Naming the Bones (26 page)

‘No.’

It was an effort not to drop his gaze to the carpet, like a guilty schoolboy.

‘Are you a journalist?’

‘Why would you think that?’

Mrs Dunn held the desk diary to her, like a shield.

‘You were asking questions about Mrs Graves yesterday and then there were all those notes in your room, newspaper cuttings and the like.’ Her voice took on a defensive tone. ‘I couldn’t help seeing them when I was making the bed.’

‘No.’ There was no point in dissembling. Better the truth reach Christie than the island decide he was a tabloid reporter in search of old scandal. Besides, he was heading home. Murray smiled to make himself less threatening. ‘I’m not a journalist. I’m a doctor of English literature.’

The photos of children with Purdey haircuts and eighties flicks smiled down on the scene from the stairway above, like well-fed cherubim. The old woman laid the diary back beside the telephone and gave him an offended look.

‘You should have stated your title in the visitors’ book. I’d be grateful if you could amend your entry before you leave.’

Murray drove to the roughcast path that Christie had disappeared down and parked the car. Mrs Dunn had phoned ahead and booked him on the five o’clock ferry. He’d be back in Glasgow by teatime, would sleep in his own bed that night.

The road looked too jagged for his small vehicle. Murray hesitated, wanting to make progress, but unwilling to risk a burst tyre or, worse still, a broken axle.

He got out and slammed the door, feeling in the pocket of his jacket for his mobile phone. He would have to keep his eye on the time, make sure he left himself space to get back before the sailing.

The cold prickled his skin after the dry air of the overheated car. Murray drew his scarf over his mouth and pulled his hat down over his ears. It had been autumn when he’d started out on his quest in Edinburgh, but already there were intimations of winter. He scented the tang of salt in the wind and wondered what the dark months were like on the small island, set unprotected on the edge of the North Atlantic.

There was no real chance he’d get to speak to Christie this trip. He would have to waste time in Glasgow, then organise himself and come back, rent a cottage or something. He would avoid lodging with Mrs Dunn again. He’d mentioned his research, hoped she might be willing to talk about Lunan’s time on the island, but the old woman had grown brisk, reminding him to pack his stuff before his walk.

‘I’ll need the room clear if I’m to get it ready for Dr Edwards and Dr Grant arriving.’

A slight emphasis on the
Dr
, as if to let him know other academics didn’t need to be outed.

Murray silently cursed the archaeology department. He remembered them from his time with Angela; a long-haired, cagoule-clad, unwashed crew, not so different, he suspected, from the ancient tribes they studied, except the ancient ones got more than the occasional drunken shag. He stopped and unlatched the aluminium gate to the next field. There was nothing ahead but stony road, sheep and shit. Wherever Christie lived, it was almost certainly too far to walk to and return from before the ferry sailed. He hoped the archaeologists got mud and Guinness on Mrs Dunn’s pink sheets.

He was plucked from his thoughts by the rumble of a diesel engine. Murray turned and saw a small vehicle with outsize wheels, a hybrid tractor-cum-dune buggy, bouncing over the uneven track, pulling a trailer in its wake. He waved a hand, to make sure the driver had seen him, then opened the gate wide, stepping back to allow it room to pass. The vehicle barely slowed as it cleared the opening, but drew to a halt a short distance ahead, waiting while Murray latched the gate. A small Jack Russell regarded his progress from the empty trailer, its tail, nose and ears frozen into inquisitive points.

He was sure the driver was about to turn him back with some warning about bulls or rutting stags, but the man flashed an easy grin.

‘Cheers.’ He was somewhere in his early thirties, compact and wiry, dressed in orange overalls and mud-spattered Wellingtons. ‘Heading for the castle?’

It was the first he had heard of the existence of a castle on the island, but Murray returned the man’s smile and said, ‘I am if I can get there and back before the ferry sails.’

‘Hop in. There’s plenty time if I drive you one way.’

The man’s accent was English, from somewhere in the Midlands, though Murray couldn’t place where.

He gripped one of the bars that composed the open frame of the small cab and hauled himself onboard, unsure of whether he should follow his whim. But the vehicle was already gaining speed, bouncing over the loose stones faster than he would have thought possible. Murray held tight to the crash bar, unable to stop himself jolting with the buggy’s movements, feeling the stranger’s body hard and unwelcome against his side.

‘I saw your car at the top of the road. You’ll be the man who almost wiped out Mrs Graves.’

‘Did she tell you?’

The weathered creases round the driver’s eyes wrinkled in amusement.

‘No, I got it from the Lismore Gazette.’

‘Shit, you’re kidding.’

The man laughed. ‘Jamie the postman.’

Murray thought he could hear the jolting of the cab in his own laugh. He said, ‘I should apologise to her.’

‘We’re headed in the right general direction, but I wouldn’t bother. She doesn’t like to be disturbed.’

‘Not the sociable type?’

The man slowed the pace and looked back towards the trailer.

‘Okay, then, off you go.’

For a second Murray thought his question had offended, but then the terrier jumped from the trailer and started to trot behind.

‘Jinx hates the next bit.’

The buggy rounded a bend and the road fell away from them into a precipitous scree-lined descent. Murray tensed his already tight grip and felt a sudden kinship with the dog. The small man’s grin grew wider. ‘My kids call it Everest.’

His bones were jarring so hard it felt they might soon be loosed from his flesh, but there was something exhilarating in the recklessness of the speed that made Murray dampen the urge to beg the stranger to stop and instead give himself over to the thrill of the plunge. He recalled ten-year-old Jack’s spew, candyfloss pink, catching the wind then coating the tough guy birling the waltzers at the Glasgow Green shows, and laughed out loud.

The man laughed with him.

‘This hill’s the reason I could afford the croft. It makes everything a hundred times harder, but I’ve got to love it. I wouldn’t be here without it.’ The terrier had somehow got ahead of them. Its rump flashed white as it ran, tail bobbing, down the rough track, too close to the tractor’s front wheels for comfort. The driver didn’t bother to slow his pace.

‘I’m Pete, by the way.’

‘Murray.’

‘On holiday?’

‘Aye, a bit of a break from Glasgow.’ His world seemed far away, here in the plunging gloom, the last greenery of the year still clinging to the leaves of the young trees that lined the sheltered track. Murray realised that the path had been dug into the hill and wondered if it was the small man’s doing. He asked, ‘Have you lived here long?’

‘Three years.’

They were almost at the bottom now. Pete put an extra spurt on the last few yards; the dog anticipated the move and resigned the race, trotting up the verge, where she sat grinning as they passed. The cab listed to the left as it turned the corner, out of the shade of the trees and into the open. Pete slowed to a halt.

‘There’s the castle.’

But he needn’t have spoken. Murray could see the ruined structure perched on top of a plug of rock, silhouetted against the sea. Its walls had been reduced by wind or warfare to crooked columns that pointed towards the sky like a warped crown. Some grazing horses raised their heads at the sound of the tractor and then lowered them back to the grass, reassured it was nothing unusual. Murray tried to envision how the scene must have looked when the castle was whole and occupied by some tribe, but his imagination failed. All he could see was the vista spread before him, like Arcadia restored after the devastation of man.

The dog leapt into the trailer, wagging its tail.

‘Decided to trust my driving again, have you, Jinxy?’ Pete reached back and rubbed her hard between her ears, then pointed towards a small white-painted cottage, about a mile from the castle.

‘That’s our place there.’

‘And this is your land?’

‘Some of it.’

‘A beautiful place to live.’

‘Yep.’ The small man creased his face into a weathered grin. ‘You can forget how stunning a landscape is when you see it every day. I do anyway, the wife’s more appreciative.’

Murray wondered if Pete had brought him here in the hope of viewing the scene afresh, through another pair of eyes.

‘And your children?’

He laughed.

‘Desperate for bright lights, big city. The horses are the only thing keeping them here, and them not for long. Meaghan will be off to university next year and I doubt her brother will be far behind.’

Murray scanned the horizon, hoping for sight of a house that might belong to Christie Graves, but apart from the castle and Pete’s cottage, there was only land and sea.

Pete started the engine again. ‘I’ll drop you down at the bottom. You should be able to climb up to the castle and make it back in good time for the ferry. Have you enjoyed your stay?’

‘It was too short.’

‘That’s holidays for you. We threw caution to the wind and took the kids to Corfu last year. I swear I was just off the plane when I was getting back on it again, couldn’t understand where I got the tan from.’

‘Aye, I would have stayed longer, but I screwed up my booking.’

‘Unless someone makes an almighty balls-up, the island will still be here next year. That’s what I told myself as we flew away from the sunshine. Mind you, Corfu would be no place for our kind of farming. Dry as beef jerky, no grazing at all.’

‘Next year will be too late.’

Pete glanced at him, his face suddenly guarded, and Murray realised he sounded like a man with terminal illness or suicide on his mind.

‘My project will have run out of time.’

He told Pete about his research, and the biography he was planning, as they closed the final distance to the ruined castle.

‘You screwed up.’

Pete slowed the tractor to a halt and Murray climbed from the cab.

‘I did indeed.’

‘Ah, well.’ The small man grinned. ‘It happens. You know where we are now. Next time you visit, don’t be a stranger. Drop by and have a dram.’

The Scots word sounded strange married with his flat, Midland vowels.

Murray nodded. ‘You’re on.’

Jinx perched her front paws on the edge of the trailer watching them. Murray reached out to pat the terrier and her teeth snarled back in a growl.

‘No manners, this one.’

Pete shoved the dog gently from its perch and climbed back into his cab. Murray raised a hand in farewell, and then started towards the castle. When he looked back the tractor was bouncing far along the track towards home.

Chapter Twenty-One

MURRAY CLIMBED UP
into the grassed-over centre of the castle and stared out to sea, his mind as blank as the white foam frothing on the incoming tide. He would go to Edinburgh tomorrow, seek out the Geordie’s landlord and ask why he’d burnt Bobby Robb’s library. What kind of books were they that the man had felt compelled to turn them into a bonfire, even though he’d already promised them to his niece?

It was a while before he could find a signal and call a directory service for the Geordie’s number. They connected him and he waited, imagining Lauren sitting in the pub’s backroom, absorbed in some existential tome while the phone rang out.

Murray killed the call. He looked at the three bars on his phone, wondering how long the battery would last, then found the phone signal again and pressed redial, determined to check whether the man was on shift and break the cycle of disorganisation that would see him expelled from the island. This time a gruff male voice answered on the second ring.

‘Yes?’

‘Hi, can I speak to the landlord, please?’

‘If you make it snappy.’

Murray hadn’t thought through what he would say and the words seemed to tumble from him.

‘I’m phoning about a recently deceased customer of yours . . .’

‘Jesus Christ, let me guess – our dear departed Crippen.’

‘How did you know?’

‘We might not attract the youth market, but they’re still not exactly dropping like flies round here.’ The landlord sounded wary. ‘What about him?’

This time Murray decided to tell the truth.

‘I’m writing a book about someone Mr Robb knew a long time ago. I was hoping to interview him.’

‘Aye, well, unless you’re planning on following him down into the eternal beer cellar, I’d say you were onto plums.’ Someone said something in the background and the landlord muffled the mouthpiece and gave an indistinct reply that sounded impatient. When he returned to the phone his voice was brisk. ‘Look, mate, I’m in the middle of a delivery. I didn’t really know the guy, just sold him a few beers over the years. I don’t think I can help you.’

‘I need to ask you a specific question.’

‘What?’

‘About Bobby’s effects.’

There was silence on the line. For a moment Murray thought he’d blown it and the other man was about to hang up, but then he heard a sigh and the landlord said, ‘Why don’t you drop by later in the day? I’m on until two.’

Murray looked out to where the grey sea met the lighter grey of the sky. The pub would be there tomorrow, but he had the man on the line now. He said, ‘You’ve no idea how good the idea of a pint sounds to me, but . . .’

‘But?’