Tracks at Eilean Dubh

I signed the contract in early June at a cramped Forestry and Land Scotland district office in Oban, Argyll and Bute. The place smelt of wet nylon and stale coffee. The woman processing my paperwork did not make eye contact. She slid the forms across the desk, pointed to the signature lines and told me induction began at 07:00 the following morning.

That was it.

The post was seasonal countryside operations technician, which sounded official but mostly meant travelling by boat to remote sites, checking equipment and completing site-condition forms.

I did not care what they called it. I needed work that came with accommodation and kept me out of Birmingham. The Scottish west coast and the Inner Hebrides felt sufficiently remote without my having to leave the country. I accepted every field assignment they offered.

It did not matter whether it was a last-minute fuel run or a weekend survey nobody else wanted. Fiona Grant, my line manager, noticed that quickly. She began giving me the jobs that required early starts, rough crossings or long stretches without a mobile signal. The sort of work that made other people complain or ring in sick.

I never complained. I just turned up.

Oban was small enough for you to see the same faces in the supermarket, the launderette and around the harbour. People began to recognise you. They asked where you came from, what had brought you north and whether you had family nearby.

Standard small-town conversation. I hated it.

So I stayed in the field as much as possible. I took assignments on small Hebridean islands with fewer than 50 permanent residents. I volunteered for trips that involved camping near wildlife cameras or testing stream gauges in places no road could reach.

Fiona was happy to oblige. I think she decided I was either running from something or too socially broken to function in town.

She was not entirely wrong.

The thing about seasonal work is that you are always expendable. They hire you on a fixed contract running from May to the end of September, and if you cause trouble or make mistakes, they simply do not renew it. There is no redundancy payment and no realistic internal challenge for a short fixed-term worker.

You are gone.

I knew that when I signed. So I made myself useful and dependable. I was the man who arrived fifteen minutes early and checked his equipment three times. I carried spare fuel cans even when the trip plan did not require them.

I logged boat travel to the nearest tenth of a nautical mile. I completed site-condition forms in exactly the format Fiona wanted, with printed labels, time-stamped log entries and notes in the margins about weather and visibility.

It was not difficult. Just tedious.

Tedious suited me. I did not want to think too much. I did not want empty hours in which I might have to sit still and process things. I wanted checklists, coordinates and machinery that either worked or did not.

Fiona treated me as disposable anyway.

She would ring at 06:00 and tell me an island transport run had been brought forward and I needed to be at the jetty in forty minutes. Sometimes she reassigned me halfway through a trip because another crew could not keep to its programme. Once she sent me to inspect a weather station that had been serviced the previous week. I mentioned it politely, and she told me to verify the first crew's work and submit an additional inspection note.

I did it. I did not argue.

Other people avoided her assignments. I heard them exchanging shifts or suddenly remembering medical appointments whenever she mentioned particular sites.

There was an official forestry cabin called Glen Sgadan bothy that had a reputation for poor foundations and mice in the walls. Nobody wanted to spend a night there. Fiona sent me three times that summer.

I went every time.

I assumed she was testing me. She wanted to see how much I would tolerate before I pushed back. I never gave her a reason to cut me loose.

Moira MacLeod began appearing on my assignments in July.

She was a wildlife technician, older than me, perhaps in her late fifties, with steel-grey hair worn in a plait and the sort of hands that looked as though they had been working outdoors for decades. She said little at first. When Fiona introduced us, Moira merely nodded and began loading her equipment into the small open workboat.

I thought she had been sent to watch me. To make sure the inexperienced seasonal worker did not get lost, damage something or create paperwork.

She never behaved that way.

She simply worked. She checked my knots without commenting on them. If one was wrong, she retied it. If it was sound, she moved on.

She treated equipment the same way. She compared the supply list with what I had packed and quietly added whatever I had missed: a spare battery for the marine-band VHF set, extra rubbish sacks, a stormproof firelighter that would actually work in wet weather.

After two or three trips, I began packing better.

She noticed. She did not say so, but I could tell.

Moira stopped me making mistakes I had not known were mistakes. Once, I nearly tied up to a floating timber boom that looked secure but had not been anchored properly. Another time, I started along a ridge path in trainers. She handed me a pair of gaiters and said the bracken grew thick farther up.

It did.

I appreciated what she was doing. I did not know how to say that without sounding as though I needed a mentor, so I kept quiet and paid attention.

By late September, we had worked together perhaps a dozen times. It had become routine. Moira would meet me at the harbour, we would load the workboat, and Callum Fraser, who handled most of the Forestry and Land Scotland island transport runs, would take us wherever Fiona had marked on the chart. For the most inaccessible sea lochs, the service occasionally contracted a Cessna Caravan fitted for amphibious operations, but that was unusual and expensive. Ordinary field teams went by boat.

On the morning Fiona assigned us to Loch Dorch, I arrived early at the district office.

She was on the telephone when I entered, speaking to someone about a delayed permit. She waved me towards a chair and continued for another five minutes. When she finished, she pushed a printout across the desk.

It contained grid coordinates, a supply checklist and a two-line description.

Inspect elevated emergency food store at Loch Dorch, Eilean Dubh. Replace damaged Forestry and Land Scotland handheld-radio battery.

"Moira's meeting you at the harbour at 09:00," Fiona said. "Callum will have the workboat ready. You'll be there tonight. Collection is Friday morning, unless the weather turns."

It was Thursday.

I scanned the printout. Loch Dorch lay on the north-west side of Eilean Dubh, which meant a long crossing and no easy way out if conditions deteriorated. The inlet was nowhere near a village. It was not near much of anything.

"Forecast good?" I asked.

Fiona shrugged. "Good enough. You've managed worse."

It was not an answer, but I did not press her.

I folded the printout and stood.

"Anything else?"

"Don't forget the camera for the food-store inspection. The bothy has a base VHF set running from its cabin supply. It can be unreliable, but leave it on channel six. The damaged item is the removable battery for the field handheld. Fit the replacement and log it with a time stamp."

"Understood."

She was already looking at her computer screen.

I left.

I met Moira at the harbour shortly before 09:00. Her rucksack was already packed, her waterproof jacket was tied around her waist and a flask was tucked into a side pocket. A locked deer-rifle slip rested beside her gear. She was authorised to carry it for deer-management work, and the autumn red-deer stalking season had begun. Fiona had also entrusted her with the key to the Loch Dorch cabin because she was the senior field technician on the assignment.

Moira looked over the printout when I showed it to her, then nodded once.

"You've been to Loch Dorch before?" I asked.

"Once. It's quiet. Not much there."

"That suits me."

She almost smiled.

Callum arrived a few minutes later, and we loaded the remaining equipment. I had the replacement handheld battery in a waterproof case, the inspection camera, spare fuel and our usual supplies. Moira had her own rucksack and the locked rifle slip.

I knew the trip was isolated. Fiona did not send people to convenient places, and this had been presented as an assignment rather than a request. I was not in a position to refuse.

I did not mind. Isolation was the point.

We climbed into the small open workboat, and Callum started the engine. The sea was calm enough. Grey sky, a light chop and visibility of perhaps five kilometres. Ordinary late-September conditions.

Moira sat opposite and tightened the straps on her rucksack. She did not look concerned. I took that as a good sign.

I asked no more questions. I settled in for the journey and watched Oban harbour recede behind us.

Callum cut the engine when we were about 6 metres from the jetty and allowed the boat to drift in. He had the timing exact. He had said little during the crossing, merely checking his watch twice and changing course as we passed a rocky headland I did not recognise.

The water remained calm throughout. The journey took about forty minutes.

Moira stood first and caught the jetty post as we came alongside. I passed up her rucksack, then mine, then the locked rifle slip. Callum tied the boat off but did not shut the engine down completely. He left it idling.

"Collection's Friday," he said. "Morning tide. Be here at 07:30."

Moira nodded.

"Weather permitting," she said.

"Weather's fine."

Callum checked his watch again.

"I've another run after this."

That was all. He untied before I had properly climbed out, pushed away with one boot against a piling and turned towards open water. The engine noise rose quickly.

I watched him for a few seconds.

He did not look back.

"He's always like that," Moira said.

Her rucksack was already on her shoulders.

"Tide doesn't wait."

I supposed that was true. It did not bother me.

I settled my own rucksack and reached for the rifle slip. Moira shook her head and took it herself. Under local field procedure, the secured rifle remained in the custody of its authorised holder.

Fine by me.

The jetty was in poor condition. Some boards had gaps between them, and the whole structure listed slightly to the left. It did not feel immediately dangerous. Only old.

We walked towards the shore, and I had my first proper view of Loch Dorch.

The beach was narrow, mostly stones and driftwood heaped in irregular lines. The woodland began about 9 metres beyond the high-water mark. It was a dense Sitka spruce plantation mixed with birch, rowan and alder, thick enough that I could see only a short distance between the trunks.

The official Forestry and Land Scotland cabin stood just within the trees on a low rise. Everyone called it a field bothy, though it was not a public mountain shelter. It appeared to contain a single room. Dark timber cladding, a pitched roof with moss spreading across its northern side and a narrow porch along the front.

There was a window on each side of the door and another on the visible side wall. No light showed within.

We crossed the beach. My boots crunched over the stones, and I stepped across two logs that had lain there long enough to sink partway into the shingle.

The air smelt of salt, wet timber and something else I could not identify. Decay, perhaps. Or old seaweed.

Moira walked ahead up a path that was scarcely a path at all, only a line where the ground cover had been trampled slightly flatter. She did not slow or look behind her.

I kept pace.

Two steps led to the porch. The timber was grey and weathered but held firm when I tested it.

Moira took the bothy key from her jacket pocket and unlocked the door. It opened inwards with exactly the creak I had expected.

The interior was dim. My eyes needed a moment to adjust.

One room, as I had thought, roughly 4.5 by 6 metres. A wood-burning stove stood in one corner with a dented kettle on top. A table and two chairs had been pushed against the opposite wall. There was a narrow camp bed on either side, both fitted with thin mattresses and woollen blankets folded at the foot.

Shelves above the table held tinned food, oatcakes, several packets of pasta, dehydrated expedition meals and a tin of instant coffee. Beside the stove stood a sink with a hand pump. A metal lockbox was bolted to the wall near the door.

The place smelt of old smoke, damp cloth and something faintly chemical. Rodent poison, probably.

Moira placed the locked rifle slip beside one of the beds and removed her rucksack.

"Not bad," she said. "I've stayed in worse."

I believed her. I had stayed in worse myself, though not by much.

I put my rucksack beside the other bed and examined the room more carefully. The floorboards were uneven but clean. Somebody had swept them recently. Hooks beside the door were intended for coats, and a small mirror nailed to the wall had a crack running through it.

The windows were covered by curtains cut from old bedsheets, all tied back with cord.

That was when I saw the list.

It had been taped to the wall above the table. It was an ordinary sheet of printer paper, but somebody had written on it in thick black marker. The letters were large and uneven, as though the writer had been hurried or indifferent to appearances. The tape had yellowed around the edges.

I stepped closer.

At the top, it read:

CABIN RULES

Keep the porch lamp off after dark.

Do not answer voices from the trees.

Never follow whistling.

Keep boots inside. Tracks invite visitors.

If you hear knocking, wait until morning.

I read it twice and said nothing.

Moira was beside the stove, inspecting the flue.

"That list has been there a while," she said without turning.

"Someone with too much time on their hands."

"It seems specific."

She shrugged. "Bored people write strange things. I've seen worse at Glen Sgadan. Someone drew an entire comic about mice stealing a man's socks."

Isolation did things to people.

Still.

"Do you think it's a joke?" I asked.

Moira straightened and looked at me.

"Do you think it isn't?"

I did not answer. I was not sure what I thought.

The rules did not feel like a joke. They felt personal. The handwriting was too deliberate. And although the tape was old, somebody had pressed its edges flat quite recently. The paper was not curling away from the wall.

Do not answer voices from the trees.

It was not the sort of thing you wrote merely to frighten the next field crew. Neither was Tracks invite visitors.

Moira crossed to the table and glanced at the list without much apparent interest.

"People become superstitious out here," she said. "They hear wind in the branches and decide it's something else. They see a shadow and convince themselves it moved. That's normal."

"Have you ever followed the rules?"

She paused, then nodded once.

"Yes. It does no harm to be cautious."

It was an answer and not an answer.

I left it there.

I returned to my rucksack and unpacked. Spare clothes went on the shelf above my bed. Our food remained in the rucksack for the moment. I took out the camera and placed it on the table beside the waterproof case containing the replacement battery.

Moira arranged her own equipment in tidy rows.

My boots were still on. I unlaced them and put them beside the stove, near enough to dry if they became wet but far enough away not to scorch.

That was what the list said. Keep boots inside.

Moira noticed but made no comment.

The light through the windows had begun to fade. Sunset was not quite upon us, but we had perhaps another hour of useful daylight. We needed to inspect the food store before dark.

"Let's get it done," Moira said.

She put on a fleece and took a head torch from her rucksack.

"The store is about 90 metres north, along the woodland spur. It shouldn't take long."

I nodded, pulled on my jacket and slipped the camera into my pocket. We put our boots back on for the inspection.

Outside, the temperature had fallen by several degrees. The wind was strengthening, coming from the water in uneven gusts. I heard it moving through the trees behind the cabin, a low rushing noise that rose and subsided.

Moira led me around the side of the bothy and north into the woods. The jetty lay downhill to the west, out of sight beyond the beach.

The path to the food store was clearer than the route up from the shore. It curved gently between the trees, over ground softened by moss and old spruce needles. I watched where I placed my feet and tried not to think about the list.

The store was easy to find. It was a forest-green metal box about the size of a large chest freezer, secured to a timber platform nearly 2 metres above the ground. Field crews used it to keep emergency provisions away from rats and mice and above the worst of the damp.

A ladder rested against the platform. A padlock hung open from the latch.

Moira climbed first. I heard her moving items and counting quietly while I waited below and photographed the structure. The light was poor enough that I doubted some images would be usable, but I took every angle Fiona would expect.

"Supplies are low," Moira called. "Perhaps three days of tinned food, one camping-gas cylinder and no rice. The first-aid kit has been opened."

I noted it on my phone.

"Anything missing that shouldn't be?"

"No. Just used."

She climbed down and I went up to make my own count.

She was right. There were tins of soup and beans, an unopened packet of oatcakes, several dehydrated expedition meals and the gas cylinder. Dressings were missing from the first-aid kit, and half the antiseptic wipes had been used.

Normal consumption.

I photographed the contents, climbed down and secured the store. Then we returned to the cabin.

The wind had grown louder, and the trees creaked beneath it. I heard no voices. No whistling either.

Only wind.

Back inside, Moira lit the stove while I opened the waterproof battery case.

The damaged handheld battery had been left on the table beside its sealed replacement. The bothy's fixed marine-band VHF set remained on a shelf near the door, powered by the cabin supply. The task had nothing to do with that base set. We were there to replace the removable battery for the Forestry and Land Scotland handheld unit we would carry in the field.

I picked up the damaged battery. Its casing was cracked along one edge and its terminals were corroded. It looked as though it had become wet and somebody had tried to dry it too late.

The replacement remained in its sealed wrapping and was marked April of that year.

The arrangement bothered me. Not the equipment itself. That made sense. It was the way the two batteries had been set side by side, as if somebody had staged them and left them waiting for us.

I put the damaged one down.

We would unwrap and fit the replacement in the morning, log the work with a time stamp and photograph it for the report. Standard procedure.

Moira filled the kettle for tea. The stove ticked as it warmed, and the last daylight through the windows became thin and orange.

I could not rid myself of the impression that the damaged battery had been lying there too long. That whoever had left it knew we were coming. That the assignment had been arranged for some purpose I did not yet understand.

Probably nothing. Probably the isolation already working on me.

But I kept thinking about the list. About boots and tracks and voices. I kept thinking about the way Moira had said yes when I asked whether she followed the rules.

Outside, the wind strengthened again. Something creaked on the porch.

Boards settling. Weather.

That was what I told myself.

I did not quite believe it.

The light was nearly gone. We had perhaps ten minutes before full darkness.

I glanced at the door and confirmed that the porch lamp was off.

Moira poured tea into two enamel mugs and handed one to me without asking. I accepted it. The warmth felt good against my palms.

"Long day tomorrow," she said. "Sleep when you can."

I nodded. I did not mention that I was unlikely to sleep much.

The damaged battery lay between us, cracked and useless. The new one remained sealed beside it.

The arrangement felt like a problem. I simply did not know what sort.

Darkness came quickly after that.

I was still at the table, holding my enamel mug, when the base VHF set on the shelf near the door crackled once. The noise was loud enough to make me flinch.

Moira did not move. Her tea was halfway to her mouth.

Static hissed for perhaps three seconds.

Then Fiona's voice came through, clipped and clear.

"Mercer, MacLeod, this is Grant. Do you copy?"

Moira put down her mug and went to the shelf. She lifted the microphone and pressed the transmission switch.

"Copy. MacLeod receiving."

"An Atlantic low-pressure system is moving in from the west faster than forecast," Fiona said. Her tone was the same as it had been during the briefing. Procedural, as if she were reading a checklist. "Callum cannot make the collection tonight. Pickup is delayed until 07:00 tomorrow. Acknowledge."

Callum had never been expected that night. Our planned collection was already Friday at 07:30.

Moira glanced at me. I saw the question in her face, but after a moment I nodded. It might have been a clumsy correction to the scheduled time.

She pressed the switch again.

"Acknowledged. We're secure."

"Stay where you are," Fiona said. "Keep the base set on channel six. Do not leave the site after dark. Confirm adequate shelter and supplies."

"Confirmed," Moira replied.

"Good. Grant out."

The channel went quiet.

Moira replaced the microphone but remained beside the shelf.

I looked at the windows. A little light persisted outside, though not much. The trees were already dark shapes against a grey sky.

The weather warning was plausible. September storms struck hard, and Callum was not the sort to risk a small open boat in rough seas. Staying until 07:00 instead of 07:30 was hardly a problem.

What troubled me was the reference to a cancelled collection that had never been arranged.

We had food. We had the stove. The bothy was sound enough.

Moira returned to the table and lifted her mug.

She did not drink.

"Probably sensible," I said. "If the weather is going to turn."

"Probably."

I waited for more, but she said nothing. Her attention remained on the base set.

Less than a minute passed. Perhaps forty seconds.

The radio crackled again.

This time, the voice coming from it was Moira's.

It sounded exactly like her. The same low register. The same west-coast cadence. The same controlled flatness she used when trying to keep a situation calm.

"Daniel."

The voice said, "Come down to the jetty now."

I looked at Moira.

She stood less than a metre from me with an enamel mug held in both hands. Her mouth was closed. She was nowhere near the radio.

The voice said my name again.

"Daniel. You need to come to the jetty immediately."

Moira set the mug on the table, slowly, without looking away from the set.

I stood, crossed to the shelf and picked up the microphone. My hand remained steady. I pressed the switch.

"Repeat your last transmission."

Static answered for a second.

Then the voice returned. Calmer now. Almost irritated.

"Daniel, come to the jetty now."

It was her voice. I had heard Moira speak often enough to recognise the exact shape of her words, the slight rasp that entered her voice when she issued instructions.

But she stood behind me in silence.

I pressed the switch again.

"Identify yourself."

Nothing.

I waited five seconds. Then ten.

The channel went dead. Not static. Silence, as if whoever had been transmitting had released the switch and walked away.

I put the microphone back on the shelf.

My heart was beating too quickly and without a steady rhythm.

I turned. Moira remained beside the table. She had not moved except to release the mug.

"That wasn't me," she said.

"I know."

"Someone has a radio."

"Yes."

She looked towards the door, then the windows, then back at me.

"It could be somebody playing games."

She did not sound convinced.

I said nothing. I was thinking about the list. The boots, the voices and the whistling. The way Moira had said caution did no harm.

"We should lock the door," I said.

She nodded once.

Moira crossed to the door and turned the deadbolt. It slid home with a firm click. The ironwork was old, but it held. She tested the handle.

Locked.

"Windows," I said.

"They latch from within."

She crossed to the nearest and pushed down the metal catch, then did the same at the other two. The thin curtains would not conceal our silhouettes if we lit the room brightly, but that scarcely mattered. If someone was outside, they already knew we were there.

I returned to the table and read the rules again, although I had memorised them.

Keep the porch lamp off after dark.

Do not answer voices from the trees.

Never follow whistling.

Keep boots inside. Tracks invite visitors.

If you hear knocking, wait until morning.

Moira came back to the table and looked at the paper too.

"We follow it," she said.

"Yes."

"The porch lamp is already off."

"Yes."

She drew her fleece more tightly around herself. The bothy was not cold. The stove was still burning.

I understood anyway.

I sat down. My boots were beside the stove where I had left them after returning from the inspection. I considered putting them on. If we needed to move quickly in the dark, I would rather be wearing boots than socks.

But the list said to keep them inside. Tracks invite visitors.

I left them where they were.

Moira sat opposite. She lifted her tea, though it had already cooled, and drank it anyway.

The wind strengthened outside. I heard it passing through the trees, a low, constant rush that made the cabin boards creak.

Nothing unusual. Only weather.

Then I heard the whistle.

It was low and distant, drifting from the direction of the shore. It might have been wind passing through a crack in the rocks. It might have been a bird I did not recognise.

It might have been a person standing beside the jetty with a radio and a vicious sense of humour.

I looked at Moira. She had heard it too. I could tell from the tightening of her jaw.

We did not answer. We did not stand. We did not approach the window.

The whistle came again.

The same pitch. The same direction.

Then it stopped.

I counted to thirty in my head.

Nothing followed.

Moira put down her mug.

"We're staying inside," she said, quietly and firmly.

"Yes."

"Whatever we hear."

"All right."

She nodded and looked at the door again, as if confirming that the lock still held even though we had checked it moments earlier.

I stood and approached the nearest window, though I did not go close to the glass. I only looked at the catch to ensure it was down.

It was.

Beyond the pane lay full darkness. I could no longer see the woodland or the beach. I saw only my own reflection in the weak orange light of the stove.

"I'm checking the porch," Moira said.

"I'll do it."

"We'll do it together."

She went to the door, and I followed. She eased back the deadbolt, opened the door about fifteen centimetres and looked outside. I stood behind her and peered over her shoulder.

The porch was empty.

Two steps descended to the path. The first trees stood about 4.5 metres beyond them. Everything else was black. It was the dense darkness of an island without artificial light beneath heavy cloud.

I could not see the jetty. I could not see the water. I could see nothing beyond the edge of the porch boards.

Moira closed the door and locked it again.

"Nothing," she said.

"No."

I did not feel better. An empty porch meant little when we could see no farther than its edge.

I returned to the table and sat. Moira remained by the door for another minute before going to her bed and sitting on its edge. She did not lie down. She sat with her hands on her knees.

I looked at my boots.

They were perhaps 3 metres away. Easy to reach if I needed them. But the rules said to keep them inside.

Tracks invite visitors.

I considered what that meant. If I wore boots outdoors, I would leave recognisable tread marks in the mud and wet sand. I wore a UK size 9. Moira's boots looked to be about a UK size 6. It would be easy to distinguish one trail from the other.

Something could follow those prints. It could know exactly where I had gone and when. It could stand outside the door and know I remained within because the tracks led there and did not lead away.

I left my boots beside the stove.

The wind pressed against the bothy. Not hard. Steadily.

Something creaked on the porch again.

The same sound as before. It might have been the boards settling. It might have been movement in the roof. It might have been weight placed on the top step.

I did not rise to check.

Moira watched the door. I watched the windows. Neither of us spoke.

The base VHF set remained on the shelf, silent now. Fiona had told us to leave it on channel six. We had done so.

I no longer trusted it.

It had lied once, using Moira's voice to summon me to the jetty while Moira stood beside me. If it could lie about that, it could lie about anything.

I thought about Fiona's transmission. The weather warning. The altered collection time. It had sounded like her, right down to her clipped tone and procedural phrasing, but I had not seen her. I had no proof she had been at the other end.

Perhaps the first transmission was genuine and the second false.

Perhaps both were false.

Perhaps someone was outside with a radio, a recording and a purpose I could not understand.

I did not know. There was no way to know until morning, when Callum either arrived or did not.

Moira lay on the bed nearest the door. She kept her fleece on and did not get beneath the blanket. She lay on top with her eyes open. Her boots remained beside the bed at first, still inside the cabin.

I stayed at the table. The stove gave off a steady warmth. My tea had gone cold, but I did not care.

The night felt as though it were arranging a trap.

Something outside wanted me at the jetty. It wanted me beyond the door, moving through the dark. Perhaps it wanted boots on my feet. Perhaps it wanted bare socks against the ground. Perhaps it made no difference so long as I was exposed.

The radio had already proved it could lie.

I was not going anywhere.

Around midnight, the rain continued but the woodland fell silent in a way that felt wrong.

I had been sitting near the stove for hours. My back ached from the wooden chair. Moira had taken the bed nearest the door and told me to sleep, but I could not, so I remained where I was with both hands around an enamel mug that had gone cold sometime before 23:00.

Rain struck the roof, hard and regular. It sounded like an ordinary September storm, but beneath it there was nothing.

No wind passing through the trees. No branches scraping. No small animals moving through the undergrowth or settling into shelter.

Only rain on metal and timber, and silence everywhere else.

I kept waiting for something to interrupt it. An owl, perhaps. A hooded crow calling from the hillside.

Even water dripping from the eaves would have been welcome.

There was nothing.

The entire woodland had shut down.

I placed the mug on the table and leant back. The stove ticked as it cooled from the last log I had put in perhaps twenty minutes earlier. I should have added another. The temperature was falling, but I did not move.

I sat listening to the rain and the silence, trying to convince myself it was normal.

It was not.

I had completed enough fieldwork to know how woods sounded at night. Even in severe weather, something always moved. Mice in walls. Branches settling. Trees creaking as their weight shifted in the wind.

This was different.

It was the sort of silence that made you hold your breath before you realised you were doing it.

I checked the windows. Still latched.

The door. Still locked.

The boots. Still inside, beside the stove.

The porch lamp. Off.

We had obeyed every rule on the list.

It made no difference. I could not relax.

Moira shifted on her bed, and I glanced across. She lay on her side facing the wall, one arm tucked beneath the thin pillow. Her breathing had become regular perhaps an hour before, and I had assumed she was asleep.

Good for her. One of us ought to be.

I looked at the stove and considered adding another log. My hands felt stiff. I flexed my fingers and rose slowly, trying not to scrape the chair across the floor.

That was when Moira spoke.

"You hear it too?"

Her voice was quiet. It did not sound like a question.

I turned. She was still facing the wall. She had not moved.

"Yes," I said.

She sat up and swung her legs from the bed. Her boots were on. I had not seen her lace them, but she must have done so after we secured the bothy for the night. The soles had not touched the ground outside. By our interpretation of the rule, they were still inside and had left no fresh tread for anything to follow.

Moira rubbed her face with both hands and looked at the door, the windows and then me.

"Silence like this usually means the animals are hiding from something."

I nodded. I did not ask what. I did not need to.

She stood, crossed to the table, drew out the other chair and sat opposite where I had been.

She did not look tired. Only alert. The way a person looks when the body has decided sleep is no longer important.

"Could be deer moving through," I said.

I did not believe it, but it was the most ordinary explanation available.

Moira shook her head once.

"A stag passes and the smaller animals go quiet for a minute. Then they start again. This has lasted too long."

"Yes."

She looked at the list and read it once more, though we both knew every line. Then she looked back at me.

"We stay inside."

"I know."

"No matter what."

"I know."

She nodded and leant back. Her hands rested flat and steady on the tabletop.

I sat opposite her, and we waited.

The smell arrived perhaps ten minutes later.

It came gradually. At first I did not notice it. Then I did, and afterwards I could notice nothing else.

Crushed bracken and bog-myrtle. I recognised the sharp green bitterness from walking through wet ground after rain.

Beneath it lay another smell. Something sweet and wrong. Rotten fruit, perhaps, or meat left somewhere warm for too long.

The scents did not belong together, yet they seeped through the gaps around the door and window frames.

Moira wrinkled her nose. She smelt it too.

I said nothing. I breathed through my mouth and tried not to imagine what might produce such a smell.

Then the scraping began.

It was faint at first. So faint that I thought I had imagined it.

But it continued.

Slow and regular, dragging across the porch boards from left to right.

Then back again.

Left to right. Back again.

It sounded like fingernails drawn across wet wood.

My chest tightened.

Moira stared at the door, her jaw set and both hands still flat on the table. She did not move. She did not tell me it was harmless or suggest that a branch was brushing the porch.

The scraping continued with the same rhythm and pressure, as though something were testing the surface. Feeling its way across it.

I stood.

I had not intended to. I simply found myself upright.

Moira's eyes shifted towards me, but she said nothing.

I crossed to the window facing the porch. My hands had begun to tremble, so I pushed them into my pockets.

The curtain was only an old bedsheet tied back with cord.

Thin. I could see the faint glow of rain through it, but nothing else. The scraping continued. I reached up and lifted the curtain.

Only a fraction. Just enough to see.

The darkness outside was complete. No moon. No stars. Only blackness, rain and the faint outline of the porch railing.

Then I saw it.

A pale oval, much too close to the glass. Right where a face should have been. It had no features. No eyes, mouth or nose. Just a smooth, pale shape pressed against the window.

Watching.

I dropped the curtain. My heart was hammering now, fast and uneven. I stepped back from the window and turned to Moira.

"There's something out there."

I kept my voice level. I did not try to make it sound worse than it was. I simply told her.

"What did you see?" she asked.

She was still sitting, still calm.

"A face, I think. Right against the glass."

She stood then. She did not go to the window. She only looked at me for a long second, then crossed the room in three strides and seized my wrist.

Hard.

Her fingers dug in until I felt the pressure against the bone.

"Stop," she said.

I blinked. "What?"

"Stop hunting for proof." Her voice was low and tight. "Concentrate on surviving."

I did not argue or pull away. She was right. I knew she was right.

She released my wrist and went to the door. The key to the emergency lockbox hung from a small hook beside the frame. We had not touched it since arriving. There had been no need. The box was bolted shut, and nothing had given us a reason to open it.

Moira took down the key and slipped it into her jacket pocket.

"Why?" I asked.

"In case we have to move quickly."

I looked at the lockbox and tried to remember what those boxes usually held. Distress flares, perhaps. First-aid supplies. Emergency signalling equipment.

Nothing that seemed likely to help us now. Moira pocketed the key anyway.

The field bothy suddenly felt smaller. The walls seemed closer and the ceiling lower. I looked again at the list, and the handwriting no longer resembled a joke. It looked like practical instruction written by someone who had been exactly where we were.

The scraping stopped.

I waited, counting to ten, then twenty. Nothing.

Moira remained beside the door. I stayed near the window. Neither of us spoke or moved. Rain fell, the stove ticked, and somewhere in the darkness outside, whatever had been on the porch was waiting for us to make one wrong choice.

The base VHF set crackled perhaps three minutes after the scraping ceased. I had been counting breaths to measure the time. Somewhere around sixty, the static returned.

Then Fiona's voice cut through, clean and clipped.

"Mercer, MacLeod, this is Grant. Weather window opening at 05:00. Contracted amphibious aircraft inbound for urgent extraction from Loch Dorch. Be ready at first light with all equipment. Acknowledge."

Moira looked at me from beside the door. I stared at the VHF set on the shelf.

Fiona's voice came again.

"Mercer, MacLeod, acknowledge."

Moira crossed to the shelf and lifted the handset, but did not press the transmit switch. She held it near her ear as though listening for something beneath the words.

I understood. I was doing the same.

The transmission sounded exactly like Fiona. It had the same routine tone, the same procedural phrasing, the same impatience when she had to repeat herself. It even carried the slight compression caused by the faulty squelch on the district office set.

That was what troubled me. It was too ordinary. Too perfectly what we would expect to hear.

I had heard the false Moira perhaps an hour earlier. It had possessed her voice, her cadence and her precise way of letting the ends of instructions fall away, but it had not been her. She had been standing less than a metre from me with an enamel mug of tea in her hand.

Now the radio had Fiona's voice, Fiona's phrasing, Fiona's every inflection. There was no way to confirm that she was actually at the Oban district office, roughly 32 kilometres away by sea, rather than standing outside in the rain.

Moira pressed the transmit switch.

"MacLeod acknowledging. Amphibious aircraft extraction, 05:00, Loch Dorch. All equipment ready."

She released it and waited.

"Confirmed," Fiona's voice said. "Weather deteriorating after 06:00. Do not miss this window. Grant out."

The set fell silent.

Moira replaced the handset and turned to me. Her face looked tired rather than frightened, but tired in the particular way people looked after managing a bad situation for too long.

"We shouldn't go," I said.

Moira nodded once but did not agree aloud.

"That could be the same thing that copied your voice," I continued. "And the earlier message said collection was delayed until 07:00. This one contradicts it."

"It wants us outside the bothy," she said. "In the open, or on the water."

"Could be."

"So we ignore it. We stay inside until proper daylight and reassess."

Moira returned to the table and sat. She looked at the two handheld-radio batteries lying between us: the damaged one with its split casing and corroded terminals, and the sealed replacement marked April of that year.

"If that really was Fiona and we don't appear," she said, "we miss the only extraction before the weather closes."

"If it wasn't Fiona, we walk straight into whatever is out there."

"Yes."

Moira picked up the damaged battery and turned it over. Water had penetrated the casing, and its terminals were green with corrosion. It had been useless for weeks, perhaps months.

The replacement had been waiting here in its sealed wrapping, marked April. Someone had known we would come. Known the field handheld would need a new battery. They had arranged the task while leaving us dependent on the unreliable base set to report back.

Moira put the damaged battery down.

"If we miss a genuine extraction, we're stuck here with an unreliable base radio and an Atlantic system coming in from the west."

"Fiona said the weather closes after 06:00. That part is credible. I checked the marine forecast yesterday. By tomorrow night this whole area could be fogbound and stormbound for days."

"We've got supplies for perhaps four days if we're careful. The food store is low. You saw it."

I had. Three days' worth of tinned food, oatcakes and dehydrated expedition meals. One camping-gas cylinder. An opened first-aid kit missing half its dressings.

Moira continued, her voice level but edged underneath.

"If we're here a week without communications, Fiona will assume something has gone wrong. She'll send someone eventually, but not until the weather clears. That could take ten days. Two weeks."

I said nothing.

She was right, and we both knew it.

"And if that transmission was genuine and we ignore it, we're the seasonal staff who failed to follow instructions during an urgent extraction. Fiona will record that. You know she will."

I did. Fiona recorded everything: every missed radio check, every late form, every deviation from procedure. She had rung me at 06:00 with changes to the work programme and sent me to verify jobs that did not need verifying simply to maintain a paper trail.

If we ignored a legitimate extraction order, it could end both our contracts. There would be no redundancy payment and no realistic internal challenge for someone on a short fixed-term contract.

But if we went into the fog and the thing that had scraped along the porch was waiting for us...

"We're stuck," Moira said.

That was exactly it. Caught between the rules warning us not to answer voices or go out after knocking, and the reality of the job: follow your line manager's instructions or lose your position.

I looked at the sheet taped above the table, at the thick black lettering and the yellowed edges of tape that someone had pressed down recently.

Keep the porch lamp off after dark.

Do not answer voices from the trees.

Never follow whistling.

Keep boots inside. Tracks invite visitors.

If you hear knocking, wait until morning.

"We go," I said, "but we follow the list."

Moira looked at me. "How?"

"The boot soles don't touch the ground. We carry them and walk in our socks. No distinct tread marks leading away from here."

Moira considered that, her jaw shifting to one side. Then she nodded.

"Treat it as field guidance."

"Yes."

She stood and gathered her equipment. She rolled her sleeping mat tightly and strapped it to her rucksack, checked that the locked deer-rifle hard case was secure across it, and pulled on her fleece despite the warmth from the stove. She possessed the rifle under the field arrangements for the autumn red-deer stalking season, and had carried both it and the official bothy key from Oban in accordance with local procedure.

I packed my own things. Spare clothes went into the rucksack. The camera and waterproof battery case went into an outer pocket. Food remained separate in a stuff sack. I tightened everything and fastened the compression straps.

All the while I thought about the transmission. Fiona's voice had been too perfect and too routine.

But it might still have been real.

That was what made it worse. Not knowing.

Moira put the damaged battery into her left jacket pocket. She tore the wrapping from the new battery, tucked the discarded plastic into a side pocket of her rucksack and fitted the battery to the Forestry and Land Scotland handheld radio. The display lit at once.

She clipped the radio to her belt.

"We move quickly," she said. "Straight to the jetty. No stopping."

"All right."

She checked her watch.

"First light in twenty minutes. We leave in fifteen."

I put on my boots long enough to tie the laces securely, then removed them and held them in one hand. My socks were thick wool. They would become soaked and probably torn on the path, but they would not leave the recognisable tread of my UK size 9 boots.

Moira watched, then did the same. She tightened the laces of her UK size 6 boots, removed them and held them in her left hand.

We spent the final fifteen minutes standing beside the door. The rain had stopped. I heard nothing beyond the bothy's walls. No wind, branches or animals.

Only that same wrong silence.

At exactly 04:45, Moira drew back the deadbolt. Grey light had begun to show through the windows. It was not sunrise, only the sky becoming less dark.

She opened the door slowly, looked left, then right, and stepped on to the porch in her socks. I followed and pulled the door shut without locking it. It no longer seemed the sort of thing that mattered.

The porch boards were wet and cold beneath my feet. I did not look down for scratches. I did not want to see them.

Moira descended the steps, and I stayed close behind her. We crossed the clearing in front of the bothy, picking our way around sharp stones and broken branches. Rain had softened the ground into moss, needles and mud. My socks were soaked within ten paces.

The jetty lay downhill to the west. We took the direct path through the dense Sitka spruce, birch, rowan and alder rather than the northern spur towards the elevated food store, which stood about 90 metres north of the bothy. The narrow western path crossed roots and slick patches of earth before dropping to the shore.

I kept my eyes on Moira's back and my boots in my right hand. My rucksack tugged at my shoulders. The locked rifle case shifted across Moira's back as she moved.

Then the fog came.

It did not gather gradually. One moment the trees were visible; the next, thick white vapour filled every space between them and erased anything more than about 3 metres away. I could see Moira in front of me and the nearest trunks on either side. Everything else vanished.

The shore was close. I could smell salt water, seaweed, wet timber, crushed bracken and bog-myrtle. Beneath those scents lingered the same sweet trace of decay.

Then I heard an engine far out over the loch, low and steady.

Forestry and Land Scotland occasionally contracted a Cessna Caravan amphibian for remote operations in inaccessible sea lochs. The sound could have belonged to one throttling back for its approach.

I stopped. Moira stopped too.

We listened.

The engine grew slightly louder, levelled off, then faded as though the aircraft were circling beyond the fog. At last it disappeared completely.

Fog. Silence. The smell of salt water.

Moira turned towards me. Her face looked grey in the weak light. Neither of us spoke. We stood in wet socks on the path, holding our boots and listening to nothing.

The handheld spat static so loudly that I flinched. Moira's head snapped towards it.

Then Fiona's voice came through, clear and urgent.

"Mercer, MacLeod, aircraft on final approach. You need to be visible at the shoreline. Wave it in."

I looked at Moira. She looked at the radio.

Neither of us moved.

Fiona's voice returned, sharper now.

"Acknowledge."

Moira unclipped the handheld and pressed the transmit switch.

"MacLeod here. Copy."

She did not say we would obey. Only that she had heard.

Fiona signed off, and the channel fell silent. Moira clipped the radio back to her belt.

My socks were saturated. I could feel cold grains of sand through the wool as we emerged from the trees. The fog had not lifted. If anything, it had thickened over the water into a solid grey wall, reducing visibility along the shoreline to about 12 metres.

"Waving doesn't make sense for an aircraft," Moira said. Her voice was flat and practical. "The pilot would be looking for the inlet and the jetty, not people on the shore."

I nodded. It was true. An amphibious aircraft did not need ground staff waving it down. It needed coordinates and a safe stretch of water.

Moira glanced towards the trees, then back to the loch.

"Signalling might matter in ways we don't understand."

The way she said it tightened my chest. It did not sound like a guess. It sounded as though she had worked something out and did not want to say it plainly.

I looked down at the sand.

That was when I saw the footprints.

Bare human prints, deep and heavy, with sharp edges pressed into the wet sand left by the retreating tide. One set came from the trees in a straight line, crossed the narrow beach and ended at the water. Another ran parallel to it, returning towards the woodland.

They were fresh. Their edges were clean, untouched by wind or water.

I had watched the ground throughout our descent because my socks were thin protection against every root and stone. I would have noticed prints that obvious. They had not been there two minutes earlier, and they were not ours.

My boots were UK size 9. Moira's were approximately a UK size 6. These prints were considerably larger. The toes spread wide, as though whoever had made them had spent a lifetime barefoot and their feet had flattened. The heel marks were so deep that they had punched through the surface into the darker wet sand beneath.

"Moira."

She turned, followed my gaze and stopped speaking.

We stared at the prints for several seconds. Five, perhaps ten. They ended precisely at the waterline, where the last wave had left a thin trace of foam and broken kelp. It looked as though whatever had made them had walked directly into Loch Dorch and continued, or stepped into the water and vanished.

Without thinking, I crouched to examine them. Close enough to see the details. There was no arch. The ball of the foot was broad, and the toes were long - human in shape, but wrong in some way I could not name.

Moira seized my shoulder and dragged me upright.

"Don't touch them."

I had not intended to. Then again, I had not intended to crouch beside them as if examining a path marker.

The fog shifted.

I looked up.

A shape was moving low over the water, perhaps 30 metres away. At first it resembled an amphibious aircraft: wings, floats and a fuselage. But it was like a drawing made from an imperfect memory. The proportions were wrong. The wings were too narrow. The floats sat too low.

It moved wrongly too, smooth and unwavering. There was no lift or drop from the air, no correction to its approach. No engine noise.

Aircraft of that kind were loud, especially when landing. You heard the turbine long before you saw them, the pitch changing as they slowed. This thing was utterly silent. Fog streamed and bent around it as if it were moving through water rather than air.

I could not make out a cockpit or pilot. Only the shape sliding through the grey.

The radio crackled again.

"Mercer, MacLeod. I need you where the aircraft can see you. Now. Move to the shoreline and signal."

Fiona's voice. Exactly the same. Procedural, impatient, carrying the tone she used when managing a problem without time for questions.

Moira stared at the shape. Her jaw was clenched, and her hand remained on my shoulder.

I looked at the footprints, the tree line and the jetty about 6 metres away. Through gaps in the trees I could make out only a pale fragment of the bothy's wall uphill, obscured by fog and woodland.

I thought of the rules.

Keep the porch lamp off after dark.

Do not answer voices from the trees.

Never follow whistling.

Keep boots inside. Tracks invite visitors.

If you hear knocking, wait until morning.

They were not jokes. They were not superstitions invented by bored seasonal staff to frighten the next crew. They were survival instructions.

And Fiona had sent us here anyway.

She had assigned the trip, chosen the timing, paired me with Moira, and handed Moira the bothy key, coordinates and field paperwork. She had told us collection would be Friday morning, one or two nights after our arrival depending on the weather.

She knew about Loch Dorch. She had to. Nobody wrote rules that specific unless people had learnt them through experience. Unless Forestry and Land Scotland held incident reports, site-condition forms and additional inspection notes that did not fit their official explanations.

Fiona knew there was something wrong with this place. Yet she had sent us with a dead handheld battery and a replacement staged on the table like bait.

Moira moved quickly. She turned the handheld's volume almost to nothing. The channel indicator still glowed green, but the voice vanished.

Then she took the damaged battery from her left pocket. She held it in both hands for a moment, as though weighing a decision, before walking towards the far end of the jetty.

Her wet socks left dark prints on the weathered boards. She moved carefully, testing each plank before committing her weight. Only then did I realise that she was checking whether the timber would hold.

At the end, where the jetty met open water, she crouched and placed the dead battery on the boards.

Gently. Like an offering on an altar.

I understood half a second too late.

"Moira."

I stepped forwards and reached for her.

The air tightened.

That is the only way I can describe it. The pressure changed at once, as if the whole inlet had drawn a breath and held it. The fog pulled closer and thickened.

It did not drift. It moved with intention, sliding in from the water, winding around the jetty piles and creeping over the sand.

Moira rose slowly and backed away from the battery. Three steps. Four. She did not turn. Her eyes remained fixed on the water.

The shape in the fog had come closer. Perhaps 15 metres away. Its narrow wings did not tilt or adjust. It glided in a straight line, its low floats skimming the surface without leaving a wake. No ripple, spray or sound.

My hand was still extended towards Moira. She glanced at it, then at me, and shook her head once.

Don't.

I lowered my arm.

The inlet pressed inwards again. I felt it in my chest and ears, like standing beside a loudspeaker in the instant before the sound began.

Moira took another step back. Her boots remained in her left hand, their laces tied tight. She had never allowed the soles to touch the ground.

The radio at her belt vibrated. The channel indicator flashed. Someone was transmitting, but the volume was too low for us to hear the words.

Neither of us turned it up.

Moira kept watching the shape, the jetty and the dead battery resting at its end like a marker. The pressure held. The fog crowded us. The shape continued forwards.

The pull struck low in my chest. It was not a thought or an urge. It felt as though something had already decided I would move and my body was only catching up.

I had felt it once before, when I crouched beside the footprints, just before Moira had hauled me back.

This time she could not reach me. She stood three paces away on the jetty, boots in her left hand and eyes fixed on the shape sliding through the fog.

I took half a step towards the water.

Moira's head snapped round. Her eyes widened. She slashed her free hand through the air.

Not merely stop.

Get out.

She mouthed something I could not hear through the pressure in my ears and pointed towards the bothy with her entire arm.

Run.

I understood that.

I reached for her anyway. I caught her forearm and tried to pull her with me.

Her skin was cold.

Not cold from the damp morning or wind off the loch. Cold like meat taken from a freezer. Like something that had not been warm for hours.

I released her by reflex. She did not react, look at me or pull away.

Her face slackened. Her mouth opened slightly. Her eyes remained fixed on the shape, but they were no longer focused or following its movement.

She was listening.

That was how it looked. She was hearing something I could not, and whatever it was had become louder than my voice. Louder than my hand on her arm. Louder than anything I could do to bring her back.

I said her name again.

"Moira."

Nothing.

The shape was about 9 metres away now. The wings remained too narrow and the floats too low. There was still no engine noise.

I made my choice.

I let go, turned and ran.

My socks struck wet sand. I no longer cared about stones or splintered shells. I cared only about reaching the bothy, slamming the door and throwing the deadbolt before whatever waited outside decided I was more interesting than Moira.

It probably cost her. I knew that even as I ran. It probably cost her the moment I let go.

Behind me came a heavy, wet slap, like a salmon dropped on to a jetty.

Then a long exhalation unlike the wind, the fog or anything natural I had heard during six months of fieldwork.

It sounded patient.

I did not look back. Not yet.

I kept my eyes on the gap in the alders where the path entered the trees. My rucksack hammered against my spine, and the boots in my hand struck my thigh with every stride.

The path was soft. Moss and needles had turned to mud in the rain. My socks slid. I fell to one knee, caught myself with my free hand and kept moving.

The climb to the bothy was short, but the fog reduced it to fragments: three metres of path, then another three, then the faint outline of the porch above me.

I reached the steps.

That was when I looked back.

Through the trees, I could see part of the jetty. The shape had reached it.

It was tall now.

Taller than it could have been if it were an aircraft. Either it had unfolded upright as it reached the shallows, its false wings narrowing into raised limbs, or my mind had only just stopped forcing it into a recognisable form. It bent the fog around itself. Not as wind bends mist, but as though the fog avoided it and drew back to make room.

The shape inclined towards Moira's head. Much too close. It seemed to smell her hair, or taste the air beside her mouth.

Sampling her breath.

That was what it looked like.

Moira did not move or flinch. She stood with her boots in her left hand, her face slack and empty.

Then she stepped off the jetty.

It was not a slip or a stumble. It was one deliberate step into open water.

She went in to her knees, then her waist, then her chest. Fog closed around her as she continued with steady purpose, as if following a path only she could see.

There was no struggle. No sound.

Then she was gone.

I did not wait to see whether she surfaced. I turned, crossed the porch in two strides, shoved open the door and slammed it behind me. I threw the deadbolt so hard that the frame shook.

Then I sat on the floor with my back against the door and my knees drawn up, my boots clutched in both hands.

The Forestry and Land Scotland handheld was still with Moira. The installed VHF set remained on the shelf, running from the bothy's supply. Its receiver hissed faintly, but I did not answer it.

The windows were latched. The curtains were still tied with cord. The stove ticked with the remains of the previous night's fire.

I watched the window facing the porch. I did not lift its curtain. I watched only its shape in the grey light filtering through the sheet.

The silence returned.

It felt heavy now, pressing on the roof, the walls and my chest. I had to concentrate on breathing at a normal pace to keep from hyperventilating.

No wind. No branches. No rain.

Only the bothy, me and whatever was outside.

The whistling began perhaps ten minutes later.

Low. Patient. The same pitch as before.

It came from somewhere close to the porch, though not on it. Perhaps 2 metres away. Perhaps 3.

I did not move.

It sounded again, closer this time. Right beside the wall near the door.

Then a voice spoke.

Moira's voice.

"Daniel."

She said she was freezing. She said she needed to come inside. It was her same flat tone, her cadence, the slight rasp at the ends of sentences.

I remained where I was. I did not answer, stand or touch the deadbolt.

The voice tried again.

"Daniel, I'm freezing. Let me in."

I looked down at my boots. The laces were still double-knotted in the way I always tied them. I held the boots against my chest so I would not put them down. I would not be tempted to wear them. I would not leave a clear tread trail if I had to move again.

The voice continued for a long time. An hour, perhaps two. I stopped listening to the words and waited for them to end.

Eventually they did.

I remained inside for the next two days. I rationed the tinned food, oatcakes and water, kept the curtains closed and slept only in brief stretches with my back against the door. The base VHF became increasingly unreliable before falling silent, as if the bothy's supply had been drained. The new handheld battery Moira had fitted, fresh from its sealed wrapping, must also have failed within hours: after the first morning I saw no green display through the fog near the jetty and heard no further radio transmissions from outside.

I never went to retrieve it.

Two days later, a small open workboat entered Loch Dorch.

I heard the engine first. A real engine, sputtering unevenly and backfiring once as it throttled down. I was still inside with my boots in my lap.

I looked through the window without lifting the curtain and saw the workboat bump against the jetty.

Three people disembarked. Fiona came first. Behind her was a Forestry and Land Scotland health-and-safety officer with neat hair, rectangular spectacles and a document folder. The third was a regional HR representative with a ponytail and a staff pass.

There was no police launch, no HM Coastguard vessel and no formal search party. They had come under the pretence of carrying out an initial internal site check, before any external report had been made.

I put on my boots, laced them and opened the door.

Fiona saw me and climbed the path without calling out. The other two followed. She stopped at the porch steps and looked at me. Her expression did not change.

"Where's MacLeod?"

I told her Moira had walked into the water at the jetty two days earlier and had not surfaced.

Fiona nodded once.

She did not ask why. She did not ask what had happened beforehand or whether I had tried to stop her.

The health-and-safety officer opened his folder and wrote something on a form. The HR representative looked at the bothy, then at me, then back at Fiona.

Fiona told me the incident report would state that Moira had slipped from the wet jetty during the aircraft pickup.

"Poor visibility, wet boards. An unfortunate accident. Not uncommon in field operations."

She asked whether I understood.

I said I did.

Fiona walked past me into the bothy. I remained on the porch with the other two. Neither spoke.

Through the open door I watched Fiona examine the shelves and stove. Then she stopped before the list taped to the wall.

She removed it carefully, folded it twice and placed it in her jacket pocket as if it were routine documentation.

The damaged handheld battery was not on the table. It was still where Moira had placed it on the jetty. Fiona did not ask about it, and neither of the others mentioned whether they had already recovered it before coming up the path.

When Fiona emerged, she told me to collect my equipment.

I fetched my rucksack. Everything remained inside: camera, waterproof case, spare clothing. We walked down to the workboat in single file. Fiona first, then me, followed by the health-and-safety officer and the HR representative.

Nobody looked at the sand.

I climbed aboard and sat on the bench near the stern, my rucksack between my knees. My old socks were still damp inside my boots. I had not changed them.

The health-and-safety officer started the engine. The HR representative untied the line. Fiona sat opposite me and said nothing for the first twenty minutes.

Then she asked whether I had any questions about the incident report.

I said no.

"Good."

She told me I would be reassigned to office duties in Oban for the remainder of my fixed seasonal contract. Standard procedure after a serious incident, she said. She did not need to threaten non-renewal. We both knew how little protection a seasonal countryside operations technician possessed.

I looked back at Loch Dorch as we pulled away. Fog still covered the jetty, shore and field bothy, thicker now than before.

I understood something I had not understood earlier.

The list was neither a joke nor superstition.

Keep boots inside. Tracks invite visitors.

I had carried my boots throughout the journey to the shore and back. I had never allowed their soles to touch the ground until the officials arrived. I had left no boot-tread marks across the porch or inside the bothy after my return.

But my wet socks had certainly left traces. Muddy, blurred impressions along the path, doubled over disturbed ground when I fled back uphill and confused with the marks we had made on the outward journey. They led back to the closed bothy rather than onwards to an offering.

Moira's wet prints had formed a clear, unbroken line along the jetty. They ran all the way to its end, to the place where she had set down the dead battery and where the shape had bent close to sample her breath.

Perhaps that was what it needed. A trail to follow. Permission to come nearer.

Perhaps the confused trail behind me was the only reason I reached the bothy.

I did not ask Fiona whether that was true.

I rode back towards Oban with my damp socks inside my boots and my rucksack between my knees, watching the water, fog and Hebridean islands slide past until the harbour came into view.