The Trowie Mound Murders

by Marsali Taylor

  There was a shout overhead, a flurry of speech. Crouched under here, I couldn’t distinguish words, or recognise voices, but I could hear the anger. They’d found the end of my tunnel. Footsteps scuffled from one side of the mound to the other. A woman’s voice spat out, ‘She can’t have gone far!’ A man replied, ‘Look!’

  I could hear the scrunch of heather, the give of the turf, as they moved, feel the vibration of the earth. It seemed forever that I crouched there, hearing the hunt go on above me. At last the feet came to the platform.

  ‘Nothing.’ It was a woman’s voice.

  ‘If he doesn’t come soon, I’m not waiting. They’ll find the boy soon.’ The man’s voice crackled with anger. I was pretty sure it was David speaking. ‘I can’t see what he’d want that would be so urgent.’

  ‘That’s him.’ There was relief in the woman’s voice. Madge’s? I couldn’t be sure. I could feel the vibration in the hill, then there was the sound of a vehicle approaching, a pick-up or 4x4, driven fast across the uneven ground. I heard it stop, not very close. There was a surprised exclamation from the man, then a shot, a scream from the woman, another shot. The double crack bounced across from hill to hill until the echo diminished into silence.

  The cavalry wouldn’t come out shooting. I waited in stillness as a single set of footsteps came around the mound above my head. There was a dragging sound, grunts of exertion, and then with a slither of little stones, something was shoved from the platform edge above me, thudded on my ledge with an inert weight and fell on downwards to the sea. I opened my eyes too late to see what it was, but heard the splash and saw the ripples. Something dark surfaced on the gold water far below.

  The second body was thrown over from the direction I was facing. I saw the cartwheeling of arms and legs, clad in a dark jacket and trousers, the heavy thud as it bounced against a ledge lower down. I recognised David’s face, mouth open beneath the thick moustache, eyes glaring blindly. I heard the second splash, then there was a long silence, as if the person with the gun was standing there, waiting. I closed my eyes once more. Lord, protect me.

  The relief when the footsteps moved away left me shaking. The pick-up started up with a roar, and drove away over the hill. I waited until the last rumble had died away before I lifted my head, stiff muscles protesting, and gradually straightened up to stand on the ledge there, hands splayed against the red stone, feet planted on the grass ledge. Below me, the two dark backs hung heavy in the water. Already they were beginning to separate from each other, tugged away from the shore by the undertow. The police would need to retrieve them soon.

  I turned to face the cliff. I’d had to drop maybe two feet onto the ledge, so I’d need to climb back up. I didn’t want to do it. I was too tired, too scared of the long drop below me. I turned my back on it again and dropped onto the grass tussocks. Someone would come looking for me. They’d throw a rope over to hoist me up –

  I must have sat there for a good half hour, watching the bodies in the water drift seawards, and feeling sorry for myself. I hurt all over. My hands were black with earth, and criss-crossed with tiny scratches which I’d have to disinfect. I had a sizeable graze showing through a tear on one knee of my jeans. The blood showed dark red among the earth. My ankles hurt where I’d jarred them, dropping down here, and I didn’t want to think about what I’d done to my face.

  It was the drone of the Coastguard helicoptor that galvanised me into action. Gavin must have got back to Brae, seen that I wasn’t there, and called them out. The red and white chopper came up from the south, quite high, then went round in a circle as if it had spotted something. The RIB, I betted, drifting with nobody aboard. Then, under the rotor-blade whirr, I heard the roar of a high-speed engine. They’d called out Aith Lifeboat as well. It came out of the Rona in a plume of white water. I was never going to hear the end of this … and the thought of dangling helplessly on the end of a rope, in full view of the combined rescue services, galvanised me into action. I turned my back on the drop to the shimmering sea, and looked properly at the cliff. All I needed was a foothold at knee height, and another at the same height again. That would get my shoulders above the cliff edge, and I could haul myself from there. If the ledge I stood on had been solid ground, I wouldn’t have hesitated for a moment.

  It didn’t take very long to find the holds I needed. I took a deep breath, then swarmed upwards, giving myself a good shove upwards from the second hold, and wriggling my torso forwards on the viewing platform while my legs kicked wildly in the air. It wasn’t elegant, but I’d made it. I didn’t need rescued any more. I staggered to my feet and stood there, swaying.

  Yes, they’d found the RIB. I could see it now, drifted out from the cottage bay. The lifeboat was taking it in tow while the chopper circled, looking for my body. I unzipped my fleece. The T-shirt beneath it had been white when I’d put it on after sailing, but it wouldn’t pass any Persil test now. I hauled it off, put my fleece back on, and began waving the T-shirt as a signal flag. My watch wasn’t quite big enough for a signal mirror, but it could give off a flash. I tilted it to the sun, away again, towards them again, several times, then went back to waving the T-shirt.

  They’d spotted me. The chopper turned and came straight for me. It hovered, the red and white chevrons right above me, then tilted sideways, moving to the open hill just past the trowie mound, hovered again, and sank to rest. The ear-splitting noise continued for a moment longer, and the wind of the blades whipped my hair across my face and buffeted my body. Then the blades slowed, drooped and stilled, and the noise ceased. The door in the side of the chopper opened, and Gavin got out.

  I wanted to run to him, to be hugged and soothed, but we weren’t on those terms. I waited, casual as I could be with my dirty face and torn jeans, until he was within earshot. ‘Doctor Livingstone, I presume.’

  ‘Ms Stanley.’ He gave me a quick, comprehensive look. ‘Superficial grazes but no real damage?’

  ‘Nothing a shower won’t cure,’ I agreed. ‘If you can give me a lift back to the RIB, I’ll take it home.’

  ‘The lifeboat had it in tow.’

  ‘Then if the winchman can put us down to the lifeboat, I’ll save them the journey to Brae.’

  ‘They’re halfway there already,’ the pilot said. ‘They set off as soon as we recognised you, and knew we didn’t have to look for a corpse.’ He grinned. ‘We might have known you’d turn up safe and sound.’

  ‘I have,’ I said, ‘but I’m afraid you do have a corpse to deal with – well, two.’ I gestured over the cliff. ‘Someone shot two people and rolled them over, about an hour ago. Dark jackets, but they were still floating.’ I grimaced at Gavin. ‘I’ve had an interesting evening. Let me tell you about it on the way home.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  The chopper landed on the football pitch in Brae. Gavin stayed with it, to get back to the police HQ in Lerwick, and I had only to walk along the road to the boating club. This being Shetland, the second car that passed was Magnie. He stopped to pick me up.

  ‘Lass, you look as if you’ve been digging.’

  ‘I have,’ I agreed wearily. ‘I got stuck inside your trowie mound – Magnie, I’m knackered. I’ll tell you the whole story once I’ve had a shower.’ My belly was reminding me I hadn’t eaten either. ‘Are you busy this evening? I couldn’t get you to drop me off at the club, and then go and get me a fish supper from Frankie’s? I’ve just realised I haven’t had any tea.’

  ‘No problem, lass.’

  The shower was magnificent. I lathered the earth out of my hair, soaped all over, wincing a bit, then just stood in the hot water for five repeat presses of the ‘on’ button. When I came out, I was pink all over. I dried myself, slathered my cuts with Savlon cream, anointed the rest of me with strawberry-smelling cream from Shetland Soap and headed back to the boat. In passing, I had a quick look in the RIB, and was pleased to find my mobile stashed in the under-seat locker. A nice touch.

  Magnie was there before m
e, and Anders with him, both tucking into fish suppers. Mine was still in its blue and white box, with a cup of tea steaming beside it. Rat whiffled disapprovingly at my strawberry and Savlon smell, but Cat swarmed straight up my clean jeans and jumper to curl around my neck, purring like a steam engine. Magnie and Anders each glanced up, then returned to eating. All the same, I knew what they’d seen; a network of scrapes and grazes across my face and hands, with the occasional bit of earth still ingrained.

  ‘Aaahh,’ I said appreciatively, sitting down on the engine box and leaning back against the cabin doorway. My box contained a slab of haddock that wasn’t far off the size of Khalida’s doorstep, and perfectly cooked chips. The fish was sea-fresh, with moist white flesh in crunchy batter. I put a piece down for Cat, then polished off every last crumb, including the inevitable final hard chip in a pool of vinegar.

  ‘I got some ice-cream too,’ Magnie said. He produced three white chocolate Magnums from a swathing of newspaper. ‘You looked as if you could do with it.’

  People who live on small boats don’t have a freezer to keep ice-cream in. An unexpected Magnum was bliss. I ate it very slowly, giving Rat a piece of white chocolate. He nibbled it from his front paws, sitting up like a squirrel, whiskers twitching appreciatively. Cat finished his fish, then sat in my lap to wash his face.

  ‘So,’ Anders said, ‘what have you been doing?’

  I launched into the story. I added what Gavin had yelled at me in the chopper, that Alex’s death was being treated as murder, because of suspicious circumstances in how he was found. He hadn’t given further details, and I hadn’t asked for them. I kept seeing his face, the lavender blue eyes, the straggle of fair hair … He hadn’t suffered, Gavin had said. A blow on the head had killed him outright.

  ‘And it was yon David and Madge that shut you into the mound, you think?’ Magnie said.

  ‘It must have been,’ I agreed. ‘They knew I’d escaped – ergo, they put me in there. But then who shot them?’

  ‘And where do the other pair fit in?’ Anders said. ‘Peter and Sandra, who owned the yacht?’

  ‘And how did my visitor come to be left apo Linga?’ Magnie added.

  ‘Gavin seems to think he swam there,’ I said. ‘He thinks the boat was scuttled in Cole Deep, that night we saw it leaving.’

  ‘There’s serious money in an operation that can afford to sink a boat like yon,’ Magnie said. ‘What’d she be worth, would you say? Seventy thousand?’

  ‘Nearer a hundred,’ I said.

  ‘Peter loved his cat,’ Anders said. ‘You could see that. He would not have left it to drown, any more than I would leave Rat. So if the boat is in Cole Deep, it was not Sandra who took her out, that night.’

  ‘But someone shot David and Madge,’ I said. ‘They were waiting for a he. Someone they weren’t afraid of.’

  ‘Someone from here who is involved in what’s going on,’ Anders said. ‘You said it was a pick-up.’

  ‘It sounded like one,’ I agreed, ‘and you couldn’t take a normal car up there.’

  ‘Well, then,’ Anders said, ‘you wouldn’t hire a pick-up from a garage. They have small run-abouts, or comfort cars, or vans. A pick-up means it was someone local.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said slowly, ‘I suppose it does.’ Kevin of the noisy motorboat had a pick-up. Brian of the cottage did too … but then, so did ninety per cent of the Shetland rural population. It wasn’t much of a clue.

  There was another thought knocking at the back of my head. I jerked upright. ‘Oh, murder! It’s Friday. I was supposed to be cleaning for Barbara o’ Staneygarth. Looking for Alex drove it clean out of my head.’ I looked at my watch. ‘Eleven o’clock. I can’t phone now.’ Realising how late it was made me give an enormous yawn that cracked all the starting-to-heal scratches on my face, and Magnie rose.

  ‘Lass, I’ll leave you to have an early night.’

  An early night sounded a good idea. Even after the shower, I was aching all over. Sleep wasn’t so easy. When I’d wriggled myself into my berth I couldn’t switch off, even with Cat purring in the crook of my neck. My eyelids were shut, but the eyes under them were wide open, gazing at ordered stone walling lit by green light. When I did sleep, I was plunged into a nightmare about being buried alive: Khalida had turned sideways, and earth was pouring into her like water. I could feel the weight of it on my legs, and smell it in my mouth –

  I was woken by Anders shaking my shoulder. ‘Komme ut, Cass, you are having a bad dream.’

  I was too shaken to argue, filled with that sense of foreboding that you get from a nightmare. I crawled out and immediately he wrapped a fleece blanket around me. He sat on my side of the table, and pulled me up against him, one arm warm around my back, my head pillowed comfortingly on his shoulder. I tucked my bare feet up into the fleece and let myself relax into being held. It had been a bad day, and although this was only Anders, the Warhammer nerd, for a moment it was good to believe in his Norse god looks. He felt strong, and safe.

  ‘See,’ he continued in Norwegian, ‘you are home now.’ I could feel the warmth of his breath on my hair. His other arm came up to curve me to him. ‘You do not need to be SuperCass, who can dare anything. You are in your own Khalida, and you are allowed to admit that you were frightened, shut in that tomb.’

  ‘It was so dark,’ I said. I wasn’t going to wail; I kept my voice low and drowsy. ‘It was like there would never be any light ever again, as if the sun and moon had been snuffed out at the end of the world. And it smelled of earth, and cold, and forgotten things. The walls were of thin stones, laid together, perfect. It was built to last till the end of time. I could see myself lying there always with their dead. I couldn’t shift the entrance stone from inside. After that I was afraid I would never get out, even though I knew that Brian had once got in. I had to believe I could, but deep down I knew he could have filled up the hole once and for all, concreted it in. And then I’d only just got out when they were hunting me again.’

  His arm shifted and tightened. ‘I could not have let myself drop down onto the cliff edge like that.’

  ‘You would have,’ I said, with conviction. ‘There wasn’t an alternative.’

  ‘I would have taken my chance on running.’

  ‘I knew they had a gun.’ My eyes were starting to close properly. I let his shoulder take the weight of my head. ‘They’d shot Cat’s mother. If they hadn’t done that I wouldn’t have known where to get out. If they hadn’t sunk the Rustler and left the Siamese to swim ashore, Gavin wouldn’t be dragging Cole Deep tomorrow. Bast’s revenge.’

  ‘Sleep, Cass.’ I could hear the smile in his voice.

  ‘The motorboat must be moored up by the cottage.’

  ‘The Inspector will find it, or the Coastguard, or the lifeboat.’

  The cottage … My brain had had a chance, now, to sort out what was going on there, with the bed and tripod. What are the laws about films of sex in this country? Not bringing in pornography, but making it. Cerys must have approached Anders, asked if he’d be in a movie. I couldn’t see many normal, healthy young men turning that one down, but once he’d done it, it must have lain on his Lutheran conscience. No wonder he’d had that air of combined bounce and misery. The prohibition on the cottage made sense too. He didn’t want me being tricked into her games.

  ‘I looked inside the cottage,’ I said. ‘I saw the set-up. It doesn’t bother me.’ It did, a little. I didn’t want to visualise Anders making love to Cerys.

  The warm arms tensed. ‘I went only once,’ Anders said. I could hear in his voice that he was blushing. ‘She asked me, and I thought it would be a laugh, you know, and then when he offered to pay me, I thought, well, why not, although I was nervous, because I had never done such a thing before. But I did not like it. It was not right, and I knew that. That was why I did not want you to go working – I thought that at least the money would buy us food for two weeks.’ Confession over, his arms relaxed. ‘But I would not do it again. I felt asha
med. It was not nice.’

  ‘Did Olaf work the camera?’ I asked.

  He nodded. ‘That is why I did not want you to have anything to do with him. He is not a nice man.’

  ‘I did something as bad,’ I confessed. ‘I heard Alain was thinking to set off across the Atlantic, so I chatted him up, became his girlfriend so I could go too.’ Was that why it had ended as it did, because I’d begun with the wrong motives? Yet we’d become good friends as well as lovers. The loss of his death swept over me again. We could have had such fun exploring the world’s oceans together –

  ‘Think about something else,’ Anders said. ‘Why do you not dress up and come dancing tomorrow night?’

  It was warm against his chest. ‘I look silly dressed up.’

  ‘I don’t know how you know. You have not dressed up for years, only once, for that press interview. The pretty dress your mother brought you for it is hanging in the locker.’

  ‘Maman. Joue avec tes poupées, chérie, sois sage. Be a little girl.’

  ‘I would like to dance,’ Anders said. ‘I have not tried your Shetland dances yet. I would like to see if they are descended from the Norwegian ones.’

  I considered this for a moment. He was being so comforting that it seemed churlish to refuse. ‘Do you mean going in to one of the Islesburgh tourist evening things?’

  ‘I meant the Show dance, tomorrow night.’

  The sleepy mood was broken. I sat upright. ‘Oh my mercy, Voe Show tomorrow! I said I’d go round and help out with the lifeboat stall. That is, I suppose it’s still happening – after Alex. Maybe they’ve cancelled it.’

  ‘It would be too late,’ Anders said. ‘We only heard about the boy here after eight o’clock, from the owner of Renegade. He had joined Olaf looking, until they found the boy, and the police took over.’