‘Hate to break it to you, but you’ve got more of a Miss Marple vibe,’ Kelly says with a smile, but her voice is still flat. I look at her until a car draws up behind us, flashing its lights, and then she accelerates through the junction and onto the Stornoway road.

*

Bobby Rankin is in his sixties. Tall and lankily thin, he stands in the office doorway with what looks like a permanent stoop, his grey eyes tired.

‘Aye, Murdo told me about you. Your book about the Kilmeray deaths in ’94.’ He comes round the desk and sits down with a wince. ‘What is it I can do for you?’

‘Um, I was just wondering …’ I take the photo out of my bag. Its frame makes too loud a clack against the desk as I set it down. ‘Mr Black, he couldn’t identify everyone, and he thought you might be able to?’

‘Ah. The famous photograph.’ He picks it up. ‘It’s in bad nick, all right. Let’s see.’ He brings it close to his eyes, squints for a couple of seconds, and then moves it a few inches away.

‘Mr Black thought the ones at the front were Jimmy Struthers, Charlie MacLeod, and maybe Bruce MacKenzie?’

‘Aye.’ Bobby Rankin nods. ‘I think he’s right at that. And behind them is the MacDonalds, Alec and Fiona.’

‘He didn’t recognise anyone on the left-hand side of the photo.’

‘Can’t say as I blame him. Not much of it left, is there?’ He squints for a few seconds more before setting the photo back down on the desk. He points to the man and woman at the very left edge of shot. ‘I can’t tell who they are, I’m afraid, but standing behind them is Euan Morrison. Definitely.’

‘Thanks.’ I’m inexplicably disappointed. Mainly because I don’t know how this helps. Or even how I thought it would help. I shove the photo back into my bag as I stand up and hold out my hand to shake his. But he’s no sooner let mine go than he shakes his head abruptly and comes back around the desk.

‘Wait a wee minute. Can I see that again?’

I hand him the photo, and he stares at it for perhaps a full minute. ‘I’m afraid someone’s told you wrong.’

‘Told me what wrong?’ Something in his certainty quickens my pulse.

‘That photo can’t have been taken on the day of the festival.’

I go still. ‘Why not?’

He holds out the photo. ‘See that fishing boat moored up behind them? CY415? It was a scalloper, out of Castlebay. Belonged to a Malcolm Sinclair. His brother, Alan, ran a Stornoway creel boat, which sank out past Ness during the storm on Saturday, ninth of April. Day of the festival. Coastguard managed to get the crew off, but Alan didn’t survive the trip to hospital. Malcolm came up from Barra to register his brother’s death on the Monday.’

‘The Monday?’

He nods. ‘Registered the death myself.’ He points at the photo. ‘That boat didn’t arrive in the harbour until Monday the eleventh of April.’