The Time and the Place: The Pitfourie Series Book 2

by Jane Renshaw

  ‘So you haven’t brought Ade?’ She felt the chaise longue upholstery depress as he sat down on the end of it.

  She opened her eyes. ‘Of course not.’

  ‘They’re going to have to find out sooner or later that you’ve been deboshed, as Mrs Mac would say, by a hairy old hippy.’

  ‘Ade isn’t a hippy. Just because he doesn’t have a nine-to-five job and a lifestyle that involves irresponsible levels of resource consumption –’

  ‘Okay, I’ll concede that he and the rest of the Tinky lot are certainly contributing to a reduction in the global consumption of personal hygiene products. But come on, Karen. What kind of a shit doesn’t let his girlfriend choose her own underwear? You need to get out of that relationship.’

  ‘Oh yeah, like you’re some sort of relationship guru? It’s not that he doesn’t let me choose my own underwear. He just got me different kinds to try.’ She wished she hadn’t told him about that. ‘He looks out for me and he really cares about me, which is more than anyone else does.’

  ‘As you would say: Yeah right.’

  She wanted to say Fuck off again, and she would in a minute, but first she needed to see his phone. She’d thought about telling him about the rescue phone and the text message, but you had to be really careful what you told Damian, because when he got involved things could quickly spiral out of control, like you’d boarded a plane to Paris but then it got hijacked by a maniac and before you knew it you were orbiting the planet and the maniac was on the intercom going, Anyone fancy a trip to the moon?

  So she just said, ‘Gimme your phone.’

  ‘Aren’t you using the rescue phone?’

  She blinked. How did he know about that? ‘Yes.’ But she wasn’t. She had wrapped it in a tissue and shoved it in her jeans pocket and had been careful not to touch it again, because there might be fingerprints on it. ‘So I may as well put its number into your phone.’

  Damian handed it over.

  She fished the rescue phone from her pocket, holding it by the edges, and turned it on. Angling Damian’s phone away from him so he couldn’t see the screen, in the contacts she typed in ‘Chimp’ and bingo, a number came up: 07700 900566. On the rescue phone, using the tip of her fingernail, she navigated through to the text message.

  Yep. Same number. Her suspicion was right.

  Chimp had sent that message!

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I can’t work out how to get the rescue phone to tell me its number.’

  ‘Let me see it.’

  ‘It’s okay, I’ll do it later.’ She handed his phone back.

  ‘Okay...’

  ‘And now you can fuck off.’

  She needed to think.

  Chimp had sent that message!

  She should go to the police, but they really had it in for everyone at Kinty. They would use this against them.

  ‘Did you –’ Damian started.

  ‘Can you please just fuck off? Mum wants “a chat” and I need to psych myself up for it. She’s probably going to pressure me to move back home.’

  ‘That’s kind of a given. She’s hardly going to be happy about you living with a load of criminals.’

  ‘They’re not criminals.’

  ‘That so-called fallen stock business they’ve got? You realise it’s a cover for rustling animals? Park up at a field entrance in a van with “fallen stock” on the side, and no one’s going to think anything of it. And even when they are genuinely contracted to collect a dead animal, the number of animals in the field often drops by more than one. David Henderson at Ardoch paid them to take a dead stirk, and ended up losing another that was alive and kicking. He told the police, but by the time they got round to checking it out, the dodgy hippies must have moved it on – either to some other dodgy operation as a live animal, or as dead meat. So there was no evidence. Nothing the police could do.’

  She sighed. She didn’t have the headspace for this. ‘Maybe they did take one of David Henderson’s animals, but have you even stopped to think that maybe there was a good reason for that? That the dead stirk had died because maybe David Henderson doesn’t look after his animals properly and they rescued another one that was in a bad way? But no, you never give anyone a break, do you, if they don’t conform to what you’ve decided is acceptable? Please just piss off, Damian. You should be listening to Mollie’s recital, anyway.’

  He lifted his eyebrows. Karen was ninety per cent sure that Damian resented Mollie’s musical prowess. Everyone else was always gushing about how amazing Mollie’s playing was, but he never did. He might say, ‘I liked the way you played that run of semidemis’ or something, and Mollie would practically dissolve with happiness, and he’d once said, ‘You’ve got very nimble fingers’ and that evening Mollie had kept looking at the fingers of her left hand and smiling to herself. But he never gave her the praise she deserved, which was pretty mean-spirited. Just because she was slightly more talented than him. Mollie was a million times more talented than Karen but that didn’t stop Karen from saying she was a disgusting prodigy and when Mollie was rich and famous she hoped she wouldn’t forget her big sis.

  Mollie had taken Damian’s crown, she guessed, as Fridolf Brotzen’s star pupil. Okay so given the choice you’d want to listen to Damian every time rather than Mollie – he was still miles better than her, but probably not for much longer. He hadn’t done his grade eight until he was thirteen, and Mollie had done hers last year when she was eleven.

  ‘And I think Mr Brotzen would probably rather be supporting Mollie than stuck in here listening to you monopolising the conversation,’ she said.

  ‘So everyone should be listening to Mollie except you?’

  ‘She’s my sister? I’m practically obliged to resent her?’ And she needed to be alone so she could think what to do about the phone.

  But Bill had just come into the room, looking over his reading glasses at everyone in his school-teacher-y way. Karen sat up and tried to look sober. When he saw her he beamed and came over, and she stood so they could hug.

  ‘Are you going to stay the night? Maybe the whole weekend? Mollie’s made plans for the two of you that seem to involve a lot of baking and eating the results while watching rubbish on TV.’

  ‘Um, no.’ That actually sounded pretty good, but Ade would go apeshit. He said her relationship with her family was toxic, they treated her like a Cinderella and lavished all their love and attention on Mollie, and that was why she had mental health issues. It was certainly true that the less she saw of them, the better she felt about herself. ‘Sorry. Maybe another time.’

  Bill gave her a look, then said to Damian, ‘Request from Christine for the Brahms sonata. Apparently you’ll know which one she means.’ He turned to Miss Larsen, who was hovering suspiciously near to Damian. ‘And could you accompany, Patty, if you’re not otherwise occupied?’

  As Damian and ‘Patty’ moved away, Bill said: ‘Mum and I would like to have a bit of a chat, Karen.’

  ‘Okay, but later, yeah?’

  She trooped through with everyone else to the music room so he couldn’t start arguing about it. And maybe it was because she’d been thinking so much about Chimp, but about three seconds after Damian started playing she felt tears prickling in her nose. It was like he could make the music reach inside you to all the things you were feeling deep down and swoosh them up to the surface. It wasn’t just her, though. As she looked round the room, in the dim light, she could see other people getting emotional.

  The master manipulator. But with his music, it was more than that. It was like it just sort of came out of him, as natural and as easy as breathing; and it grabbed hold of you and took you wherever he wanted to go.

  Back when she was trying to play the cello, she had tried to analyse it. Part of it was the sound he could get out of that violin – yes, it was a really good instrument, but she’d heard Mollie and Andrew play it and they couldn’t do it. He could get an incredible roundness of sound throughout t
he register. Or a harshness, or a sweetness; a sudden fortissimo, or a pianissimo that had you straining forward to catch every nerve-tingly note. But how did he do it? The best explanation she’d come up with was that it was to do with his excellent vibrato, the strength and accuracy of his touch on the fingerboard, the control he had in his bow arm.

  But she knew it was more than that.

  It was much more than that.

  She sniffed and wiped at her nose.

  Maybe she could stay the night. Maybe she should tell Mum and Bill about the phone and Chimp’s message. But then they’d make her go to the police, and everyone at Kinty would be under suspicion.

  Suspicion of murder.

  She didn’t know what to do.

  When Damian had finished, there was a long moment in which the last notes lingered in the room, as if no one wanted to make a noise and end it. Then Cat, at Karen’s elbow, gave a sort of shuddery gasp, and Mollie whispered, ‘He’s sooo good. I’m never going to be that good,’ and Karen glared down at her and said, ‘Of course you are. Don’t let him fool you into thinking that,’ and Mollie frowned and said, ‘What do you mean?’ as if Karen had just said something horrible. And then: ‘Are you staying the weekend?’

  Was she? Maybe Ade would be okay with it? But she could just imagine what he would say: If that’s what you want, maybe you shouldn’t bother coming back.

  ‘No. I can’t.’

  Mollie grabbed her arm and hugged it. ‘Pleeease? It would be fuuuuun.’

  ‘I said no! God!’

  Mollie shoved her arm away. ‘You’re such a crabby cow.’

  ‘And you’re a spoilt brat who needs to grow up.’

  ‘Karen!’ Mum suddenly appeared and gave her a quick hug. She smiled at both of them. ‘This is nice!’

  ‘Maybe we could have that chat now?’ said Bill, behind her.

  ‘Okay, but I’m starving.’ Karen headed for the kitchen, hoping to find people there so the chat couldn’t happen, but it was empty.

  ‘We just think, Karen, it’s maybe time you came home,’ said Bill.

  She took a packet of oatcakes from the cupboard and opened the fridge to see if there was any houmous.

  ‘I’m sure it’s interesting, living on the farm,’ said Mum, reaching past her to root out a tub of Moroccan-style houmous from behind a quiche. ‘But it’s not very comfortable, is it? And...’ She gave Karen a little quirk of a smile. ‘I imagine Doffy and Rainbow and Co. might just be getting a little bit on your nerves by now?’

  Karen took the tub of houmous with a sigh. ‘I’m not moving back. Kinty is my home now.’

  Bill folded his arms. ‘Oh, come on! That’s not a home, it’s a...’

  Mum shook her head at him.

  ‘It’s a what?’ Karen demanded.

  ‘It’s a doss house for layabouts. Can’t you see that they’re taking advantage of you? None of them work, they’re all on benefits I suppose, and yet they expect you to slave away as a cleaner to fund their “alternative” lifestyle.’

  ‘Baz works.’

  ‘Well, more fool him.’

  ‘The others all work. They’re self-employed on the farm.’

  ‘They don’t even let you keep enough from your wages to afford a phone, let alone a maths tutor.’

  Oh my God! Ade was so right – when they looked at Karen, all Mum and Bill saw was one big problem. She took a long breath. ‘It’s not a case of them not letting me do stuff. I don’t want a fucking phone! And I don’t need a maths tutor because Baz tutors me. Everyone contributes to everything.’

  ‘Just some more than others?’

  She could hardly tell them about the ‘involuntary contributions’ made by people like Hector, and retailers who were raping the planet and were morally legitimate targets for people who were actually using the money to do something sustainable rather than fill the pockets of shareholders who were already filthy rich.

  ‘Anna and Damian have met everyone, and they think they’re cool,’ she lied.

  And of course Damian chose that moment to walk in.

  He had turned back round again to leave, but then Mum said, ‘Damian. Karen says you’ve been to Moss of Kinty. You’ve seen the set-up there. What do you think?’

  Damian looked from her to Bill to Karen. ‘Um.’

  Karen widened her eyes at him to telegraph: You’d better come through for me here.

  ‘Are you happy with Karen living there?’ said Bill.

  ‘No, I wouldn’t say I was happy about it.’

  ‘But you respect my choices,’ Karen prompted.

  ‘Not really.’ Bastard. ‘Okay, if you want me to be honest... Anyone who chooses to live in squalor with a load of dodgy potheads in what’s basically a cult is pretty much asking for an intervention by their friends and family. What are we going to do – lock her in her room and make her watch Jeremy Kyle until she cracks?’

  ‘It’s not a fucking cult!’ Karen yelled at him. ‘They’re not dodgy!’

  ‘The whole situation’s pretty much the definition of dodgy. You’re sleeping with a messianic forty-year-old who controls your every waking moment and seems to have hypnotised you into thinking you’ve got some kind of future together.’

  Mum was staring at her. Bill had shut his eyes like he couldn’t bear to look at her.

  ‘He’s twenty-eight,’ was all she could think to say. ‘He’s – it’s not like that. He’s my boyfriend.’

  ‘He’s not twenty-eight,’ said Damian. ‘Have you met him?’ he raised his eyebrows at Mum and Bill. ‘At least forty, long hair and stubble, seems to model himself on David Koresh?’

  She didn’t know who the hell David Koresh was, but that was when it all really kicked off.

  18

  ‘I’m that sorry,’ Mick said again, his grubby hands around the mug of tea Claire had made him.

  They were sitting opposite each other at the kitchen table. Claire pressed her hands around her own mug, leaning slightly forward. Mirroring his body language. She put just the faintest quaver into her voice as she said, ‘It’s fine.’

  She hadn’t had to fake her first, instinctive reaction to a man looming up behind her in the gathering gloom of a snowy winter dusk. She had screamed. She had stumbled backwards away from him, tripped over a rock and fallen on her bum in the snow. She had quickly recognised him, the man bending over her, as Mick Shepherd, a man on whom she had several decades, several pounds and several inches, but these wiry older men were often a lot stronger than they looked. The gender muscle mass inequality being what it was, he could probably overpower her no problem.

  Her best chance had been to run.

  She had got all of ten metres before she’d slipped and toppled into the hedge. Like something in a bad comedy.

  And then she had realised that he wasn’t pursuing her, that he was standing where she had left him, telling her he was sorry, that he was here with the winter tyres and the chains, that he hadn’t meant to ‘fright’ her –

  Claire had quickly recovered her equanimity, but she’d gone on playing the hysterical female. She’d started to cry, babbling about Chimp and how much on edge she’d been after finding out about his death. His flood of apologies, his insistence, over and over again, that he’d meant her no harm, had started a suspicion forming in her mind. He had the look, that indefinable look, of an ex-con.

  Hector Forbes had been in prison, as a very young man.

  What had Mick been in for?

  She took a sip of her tea. It was sickly sweet. He had asked for milk and two sugars, so she had spooned sugar into her own mug too. ‘No, I’m sorry, I completely overreacted. I’m a city girl – I’m not used to living out in the country, in the middle of a wood.’

  ‘Aye, it’s nae richt. Boss shouldna hae pit a quinie in here on her ain.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘The Boss – Hector – shouldn’t have put you here. There’s a flat in the yard empty. You could have had that.’

  ‘Oh.’r />
  ‘It’s nae richt.’

  ‘I suppose I’ll get used to it... It’s just that I’ve been working myself up into a bit of a state about – well, about Chimp having lived here and then being found dead in the pond... I mean, I know it was an accident...’

  He looked up at her, and back down at his tea.

  She didn’t fill the silence.

  ‘I was one of them lived here with him,’ he said at last.

  ‘Oh!’ She opened her eyes wide. ‘Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realise!’ She bit her lip. ‘So he must have been a friend?’

  ‘Aye, he was a fine lad, Chimp.’

  ‘I’m so sorry.’ She blinked. ‘When you say Hector shouldn’t have put me here... Do you mean it maybe wasn’t an accident? That – that I might be in danger?’ She raised the pitch of her voice on the last word.

  ‘I dinna think it.’

  ‘You don’t sound very sure.’ She stood up and walked to the window, looking out at the snowy hedge. ‘I keep imagining... that I hear things.’

  Quick as a flash: ‘What things?’

  Interesting.

  ‘Someone out there. Someone walking round the house. That’s why – that’s why I overreacted so badly, when you –’ She came back to the table and sat back down opposite him, leaning forward slightly, eyes wide, imploring. ‘Please, can you tell me – Do you think it wasn’t an accident, what happened to Chimp? Do you think someone... Do you think I should ask Hector if I can move out of here?’

  He shrugged. ‘Aye, that might be an idea.’

  ‘You do think that there was something suspicious about his death?’

  Mick took a big breath and sat back in his chair. ‘I’m nae just sure what to think about it.’

  Hector had told her, on the day of the interview, that Chimp had been drunk, although Claire knew there had been no alcohol in his system. How would this man react to that theory? ‘Hector says Chimp was probably drunk when he died.’

  Mick’s eyebrows shot up. ‘Na na. Chimp wasna a big drinker at aa.’ And he frowned, obviously wondering why Hector would have told her that.

  ‘What exactly happened?’ said Claire.