A Double Death on the Black Isle (22 page)

“
Slainthe mhath
,” Rob held up his shandy. “Thanks for agreeing to meet.”

“I'll help if I can. I owe your editor. As I said, I canny talk about the details of ma brothers' trial . . . unless you have any information to help them.”

“I'm looking for information on the Skinner family.”

“I know little about they fishermen,” Jimmy shrugged. “A tight, closed bunch they are. Look after their own.”

“Like your lot then,” Rob remarked.

“Aye. You're right, and you'll never catch a tinker at sea. River fishermen and pearlers, we are. Poachers an' all.”

“I know it's not relevant, but I'm really curious as to how Patricia Ord Mackenzie met Sandy Skinner and why on earth did she marry him?” Rob asked.

Jimmy gave his full beam Jimmy grin, making him look like a naughty boy, not a legendary hard man.

“The
why
is obvious by now,” he laughed. “I heard that she was havin' a bit o' hochmagandy wi' Sandy for many a year. How they met? I'm no sure, but Sandy Skinner used to pal around wi' Fraser Munro. After all, they were in the same class at school, from five-year-olds to leaving. Right troublemakers they were.”

“Really?”

“Ask the schoolmaster. He was always reaching for his belt wi' those two.” Jimmy paused, “I'm no sure, I'll check wi' Ma, but I seem to remember Sandy coming to Achnafern a time or two to work at the tatties. It wasn't unusual for a fisherman's lad to work the harvest, there's good money at tattie picking. Great company too—farm workers, tinkers, loads o' young folk, from the town even—we all work thegether, have a bit o' a laugh at day's end. Making a fire, roasting tatties in the embers, a song or two. Patricia loved it. Always managed to wangle a holiday from thon posh school o' hers at tattie harvest. And she worked as hard as anyone.”

“I did the same a few times,” Rob remembered. “I worked with one or other of your cousins.”

“That'll be right,” Jimmy said, “the Black Isle is hooching wi' McPhees. Anyhow, why do you want to know about the Skinners?”

“I'm mystified as to who set fire to the boat.”

“You're the only one who doesn't know then,” Jimmy laughed.

“What?”

“It'll cost you.” Jimmy held up an empty glass. “Make it a double this time.”

Rob did as he was told, but shuddered at the thought of how on earth he could wangle the expenses past Mrs. Smart.

“
Slainthe
,” Jimmy toasted. “Lovely drop, this.” He smacked his lips, enjoying making Rob wait. “John Skinner,” he announced, “was questioned by the polis. Now he has been charged.”

Rob grinned. He had a story. Then he thought about it. “That makes no sense.”

“Does it have to? The boy could have done it to spite his brother, simple as that.”

“Aye, possibly.” Rob sipped his shandy, thinking. He didn't notice it was flat and oversweet. “I'm certain there's more. I went to their village. The Skinner warehouse was locked, and this is in the middle of the herring season.”

“No, it's no,” Jimmy told him. “It was open a couple o' days ago. I saw it maself when I was asking around about Fraser Munro.”

“Did you find out anything useful?”

“That would be telling.” Jimmy enjoyed the look on Rob's face, enjoyed teasing him. “All right. Seeing how you bought me a drop of the good stuff, I'll tell you. Thon big shed, where the lassies box the herring, was sold to another family in the village. John Jack bought it and at a good price, so I heard.”

“Really?” Rob couldn't take it in. “I've no idea what that means.”

“Means Skinners needed the money. Why else would they sell?”

“Right.” Rob needed time to think about this. “How about your brothers? Is it hopeful?”

“We're tinkers, we need more than hopeful.”

“You have Calum Sinclair. My father says he's good.”

“Aye. He seems right smart. I have a bad feeling that we'll need him.” Jimmy paused. “You're likely to find out soon enough, being the nosy fellow that you are. . . .”

“What's that?”

“Fraser Munro didn't die until early morning, dawn or a wee whiley after.”

“Does that help?”

“Maybe someone else attacked him—later on that night, or early morning.”

“Do you have any idea who?”

“Aye, that's the question, isn't it? No writing this in the
Gazette
,” Jimmy warned.

“Never,” Rob assured him. Jimmy looked at Rob, looked straight into his eyes. Rob had to look away. What Rob saw, he didn't want to see again. He took a sip of shandy to recover, but the glass was empty. “If I hear anything, I'll let you know, Mr. McPhee.”

Rob knew that Jimmy had said all he was going to say. It was time to leave before any more glares scared the life out of him.

“Thank you very much, Mr. McPhee.” Rob stood. “Thanks for everything. I'll let you know if I hear anything.” Rob knew he was gabbling. Jimmy did too.

When he heard Rob's motorbike roar down the road, Jimmy thought,
Haven't lost ma touch
,
one look is all it takes to scare the daylights out o' them
. He finished his drink, made his way across the room, giving the stare. A vacuum of silence followed him.
Aye
, he thought with great satisfaction,
works every time
.

When Rob reached home, he ran to his room, took the cover off his portable Olivetti, a secondhand red one that he loved and cherished and wished he could use at work. He sat down to write up his notes.

After an hour and a half of feverish typing, he thought,
I wish it wasn't Sunday, I can't wait to get to the office.

Once again the ace reporter scores a scoop
, he congratulated himself as he rolled the sheets and the carbon paper out of the typewriter.
No,
he realized,
it's scoops, plural.

P
atricia read about the charges against John Skinner in the
Highland Gazette
. Her first thought was,
my ex-mother-in-law will be livid.
Her next thought surprised her.
I must help him.

It was the report from the boatyard that really set Patricia thinking. She had not considered her late husband's financial affairs because she knew little about them—only that he was desperate for money and had even suggested they sell one of Achnafern's fields to raise cash.

The new boat was partly paid for; that was what the
Gazette
article stated. So was she, as Sandy's widow, part-owner of a boat or owner of half a boat? And the wages owed to the crew of the boat that was destroyed? The
Gazette
had quoted them as saying they were hoping
she
would pay them. Was she obligated? Was she liable for Sandy's debts?

One problem at a time,
Patricia told herself. First the fatal accident inquiry into Sandy's death—let's get that out of the way, then I can find out my legal position.

That the death of Sandy Skinner would be declared an accident, she had no doubt.

Next morning Patricia met Allie Munro earlier than usual, seven o'clock instead of eight. The court hearing was scheduled for ten.

Five weeks had passed since Allie Munro lost his son and Sandy Skinner had his accident. Time passing hadn't made it easier for Allie. It was the sense of a deep, abiding sadness that
Patricia noticed. She felt it emanating from his voice, his face, the way he moved, the way his finger was less precise when pointing at the map of the farm as they discussed farm business; she was in the presence of a man who had aged ten years in five weeks.

Farm business dealt with, Patricia went to the kitchen to fetch the car keys. When she had asked her mother for the car, she had had to put up with the usual rigmarole. “No Mummy, I do not want a lift. No, I will not take the bus into town. No, I am not driving the Land Rover, not in my condition.” Her final point—think how it would look if anyone in town saw her, especially on the day of the hearing into her husband's death—won the argument.

Mrs. Munro was scrubbing vegetables when Patricia came in, “I've time for a quick cup of tea before I leave,” she said, putting the kettle on the hob. “How are you, Mrs. M?”

“As well as can be expected, lass.”

Patricia went over and gave her a hug. She was surprised by the way the older woman clung to her. She stepped back, looked at the crumpled face, the pink eyes, the hair without its usual immaculate side parting showing a pink line of scalp. “You look all in.”

“I canny sleep.”

“I can understand that.” Patricia, by contrast, looked bonnie and blooming in her grief.

“You look well, lass.”

“Thanks to this little fellow.” She laughed, patting her stomach.

Patricia insisted on making, then pouring the tea. They sat at the table as they always did, side by side, close.

“Mr. M seems a bit out of sorts.”

“Aye, it's hit him hard, all this.” Mrs. Munro shook her head.
Her eyes filled with tears. One slowly rolled from the faded blue of her right eye, dropping audibly into her tea.

“Salt and sugar together. I hope the tea tastes all right,” Patricia joked.

“You always do me good, lass. Everyone, the neighbors, the wifie in the shop, or her in the post office, they don't know how to treat me. It's like I have a disease.”

“I know. Me too. And as for the bump, people don't know where to look. They generally fix their eyes on a point halfway to Tain.”

They smiled, a brief and healing respite from grief.

“I'll start a bit o' knitting. I could do with something to take my mind off things. A shawl, I think.”

“I'd love that. I'll get some wool for myself and a simple pattern. You know me, a plain purl girl.”

“You were always too busy outdoors to knit,” Mrs. Munro fondly remembered. “Get white Shetland two-ply for me, ten ounces.”

When Mrs. Munro heard the car pull away, she went back to Patricia's remark. There
was
something worrying Allie. She felt him sigh in the night, she heard him get up and go out into the dark to smoke a pipe, she saw his face line and crinkle a little more each day. No longer could she tell herself this was only to be expected—it was more than grief that was troubling him.

She went to the pantry to fetch the meat for a shepherd's pie. As she worked, her mind wandered.

What were those funny wee brass monkeys Patricia had had since she was a child? Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil?

I'm just like them. If there is something bad going on, I don't want to see nor hear.
Her eyes filled with tears. She hated this need to cry, she'd never been a crying sort before now.
Given time,
it will be all fine,
she told herself, not really believing it.
Talk to Allie, ask him what's wrong.
“A trouble shared was a trouble halved,” her granny used to say. Aye, and there's plenty of troubles on this farm.

On the ferry crossing to town, Patricia leaned on the railing. There was a chilly edge to the wind. She watched the white horses race across the water, towards the mouth of the Beauly River in the far distance. She watched three fishing boats working the firth, May and June being the herring season. She looked up at the forested crag of Craig Phadric and below she saw the whitewashed lock keeper's cottage, with the stumpy white lighthouse jutting out into the water, marking the beginning of the Caledonian Canal.

This is where it all came to grief,
Patricia thought,
the sinking of the boat. No, not true—married life with Sandy Skinner would have come to grief sooner or later.

Patricia parked beneath the castle rampart. She checked her lipstick in the rearview mirror, she patted her hair into place. She got out, locked the car, put on her camel-hair coat and headscarf, hooked her handbag over her arm.
I look as good as Queen Elizabeth on a trip to the shops in Balmoral
, Patricia thought.
We're the same age, but I'm sure she didn't have such problems with her husband—or her mother.