‘One more thing, Sergeant,’ Christopher Freeman drawled.
‘Yes?’
‘The poof. Nicholas… whatever. I never saw him in Moray Place. Did he…’ the man’s question tailed off as he started on his pudding again.
‘Did he… what, Sir?’
‘Oh never mind, Sergeant. I forget.’
‘Have you been to Moray Place recently, Major?’
The man shook his head, still savouring his mouthful.
Tears coursed down the old man’s face, slipping off his jowls and tainting the coffee that he was trying unsuccessfully, with a trembling hand, to drink. Nothing he did seemed to staunch the flow and his eyes felt gritty, an ache in their very sockets. Twice the kind waitress had approached him to check that he was all right, and twice he had tried to allay her anxieties with a silence and a nod of his head.
I never wanted money, land, anything, he raged to himself. Just James. And I would lose every penny I ever had for him to stay here with me. That bloody motor neurone disease. Without it he would never have chosen to die. I know, he told himself, I know that the disease forced it on him, but what about me, left on my own?
But worse still to witness James’ suffering and be able to do nothing. And what kind of God confronts his creatures with such an impossible choice? What kind of God, after such a choice has been made, allows a murderer to make it meaningless and transforms a peaceful end into a terrifying death? Couldn’t he just have been allowed to slip away in his sleep as he had planned?
The sight of a gold-tipped black umbrella resting on a nearby table delivered another blow. It was identical to James’ brolly. Everywhere he looked there seemed to be reminders, ambushing him and overwhelming him. The effort of hiding his emotions, ostensibly functioning as normal, left him exhausted, drained of all life. And now, today, for the first time, he realised that he no longer looked forward to returning to their home. It was no more than an empty shell without James. What did it matter if the weeds grew tall? The lawn remained unmown? They would never again walk, hand in hand, enjoying the beauty of the garden that they had created. Somehow, the conversation with the solicitor, Mr McKay, had impressed upon him, as nothing else had, the finality of his lover’s departure; and an endless line of grey, cold days stretched before him. A new half-life, or existence; one devoid of all warmth and colour.
8
With a thud a large, sealed box was dropped onto Alice’s desk, startling her and causing the tea in her cup to spill onto her opened newspaper. She looked up, annoyed, into the smiling face of DC Lowe.
‘Special delivery for you, Sarge. Nicholas Lyon dropped it off yesterday and the DI said to pass it on to you, as the expert, like. The boss knows you’ve got it and he wants it checked out immediately. The Evening News is planning a front page spread on the Freeman murder and he’s shitting himself because he’s got nothing to fend them off with. I overheard him on the phone to Charlie at Fettes trying to postpone the next press conference. Not like him, eh?’
Opening the flaps of the box Alice looked inside and found eight ring binders, all devoted to the Scowling Crags wind farm proposal, produced by Vertenergy. She pulled out the topmost one and flicked through previous felling plans, site layouts, habitat maps and visibility diagrams. Nothing of any use there. The next volume was headed ‘Environmental Statement’, and she scanned a paragraph entitled ‘People and Safety’:
‘13.02-Under certain combinations of geographical position, time of day and time of year, the sun may pass behind a rotor and cast a shadow over neighbouring properties. When the blades rotate, the shadow flicks on and off; the effect is known as Shadow Flicker. It occurs only within buildings where the flicker appears through a narrow window opening…
‘13.04-Shadow Flicker frequency tends to be related to the rotor speed and the number of blades on the rotor and this can be translated into “blade path frequency” and measured in alternations per second or hertz. Two main concerns have been raised regarding the effects of Shadow Flicker and they are not exclusive to wind turbines: (1) they may cause seizures in people who are photo-sensitive and (2) they may cause considerable annoyance to people.’
Further down the same page was a table headed ‘Detailed Dwelling Assessment’ and in it each property scheduled to have a turbine at 11.5 rotor diameters to the east, south or west of it, was listed. In all, eleven houses were named: Foxhill Farm and Farm Cottage; Blaestane Cottage; Cockers Toll Cottage; Ballinder Farm and Farm Cottage; Wester Broadhill Cottage; Easter Broadhill Cottage; Struieford Cottage; Gowkshill Farm and Scowling Crags Farm. Another nearby page showed proposed turbine locations on an enlarged section from the Ordnance Survey map with all of the nearby dwellings marked with a red star.
Eric Manson strolled past Alice’s desk to his own and emptied a black bin bag, full of correspondence, onto it, sighing deeply as he did so.
‘Could I have a quick look, Sir?’ Alice asked.
‘Be my guest, doll, I’m off to talk to the boss and then I’m going to see what Forensics has come up with, if anything.’
She combed through the pile, item by item. It was composed largely of e-mails, typed submissions and a few pre-printed postcards; and, diligently, she wrote down the names of all the senders. A few of them kept recurring: Angus Kersley, Joanna Hart, David Oxford, Gavin Logan and Morag McTear. Morag McTear’s contribution was contained in a slim folder and her address was marked, together with her name, prominently on the first page. She lived in Gowkshill Farm and her date of birth was also marked: 11th January 1920. An old lady. For Angus Kersley two addresses had been given: Wester Broadhill Cottage and ‘Barleyknowe’ in Ravelston Dykes, Edinburgh. Hundreds of the e-mails had come from another source, [email protected]. Enough to be going on with.
When Alice rang Angus Kersley he was, by her good fortune, in Ravelston, suffering from a broken ankle, instead of at work, attending to his legal practice in his Alva Street office. Home turned out to be a half-timbered mock-Tudor mansion in the middle of the comfortable suburb. Even the garage had been decked with dark horizontal beams, and the front garden showed signs of slavish adherence to current gardening trends, with alarming clumps of black-leaved plants, tussocks of arid grasses and not a flower in sight. The delay between the pressing of the doorbell and the door being finally opened was explained by the large plaster cast encasing the man’s left leg and foot. He guided her to his study, his leaden limb dragging against the deep pile of the carpet, leaving a broad trail behind him.
The sight that met her eyes on entering the room amazed her. It was like gaining access to some kind of military headquarters. Pinned on the walls were large-scale maps, most of them of the Scowling Crags wind farm area. Each one displayed something different. One mapped out the turbine locations relative to the houses within the development. Another showed the system of tracks required for the wind farm, together with the ‘borrow pits’ from which the track construction materials would be quarried. Others showed the hydrogeology of the area and others still depicted the principal archaeological sites either within the development or close to it. Part of one wall was devoted to lists, each written in a neat, workaday hand with no pretension to style. They contained the names of the members of the local Council and the names of the members of the various committees of the Council. The names of those on the Planning Development and Control Committee were all underlined in red. Vast piles of pre-printed postcards lay strewn about the floor, together with blank sheets headed ‘Petition Against Scowling Crags Wind Farm’.
Kersley’s computer was on, and Alice noticed that some of the material that Vertenergy had produced appeared to have been scanned into it.
‘A day off?’ she said conversationally, as he closed his study door.
‘A day off paid work,’ he corrected her, in his distinctive Morningside accent. The telephone rang and he picked it up.
‘Sorry, Alistair, I’m busy just now. We’ll speak at the big meeting and I’ll bring along forms fo
r your group then. Have you discovered how much the Post Office charge for a drop? Mmmm. OK. Speak to you later.’
‘I need to…’ Alice began. The telephone rang again and, once more, he picked up the receiver.
‘David. OK. I can’t talk now. I suggest that you contact the RSPB to see if their ornithological data about the geese is correct. No, I haven’t got a number for them. You’ll have to fish it out yourself. It’ll probably be in the book.’
‘Sorry,’ the man said, turning his attention back to Alice. Yet again the telephone rang.
‘Nope. It’s Councillor Garth you need to speak to, and you can forget the Community Council, they’re hopeless. I’m afraid I’ve got someone here so I must go. Bye.’
So saying the man took the phone off the hook and they both, momentarily, enjoyed the silence before Alice attempted to re-start the interview.
‘It’s about the Scowling Crags wind farm, Mr Kersley. You seem to be part of the group, quite possibly its leader judging by the stuff your study’s now filled with, and all those telephone enquiries…’
‘I am, for my sins. Absolutely,’ he replied. ‘I’ve a house within the proposed development, Wester Broadhill, and I’d planned retiring there. But the place will be ruined if the developers get their way. How can I help you, Sergeant?’
‘First of all, can I ask you where you were on Monday 12th June between, say, seven pm and ten pm?’
‘Easy. I was here, preparing for the next day. I’m a solicitor. I had a complicated fatal accident enquiry in Glasgow Sheriff Court, all about a suicide in a mental hospital. I had to work on it until about two am to try and master some of the more arcane stuff about staff rotas and so on.’
‘Was there anyone here with you?’
‘Aha. My wife, Angela. She can confirm it for you if you want. She’ll remember all right, because we had a blazing row that night as we were supposed to be having dinner with friends and I said I couldn’t go. Caused some unbelievable fireworks.’
‘Those lists on the wall, the Councillors and so on. Is that your handwriting?’
The man looked bemused. ‘Yes. It’s mine.’
Alice handed over a sheet bearing examples of the anonymous letter writer’s script.
‘Can you tell me, do you recognise that writing, Mr Kersley?’
The man examined the paper carefully before handing it back.
‘No. It’s very distinctive. Artistic looking. Why?’
Alice ignored the question. ‘Would it be possible for you to give me a list of all the people in your group?’
‘No problem. Anything else you need?’
‘Thank you. Do you know who the landlords are, I mean those allowing Vertenergy to put up the turbines on their land?’
‘Yes, of course. I tried, personally, to persuade some of them not to go ahead. Let me see… they’re mainly absentees, of course. Well, there’s Tony Theobold, Kenneth Winston and the retired Sheriff, James Freeman. The dead one. Is that why you’re here?’ A look of anxiety passed across his face.
‘Was Sheriff Freeman one of the ones you met with?’
‘So that’s what this is all about. I see,’ he smiled weakly. ‘My leg’s been in plaster for over six weeks, Sergeant, so I couldn’t have killed him even if I had wanted to. And I didn’t, by the way. Either want to. Or kill him. Yes, I met with James Freeman at the cottage. It must have been months and months ago. Spring, I think. The daffodils were certainly still out. He was polite, as you’d expect, but obstinate. He lectured me about clean, renewable energy, although, to be fair, he did listen to my counter-arguments. It was all very civilised.’
‘Forgive me for asking, but are there any members of your group who feel particularly passionate about the development, stopping it, I mean?’
‘I wouldn’t know where to begin. They all, I repeat, all, hate it. Really hate it! Would any of them kill someone to stop it? I don’t know. No-one sane for sure. But why don’t you come and see for yourself? There’s to be a big meeting in Perth Town Hall, four days hence, on Sunday 9th July. There’s no admission charge and virtually all of us plan to attend. There’s supposed to be groups from all over the country.’
‘Will Joanna Hart be there?’
‘I’d be surprised if she wasn’t. She’s one of the speakers.’
The PM programme was just starting on the radio, so time was plentiful. She turned on the cold tap with her big toe, reducing the temperature of the water until it was just above tepid. The air in her flat, like that in the street outside, was warm. It would dry her without the need for a towel. Resting on the bath was her glass of white wine, all but empty, and she drained its dregs, relishing the taste on her tongue. While so thoroughly relaxed she should, she thought, plan what to wear. If they were going for a walk by the sea then her black jeans would do and, maybe, her red tee-shirt. No, she would have to think again. That tee-shirt was still in the wash, and with it her second favourite top, a light-blue short sleeved blouse.
Eddie Mair’s voice, interviewing the latest Secretary of State for Defence about the campaign against the Taliban in Afghanistan, re-directed her thoughts away from clothes and back onto an old and well-worn track. Women had been oppressed in that country for years and years, and no-one in the West had given a stuff. Scant bloody Radio Four coverage of their suffering then. Now thoroughly annoyed, she rose from her bath and stomped off to her room to dress.
At six-thirty on the dot the doorbell rang, and the tall form of Ian Melville, slightly out of breath from running up the tenement stairs, stood before her. ‘Let’s go to the Dean Cemetery and have a look around it, eh?’
Not what she had planned. ‘OK. I’ve certainly never been. Have your got your car?’
‘No,’ he looked slightly uneasy, ‘the exhaust’s fallen off, but I thought, perhaps, we could walk there? I’m really sorry. Quill could come on the lead.’
Again, not what she had planned. ‘That‘ll be fine. But do you mind deciding on our route? I’ll follow happily, but I’ve had enough decision-making today.’
As they emerged onto Broughton Place the tinny, discordant chimes of an ice cream van could be heard on the windless air. The sun was high in the sky, and on the pavement, in places, the tar seemed sticky. They strolled down the hill towards Canonmills, intending to use the Water of Leith Walkway as a route across the city. A thin mist hung above the turbid waters of the river, making its characteristic scent more pungent and, in the dense shade of the overhanging trees, the atmosphere was unexpectedly dank and humid. Quill, eager to run, strained on the lead as if an invisible hare was half a metre in front of his nose, and by the time they reached the Colonies, Alice’s arm ached. Half of Stockbridge seemed to have decided to promenade along the river that evening, and the couple strolled together, hand in hand, amongst the others, occasionally lurching unpredictably to the left or right, following Quill’s whim like puppets.
They arrived at a discreet back-entrance to the cemetery, having left the river at Bells Mills, retraced their steps up Belford Road and crossed the grounds of the Dean Gallery. A ‘No Dogs’ sign immediately confronted them. Alice tied Quill’s lead to a tree and tried to ignore his piteous yelps, as he railed against the division of his pack and, in particular, her desertion of him. As they entered the consecrated ground, a massive, pink granite pyramid stood on their right, a strange cave hollowed out of one side, making the structure imperfect and profoundly pagan. Still holding hands they meandered past memorials, grand and grander, until, on reaching the apotheosis of grandeur, Buchanan’s Monument, they watched in amazement as a pair of grey squirrels frolicked all over it, using it as a gymnasium, unabashed by the disapproving chorus set up by the magpie residents in the canopy above.
Having torn themselves away from the display, the couple came across a tall sculpture and stopped, rapt by its eccentric charm, the delight of each enhanced by the presence of the other. The base of the piece was composed of winged lions supporting a pedestal with rams’ heads
on it and they, in turn, supported spindly pelicans.
As they examined it the Dean Bell tolled mournfully and, as if on cue, a few raindrops began to fall, rapidly followed by a heavier downpour. Dropping Ian’s hand, Alice raced off towards the pyramid, tearing breathlessly past deceased lawyers, engineers and architects, and on reaching it crouched down in the hollowed-out section. Within seconds he had joined her, and Quill, sensing their closeness, began howling afresh. And in the grounds of the Necropolis, surrounded by the remains of the great and the good, they kissed.
The grandfather clock chimed nine. Alone again. He looked around the drawing room, surveying it as if seeing it for the first time. In his youth its grandeur had both impressed and appalled him until, as the years passed, he had become accustomed to the strange collection of family relics it contained and ceased to shiver on finding himself looked down upon by the stern warriors arrayed on the walls. Slowly he walked upstairs, crossed the landing to James’ room and pushed the door open. The scent of his lover hit him immediately, unexpectedly and powerfully, and he buried his face in the pillows, painfully conscious that with time even this slight comfort would disappear. By the bedside was a framed photograph of himself, laughing on holiday in the Alps, and he turned it over, face down, onto the cabinet. It belonged to the past, and somehow, somehow, a new future would have to be forged, one in which he could live each minute of every hour as if it mattered, until, finally, he, too, would be released.
Removing his key from the lock he descended the stone steps to the pavement, watching, as he did so, a troupe of starlings bobbing up and down, bickering with each other on the black railings encircling the gardens. As he began crossing the cobbles, a screeching sound cut through his head, and he turned to his left, attempting to locate the noise. Then there was an ear-splitting bang. The impact of the car sent him flying, hurtling through the air as if he weighed nothing until, everything having slowed down, he slammed into a parked jeep with a strange crunching sound and felt himself sliding down the bonnet, crumpling onto the ground below.
Where The Shadow Falls Page 10
