No Stranger to Death: A Scottish mystery where cosy crime meets tartan noir: Borders Mysteries Book 1 (3 page)

‘Was anyone behaving strangely?’

No, that came afterwards
. She hadn’t known how to react then and was no surer now.

‘Doctor?’

‘Sorry. Not that I noticed.’

‘And there was nothing unusual about the bonfire?’

‘It was much bigger than I’d expected, but it looked like any other.’

Mather brushed his knee to dislodge a dog hair which had landed on it. ‘What time did you leave?’

‘We were in The Rocket until about nine. Kate’s aunt and uncle took the children home with them when the rain started, to let Kate stay on. She doesn’t go out much, being a single parent.’

An expression flickered across Mather’s face which was impossible to interpret, then he gazed out of the window as though their conversation had come to an end. Zoe released her tensed-up shoulders; it was almost over. She was surprised when he turned his attention back to her.

‘Are you acquainted with Mr and Mrs Baird? They used to run the pub, I believe.’

‘Yes they did, but that was before my time. I’ve seen Mr Baird there occasionally, but never to say more than hello. I only spoke to his wife once, not long after I moved here.’

‘Did you form an opinion about her?’

‘We just exchanged a few words, when I was walking home from the shop one Sunday with the newspaper. She introduced herself, asked me a few personal questions, then went on her way.’

‘What sort of questions?’

‘Mainly about why I wanted such a big house, what my plans were for it, that sort of thing.’

Mather looked around, obviously puzzled.

Zoe smiled. ‘This isn’t mine. It belongs to Douglas Mackenzie, Kate’s brother. I’m renting it while I’m having the old coach house at Larimer Park converted. Anyway, Mrs Baird must have realised I’m not at all interesting because I don’t think I saw her again. Although that doesn’t mean she isn’t registered at our practice.’

‘We’re calling on your colleague, Doctor Ryder, next,’ Mather said. ‘I have one final question. Were you involved in the construction of the bonfire?’

‘I didn’t help to build it, if that’s what you mean, but I contributed some old timber from the coach house.’

Mather stood up. ‘We won’t keep you any longer, Doctor. Thank you. You’ve been very helpful.’

‘Helpful enough that you won’t release my name to the press? It doesn’t do a doctor’s image any good, being associated with this sort of thing.’

Mather smiled politely, obviously not taken in by her feeble joke but with more important issues on his mind. ‘We never share witnesses’ details with the press.’ As he put on his overcoat he ran a hand down its front, checking for dog hairs, oblivious to the ones which had transferred themselves from Mac’s chair to the seat of his trousers.

Trent nodded a farewell as he scurried after his boss.

Zoe shut the front door.
Thank goodness that was over
. With luck she’d never have to see them again.

Chapter 4

Despite not being in the telephone directory and having given no one the Keeper’s Cottage number, Zoe had received five calls by early that afternoon, all from people she hardly knew, all claiming concern for her wellbeing. It was obvious they were more interested in what she had found than how it was affecting her, and she got rid of them politely but speedily. The only conversation she welcomed was with Paul Ryder, the senior partner in the practice she had recently joined, who rang from the health centre after seeing Mather. Zoe assured him she was fine and would be at work the next morning, as scheduled.

She tried watching TV and catching up with the ironing but could settle to nothing. Even reading, her lifelong refuge from boredom and sadness, and a short walk with Mac, going away from the village this time, did not work. So she went out to the garage, Mac at her heels. It was a novelty to have somewhere to keep the car, and it was big enough that if she bought a padlock for the doors she could move some boxes in there too.

Mac leapt onto the passenger seat, his claws scraping its protective cover, and squirmed with excitement at the prospect of being taken for a drive. Crossing round the front of the car to get to her own door, Zoe ran her hand over the bonnet and frowned.
Must get that chip seen to before rust sets in
.

A few minutes later, driving cautiously along the rough track leading to Tolbyres Farm and wincing every time the bottom of her car scraped the ground, she wondered about Kate’s history with Erskine Mather. What she witnessed had not been a reunion of acquaintances who had simply lost touch over the years. She would wait for Kate to raise the subject first, though. They enjoyed each other’s company but had only been friends for a short time, since Kate had called in to meet her brother’s new tenant. It was too soon to start sharing personal confidences.

A light came on automatically when she pulled up in front of Tolbyres Cottage next to Kate’s ancient Volvo. As usual, Mac jumped across her lap and sprang out as soon as she opened her door.

She had gone to the wrong entrance on their first visit. Her friend’s home had been built by the Mackenzie family more than a century ago as a pair of semis for their farm workers. More recently, the cottages had stood empty for several years until Kate returned to the Borders with two demanding toddlers, a baby on the way and a jobless husband. Her parents had hastily started to convert the building into a single dwelling. However, owing to baby Mhairi’s early arrival and the departure soon afterwards of Kate’s husband – bearing out her father’s direst predictions – the remodeling had stalled, never to be completed. So Tolbyres Cottage still boasted two front doors (one nailed shut), two staircases (one leading nowhere) and walls in unexpected places. It was a home as individual as its occupants.

By the time Zoe entered the warm kitchen, Mac was already there, catching and bolting down biscuits thrown to him by Frankie, Eva and Mhairi. The family’s outsized ginger cat, Bluto, sprawled in his favourite position along the Aga’s pot rack, his tail hanging perilously close to the hotplates.

Wearing a faded pink apron bearing the message ‘Mum’s in charge’, Kate straightened up from putting a dish into the oven and shooed the children away, telling them to change out of their school clothes.

‘I hope it’s okay to arrive unannounced,’ Zoe said. ‘I had to get out for a while. Here, I brought you something.’

Kate took the bag Zoe held out and peered inside. ‘You know you’re always welcome here, especially bearing food. Is this the sort of bread we had this morning? It makes lovely toast.’

‘Glad it meets with your approval,’ Zoe said. ‘It’s an old family recipe.’

‘You made it? I thought you didn’t do cooking.’

‘Bread-making’s more science than cookery. It’s the only culinary skill I inherited from my grandmother.’

Kate put away the loaf then slid the kettle onto a hotplate, brushing aside Bluto’s tail. As she turned back to face Zoe, she said, ‘Sorry I rushed off earlier. I couldn’t think what to say when I saw who your visitor was.’

‘A shock for both of you, by the looks of it.’

‘We haven’t seen each other since university.’

‘That’s a long time. I’m surprised you recognised him. He’s gone very grey.’

Kate shook her head. ‘His hair was already like that when I knew him. It’s a family trait. He’s put on weight, but haven’t we all?’ She made a pot of tea, covering it with a hand-knitted cosy, then closed the door into the sitting room where the children were playing with Mac. ‘I want to explain.’

‘You don’t have to.’ Every day Zoe heard things – deeply personal, often sad or disturbing things – that her patients felt unable to share with anyone else. It was all part of the job. But she was never comfortable when people chose to unburden themselves outside the surgery, especially as they often expected her to do the same in return.

‘I’d hate you to keep wondering what the big deal is.’

‘My involvement with the police began and ended with finding that body. It’s not likely I’ll see him again.’

Kate continued to speak, looking out of the window rather than maintaining eye contact like she usually did. Zoe could not have interrupted her even if she had wanted to.

‘A friend introduced us. Although Erskine was a couple of years ahead of me she reckoned we’d get on because we both came from the Borders. Which was ridiculous – Kelso’s nothing like Galashiels and I’m nothing like him. He deserved the inevitable nickname because he really was skinny then, not my type at all. I only accepted his invitation to go to a party because I had nothing else on that weekend.

‘He told me afterwards he was nervous about how I would cope with all those people I’d never met before. But fairly early on in the evening he stopped telling his friends I couldn’t hear. Being able to lip read comes in handy when everyone else is deafened by loud music.’

She turned round to pour the tea and handed Zoe a mug, meeting her gaze again. ‘It got to the stage where we were talking about getting married. Our mothers became friends. They still are.’

‘Which must have made it worse when you broke up,’ Zoe said. She took a sponge from the sink to wipe something sticky off her mug’s handle.

‘Aye, you’re right. Mum and Bette still meet up occasionally to swap news. I shouldn’t have been surprised to see him, because I knew full well he was living in the Borders again.’

Zoe said nothing, watching Kate take a gulp of tea, letting her tell the story at her own pace. When she spoke again, the words poured out of her.

‘I got pregnant and had an abortion. I couldn’t tell him, he was in the middle of his finals, so I went ahead and did it. Then someone else found out and told him, and he said he never wanted to see me again.’ Kate’s shoulders drooped and she gazed down at her hands.

Zoe waited until her friend looked up again before speaking. ‘He must have realised it wasn’t an easy decision for you.’

‘I can’t blame him. It was his baby too.’

‘And it was your body. He treated you very badly.’

‘With hindsight, I see now it wasn’t so much my having the abortion he was upset at, but the fact I shut him out and didn’t share the decision with him.’ Kate took another mouthful of tea. ‘I never saw him again, until today. He joined the police, moved to Glasgow and married a lassie called Laura. She’s a social worker.’

‘No wonder it was such a shock for you, meeting him again without warning.’

‘It was inevitable – the Borders isn’t a big place. Though I never guessed our paths would cross as the result of a murder enquiry. Thanks a lot, Chrissie.’ Kate raised her mug in mock salute.

It was a relief to see Kate’s sense of humour starting to return, so Zoe refrained from pointing out again that the body had not yet been identified. ‘Why is he here now?’ she asked. ‘I would have thought Glasgow’s a better place for an ambitious policeman to be based.’

‘Bette had a stroke about a year ago and Erskine came back to be near her. His father died when he was a child, so they’re very close. Laura’s still in Glasgow, but they’re not getting a divorce.’

‘You’re well-informed.’

‘Mum regularly tells me about his promotions and how Bette blames Laura for not making her a granny yet. But I try not to –’

The door flew open. Three children and a dog rushed in.

‘Mum, is tea ready yet?’

‘Mummy, I’m starving.’

Zoe felt a light touch on her arm. She had noticed on her first visit to Tolbyres how Kate’s children did this to be sure they had their mother’s attention before speaking to her. Mhairi often used the technique on other adults too. ‘She’ll grow out of it. Her brother and sister did,’ Kate said when Zoe commented on this.

‘Zoe, did you know it’s my birthday soon?’ Mhairi asked.

‘I think you told me before,’ Zoe said. ‘It’s Saturday, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, and I’ll be seven.’

‘That’s very grown up.’

‘When’s Mac’s birthday?’

‘I’m afraid I don’t know.’

‘Hasn’t he got a stifficate?’ asked Eva, the middle child and usually the quietest. ‘Granddad’s dogs have all got stifficates.’

‘That’s because Granddad’s dogs are pedigree sheepdogs,’ Kate said. ‘Mac is what’s called a mongrel. He’s a mixture of breeds, so he doesn’t have one.’

‘But he must have a birthday.’ Eva sounded scathing. ‘Everyone’s got a birthday.’

‘You’re right,’ Zoe said, ‘but I don’t know when it is. I wasn’t there when he was born, and I never met the people who were.’

‘Why not?’ Mhairi asked.

Zoe looked at Kate. Unused to conversing with children except to ask where it hurt, she had no idea how much of the story she should tell. Kate grinned and shrugged.

‘Well, the people who owned Mac didn’t want to keep him, so they put him in a box and left him by the side of the road for someone else to find and look after.’

‘Like baby Moses?’ Mhairi asked.

Zoe admitted the similarity. She had expected her audience to be upset by the harsh reality of Mac’s arrival in her life, but instead they were enthralled and wanted to hear more. They knew there was going to be a happy ending.

‘It was a Friday, and I was driving home when I needed to stop and stretch my legs. I saw a cardboard box and it started to move. When I opened it up, there was Mac. He seemed hungry, so I took him home to give him something to eat. And then I decided to keep him.’

‘Why did you call him Mac?’ Eva asked. ‘Is it short for Mackenzie?’

‘Don’t be silly. She didn’t know us then,’ Frankie said.

‘Because I wrapped him in my mac – my raincoat – to keep him warm.’

The children were delighted with this story, and they all agreed that Mhairi should share her birthday with Mac. Then their mother told them to go and wash their hands because tea was nearly ready.

In the silence which followed, Zoe could not help thinking back to the day Mac came into her life. She had left a lot out. Like having to pull over on to the hard shoulder during the drive home from Russell’s funeral because she was shaking, not so much from grief but shock at the hostility she had encountered from people who used to be her friends. And how Mac was not on his own in the box but standing on top of three siblings who had not shared his tenacious grip on life.