The woman shook her head.
‘Get your coat. I’ll take you home.’
Still holding her handkerchief to her face, Lorna Cullen went off to fetch her coat while Bannerman sought out Morag Napier and told her what he was going to do.
‘Why?’
‘Stoddart fired her.’
Bannerman walked off leaving Morag Napier staring after him, wide-eyed but silent.
By seven in the evening Bannerman had packed up all his belongings and was ready to return to London the next morning. He had taken the car back to the rental company, cleared his desk in the medical school and had thanked Stoddart for his hospitality. He couldn’t find Morag Napier to say goodbye to her but had asked Stoddart to do it for him and to thank her for her help. He had tried to put in a good word for Lorna Cullen but Stoddart was unwilling to move on the subject. The damned woman was always leaving the place open,’ he maintained.
Bannerman stood quietly at the window looking out over the lights of the city and noting for once that the wind had dropped. The dark silhouettes of the trees in Princes Street Gardens were motionless. The stars had come out in a clear sky and there was a suggestion of moonlight behind the castle rock. He wished that he could have felt better about his trip, but the truth was that he felt thoroughly dejected. His investigation had been thwarted at every turn, leaving him feeling empty and frustrated. There was only one thing he wanted to do now, and that was get drunk.
He was about to leave when the telephone rang. Fearing that it might be George Stoddart asking him to dinner, Bannerman prepared his excuse for not going and picked up the receiver. It was Shona MacLean.
‘Hello, Ian. I’m back home on the island.’
‘Oh God it’s so good to hear your voice,’ he blurted out.
‘I’m glad you said that,’ said Shona, ‘because I don’t have a good reason for calling. I just wanted to hear
‘That’s good enough,’ said Bannerman quickly, knowing that if he slowed down his response he would start considering his replies and editing them. If he answered quickly there was a chance that the truth might get out. “There was so much I wanted to say this morning and didn’t. I’ve got to see you again.’
‘But how?’
‘I don’t know how,’ said Bannerman. ‘Just tell me that you want to see me?’
‘Yes,’ said Shona. ‘I want that.’
‘Then we’ll work something out,’ said Bannerman.
‘I’m so glad I phoned,’ said Shona.
‘You’re glad?’ laughed Bannerman.
‘Did you get your experiments finished today?’ asked Shona.
Bannerman told her about the fire.
‘That’s awful!’ exclaimed Shona. ‘You won’t be able to prove that
‘No,’ agreed Bannerman. ‘It’s all been one big waste of time.’
‘Maybe you should get drunk,’ said Shona.
That’s exactly what I intend doing,’ said Bannerman. ‘You caught me just as I was about to leave.’
‘Then I won’t hold you back any more,’ said Shona. ‘Call me tomorrow?’
‘You bet.’
After a couple of drinks Bannerman’s euphoria over Shona’s call and his relief at his honesty in telling her how he felt, began to subside. He had no doubts about his feelings for Shona but he began to see some of the problems he was creating. How could he hope to carry on a relationship with Shona when he worked in London and she lived on a remote island? One of them would have to move and he could imagine Shona’s thoughts about a move to London. Bannerman’s head started to protest under the relentless assault of his own questions. He dealt with them, temporarily, with a third drink and then decided to find something to eat.
There was a Greek restaurant not too far from the last pub he had been in, so he opted for that. He ordered a traditional dish and asked for a carafe of the house red. When it came, the wine wasn’t good, but it didn’t matter so long as it continued to dull the cutting edge of reality. He sipped it slowly while waiting for his food and amused himself by looking at the obligatory travel posters of Greece on the walls.
They’d make it seem a lot more like Greece if they’d heat the bloody place properly, he thought as the door opened and another blast of cold air swept in. He looked round at the new arrivals and was surprised to see Morag Napier standing there. She was with a man who Bannerman deduced must be her fiance. He got a brief glimpse of a handsome man in his twenties before Morag walked over to his table and said, ‘Dr Bannerman, what a surprise. I didn’t think I’d get a chance to say goodbye. Professor Stoddart said that you’d left already.’
‘I’m going back to London in the morning,’ said Bannerman, hoping he wasn’t slurring his words. ‘Perhaps you and your young man would care to join me?’
That’s very kind but we just popped in on our way past to book a table for tomorrow,’ said Morag. ‘We’re on our way out.’
‘Well thank you for all your help, Dr Napier,’ said Bannerman, making to get to his feet.
‘Please don’t get up Doctor,’ insisted Morag. ‘And
‘Thank you,’ said Bannerman, watching her walk back over to her fiance and take him by the arm to turn him round and usher him out of the door. A waiter was left looking bemused as the door closed behind the couple.
It was obvious to Bannerman that the story about them having come in to book a table had been a lie. Morag Napier had not wanted to stay in the restaurant when she had found out that he was there. Was he really that drunk? he wondered.
Bannerman finished his meal and left. Despite the fact that he had drunk a fair bit over the course of the evening he felt stone cold sober, yet had no desire to drink any more. That was the trouble with alcohol, he mused, it only exaggerated the mood you’re in, and he was feeling low.
The temperature had fallen because of the clearness of the sky and there was a suggestion of frost in the air. He decided to walk for a bit before returning to the apartment. This would be his last chance to look at the city by night, unless he came back here at some time in the future. He walked to the head of the Mound, once literally a mound of earth that had been piled up to connect the old town of Edinburgh, high up on the back of the castle rock, to the Georgian new town lying below. Traffic formed strings of light on the steep hill.
Bannerman rested his hands on the railings near the top and looked at the lights spread out below. It was a beautiful city, he thought; when the weather allowed you to love it, when the wind dropped and allowed you to hear its heart beat. He could smell
The phone was ringing inside but by the time he had unlocked the door and switched on the light it had stopped. Something else to wonder about, he thought, but it would have to take its place in the queue. At the moment it was well down the list of questions that kept niggling away at him. The question of why Morag Napier had been so anxious to get out of the restaurant earlier was near the top, but at the very top was the fact that the animal rights people had succeeded in murdering all the animals in their attack on the department.
There was a contradiction in that which worried Bannerman because it could not be argued that the animal deaths had been accidental. The terrorists had entered the building through the animal house itself so they had had every opportunity to release the animals before setting fire to the place … but they hadn’t.
It was just conceivable that there had been an element of social responsibility in this. The terrorists just might have been bright enough to acknowledge that releasing experimental animals into the wild was an act fraught with danger. The animals might be carrying all kinds of diseases which they would spread into the community. On the other hand and despite frequent warnings, the animal liberation people had not taken much notice of this in the past.
The electric kettle came to the boil and Bannerman went into the kitchen to make coffee. He spooned coffee grounds into the cafetiere while he faced the fact that paranoia might be playing a part in his thoughts. It seemed such a cruel quirk of fate for a fire to destroy all Gill’s experimental animals and with them, the Achnagelloch
