WHITE NIGHTS
Also by Ann Cleeves
A Bird in the Hand
Come Death and High Water
Murder in Paradise
A Prey to Murder
A Lesson in Dying
Murder in My Backyard
A Day in the Death of Dorothea Cassidy
Another Man’s Poison
Killjoy
The Mill on the Shore
Sea Fever
The Healers
High Island Blues
The Baby-Snatcher
The Crow Trap
The Sleeping and the Dead
Burial of Ghosts
Telling Tales
Raven Black
Hidden Depths
ANN
CLEEVES
WHITE NIGHTS
MACMILLAN
First published 2008 by Macmillan
This electronic edition published 2008 by Macmillan
an imprint of Pan Macmillan Ltd
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ISBN 978-0-230-71464-9 in Adobe Reader format
ISBN 978-0-230-71463-2 in Adobe Digital Editions format
ISBN 978-0-230-71466-3 in Microsoft Reader format
ISBN 978-0-230-71465-6 in Mobipocket format
Copyright © Ann Cleeves 2008
The right of Ann Cleeves to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
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For Ingirid Eunson, with thanks for great times at Gunglesund
Acknowledgements
Thanks to everyone who has helped with this book. Helen again explained crime scene investigation so even I could understand. Sara and Moses brought fresh and expert eyes to the first draft. Sarah Turner provided valuable encouragement when the Shetland quartet was first conceived. And Julie made the editorial process a pleasure.
Prologue
The passengers streamed ashore from the cruise ship. They wore light jackets and sunglasses and jerseys tied around their shoulders. They had been told that the weather was unpredictable this far north. The ship was so big that from this perspective, looking up at it from Morrison’s Dock, the town beyond was dwarfed. Row after row of windows, each with its own balcony, a floating city. It was midday in Lerwick. The sun was bouncing off the still water and the great white hull was so bright that you had to squint to look at it. In the car park, a fleet of buses waited; the tourists would be taken to the archaeological sites in the south, to see the seabird cliffs to photograph the puffins, and for a guided tour of the silverworks. At some point there would be a stop for a Shetland high tea.
Waiting at the foot of the gangplank was a performer. A moving piece of art or street theatre. A slender man, dressed like a Pierrot. A clown mask on his face. He didn’t speak, but he acted out a pantomime for the visiting travellers. He made a lavish bow, one hand held across his stomach, the other sweeping towards the floor. The tourists smiled. They were willing to be entertained. To be accosted in a city was one thing – a city housed beggars and disturbed people and it was safest to turn away, not to catch the eye – but this was Shetland. There could be nowhere more safe. And they wanted to meet the local people. How else would they have stories to take back home?
The clown carried a bag made of red velvet and sewn with sequins. It glittered as he moved. He wore it slung across his body, the way elderly women, worried about street theft, carry their handbags. From his bag he took a handful of printed flyers which he began to distribute to the crowd.
Then they understood. This was an advertising stunt. Perhaps this place wasn’t so different from London, New York or Chicago after all. But they kept their good humour. They were on holiday. And they took the brightly coloured paper and read it. They had a free evening in Lerwick. Perhaps there was a show they might take in. There was something about this guy that had appealed to them. He made them smile, despite the sinister mask on his face.
As they climbed into the buses, they watched him disappear down a narrow lane into the town. He was still handing out his leaflets to passers-by.
Chapter One
Jimmy Perez glimpsed the back of the street performer as he drove through the town, but it didn’t register. He had other things on his mind.
He’d just landed at the airstrip in Tingwall after a short break in Fair Isle, staying on his parents’ croft. Three days of being spoiled by his mother and listening to his father complain about the price of sheep. As always after a trip home, he wondered why he found it so difficult to get on with his father. There were never arguments, no real antagonism, but he always left feeling an edgy mixture of guilt and inadequacy.