3 A Reformed Character

by Cecilia Peartree

  'What about Stewie's Mum?' said Amaryllis, risking a direct question again.

  'Do you want that last scone?'

  'No - you have it.'

  Mrs Patterson grabbed the scone and transferred it to her own plate. She took her time ladling out more blackcurrant jam. She hadn't even quite finished the previous scone. 'His Mum's got her own troubles. Four more kids, mostly by different fathers. But I don't mind him staying with me. He's not difficult. I don't see that much of him - he's got a wee job now,' she added proudly. 'He goes out with his friends a lot.'

  'Do you know what they do when they're all out together?' said Amaryllis. 'Does he ever talk about - anything? Where do they go?'

  'Are you a social worker, dear?' said Mrs Patterson, suddenly fierce.

  Amaryllis laughed. 'Certainly not!'

  'What do you want? You didn't bring me here and ply me with tea and scones just because you liked my company, did you? I've answered enough of your questions. Go and pick on somebody else.'

  Amaryllis sat there, stunned into stillness, as Mrs Patterson left, pausing to speak to the waitress and to explain, no doubt, that someone else was paying.

  The strange feeling of pity for Stewie that she had felt earlier returned. Or maybe it was just the after-effects of the scone. Or of being accused of being a social worker. That was enough to make anyone feel funny.

  She went home, walking slowly this time, because there was nothing to get home for. She climbed the stairs to her flat heavily, as if there was something, possibly the pity, weighing her down. She wasn’t sure what to do to get rid of it. Would it help to do some knitting?

  Amaryllis rummaged in a bag and brought out the needles, wool and beginnings of the scarf. Grimly, she set to work. Knit one, slip one, pass slipped stitch over...She wasn't going to let a simple piece of knitting defeat her.

  Chapter 20 Return of the Jedi

  Christopher decided it was time to go round to see Amaryllis. He had been in Pontefract for most of the week on a course which was meant to teach him how to run a folk museum, then he had been at work trying to run a folk museum, which involved learning that his new ideas would never work. Although he had thought about Amaryllis a lot, as he always did, he hadn't yet translated that into action. In some ways he was glad he had been away from Pitkirtly for a few days. It was a long time since he had attended a course. He had enjoyed the illusion of bouncing around serenely in a bubble which insulated him from day to day problems such as what to have for tea, and who had murdered Old Mrs Petrelli. But now it was time to get back to reality.

  He supposed he should have been fretting all the time about Jock McLean's whereabouts and wellbeing - after all, the man was supposed to be one of his closest friends - but in reality he thought Jock was well able to take care of himself and would have felt patronised by Christopher's worrying.

  All things considered, it took a considerable mental effort to ring Amaryllis's doorbell even once he had got himself round to the small apartment block and stood on the doorstep.

  'Christopher! I'll buzz you in,' she said. There was an odd note in her voice: was it relief? Was she actually pleased to see him?

  She gave him a wide, natural-looking smile when she opened her own door at the top of the stairs and ushered him into the flat. He noticed that the carpet in front of the sliding doors that led to the balcony was starting to look worn where she often paced. He wondered if she could measure the complexity of a case in carpet wear as Sherlock Holmes measured in pipes.

  'Sorry I haven't been in touch,' said Christopher. 'Is there any word of Jock and Darren?'

  She nodded. He couldn't work out from her expression whether it was good or bad news.

  'Darren's surfaced. He's back in custody. I haven't seen Jock but I think he's ok. They were at a cattery.'

  'A cattery?'

  He sat down on the nearest chair with a bump.

  'Is Jock still there?' he added. It might even be worth visiting the cattery just to see Jock in action, he thought.

  'I'm not sure. But that's where Darren last saw him. He could be home by now... I got his window fixed just in case.'

  'But we didn't have the keys to get in and do that.'

  ''I phoned his son. The one in Milngavie. One of the neighbours had a set. I've tidied up in the front room. Broken glass and so on. It was a brick, not a bullet or anything.'

  'It doesn't make any sense,' said Christopher. 'A cattery!'

  'It does make sense,' said Amaryllis. 'We just have to put the pieces together in the right order.'

  'Shouldn't the police be doing that?' He knew he must sound as if he had abdicated responsibility, but with his revived career to consider, he really couldn't go around playing at detectives, or at least not on weekdays.

  'I've been hired to investigate,' said Amaryllis with a somewhat smug expression on her face.

  'Hired? By the police?'

  'Oh God, no. By Tricia Laidlaw. As a private eye.'

  'To prove Darren innocent?'

  'The last I heard,' said Amaryllis, 'it was up to the police to prove him guilty. And he certainly wasn't guilty of the Petrelli murder. He was round at Jock's house keeping a low profile.'

  'The Petrelli murder. It sounds like some sort of Mafia thing,' said Christopher absently.

  Amaryllis started to pace. She would need a new carpet by midsummer at this rate. Christopher watched her in silence for a few minutes.

  'Some sort of Mafia thing!' she exclaimed suddenly. 'Christopher, you are definitely Dr Watson and Captain Hastings rolled into one.'

  'Oh dear,' he said, feeling inadequate.

  'Mafia thing - of course. That's what it is!'

  'The Mafia in Pitkirtly?' said Christopher. 'That's ridiculous!'

  'It's all a protection racket!' said Amaryllis. 'The Donaldsons - they said we didn't know what we were getting into. The attack on the cattery. The gunman in the woods. Jock McLean's window. It all fits! Even Maisie Sue said it reminded her of Chicago, only of course we weren't listening.'

  'So you think the Petrellis are running it,' said Christopher. He pictured Victoria with her melting brown eyes and dark curly hair and stylish appearance, Giancarlo, masculine to the core and yet so like his sister. Giulia Petrelli and Old Mrs Petrelli at Cosy Clicks. What was the father's name? He wasn't sure if he'd ever heard it.

  'I'm not sure - it might just be local gangsters who've been inspired by the Mafia,' said Amaryllis, still pacing. 'It could be coincidence that there's a family of Italians in town.'

  'Yes,' said Christopher, cheering up a bit. 'Local gangsters - that's a lot more likely when you think about it.'

  'Maybe it's just the kids doing it all,' Amaryllis said. 'But I'm guessing there's somebody else behind them - someone who can afford cars and guns. A sponsor.'

  'Mr Big,' said Christopher. 'Not Dave, obviously. A criminal mastermind.'

  He wondered if there was a big white fluffy cat in the picture too. Or maybe that was a step too far.

  'So what if the gangsters - we'd better not call them the Mafia, it would probably infringe equalities legislation - demanded protection money from the Donaldsons in return for not vandalising their building work, and the Donaldsons refused to pay?' said Amaryllis, excited. 'So they killed Alan Donaldson as a reprisal and a warning.'

  'That's a bit drastic, isn't it?' said Christopher.

  'Of course it's drastic, but they don't want their credibility going down the drain, do they? They can't afford not to do something serious.'

  'Why didn't the Donaldsons tell the police all this?'

  'There must have been something dodgy going on as part of their business,' said Amaryllis. 'Something they didn't want the police to know about.'

  'But their son's life! It must have been more important than their business.'

  'Maybe not,' said Amaryllis. 'It depends what they were up to.'

  'What about the attack on the cattery? How does that fit in?'

  Right on cue, the doorbell
rang again. With inaccurate mutterings about her flat being like King's Cross station, Amaryllis left the room. He heard her opening the door and running downstairs. It must be someone important at the door. She usually just buzzed people in. Or maybe it was someone she didn't know.

  Several minutes later he heard several sets of feet on the stairs, accompanied by various exclamations in different voices, and then Jemima Stevenson appeared, followed closely by Dave, a woman he had never seen before, Jock McLean and finally Amaryllis. The minimalist room, usually so uncluttered, seemed to shrink as they all spread out in it. Jemima sat down next to Christopher.

  'Well, this is some stramash you've got yourself mixed up in!' she said accusingly.

  He started to deny being mixed up in it, but that was when he saw Jock McLean, smiling at him in a particularly irritating way.

  'It's Jock,' he said, pointing. 'He's the one who's mixed up in things. I'm just an innocent bystander.'

  'Hmph! Innocent! That'll be the day!' said Jock.

  Christopher felt relieved at this sign that things were back to normal. To all intents and purposes, the exchange of vague insults had been their equivalent of the modern manly hug, which certainly neither of them would have felt comfortable with.

  'Christopher, this is Rosie,' said Amaryllis, introducing the strange woman. 'She's Dave's niece. It's funny, we were just talking about the cattery.'

  'I prefer to think of it as a cats' holiday home,' said Rosie, shaking hands with Christopher. She was built on the same scale as her uncle but in a more feminine, curvy style. But he didn't think she would be easily intimidated, and she certainly didn't look like the fragile victim type.

  ‘So, what did they threaten you with?’ said Amaryllis. ‘Or was it the cats they threatened?’

  Rosie sat down and put her head in her hands. Christopher didn’t think she was crying, she just needed to hide her face for a while. He could sympathise with that, having experienced times in his life when he wished he could crawl into a hole and hide.

  ‘It was the cats,’ she said in a muffled voice. ‘The story I told Jock and Darren about cat rustlers was a lot of nonsense. I made up the story about the Russian Blue and everything.’

  ‘You certainly had me fooled,’ said Jock looking at Rosie with what seemed to be admiration.

  ‘It started just before Christmas,’ she continued. ‘I had a visit from a man who pretended he wanted a look round before booking in his cats. I was on my own that day, which of course was a mistake. He just went straight to one of the cat enclosures, opened the gates and let two of the cats out. I was frantic. I’ve never lost a cat yet. I managed to catch them both – it was Spider and Earwig, Mrs Macdonald’s tabbies – why she had to give them such awful names I don’t know. He stood there and watched me chasing them. Then he said something like, it would be a shame if anything happened to any of the cats, wouldn’t it? And I didn’t know what he meant at first, but then he said two hundred pounds a month and I would be safe.’

  ‘Daylight robbery,’ said Jock McLean, looking fierce.

  ‘That’s exactly it,’ said Amaryllis. She seemed to have come to life now that she had started to understand what was going on.

  ‘I laughed and said two pounds a month would be more like it,’ said Rosie. ‘It isn’t a big business, you see. The overheads are enormous, especially when you provide heating in the chalets in winter, and special diets and so on. And I don’t like to charge so much that people can’t afford it – they need to know their cats are being looked after properly, otherwise they won’t enjoy their holidays…. Where was I?’

  Dave, who had been watching from near the windows, sighed. ‘Just like her mother – any excuse to ramble on. You were telling us about this man asking for protection money.’

  ‘He didn’t like me laughing,’ continued Rosie. ‘And by the way, Uncle Dave, sometimes you need to ramble on a bit to get to where you want to be. He said I’d be laughing the other side of my face if anything went wrong. And he said he’d be back.’

  ‘And was he?’ said Amaryllis.

  ‘Yes, but by that time I had the fence up, and some of my security systems. The man from the security company was just there that day as it happened, getting the cctv working. I tried to get the other man to repeat his threats in front of him, but he wouldn’t. Too clever, I suppose… Anyway, they had a go one evening in January – I suppose they were just testing out the fences and everything, but they didn’t get through. And then they came up the other night. Only it wasn’t the man who had been round in the first place – it was some younger lads.’

  ‘Did you see anybody you recognised?’ said Amaryllis. 'Anyone from around here?'

  Rosie shrugged. ‘I don’t see many people in the average week. I’m hardly ever down in Pitkirtly. If I have to buy a lot of cat supplies I either get them delivered or go into Dunfermline. I wouldn’t recognise local people even if I saw them. And it was dark, and they seemed to be wearing balaclavas.’

  ‘How about you, Jock?’ said Amaryllis.

  Jock was leaning on the back of Rosie’s chair. Christopher wondered about his interest in her. She was just about young enough to be his daughter.

  ‘No,’ said Jock. ‘I’m not very good with faces though. Especially the young ones – they all look much the same to me.’ He frowned. ‘I wouldn’t swear to young Darren not recognising them though. He went very quiet. And one of them lost his balaclava so Darren could’ve seen his face.’

  ‘It was just after that he started talking about secrets, and wanting to give himself up,’ said Rosie thoughtfully.

  ‘It sounds as if he might have known something,’ said Amaryllis. ‘I don’t suppose he was involved in the actual protection racket though. It doesn’t sound like his style.’

  ‘He wouldn’t do anything to harm the cats,’ said Rosie. ‘He was very good with the cats.’

  ‘Maybe his friends – wait a minute!’ said Amaryllis. ‘Zak Johnstone and the other one!’

  She paused.

  ‘What?’ said Christopher.

  ‘I saw them getting into a car in town in the middle of the night. Zak and the other one…When was the attack on the cattery? Sorry, cats’ holiday home.’

  ‘The night before last,’ said Jock.

  ‘Is that the same Zak Johnstone?’ said Christopher. ‘The one we didn’t chase that time…’

  ‘I’m sure there’s only one Zak Johnstone,’ said Amaryllis. ‘If it was really him, there’s only one thing we need to work out… Which of his friends has a car?’

  ‘Or access to a car,’ said Christopher. ‘Could be one of them borrowed their parents’ car.’

  ‘Ha!’ said Jock with satisfaction. ‘In that case I hope they have fun explaining the damage.’

  They talked round this for a while longer, but without coming to any conclusion except that Amaryllis would go out looking for the car, and Rosie would go round to Mrs Stevenson’s for tea and to spend the night.

  ‘I feel much better,’ she said to Amaryllis on the way out. ‘It’s good to be able to talk to somebody about the protection racket thing. I was feeling as if there was no way out of it.’

  ‘Who’s minding the cats today?’ said Amaryllis.

  ‘I’ve asked a friend who has her own boarding kennels to come over and help for a day or two,’ said Rosie. ‘She’s a black belt in karate and a crack shot.’

  'The world would be a better place,' said Jemima Stevenson solemnly, 'if more cattery owners were licensed to kill.'

  Chapter 21 The Evil Moment

  Jock McLean had been putting off the evil moment when he had to go home to his own house and clear up the mess made by whoever had broken his front window. Eventually, in the absence of offers from any of his friends to put him up for the night, he had to face up to it. He considered checking into Pitkirtly's only hotel, the rather grand Holiday Inn situated in the former Pitkirtly Castle, but that would be a ridiculous waste of money when he had a perfectly good house to s
leep in.

  He said goodbye to Dave, Mrs Stevenson and Rosie, who were on their way to a convivial evening around Mrs Stevenson's coal fire, and set off towards his own house, hunched up against the cold and walking as slowly as was humanly possible in the drizzle which had just come on.

  To his great surprise, the moment turned out to be not nearly as evil as he had expected.

  He stared at the window from outside in the street. There wasn't even a mark on it. Surely he hadn't imagined the whole thing!

  One of his neighbours, the skinny woman from number 58, appeared at her door and called to him.

  'Oh, Mr McLean, I'm glad to see you back. I lent the spare key to that woman with the spiky red hair.'

  Amaryllis, of course!

  'I wasn’t sure if it was the right thing to do, but she said she was a friend of yours, and I remembered seeing the two of you together once in the Queen of Scots. Not that I go in there very often myself, but we had Women's Guild Christmas drinks in there and... anyway, she's had your window all fixed for you, and I had a wee peek in and she's cleaned up in the front room as well. A kind thought, when you were away. You weren't in hospital, were you?'

  'No, I was helping out with a friend's business,' said Jock. He wondered what she would have said if he'd told her he was on the run with a murder suspect. Perhaps she would have nodded and smiled and not really understood what he was talking about.

  She nodded, smiled and went back inside her house.

  It was all right opening the door and going into the hall and picking up the junk mail off the door-mat. It wasn't so bad going into the kitchen and seeing the chocolate digestive crumbs on the floor where Amaryllis had left them. For some reason he didn't feel like going into the front room yet. He put the kettle on and made himself some cocoa. That brought back memories of sitting in Rosie's house drinking cocoa all that time ago - well, the night before last - when they were all in shock after the raid of the cat rustlers, who had now metamorphosed into gangsters. It was all starting to seem unreal. He decided to have an early night.