by Emma Fraser
‘Fair enough, Inspector,’ I murmured. ‘Thank you.’
‘James will do.’ He held out a hand. ‘Family and friends call me Jamie.’
‘Charlotte Friel,’ I replied, taking it. His hand was warm and dry, his grip not too firm and not like a wet fish either. The touch of his fingers made my whole body tingle and we both held on for a moment longer than necessary. I came to my senses and withdrew mine, flustered by my reaction. I told myself not to be silly. Near-death experiences probably did that to a person.
His cottage was the end one of three, the painted one with the fishing gear and motor bike. Having only two small windows the inside of the cottage was gloomy and it took a few moments for my eyes to adjust. We were standing in a kitchen-cum-sitting room. On one side was a sink and an array of cupboards, on the other, a small sofa faced the window overlooking the beach. On it was a hard-back edition of Gavin Maxwell’s Ring of Bright Water. A kitchen table took up most of the remainder of the room. There was an old-fashioned Aga above which hung several pairs of thick socks with an armchair next to it. Apart from a mug, turned upside down on the worktop beside the sink, the room was immaculately tidy. He went up another notch in my estimation.
‘Right, you need to get out of these clothes and into a hot shower. I’ll get you a clean towel – and one for Tiger.’ He indicated a door with a tip of his head. ‘The bathroom’s through there, with a dressing gown on a hook. I’ll chuck your clothes in the tumble dryer and get a fire going.’
Before I could say anything he’d disappeared, returning moments later with a couple of towels. He passed me one before bending down and enveloping Tiger in the other and beginning to rub her dry. ‘Go on,’ Jamie said, turning to me. ‘The shower’s electric. There’s a switch for it just outside the door. Tiger will be fine with me.’
My teeth were chattering too much for me to reply. He was right; the sooner I warmed up, the better.
The small bathroom was as clean and tidy as the rest of the house. As I removed my sodden clothes, I glanced around. It was bare, apart from a toothbrush and a tube of toothpaste in a mug along with an electric shaver on the window sill. There was no sign of anything feminine.
The shower was above a spotlessly clean avocado-coloured bath. I shoved aside the plastic curtain, stepped in and turned the dial. The water was hot and I luxuriated in its heat, staying under the spray until I was sure that the blood had returned to every cell.
I dried myself briskly and, finding the dressing gown he mentioned which smelled of wood-smoke and soap, put it on. I picked up my sodden clothes and went in search of my host. An ecstatic and apparently fully recovered Tiger greeted me as if she hadn’t seen me for years.
‘Feeling better?’ Jamie asked, taking my wet clothes from me with one hand and removing the book from the sofa so I could sit with the other. Heat radiated from the Aga and the room was already warmer than it had been.
‘Much, much better. Thank you, Jamie. I don’t usually do the damsel in distress thing.’ Tiger sat by my feet and I tickled her behind her ears.
‘I’m sure you don’t.’ He bent down and thrust my clothes into the tumble dryer and switched it on before turning back to me.
‘So what brings you to Balcreen? Holiday?’ He poured a finger of whisky into a glass and handed it to me.
‘Not exactly. I’ve come to visit family.’
He sat facing me in the armchair. Tiger had abandoned me and placed her head on his feet gazing up at him with adoring eyes. She wasn’t usually so friendly. Jamie must have fed her a treat or two while I’d been in the shower.
‘You have family here?’ he asked, bending down to stroke Tiger.
‘Yes. Great-aunts. I’m staying with them on Kerista Island.’
‘The Misses Guthrie are your aunts?’ He couldn’t have sounded more astonished had I told him I was a mermaid. He let out a low whistle. ‘You must be the first guest they’ve had in years.’
‘So I gather. You know them?’
‘Know of them. I was beginning to wonder whether they existed – if it wasn’t for the fact people see a light at night and that Ian delivers their groceries on a weekly basis I’d doubt whether they even existed.’ Whenever he smiled, one side of his mouth turned up more than the other. ‘What are they like?’
‘I don’t know them very well – at all really.’ I had no idea how to describe them. Sweet old ladies wasn’t the first description that came to mind.
His smile grew wider. ‘Are you sure they aren’t growing cannabis or something out there? They could easily arrange for it to be picked up by boat to sell in Europe. It would be the perfect spot and the perfect cover.’
‘You don’t really believe that! I can’t imagine two women less likely to be drug smugglers!’
‘As a policeman I’ve come to realise nothing is impossible.’
I was about to protest again, when, catching the glint in his eyes I realised he’d been teasing me. I smiled back at him. ‘If you met them you’d know the most they grow are carrots and potatoes.’
‘So why now?’
‘Why now what?’
‘What brought you to visit your great-aunts now? You said you barely know them.’
It wasn’t a question I particularly wanted to answer.
He stayed quiet. I knew the tactic well. It was the same one I used when I suspected a client or a witness had more to reveal.
‘I had no idea they existed until recently. They wrote to my mother a few weeks ago asking her to come and see them. I’m here in her stead.’
‘Your mother didn’t want to come herself?’
Suddenly and humiliatingly I was on the verge of tears again. ‘She couldn’t. She died. Just over a week ago.’
‘That recently!’
I could see the questions in his eyes but I ducked my head so I wouldn’t have to meet his enquiring gaze. ‘She was sick for a while,’ I added as if that explained everything. I took a gulp of whisky, grimacing as it burned my throat. I never drank spirits – rarely drank anything at all apart from the odd glass of wine if I were out for dinner. I’d drunk too much vodka once at university and ended up throwing up over the person next to me. I’d sworn I’d never touch spirits again and I’d never had but today I welcomed the way the whisky’s warmth was spreading through my limbs.
‘I would have liked to have thanked the man who rescued Tiger and me, but he stomped off before I could,’ I told Jamie, wanting to turn the conversation away from me and Mum.
‘Was he elderly? Tall? Did he have a collie with him? One with a chunk out of his ear?’
‘As a matter of fact, he did. How do you know?’
‘Didn’t take too much detective work. Findlay goes down there every day around the same time. You can set your watch by him. Luckily for you.’
I latched on to the name. It couldn’t be the same Findlay, surely? Yet he was around the right age and Findlay wasn’t a common name.
‘Findlay who?’
‘Armstrong. Why do you ask?’
It had to be the same Findlay. In which case, did my aunts know he was here? I realised Jamie was waiting for my reply, so I thought quickly. Not only did I feel a perverse need to protect my great-aunt’s privacy, as a lawyer I was used to keeping information to myself.
‘I just want to know who I have to thank.’
His mouth tilted up at the corner. ‘I doubt Findlay will expect, or want, your thanks.’
‘I gather he’s not the friendliest of men.’
His smile grew broader and something strange happened inside my chest. It was as if my heart had done a little dance.
‘I would say that’s a fair assessment.’
‘How do you know him?’
‘Know is a relative word with Findlay. Despite the common view, he’s a good man at heart.’
I raised an eyebrow inviting him to continue.
‘I’ve known of him – about him – most of my life, although I only met him a couple of years ago.’ He
swirled his whisky around his glass. ‘I was visiting and just happened to be at the station in Oban looking up an old pal when Findlay was brought in. He’d got into a fight with a fisherman – can’t remember what about – if anyone ever knew. Findlay had been drinking in the Balcreen Inn all day and could hardly stand, but it had taken four people to restrain him – men known to be tough – and not before he’d managed to crack a jaw and break a nose.’
‘Good God!’
‘I hung about. I don’t think the sergeant fancied dealing with him with just a constable for help – even though Findlay was handcuffed.’ Jamie grinned again. ‘I could tell immediately he was ex-army and almost certainly an officer.’
‘How?’
‘There are signs – the way men carry themselves – a certain look in their eye. There was still enough of the soldier in me to want to protect him from himself. Not that I wanted him going around putting men in hospital either. I saluted him and instinctively he saluted me back – then glared at me. I worked out pretty quickly that if he’d been in the forces he must have served in the war – like my godfather, Michael. My godfather was one of the few men who was prepared to share their war stories.’ His eyes took on a faraway look. ‘The things those poor buggers had to go through – no wonder half of them are a little mad. And then we have to go and do it all again in the Falklands.’
‘You were in the army?’ Not wanting to interrupt, I had filed away his earlier comment. ‘Did you serve in the Falklands?’
‘Yes to being in the army – no to serving in the Falklands but I had friends who did.’ There was no longer any trace of the earlier amusement in his eyes.
‘And did you talk to Findlay?’
‘Not then. He was still drunk. But the next morning I went back and persuaded the sergeant to release him into my care.’
‘Weren’t there charges?’
‘There should have been. But things are done differently here. The men he’d been fighting with decided not to go ahead and make a complaint.’
‘Why ever not?’
‘I had a word with them. The police in these parts tend to turn a blind eye to lock-ins, the odd spot of poaching, driving without road tax, and no one wants to get on their wrong side. They know I’m a cop.’
It all sounded very irregular.
‘I drove him back to his house,’ Jamie continued. ‘He was sober by then. But if I expected him to be grateful I was to be disappointed. He got out of the car without a word of thanks. I went back to see him a couple of nights later. I had given my word to the sergeant that I would keep an eye on him. Findlay had been barred from the pub for a month and I wanted to make sure he wouldn’t attempt to ignore the ban. Since then I drop in on him every time I come home.’
So much of what he’d said intrigued me. Perhaps it was the relaxing effect of the whisky or because Tiger was fast asleep in front of the fire and it would be a while yet before my clothes were dry, but I was reluctant to move. Or perhaps it was my insatiable curiosity to know a person’s story. I stretched my feet out in front of me and smiled at Jamie. I’d only spent a short while in his company but already I had the strong impression that Jamie was a what-you-see-is-what-you-get kind of man. So different to the men in London I had dated. As it struck home what I was thinking, I felt myself flush and quickly bent down, ostensibly to pat Tiger, but in reality to hide my face. When I glanced back up it was to find him looking at me, amusement in his warm brown eyes. Almost as if he knew what I’d been thinking moments before.
‘You’re from Balcreen, then?’ I said, hoping he’d think my flushed face was from the whisky.
‘Not exactly. Oban.’
‘And you’re here on holiday?’
He linked his hands behind his neck. ‘Two whole weeks – or to be more precise two weeks minus four days. I come every year.’
‘Why did you become a policeman?’
‘When I was at university I joined the cadets. My parents weren’t very well off and the cadets paid you while you were with them. It helped. Besides, I liked it that they always had plenty going on at weekends – sailing, climbing, pot holing – all stuff I liked to do. Part of the deal was that when cadets finished university they joined the army for five years – to pay back the training and money the army had invested. I served my time but when it was up, I realised the army wasn’t for me. But,’ it was his turn to look sheepish, ‘I still wanted to serve, so I joined the force. I liked the thought of catching bad guys.’
‘And do you? Catch many?’
He smiled and my heart skipped a beat. If my direct questioning made him uncomfortable, he gave no inkling of it.
‘Not as many as I’d like. Dealing with criminals is like watching a revolving door. Doesn’t matter how many you put away there’s always more to take their place. The part I find most frustrating is that we catch them and then some smart-arse lawyer gets them off on a technicality.’
It was as if a cool wind had swept over my skin. Police and defence lawyers were natural enemies. They hated us for getting people they thought of as scum off, we disliked and mistrusted them for their bullying tactics and the way they sometimes twisted the truth to get a result. If they did their jobs better I wouldn’t be able to get so many criminals off.
‘Don’t you think everyone deserves a fair trial? Even the guilty?’
‘Not if it means that they are back on the streets to rape and murder – no.’
I winced inside. If only he knew how close to the mark his words were. I hesitated, reluctant to tell him I was one of the smart-arsed lawyers he’d so bitterly referred to. But what the hell! I was proud of what I did – I winced again – or had been until recently.
‘I should tell you that I’m a barrister.’ Despite what I’d just been telling myself, I was aware I sounded defensive.
He tipped his head to the side and I could tell he was reassessing me.
‘I hope you are going to tell me you are on the side of the angels,’ he said finally, referring to the way policemen describe lawyers who work for the prosecution.
I shook my head. ‘Not unless you call defending the innocent the side of the angels.’
His eyes darkened with disapproval.
‘Not all policemen are on the side of the angels,’ I went on. ‘Some are no better, worse even, than the criminals they purport to despise.’
I saw the dawning recognition. He leaned forward and regarded me intently. ‘I thought I’d seen you before – in the newspaper. You were one of the barristers who defended the woman who murdered her policeman husband.’
I’d forgotten my picture had been in the press. That time seemed so long ago.
‘I didn’t recognise you at first,’ Jamie continued.
It was hardly surprising, the crumpled heap he’d come across earlier couldn’t have looked less like the woman in the photo.
‘She didn’t murder her husband – it was self-defence.’
‘She stabbed him six times, if I remember correctly!’
‘And he had spent the previous ten years beating the crap out of her. She was terrified of him.’
‘Yet she stayed.’
I clicked my tongue. ‘She had nowhere else to go, no money of her own. She tried to get help from the police – I found records of thirty-four phone calls. Not one of them ended in an arrest; on the contrary all of them resulted in a beating that was even worse than the one that instigated the 999 call in the first place. Unsurprisingly she gave up looking to the police for protection. It was only when her husband – her police husband – turned on their son – who’d tried to come to her aid, that something snapped. I’m only surprised she didn’t do it sooner.’
‘Touché,’ he said. ‘Okay then, let’s agree, not every policeman is on the side of the angels.’ He continued to study me with his lovely brown eyes. Something passed between us at that moment. A shock of mutual recognition. ‘You really care, don’t you?’
I held his gaze. ‘I do.’ Even if I didn’t
always get it right.
‘What made you choose law?’ he continued after a long pause.
‘Dickens,’ I said without hesitation. ‘Or more exactly Bleak House. You read it?’
‘S’matter of fact I have. Jarndyce and Jarndyce?’
He might be a policeman but there was definitely a connection between us.
‘I felt so bad for them and so angry with the lawyers. I thought, all they need is one good lawyer, someone like me. I would sort it out. I was never one for doubting my capabilities.’ I smiled, remembering. ‘Then when I was sixteen, Mum took me on a trip to London. We visited all the places in London where Dickens lived and worked, including the Inns of Court. She also took me to the Old Bailey and we sat in on a trial and I fell even more in love with the idea of being a lawyer. Not just an ordinary lawyer, but a barrister. I wanted to be the person in the gown and wig, defending the helpless, the desperate, the weak. I wanted to be the one addressing the court who had everyone hanging on her every word.’ I trailed off. I couldn’t remember ever telling anyone that before.
