2007 - The Dead Pool (30 page)

Kirstin struggled to get up, but the pain in her leg was too much. ‘
No, Morag! No! Leave him!
’ She grappled with the handrail of the bridge.
Forget the pain. Get up! Get up!
Ignoring the agony in her leg, and the blood still flowing freely from her forehead, she limped forward. But she was too late. Morag and Ross were locked in an embrace. He had disarmed her of the branch, but she was dragging him by the hood of his waterproof, over to the swollen edge of the Cauldron. The elements were with her. A fierce gust of wind and vicious sheet of rain momentarily unbalanced him. Suddenly his footing was gone. Morag stood aside as he clawed futilely at the air, before falling backwards into the racing waters. Within moments the current had turned his body over, dragging it towards the weir.

Kirstin felt the yell tear from her throat. ‘
Noooooo!Help him. Get to the weir!
’

But Morag was standing, rooted to the flooded riverbank, her eyes following the progress of Ross’s body, his arms flailing uselessly against the current. Kirstin dragged her leg, cursing at her snail’s pace, reaching the wall just in time to see the lifeless body slither over the weir and disappear into the darkness.

Kirstin stumbled back against the wall, a prisoner of her injured leg. ‘
Whathave you done? What have you done? Stay away from me!
’

She had no way to protect herself now. With unnerving casualness, Morag wandered over to collect the torch and then, wordlessly, returned to place it back on the wall. Its strong yellow beam shone across Kirstin’s lap, and disappeared into a vanishing point far ahead in the undergrowth.

The wind had dropped, and the rain was down to a fine mist, leaving a patina of damp on her face and hands. All would have been silent. But the weir continued its endless shushing as the swollen waters made their way downstream, the freshwater scent more pungent than ever.
This is myfinal memory. The last sound. The final smell. The last sensation
.

Morag coughed and wiped a hand across her bleeding face before reaching into her pocket. ‘I have something for you.’ The voice was strangely calm, confident, resigned.

Kirstin shut her eyes as Morag moved slowly towards her.

K
irstin inched backwards across the wall. Not again. Surely this was the final time she would find herself trapped. Behind her, the raging Cauldron and weir. Before her, Morag with legs astride, trying to keep her balance, a bedraggled vision of insanity. Kirstin reached for the torch. If this was to be her only weapon, then so be it.

Morag took a step forward. ‘I want you to stay where you are. You’re injured. So am I. And you’re not in control of yourself.’ The voice was surprisingly steady. ‘Just stay.’

Morag’s look nailed Kirstin in place.
Okay, just wait, bide your time. She’s unbalanced. She’s dangerous, gone over theedge. But she
is
injured. Maybe she’s weaker than you
.

The steady voice wavered as Morag took a painful inhalation of breath. ‘lona Sutherland was the cause of her own death bee—‘ She stopped abruptly, another wave of pain taking over. Then she began coughing, wincing at each splutter. ‘Because she played with people. There must…be countless men out there who raised a silent cheer when they heard of lona’s death.’ Another pause. Kirstin saw Morag’s eyes flicker and wondered if she was going to lose consciousness and collapse. She tensed herself, ready to escape. But, within a second, Morag had rallied. ‘lona’s lovers had all been used and discarded by her. Craig would have suffered the same fate. He’d have deserved it.
The bastard!
’

She pulled the object from her pocket. Kirstin recoiled and raised the torch. And then she gasped. It was the camera!

Jamie’s camera. As Morag manipulated the various buttons, suddenly her face was transformed by the screen’s glow into an eerie, uplit gargoyle.

She thrust the camera towards Kirstin. ‘I found another memory card. Here.’

Still wary, Kirstin reached out her trembling arm. And then her focus shifted. Over Morag’s shoulder she saw him. Ross! He’d come back from the dead! He looked like a feral creature, barely human. His torso was bare and peppered with bleeding scrapes and cuts. His clothes must have been ripped off by the powerful currents. Morag realized too late what was happening. He caught her in a bear hug from behind, and the camera fell from her grasp, its tiny screen still beaconing out through the soggy grass below.

He was holding Morag in a tight stranglehold, speech and movement beyond her. ‘I’ve got her, Kirstin! Are you okay?’

Slowly, Kirstin slid her painful body down from the wall. ‘Yes…yes, I’m okay. We need to call the police. The phone. There’s a phone back there. Where I left her.’

‘Okay, you go on. I’ll hold her here.’

Kirstin called back, ready to get on her way. ‘All right. But try not to hurt her any more. She’s ill. She needs help.’

The shriek was ear-piercing, reminding Kirstin of the animal wail Morag had let out on hearing the news of Bonnie’s death. Despite the obvious agony it had caused her, Morag had managed to free herself. Ross had been too injured to hold her, and he fell to the ground as she kneed him in the groin and then began kicking him repeatedly in the stomach.

‘
No,Morag! Wait. We’ll helpjou, whatever happened. We’ll help!
’

Kirstin watched, helpless, as Morag foraged on the ground.
The camera! She’s after the camera
. But Kirstin was wrong. In her hands shone a large rock, gleaming black from rain and river water. Ross, now on his knees, was struggling to get to his feet.

‘
Morag! Don’t, please don’t!
’

Kirstin watched in terror as Morag raised the rock above her head. The single blow felled him, leaving his inert body prostrate on the mud-soaked ground. Kirstin felt her control snap and, ignoring the agony screaming from her right leg, she threw herself at Morag.

‘
No more! Haven’tyou done enough’? I wanted to help you!
’

Morag dodged out of her way and Kirstin felt her right leg collapse under her as she fell, face first, into a flooded dip in the ground. Her mouth was filling quickly with rainwater and mud.
Get up! Get up, oryou’II drown!
She spat the filth from her mouth, gasping frantically for air. And then she sensed it. Turning over on to her side, she saw Morag towering over her, one hand raised.
This is it. Be quick. Please, be quick
.

Then, to her surprise, Morag was on the ground with her, the camera thrust inches from her face. Roughly, Morag tugged painfully at Kirstin’s sodden hair, pulling her head back so she could focus on the tiny screen.

‘
Look! Look at this. And the next one, and the next one, andthenext one! Thenback again, back again, back again! Look! Understand!
’

Kirstin blinked as myriad images flashed in front of her eyes, and Morag’s manic mantra screamed in her ears.

And then the data went in. The brain processed, analysed.

The static images came alive in her imagination.

Iona, writhing in orgasmic pleasure. Underneath a grinning, jubilant Ross.

‘This way, Ms Rutherford.’

S
he followed the police officer down the silent hospital corridor. Her progress was slow as she hobbled along, the walking stick taking as much of her weight as possible. The officer stopped and invited her to go ahead of him.-The room was darkened, but she could make out what she needed to. Morag, flanked by a plain-clothes officer on one side and by Dr Lockhart on the other, was sitting facing a window that gave out on to another room. As Kirstin took her seat, Dr Lockhart whispered a soft, ‘I’m so sorry.’

The senior officer spoke quietly but firmly. ‘We have all the necessary consents in place. He is asking, pleading, for you to go in. Be with him?’

Kirstin felt all eyes on her, and shifted her weight further on to the stick. She glanced from them to the small hospital room, containing one bed, with half a dozen people clustered around it, clearly visible through the glass.

‘No. Absolutely not.’ With that she took the offered seat and waited. A disembodied voice sounded out behind her.

‘The following is being recorded in the presence of a representative from the procurator fiscal’s office and is at the request of the accused, Ross James Munro.’

Above her a television monitor flickered into life. The camera zoomed in and refocused. Ross was unrecognizable. His head was swathed in a white skullcap. Thin plastic tubing was laced into his nose and the side of his mouth. A variety of sensors were attached to his body and the tip of a finger, as the life-preserving machines emitted their steady chorus of bleeps. But he was conscious and lucid. His eyes, remarkably alert, gazed directly into the camera lens.
Looking ather?

An indistinct figure by Ross’s bed nodded at him. Kirstin breathed deeply and sneaked a glance at the TV monitor as he began.

‘I first met lona Sutherland because of my father. She came to my office to complain about his behaviour towards her and her friends. And to show me some photographs of him trespassing on her property. That’s how it began.’ He paused to swallow. Kirstin was amazed at how strong his voice sounded, his delivery hurried, almost garrulous. Had they given him drugs to get through this?

‘I thought we had something special, really special. I was going to give up my fiancée, Annelise. I would have had to leave the firm because of it. So I was giving up everything for her. I wanted lona. And then, early last summer, she dropped me like a stone. ‘Too serious.’ That was what she said. She didn’t want to be tied down. I kept trying to get her to see me, but she got angry. Threatened to tell Annelise. And then I found out about Craig Irvine and about the river party.’

A neutral voice interjected. ‘How did you find out about that?’

He didn’t answer immediately and, once again, Kirstin darted a quick glance up at the monitor. He had his eyes shut, the pale lids trembling with uncontrolled spasms. Then suddenly, the eyelids opened and he was staring down at her again, the multiple bleeps of the machines fading into the background as he spoke.

‘Through my father. His surveillance logs, and photographs he had taken of the two of them. I used to go through his study to find out what he had been up to.

I decided to go and watch her that Sunday. Have it out with her.’

The neutral voice was back. ‘Describe what happened.’

Ross’s voice was weaker now. ‘I went to the art gallery that day. Hung around, and then I used the back steps down to the river and cut through to the wooded area. From there I could see what was going on. Sure enough, it looked like she was with Craig. I could tell from her behaviour. I watched for a while, wondering what to do, and then they started this game. Hide and seek. Suddenly, the two of them were skipping over the bridge towards me. I hid and before I knew it they were…they were having sex. Right in front of me.’

There was another pause. Kirstin couldn’t help herself. Sure enough, the eyes were closed again.
Is he seeing it? Reliving it? Re-enacting it!
The rhythmic bleeps of the machines were beginning to tear at her nerves now.

The questioner’s voice broke in. ‘What happened next?’

‘I
was
going to talk to her…I mean, before they started…but once they’d started…I came out from where I was hiding to confront them. And…’

‘Please, go on.’

‘And she opened her eyes from underneath him and smiled.
She saw me and smiled! A wicked, wickedsmile!
’

Kirstin gave in. She shifted her position to look direcdy at the monitor. His face was contorted now, his voice a near whisper.

‘There was an old metal oar lying very near, so near. I think it might have been one of my father’s. He lost one around there a long time ago. I used that. It didn’t take long. And after…afterwards…when I saw what I’d done, I could hear people coming my way. I saw my father approaching from one direction and Morag Ramsay from another. I scrabbled higher up the slope. My father actually saw the bodies. He had his camera raised. I think he thought they were having sex and he was going to catch them. And then he realized what he was really looking at and ran away. But he must have seen Morag about to arrive. At the time he probably thought he’d be suspected. After all, he had been in a bitter row with the group, lona in particular. All of that would have been swirling round his mind. But there is one other thing. My father had spent time in the army as a very young man. He’d seen violent death at close quarters. He knew the two of them were beyond help. I think if there had been any chance of them surviving, things would have been very different for him. And for me. But no, he fled, panicked and began lying. Once he started lying, he had to keep going. And that must have torn him apart. He hated lies.’

Kirstin looked back into the room. For the first time she could see the questioner. Medical staff had been blocking the view before. A middle-aged police officer with his head bent over a file. ‘What did you do with the weapon?’

‘I drove to St Andrews, played golf, and threw it and my clothes into the sea.’

The questioner shifted slightly in his seat. ‘What do you know about the death of your father?’

Kirstin shut her eyes this time.
No. Please no
.

Ross gave a dry cough. ‘My father had no idea of what I had done until, by accident, we swapped cameras. I bought him the same model as mine as a gift, since he’d been admiring it for ages. He took mine home after lunch one weekend. When he brought it back, I just knew. It had had a selection of photographs that lona and I had taken of ourselves. Having sex. He confronted me. I admitted the affair. But denied being there that Sunday. I knew he didn’t believe me. He kept the memory card. He told me he’d been there that day and when Morag was arrested, he was an inch away from telling the police that. I tried to convince him that she’d done the deed, and that what he had seen was her returning to make sure that they were dead. He didn’t believe it, but I know this planted a seed of doubt about him coming forward. What if the police, hell-bent on getting Morag, threw this theory back at him? He would be in deep trouble for lying. Maybe he’d be accused of colluding with her. Why was he taking such a close interest in her case?