‘So that’s why you threatened the Sheriff?’
‘Yes, that’s why I threatened him. But what else could I do? What would you have done?’ he pleaded, and, getting no response, continued. ‘It was nothing to him. A bit more money for an already rich man. I tried, just once, to speak to him about it, but he brushed me aside, said he was in a hurry, had to go to a meeting or something and then he left. Rude bugger! But, you see, without him, his participation, the thing can’t go ahead, however willing every other landlord in the scheme is. I’ve fallen pretty low, you know. I can’t even educate my own child properly, as I’d like. As Hil would like. But I can’t… I can’t hit rock bottom. I’d take her with me. And the worst of it is, believe it or not, she’d stay with me. But we are going to make a go of this. I’ll grow the vegetables, do the general maintenance, even be the butler, and she’ll cook. She’s a cordon-bleu, you know. Eventually, we’ll maybe be able to send Rosanna to public school, just for her last two years…’
‘You threatened the Sheriff. Maybe you killed him, too?’
‘You think I murdered Sheriff Freeman?’ the man asked, disbelief patent in his voice.
‘You threatened to put “a stop” to him, didn’t you?’ Alice answered.
‘I know, I know I did.’ He seemed irritated. ‘I had to. Obviously. I had to threaten him otherwise he wouldn’t stop it, would he? The wind farm, I mean.’
‘So did you do it? Kill him?’
‘Of course not,’ Colin Norris was now speaking fast, ‘of course not. It’s a ridiculous idea. They were only words. Words on paper. I wouldn’t do that, and if I had, you’d be the last person I’d be telling…’
‘Quite, sir. What about Nicholas Lyon?’
‘What about Nicholas Lyon, whoever he is?’
‘Did you kill him?’
‘Jesus Christ!’ the man laughed out loud, ‘what are you going on about? I don’t even know who he is. What in heaven’s name do you think I am? I only wrote letters, silly letters, for God’s sake!’
Abruptly, Colin Norris stood up as if to stop any further questioning.
‘Have you got a car, Mr Norris?’ Alice rose beside him, maintaining eye contact.
‘Yes, a white Vauxhall Corsa. It’s parked in the square.’
13
As instructed, Alice lowered herself down the buoy chain, hand under hand, until she became aware from the solid ground beneath her fins that she had landed on the sea-bed. An arm gripped hers and she manoeuvred herself along the line of student bodies until she reached the last link, the beer-bellied waste entrepreneur. This undersea world was indeed, as they had been promised, a silent one, and also, unfortunately, a sightless one. In the turbid waters around Oban that Saturday, visibility was non-existent, and without a tight hold on a companion, any of the students could have become lost in the murk in seconds. Shoals of colourful underwater life might well have been gliding inches above their heads or grazing on their flippers, but in that cold, grey, impenetrable liquid they would have been unaware of it all, eyes near useless.
A message was passed in sign language from diver to diver, hand touching mask, that a circle was to be formed; and, obediently, the students huddled in a tight ring with the instructor in the middle. Each of them then, in turn, flooded and cleared their masks and demonstrated some vestigial understanding of neutral buoyancy. Alice attempted to hover motionless in the water, awaiting her go, and became aware of an unwelcome sensation. Cold water was trickling down the neck of her dry suit, weaving between her shoulder blades, headed for her buttocks. Sticking a thumb up to signal her impending ascent, she attempted to catch the instructor’s attention, but he, too, could only see things in front of his nose and was concentrating on assessing Bridget’s cack-handed attempt to buddy-breathe with him. The trickle of water now becoming a flood, Alice decided to make for the surface, freeing her hands roughly from her startled companions and rising at an increasing speed. She broke the water about five metres south of the buoy, blood seeping from her nostrils, overjoyed to rejoin the fresh, clear, sunlit world.
In the warmth of the Harbour Cafe she sipped her coffee, teeth still chattering like castanets, whilst Bridget busied herself examining their open water certificates.
‘What nnn… next,’ Alice asked, ‘… you… you going to become an advanced one… or even a dive master… er, mistress?’
‘Not likely,’ Bridget replied perkily, ‘I told you, I am going to check out electrical engineering classes. I need some sparks in my life.’
‘So you’re not going to do more of this… ddd… diving stuff, then?’
‘God, no! It’s far too cold and unpleasant for me. Did you hear what they’ve promised us next? Coldingham! I don’t care if the water is as clear as crystal there, which I doubt, wild horses wouldn’t persuade me to attend for another jolly minibus excursion with…’ she hesitated momentarily, ‘our new friends. If I can’t get into electrical engineering, plumbing sounds…’
‘Congratulathions, ladieth!’ Uninvited, the waste entrepreneur took a seat at their table and beamed broadly at them both, exposing toothless gums. ‘Unfortunately, I failed thith time, broke my dentureth on my regulator, thadly. Ith the thelery thoup good, Bridget?’
Bridget caught Alice’s eye, gave the extended arm diving signal for ‘danger’ while ostensibly stretching for her shoulder bag, muttered, ‘My phone’s going, I’ll have to answer it,’ and jerked her head in the direction of the exit for a joint retreat. Alice, however, remained seated, smiling fixedly at the man, concerned that he should not be publicly abandoned, leper-like, among their mutual acquaintances. He had chosen to join them after all.
‘Tho… eh… eh…?’
‘Alice,’ she reminded him.
‘Indeed, tho Alith…’ he smiled again, apparently keen to please, ‘have you got your friend Bridget’th number?’
‘I’m afraid not,’ she lied. Kinder to extinguish all hope.
He took a gulp of his cappuccino, surfacing with the creamy lips of a black-and-white minstrel, and then scanned the entire room. ‘Oh… there’th Thuthan, I’ll think I’ll go and join her, thee how she got on.’
So saying he picked up his tray and lumbered off in the direction of a plump blonde, leaving Alice, leper-like, alone amongst their acquaintances.
Rain had transformed the cottage and its surroundings. The dried-up river-bed was awash with torrents of muddy water, and the yard in front of the cottage had become a quagmire, a patchwork of puddles in which the duck and her offspring were dabbling, raindrops bouncing off them as if they were made of plastic. Alice stepped carefully out of the vehicle, inadvertently landing in a runnel of rainwater and sinking heel-deep in mud. Although only seconds passed before she reached the shelter of the porch, she was drenched, hair sticking to her forehead, legs splashed to the knee. Mrs Norris appeared quickly and recognised her from their previous encounter.
The old sheets of newspaper on the kitchen floor were now torn, sodden with muck from outside, and she was busy replacing them, a dry stack ready beside the ancient Raeburn. Her dejected state became obvious the moment she opened her mouth, her voice sounding flat, drained of all vivacity.
‘I know Colin’s still at the station helping you, his mother told me, and she warned me to expect another visit.’
Alice smiled, attempting to reassure her. ‘It’s simply that you may be able to help us with our enquiries. Possibly, help Colin too.’
Loud music, all heavy drum rhythms and shrieking electric guitars, could be heard coming ever closer, and Jason and Rosanna traipsed in, radios in hand, and began grappling with chairs at the kitchen table as if they intended to have their breakfast there.