Palmer-Jones 03 - Murder in Paradise (18 page)

“I’ll tell her.”

“The police phoned from Baltasay,” Jonathan said, “just after you’d gone out. They’re coming in this afternoon, in their own plane.”

“They’ll miss me, then.”

He went into the house to pack an overnight bag, then began to walk to the airstrip. He hoped to leave before the police arrived on Kinness. It was not that he felt in competition with them. He would have been glad of a chance to discuss the information that Elspeth Dance had a secret and was frightened of being recognized. But he knew that they would not be interested. They were willing to consider that Robert’s death was murder, but he was certain that Robert had died only because he shared Mary Stennet’s knowledge. Mary Stennet’s death was the key to the thing, and they believed that she was a foolhardy girl who had slipped.

He enjoyed the walk to the airstrip and got there before Alec’s car or the aeroplane. He heard the engine of the plane first, then Alec’s car raced up the track and stopped dramatically with squealing brakes and a cloud of sand, just as the plane touched down.

As the Woollie Man unloaded his luggage from the boot, Alec stuck his head through the car window and shouted at George:

“You’re leaving then, are you? You rake up all the muck and then you piss off. Well, don’t think you’ll be welcome on Kinness again.”

Perhaps he thought that George would not hear him. The noise of the plane’s engine was very loud. George got in and chose a seat by the window. The plane took off and circled the island once before heading for Baltasay. George looked at Kinness, green and perfect below him, and he knew that what Alec had said was true. However things turned out, he would never be welcome on the island again, and once the matter was resolved, he knew he would never return.

That afternoon Sarah met Elspeth quite by chance. Alec had told her that George had gone to Baltasay. She supposed that he was following some line of investigation and felt resentful because he had not told her why he was going. Jim had refused her offer of help on the croft and she did not want to stay inside. The sunshine tempted her to explore.

On the west side of the island there was a small, sandy beach. Sarah saw it from the clifftop and thought that she could get down to it. It was an adventure. When she got to the beach, Elspeth was already there. Sarah had not seen her from the clifftop. She was sitting on a rock and she was crying. She was wearing a shawl round her shoulders and Sarah thought that the first Ellie Dance must have looked like that. Sarah did not know what to do. Elspeth had not seen her, she was staring out to sea with a mournful, melodramatic air. Then Sarah slipped on the shingle at the top of the beach. The pebbles rattled and bounced with a sound like gunshot and Elspeth turned and saw her.

“I’m sorry,” Sarah said awkwardly, walking up to the rock. “I didn’t know you were here. I didn’t mean to disturb you.”

“I suppose that they’re all talking about me,” Elspeth said, “because I made a fool of myself at the sale.” She had not dried her tears and her face was red and blotchy like a miserable child’s. “I suppose I should be used to it by now, but the thought of all the tongues wagging still bothers me.”

She seemed not to expect any answer and continued:

“The police are coming in this afternoon to ask more questions about Robert. I wish they’d stop. I hate it.”

With another sudden change of conversation she said:

“You seem very happy with Jim. I’ve been jealous. I suppose I’m a bitch.”

“It must have been difficult,” Sarah said carefully. “All the fuss about the wedding. If you still cared for Jim.”

“Yes. It was difficult. It wouldn’t have worked, if we’d married. He would have hated me very soon. But it was nice to dream about. I suppose we all need something to dream about during the difficult times. I dreamt about coming home and marrying Jim. When I got here, I found that he was already engaged to a pretty English girl.”

“But you didn’t pin the note on my wedding dress?”

“No.” She did not ask for an explanation for the question. “ I hoped that you wouldn’t like it here,” she said. “ I hoped that you would leave. But it must have been horrible. First Mary and now Robert.”

“It hasn’t been too comfortable.”

“I wonder if I would have been different, nicer, if I’d been born somewhere else,” Elspeth said. “ I seem to have been doomed from birth. I was named after a girl who went mad and committed suicide.”

“I know.”

“It haunts me sometimes. As if that’s my fate, too, and there’s nothing I can do to prevent it.”

“That’s ridiculous. And it’s an excuse for making no effort to determine your own future.”

“Perhaps. But that’s how I feel. I tried to explain to them in Glasgow but they couldn’t understand. They thought I was making excuses.”

“There’s Ben,” Sarah said. “ You have to make a future for him.”

“They said that in Glasgow too. And they were right. Of course they were right. But they didn’t know how guilty I felt, and that it helped sometimes to think that I wasn’t entirely responsible.”

“Elspeth,” Sarah said, “ what happened in Glasgow?”

She was quite sure that Elspeth was preparing to tell her everything. She felt very close to the other woman. She could smell the wet wool of the shawl mixed with the odour of salt and seaweed. Sheltered by the cliffs, they could see nothing of the island, and the middle-aged gossips in the tidy white houses seemed a thousand miles away.

Then around the bottom of the cliff, looking out of place in his working clothes, walked Kenneth Dance. He was wearing Wellingtons over his grey trousers, but the tie, the neat waistcoat, and grey jacket made it seem that he had left the post office in a hurry. He was obviously finding the exertion of the walk uncomfortable, and stopped to catch his breath.

“Damn that man,” Elspeth said. “He’s spying on me. He follows me everywhere.”

“He can’t hear us.”

“It’s no good. He doesn’t trust me. He’s come to take me home to face the police.”

Sarah expected her to walk down the beach towards her father, but she ran away up the cliff, her shoes in her hand and the shawl in a tangled mat around her shoulders. Kenneth Dance looked helplessly as she disappeared, then walked back the way he had come.

As he went the plane flew in again.

George was surprised to find Sylvia waiting for him at the Baltasay airport in a hire car.

“Jonathan telephoned me and said you were coming.” she said, “I thought this would save you the bother of coming to find me.”

“It was kind of you.”

“Oh, I’ve been starting to feel bored again. Baltasay isn’t very much more entertaining than Kinness.”

She turned to him and smiled and he felt that she was pleased to see him.

“Where do you want to go?” she asked.

“Would you mind if we had tea? I missed lunch. Perhaps we could have a proper island tea with scones and cakes.”

She laughed, and as she tipped back her head her long earrings moved and reflected the warm colour of her skin. He was glad to be alone with her.

She took him to the hotel where James had courted Melissa. It had not changed very much. They sat in a large, gloomy lounge, surrounded by dark stained wood. They were alone.

“Why have you come?” she asked. “There’s no mystery about my leaving, and I’m going back to Kinness on the next boat. Won’t your questions wait until then?”

She was humouring him, taking an interest in the inquiry through politeness. She thought that he was bored, as she was, missing his work, and he had to create a little diversion for himself, to pass the time.

“They would have waited,” he said. “ Something else brought me to Baltasay.”

“Did it?” Again she was not really interested. She was pouring the tea and she seemed to be devoting her attention to giving him just the right amount of milk. But he felt that her thoughts were elsewhere. It was not that she was anxious, only preoccupied with a pleasant daydream. She looked up and saw that he was watching her.

“I’m sorry that I left the island in such an impulsive way. Did you think that I was your murderer?”

She realized that she had gone too far. He knew that she was mocking him. “ I’m sorry,” she said again. “What do you want to know?”

“I want to know your secret.”

She had not expected this and gave him her full attention. The languorous mood was over.

“That’s very ungallant,” she said, recovering herself. “ No woman will reveal all her secrets.”

“Start by telling me about Alec Stennet.”

She was relieved and laughed again. She stretched a long, smooth arm across the polished table, then turned the palm of the hand up in a gesture of indifference.

“One night at a party he got drunk and I let him walk home with me. Jonathan had left hours before. He’s an unsocial bore at times. I must have been drunk, too, because I let Alec kiss me. He is handsome, you know, in a strange, brutish way. He won’t let me forget it and neither will the island. It was only a kiss, despite what he’s told them. They think I’m a scarlet woman anyway because I won’t go to church, so they’re quite prepared to think the worst of me. There would hardly be less gossip if I were running a brothel in the school house. Alec’s attentions were entertaining for a while, but they became tedious.”

Her diversion, he thought, her relief from boredom.

“And there are no other secrets?” he asked.

“Nothing that I’d be prepared to talk to you about.” She smiled. “And nothing that could have any relevance to Mary’s death.”

“Jonathan did tell you,” George said slowly, “that Robert was murdered?”

“No.” She was very shocked. “He said there was an accident with a shotgun.”

“It was murder,” George said. “The police are back on Kinness this afternoon, asking questions.” He paused. “I shall have to tell them that Robert was on the hill on Monday morning, watching you. You were in the empty croft, talking to someone.”

“No.” Her hands were shaking and she lit a cigarette. “ I told you at the time. I was on my own.”

“You should tell me. It may have no relevance.”

“No.”

As she sat and smoked she seemed to recover her poise. Despite her refusal to answer his questions George knew that he wanted to prolong the encounter. It was as if she had enchanted him, and he were unable to let her go.

“I have a message for you,” he said, “from Jonathan.”

She waited with polite but wary interest. She was turning the wedding ring round and round on her finger, but gave no other sign of concern.

“He says that he will leave the island as soon as he can get another job. Before that if it makes you happy.”

There was no reaction.

“Does he?” she said. “ I think, you know, that it’s a little late for that.”

She was staying at the hotel and excused herself to go upstairs to prepare to go out. She had arranged to meet a friend, a woman she stressed, who taught music at the high school. There was an exhibition of local art in the museum and they were going together. He watched her walk across the lounge, then poured himself another cup of tea from the ample pot. He seemed unable to leave. He was tied to her.

She was away for longer than he had expected, and he felt foolish, sitting by the dirty plates in the empty room. When she came down the stairs at last, she was dressed in a warm jacket and leather boots. She saw him through the open door of the lounge, but she did not approach him again. She waved and went out. He had the impression that she was running away from him.

He waited until she left the building, then walked to the reception desk. The receptionist was a local girl, buxom and saucy, with a round red face. She grinned at him.

“It’s very quiet here today,” he said.

“You’re telling me. I’ve not spoken to a soul since lunchtime.”

It was a great hardship to her, this solitude.

“As it’s so quiet, I suppose you’d remember all the incoming telephone calls received by your guests.”

“I might.” She was curious but suspicious.

“I’m a private detective,” he said confidentially. “It’s a divorce matter.”

She was enthralled. “ You want to know about the lady you were taking tea with?” She had no hesitation now in talking to him.

“Yes. Has she had any telephone calls since she’s been staying here?”

“I’m not here all the time, of course.” She spoke in a stage whisper, although there was no one to hear. “ I was working last night and there were two calls for her then.”

“Did you take the calls yourself?”

“Yes I did.”

“Do you remember anything about them? Were the callers men or women?”

“They were both men.”

“It wasn’t the same man ringing twice?”

“Certainly not.” She was indignant that he should question her competence at information-gathering. She was obviously skilled at it. It was her way of passing the time. “The voices were quite different.”

“In what way?”

“One was la-di-da. Toffee-nosed English. A bit like the lady speaks. The other was local, an islander. Not from Baltasay, though. From one of the outer isles. I’d say he came from Kinness.”

“Would you?” He nodded. “I see.”

“Is that useful?” she asked excitedly.

“Oh yes. Very useful.”

She was thrilled to have helped him.

After he had left the hotel he wondered if he should have paid her for the information. It had not occurred to him. He thought she would feel that she had been adequately rewarded because her afternoon would pass much more quickly and she would have something to chat about to her friends.

What had he learnt? The toffee-nosed Englishman was obviously Jonathan, but who was the other man with the Kinness accent? Perhaps Alec refused to accept that Sylvia was no longer interested in him. That was possible. She was very attractive.

He walked along the quay past the fishing boats, the big oil supply vessels. The town was busy. Children, just out of school, lingered around the harbour, putting off the time of parents and homework. The move to the high school must be hard for the Kinness children, George thought. They had to face the sudden exposure to the bustle and relative anonymity of the small town without the support of their parents. Did they revel in the freedom or were they dreadfully homesick? He remembered Will’s resentment at being dragged back to Kinness. He at least had been happy to leave the island. Wouldn’t everything have been different if Mary had been allowed out to Baltasay, too? She would have had friends of her own age. More stimulating school work. There would have been more to think about than adult secrets.