‘There are birds …’ I say. ‘There’s a canvas rucksack in the mudroom. Please, there are—’

‘You want me to get it?’

When I nod, Will lets me go, tries not to show the concern in his face as he cups my cheeks in his hands. ‘Lock the door behind me this time, okay?’ He opens it and I try not to wince at the howling wind. ‘I’ll be back in a minute.’

I lock the door, sit back down at that wooden table inside that wooden room. I don’t shake. I don’t think of Mum. I don’t think of anything. When Will calls my name, I get up on aching legs, let the wind back in, cold and punishing. There’s nothing in his hands. There’s no expression on his face, but he doesn’t know that I can see what’s in his eyes. Because I’ve seen it many times before.

‘There was someone there,’ I whisper. ‘There was …’

Will closes the door and lifts me up. Carries me towards the couch without saying a word.

Help me, I think, as I let him. As I hold on to his solid warmth. Make it go away.

CHAPTER 26

Robert

There are two more dead ewes less than three weeks after the first. I find them in almost the same place; in the shelter of the low cemetery wall. It’s late afternoon, the skies are fastmoving and dark. I can smell the sea on the wind – another winter storm blowing in from the Atlantic to batter its rage against rock and stone and sand. I can smell the blood too, so much of it, turning the ewes’ sun-bleached coats black and slick. They died the same way as the first; a deep ugly wound above their pregnant bellies. I’m too tired and despairing to be angry. More than three healthy ewes, I’ve lost at least three lambs, an entire winter’s feed and vaccines. The claustrophobia is back; a weight that I feel in every step. The fear too, taut and debilitating. Because until I know who is doing this, how can I stop it?

I think about dumping the carcasses in the same place as the first: up on the empty moorland beyond the standing stones at Oir na Tìr, but at the last minute decide not to. Some small spark of anger bursts finally into life inside my stomach, and I haul them onto the back of the ATV instead. Ignoring the blood, the stiff and unyielding weight, the punishing wind.

The lights are on inside the blackhouse, but I drive up to the barn. I park at the back door. Sheep might be simple animals, but they’re not stupid. I go marching past them carrying two dead ewes and there’ll be hell to pay. The chest freezer is just inside the door. There’s not much in it. Mary has used most of the meat and fish over the last few months; we’re due another trip east to restock. I put the dead sheep inside binbags before stacking them at one end of the freezer. I strip off my coat and wash the blood from my hands before going back outside again.