Chapter Four

"SAINT Columba's footsteps," Julia Lovat murmured, looking up from the pages of her much-thumbed guidebook. "Do you suppose those marks we saw on the top of that rock by Kilcolmkill Church really are the imprints of his feet?"

Peregrine had his portable campstool firmly planted in the sand a short distance away, his travelling easel propped up on its tripod in front of him. He was overlaying thin washes of watercolor to a developing study of his wife where she sat perched above him on a large flat-topped boulder, with the intense blue-green waters of the North Channel for a background. Julia's question came just as he was trading the fine sable brush in his hand for one finer still. Lifting his hazel gaze from the paintbox, he gave her a grin.

' 'Given the way the currents run in these waters, I suppose this stretch of shoreline is as likely a place as any for an Irish-born saint to have made his landfall. As for the footprints themselves - I don't know about you, but-1 am a firm believer in miracles."

The fond look that accompanied this declaration left Julia in no doubt as to the romantic nature of his meaning. She accepted the tribute with a chuckle and said wryly, "I hope that's not meant to be an assessment of my driving ability."

"Not in the least!" her new husband averred. "You and Algy are getting along famously."

The dark-green Alvis so named was parked at the side of the narrow road overlooking the beach where the couple had just finished picnicking on oatcakes, smoked salmon, and "truckles," a creamy variety of local cheese. It was the third day of their honeymoon, the second since their arrival in Kintyre, a wild and scenic peninsula on Scotland's west coast. Among the places they had explored since leaving their guesthouse in Campbeltown earlier that morning was the spot where the seventh-century Irish missionary, St. Co-lumba, was purported to have preached his first sermon on Scottish soil. A set of footprints visible on the flattened summit of a rock near the local village of Southend was said to be a permanent memento of that historic visit.

From Southend the pair had driven west along a road that was little more than a paved one-lane farm track, making for the point at the southwestern tip of the peninsula known as the Mull of Kintyre. From where they were sitting now, they had a view of the Kintyre lighthouse, built in 1788 and one of the first of its kind to be erected by the Trustees for Northern Lighthouses. Julia's expression turned meditative as she surveyed the lighthouse's turret-like outline, rising off its rocky base like some seagirt tower out of a Scottish folk tale.

"I always thought I'd like to live in a lighthouse," she observed dreamily. "To live balanced between the land and the sea and the sky, and to listen by night to the songs the silkies sing…"

Silkies were the mer-people of Scottish legend, gifted with the ability to shed their seagoing skins of seal-fur in order to go about ashore in the likeness of men. Softly Julia began to sing the ballad of the Great Silkie, which told how this lord of the sea had fathered a child on a woman of the land, returning from the waves thereafter to claim his son. Clear as a crystalline bell, her soprano voice floated up over the surrounding rocks, carrying with it the words of the Silkie himself:

"I am a man, upon the land, An I am a silkie in the sea; And when I'm far and far frae land, My dwelling is in Sule Skerry…."

Had they been at home, Julia would have accompanied herself on the harp, but even without the delicate counterpoint of harp strings, her rendition of the melody had the power to arrest Peregrine in the midst of his work. As he listened, he was reminded how it had been her singing which first had captivated him, even before he ever set eyes on her.

The occasion had been a sad one: the funeral service for Julia's godmother, the same Lady Laura Kintoul who had made Peregrine a present of the Alvis in her will. A mere apprentice then in the use of the Deep Sight which was now second nature to him, Peregrine had come to the church with Adam, half-dreading to find himself confronted by spectres of the dead. Instead, he had found not only peace but a new direction, for which Adam had been the catalyst and of which Julia was the living embodiment.

The silvery lilt of her voice lingered in his ears even after she had finished her song. He roused himself from contemplating a host of pleasant memories to discover that she had gone back to her guidebook. Bestirring himself to return to his work, he asked, "Where are you proposing that we should go tomorrow?"

"If it's all the same to you," she said, " I rather fancy taking the ferry across to Arran to see Lochranza Castle and King's Cave. That's where Robert the Bruce reputedly met the famous spider."

Peregrine smiled. Every schoolchild in Scotland was familiar with the legend of how Bruce, discouraged- and demoralized after a string of military reversals, had drawn fresh resolve from the sight of a small grey spider painstakingly rebuilding a shattered web.

"That sounds fine to me," he said. "Brodick Castle might be well worth a visit as well. After that, weather permitting, we might even try to hire -a boat and have a look at Holy Island."

Julia's sea-blue eyes turned quizzical as she lowered her guidebook. "Didn't I read somewhere that Tibetan Buddhists recently bought that island? It strikes me as odd, you know, that Buddhists would want to buy a Christian holy site."

Peregrine shrugged, not looking up from his work. "I understand the local folk felt that way, too, at first. But from what I hear, the order that bought it have been well- established and respected in the Borders for nigh on twenty years now, and they made it clear from the start that their purpose was to preserve the historic spiritual character of the island, to make it a place that would welcome seekers of all faiths."

"Well, that's refreshing, in these days when people are killing one another over religion."

"Aye, but the Buddhists have always been known for their tolerance. As you might expect, they're also very focused on the ecological aspects of the place. I understand that most of the island will be maintained as a nature preserve for the protection of the island's wildlife. I thought I might do some sketching. They've got all kinds of rare birds, about a dozen Ersikay ponies - which are the original Celtic horse - and even a small flock of Soay sheep."

"Soay sheep?" Julia looked at him in some disbelief. "Do they really?"

"That's what I hear. They're a very ancient breed, aren't they?"

"Aye, Bronze Age. They look rather like small goats, and you don't shear them - you pluck them. I don't know what kind of yarn the wool makes - though you can spin almost anything. I've got a cousin who's very keen on spinning and weaving."

"Well, maybe we can bring back some wool for her," Peregrine said. "See what the guidebook says about the island."

As she consulted the book, Peregrine carried on with his painting, considering Julia's comment about Buddhist interest in a Christian holy site. Though a formerly lukewarm childhood faith had been kindled to a sustaining flame through his association with Adam and the Hunting Lodge, and he was content for it to be so, Peregrine felt drawn to the island with a keenness that he was somewhat at a loss to explain.

Wondering what the lure might be, he allowed his gaze to wander out to sea. A gauzy haze was forming on the western horizon, blurring the distinction between sea and sky. Even as it occurred to him that he had better finish his painting before the light changed, his eye was drawn to a curious patch of shadow bobbing up and down among the swells of the incoming tide.

Peregrine's first thought was that it was probably just a large patch of kelp. Unlike kelp, however, this object seemed to keep to a solid shape, and was showing disconcertingly unnatural flashes of bright orange as it rolled closer in the surf. Whatever it was, it was attracting the attention of the gulls and other birds feeding along the shoreline.

With a pang of sudden foreboding, the young artist laid aside his brush and got to his feet to go take a closer look. His movement was abrupt enough to divert Julia's attention from her book.

"What's the matter?" she asked. Her expression was more curious than alarmed.

"Probably nothing," Peregrine said, with what he hoped was a reassuring smile. "Just stay where you are. I'll be right back."

He made his way down toward the water's edge just as an incoming swell swept the object into the shallows, tumbling black and bright orange amid the expected sea-wrack. One reluctant glance was enough to confirm Peregrine's worst misgivings. The object was the body of a man, encased in the black-and-orange neoprene of what looked like a wet suit.

Reluctantly he bent closer. The corpse was more than a little battered from its passage through the rocks. It half-floated face-down in the surf with arms and legs loosely out-sprawled like the limbs of a sodden rag doll. The bloated hands were starting to show evidence of decomposition. Peregrine decided it was probably just as well that he couldn't see the face.

Calling on his forensic training with McLeod, he made himself draw breath and distance himself a little as he continued to note first impressions. Alive, the man probably had been fit and sturdy. The short hair that capped his skull was a uniform shade of sandy-red, and thick, indicating that he had been relatively young. A serious laceration laid open the back of his skull, but the sea had washed away any blood. From the wet suit, Peregrine wondered if he might have been a diver, or possibly a wind-surfer met with mishap.

Even as the possibilities crossed his mind, a muffled exclamation from behind him made him start around. Julia had come down off her perch to join him, and was staring at the corpse with an expression of mingled pity and horror. His own squeamishness momentarily forgotten, Peregrine went to take her in his arms, at the same time trying to block her view with his own body.

"Julia, I'm sorry," he said lamely. "I didn't mean for you to see this. Let me take you back to the car."

He made a gentle attempt to steer her away, but somewhat to his surprise, she resisted his efforts. Her gaze partly averted, she murmured, "Poor soul! I wonder if he's the man who went missing off the Irish coast at the weekend."

Her observation put Peregrine in mind of a news bulletin he had picked up in the car on his way to the church on their wedding day. Dimly he recalled something having been said about a vessel from the Irish Department of the Marine being found adrift off Malin Head, with a dead man aboard.

He glanced uneasily down at Julia. She was looking rather white about the lips, but he saw with some relief that her face was otherwise composed. After a moment's pause, she drew herself up and asked, "Shouldn't we be thinking about telephoning an ambulance or something?"

"Not an ambulance," Peregrine said with a shake of his head. "We'll want the police back in Campbeltown. They should have the facilities to deal with this. How would you feel about driving Algy all on your own?"

Julia registered a blink. "More confident than I would have felt a week ago. Why?"

"I want you to go find a phone box and report what we've found," Peregrine said. "Southend is the nearest place where you'd be likely to locate one. Failing that, however, you may find yourself obliged to drive back to Campbeltown. I realize the road's none too good. Do you think you're up to it?"

"I suppose I'd better be, hadn't I?" Julia said with a small grimace. "What will you be doing in the meantime?"

"Keeping an eye on the body," Peregrine said. "I don't want to handle it, if I can help it, because if this turns out to be more than a simple case of death by misadventure, the procurator fiscal won't thank me for doing anything that might compromise the evidence. At the same time, the tide is going to be turning soon, and we don't want our unfortunate friend to be carried back out to sea again before the police can retrieve him."

"Certainly not if we're going to call them out on a round trip drive of thirty miles," Julia agreed with feeling. She glanced over at the body on the shore and hurriedly looked away again with a shiver. "Thanks for giving me the easy job."

"Don't mention it," Peregrine said wryly. Gathering his bride into his arms, he added, "I really am sorry about this. I hope it hasn't ruined your honeymoon."

Julia nestled into his embrace and smiled. "Darling, it's our honeymoon - and do you really think anything could do that?"

This declaration earned her a lingering kiss. Resisting an impulse to repeat it, Peregrine fished in his trouser pocket for the car keys.

"Here you are," he told her as he handed them over. "Take as much time as you have to, for your own safety. I'm certainly not planning to go anywhere else between now and when you get back - and neither is he."

He followed her with his eyes as she made her way up through the rocks toward the road, where the Alvis stood waiting. Before climbing into the driver's seat, she vouchsafed him a wave and a kiss blown from her hand. He heard the smooth growl of a well-tuned engine as she turned the key in the ignition. A moment later, the Alvis swung around in a compact U-turn and headed back up the road in the direction of Campbeltown.

Left alone, Peregrine spent the next few minutes pacing uneasily up and down at the water's edge. He found himself wondering if he would ever achieve the degree of fortitude he had seen Adam and McLeod display when confronted with a corpse. As he reflected back over the experience he had gained in their company as a forensic artist, it occurred to him that it might not be a bad idea on this occasion to take some photographs for the record. Satisfied that the body on the shore was in no immediate danger of floating away, he went to retrieve his camera from amongst the rest of his artist's paraphernalia.

He removed the lens cap from his Pentax as he returned to the water's edge, casually framing up a cover-shot as he walked. But when he paused to take it, adjusting the zoom lens, he had trouble getting it to focus.

"That's odd."

He shook his head, blinked, and tried again. His efforts brought no improvement to the imaging. A quick inspection of his glasses showed nothing to account for the fuzziness. Clucking his tongue impatiently, he unscrewed the lens and held it to the light from both directions - perfectly clean - then replaced it and looked again. The results were still no better. Though his vision by itself seemed clear enough, the picture seen through the lens remained curiously blurred.

Perplexed, Peregrine went ahead and shot several different angles of the body, focused as best he could, then sat back on his heels and scowled as he contemplated this peculiar development. The absence of anything like a logical explanation aroused hitherto dormant suspicions, and made him begin to wonder what would happen if he were to try his luck with a sketch.

He decided to test his perceptions before going to the bother of fetching his sketchbook. For Peregrine, the act of drawing was the means by which he could both activate and direct his own distinctive powers of psychic perception. Laying the camera on a nest of sea grass behind him, he settled gingerly on a rock beside the body and composed himself, momentarily closing his eyes. Calling now upon the training given him by Adam, he drew several deep, measured breaths. The centrifugal whirl of his thoughts and emotions fell away, leaving him centered in an island of calm. Grounded in that calm, he opened his eyes again, simultaneously willing himself to See.

For a moment, he could envision nothing but the piebald shape of the corpse itself. As he continued to watch, however, another, hazier image began to form, hovering over the body like a ghost. Insubstantial as mist, it assumed a vaguely human shape. But as soon as Peregrine attempted to bring that shape into sharper focus, it abruptly dissolved.

With a hard-won patience born of self-discipline, he set himself to try again. Before he could reestablish any degree of perception, however, a sudden surge in the tide lifted the dead man's body from its grounding on the beach. The wave's backwash started to pull the corpse with it, tumbling it back in the direction of the open sea.

Peregrine roused himself with a jerk and made a hasty lunge to recapture it. A splash of cold brine left him wet to the knees, but he managed to get a hand around one orange-clad wrist. While he was struggling to maintain his grip, his eyes lighted for the first time on an irregular three-cornered tear in the back of the man's wet suit.

A wound?

His curiosity piqued, Peregrine towed the body back to its resting place at the waterline, then bent down for a closer look. He could see no immediate evidence of any wound beneath the tear, but he refrained from poking and prodding. Even if his work with McLeod had not taught him a healthy respect for proper forensic procedure, he was strongly disinclined to have anything more to do with the dead man's remains than he absolutely had to". He took the minimal measures necessary to get the body beached, retrieved the camera and put it away, then sat back on a nearby rock to guard the body and await reinforcements.

A full hour passed before the distinctive purr of a familiar engine brought him to his feet. When the Alvis swung into view, Peregrine was relieved to see that it was accompanied by a white Range Rover bearing the fluorescent yellow side stripe and door insignia of the Strathclyde Police.

Julia stopped the Alvis where she had parked before and sprang out as the police car slowed to a halt a yard or two behind the Alvis' rear bumper. Two uniformed policemen alighted and came to join her on the shoulder, falling in behind her as she led the way down to the beach. As soon as she reached the sand, Julia broke away from her escort and ran forward to greet her husband.

"Sorry it took me so long," she said. "I couldn't find a public telephone anywhere between here and Campbeltown, and once I got there I had a bit of trouble finding the police station. This is Sergeant MacDonald, and that's P.C. Williamson." Turning back to the two police officers, she added, "This is my husband."

"Gentlemen." Peregrine acknowledged the introduction with a nod. "Thank you for coming out."

"Not at all, Mr. Lovat," the sergeant replied, directing his subordinate toward the castaway corpse. "Sorry you and Mrs. Lovat have had your stay here in Kintyre so rudely interrupted. I'm thankful to say we don't get many calls like this. We'll try to run through the formalities as quickly as possible, so that you and your wife can get back to your holiday."

Delving into the breast pocket of his police tunic, he took out a notebook and pen.

"Mrs. Lovat has already given us a statement," he told Peregrine. "While we're waiting for the ambulance to arrive, I'd appreciate it if you'd give me your version."

Peregrine was familiar with the procedure, having witnessed McLeod in action on the scene of more than one investigation. Knowing full well what to expect, he responded to the ensuing series of questions with a conciseness consistent with police methods. At the end of their dialogue, the sergeant gave him a quizzical look over the top of his notebook.

"Have you given evidence before in a police inquiry, Mr. Lovat?"

"Yes, I have," Peregrine admitted. "I occasionally do freelance work as a forensic artist for Detective Chief Inspector Noel McLeod of the Lothian and Borders Police."

Sergeant MacDonald's blue eyes registered a spark of lively interest. "That wouldn't be the same DCI McLeod who headed up the investigation into those so-called jack-o'-lantern killings last October?"

"The very same, I'm afraid."

MacDonald pulled a wry grin. "Gets all the strange ones, does your Inspector McLeod. Well, I guess somebody has to tackle them. Were you involved with the case?"

"Only in a very minor way," Peregrine said evasively. He did not add that, in seeking to apprehend the killer, McLeod had drawn - unofficially - on the collective resources of the Hunting Lodge.

MacDonald favored Peregrine with a speculative look, but any further comment on McLeod's apparent notoriety in police circles was forestalled by the return of P.C. Williamson.

"Sergeant, I think this might be that Irish Fisheries officer who went missing over the weekend," he said. "Scanlan, I think the name was. They use this kind of survival gear. He's got a wound in the back to match his partner's."

MacDonald pursed his lips in a brief, soundless whistle, then gave a deprecatory shake of his head. "Well, that rules out a fight between the two of them," he said. "They can't both have stabbed one another in the back. And he had to wash up on our beat."

The subdued rumble of another vehicle approaching heralded the arrival of the ambulance. Conscious of a growing sea chill in the air, Peregrine wrapped an arm around Julia's shoulders and gathered her close to him as two ambulance attendants made their way down from the road to meet them. Under the supervision of the two police officers, they zipped the remains into a black body bag and shifted the bag onto a portable stretcher for conveyance up to their car, Sergeant MacDonald lingered long enough to exchange parting words with the Lovats.

"Once again, let me express my regrets that you should have had your visit interrupted by a thing like this," he told them. "I hope the rest of your trip goes smoothly."

"So do I," Julia said solemnly. "This certainly wasn't on our agenda!"

"We were planning to leave Kintyre in the morning," Peregrine said, with a glance down at his wife's upturned face, "but I suppose we could stay on for another day or two, if you think you might need us as witnesses."

"I don't think that will be at all necessary," MacDonald assured them. "You've done your bit, and admirably. I don't anticipate our having to trouble you again. Best wishes to you both. Enjoy the rest of your holiday."

"We fully intend to," Peregrine said, giving Julia a hug.

The two men traded handshakes before MacDonald took his leave. Once the police and the ambulance men had departed, the Lovats began gathering up their things. It was only when Peregrine had to shift his camera bag that he remembered the photos he had taken of the dead man.

He said nothing to Julia, but he made a mental note to see about having the film processed as soon as possible, and also have the camera checked out. With the camera misbehaving, he doubted the photos would be of much help to the police, but at least he wanted to be sure that further photos of the wedding trip were not ruined - and it would be fun to see the photos they had taken thus far.

Putting the camera out of mind, he packed up his paintbox, then paused to contemplate the unfinished painting still mounted on his easel. He was debating whether or not to crumple it up and consign it to the nearest rubbish bin when he felt Julia's arms encircle his waist from behind.

"I hope you're not thinking of getting rid of that," she said.

Peregrine turned to her in some surprise, circling her shoulders with his arms. "Are you saying you'd like me to keep it?"

"More than that, I'd like you to finish it, if you can," Julia said. Seeing that her husband was still looking dubious, she went on. "It's true I had a bit of a shock today, darling, but the experience was also something of a revelation. I got to see a side of you that I'd hitherto only heard about secondhand - the side of you that only comes out when you're working on a case with Adam and Noel McLeod. Since you're obviously going to continue in that association, it's important to both of us that I should come to understand that aspect of your life. This was the first step toward my achieving that understanding, and I want to remember it."

Peregrine gazed down at his wife's earnest face with something approaching wonder. "Julia, are you sure? The kind of enforcement work I get involved in from time to time can often get pretty harrowing."

Even as he spoke, it cost him a pang to think of some of the uglier sights he had seen. But Julia's blue eyes never wavered from his.

"You don't have to tell me all the gory details," she conceded. "But you don't have to shield me completely, either. Our lives are now inextricably intertwined. If each of us doesn't grow with the other, both of us will wind up stunted. Trust me to know my own mind in this, darling, and promise me you'll keep that painting."

Peregrine had never heard Julia speak so seriously before. "I promise," he told her. And sealed it with a fervent kiss.