Marsaili glanced at Fin, offering him a rueful smile. “How could I forget?”

“A very fair man. Honest, and without prejudice in almost everything except . . .”

“I know.” Marsaili grinned. “He hated Catholics. Papes and Fenians, he called them.”

Her mother shook her head. “I never approved. My father was Church of England, which is not that different from Catholicism. Without the Pope, of course. But, still, it was an unreasonable hatred he had of them.”

Marsaili shrugged. “I was never sure whether or not he was entirely serious.”

“Oh, he was serious, all right.”

“So what’s strange, Mrs. Macdonald?” Fin tried to steer her back to her original thought.

She looked at him blankly for a moment before the memory returned. “Oh. Yes. I was going through some of his things last night. He’s accumulated a lot of rubbish over the years. I don’t know why he keeps the half of it. In old shoeboxes and cupboards and drawers in the spare room. He used to spend hours in there going through stuff. I have no idea why.” She sipped her tea. “Anyway, I found something at the bottom of one of those shoeboxes that seemed . . . well, out of character somehow.”

“What, Mum?” Marsaili was intrigued.

“Wait, I’ll show you.” She got up and left the room, returning less than half a minute later to sit down again between them on the settee. She opened her right hand over the coffee table in front of them, and a silver chain and small, round, tarnished medallion spilled on to the open pages of the wedding album.

Fin and Marsaili leaned closer to get a better look, and Marsaili picked it up, turning it over. “Saint Christopher,” she said. “Patron saint of travellers.”

Fin craned and tilted his head to see the worn figure of Saint Christopher leaning on his staff, as he carried the Christ child through storms and troubled waters. Saint Christopher Protect Us was engraved around the edge of it.

“Of course,” said Mrs. Macdonald, “as I understand it, the Catholic Church removed his status as a saint about forty years ago, but it still belongs to a very Catholic tradition. What your father was doing with it is beyond me.”

Fin reached out to take it from Marsaili. “Could we borrow this, Mrs. Macdonald? It might be interesting to see if it stimulates any memories.”

Mrs. Macdonald waved a dismissive hand. “Of course. Take it. Keep it. Throw it away if you like. It’s of no use to me.”

Fin dropped a reluctant Marsaili off at the bungalow. He had persuaded her it might be better if she let him talk to Tormod on his own first. The old man would have so many memories associated with Marsaili that it might cloud his recollection. He didn’t tell her that he had other business he wanted to attend to en route.