I got up from the table and slid the hatch back. There were dark shadows under Gavin’s eyes, as if he’d had no sleep. His hair was damp from a wake-up shower. ‘Good morning.’ I suddenly realised I’d never called him Gavin, directly. I wasn’t going to start now, with Sergeant Peterson standing at his back, her feet at ten to two. I lifted out the washboards and stowed them in their slot. ‘Come aboard.’
‘Just a few questions about last night,’ he said, swinging over the guard rail in a swish of green pleats. I motioned him down the steps. Sergeant Peterson followed him, notebook in one hand. Her green eyes slid across to Anders. ‘It’s good to see you on your feet again, Mr Johansson.’
He gave her a blank look.
‘I was there,’ she explained, ‘when the bull attacked you, in the summer.’
A tide of pink swept up his neck and coloured his jaw. Maybe I could foist him off on the mermaid. They would make a bonny couple, I told myself, ignoring the twist of jealousy that curled in my belly, except that she wasn’t a sailor – but she could learn. Women were good at taking up their men’s hobbies, and a police lifestyle with odd shifts might complement a gamer apt to disappear into interplanetary warfare for several days.
Gavin looked at Anders in his corner, and his face took on that blank look of someone who’s not going to say anything. In this case, attack was better than silence.
‘Anders wasn’t happy about me being alone,’ I said. I nodded at the tumbled sleeping bag in the forepeak. ‘He and Rat came back to their old berth. Have you had breakfast?’
‘Tea is always welcome,’ Gavin said. He sat down opposite Anders. Sergeant Peterson settled for squishing herself into the awkward seat beside the chart table. ‘When did you come over from Norway, Mr Johansson?’
‘The day before yesterday,’ Anders said. He frowned, and re-thought. ‘No, it was just before dawn yesterday.’ He gave Gavin one of those men-ganging-up-together smiles. ‘Life is exciting with Cass around. Each day feels longer.’
‘I don’t see,’ I said frostily, ‘how I can be held responsible for what idiot women decide to do up on the hill on a moonlit night.’
Anders grinned, and made a winding motion with his hand. I scowled at him and got on with boiling the kettle, setting mugs out and fishing the milk out from below sea-level.
‘Samhain,’ Sergeant Peterson said, flipping her notebook open. ‘The Night of the Dead, and their principal celebration of the year.’
‘Tell me your side of it first,’ Gavin said. ‘We haven’t charged them with anything so far, because they’re consenting adults.’
‘I suppose you could try breach of the peace,’ I said, ‘but I escaped before they could do me any harm, so you might have difficulty proving they intended any. That nasty looking knife could have been for cutting their bread.’ I told him the whole story, beginning with James Leask’s phone call, my capture, the walk up the hill, the arrival of the devil, the horrid ceremony, as neutrally as I could, pausing in the middle to make a pot of tea when the kettle whistled at last. ‘And then you arrived,’ I ended, ‘and I brought Rachel down here.’
‘They all clammed up the minute I mentioned you,’ Gavin said. ‘The one I took to be the leader said she didn’t know what I was talking about, there were the four of them up on the hill, and that was all. No prisoners, no devil, and anyone who said different was just trying to cover up the fact they’d been sneaking about watching, and hoping they’d take their clothes off.’ I could just hear her saying it.
‘Who was the fourth?’
Sergeant Peterson didn’t need to look at her notebook. ‘Sarah Cheyne, 23 Ladysmith Road, works at the college café with Nate.’
I nodded. ‘I should have thought of her. I saw her with Nate and the other three a couple of days ago.’
‘They began their rituals about six months ago after listening to Nate telling them about what witches used to do, because they thought it sounded cool.’
‘We thought Nate was at the bottom of it,’ I said, and explained our thinking that they’d believed Nate was the devil, and been shocked by the appearance of someone else in the devil suit. Gavin nodded, considering it.
‘As for your idea about the £100,’ Sergeant Peterson said, ‘they denied it. The one with the spider on her cheek admitted that they’d given the dog something to make it sick, “just an emetic, nothing harmful”, then told Annette they’d put a curse on it, to frighten her. The local SSPCA man will be having a word with them about that. They denied having asked her for money, and they all insisted she’d never given them any.’
‘So where did it go, then?’ My head was closing in again. I rubbed my temple. I’d take an aspirin after Gavin had gone.
‘They were frightened of the devil,’ Anders said. ‘They enjoyed the whippings, but they jumped to do his bidding.’
‘Yes,’ Gavin agreed. ‘I picked up on a genuine fear, although I’m not sure they really believed he was a supernatural devil. What description can you give me of the person under the costume?’
I shook my head. ‘None. Height and walk, build, voice, they were all altered.’
Gavin looked over at Anders. ‘Mr Johansson?’
‘Nothing. You could see only the costume.’
‘Then we’ll try to trace that,’ Gavin said. ‘If we don’t find it on the hill, I’ll send Sergeant Peterson back for the fullest description you can manage.’
‘You didn’t find it last night?’
Gavin shook his head. ‘We couldn’t search every rock shadow in the moonlight. I left a man up there overnight, and sent a party up this morning. I can’t say I’m hopeful. It sounds too distinctive to be left where we could find it.’
‘Too expensive too,’ I said. ‘Unless it was homemade – and if it was, you’re looking for someone who’s inventive, handy with a sewing machine, and able to fix electronics.’
‘From what you’ve said, I’d guess a theatrical costumier.’ He looked at Sergeant Peterson. ‘If we don’t find it on the hill, Freya, you might need to spend the afternoon phoning round as many as you can find.’
That was a move-on from his earlier brisk ‘Sergeant’: . Freya, the Queen of the Norse goddesses. I checked my lower lip wasn’t pouting like a sulky child’s, and put my own oar in. ‘Something that cost that much to make would have to be signed for. Are we looking for someone without a family to say “What was that large package, dear?”’
Of course it could have been delivered to the college, along with a dozen other packages each day: books, chemical supplies, lobster eggs for their breeding programme marine equipment. Perhaps a glimpse of a black suit in a brown parcel, or a costumier’s name blazoned above the address, was what had told the chief hoodie their devil was Nate.
‘He couldn’t have walked up the hill in those hooves,’ Anders said. ‘He must have climbed the hill in ordinary clothes, with his costume in a backpack. He crept up on them, changed, sounded his horn, then bounded into their midst, as if by magic.’
Gavin nodded. ‘Yes. When we arrived, he could have done the reverse: stuffed the disguise into the backpack, put on different shoes, and strolled away, mingling confidently with the police. We had a lot of men up there, not all in uniform, and we were focused on the ones who were running away.’
‘We had an idea,’ I said diffidently. Sergeant Peterson straightened in her space. Gavin’s sea-grey eyes narrowed. ‘We thought it might have been Rachel. I released the prisoner, and Rachel said she’d been that prisoner, but I didn’t see her face. She could have run out of the firelight, ditched the suit, and re-appeared behind me.’
‘Interesting,’ Gavin said. ‘Sarah Cheyne denied she was one of them. She said she’d been kidnapped and marched up the burn with you, and tied to a post – until you freed her.’
I stared at him. ‘Sarah did? So if she was the prisoner, do we have an escaped witch? Rachel …?’
‘The others said she was lying,’ Sergeant Peterson said. ‘She said they had it in for
her because she’d called their games ‘a lock o’ bruck.’
‘If Nate was the devil before,’ I said, ‘then Rachel would have had access to his suit.’
‘So would the person who killed him,’ Gavin said. ‘Maybe that was the reason he called on Nate – to borrow the suit. He made a joke about wearing it out, and Nate came with him – to his death.’
‘You don’t think Rachel might have been the devil?’
Gavin shook his head. ‘You said the devil last night seemed to know the ritual?’
‘He said about the Maiden offering him a cup … he seemed to be at ease with it all.’ I looked across at Anders, who nodded.
‘I did not have any sense that he was feeling his way,’ he said.
‘Then Rachel couldn’t have hoped to impersonate him.’ Gavin stopped looking at me, and focused on swirling the last of his tea in its mug. Under his tan, his cheeks reddened. ‘They based the ritual on the confessions of a woman called Isobel Gowdie, who was the best known of the Scottish witches.’ His voice was matter of fact. Sergeant Peterson was looking at her sensible shoes, but I thought there was the twitch of a smile at her mouth. ‘After the pretence of a Mass, then there was an orgy.’
A hot tide of scarlet flooded my cheeks. Stupid, stupid! I had read it myself. Of course the devil had to be male, and from the sound of it, he’d have needed a hefty dose of Viagra beforehand.
‘All the same,’ Gavin said, in a much easier tone, ‘that’s an interesting idea, that they’d expected no devil because they’d believed it was Nate.’ He looked across at Sergeant Peterson. ‘Then, when someone turned up, it gave them the fright of their lives. That’d explain their reactions, don’t you think?’
She nodded. ‘It’s possible, sir.’
‘Backtrack,’ Gavin said. ‘Do you think James Leask set you up?’
I shook my head. ‘He was here when we got down to the boat. He’d been really worried about it all.’
Sergeant Peterson gave me the kindly look reserved for the weak-minded. ‘Had he been with your friend Reidar all the time?’
‘No,’ Anders said. His fair brows drew together in a frown. ‘He came to the meeting place at seven, waited for a bit, then left. He would have had time to climb the hill and appear as the devil. Then when you escaped, yes, he would have had time to come down before us and get to the marina. It was very odd that he should ask you to meet him like that. If he really had seen Lawrence on the night Nate died, why should he tell you? What is it to do with you? It was the police he should have told.’ He added, fatally, ‘I wish you had consulted me before setting off to meet him like that.’
‘Or the police,’ Sergeant Peterson said.
I sat up straighter on my box. ‘I’m accustomed to making my own judgements,’ I said. ‘Reidar was there as guard at the meeting place. You don’t expect to be kidnapped in the middle of Scalloway. Especially,’ I added, for good measure, ‘when it’s crawling with police cars.’
Gavin laughed out at that, looking suddenly younger. He was smiling at me, eyes warm, the companion of the sail to Aith, my fellow-judge and fellow-dancer in The Grand Old Duke of York. We were friends again. I wouldn’t analyse the rush of gladness that filled my breast, not right now. ‘But if he was telling the truth, and he did see Lawrence the night Nate died – ’
‘He was at the Hallowe’en Party,’ Gavin said.
Memory returned. Yes, he’d been at the Hallowe’en Party, wearing his furry suit with the claws which had made the indented marks I’d seen around Annette’s neck.
‘But he and Rachel were back in Scalloway by half past nine,’ Gavin said. ‘Nate was attacked around eleven.’ He rose, took Sergeant Peterson’s mug from her, and rinsed both in the sink with the last of the hot water from the kettle. I watched her clock his familiarity with the boat and her habits, the way he reached for the dish towel without looking at it, and set the dry mugs back in their slot above the cooker. Mentally, I descended to a three-year old, sticking my tongue out at an annoying rival, and was well served for my petulance when Gavin said, turning, ‘I was going in to the 1.15 Mass. Can I give you a lift?’
I looked blankly at him.
‘All Saints,’ he said.
Of course it was, and a Holy Day of Obligation too. I’d completely forgotten. That meant Mass at either 1.15 or 7.30, in Lerwick. ‘Yes, please. I’ll meet you at the old museum.’
‘One o’clock?’
‘That’ll be fine.’ I glanced at Khalida’s little clock, velcroed to where I could see it from my berth. It was half past nine already. ‘My mercy, I’m late.’ I grabbed my jacket. ‘Come on, Cat, we’ve a garden to clear.’
Everything was bright outside: the blue water, the coloured houses, the red-brown stones of Scalloway Castle. The great turbines on the hill blinked white light as the sun caught the slow turn of the blades. At ground level, each grass had a thin blade of frost, each curled leaf was outlined with ragged white. In Kate’s garden, the newly turned earth was glazed with silver. Kate was standing on the doorstep waiting for me, a mug of tea cradled in her hands, the barrow parked beside her. The fork and spade lay in it, and two pairs of thick gloves.
‘Good morning, Cass. Isn’t it cold? I was beginning to wonder if you were okay, then I saw the police car at the marina.’
‘Just more questions,’ I said.
‘They caught them, didn’t they? The witches. Last night, on the hill. You can’t see the flames from here, but I saw the light of the bonfire in the sky, and then there were all the police cars going up past.’ She set her mug down, face earnest. ‘Did they catch them? Will it be stopped?’
I couldn’t answer that. ‘They got the girls. It was those ones in grey and black who hang about by the shop, smoking and trying to be cool.’
Kate’s eyes filled with tears. ‘Playing at witchcraft … Their stupidity killed my child. Can they be held to account for that?’
‘Maybe,’ I said. ‘If what they did led to her death.’
Kate stood up, moving slowly, like an old woman. ‘Peter wants to leave here. He’s asked for a transfer.’ Her eyes went slowly across the cleared garden. ‘But it’ll take time. Maybe I’ll still see this garden in spring.’
‘Do you want to go?’ I asked.
She shook her head, spilling the tears down her cheeks. ‘Annette’s grave will be here.’
My heart wrenched with pity. There was nothing I could say. I was glad when she picked up the handles of the barrow and headed down towards the broad border.
We worked in silence, digging up forkful after forkful of the tangled, bitter roots, whacking them free of earth and flinging them into the barrow. The earth was cold as death. The crisp brown sycamore leaves fell around as us as we worked.
I was still trying to make sense of it all, my brain teasing at the deaths here in Scalloway. It had begun with Annette’s dreams of being a witch. She’d gone to Nate to ask him for help, for exorcism, and he’d said he would help, if she would steal him the ash of the burned witches from the museum, using Peter’s keys. They’d set Wednesday night for the ritual. Annette had waited till Peter had taken the dogs out, then she’d gone to the museum and got the ash and the castle keys. She’d met Nate in the castle – no. No, Nate had been the werewolf whose claws around her neck had shocked Annette into the seizure that had killed her. Someone had been the werewolf, and there’d been the devil that Kevin’s nan had seen, who’d carried her.
I started again. Nate had been the demon of the witches’ sabbats up on the hill. He was strong enough to have carried Annette; I’d seen him lifting the chief hooded crow in the college, and he’d ‘carried her off’ in that play they’d done. Someone else had done the ritual, and he’d appeared behind Annette – no, that didn’t work either, for it had been claw marks from the werewolf on her neck. He’d made them earlier, when she’d first demurred at getting the ash. He’d stretched out his gloved hand, and caught her neck, and said, ‘Get it for me, or you’ll never be free.’
I could see that. It fitted in with the way she’d spoken to James. She didn’t want to do it, but she had to.
Hang on! We didn’t know for certain the suit had been Nate’s. Rachel said it had been, that she’d borrowed it from Nate for Lawrence; but suppose it had been Lawrence’s all the time? I tried that idea out. Annette went to Rachel and asked her to exorcise her, and Rachel said she would, if Annette got her the ash. Lawrence was there too, and he did the clawed intimidation. Then, at the castle that night, while Rachel was bending over the cauldron, Lawrence appeared from behind, and shocked Annette. And then … no, I wasn’t going to believe that they ran in shock, and the real Devil appeared in a cloud of sulphur, with the hounds of hell at his back, and carried the body to Spanish closs to accuse the murderers.
‘Kate?’ I asked. She turned and wiped her hand over her brow, leaving a smear of earth. ‘Kate, that last day of Annette’s life, just as I was going out, Peter said he’d found out who Annette had got herself entangled with.’
Kate nodded. ‘Nate. John Ratter, he works at the bank, he’d seen Annette going into Nate’s house. He knew the boy’s reputation, so he had a word with Peter, that maybe he should try and discourage that friendship.’
‘He saw her going into the house, he didn’t see her with Nate?’ That left Rachel still in the frame.
‘It doesn’t matter now,’ Kate murmured. She flung her handful of roots into the barrow. ‘He’s dead too.’
A rhyme from an Agatha Christie swam into my head. Mrs McGinty’s dead, why did she die? I watched unseeing as Kate picked up the barrow and trundled it off up the garden. Why had Nate died?
Because he’d seen the murderer. He hadn’t been part of the ritual. He’d been watching from behind the window, the shadow I’d seen, and he’d seen the murderer dropping Annette’s body at his door. And then … and then … I saw it suddenly, as if I’d been there. He’d gone out with his clawed glove and made fresh marks on her throat. I heard his voice in my mind, the day she’d died: The Devil’s loose in Scalloway. Nate had started the three hooded crows on the idea of witchcraft, that had turned into the satanic rituals up on Gallow Hill. He’d enjoyed spreading ideas of devilry. Malice or just mischief, he’d gone out and made those marks, then slipped back into the house as he heard me approach. I remembered the closing door.
A Handful of Ash Page 25