Entry Island

Blanc drew on his cigarette and let the wind draw the smoke from his mouth. ‘Well, the statistics tell us that more than half of all murders are committed by someone known to the victim. So if I was a betting man my money would be on her.’

‘Shit!’ Crozes’s voice cut across the wind and turned their heads towards him as he thrust his phone back in his pocket.

‘What’s up, Lieutenant?’ Blanc said.

‘Could be this is going to get more complicated than we thought.’ He pushed a pensive jaw out towards the silhouette of the island across the bay. ‘Seems some guy’s gone missing on Entry Island overnight.’

Chapter thirteen

I

The crossing from Cap aux Meules took well over an hour in the boat that Crozes had requisitioned. It stank of fish and afforded little protection from the elements.

The sea was still tormented, and the wind strong enough to make their passage across the bay unpleasantly slow. Sime and Blanc huddled in a dark, cramped space below deck, salt water sloshing around their feet, the perfume of putrefying fish filling their nostrils and making their stomachs heave with every lurch of the boat. Crozes seemed unaffected, sitting lost in thought alone on a rusted cross-beam at the stern. Jack Aitkens spent the crossing in the wheelhouse chatting to the boat’s owner as if he were out for a sail on a sunny Sunday afternoon.

Arseneau met them at the harbour, and while Aitkens was sent to sit in the minibus the sergeant enquêteur briefed them on the missing man. They stood in a huddle at the end of the quay, braced against the wind, and Blanc made several attempts to light his cigarette before giving up.

‘His name’s Norman Morrison,’ Arseneau said. ‘Aged thirty-five. And...’ he hesitated, unsure of what was politically correct, ‘... well, a bit simple, if you know what I mean. One sausage short of a fry-up as my old man would have said.’

‘What’s the story?’ Sime asked.

‘He and his mother live alone up on the hill there. He went out after their evening meal last night to lash down some stuff in the yard. Or so he said. When he hadn’t come back in after half an hour, his mother went out with a flashlight in the dark to look for him. But he wasn’t there. And no one’s set eyes on him since.’

Crozes shrugged. ‘Anything could have happened to him in a storm like that. But what’s the connection? Why should we be interested?’

Sime could tell from Arseneau’s demeanour that he was about to drop a live grenade into the briefing. ‘Apparently he was obsessed by Kirsty Cowell, Lieutenant. Fixated on her. And if we’re to believe his mother, Cowell did more than just warn him off.’

Crozes did not take the news well. Sime watched as his jaw clenched and his mouth set in a grim line. But he wasn’t going to be deflected from his predetermined course. ‘Okay, we’ll take Aitkens up to the Cowell house first. I want to see how she reacts to him. Then you can take us on up to the Morrison place.’

She was waiting on the porch of the summerhouse watching as they drove up the hill. She wore a white blouse beneath a grey woollen shawl pulled tight around her shoulders, and pleated black jeans tucked into calf-length leather boots. Her hair was blowing out in a stream behind her, like a tattered black flag, furling and unfurling in the wind. It was the first time that Sime had set eyes on her since his dream, and against all of his instincts he felt himself unaccountably drawn to her.

Jack Aitkens was the first out of the vehicle as they pulled up, and he ran across the lawn to take his cousin in his arms. Watching from a distance Sime felt the oddest twinge of jealousy. He saw tears glistening on Kirsty Cowell’s face and after a brief conversation with her Aitkens came back to the minibus.

He lowered his voice, and it carried more than the hint of a threat in it. ‘She tells me you’ve already grilled her twice.’

‘Interviewed her,’ Sime corrected him. ‘And I’d like to talk to her again.’

‘Is she a suspect or not? Because if she is, she’s entitled to an attorney.’

Crozes said, ‘As of this moment she is a material witness, that’s all.’

Then Aitkens swung hostile eyes in Sime’s direction. ‘In that case your interview can wait. I’d like some time with my cousin, if that’s all right with you.’

He didn’t wait for their permission, but turned and went back to the house, taking his cousin’s hand and leading her down the steps from the porch in a wash of watery sunlight that suddenly played itself out across the cliffs,

The four policemen watched them start up off the slope together and Crozes said, ‘I don’t like that man.’

But Sime knew that Crozes wouldn’t like anyone who stood in the way of a speedy resolution to their investigation.

II