Gently with Love (13 page)

‘Take it from our point of view, now. We get this phone call from Iain Mackenzie to say there is a body at the foot of the cliff. We send a car, and what do we find? We find Iain Mackenzie along with his crew – they are hauling the body up the cliff – it’s hot, it has not been dead for an hour. And who should have found it? Just this same Iain, coming up alone from his boat in the harbour – though it might well have waited there for the hoodies if he had not strayed a little from the path. And who is the culprit? Nobody kens that has the surname of Mackenzie. It was but the greeting of the lassie that put our hands on Sambrooke’s shoulder.’

‘Then you think they knew.’

‘You heard the laddie. It was a point you were bringing out yourself. Iain kent him, who had never seen him, and kent he was back from a punch-up with Fortuny. It was all round the town – aye, and before Sambrooke ever threw a punch. There was not a soul that day in Kyleness who kentna a fight was going on in the turn.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘Now listen to this. I have not been backward in making inquiries. I can tell you that Fortuny was gravely misliked for what he was doing up in Kyleness. He was the father of the child – fine. He had a right to seek to do the honest thing. He had a right to be admitted to the house and to represent himself to the lassie. But the lassie could not stand him, and he took no heed of it. He took no heed of hints from the family. And he gave a deal of deadly offence with his speak-me-fair-stab-my-back southron manners.’ Sinclair took an emphatic puff. ‘And this is what is going through my mind. I am thinking that whether Sambrooke came here or stayed in London, Fortuny might have finished up at the foot of a cliff.’

He stared at me fiercely, with smoke trickling from his nostrils. I conceded the compliment of a shrug. I could sense that it required no small resolution to broach such a theory to one like myself.

It had come to that stage.’

‘Aye, so I read it. And mark this – the trawler was back there that day. It had been away fishing the whole week before and was lying at Ullapool the previous night.’

‘James Mackenzie recalled it.’

‘Doesna that fit, man? If there was anything afoot it called for Iain. And just that afternoon he tied up there, him and his close-mouthed, hard-drinking crew. And if you’re looking for knives you need go no further – you ken of your own knowledge how it is with fishermen.’

‘But meanwhile Sambrooke had arrived.’

‘And you heard how the old man handled that. If Jack Solomons himself had been biding at Kyleness he could not have promoted a fight better. And I have a passable notion why, apart from Fortuny getting a drubbing. It was that if anything unco should happen to Fortuny, Sambrooke for one would be keeping his mouth shut. Well, it did not work out quite so. We nabbed Sambrooke and took him hostage. I have no doubt that they wish to see the laddie cleared, but bear in mind that it will not be at any price. First the Mackenzies look after their own – that’s the way of the world at Kyleness.’

I kept every expression out of my face. ‘And this is where you think I can help you.’

Sinclair’s head weaved. ‘You have a privileged position there. And you are not the man to let it slip.’

‘With me they won’t be so close-mouthed.’

‘Aye, it’s a credible proposition.’

‘They will take me for a friend.’

‘You’ll pass fine.’

‘But meanwhile, I shall be reporting to you.’

He gave me a long, long look; then rose abruptly and went to the window. For a while he stood stiffly, with his back to me, staring out at the rainswept street. He turned suddenly.

‘Well – very well. You’re still for playing it like a careful mannie. And no doubt you are right. Putting other things aside, it is not a reasonable matter for me to be asking. And yet . . .’, he came back to his chair, and there was a twinkle in his eye, ‘and yet I am thinking that you may not entirely have got a grip of what I’m after.’

I continued wooden. ‘You want me to inform on them.’

He shook his head. ‘That’s not just the way of it. But I am for sewing this business up on the easiest terms that come to hand.’ He leaned closer. ‘You want Sambrooke out of it. That is precisely for what I am asking. Just a shred of reasonable doubt, and we’ll let it hang at Mackay’s tooth.’

I held his eyes. ‘You won’t press charges?’

‘Man, do I have to spell it out for you? If this affair is Mackenzie business we shall never get near to pressing charges. We have no evidence and there will be no confessions. It will just stay comfortable and circumstantial. We can maybe hazard a canny guess, but nothing the Sheriff will take two looks at.’

‘What about the press?’

‘Never fear the press. The press about here are douce bodies. There’s a rumour going round that the death was an accident – I kenna exactly how it took the air.’

I couldn’t help smiling a little at that. Sinclair seized on my change of expression.

‘Then you’ll do it?’

‘I think Sambrooke is innocent. I’m willing to pass on any findings that support him.’

‘Ach, you will need to be canny.’

‘I shall certainly be canny. The Mackenzies are still by way of being my friends. Also I’m not sure that I share your suspicions. They don’t altogether square with what I heard from Sambrooke.’

Sinclair looked doubtful for a moment, but the next he was grabbing my hand. ‘You will do your best,’ he said. ‘I ken that. And you have shown yourself a person with a rare capacity.’

‘Have you a man at Kyleness?’

‘Aye, Robertson. You will find him at the hotel. I shall ring to let him know you are coming.’

‘Just that and no more,’ I said.

Sinclair nodded.

A
ND SO IT
was that I left the police station at Dornoch in a more sanguine frame of mind than when I had entered it. I had gone up the steps as an interfering Englishman and I was coming down them again as an accredited auxiliary. Not that I was uncritically elated by that. I suspected the wisdom of trusting Sinclair unconditionally. I was flattered to find him agreeing with me that Earle was innocent but I felt obliged to consider what advantages it was bringing him. It meant, in brief, that he had got me on his side. I was going to interfere, so he proposed to have the benefit. I was friendly with the Mackenzies: they might not implicate themselves but they might well drop some damaging hints about Earle. And I was a policeman; I would feel constrained to pass on what I had learned. Certainly, if I happened on evidence of Earle’s guilt I would at least reveal a change in my attitude towards him. That would be enough. Though I shut my mouth tight Sinclair would know he was safe to go ahead, and even though the evidence never came to hand I imagined that he was good enough to get a conviction. The Mackenzies were his lure. He had judged rightly that my first sympathies lay with Earle. He had played on this, and had drawn me a picture of circumstantial evidence against the former. I grinned: I didn’t blame him. Rather, I admired his handling of the cards. A man less adroit would have tried to choke me off and perhaps have antagonized me by using threats. Sinclair was canny, he was a good policeman, but I couldn’t rely on him to show favour to Earle.

Nor did I feel it would be wise, on the other hand, to discount his insinuations against the Mackenzies. Sinclair had loaded them, but he had revealed some interesting circumstances by the way. The arrival of the trawler would bear looking into, and so would the movements of her crew. It would be pertinent to know why Iain Mackenzie was walking up from the quay alone. The body had indeed been found very promptly and its recovery had proceeded with surprising dispatch. When the arrival of the patrol car was imminent one would have expected the body to have been undisturbed. If the Mackenzie house was in communication with the quay that would explain Iain’s knowledge of the fight, but why had Iain remained at the quay until, or after, he had received the intelligence? Sinclair of course would have covered this ground and might have information that he had not given me; but when the country appeared so fertile I would be a fool not to plough my own furrow. In all, I felt I was primed for a profitable descent on Kyleness, and I braved the rain again with eagerness to be on my way.

Verna was waiting in the car; she was boredly leafing through a magazine.

‘Well?’

‘I’ve seen Earle, and spoken to the officer in charge of the case.’

‘And
I’ve
been to lunch, and got wet, and waited for three solid hours.’

‘Two and a half.’

‘Three. My God, if I’d known I’d have come in too. Of course Earle would have been rude and desperately unfair to me, but that would have been better than watching the rain.’ She slid me a look. ‘What did he say about me?’

‘He was just being rude and desperately unfair.’

‘Beast.’

‘It’s a failing of young people to be frank and over-exacting.’

She bit her lip. ‘You think I’m a bitch, don’t you?’

I strapped myself in but said nothing.

‘Perhaps I am. But the point is that I shall have to live with Earle if he marries Anne.’

I started the engine. ‘He’ll simmer down.’

‘Yes, but there’ll be all sorts of ructions first. You know what a filthy temper he has, and Anne will only make matters worse. And really I was only doing my best. I was simply trying to be a good mother. There’s no justice. All I’ve left to hope for is that he’ll take her back to Canada.’

There were genuine tears in Verna’s eyes and she borrowed my handkerchief to prove it. I was touched, but I felt it would be unmannerly to interrupt such artless grief. I switched on the wipers and drove away. There was no break in the wrack overhead. We left Dornoch as we had found it, in twilight and torrents, and pointed our bonnet to the murky hills.

A
S EARLE HAD
reported, the road was a slow one that seemed to go on for ever. After Lairg it became very narrow, a slender ribbon coiling through the wilderness. At distances of a hundred yards or more glimmered the white staves of passing places, and often they appeared in unexpected situations to which the road gave no indication that it would wind. But it always did. There was but the one road, climbing and turning across the mountains, the single, tenuous evidence of man in this empty, primeval landscape. We met few vehicles. We were often alone through many miles of wrack-laden country. When the mist parted we caught the sight of dark peaks and stretches of dreary moor and bogland. There were few trees, there were no animals, and we passed more lochs than houses. The rustle of the rain was brisk and continuous; the whole of Sutherland seemed to weep. Once I stopped to fill my pipe, and then the only sound was of rain. It battered the car and hissed on the road and rattled on the foliage of scrubby birches. It seemed to sum up the remoteness of a country that was proof against the usage of man; here he could fret a little at the edges but no more: he didn’t belong. Even Verna was moved. ‘Just think what it must be like to live here in the winter.’

‘People don’t live here. They stick to the coast. Here you can’t even graze sheep.’

‘But the coast is just as bad. It’s the back of beyond, and the nights there are just as long. No wonder the natives are so queer. You can’t expect civilized people up this way.’

‘You are worrying about meeting Colin’s people.’

Verna shivered. ‘It won’t be pleasant. George, I’m relying on you to stand by me. That old man Jamie scares me stiff.’

‘He was fond of Colin.’

‘Don’t I know it!’

‘You had better take the line that you’re still grieving for him.’

‘Well, it’s the truth.’ Her eyes upbraided me.

‘If you let it show I think you’ll get by.’

I drove on. Verna was quiet, but on her face was a thoughtful expression. I have no doubt she was thinking that it wouldn’t be easy to play the heartbroken widow with Anne looking on. But then the expression grew complacent and I took it that she had settled her tactics. I had confidence in her. The role might be difficult, but Verna brought to it the poise of a genuine hypocrite.

At long last our tedious trail joined the equally tedious west-coast road, and after but few more rainy miles we reached the turn to Kyleness. The way thence began benevolently enough with a winding stretch through streaming birch woods. and not until a mile later did the going become truly dramatic. Then it was brutal but unforgettable. I know of no other road with which to compare it. The improbable gradients were quite lost sight of in its sheer tortuosity and scenic grandeur. Now we had left the wilderness behind and had entered the lush landscape of the west coast. The road soared and dipped through an extravagant forest where wild roses bloomed and ferns grew thickly. Rocks were multicoloured and spectacular in form; torrents and waterfalls sheeted down them; we whirled past lochans where, unbelievably, waterlilies floated in peaceful colonies. It was a road of violence and luxury and not one hundred yards was straight. Vistas, coming and going like flashes of film, opened majestic views of a pale sea. Finally we crawled over a breakneck gradient between reddish rocks that rose in terraces, and found ourselves cruising along level road on heights above a sea loch, beyond which lay islands.

‘Not much further,’ Verna said, a little tensely. ‘Kyleness is on the other side of the headland.’

‘It’s stopped raining.’

‘I’d rather it began again. What we need is a bit of thunder.’

In fact there was a patch of fiery blue showing through the clouds above the islands; and as we drew closer I could see, like a vision, ghosted sunlight on a country further off still.

‘What’s that out there?’

‘Lewis.’

I kept my eyes on it as I drove. We seemed suddenly to have entered a legendary land beyond the confines of an accountable world.

W
E CAME TO
the hotel. It was a white-painted house standing alone near the point of the headland, with, descending from it, a steep path to a staithe and a boathouse on the loch shore below. A cluster of rowing boats were moored at the staithe. A sign at the top of the path said Private. A sign outside the hotel said House of Reay/Robert Mackenzie/Fishing. I stopped the Sceptre at the gate.