She was thinking too that there were no other story stones, so there must be a different cause of death. A flippant thought flew into her head: perhaps the tabloids would have to change their headline now. They’d been lucky – the weather had kept away most of the reporters from the rest of the UK – but that hadn’t stopped the story leading the news for days.

  ‘It looks like a stabbing. I’ll let you know more when I’ve been there.’

  She decided that as soon as she decently could, she’d phone Alison to ask if she’d have James for a few hours. There was no nursery today. She also thought that before she dropped off her son, she’d need to hit the Dounby Asda. With any luck it’d be quiet. The organized residents of the parish would already have their freezers full of seasonal treats and their larders crammed. Their presents would have been wrapped months earlier.

  Before leaving the house, she made a few more calls. The first was to Nat Wilkinson’s phone, but it went straight to voicemail. The next was to the Pierowall Hotel. She spoke to Bill, island gossip and teller of tales.

  ‘I don’t suppose you know where Nat is? Still there in Westray?’

  ‘Nah, he went off on the ferry yesterday morning. Something urgent he had to deal with, he said.’

  ‘Any idea what that was?’

  ‘Nope. He was very mysterious about it all. He can get like that sometimes. Apparently, he’ll stay out and come back with everyone who’ll be at the Ba’ tomorrow. We’ll be in town for that.’

  She thanked him and ended the call, then immediately dialled again. This time to the Loganair office in Kirkwall airport.

  ‘Any chance of getting a flight in and out of North Ronaldsay today?’

  She knew that man at the end of the phone. He was older, a former engineer, inclined to be chatty. ‘It’s urgent, Davie.’ Stopping the questions about the welfare of Jimmy and her son.

  ‘You might be lucky. Be here for eleven. There’s a charter flight going in. They’re bringing old Willie home from the hospital to be with his daughter for Christmas. They have to be sure he’s properly settled there before coming back, and that she has all the meds and equipment he’ll need.’ A pause. ‘Myself, I don’t think he’ll be back. He’s gone home to die.’ Another pause, before he continued, his voice cheerier. ‘So you’ll have an hour or so. That do you?’

  ‘Perfectly. You’re a total star.’ She pressed the button on the phone before he could come up with any more questions.

  When she arrived at Stenness it was just getting light. This time of year, daytime was late arriving. The circle of standing stones formed silhouettes against the rising sun, which disappeared occasionally behind low cloud. Willow had been to Stonehenge, but thought this monument was more dramatic, not because of the stones themselves but because of the landscape within which it had been built. The hills of Hoy provided the backdrop, and in the same view, there was the loch and the sea. A breeze had sprung up, and the loch was choppier than it had been for more than a week.

  In this light and dressed in scene suits, everyone there looked the same, but she picked up Perez even from a distance. It was something about the way he stood, the space he always managed to create around himself. She’d found an oversized paper suit to reach across her belly. That meant that the arms and legs were too long, and she had to roll them up so she didn’t trip and still had use of her gloved hands.

  Perez was talking to a group of colleagues, and she stood back, watching, until he’d finished. There was already a cordon around the stones and the road leading to the car park had been blocked. She imagined the locals complaining about the diversion.

  The group around him scattered and she approached him. ‘You’ve done well to get all this sorted in such a short time.’

  ‘The team want it over, don’t they, so they can get back to their families and prepare for Christmas. And then there’s the Ba’ tomorrow. We’ll need manpower for that.’ A pause. ‘I was wondering about cancelling the Ba’.’

  ‘Think carefully,’ she said. ‘There are people who are treating the game as a celebration of Archie’s life. George’s life too. He might never have participated but you know he wrote the definitive history of the Ba’. So really, it’s much more than a game to them. There’d be an absolute outcry if you cancel, especially among Kirkwall residents. It’s a matter of pride and tradition. You’ll be alienating a lot of folk just when you need them on side.’

  ‘Yeah, I know. But it feels like one thing too many.’ She could hear the despair in his voice through the mask. He looked through the backlit stones towards the water. ‘Do you think his wife could have killed him?’ he asked. ‘If not, where on earth can she be? How did he get here? I’m feeling swamped by all the questions. Last night, I thought I had a possible answer to it all – Johnson and his wife working together. At least then I had a motive. Now I’m lost and have no idea at all.’

  Willow was reminded of the old Jimmy Perez, the Perez she’d first met after the murder of Fran, the love of his life. He’d been drowning then. Lost under a wave of depression. All his confidence gone.

  ‘Nat Wilkinson came out on the ferry yesterday. I tried to call him but he’s not answering his phone. According to Bill, he said something urgent had come up. He’d have seen the Johnsons on the boat, so he’d be a witness, even if we don’t think of him as a suspect.’

  ‘So that’s someone else we need to look for! As I said, it’s all too much.’

  ‘Go back to routine policing.’ She spoke to him as she would to anyone who came to her, asking her advice. She needed him to focus on detail, the small actions that he could easily achieve. ‘Have you organized a search here for Barbara?’ She waved an arm, taking in the flat, windswept landscape. ‘There might be another body.’

  ‘Aye, that’s what I was sorting with the team. They’re bringing in the coastguard to help.’ He paused. ‘Do you really think she might be dead?’

  ‘I’m not thinking anything just now. No facts to work on. But we need to find that car.’

  ‘We’ve had a watch out for that since they went missing yesterday.’

  ‘Then it’ll be found.’ She hoped she sounded more positive than she felt. ‘Have you come across the murder weapon?’

  ‘Aye, nothing as exotic as a Neolithic stone with Nordic runes. A knife. One you’d find in any workshop or fishing boat. It was left at the scene.’

  ‘A possibility then of prints or DNA.’

  ‘Maybe.’ He waited for a moment before speaking again, and now the words came out as a cry, loud even over the sound of the wind. ‘But we won’t hear about that anytime soon, will we? Not with the holidays. Even without the holidays with the backlog there is, and the time everything takes at the lab. Vaila and her boys are waiting for answers. And Miles is going slowly crazy in that madhouse that he shared with George.’

  She wanted to take him into her arms to reassure him. But she was his lover and his colleague, not his mother. Usually, he was the person not to demand comfort but to give it – to friends and colleagues, to witnesses, even to offenders. He was the least needy person she knew.

  ‘They’re not your responsibility, Jimmy. You can’t stop them from hurting, and at the moment they’re just a distraction. You can only do your job.’ She paused for a moment. ‘I’ve arranged to go into North Ronaldsay this morning with an ambulance flight. Probably a waste of time, but I’d like to talk to one of the islanders, see if I can dig up a bit more detail on Nat’s father’s death, and you’ve got it covered here. I should be back early afternoon.’ She looked across at him. In the artificial lights, his face looked gaunt and haunted. His olive skin was grey. ‘That is okay?’

  ‘Sure,’ he said, but he seemed distracted, focused entirely on his own thoughts.

  She touched his arm, turned away and started walking back to her car. This was Jimmy’s crime scene, and she couldn’t interfere. Her presence would only undermine his authority. When she got to the cordon, she gave him a little wave, but she wasn’t sure that he’d seen her.

  Willow was at the airport half an hour early and the team at the desk were expecting her. She was antsy, uncomfortable, pacing past the display of Orkney crafts, and the posters celebrating the islands’ archaeology and natural history. She’d wondered if Nat might be there, trying to get back to a place he thought of as home, but there was no sign of him, and he still wasn’t answering his phone.

  They were frying bacon in the cafe and the smell made her want to throw up. At last, the ambulance appeared and a frail elderly man was loaded into the plane. Willow knew one of the medics who was with him.

  ‘Thanks for letting me hitch a lift.’

  ‘Ah, no problem at all. We’re all seeing the news. Another death! We all want to help as much as we can.’

  She knew the man was hoping for information about the investigation but couldn’t quite bring himself to ask why she was heading into North Ronaldsay. She was grateful for his tact.

  Again she sat in the front, next to the pilot, watching the map of Orkney spread below her, and thought once more how lucky she was to live in this place.

  They bounced to a landing on the airstrip. The fire tender and crew were there, and she waved to a couple of islanders she knew. North Ronaldsay always felt remote to her, different and separate. It was flatter, more distant. As in Fair Isle, most of the visitors stayed at the Bird Observatory and came for the natural history. Or the sheep or the knitting.

  The person Willow had arranged to meet was there, waiting, with a car that looked as ancient as she was. Willow had met Mima through work. Mima’s husband had suffered from early onset Alzheimer’s, and in the end, she hadn’t been able to care for him at home. He’d had to move out to a residential home in Kirkwall, and away from North Ronaldsay he’d become lost and confused, given to slipping away from the place, even though the door was usually locked. He’d been as wily and invisible as a fox after hens, and Willow had been able to track him down when none of her junior colleagues could. When he’d died a couple of months later, Mima had invited Willow to the funeral.

  ‘You’re a kind woman,’ Mima had said. ‘You saw the man in him. The man that he once was.’

  Willow had called Mima on impulse as soon as she’d booked herself onto the flight. ‘I’m coming to the island this morning. Any chance I could talk to you?’

  ‘That will be splendid.’ No questions. No need for further explanation. ‘I’ll be there to collect you. I have a parcel coming in on the plane anyway.’

  Now Willow gave her a hug. ‘I’m sorry to disturb you. Christmas Eve! You’ll be busy.’

  ‘Not at all.’ The accent was so strong that Willow had to concentrate to understand her. ‘I’ll be at my daughter’s tomorrow. I have nothing to do, and I’m loving every minute of my idleness.’

  They drove down the island, past the stone dyke that kept the wild sheep on the rocky beach, where they ate the seaweed that flavoured their meat.

  Mima’s house was small and white and close to the pier. Nowhere near as grand as most of the houses on Westray. This wasn’t a wealthy island. Her husband had been born here too and had worked on the ferry. In the kitchen there was a solid fuel range, a kettle on the hob, the smell of baking. A view from the window of the little harbour, gulls pecking at a pile of creels, nets waiting to be mended. Mima made tea.

  Only when they were sitting at the table did Mima speak.

  ‘Now. How can I help you? You said you were here for work.’

  ‘I have some questions about Nat Wilkinson and his father. I hoped you might be able to help.’

  ‘Not that old story again.’ Mima sounded angry. ‘Is that what this is about? That cruel and foolish gossip. I’d hoped that had been forgotten years ago.’

  ‘So you don’t think Nat killed his father?’

  ‘I never believed it for one minute.’

  ‘How could you be so sure? I understand that the father was abusive. The boy could have lashed out, sent him flying. More an accident maybe than a deliberate killing.’

  Mima shook her head. ‘Nathaniel was a good boy. Harmless. Nervy. But that’s hardly surprising with a family like that. We should have done something about the way his father treated him. Called social services.’ There was a pause. ‘I nearly called the police once. But you know how it is in a place like this.’

  Willow nodded.

  The secrets known but not spoken of.

  ‘We suspected that bad things were going on in the family, but we closed our eyes to it. They kept themselves apart, you know. Maybe we thought it wasn’t our business. Of course it was our business. It should have been everyone’s business.’

  ‘That doesn’t mean Nat didn’t push his father, you know.’ Willow kept her voice low. ‘You can’t take the blame for what happened.’

  ‘He didn’t push his father,’ Mima said. ‘I saw it all. I was out on that bench in the garden, shelling peas. It was summer, a splendid day. I couldn’t hear what they were saying between them, but the lad was nowhere near the man when he tumbled in, and Nat was in the water trying to save him, as soon as he realized that his father had fallen.’ She paused for a moment and Willow could tell that she was reliving the afternoon. ‘I told the young officer who came asking about it. But that would have been before your time, of course.’

  ‘So what caused all the rumours that the man had been pushed?’

  Mima didn’t answer immediately. ‘Boredom! All those people with nothing else going on in their lives so they had to make up stories. And ignorance. Because the Wilkinsons weren’t local, they were fair game.’

  ‘Did you know that Nat was bullied at school?’

  Mima nodded. ‘He came here once and told me about it. His mother was struggling to keep the shop running and I popped in most days to help her. Not out of charity, you understand, but a place like this, we need a shop to survive. It’s not just the convenience. It’s a place where folk meet and chat. And who wants to be collecting orders from the boat every time the cupboard looks bare? So I went in, and I helped to keep things straight for her. Nothing formal. No pay.’

  ‘That was kind.’

  ‘Aye well, they could have done with a bit more kindness in their lives. The woman struggled on for a few more years, but then she gave up the business and moved south. I got to know the lad properly when he was home from the grammar school for the holidays, when his mother was still thinking she could make a go of the shop. I was a sort of nan to him. And he knew he could always come in and chat. I liked the company when my man was out with the ferry.’

  ‘Have you seen Nat recently?’

  Mima shook her head. ‘When my Alec got sick, I had enough to do taking care of him.’

  Willow didn’t speak. She let Mima continue.

  ‘One time, Nat came here. It must have been six months after his father died. He sat where you are now and told me he never wanted to go back to school again. “Don’t send me back, Mima. You were a teacher once. Why can’t I stay here on the island and you can teach me?” I told him that I’d only taught little kids and I’d be no use to him at all. What was so wrong about school? He said that the boys there were so mean to him that he wanted to kill himself. I asked him if there was someone he could tell. A teacher. A houseparent at the hostel. He said he’d already talked to his form teacher, but that had only made things worse. “Now they call me a sneak as well as a murderer,” he said. He was almost in tears. It made my heart bleed. He’d told a teacher, who’d had the arrogance to think that he could sort it all out, when what he really needed was professional help for his mental ill health.’ She looked up at Willow, who saw that now Mima herself was almost in tears.

  ‘I’m so sorry to bring that time back,’ she said. ‘You’ve been very helpful though.’

  Mima was still remembering. ‘The next time I saw Nathaniel he was in Kirkwall, so drunk he could barely stand, looking as if he hadn’t had a bath for a month. He was with a group of other men, and they had that look about them. Edgy. As if it wasn’t only the drink that they’d taken.’

  She glanced up. ‘I just walked past. I didn’t do anything to help him. I was scared by them, by a group of lads who could hardly stand. What does that make me? As bad as the teacher Nat confided in, the one who couldn’t stop the bullying.’

  ‘Did you ever hear the name of that teacher?’

  Mima shook her head. ‘If I ever knew it, I forgot it long ago.’

  ‘Could it have been George Riley?’

  ‘Isn’t that the man who was killed in Maeshowe?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘Is that why you’re here?’ Mima was suddenly upset. Angry. ‘You think poor Nathaniel might have killed him after all this time. Is that what folk are saying? That he killed his father, so he must have killed this teacher? More rumours, more people pointing the finger. You do know that’s ridiculous.’

  ‘I’m sorry. I’m sure you’re right.’ Willow couldn’t see Nat Wilkinson as a killer either. ‘I had to check though. I hope you understand.’

  ‘Aye, I suppose you’re only doing your job.’

  ‘Nat’s doing well,’ Willow said. ‘He’s living and working in Westray. He’s developing his art, selling to visitors. I spoke to him last week. He’d had George Riley to stay when he was stranded in Westray the night of the storm. They were friendly, on good terms.’

  ‘Really? Well, that’s good then. He was always a fine artist when he was a boy.’ Mima wasn’t entirely convinced, but she gave a little smile as she got to her feet. The anger had left her. ‘I’d best get you back to the airstrip or you’ll be stranded too.’

  In the plane on the way home, Willow was relegated to the back seat. One of the medics sat next to the pilot. They were friends it seemed. There was a heated discussion about tactics for the Ba’. Willow stared out of the window and replayed the conversation with Mima. She was quite sure now that Nat’s father’s death had been an accident. This was another lead then that seemed to be going nowhere, but the meeting had triggered another idea, a connection so tentative that she couldn’t quite believe it. She let the thought settle in the back of her mind as they landed into Kirkwall, hoping that it would grow into something more meaningful.