Shadow dashes ahead, chasing my torch beam, loving his night-time adventure. Tom Kinsella is far more subdued. His silence feels oppressive until I ask how he’s adapted to the change from army to police duties.
‘It wasn’t my first choice,’ he says, keeping his eyes on the path. ‘But it beats sitting at home drinking all day.’
‘Did you see much active service?’
‘Fourteen years, but EOD isn’t always front-line.’
‘How do you mean?’
‘We cleared old battlegrounds. Landmines, chemical devices, and dirty bombs full of shrapnel. It’s easy to get hurt in that environment.’
‘Tread on a bomb, you mean?’
‘We’d emptied a whole field the day I got hurt. My commanding officer tripped and fell. If he’d stayed on his feet, it would have been a different story, but the device killed him instantly. The fallout hit me and two colleagues. My chest and torso took the worst of it, plus a few facial wounds, but I was lucky. One of the guys was blinded.’ Kinsella comes to a sudden halt, then listens to the night air, his voice lowering. ‘Someone’s following us, sir. Take cover down here.’
He shunts me off the path, dropping behind some bushes. His hearing must be sharper than mine. A minute passes before footsteps, light and rapid, tap along the path. Kinsella’s face looks white in the moonlight, his expression fixed as he clutches his gun. I only draw breath again when I spot Bella Porthcawl hurrying along, her face solemn. She’s sure-footed despite the dark, relying on her knowledge of the landscape and the moon’s glitter to find her way home.
There’s no embarrassment on Kinsella’s face as we rise to our feet, his gun back in its holster, but I can see he’s unsettled. I let the last five minutes of our journey pass in silence, instead of forcing conversation. As we follow the path down to Penny Cadgwith’s home by the beach, it’s so quiet I can hear her bees collecting pollen, even though the air’s cooling.
‘Wait here, please, Kinsella. I won’t be long.’
He comes to a halt, shoulders back like a sentinel, but Shadow stays at my heels as I approach the back door. No one bothers to pull their curtains in Scilly during the warmest months of the year, with few neighbours around to play peeping Tom. I can see directly into Penny’s kitchen. She’s standing by the table, rooted to the spot, her fingers pressed against her lips. I wait for a moment, but her posture doesn’t change. When I tap on the door, she jumps out of her skin.
‘Sorry to startle you, Penny. You looked deep in thought.’
Her eyes are puffy with tears. ‘Bella’s just given me the news.’
‘She told you about Hugh Porthcawl?’
Penny manages a smile. ‘Maybe his promises were genuine after all. I feel bad for doubting him.’
‘Did you guess it was him on Badplace Hill? Is that why you were so upset at seeing the skeleton?’
‘I tried to ignore my doubts. He was so young, Ben. We talked about all the adventures we’d have together, but then I saw those letters sent from abroad years ago. The handwriting looked different, but his mum was convinced they were from him. It hurt to believe he’d walked away.’
‘It must have broken your heart when he vanished.’
She looks away. ‘I didn’t tell the whole truth about never hearing from him again.’
‘You got something in the post?’
‘The envelope was typewritten, franked in America, six months after he’d gone. It was the words of a song we both loved, after seeing a live performance in Penzance.’
‘Do you still have it?’
She hands me a worn envelope from the table. I can see it’s been read often, the page inside refolded carefully every time. It contains the typed words to ‘Elusive’, by Scott Matthews, and I suppress a smile. Matthews is one of my favourites too. The song describes the pleasure and pain of young love in a few poetic words.
‘How did you feel getting this, Penny?’
‘Devastated, but it seemed like an apology of sorts.’
‘Who else knew that you and Hugh liked Scott Matthews?’
‘All my friends and family.’
‘What about Louis Hayle?’
She looks uncomfortable. ‘Hugh was so close to him, maybe he mentioned it.’
‘It’s time to level with me, Penny. There’s no shame in admitting the truth.’
‘I don’t understand, Ben. I’ve never lied to you.’ Her voice has risen by half an octave, high and breathless. ‘Things improved after the letter came. I was able to move on, but it affected my choice of career. I wanted to reunite victims’ families with their loved ones, because I knew how much separation hurt.’
‘Do you know why Hugh spent time with Louis Hayle?’
‘Louis was successful, rich and charismatic. We were just kids, looking for role models.’
‘Hayle sexually abused one of his protégés. I’m certain there were more.’
My words make her flinch. ‘Not me, thank God, but I’ve wondered over the years. There was something predatory about him. The vulnerable ones got most of his time; he called it individual coaching.’ Her gaze is fixed on the blank wall, picturing things I can’t see. ‘If Hugh found out there was abuse, he’d have challenged Louis straight away. He hated cruelty more than anything.’
‘I think he faced him down, on Badplace Hill. It may have cost him his life.’
Tears well in her eyes. ‘That monster got what he deserved then, didn’t he?’
‘I have to ask this, Penny. Did you take the bones from Badplace Hill and leave them at Hayle’s house?’
‘Of course not. Why would I?’ The astonishment on her face would be hard to fake.
‘They were placed in a box by his back door.’
‘Someone wanted him to suffer for his past,’ she says quietly.
‘Another of his victims, maybe?’
‘Vulnerable kids become vulnerable adults, Ben. They wouldn’t have the strength to face him down.’
‘Some have got plenty of guts, believe me.’ I’m thinking of Nathan Kernow. At eleven he was brave enough to plan his escape route and force his rapist to make amends.
Penny’s hands are shaking, even though she’s one of the toughest people on Bryher. I know she’s got the technical expertise to remove Hugh Porthcawl’s bones from the crime scene, without leaving evidence, yet her reaction seems genuine. Who else could have done such a thorough job of removing a skeleton from a haunted piece of land?