by Carly Reid
* * *
Jessica had to leave the question unanswered. Reenie had caught up with them, and Willow had pulled towards her, then behaved with contrition, whimpering and rubbing herself against Reenie’s legs. After making sure the little dog had had a drink, Reenie for her part was concerned about Willow’s developing muscles – the advice was short walks on lead only for the first few months, and no-one had said anything about a mad dash across a country park.
The two women had ended up taking it in turns to carry the puppy home, much as they had done in the first few weeks after bringing her home, before she had completed her vaccination schedule. She didn’t seem to be any the worse for her escapade, wolfing down her dinner and sleeping soundly for most of the night, apart from her usual training trip to the garden.
There had been no time to think about it the next morning either, as Reenie and Jessica both breakfasted and hurried to their workplaces. The Drummond and Dalkinchie Herald was printed on a Wednesday, so Tuesdays were quite often a rush of finalising last minute copy. Jessica went straight to the newspaper offices to check that Grant was happy with the article she had sent him the evening before, and to find out if there was anything else he required her to do.
“It’s wonderful, Jessica – clear, respectful, and you have all the information about this year’s Show that anyone could possibly need. You’ve chosen excellent retrospective pieces to showcase as well. Well done. You really have a flair for archival research – it would be great if you could do more pieces along these lines in the future.”
Grant’s feedback was always well thought out and genuinely useful. Jessica had begun to feel as if she knew what she was doing, gathering information, shaping it into a coherent piece for the local audience, and writing it up quickly. If she was honest with herself, her choice of journalism as a career had been more to do with it seeming like the next logical step after her English Lit major, and the fact that she could study it at the same grad school as her now ex-boyfriend, Mike. It had been a terrible basis on which to make decisions, she now realized, and although his decision to dump her just before graduation had broken her heart at the time, she was beginning to think that he might have done her an enormous favor. Mike was the reason that she was in Scotland at all, having canceled her plans to spend the summer working as camp counselors together before grad school. She vastly preferred her current situation and knew that if she were to decide to pick up her deferred journalism place at grad school the following year, it would be coming from a place of genuine interest and a passion for studying the subject.
“Do you need me for anything this morning, Grant?”
“Not right now, Jessica. Your four-page spread has cut down on the amount of work I have to do, so thank you for that. If you give me a call later, there’s a small reporting job that I might need you and Magnus to cover, but right now please take a break.”
Jessica nodded. This was the usual pattern on a Tuesday. She hadn’t yet learned any design or layout skills, and both freelancer desks in the outer office were occupied today – one by Magnus, who was finalizing his photo edits, and the other by Marian Sheddon, a woman who came in once a week on deadline day to pull together all the diary entries submitted by locals and community groups in both Drummond and Dalkinchie. In it were items like fundraising efforts, local events, and notices for long-running groups. Classes and promotional services were permitted as well, although no direct advertising – for that people had to pay. She also compiled the ‘News from our Schools’ section and the Births, Marriages and Deaths notices. She was a friendly woman and had smiled at Jessica as she came in, but had no time for small-talk – she did all her work in one day to ensure that it was as up-to-date as possible. Grant had told Jessica that she had been there for a couple of decades, long predating his time as editor of The Herald and had been an enormous help to him when he first started, but that she had no interest in taking on any more work beyond her one day per week.
Happy to be getting a break, Jessica headed down the hill with the intention of checking whether Reenie needed any help in The Bloom Room, and, if not, treating herself to brunch at Lissa’s. If Ealisaid wasn’t too busy, she might be able to catch up with her as well. Her plans changed, however, when she bumped into Patricia Wilcott outside the coffee shop.
“Jessica, how lovely to see you. Are you in a hurry? I was just going to go in for a cup of tea. You would be more than welcome to join me – my treat.” Patricia looked well, considering, her eyes bright and her voice animated. She was pale, but then she was the type of woman that Jessica suspected would always be pale, her skin almost translucent in places. The purplish shadows under her eyes indicated that she perhaps wasn’t getting enough sleep, but apart from that she seemed fine.
Jessica glanced over at The Bloom Room. Reenie was within, attending to one customer while another browsed the vases of flowers; she didn’t seem swamped. Jessica made up her mind.
“Thanks Patricia, I would love to have some tea with you. It doesn’t have to be your treat though, I was thinking of having brunch myself anyway. I was in a hurry this morning and only grabbed a banana for breakfast.”
Patricia’s smile widened. “Wonderful. I insist on paying, however. I might join you in a snack. I’m partial to Ealisaid’s hot rolls.”
They made their way into the café, and as ever, Jessica was struck by the cozy ambience and friendly feel. Over the last few months she had realized just how important Lissa’s was as the centre of the community, serving as a hub for information, sustenance and promoting local business and services. Ealisaid herself was dealing with her usual line of morning customers, but still managed to glance up and wave at Jessica and Patricia as they came in. The café was filling up but Jessica found a table for two, nestled in one of the back corners. While Patricia went up to order the food and drinks, she sat and fiddled with a tiny vase which held a sprig of heather. She didn’t see anyone she recognised in the café apart from Ealisaid herself.
Patricia returned, carrying two mugs, and behind her was a teenager that Jessica didn’t recognise, carrying a tray with a large white porcelain teapot, and milk jug and sugar bowl. There was also a wooden spoon with a number painted on the bowl, which the young waiter slotted into the holder on the table, created for that very purpose. This was how Ealisaid managed her food orders, saving the need to shout them out over the hubbub of a busy café.
“How are you, Patricia?”
“To be honest with you, I’m not sure Jessica. Everywhere I look there seems to be another job to do, something else to sort out, another form to fill in. I’m keeping going purely on adrenaline I think – I don’t even remember if I ate breakfast this morning, which is why this is such a good idea. I am in Dalkinchie this morning to pick up the car. It has been parked outside the Village Hall since Saturday, and it only just occurred to me that I have a spare car key and I could fetch it any time I liked! That’s an example of how scattered I have been.” Patricia shook her head, as if in despair at herself, and moved to pour tea in first Jessica’s, then her own mug.
“I’m sure that is totally normal. It would be stranger if you just carried on as if nothing had happened.” Jessica wondered if this was perhaps the wrong thing to say – was there any normal in this situation? She had heard of people reacting to grief in all sorts of ways, and this was more than grief – there was the ongoing police investigation, too.
Patricia smiled. “You are right, of course. You really do remind me of my daughter, Helen. The same knack for knowing what to say.”
Jessica realized, not for the first time, that she should trust her instincts more and stop second-guessing herself. She was about to answer when the same young waiter arrived, bringing their rolls. She had gone for a bacon roll with tattie scone, a Scottish speciality – a flat, triangular item that was more like a pancake than a scone, and made of a combination of flour and mashed potato. They were a very popular breakfast food here. Patricia was also having a typi
cal Scottish morning roll, but she had clearly requested the ‘well-fired’ type as her bread roll was darker on top. Hers contained a fried egg. Jessica loved the morning rolls, with a dry (but not too chewy) exterior, and a soft (but not too doughy) interior, it was no wonder that most of the other people in Lissa’s were also tucking into one. Ealisaid bought them in bulk from the bakery next door to her café, along with the potato scones and sliced loaves for her sandwiches. She baked all the cakes and scones herself.
She added some HP brown sauce to hers and then tucked in. Patricia, meanwhile, took a dainty bite. Jessica marveled at the woman’s ability to eat a fried egg roll so tidily. “Mmm, delicious. Thank you, Jessica, for reminding me to eat! With my usual routines disrupted and no-one in the house to cook for, I could easily forget.”
“You’re welcome. That’s not something I ever have a problem remembering! Will you have someone to cook for soon – I mean, is your daughter traveling home to spend some time here?”
Patricia sighed. She took a sip of tea before replying. “I wish she was Jessica, but it’s complicated. I’ve actually had Donald over this morning trying to help me figure it out. Helen originally moved to Australia with her husband – his job took him there. They have a child, my little granddaughter, Evie.” Patricia paused, her eyes lighting up, clearly delighted by the thought of the child. “However, in recent months, Helen and her husband’s relationship has…broken down, and in fact they are separated. Helen moved out, taking the child, very recently. However, they are not divorced.”
“Helen and Mark married here,” she continued, “but moved to Australia before having Evie, and she is actually an Australian citizen. She doesn’t have a passport of any sort yet. We have always traveled to visit her. Helen now wants to return to the U.K. Mark, understandably, doesn’t want her to do that because he wouldn’t be able to see his daughter as much. He is making it very difficult for Helen to apply for a passport for their daughter, and is threatening her with lawyers if she attempts to bring Evie here, even if just for a visit. He doesn’t trust her. For her part, Helen doesn’t want to come home without Evie. She is worried about what Mark might be able to achieve with regards to custody in her absence. It really is a mess, and on top of all that Helen has been a stay-at-home mum since Evie was born, meaning that she has no money or resources to get lawyers of her own over there. I have been supporting her as best I can, but…”
Patricia tailed off, looking towards the café window for a moment. Her eyes had misted over, and she seemed lost in reflection for a moment or two. Then she resumed: “It’s difficult, from such a distance away.”
Jessica really didn’t know how to respond this time. What could she possibly offer? It seemed like such a hopelessly fraught issue, and a specialist one at that, probably requiring a family lawyer. Her own mom was a lawyer, but not one that handled divorces or custody issues – and she practised in the States. Australia would undoubtedly be different. She waited for Patricia to regain her thoughts, topping up both of their mugs with hot tea from the pot. The sympathy she already felt for Patricia had increased tenfold. How was the woman coping?
Patricia came to, and nodded her thanks. “I’m sorry to have bombarded you with all of that, Jessica. It’s not your concern. It’s just weighing heavily on my mind at the moment, that’s all, and with Desmond’s death, it has really made it more urgent that we sort something out. Let’s change the subject. What have you been up to?”
“Actually, I was hoping to talk to you about that, if you don’t mind. The police were interested in the feud your husband had with the letter-writer in the newspaper, and I ended up going to Dundee yesterday to try and verify their identity. Have they asked you about it?”
“About McScunnered? Not specifically, no. They have asked about anyone he had a run-in with. In all honesty, Jessica, it’s a long list. He put people’s backs up, and his actions sometimes had very unfortunate consequences as well. If I was to rank his feuds, I wouldn’t put McScunnered very high at all. If anything, I got the impression that the two of them almost enjoyed the letter-writing, back and forth.”
“Did your husband…Mr Wilcott ever suspect who it might have been?”
“He speculated, definitely, but never found out for sure as far as I am aware. I didn’t pay too much attention to be honest. It was just another of his obsessions, typing away at that computer of his. I know that he thought it was probably somebody he had worked with, or that knew somebody else at the bank well. Some details were too specific to be common knowledge, he said. Have you heard about what happened at the bank?”
“Yes…at least, I have heard some of it. I know that something happened, and some people lost their jobs.”
“That’s part of it. In truth, it was part of a much bigger problem. This was one occasion where Desmond really was not at fault. The whole bank went under, and had to be bailed out by the British government – do you know anything about this? I’m not sure whether it would have made the news in the U.S.A., but it was a big deal here at the time. It was connected to the big global financial crisis, of course. Desmond really had nothing to do with it at all. He unfortunately was in charge of restructuring the departments at the offices here, and had to make a number of people redundant. He was not unaffected – none of the management team received a bonus that year, and in fact he retired on a lesser package than he would have been due to receive if circumstances had been different. There’s no point telling anyone that around here though, and I’m certainly not saying he was badly off – it was still an extremely comfortable retirement package, and I quite understand the resentment that built up. It did become very nasty at times.”
“Why, what happened?” Jessica encouraged Patricia to continue.
“People started to make scenes at the various committees that Desmond was a member of. Drummond and Dalkinchie are actually relatively small communities, and it seemed that everyone knew someone who had been affected by the redundancies, and felt like airing their grievances at committee meetings. Desmond would become incredibly frustrated that people were bringing their personal matters into committee business and on one particularly memorable occasion, someone resigned from the committee and walked out, after calling him something…a pernickety old goat, that was it! He thought it highly inappropriate!”
“Who was that? Was it – ”
“It was Margaret Mustard. One of the worst parts was that I believe she had planned the confrontation in advance and had persuaded her cronies to walk out with her – but when push came to shove, everybody shrank back in their seats and didn’t follow her out. So she also fell out with some of her friends, and then she held that against Desmond as well, of course.”
Margaret Mustard. Again. Could Margaret Mustard be McScunnered? One and the same? She fit the criteria of being close to someone who worked in the bank, and although Desmond Wilcott had believed McScunnered to be a man, Jessica had found nothing that definitively stated this. In addition, although Jessica knew that Margaret Mustard lived in Dalkinchie and not in Drummond, she certainly considered Castle Drummond her second home and might use that address for her alternative persona. Suddenly, she felt the need to speak to Murdo and see if she could get any information from him on where the police suspicions lay.
Patricia was still speaking. “Anyway, Desmond never bothered about whether people liked him or not. He just wanted to be in charge, and get things done. He was not unlike our son-in-law Mark, in that regard. The two of them clashed horribly on our visits over there, especially as we tended to stay for a number of weeks to make it worth the journey. We were due to go out together again, actually, next week.”
Jessica was confused. This surely could not be the case; it directly contradicted the conversation she had overheard Patricia having on her cell phone on Saturday morning. On that call, she had been very clear that she would be traveling to Australia alone. Why would Patricia lie to her about it? But before she had a chance to ask, she received a text message
from Grant. She had been half-expecting one, as he had said there might be a story to report on later, but what she read when she opened it made her sit up straighter in her seat, so focused that the rest of the sound of the café was blocked out:
“Jessica. Would you be able to come to the office ASAP? We have been processing the letters to the editor and there’s one final one here from McScunnered. It would be good to have your opinion. Grant.”
10
Shortbread at the Castle
“Hello, Jessica. Thank you for coming back in. I did think it would be best if you could take a look at this. Two heads are better than one!”
Jessica moved into Grant’s inner office where she was greeted by his beautiful black labrador, Skye. Always a gentle dog, Jessica had cause to appreciate her dignity even more lately as a comparison to the wild bundle of fluff and teeth she had to deal with at home. Skye moved slowly and elegantly, rising from her soft tartan bed that lay under the window, and stretching deeply before padding unhurriedly over to Jessica and lifting her muzzle up for a scratch behind her ears.
“Hello again, Skye,” Jessica said softly and Skye stood for a few moments more, then turned and moved at the same pace back to her bed where she curled up and rested her chin on the edge, steadily observing Jessica as she sat down. Jessica found the dog’s presence hugely comforting, and knew that she had been spoiled for future jobs. It would probably not be reasonable to make an office dog a condition of working somewhere, although she really felt that they should be mandatory in every workplace.
She turned to Grant.
“Another letter from McScunnered. Did it arrive in the mail? What does it say?”
“Yes, it was just in the bundle of post with some others. That’s how they have always arrived, and I don’t think it’s significant. I get emails, but still plenty of written letters too, some of them hand-delivered. Not McScunnered though, nor Desmond Wilcott for that matter. They always used good old Royal Mail, and usually a first class stamp. As for what it says, you had probably best take a look yourself.”
