The Sea Detective

by Mark Douglas-Home

  Cal let his eye run down the entries on the opposite page. They were more of the same; his grandmother missing Uilleam and wishing for his safe return; and hurtful confrontations with Mrs MacKay.

  Cal turned the pages until he came to 1942. The writing was the same but her tone more despairing and there was an enigmatic reference in March of that year. ‘If only I could persuade Uilleam to come with me, we would be content, I know we would.’

  In May she recorded the day the Eilean Iasgaich arrived in its new livery as an anti-submarine trawler. ‘I am so proud of Uilleam and frightened for us both. When I saw the boat with its fresh paint and its gun, the men lined up on deck and my Uilleam among them, I became sick with worry. I would have cried all night except that Uilleam would have heard me.’

  There was a brief burst of euphoria on July 23. ‘I am pregnant as I suspected though I didn’t dare to write it here until now. The doctor has come and I can expect our baby before next spring. My prayers have been answered, though Mrs Sinclair told me that her prayers had not, not yet, and she would not be celebrating until she knew it was a boy because ‘if it is not it will have been nine wasted months’. Uilleam is at sea. I will go to the hill every day and watch for the boat returning so I can be first at the pier.’

  Then on July 24 she wrote, ‘I hate this island and the people on it. Some person has nailed a rabbit’s skin to the door of our house. Mrs Sinclair said it was the Raes who have desired the Sinclair croft for more years than she can remember. They want to frighten me, she said, to make me lose the baby or leave the island. I told her firmly ‘I will do nothing of the sort’. The talk is that it was Murdo Rae’s doing – a man who has never said a word to me, kind or cruel, not in all the months I have been here. Nor does he speak to Uilleam even though they work side by side on the boat.’

  Cal turned hurriedly to September 29, the day Uilleam was washed overboard, forgetting his grandmother did not hear news of it until later, when the boat returned to the island with seven men missing.

  ‘The baby kicks me mercilessly. It must be a boy. Pray God that it is.’

  Cal found the entry he was looking for on October 7. It was brief and underlined with two lines of black ink. ‘Uilleam is gone. I cannot bear to write another thing this cruel night in this cruel place.’

  The following day her journal seemed to bring her comfort of a sort, because the entry was long, filling almost a page. She wrote of Mrs Sinclair ‘screeching and howling’ all night, of hiding her own grief because she didn’t feel comfortable displaying it. She was a 19-year old who had known Uilleam for so short a time and ‘what comparison was that with a mother who had borne him, raised him and loved him all his life’. She added, ‘though who could have loved Uilleam more than I?’

  Ishbel related how she went out intending to climb Cnoc a’ Mhonaidh to be alone in her misery and to scan the sea ‘to look for Uilleam’. She had collapsed, exhausted by her grief, before reaching the hill, when she was surprised by Grace Ann MacKay. ‘She embraced me and said tragedy had now brought us together. ‘Our men are dead and we must be strong for each other.’ She apologised for the way she had been. The hurt of Uilleam’s marriage had set her against me and him though now it shamed her. She said she had loved Uilleam too but he had not loved her as he loved me. We hugged and cried and I said how sorry I was about the loss of her fine brother Sandy and for Hamish Sutherland who had to bring the dreadful news to our door. Grace Ann looked surprised and said it was surely Hector MacKay. I told her I was certain it was Mr Sutherland and she let the subject pass. When I returned to our house, I asked Mrs Sinclair about it. ‘Grace Ann said I must be mistaken about Hamish Sutherland but I wasn’t, was I?’ ‘No, Ishbel you were not. Hector MacKay went to the houses of all the other dead men.’

  ‘Why didn’t he come to ours?’

  ‘Because of something that Uilleam has done.’

  ‘What has Uilleam done?’

  Ishbel recorded that Mrs Sinclair left the question unanswered and became uncontrollable with grief.

  ‘October 9: Grace Ann visited today and made her condolences which we returned, for her brother Sandy who was like a younger brother to dear Uilleam. All three of us cried and when we were finished I asked why it was that no-one else had come to our door when I’d seen mourners visiting other houses. Grace Ann said she didn’t know but Mrs Sinclair said, ‘Why do they blame Uilleam for your Sandy’s death?’

  ‘Why would they indeed?’ I said in innocence.

  ‘Grace Ann replied, ‘It must be mistaken Mrs Sinclair for they died together, one 16, one 21, two brave young men.’

  ‘Mrs Sinclair persevered, ‘They say the depth charge breaking loose was Uilleam’s fault because the repair to the rack was his and he should have been the one to secure it.’

  ‘He did, with Sandy.’

  ‘They say Sandy went to it first and when Uilleam followed him Sandy had already been swept overboard.’

  ‘Grace Ann said something about war being to blame, but this knowledge shocked me. Is this why we are being treated like outcasts?’

  ‘October 10: Hamish Sutherland came to the door but refused Mrs Sinclair’s invitation to enter. He said – and I will remember these words until I die – ‘Mrs Sinclair, you and your daughter-in-law will not be welcome at the memorial service for the men who died.’ Mrs Sinclair remonstrated with him. ‘Wasn’t Uilleam one of the crew, one of the men who died?’ ‘He will not be remembered Mrs Sinclair, for what he has done.’ Until that moment neither of us knew of the memorial service. What has my sweet Uilleam done?’

  After that Ishbel’s diary entries became fewer.

  ‘November 20: A curious incident with Grace Ann. I saw her walking the path to Cnoc a’ Mhonaidh and, not having anything better to do, I went after her hoping for some company. I followed the path all the way to the sheepfold but there was no sign of her there. When I encountered her later, I asked, ‘Grace Ann, was that you I saw on the path to the hill this forenoon?’ She replied, ‘Indeed it wasn’t Ishbel. Why would I be going to the hill when I have work to do?’ Her manner was off-hand and she wouldn’t look me in the eye. Then she excused herself and hurried away indoors. Why, suddenly, does she want to avoid me when she has been so kind since the news of our bereavements? I have searched my memory for occasions when I might have offended her though I can think of none.

  ‘December 14: I am leaving this place. This is my final day; the last I will have to put up with these unfeeling people, the last I will have to listen to Mrs Sinclair telling me my duty to Uilleam is to remain here, to give birth to his son here and to secure the tenancy for the Sinclair family.’

  ‘February 24 1943’ – it was the first entry of that year – ‘Eilidh was born today. She is 7lbs 3oz and lovely in every way with Uilleam’s mouth. I am entranced by her.’

  ‘March 7: Mrs Sinclair called at the shop. She is leaving the island. She is disappointed in me ‘because your duty was to produce a boy and you failed and now my life’s work is wasted. The Raes have your husband’s inheritance and may it curse them and you’. I asked her to accompany me upstairs to see Eilidh, her granddaughter, and she replied ‘a girl is of no use to me’ and she turned and left the house for Thurso, to stay with her sister.’

  The next entry was September 29, 1943. It was at the top of a page, three lines of text. The remainder of the page was empty.

  ‘I took Eilidh to the hill and we looked across the sea for Uilleam, this being the first anniversary of his death. I will do the same every year. I prayed for Uilleam, and also for Sandy. My comfort is that they are together in death and my blessing is Uilleam’s child, my sweet daughter Eilidh, whose nature is as kind and loving as her father’s.’

  Cal read it again. Had she not known Sandy’s body was buried on the Lofoten Islands? The diary entry suggested she didn’t. According to Grace Ann, Sandy’s mother had received the letter five months before. Surely Cal’s grandmother would have made reference to it if she ha
d known.

  He turned the remaining pages of the ledger. They were empty. On the inside back cover he noticed a flap for documents and tissue poking from it. He pulled it out and a curl of white-blond hair dropped out. It fell on to the ledger. Cal touched it, wondering whether this was grandfather’s hair, or his mother’s, though she had been dark like Ishbel.

  Chapter 19

  It was less than a mile from his parents’ house to The Mound, the man-made rampart which links Edinburgh’s Old Town to the Georgian New Town. Cal was at the bottom of the slope by the Royal Scottish Academy when it began to rain and he hailed a passing black taxi. The driver, a retired male nurse working night shift for holiday money, attempted conversation, moaning about the digging up of Princes Street for trams that nobody wanted. Cal made occasional sounds of agreement, for the sake of politeness and because he didn’t want a discussion. When the taxi arrived at The Cask, it was almost midnight and the driver said, without irony, ‘Thanks for the natter chief, God bless’. Cal paid him and hurried inside, holding his grandmother’s journals close to him to shield them from the drizzle.

  One of the teenagers who lived the floor below passed him on the stairs. Cal said, ‘All right?’ The boy didn’t reply and Cal carried on to the top landing, taking his key from his pocket, forcing it into the lock – Ryan or whoever had ransacked the place had damaged the alignment. As soon as he opened the door he smelt it: a pungent, feral odour. The hairs on his arms bristled. Someone or something was in his flat. He kicked the door shut with a bang, kept off the light and dropped his grandmother’s diaries on his work table to free his hands. He hurried to his left. Now he was passing the spiral staircase to the roof. Was an intruder waiting for him there? At any moment he expected to be jumped, a knife cutting into him. When he reached the bathroom his heart was drumming. He closed the door, snapped shut the bolt and offered up a prayer that whoever was in his flat wasn’t in the dark of the locked bathroom. With him.

  He listened, his shoulder against the door, his legs braced. After a few minutes, he shouted, ‘I’m calling the police. …’ Perhaps it was the police, he thought ruefully; another of Detective Inspector Ryan’s extra-judicial surprises. Still there was no sound from the other side of the door. ‘I’ve got no money,’ he called out.

  ‘… Or drugs.’

  Or computers, his only possessions of any cash value, thanks to Ryan and Detective Constable Helen Jamieson.

  ‘Ok, time’s up. I’m ringing the police now.’

  ‘Help me, please help me.’ It was a young woman’s voice; pleading with him.

  ‘Who is that?’

  ‘My name is Basanti, Please help me.’ Her voice sounded foreign.

  Cal listened at the door before shouting, ‘What do you want?’

  He couldn’t hear all of her answer, but it ended with her begging him not to call the police. ‘Please.’

  ‘Are you on your own?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Go to the back of the room,’ he instructed. ‘Turn on the light by the door.’

  He heard her moving and the snap of the switch.

  Then he opened the bathroom door, a fraction at first, his shoulder against it, certain this was the biggest mistake of his life. When he saw her she was at the far end of his work table, still walking backwards. Her clothes, baggy black jeans and grey hoodie, were stained and dirty, her dark brown hair cut short and ragged. Cal opened the door wider and she lifted her face at the movement, revealing hollowed cheeks and scabs on her cracked lips. Cal noticed this though not the knife behind her back which she’d taken from his kitchen drawer and which she kept hidden from him. Just in case.

  ‘What do you want?’ he said climbing the stairs from the bathroom and she told him about her friend whose body was fished out of the sea off the Argyll coast three years ago; the girl whose death was recorded in a newspaper cutting on his wall. ‘Please help me. There’s no-one else I can go to.’ She apologised for frightening him, for being in his flat.

  ‘How did you get in?’

  ‘I climbed the ladders at the back of the building. I got in by the door in the roof. It was unlocked.’

  She said she’d waited for him, for three nights now. She’d seen her friend’s photograph in the background of the newspaper pictures of Cal. ‘You must help me find the men who killed her?’ It sounded authentic, particularly when she called the dead girl ‘Preeti’ and she added with a tremble of emotion ‘she’s from the Bedia tribe, like me.’

  In the end what could he do but take her at her word? He sighed. ‘Can I trust you?’

  She nodded.

  He watched her, making up his mind. Then he went to the kitchen alcove and picked up the kettle and held it up. ‘I need some coffee. What about you?’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Suddenly she looked very young.

  ‘How old are you?’

  ‘Seventeen, I think.’

  Cal registered her uncertainty, but didn’t pick up on it. ‘Listen, have a seat and I’ll bring this over. Milk? Sugar?’

  She shook her head.

  While he waited for the kettle to boil she sat cross-legged on the hearth stone and slid the knife behind a pile of books.

  When Cal joined her, handing her a mug, he hooked his foot round a moulded plastic chair, one he’d salvaged from a skip, and dragged it towards him. He sat about two strides from her, closer than he’d intended. The smell from her was strong: sweat, damp clothes and terror. Putting his mug between his feet, he said, ‘So why do you think your friend was killed?’

  ‘I didn’t know Preeti was dead until I came here and read about her.’ She glanced up to the map and the newspaper cutting of Preeti beside it.

  A tear ran down her face. It sparkled in the bright overhead light. ‘She died three years ago …’ She turned her head away from Cal towards the window. The back of her hand brushed her cheek. ‘… She must have been so frightened.’

  A tremor passed through her.

  Cal asked, ‘Could it have been an accident …? The police don’t know what happened to her …’

  Basanti didn’t answer and Cal turned on a lamp and went to the door to switch off the overhead light. ‘That’s better.’

  The glow from the lamp cast shadows on the floor where Basanti sat. They seemed to comfort her and draw her tension so that when Cal sat down again and asked, ‘How did you know Preeti?’ she told him about the Bedia and the tradition of selling daughters into the dhanda, the sex trade. ‘The Bedia are a warrior tribe. The dhanda is more honourable for Bedia girls than domestic work.’ Her tone of voice made it clear she didn’t believe this any more.

  ‘Your parents sold you?’

  ‘Preeti, too. We are from different villages. Our families were paid 60,000 rupees, for each of us.’ She glanced at Cal, as if expecting him to be impressed, but he didn’t react. She tried to make him understand. ‘For our virginity …’

  ‘They sold your virginity?’ Now he got it. ‘My God.’

  ‘Yes.’

  She told him about the shiny black car, about Preeti holding her hand and looking after her even though she, Basanti, was the older girl and Preeti the younger.

  ‘How old was she?’

  ‘She was thirteen and I was fourteen.’

  Basanti’s hands clutched her coffee mug. She hadn’t drunk from it. Cal asked if she would like something else instead and she shook her head. The warmth from the cup seemed to be sustaining her.

  ‘We were taken to a city, Mumbai I think, and then to an airfield where there were other girls we didn’t know, and then to a port where Preeti and I were put on a ship. I don’t know about the other girls. We never saw them again.’

  Gradually the story tumbled from her, with Cal interrupting with questions or comments when her voice tired with the effort of it or when it cracked with emotion. She held her head down. Occasionally her voice would waver as though she was crying. Cal imagined that was why she hid her face from him. It allowed her some d
ignity, what little of it she had left. She told Cal how Preeti and she had been kept on the ship for weeks, months – ‘We lost any sense of time passing so I began scratching the days on the paint in our cabin and when we were taken ashore there were twenty seven scratches.’ That was the last time she’d seen Preeti. ‘We were taken ashore in a small boat, tied and blindfolded and carried from the boat …’

  Cal helped her. ‘Where were you taken?’

  ‘I don’t know. It was a room without windows.’

  ‘And Preeti?’

  ‘I don’t know what happened to her. She was behind me, being carried when we came ashore … I never saw her again.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Cal said.

  She sighed. ‘Then the men came … for sex.’

  She stopped again and Cal tried to make it easier for her by saying ‘only tell me what you can.’

  ‘Until this one night when I was taken outside. There was something going on. The man carrying me was running across rough ground – he was frightened. He tied me to an iron ring and left me. Then I heard shouting and sirens. By the morning I’d worked off my blindfold and that’s when I saw the hill and the tree.’

  She paused again. He wanted to ask, ‘What hill and tree?’ but before he could she said, ‘The man came back for me and I was put in a van and taken away to a city. My new owners told me I’d been sold to them. I was their property. They said they could kill me if they chose, or sell me. I was theirs. They could do what they wanted with me.’ She knew now the city had been Glasgow.

  ‘How long were you there?’

  ‘I don’t know. Many months, years, I don’t know. I escaped nine days ago