Too Soon a Death: A Scottish mystery where cosy crime meets tartan noir: Borders Mysteries Book 2 (19 page)

‘I suppose so. He says he’s always been honest with her, but I don’t know what that means in practice.’

‘How did he react to this?’

‘You’re the only person who knows so far.’

‘Don’t you think you should tell him about it?’

‘I’d rather find out what she has to say first.’

‘So you are going to meet her?’

‘I’m swithering. What do you think I should do?’

‘When have you ever taken notice of my advice?’ Zoe smiled to let Kate knew she was only joking.

‘There’s a first time for everything. Really, I want to know what you think.’

‘I’m not sure what I think. It’s your decision.’

‘I know.’ Kate got up. ‘Come on, let’s go for a paddle.’

Ten minutes later they were walking barefoot along the water’s edge, Mac trotting happily a few metres in front of them on his extending lead. Zoe couldn’t remember the last time she’d felt sand beneath her feet.

‘This is wonderful. I think I may come here a lot in the future,’ she said.

‘You could take up windsurfing,’ Kate said. ‘I’ll sit on the beach and play with your baby. Which reminds me, have you heard the latest about Dave Trent’s son?’

‘No. Is he alright?’

‘He’s out of danger, though he’ll be in an incubator for a while longer.’

‘What a relief for his parents.’

‘And Erskine. It means Dave’s back at work.’

Zoe drew up and faced her friend head on. ‘Speaking of whom, is all this fresh air helping you to decide how to answer Mrs Mather’s email?’

‘Not really. Should I agree to meet her without telling Erskine? It was obvious when we briefly got together last night that he has no idea she’s been in touch with me.’

‘If you refuse, what do you think she’ll do?’

‘I’m more worried about what her husband will do. If I tell him, he’s bound to rush off and confront her, but if I don’t and he finds out—he’s a detective, after all—I’ll be in trouble for keeping him in the dark.’

‘Be honest, Kate, aren’t you just a tiny bit curious about what she’s like and why she wants to see you? I would be.’

‘You’re saying I should meet her without telling him?’

Zoe put her hands up. ‘You can’t expect me to comment on that aspect of it. My point is, if you don’t see her, you’ll never know what she wants. Maybe she’s decided to be your friend.’

They both laughed at this idea, then turned to continue their walk along the beach. Back at the hut, Zoe opted to sit on a towel rather than risk the deckchair again, and a damp but happy Mac settled next to her.

Kate sat down opposite them. ‘My other piece of news is I’ve lost a client and gained two new ones since we last met.’

‘Wasn’t the rugby-playing banker pleased with your brilliant deductions about his ancestors?’

‘One of things you learn early on in this game is that clients have to be handled very carefully. They often have unrealistic expectations of what a genealogist is able to do, and they don’t want to hear about any loose ends. Worse still are those who bring along their own preconceptions about what you’re going to find, based on family lore or something Great-Aunt Ada once told them. So I explained in detail to Simon how I made the jump from the Criminal Register to what we found in the graveyard and the records I subsequently unearthed. I needed him to understand that my theory about his lineage on his father’s side going across the border to Northumberland wasn’t just a wild guess.’ Kate paused to take a mouthful of lemonade.

‘Was he displeased at the suggestion one of his ancestors had been a petty criminal?’ Zoe asked.

‘I couldn’t tell what he thought. You know me, I’m pretty good at interpreting facial expressions and body language, but I found him almost impossible to read. He heard me out, nodded, then asked me to hand over the copies of documents I’d brought with me and email him the balance of my bill. He didn’t even want the presentation copy of his family tree which I give every client. Either he wasn’t interested or for some reason he was pretending not to be.’

‘That’s bizarre. He seemed very keen at the start, didn’t he?’

‘Maybe it’s a case of buyer’s remorse. He suddenly realised how much I’d had cost him and wished he’d kept hold of his money.’

‘Does that happen often?’

‘I don’t usually meet clients face to face, so maybe more of them regret hiring me than I know.’

‘You’d have gone out of business years ago if that was the case.’

‘True. In fact, if you look on my website you’ll see I’ve got a pageful of testimonials. And, perhaps more importantly, I’ve only ever not been paid in full once. The credit card I’d put the deposit through on was refused for the balance and the client—who’d given me an address in Alaska—never responded to emails or letters. I chalked it up to experience.’

Zoe shifted on the towel, ending up with her legs splayed out in front of her. This felt unladylike but extremely comfortable. ‘So you’ll do as he asked and then just get on with the next one?’

‘I already have. Anyway, let’s not talk about work. How’s Patrick?’

‘I’ve not seen him since your birthday. Why would I?’

‘He mentioned you’d gone out walking together.’

‘Our dogs get on well.’

Kate burst out laughing. ‘That’s priceless. You will tell me if your dogs decide to take their relationship to the next level, won’t you?’

‘Don’t you think they deserve some privacy?’ Zoe said, trying to keep a straight face.

Before they realised, it was time to leave. Despite a lavish layer of suntan lotion, Zoe’s shoulders had started to redden and her back ached. It had been a lovely day but she felt relieved to be on her own again when Kate dropped her off at Keeper’s Cottage.

Expecting to have been contacted by Paul by now, she dialled 1471 on the house phone to see if she’d missed any calls. She had, but the anodyne female voice informed her that whoever had rung just after two o’clock had withheld their number.

Another unwanted sales pitch for home improvements? Or was her stalker back?

TWENTY-TWO

Although he was seeing no patients on Thursday morning, Walter’s door remained shut and Margaret reported relations had been frosty between the partners since their heated discussion on Tuesday. Paul wasn’t due in until the afternoon, and in the absence of a phone call from him, Zoe wondered if she should stick around after surgery to see him. She even briefly considered barging into Walter’s room and tackling him face to face about this latest discord which had at its heart his long-standing resentment of her.

In the end, she decided to wait for the men to work things out between them. Which wasn’t like her at all. ‘Having you to think about is changing me,’ she whispered as she sat down and smoothed her white blouse over her bump.

Half an hour later, during a lull caused by two patients in a row failing to turn up, she checked her mobile and found a text had come in from Kate.

Meeting Mrs M tomorrow morn in Edinburgh. Wish me luck. K

Good luck. Let me know how you get on. Z

Again suppressing the urge to confront Walter, Zoe left the health centre around noon to go home. As soon as she walked into the hall and tripped over a pile of books she knew she could no longer put off going to the charity shop.

She took a call from Patrick just after loading the final bag into the Jeep.

‘Hi, Zoe. I’m calling to check you’re still on for our not-a-date tomorrow night.’

‘Have you decided where we’re going?’

‘I thought we might try the Rowan Tree Inn. It closed last year but someone new’s taken over and it’s reopened as a small restaurant rather than a pub. Do you know it?’

‘I’ve driven past it a few times.’

‘I have to go through Westerlea to get there, so can you tolerate my driving for one night?’

‘If you want. Though I’m off alcohol anyway so you might still prefer it if I picked you up.’

After a pause, Patrick said, ‘No need. I’ll be there for seven, if that suits you.’

‘Alright.’

Weary of waiting for Kate, Paul and her father to get in touch, Zoe decided to get away for a few hours the next morning by taking Mac for a long walk somewhere further away from home. Tempted to go to Coldingham Bay again, she opted instead to drive to the Chain Bridge. Hadn’t she told Sergeant Trent that Mac would enjoy walking alongside the river? Returning to where the boy’s body had been pulled ashore didn’t worry her. She had no fear of open spaces; experience had taught her that far greater dangers lurked indoors.

Surprised to find no parking spaces at nine-thirty on a Friday morning, she drove the Jeep onto the Chain Bridge, concentrating on negotiating those concrete bollards. When she looked up, the sight ahead made her gasp. The centre third of the bridge was heaped with flowers. Several wreaths and many bunches, some large but mostly small, had been placed on the wooden walkway, while still more had been tied to the web of metal struts. As she watched, a young woman approached these floral tributes and crouched down to add her own.

A vehicle’s horn sounded, making Zoe jump. She held up her hand in acknowledgment and slowly drove across the rest of the bridge and through the second set of bollards, parking on the road behind several other cars.

Laying floral tributes to a young man they’d never met hadn’t been enough for some visitors. They had also left cards, many of them made by children, and notes on pieces of paper which had started to curl in the sun. Zoe read several, felt her eyelids prickle and a lump rise in her throat, and resumed walking until she and Mac were back in Scotland. Going down the steps she had climbed up with Sergeant Trent, she felt relieved to be alone again, and stopped to blow her nose. Had it only been three weeks ago?

She took a drink of water and walked on, dragging Mac away from a smell he didn’t want to leave. Even this close to the river, lack of rainfall had turned the grass yellow and the ground beneath it looked cracked and dry. She stopped to admire several butterflies feeding on a patch of wild flowers. Less welcome were the clouds of flies which occasionally collided with her.

Nearing the bench she had sat on while waiting for Trent, she heard a clamour of voices. Once past the bench, she saw the source of the noise. About a dozen people crowded around the stones Zoe had stepped over to reach the dead boy, one pointing upriver towards the Chain Bridge, another standing a little apart, taking photographs.

She turned on her heel and led Mac back the way they’d come. As they reached the Jeep, she took a call from Robbie Mackenzie who was polite but clearly put out that her solicitor hadn’t yet returned some paperwork connected with her purchase of his field. She apologised and promised to chase it up, but when he rang off, she stood staring at her mobile, trying to figure out why such a minor transaction, for Robbie at least, seemed so important to him. From what his sister had said, money was no object to that branch of the Mackenzie clan.

Since coming to the Borders, Zoe hadn’t been out on what could even loosely be termed a date. Her efforts to forget the closest she had come to one were usually successful, but that extraordinary night lingered stubbornly in her mind on Friday evening as she waited for Patrick to arrive. The feelings she’d had then were certainly not replicated now, but she was in the same house killing time once again before a man came to take her out for a meal. Agreeing to this had been a big mistake.

Her vague hope that history might repeat itself to the extent that he wouldn’t turn up was dashed when she heard Mac barking. She looked out of the window. Patrick wore a blue-and-white striped shirt over a pair of jeans, instantly making Zoe feel overdressed in the silk maxi-skirt which still fitted her because it had an elasticated waist with its matching blouse unbuttoned as a jacket over a sleeveless tee-shirt.

As he leaned back into his car, she froze. Don’t say he’d brought her flowers. Relief flooded through her when she saw Peggy jump down and scamper towards the cottage’s front door.

Despite the informality of his clothes, Patrick had trimmed his beard and a pleasant lemony smell hung about him. They settled the dogs in the lounge, shutting the kitchen door to prevent Peggy from escaping through the cat-flap as she had nearly done on her earlier visit, and Patrick acquiesced to Zoe’s insistence that they go in her Jeep.

Just before the track leading to Tolbyres Farm, a tractor flashed its lights at them and Zoe waved to its driver, Dod Affleck, the Tolbyres herdsman. From there, the journey to the Rowan Tree Inn took about half an hour, during which time they discovered a shared love of seventies rock music. In between singing along with The Steve Miller Band and Fleetwood Mac, they chatted about how much patients and pet-owners relied on the internet for information. Although good-naturedly trying to top each other’s stories for absurdity, both were discreet when it came to identities. In such a small community there was probably a great deal of overlap between their customers.

Apart from Kate, Zoe found few people had the ability to raise more than a wry smile in her these days, so it felt good to laugh out loud at Patrick’s imitation of the enraged owner of a Siamese cat who refused to believe her beloved pet’s swollen tummy wasn’t indication of a tumour but impregnation, most likely by a neighbour’s moggy. He laughed too, then groaned.

‘What’s wrong?’ Zoe asked.

‘I’ve just realised that’s probably an insensitive story to tell a heavily pregnant woman.’

‘Oh please. I’m not the delicate flower everyone thinks I am. Didn’t you hear me laughing?’

They arrived at their destination. Separated from the road by a stretch of grass and the inevitable rowan tree, the inn no longer looked sad and neglected as it had the previous times Zoe had driven past it. The front door sat open, as did the windows which for so long had been boarded up. The building’s paintwork was fresh and bright, and a new sign hung from an ornate metal bracket.

After parking at the rear, Zoe and Patrick walked back towards the front entrance.

‘Rowan trees are at their prettiest later in the year when they have berries,’ Zoe said. ‘I’m going to plant one in my garden once my building work’s finished. Kate tells me it’ll protect us from fairy spells.’