Authors: Margaret Thomson Davis
Double Danger
This book is dedicated with gratitude and admiration to Edward Finnigan and his mother Evelyn Pullar.
I would like to thank Margot and Evelyn Cook, Margaret Martin and Debbie Healy for their generous help with my Barras research. Many thanks also to Evelyn Pullar and Edward Finnigan for their detailed information about life in Saudi Arabia and Dubai.
Librarians have always been kind and helpful to me but none more so than the librarians at Bishopbriggs Library while I was working on
Double Danger
.
The latter part of the book is set in the Campsie Hills area. However, no such place as Vale of Lennox exists. And Hilltop House is an imaginative mixture of several locations from different areas across Scotland.
Saudi Arabia – Jessica McKay had never heard of it until she met Brian Anderson. She was working as usual at the Barras market stall owned by Mrs Margaret Mellors. Then along comes this gorgeous man with blue-black hair and a deep tan. Her own hair was what she regarded as boring brown, and long and outrageously thick and curly. The only way she could tame it was by tying it back, but a thick crowd of curls still escaped and bunched over her forehead.
The man poked curiously around all the goods on the stall.
‘Can I help you?’ she asked.
He just smiled and said, ‘I’m only having a look around.’
‘That’s a great tan you’ve got. Been away on holiday?’
‘No, I work in Saudi Arabia.’
‘Saudi Arabia?’ Jessica echoed incredulously.
‘In a compound in the desert. I’m Brian Anderson, by the way.’
‘Gosh!’
‘When we lived in Bishopbriggs, my father once took me with him to visit the Barras. I was quite small at the time and I don’t remember all that much about it. Then we moved to Bearsden and I went to school there until I got a place at Dundee University. After my parents died, I’d nothing to come back to Bearsden or Glasgow for.’
Jessica stretched out her hand.
‘Jessica McKay.’ Mrs Mellors and everyone at the Barras called her Jessie, but she felt that Jessica would sound better to Brian Anderson.
Her hand tingled as it was gripped by his. She felt quite excited, but of course she always had been an excitable person.
‘Don’t tell me you came all the way from a compound in the desert just for a look around the Barras!’
He laughed.
‘No. But we all get so fed up with Arab food. Most of us come over occasionally to stock up with things like Marmite and Vegemite and sauces and herbs.’
‘Marmite?’ She sounded incredulous.
‘Oh yes, you get that you long for the sight of a pot of good old Marmite.’
Against the deep tan of his skin, his teeth were startling white. She’d never seen such a handsome man in her life.
‘What’s a compound?’ she asked. ‘Is it mostly Arabs who live there?’
‘It’s a good mile square with high walls and guards at different points. Inside, it’s really beautiful with well-kept gardens and villas and every amenity, like a swimming pool, a medical centre, a leisure centre, a restaurant, a golf club, a café and so on. It’s mostly Scots and English who live in the compound. The gardens are beautifully maintained by the south-east Asian and Indian workers. We get hot summers and mild winters and rain usually from November to March, so that helps the gardens.’
‘But it’s an Arab country?’
‘Oh yes, we do business with them and I find they are mostly hospitable and friendly. But their customs take a bit of getting used to.’
‘How do you mean?’
A couple of customers interrupted her at this point and she had to reluctantly attend to them.
‘When do you knock off?’ he asked.
She glanced at her watch. ‘Mrs Mellors is due any minute. She’s been away having her tea and I’ll get time off for mine when she gets back. Here she is now.’
‘Can I take you for a meal? I’m enjoying our chat.’
‘Thanks. So am I.’
She immediately lifted her coat and struggled into it. Mrs Mellors, a small slim perky woman, grinned at her.
‘You’re in a great hurry today, hen.’
‘This is Brian Anderson, Mrs Mellors. He’s invited me out for tea.’
‘Oh aye? Well.’ She turned to Brian. ‘You look after her, do you hear me, and bring her back here safe and sound.’
Brian gave a mock salute. ‘Your wish is my command.’
‘We’d better just go somewhere nearby,’ Jessica told him, ‘since there’s not much time. A snack in one of the bars would do me OK.’
‘All right,’ he said.
They went across to Bar 67 which was comparatively quiet as there was no football match on. It was called Bar 67 because Celtic won the European cup in 1967, the first British team ever to win it.
‘So you get on OK with the Arabs then?’ Jessica asked after they’d settled down with a drink and some food.
‘Well, their customs take a bit of getting used to, as I said. There’s a lot of touching and close contact. Arab men walk hand in hand, for instance.’
‘Gosh. Does that mean they’re all …’
‘No, no, far from it. No, it’s just the custom. They’re even liable to take a Western man’s hand as they walk along with him.’
Jessica was fascinated. She’d never heard the like of it in her life.
‘It can be infuriating to have a business appointment with them, as I often need to. It’s supposed to be a private appointment but it’s always interrupted by phone calls and visits from their friends and family.’
‘No!’
‘Oh yes, even at the best of times business meetings are much slower and start with long enquiries into one’s health and journey. It’s really maddening but you’ve to be careful never to show any annoyance or impatience.’
The time flew by and eventually Jessica said, ‘I’d better go. Thanks for everything. I’ve really enjoyed talking to you.’
‘Can I keep seeing you while I’m here? I’ve made no plans for my leave, other than the shopping, and I’ve done all that today. I’ve rented a serviced apartment nearby so it’s no problem to call for you. You don’t work in the Barras during the week, do you? The market’s just open at weekends, if I remember.’
‘Yes, OK.’
‘Where do you live? I could call for you tomorrow first thing and we could tour around Glasgow. It feels like it’s a lifetime since I’ve been to the old place. I’d really enjoy touring around everywhere.’ He flashed her one of his smiles. ‘Especially with such good company.’
They made their way back across the road.
‘You’ll see an awful lot of changes. That’s where I live – above the market.’
‘272A The Gallowgate,’ he said. ‘I’ll remember that and call for you at – what, nine o’clock?’
‘Fine, see you then.’ She ran back into the market, eager to tell Mrs Mellors all about her new friend.
‘You watch yourself,’ Margaret Mellors warned her. ‘He’s a right man of the world and you’re just a wee lassie. You’ve only got me to see to you. I’m lucky, I’ve got a marvellous son. He’d do anything for me.’
‘I know. I know. But it’ll be great. We can maybe walk in the direction of the Trongate first. I know my Glasgow history. History was my favourite subject at school. All around there and right up the High Street is the oldest area of Glasgow.’
‘What’s wrong with starting here and telling him all about the Barras? I bet even you didn’t know that this is the largest enclosed market in Europe. There’s thousands of traders, not to mention the hundreds of shopkeepers spilling out into the streets all around.’
‘I did know but he’s had a look around here already today. He told me how he was admiring the big decorative gates, as he called them. He was down here early this morning having a walk around all the stalls.’
‘He couldn’t have got round them all.’
‘Well, some. Anyway, I think he’s absolutely wonderful.’
‘Aye, I can see that but just you remember what I’ve said – watch yourself.’
‘All right, all right.’
After she finished work, she ran up the stairs to her flat.
She was lucky to have such a lovely big place – three bedrooms it had, and a nice big sitting room, a kitchen and a bathroom. And no flats above her. Her parents had invested all the money from their stall in the house – had bought everything outright, and so now she was living rent-free.
Happily Jessica went over to the kitchen window, opened it and rested her elbows on the sill. Down below and all around as far as the eye could see were the brilliant, multi-coloured booths, trading carts, barrows and tables all laid out under the corrugated iron canopy. Absolutely everything you could think of was sold here, including the kitchen sink. And the noise was ear-splitting. The vendors were vying with one another in boasting about their wares and what marvellous bargains they were offering.
One wee woman was yelling, ‘Epples, a tanner each. No, I kid ye not. These epples are only a tanner each.’
A man was juggling plates and bawling, ‘I’m not asking you for £30 for these beautiful plates, not even £20. No, believe it or not, not even £10. Come up quick enough and you can have them for £3 each. Yes folks, I swear it, if you’re quick enough, I’ll let them go for just £3 each.’
Jessica chuckled to herself. He had probably paid fifty pence each for them. She felt part of the huge crowd and crescendo of noise and she clapped her hands in excitement and delight.
There were lots of Cockney accents to be heard. Quite a few men came up with packed vans from London and got to like the Barras so much that they bought houses in Glasgow and made it their home base. They never lost their Cockney accents, though, or their Cockney humour. The Cockneys had some of the best patter in the market and created the loudest laughs.
Eventually Jessica shut the window and went through to the bedroom to study herself in the wardrobe mirror. She could hardly believe her luck that such a handsome and fascinating man wanted to spend the next three or four weeks with her. After all, she was no raving beauty. OK, she was slim and quite shapely but what an enormous, curly mop of hair she had hanging right down her back. It was as thick as a bush and made her look crazy if she let it hang loose.
There was nothing she could do to tame it, except tie it back. Nothing at all, though, to keep the bundle of curls from sticking over her brow. She looked eccentric, to say the least. Brian Anderson must have liked her, though, to want to spend the whole of his leave with her. It was amazing and exciting and wonderful. She danced around the room and then flung herself recklessly on to the bed and kicked her heels.
Dead on nine o’clock next morning, the doorbell rang and there he was, dressed in a dark suit, pale blue shirt and silver tie.
He had a bag slung over his shoulder. He patted it.
‘Got a plastic raincoat and a camera, a notebook and a tape recorder in here.’
‘Gosh, you’re well organised. Come in for a minute while I get my jacket.’
How she wished now that she’d put on something smarter than her white trainers, blue denims and white polo neck. It had been showery earlier and she’d thought if they were going to be traipsing around outside for hours on end, it would be more sensible to wear casual clothes. Her jacket was waterproof and had a hood.
‘This is a lovely big flat,’ he said, staring around. ‘I bet you don’t often see high corniced ceilings like that nowadays.’