‘But you’ll be back?’ There was a moment of panic. He saw how much he would miss her.
‘Oh, I’ll probably be back. You know these cases. Always ends to tie up.’
He thought she would kiss him again as she had in the hotel that night. A dry kiss on his cheek. But she gave a little wave and followed Sandy down the hill. Perez stood in the open door and felt cheated.
Chapter Forty-Seven
The next day was fine and still and surprisingly warm. A week away from May, but it felt like summer. Rhona Laing served tea outside, on a round wooden table, sheltered by shrubs. Hidden from view, the space had the feeling of a child’s den, a secret garden. Had she sat here with John, drinking wine or coffee, away from the prying eyes of her neighbours? Perez had been summoned by phone.
‘Jimmy, I think you deserve an explanation.’
The tea was Earl Grey. Fran had enjoyed that too.
‘I did care for John,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t a thoughtless fling.’
Perez said that really it was none of his business.
‘You saved my life, Jimmy. As I said, you deserve an explanation.’
‘I should have made more effort to answer your phone call.’ He poured more tea.
‘And I should have been prepared to confide in you.’ She looked at him coolly across the table. ‘I’ve always struggled to place my trust in men.’
Perez thought she would find that even more difficult now.
Rhona continued. ‘I’d allowed myself to be blackmailed by Markham,’ she said. ‘Ridiculous! That made it hard for me to tell anyone what had happened. It made me party to a criminal activity… If it had just been the affair…’ Her voice tailed off. ‘But I couldn’t have people gossiping about John when Agnes was still alive. Markham was leaving for London. I assumed if I paid him off, that would be the end of it.’
‘What happened the day you were abducted by Francis Watt?’ Perez had read her statement, but that had been dry and factual. He couldn’t imagine what it must have been like for her. She’d been imprisoned all day. And still had the marks of the encounter on her body.
‘I was just about to leave for work, in the office checking my emails. I heard someone in the house. I think he’d been in there before. I’d had a sense, you know, of my space having been invaded, of my things having been moved, earlier in the week. I’d thought I was going mad, but he’d found some way in. Security isn’t at the top of our list of priorities here. You know that, Jimmy.’ Perez saw how grey she was and thought she’d been living in a nightmare since she’d found Markham’s body.
‘At first he was quite polite,’ she said. ‘He apologized for disturbing me so early. Then he changed. As if a switch had been tripped. He began to rant. About how I’d ruined his daughter’s life. It wasn’t the affair with John that he objected to, but that I’d let Markham find out about it. “Would it have hurt you to be discreet?” As if I’d been boasting about the relationship to everyone I met. Then he said I’d turned him into a killer. Until that point I hadn’t believed that he was more than a strange middle-aged man.’ She looked up at Perez. ‘I reached for the phone, but he was too quick for me. And very strong. I suppose it’s hard physical work, building the yoals.’ She reached out towards her cup, but paused, her hand resting on the table. ‘How could someone who creates such beautiful objects turn into a monster?’
‘He wanted to protect his daughter,’ Perez said. ‘At least that was how it started. And he was convinced he was right, that in some sense the murder of Markham was justified. In his eyes, Markham was an evil man.’
‘But he couldn’t have thought that about John,’ Rhona Laing said. ‘Nobody could believe that John was anything other than kind and generous.’
Perez thought about that. It seemed to him that Watt’s instinct for survival had taken over then. He hadn’t been thinking about Evie when he killed John Henderson. He’d been protecting himself. At the same time hating himself for doing it. And that was why he’d attacked the Fiscaclass="underline" he’d needed somebody else to blame.
Rhona was continuing her story. ‘He wrapped me in a piece of tarpaulin and stuck me in a van, drove me down to the marina. Nobody was around. Besides, nobody notices a scruffy white van. I did struggle when he took me out, Jimmy, but he was too strong.’ She sounded ashamed. ‘He lifted me as if I was a baby, put me below in the Marie-Louise and sailed her round to Hvidahus. A long sail. I know that now, but I didn’t at the time. I thought he intended to drown me then, out in the voe.’
She sat for a moment in silence. In the distance there was the sound of a curlew on the hill. ‘He knocked me around a bit in the cabin and I must have fainted. I don’t remember the trip to Hvidahus at all.’
Perez had been shocked by the marks on her arms, the bruised cheekbone, but hadn’t mentioned them. Rhona Laing wouldn’t be a woman to want sympathy. ‘When I woke up we’d arrived at Hvidahus pier. He made me walk to the hatchery. He had a knife to my back.’
‘You stuck the Jamieson’s receipt behind the clock,’ Perez said. He wanted her to know that she’d taken some control in the situation.
‘It was in his jacket pocket. I thought maybe if the worst happened, it might help. Fingerprints. I don’t know…’ Her voice tailed off.
‘It did help! I knew it wasn’t yours. I didn’t have you down as a knitter.’
She gave a sudden smile, winced because of the bruising on her cheek.
‘But Jessie Watt… ’ he said.
Rhona continued more strongly. ‘Watt threw me into the hatchery. There was a padlock on the outside. Then he disappeared. To provide himself with some kind of alibi, I suppose. Jessie must have been around in Aith to collect the van and she’d picked him up. I heard the engine. The dutiful wife. Then I lost consciousness again. When I woke it was dark.’ She shifted in her seat. ‘And Watt was in the shed. I smelled him, heard him moving. And you turned up.’ She looked directly at Perez. ‘He was going to drown me. I love sailing and the water, but I’ve always had nightmares about drowning.’
There was a pause. A small bird was singing very loudly in the bush behind them. Perez thought he should just walk away, but he was too curious.
‘Agnes knew about you and John, didn’t she?’
Another silence and Perez thought he’d overstepped the mark and she’d refuse to answer.
‘John told her,’ Rhona Laing said. ‘He was hopeless at lying. Just as he would have told Evie eventually.’ She looked at him. ‘Agnes gave me her blessing. She said John needed someone to help him through it. She said she was grateful to me for making him happy. I went to see her. She was a remarkable woman.’
‘And the painting in your room?’ Perez nodded towards the Old Schoolhouse.
‘Yes,’ the Fiscal said. ‘Agnes gave that to me too.’ Another pause. ‘She thought John and I would stay together. But he couldn’t do it, once Agnes died. Guilt, eating away at him every time he looked at me. If Watt had seen that, he’d have known that John had suffered enough.’
‘What will you do now?’ Perez asked. ‘Will you stay in Shetland?’
‘Oh, I don’t think so, Jimmy. It’s time to move on. To leave the past behind.’ Rhona looked up at him, put a hand on his arm and said more urgently, ‘Don’t you think so, Jimmy? Isn’t it time for you to move on too?’
He stood up and looked down to the sea and thought that, for him, it wasn’t that easy.
Acknowledgements
Thanks as always to the magnificent team at Pan Macmillan, and to my agent Sara Menguc and all her associates. I’m delighted that Dr James Grieve was prepared to appear as himself. He knows that my grasp of his subject is weak and will make allowances. My friends in Shetland have been as helpful as always and I’d particularly like to thank Maurice Henderson of Shetland Islands Council, Jim Dickson and Ingirid Eunson. Ian Best and Lise Sinclair from Fair Isle gave invaluable help on building yoals. Any mistakes are mine.