Taylor, M [Shetland Sailing Mysteries 10] A Shetland Winter Mystery by Marsali Taylor

Author:Marsali Taylor
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Hachette Headline Accent
Published: 2021-06-18T23:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

haeing a spree: having a party or celebration

Gavin and I caught up during the drive to the Brae Bairns’ Christmas Party. We were both smartly dressed, Gavin in his green kilt with his good green jacket, the one without baggy pockets, and me in my dress, black with sprigged flowers and a dancing skirt. I’d washed my hair and left it in a black cloud of curls, and I’d done my best to apply some make-up.

‘Berwin said he remembered us coming into the shop, but nothing after that,’ Gavin said, ‘until he woke up at Helge’s in a pair of his dad’s pyjamas.’

‘His dad’s?’

‘That’s what he said.’

I was silent for a moment, considering that. Dad went to bide at Helge’s for a bit, Sheila had said, about the row over Robin moving out.

Gavin was following my thoughts. ‘Local gossip has him living in both houses. If one wife annoys him he goes to the other one for a few days.’

‘Emotional blackmail to keep them both doing what he wants.’

Gavin sighed. ‘But not illegal. He’d probably say he was doing nothing wrong. They’re both his wife – well, barring a little matter of a divorce. It’s not actually harming anyone.’

‘Except themselves. Helge can’t move on and find another man, Frigg can’t fight their differences out properly.’

‘It’s certainly liable to brew the kind of poisonous situation that made Helge hide Berwin like that.’

‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Did DS Peterson believe her story?’

‘With reservations. The boy had certainly ended up there with a crack on the head, and she thought he’d come there by boat.’

‘Yes,’ I agreed. ‘That rang true.’ I was about to add that I’d seen the next morning that she’d had the boat out, when I remembered that Gavin didn’t know that I’d been to Robin’s. ‘Once she got him into the boat she relaxed, and she was quite easy telling us about getting him into the house.’

‘When, though? Because his sister told us he’d come home after the disappearing trick.’

I nodded. ‘I’m sure Sheila was telling the truth. It all made sense, the way she told it.’

‘I agree. So, Berwin came home, he slipped out the next morning and headed along towards Helge’s and Tirval’s, instead of to school as he should have.’

‘John-Lowrie thought he might have been watching otters at the beach past Tirval’s.’

‘Maybe. That would bring the boat in, which him falling on the road wouldn’t. Maybe he slipped there, and knocked himself cold.’

‘Can Tirval see that beach from his house? Because if he can, there’s not much would get past him.’

‘Maybe he did see, and phoned Helge to bring a boat to come and get him. But then, he’d have phoned Leonard . . . unless he’s on Helge’s side against Frigg.’

Leonard’s new wife, he’d called her, after fifteen years.

‘Maybe the boy was on the other side of the headland, the Grobsness side, and Helge rowed round there for the exercise, and found him. But why should she say it was in the night if it wasn’t?’ He shook his head.

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