The Going Down of the Sun Read Online Free PDF

aboard. I said, “She couldn’t have known anything about it, Alex. We were right in front of you, and by the time we got on deck the Skara Sun was gone. She had no time to be hurt, or afraid.”
    He couldn’t speak. He nodded, his eyes grateful. His hand was tight in mine.
    I said, “Where were you when it happened?”
    His eyes flared as if I’d threatened him. “I—I’m not sure. Didn’t you see?”
    â€œWe were below. We didn’t see anything until afterwards.”
    â€œI was in the cabin, I think. Alison was making breakfast.”
    It wasn’t credible and I knew it too, but I wouldn’t have said anything. If there’s one thing policemen can’t abide it’s well-meaning busybodies polishing the stories of people who are going to help them with their enquiries.
    But Neil Burns wasn’t married to a policeman and so didn’t know the taboos. “You can’t have been. You’d have gone the same way she did. But you’re practically undamaged. Apart from nearly drowning, I mean.”
    I winced but it didn’t stop me listening for the answer. It took time coming. I saw him look at the broken arm wedged at his side, think about his battered head and other injuries. I saw him consider the plausibility of what he was going to say.
    â€œI must have been on deck. That’s right, I went to check the anchor-chain. I had the forward hatch open, so I could get in and out of my cabin without disturbing Mrs. McAllister. Then she said she was making breakfast, and I leaned over to check the fairlead before going aft. She must have lit the gas then. I don’t remember anything more.”
    Well, he wouldn’t. When that boat went up she went like a bomb; he would have had no warning of whatever it was that hit him and threw him senseless into the sea. He could have been up in the bows: that would have put him, and the dinghy on its painter trailing from the stern, about equally as far from the gas stove, which would explain why they escaped the otherwise comprehensive destruction.
    That left the third improbable survivor. “Alex, there wasn’t a child on board?”
    His eyes rounded at me with a peculiar horror. “A child? God almighty, no.”
    â€œI saw a plastic toy floating in the water. Did Mrs. McAllister have a child?”
    â€œAye, a baby, four months old. But he was never on the boat. She left him at home, with her husband.” He swallowed. “Has he been told yet?”
    Burns shrugged. “I’ve no idea.”
    Back home Harry would have been trying to contact the next-of-kin within minutes of the victim’s identity being discovered. I presumed it would be the same here. “Yes, probably. Unless he’s neither at home nor his office, in which case the police willl be making every effort to find him before it goes out on the news. Yes, I think he’ll know by now.”
    â€œThere was nothing I could have done,” said Alex Curragh. I wasn’t sure if he was telling me or asking me. “Even if I’d been right beside her, there was nothing I could have done to save her?”
    The reassurance he craved was also the truth. “Nothing. If it was a gas leak, it was always going to kill everyone in the cabin when the first match was struck. It’s a miracle it didn’t kill everyone on board.”
    For the traditional minute none of us said anything. Then Neil Burns cleared his throat. Interested as he was in the domestic tragedy of Alison McAllister’s death, he had work of his own to do. I left them to get on with it. I made my way down to Reception and asked if Harry had phoned, but he hadn’t.
    What I wanted most of all was some dry clothes, and after a minute chatting with the receptionist I confessed as much. I could have lived with the sweater, once I got round to turning the V to the front, but underneath it I had a wet shirt, wet shorts, wet