swallowed one and sucked on his puffer while he waited for it to work, still on his knees, breath rasping in the dark. Slowly his breathing became easier again, and he listened for the sound which had sparked his attack. But he heard nothing, and returned then to his task, slipping thick fingers around the big man’s throat. And pressing. An urgency now about everything he would do.
Fin closed his eyes tight to try to squeeze the images out of them, and then opened them again to see Marsaili’s consternation. ‘Fin, for God’s sake talk to me!’
His voice, when he found it, sounded small and caught phlegm in his throat. ‘Tell me about Artair’s asthma.’
She frowned. ‘What do you mean, tell you about his asthma?’
‘Just tell me.’ He was finding strength in his voice. ‘Is it worse than it used to be?’
She shook her head in frustration, wondering why he was asking her such stupid questions. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It was becoming a nightmare. The attacks were getting worse and worse, until they put him on new medication.’
‘Prednisone?’
Her head tilted in surprise, and something darkened the blue of her eyes. Premonition, perhaps. ‘How did you know that?’
He took her arm and started pulling her towards the house. ‘Show me.’
‘Fin, what’s this all about?’
‘Just show me, Marsaili.’
They went into the bathroom, and she opened a mirrored cabinet on the wall above the washbasin. The bottle was on the top shelf. Fin lifted it down and opened it. It was nearly full.
‘Why doesn’t he have these with him?’
Marsaili was at a loss. ‘I’ve no idea. Maybe there’s another bottle.’
Fin did not even want to think about it. ‘Is there somewhere he keeps his private papers? Stuff he never lets you see?’
‘I don’t know.’ She thought about it, distracted, finding concentration difficult. ‘There’s a drawer in his father’s old desk that he always keeps locked.’
‘Show me.’
The desk was pushed up under the window in Mr Macinnes’s former study, buried beneath an avalanche of papers and magazines, and wire trays overflowing with paid and unpaid bills. Fin had slept in here the other night, but not even noticed it. The captain’s chair that originally went with the desk was nowhere in evidence. An old dining chair was tucked between the pedestals. Fin pulled it out and sat down. He tried the lefthand drawer. It slid open to reveal a concertina folder full of household papers. Fin flicked quickly through it, but there was nothing to interest him. He tried the right-hand drawer and it was locked.
‘Do you have a key?’
‘No.’
‘A heavy screwdriver, then. Or a chisel.’
She turned without a word and left the room, returning a few moments later with a large, heavy-duty screwdriver. Fin took it, driving it between the top of the drawer and the pedestal, levering it upwards until the wood splintered and the lock broke. The drawer slid open. Suspension folders hung from a built-in rack. Yellow, blue, pink. He went through them one by one. Bills, investments, letters. Newspaper articles, downloaded from the internet. Fin stopped and heard himself breathing. Short, shallow breaths. He tipped the articles out on to the desktop. The
Fin slammed his fist down on the desk, and a pile of magazines slid on to the floor.
‘For Christ’s sake, Fin, tell me what’s going on!’ A hint of hysteria was creeping into Marsaili’s voice.
Fin dropped his head into his hands and screwed his eyes tight shut. ‘Artair killed Angel Macritchie.’
There was a hush in the room so thick that Fin could almost feel it. Marsaili’s voice, small and frightened, forced its way through it. ‘Why?’
‘It was the only way he could be sure of getting me back to the island.’ He scuffed his hand through the printouts of the articles, sending several of them fluttering through still air. ‘The papers were full of the murder in Edinburgh. All the gory details. The fact that I was in charge of the investigation. So if another body turned up here on Lewis, same weird MO, what was the betting I’d get involved at some stage? Especially when the victim was someone I was at school with. A gamble, maybe. But it paid off. Here I am.’
‘But why? Oh, Fin, I can’t believe I’m even hearing you say these things. Why would he want you here?’
‘To tell me about Fionnlagh. So that I would know he was my son.’ He thought about what Donna Murray had said.
Marsaili sat heavily on the edge of the bed and put her hands to her face. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘You said you thought he beat Fionnlagh to get at you. It wasn’t you he was getting at. It was me. All those years, beating that poor kid, and all the time it was me he was punching, me he was kicking. And it was important to him that I knew that before …’ And he broke off, frightened even to give voice to the thought.
‘Before what?’
Fin turned slowly to look at her. ‘He wasn’t bothered about giving a DNA sample to the police. He knew he’d be on the rock by the time we figured out it was him. Too late to stop him.’
Marsaili stood up abruptly, as suddenly it occurred to her where all this was leading. ‘Stop it, Fin! Stop it!’
He shook his head. ‘That’s why he didn’t bother taking his pills with him. After all, why would he need them if he wasn’t coming back?’
He checked his watch and stood up, scooping the newspaper articles back into their folder. Outside the wind was picking up. He could see all the way down to the shore, waves smashing across the rocks, retreating in foam. He turned towards the door, and Marsaili caught his arm.
‘Where are you going?’
‘I’m going to try and stop him killing our son.’
She bit down hard on her lip and tried to stop the sobs that threatened to choke her. Tears coursed down her cheeks. ‘Why, Fin? Why would he do that?’
‘Because for some reason he wants to hurt me, Marsaili. To inflict more pain on me than I can bear. He must know I’ve already lost one son.’ And he saw a look in her eyes that told him she had not known. ‘What better way to turn the screw than to kill the other?’ He pulled himself free of her grasp, but she followed him to the door and grabbed him again.
‘Fin, look at me.’ There was something compelling in her voice. He turned to meet her intensity. ‘Before you go … there’s something you need to know.’
II
Rain battered against the window of the incident room, obliterating the view over harbour rooftops to the semi-derelict Lews Castle across the bay. There were nearly two dozen officers at desks around the room. All of them were turned towards Fin. Except for George Gunn and a couple of others who were still speaking on the phone. DCI Smith was flushed and exasperated. He had showered, and changed. His hair was smoothly Brylcreemed back from his face, and he smelled of Brut again. He might hold centre stage in the incident room, but he had been upstaged in his investigation by Fin. He was not a happy man, but he was being squeezed into a corner.
He said, ‘Okay, so I accept that this Artair Macinnes probably is our killer.’
‘His DNA’ll confirm it,’ Fin said.
Smith glanced irritably at the newspaper articles spread across the nearest desk. ‘And you think he copied
