Gunn knocked on the door, and the assistant returned to slide the drawer shut, consigning the unknown young man they had pulled from the bog to an eternity of darkness.

Outside, the wind tugged at their jackets and trousers, spitting rain, but without serious intent. The sun was still breaking through in transient moments of illumination, quickly extinguished by an ever-changing sky. At the top of the hill they were building an extension to the hospital, the sound of drills and jackhammers carried on the wind, fluorescent orange vests and white hard hats catching fleeting fragments of sunshine.

There is always a moment of internal silence after being in the presence of death. A reminder of your own fragile mortality. The two men got back into Gunn’s car without a word and sat for nearly a minute before finally Fin said, “Any chance you could slip me a copy of the post-mortem report, George?”

He heard Gunn’s explosion of breath. “Jesus, Mr. Macleod!”

Fin turned his face towards him. “If you can’t, just say no.”

Gunn glared back at him, breathing through clenched teeth. “I’ll see what I can do.” He paused and then, in a voice laden with irony, “Anything else I can do for you?”

Fin smiled and held up his camera. “You can tell me where I can get prints made of these.”

Malcolm J. Macleod’s photography shop was in a whitewashed roughcast building in Point Street, or what they called The Narrows, where generations of island kids had gathered on Friday and Saturday nights to drink and fight, smoke dope and indulge teenage hormones. The smell of fat and fried fish carried on the breeze from the fish and chip shop two doors along.

When the photographs of the dead man had downloaded from Fin’s camera and appeared on the computer screen, the shop assistant cast curious looks in their direction. But George Gunn’s was a well-known face in the town, and so whatever questions there might have been remained unasked.

Fin looked carefully at the images. The flash of his camera had flattened the features a little, but the face was still perfectly recognisable to anyone who might have known him. He picked the best of them and tapped it with his finger. “That one, please.”

“How many copies?”

“Just the one.”

Fin was intercepted in the hallway as he entered the Dun Eisdean care home. An anxious young woman with dark hair drawn back in a ponytail. She ushered him into her office.

“You were with Tormod Macdonald’s daughter when she brought him in yesterday, weren’t you, Mr. er . . .”

“Macleod. Yes. I’m a friend of the family.”

She nodded nervously. “I’ve been trying to get hold of her all morning, without any luck. There’s been a bit of trouble.”

Fin frowned. “What kind of trouble?”

“Mr. Macdonald . . . how can I put it . . . tried to escape.”