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‘I’m looking for someone who knows about the fishing industry,’ I say. ‘In particular, an accident. A trawler sank off the Scottish coast about twelve years ago.’
‘Dylan might know. He volunteers at the lifeboat station, when he’s not delivering the post.’
‘Where would I find Dylan?’
‘At home having breakfast. You’re welcome to join us. Call me Patrick.’
‘Cyrus,’ I reply. He has a firm dry handshake that feels like I’m squeezing a wad of crumpled paper.
I follow him to the end of a lane where the terraced cottage matches all the others in the street. Patrick takes off his boots in the entrance hall. The dog runs ahead of him. The place smells of boiled milk, porridge and brown sugar. Toys are scattered along the hallway. One of them squeaks under my feet and a young woman appears. Pretty. Careworn.
‘Have you picked up another stray, Dad?’ she asks.
‘Found him on the road,’ says Patrick.
I begin to apologise, but she waves me to the table where two small children with food-smeared faces are seated on matching highchairs. Twin boys.
‘I’m Jessica,’ she says. ‘These two terrorists are Rory and Lachlan.’ She wipes their grimacing faces with a flannel.
‘And I’m Dylan,’ says a bearded man, who is built like a brick outhouse, dressed in dark cargo shorts, a red Royal Mail shirt and heavy boots.
‘Cyrus is looking for details about a fishing trawler that sank off the coast,’ says Patrick, who shows me where to wash my hands.
‘The Arianna II,’ I say.
‘Willie Radford’s boat,’ says Dylan. ‘That was south of here. The lifeboat crew from Aberdeen got the call-out, along with the coastguard chopper.’
‘What happened?’ I ask.
‘A fire in the engine room. One crewman lost. Two more airlifted to hospital.’
‘Lost?’
‘Cameron Radford,’ says Jessica, her voice tinged with sadness.
‘Jessica used to date him,’ says Dylan.
‘In primary school,’ she laughs. ‘We didn’t even hold hands.’
‘Everybody knew the family,’ says Dylan. ‘Three brothers. Cam was the youngest. Finn was never the same afterwards. You still see him around St Claire, off his head on booze and talking to hisself.’
‘Who is Willie Radford?’ I ask.
‘Their father. He’s a big gaffer in town. Runs a fish processing plant. Employs a lot of locals.’
‘And the mother?’
‘They divorced after the sinking. She went back to her maiden name, Maureen Collie. She owns a guest house here in St Claire.’
‘The Belhaven Inn?’
‘That’s the place.’
I think about the woman who signed us in last night. She’d be about the right age.
‘Maureen is a force of nature,’ says Jessica. ‘One of eight – four boys and four girls. Bit of Irish Catholic in them.’
‘You mentioned three brothers,’ I say.
