3 A Reformed Character (13 page)

'They've all gone,' she said. He couldn't help feeling she was being a bit over-confident.

'It suggests he knows something we don't know... This is a bigger thing than it seems. That's why it's interesting. That and the gunmen, of course.'

They crossed the small stream again - or was it a different one? Suddenly they were back in the shrubbery at the bottom of the Donaldsons' garden.

'Wait here, I'll get them.' said Amaryllis. She pushed through the bushes towards the shed. Within moments she was back at a run.

'They've disappeared!'

Chapter 14  Off on their holidays

Jock didn’t want to leave the shed. It was Darren who just barged out on to the lawn, and stood there staring around him. He might as well, Jock thought, have had a big arrow pointing at his head with a neon sign saying 'He's here.' Quite apart from the police and the mysterious gunman or gunmen who had chased them through the woods, what if the owners of the house happened to look out their back window and see him? They might easily call the police.

It was going to be even more difficult to talk him into giving himself up this time. For one thing, Darren had already had experience of prison before in his short life and didn’t like the idea of being on remand. For another, there was now nowhere safe to go and reason it all out. Jock's house was presumably out of bounds: at the very least the front window had been shattered by some sort of missile, and there was no knowing what other damage might have been done. If the missile had been some sort of explosive device... Jock's imagination ran riot in a way he didn't usually allow it to, and before long he had written off his house as a lost cause, picturing it as a smouldering wreck which would be so far from being habitable that it would have to be demolished. Oh well, he thought. At least we got out in time.

He considered and discarded several other options. He knew his friends would have opened their doors to him willingly, but how could he bring such terrible danger to the door of Jemima Stevenson, for instance? He couldn't see her being able to hide in a shed for very long without complaining about her arthritis. Anyway, Dave would kill him if anything happened to her.

Christopher or Amaryllis would have taken him and Darren in, but he didn't consider their homes as being any safer than his home at this point. Maybe Christopher would let them camp in the Cultural Centre?

Darren wandered off into the woods again, and Jock followed him, reluctantly. He wasn't entirely convinced the gunman or gunmen had gone. But they managed to arrive at the ornamental fence of Jock's neighbour unscathed, and then they both instinctively turned to walk down Jock's road in the opposite direction from his house – they didn’t even look to see what sort of state it was in, but Jock couldn't smell burning which was a good sign - and headed in the direction of the High Street.

That was when their luck changed.

With the roar of a souped-up engine, a pick-up truck screeched to a halt beside them as they walked along what had only moments before been a peaceful back street. It was Dave.

'Going anywhere?' he called from the driving seat.

'Yes,' said Jock. 'Can you give us a lift?'

'Jump in!'

He held the front passenger door open for them, but they both got in the back seat. He gave them an odd look. 'Do you not want to sit up in the front, Jock?' he asked. 'My driving isn't that scary.'

'We're on the run,' Jock explained. 'We don't want anybody seeing us.'

'Who the hell are you on the run from this time?'

'What do you mean, this time? I don't make a habit of being on the run,' said Jock.

'Who is it though?'

'Well, there's the police, for starters. Then there were some idiots who threw a brick through my front window and chased us through the woods shooting at us, and we had to hide in some garden shed for hours...'

'That'll do to be going on with,' said Dave, and got the truck under way without wasting any more time.

'Where do you want to go?' he asked after a while.

'I don't know,' said Jock. 'We've got nowhere to go.'

'So you need a hideout, do you?' Dave pondered this for a few moments, as he drove in his usual fashion through Pitkirtly town centre, scattering before him pedestrians, cyclists, dogs and people unfortunate enough to be driving smaller cars.

They were driving along the river front when Jock had the courage to look again.

'Well, you can't come up to ours,' said Dave. 'I don't want Jemima getting in the way of any gunmen. She's had enough of that kind of thing... I suppose it's out of the question to go to Christopher's or -'

'They're compromised,' said Jock. 'They're on the police radar already.'

'There's only one thing for it then,' said Dave, and did a sudden U-turn which confused the woman in the Fiat Panda who was coming the other way. As far as Dave was concerned Fiat Pandas didn't really exist, so he wasn't bothered by the blast of its horn. 'You aren't allergic to cats, are you?'

‘Um – I don’t think so,’ said Jock. He nudged Darren, who looked as if he was almost asleep. ‘Cats. Any allergies?’

‘No, I don’t mind them,’ said Darren. ‘I don’t like dogs though.’

‘There won’t be any dogs,’ said Dave. ‘Lots of cats. No dogs.’

He accelerated past the harbour. The Petrellis’ café was all closed up. Funny, you’d think they’d be open at this time of day. Of course, Jock remembered suddenly, they must have closed out of respect for Old Mrs Petrelli. Such a lot else had happened to him in the last twenty-four hours that he had almost forgotten about her.

Before long they were outside Pitkirtly. Dave drove up towards the main road that ran all the way between a roundabout near the Forth Road Bridge and Kincardine, where there was another, less spectacular bridge across the Forth.

‘Are we nearly there?’ said Darren, whose face looked grey by this time. The pick-up truck bounced round another corner. ‘I think I’m going to – ‘

He was violently sick into one of Dave’s wellies which was conveniently to hand.

Dave stopped on the verge on a narrow bit of road and they did as much cleaning up as they could stand.

‘Better out than in,’ said Jock hopefully.

‘Maybe you’d both better sit in the front with me now,’ said Dave. ‘You won’t get swung about so much there.’

They clambered back in and set off again. Jock himself was also wondering if they were nearly there yet but he didn’t want to annoy Dave by asking the question. It was quite enough like a school outing without that. They crossed the main road and dived down another narrow winding road. Just when Jock thought the road couldn’t get any narrower or more winding, it got narrower and started to climb. Soon they had turned on to a track and were apparently driving up a cliff. Dave couldn’t possibly tell whether anything was coming the other way, but he kept going at approximately the same suicidal speed. It seemed impossible that they wouldn’t have an accident.

‘It’s just round the next corner,’ said Dave at last, after a seemingly endless journey. ‘Or do we have to turn off this road first? I can’t remember. It’s a while since I’ve been up here.’

‘Where are we heading exactly?’ said Jock, daring to voice his thoughts for the first time since they got in the truck. One thing was for sure: nobody would find them up here unless they knew where to look. He would have been cautiously optimistic if he hadn’t started to feel travel-sick by then.

‘My niece’s place,’ said Dave. They went round a corner at speed, shot past a farm gate and screeched to a halt Dave jammed the gear-lever into reverse and they shot backwards.

‘This is it,’ he announced. ‘Can one of you open the gate?’

Jock climbed out to open the gate. It seemed to lead to a large field, but at the other side stood some sort of an enclosure. As they approached, it looked more and more forbidding, with a tall sturdy metal fence topped with big lights and security cameras every so often along its length, and razor wire in the gaps. Somewhere behind the fence was a cluster of farm buildings.

‘What the hell is this place?’ said Jock.

Dave didn’t answer. He drew up beside a gate in the fence, got out and pressed a button on a keypad, held a brief conversation with someone at the other end of the connection, and got back into the truck.

‘She’s just going to let us in,’ he said, starting the engine again. ‘It’s a cattery, by the way, in case you were wondering,’ he added.

‘A cattery? It’s more like Fort Knox!’ said Jock, staring around as the gate swung open and they drove in. There was open ground, then another fence which bristled with more security. They went through another gate and found themselves in a farmyard, where the truck stopped at last.

‘She takes her responsibilities very seriously,’ said Dave.

A woman came out of one of the buildings. She was tall and big-built and looked a bit like Dave around the eyes. Jock started to wonder why she needed all the security. She looked as if she would have been quite capable of defending the place single-handed, should the need arise. They all got out; Jock and Darren stood there awkwardly while Dave greeted his niece.

‘Rosie! How are you doing?’

‘Not too bad, thanks. Busy. I blame Ryanair. People taking more and more holidays. Some of them hardly see their cats from one year’s end to the next.’

She eyed Jock and Darren.

‘I wondered if you could look after two strays for me,’ said Dave.

‘If they can work their passage, I can,’ she said. ‘My assistant Jo’s just gone off sick – I was thinking I’d have to work round the clock. Those two look like good strong lads.’

It was some time since Jock had been called a lad, and he was rather flattered if anything.

‘That’s great,’ said Dave. ‘Well, better be getting back. I told Jemima I was going down to the fish shop. She’ll be wondering where I am. She’s probably reported me missing by now.’

He laughed. Jock and Darren didn’t share the joke.

‘We’re in a bit of trouble,’ said Jock. It seemed only fair to warn her. ‘People might come looking for us.’

‘Not up here, they won’t,’ said Rosie. ‘Anyway, I’ve got my perimeter secured. They won’t get through.’

Dave drove off, in a hurry as usual.

‘Just got to go and open the gates for him,’ said Rosie. They followed her into an office and watched as she did something with her computer. ‘There we are… Now we’ll find you something to do. Not allergic to cats, are you?’

They shook their heads.

‘Good.’

She led them through an archway, and suddenly they were surrounded by smaller enclosures, each with a little wooden house on a stand in it. The sound and smell of cats filled the air. There were cats on top of the little houses, in the doorways of little houses, under the little houses, hidden cats miaowing from apparently empty enclosures. She rummaged in a plastic box.

‘Here we are then.’

She presented them with two little trowels and a handful of plastic bags.

‘You can start with Burke and Hare’s litter tray.’

Chapter 15  Encounters

Amaryllis wished she hadn't blurted out the news about Jock’s and Darren’s disappearance in that dramatic way: Christopher had got into an awful panic. Fortunately a panic for him was characterised not by running round in circles waving his arms in the air, but by raising his voice and saying everything more than once.

'Where have they got to? Do you think somebody's taken them?'

Or, to put it another way, 'Have they been kidnapped? Where will we start looking?'

'I expect they went off somewhere under their own steam.' said Amaryllis. 'Jock isn't the most patient person in the world, and Darren's so ditzy he could easily have wandered away. They probably just got bored waiting.'

'Do you think we should report them missing?' said Christopher.

'I don't think so,' said Amaryllis. 'But we can have a look for them ourselves. In the obvious places.'

The obvious places turned out to be the old railway yard, still ringed round with police tape - Amaryllis ducked under it and went in to have a look, but she reported back that there was no sign of the runaways - and Jock's house, which had a smashed front window but no other visible signs of damage.

'It must have just been a brick,' said Amaryllis, a tinge of disappointment creeping into her voice. 'Or I suppose it could have been a bullet. I'll go and have a quick look and see if I can get in.'

But the front door was obviously more secure than it looked, for she tried her best and couldn't get in.

'I could have done it if it hadn't been broad daylight,' she announced, 'but the neighbours might be watching.'

'Jock always was paranoid about neighbours,' said Christopher. 'I mean, he IS always paranoid -'

'I know what you mean,' said Amaryllis. She frowned. 'Do you think they've gone round to someone else's house? What about yours?'

'What about your flat?'

They glared at each other. Amaryllis, unusually for her, didn't particularly want to go back to her flat alone, but she disguised this as concern for Christopher.

'Let's go to yours first, then if they're not there we can go on to mine.'

Half an hour later, having satisfied themselves that Jock and Darren were not at either place, they sat down in Amaryllis's startlingly white room and reviewed the situation.

'I suppose they might be at Jemima's, but it would be stupid of Jock to go there and put her in danger too,' said Christopher.

'We could give her a call,' suggested Amaryllis.

'No, we don't want her getting in a panic,' said Christopher. He slumped back against the white sofa cushions and stared round the room. 'Do you ever get tired of having everything so clean?'

'No,' she said. She started to pace up and down. 'There's something going on here.'

Amaryllis didn't like the feeling she had that there was something big and amorphous just out of reach, something that whisked itself round corners and out of sight as she approached, and that lurked at the edge of her dreams and mocked her.

'The Donaldsons - the old railway yard - a knitting needle - the Petrellis - ' she said aloud. 'What are we not seeing here?'

'Darren,' said Christopher.

'You're right, he doesn't fit in. It's way too complicated for him. His style would be simpler and more direct.'

'Maybe these are all unconnected things that have just happened to happen,' said Christopher, making very little sense. Sometimes she wondered how he had survived before she came into his life. He could be so clueless, and yet he must be quite intelligent underneath the surface veneer.

It was annoying. She moved suddenly in the wrong direction, banged her elbow against the corner of the bookcase and yelped. Tears sprung to her eyes. She turned away so that he wouldn't notice, pretending she was going to put the kettle on. He followed her. 'That looked nasty. Hasn't that elbow been injured for a while?'

If he had shown sympathy or concern rather than curiosity, she would probably have put her head on his shoulder and cried, but his tone of casual enquiry steadied her nerves and made her blink back the tears and say, 'Not exactly injured. It's fine.'

'What happened in the railway yard?' he persisted.

‘Nothing,’ she said, realising she sounded like a schoolgirl.

‘What sort of nothing?’

‘You’re not my mother, Christopher! Stop stressing about it. Do you want some toast with your tea?’

She was relying on the mention of toast to stop him looking so grim, and she was right. He smiled.

‘Silly question,’ she said, talking aloud to herself. ‘So what are we missing? Where do the other kids fit in? Zak and Stewie, I mean. Why did they run away when we saw them?’

Too many questions, not enough answers. Amaryllis didn’t like not even knowing where to start. But she knew you had to start somewhere, as with unravelling a piece of knitting that had gone wrong. Just pull at a loose end and before long the whole thing was reduced to a single strand of wool. She was only too well aware of the truth of that figure of speech.

Maybe knitting would help her concentrate.

She made the tea and toast, got Christopher settled with his cup and plate and the local free newspaper, and went to fetch her embryo scarf. It hadn’t grown in size or attractiveness since she last saw it. Another hole seemed to have developed while it had been lying in her bag. She didn’t even like the colours either – the sizzling red she had started out with had acquired a muddy tinge, perhaps because of the wear and tear caused by the unravelling and re-knitting of the small amount she had produced.

Penelope Johnstone, mother of Zak. Amaryllis didn’t know her very well but she seemed like a sensible woman. Could she be persuaded to tell them anything useful? But then, even sensible women didn’t necessarily know what their sons were doing at night, especially if it was something bad. She suddenly remembered Mrs Laidlaw, Darren’s mum. Could she have engineered Darren’s escape from police custody? It didn’t seem very likely, but who would be more likely than a mother to try and get her son out of trouble? Never mind that he was bound to face even more trouble sooner or later by escaping.

Who would be more likely to help him than his mother would? His girl-friend, of course. She had done it once before.

‘Victoria,’ said Amaryllis, who hadn’t knitted a stitch yet despite holding the needles with the knitting on them.

‘Victoria?’ said Christopher, glancing up. The free sheet wasn’t exciting enough to hold his attention once Victoria was mentioned, of course.

‘Maybe she was the one who got Darren away from the police again. She can drive. Jan from the wool shop told me she drove Old Mrs Petrelli to hospital appointments.’

But did Darren’s escape have anything to do with anything else?

Only if you thought he had murdered Old Mrs Petrelli, thought Amaryllis, frowning in concentration and accidentally purling when she should have been knitting plain. If you knew he hadn’t – which they did, since he had an alibi, having been at Jock’s at the time – then it was irrelevant. And if he hadn’t murdered Old Mrs Petrelli then he was a little less likely to have murdered Alan Donaldson, since the methods used in each case were fairly similar.

So it didn’t really matter how Darren had escaped or who had helped him do it. At the same time, though, it seemed like another piece in the puzzle, even though it was dark where the rest of the picture was bright, and the shape didn’t look as if it would fit in at all anywhere. Maybe the best thing to do next was to tug at some loose ends and see what happened. Assuming they could get out and about without being shot at, arrested or hit by a random falling star.

‘Have you finished your toast yet?’

‘Just a minute,’ said Christopher, crunching up the last crust. ‘We’re not going out again, are we?’

‘We should try and speak to Zak and Stewie,’ said Amaryllis decisively. ‘I wonder where we can catch them at this time of day.’

He looked at his watch. ‘Oh, God, is it that time already? I told Jemima I’d have her round to the house again for a lesson on making cranachan.’

‘You’re making that up,’ Amaryllis accused him. ‘I don’t believe this sudden interest of yours in pseudo-Scottish concoctions.’

‘I couldn’t make it up if I tried,’ said Christopher.

 ‘This’ll be more exciting than making cranachan,’ said Amaryllis.

‘That’s what I’m afraid of,’ he said. ‘I’d better give Jemima a call.’

‘No, don’t bother her just now, there might still be time for your cooking lesson later. Come on.’

Walking back along Merchantman Wynd, she had a brief qualm about possibly leading Christopher to his death at the hands of the mysterious gunmen, but she squashed it ruthlessly, telling herself that he had put himself at risk on several occasions since they had first met, and anyway, what was life without an element of danger. Amaryllis always found it easy to rationalise these things.

They started at the butcher’s shop where Stewie had acted the part of a talking ham. Amaryllis asked for him at the counter and was told it was his day off. The talking ham outfit sat crumpled up in a corner, looking even less realistic than it had done when he was wearing it. The butcher stared after them through the window. He obviously didn’t get much entertainment in the course of an average day’s shop-keeping. Slicing up bits of dead animals must pall quite quickly.

Their luck changed as they walked past the Pitkirtly Yarn Store. Penelope Johnstone was looking in the window, apparently trying to decide between Scatty Sepia and Overdone Ochre, or substitute bizarre wool names of choice.

‘Penelope!’ said Amaryllis, relief making her voice higher and more feminine than usual.

‘Amaryllis!’ said Penelope, turning round. ‘How lovely to see you. How’s the scarf coming along?’

‘About the same,’ Amaryllis confessed. ‘Have you met Christopher?’

‘No, but I think I’ve heard of him. You are the same Christopher Wilson who works in the Cultural Centre, aren’t you?’ said Penelope as they shook hands. She was a smartly dressed woman with a confident manner. She wore a quilted jacket and a tweed hat that made her look like a racehorse trainer. Hard to imagine her as the parent of a trouble-making youth. But Amaryllis supposed it could happen to anybody.

‘How’s your – um – knitting?’ said Amaryllis, trying hard to say something polite before jumping in at the conversational deep end. She couldn’t remember anything about Penelope’s knitting, or anything the woman had ever said at the Cosy Clicks group. So much had happened since the previous meeting that she could barely remember any of the relevant details.

Penelope frowned. ‘I’ve had to unpick a bit. So annoying – my grandmother would have been cross with me! It’s the lacy edging. I can’t get the right number of stitches picked up.’

'I couldn't even begin to try to pick up stitches,' said Amaryllis, not exaggerating in the slightest.

'So sad about Old Mrs Petrelli,' said Penelope, in hushed tones.

'It's dreadful, isn't it?' said Amaryllis encouragingly.

'Who would do such a thing to an old lady?' said Penelope. 'I just can't imagine such wickedness.'

Even Amaryllis, with her limited grasp of everyday social skills, realised this wasn't the right moment to ask where Penelope's son Zak had been at the time the murder occurred.

No,' she pretended to agree. 'It's impossible to imagine.'

What she meant, of course, was that it was impossible for a normal person who had led an average sheltered life to imagine; it was perfectly possible for someone like her with her training as a killer and her experience of violent deaths. She sensed Christopher's incredulity at the way the conversation was going. But she meant to play along for as long as she could before her own hypocrisy made her throw up on the pavement.