by Bill Knox
Carrick tossed the rest of his cigarette away. The glowing stub died as it hit the water. ‘Even when she’s patched she won’t come off easily,’ he warned. ‘How about insurance?’
‘She’s covered,’ agreed the distillery manager with minimal enthusiasm. ‘But did you ever hear of an insurance company that paid out full value?’
‘None that stayed in business,’ said Carrick dryly. ‘What boat are you using?’
‘The Heather Bee.’ Graham brightened a little. ‘She’s big enough for the job and her skipper is a local man, Dan Elder. He knows what he’s doing.’
‘He should. My brother taught him.’ Alec MacBean joined them again with a scowl still on his face. ‘You said you’d have another world wi’ him before you left, Harry.’
Graham nodded and they started back. Walking with them, Carrick followed the men to the opposite side of the pier from where Marlin lay and stopped at the edge. Lying below them was a blunt-bowed eighty-foot seine-netter. She was broad beamed, with a dark, varnished hull and an overall air of inbuilt strength. Some of her deck lights were on and three men were working around her fo’c’sle hatch.
‘Any problems now, Skipper?’ hailed Graham.
A muscular figure in a red wool shirt shook his head. ‘None, Mr Graham. An’ that’s the last o’ the gear stowed away.’
‘How about you, Fergie?’ demanded MacBean. ‘Sure you’ve got all you need?’
‘And more.’ The stockily built man who answered was surly. He had light brown hair cropped short and an aggressive young face which wasn’t improved by a broad white patch of sticking plaster above one eyebrow. ‘Hell, man – we’ve enough junk aboard to build another damned boat from scratch.’
‘The Harvest Lass will do,’ answered Graham with a surprising curtness. ‘Make another check against your list.’
The man shrugged. Beside him, the fishing boat’s skipper stifled a grin and asked, ‘Will you be back before we sail, Mr Graham?’
‘I’ll be too busy.’ Graham shook his head. ‘There’s a coaster coming in tomorrow for a load of whisky. But I’ll call you by radio before noon.’ He glanced at MacBean. ‘We may as well leave them to it. Coming?’
‘Eh … no.’ MacBean rubbed a hand along his jaw-line. ‘I want a word wi’ Fergie.’
Graham frowned. ‘All right. But remember I want you at the distillery early tomorrow. We’ve plenty to do.’
‘I’ll walk back with you,’ said Carrick easily. ‘As far as the village, anyway.’
‘Suit yourself.’ Graham gestured a farewell to the men below then turned away. They started off, Carrick keeping pace with the distillery manager’s long, quick stride.
‘Was that Fergie Lucas down there?’ asked Carrick.
‘Yes.’ Graham’s sniff was eloquent. ‘It was his damned fault as much as anyone’s that the Harvest Lass was wrecked. So I’m giving him the job of helping get her off again … Stewart, the other deckie, is going too.’
‘Compulsory penance?’
‘Partly. But they also know what they’re doing.’ Graham broke his step to avoid a tangle of mooring ropes. ‘And it’ll keep them out of the way of fresh trouble.’ He flicked a sideways glance at Carrick. ‘You’ll find Alec MacBean an equal problem.’
‘I’d heard,’ agreed Carrick. ‘But it sounds like you could keep him busy tomorrow. How much whisky are you shipping out?’
‘Our usual quarterly quota, 20,000 gallons of matured malt in 100-gallon casks – plus a special order, another 16,000 gallons in 2,000-gallon bulk tanks.’ Graham scowled in the fading light. ‘All of it still at 105 degree proof, Customs sealed and under bond. That’s where the real work comes in. We’ve to account for every damned drop at either end of the trip or the taxman is on our top.’
‘It’s a lot of liquor,’ said Carrick appreciatively as they skirted a pile of fish boxes.
‘For here, yes. But not by head office standards. Broomfire Distillery is the smallest in the company group, though they’ve a habit of forgetting it.’ Graham sounded slightly bitter. ‘Our single-malt is all seven-year-old spirit, top quality. But the bulk stuff is three-year spirit they want for blending – too young the way I see it. Not that head office give any particular damn what I say.’
They walked on in silence until they reached the shore end of the pier and the first cottages were just ahead.
‘Mind if I ask you about something very different?’ asked Carrick quietly.
‘I was waiting on it.’ Graham came to a halt, his manner chilling. ‘You mean my niece’s death?’
Carrick nodded.
‘Why?’
‘Because of what’s happening here,’ said Carrick, his face expressionless. ‘Things are building up to a feud, Rother’s men against the rest. And I don’t mean just pin-pricks like some idiot cutting a few sharks loose.’
Graham stood tight-lipped for a moment, then shrugged. ‘There isn’t much to tell. Helen was nineteen, my sister’s child – and with brains as well as looks, studying geology, always collecting the odd pebble or chipping some rock. She visited up here any time she could and I liked it when she came. I live alone, and she was good company.’ He paused, then added in ice-cold fashion, ‘You’ll have heard she was pregnant?’
‘Yes.’ Carrick chose his words carefully. ‘Did she give you any hint …?’
‘No.’ It came fiercely. ‘The girl said nothing to me. All I noticed on that last visit was that she seemed a lot quieter than usual. Afterwards – well, the doctor who carried out the post-mortem reckoned she’d been nearly three months with child.’
The old-fashioned phrase carried its own built-in hurt, and by outside standards the West Coast islands clung to a fiercely Calvinistic outlook when it came to morals. For a moment Carrick wondered which mattered most to Graham – that his niece had died or that disgrace had been brought to his doorstep.
‘The village think the father could be Dave Rother – or young Benson,’ he said softly.
‘Not because of anything I’ve said,’ rasped Graham. ‘Let’s get that clear. For all I know she was sleeping with some of her university friends. I’ve little time for Rother or his people – they’re outsiders here. But I can’t judge them on that alone and if I did know the man, knew for sure, I think I’d kill him.’ He held out his hands, the long, thin fingers spread wide. ‘With these, Carrick – that’s how I feel about it. So I’ve got to be sure.’ His hands closed slowly again and he drew a deep breath. ‘Helen wasn’t a bad girl. She was more a child, a child who panicked. But the shame stays. With her and with me. And there’s no more to say.’
Before Carrick could answer the tall, thin figure was stalking away from him into the dusk. An old Ford was parked a little way along the road and Graham stopped at it and climbed aboard. A moment later the engine fired, was revved hard, then slammed into gear. The car took off almost viciously, wheels scrabbling, cutting across the road in a full-lock U-turn.
Brakes squealed a protest as another approaching car swerved to avoid collision. Graham didn’t slow, his engine still at full throttle, the Ford rapidly heading inland. The car he’d so nearly hit coasted to a stop beside Carrick.
‘Who on earth was that maniac?’ asked Sheila Francis through the opened driver’s window.
‘Graham from the distillery.’ Carrick went over to her. ‘He – well, let’s say I was probing an old wound.’
‘Oh.’ Her voice showed an immediate understanding. Hands resting on the steering wheel, neat in her blue nursing uniform, she grimaced. ‘Then let me know if you do it again. I’ll make sure I’m not around.’
‘Sorry.’ Carrick answered absently. Till five minutes before he’d thought of Harry Graham as a fairly colourless individual with a minor mean streak. Now he felt he’d been given a brief glimpse inside the man but still wasn’t completely sure of all he’d seen – except that Graham was no person to trifle with.
‘What’s wrong?’ Sheila Francis reacted to his expression with a frow
n. ‘Webb, if you were talking about Helen Grant …’
He nodded. ‘You know about her?’
‘Most of my patients made sure I did the first time I was seen talking to Dave.’ She grimaced at the memory then looked at him again. ‘Going anywhere special?’
‘No.’
‘Then get in.’ Reaching over, she swung open the passenger door. ‘I’ve finished my calls, but Maggie MacKenzie told me to look in on the way home. She won’t mind an extra visitor – and we can talk there.’
Carrick went round, climbed in, and she set the car moving again. It was a small Health Department issue Austin and her black nursing bag was lying on the back seat.
‘Whose side are you on?’ she asked suddenly, her eyes on the road. ‘Do you back Dave or the village?’
‘I’m supposed to be a professional neutral,’ he reminded her wryly.
‘There’s no such animal.’ She changed down a gear for a bend ahead. ‘I use the same line often enough but it isn’t true. When it comes to Dave, I like him – but I wouldn’t particularly trust him.’ Her eyes flickered in his direction for a moment. ‘Would you?’
Carrick shook his head but didn’t answer.
The Austin travelled through the village, then slowed at the far end, turned into a narrow lane, and climbed a steep gradient for about a hundred yards. She stopped it and pulled on the handbrake outside a small, white-walled cottage with a black slate roof, a tiny garden and a view which encompassed the entire bay. Carrick got out, waited till the girl joined him, then they went together up the path to the front door. It opened as they arrived and Maggie MacKenzie stood there smiling a welcome.
‘God!’ The smile died as she saw him. ‘Sheila, you didn’t tell me you’d have a man wi’ you – look at me!’ She was in an old dressing gown, her feet in slippers, a scarf wrapped turban-style round her head with metal curlers showing. ‘It’s the night I wash my hair and – oh, come on in anyway, both of you.’
Inside the cottage was bright and neat with chintz curtains, matching chair-covers and an array of polished brass ornaments above the hearth, where a peat fire smouldered.
‘Sit down now you’re here.’ Maggie MacKenzie waved towards the chairs, then bustled to add another cup and saucer to the tray already waiting on a table. Turning, she unplugged a bubbling coffee percolator. ‘Some folk have been having a busy night, eh?’
‘Meaning what, Aunt Maggie?’ asked Sheila Francis. Flopping back in a chair, she removed her nursing cap and let her copper-red hair cascade around her shoulders. ‘If you mean the sharks, say so, will you? I’m too tired to try guessing.’
‘The sharks,’ agreed the woman. She gestured towards the window, where an old brass telescope was mounted on a tripod stand with the barrel trained out towards the bay. ‘I’d almost a ringside seat with that thing.’
Crossing over, Carrick used the eyepiece and adjusted the focus. A stretch of dark water leapt into close-up, then, as he eased the barrel slightly, he found himself looking at the shark-base huts on Camsha Island. They were dark shapes in the gathering night but lights were burning in most windows.
‘Maggie …’ he began.
‘Coffee first,’ she said firmly.
It came black from the percolator. She gave them a cup each, poured one for herself, then settled in a chair with a sigh of contentment.
‘How’s Mrs MacPherson’s boy, Sheila?’ she queried.
‘Still waiting.’ The girl sipped her coffee then explained for Carrick’s benefit. ‘He’s a five-year-old who swallowed a marble.’
‘Och, I wouldn’t worry. It’ll be like the old story about the horse and the bee.’ Maggie MacKenzie ignored Carrick’s unconcealed impatience and rocked gently in her chair. ‘This particular bee was swallowed by the horse. So there the bee finds himself, inside the horse’s stomach and as angry as Satan at a saints’ reunion. But it was snug and dark and warm down there, so the bee decided to have a rest before he stung the horse. Only he went to sleep … and when he woke up the horse had gone!’
Carrick grinned, heard Sheila Francis chuckle, then deliberately put down his cup and pointed towards the telescope.
‘All right, Maggie. What did you see?’
She considered him thoughtfully. ‘I wouldn’t want to get anyone into any kind of bother …’
‘You won’t. Not through me, anyway.’
‘And I wouldn’t like to be thought a nosy old bitch …’
‘No.’ He said it flatly. ‘Let’s have it, Maggie.’
‘Well,’ – she leaned forward almost eagerly – ‘I happened to be having my usual wee look around the bay at sunset, the way I do most evenings. That was when I saw someone I thought I recognized prowling around over on Camsha Island.’
‘Who?’ asked Sheila Francis, puzzled.
The older woman shrugged. ‘It looked like that young Peter Benson from here. He was sneaking around the huts near the slipway when I saw him – acting as if he was hiding from someone. Then I lost sight of him, an’ a wee while later the shark carcasses began drifting out into the bay.’
‘Benson?’ Carrick stared at her. ‘Are you sure?’
‘I couldn’t be, man. Not at that distance,’ she retorted in a slightly peevish voice. ‘But I still say it looked like him.’
Carrick frowned at his feet. ‘He loses his job at the end of this week. So he could be trying to get his own back.’
‘The lad has had a rough time all round,’ mused Maggie MacKenzie. ‘First he finds folk cold-shouldering him over Helen Grant’s death. Then those idiots from the Harvest Lass beat him up and while he’s practically still bleeding his own boss gives him the heave.’ She smiled to herself. ‘Well, if he did do it good luck to him. It shows he’s got some backbone.’
‘Dave will kill him if he finds out,’ said Sheila Francis in a worried voice.
‘He may have to find him first, Sheila,’ Maggie MacKenzie told her. ‘You see, there’s another wee thing. Just about the time the sharks started drifting I thought I saw someone leave Camsha, wading across the shallows to the far side of the bay. Remember, the tide was out.’
For Carrick, it amounted to a feeling of relief. If Aunt Maggie was right then the whole incident shrank in importance. Dave Rother might howl his rage, but as long as young Benson had the sense to get well away …
‘At least it wasn’t anyone from the village,’ said Sheila Francis, as if reading his mind. She eased herself with a murmur of relief and swung her long, slim legs up on the chair. ‘Things are stirred up enough already.’ She looked pointedly at Carrick, then turned. ‘He hasn’t been exactly helping, Maggie. When I found him he’d been talking to Harry Graham. You can guess why.’
‘And being his usual tactful self, I imagine,’ said Maggie with a heavy sarcasm. ‘Men – they’re a damned menace, all of them.’
Carrick shrugged defensively. ‘It was worth it, Maggie. He’s a lot different underneath from what I expected. I’d say he has his own kind of patience – but I wouldn’t like to cross him.’
‘That’s sense, at least.’ The woman’s voice became suddenly serious. Reaching down, she silently picked up a poker from the hearth and used it to stir the smouldering peat fire. It sputtered to a fresh glow as she looked up. ‘The man may not look it now, but he was a Commando in the last war. So was my own husband till he was killed – they were in the same platoon. My Andrew used to say Harry Graham never rushed anything, but that he was the one man he knew who’d rather kill with his hands than waste a bullet.’
‘That’s what he said he had in mind, when he’s sure,’ said Carrick quietly.
‘Then he means it.’ She laid down the poker and tucked her dressing gown closer, sitting quietly for a moment as if alone with her own memories. There was a silence in the room, broken only by the soft sputter of the fire and the ticking of the clock.
‘What was his niece like?’ asked Sheila Francis suddenly.
‘Pretty in her own way and fond of having a man ar
ound.’ The tanned face wrinkled in a smile. ‘Mind you, at that age I felt the same. A man’s a useful thing if you keep him in his place.’
Carrick grinned wryly at the thrust. ‘Was that the reason she kept coming up here?’
‘Maybe part of it. Though I’d the feeling things might not be too happy at her own home. She certainly had her freedom in Portcoig. Harry Graham didn’t worry about what she did and usually he was too busy at the distillery to know anyway.’ She stopped, her mouth firmly resolute. ‘Now that’s enough about it. There’s no use asking me more because I just don’t know. Nobody does.’
‘It might be better if it stays that way,’ said Sheila Francis quietly. She uncurled from her chair. ‘Is there more coffee in that pot, Aunt Maggie?’
‘Help yourself.’ The woman’s manner became brisk again. ‘I’ll take some too. And now it’s my turn. Webb, tell me about this Pettigrew man you’ve got aboard – starting with why he always looks so damnably miserable. He’s not much to look at, but when you get to my age that doesn’t matter so much as long as they’re in trousers.’
Carrick grinned and tried to answer.
It was close to midnight when Maggie MacKenzie gave a first polite yawn. Carrick and the girl took the hint, shook their heads at her mild protests, and left the cottage minutes later.
Outside the clouds had cleared and the black velvet sky sparkled with starlight. But it was cold and the on-shore wind had built up in strength.
‘I’ll drive you back to the pier,’ volunteered Sheila Francis as they reached her car. ‘After that I’m heading straight for bed – I had to be up at dawn this morning.’
‘I could always walk,’ said Carrick quizzically.
‘Why? I pass the pier to get home anyway,’ she declared with a mild irritation. ‘Look, I’m getting cold just standing here. So stop arguing and get in.’
He gave her a mock salute and obeyed. Starting the car, she turned it and drove back the way they’d come. As the long silhouette of the pier showed ahead, Carrick cleared his throat mildly.