Perez didn’t tell Sandy about Hattie’s phone call or that he was coming into Whalsay to meet up with her. He was hoping he could reassure her and leave again before word got out that he was there. He assumed that she wanted to talk to him about the dig. On the phone he’d sensed she had something to confess, something that was making her feel sheepish, uncomfortable with herself. It would likely be some irregularity she wouldn’t want Paul Berglund and the university to know about. Perhaps there had been earlier finds on Setter land and she’d had her own reasons for not telling her supervisor about them. It would be easy enough to set her mind at rest if the matter had nothing to do with the old woman’s death.

Although he hadn’t been looking forward to the trip, when he arrived at Laxo the weather lifted his spirits. The fog had cleared. The breeze blew the water into little white peaks and even on the ferry he could feel the sea moving beneath his feet. Billy Watt was on duty again and they stood on the car deck chatting. Billy had married late and had a little boy. ‘Eh, man, it’s fantastic. The best feeling in the world. You should try it.’

I should, Perez thought. He imagined what it must be like to hold his own child in his arms. Do men get broody? Is this how women feel? He told himself it was just the time of the year. Spring. All those new lambs on the hill. He should concentrate on the case.

‘I’m meeting one of the lasses from the university in the camping bod,’ he said. ‘Can you tell me how to find it?’

So when he drove off the ferry at Symbister he knew exactly where he was going and he didn’t have to ask. He pulled into the side of the road and walked down past a couple of empty houses until he reached it. He looked at his watch. Five to six. He was pleased; he didn’t like to be late. Many of the Shetlanders he knew had a relaxed attitude to time and it always irritated him.