Cold Earth

by Ann Cleeves

  ‘This woman who was staying at Tain . . .’ She smiled at him, but didn’t complete the sentence. There was an awkward silence.

  ‘What about her?’

  ‘I find it hard to believe that you didn’t know she was there. I can just about believe that your wife hadn’t realized that the place was lived in. But you? You were out on your land. You must have walked past most days. You’d have seen a light in the house. A car on the track.’

  ‘I saw no cars. I told Jimmy Perez the day that he found the body.’

  ‘You were aware of the tenant before that. Craig. You saw his car.’

  ‘I’ve known Craig and his family for my whole life. Of course I knew he was taking over the place for a peerie while. I helped him out with a few repairs before he moved in. When he went off to the Middle East he didn’t say anything about a new tenant.’

  ‘The tenant’s name was Alison Teal. Does that mean anything to you?’

  His face gave nothing away. She thought he’d be a good poker player and wondered what it must be like to live with a man who was so impassive. But perhaps he was different with his wife. Perhaps he revealed himself to her.

  He shook his head.

  ‘She was an actress,’ Willow said. ‘Quite a long time ago. She’s been to the islands before, caused a bit of a stir. She’d gone missing and turned up in the Ravenswick Hotel. Just down the road. You were living here at the time?’

  That was barely a question, because she already knew the answer and again it seemed he thought it wasn’t worth speaking, because there was just a brief nod of the head.

  ‘You don’t remember the fuss?’ She leaned towards him. She’d arranged the chairs so that she wasn’t sitting across the desk from him, and her face was very close to his.

  ‘When was it?’ Still not a real answer.

  ‘Fifteen years ago.’

  ‘My wife wasn’t very well back then. She had mental-health issues. All my time was taken up looking after the family. Looking out for her. There could have been another landslide and I’d scarcely have noticed.’ He turned his face so that he was looking out of the narrow window and not at her. ‘I certainly wouldn’t have paid any attention to gossip about an actress.’

  ‘Rogerson.’ The name hung between them.

  Again he waited for the question to come.

  ‘It seems a bit of a coincidence,’ she said, ‘to have two bodies within walking distance of your house.’

  Still there was no comment and Willow came out with the question at last. ‘Did you like the man?’

  ‘I scarcely knew him. We didn’t mix in the same circles.’ For the first time Hay showed some emotion. A little sneer.

  ‘You must be about the same age. Did you go to school with him?’

  ‘He was a couple of years older. That was too much of a gap for us to be pals.’

  ‘Jimmy Perez had the impression that you didn’t like him.’

  ‘I didn’t know him personally.’ Hay paused for a moment. ‘I knew the sort of man he was.’

  ‘And what sort was that?’

  ‘One of those charmers who take folk in. A user and a taker.’

  Willow leaned back in her chair. ‘You know, Mr Hay, that does sound very personal to me.’

  In the silence that followed, sounds from outside came into the room. A flock of whooper swans calling from the sky. A dog barking. Still mid-afternoon, but the shadows were lengthening and soon the light would be gone. Willow let the silence grow, before speaking.

  ‘And your wife? Did she know Tom Rogerson personally?’

  There was no response for a few seconds. Kevin Hay stared back at her. No expression at all on his face. Then he got to his feet and walked out. For such a big man, his feet made no sound at all on the stone floor.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Jane wasn’t sure what to make of the female detective who turned up on their doorstep. Jane had just cleared the lunch things and was wondering if they’d have to spend all day indoors. Odd inappropriate thoughts had flown in and out of her head all morning: The first nice day for weeks and we’re not allowed out of the house. Then: What will I make for tea tonight, if I can’t get to the shop? Maybe I could invite Simon along. He’ll put all this into perspective and cheer us up. And then, a little guiltily, because she should have thought of it earlier: Should I phone Michael and let him know that there’s a dead man on the beach? Interspersed with the random thoughts, pictures forced their way into her head. She saw Tom Rogerson, lying on the shingle, only half his head left intact. Like the hill after the landslide. Recognizable, but not at all the same. And Kevin, standing on the edge of the cliff as the first light came.

  She’d asked the young officer about phoning Michael. ‘I don’t want my son picking up rumours at school. You know how news spreads here. If he hears there’s a body, he might imagine it’s one of us.’

  ‘I think perhaps you should ask your son to come home,’ the policeman had said. ‘The boss might want to talk to him.’

  ‘But Jimmy’s gone.’

  ‘Not Jimmy Perez.’ The man had seemed a little confused. ‘The boss from Inverness who’s in charge of the case.’

  And then the woman from Inverness had floated in like a kind of weird Mary Poppins. Only she’d looked more like one of the hikers that turned up on the NorthLink ferry, with their big boots and heavy rucksacks. She was wearing a long jersey and jeans and her hair was wild.

  ‘Mrs Hay was wondering if she should contact her youngest son.’ The police officer seemed a little out of his depth and anxious for advice. ‘I thought maybe you’d like to talk to him, so we should get him back.’

  ‘How old is he?’ The detective turned to Jane and smiled.

  ‘Sixteen.’

  ‘Perhaps it would be a good plan to get him home then. No need to wait for the school bus. Sandy Wilson will be driving down from Lerwick. He can give him a lift.’ Then she asked Jane if there was a room they could use, and called Andy in to speak to her, so for Jane the waiting continued.

  When Andy emerged from the office, it was impossible to be sure what mood he was in. He just waved at them as he walked past the open kitchen door to his bedroom. Jane thought there could be something manic about the wave, the glittery eyes, the jerky walk, but she was hyper-sensitive at the moment. Perhaps her eldest son wasn’t anxious or excited at all, just bored and wanting some time to himself.

  The detective shoved her head round the kitchen door and Jane prepared herself for the interview to come, but the woman turned to Kevin.

  ‘If you’re ready, Mr Hay, I’ll see you now.’ As if they were patients in a dentist’s waiting room. Then Jane was in the kitchen alone, watching the shadow of the house lengthen until it reached the polytunnels, while the young policeman sat nervously in a corner, picking at his fingernails until she wanted to scream at him to be still. She offered him tea and he accepted – grateful, she thought, to have something to relieve the boredom.

  Suddenly there was a flurry of activity. Kevin burst in from the hall, his face red and his fists clenched by his sides. He was furious and she was anxious about what might have triggered the change in mood. He didn’t lose his temper often, but when he did he was terrifying. He simmered and then exploded. She was on her feet to hold him, to try to calm him before the rage overtook him, and at the same time Michael arrived with Sandy Wilson, the young detective from Whalsay. After its previous silence, the room seemed full of people, all talking and asking questions. And then Willow Reeves appeared at the door. She ignored the tension and the raised voices, smiled a greeting to Michael, nodded to Sandy Wilson and asked Jane to follow her. Jane put her hand on Kevin’s arm, a gesture of understanding, a message for him to be calm, and she left the room.

  In the office the detective was already seated. ‘You make truly fab coffee.’ A wide smile. ‘Jimmy will be sorry he had to rush off.’

  Jane knew this was a tactic – the woman would make her feel at ease and then start to ask th
e difficult questions. Waiting in the kitchen, Jane had been preparing her answers, but now she wasn’t sure how convincing they would be. She took her seat and waited.

  ‘How well did you know Tom Rogerson?’ Another bright smile.

  This close, Jane could see that the detective had freckles along the line of her cheekbones. Lines around her eyes too, so she must be approaching middle age, but somehow the freckles gave her the look of a schoolgirl.

  ‘I knew of him,’ Jane said. ‘He was one of those Shetlanders who seem to be on every committee going. And I met him occasionally at social occasions. Charity dos, parties.’

  ‘But you didn’t know him personally?’ Willow Reeves put great emphasis on the last word. ‘You would never have invited him and his wife to supper, for instance, or gone out for a meal with them?’

  Jane shook her head. ‘We were never on those terms.’

  ‘Only your husband seems to have taken a dislike to him, and I can’t work out why that could be. If he didn’t really know him.’

  ‘Kevin’s a very black-and-white sort of person. He’ll make up his mind about someone without knowing them at all. Politicians, folk he reads about in the paper . . .’ Jane stopped herself from rambling further.

  The detective nodded as if she, too, knew people like that.

  ‘This morning,’ she went on, ‘you said Kevin got up to check on the ewes, but it was very early when you found Mr Rogerson’s body. Wouldn’t it still have been dark when he set off? And I wonder why you went after him. I’d be tempted to stay in the warm, a morning like today.’

  This was one of the difficult questions Jane had been planning for, but now her practised response seemed incredible. She paused before answering. ‘It was a beautiful morning. After all that rain, it was good to be outside. We wanted to see the sun come up together. You get fantastic sunrises on the east side.’

  ‘Very romantic.’ The detective sounded sincere, even a little envious, but she continued, ‘If you and your husband spend so much time out on your land, even at this time of year, I do find it very strange that you didn’t realize there was anyone staying at Tain.’

  ‘I did see someone inside,’ Jane said. ‘I told Jimmy Perez.’

  ‘You didn’t mention that to Kevin? Because he didn’t seem to know the place was occupied at all when the landslide took place.’

  ‘I can’t have done.’ She paused. ‘We’re both very busy.’

  ‘Of course.’ Another wide smile, to put Jane at her ease. ‘Tell me about your mental-health problems.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘The woman who died at Tain was called Alison Teal. She was an actress, famous for disappearing while she was playing a role in a popular television drama. She was discovered in Shetland, in the Ravenswick Hotel, which is just down the coast from here on the south side of the landslip. Kevin told me he couldn’t remember the publicity surrounding the story because you were very ill at the time.’

  Jane wondered if that conversation had made Kevin angry. Perhaps it was being taken back to the past that had caused the clenched fists and the simmering rage. He’d always said that he forgave her for the betrayals and the thoughtlessness of her drinking days. One of the steps of her recovery had been to be honest with him. ‘You were ill,’ he’d told her. ‘Not yourself. Of course we can start again.’

  But she’d never been entirely convinced by his reassurance. She knew he needed her; he’d never been much good on his own. Whether he forgave her was another matter altogether.

  Now she looked up at the detective. ‘I’m an alcoholic,’ she said. ‘In recovery now, but then my life was completely chaotic. We had two small children and Kevin had to hold things together at the same time as he was expanding the farm. He was magnificent. I’m not surprised he couldn’t remember a news story about an actress from the south.’

  ‘Do you remember anything about the woman’s disappearance?’

  Jane shook her head. ‘It was a bad time.’ She caught a sudden glimpse of her past: the panic attacks, the craving and the crippling hangovers and the overwhelming self-pity. She shook her head again to clear the memories from her mind.

  ‘What did you do last night?’ Willow Reeves was satisfied, it seemed, by Jane’s answer and had moved on.

  ‘Not much. We had a big Sunday lunch. The family all together and Michael’s girlfriend was here too. After that I only felt like sagging out in front of the television.’ She paused, expecting another question. None came and she felt compelled to fill the silence. ‘I went to bed early. I hadn’t slept well the night before.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Oh, my son was late home. You know what it’s like. Even when they’re grown-up, you never stop worrying about them.’ Though Jane thought the detective probably had no idea what it was like to be a parent. It was impossible to imagine the woman with the responsibilities of a baby.

  ‘Which son?’ The detective had been scribbling notes, but now looked up and gave Jane her full attention.

  ‘Andy. The big one. He dropped out of uni and has a bar job at Mareel. Sometimes they ask him to stay on for an extra shift.’

  ‘And that’s what happened on Saturday night?’ Willow Reeves’s voice was deceptively calm, but Jane wasn’t taken in. This was important to the woman. And she would check anything Jane told her, so it was important not to lie.

  ‘I’m not sure. I assumed that was why he was late. Maybe he just went on to catch up with some friends in town.’ A pause. ‘Why are you interested? Tom Rogerson died on Sunday night.’

  ‘Did he?’ Willow stared at her.

  ‘I don’t know!’ Jane felt herself start to panic. ‘Surely someone would have seen the body, if it had been on the beach for a whole day. Can’t you tell when someone died?’

  ‘Not with any accuracy. You shouldn’t believe what you see in television dramas. Tom was last seen on Sunday morning, though. We don’t have any anxieties about Saturday night. We’re asking everyone involved to account for their movements yesterday.’

  ‘But we’re not involved!’ Jane’s voice rose almost to a shriek.

  Willow smiled. ‘But you are, aren’t you? Even if it’s only a matter of geography. Two people have died very close to where you live. There are no other houses nearby. I’m not suggesting that any of you are killers, but I do think you can help us.’

  In the silence that followed they heard the sound of a vehicle on the track outside. Headlights lit up the polytunnels as the car swung into the yard.

  ‘Are you expecting anyone?’ Willow asked.

  Jane shook her head. She couldn’t think who might be visiting, unless Simon Agnew had heard of the death and had arrived to offer comfort and support. That would be his style. But the silhouette that they saw at the door into the house was shorter than Simon’s would have been, and the voice he called in was Shetland.

  ‘Kev! Are you alright, man? I’ve just heard about Tom Rogerson. Is there anything we can do?’

  Willow looked at Jane.

  ‘That’s Craig Henderson.’ Jane was thinking that if anyone could calm Kevin down, it would be Craig, and in this situation he’d probably be more useful than Simon, who always seemed to delight in a drama. ‘He’s an old friend of my husband’s.’

  ‘And he used to be a close neighbour.’ It wasn’t a question. The detective seemed almost to be talking at herself. ‘He used to live next door in Tain. We’ve already talked to him about the dead woman. And I’m sure he knew the dead man too.’ She turned to Jane and smiled. ‘That’s the way of islands, isn’t it? So many connections.’

  It seemed then that the interview was over, because the detective got to her feet. Jane stood for a moment at the office door.

  ‘I hope you find the killer. This is too close to home. We all want things back to normal.’

  The detective nodded as if she understood.

  Standing outside in the corridor, Jane paused for a moment to compose herself. Perhaps the interview hadn’t gone
too badly after all. There was still a lot of noise coming from the kitchen. Loud men’s voices, a sudden burst of laughter. It sounded almost like a party. Almost certainly Kevin would have offered Craig a beer or a dram. She couldn’t face it and instead took the stairs to her room.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  They met up again in Jimmy Perez’s house in Ravenswick. Nothing was said about the decision to meet there, but everyone knew he liked to be home for Cassie in the evenings. Sandy had become more comfortable in these informal discussions, felt almost as if he belonged with the others now. Willow had gone back to Lerwick to shower and change and had turned up with foil cartons of Chinese food that were keeping warm in Jimmy’s oven. Sandy was the last one to arrive. The fire was burning and Jimmy had lit candles. Sandy wondered what that was all about. This was work, not some kind of dinner party. His mind jumped for a moment to Louisa, who’d said she wanted to invite some of her friends to supper to meet him. He imagined they’d all be very clever people and he was already feeling anxious about it.

  As soon as Sandy came in, Jimmy jumped up and started setting plates and cutlery on the table. Whatever conversation he’d been having with Willow in the candlelight seemed to be over. Willow ate her food with the chopsticks they’d sent from the Great Wall, not showing off, but as if that was the most natural thing in the world. Sandy couldn’t help staring at the deft way she caught up the food and got it into her mouth. Once or twice he caught Jimmy staring too.

  ‘Did you get a chance to talk to Michael Hay when you gave him a lift from school?’ Perez had finished eating.

  ‘I told him a body had been found on the beach below Tain.’

  ‘What did he make of that?’

  Sandy thought for a moment. He pictured himself back in the car, driving south from Lerwick, the low sun very bright, slanting across the road. The boy had been sitting beside him in the passenger seat, his school rucksack by his feet. He’d seemed like one of those boys who turn into a man at a very young age, with square shoulders, big feet and an already grown-up face.