Shadows of Death (17 page)

Speculation was fruitless. I’d have to wait until this evening. Meanwhile, I had the whole day ahead of me, with neither husband nor dog to consider. What should I do with those precious hours?

I wandered aimlessly on down The Street. I half-remembered seeing, tucked away somewhere around here … ah, there it was!

Like a homing pigeon, I had found the bookstore.

For a booklover, finding a bookstore one has never visited before is like coming upon a pirate’s cave full of treasure. The first reaction is bedazzlement. Where, in the midst of such riches, shall one begin to delve?

This shop was small, but jammed floor to ceiling with shelves. There was scarcely room for two people. The proprietor, one Mr Brown according to the sign over the door, was seated on a stool wedged into a corner behind the desk. He looked up when I came in, smiled, said, ‘Let me know if I can help you find something,’ and went back to the book he was reading.

I wasn’t looking for anything in particular, so I perused the shelves happily, greeting old friends, finding intriguing new possibilities. I pulled down a volume of poems by George Mackay Brown who was, I knew, Orkney’s most famous poet (and wondered if Mr Brown the bookseller was any relation). I looked over several books about Orkney and chose three, and was amused to find an Orcadian dictionary. ‘I haven’t noticed that Orcadians speak any differently from people in the Highlands,’ I commented to Mr Brown.

‘That’s because we speak Standard English to strangers. But amongst ourselves, we use our own words. There are a lot of Norwegian derivations, you know, because we’re nearly as close to Norway as to Scotland, and many of our forebears came from Norway. The Vikings?’ he said, as if questioning whether I’d ever heard of the Vikings.

‘I do know a little about the Vikings, though not a lot. I understand Mr Carter, the man who was killed, thought there might be Viking treasure buried at High Sanday.’

Mr Brown smiled. ‘Anything’s possible, I suppose.’

‘But not very likely?’

‘Not very. If the Vikings had buried any treasure there – and why would they? – it would have been one of the first things discovered, thousands of years newer than what they’re digging up now. No, I fear Viking gold is a pipe dream. I could be wrong, of course.’

‘What did Mr Norquist think of the idea, I wonder?’ I had spoken in the past tense without intending it, but Mr Brown didn’t appear to notice.

‘Charles Norquist,’ he said with precision, ‘finds any modern intrusion into the ancient sites to be sacrilege, and in his mind, the Vikings definitely were modern. He lives and moves and has his being several millennia ago. It used to be a harmless obsession. Now I fear he has become, in your parlance, a crackpot.’

‘But he’s a member of the Friends, isn’t he? And they support and encourage archaeological activity all over the islands.’

‘He is a member of the Friends as a political necessity. They control the museum, and he values his association with the museum above life itself. His own or anyone else’s,’ he added, almost to himself. ‘If he were stronger, physically, I’d suspect him of smuggling the artefacts back into the earth, a few at a time. He feels they belong there.’

‘They’d just be dug up again.’

‘Not if he chose a place that had already been thoroughly excavated and filled in again. But I’m talking nonsense. Norquist couldn’t dig so much as a flower bed for petunias. His heart, you know.’

‘No, I had no idea. He has heart trouble?’

‘He’s had several heart attacks. He ought to have surgery, but he says it’s against his religion. I personally think he doesn’t care about prolonging his life. He’s willing, even eager, to join the Company of the Immortals.’

‘Whatever he conceives that to be. Mr Brown, where do you think he is now?’

He frowned and looked at his watch. ‘At the museum, of course. It opened an hour ago.’

‘But it didn’t. He isn’t. Didn’t you know? He seems to have vanished. Nobody’s seen him since Saturday.’ At the look of disbelief on his face, I added, ‘Truly. The police are looking for him. Or actually, they’ve deputized my husband to do that, given the terrorist scare. Alan is a retired policeman, you see, and the police want Norquist to be found. They’re worried about his state of mind.’

‘As well they might be. He seems to me to have stepped over the edge some time ago. But I wouldn’t have thought a disappearing act to be typical of him. He likes to demonstrate his disapproval in more dramatic ways.’

‘Like, for example, a ritual sacrifice?’

‘The cat?’ Mr Brown pondered. ‘It’s true that he hates and fears cats. But I doubt we can lay that particular crime at his feet, for the simple reason that cats are quite recent imports to these islands. Recent in his terms, that is. If he wanted to sacrifice something, it would more likely be a bird of some sort, perhaps a gull, or a small mammal. Authenticity in all things, you see. But again, I doubt he’d have the strength to catch such an animal. He certainly could not have subdued that old orange tomcat, whom I always suspected of being Beelzebub in disguise.’

‘Hmm. But then who did kill the cat? And where’s Mr Norquist?’

‘About the cat, I fear I have no idea. As for Norquist, if he doesn’t turn up soon, I’ll begin to fear an accident. He isn’t strong, as I said, and if he were on a beach and was caught by a strong wave, I doubt he’d be able to swim away.’

‘If he’s drowned, they might never find him.’

He nodded sadly. ‘These seas don’t always give up their dead.’

I sighed, gathered up the books I wanted, paid, and left the shop, mulling over what Mr Brown had said.

I had moved only a few steps down the street when the rain began. It was the devious kind of fine drizzle that falls with almost no fuss but can soak you through in seconds. I hadn’t thought to bring my umbrella. Clutching my books to my breast, I ran for the nearest shop, which happened to be the pharmacy.

There were several others seeking shelter like myself, and among them I recognized the woman from the cat charity. ‘This place,’ I said to her ruefully, ‘has the most changeable weather I’ve ever seen. The sun was shining brightly with not a cloud in the sky when I set out this morning.’

‘That’s why I always carry a brolly,’ she said. ‘We’ve some for sale cheap at the shop, if you left yours at home.’

‘Thank you, but mine is back at the flat. I was just too optimistic to bring it with me.’

‘Come back with me, anyway, and I’ll lend you one. Mine is big enough for two.’

The shop wasn’t far away. Nothing is far away from anything else in Stromness, which is one of its great charms. The woman’s umbrella didn’t really provide much protection from the persistent rain, but I couldn’t get much wetter anyway, and I was happy with the gesture of reconciliation. I had apparently been well and truly acquitted of felicide.

She found me a faded and decrepit umbrella with one broken rib and a chipped handle. ‘Here, take it. Someone left it behind years ago, and no one will ever buy it. It’ll help a bit, and you can put it in the rubbish when you’ve finished with it.’

I expressed suitable thanks, and then bent to pet a cat that had rubbed up against my legs. ‘Poor baby, you’re going to get all wet. My slacks are soaked through.’

‘Oh, her fur is so thick, she won’t even notice. She’s just hoping for a hand-out. She tries that on with everyone who comes in.’

‘And from the look of her she must be successful.’ The cat was a lovely long-haired tortoiseshell, but so fat that her belly nearly rubbed the floor. She mewed pitifully as I stroked her head.

‘Don’t you dare give her anything! I’ve put her on a diet, but she’ll never lose weight if she keeps on cadging treats out of everyone. My name is Isabel, by the way. Isabel Duncan. You’re Dorothy Martin, and I understand you’re coming to Ruth’s little drinks party this afternoon.’

‘I am indeed. You’ll be there then?’

‘Half the town will be there. Ruth serves good drink, and everyone is panting to meet you and decide for themselves about you.’

I laughed a little uncertainly. ‘Well, thanks for warning me. I’ll be on my best behaviour.’

‘And bring your dog, if he’s good around other dogs. There’ll be several there, and most of the women trust people who own dogs.’

‘Watson’s very well behaved. He’s only a mutt, but I wouldn’t say that in his hearing. He’s a sweetheart, and I say that as a life-long cat lover. I never thought I’d fall in love with a dog, but he’s been a great joy to Alan and me ever since he came into our lives.’

So then I had to tell the story of how he came to our holiday cottage during a raging thunderstorm when we were vacationing in the Cotswolds, walked in, shook muddy water all over the room, and made himself at home. ‘We were worried about how our two cats would react when we took him home, but they became the best of friends in nothing flat. I suppose everyone thinks their dog is the best in the world, but ours really is.’

Isabel laughed, and the tortoiseshell rubbed against my ankles more forcefully. Enough talk, she seemed to say. Feed me.

‘No, beautiful. Your mistress would never forgive me.’ She gave me a look that reminded me of the old saying about dogs having owners, while cats had staff, and left me for a couple who had just entered the store. The pickings might be better there.

‘I’ll see you later, then.’ I waved and went out into the rain, which was pelting down harder than before. I was glad, after all, of the bedraggled umbrella. It at least kept the worst of it off the books and my glasses, as I headed for the flat.

Alan hadn’t returned yet, so I luxuriated for a while in a lovely hot bath, dressed in dry clothes, and made myself some tea. I’d wait for Alan for a little while before I scrounged some lunch.

Meanwhile I decided it was time for another list. This time I thought I’d adopt the method from Dorothy L. Sayers’s
Have His Carcase
, where Harriet and Lord Peter listed ‘Things to be Noted and Things to be Done’.

There were several new Things to be Noted:

1. The whole town thinks Norquist is crazy. There are three theories about where he is:
   
   1. Dead by suicide
      
   2. Dead by accident
      
   3. In hiding somewhere off the island either because he stole from the museum, or simply because of his unbalanced mind
      
2. The bookseller thinks that he didn’t kill the cat, because:
   
   1. He didn’t have the strength, with his heart trouble, and;
      
   2. If he was crazy enough to think a ritual sacrifice a good idea, he wouldn’t have chosen a cat.
      
3. Ruth thinks that he killed someone or something. (I mean to find out more about that this evening.)
   
4. His mother frightened at least some people in the town, talking strangely and brandishing her cane like a weapon.
   

I put my pen down and looked over my list. There were a few suggestive points, but nothing that could be considered a real lead. I sighed, considered heating up some soup, and decided to wait a little longer for Alan. I headed a second sheet ‘Things to be Done’:

I chewed on my pen and tried to think of anything else Alan and I could do that would be in the least productive. I finally added:

I couldn’t imagine why Mr Brown would make up something that was so easily checked, but I’d check anyway.

Except that the police might already have looked into that – or no, probably not, with the current crisis taking all their attention. Oh, well, it wouldn’t hurt to check it out anyway. Because he could have had a heart attack somewhere and be lying helpless, out in this weather, waiting to be rescued …

I shook my head, hoping to clear it. I was beginning to feel sorry for the man again. What I needed was some lunch, or coffee, or something to get my mind working properly.

I had just heated up some canned soup and made a grilled cheese sandwich when Alan and Watson came home. I ran for a towel. ‘Don’t let that dog in here till he’s dried off,’ I called, but it was too late. He pushed into the kitchen, shook himself, and padded with muddy feet over to his water bowl.

‘Why did we ever want a dog?’ I asked.

‘I can’t imagine. I’ll clean up, if you’ll make a sandwich for me.’

Once we were seated around the reasonably clean and dry table and had a little food in us, I asked, ‘OK, who goes first?’

‘After you, madam.’

I pulled my notebook over to make sure I didn’t miss anything. ‘Let’s see. I didn’t learn a lot, but the most interesting bits are that Norquist has, or had, a serious heart condition and couldn’t do anything at all strenuous. And he was a stickler for authenticity with respect to anything ancient, so he wouldn’t have killed the cat.’ I gave him the bookseller’s reasoning. ‘And Alan, I hate to say it, but I think that makes sense. I was so sure he did it, but now I’m almost certain he didn’t. I’m even beginning to feel sorry for him again, because absolutely everybody in town thinks he’s totally out of his mind, and the woman at the knit shop, Ruth Menzies, thinks he killed someone or something. She was interrupted before she could finish saying who or what.’

‘“What” as in a cat?’

‘I don’t know. We think of a cat as a “who”, but not everybody does. I was thinking more of a plan or a project or an idea, that sort of thing. People do sometimes refer to those things being killed. But we’ll have a chance later today to hear what she meant. We’ve been invited to a little party at her house. Because, listen to this, Alan, she knows Jane Langland!’

‘Good heavens!’

I explained. ‘So once we had established that, I was firmly enrolled in her good books, so she invited me, or us if you want to, to come round to her house after she closes the shop, and talk to a bunch of her friends. I’m told the drinks will be good, but the other guests will all be women, I’m afraid.’