The Darkness and the Deep (33 page)

Marjory’s heart sank. ‘Cat?’ she asked hollowly. As if she didn’t know.

Katy Anderson, too, was heating up a casserole for supper. Shamed by Joanna Elder’s ill-concealed distaste at the state of the sitting room and almost more by Enid Davis’s kindly offer to stay on and help her tidy everything away, she had taken up the reins of her household again. They felt strange in her hands, but she realised she must move on to the second, almost more painful stage of grief: accepting that life continued, even in this mutilated form when you had lost half of yourself.

She opened the windows in the sitting room, picked up the scattered newspapers and untidy bundles of memories to sort through and put away tomorrow, then vacuumed and dusted and polished. In the kitchen, she washed up the dishes Nat had left, threw out dead flowers and watered thirsty pot-plants, putting away the kindly offerings from her neighbours (and Joanna’s almond-stuffed olives and balsamic vinegar). At the end of it she was feeling tired, but to her surprise hungry too. Enid’s casserole, a sort of all-in-one hotpot, must be almost ready. Perhaps she’d open a bottle of wine and see whether the theory about a new beginning, which had sounded plausible at the time, would work.

Katy had heard Nat come in earlier and go straight across to his room. When she called him he came in looking surprised, his eyes flicking round the now orderly kitchen. He was wearing jeans with a hole in the knee and a V-necked T-shirt and he looked grubby, with a fluff of adolescent beard; she’d always had to nag him to shower and shave.

‘Oh – feeling better, then?’ he said, going to sit down.

‘Well . . .’ It was oversensitive to feel he was suggesting grief was like flu, to be got over in a week. ‘I thought we ought to get back to proper meals. A friend of mine handed in this casserole.’

Nat peered at it distrustfully as she brought it to the table. ‘S’pose it’ll do.’

Don’t react,
she told herself. ‘Would you like a glass of wine?’

‘Any beer?’

‘Not up here, no.’

‘Oh, whatever.’

Katy served the food, opened the wine and poured out a glass for each of them; he drank his in two mouthfuls, then, unasked, helped himself to another. That alarmed her; perhaps wine hadn’t been such a good idea after all. His father had been a mean drunk.

He was eating in silence. ‘What have you been doing, then?’ she asked, feeling foolish but unable to think of a less banal way to open the conversation.

‘Nothing much. School – the usual. Having to look after myself.’

She ignored the implied reproach. ‘Was everyone talking about what happened to Willie? I can’t bear to think about it – on the way back from helping me out in the bar, just being kind. Did – did you see anything?’

Nat’s eyes flickered to her face for a moment, then back to his plate. ‘Nuh.’

‘Nat, think about it! Your room looks out that way – if you noticed anything, a car parked in a funny place, say, or anything, however small, you should tell the police.’

He set down his knife and fork and leaned across the table towards her, scowling. ‘Look, I said I didn’t see anything, OK?’

She could feel her heart start to race in fright, but she wouldn’t show it. ‘Fine,’ she said lightly.

This wasn’t going well. How could you build bridges with a son whose every instinct was aggressive? He was making no attempt to talk to her, though he had taken a third glass of wine and helped himself to the remains of the despised casserole.

Desperately, she said, ‘This is pointless, Nat. We need to talk, to get things sorted out between us. I know you resented Rob and I know too that I’ve neglected you this last bit. I’m sorry about that. But there were faults on both sides, you know.

‘So let’s put all that behind us. We can’t go on like this.’

For the first time, he smiled. ‘Sounds good. Let’s do that.’

‘I’ll tell you what I was thinking—’

‘No, why don’t I tell you?’ He put down his knife and fork, sat back with his glass in his hand. ‘First off, we get this dump sold, right? Go back to Glasgow, maybe, where there’s some sort of scene for me. There’ll be a bit of cash—’

Katy swallowed. ‘Nat, I don’t see it quite like that. First of all, there’s a mortgage—’

‘Oh, sure. But I’m not daft – I know what the property market’s done. And don’t tell me Rob didn’t have money he put in himself.’

‘Invested it, yes, in the business. And I need a business to earn my living.’

‘Nothing to stop you going back to your old job, is there?’

Waitressing – terrible hours, worse pay, no future. ‘What about you, Nat – what would you do?’ she asked quietly.

‘Oh, leave school, get something, I suppose. I’m still a kid – entitled to have a bit of time to enjoy myself. Gap year, they call it. If we split the money—’

She had been undecided about her own future, until now. She was still afraid of what Nat might do but it was almost as if she could feel Rob’s steadying hand on her shoulder. ‘Any money there is was Rob’s money. He put it into the pub to provide for our future, his and mine. If I waste it – or let you just throw it away – I’d be betraying him, and I’m not going to do that. The Anchor’s the business we built together and we’ve had good friends here. I’m not selling it. That’s final. And if you don’t like it, Nat, well, there’s plenty of young men your age earning their own living.’ She braced herself for his response, ready to move out of the danger zone if he flared up.

He didn’t. There was anger in Nat’s face, but also uncertainty. He gave a tight-lipped smile. ‘Well, let’s cool it for now. See how things go.’ He set down his glass, unfinished, and got up. ‘I’m going out. Don’t wait up.’

As he shut the door, Katy found that she was trembling. She buried her face in her hands. What sort of awful mother was she? Was there another woman in the world who so disliked what her child had become that she could no longer be sure she loved him? She tried to reach back for the memories other mothers seemed to keep preserved like rose petals in pot-pourri, memories of sunshine and laughter and chubby little hands, but Nat’s childhood seemed to have passed in a fog of fear and anxiety. The Nat she remembered was a frightened kiddie she’d taken blows for, to protect him from his drunken father – and what he had learned was that violent bullies got what they wanted. Both Nat, and her relationship with him, had been deformed as a result. It was her fault for being weak – she should have left, with Nat, before that damage was done – but no one who hadn’t suffered abuse would ever understand how hard it had been.

Her every instinct was to send him back to Glasgow, now. It was only, really, her promise to Enid that she would try again that was stopping her – that and his unexpected reaction to her ultimatum which had suggested that perhaps he was still scared of the world outside, still reluctant to leave his home.

Or – something else? Something more calculating? She shivered. One more chance, but she’d phone Dave’s mother meantime and have a chat with her about renting a room for Nat somewhere near enough for her to keep an eye on him. Just in case. Because she knew that if she let herself be abused again Rob would feel that she was letting him down.

At least the smug bastard had the sense not to gloat openly at the morning briefing when he heard what Tansy Kerr had to say, even if Tam MacNee was scunnered by the modest smile Kingsley had chosen to adopt instead. Tempted though MacNee felt to point out that an unconfirmed alibi wasn’t the same as a false one, he managed to keep his mouth shut. There was still the evidence of the mobile phone to come, though not for a day or two, apparently, for some technological reason he hadn’t even tried to understand.

Meantime, there was no choice. They’d have to wheel out the big guns against this their most promising suspect in the hope that sooner rather than later they could find something – anything – to link Elder with the more serious crimes. When the man got out today on bail, as he certainly would, and returned to his executive palace, he’d find JCBs digging up the drains – and, according to Tansy, a wife who’d been ‘
nursing her wrath to keep it warm
’. He grinned inwardly at the thought; it was a pound to a dud penny that Joanna Elder could be a right little hell-cat when she got going.

There would be a lot of legwork today too – more interviews, lots more, with everyone you could think of and probably a few that never even crossed your mind. He hated jobs like this, particularly when he was far from convinced that they were heading in the right direction, but there was no doubt he was in the minority. The rest of the troops were enthusiastic: Ritchie Elder was just the sort of guy everyone liked to see fall on their face, and the flatter the better. Jon Kingsley’s stock was high this morning.

At least, at the end of the briefing, the boss had reminded them of the status of unconfirmed alibis and warned them to keep an open mind, though when MacNee brightened and said, ‘In that case, if it’s unconfirmed—’ she just said firmly, ‘No, Tam.’ So that was that. He’d be expected to put his heart and soul into his allotted task of checking the schedule for every vehicle operating out of Elder’s company. Oh, he was looking forward to it already.

As he left, he found himself in the company of Jock Naismith, sergeant of long standing and deep-dyed cynic. He jerked his thumb back over his shoulder to where Kingsley was the centre of an animated group. ‘See him? Thinks he’s Archie, and he’s not even Archie’s
dog
!’

Grinning, Tam slapped him on the back, then went to collect his detail in at least a slightly better frame of mind.

PC Sandy Langlands was feeling cheerful this morning as he drove away from the showhouse office at Fuill’s Inlat. Right enough, it would have been good to feel he’d had more of a hand in bringing Elder to justice himself, but like all the lads he was glad to know that the bastard who’d flooded the district with drugs and killed four people to protect his trade would soon be having an intimate acquaintance with the inside of one of Her Majesty’s less glamorous properties. Peterhead, maybe. He fancied the thought of Elder away up on the bleak East Coast. They still had slopping out there, didn’t they?

His mission this morning had been to make quite sure that the girls working in the showhouse office could confirm that they hadn’t seen Elder until he came in to tell them the lifeboat had been called out, and that the time they’d given in their previous statements was correct. They could: one had moaned to the other that it was all right for the boss – twenty-past seven and there he was away, when they’d be on till ten. He’d noted that down and thanked them warmly.

Their case was still on track; the coastguard’s call had gone out at five-past seven, so if no one had seen Elder until twenty-past, he could have parked his car, reckoning if anyone noticed it they’d assume he was somewhere else on the site, and then in the rain and darkness slipped behind it and down into the cove to place the lanterns, which would have taken ten minutes, max. Seven-twenty, and he’d have been ready to stick his head round the showhouse door and go back to Knockhaven.

Langlands’s next task was to go back to the couples who had been viewing the houses. Several hadn’t arrived until after Elder had left but there were four he had to see again to question in more detail. Ideally, they too would confirm he hadn’t been in any of the houses and just maybe someone might remember seeing the Mitsubishi parked well before seven-twenty. You never knew your luck. His problem would be getting hold of them at this time of day – out at work, probably. He’d maybe have to call HQ to see if their work addresses were on file as well.

His mind on this problem, he was driving just a shade too fast up the narrow lane. Suddenly, just short of the point at which it joined the main road, he saw a woman come out of the cottage on the corner and with a fine disregard for her safety place herself in his path. He braked to an untidy stop.

She was elderly, in her seventies, perhaps, with rigid rows of curls covering her head; her mouth, he noticed with a sinking heart, was pursed up like a cat’s bum. Now she was placing her hands on her hips.

Langlands drew the car into the side, put on his diced cap and got out. ‘Good morning, madam. Were you wanting to speak to me?’

‘I should have thought,’ she said shrilly, ‘that the boot would have been on the other foot – that the police would have been wanting
me
.’

His sense of humour threatened to get the better of him, but he realised in time that the brief pleasure of saying, ‘Shall I fetch the handcuffs, then?’ would not be worth the consequent pain. ‘Now, why would that be?’ he wondered gravely.

‘You’ve asked everyone else about the night that lifeboat was wrecked but you’ve never asked me. Or my husband. For whatever good
that
would do you,’ she added darkly.

‘I’m sorry, madam. I suppose it was felt that you wouldn’t have seen much from the top of the road. And of course we always hope that anyone with useful information will contact us.’

‘Huh!’ she snorted. ‘Well, now you’re here you’d better come in.’ Without waiting for his response she went back inside and he followed her meekly into a small sitting room with a window which gave directly on to the lane.

A depressed-looking, grey-haired man in a beige cardigan was sitting in one corner by a meagre fire, a red-top open at the sports pages in his hand. He set it down, looking over it at his visitor with glum indifference. ‘What are you after now, Jeanie?’ he asked his wife but she behaved as if he hadn’t spoken.

‘There – see?’ Jeanie had picked up a brown exercise book which had been lying, with a pen beside it, on the windowledge. ‘See this jotter? The traffic down here’s been a scandal ever since those gomerils in the Council were daft enough to agree to the houses. And a few wee backhanders slipped under the table too, I’ve no doubt, so there was little chance they’d pay any mind to what
we
had to say about it. Well, I’ve been keeping this log of every car that’s been up and down here since. It’s maybe too late to change it now, but if they think they’ve shut me up they’ve got another think coming.’