A woman who had been close to Ealasaid MacCallum: “I can’t sleep at night thinking how this would have hurt dear Ealasaid. I’ve known her since she was a girl, and it would have broken her heart to find out how she’d been—used— in this fashion. It won’t surprise me at all if Fiona is a murderess! Look how she treated her own flesh and blood—she knows no shame!—”

Hamish railed, “The shame’s hers—”

“It’s human nature we’re dealing with here,” Rutledge answered. “Don’t you see? The first stone has already been cast. When the police interview the next person, he or she wants to be counted among the righteous. It doesn’t prove anything except that people as a rule are easily led.”

Rutledge put the statements back in their original order and set them in the box. It had been unpleasant reading. Someone—Constable McKinstry, he thought—had likened Fiona MacDonald’s situation to the hysteria of witch hunts in the 1600s. And so it was. Fiona’s sin—if there was a sin— had been to keep to herself. Many people had held that against her and at the first test showed neither generosity nor trust.

In choosing so carefully, the writer of the letters had been successful in destroying Fiona MacDonald’s good name.

But were there other people, reluctant to step forward in the face of overwhelming public opinion, who privately might help?

RUTLEDGE WENT BACK to the square and at random stopped several women doing their day’s marketing. The first one was red-faced, with graying hair straggling out of the tight bun at the nape of her neck.

Introducing himself, he explained that he was searching for anyone who could give him information about Fiona MacDonald’s history before coming to Duncarrick.

The red-faced woman assured him that she had no knowledge of “that person.”

He thanked her and moved on. His next choice was a middle-aged woman in a neat blue coat and a hat with a modicum of style. A schoolmistress, he thought, walking the narrow line of decorum required by her position.

She was flustered by his question, and he wondered if she had known Fiona better than she wished people to remember.

“No—no, I really didn’t know her well. A passing—acquaintance. I accepted her for her aunt’s sake, of course, believing that Ealasaid’s family must be above reproach. It was a terrible shock when I heard—my first thought was ‘Oh, I’m glad her aunt isn’t alive to see her taken up by the police!’ ”

“You knew nothing about where Miss MacDonald lived before coming here? Her aunt never spoke of her niece in your hearing?”