Little Black Lies
Page 6
We explain ourselves to the constable on duty who agrees to let Chief Superintendent Stopford know our plans. The boat is searched, quickly, once again and then we’re on our way out towards The Narrows.
Normally, there’s something rather magical about harbours at night-time. Even I’m not immune to the beauty of coloured light dancing on water, the playful sounds of water round hulls. Tonight, though, the tension hovers around the masts like gulls hanging on the air currents. The suspicion that arose when the child wasn’t found is spreading like an infectious disease.
We turn south around Cape Pembroke and the Antarctic wind hits us full on. Queenie shoots me a look of disdain and does her usual half run, half fall into the bow cabin, as I become conscious that this is the first time Callum and I have been alone, properly alone, in years. I wait for him to say something, make some comment about the search, or the plans of either police or military. He remains silent, and when I turn I see him sitting on the side couch, arms on his knees, head down.
The sea gets bigger. Both the wind and the tide are against us and it’s going to take longer than the usual hour to reach the wreck. The waves are five, six feet high. They hit the bow and droplets of water scatter like pebbles over the hull, running down the glass panes of the wheelhouse windows. Callum hasn’t moved.
‘If you’re not feeling too good, you’re probably better on deck.’
‘I’m good. I don’t get seasick.’
Seasick or not, something is bothering him. He’s the colour of the water that is splashing over the bow, a sort of sickly grey-green. Sensing me watching him, he lifts his head.
‘I know you don’t want to hear this, but there’s a killer on the islands.’
I’m conscious of my heartbeat picking up, of a chill that has nothing to do with wind or weather creeping up on me. ‘This isn’t Glasgow, or Dundee or London.’ I’m trying hard to keep my voice light, as though I’m half joking. ‘We only have a couple of thousand people. What are the chances of one of them being a psychopath?’
His stare hardens. ‘Well, I’m no actuary, but I’d say greater than the chances of three boys between the ages of seven and three disappearing in three years.’
It seems a good moment to concentrate on steering.
‘I was at Port Howard when Fred vanished. So was Stopford. I begged him to search all the visiting boats but he refused. He said the owners would check themselves, that if the little boy was hiding on any of them, he’d be found without a disruptive and distressing search.’
I don’t answer. No point. I can tell he’s far from finished.
‘Think about it, Cat. Two of our biggest events, Sports Day and the Midwinter Swim. Loads of people milling around. Kids wandering away from their parents. If you were a paedophile, isn’t that when you’d choose?’
I shake my head. He just doesn’t get it. He doesn’t get that that sort of thing simply doesn’t happen here.
His raised voice is as shocking as a sudden cold wave. ‘Jeez, Catrin, what happened to you?’
I look at him then. I forget the boat completely. That he, of all people—
‘Sorry.’ He’s on his feet. ‘That was a stupid thing to say.’ He runs his hand over his face. ‘I haven’t slept in God knows how long.’
I turn back to the wheel. ‘Archie didn’t vanish during an event. He was just picnicking with his family.’
‘So maybe he’s becoming an opportunist. He could have been stalking Archie and his family for days.’
‘He?’ Callum is directly behind me. I can see him in the glass of the wheelhouse, not quite as tall as I would expect him to be. His feet are planted wide apart to give him balance in the rolling sea.
‘Paedophiles and child killers are usually male.’
If the boat pitches suddenly, he’ll fall into me.
‘When Fred vanished, some teenagers said they’d seen a young kid wandering off towards the beach. They followed but when they got down there, no sign of him. Which suggests to me, he didn’t make it to the beach. When Jimmy went, more than one person thought they’d seen him near the parked cars.’
‘None of them were sure, though, from what I can remember.’
‘Why do you think they all vanished near water?’
He’s not going to let this go.
‘If a child is going to come to harm here, the chances are it will be in the water.’
‘I think he’s got a boat. I think he lures the kids on to his boat, somehow, and then’ – Callum lifts his hands, spreads them wide – ‘there is no end to the places he can take them.’
‘Why are you telling me this?’
‘Because the woman I knew would care.’
I can’t even look at his reflection any more. The woman he knew had two sons to protect. Of course I’d have cared had there been a killer on the loose when Ned and Kit were alive. As it is, I care so little I can’t even take what Callum is saying seriously. He’s right. What has happened to me?
* * *
We travel on, Callum resumes his seat, I stare at the sea. Some time later, when we’re still a little way from the Endeavour, I jump when he taps me on the shoulder. He’s looking out of the wheelhouse window towards land. On the beach and stretching back miles into camp, small fires have been lit. They dot the countryside like fireflies. I slow the boat almost to a halt.
We stand side by side for several minutes, letting the boat find its own course, watching the orange beacons sprinkled across the hillside like fairy dust. Then Callum unzips his jacket. ‘I’ll take the wheel.’ He steps to the helm. ‘You need to look at something.’
As we move again, faster than I would go given the size of the sea, I take the folded papers he’s holding out to me and then his seat on the side bench. It’s still warm from his body. He’s handed me three sheets of A4. It’s a spreadsheet, a list of names.
‘What’s this?’ I know most of these people. I see Rob and Jan Duncan, Rachel’s parents. Simon Savidge. My colleague, Brian. The Governor.
Callum pushes the throttle further and the boat starts to ride the waves. ‘These are the people who were at the Sports Day on West Falkland when Fred vanished and at Surf Bay when Jimmy did.’
I flick through to the second page, and the third. ‘Seventy-five in total.’
‘There were more. I took out those aged under sixteen and the elderly ladies.’
I make a point of raising my eyebrows as a wave crashes over the bow but he doesn’t take the hint. ‘And the ones in bold?’
‘Men, between the ages of sixteen and seventy-five. Able-bodied. Forty-one prime suspects.’
‘Mel’s on this list. You think because he’s gay he has to be a child molester?’
‘I’m on it too. So is the frigging Governor. Those names marked with an asterisk have a boat, although to be fair, most people here have access to one.’
‘How did you pull this together?’
‘I started with those I could remember, then looked at the sports teams I knew had taken part. It’s easy to get hold of team sheets. I asked other people who they could remember. Skye McNair helped a bit. Unofficially.’
‘Has Bob Stopford seen it?’
He makes an exasperated movement and the speed increases again. ‘Course he bloody has. Trouble is, he’s not listening. I’m an incomer. I don’t understand island ways. I’m judging what happens here by the standards of Glasgow’s sink estates. He used those exact words.’
We’re going recklessly fast. A big wave now could swamp the wheelhouse. ‘What do you want Stopford to do?’
‘Go through this list and find out where each person was when Archie disappeared. If they can’t account for themselves, he should search their properties. He won’t do that, though, because then he has to admit that I’m right.’
‘Why should that be such a big deal?’ I stand and gesture that I’m ready to take the wheel back. ‘I’m not saying you are right, but if you are, why would it be such a problem for Stopford?’
‘Wouldn’t he want the challenge of working on a big case?’ I ease back on the throttle, but gently. He notices, though. He misses nothing.
‘It won’t be just about him, though, will it? The Governor, the Legislative Assembly, the Foreign Office, hell, probably the entire British Government, all have an interest in keeping this place under the radar screen. If you start making a nuisance of yourselves, if you put your heads above the parapet again, for the wrong reasons, then the groundswell of opinion that you’re not worth the effort or the expense any more might just become uncontainable.’
‘You’re saying we can’t afford a serial killer?’
He shakes his head, as though despairing of my naivety. ‘Of the whole frigging world, Catrin, the Falklands can least afford a serial killer.’
I ramp the speed up again and we travel on.
* * *
On the south coast of East Falkland there is a long, narrow harbour called Port Pleasant and, at the harbour entrance, the low-lying Pleasant Island. It is just about becoming visible as a darker smudge on the horizon. The Endeavour lies in the narrow strip of water between the smaller and larger islands. Large boats rarely come in here, which is just as well because the Endeavour is dark metal, low lying in the water and in the dark, other boats could easily ram it. On a rough night, you’d mistake it for a wave until you were practically upon it.
I keep an eye on the depth as we get closer. My boat has a shallow hull but the tide is low and there are rocks scattered around this stretch of the coast. I can see the wreck now. It sits on the ocean floor and its bilges and lower cabins will be flooded, but it’s a tall boat and the wheelhouse at least is out of the water.
About twenty metres away I stop and release the anchor. As the grinding sound of the mechanism wakes my dog, Callum takes a deep breath and runs his hands over his face. For the last twenty minutes he’s said nothing.
‘We’ll have to do the last bit by dinghy. I hope you’re prepared to get wet.’ As I check the anchor is holding, pull on oilskins and speak a few words of reassurance to Queenie, Callum hauls the dinghy from the cabin roof. I hand him a life jacket, grab my kitbag and we climb down. The dinghy has an engine, of course, but at a shake of Callum’s head I don’t turn it on. He picks up the oars and we move silently through the water.
The wreck looks enormous from the water. It rises up before us, black and dead. Maybe sixty or seventy years ago it was left behind by those it served well. Not for the first time, I wonder if ships feel pain when their days on the sea come to an end.
It’s swaying in the rough sea. As we get closer, it rocks and pitches in a sad echo of how it used to move on water.
I dive wrecks from time to time, but I never really enjoy doing so. They attract a particular sort of ocean life into their secret places. Boats belong on top of the waves, not beneath them. Wrecks speak of lost hopes, of wasted lives, of dreams that didn’t survive the storm.
This is a horrific place to keep someone imprisoned. I can think of few crueller things to do to a child. On the other hand, if he’s here, imprisoned, then he’s still alive.
‘How do we get on board?’ We are approaching the bow and I can’t help feeling that the old ship is watching us, that there is something sentient on board, and that our presence is unwelcome. Maybe Callum is more right about this than he knew. I have a moment to feel glad he’s with me, this six and a half feet of muscle, then remember that I wouldn’t be anywhere near this place if he hadn’t bullied me into it. The deck must be twelve feet above us. There is no way up that I can see.
‘There’s a ladder at the stern. Starboard side.’
Starboard side is facing away from the shore. Callum pulls hard, and we move into the deeper shadow between the great hull and the moon.
‘Wait here.’ He stows the oars in the dinghy and stands up.
‘You’re going up on your own?’
As he reaches out, I see his hand shaking. ‘We really don’t know what’s up there.’ He tugs at the ladder, testing its strength. ‘If anything happens, if I’m more than ten minutes, get yourself back to the boat and call for assistance.’
He really does expect to find something on this boat, I realize. His silences on the trip over. His sickly green colour. Shaking hands. He’s scared.
Climbing quickly and silently for so big a man he disappears over the side and I’m alone on the ocean.
6
I listen, for the sound of footsteps, for the voice of a small child, and hear nothing but waves slapping the hull and wind screeching around the nearby hills. I want to stand up, to follow Callum up on deck, or cast off and get back to my own boat. I don’t want to be here, tethered to this dead ship.
How long has it been?
I keep listening, but the wind is strong and the water pulls and sucks at the iron hull of the ship, as though trying to lift it from its grave on the ocean bed. Callum might have vanished into the night.
How long can it take to search a wreck? The wheelhouse is above the water line but much of it has been damaged by the elements. There will be a cabin to its front that is the most likely prison for a child. All the other cabins and storage space below will be flooded. There really isn’t that much to search and I would have heard something by now.
Some way off, my boat is rocking on its anchor. I think I can see the gleam of Queenie’s eyes on the side deck.
He’s been gone too long. I reach into my kitbag and find what I’m looking for, then tuck my grandfather’s handgun in my pocket before reaching for the ladder. Meaning just to climb and look, I take one rung and the next until I can see over the side.
Constant movement on deck. Water is splashing over it every few seconds and then racing back to the sea. Clouds overhead cast drifting shadows. I search, for the glimmer of movement that isn’t water, for darkness that isn’t empty. There is no sign of Callum. A big wave hurls the Endeavour to one side, almost throwing me off the ladder. Suddenly, climbing aboard seems the safer option.
I’m on deck now, but rooted to the spot. The iron beneath my feet is covered in wet silt, rough with clinging shellfish. Weed is everywhere, some left strewn by wind, some growing of its own accord. The wreck is in the middle of a kelp field and the vegetation is trying to claim it. The wind grabs hold of my hair, pulling it up around my head. I reach into my pocket and pull out my grandfather’s pistol, hoping my hand doesn’t shake too much. I am not, particularly, experienced with firearms. My footsteps squelch as I move closer to the wheelhouse and the dank darkness of the ship seems to wrap itself around me.
It smells vile. It smells as though the carcasses of long-dead animals are rotting here, as though unspeakable things have crawled out of the water to feed on them.
The door of the wheelhouse is missing and I can see only blackness inside. I draw closer still and a tall figure takes form. I’m startled, have half turned to run, even as I realize it can only be Callum. He is standing upright, completely still. I see his shoulders rise and fall. His head is fixed, looking at something in front of him. Something I can’t see. It cannot be a scared but still living little boy, because if it were, he’d have bent to pick him up by now, would be carrying him back towards the dinghy, grinning in triumph, the way he always looked when—
I’ve reached out, laid my hand on his left shoulder. He spins on the spot, knocks my hand away so forcefully I drop the gun and stagger back. The stagger is what saves me, or possibly the weed on the floor that gets beneath his feet and brings him to his knees. Without my stagger, his stumble, those reaching hands would surely have found my throat. He’s on his feet again in an instant, but I didn’t fall and have a split-second advantage.
I’m out of the wheelhouse, racing for the side of the boat, have almost made the ladder when he catches me. I hit the deck flat out. He’s on top of me. Impossible to move wit
h that weight pressing down on my chest. His hands are around my throat. I reach out and my hand closes around something hard. A backward twist of the elbow and I make contact with his skull. His weight lifts as he rolls away, grunting. I spring forward, twist round and his eyes meet mine.
There is blood dripping from the wound I made on his temple.
‘What are you doing?’ Instead of getting away while I can, I whimper like a child. ‘Callum? It’s me. What the hell are you doing?’
One hand goes to his bleeding head. The other stays on the deck to keep him steady. ‘Christ, what did I do?’
For a few seconds we crouch, a yard or so apart, holding eye contact. Then I stand quickly and back away. I see the gun on the deck by the wheelhouse and race towards it.
‘No, don’t go in th— Christ, is that thing loaded?’
I spin round. ‘It is. It put down a one-and-a-half-ton beached killer whale last year with a single shot to the head. I’m guessing your brain’s smaller.’
‘I’m not arguing on that one.’
‘Now talk to me. Do you know who I am?’
He gets up, but slowly, not wanting to alarm me. Or give me an excuse to fire. ‘Catrin Quinn, née Coffin. You’re thirty-four years old and you live on a cliff above Stanley, in a house with the creepiest frigging garden I’ve ever seen.’
He waits, and sees in my face that this probably isn’t enough.
‘I’m Callum Murray, former Second Lieutenant with the Parachute Regiment, originally from Dundee in Scotland. Sir Bradley Rose is Governor of the Falkland Islands and back home in the UK, John Major is Prime Minister. Want me to go on?’
‘No. Are you OK?’
‘I’m OK.’
I flick my head backwards, indicating the wheelhouse. ‘What’s in there? What did this to you and what is it you don’t want me to see?’
His face tightens. ‘We need to call Stopford. Let’s get back to the boat and get him on the radio.’
‘What’s in there?’
He shakes his head. ‘Stopford.’
Going into the wheelhouse means turning my back on him, but I don’t think it’s Callum I need to be afraid of any more. So I spin round and step inside. Apart from the thin beam of light gleaming from the torch he dropped, the wheelhouse is in darkness. The stench is stronger in here, as is the sense that I am surrounded by the sort of creeping, half-rotten life forms that inhabit nightmares. I find myself thinking of the poem Rachel loved so much, the one she was always quoting at me. The one she thought I’d like, because I always loved the sea. I didn’t, I hated it, but I’m remembering too much of it now.