The party house, p.27
The Party House, page 27
With no visitors to attend to, he and Colin carried on with all the other tasks of the estate. Their wages were deposited in their bank accounts, but there was no further contact from either Stratton or Chalmers.
As long as both he and Colin were paid, Greg didn’t care. Plus he’d begun to nourish hopes that Malcolm’s idea of a community buy-out might actually be a possibility.
On one of his many walks with the dogs, he eventually found the courage to visit Forrigan. On the neighbouring hill to Beanach, it had been the unlucky victim of the fire. Burning round behind both hills, its wind-borne sparks had caught hold on the Forrigan roof, and as the team focused so much energy and work on Ard Choille, Forrigan became a victim of that particular war.
As he got closer, he could see that the rafters had been the first casualty, and as the flames had gained entrance, the attic bedrooms had paid the price. The helicopter had deposited a load of water on the abandoned house, in the hope of further protecting its nearest neighbour, Beanach.
He was grateful for that, but sad too at the destruction of a cottage that had stood there almost as long as Beanach had.
When he finally made himself go inside, he discovered the staircase gone, so there was no opportunity for him to go upstairs and look in Ailsa’s bedroom as Joanne had done. Something that had made him angry with her at the time.
That memory made him as despondent as observing the gutted building.
Checking the time, he called the dogs and began to make his way back to Beanach and the Land Rover, intent on heading into Blackrig to be updated by Kath, who would shortly be back from visiting Caroline in Inverness prison.
Caroline had been charged with culpable homicide and held on remand, and they were expecting the date of the trial to be announced soon.
Finn they’d released on bail with Malcolm acting as his guarantor, and he was currently staying at the hotel.
Both Caroline and Finn had refused to see him, with Finn blaming all his sister’s woes on Greg. Something Greg accepted.
His own brush with the law in the form of Richard Longman QC had eventually fizzled out, mainly because Joanne had decided not to press charges regarding Richard’s attack on her in the lochan and, quid pro quo, Richard had dropped his own charge of assault against Greg.
Greg had no idea why Joanne had given up on that until eventually he’d decided to follow her blog posts as Maya Villan, convincing himself that this still lay within the rules of not contacting her.
There he discovered that instead of charging him with the single attack, she had outed Richard for what he was – a violent, abusive partner and sexual predator – and since that moment of courage, many other women had come forward to support her claims with their own.
He guessed that exposing Richard Longman QC on the hallowed London turf he called his own had been her intention, although he still feared for her safety because of it.
The blog was without images of her, so he had no idea if she’d ended the pregnancy or not, and no amount of googling either ‘Joanne Addington’ or ‘Maya Villan’ had changed that.
‘I’ll get in touch when it’s over,’ had been her final words to him, and he still had no idea what the ‘it’ she’d referred to encompassed.
What was in no doubt, however, was her determination to accomplish whatever journey she’d set out on.
Driving along Main Street, he noted that Kath was back, her car parked in the drive, so he pulled in behind her. Obviously watching for him, she opened the door on his approach. ‘Come away in, Greg, and I’ll bring you up to date.’
It had been like this from the beginning. He had tried to keep his promise to Joanne to help Caroline in any way he could, but a visit from him hadn’t been permitted. He was almost relieved by her refusal to allow this to happen. It would have been painful for them both. At least via Kath he could still offer whatever help he could.
‘The date for the trial is set for—’ She gave a date in November. ‘As you’re aware, Caroline’s defence will argue that she had no intention of hurting Ailsa, only of remonstrating with her. Her sudden death caused by the fall was an accident. Mitigating circumstances will apply and you will be asked to explain what those were.’ She was watching him closely. ‘The pregnancy and your affair. Are you willing to do that?’
The blame, he knew, could be attributed to his treatment of both women. Even as he nodded, the same small thought surfaced again. The one that reminded him that Caroline had wished ill on Ailsa, just as she’d wished ill on Joanne.
But wishing ill wasn’t the same as doing it.
And yet . . . and yet, she’d admitted she would have told Richard of Joanne’s whereabouts even had she known that he would be violent towards her. Because she hated Joanne, just as she’d hated Ailsa, because they had, in her words, taken him away from her.
The truth was he’d never been ‘hers’ in the first place. Just as Joanne didn’t belong either to him or to Richard.
Kath was waiting for his answer, so he gave it.
‘I’ll do whatever I can.’
‘Right, now tell me, have you heard anything from Joanne?’
He shook his head. ‘I keep an eye on her Maya Villan blog. She’s written about the virus and the wildfire, but nothing about Ailsa.’
‘Well, that story’s not yet complete,’ Kath said, reminding him of something he’d said to Joanne earlier in their story.
‘She’s also pursuing Richard and getting a lot of support from other women who have stories about him too.’
‘Good for her,’ Kath said.
‘How’s Finn?’
‘Caroline worries more about him than herself. She blames herself for getting him involved.’ She fell silent for a moment. ‘We all do stupid things in the horror of the moment. Things we ultimately regret. That doesn’t make us bad people. Just flawed ones.’
She continued. ‘You’ll have to forgive yourself some time, you know. Just like we all will. We imagine somehow we’ll see the bad things that are headed our way. The bad things and the good. So we can prepare for the bad and take time to enjoy the good – but, sadly, we rarely do.
‘You and Caroline weren’t meant for each other. You and Joanne are, despite the circumstances. My advice is to stand up in court and say your piece to help Caroline. Then get on with your life and make sure Joanne is a part of it.’
Greg
He’d read up on everything he could find that might have a bearing on the trial. What he couldn’t find online, he’d questioned Caroline’s defence lawyer about.
However, none of what he’d learned prepared him for what was to follow. In particular when he spotted Ailsa’s traumatized parents sitting in the gallery.
He spent every day in court, listening to the evidence, until he too was called to give his version of the events of that fateful night. That, and his relationship with both the victim and the accused.
It was a sorry tale, although he felt relieved to at last tell the full truth of what he could remember.
Caroline did not look once in his direction while he did this. Yet he would have given anything to have her do that.
When it came her time to be questioned, she’d sat rigidly upright, her eyes staring as though into the past. As she began her story, she appeared to relax a little, letting the words flow as if grateful to at last say it all out loud.
‘I was pregnant with Greg’s baby. He’d promised he wouldn’t see Ailsa again. He avoided meeting her that night after the ceilidh and went straight back to Beanach. I followed him a little later.
‘When I arrived, Ailsa was inside. They were having sex. Afterwards they began arguing. Greg told her that would be the last time it ever happened. That he didn’t want to see her again. That he was going to become a father.
‘She was really angry when he said that. Greg told her to leave. I thought she would go back home to Forrigan. When she didn’t, I decided to follow her. She entered the woods by the green loch and I realized she was going to the campsite, where her Glasgow friends were staying.’
Caroline fell silent at that point, staring ahead, her face white and drawn.
‘I waited because I wanted to talk to her, explain properly about the baby. How we knew it was a boy and we were going to call him Mac. When she reappeared, I asked her not to break us up, because of the baby. She said she didn’t care about that shit. That Greg liked to fuck her, not me.’
She’d halted there for a moment, her face a mask of pain, before drawing breath to continue.
‘She pushed me out of the way and I shoved her back. She grabbed my hair and yanked it. I remember screaming. She told me to “shut the fuck up” and scratched at my face. When I managed to break free, she stumbled, missed her footing and fell backwards. I expected her to get up, but she didn’t.
‘I thought of going to Greg’s place but I didn’t want him to know I’d seen them together. So I called my young brother, Finn. By the time he arrived I was out of my mind, because I couldn’t find a pulse.
‘I didn’t think anyone would believe me that it was an accident. And I was pregnant. I wanted the baby desperately. I wanted to be with Greg. It was my fault we hid her body. Finn didn’t want to do that, but I begged him. I thought folk would think she’d run away again. She’d done it before in Glasgow. I’m sorry I did that. Sorry that her parents had to go through that. I’m sorry I got Finn involved. It was all my fault.’
According to the police, Caroline’s story matched the forensic material they’d collected from the body. Flakes of Caroline’s skin had been under Ailsa’s nails. Clumps of hair in Ailsa’s hands.
For five years Caroline had been carrying this guilt, knowing that everything she’d done was in the hope that Mac would be born and make them the family she craved.
The sentence was what Greg had been told to expect. In respect of culpable homicide on the basis of a minor assault leading to death, Caroline was given a custodial sentence of two years. For her attempts to pervert the course of justice by burying the body, she had three years added to that. Her time in remand would be taken into account.
As for Finn, he was given two years for aiding and abetting his sister in the disposal of the body.
Greg didn’t return directly to Beanach after the trial, but drove instead to Ard Choille.
He wanted to remember the times as teenagers that he and Caroline had spent by the lochside. To remember how things had been between them back then.
An Lochan Uaine’s green hue changed with the shifting lights of the seasons, but to his mind it always looked magical. A green fairy loch like the fairy glen.
They’d spent a lot of time here together. Most of every summer, even after they took up summer jobs, him on the estate, her at her family’s shop. She’d had to bring Finn along some of the time. She never seemed to mind that, although he had occasionally been irked by her wee brother’s presence.
When had everything changed between them?
Listening to Caroline’s story of that terrible night, he could now see where all the lies and omissions had begun, both his and hers. The jigsaw that portrayed their lives – Caroline’s, Ailsa’s and his own – had finally been put together, and at its centre was his betrayal of both women.
Something he was going to have to learn to live with.
That, and the fact that Joanne wasn’t coming back.
He turned from the loch and walked towards Ard Choille.
He and Colin had made a point of trimming the lawn until such time as the grass had finally given in to the fast approach of winter. They’d also done their best with the house. They’d got rid of all the mud and soot, although without an okay from Global Investment Holdings, they couldn’t order the repairs to begin.
The sauna by the water had been destroyed by the fire; the gaping hole that had been Ailsa’s grave, they’d filled in themselves.
As for the house, Ard Choille wasn’t looking its best, but the villagers, having saved it from the fire, had plans for its future. They had a mind to try and achieve Lord Main’s dream of a wildlife centre with the birch house at its heart.
It appeared their wish might come true, he thought, as he drew closer. For the birds that hadn’t taken off for warmer climes had decided to make Ard Choille their winter home.
The balconies and walkways no longer rang with party voices and clinking glasses, but with the fluttering of wings and the songs of its resident birds.
Blackrig Revisited
By Maya Villan
The area of the graveyard where the children and their nurse are buried is surrounded by a white fence. Nearby is a seat where those who loved them can watch over them for a while.
Beyond the stone wall that circles the cemetery are the trees. The scent of pine is fresh and sharp in the December air. I’d forgotten how wonderful that scent was.
Sitting there, I imagine the burials, one after another, swift and without ceremony for fear of crowds and the mutating virus that stole their young lives.
Today, at last, the people of Blackrig will come together to commemorate those they lost. They will follow their age-old tradition of walking en masse behind a piper, from the church along Main Street and into the woods and from there to the cemetery, which wasn’t permitted at the height of the pandemic.
I have chosen not to join them in this walk. I didn’t know the children or their nurse. I was not here when they were taken. This ceremony, I feel, is theirs and theirs alone.
This is why I, an outsider, am here alone now to pay my respects before their arrival.
Just beyond the little graveyard, another stone has been raised. This one is for a child that was loved, named, but never born.
Mac Campbell Taylor.
If you have been following the blog on Blackrig, you will know how much the raising of that headstone means to his mother, Caroline.
My story of Blackrig is coming to an end. I will miss writing about this place, these woods, the hills that surround it. Most of all, I will miss writing about the people who call it home.
Rising from the seat, with a little difficulty because of my ever-increasing bump, I’ve decided to visit the green man and green woman and their assorted woodland creatures.
Arriving in the fairy glen, I can see that yet another carving has been installed during my time away. I know who it is, although I never got to meet her.
Ailsa, her long hair flowing, sits on a tree trunk, her sketch pad in hand.
Walking on through the woods, I emerge onto the road that leads eventually to Ard Choille. The folk hereabouts no longer refer to it as the Party House. It, together with the estate, is up for sale. Not wishing for any more absentee landlords, there are plans afoot for a community buy-out which looks very promising indeed. They hope Ard Choille itself will be reopened as a wildlife centre. Locals will once again swim in An Lochan Uaine and sit on its sandy shore.
My breath is condensing in the cold air as I trudge up the track to Beanach. Greg, still surprised by my return, wanted me to wait for him at the hotel, but I insisted that I welcomed the walk, after so many months in London.
The strength to fight Richard Longman QC came because of the time I spent here in Blackrig. I thank all of you who supported my endeavours to expose him for what he was, especially the women who found the courage to come forward and add their voices to mine.
Greg predicts snow soon, possibly in time for Christmas. He says he can smell it in the air.
Acknowledgements
Firstly, a big thank you to gamekeeper Ewan Archer, who patiently answered all my questions regarding my mythical small West Highland Estate, Blackrig.
Thanks also to his wife Karen, for offering her husband’s services for research purposes.
To Doug Macdonald, Watch Manager of Carrbridge Community Response Unit, for his expert knowledge on firefighting, and to Bunty, his wife, for her help with research.
To Donald Findlay QC who advised me on sentencing in the Scottish Courts, and to Dr Jennifer Miller, Associate Professor of Forensic Science, Nottingham Trent University, who I first met when I did the Diploma in Forensic Medical Science course at Glasgow University, and who continues to be an inspiration.
Lastly, a special thanks to my wonderful editor Alex Saunders, and all the team at Pan Macmillan for their support for The Party House.
Introducing Rhona MacLeod . . .
Lin Anderson’s series of crime novels featuring forensic scientist Rhona MacLeod are set in and around Scotland. From the beautiful remoteness of the Orkney islands to the dark underbelly of urban Glasgow, the locations she chooses to write about play as much a role in her novels as the characters that she populates them with.
Go back to where it all began with the thrilling first novel in the Rhona MacLeod series. Read on for an extract now . . .
1
THE BOY DIDN’T expect to die.
When the guy put the tasselled cord round his neck, grinning at him, he thought it was just part of the usual game. The guy was excited, a dribble of saliva slithering down his chin and falling onto the boy’s bare shoulder. He nodded his agreement. He was past feeling sick at their antics. He lay back down, turning his head sideways to the greyish pillow that smelt of other games, closed his eyes and shifted his thoughts to something else. There was a goal he liked to play out in his head.
On the right, the Frenchman, arrogant, the ball licking his feet, thrusting forward. The opposition starts to group and there’s a scuffle. Bastards. But no worry ’cos the Frenchman’s through and running, the ball anchored to him, like a child to its mother. The crowd breathes in. Time stretches like an elastic band. Then the ball’s away, curving through the air.
Wham! It’s in the net.
The boy can usually go home now. Not this time. This time, before the ball reaches the net, his head is pulled back, then up. The intense pressure bulges his eyes, bursting a myriad of tiny blood vessels to pattern the white. His body spasms as the cord bites deeper, slicing through skin, cutting the blood supply to his brain. At the moment of death his penis erupts, scattering silver strands of semen over the multicoloured cover.
