Peter May - The Blackhouse

‘You don’t remember me, do you?’ There was no warmth in her question.

‘Should I?’

‘We were at secondary school together. But I was a couple of years behind you, so you probably didn’t notice me. Of course, we all had a crush on you.’

Fin felt himself blushing. So she was thirty-three, maybe thirty-four, which meant she was perhaps only seventeen when she’d had Donna.

‘I can almost hear the wheels turning.’ There was a seam of sarcasm in her voice. ‘Don’t you remember? Donald and I went out for a while at the Nicholson. Then we met up again in Glasgow after I left school. I went to London with him. He still hadn’t found God in those days, so marriage was something of an afterthought. After I got pregnant, that is.’

‘Catriona,’ Fin said suddenly.

She raised her eyebrows in mock surprise. ‘Well done.’

‘Macfarlane.’

‘You do have a good memory. Is it Donald you want to see?’

‘Actually it’s Donna.’

An invisible shutter came down. ‘No, it’s Donald.’ She was emphatic. ‘I’ll go and get him.’

As he waited, the rain started to fall, and by the time Donald Murray came to the door Fin was already drenched. The minister looked at him impassively. ‘I didn’t know we had anything more to say to each other, Fin.’

‘We don’t. It’s your daughter I want to talk to.’

‘She doesn’t want to speak to you.’

Fin glanced up at the sky, screwing up his face against the rain. ‘Look, can I come in? I’m getting soaked out here.’

‘No. If you want to talk to Donna, Fin, you’re going to have to make it official. Arrest her, or whatever it is you people do when you want to question folk. Otherwise just leave us alone, please.’ And he closed the door.

Fin stood for a while on the step, choking back his anger, before pulling up his collar and making a dash for the car. He started the engine and set the blower going, and struggled out of his wet jacket, throwing it onto the back seat. He slipped into first gear and was lifting the clutch when the passenger door opened. Catriona Macfarlane got in, slamming the door shut behind her. Her hair was wet and plastered to her head. Her T-shirt had become almost see-through, a lacy black bra clearly visible beneath it. Fin couldn’t help noticing, and reflecting on how little God seemed to have changed Donald’s predilections over the years.

She sat staring straight ahead, her hands clasped in her lap, fingers interlocked. And she said nothing.

Fin broke the silence. ‘So did you find him, too?’

She turned to look at him, frowning. ‘Find who?’

‘God. Or was that just Donald’s idea?’

‘You’ve never seen him like we have. When he’s angry. With God on his side. Full of sound and fury and righteous indignation.’

‘Are you scared of him?’

‘I’m scared of what he’ll do when he finds out the truth.’

‘And what is the truth?’

Her hesitation was momentary. She rubbed a clear patch in the condensation on the passenger window and peered up at the manse. ‘Donna lied about being raped by Macritchie.’

Fin grunted. ‘I’d already worked that one out. And I wouldn’t be surprised if Donald has, too.’

‘Maybe he has.’ Another glance up at the manse. ‘But he doesn’t know why.’

Fin waited, but Catriona said nothing. ‘Well, are you going to tell me or not?’

She was wringing her hands now. ‘I wouldn’t have known myself if I hadn’t found the open pack in her room and confronted her with it.’ She glanced at him self-consciously. ‘A pregnancy-testing kit.’

‘How far gone?’

‘Then, just a matter of weeks. But she’s three months now and starting to show. She was terrified of what Donald would do if he found out.’

‘And that’s why she made up the story about Macritchie?’ Fin was incredulous. Catriona nodded. ‘Jesus Christ. Didn’t she know that paternity could be established by a simple DNA test?’

‘I know, I know. It was stupid. She was panicking. And she’d had too much to drink that night. It was a really bad idea.’

‘You’re right.’ Fin watched her closely for several moments. ‘Why are you telling me this, Catriona?’

‘So you’ll leave us alone. It doesn’t matter about the rape claim any more. The poor man’s dead. I want you to stop bothering us so we can work this out for ourselves.’ She turned to meet his gaze. ‘Just leave us in peace, Fin.’

‘I can’t make any promises.’

She glared her hatred and fear at him, and then turned to open the car door.

As she stepped out into the rain, Fin said, ‘So who’s the father?’

She stooped to look back at him, the rain pouring down her face, dripping from her nose and chin. ‘Your pal’s son.’ She nearly spat it out. ‘Fionnlagh Macinnes.’

He had very little recollection of the drive back to town. He drifted between confusion and uncertainty, an oppressive sky bearing down on him, reducing the mountains of Harris to a grey smear in the distance, rain blurring his windscreen. The wind drove it laterally across the Barvas moor, and he had to focus his attention on the road until he reached the summit, just beyond the tiny Loch Dubh, and saw the lights of Stornoway spread out below him in the gloomy early evening, the town crouching in the shelter of the hills, cradled in the protective arms of its harbour.

Rush hour over, Bayhead was all but deserted in the rain, but as he turned into the harbour car park he was surprised to see a large crowd caught in lurid technicolor by the lights raised on stands by the television crew come to video them. Mostly they were just curious spectators braving the rain in the hope of getting their faces on TV. At their core were a dozen or more banner-toting protesters in red and yellow waterproofs. Hand-scrawled banners with slogans like Save the Guga, Murderers, Strangled and Beheaded, Bird Killers. Ink running in the wet. All a little cheap and nasty, Fin thought, and not very original. He wondered who funded these people.

When he got out of the car he heard them chanting, Kill-ers, Kill-ers, Kill-ers. There were one or two familiar faces on the periphery of the crowd, reporters whom Fin recognized from national newspapers. A couple of grim-faced uniformed police officers stood watching from a discreet distance, rain falling like veils from the peaks of their chequered caps.

On the quayside was the lorry they had loaded that morning at Port of Ness. It was empty now, standing idling amongst the empty creels and heaps of fishing net. A bunch of men in oilskins and sou’westers stood looking down into the hold of the Purple Isle , the same trawler which had taken Fin out to An Sgeir all those years before. Thick coats of fresh paint had been applied to rusted rails and weathered planking. Her deck was blue, the wheelhouse a recently lacquered mahogany. She looked like an old whore trying hard to hide her age.

Fin put his head down and pushed through the crowd on to the quay. He caught a glimpse of Chris Adams leading the chants of the protesters, but he had no time for him right now. He spotted Fionnlagh beneath one of the sou’westers, and grabbed his arm. The boy turned. Fin said, ‘Fionnlagh, I need to talk to you.’

‘Hey, my man!’ It was Artair’s voice, full of good-natured bonhomie. He slapped Fin on the back. ‘You’re just in time to join us for a pint before we set sail. Are you game?’ Fin looked round to find Artair grinning at him from beneath another dripping sou’wester. ‘Jesus, man, have you not got a fucking coat? You’re soaked to the skin. Here …’ He jumped up into the cab of the lorry and pulled out a yellow oilskin jacket and threw it over Fin’s head. ‘Come on, we’ll get pissed together. I need some drink in me before we go. It’s going to be a rough ride out.’