4 Death at the Happiness Club (23 page)

Chapter 27 A head of steam

Christopher couldn't understand why Amaryllis was so insistent on taking him down to the harbour that Saturday morning. He knew she usually operated at night, slinking through the town like a shadow, discovering all the darkest secrets of the place and only sharing a small fraction of what she found out with her friends.

A creature of darkness - that was how, he realised, he liked to think of her.

Now the sun was out and the sky was relentlessly blue. There wasn't even the slightest breeze, so that by afternoon he knew they were all going to have to go indoors - perhaps to the Queen of Scots - to get out of the sun for a respite. For the moment they stood looking at the railway track.

'Wasn't it near here they found Sean Fraser?' he said.

'Yes, out on the mud-flats.'

At the moment the tide was in, so even the mud-flats didn't look slimy and grim and sinister but were well covered with greenish water, rippling very slightly in a picturesque way. For some reason it was very crowded here this morning, with amateur photographers standing all along the railway fence. Some of them even had tripods and spare lenses.  Even Christopher realised there was something going on. But he didn't want to admit, even to Amaryllis, that he didn't have a clue what it was.

Jock McLean appeared at his side, now walking with only one crutch.

'Train's late,' he commented.

'Train?' said Christopher.

He didn't think this many people would have turned out to see the coal train to Longannet, but there was no knowing with Pitkirtly people. Maybe it was the last time a certain engine would be travelling along this track, or the first time for a new one. For once he wished he had found the enthusiasm to read the local paper.

'You don't know what's going on, do you?' said Jock, who knew Christopher too well for anyone's good. 'You haven't been paying attention.'

'It's a special train?' Christopher ventured.

Jock gave a long sigh. 'Oh, all right, go to the top of the class.'

Amaryllis intervened. 'Stop teasing him, Jock, or you'll be the one standing in the corner.' She turned to Christopher and spoke clearly and simply, as if he were a very small child or a very old man. He felt like both of these from time to time so it wasn't a huge stretch of the imagination.

'It's a special steam train. And Jemima and Dave are on board.'

'Jemima and Dave? They're not driving, are they?'

'I shouldn't think so. No, they're passengers. In the royal coach.'

'That figures,' said Maisie Sue, who had appeared at Christopher's side as he focussed on Amaryllis.

'Do you think Jemima will be wearing her woolly hat under the crown, or over it?' said Jock.

There was a 'whooooo' in the middle distance.

'That'll be it now,' said Jock.

'What's all this about the royal coach?' said Christopher.

'You'll see,' said Amaryllis. 'Jemima had pictures of it the other day round at the Queen of Scots. If you hadn't gone off to see to the fire alarm you'd know all about it.'

'So I should have left the Cultural Centre to burn down - just like the village hall did - to look at Jemima's pictures?' said Christopher huffily. He didn't think the others understood the importance of his job.

Amaryllis patted him on the arm. 'Never mind, you'll know the next time.'

‘Is Jemima planning to do this again?’

‘Oh, not for another fifty or so years,’ Amaryllis told him.

She looked as if she were about to burst out laughing. Jock beamed at him. Maisie Sue smiled serenely: she had just had her visa granted now that she was starting up a quilting business and planning to employ a school-leaver. Christopher was in the process of considering a commission for a quilt depicting the history of Pitkirtly, but he was trying not to give in too easily. Council procurement rules said he had to get at least three quotes, but he was having a lot of trouble finding two more quilt-making companies within a reasonable distance of the town.

All this merriment, however, was unnatural. Was there something nobody had told him? Christopher was uneasily conscious that he had buried himself so deeply in work that he hadn’t really been paying attention to anything else. When Jemima held forth in the Queen of Scots about the good old days or scrapbooking or her family history project, he had either gone outside with Jock McLean and watched Jock smoke his pipe, or switched off from all the talk and tuned his mind into the latest Cultural Centre issue, such how to persuade Andrew to agree to an artist or writer in residence, and why visitor numbers were so miniscule on Tuesdays.

One reason for this, he realised, was that he wanted to avoid having a proper conversation with Amaryllis. There were things he wanted to say to her, and he was worried that if he didn’t get round to them soon he never would, but it was a huge effort for him even to think about the subject. And he didn’t want to say anything without knowing in advance what her reaction would be, which rather defeated the purpose anyway.

What he needed, he thought suddenly, was a visit from Caroline with her new in-depth knowledge of psychology and various therapies. She might know the answer. Maybe it was a case for neuro-linguistic programming, or lateral thinking, or mind-mapping. Or group hugs.

He shuddered slightly.

‘Are you all right?’ said Amaryllis.

‘Not really,’ he said as the steam train came round the corner. He cleared his throat. ‘Would you like to go out to the pictures next week?’

The noise from the train overwhelmed his faint, nervous words.

‘Sorry?’ said Amaryllis.

The engine stopped right in front of them with a lot of grinding of pistons and screeching of brakes. All sorts of people were going mad with cameras. Steam billowed around them.

'What did you say just now?' she asked.

'Nothing,' he muttered.

He panicked immediately that he had missed his one chance to take his odd relationship with Amaryllis to a new level; the idea that if it was meant to happen, it would, didn't really convince him. This could be a great turning point in his life, when the fact that he hadn't asked Amaryllis out caused some sort of hideous ripples to spread out in all directions and eventually cause the end of the universe or something equally, or less, momentous. In any case, something much more interesting was happening on the train.

Jemima and Dave, both dressed up to the nines, were descending regally from a coach that was painted royal blue with a gold crown on the side. They seemed to have been the only passengers in this particular coach.

'She isn't wearing a woolly hat!' said Christopher, feeling as if the world had turned upside down.

'She looks great,' said Amaryllis, and went forward to meet them. She shook hands with each of them in turn, and he saw them all laughing. What on earth was going on?

As they approached, coming down the slope where the station platform became a riverside path, Jock McLean darted forward - insofar as he could dart on his bad leg - and flung confetti over them. Christopher put a hand up to the back of his neck and rubbed it, confused. Was he dreaming? How had he missed out on this?

'Congratulations,' said Jock McLean to Jemima and Dave. 'You'll have to explain to Christopher - he's managed not to find out about this.'

'We've got married,' said Dave proudly.

'To each other?'' he asked, knowing it was an extremely silly question he would be teased well into the next decade for asking.

Jemima laughed so hard he thought she was going to have a seizure.

'You silly boy,' she said fondly.

'I win - hand over your money, Amaryllis,' said Jock.

'We knew you didn't know,' said Amaryllis, giving Jock a ten pound note. 'Jock and I had a bet on - he didn't think you'd find out until today, but I thought you might have guessed earlier.'

'Wouldn't it have been simpler just to tell me about it?' said Christopher. He was finding it hard not to spoil this big day by getting cross.

'Yes, but not so much fun,' said Amaryllis. She must have taken pity on him, for she added, 'Most of it was arranged that weekend you had Caroline and the kids to stay. It wasn't just that you weren't listening.'

'Did you get married on the train, Jemima?' said Christopher. He had the oddly familiar feeling of having lost his way and fallen through a crack into a parallel universe.

'No, of course not, that would be silly,' said Jemima. 'We got married at Paradise Halt. I read about it in the paper.'

Christopher wished he could go back to his own much more rational universe and get on with his daily routine. It was about time for a lunch-time drink at the Queen of Scots.

'It's a station halt on the route between Bo'ness and Dalmeny,' said Amaryllis, putting her arm through his in a comforting gesture. 'It's been invented by some hotel company to try and get the wedding trade. It's all big business now, you know.'

'Maybe I should go into weddings instead of quilts,' said Maisie Sue.

'I wouldn't do that if I were you,' said Amaryllis. 'It would be too depressing.'

'Weddings? Depressing?' queried Maisie Sue.

'Yes - just imagine seeing all those unsuspecting people about to make the biggest mistake of their lives, and knowing they'll regret it before the end of the day,' said Amaryllis.

'Hey, wait a minute!' said Dave, grasping even through his euphoria that he was being insulted.

'Come along, now,' said Jemima. 'We're having our reception at the Queen of Scots - everybody welcome.'

Looking resplendent in deep purple with a very stylish flowery fascinator - Christopher knew what they were called from watching the televised highlights of a recent royal wedding - Jemima led the way.

'Congratulations!' said Maisie Sue, falling into step beside them all. Was there a trace of envy in her voice? Maybe not, given the events of the past few weeks. Christopher knew she had told Amaryllis the self-help books were right and there was no point in expecting anyone else to guarantee your own happiness.

Christopher was still sort of hoping the self-help books were wrong.

The End

Author's Note

Cecilia Peartree is a pen name. I live in Edinburgh, where I work in an art gallery by day and help with community theatre by night, which doesn’t always leave much time to work on my mystery, historical and sci-fi novels.

'Death at the Happiness Club' is the latest in my quirky mystery series set in a small town in Scotland.  The others are 'Crime in the Community', 'Reunited in Death' and 'A Reformed Character'.

Read my blog at http://ceciliapeartree.wordpress.com