Ann Cleeves - White Nights

They sat on a drystone wall looking down over the beach and the flat island at the mouth of the bay.

‘Why didn’t you tell me you’d been to Biddista before?’ Perez looked at the horizon.

‘I’m not sure that you asked.’

‘You didn’t tell Bella that you’d met before, that you’d been a guest in her house?’

‘Well, I thought that might be a little ungallant.’ Wilding turned to Perez and smiled. ‘It might imply that her memory was failing her. Or that I should mean more to her than I obviously do. I thought too that she might prefer to forget that summer.’

‘Why would she want to do that?’

‘It was a rather wild time. Frantic. We all have a little more dignity these days.’

‘How did you come to be there?’

‘She invited me. We met on a train. The sleeper which went then from London to Aberdeen. Perhaps it still does. I was on my way to Dundee to talk at a literary lunch and she was going home. Neither of us had berths booked and we sat up all night drinking and talking. One of those memorable, strange encounters that can change your life. “Come and stay. I love creative people.” She was, still is, so charismatic, don’t you think? I was bewitched. So after the gig in Dundee I went on to Aberdeen and got the ferry north, took her at her word. The old St Clare : oilmen boozing in the bar and kids dossing on deck in sleeping bags. When I turned up at the Manse I’m not entirely sure she knew who I was even then. She’d had a lot to drink in the train. I’d imagined a love affair, that she’d invited me because we were in some way kindred spirits, but the house was full of people.’

He turned to Perez and smiled. ‘It was a little humiliating. I turned up on the doorstep with champagne and chocolates and there was a blank stare before she welcomed me in. You can see why I didn’t want to repeat that experience a second time. If she wasn’t going to know me after two days, she was hardly likely to remember after nearly fifteen years.’

‘Who else was staying that summer?’

‘I’m not sure. A couple of young men, art students from Glasgow.’

‘Jeremy Booth,’ Perez said. ‘He was there.’

‘The man who died at the Biddista jetty?’ Wilding seemed genuinely surprised. ‘Was he?’

‘You don’t remember him?’

‘No.’

Perez laid the photograph of Bella’s party on the wall between them. ‘Perhaps this will jog your memory.’

Wilding looked at the photograph. ‘Good God, I can’t even remember this being taken. I don’t think I ever saw it. Doesn’t Bella look wonderful? But rather unhappy, I fancy.’

‘That’s you, I think.’ Perez pointed to the dark man, standing in line.

‘So it is, of course. That’s still how I remember myself. It’s always a shock when I look in the mirror.’

‘What were the masks about?’

‘A whim of Bella’s. Her idea of a sophisticated evening.’

Perez pointed again. ‘We think that’s Jeremy Booth. Do you recognize him?’

Wilding considered. ‘Perhaps I do. You know, the name seemed familiar when you first told me it. He was an actor, just as you said, and he was there that summer. Not for long though. I was obsessed and I couldn’t leave until everyone else did, but he was only there for a few days. He arrived right at the end of my stay. Bella had picked him up in much the same way as she’d collected me from the train. I think he had the same expectation as me of romance, a sexual encounter at least, and was similarly disappointed. He followed her round like a lovesick puppy, but nobody could take him seriously. He looked very different then from his picture in the paper and the man who caused the scene in the Herring House. He had long hair. Jem, he called himself. We got on rather well. I can’t believe that Bella remembered him. She had so many admirers.’

‘She had this photograph. Something triggered her memory.’

‘It was taken at the farewell dinner,’ Wilding said. ‘We told each other we didn’t want to go and yet most of us seemed relieved it was over.’

‘You came back, though, after fifteen years. The place must have held some importance to you.’

‘Ah, this time I was in Shetland with quite different expectations. I wanted peace and an escape from my girlfriend. At least an escape from my obsession with my girlfriend. I met Helen soon after my stay at the Manse. She’s very different from Bella. Frail, rather shy. Though she haunted me too.’

‘You don’t look very haunted.’ It was an unprofessional comment but Wilding, with confidence and his precise, arrogant words, sitting on the wall with a chocolate biscuit in one hand and his coffee in the other, seemed incapable of such sensibility.

‘I’ve had to toughen up, inspector. I’ve learned it’s the only way to survive.’

‘Why Biddista? You could have gone anywhere in Shetland.’

‘I think I explained that before. I did still love the paintings. Bella’s work got better, much stronger, as she got older, and I renewed my contact with her by email. I hoped of course that she’d recognize my name but she didn’t. When I said I wanted a break in Shetland, she offered me the house in Biddista to rent.’

They sat for a moment in silence.

Perez spoke first. ‘You went to visit Willy in the care home. Did you talk about that summer?’

‘Of course not, inspector. Willy can’t remember what happened last week. I enjoy hearing his stories, that’s all.’

‘What happened that night fifteen years ago? The night the photograph was taken?’

‘Really, inspector, can it have any relevance to your present investigation?’

‘I think it can. It might tell us why Jeremy Booth came back.’

‘We all drank too much and made fools of ourselves.’ He paused. ‘At one point Bella was weeping. I’d never seen her lose control in that way before. The tears were rolling down her cheeks, her face was all red and blotchy. She was ugly. It was horrible. It was that image I think that persuaded me to leave with the others. I didn’t want to know that she was human.’

‘Why was she crying?’

‘I don’t know. Someone said something to offend her, perhaps. She could take offence very quickly.’

‘Was there a row? An argument?’

‘No. We were all too drunk and stoned to fight.’ He paused. ‘We didn’t see her the next day. She stayed in bed. We joked that she must have a massive hangover, but really I think she was embarrassed that we’d seen her like that. We went without saying goodbye.’

‘Nobody thought to check that she wasn’t ill?’

‘The boy, Roddy, was there. I suppose he’d stayed all night, gone to bed before the festivities started. Or perhaps his parents dropped him off in the middle of the morning. I don’t remember. He spent a lot of time in the Manse that summer. He was quite young then, but a bright little thing. We sent him into Bella’s bedroom to see how she was. How cowardly we all were! We couldn’t face her. He came back to the kitchen where we were all sitting. “Auntie says, ‘Piss off the lot of you!’” It was so much the sort of thing that Bella would have said that we went with a clear conscience. We always did what she told us.’

‘Booth left with you too?’

‘Not exactly the same time. Willy gave him a lift to Lerwick in his van. I’d been in Willy’s van before. There were no real seats in the back. I remember the bruises. I decided to leave Biddista in style and ordered a taxi from Lerwick.’

‘We’ve found another body in the Pit o’ Biddista.’

Wilding turned sharply. ‘I heard you’d found bones. Couldn’t they have been there for generations?’

‘You have no idea who it could be?’

‘Of course not!’