‘We don’t know that he had an affair,’ Belshaw said. ‘We never knew for certain. And it wasn’t something you’d ask someone like John Henderson. He was such a private man.’
‘But there were rumours?’
‘Oh!’ Jen said dismissively. ‘A place like this there are always rumours. Most of them mean nothing.’
‘But you guessed, didn’t you? Or you found out?’
The three of them sat, looking at each other. Perez’s phone rang. He switched it off without looking at it. It would be Willow Reeves, on the warpath again, wondering what he was up to and why he hadn’t asked permission to leave the police station without telling her where he was going, and demanding an explanation.
‘Henderson’s dead!’ Perez said. ‘You can’t hurt him now.’
‘You’d ruin his reputation.’ Despite his sore throat, Belshaw was almost shouting. ‘Bad enough that his body was all dressed up by the side of the road with that stupid mask on his head. I’ll not have folk sitting in bars and laughing about what he got up to when his wife was ill. He would have hated that.’
‘You cared about him,’ Perez said.
‘I told you, he was the nearest thing to a brother I’ll ever have.’
I used to think that about Duncan Hunter, and he let me down.
‘You should tell the inspector.’ It was as if Jen had come to a sudden decision. ‘He’ll not make it public if he can help it.’ She looked at Perez, a challenge. ‘Will you, Jimmy? But this is horrible. Knowing there’s a killer out there, having to keep the bairns indoors, and looking over my shoulder when I walk up from work on my own. That’s a sort of cancer too.’
If he’d been feeling well, Belshaw might have continued to fight, but he was weak and feverish and he gave up immediately, collapsed in on himself, so that he looked smaller. He told his story in strange barks and whispers, and the voice itself increased the tension in the room, like fingernails on a blackboard. Jen fetched him a glass of water before he began.
‘I don’t know when it started,’ he said. ‘I don’t know how long it went on. I think it stopped soon after Agnes died. Maybe John felt guilty, or maybe the woman finished it. If all she wanted was a bit of fun, the fact that he was single again could have frightened her off.’ He sipped the water. ‘We had football practice on Friday nights, just like now. We’d train the boys for an hour and then go for a beer, usually to the Mid-Brae Inn. It wasn’t so much for the drink as the chance to wind down. The start of the weekend for me, and a break for John. It sounds daft, as if I was some kind of kid, but I looked forward to those Fridays. I loved the company, the chat.’
He paused. In the background the computer game was reaching a climax.
‘Then he stopped coming. Not to the football training, but to the pub. He said he didn’t like Agnes to be left on her own for so long. I was disappointed, but I understood.’ He looked up at Perez. ‘Then I called in to see Agnes. It was summertime and one of our neighbours had given us loads of raspberries. I thought she’d like them. John was at work. She was upstairs in that room John had made for her. Some days, if he knew he’d not be away too long, he’d help her up there in the morning. She loved the colour of it and the view from the window. I just let myself into the house. It was never locked. She was in fine form that day. It was almost the last time I saw her. We shared the raspberries and she teased me about John. “What are you doing to my man?” she said. “Are you turning him into a drinker? It was past midnight when he came in last Friday.” And when I apologized – because what else could I do? – she patted my hand and said that she was only joking, and she was delighted we were friends and that John had one night out to relax.’
Belshaw had a fit of coughing then and wiped his mouth with a handkerchief.
‘So you were suspicious?’ Perez said.
‘Curious,’ Belshaw said. He paused. ‘And a bit jealous, if I’m honest. I know it’s stupid, but I didn’t like the idea of John having other close friends. Even then it didn’t occur to me that he might have a woman. I thought he was meeting up with mates from work and was too tactful to tell me that he preferred to be with them on his one night out.’
Perez looked towards the window. He wanted to reach out and wipe off the condensation so that he could see if Rhona’s boat was back in the marina, but now this was more important and he turned his attention to the room.
‘What did you do?’
‘One Friday night I followed him.’ Now Belshaw seemed embarrassed. ‘It wasn’t planned, but I’d decided to come home early, not to bother with the beer at all if I was going to be on my own. Usually I’d stay behind to clear up in the sports centre and John would be long gone by the time I left, but that night I was out early and he was just leaving the car park.’
‘And where did he go?’ Perez’s voice was flat. He didn’t want to give too much importance to the question, in case Belshaw reconsidered his decision to tell the story. And besides, he knew already what was coming.
‘John came here,’ Belshaw said. ‘To Aith. He drove his car down to the school, so it couldn’t be seen from the main road. He sat for a moment and then he walked back the way he’d come.’
‘To the Fiscal’s house.’ It wasn’t a question.
‘Yes, to the Fiscal’s house.’ Belshaw paused for a moment before continuing. ‘I thought they were having a meeting. Business. Something to do with that water-power scheme they’ve been rattling on about for years. They were still planning it then.’
‘You don’t believe in renewable energy?’ For a moment Perez was distracted.
Belshaw shrugged impatiently. ‘It’ll not provide enough. Not for the whole country! For Shetland perhaps, but we can’t live our lives here in isolation. In the real world we still need oil and gas.’ He gave a rueful grin. ‘Sorry – this is something John and I argued about too.’
‘So you thought maybe John and Rhona were meeting to discuss the water-power project?’
Belshaw considered for a moment. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I would have liked to believe that, but really I knew it wasn’t true. Because if that was why John was there, he wouldn’t have lied. And he’d have parked his car right outside the house.’
‘When was this?’ Perez asked. ‘When did it happen?’
‘Years ago. Neil was still a baby. Too young to play football, at least. And it’s five years since Agnes died.’
Perez was doing calculations in his head. Jerry Markham would have still been living in Shetland then, and Evie Watt could have been a chambermaid at the Ravenswick Hotel. Or still at school. He was trying to work out what it could mean, how it could all hang together, when Jen Belshaw spoke.
‘I saw him occasionally,’ she said. ‘Midsummer, you know, it’s light all night and the youngest bairn could never get the hang of sleeping. So I’d be upstairs in the front bedroom, nursing her. And I’d see John slipping out of the house and running down the street to his car. Eager to be back with Agnes, I suppose. Guilty for having left her alone for so long.’ She looked up at Perez. ‘If I saw him, other folk might have done too. I didn’t hear any rumours, but then people knew we were friends.’
‘You’re in the rowing team with the Fiscal,’ Perez said. ‘She never let anything slip?’