Blue Lightning

midsummer parties to formal dinners for a dozen people. It had been a crumb of comfort to her, on walking away from the house in Richmond, pulling the large wheeled suitcase behind her, to wonder who would cater for these occasions now. She couldn’t imagine Dee’s new woman, Flora, who was sharp-featured and shiny-haired, in an apron.

Jane had arrived in Fair Isle without any real idea of what to expect. It was an indication of how disturbed she was that she hadn’t researched the place beforehand. That would have been her normal style. She’d have checked out the websites, gone to the library, compiled a file of important information. But her only preparation had been to buy a couple of cookbooks. She would need to prepare hearty meals brought in to budget and she wasn’t acting so completely out of character that she could contemplate doing a poor job in her new role.

She’d come in on the mail boat, the Good Shepherd. It had been a sunny day, a light south-easterly wind had been blowing, and she’d sat on the deck watching the island approach. There had been the excitement of discovery. It had occurred to her then – and it still did – that this was like meeting a lover. There was the first affectionate glimpse, then the growing understanding. Spring in good weather and it’s easy to fall in love with Fair Isle. The cliffs are full of seabirds; Gilsetter, the flat grassland south of the havens, is covered with flowers. And she’d fallen head over heels. With the centre as well as the island. It had been converted from the North Lighthouse, now automatic, which stood in magnificent isolation on the high, grey cliffs. She’d grown up in the suburbs and had never imagined she would live somewhere so wild or dramatic. She thought that here she could be quite a different person from the timid woman who hadn’t been able to stand up to Dee. The kitchen had become her place immediately. It was big and cavernous. Once it had been the senior lightkeeper’s living room and there was a chimney breast and two windows which looked out over the sea. She’d ordered it to suit her as soon as she’d arrived, before even she’d emptied her case. It was too early in the season then for guests but the staff still needed feeding.

‘What were you planning for supper?’ she’d asked, rolling up the sleeves of her cotton shirt and slipping her favourite long blue apron over her head. When there’d been no immediate response she’d looked in the fridge and then the freezer. In the fridge there was a stainless-steel bowl of cooked rice covered with cling film, in the freezer some smoked haddock. She’d rustled up a big pan of kedgeree, using real butter despite the expense and big chunks of hard-boiled egg. They’d eaten it around the table in the kitchen. The talk had been of wheatear nests and seabird numbers. Nobody had asked why she’d decided to come to Fair Isle to be a cook.

Later Maurice had said it was like Mary Poppins arriving and taking over. They all knew that everything would be all right. Jane had always treasured that remark.

She could tell from the smell that the baking was almost ready. She lifted out the tray and set it on the table, pulled the scones apart so they could cook properly inside, and put them back in the oven. She set the timer for three minutes though she wouldn’t need it. In this kitchen things didn’t burn. Not when Jane was in charge.

The door opened and Maurice came in. He was wearing a flannel shirt and a grey cardigan, cord trousers bagged at the knee, leather slippers. He looked like the crumpled academic he had been before moving to the Isle with his new young wife. Automatically, Jane switched on the kettle. Maurice and Angela had their own accommodation within the field centre, but he usually came into the big kitchen for coffee in the morning. Jane had a cafetiere, ordered real coffee from Lerwick. He was the only person with whom she shared it.

‘The plane got off all right,’ he said.

‘Yes, I heard it.’ She paused, filled the cafetiere, then lifted the scones out of the oven, just as the timer went off. ‘How many guests are left?’

Maurice had given the departing visitors and their luggage a lift to the plane in the Land Rover. ‘Only four,’ he said. ‘Ron and Sue Johns went out too. They’d heard the forecast and didn’t want to be stuck.’

Jane was transferring the scones on to a rack to cool. Maurice took one absent-mindedly, split it and spread it with butter.

‘Jimmy Perez was in today with his new woman,’ he went on, his mouth still full. ‘James and Mary were waiting for them. Poor girl! She looked as white as a sheet when she got out of the plane. And I don’t blame her. I wouldn’t have enjoyed a flight like that.’

Maurice was the centre administrator. The place carried out scientific work but it also provided accommodation for visiting naturalists or for people who were interested in experiencing the UK’s most remote inhabited island. During September the place had been full of birdwatchers. September was peak migration time and a week of easterly winds had brought in two species new to Britain and a handful of minor rarities. Now, in the middle of October, with the forecast showing fierce westerlies, the centre was almost empty. Maurice had taken early retirement from the university to act as a glorified B &B landlord. Jane wasn’t sure what he felt about that and it would never have occurred to her to pry.

But she did know that what he loved about the place was the gossip. Perhaps that wasn’t so very different from the slightly bitchy chat in a senior common room of a small college. He knew what was going on apparently without any effort at all. Jane had kept her distance from most of the islanders. She knew and liked Mary Perez, was occasionally invited to Springfield for lunch on her days off, but they were hardly close friends.

‘He’s the policeman, isn’t he?’ Jane wasn’t very interested. She looked at her watch. Half an hour to lunchtime. She lit the Calor gas under a big pan of soup, stirred it and replaced the lid.

‘That’s right. Mary was hoping he might come back when a croft became vacant a couple of years ago but he stayed out in Lerwick. If he doesn’t have a son he’ll be the last Perez in Shetland. There’s been a Perez in Fair Isle since the first one was washed ashore from a ship during the Spanish Armada.’

‘A daughter could keep the name and pass it on,’ Jane said sharply. She thought Maurice should be more aware of the dangers of gender stereotyping than anyone. All the visitors assumed that he was the warden of the place and that Angela organized the bookings and the housekeeping. In fact, Angela was the scientist. She was the one who climbed down the cliffs to ring fulmars and guillemots, she took the Zodiac out to count seabird numbers, while Maurice answered the phone, managed the domestic staff and ordered the toilet rolls. And Angela had kept her maiden name after they’d married, for professional reasons.

Maurice smiled. ‘Of course, but it wouldn’t be the same for James and Mary. Especially James. It’s bad enough for him that Jimmy won’t be home to take on the Good Shepherd. James wants a grandson.’

Jane moved out into the dining room and began to lay the tables.

Angela made her appearance after the rest of them had sat at the table. There were times when Jane thought she came in late just so she could make an entrance. But today there hardly seemed enough of them to make a good audience: four visitors plus Poppy, Maurice’s daughter, and the field centre staff, who should be used by now to her theatrics. And Maurice, who seemed to adore her, who seemed not to mind at all his changed role in life as long as it made her happy.

Angela had helped herself to soup from the pan still simmering on the stove and stood looking down at them. She was twenty years younger than Maurice, tall and strong. Her hair was almost black, curly and long enough to sit on, twisted up now and held by a comb. The hair was her trademark. She had become a regular commentator on BBC natural history programmes and it was the hair that people remembered. Jane supposed Maurice had been flattered by her attention, her celebrity and her youth. That was why he had left the wife who’d washed his clothes and cooked his meals and looked after his children, nurturing them to adulthood – if Poppy could be considered an adult. Jane had never met this deserted wife but felt a huge sympathy for her.

Jane expected Angela to join them, to move the conversation quickly and skilfully to her own preoccupations. That was the usual pattern. But Angela remained standing and Jane realized then that the woman was furious, was so angry that the hands that held the soup bowl were shaking. She set it on the table, very carefully. Conversation in the room dwindled to nothing. Outside, the storm had become even more ferocious and they were aware of that too. Even through the double-glazed windows they heard the waves breaking on the rocks, could see the spray like a giant’s spit blown above the cliff.

‘Who’s been into the bird room?’ The question was restrained, hardly more than a whisper, but they could hear the fury behind it. Only Maurice seemed oblivious. He wiped a piece of bread around the bowl and looked up.

‘Is there a problem?’

‘I think somebody has been interfering with my work.’

‘I went in to check the bookings on the computer. Roger phoned to see if we could fit in a group next June and