What with rage and astonishment and confusion, I had almost nothing to shout with. I croaked, ‘But his name was on the Paradise Island golf register.’
‘No, it wasn’t,’ said Krishtof Bey, flicking a strand of silver off his impeccable Lincoln Centre filibeg and plush doublet. ‘I played a round of golf just behind Mr Tiko. It wasn’t his name you saw in the book, it was mine.’
The pipers switched to ‘The Garb of Old Gaul’ and got half-way through it quite uninterrupted. I could hear my father’s F.E.V. revving up. The Begum was smiling, strolling along. I said, ‘What?’
Krishtof Bey said mildly, ‘I am T. Krishtof MacRannoch. It is a bizarre name for a ballet-dancer. I do not use it.’
My father said, in a fixed voice, ‘The name of my heir after Beltanno is T. K. MacRannoch. A Japanese.’
‘A Turk,’ said the Begum dreamily. ‘James, I ought to have told you. But after Wallace mentioned what Krishtof’s real name was. I went over the papers again. The genealogical people didn’t mean to mislead you, darling. It was a typing error. T. K. MacRannoch. Turk. Krishtof Bey is the heir to the chieftainship.’
‘And?’ I said thinly. It was another damnable plot. It was a plot between the Begum and Brady. I remembered she had even got James Ulric to agree to my marrying Krishtof. ‘What about me? What about Mr Tiko?’
‘Mr Tiko is polite,’ said the Begum. ‘He will marry you if you insist, but I believe he would be rather relieved not to have James Ulric for a father-in-law.’
‘And Krishtof?’ I said.
Krishtof was admiring the swing of his kilt. ‘I? I never interfere.’ he remarked. ‘I am interested in love, not in chieftains or marriage.”
‘I’ve noticed as much,’ said James Ulric. His face had brightened. ‘But I’ll not deny you’re a treat at the sixteensome. You’ll mind, Beltanno, that “The MacRannoch for Ever” is due at the bridge?’
His words fell in to a wheezing withdrawal of bedlam. The pipes had ceased. The files were opening and halting, displaying before me the dazzle of concrete under a flock of bright, floodlit banners, with the standard of the MacRannochs flying over it all. Ahead, in the darkness, on either side of the white arch before me, I could hear the low chuckle of water, and smell the salt, soft air of the sea.
Here was the new bridge. And here was I, at the head of two thousand, to pipe the 45th Chief to his castle.
The MacRannoch for Ever is not a difficult solo, but there is a knack to it.
I had the knack. I settled the bag and put the blow-pipe into my mouth and sent up a prayer and drew in all the sea air I could muster between there and the Florida coast. The drones started up, and then the first note, clear and steady; and I launched into my father’s own tune as I set foot on his bridge.
I played steadily as I walked over, and behind me I could sense the trample and thud as the MacRannochs flocked after the piping: whether as rats or as children it is not for me, a MacRannoch, to say. I filled my own ears with my music so that no lesser rumble could reach me: no crumbling chasm of concrete: no cracking and sliding of piers.
Beneath my feet the new bridge was solid. Solid to the midway reach of the strait, with the lights twinkling in front and behind. Solid as the far end came nearer, and the lights of the castle shone sharp-cut and welcoming there.
I walked on, and James Ulric walked firmly behind me; and when we both stepped on to dry land, he moved forward and laying his hands on my shoulders, he embraced me for the first time since childhood.
‘The curse is broken,’ he said.
He underestimated his reticuloendothelial system; but success is an excellent doctor. I kissed him back fondly. And through the fronds of his tall Chieftain’s bonnet, I saw not MacRannoch Castle before me, but a palm tree with a banana bird in it, and beneath it, B. Douglas MacRannoch: mistress to the man on my one hand, or wife to the man on my other; or both.
Thank you. Johnson. Thank you for everything.
Synopses of ‘Johnson Johnson’ Titles
Published by House of Stratus
Ibiza Surprise
Life in Ibiza can be glorious and fast, especially for those who have money. Sarah Cassells is an intelligent girl and has many admirers. Having completed her training as a chef, she hears of her father’s violent death on the island, and refuses to believe it when told it was suicide. She becomes involved with a series of people who might be able to shed some light on events, including her brother who is an engineer for a Dutch firm from whom a secret piece of machinery has been stolen. As Ibiza prepares to celebrate an annual religious festival events become more convoluted and macabre. Sarah has choices to make; none are simple, but fortunately Johnson Johnson, the enigmatic portrait painter and master of mystery sails in on his yacht ‘Dolly’. Together they may get at the truth, but with murder, espionage and theft all entwined within the tale, there are constant surprises for the reader - and for Sarah!
Moroccan Traffic
The Chairman of Kingsley Conglomerates is conducting negotiations, which are both difficult and somewhat dubious, in Morocco. He is accompanied by executive secretary Wendy Helmann. However, there are soon distractions when unorthodox Rita Geddes appears on the scene. Wendy discovers that there is much more at stake than the supposed negotiations, and finds herself at the centre of kidnappings, murder, and industrial espionage. Explosions, a car chase across the High Atlas out of Marrakesh and much more follows. Of course, the prior arrival of portrait painter Johnson Johnson is in many ways fortuitous, but he has some ghosts of his own to lay.
Operation Nassau
Dr. B. McRannoch is in the Bahamas with her father who has moved there from Scotland because of asthma. She is a savvy and tough young lady who shows much independence of mind and spirit. However, when Sir Bart Edgecombe, a British agent who has been poisoned with arsenic falls ill on his way back from New York, she becomes involved in a series of events beyond her wildest imagination. Drawn into an espionage plot where there are multiple suspects and characters, it is only the inevitable presence of Johnson Johnson that saves the day. As with all of the Johnson series, nothing is quite as straightforward as it at first seems, and there are many complicating factors to grip the reader as well as the added bonus of another exotic location.
Roman Nights
Ruth Russell, an astronomer working at the Maurice Frazer Observatory, is enjoying herself in Rome – that is, until her lover, Charles Digham, a fashion photographer and writer of obituary verses, has his camera stolen. The thief ends up as a headless corpse in the zoo park tolleta. Johnson Johnson, enigmatic portrait painter, spy and sleuth, is in Rome to paint a portrait of the Pope and is therefore on hand to investigate in one of Dunnett’s usual thrilling and convoluted plots that grips the reader from cover to cover. There is something far more deadly at stake than just the secrets of a couture house …
Rum Affair
This mystery is told from the point of view of the ‘Bird’; Tina Rossi, a famous coloratura soprano who arrives to sing at the Edinburgh Festival, only to find a murder victim in a cupboard, whilst at the same time her lover, top scientist Kenneth Homes, has gone missing. Saved from the long arm of the law by Johnson Johnson, a world renowned portrait painter and enigmatic solver of mysteries, Tina joins him on a yacht race to the Hebrides - there are connections anyway as Homes was conducting top secret research in the area. Here, though, there is yet more trouble and the mystery deepens as Johnson’s yacht ‘Dolly’ nears the island of Rum, where it turns into a race for life rather than prize money. This is the first title in the Johnson Johnson series and in common with the remainder involves an intricate plot and solution which is far from immediately obvious.
Split Code
Joanna Emerson, a trained nursery nurse, is hired as a nanny, albeit reluctantly, to the infant heir of a cosmetics fortune. She then becomes caught up in a complex kidnap plot. She is also an expert in codes and her purpose is to gain an insight into the opposition plan? But how does kidnapping
further anyone’s interests? Commencing in Winnipeg, Manitoba, the story moves quickly through locations, as with many of Dunnett’s stories. On this occasion Joanna ends up on a crippled yacht off the coast of Yugoslavia. As always, both behind and aside from the plot and it’s inevitable conclusion is enigmatic portrait painter, yachtsman and former spy, Johnson Johnson. Bullets are flying, most of them in Joanna’s direction. Just how can this end?
Tropical Issue
Rita Geddes is a dyslexic makeup artist whose appearance seems to change with the weather. She is called to Johnson Johnson’s apartment, which he has let to a friend who wishes to use his studio, to fix the makeup of the famous Natalie Sheridan. However, Johnson, who is seemingly recovering from an accident, which turns out to be a murder attempt, is also present - as is it seems a mysterious figure seen by security outside of the apartment. What follows is murder, mystery and mayhem, with Johnson and his yacht Dolly, as always, at the centre. The reader will not be involved in second guessing a simple plot, however, as it is as intricate as fast moving, and far from a straightforward ‘whodunit’. The journey through this gripping story also moves from London to Madeira and the West Indies with equal pace.
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Operation Nassau: Dolly and the Doctor Bird; Match for a Murderer Page 30
