Chapter 2 A Stranger in Town
Amaryllis hadn’t known what to expect from Jimbo’s friend Mal. Yes, she knew he had trekked to the North Pole a couple of years before with a group of army colleagues in aid of something-or-other, and that he had been injured in Afghanistan rescuing hostages some time after that, but she was rather hazy about why he had turned up in Pitkirtly so close to Christmas when most people headed home to be with their nearest and dearest - well, nearest, anyway.
She was pleasantly surprised when he at last arrived at the Queen of Scots. He was tall, good-looking in a kind of military way, with short cropped hair, a slightly weather-beaten face and army-style boots which looked just right with jeans, and he reminded her a bit of an ex-boy-friend who had been in the US Marines. Instead of talking about himself and his exploits all the time, which would have been forgiveable under the circumstances, he showed a flattering interest in her and her life. Only a few moments into their conversation, while Jock McLean was getting the drinks in, he said unexpectedly,
‘So tell me, what made you choose Pitkirtly, out of all the places you could have ended up?’
‘I like it here,’ she said, unwilling to go into her reasons, which were in any case now lost in the mists of time as far as she was concerned.
He smiled, his dark eyes sparkling. ‘But it’s so small!’ he said. ‘And quiet. I have a sense that you were meant for more interesting things. Epic events.’
She sighed. ‘It would be nice to do something that made a difference, I suppose.’
Amaryllis was conscious from time to time that the activities she had engaged in during her career had sometimes been theoretically all that stood between Britain and Armageddon; however she had always been just a small cog in a very diverse and dispersed set of machinery, and the epic nature of her work had been hidden under a blanket of bureaucracy. But maybe there was still time… Maybe this stranger would show her the way.
Almost as the thought crossed her mind, she glanced up and saw Christopher standing in the doorway gazing at her. She couldn’t quite fathom the expression on his face. It wasn’t quite censorious, or panic-stricken, but it could have been somewhere in between.
‘… sure you’ve made a difference before!’ Mal was saying politely. ‘And there’s still time for you to go on an epic quest - if you want to, that is.’
She brightened a little. An epic quest - now he was talking!
‘Here’s your drinks,’ said Jock McLean. ‘Christopher’s here!’
‘Yes, I noticed,’ said Amaryllis. She glanced quickly from Mal’s dark lean face to Christopher’s pale roundish one with the permanently bewildered expression, and smiled. The men were at opposite ends of the spectrum, both in terms of their physical attractiveness and, as far as she knew, in their aspirations.
Mal poured out wine for both of them. Jock sat down and leaned back in his chair, surveying the newcomer through shrewd eyes. Amaryllis never knew what he was thinking at the best of times. He seemed even more cryptic today. She hoped he wouldn’t come out with something weird that would scare Mal away. She had a feeling it would be good to sit at Mal’s feet for a while: to listen and learn.
Christopher came over and slid into the spare chair, setting down a glass of what looked like Old Pictish Brew on the table soundlessly, as if he were trying to be unobtrusive. He didn’t usually have to make an effort, perhaps because being unobtrusive came naturally to him, she thought. She introduced him and Mal to each other. Christopher seemed a bit standoffish, but again that was more or less how he usually appeared. He probably wouldn’t even comment at this point about the epic quest idea. She knew he liked to mull things over, sometimes for weeks or even months, before saying anything. Mal, on the other hand, must be accustomed to making decisions instantly in the heat of battle, otherwise he wouldn’t have survived this long.
‘I’ve always fancied space exploration myself,’ Mal said, continuing their previous conversation after the small interruption.
Christopher blinked.
‘Oh, me too!’ said Amaryllis, although in fact she had never really thought about it.
‘Think of it - you’d be a pioneer, helping to work out man’s final escape route from earth.’
‘Escape route?’ said Christopher.
‘Yes - we’ll have to get out of here one day - before the sun goes nuclear,’ said Mal carelessly, just as if he hadn’t been predicting the end of the world.
‘Hmm,’ said Christopher. ‘I don’t usually look that far ahead.’
‘Large horizons,’ said Mal. ‘That’s what you need.’
Amaryllis wasn’t sure exactly what he meant by that, but it did sound like a veiled criticism of people who spent all their lives in the cosy, closed community of Pitkirtly, where the main excitement of the past week had been the official town Christmas tree scandal. Of course, that would now be superseded in the headlines of the local newspaper by the supermarket robbery, if that was really what it had been.
‘Of course, you could always start in a small way,’ said Mal. ‘A wee bit closer to home.’
‘Exploration closer to home?’ said Christopher.
‘It doesn’t have to be exploration,’ said Mal. ‘It could be something else - helping someone. Putting right a wrong. That kind of thing.’
Amaryllis was rather disappointed by these suggestions. They didn’t sound very epic.
‘Amaryllis does that kind of thing all the time,’ commented Jock McLean suddenly. ‘Sorting out murders. Solving puzzles.’
‘Yes, that’s all good,’ said Mal.
‘So what are you planning to do next?’ said Amaryllis. ‘You won’t be settling in Pitkirtly, will you?’
‘What are you doing here, anyway?’ said Christopher before Mal had time to reply. It wasn’t like him to be so rude. Amaryllis saw him watching the other man, and sighed inwardly. It was a classic male thing. Dog in the manger, even. He just didn’t like having this intruder on his patch.
‘Oh, family stuff,’ said Mal, taking a sip of wine. He smiled blandly at Christopher and then replied to Amaryllis. ‘Well, as you know I’ve retired from the army. I think I’ve gone just about as far as I can with that. I’m planning to start a charity to help war orphans. Not giving them handouts, you know. Helping them to get on with their lives. Realise their potential.’
Surely even Christopher couldn’t be suspicious of this, Amaryllis thought. But she noticed he was still staring at Mal with a frown between his brows. Was it critical or just puzzled? He often seemed bemused by life and people and everything, so perhaps it was just his usual expression after all.
‘It would mean a lot of travelling, of course,’ Mal continued, looking into her eyes. ‘Sometimes under difficult conditions. And there’ll be harrowing sights involved. But I like to think it will make a difference.’
He gave a small, self-deprecating smile. She smiled back at him. There was something almost mesmerising about his eyes.
Jock McLean coughed horribly, almost as if he was about to be sick. The moment passed.
The door opened, letting cold air and snowflakes into the bar. Glancing round, Amaryllis saw that Chief Inspector Smith had come in with them.
She registered that he had a uniformed officer with him,
‘Well,’ said Mal, leaving his glass half-full on the table, ‘I’d better go. I see it’s still snowing out there. I’ve got some way to go, and I don’t want to be stranded.’
Amaryllis opened her mouth to offer him her spare room, but Christopher got in first.
‘That makes sense. The roads are bad enough already. You don’t know where you might get stuck.’
Mal got to his feet and grabbed a set of keys from the table. ‘Good to meet you guys.’
‘Yes,’ said Amaryllis, conscious that Christopher and Jock were unlikely to make effusive farewell speeches. ‘Good luck with your orphans - um - thing. Project, I mean.’
She got up too and walked with him across to the door, wh
ere he turned and said, ‘I’ll give you a call. Maybe we can meet again the next time I’m in town. Without your personal Rottweilers, though.’
‘More like poodles,’ she said, smiling.
‘Don’t be cruel now. I’m sure they have your best interests in mind.’
He patted her on the shoulder quickly and left, nodding politely to Chief Inspector Smith and the other officer as he passed them.
‘Can I help you, Chief Inspector Smith?’ said Amaryllis. She thought she had better not call him ‘Charlie’ in front of his junior officer, although it was very tempting to use the opportunity to wind him up. Especially when she was invigorated by speaking to Mal. She suddenly felt as if she had been living the life of a hobbit here in Pitkirtly while the whole Lord of the Rings saga was taking place somewhere else.
‘I’m here to speak to your friend Mr Wilson.’ As usual he made it sounds as if Christopher and she were master criminals and their friendship was somehow sinister, as if they were gang members in a Pitkirtly criminal underworld.
The two policemen made their way across the room to the table where Christopher and Jock were sitting, and Amaryllis followed, curious to know what questions they planned to ask and to find out all she could about their investigation.
‘I understand from Sergeant Whitefield you were in your office at the Cultural Centre when you witnessed a crime being committed?’ Charlie Smith began.
‘Me too!’ said Jock McLean, getting in on the act.
‘One at a time, please,’ said Mr Smith.
‘I witnessed something happening,’ admitted Christopher with his usual caution. ‘It seemed to involve shooting, panic and people running away. Two men ran towards the office window - I assume they were the robbers, if it was a robbery. I heard a banging on the window, and then I thought of closing the outside doors to stop them getting in. But I expect they were long gone by then anyway.’
‘We have another witness who says she thinks they shot at the window and then went round to the door to try and get in,’ said Mr Smith. ‘When you slammed the doors in their faces they dodged away round the building. But she was over at the other side of the car park. Just getting into her Fiat Panda when she heard the shots and saw people running about. Very sensibly, she just got in the car and sat there watching.’
‘You’ll be able to tell if they did hit the window, won’t you?’ said Christopher. He sighed. ‘I suppose I’ll need your report for the insurance.’
‘Can you tell me anything about the two men you saw, please?’
‘I didn’t see very much. I think they were wearing balaclavas, but one of them glared at me. He had big dark staring eyes, I remember.’
‘Big dark staring eyes? Are you sure about that?’
Amaryllis thought Charlie Smith was trying not to laugh. It was such a stereotypical description of an armed robber.
‘Yes - I remember worrying he would know me again. He looked angry. I thought he might come after me.’
‘He won’t, not if we catch up with him,’ said Mr Smith grimly. ‘There were two seriously injured and a handful of others with various minor injuries outside the supermarket.’
Amaryllis gulped as she realised that his official phrase might represent one or even two people she knew. Christopher put her vague thought into words.
‘Can you tell us any more than that?’
‘We haven’t got an official id on either of them yet,’ said Chief Inspector Smith. ‘But I can tell you two young women and a middle-aged man were involved in the incident… There were people coming out of the supermarket with their food shopping for Christmas when the robbers came past. But most of the minor injuries were caused by people falling on the ice outside when they started panicking.’
He sounded gruff and cross. Not surprisingly, Amaryllis thought. He didn’t really need this hassle so close to Christmas, and in such severe weather conditions too.
She ruthlessly cut off this train of thought, seeing it as sign of softness and sentimentality. It would start with her feeling sorry for Charlie Smith, which was harmless enough in itself, but where would it end? Before long she would be searching the internet for cute kitten videos and then tweeting about them. Since Amaryllis currently used Twitter to keep up with what was happening in some quite serious spheres of interest, this idea made her shudder.
‘Why do you think they decided to hit the supermarket in the first place, when it was always going to be full of people?’ she said, partly to conceal her reaction.
‘Oh, it wasn’t the supermarket they went for,’ said Charlie Smith. ‘It was that little jeweller’s shop round the corner.’
‘The one with the grandfather clock in the corner that’s always two hours slow?’ said Jock McLean, sounding incredulous.
‘Yes, that’s the one,’ said Mr Smith.
‘I thought it was all fake stuff in there,’ said Jock. ‘It’s all so shiny - it can’t possibly be real.’
‘It’s real all right,’ said Mr Smith grimly. ‘Worth a bit to people who know what they’re after - and this lot did.’
‘Selective?’ said Amaryllis.
Mr Smith nodded. ‘Very.’
He obviously wasn’t going to say any more at this point, although Amaryllis knew she would be able to get it all out of him later if she really wanted to. The question was, did she really want to know more about this sordid small-town robbery when there was a world of adventure out there?
‘If you remember anything else about the two men, Mr Wilson, please let us know,’ said Mr Smith. He didn’t sound very hopeful. Of course he had encountered Christopher many times before and must have known how annoyingly vague he could be on occasion.
‘Aren’t you going to interrogate me too?’ said Jock McLean.
‘Interrogate? Well, I don’t know about that,’ said Mr Smith. ‘The last time I tried asking you anything you told me a lot of lies.’
‘Lies? That’s a bit harsh,’ said Jock. ‘When I took so much trouble not to tell lies in my statement.’
‘Well, let’s just say I think you might have been a slightly unreliable witness.’
‘I’ll tell you one thing,’ said Jock. ‘One of the men had quite a bad limp.’
‘Oh, yes,’ said Christopher. ‘I’d forgotten that. I remember thinking he must have fallen over and hurt his leg. It’s easily done - Maisie Sue’s got a broken wrist at the moment because she slipped on a patch of ice right outside her house. She was a bit cross that she had to postpone the completion of the Pitkirtly Quilt Project until after New Year.’
The junior police officer made a note, but Amaryllis was willing to bet that it didn’t have anything to do with Maisie Sue or with quilting. Christopher really did ramble sometimes. She contrasted him unfavourably with Mal in that respect. But of course, there wouldn’t be time on the battlefield for all this vague indecisive waffle.
After Mr Smith and the junior officer had left, she decided to leave too. There didn’t seem to be much point in staying on now. If Christopher and Jock wanted to stay there gossiping about Maisie Sue like a couple of old women, she would just leave them to it.
She remembered she and Christopher were planning to spend Christmas Day together. It was too much to hope that he would have a complete personality transplant before then.