She thought about her dad, the lies Dorothy thought he’d told. She remembered once when she was ten, she was playing aimlessly in the storeroom out back when she knocked over one of the boxes of unclaimed cremation remains. She stood and stared at 142the ashes spread across the floor, then walked out to the garden and kept playing, cartwheels on the grass, a skipping game. Later her dad wandered out and confronted her about the mess and she lied, felt the rush of blood to her cheeks, such a giveaway. Instead of shouting at her, he lowered his voice, always a bad sign, and gave her a pep talk about the importance of honesty and taking responsibility for your mistakes. She felt her cheeks flush again now as she remembered it, and thought about Jim’s honesty, whether he had taken responsibility for his actions.

She looked up. ‘What about your old guy in the Hermitage?’

Dorothy shrugged. ‘We’ll see what the cameras throw up but I’m not convinced. My gut tells me he’s imagining it.’

Hannah frowned. ‘He seemed pretty sharp to me.’

‘Maybe.’

Dorothy went to the other whiteboard and looked at the funeral jobs. Gina O’Donnell had been wiped away, cremated and gone. There were still four names up there, one body to pick up, two in the fridges downstairs and a fourth in the viewing room, ready for tomorrow’s ceremony.

Jenny saw William Baxter’s name, the call she’d taken. He was in the fridge. She thought of him, cold and naked. She pictured herself crawling into the adjacent slot in the fridge, lying down in the cool air, slowing her metabolism until there was nothing to measure, no heartbeat or pulse, no brainwaves or thoughts, nothing left of her except dead cells and lifeless matter.

143

27

DOROTHY

The Church of Scotland minister didn’t seem to know anything about William Baxter. Dorothy knew more from Jenny’s scribbled notes a few days ago. There were two dozen people at the service in the Skelfs’ chapel, William’s widow stoic and quiet at the front, flanked by two sons, their wives and three grandchildren. The rest were elderly, in various states of decay, many walking sticks and a mobility scooter parked at the back. Dorothy felt the age of her bones. She closed her eyes and thought of those Pismo barbecues, school dances, picnics and fairgrounds, car trips and flirtations with boys, then Jim, her big, daft Scottish boy appearing and changing everything. She looked out of the window to where they’d burned his body, not even a week ago.