‘Mrs Macfarlane?’ I assume this is Vicky’s mother.

‘Miss Macfarlane,’ she snaps back.

‘I wonder if I could speak to Vicky.’ I’ve learned to speak properly and my voice is polite.

She looks horrified, as if I’ve hit her. ‘There’s nobody of that name here.’ Then she seems more curious than angry. ‘Who told you about Vicky?’

I’m starting to think that this woman is crazy and I back away from the door. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have bothered you. I’ve obviously made a mistake.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘Come in. I want to tell you the story. Nobody remembers her now but me.’

She steps aside and I follow her in. We sit in a room at the back of the house and there on the wall is a photo of two young women. I recognize one of them as the girl I made love to on Hilbre. ‘That’s me and Vicky,’ Miss Macfarlane says, ‘just before she died in 1950. She drowned, you know, and our family was never the same again. It seemed so unfair, when we survived the war.’ And she goes on to tell me the story that’s already familiar, of the wild and sparky girl who tried to cross the estuary from Hilbre too close to the tide as a fog was rolling in. ‘Her body was never found,’ she says. ‘I imagine Vicky on the island, just as she was that day.’

I imagine it too. A young woman, dead for nearly thirty years. Stranded and lonely. Looking for company. Desperate for me to join her.

The Soothmoothers

I always take more than a professional interest in the guests who stay in the Ravenswick House. Partly it’s a matter of pride. I manage one of the best hotels in Shetland and our visitors deserve more than a perfunctory welcome. It’s an effort to get here and, after thirteen hours on the ferry or a bumpy flight, the least they should expect is a pleasant smile and a cup of good tea by the fire. And partly of course it’s curiosity; I’ve always been inquisitive by nature.

These particular visitors fascinated me from the moment they walked in. They’d run down the steps from the car park through one of those gusty showers that come out of nowhere in the islands and arrived in the lobby shaking the rain from their clothes. A woman and two men, all soothmoothers. Confident English. You know the sort. Voices slightly too loud, expensive shoes, good haircuts. I could tell they were in Shetland on business, not pleasure.

It was hard to read the relationships. More than just colleagues, I was sure of that. There was an emotional charge, sexy, edgily flirtatious. But who was flirting with whom? It was hard to tell. I wouldn’t even have been surprised if the men had turned out to be lovers and the woman a voyeur or a fixer. They’d booked single rooms and I put them on the same landing, with views over Mousa. They continued their conversation as they followed me up the stairs. ‘A quick shower, then we’ll meet up in the bar, shall we? A large G&T before dinner? At least we don’t have to drive anywhere tonight.’ That was the woman, and she looked at the younger man hungrily, as if she wanted him to take her into his arms. She was well preserved, but ten years older than him. Perhaps I’d found the cause of the sexual tension in the group. But I thought there were other secrets holding them all together. Of course they took no notice of me. They treated me like a servant, as if I was invisible, and they didn’t realize I was listening.