I thought of going home: not good, practically the first place they’d look. I thought of going back to the hospital: plenty of quiet areas this time of night but I’d almost certainly be recognized. I thought of cruising downtown Lerwick, looking for an all-night café or even a nightclub: potentially quite a good idea, except I was pretty sure there weren’t any. Helen and I couldn’t hide amongst people; there simply weren’t enough of them on Shetland.
‘Can you ride?’ I asked.
Fifteen minutes later I was parking, for the second time that night, some way down the hill from our house. Charles and Henry heard us coming and trotted over to the fence. A few Polo mints each and they were perfectly amenable to being tacked up. I was a bit anxious about Charles’s leg; dealing with a lame horse in the middle of nowhere wasn’t a prospect I relished, but it seemed to be healing well and as long as we took it easy it should hold up.
Dana’s laptop, the books from her desk, our money and Helen’s mobile went into two saddlebags; everything else we had to leave behind. I helped Helen on to Henry then climbed on to Charles. The horses were excited about the prospect of a moonlight outing and skittered about. Helen sat rigid, her knuckles white against the reins. As we set off I felt a pang of misgiving; riding at night isn’t a British Horse Society recommended activity, especially over rough ground with a barely sound horse and an inexperienced rider.
Our property is on the hill above Tresta and I was able to guide us through a field and out of the village before we turned on to the main road; which was probably just as well, because I don’t think I’d ever appreciated what a racket the hoofs of two large horses make on a tarmac surface. Fortunately, Charles was walking well forward, excited about his first real exercise in a week, but setting a good pace that Henry was happy to follow. I wanted to trot, to get off the road as quickly as I could, but I didn’t dare risk it until Helen felt a bit more confident. I could hear her swearing softly to herself as Henry’s hoofs slid on smooth tarmac or clattered against loose stones.
As we moved east from Tresta we lost much of our light. The moon disappeared behind a cloud and the hills seemed to close in around us. We reached the point where the road is cut through the rock of the hills. Neither Helen nor I had much night vision yet and even the horses were struggling. I’ve always hated the feeling when a hoof slides along the road and a quarter of the horse sinks beneath you, and I had a pretty good idea of what Helen must be going through.
We rounded a bend and to our left the hill became a cliff, towering above us. To our right, the land fell away, down towards Weisdale Voe, one of the biggest of the mainland water inlets. In the daylight, this was a well-known beauty spot; at night, without the richness of colour or the sharp contrast of light playing on land and water, the landscape looked empty and unfinished. The rocks were dark and alien; barren, as though incapable of supporting life. In spite of the twinkling lights down at the water’s edge the land around us felt hostile.
As we walked on, I tried to make sense of what we’d discovered in the last couple of hours. Following Dana’s lead, we’d found what appeared to be an illegal money trail: huge sums entering Stephen Gair’s business accounts from unknown sources, much of it being forwarded to a Tronal account, only to be distributed again to prominent men on the islands; including my own husband. Where was all that money coming from? What sort of activity could generate such large amounts? And was there any possibility that we’d misinterpreted what we’d seen? That Duncan, Richard, even Kenn, weren’t involved in Melissa’s and Dana’s deaths.
Half a mile on, I heard what I’d been dreading: the sound of a car. I pulled Charles tightly into the side of the road and behind me Henry, rather than Helen, did the same thing. I could see lights ahead. Charles started to fidget and I tightened the reins. ‘Steady,’ I muttered. ‘Hold him steady,’ I called over my shoulder. The car was almost level with us, we heard the sudden loss of acceleration as the driver saw us and moved his foot towards the brake. The car didn’t stop but continued its way out west.
A quick word to reassure Helen and we were off again. Soon we reached the point where we could turn off on to a smaller road. Now we were heading almost due north along the B9075 to Weisdale. The chances of meeting a speeding car reduced, but not those of being heard and recognized. We had to get through the village quickly and I was going to risk a trot. Checking that Helen’s stirrups were short enough, I reminded her to keep her heels down and tighten up contact on the reins. Then I encouraged Charles forward.
Henry drew level with us. I glanced over and gave Helen what I hoped would be an encouraging smile. She was rising to the trot, but rather overdoing it and missing a few beats. She’d ridden a bit, she’d said, but wasn’t up to jumping or galloping. She was a hell of a trouper, though.
‘Where are we going?’ she asked, having to shout above the sound of the hoofs. It was a good sign that she felt relaxed enough to talk.
‘We’re heading north through the Kergord valley to Voe,’ I answered. ‘A friend of mine has a couple of horses there. She’ll keep these two in her field until I can arrange to have them collected.’
‘Is there road all the way?’ she asked hopefully. We were passing Weisdale Mill and I could see light in the house next to it.
‘No. We’ve got about half a mile of this road and then a farm track for another three-quarters. Then we’re in open country.’
There was silence while she considered the implications of riding across country in the dark.
‘Have you ridden this way before?’
I nodded. There seemed little point adding that on the one occasion I’d done it previously, it had been in daylight, with perfectly sound horses and an experienced local guide.
‘How long will it take?’
‘Couple of hours.’
‘We should have brought food.’
I too was starving. I didn’t want to think about when I’d last eaten. Except once I started I couldn’t help it. About twelve hours ago, I reckoned: a chicken and mayonnaise sandwich on the bus. I was regretting my squeamishness over Dana’s fridge.
Ahead of us reared dark shapes, rare enough in this landscape to seem strange. They were trees: the Kergord plantations, covering about eight to nine acres in total and possibly the only woodlands on Shetland; certainly the only ones I’d ever seen.
The sound we were making changed from the clatter of hoofs on a track to the crunching of dead leaves. Last time I’d ridden this way, my guide had told me how in late spring the woodland carpet is covered with tiny yellow celandines. I tried to make them out but the cloud and the tree cover made it impossible. A flapping and cawing above us made both horses jump. Rooks whirled in the sky, scolding us for waking them.
We’d reached the farm track and I slowed the horses to a walk as we were forced to navigate around a cattle grid. The brief trot had settled them and their pace was steadier.
The horses walked on and the hills rose up around us, casting their shadows across the valley as the night grew darker. I felt panic rising again and told myself to calm down. Horses had been used for transport at night for hundreds of years. Charles and Henry could deal with this, and so could I.
After a few minutes I judged Helen was relaxed enough to talk again.
‘Well, I guess millions of pounds don’t usually appear from nowhere without something dodgy going on. Any idea what?’
Helen risked taking her eyes off the path ahead. ‘I’ve been thinking about that,’ she said. ‘I wonder if they’re selling babies. Maybe to wealthy couples from overseas, countries where private adoption is the norm and money changes hands. Most of the money we saw seemed to be coming from the United States.’
The same thought had occurred to me, but, knowing what I did about Tronal, it didn’t seem possible. ‘According to the records, only about eight babies are born there every year,’ I said. ‘They’d need more, wouldn’t they, to generate that sort of income? And what about the babies who are supposed to be
adopted locally? Where are they coming from?
‘Eight babies, huh? A maternity clinic on a private island for eight babies a year? Seem likely to you?’
‘No,’ I said; that had never seemed even remotely likely.
We’d reached the end of the farm track. We had to go past a few farm buildings and we’d be in open country. At that moment the front door to the farmhouse was flung open and a man appeared. He was short and substantially overweight, close to seventy years old and dressed in a torn string vest and baggy grey jogging pants that hung low on his hips. His feet were bare and I guessed he’d risen from bed too quickly to find his spectacles; he was scowling and squinting, as though struggling to see us properly. A fact that caused me no small level of disquiet, given that he was staring at us down the barrel of a twelve-bore shotgun.
30
I WAS BROUGHT up in the country, my father and brothers were members of the local shoot, I’m even quite handy with a shotgun myself and I know the damage one of those things can do at close range.
It was a tense moment.
Helen held her right hand out in front of her. For a second, I thought it was a gesture of surrender.
‘Police. Put your weapon down immediately, sir.’ She was holding out her ID. Slowly, I dug my hand into my jacket pocket, found my hospital ID and brought it out. I held it up, confident that Jogging Pants would never be able to make out the details.
Far from sure, he lowered his shotgun. ‘What’s going on?’
‘Night patrol, sir,’ said Helen. ‘Now, I need you to put your weapon on the ground. Right now, sir. Aiming a weapon at a police officer is a very serious offence.’
I had to bite my lip. Night patrol! He seemed to be buying it, though. His knees buckled under him and his shotgun slipped to the ground. With an effort, he straightened up.
‘Will I just be phoning the local station?’ he muttered.
‘Certainly, sir,’ said Helen. ‘They’ll need you to go in to sign a statement, so you may prefer to leave it till morning. And you should take in your shotgun licence. They’ll need to check the serial number.’
I loved this woman. Although shotgun licences could be obtained reasonably easily, it was common knowledge that numerous farmers hadn’t bothered.
‘We’ll be on our way now, sir. I’m sorry to have disturbed you. Please give my apologies to your family. Sergeant, will you get the gate?’
I rode forward, jumped down and pushed open the gate that led from the farmyard into the valley. Helen rode past without looking at me. I pushed the gate shut and jumped back into the saddle. I trotted forward to catch up and we walked in silence until I judged we were out of earshot. Looking back, I saw that Jogging Pants had gone inside and closed the door but the light still shone from an upstairs window. As I watched, it flicked off.
‘You couldn’t have made me an inspector?’ I asked.
She glanced over and seemed to force a smile. ‘Night patrol,’ she said. ‘Oh God, Dana would’ve loved that.’
And then she crumpled, from the top down. First her face collapsed, then her shoulders sagged forward, then she fell until she was leaning against Henry’s mane. Her body jerked in great, racking sobs and she began making the sound you only ever hear from someone suffering the deepest grief: a primitive noise, halfway between a howl and a scream. Henry shuddered in protest. Charles, the more highly strung of the two, whinnied and started to jump sideways. I steadied him and, leaning over, took Helen’s reins from her hands and pulled them forwards over Henry’s head. We walked on, I leading Henry, as Helen’s sobs gradually grew softer and less insistent. After a while she was quiet. I glanced back; she was wiping her face on her sleeve. She looked like she’d aged ten years.
‘Sorry,’ she muttered.
‘No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be putting you through this. You can’t possibly be up to it.’
She straightened in the saddle. ‘Was Dana murdered yesterday?’
I thought very carefully before I answered her. I wasn’t playing at Nancy Drew any more. This was real and very, very serious. ‘Yes,’ I said, ‘I think she was.’
‘I’m up to it. Can I have my reins back?’
We walked on for a few minutes. On either side the hills loomed high above us, deep shadows against a charcoal sky. We were about as far from the sea as it is possible to get on Shetland – which isn’t far, three or four miles at most – but it seemed the landscape had changed when we entered the valley: the scents became those of land rather than sea, the musty dampness of peat, the ripeness of fresh vegetation. The wind had lost some of its ferocity, just buffeting us gently every few minutes, lest we get complacent.
Every now and again the moon appeared from behind a cloud and in its light the ground sparkled as though showered with broken glass. We were walking over flints gripped tight by the land, and they shone around us in the moonlight.
We came to the first of several streams that we had to cross. As I urged Charles over, he tugged his head forward and bent to drink. Henry copied him.
‘Is this water drinkable?’ asked Helen.
I was pretty parched too. The wine I’d drunk earlier had had its usual dehydrating effect.
‘Well, these two seem to think so,’ I said, jumping down. Helen followed suit and the four of us drank the ice-cold, slightly peaty-flavoured water. Helen washed her face; I splashed copious amounts over my head and felt better immediately. Still starving hungry, though.
Out of the corner of my eye I saw something moving towards us; something too large to be a sheep. I cried out, every nerve-ending in my body prickling. Helen was beside me in a second. Then we both relaxed. The one shape had become several and they were all heading our way. They were a dozen or more native Shetland ponies. I’d forgotten this valley was home to a large herd.
Horses are immensely social creatures and the herd, spotting two strangers of their own kind, had come up to say hello. They seemed not remotely perturbed at finding two humans as well. Two of the bolder ones started nuzzling my legs; one even allowed Helen to bend down and pet her.
‘You know it could catch on,’ I said, watching Henry rub muzzles with a grey mare that could only have been nine hands high.
‘What could?’ said Helen.
‘Mounted police on the Shetlands,’ I said. ‘There’s a whole mass of terrain that’s totally inaccessible by road and no shortage of native livestock.’
‘Worth thinking about,’ agreed Helen. ‘Course the mounties would have to be midgets.’
‘You’d need to rethink the height rule.’
‘Maybe special dispensation for Shetland. How many of these ponies do you have up here?’
‘Not sure anyone knows. They breed like rabbits, apparently. A lot are sold – to pet centres, model farms, that sort of place. And as children’s mounts. They’re incredibly popular. Exported all over the wor—’ I stopped, realizing what I was saying.
‘Like Shetland babies?’ asked Helen.
‘Possibly,’ I said, ‘except . . .’
‘Where are they all coming from?’ she prompted.
I nodded.
Helen frowned, appeared to think for a moment. ‘Let’s just say there are more babies being born there than appear on your register,’ she said at last. ‘Let’s say that Stephen Gair, Andy Dunn, Kenn Gifford . . . all the men whose records we checked earlier . . .’
‘It’s OK,’ I interrupted. ‘You’re allowed to mention Duncan and Richard.’
She gave me a half smile. ‘Suppose they are involved, making a whole packet of money from it, and somehow Melissa Gair found out, threatened to go to the police. That would be motive enough, wouldn’t it, to get her out of the way?’
‘I guess.’
‘But why not just kill her, stage an accident? Why fake her death and keep her alive for so long?’
‘Because Stephen Gair knew she was pregnant. He wanted his child.’ I explained Dana’s theory about the boy Stephen Gair called his stepson being, in
fact, his own son by Melissa. Helen seemed to shrink a little inside herself at the mention of Dana, but managed to hold it together.
‘Hell of a risk,’ she said. ‘And why cut out her heart? Why those weird symbols on her back? Why bury her in your field, for God’s sake? Why not just dump her out at sea?’
‘Because they have to be buried in sweet, dark earth,’ I whispered, not really intending that she should hear.
She gave me a look. ‘Are we back to trolls again? I can’t do trolls right now. We need to get moving.’
She gathered up her reins and lifted her foot to the stirrup. She was mounting from the wrong side but I didn’t say anything. Henry would probably go with it. Then she stopped.
‘Do you want me to hold him?’ I offered.
‘Shut up,’ she hissed. ‘Listen.’
I listened. Soft whinnying from the ponies, gentle slurping as several of them drank, whistling of the wind down from the hill tops. And something else. Something low, regular, mechanical. Not a sound of nature. Something insistent; something approaching.
‘Shit!’ Helen threw the reins forward over Henry’s head and started pulling him towards a steep overhang of rock at the valley’s edge.
‘Come on,’ she urged. The noise was getting louder. The ponies could hear it now and didn’t like it. Several of them kept breaking away from the group, sprinting off and then back again. Helen had reached the outcrop. I made it a few seconds later. We backed close to the rock, pulling the horses up against us. We held their heads and tried to keep them still as we waited for the helicopter to approach.
‘The farmer phoned the police after all,’ I whispered, as though people in a helicopter still half a mile away could hear us.
‘More likely they found your car,’ said Helen. ‘Does everyone know you have horses?’
I thought about it. Duncan, of course, would know immediately that the horses were missing, but he was off the islands. Gifford! Gifford knew. And Dunn, of course. In fact, pretty much the entire Shetland police force. Richard. Yes, just about everyone knew I had horses.
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