Sacrifice (46 page)

I ran on, getting more and more out of breath. I reached the highest ridge I had to cross and began to stumble down the other side. The water of Skuda Sound was ahead of me and, tantalizingly close, the lights of Uyeasound. The motor launch was still moored to the pier. Its cabin lights were on and, from the bubble of water at its stern, I knew its engines were running.

The wind was still pretty ferocious, masking any sounds that might be coming from the boat, but several of the dark clouds had blown away, allowing a small moon and a few stars to shine through. Visibility was better than when I’d arrived on the island and I could make out the figures on my watch. Eleven-thirty. I ran down to the pier and crouched low, by the side of the launch. It was fastened, port side to, by lines at the bow and the stern. I crept to the nearest cabin hatch and peered through. It was the main cabin. There was a helm, control panel and radio, a small teak-fitted living area with tiny galley, a chart table and three further doors leading off. No sign of Richard. I moved on and looked through the hatch of a small sleeping cabin. Dana lay on the bunk, motionless, but she wasn’t alone in the cabin. I could see the tip of a polished black brogue and a few inches of charcoal-grey trouser fabric. Thank God, Duncan was already on board. As gently as I could, I pulled myself up and swung my leg over the guardrail. The boat rocked only a fraction.

‘Someone up there?’ called my father-in-law from below.

Small boats aren’t exactly blessed with hiding places. Frantically looking round, I could see only one way out – jumping over the side and swimming for Unst. Someone was moving below, climbing the steps.

On the cabin roof was a folded awning, used to protect the cockpit from spray in poor weather
conditions. I climbed up, lay down and burrowed into its folds.

The boat rocked as Richard climbed the companionway steps. I could see nothing, but knew Richard would be at the top of the steps, looking around, puzzled to see no one on board. He’d be less than two feet away from me. I held my breath, praying the canvas awning covered all of me and that he wouldn’t notice it looking bulkier than normal.

Below, the boat’s radio burst into crackling, static life. ‘
Arctic Skua
, come in,
Arctic Skua
. Base here.’ Richard climbed back down the steps. I prayed the wind would die down a little, just enough for me to hear what was going on.

The radio crackled again; I thought I heard the word ‘basement’ and a couple of expletives but I couldn’t be sure. Then Richard spoke.

‘Right, I understand. I’ll be careful. I’m setting off now.
Arctic Skua
out.’

Below me, Richard was moving again. A cabin door opened and shut, then I heard him heading up top. I counted seven footsteps and then he was in the cockpit. He climbed heavily on to the seat and then the deck. I heard him walk forwards and then the sliding sound of the bow-line being released. At once the boat swung round, the current taking it away from the pier. Then Richard walked back down the deck towards the stern. I waited for him to stop and then I risked peering out over the top of the canvas. He was bent almost double, his back to me, unfastening the stern-line from the cleat. Once
released, the boat would drift swiftly away from the pier and he would have to rush back to the cabin to steer us away from Tronal. This was my best chance. Creep up behind him, give one almighty shove and he’d go overboard. It would be the easiest thing in the world then for Duncan and me to drive the boat to Uyeasound.

Too late. Richard began to turn. I crouched back down.

The boat was drifting fast from the marina. Richard strode through the cockpit and down the steps. Then I heard the engines revving and the boat swung round to starboard. I looked up, trying to get my bearings. Nothing but blackness ahead. Behind me the lights of Uyeasound were shrinking. We were heading east down the Skuda Sound, out into the North Sea.

Richard wasn’t sparing the engines. We sped along at seven or eight knots. Rhythmically, like hammers striking the seconds on a giant clock, waves thudded against the hull. The bow of the boat rose and dipped and spray came hurtling over the deck like an intermittent and very cold shower. It was extremely uncomfortable and I knew the longer I stayed where I was, the colder and stiffer I’d become. When was Duncan going to make his move? I got up. The cabin roof was slippery with sea water and I gripped the rail before lowering myself on to the deck. The rucksack on my back was making me clumsy. I pulled it off and fastened it to a cleat. Then I reached inside. I found what I was looking for and tucked it into the front pocket of my waterproofs.

Then Richard cut down the revs and the boat slowed by several knots. We were heading south; Tronal was about two hundred yards away on the starboard side and around us loomed huge, dark shapes, as menacing as they were unexpected. I’d never been this far east of the islands and I didn’t know that some of the oldest rocks in Shetland can be found exactly here. Stacks of granite, echoes of the majestic cliffs that towered here millions of years ago, were all around us. Some were massive, soaring above us in archways and monoliths, others crouched low in the water like fell beasts waiting to pounce. They’d be beneath us too, making navigation treacherous and explaining Richard’s drop in speed. Like black-cowled monks, frozen in prayer, they stood in silence and watched us passing.

And something weird had got into my head that night, because it seemed to me these rocks were sentient, that the human drama taking place before them was hardly new, and that they watched, coldly curious, waiting to see how the act would be played out this time.

After ten minutes or so we left them behind and Richard picked up speed again. Still no sign of Duncan, but we were travelling away from help. We had to move soon. I wondered if Duncan, down in the cabin, might not realize which direction we were going in. In any case, we couldn’t wait much longer. I moved along the deck until I could step into the cockpit. Glancing down the companion-way, I could see Richard at the helm, chart at his elbow.
If he turned, he would see me. I just had to hope he wouldn’t. I raised the lid of the portside locker and looked inside: several coils of rope. I chose the shortest and closed the lid. Then I moved across the cockpit to the steps. I wasn’t going to hide again. When he turned, he would see me. So be it.

I stepped into the companion-way, put my foot on the top step.

Richard didn’t move.

Holding the guard-rail with my free hand, I lowered myself on to the next step down. Then the next.

The third step was damp and my trainer slipped a fraction. It made a faint squelching sound.

‘Good evening, Tora,’ said Richard quietly.

All the wind went out of me and I sat down, hard, on the steps. He turned and we looked into each other’s eyes. I’d expected anger, exasperation, maybe even a cruel sort of triumph. What I saw was sadness.

We stared at each other for a long time. Then his eyes flickered over my shoulder to the port-side cabin. Did he know already that Duncan was on board too? I glanced to one side. The door was closed tight. I turned back to Richard. He pulled back the throttle and the boat slowed almost to a halt. He reached over and switched on the auto-pilot. Then he stood and took a step towards me.

‘I wish you hadn’t,’ he said.

I felt my eyes sting and my jaw start to tremble.
Please let me not be about to cry, not now.

‘I suppose Emma gave me away?’ I asked, pray
ing that was the case. If Emma had told them, they might not know I’d met up with Duncan. Richard might not know he was on board. And where the hell was he, anyway? I pressed my right hand against my chest, felt the reassuring hardness beneath my waterproofs.

‘Yes, she mentioned your visit. And then it was a simple matter of checking video footage to confirm it was you. Not that any of us had any doubt. You’ve been very brave, my dear.’

I pushed myself up and jumped down into the cabin. Richard took a step back. Again his eyes flickered to the door behind me, but I wasn’t about to be distracted.

‘OK, less of the “my dears”; you and I have never been close, nor are we likely to be in future, given where you’re going. I think the GMC might have a few questions about the services you offer at that clinic of yours. That’s when the police have finished with you.’

Richard stiffened. ‘Please don’t presume to preach at me. Those babies would have died before birth – would have been murdered before birth – without us. Because of us they will have a good life, with parents who love and want them.’

I was close to speechless. ‘It’s totally illegal.’

‘The law is a complete mess, Tora. The law allows us to inject potassium chloride into an infant’s heart, right up until the moment of birth. Up to twenty-four weeks we can do it for no other reason than that the pregnancy is inconvenient to the mother. Yet
if a child of twenty-four weeks is actually born, we have to do everything in our power to preserve its life. Where’s the sense in any of that?’

‘We don’t make the law,’ I said, knowing I was sounding lame. ‘And we certainly don’t exploit its weaknesses for commercial—’

‘Do you have any idea how many terminations go wrong every year, when the babies come out alive, often severely handicapped?’ Richard came back at me angrily. ‘Because I’ve come across several in my time; babies whose mothers abandoned them even before birth. What kind of life are they going to have? Surely our way is better than that.’

‘You’re trading in human beings,’ I almost hissed at him.

‘We help women out of difficult situations. We provide childless couples with hope for the future. And we save dozens of babies who would otherwise be murdered for social expediency. We are preservers of life.’

I couldn’t believe he was seriously trying to take the moral high ground. ‘And Dana? Are you planning on preserving her life?’

He seemed to shrink a little into himself. ‘Sadly, no. That’s out of my hands. I hear she was a fine young woman. I’m sorry she had to get involved.’ Then he pulled himself up again. ‘Although, frankly, if anyone’s responsible for Miss Tulloch’s death, it’s you. If you hadn’t been so determined to meddle in the police investigation, she’d never have learned enough to put her life in danger.’

‘
Out of your hands, you sick shit? It’s your hands that will be weighting her down and throwing her overboard.’

Richard shook his head, as though dealing with an unreasonable child. I began to wonder if he was mad. Or if I was.

‘This is so typical of you, Tora. You can’t reason your way out of an argument, so you resort to abuse. Is it any wonder we’ve never been close?’

‘Shut up! This is not family therapy time. I can’t believe you’re preaching to me about saving lives. You tried to kill me last Sunday. You sabotaged my boat and my life jacket.’

‘Actually I knew nothing about that.’

‘Stop lying to me. You’re about to kill me: the least you can do is tell me the truth.’

‘He isn’t lying. I sawed though the mast.’

I whipped round. Stephen Gair stood in the doorway of the port cabin. His face was crumpled, slightly red. My eyes dropped to his feet. Black brogues.

‘Jesus,’ he said. ‘What do you have to do to get some decent kip around here?’

38

I DROPPED THE
rope and backed up out of gair’s reach, and came up sharply against the chart table. Gair stepped to one side and leaned against the steps. No way out. ‘You look like you’ve seen a ghost, Tora,’ he said, smiling sleepily.

I took hold of the zip on the pocket of my waterproofs and started to inch it down. ‘Don’t tell me,’ I said, ‘reports of your death have been exaggerated. Where’s Duncan?’

‘Duncan had a change of heart. He won’t be joining us tonight.’

I risked taking my eyes off Gair to look at Richard.

‘What have you done with Duncan?’ I demanded.

Richard leaned over and fumbled on the shelf that ran around the cabin’s interior. He straightened up again and I thought I saw the wrapping of a hypodermic concealed in his large hand.

‘And no one’s about to kill you,’ said Gair, his arms stretching high above his head. ‘At least, not
any more,’ he continued when he’d done yawning. ‘You’re going back to Tronal.’

I stared at him, not sure what he meant. Then I got it; as a strong, cold hand took a grip on my heart, I got it.

‘Not this time,’ I managed. ‘I think one or two people might just notice I’m gone.’

Gair shook his head, seemingly unable to take the grin off his face. ‘That boat you stole will be found drifting some time in the next couple of days,’ he said. ‘Some of your things will be discovered in the cabin, traces of your blood on the deck. People will assume you had an accident and went overboard. They’ll look for your body, of course. Hold a very tasteful memorial service when they don’t find it.’

I bit my tongue to keep from blurting out about the note I’d left for Helen. If they knew about that, they’d break into Dana’s house before dawn and destroy it. Without the note, without Duncan, who would doubt that I’d taken out a boat in storm conditions – for unfathomable reasons of my own, but I had been pretty disturbed of late – and hadn’t made it back? Without the note, the bastards might just get away with it. I couldn’t let them know about the note.

‘If it’s all the same to you,’ I said, glaring at Gair, ‘I’d just as soon you drowned me now.’

Without my noticing, Richard had moved closer. ‘She has a weapon, Stephen. Something tucked down the front of her suit.’

Gair glanced at Richard, then back at me. His eyes
dropped to my stomach. ‘I’ll say she has. Sorry, love, you and your little friend are far too valuable.’

My right hand was ready to slip inside my waterproofs. ‘What are you talking about?’

‘You’re pregnant, Tora. Congratulations.’ His grin got even wider. He looked like a wolf.

‘What?’ For a second I was so amazed I forgot to feel afraid.

‘In the club, up the duff, bun in the oven.’

‘You’re insane.’

‘Richard, is she pregnant?’