Sacrifice

There was no easy way into the small, walled churchyard. I guessed official visitors had to go through the church. I spent a few seconds plucking up courage and then I leaped over the wall. None of the headstones near by carried dates later than the nineteenth century so I followed the narrow, overgrown path around to the back. The rear left corner looked promising. There were patches of bare ground, the graves were better tended and one grave even had a raised mound and some remains of funeral flowers.

It took me five minutes to find it. A large, rectangular headstone, the granite dark and glossy, the carving simple:

Kirsten Hawick

1975-2004

A most beloved wife.

The mound of earth had been flattened and planted with spring bulbs. Some of the daffodils were still in bloom; others had dried, their petals shrivelled and orange. They needed to be deadheaded, tied in neat bunches and replaced with summer bedding plants but I had the feeling that Joss Hawick probably didn't come here too much. I suppose it's a very individual thing, one's relationship with the grave of a loved one. Some people seem to need the close personal connection they feel with the deceased and can spend hours just standing or sitting by a grave. For others, I guess, a grave is a rather dreadful reminder of the physical process of decay taking place beneath their feet.

I knelt down and, because I really couldn't think of anything else to do, I started knotting the stalks. When I'd finished the grave looked neater, apart from the weeds. After all the rain we'd had recently they came out pretty easily, but my hands were soon filthy.

'Touching,' said a voice.

I spun round to see two men standing over me. Two tall men. The setting sun was directly behind them and for a second I wasn't sure who they were. Then, with a sinking heart, I recognized both. I stood up, determined to brazen it out, and looked down at the grave. 'So, who do you reckon is down here?' I said.

Andy Dunn looked back at me as though I was a difficult child in whom he'd invested an enormous amount of time and energy and who had just let him down, again.

'Kirsten Hawick is buried here,' he said. 'Joss Hawick is extremely distressed. He'll probably make a formal complaint.'

Well, I may not be the sharpest knife in the box but I know bullshit when I hear it.

'I can't imagine what about,' I snapped. 'He was handled with extreme sensitivity and the visit was perfectly legitimate. There was every chance the ring – and I'm referring to the one that I found, by the way, on my land – was his wife's.'

'How's your horse?' asked Gifford, successfully interrupting my train of thought. Christ, had that really only been this morning?

'Please, Kenn,' said Dunn, sounding tired.

I decided to ignore Gifford. Well, at least try. Looking directly at Andy Dunn I said, 'I saw her photograph this evening. It's the same woman. How else do you explain the fact that a ring, bearing the exact date of their wedding and their initials, could be found in my field. In the hole I dug her out of, for God's sake?'

'Tora,' it was Gifford again, 'you saw the corpse only twice. The first time it was covered in peat and you were understandably in shock. The second time was on an autopsy table and, frankly, you didn't look at her face that much.'

I looked at Gifford. His eyes seemed larger and brighter than I remembered. For the first time that evening I started to have doubts.

'Lots of women on these islands look like she did,' he said. 'Red hair, fair skin and small features are typically Scottish. But I knew Kirsten Hawick. For one thing, she was nearly your height. A good five inches taller than the corpse you found.'

I shook my head, but what he was saying was plausible.

He reached out and put a hand on my shoulder, speaking quietly, as though he didn't want Dunn to hear. 'Two doctors, a nurse and her husband were present when the machines were turned off. Kirsten Hawick died in our hospital.'

I wasn't giving in easily. 'Then her body was stolen. Probably from the hospital morgue. Someone stole the body because they wanted her heart.'

They looked at me like I was deranged.

'Don't ask me why they wanted it, but someone did. They stole the body, took out the heart and dumped her in my field.'

'The woman in your field had just had a baby. Kirsten Hawick had never been pregnant.'

Well, I had to admit, he had me there. Plus, according to Dr Renney, the heart had been removed while the victim was still alive, not post mortem.

And the timing just doesn't fit,' added Dunn, imitating Gifford's gentle tones. 'I've checked with Stephen Renney and the Inverness pathology team. They've had a chance to examine the body extensively and to carry out all sorts of tests on the peat around her. The woman from your field could not have been dead since 2004.'

I looked down at the grave. 'There's one way to know for sure.'

Well, that at least dented Dunn's annoying self-control. He flushed and glared at me. 'Don't even think about it. We are not about to start exhuming graves. Do you have any idea how much distress that causes? To the whole community, not just the family concerned.'

Gifford's hand left my shoulder and slid down my arm, my sore arm. He squeezed gently and I had to grit my teeth not to flinch. 'This is exactly what I was afraid of. Tora, I don't blame you, but this has all become too personal. I want you to think again about taking some time off.'

At least he wasn't firing me yet. But I wasn't about to take time off. There were some difficult deliveries coming up and the hospital needed me. I shook my head.

'OK.' He glanced at Andy Dunn, as if to say, I've done my best. You see what I have to deal with?

Maybe he was right, maybe I did need to detach at bit. Forget about the murder, just concentrate on doing my job and let the police do theirs.

'You have a clinic in the morning, don't you?' Gifford was saying.

I nodded.

'I'd like to see you just before. Can you be in by eight?'

I nodded again, feeling like a delinquent teenager whose parents were being just too understanding.

Gifford smiled at me. He laid his arm along my shoulders and pushed me gently down the path.

'Come on, I'll walk you to your car.'

Andy Dunn followed us in silence as we walked down the path and left the churchyard. As I drove away, I could see them both, in the rear-view mirror, standing in the road and watching me.

When I arrived home a shadowy figure was huddled on my door- step. I shrieked as it moved towards me.

'It's OK, it's only me.' Dana stepped out into the light. The body is slow to catch up with the brain on these occasions. Even as I knew there was nothing to worry about, my nerve endings felt as though someone had administered a thousand tiny electric shocks. I looked round.

'Where's your car?'

'Down the road.'

I stared at her stupidly. 'Why?' I managed.

'I don't want anyone seeing it outside your house. We arranged to meet here, remember?' she prompted.

'Yes, but… you obviously haven't seen your DI this evening.'

'Of course I've seen him. Why, have you?'

I nodded. 'He found me in St Magnus's churchyard. At Kirsten's grave.'

Her eyebrows shot up. 'Did he now?'

'He explained everything. He and Kenn Gifford.'

She looked at me with both amusement and pity on her face. 'And you fell for it? Tora Hamilton, you are not the woman I took you for.'

10

'I SAW HER GRAVE, DANA. IT'S JUST NOT POSSIBLE.'

We were sitting at my kitchen table, doors locked, blinds drawn. I was tired and had an uncomfortable sense of being drawn back into something I'd been happy to leave behind just half an hour ago. We were drinking hot, strong coffee. I'd offered red wine but Dana had shaken her head. 'We need to think,' she'd said. Scary word: we. Suddenly, we were accomplices, working against clear instructions from our superiors. We were arguably being foolish, possibly about to do considerable harm and definitely in for a whole heap of trouble when – not if- we were found out.