Chapter Eleven
Perez’s call, asking to borrow her camera, came as a relief to Fran. Mary was great. Good company. She could see that they might become friends. But by lunchtime Fran was starting to get so bored that she wanted to scream. What must it have been like for island women before electricity and flights to the mainland? Fran thought she could have coped in the summer. Then there’d have been shared work in the fields, light nights, music. But at this time of year when the stormy weather kept folk indoors, you’d go slightly mad by the end of it. There’d be nothing to do but gossip and knit. She imagined knitting all day in poor light in a room filled with stir-crazy children and thought that at the end of it she’d feel like committing murder.
Could I live here now? If I had my own work and my own house, could I make my home here?
She didn’t come up with an answer.
‘I’ll bring the camera up to you,’ she said as soon as Perez had explained what he wanted. ‘I’m sure you’re busy there.’
‘I don’t know . . .’ He was thinking rules, she could tell. Procedures. He was a great one for going by the book.
‘Please, Jimmy.’
He must have heard the desperation in her voice.
‘OK then, but could you come up in Leogh Willie’s truck? Mum will arrange it for you. You could take Dad’s car back. And there’s a big roll of polythene at the back of the shed at home. The new bedroom carpet was delivered in it. Could you bring that too?’
‘Sure,’ she said. ‘Sure.’ No questions. She always asked too many questions and she didn’t want to give him time to change his mind.
She loved driving the truck up the island towards the North Light. The vehicle was so eaten away by rust that it was hard to believe it would go at all, but perched in the cab, she felt as she’d done as a child on a fairground ride. There was the same engine noise and smell of diesel and she had a new perspective on the landscape around her. There was a joyous sense too that she was playing truant. She was such a kid. Perez was waiting for her.
‘The keys are in Dad’s car,’ he said. ‘You’d better get straight back.’
‘Jimmy!’
‘You shouldn’t be here,’ he said.
‘I could help. Hold things. Take notes. Everyone else here is a suspect. You know I couldn’t have killed the woman. I wouldn’t get in the way.’ She could tell she was wheedling like Cassie on a bad day and was certain he’d send her away. But he relented. Perhaps this was such an unusual situation that rules weren’t so important. Perhaps he felt isolated in the field centre, where everyone was English and he was like an impostor in his own land. And she was a much better photographer than he was.
‘I’ll need to phone the Fiscal and check that it’s OK. I couldn’t do anything to prejudice a possible case.’
He left her standing in the lobby, unlocked the bird room door and went inside. She realized he would feel awkward talking to the Fiscal in front of her. She wondered if he would stretch the truth? Would he tell the woman he couldn’t possibly manage without an assistant? He wouldn’t want Fran to hear him lying. She imagined him standing next to the body of Angela Moore, conducting a normal conversation with Rhona Laing, and wondered how he could do that. Did she really want to work with him after all? She’d seen a dead woman before and the sight had haunted her for weeks. Perhaps Perez had only been trying to protect her.
The door opened. ‘Are you sure about this?’ As if he’d been tuned in to her doubts.
She nodded. This was his work and she wanted to be involved in it. She wouldn’t have another chance. He stood aside to let her in and locked the door behind them. She looked at the figure as if Angela were a subject for a painting; it would be a big canvas because this was a strong woman. There was the texture of the hair, the muscular shoulders. The handle of the knife, smooth, cream-coloured, in contrast to the hair. The long, bony hands that already looked skeletal, lying on the desk. The strange arrangement of feathers resting on the head.
The piece of art could be a collage,
Fran thought.
Glorious and three-dimensional.
‘What’s going on with the feathers?’
‘I don’t know,’ Perez said. ‘They must have been arranged after death, I think. But I haven’t a clue why.’
‘It makes her look like a child who’s been dressing up.’
‘Do you think so?’ Perez seemed surprised. ‘The first thought that came into my head was that they look like those silly hats smart women wear to Ascot. Then I wondered if they might be sending a message. Something about cowardice, maybe? Didn’t women hand out white feathers to men who wouldn’t sign up to fight in the First World War?’
Fran thought that seemed too elaborate. Too preachy. This was about decoration. ‘Were the feathers already in the room?’
‘I don’t know,’ Perez said. ‘Something else to check.’
‘What about the knife?’
‘It was hers. Maurice said she brought it back from one of her trips abroad. India, I think. Apparently she used it to cut a net if a bird got caught while she was trapping. She kept it in her belt when she was out, otherwise here in the bird room. The assistant warden said it was always very sharp.’
‘She bit her nails,’ Fran said. ‘Strange, you expect nervous people to bite their nails and she didn’t come across that way at all.’ She looked up at him. ‘Does that mean they won’t find anything under them?’
He shrugged. ‘They’ll take samples at the p-m. We don’t have the facilities to do it here and we can’t leave the body here in the centre for another night. It would mean me camping out outside the door to make sure no one tampers with her. Besides, I need to get her somewhere a bit cooler. The radiator’s switched off here now but it was on all night – Angela would have been the person to switch off the generator before she went to bed – and the room’s still quite warm.’
‘What would you like me to do?’ She refused to play the little woman and go all squeamish on him, but suddenly she imagined the stink of decomposition and felt faint. She needed to concentrate on the practical.
‘Take photographs,’ he said. ‘Loads of photographs. Of everything here. The whole room from as many angles as you can and then everything in detail. Have you got gloves?’
She grinned and took a thin woollen pair from her jacket pocket. ‘Just call me Dr Watson.’
‘Mm?’ He looked at her and she saw he was so preoccupied with his own thoughts that he hadn’t understood the bad joke.
‘Doesn’t matter.’ She took her camera from its case and positioned herself to take the first photograph.
‘I don’t have a fingerprinting kit,’ he said, ‘but I don’t suppose it’s important. Everyone staying in the lighthouse would have been in here at some point. It’s where Angela ringed the birds and apparently the visitors are invited to watch.’
Through the camera lens she looked at the room in detail. There was the ringing equipment, a shelf of bird books, a PC and printer. There was dust on the shelf and the floor was mucky.
‘They haven’t cleaned in here recently,’ she said. ‘Not as recently as in the common room at least. That was spotless last night. I suppose they must be allowed in here in their boots.’ She guessed that was Jane’s job too. It seemed overwhelming, to be cook and housekeeper for the whole place.
‘No point looking for footwear impressions then.’ Perez was talking almost to himself. ‘Again, any of the staff or visitors would have had a reason to be in here, and the killer would have come straight from the party. He’d have been wearing indoor shoes and wouldn’t have left a mark.’
‘He?’ Fran looked up from the camera.
‘Or she,’ he said.
She couldn’t tell whether he had any idea who the murderer might be and she didn’t ask. She thought of the people who’d been at the party the night before; she’d been chatting and laughing with them. When she said goodbye, she’d touched them, held their hands and kissed their cheeks. One of them had stuck a knife in the back of the young woman who lay in front of them, then carefully laid feathers over her hair. She tried to imagine being so angry that she might do that.
I might lash out,
she thought.
If someone had hurt Cassie or Jimmy, I might even kill. But afterwards I’d come to my senses. I’d want to put things right. I’d fetch help. I couldn’t stand here and watch a young woman bleed to death, knowing it was my fault.
She shifted position, so she could take a photograph of the desk. Angela’s head was twisted, so one cheek lay against the wood. Fran found herself looking into the staring eyes that were only partly covered by the long hair. She took the picture quickly and turned away.
Perez was unplugging the computer. ‘I’ll take this back to Springfield and check it out there.’
‘Won’t it have personal stuff on it?’
‘Of course,’ he said. ‘It’s the personal that interests me most.’
She suddenly found it slightly distasteful, his preoccupation with the private lives of dead people. He enjoyed the prying and the privileged knowledge of their domestic affairs. It was the enjoyment that was the problem for her: she’d find it acceptable if he considered it a duty and a chore. She wondered if that was all she was to him. An interesting specimen and someone else to investigate. Then he caught her eye and smiled at her, a brief flash of affection. She saw him as she’d seen him first – the dark, untidy hair, the tired eyes. She felt a deep and inappropriate moment of lust and thought everything would probably be all right.
Outside in the lobby the phone rang. She sensed Perez tense. ‘It won’t be for you, surely,’ she said. ‘Work would use your mobile.’
‘Angela was a bit of a media star. I’m worried Maurice and Poppy Parry will start being hassled by reporters once the news gets out.’
He opened the bird room door, but came back when he realized Ben was already answering. He left the door ajar and they stood quietly so they could overhear the assistant warden’s side of the conversation. As soon as he realized the conversation was about birds, some rare swan, Perez turned away.
‘Have you recorded this?’ He nodded to a pile of books and papers on the desk. ‘It all seems a bit random. What do you think she was doing?’
‘Maybe it isn’t related at all. Could be stuff she’s been working on over the past few weeks and just hasn’t put away yet. It seems she was hardly obsessively tidy.’
Fran took a photograph of a book that was lying face down, close to one long hand. The book had been written by Angela Moore and there was a photo of the woman, the trademark hair clipped away from her face, on the back jacket. ‘
On the trail of the slender-billed curlew
,’ Fran read from the blurb. ‘
The species everyone thought was extinct, rediscovered on the silk trail of Uzbekistan. A modern tale of adventure and exploration
.’ She looked up at Perez. ‘Didn’t they make a television series about that?’
He looked up briefly. ‘Yes, it was the first programme to make her famous. She led the expedition into the desert and found a small number of the birds. Soon after the series was broadcast she moved here to Fair Isle. It caused a bit of a stir on the island, having someone who was almost a celebrity moving in.’
‘Why would she want to read her own book?’
‘I’m not sure.’ He straightened up and considered the matter seriously. ‘Perhaps she was writing an article and wanted to check a fact. Or perhaps she just wanted to cheer herself up. It was her moment of glory, after all.’
He went back to his methodical investigation of the papers on the desk, carefully marking the page where the book had been opened, before adding it to the black bin bag.
Outside in the lobby, they heard the ring that showed the phone had been replaced and there was a sudden flurry of activity. Ben Catchpole was shouting something unintelligible up the stairs and they heard running footsteps, the sound of the Land Rover being started. Through the window they saw the youngest of the visiting birdwatchers running across the yard and out onto the hill.
‘What’s all that about?’ Fran thought it sounded urgent and wondered why Perez was being so relaxed. ‘Shouldn’t we go and find out?’
He looked up briefly from sorting through a bunch of printed papers. ‘It’ll be a rare bird,’ he said. ‘It happens all the time. I told you, they’re kind of obsessed.’
Big James came to the North Light to help Perez move Angela’s body into the lorry. Fran was relieved. All the time she was taking photographs she’d been wondering how she and Jimmy would manage to roll the woman in the polythene and carry her outside. She didn’t have much strength and imagined spilling Angela on the grass among the sheep droppings and rabbit holes, the indignity of a farcical pantomime trying to manoeuvre her into the back of the lorry. At least with the field centre empty of guests and Maurice and Poppy hidden away in the flat, they wouldn’t have an audience.
But when James came he took charge and the whole thing was managed quickly and without drama. All Fran had to do was hold the door and let down the back of the lorry. While Perez was talking to his father, his accent changed and she hardly understood what they were saying. Not many words were exchanged. She supposed they’d worked together before on the croft and loading the boat. James drove the lorry away and they stood watching at the back door of the field centre.
‘Wait in the car,’ Perez said. ‘I need to tell Maurice what’s happened.’
She expected him to be a long time. There would surely be other questions. Perez was a meticulous investigator. But he came out very quickly. It seemed to her that he was distressed.