White Nights (6 page)

The Manse was a square, stone building, imposing, on a slight rise, looking down to the sea. Fran had seen it from outside but never been in. All her previous meetings with Bella had been in the Herring House café, with Martin Williamson dancing attendance with coffee or tall glasses of wine. Bella must have heard the car on the gravel because she had the door open before Fran had climbed out. She was wearing jeans and a loose linen shirt. Even at home she had style.

‘Come in.’

Once there had been a kirk standing between the house and the beach, and the architecture of the Manse reflected the religious connection. Inside, the staircase was lit by a tall thin window, two storeys high, a church window but with clear glass which let the sunlight in. Fran stood just inside the door and took it all in. ‘What a wonderful house!’ She saw at once that was the right thing to say. Bella knew it was a wonderful house, but she liked to be told. She relaxed a little, became less imperious.

‘Come into the kitchen. It’s last night’s leftovers, I’m afraid, but there are plenty of those.’

‘I’m
so
sorry so few of the people I invited came. I had asked them.’

‘Don’t blame yourself,’ Bella said. ‘Oh no, you mustn’t blame yourself.’

Fran expected some explanation then, but Bella was moving on and talking about Biddista and the house, not about the party.

‘I grew up in Biddista, you know. Not here in the Manse, but in one of the council houses down on
the shore. They
were
council houses then. They’ve all sold now. None of the people I grew up with could afford them. Willy was the last of them to live there and even he wasn’t a council tenant in the end.’

Fran was a little flattered that Bella assumed she knew who she was talking about, was treating her as a Shetlander. She hadn’t a clue of course, but she let Bella continue.

‘There was still a minister living in the Manse in those days. An Englishman who’d been a missionary in the Far East and treated us as natives who needed educating. The kirk had already gone by then and he held services in the dining room. Sometimes in the middle of a dinner party, I think I can hear the hymns.’

The kitchen, at the back of the house, seemed a little dark after the sunlight in the hall. It too still had something of the church about it. A dark wood bench under the window which could have been a pew, a high ceiling. All the ceilings seemed very high to Fran. She was used to being able to reach up and touch hers. Bella lifted plates covered with clingfilm from the fridge and Fran recognized the buffet food from the night before.

‘I need wine,’ Bella said. ‘Let’s see if Roddy has left any. He was still up when I went to bed last night, but I doubt if even he could have drunk his way through everything that was left. There are cases still in the Herring House.’ She returned to the fridge and came back with a bottle. ‘Would you like a glass? This one’s rather good.’

Fran shook her head. ‘Will Roddy be joining us?’ Despite herself she was attracted by the celebrity of Roddy Sinclair. Being a Shetlander was his trademark
and his unique selling point, but for her he represented life away from the islands, her old life of wine bars and serious shopping and tabloid gossip. She told herself that world was shabby and vulgar, but she missed it. She found it alluring, caught herself reading
Hello!
magazine when no one was looking.

Bella looked at the clock. ‘I don’t think Roddy’s been out of his bed before mid-afternoon since he left school. Unless he had a plane to catch.’ She set plates and cutlery on the table, lifted cling wrap from the trays of food.

Fran still didn’t understand the reason for the urgent summons. Was it just Bella reminding herself that she had the power to make things happen? ‘You said you wanted to talk to me. It sounded important.’

‘Perhaps I overreacted.’

‘I’m a busy woman, Bella. Will you tell me what this is about?’ Something of her old confidence reasserting itself.

Her tone seemed to shock Bella because there was a moment of silence. She is
such
a drama queen, Fran thought. She doesn’t move a muscle without calculating the impression she’ll make. Bella got to her feet, reached into her bag and pulled out a folded sheet of paper.

‘This is what it’s about. Andy from Visit Shetland dropped it in this morning. He couldn’t understand it, of course. He had a day off yesterday and came straight to the party from his home.’ She put the paper on the table, unfolded it and slid it towards Fran. ‘I don’t suppose you know anything about it?’

It was a computer-generated flyer, printed in red and black on white. Not professionally printed, but not
badly designed. Fran noticed that before reading the words.

EXHIBITION OPENING CANCELLED

Because of a death in the family.

SHORELINES

An exhibition of original art by Bella Sinclair and Fran Hunter in The Herring House, Biddista has been cancelled.

The family requests privacy at this time.

Fran looked at it, confused. She could see that Bella expected a reaction, but felt foolish because she couldn’t understand what lay behind the scrap of paper. ‘What is this? Why would I know anything about it?’

‘They were all over Lerwick yesterday. Posted in the window of the tourist office, on the noticeboard in the library and handed out to visitors coming off the cruise ships. Scalloway too. It’s hardly surprising there wasn’t much of a turnout at the party.’

‘Of course I don’t know anything about it,’ Fran said. ‘I mean, nobody in my family’s died.’

‘Nor mine. So what is this about?’ Bella was in dramatic mode again. ‘A mistake? A tasteless prank? An act of sabotage?’

‘Why would anyone want to sabotage an art exhibition?’

Bella shrugged. ‘Jealousy. Spite. I don’t think I’ve upset anyone enough for them to bother with something like this. Not recently at least. What about you?
A first exhibition’s a big deal. Anyone out there who’d want to spoil it for you?’

‘That’s a horrible idea. No. Absolutely not.’

‘It couldn’t be your ex playing games?’

‘Duncan and I are being civilized at the moment, for Cassie’s sake. Besides, it’s not his style. He has a temper but this is petty and unpleasant. Anonymous too. Duncan would want everyone to know it was him.’ She nodded towards the flyer. ‘He’d think that beneath his dignity.’

‘A prank then.’ Bella’s voice was quiet. ‘A joke that got out of hand.’

The doorbell rang. There was an old-fashioned pull which rang a bell in the hall. Perhaps the bell was cracked because the sound was tinny, grating. Bella seemed relieved by the interruption, jumped to her feet and hurried away. She returned followed by Perez. He nodded to Fran, gave an embarrassed little smile.

‘I saw your car in the drive.’

‘Were you looking for me?’ Fran felt confused, as if the day was spinning out of control. It’s the lack of sleep, she thought. She longed suddenly for dark nights, thunderclouds, rain.

‘No. I need to talk to Bella. It’s work.’

‘I should go then.’ She was relieved to have an excuse to leave. She didn’t want an inquest into the fiasco of the launch. The flyers were obviously part of some stupid game played by Roddy and his friends. It was the sort of imbecility he was famous for. Bella had been the target and she, Fran, had been caught in the crossfire. Later she’d be angry. Now she just felt
embarrassed. It was like being caught eavesdropping on a very personal row between a married couple.

‘No,’ Perez said. ‘I need to talk to you too.’

She had a sudden panic. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘Not Cassie,’ he said. ‘Nothing like that.’

Bella went to the fridge and absent-mindedly poured more wine. ‘If it’s about the flyers cancelling the party last night,’ she said, ‘we know about them. Hardly a police matter, I’d have thought, even here. We don’t want to press charges.’

I might, Fran thought. Don’t speak for me.

‘This
is
why you’re here, Jimmy?’ Bella picked up the paper between her thumb and index finger as if she could hardly bear to touch it, then dropped it on the table in front of him.

Perez frowned as he read it. Fran decided the information was new to him. ‘That’s why so few people turned up last night,’ she said. ‘These were all over Lerwick, apparently, and because of the final line, nobody liked to phone.’ She wanted him to know she
did
have friends, and that they would all have been there to support her if it hadn’t been for this.

‘I’ll have to take the flyer with me.’

‘I’ve told you,’ Bella said sharply, ‘I don’t want to press charges.’

‘Do you think that little scene last night could be related to this?’ he asked. ‘The hysterical Englishman who claimed to have no memory?’

‘Another attempt to disrupt the party? I suppose it could. Certainly after that drama people started to leave. He made them uncomfortable.’ Bella looked at him over her wineglass.

‘There’s a body in the hut on the jetty,’ Perez said.
‘We’re pretty sure it was the man who caused the scene last night.’

‘Really!’ For a moment Bella seemed to take an unsophisticated pleasure in the news. It was a story, gossip to pass on. ‘How did he die?’

‘We’re not sure yet. The circumstances seem a little unclear.’

What are you hiding? Fran thought.

‘My God,’ Bella said. ‘Don’t you think that’s a bit spooky? The flyer, I mean. “A death in the family”. Do you think he was predicting his own death?’

‘But he wasn’t family, was he?’

‘Don’t be silly, Jimmy. Of course not. I don’t have any immediate family left. Only Roddy and he’s still alive, thank God.’

‘We want to inform the man’s relatives and he has no ID. Are you sure you didn’t recognize him, either of you?’

‘Quite sure,’ Fran said.

‘I didn’t know him last night.’ Bella was twisting the stem of her glass. ‘But that doesn’t mean he wasn’t an acquaintance. Someone from my past. I’ve met so many people and my memory isn’t what it was. I’m an old woman now, Jimmy.’

She smiled, waiting to be contradicted.

It seemed to take him a moment to understand the rules of the game. Fran found that she was holding her breath. This was such a blatant cue for a compliment. Would he really have the nerve to ignore it?

At last he smiled. ‘I’m sure you’ll never seem old, Bella.’

In the silence that followed, Fran saw the scene as a painting. A gloomy Dutch interior, all dark wood and
shadow. Bella’s face in profile had an anxious, almost haunted look, and the lines of stress round her eyes made Perez’s words seem cruel, mocking.

‘I wonder if I might talk to Roddy.’ He leaned forward. Fran could smell the soap, her soap, on his skin.

Bella seemed about to refuse, but there were footsteps on the wooden floor outside and the kitchen door opened. Roddy Sinclair stood, backlit by the sunshine flooding through the long window in the hall. He yawned and stretched, aware that they were all looking at him.

‘A party,’ he said. ‘Oh good. I do love a party.’