The huge farmhouse kitchen was a deep red colour, a bit too womb-like to be cosy. Lots of wooden cabinets. A big AGA-style range cooker gurgling and thrumming away to itself. The kettle rattling to a boil as Rennie busied himself making three mugs of tea.
Logan pulled out a chair and sat across from Mrs MacAuley. ‘You have a lovely home.’
Rennie pointed with a teabag. ‘Shame about the shed, though.’
She frowned. ‘Shed?’
A pair of patio doors led out from the kitchen into a big garden, bordered by a six-foot-high hedge, surrounded by woods.
‘All burnt down.’
He was right. It must’ve been a fairly substantial one too, at least six-by-eight, but all that was left of it were a few burnt stubs where the walls used to be. Glistening and dark in the rain.
‘Ah. No. That was years ago. Kids. I think.’ She looked away. ‘I keep meaning to get rid of it, but Ken built it and Aiden painted every single bit he could reach, even when we asked him not to.
‘Sorry. Didn’t mean to upset—’
‘Anyway,’ Logan sat forward, ‘we’d like to ask some questions about the investigation, if you’re OK with that?’
She nodded.
‘Good. Well, when—’
‘Aiden had been a pain in the backside all morning, shouting and squealing and running about the house.’ She picked at her palm again, digging at it with her fingernails. ‘I was trying to do the ironing. He wasn’t looking where he was going and he... he battered right into the ironing board. The whole thing went crashing down.’ Voice getting more and more brittle. ‘And I screamed at him. I...’
Rennie threw Logan a pained look as she wiped away a tear.
‘I called him a “horrible little monster”; told him he was stupid and careless.’ She looked up. Pleading. ‘He could’ve killed himself! The iron was red hot, what if it’d landed on his head? Or scarred him for life?’ She lowered her eyes, nails gouging away at her palm. ‘So Ken took him off to the shops. And I never saw Aiden again. I never saw either of them ever again.’
Logan put his hand on her arm. ‘I’m sorry.’
‘The last thing I said to my son was “You’re a stupid, careless, horrible little boy.”’
‘You weren’t to know.’
Deep breath. ‘It’s only fifteen minutes through the woods — there’s a track takes you right into Rothienorman. They went out for milk and flour and eggs and they never came back.’
In the silence that followed, Rennie placed the mugs on the table.
Mrs MacAuley covered her face. Her whole body wracked by each juddering sob. ‘They... they were going... to make pancakes... to cheer... to cheer me up... My husband... died... and my... my little boy vanished... because... because of bloody pancakes!’
Rennie was outside on the patio, wandering across the paving slabs, phone clamped to his ear. ‘Yeah... Yeah... No. Don’t think so anyway.’
Logan stepped through the open patio doors, closing them behind him. ‘We better give her a bit of space.’ Up above, the clouds were nearly skimming the treetops. Rain drumming against Logan’s peaked cap. He set off down the path towards the bottom of the garden. ‘Come on.’
‘Yeah... Will do... OK. Thanks.’ Rennie hung up and hurried after him. ‘Creepy Sheila says that’s our exhumed remains all installed at the mortuary. Kickoff’s at three.’
They passed the burned-out shed. Ivy crawled around the base. A drooping fern curling its way through the charcoaled wood in one corner.
Rennie scampered past, looking back towards the house. ‘Nice place, isn’t it? Very big and fancy. Be great to bring a kid up here. Donna would love it. All this space...’
A couple more sheds lurked in different corners of the garden, the undergrowth pressing in on all sides, windows greyed with dust and spiders’ webs. One was almost completely consumed by a rampant thicket of ivy and brambles. The other shed’s door barely clung on to its hinges, exposing the rusting hulk of a ride-on mower inside.
Nature was reclaiming most of the garden, all except the washing line and a child’s play area: climbing frame, slide, and a pristine swingset. Slowly being battered into submission by the rain.
The path led to a gap in the hedge, then off away into the woods. Dark and cold and deep. A thick canopy of pine blocked out most of the rain. The drops hissed and clicked above them, joining the chorus of crunching twigs and rustling needles beneath their feet as they followed the path downhill.
Rennie stuck his hands in his pockets. ‘I mean, did you see how big that back garden was? Ours is about the size of a facecloth.’
They passed the remains of what was probably a croft, now little more than tumbled-down ruins. Ominous bones in the gloom.
‘And think of the games you could play in here! Charging about with a wooden sword.’ He slashed the air with an imaginary one. ‘Being dinosaurs.’
A clump of broom had invaded the path, crowding in from both sides so only a narrow gap remained. Logan pushed through it.
The pine gave way to beech — leaves drooping like scraps of skin waiting to drop — opening out into a clearing with a burn running through the middle of it. Someone had thrown together a makeshift bridge over the water with planks and chunks of stone. The sort of thing a child would build.
On the other side, a fusty grey teddy bear was cable-tied to a tree, along with some faded artificial flowers.
Rennie wandered out into the rain. ‘Ooh... It’s like something off Winnie-the-Pooh, isn’t it?’ He grabbed a twig. ‘Wanna play Poohsticks?’
Logan reached into his jacket and pulled out the case file, sheltering beneath a huge beech tree. He checked the crime-scene photographs, then pointed at the far side of the bridge. ‘That’s where they found Kenneth MacAuley.’
MacAuley lay on his side, one hand dangling in the burn, head reduced to red and purple mush. Logan held the picture out to Rennie.
‘Urgh... That’s horrible.’ Backing away. Face curdled with disgust.
‘Thought you’d read the case file? I told you to read the case file!’
‘Yeah, but I didn’t ogle the crime-scene photos, did I? I’m not a sickie weirdo.’ A shudder. ‘Urgh...’
‘Imagine you’re the killer: why are you here?’
‘To bump off Kenneth MacAuley.’
Logan leaned back against the tree. ‘Then why abduct Aiden?’
‘Ah, OK. So either that was a bonus, or maybe that’s why I’m here? It’s an abduction gone wrong.’
‘Then why the overkill? First blow to the head probably did the job, but you keep on going till there’s nothing left above his neck but mince. Why?’ Logan held up the photograph, moving it around until it overlaid the real scene. Kenneth MacAuley sprawled out with his hand in the water. ‘What does that get you? Why do you do that?’
‘Because I’m a freak?’
‘Or maybe you know him and you can’t stand him looking at you with those accusing dead eyes...’ Logan lowered the photo and stared off into the woods. ‘And what do you do with the wee boy afterwards?’
Rennie dropped his stick in the water and watched it float away.
Mrs MacAuley stood at the living room window, looking out at the dreich view. Shoulders slumped.
A pair of big leather sofas faced each other across a large wooden coffee table covered in dog-eared — and possibly dog-chewed — copies of Horse and Hound. An old upright piano in the corner, almost buried under framed photos of Sally, Kenneth, and Aiden MacAuley. More on the walls. A shrine to the missing and the dead.
It was difficult to tell which Mrs MacAuley was. Probably more than a little bit of both.