Simon Beckett - Written in Bone

The sense of foreboding was growing stronger. ‘I just saw her. She’s down here,’ I said, looking round.

There was no longer any sign of Cameron, but Maggie was still where I’d last seen her, watching the boat burn with Karen Tait and a group of other islanders. She had her back to me, an unmistakable figure in her oversized coat. I went across, driven by an apprehension I still couldn’t name.

‘Maggie?’ I said.

But at that moment a cry went up from the boat. ‘Over here. We’ve got it.’

I looked over, saw that the men had succeeded in dislodging a still-burning shape from the fire. Kinross and the others pawed at the blackened object with poles, trying to drag it further away from the flames. It could almost have been a log, its smoking surface still licked by tongues of flame.

But it wasn’t.

I’d actually started to go over when Maggie turned round, and shock rooted me to the spot.

The face gazing back at me from inside the red hood wasn’t Maggie’s. It was a teenage girl’s, blank and uncomprehending.

Mary Tait. The girl I’d seen outside my window.

AN EERIE SILENCE had descended in the boatyard, a collective hush as people saw what had been pulled from the blaze. Then the spell broke. A fresh clamour erupted all around me as people jostled to either get away from the sight, or to get a better look.

But I was still struggling to recover from the shock of seeing Karen Tait’s daughter wearing Maggie’s coat. Because it obviously was Maggie’s. The distinctive red coat had seemed huge on the reporter, but Mary Tait was much bigger. Large as the coat was, it looked almost too small for her heavy frame.

Karen Tait, Mary’s mother, had turned to glare at me, but by now Brody had followed me over.

‘What’s wrong?’ he asked.

I found my voice. ‘That’s Maggie’s coat.’

‘He’s lying!’ Karen Tait bridled drunkenly. But there was a shrillness to the accusation that didn’t ring true.

Kinross had broken away from the group of men by the fire and was pushing his way towards us. His son trailed behind, the firelight cruelly highlighting his pockmarked features with shadowed craters. At the sight of Kevin, Mary’s face broke into a beaming smile, but it wasn’t returned. When the teenager saw where his father was heading he dropped back. Mary’s smile faded as he slunk away into the crowd.

Kinross was blackened and stinking of smoke, still clutching the charred pole he’d used to drag the body from the fire. He hawked and spat a glob of sooty phlegm on to the floor.

‘We’ve got it out, like you asked.’ He looked from me to Karen Tait. ‘What’s going on?’

‘It’s them, they’re calling Mary a thief!’ Tait cried.

Brody didn’t react to the accusation. ‘That’s Maggie’s coat Mary’s wearing.’

Tait’s face contorted. ‘That’s a lie! Don’t believe him!’

But Kinross was staring at the girl’s coat with recognition. I remembered how he and Maggie had bantered on the ferry. There had been real affection there. He looked back at where the other firefighters had gathered to stare at the smouldering body they’d pried from the flames, and I saw him make the same connection I already had.

‘Where is Maggie?’ he asked sharply.

No one answered. Something in Kinross’s expression seemed to close down. He swivelled his gaze back towards Karen Tait.

‘We don’t have time for this now,’ I said quickly, trying to ignore my own fears for Maggie. ‘We need to get this place secured, and get the body somewhere safe.’

Brody nodded. ‘He’s right, Iain. This can wait. We have to get everyone out of here. Will you help?’

Kinross didn’t respond. He continued to stare at Karen Tait, but she wouldn’t meet his eyes. He levelled a finger at her.

‘We haven’t finished,’ he warned. Then, turning his back, he began yelling instructions to clear the yard.

Leaving Brody to watch Karen Tait and her daughter, I pushed my way through to the body as Kinross and a handful of other men began herding people away. It lay charred and twisted on the dirty concrete floor of the yard, a sight that was both pitiful and horrific. Rain had puddled nearby, and in the light from the burning boat oil glistened on the water like a dead rainbow. Tendrils of steam rose from the cooked flesh, and I could feel the heat still radiating from it, like a joint left too long in the oven. The mouth had pulled open as though in a rictus of agony. I knew that was fanciful, that it was an inevitable effect of the tendons contracting in the fire, but somehow I couldn’t shake the image.

Please, let me be wrong.

I turned to Guthrie as he went past, ushering a huddle of people from the yard. ‘Can I have a sheet of plastic or tarpaulin?’

I thought he either hadn’t heard or was ignoring me. But a few moments later the big man returned with a bundled-up piece of dirty canvas. He thrust it out at me.

‘Here.’

I started to open it out, struggling in the high wind with only one arm. To my surprise Guthrie came to help. As we wrestled with the flapping canvas, a figure emerged from the shadows. In the flickering light from the flames, I saw it was Cameron. He stared down at the body.

‘Dear God,’ he whispered. His Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. ‘What can I do?’

There was none of his usual bombast, and I wondered if he was only now starting to realize what was at stake. I might have accepted his offer, but Guthrie didn’t give me the chance.

‘Fuck all, as usual,’ he rumbled dismissively. You think a bandage is going to do any good here?’

Cameron looked as though he’d been struck. Without a word he turned and made his way out of the yard with the rest. At another time I might have felt sorry for him, but there were more urgent matters just then.

A decision would have to be made eventually about what to do with the body, but for now it needed to be covered. Without asking, once we had the tarpaulin open Guthrie helped me start to spread it over the blackened form.

‘Who do you think it is?’ he asked.

I might have imagined it, but I thought there was an almost fearful note in his voice. I just shook my head as we lowered the canvas and hid the body from sight.

But the heaviness in my heart told me that Maggie finally had her front-page story.

The fire had all but burned itself out. What had once been a boat was now a mound of glowing ash and embers, still guttering fitfully with flame. The wind kept it alive for the time being, but it was rapidly dying, beaten by its own fury as much as the efforts of the islanders. The entrance to the boatyard was now cordoned off with a pitifully inadequate strip of police tape, the last that Fraser had left. Tied to two posts, it thrummed like a live thing in the wind, little more than a token obstruction.

Most of the islanders had gone home. Brody had asked Ellen to wake Fraser when she got back to the hotel, and the police sergeant had appeared not long afterwards, sheepish and rumpled. He’d tried to grumble that I should have tried harder to wake him, but no one was in the mood to listen to either his complaints or his excuses.

We’d eventually decided on taking the body into the workshop. There was still no way of knowing when SOC would arrive, and the protocol that said a crime scene should be left undisturbed hardly seemed to apply here. Dozens of people had been milling around the boatyard, and after it had been manhandled from the fire there was no longer any point worrying about contaminating the body. I would have to take a look at it later, but in the meantime the best we could do was make sure it was kept safe.

The body was far too badly burned to be recognizable, but I don’t think anyone really doubted any more who it was. There had still been no sign of Maggie, and for all her faults she wouldn’t have abandoned her grandmother like that. Guthrie and Kinross had carried the body inside using the tarpaulin as a stretcher, and set it at the back of the workshop. Guthrie had gone straight home, subdued and sombre-faced. But Kinross had flatly refused to leave.