A small weeping lab-2

by Alex Gray

  ‘Just come in, have you?’ the young barman inquired.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Holiday?’

  ‘Not exactly, though I’d like to do a bit of sightseeing,’ Lorimer fenced the question.

  ‘Oh, you’ll see some grand sights over here. Never seen beaches like ours, I’ll bet!’ The pride in the lad’s tone was unmistakeable. ‘Or the standing stones.’

  ‘You mean the ones at Callanish?’ Lorimer knew a bit about these ancient rivals to Stonehenge.

  ‘Och, no. Not just those. We’ve our own down here. There’s MacLeod’s stone just along the road. You’ll have passed it by, no doubt, not knowing what to look for.’ The boy smiled and Lorimer had the sense that he was indulging this visitor from Glasgow. He’d have cultivated a pleasant manner for the tourists, no doubt.

  ‘Is this your first time on the island?’

  ‘Yes, it is, but I was hoping to look someone up while I’m here,’ Lorimer fixed his gaze on the barman. ‘A Miss MacLeod.’

  The boy gave a short laugh. ‘Oh, there are lots of MacLeods in these parts. Which one would it be that you’re after, now?’

  ‘Mhairi. A Miss Mhairi MacLeod. An elderly lady.’

  The boy’s smile dropped like a stone. He narrowed his eyes at Lorimer, trying to sum up his visitor. ‘You mean Kirsty’s Aunty Mhairi?’

  ‘That’s the one,’ Lorimer said cheerfully, taking a swig of vodka. His expression never betrayed the vision inside his head, of that lonely little figure in blue dumped in the basement of a Glasgow clinic.

  ‘You Press, or what?’ The lad’s voice was devoid of any semblance of courtesy now and he placed both hands on the edge of the bar defiantly.

  ‘Or what, I’m afraid,’ Lorimer replied, taking out his warrant card and laying it open on the polished surface of the bar. He watched the boy’s face relax a fraction.

  ‘Chief Inspector Lorimer,’ he read aloud.

  Lorimer pocketed the card again. ‘Miss Mhairi MacLeod?’ He let the name hang in the air.

  ‘Aye, she’s at home, just along the road past the cathedral. The two white houses joined together. Miss MacLeod’s is the first one. You can’t miss it.’

  Chapter Sixteen

  Borve Cottage was a five minute walk from the hotel. They must have passed it on their way into the village, thought Lorimer as he and Solly reached the long white house. It might have been a single dwelling house in days gone by but was now split into two semidetached cottages. Deep-set windows told of thick walls that had withstood centuries of Atlantic gales but, despite its age, the stone seemed freshly painted and both gardens to the front showed signs of recent care. As Lorimer reached out a hand to the brass knocker, his sleeve caught on a tendril of clematis trailing down beside the door. He looked up to see fat buds along the new shoots, promising a froth of pink to come.

  Solly stood to one side, whether out of deference to the DCI or simply to see how the old lady would react, Lorimer couldn’t tell.

  When the door opened a diminutive, grey-haired woman stood before them. Her lilac twinset topped a heathery coloured tweed skirt and her leather lacing shoes looked as if they’d walked for miles over the rough island terrain.

  ‘Miss MacLeod?’

  ‘No. She’s through the house. Who shall I say is calling?’

  ‘Detective Chief Inspector Lorimer, Strathclyde CID and Dr Solomon Brightman,’ Lorimer held out his warrant card and the woman peered short-sightedly at it.

  ‘You’ll be here about Kirsty, I suppose?’ her tone was disapproving but she opened the door wider to let them in.

  ‘That’s right,’ Lorimer answered and was on the point of asking the woman’s name when she fixed them with a gimlet stare and said, ‘Follow me, please.’

  The woman closed the door behind them and stepped into a darkened hallway.

  ‘She’s through here.’ Lorimer and Solly followed her into a light, airy room facing the water. An old lady was sitting with her back to them in a huge wing chair that faced the bay window.

  ‘Mhairi, it’s folk from Glasgow to see you. A Mr Lorimer from the police and his Doctor friend.’ Lorimer was struck by the change in the woman’s voice. It was the tone one would use with a child, soothing and whispery. He stepped forward just as the old woman turned her head towards the voice. For a moment he was speechless. Mhairi MacLeod might be over eighty, but she was one of the most beautiful women he’d ever seen. Her face was smooth and brown with not a sign of a wrinkle except where fine spider’s web laughter lines spread from her mouth and eyes. The snow-white hair was wispy and caught back in a net but he could see its abundance of plaited coils and wondered if it had ever been cut. The eyes regarding him were blue, but faded.

  ‘Mr Lorimer, Dr…?’ she turned to Solomon and gave him a sweet smile.

  ‘Brightman. How do you do, Miss MacLeod,’ Solly came forward, gave a stiff little bow then took the old woman’s hand.

  ‘Would you like a cup of tea, gentlemen?’

  ‘Thank you. That would be most welcome,’ Solomon replied before Lorimer had time to think.

  ‘Make us all a pot of tea, would you, Chrissie. And could we have some of those lovely scones you brought in? Thank you, dear.’

  Mhairi MacLeod waved her hand at the two men. ‘Bring a couple of chairs over and sit beside me. The view’s too good to miss.’ There was a twinkle in her eye as she addressed Lorimer. He looked around, found two small wooden chairs, each with plump embroidered cushions, then lifted them over and set them down on either side of the wing chair.

  ‘I don’t know what I’d do without Chrissie. She’s been so good to me since Kirsty’s passing.’

  ‘She’s your home help?’ asked Lorimer.

  ‘Oh, don’t let her hear you say that! No, no. Chrissie’s my next door neighbour, which makes life easier for us both. Home help? Dear me, we don’t have such luxuries in this part of the world unless we’re really poor old souls with nobody to care for us.’ She glanced as Lorimer turned his chair slightly inwards. ‘Did you have a good journey up?’

  ‘Yes, indeed,’ Solomon answered.

  ‘You’re not with Strathclyde police, are you, my dear?’ Mhairi MacLeod looked at Solomon with interest.

  The psychologist shook his head and turned his large brown eyes upon the old lady. ‘No, I’m helping the police with their case. I may be able to construct a profile of Kirsty’s killer which would assist the investigation,’ he explained.

  ‘Ah, like Cracker on the TV?’ she smiled at them. ‘Oh, we’re not entirely in the backwoods here, we do have the television. Don’t know what Chrissie would do without Coronation Street’ she added. ‘You’re not from this part of the country, then Dr Brightman?’

  ‘No. I was born in London, but Glasgow’s my home now,’ Solly replied.

  She nodded. ‘Aye. And it was poor wee Kirsty’s home for a while.’ Lorimer noticed her lip tremble for a second but then Chrissie came bustling into the room bearing a tray laden with what looked like the best china and a huge plate of buttered scones. She set it down on the table in front of the old lady.

  ‘Right, I’m away ben. Just give me a knock when you want me through,’ Chrissie told her and marched out of the room. They heard the front door close behind her.

  ‘She said to give her a knock?’ Solomon asked, puzzled.

  Mhairi MacLeod smiled at him. ‘Aye, with my stick.’ She picked up a walking stick that lay at her feet and motioned with it towards the partition wall. ‘I don’t have the telephone, you see. A couple of raps and Chrissie knows I need her.’

  The old woman leant forward and grasped the teapot with both hands then concentrated on pouring out three cups of tea. Lorimer’s instinct was to offer to do it for her but a glance from Solly warned him off. Mhairi MacLeod might be old and infirm but she was still the hostess in her own home. Lorimer watched her frail hand shaking as she passed him a cup. She saw his expression and pursed her lips together in a gesture of determinati
on. Chrissie might have to make the tea but she was the one who would serve her guests.

  She took a few sips of tea then placed her cup back on the tray, rattling the saucer. Her shoulders sagged as she leant back into the deep armchair and patiently folded her hands.

  Mhairi MacLeod gave a short sigh. ‘Right, now. You’ve come to see me about Kirsty, haven’t you?’ Lorimer looked straight at her, returning her directness. He nodded. ‘I’m afraid so.’

  ‘Don’t be afraid, Chief Inspector.’ Her hand was suddenly covering his own and he felt the warmth of its light touch. ‘May I ask you something first?’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘Kirsty,’ she paused to let the name roll off her tongue as if she’d become unused to saying it. ‘Did she suffer much? I never asked before.’

  Lorimer saw her bite her lip to stop it trembling. ‘No. Not at all. She’d hardly have known what was happening. The Doctor said it was over very quickly. There were no signs of a struggle,’ he added gently.

  For a moment Mhairi MacLeod stared at him, those faded eyes trying to outmatch his own blue gaze. Then she nodded, apparently satisfied that Lorimer was telling her the truth.

  ‘There are several things we’d like to ask you about Kirsty, your niece.’

  ‘Great-niece, Mister Lorimer.’ There was a faint smile around her mouth as she corrected him. He smiled back.

  ‘Did you know of any men friends that she’d made in Glasgow, anybody she might have written to you about? A particular boyfriend perhaps?’

  ‘No. Nobody special. She used to say she was waiting for Mr Right. But I don’t think he ever came into Kirsty’s life.’ She gave a sigh. ‘She wrote regularly and would have told me if she’d met a young man. Always started her letters, Dear Aunty Mhairi, I’m fine, how are you?’ Suddenly the old woman’s face crumpled and she groped into the depth of a cushion behind her back for a handkerchief.

  ‘Here,’ Solomon was immediately hunkering down by her side, offering a large white linen hanky. There was silence except for the blowing of her nose and a muffled sobbing from the folds of the handkerchief until Mhairi MacLeod shook her head at them. ‘So sorry. I’m just a silly old woman.’

  ‘No, you’re not.’ Solomon was holding her hand now and stroking it with some concern, his eyes fixed on the old lady’s face. She straightened up again and wiped her eyes.

  ‘What was I saying? Yes. Kirsty had nobody special down in Glasgow. She’d had a nice boyfriend up here, Calum, but he went away down to university and they only kept in touch occasionally; birthdays, Christmas cards, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Did she ever mention anything about her work in the letters?’

  ‘What sort of thing?’ The faded eyes were alert again.

  ‘Did she say if she was happy? Did she like the staff? Was she was coping with the patients, that sort of thing.’

  Mhairi MacLeod frowned. Was she remembering something? Lorimer asked himself.

  ‘I sometimes wondered if Kirsty was suited to the nursing,’ she began slowly. ‘She took everything so much to heart. Became involved with her patients. Grieved terribly whenever one of them passed over. Oh, I know it’s a grand thing to be concerned about those who are sick, whether in mind or body,’ she said, waving a hand at them. ‘But you need to be a bit hard to be a good nurse, don’t you think? It’s the same in the police, I suppose,’ she directed her question to Lorimer who nodded silently. Her voice was quiet when she added, ‘Kirsty wasn’t hard enough, I’m thinking.’

  They waited for the old lady to elaborate on that statement but apparently that was all she had to offer on the subject.

  ‘Did Kirsty ever talk to you about anything that was worrying her?’ Solomon asked.

  The old lady looked at him, troubled, as if such questions had never occurred to her before. Her eyes drifted away from them and looked out over the view of the water beyond the shore. Solomon and Lorimer watched her intently. Was there something she recalled? They waited.

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe there was something. I felt a sort of sadness in her a while back. I thought maybe she was homesick. She was so good to me, you know. Always wrote cheery letters. Kirsty wouldn’t have wanted to burden me with her troubles.’

  ‘She kept a diary,’ Lorimer began.

  ‘Ah, yes. Her five-year diary. I gave it to her one Christmas.’ Mhairi MacLeod narrowed her eyes. ‘You’ve been reading Kirsty’s diary?’ she asked, affronted.

  ‘This is a murder inquiry,’ Lorimer reminded her quietly.

  ‘Of course. It’s just…’ she bit her lip.

  ‘Just that we seem to be invading your great niece’s privacy,’ Lorimer finished for her.

  Mhairi MacLeod nodded slowly. ‘Just that, Chief Inspector.’

  Lorimer drew the red diary from his pocket. He’d read and reread the entries till the wee small hours but had found nothing enlightening in its pages.

  ‘She mentions someone named Malcolm. On the Hogmanay before last,’ Lorimer suggested.

  ‘Aye, she would. That’ll be Malcolm Munro from the store. He always brings the black bun. They were all here then, all the folks from Rodel.’

  ‘This Malcolm, he’s not an old boyfriend, then?’

  Mhairi MacLeod’s eyes twinkled for a moment. ‘He’s sixty if he’s a day, Chief Inspector. Kirsty’s known Malcolm at the store since she was a wee girl spending her pennies on sherbet dabs.’

  Solomon smiled and caught Lorimer’s eye. The picture of Kirsty MacLeod was beginning to take shape. Solly warmed to this island girl who had become a victim for no apparent reason.

  ‘There are several weeks missing,’ Lorimer opened the diary and showed her. ‘From May to late June.’

  The old woman took the book from his hands and turned its thin pages, her gnarled fingers tracing the dead girl’s writing.

  ‘Why would she do that?’ Mhairi MacLeod asked, her eyes troubled.

  ‘I was hoping you might be able to tell us,’ he replied. ‘I thought something might have happened that she didn’t want to remember.’

  ‘Or let anybody else see,’ Solly put in.

  ‘Kirsty never did anything she’d be ashamed of,’ she said firmly. ‘And there were no affairs of the heart,’ she added, looking down at the diary. Solomon watched her stroke the pages as if she were giving comfort to a troubled mind. She wasn’t so certain of that, though, was she? What young woman was going to confide her most intimate secrets to an old lady? One she loved too much to burden with her own troubles, he thought, echoing the old woman’s words.

  ‘So there’s nothing you know that would have upset Kirsty to the extent of cutting up her diary?’ Lorimer asked.

  Mhairi MacLeod shook her head slowly.

  ‘We think we know so much, don’t we? And all the time we really know nothing at all.’ She spoke softly to herself as if she’d forgotten their presence in the room. Then she turned and Lorimer could see tears in her eyes. ‘It’s not right, is it?’ she whispered. ‘Her mammy and daddy and now wee Kirsty. I should have been away long before them all.’ She lifted her hand as if in protest. ‘And here I am. An old, done woman taking up space.’

  Lorimer didn’t reply. For how could he be expected to comment on the unfairness of life? That was what his job was about most of the time. Solomon’s eye caught his as Lorimer looked up and the psychologist inclined his head towards the door. Lorimer gave a brief nod in reply. It was time to go.

  The early evening sun was glowing against the hillside as they stepped out of Borve Cottage.

  ‘Do you mind if we pay a short visit?’ Lorimer asked, indicating Saint Clement’s Church.

  ‘Why not,’ agreed Solly. The two men made their way over to the entrance, Lorimer stooping slightly as he ducked through the doorway. It was the smallest cathedral he’d ever seen, Lorimer thought, blinking as the gloom enfolded them. The stone flags that were polished from centuries of use gave a dull echo as they walked out of the light and into the shadows.

&nbs
p; Neither of them spoke a word. It was as if these grey walls hadn’t noticed the passing of time. Lorimer had felt like this before. Sometimes standing by a mortuary slab he had that sense of being a tiny speck of dust in a swirling, meaningless universe.

  Now here, as his footfall sounded on the worn stones, the Chief Inspector wondered at those Saints who had risked everything to try to bring their beliefs to these parts. What had it all been for? Was the so-called Christian West more law-abiding than in those far off pagan times? perhaps, just perhaps. He looked over to where Solomon stood poring over a leaflet that he’d picked up from a small wooden table. Did Solly have any religious beliefs? Judaism was so old and venerable. In all his dealings with human behaviour had Solomon retained something extra to sustain him against cynicism? Somehow Lorimer knew that was a question he’d be unable to ask.

  As if aware of his companion’s scrutiny, Solly turned around, waving the leaflet in his hand.

  Lorimer joined him, noticing that there were postcards for sale. An honesty box lay beyond them, fixed to the wall.

  ‘Listen to this,’ said Solly. ‘Tradition has it that Saint Clement of Rome was banished to the Crimea where he was put to death by being thrown into the sea with an anchor around his neck. The Church was built by MacLeod of Harris in the thirteenth century as Saint Clement was the patron saint of the MacLeods. Within the church is the tomb of Alexander Macclod, domino de Dunvegan 1528.’

  As Solly picked up a few postcards and rattled in his pocket for change, Lorimer took a lingering look at the interior of the tiny, ancient cathedral. He tried to imagine all the folk who had come to worship here over the years. Then another thought came to him. Kirsty would have come here. And her old Aunty Mhairi. Lorimer chewed on a raggled nail. The MacLeods had been here for centuries. That meant that there would be a whole load of them outside. In the graveyard.

  For a moment Lorimer stood with his face up to the last warmth of the setting sun. Heedless of his presence, a sheep cropped at the grass. Overhead a gull mewed. He took a deep breath and smelt something fragrant in the soft air. All his weariness seemed to fall away like a cloak being shed. He could so easily forget everything in this quiet corner away from the world. The sky and sea merged into one blur of blue. Somewhere beyond lay a world of offices, streets, computers, files, telephones…all the paraphernalia of his working life.