‘It’s hard to imagine Evie Watt getting bladdered,’ Willow said.
‘She was throwing up by the side of the road when I saw her.’ Sandy frowned. ‘I didn’t recognize her at the time, but it came to me later that I knew her.’ A pause. ‘Maybe she wasn’t used to it.’
‘Or someone spiked her drink.’ Perez remembered the photo of Evie in the animal suit in her house. She’d been pulling faces, looking rather odd.
‘How would we get a list of the women on the bus?’ Willow asked. ‘I wouldn’t want to trouble Evie or her family again.’
Perez thought she couldn’t face the Watts again so soon. It was more about that than sparing their feelings.
‘We could ask Jen Belshaw,’ Sandy said. ‘She was on the bus.’ He turned to Willow. ‘They were talking about her in the bar in Voe when we stopped there for lunch on Saturday. Don’t you remember?’
She shook her head.
‘Jen Belshaw,’ Perez said. ‘Married to Andy Belshaw, the press officer at Sullom Voe. Works as school cook at Aith, where the first body was found. Volunteers in Vatnagarth, where Markham’s car was found. Rows in the same team as the Fiscal at the regattas. You didn’t think to mention before that she was with Evie Watt on Friday night? Providing her maybe with an alibi for Markham’s murder?’ He’d raised his voice, but really he was angrier with himself than with Sandy. He’d intended to interview Jen, but then Annabel Grey had turned up and he’d forgotten to follow that thread of the inquiry.
‘It’s not just Jen Belshaw that’s providing the alibi.’ Sandy was fighting back. ‘It’s a minibus full of pissed women, in fancy dress and all tied to each other. Honestly, I don’t see how Evie Watt could have moved that car on Friday night, even if she was sober.’
He sounded so self-righteous, and the picture he painted was so silly, that the mood in the room lightened again and Willow started to giggle.
‘Jimmy, will you go and see Jen Belshaw first thing?’ she said. ‘She looked up at them. ‘Let’s call it a day now, shall we? Have an early night.’
They left the building together. The rain had stopped and the sky was lighter.
When Perez called into his neighbour’s house to collect Cassie, the table was laid for supper and he was expected to stay for a meal.
‘Really,’ he said. ‘There’s no need. I have food in the house.’
But Cassie had helped to prepare the pudding and he could tell that she would be disappointed if they left immediately. And the casserole smelled very good, and Maggie and David were good company. They were careful not to talk about the case while the children were in the room, but later, when the girls were watching television and the adults were drinking coffee, Maggie mentioned it.
‘It must be hard, Jimmy. Another murder investigation. So soon.’
He didn’t answer directly. ‘Did you know Jerry Markham when he was a boy?’ he asked. ‘You’d have been almost neighbours.’ Maggie had grown up in Ravenswick. She’d have been older than Jerry, but not by so much.
‘He was a classic only child,’ Maggie said. ‘Spoilt rotten. By his mother at least.’ Then: ‘Oh, I’m sorry Jimmy, I didn’t mean that Cassie’s spoilt because she’s on her own. She’s a lovely girl.’
He waved his hand to show that no offence had been taken. He wished folk would be less sensitive around him.
‘Was he malicious, do you think?’
‘No, just thoughtless. One of those kids who love being the centre of attention, who try just a little bit too hard. I always thought that he was very young for his age. Maria had never really let him grow up. Even when he was in his twenties, he seemed to me like a little boy pretending to be an adult.’
Perez thought that helped him to bring Jerry Markham back into focus and to understand him better again.
By the time he had Cassie in bed, and her school clothes in the washing machine and her gym bag prepared for the next day, it was already late. Perez sat and watched the news on the television. Other tragedies. It was only when he was ready for bed himself that he checked his answer machine. One message. It was a surprise to hear the Fiscal’s voice. She sounded calm. Calmer certainly than when he’d called to tell her that there’d been another murder. ‘Something rather odd has happened, Jimmy, and I’d like to discuss it with you. I wonder if you’d give me a ring. When it’s convenient. It’s not urgent.’
He looked at his watch. It was too late to phone her tonight. He’d try her in the morning.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Sandy thought it was like old times, he and Jimmy Perez out on the island together heading up to Aith, and Jimmy almost back to his old self. Perez didn’t say much in the car on the way north, but then he’d never been exactly chatty. And at least he didn’t sit in the passenger seat, crouched and brooding, looking as if he might hit you every time you asked him a question. It had been a bit like that until recently.
When they got to the Fiscal’s house, Perez told him to slow down.
But when Sandy asked if he should stop, Perez said to carry on. ‘There’s no sign of her,’ he said. ‘Her car’s not there. She left a message on my answer phone at home last night. I tried to call her this morning, but there was no reply. She must have been on her way to work.’
Sandy couldn’t see that it would be important. ‘She has your work mobile number. She would contact you on that if it was urgent.’
‘Aye, maybe.’ Perez seemed about to say something else, but no words came out. Sandy thought Willow would want to talk to Rhona Laing about the Fiscal’s connection to Richard Grey and she wouldn’t be best pleased if Perez interfered.
When they got to the school the children were in assembly, singing a hymn that Sandy remembered from when he was a boy. It took him straight back to the school in Whalsay, he and his cousin Ronnie sitting at the back of the hall causing mischief. In the Aith kitchen two women, dressed in white overalls and white caps, were preparing lunch. One was peeling carrots by the sink and the other was rolling out pastry on a workbench. This was Jen Belshaw. She looked very different from when he’d interviewed her in Vatnagarth and she’d been dressed in old-fashioned clothes.
‘You can’t come in here,’ she said. ‘Health and safety.’ She was a big woman, not fat, but soft and round. ‘We don’t know what germs you might be carrying.’ Though she was telling them off, it sounded as if she was laughing at the notion too.
‘Any chance we could have a few words?’ Perez stood in the doorway to talk to her and Sandy couldn’t really see past. ‘It’s about the murders.’
Jen Belshaw said something to her colleague and washed her hands in a little basin in the corner. ‘We’ll go through to the staffroom,’ she said. ‘There’ll be nobody in there at the minute. I might even make you a coffee.’ She led them into a pleasant room, easy chairs around the wall, a coffee table in the centre, and switched on a filter machine. ‘So how can I help? Andy said you were round at the house asking about John.’
‘Who was looking after your kids on Friday night?’ Perez asked. Sandy thought that was a strange place to start.
‘They stayed at my mother’s. Except Neil, who was playing football in Brae with Andy. Why?’ She wasn’t hostile, but she looked at Perez as if he were a bit mad.
‘And you were out with Evie?’
‘Aye, the hen party. A charity pub-crawl. Typical Evie. She couldn’t just get pissed and make a fool of herself, like everyone else. She had to save the world at the same time.’
‘Could you talk me through the evening?’ Perez said. ‘It’s not that I’m accusing anyone, but you might have been witnesses.’