Jackie seemed to know exactly who he was and why he was there. ‘Ronald’s in the kitchen,’ she said. ‘The baby’s finally gone to sleep, so Anna thought she’d do some work and he decided to keep out of her way.’ She paused briefly for breath. ‘Whoever would have thought you could make a business out of teaching people to knit and to spin? It’s always seemed an old-fashioned kind of pastime to me and it’s so easy, with the internet, to buy clothes in. But Anna says it’s a big business in America. In my day it was enough for us to look after the house and bring up the bairns, but now all the women want work of their own. It doesn’t seem right so soon after the baby was born.’ She paused again. He wondered if she was remembering the time when Andrew was skipper of a trawler and Ronald was a boy.
‘Thanks,’ he said. He didn’t want to encourage the flow of words. He understood that Jackie was nervous on behalf of her son, but her tension was having an effect on him. He suddenly felt an irrational panic, as if the woman’s stress was contagious.
The kitchen was the size of his house, with chunky units built of orange pine, a six-hob range cooker and a huge stainless-steel fridge. Jackie pointed out the main features of the room with pride. ‘We’ve just had it done.’ Her speech was rapid, clipped. It reminded him of the regular metronomic click of knitting needles. ‘The old one was looking kind of tired.’
Ronald sat at the table reading a newspaper. Not the Shetland Times, one of the more intelligent nationals. When he saw them come in he got to his feet. He appeared to Perez like one of the rabbits he dazzled and then shot, terrified but unable to move. Next to him was an older man.
‘This is Andrew,’ Jackie said. ‘My husband.’
The man waved a hand at them. He was a giant, tall and big-boned, with frizzy grey hair and a full grey beard. Perez could tell Andrew Clouston wasn’t well, but wasn’t sure how he knew. Something about the stiffness of the gesture, the brief moment of panic in the eyes at seeing a stranger in the house. The fact that he was wearing slippers and a cardigan rather than working clothes during the day. Jackie stroked his shoulder. ‘There’s nothing to worry about. He just wants to speak to Ronald.’
‘Perhaps Ronald and I could talk on our own.’ Perez thought the house was sufficiently large to allow half a dozen confidential interviews. It wasn’t that he felt the need for privacy, but he wanted to escape the woman’s words for a while.
‘You can use the office,’ Jackie said. Ronald seemed to have lost the power of speech.
The office was on the ground floor just off the lobby. There was a desk with a PC, printer and scanner. Perez shut the door behind him and leaned against it. He nodded to Ronald to take the chair.
‘The Fiscal’s decided not to proceed with the matter,’ he said at once. ‘You won’t be charged.’
Ronald stared at him, speechless.
‘She couldn’t get a conviction to any criminal charge at this point.’ Perez went on. ‘It’ll go down as an unfortunate accident.’
‘But I killed a woman.’
‘You couldn’t have known she would be outside. You had every reason to think she’d be in her house, not wandering about on her land. That means you weren’t criminally reckless.’
‘I feel as if I should be charged with something,’ Ronald said. ‘Not murder – I honestly didn’t know she was there – but it doesn’t feel right to kill someone and for nothing to happen.’
‘It’s the law.’
‘I must go home and tell Anna,’ Ronald said. ‘She’ll be so relieved. I don’t think either of us has slept since it happened, and that’s nothing to do with the baby. She was worried about it affecting her business. She wants us to be more independent here. My parents are brilliant – I’m the only child and they’d give me everything I wanted. But she doesn’t like that. She says we should stand on our own feet. And besides, she says the fishing’s precarious. We still make a good living from it, but maybe she’s right and it won’t go on for ever.’
Perez wondered if Ronald had any opinions of his own. He might be a bright man but he seemed incapable of independent thought. ‘Do you enjoy the work?’
There was a second’s pause. ‘I hate it. I’d be glad if the seas were all fished out and there’d be no reason to leave harbour.’
‘You have a choice,’ Perez said mildly. ‘You were at university. You could have finished your degree.’
‘My father had a stroke. It’s a family business. There was nobody else.’
‘Your family could have found someone.’
‘That wouldn’t be the same. Besides…’
Perez said nothing, waited for him to find the words to continue.
‘Besides, the money’s addictive. I’m not sure how I’d take to being poor. I earn more in a month than some of my old schoolfriends do in a year. I grew up living comfortably and I want that for my children.’ His mood suddenly lightened. ‘So I’ll have to hope that Anna’s business becomes a roaring success, won’t I? Then she can support the family and I can go back and take my degree.’
‘I’m still not quite sure how the accident happened,’ Perez said. ‘Now you’ve had some time to think about it, perhaps it’ll be clearer in your mind.’
‘No,’ he said. ‘I’ve been running it over and over again in my head to work out what must have happened and I still don’t understand it.’ His relief at finding out that he wouldn’t be charged had already evaporated. He seemed pleased for Anna, but still haunted by what he’d done.
‘All the same, I would like you to take me through it again.’
‘Is there any point now?’ Ronald looked up at him. ‘Mima’s dead. I killed her. I accept that.’
‘I still have to make a report, tie up the loose ends.’
‘I went out to shoot rabbits. I’d had a row with Anna so I wasn’t in the best of moods. It was dark and murky. I shot a couple from the car then went out with the flashlight into the field. I didn’t think I was anywhere near Mima’s place, but I was thinking about Anna and what I should have said to her. About how I shouldn’t have been so scratchy. She was still tired after giving birth. Moody. Hormonal. It wasn’t easy for her. I never thought giving birth would be…’ he paused to search for the right word, ‘… as violent as that. You know how it is when you’ve had an argument, you rerun everything in your mind.’
Perez reflected that he and Fran didn’t argue much. He’d never liked rows, didn’t see the point of them. Sometimes that frustrated her. ‘Don’t just agree with me! Stand your ground and fight!’ But usually he did agree with her. He could see her point of view and was happy to concede that she was right.
‘You’re sure you didn’t see anyone else out?’
‘No one else was shooting.’ Ronald looked out of the window. Following his gaze, Perez had a view of the bungalow where he and Anna lived. Anna came outside and hung a basket of washing on the line, just as Mima had done the day before she was shot.
‘But there were people about?’ Perez persisted. He could understand why Ronald just wanted the nightmare of Mima’s death to be over but he couldn’t let it go. And it wasn’t something Ronald would wake up from.
‘A car went down the road while I was shooting over the field.’
‘You have no idea who it belonged to?’
‘It was dark, man, and I had other things on my mind.’ The tension was starting to tell again. ‘I saw headlights and heard an engine. Nothing more.’
‘Which direction was it going?’
‘I don’t know! Does it really matter?’
‘Was it coming from the Pier House, or away from Lindby?’
‘Not from the Pier House. The other way.’
So, Perez thought, not drinkers on their way home from the bar.