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the field for weeks on end.’ Smith was one of the new breed of senior cops whose primary concern was the bottom line.
    Still, Fin was surprised. ‘You have a DNA sample of the killer?’
    Smith beamed. ‘We think so. Despite local sensibilities, we put out teams of uniforms to search the locus on Sunday. We found the victim’s clothes in a plastic binbag dropped in a ditch about half a mile away. The clothes are covered in vomit. And since the police surgeon is pretty sure the victim wasn’t sick, we have to assume the murderer was. If the forensic pathologist can confirm that, we should have a perfect sample of the killer’s DNA.’
    II
     
    In Church Street, and all the way down to the inner harbour, little hanging baskets of flowers swung in the wind, a brave effort to bring colour into grey lives. Pink- and white- and green-painted shops lined the street, and at the bottom of it Fin could see a cluster of fishing boats tied up at the quay, moving with the rise and fall of the ocean. A blink of sunlight caught the white boatshed on the opposite shore, and swept across the tops of trees in the Lews Castle grounds.
    ‘What did you make of the CIO, then?’ Gunn said.
    ‘I’d pretty much concur with your assessment.’ Fin and Gunn shared a grin.
    Gunn unlocked the car and they got in. ‘Thinks he’s a superstar, that one. My old boss in Inverness used to say of the brass, they’re no different from you and me. They still have to get their legs out of their breeks one at a time.’
    Fin laughed. He liked the image of DCI Smith struggling to get his stocky little legs out of his trousers.
    ‘Listen,’ Gunn said, ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t give you the inside line on the pathologist. I didn’t even know he was on the island. Shows you how much they’re keeping me in the loop.’
    ‘That’s okay.’ Fin brushed the apology aside. ‘Actually, I know Angus pretty well. He’s a good guy. And at least he’ll be on our side.’ They backed out into the street. ‘Why do you think Smith’s not attending the PM himself?’
    ‘Maybe he’s squeamish.’
    ‘I don’t know. A man who uses that much aftershave can’t be too sensitive.’
    ‘Aye, right enough. Most corpses smell better than he does.’
    They slipped out of Kenneth Street on to Bayhead, heading north out of town. Fin looked from the passenger window at the children’s playpark, the tennis courts, the bowling green, the sports ground beyond and the golf course on the hill behind it. On the other side of the street, tiny shops were crammed together beneath the dormer windows of flats above. It almost felt as if he had never been away. He said, ‘Friday, Saturday nights in the eighties, the kids used to cruise up and down here in their old bangers.’
    ‘They still do. Regular as clockwork, every weekend. Whole processions of them.’
    Fin reflected on what a sad existence it was for these kids. Little or nothing to do, strangled by a society still in the grips of a joyless religion. An economy on the slide, unemployment high. Alcoholism rife, a suicide rate well above the national average. The motivation to leave was as compelling now as it had been eighteen years ago.
    The Western Isles Hospital was new since Fin’s day, replacing the old cottage hospital on the hill below the war memorial. It was a fully equipped, modern facility, better than many of those serving urban populations on the mainland. They turned in off Macaulay Road, and Fin saw the low, two-storey structure built in shallow angles around a sprawling car park. Gunn drove to the foot of the hill and turned right into a small, private parking area.
    Professor Angus Wilson was waiting in the mortuary room. His goggles were pushed up over his shower cap, his mask pulled down below his chin, pushing out a thick beard of fusewire copper shot through with silver. He wore a plastic apron over green surgical pyjamas covered by a long-sleeved cotton gown. On the stainless steel table in