Sandy realized he’d reached Perez’s house and was on the edge of the settlement of Ravenswick. There were still lights on in the old chapel, but the curtains were drawn. Perhaps Jimmy kept the light on now when he went to sleep. Perhaps, like a bairn, he got nightmares in the dark. Or perhaps he was sitting up awake, staring into the fire.

There was a fire lit in the entrance to the hotel. Peat that you could smell all the way from the car park. Stuart Brodie was on reception. Sandy had been at school with him too. The bar was full of residents drinking coffee or taking a dram after their dinners. The reception was all dark wood, with the smell of beeswax.

‘Are Peter and Maria around?’ Sandy leaned across the polished desk so that he was close to Brodie and didn’t have to shout to make himself heard.

‘They’ve just gone up to the flat.’ Brodie was conscientious. A bit dull; he had no curiosity at all. ‘Is it something I can help with? I wouldn’t want to disturb them.’

‘Point me in the right direction and I’ll find my own way,’ Sandy said. ‘Don’t ring them.’ He took the grand staircase to the first floor and then a smaller staircase until he reached a door marked ‘Private’. He knocked a couple of times, then at last he heard footsteps on the other side and it opened.

Peter Markham was still dressed for work in a suit, though he’d taken off the tie and there was a glass in his hand. His hair was turning grey, but he was still fit. He didn’t come across to Sandy as an old man.

‘Can I help you?’ He seemed a little irritated by the interruption, but he wasn’t rude. Perhaps guests often knocked on his door to complain or ask for help and, given the prices they were paying, Peter Markham couldn’t afford to lose his temper.

Sandy introduced himself and the man stood aside. ‘What is it, Sergeant? Has one of our guests been misbehaving?’ He didn’t recognize Sandy, but then his wife had dozens of distant relatives.

Sandy followed him through to a large sitting room. Once these might have been servants’ quarters, but this end of the attic had been knocked into a large space and painted white. The polished wood floors of the hotel were here too, and there was a blue patterned rug near the wood-burning stove. Sandy thought it would be a bit chilly in the winter. He preferred a carpet. On a shelf near the stove was a sculpture of a gannet, almost life-size, made of driftwood. Sandy found himself staring at it. How had the artist made it look as if it was about to dive?