbag. ‘I’m getting so absent-minded. You can’t see my bag anywhere, can you, Brian?’

  ‘Absent-minded? Join the club. It’s one o’ the pleasures o’ getting old. I keep wandering intae rooms and wondering why the hell I’m in there . . . Here, is this what you’re after?’ He picked up the handbag, which had been tucked under a chair, and handed it to Symington.

  ‘Thanks.’ She zipped the filing-cabinet key into an inside pocket of her bag, just as a young waitress leaned her head around the door. ‘The chef says he’s just about to go, and would you like something before he does?’

  ‘We’re just on our way through, thanks,’ replied Symington.

  The girl paused for a moment, looking at the police officer’s bag. ‘Is that a real Louis Vuitton?’

  ‘Yes, I confess it is,’ said Symington, embarrassed. ‘I’ve got a bit of a thing about bags.’

  ‘Me too. I’m saving up for one with my tips. See you in a minute.’ She returned to the dining room.

  ‘Brian, I need you to do me a favour tomorrow.’

  ‘Yes, ma’am, nae bother.’

  ‘I want you to get out and about, ask the islanders if the Bremners were in the habit of having guests. If so, how did they get here and how did they leave. I’m sure everyone notices everything in a place like this.’

  They left the incident room together, Symington locking the door behind them.

  ‘If it’s anything like Kinloch,’ said Scott, ‘there’ll be no doubt aboot it. Worse than MI5 o’er there.’ He eyed the window with some dismay. ‘I hope the weather clears up a bit.’

  15

  The man was struggling now. He’d hung on to the piece of wreckage for dear life, eventually being washed up on a rocky shore beneath cliffs, where he was still marooned. His right leg was useless; agony every time he tried to move it. He had called out pitifully for help, but who would come to save him here?

  He had managed to drag himself along the sand and was lying in the lee of a huge boulder, drifting in and out of consciousness, his body numb in the biting cold and rain.

  He was finding it difficult to swallow now. Though he was drenched, his mouth was bone dry, the taste of the salt water he’d swallowed making him retch from time to time.

  He remembered playing in the sand as a child. Sunny days, under blue skies. Buckets and spades. His grandfather building a huge fort in the sand, complete with a moat, into which, through a small channel, sea water flowed. This was where he kept the unfortunate crabs he’d plunder from the rock pools – rock pools like the one he was lying beside. But there was no sandcastle fort here, no sun; just pain, cold and fear.

  He’d tried to hold on to her tiny hand, but the rise of the swell had ripped them apart. He had watched her drift away, in and out of sight as he bobbed in the cold sea. He had called out to her, but only moments after her hand had slipped from his, her body had disappeared, consumed by the water and the thick slick of oil that had come fro
m the wreckage of the boat.

  As he felt himself drifting off into a sleep from which there was no awakening, he heard voices. Someone was shouting. He lifted his head and thought he saw the flashing of a torch.

  He called out as best he could, praying that he could make his voice heard above the churning waves and the driving rain. ‘I’m here! I’m here!’ he rasped. Then, with one last gargantuan effort, he managed to shout, ‘Over here, help me!’

  Relief washed over him as he saw the light flash on the surface of the rock pool, piercing the raindrops that fell in a downpour in front of him. He shielded his eyes against the beam as it was directed into his face, trying his best to speak, but could only mouth the words, ‘Thank you, thank you, please, help me.’

  A dark figure loomed over the stricken man, holding the torch steady, pointing it into his face.

  He could hear the croak of the man’s voice, but couldn’t reply.

  Soon the beam of the man’s torch was joined by another.

  ‘This is him, no?’

  A second figure leaned down over the man lying against the rock, pushing his soaking hair from his bloodied face. He turned to his companion and nodded. ‘Yes, this is the grandson. No doubt about it.’

  The first man hesitated for a heartbeat, then tugged something from his belt. ‘Move out of the way, but keep the light on him.’

  He raised the cosh into the air, bringing it down heavily on the injured man’s head again and again, the cracking of his skull audible against the noise of the wind and the crash of the sea. Splattered in the dead man’s blood, he dragged the corpse into the surf.

  Carrie Symington was feeling much more relaxed as she sat at the table with her dining companion. Though she’d known Scott for a few months, this was the first proper opportunity she’d had to speak to him about anything but work, without someone else present. She smiled as he regaled her with yet another story about his early career in Glasgow, and how he and Jim Daley had become friends.