In Aith Perez stopped at the marina, got out of the car and looked up at the Belshaw house. From its position at the top of the bank there was a view over the whole settlement to the tops beyond. You’d see the Fiscal’s house from there. He pondered the implication of that before walking back to his vehicle.

The school had closed for the day and Perez was tempted to drive back up the bank to talk to Jen Belshaw. But her children would be at home, it would be all noise and domestic chaos, and besides, he wasn’t sure he was ready yet. He didn’t have the right questions to ask. At Voe he passed the bar, another hennie bus stop and, at the junction to the main road, he looked south to where Markham’s car had been ambushed. All the action surrounding the murders had taken place in such a small area, all in the North Mainland. The biggest proportion of Shetland’s population lived in Lerwick and to the south, so he thought this was significant too, something that Willow, coming in from outside, hadn’t considered. The only major players living outside this region were Peter and Maria Markham in the Ravenswick Hotel. It occurred to him that he’d never seen them away from their business, but of course that didn’t mean they were stranded there, isolated from the rest of the islands. They could travel north too.

Instead of taking the road south towards home, he turned left. He drove on through Brae, where Joe Sinclair lived with his family. There was a kids’ football match on the field, but no sign of Andy Belshaw. These looked like school teams and the woman referee, in a bright tracksuit, must be a teacher. Perez thought Andy would be in his office at the oil terminal, drafting his press releases and selling his stories, perhaps finding it hard to concentrate because he was still mourning his best friend.

There were no scarecrow figures now at the gate where the track led off to Evie Watt’s croft, but in their place a mound of flowers. Some picked from gardens, daffodils and early tulips. Big bouquets, still in their clear plastic wrappers, bought from the supermarkets in Lerwick. Perez pulled his car into the side of the road and went to look. There were pictures and messages, many of them directed to Evie. We’re so sorry for your loss. We’ll miss him, he was a lovely man.

Perez felt relieved that Fran had died on Fair Isle. A small comfort. None of her acquaintances, her students or the other people, who would have enjoyed their own brief role in a life-and-death drama, could make it there. So there’d been no flowers to shrivel in the frost. No dying petals to scatter in the wind.