He thought she would say more to convince him that it might be, but she suddenly gave up the fight.

‘Of course,’ she said. ‘You’re right. I’m being foolish. I don’t know what’s been wrong with me to day. My head’s full of all kinds of fancies. You would know your own brother.’ She paused. ‘After the policeman left I even wondered for a moment if it might be Andrew. They didn’t find his body until weeks after he fell. The tide was so strong, the coastguard said he must have been taken out to open water. I thought maybe he survived after all. For all those weeks I kept hoping. There was some chance he’d survived, swum ashore somewhere, taken himself away to sober up. Even when the body was washed up, it could have been anyone.’

‘Andrew’s dead,’ Kenny said.

‘I know. It’s my imagination. I think, What if . . . and then I’m carried along by the possibility. The story.’ She gave a little smile. ‘I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have come.’

‘Have some tea while you’re here.’ Now, he felt sorry for her, living all on her own. She had no one to take her to bed on stolen afternoons.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I just shut up the post office and ran up here. I need to get back. I might have customers waiting.’

‘It’s the time of year,’ he said. ‘The light nights. It makes us all go a little bit mad.’

Chapter Twelve

Roy Taylor was head of the Inverness team. He’d be the senior investigating officer once he arrived. Perez had worked with him before and they’d become friends of a sort. Not close friends. Perez knew nothing about his private life, didn’t even know if he was married. But they’d come to an understanding about the case they were working on.

Now, listening to Taylor’s impatience, Perez was irritated. He didn’t need telling that the priority was to get an ID on the victim. He’d only officially been a victim for half an hour, for Christ’s sake. Sandy should have arrived in Lerwick now. He’d be on the phone, chatting to the lasses in the NorthLink office at Holmsgarth, checking with Loganair on the BA bookings. It was the sort of work Sandy liked and was good at, routine and not too demanding. Perez was confident they’d have a name by the end of the day. At this point there was little else they could do. He knew that Taylor’s impatience had little to do with his handling of the case. He’d be frustrated because he was still in Inverness, because he hadn’t set out for Aberdeen the minute he got the call. If the weather had changed just a little earlier, if they hadn’t banked on getting the last plane into Sumburgh, they’d have been able to reach the ferry before it sailed and at least they’d be in Lerwick at seven the next morning. Taylor was a man who liked to be in control. Perez could imagine him, angry with himself and taking it out on the rest of the team.

Perez was hungry now too. Fran had woken when he got up, made mumbled offers of toast and fruit, but he was already late for work by then. He was tempted to head back for town, thought of bacon sandwiches, fish and chips. Something warm and greasy and filling. But for completeness’ sake he thought he should talk to Peter Wilding, the Englishman who had taken on Willy Jamieson’s house. He could tell Taylor that he’d spoken to everyone who lived in Biddista then. Taylor wouldn’t be able to pull him up on that.

Wilding was sitting in the upstairs window, looking out, just as Martin had described. The fog had made the day so gloomy that he’d switched on a light in the room. Perez could only see him when he reached the end of the terrace and even then the view wasn’t so good. He thought the man had been watching him all along, from the moment he’d pulled up in his car. He’d have watched Perez go to Skoles and to the Manse, seen him in the shop and in Aggie’s house. It seemed odd to him that a man should take so much interest in the trivia of everyday life. In Perez’s experience, women were the nosy ones. Why would this Englishman care what the people of Biddista got up to? But Wilding’s curiosity might be useful. There was a real possibility that he’d seen the stranger.

The writer must just have seen Perez as a silhouette coming out of the mist. Why is he still sitting there, Perez thought, when there’s nothing to see? As soon as he knocked on the door, Wilding left his place at the window. Perez heard footsteps on wooden floorboards, a key turning in the lock. The door must have warped because it stuck against the frame. Did the locked door mean the man hadn’t been out yet that day? Or that security was a habit brought up from the south?

He recognized Wilding as soon as he came to the door as the dark man who’d been talking to Fran at the gallery. He was tall, rather good-looking, Perez saw now. He was wearing a striped collarless cotton shirt and jeans, canvas shoes. The writer smiled. He didn’t speak but waited for his visitor to explain himself. Perez found the silence disconcerting.

Perez supposed he should show his warrant card, but couldn’t quite remember what he’d done with it and introduced himself instead. ‘I wonder if I could ask you a few questions.’

‘Oh, please do. Any excuse to stop staring at a blank laptop screen.’ It was a rich voice, as if he was constantly amused by a private joke. Perez had imagined a writer with a deadline to meet as brooding, self-absorbed, but now there was no hint of that. The man stood aside. ‘I noticed that there’s been some activity on the jetty. Is it about that, I wonder?’ Perez remained silent. ‘Oh well,’ Wilding went on. ‘No doubt you’ll tell me when you’re ready.’ His eyes were so blue that Perez wondered if he was wearing coloured contact lenses. It pleased him to think of Wilding as vain.

Willy Jamieson had been born in this house and lived in it until he’d moved into sheltered housing. He’d scratched a living from fishing and, when he was younger, from odd bits of work for the council. Perez could remember seeing him by the side of the road sometimes, helping the contractors lay new tarmac. He’d never married, and when he’d moved out the house was in much the same state as the day his parents had moved in. Perez supposed that he’d bought it from the council. Wilding must be the owner now, or be renting it privately. He was hardly a normal council tenant.

Inside the house, Perez could see across a passageway into a small kitchen which held a deep sink with one tap and a Calor gas stove. The table, folded against one wall, looked as if it had been left behind by Willy. There were no fitted cupboards, no washing machine. The only additions were a small fridge, balanced on the workbench, and a coffee grinder. The place had an air of impermanence. A squat. It was as if Wilding were camping out here.

Wilding seemed untroubled that Perez could see the primitive nature of his domestic arrangements and gave another of his smiles. ‘Let’s go upstairs. It’s more civilized there. Can I make you tea? I’m sure Aggie will have offered you tea earlier, but I expect you could use another by now. Or coffee perhaps? Coffee is one of my few luxuries here. I grind the beans every time.’ He spoke slowly and Perez had the sense that he was considering the effect of every word. But perhaps it was just that he’d spent too long on his own in his upstairs room and conversation no longer came easily.

Perez was tempted by the coffee. It would be a long day and he would need something to keep awake and alert.

‘Coffee would be fine.’ He paused. ‘One of my luxuries too.’

‘Ah! Another addict! I can recognize the signs. Splendid. Go in and make yourself at home. The room at the front. I’ll not keep you waiting long.’