“I’ll be quite alright,” Moira said. She turned her head and went back to looking out of the window. Ben returned the Lucozade to the bag and had just picked it up when Moira spoke again. “You can sit down if you must. Man your age, legs must be getting past it.”

Ben chuckled and pulled out the chair. “Aye, no’ half,” he said. There was a whuff of air as he dropped his weight down onto the padded vinyl seat. “Mind you, reckon I’d beat you in an arm wrestle.”

Moira turned her head on her pillow and glowered at him. “What?”

“Depending on the arm, I mean,” Ben said. He indicated her right arm, which lay limply on top of the bedcovers. “I’d be in with a shot against that one. The other one? Anyone’s game.”

Moira continued to glare at him for what seemed like forever. The voices of the other patients and visitors continued to ring out in the chilly silence.

And then, she let out an exhalation—a single ejection of air—that might, under intense forensic examination, reveal itself to be a laugh.

“Just you go ahead and keep telling yourself that,” she said, her stare losing some of its intensity. “What on earth are you doing here, anyway?”

“I told you, I thought I’d pop in and—”

“Here in Fort William, I mean,” Moira spat, like only an idiot would have failed to realise this. “I thought you lot were all away back to Inverness? I thought we’d got rid of you?”

“Oh. Aye, we were,” Ben said. “But we’re back again.”

“God, what now?” Moira asked.

“Home invasion in Glen Coe,” Ben said. “Nasty business. Tourists. A family.” He lowered his voice. “Mind Archie Tatties? Off the telly?”

“Couldn’t abide him,” Moira said, the flaring of her nostrils confirming her opinion. “Awful unfunny shite.”

“Aye. Well. It was him,” Ben told her. “I probably shouldn’t have said, we’re trying to keep it—”

Moira had more pressing concerns than the identity of the victim. “You get checked in properly at the desk?”

“Eh? Oh. Sure. Aye.”

“Properly properly, I mean?”

“I’m telling you, aye. We did. Some young constable did it,” Ben said.

“Filled out all the paperwork? Signed the forms?”

“Yes, Moira, we did,” Ben said, but a badly timed swallow gave the game away.

“You’re telling me lies,” the woman in the bed scolded.

“I’m no’! We filled everything in properly, just the way you’d have wanted,” Ben said, then he quickly changed the subject before she could question him further on it. “Everyone’s asking for you, by the way.”

Moira stared straight up at the ceiling. “Now I know you’re lying. Why are you even here, anyway?”

Ben hesitated. “Which one do you mean this time? Here in Fort William, or here in the hospital?”