He then paused for effect, in the manner of the host addressing an audience of the great and the good at the annual Oscars ceremony in Hollywood. Unsure what to expect, Jack and Annie braced themselves, ready to be overwhelmed by the combined largesse of an entire farming community.
‘You’ll never need to buy an egg again, as long as you both stay here. Your money’s no good for eggs,’ said the farmer. Then he reached behind and, with a flourish, handed over a cardboard tray containing two dozen fresh eggs.
Jack took the gift and looked sideways at Annie, then rolled his eyes and said with as much sincerity as he could muster, ‘I really don’t know what to say. I’m overcome with … what’s the word I’m looking for, Annie?’
‘Em, I’m really not sure, boss. Gratitude?’
‘That’ll do, yes, gratitude. Thank you so much Mr Kemp, I do love a fresh egg with soldiers for breakfast. It’s one of life’s simple pleasures.’
‘I knew you’d be pleased, anyway come into the house for a minute and we can have a cup of coffee. By the way, did you find what you were looking for, you know, in the car?’
‘Yes we did, thanks. It was just where I thought it would be. Tell me, have there been any strangers around the farm in the last few days, anybody who looked suspicious or out of place?’
‘No, there’s only been a young bloke, from the local council Trading Standards department, who was doing a routine check on my stock movement records. But between you and me, they always look a bit strange and out of place. I reckon it must be a requirement of the job. Oh, and while I remember, my neighbour who farms over the hill asked me to pass on his business card and he said you should give him a bell, if you’re interested in more work.’
‘Do you know what the job is?’ Jack asked, as he slipped the card into his wallet.
‘I did ask him about it but, to tell you the truth, he was a bit vague about the details. But as far as I can gather, it’s about someone on his wife’s side of the family who’s in a bit of trouble. That’s all I know, Mr Davidson, but I can tell you this, though, he’s not short of a bob or two, that one.’
Jack immediately thought ruefully to himself that they’re all worth a bob or two, these farmers. However, the puzzle that no one alive has ever worked out, is how to get any of them to part with it.
Chapter 34
Later the same day Jack and Annie arranged to meet Robert Blake at his home to hand over their completed report on his wife’s extra-curricular activities. When they arrived at the Blake house, he ushered them into the same room and all three sat down in exactly the same seats as before. But the seating arrangements were the only thing that remained unchanged, because there was an unspoken understanding in the room, that for Robert Blake nothing would ever be the same again. His world was about to be turned upside down.
‘So, Mr Davidson, I understand that you’ve completed your investigation.’
Passing the report folder across the table, Jack nodded and said, ‘Yes we have and it’s all in there. As I indicated previously, because your wife is very much a creature of habit, her movements were fairly straightforward to monitor and it only took three days to get a pretty comprehensive picture of her, ahem, activities. Our report details where she went, who she met, what she did. And it also contains a number of pictures, which are fairly self-explanatory.’
‘I will read the whole thing with interest later, but from your tone and also the apparent thickness of the report, would I be right in thinking that my original suspicions have proved to be correct?’
‘Yes, I’m afraid so.’
‘I see, and am I likely to know the other man? What I’m trying to say … is my wife having an affair with someone who lives locally? Perhaps even someone I play golf with?’
‘It’s possible, but obviously we don’t know how many golf partners you have. But I think it is fair to say that your wife has certainly been playing around, and to a very low handicap.’
Blake sat staring at the report lying before him on the desk, but appeared reluctant to reach out and actually touch it. Finally he asked, ‘Could you please give me a brief summary of the contents?’
Jack hesitated, unsure exactly how to reply, and wished that Blake would just read the damn thing for himself, and then write out a cheque.
However, Annie had no such reservations and, picking up the document she took the lead and flicked through the first few pages before announcing, ‘You might want to get yourself a stiff drink first, before I begin.’
‘That won’t be necessary, I assure you. Until very recently I served as a part-time Sheriff at Kirkcudbright and after more than twenty years serving on the bench, observing the full gamut of human behaviour, both good and bad … well, I can say with some confidence, that there’s very little that can shock me anymore.’
Deciding that there was no easy way to sugar this particular pill, Annie took a deep breath and then laid out, in sequence on Blake’s desk, several graphic A5 size colour prints, which she knew would need little by way of explanation. Then, pointing to the first of six pictures, she got right to it, ‘Number one here is a picture of the plumber your wife had sex with in a car park on Tuesday afternoon. Number two is of a different man she met for sex on Tuesday evening, once again in a car park. Picture three shows a similar encounter which took place on Wednesday evening and she met the gentleman shown there, receiving oral sex, in picture number four, on Thursday afternoon. There was a slight change to her routine with these last two, pictures five and six, which are of two men she enjoyed a threesome with, late on Thursday evening, in the back of a baker’s delivery van behind the local library.’
For the first time Blake’s inscrutable expression cracked slightly and a fast tic began to affect his left eye and cheek. Getting up slowly from his chair, he turned to gaze out of the bay window in the drawing room, with both hands clasped tightly behind his back, and then sighed, ‘This is quite incredible, much worse than I could ever have imagined. So, tell me, these men that you’ve photographed having relations with my wife … are they all tradesmen?’
‘We’re not sure, because they didn’t all drive vans with their names painted on the side. In fact a couple of them did have quite nice cars, one was a Jaguar and the other a newish Saab estate, if I remember correctly,’ said Annie.
Tentatively lifting one of the A5 size pictures, Robert Blake paused to polish his spectacles and then peered closely at it before exclaiming, ‘Good grief, Helen’s bottom is partly in the way here, so I can’t quite make out all of the man’s face, but I’m sure that’s the plumber who came round at short notice, to unblock our septic tank, two or three months ago.’
With commendable self-control, Annie replied straight-faced, ‘Yes, we understand that emergency rodding jobs appear to be his speciality.’
Jack then attempted to summarise their conclusions. ‘So, to answer your earlier question, from our observations your wife does not appear to be involved with a single “other man” as you perhaps suspected. Rather she seems to favour a succession of hook-ups with complete strangers, who she first meets online, and with whom she then goes on to have sex, usually in public car parks, and sometimes with an audience watching. So this is not an extra marital affair in the conventional sense. There is no one individual who brings her gifts of flowers or chocolates, there are no candlelit meals over a bottle of wine, followed by slow dancing. For your wife this is simply about sex, pure and simple. Wham bam thank you mam, as they say, and then she swiftly moves onto the next encounter. I’m not a complete expert on such things but I’m told that dogging, as it’s commonly known, is actually quite popular right across the country.’
Sitting back down, Robert Blake straightened his tie and said, ‘For the first time in my life, I’m at a complete loss to know what to do. I know that this is not in any way part of your brief, Mr Davidson, but as an experienced man of the world, what would you do now if you were in my position?’
‘Look, trust me, I’m the la
st person in the world to try and give anyone advice on how to rescue a failing marriage. But, for what it’s worth, I think you have three options. Which one you end up choosing depends entirely on how strongly you feel about the revelations in our report. Divorce is obviously one option, which usually involves selling the marital home and then making a fifty-fifty split of all joint assets.’
Annie looked questioningly at Jack and then rolled her eyes, but remained silent as he went on. ‘Continuing to stay together, but essentially living completely separate lives, is another alternative and the third one is the toughest. Trying to rediscover what it was that you had before all this came along. But to do that you would probably both need to make big changes, you know, to make things work.’
Robert Blake nodded and for the first time acknowledged Annie’s presence, as he half-turned in his chair to address her directly, ‘And you, Ms James, you’re an attractive intelligent young woman. What do you think I should do?’
As ever, Annie was not backward about coming forward with an opinion. ‘I’ve never been married, so trying to give advice on something like this is way above my pay grade. But, if you really want to know, I think you should surprise your wife by doing something completely different. Take her away for a few days to a fancy hotel in somewhere like Paris or Rome. Make an effort to really talk to each other honestly about why she’s behaving in this way and, if you discover that you still love each other, try and find a way to work through this. I don’t know, maybe it isn’t the end of the world after all.’
Sensing that their meeting was thankfully almost over, Jack took the opportunity to slide an invoice across the desk, which Robert Blake studied briefly without comment, before taking out his cheque book from a desk drawer and then writing a cheque for £1750, to cover three days of Jack’s and Annie’s time, plus expenses.
He then stood up, gave Jack the cheque and shook both Jack and Annie by the hand, before saying, ‘Thank you both for dealing with such a delicate matter in a thoroughly professional manner. And also for the excellent advice. You’ve given me a lot to think about.’
Back in the Land Rover, Annie said, ‘That was a pretty good steer that you gave old man Blake back there, boss. Maybe you aren’t such an unreconstructed male chauvinist pig after all.’
Smiling, Jack replied, ‘You weren’t so bad yourself, kiddo, at dishing out the handy hints to the poor old bugger. But I was so glad that you didn’t suggest that he tries to surprise his wife, you know, dressed in the full BDSM kit. We would have been stuck there all day trying to explain, if you’d opened that particular can of worms. But, kidding aside, I really can’t be arsed with all that agony aunt, touchy feely shit. I just wanted him to sign the cheque so we could get out of there. Although, now you come to mention it, I do see a completely new side line opening up for us, Annie. We could write a problem page for one of the trashy Sunday papers. You know, giving advice on their readers’ sex and relationship issues. We could call it Ask Jack and Annie, life coaches to the stars.
‘Ask Annie and Jack sounds so much better, boss.’
Chapter 35
As they were driving back to base, Annie’s phone rang and she took a quick look to see who was calling. ‘Oh God, no. It’s Auntie Peg, I’ve been dreading this. She doesn’t usually phone unless it’s something important, so I better pull over and speak to her.’
Jack got out of the Land Rover and lit a cigarette, leaving Annie to speak in private. ‘Hello Auntie Peg, I’m really sorry that I haven’t been in touch sooner. I keep meaning to phone you, but we’ve been really, really busy with work, you know.’
‘Don’t you give me that busy at work crap, Miss. I know something’s going on. It’s been nearly two weeks since Jack Davidson was last in the bar and some of the other regulars were wondering if he was maybe dead, or in jail, because he’s never gone AWOL for that length of time before. But I’ve been more worried about you, Annie. Where on earth have you been?’
‘We’re both down in Dumfries and Galloway at the moment, as I said we’ve been working,’ said Annie, as her aunt got into her stride with the questioning.
‘You’re being a bit vague. So which is it, Dumfries or Galloway? And where are you staying? He’s not done anything to you has he? If he has I’ll swing for the stupid old bastard.’
‘No, of course not. He’s been a perfect gentleman in his own mad way. Look Auntie, I’ll explain everything later, but it’s probably better that I don’t say exactly where we’re based at the moment.’
‘You know I can read you like a book, girl. There’s something going on that you’re hiding from me. I knew it, this is what I was worried about from the beginning. That bloody idiot Davidson has gone and got you mixed up in one of his daft cases, when he was supposed to keep you safe inside the office, remember. He promised me that the first time the two of you came into the bar together. Remember?’
‘I do remember, Auntie. I just can’t believe it was only ten days ago. But the thing is, the way things have turned out, being in the office wasn’t the safest place after all.’
‘Holy mother of God! What do you mean? What’s happened?’
Desperately trying to keep the number of lies told in one phone call to single figures, Annie rolled her eyes and babbled on, ‘You see, there was a fire at the office, just a little one. I’m not sure what started it, possibly some electrical problem. But the main thing is nobody in the building was hurt, there was just a bit of smoke and water damage. So anyway it’s just routine and we had to move out for a while, you know, until the insurance claim gets dealt with and repairs are carried out. Then out of the blue the chance of this out of town work came along, so here we are down in Dumfries and Galloway.’
Annie interpreted the loud harrumph, followed by a prolonged hissing through clenched teeth at the other end of the line as a bad sign, immediately confirmed by her Aunt Peg snarling, ‘Is he there? Put the stupid bugger on the phone right now, till I mark his card good and proper.’
‘Please auntie … honestly, I’m fine and Jack’s fine too. He’s not with me at the moment, but he’s hardly been drinking at all and we’ve just been very busy, that’s all. Look, I’m really enjoying my new job and I think I’m maybe going to be good at it, so just relax and be happy for me, please. Everything’s cool and we’ll be up in Glasgow soon. I’ll pop in and see you just as soon as we get back, I promise.’
Sensing that the inquisition by her aunt was nowhere near finished, Annie slipped in a final lie. ‘Look, Auntie Peg, I’ve got to go. I’ve got another call waiting, that I need to take right now, so I’ll say cheerio and see you soon. Love you, bye.’
As Jack climbed back into the Land Rover, he caught the tail end of the phone call and saw the strain draining away from Annie’s face as she put her phone back on the dashboard. ‘Nosey old cow, she’ll have been racking her brains wondering where we are. And she’s probably worrying about her bar takings being down by twenty per cent, with me being down here.’
Annie shook her head and sighed, ‘Oh my God, what a woman, she’s absolutely relentless once she gets started with the questions. Oh, and she sends her love, by the way.’
‘Aye, right. So, do you think she believed you?’
‘Not a word.’
‘Okay then, we better go and see her. We need to go back to Glasgow anyway, to pick up our mail from the PO boxes. So we can do that in the next few days.’
Chapter 36
The next morning Jack was sitting in a deck chair outside the cabin, chewing his pen and staring disconsolately at the same Times crossword he’d been stuck on for the past three days. He eventually tossed the paper aside and then snapped the ballpoint pen in half, before announcing, ‘I don’t think I can do this anymore, Annie.’
Annie looked up absentmindedly from checking through the email inbox on her MacBook. ‘Come on, don’t give up boss. It’s probably just early Alzheimer’s, caused by a lifetime’s over-exposure to Hank Williams songs and fish suppers. B
ut don’t worry about it, half the old guys in Glasgow are probably in the same state. Anyway, what’s the clue you’re struggling with this time?’
Jack stood up and started pacing around. ‘No, it’s not the crossword, Annie, it’s this,’ he said, waving his arms. ‘It’s about sleeping on an old settee in a garden shed and being on the run, constantly looking over my shoulder for the bogey man.’
‘Look, you know why we’re here,’ countered Annie. ‘A madman back in Glasgow wants to kill us both. It’s completely unfair, no argument, but we just have to deal with it.’
‘Yes, I know. But I’m starting to think there are some things more important than being dead.’
‘Oh really? Do tell.’
‘I know this will sound stupid, but I just want to be able to sit on a stool in the Royal Bar again with a cold, foaming pint of Best in my hand and I’d really like to be able to flush the toilet after I’ve had a shit. I want to stretch out in my armchair and fall asleep watching the football on television. I want to be surrounded by the noise and smells of the city, the pure buzz of a place where all human life doesn’t revolve around cattle, dipping sheep and the price of hay bales. And I’m fed up stepping in sodding cow pats. I just want my life back, Annie, it’s as simple as that.’
‘Well you were right about one thing, that did sound stupid,’ replied Annie sourly.
‘Look, Burke could have dropped dead with a heart attack or been knocked down by a bus. He might even have gone back to Ireland for all we know. But what we do know is that he doesn’t appear to be still in Glasgow. Or if he is he’s keeping a lower profile than Craig Whyte, because the police haven’t been able to find him.’
Acknowledging that her boss wasn’t going to change his mind any time soon, Annie advised, ‘Okay then, what we need is some safe way to find out if he’s still around and still wanting to play silly buggers.’
Fire in the Blood Page 15
