Does Your Mother Know?

by Maureen Jennings

  CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT

  I pulled over into the passing place and got out. Andy was sitting up. The side of his face was scraped, but he seemed all right. He was moving anyway. As I approached, he gazed up at me in utter bewilderment, as if I had materialized out of the air. I crouched beside him.

  “Are you okay? Can you stand up?”

  “I don’t know. I think I’ve broken my ankle.” I helped him to his feet and he winced. He couldn’t put any weight down – it was too painful. I checked his ankle; it had already ballooned out and was dangling at an unnatural angle.

  “Here, put your arm around my shoulder. Let’s get you to the car.”

  He managed to hop the few feet to the car. He was crying uncontrollably.

  “I could have been killed. Oh, Lynnie, how could you?”

  “Where’s the best place to take you? There’s a hospital in Stornoway, isn’t there?”

  He stopped and faced me. His breath was fierce this close to my face and his nose was wet with mucous.

  “No! We’ve got to go after her. She’s not in her right mind and who knows what she’ll do?”

  “Are you saying she’s suicidal?”

  “She could be. It won’t be the first time. Please, Miss Morris, I’ll be fine. You must go after her. She’s heading for the Butt.”

  “If she’s suicidal, we’d better get the police involved. Do you have a mobile phone?”

  “No, I left it at home. Please, there isn’t time. If we can catch her, I might be able to talk her into some sense.”

  By now, he’d hopped around the car and was getting into the passenger seat. I didn’t have much choice. I got in and drove off. The Nissan was long out of sight.

  “Just keep on this road. It’ll take us there.”

  “How do you know where’s she’s headed?”

  “She believes God will speak to her up there. She’s done that before. I hadn’t known her that long, and we were up there just walking on the cliffs. She suddenly decided that she had to trust in God and asked Him to reveal His will to her. She ran, literally ran, to the edge of the cliff and held out her arms as if she thought she could just fly over.”

  That didn’t sound too promising.

  “The wind is so strong up there sometimes,” he went on, “I had to pull her away. She was so wild that day, I didn’t know her.”

  “But nevertheless, you got engaged.”

  That was a bit insensitive of me, I admit, but I’d heard stories like his ad nauseum. He/she was so sweet when we first met, they just had these off days. Hey, put the light on and read the text, folks. These insane traits aren’t going to vanish because you have so-called love stars in your eyes.

  “She was so, er... ” he turned quite red. “She is very warm-hearted. I thought she loved me. I’ve never had anybody love me like that before.”

  He wiped his face with the back of his sleeve. I wished I could offer him a tissue to mop up and blow into, but I didn’t have anything. All this time, I was driving as fast as I could round the tight turns, as the road continued to wind around the foot of the hills. The sheep were scattered on the slopes and on the verge of the road. I hoped they’d stay out of my way. Then the road straightened out and we were driving through a village.

  “Shall I stop and get somebody to phone the police?”

  “No, please believe me. I’m the only one she’ll listen to. Look! There she is.”

  I pushed down the accelerator, but I was already way over the speed limit, and it wouldn’t do anybody any good if I rolled the car and killed us both. I tried to maintain a speed I could handle and still keep her in sight.

  “Why is she in such a bad state?”

  “She thinks she’s lost everything she ever dreamed about.”

  “Which is?”

  “Just everything. The house... me, I suppose... I told her I didn’t think I could stay engaged.”

  Suddenly, he leaned forward and buried his face in his hands, sobbing. I could hardly hear what he was saying.

  “I feel terrible.... What we did.... was very wrong.”

  It isn’t easy racing along a narrow, unfamiliar road in a strange car with a young man crying his guts out right beside you. I didn’t know if he was suicidal as well. I decided not to risk it, and I slowed down and pulled over onto the verge. He gasped at me.

  “Why have you stopped? We must keep going. Please.”

  “Andy, we’re not going anywhere at the moment. What are you saying? What did you do that was wrong?”

  He was a sorry sight, red gravel burns on his cheek, tears and snot all over his face, and wide dilated pupils.

  “It wasn’t anything.... We just took her briefcase. I didn’t want to, but Coral-Lyn said we had to... ” More tears. Another story I’d heard before: abnegating responsibility. He looked frantically at the road. “She’s almost out of sight. Please keep driving. I’ll control myself, I promise I will. I wouldn’t forgive myself if anything happened to her.”

  I didn’t want to be left with that guilt either. “Andy, you’ve already handed me a pile of bullshit. If I think you’re lying again or not telling the whole truth and nothing but the truth, you’re on your own. You can walk to the Butt. I won’t help you.”

  “I’ll tell you, I promise. Please drive.”

  I shoved in the gear and, with a perceptible jolt and a little spit of dirt from the wheels, we started off again. I picked up speed and we saw the Nissan, further off but still visible.

  “So, tell me what happened on Friday night. What really happened — no crap.”

  He groaned, but the floodgate was opened and he started to talk, almost gabbling he was so keen to tell all.

  “I biked over to see Grandda about ten o’clock. I go every day, but I was late because we had a meeting at the church and we couldn’t settle anything, so it ran late. We’re trying to help one of the churches select a new minister — Oops, watch out!”

  The warning was because the red and white postal van was hurtling towards us. He’d probably moved out to avoid a sheep. I leaned on my horn and the driver ducked back to his lane, giving me a cheery wave of the hand as he went by. More adrenaline rush.

  “Carry on,” I said to Andy, who seemed to have temporarily lost his train of thought.

  “I almost didn’t go because the weather was bad, but I didn’t want to disappoint him. He liked company.” Several sniffs at this point and another wipe with his sleeve. “I got there at... it must have been just before ten o’clock. I could hear voices even before I opened the front door. There was a car in front of the house, so I knew he had visitors. I walked in the way I always do. But I only got as far as the hall, because he heard me and came out of the living room right away. He looked really upset and he said he had company and he couldn’t see me tonight. I asked him if anything was wrong, but he said, ‘No, nothing is wrong.’” Andy paused, remembering. “Then he said something very strange... he said, ‘It has been wrong, but it won’t be any more.’ I could hear a woman carrying on in the living room —”

  “Carrying on how?”

  “Crying. She sounded quite hysterical. I actually got a glimpse of her when he opened the door to go back in. It was Mrs. MacDonald, the estate agent. There was another woman I hadn’t seen before, who was trying to calm her down. I didn’t know what to do. Grandda was almost shoving me out of the door. So I walked to the shed where I’d left my bike and got through to Lynnie on my mobile.” He pulled his sleeve over his hand and wiped his face off. “She told me to wait there, and she’d come over right away.”

  “Because of the estate agent?”

  “That’s right. It seemed odd that she was there, because Grandda had agreed to sell the cottage and the land to Lynnie’s father. Mr. Pitchers wants to turn it into a centre for religious studies.” He let out a hiccup. “Lynnie’s father is a man of strong character. She has two older sisters who have married ministers, and her dad is so proud of them.... I think sometimes Lynnie has felt ove
rlooked.” He glanced over at me, offering the insight tentatively, as if this awareness of psychology was a foreign language. “When she and I met and when Grandda said he would sell Mr Pitchers his house, I think she felt as if she were going to join the charmed circle.” He wiped again. “I do believe my position as a deacon of the church was a large part of my appeal.”

  His voice was dripping with self-pity, but I wasn’t about to reassure him. His insight into his fiancée sounded accurate. Sometimes I think sibling rivalry is the most overlooked motivating factor in many major crimes. Think King Lear.

  We had raced through another village, and now the houses were getting more spread out. The grey sea stretched to the horizon on the left.

  “How much further is it?”

  “About ten minutes. Can you drive faster?”

  It had begun to rain again and the road was slick.

  “No. We can see her. Go on with what you were saying.”

  “Lynnie was afraid our negotiations might be in jeopardy because the final papers weren’t yet signed and you have to watch out in Scotland.”

  The infamous gazump.

  “It was quite soon after I’d telephoned when Mrs. MacDonald came dashing out of the house. The other lady was right behind her. Mrs. MacDonald tried to get into the car and the other lady tried to stop her. The next thing I saw was Mrs. MacDonald had shoved her away and got into the car. The lady ran around to the passenger side and just managed to get in as Mrs. MacDonald drove off.”

  I couldn’t help but let out a sigh myself. Vindication for Joan.

  Andy rubbed at his shin. He was looking white around the gills, and I knew his ankle must be getting very painful.

  “Anyway, I didn’t know what to do. I stayed in the shed until Lynnie arrived shortly after. I told her what had happened, and we went in to see what was going on. Grandda was beside himself, and he looked dreadfully ill. He just burst out at us, ‘I’m not selling the house any more. All plans are cancelled.’ Lynnie asked him why, and he said, ‘I’ve got to put things right.’ If he said that once, he said it ten times. ‘What things?’ Lynnie asked. He just wouldn’t say. Then he insisted we leave. There wasn’t anything we could do.” Andy’s thoughts turned inward and I knew he was coming to the meat of the story. I concentrated on driving. One of the windshield wipers wasn’t working properly and the wind-shield was smeared.

  “We left. We had no choice. We were heading for Shawbost, where Lynnie is staying, but we hadn’t gone too far when we saw the accident site. You know where it was... just before you get to the Dail Beag sign. I mightn’t have noticed, because the car had rolled down the hill, but Lynnie saw it. So we stopped, of course. Mrs. MacDonald was lying across one of the rocks and it was obvious to anyone that she had broken her neck and she was dead. The other blonde lady was still in the car, pinned by her seatbelt. Lynnie went to see to her. She made me stay where I was.”

  His voice lowered as he bent his head, full of shame at the memory of his own cowardice. “I faint at the sight of blood, you see. She came back and said that both of the women were dead. She was sort of odd... almost exhilarated, actually. She had a briefcase in her hand, and she said we’d soon know what Grandda was up to.” His face had turned even more red and his voice was strangled. “I wanted to ring the police right away, I really did, but Lynnie said, ‘No. We can’t help the women now.’ She looked in the case and found papers that said that Grandda had... changed his mind, and was planning to sell the house to some Norwegians at a much better price.” He glanced over at me. “You can do that here. Change your mind that is. We call it gazumping.”

  I nodded. “It’s okay, you don’t need to explain. I know what it means.”

  “I’ve never seen Lynnie so angry. She said she’d sue him, but that would be awful. Technically, Grandda hadn’t done anything illegal, but Lynnie was so concerned about disappointing her father... ”

  He shuddered. I imagined her wrath had been fierce indeed. “She was angry with me too, because she said I was... I was being weak.”

  I thought she had probably used a less polite word, but I didn’t press him. I got the picture.

  “What could I have done though? It was up to Grandda.”

  I shrugged. Andy was the kind of guy who always hooked up with a domineering woman, then drove her crazy with his lack of spine. I was amazed he’d got up the nerve to break off with Coral-Lyn.

  He rubbed at his neck. “I think she was a little hysterical. But she said it was obviously God’s will that the religious centre be built. He’d led us to the papers and He would not tolerate any interference.”

  “Hey, that’s a pretty high authority you’ve got there.”

  I won’t go into how many people I’ve heard spout that sort of line. Including people on opposite sides of a war. Name any war.

  We had a straight stretch of road ahead of us now, so I stepped on the gas. The Nissan had vanished from sight. Andy kept talking, fast and agitated.

  “You can imagine how shocked I was when I heard that the other lady in the accident wasn’t dead and that she had disappeared. What if she had been lying there injured and we could have saved her?”

  “What indeed.”

  “But you said she’s all right?”

  “Yes. You must have felt awful when I told you Coral-Lyn probably caused the accident in the first place on her way to pick you up?”

  “Oh, I did.”

  And from his expression, I gathered he’d probably wondered exactly what he’d got himself hooked up with. I was starting to suspect there was worse to come.

  “So, after you checked out the accident, what did you do?”

  “We turned around and drove back to my house.”

  “Did you stay together for the weekend?”

  “No. She was too disappointed, in me... and Grandda. She left me at my lodgings, and I didn’t see her until Saturday. But by then she was as nice as could be. She came and got me and we went to her house until Sunday.” He shifted uncomfortably. “I did try to talk her into going to the police, but she said we were in God’s hands and what would be, would be. She was very different, very sweet... ”

  Never mind God’s hands, I’m sure Coral-Lyn had used something else to keep him in line.

  “Did you talk to Tormod? Or go back there?”

  “No, we tried his phone but nobody answered.”

  “Didn’t you worry that he might have got ill?”

  “Not really. I never spoke to him on weekends, and we thought that Lisa MacKenzie was with him. We decided to wait until Monday and then see what we could do. But then we got the call while we were demonstrating at the airport that Grandda had died. Lynnie insisted this was another message from God. She said nobody need ever know that he’d changed his mind about selling the house. I would inherit it and we could have the centre as we’d planned. She burned the papers that she found in Mrs. MacDonald’s briefcase. She said it was better if we didn’t say anything at all about being there on Friday. It would only complicate matters. I was so upset I wasn’t thinking clearly, and I just went along with everything she said.”

  I’d gained on the Nissan and could see it now. It turned off the main road onto a side road.

  “Is that the way?”

  “Yes, please hurry.”

  I roared around the turn and up a bumpy gravel road. A sign said TO THE BUTT and, hardly more than two minutes later, I saw the lighthouse and a small parking lot to the right of it. Coral-Lyn had her head down on the dashboard in prayer position but as soon as she saw us pulling in, she jumped out of her car, made some frantic “leave me alone” gestures, and set off at the run up the slope towards the cliffs. Andy scrambled out of my car but despite all the best will in the world, he couldn’t walk, and he yelped with pain. He literally dropped to his hands and knees and tried to crawl after her.

  There wasn’t another soul in the parking lot. “Try to get to the lighthouse and get help,” I ordered him.

  I sprinted
after Coral-Lyn. There was a flat grassy shelf at the top of the cliffs and she was heading straight for the edge. I knew that I didn’t stand a chance of grabbing her, so I tacked off to the left, running hard but trying to approach her obliquely.

  At the edge of the cliff, she dropped into a half-crouch and scuttled out onto a narrow projection. There were sheer drops all around her. At the tip, she turned around to face me and sat down, hugging her knees. I immediately slowed to a walk. I was struggling for breath and I tried to suck in air as deeply as I could. I too, went into a crouch, and still approaching from the side, I stopped at the end of the projectory. I squatted. I’d be able to move quickly if necessary, although she was tantalizingly out of reach. In spite of the wind, which was blowing fiercely, we could just about hear each other.

  “You’ve come for me, haven’t you?”

  I didn’t answer that. “Why don’t you come back to the car and we can talk properly.”

  She actually giggled. “What you mean is you’re going to arrest me.”

  “Why would I do that?’ “Because I killed Grandda, of course.”

  “Did you, Coral-Lyn? How did you do that?”

  “He was a wicked man, you know, even if he was Andy’s grandda. We had made an arrangement, and he wasn’t going to go through with it.”

  “I heard about the centre for religious studies you are planning. It sounds like a very worthwhile project.”

  Yes, I was trying to keep her talking.

  “It would have changed the life of the entire island. But he wouldn’t listen to me.”

  She leaned her chin on her knees, and she looked about five years old. I couldn’t risk taking my eyes off her, but I didn’t get the sense anybody else was in the vicinity, which in this case was probably a good thing. Unless they had a lasso, she was unassailable.

  “You went over to Tormod’s house on Friday, did you, after you left Andy?”

  My voice was as conversational as you can get when you’re sitting on the edge of a high cliff being buffeted by wind.

  “Yes, and it was a good thing I did. All of his wickedness was pouring out of his mouth. I could have left him, but I prayed for guidance and God said to help him.” Like her posture, her voice, high and thin, was that of a child. “I felt so sorry for him, even though he’d been so very wicked. God said it was only kind to put him out of his misery. So I did. It didn’t hurt him. He actually thanked me afterward when he was lying there. He looked so peaceful at last, and I knew he was grateful.”