'If not Tait, who then?' Taylor demanded.
Perez shrugged. All the circumstantial evidence pointed to Magnus, but he didn't want to sleepwalk into an arrest without considering the alternatives.
'I don't have any theories,' he said. 'I just want to keep an open mind!
'Was there a boyfriend?'
'Maybe. She stayed with someone the night before she disappeared!
'And we don't know who that was?'
'Not yet. I've been asking around. He shouldn't be too hard to trace!
'A priority to find out, wouldn't you say?' Nobody answered.
Suddenly Taylor stood up again. 'I'm off to my bed,' he said. "Tomorrow’s going to be busy. I need my beauty sleep and so do you!
Perez thought that Taylor wouldn't be one for sleeping much. He imagined him awake all night, walking backwards and forwards, caged in his room.
Chapter Fourteen
Jimmy Perez walked to his house. It was only five minutes from the hotel. He stopped once to look across the harbour to a huge factory ship. The vessel was lit up but there was no sign of anyone working. The narrow streets were empty. In the cold he felt sober and clearheaded.
He lived on the waterfront in a tiny house crammed between two bigger ones. There was a tidemark on the external stone wall and in rough weather the salt spray whipped against even the upstairs window. The house was cramped, damp and impractical. There was no parking. If his parents stayed he had to sleep on the sofa. He'd bought it on a romantic whim after Sarah had left and he'd moved back to Shetland. He couldn't quite regret it. It was like having a home on a boat. Inside it was much like a boat too. Very tidy. Everything in its place.
He didn't care about his appearance but he cared how the house looked. The walls of the living room were lined with horizontal wood panels, neatly fitted carvel-fashion, painted grey. An attempt, he realized now, to hide the effect of the damp. Wallpaper would be impossible. The only window was small and looked out over the water.
He could stand in the middle of the galley kitchen and touch each wall.
It was precisely midnight when he stepped through the door. Taylor had said he wanted everyone in the Incident Room an hour before first light the next day, but Perez wasn't ready for sleep. As he switched on the kettle to make tea, he remembered he hadn't eaten since lunchtime and stuck sliced bread under the grill, fished margarine and marmalade from the fridge. He'd have breakfast now, save time in the morning.
As he ate, he read the previous morning's mail - a thin airmail letter from an old Fair Isle friend who'd decided in her thirties that she needed to see more of the world than the north isles. She was working as a teacher for VSO in Tanzania. With her words she conjured up dusty roads, exotic fruit, smiling children.
Why don't you come to visit? When he was fifteen he'd loved her. He thought he probably still did. But then he'd loved Sarah when he'd married her. Emotionally incontinent. A phrase he'd picked up from somewhere.
It was the sort of thing Sarah might have said. Horrible but probably appropriate. He leaked unsuitable affection.
Already, in this investigation, he felt protective towards Fran Hunter and her child and an almost overwhelming pity for Magnus Tait, whether he was a murderer or not. And police officers were supposed to be detached.
He rinsed the cup and plate and set them on the draining board, filled a glass with water to take with him to bed. But still he didn't go upstairs. He lifted the handset on his phone and heard the signal which meant there were messages. The first was from his friend John and was timed at eight-fifteen. John was in The Lounge, a bar in town, and was calling from his mobile. In the background Perez heard fiddle music and laughter. If you're free come along and I’ll buy you that pint I owe you. But I guess you're probably tied up. Catch up with you soon. That meant news of the murder must be common knowledge.
The second message was from his mother. She didn't bother to identify herself.
I thought you'd be interested to know that Willie and Ellen have finally decided to leave Skerry. They're moving south to be closer to Anne. Phone me sometime.
He recognized a suppressed excitement in her voice. He knew what that was about. Willie and Ellen were an elderly couple who'd been farming on Fair Isle since they were married. Willie had been born on the island, was a sort of relative through Perez's grandmother. Ellen had come in as a young woman to be a nurse. Once they left, a croft would be free. what was his response to the news? Panic? Depression? Delight? He found it impossible to decide. Instead he had a clear visual memory of his last visit to Skerry.
The house had recently been renovated and Ellen was showing it off. There'd been a new roof, they'd made the window in the kitchen bigger and there was a view all the way down to the South Light.
Ellen had made griddle scones. He'd stood by the window munching and thinking that the fields around the croft were sheltered enough for barley. If ever he came back, he'd thought, he'd like to return to the days when the farming was more mixed.
And now the matter was more than speculation. Perez could take over Skerry if he wanted to. The National
'Trust for Scotland which owned the island always gave priority to applicants from Fair Isle families. So he'd be forced to face the decision which he'd hoped to put off for a while longer. If he moved back to the island his future would be settled. 'Tradition was still important. His father was skipper of the mail boat. Perez would automatically join the crew and eventually he would become skipper in his father's place. At one time he'd thought that was what he'd wanted the continuity and security of island life. Now that he was faced with the possibility, he wasn't so certain. Wouldn't it bore him rigid?
Perhaps he would think differently if he wasn't in the middle of the most exciting investigation he'd ever worked on. He knew he'd been influenced by the passion of the Inspector from Inverness. It was probably another romantic whim, but tonight it seemed important to be a policeman. Would he feel the same when his workload consisted of petty theft and traffic violations?
His family longed for him to be home though they would never say so. It was his choice, they said. He should do whatever made him happy. They were proud of the work he did. But the pressure was there, subtle and unspoken. He was the last Perez. His sisters had married and were living on the Isle, but he was the only one to carry the name. When he'd told his mother about his separation from Sarah, there'd been one brief unguarded moment and he'd known she'd been thinking,
So. No grandchildren. At least for a while. Sarah must have felt the pressure too. Throughout the pregnancy and after the child was lost.
He carried his drink upstairs. He was in no state to make any rational decision tonight He looked out of the window and closed the curtains. Usually he fell asleep to the sound of water, almost imperceptible, not consciously noticed.
Tonight the sea closest to the shore was still frozen and there was silence, except for the occasional strange creak. He had thought the image of the dead girl, her face pecked by birds, might keep him awake, but he was haunted by the view down Fair Isle from Skerry, sunlight over the South Harbour and cloud-shaped shadows racing over Malcolm's Head.