The Malice of Waves

by Mark Douglas-Home

  Isobel was unsettled by what she heard and went to stand by Bella. She thought she would show solidarity, since Ewan was one of Bella’s brood. The two women were together when a call went up that Beacom was walking towards the tea room. Unlike the day before, the movement inside – the pulling back, the shrinking away – happened before the door opened in anticipation of bad news. By the time Beacom entered, the tea room was hushed, everyone still, waiting. As before, Beacom planted his feet and told them he had a brief announcement to make.

  ‘I would like you to know that our inquiries are continuing and a twenty-year-old man has been charged with the murder of Joss Wheeler.’ Beacom dipped his head as if to indicate that was the end. ‘Thank you, that’s all I am able to say at the moment.’ He turned and went out of the door.

  Afterwards Catriona became tearful and was comforted by Helen. Isobel helped Bella behind the counter and listened to the chatter of the reporters and photographers who formed a queue after Beacom’s media briefing outside.

  Max Wheeler’s death was to be reinvestigated, she heard them say. All the evidence, including witness statements, would be double-checked.

  Everyone in the township would be interviewed again.

  Every property would be searched.

  There was also mention of a statement from David Wheeler’s lawyer. Dr Caladh McGill’s investigation into Max Wheeler’s murder had been stopped because it might interfere with the ongoing police inquiry.

  Only later, when she was asked by Bella to collect dirty mugs and cups from the tables and to take orders, was Isobel able to tune back in to the mood of her neighbours. As she expected, people were alarmed at their houses being searched and at being questioned about Max Wheeler’s disappearance. What would happen if there were discrepancies between their previous interview and the next one? And there was dismay at Beacom again telling the media more than the tea room, a sign that he thought someone else in the township apart from Ewan was guilty. He wouldn’t treat the residents that way unless he was deliberately trying to unsettle them. Once again, there were quieter comments. Isobel heard enough of what was being said to realize the murder charge against Ewan had hardened opinion. Not only had Ewan murdered Joss and taken her money, but he had probably killed Max too. His upbringing was to blame: the violence, the drunkenness of his father; what goes around comes around. Ewan was a weak character. It wasn’t right that the township should be turned upside down again because of him. It was as if they were casting off Ewan as a way of cleansing the township of the unspoken guilt at having sheltered him for so long and for having obstructed the police’s inquiry into Max Wheeler’s disappearance.

  Isobel went over to Mary-Anne who was sitting alone. ‘You were right,’ Isobel said. ‘We have changed.’

  ‘You see what Beacom’s doing, don’t you?’ Mary-Anne said. ‘He’s destroying the thing that kept us safe the last time. Day by day he’s breaking us down. Already we’re abandoning Ewan to him. Who will be next? Who knows what we’ll be capable of?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Isobel said.

  Mary-Anne shook at the thought. ‘Then God forgive us.’

  Passing by the window, Isobel was aware of a quick movement by the harbour. She stopped to look and saw a young woman running. She was wearing a red jacket or anorak. Reporters and photographers were converging to block her way. Isobel recognized Chloe Wheeler just as she disappeared from view, surrounded by all the other bodies. Another figure appeared on the deck of the Jacqueline. A young woman with blonde hair: Hannah Wheeler. She scrambled off the boat on to the harbour wall and began running too. The policeman on guard duty was gesticulating as Hannah pursued Chloe and also became lost in the media scrum. Isobel was about to tell Mary-Anne when both young women reappeared, Hannah gripping her older sister’s arm. They were arguing. Chloe pulled away and began walking towards the Deep Blue. Hannah stayed where she was, the reporters pushing past, the policeman walking in front holding out his arms as a barrier.

  ‘Chloe Wheeler’s outside,’ Isobel blurted. ‘I think she’s coming in.’ Isobel might as well have said a runaway lorry was about to crash into the tea room. Everyone stopped talking. Some stood. There was a shuffling sound, a general bracing against the inevitability of impact.

  When the door opened, two dozen pairs of eyes were watching Chloe. She stopped just inside.

  ‘What kind of people are you?’ She stared at them and now two dozen pairs of eyes avoided hers. ‘You protect my brother’s murderer and you allow him to kill my sister. What would make you do something like that? My beautiful sister …’ She put her hands to her face. ‘Have you any idea what you’ve done?’ She laughed bitterly. ‘As if people like you could have any idea. You’ve ruined my father’s life … my life … Hannah’s life.’ She blinked away tears. ‘What did we ever do to you?’ No one answered. ‘What?’ She directed the question at Catriona, who was closest to her.

  The two young women looked at one another.

  ‘Ewan didn’t kill anyone,’ Catriona said quietly. ‘I know he didn’t. He couldn’t have.’

  Chloe’s expression changed. ‘So, you’re the girlfriend.’ Now she looked at Catriona with disdain. ‘How can you stand there when you know what he’s done?’ She screwed up her face. ‘You people.’ She looked at them all again, slowly, before turning for the door.

  Catriona went after her and grabbed her arm. ‘It wasn’t Ewan. I’m sorry about what’s happened but it wasn’t him.’

  Chloe shook her off with reporters and photographers pressing at the open door. ‘Don’t,’ she shouted at Catriona. ‘Don’t you touch me. Ever.’ Cameras flashed and Chloe pushed her way outside. The reporters fell back: more camera flashes, cries of ‘Chloe’. Catriona watched at the doorway. She turned back towards the tea room. Her expression was pained. ‘It wasn’t him.’ Her voice was pleading. ‘You know it wasn’t.’

  As with Chloe, Catriona found the tea room reluctant to look her in the eye. No one said anything. People went back to their seats.

  Isobel wasn’t sure whether the silence was an aftershock caused by Chloe’s outburst – an understandable reaction – or whether it was brought on by something more worrying, a further hardening of mood. She carried on clearing tables and taking orders. At first she overheard comments about Chloe, how hurt she must be, how distressed, what terrible tragedies she had suffered. Her mother, Max and now Joss were dead, each one killed violently, a car crash and one, if not two, murders. No wonder she was beside herself with grief. Wouldn’t anyone be?

  After a while, Isobel began to pick up criticisms of Catriona. Piecing it together from a snatch here, another there, she was taken aback by the strength of resentment. Catriona had been wrong to speak up for Ewan. The pictures of her arguing with Chloe would be everywhere, in the papers, on TV, the township’s name blackened again. Couldn’t she have kept quiet? Didn’t she have any sense?

  ‘I thought you might be here,’ Helen said when she found Catriona later on the hill behind the Deep Blue. ‘I’ve been looking everywhere. Then I remembered this was where you went to find a phone signal and to get away from people.’ Catriona was smoking a cigarette in that nervy way Helen associated with runaways. Drag, exhale, fast and shallow. When Helen was a police constable, she would often come across kids smoking like that. They would be twelve-or thirteen-year-olds who were being abused or whose mothers had moved in a man who was violent or sleazy. She would discover them in derelict flats or abandoned outbuildings, shivering in some damp corner, lost. Helen would arrive with a flask of sugary tea she kept in the car for that purpose. With something sweet and warm inside them, they would become less jumpy. They might even talk.

  ‘You must be frozen,’ Helen said when she saw how little Catriona had on – blue shirt, apron, jeans and trainers, just what she’d been wearing at the Deep Blue. ‘Here, I’ve brought you some tea.’ She put the take-away cup down within reach of Catriona, then sat on a rock just below her. Another thing she learned from run
aways: if you want them to talk, sit, don’t stand, don’t watch. She said, ‘I thought that was brave of you.’

  ‘What was?’

  ‘Sticking up for Ewan like that. He’s lucky to have such a good friend.’

  ‘He’d do the same for me.’

  ‘Would he? Not many men would. Not the kind of men I meet. I suppose that makes you lucky too.’

  Catriona lit another cigarette. Drag, exhale, in, out. ‘What will I do?’ Her voice was plaintive, despairing.

  Helen glanced round and found Catriona watching her. ‘What?’ Helen asked. ‘What is it?’

  ‘You’ll tell no one.’ Drag. Exhale.

  ‘Course I won’t.’

  ‘Auntie Bella knows Ewan wasn’t on Eilean Dubh when Joss was murdered.’ Drag. Exhale. ‘Cal McGill came to the house and said so.’

  ‘Did you ask Bella about it?’

  ‘She wouldn’t tell me. She said I shouldn’t listen to McGill because he worked for Wheeler. He was a liar, a troublemaker who was protecting his own skin because he killed Joss.’ Catriona looked panicked. ‘McGill said the police weren’t looking for anyone else. He said Ewan would go to prison for, God, life.’ Drag. Exhale. ‘Why won’t Auntie Bella tell me?’

  ‘Why don’t you ask McGill what he knows?’ Helen suggested. ‘Why not? If it could help Ewan.’

  Catriona stared at her.

  ‘What’s the problem?’ Helen said. ‘People were talking in the tea room about his investigation ending. He’s not on Wheeler’s side now.’

  Catriona’s mouth pulled.

  ‘Not that easy, huh?’ Helen asked. ‘The township doesn’t let people change sides, is that it?’

  Catriona nodded.

  ‘So you don’t want to be seen with McGill, is that what you mean?’

  She nodded again uncertainly and Helen thought aloud. ‘You come up here after the tea room has closed to check your phone, don’t you?’

  Catriona said she did, some days, depending on the weather.

  ‘Well,’ Helen said, ‘it’s going to be fine tonight. I’ll find McGill and bring him to you. I pass his pickup when I go running. I’ll ask him this evening. OK?’

  Drag. Exhale.

  Bella replayed the message from Ewan’s lawyer. ‘Mr Chisholm has asked me to thank you for your inquiry and to tell you he is well, under the circumstances. There is nothing you can provide by way of practical support at the present time but if that changes he will give his instructions to me and I will pass them to you.’ Bella listened to the affectation in the lawyer’s voice and his formal choice of words. Ewan’s meaning was clear enough. Bella should say nothing.

  If only she could speak to Ewan – then she would know what was really happening.

  She checked her emails and clicked for the second time on the automatic reply from Pryke Property Management. It said that Stanley Pryke would be out of the office on business until 5th March. Yesterday – Pinkie should have been back by now. In case of emergency a mobile phone number was supplied. As before, when Bella rang, it went straight to message. She composed another email, saying she was worried about missing out on a flat for rent advertised on the company’s website. She would like to arrange a viewing, so could Mr Pryke get in touch as soon as possible? She clicked ‘send’ and waited. Another ‘out of office’ reply appeared in her inbox. She checked his return date: yesterday, still yesterday. Where was Pinkie? She went to the office door. ‘Still no Catriona?’ she asked Isobel.

  Isobel wiped up a puddle of coffee. ‘Not that I’ve seen.’ She glanced around the tea room. ‘Helen doesn’t seem to have returned either.’

  Frowning, Bella asked Isobel to look after things for a few minutes while she went home to check for Catriona there. After opening her front door she called her niece’s name. She shouted it again going upstairs and, softly, outside her niece’s room. ‘Are you there?’ She knocked. ‘Catriona?’ She looked inside. The bed was unmade. Catriona’s clothes were scattered around the floor. A towel was thrown over the chair in front of her dressing table. Bella picked it up and sat down. In the mirror, an old woman looked back at her.

  She was disturbed by sounds from downstairs. With dismay, she realized that any moment Catriona could catch her in her room. What excuse could she give? Then she heard Isobel’s voice, calling for her. Bella hurried out on to the landing and arrived at the top of the stairs as Isobel was coming out of the kitchen.

  ‘Ah, there you are,’ Isobel said. ‘Catriona’s back. She’d just gone for a walk. She asked me to tell you she’ll work through until closing.’

  ‘Is she all right?’ Bella asked.

  ‘A bit upset after what Chloe said to her but she says she’d rather be busy.’ Isobel smiled. ‘And you think she’s not like you!’

  24

  That evening, they arrived separately on top of the hill, Helen ascending the stony path from the road, Cal approaching by way of the long slope of its eastern shoulder. As they walked along a narrow sheep’s track, Helen told him Catriona would join them when the Deep Blue closed. She would be another half an hour.

  ‘Which is just as well,’ Helen continued, ‘because I’ve got news. An inspector in charge of wildlife crime has been in touch. He’s confirmed the egg was laid by a raven, but not just any raven. The egg’s a genetic freak, a collector’s item.’

  She explained the difference was in its colouring, in the pinkness of the background and the redness of the blotches. Normally ravens’ eggs were drabber, their background colour blue-green or grey-green, the blotches and streaks in greys, browns or blacks. The abnormality, called erythrism, had been documented in a number of different species. It was rare in ravens, a fact illustrated by the scarcity of records. The inspector had consulted a number of ornithological experts, who had been able to find only occasional references in more than a hundred and fifty years. They included a clutch found in Shetland in the middle of the nineteenth century and another taken from a nest near Tyndrum in the Scottish Highlands by a collector called P. Meeson on 6th April 1938. At various times during the twentieth century erythristic ravens were known about in Westmoreland, Cumberland, Wales and the Southern Uplands.

  ‘They’re potentially very valuable to an illegal collector,’ Helen said.

  ‘Which might explain how Ewan managed to have three thousand pounds when he was arrested,’ Cal replied.

  ‘Wait till you hear this.’

  The inspector had provided a list of a dozen known collectors. All but one was active or had been active in the past five years. The exception was a man called Stanley Wise or Pryke, nicknamed Pinkie because of his particular interest in erythristic eggs. He was in his mid forties and was thought to have retired from collecting. ‘But he continues to be a legend among egg collectors,’ the inspector reported. Even a museum curator who was in charge of one of England’s largest collections of eggs admitted to having a sneaking regard for the man. Wise or Pryke (he took his wife’s maiden name after a minor conviction) was reputed to have the largest variety of erythristic eggs ever assembled in a single collection. According to rumour, it comprised nineteen different species and, in some cases, multiple clutches. Although the RSPB and the police had targeted him when he was younger, his collection had never been found. After he pleaded guilty and was fined for disturbing a sedge warbler’s nest and being in possession of equipment to blow eggs eight years ago, he disappeared from view. Stories about him continued to circulate. Some said he had grown fat on his wife’s money, others that he continued to outwit the law by using his property management company as a front for his activities. Whatever the truth, he hadn’t come to police attention for a while.

  ‘The inspector said two other interesting things,’ Helen said. ‘It seems to be common knowledge that the species missing from his collection of eggs is a raven. If anything would bring Pinkie out of retirement, an erythristic raven’s clutch would. Also, it would be out of character for him to be careless. Both the inspector and the curator stressed
the point. Pinkie is renowned for his meticulous fieldwork, for never breaking an egg and for taking only a clutch at the start of incubation so that the parent birds were more likely to breed that same year. The curator was surprised when the inspector informed him that four other eggs in the clutch had been broken. His view was that something must have happened if that was Pinkie. Something must have gone wrong.’

  ‘Whoever the man was with Ewan, he wasn’t fit,’ Cal said. ‘He could have been in his mid forties. He didn’t look like he could climb down a cliff in a strong wind.’

  ‘Pinkie would have insisted on doing the climb himself,’ Helen said. ‘According to the inspector, he was well known for that. It was a matter of honour for him, being a collector who did his own fieldwork.’

  ‘Something did go wrong,’ Cal said. ‘Ewan thought so – that’s why he was pacing up and down at first light. That’s why he had to go back up the hill.’

  ‘There’s more,’ Helen said. ‘The inspector sent an officer to Pinkie’s house and to his company, Pryke Property Management. There was no answer at either. The company’s phone has a message saying that Stanley Pryke expected to be out of the office until yesterday. A constable will call at the house again tonight. The inspector also showed the curator a photograph of the bag you found. He said it was something a collector might use during a climb. But afterwards the eggs would be transferred to a secure container, typically a tin or reinforced box. It would be separated into compartments and lined.’