Crime in the Community

by Cecilia Peartree

  Chapter 14 Desperately seeking…

  Now that he at last had time to find one of the mysterious strangers who had been complicating his life for the past week, of course there was no sign of any of them. After following Christopher around relentlessly for days, they must all have decided to have a break from it. Or perhaps one of them was just sitting back monitoring Christopher's whereabouts electronically using the bugs planted in the parcel of money instead of having to use a shiny black or other appropriate car. More environmentally friendly, after all. And cheaper for whoever his paymasters were. Christopher no longer thought one of the paymasters was Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. It was obviously something far more sinister. The CIA, perhaps, or a similarly ruthless organisation. And was there still a KGB?

  It was funny that before Christopher had ever encountered Simon Fairfax, he had found Steve Paxman a bit sinister. Now the latter seemed more like a powerless puppet, tied up so tightly in red tape himself that he wouldn't have been able to get a hand free to tie anyone else up in it even if that had been his mission. Christopher even felt the tiniest crumb of compassion for the man. He had probably led a completely grey colourless life too. Monochrome man, that was Steve. The most exciting thing he had ever done was to disappear suddenly and without a trace.

  Simon, on the other hand, had probably been round the world several times, leaving a trail of people terminated with extreme prejudice, and perhaps a selection of heartbroken women too. Maybe Amaryllis had been one of them, and that was why she was so determined to work against him. Christopher's intellect told him that Simon and Amaryllis could still be working together, but the softer part of his brain - he refused to think of it as his heart - said they weren't. He didn't want to explore the reasoning behind that for the moment. There would come a time when it was right to do so.

  Christopher's mobile phone rang. He contemplated switching it off again, but Amaryllis, Faisal, Mrs Stevenson and Big Dave, who had returned traumatised after his trip to the school gates with Marina, had all insisted that he switched it on and left it on, in case of emergency. Big Dave had been very indignant about the language he had heard in the playground. ‘I've never heard anything like it! All that swearing, and the grammar! It's not a very good example for the teachers to set!' Nobody could work out whether he was joking or not.

  'Hello,' said Christopher cautiously, hoping he was speaking into the right part of the phone.

  'Egglegig.... Memorial....'

  'Egglegig?'

  'I'm sorry,' said the voice at the other end, more clearly now. 'Did you say Egglegig?'

  'Yes but - who is this?'

  'Is that Mr Wilson?'

  'Yes,' he said even more cautiously.

  'It's Estelle McCrone, the nursing supervisor at Kirkcaldy Memorial Hospital, Mr Wilson. I've got bad news, I'm afraid.'

  'Caroline? She's not - has something gone wrong?'

  'Something has indeed gone wrong,' said the nursing supervisor severely. 'I'm afraid your sister has walked out of the hospital - wearing a hospital gown, which will of course need to be returned in good condition to us as soon as possible - and still in a confused state and in need of medical attention.'

  'Walked out? You mean she's escaped?'

  'She hasn't escaped, Mr Wilson, this isn't a prison, you know,' said the nursing supervisor reprovingly. 'But we are concerned for her health and safety, and yes, she is missing.'

  'Missing? You've lost her?'

  'I must emphasise that she left apparently of her own volition, Mr Wilson.'

  There was a pause, during which Christopher quickly evaluated various possible responses. His initial thought was to reply 'What do you expect me to do about it?' but he didn't want to invite further censure from the nursing supervisor.

  'So - have you sent somebody out looking for her then?' he said hopefully.

  There was an indrawn breath from the other end of the phone - or perhaps just a burst of static.

  'My nursing staff can't spend their time out looking for an adult who decides of their own free will to discharge themselves in an unconventional manner,' said the nursing supervisor frostily. 'But,' she added, softening slightly, 'I've reported the incident to the police, and they will no doubt be in touch with you in due course.'

  'The police?'

  The last thing Christopher needed at this point was for the police to get in touch with him for the third time in as many days. But he hoped if the police were out looking for Caroline then he wouldn't have to be involved.

  'Yes, indeed. Under the circumstances that seems to be appropriate.'

  'Thanks for letting me know,' he said, feeling foolish.

  'Goodbye, Mr Wilson.'

  No sooner had she rung off that the phone rang again. Christopher hadn't had this many mobile phone calls since Marina had been in trouble at school and Caroline had given them his number so that she wouldn't have to interrupt her daytime television viewing to answer the phone.

  'It's Mrs Wingford,' said a brisk voice. Surely it couldn't be another nursing supervisor. It did sound very much like one, though.

  'Head teacher at Pitkirtly High School,' she added helpfully. 'Is that Mr Wilson?'

  'Yes,' he said reluctantly. She would track him down eventually, even if he put her off now.

  'I just wanted to alert you to the fact that Marina was seen talking to a very odd-looking man outside the school this morning, and we thought you should be aware - '

  'What sort of man?' said Christopher, feeling somewhat at a loss. Again, what did they expect him to do about it? After all, it wasn't as if Marina had gone to school on her own; she had been escorted by Big Dave, who surely would have -

  'Was he big and - well, big, with dark hair and a beard, and wearing a woolly hat?' he said, interrupting Mrs Wingford's ramblings.

  'As I was saying,' said Mrs Wingford reprovingly, perhaps on the verge of telling him off for interrupting, 'I have a note here of what he looked like. Yes, big, dark hair, beard, woolly hat - seemed scruffy - shoes worn down at the heel slightly - possibly a rough sleeper - query alcohol problems...'

  'With all due respect, Mrs Wingford,' said Christopher, offended on Big Dave's behalf by this woman who thought she could diagnose alcohol problems by looking at someone's shoes, 'I don't see how you can diagnose alcoholism by looking at someone's shoes. If you could, then maybe my sister would have got treatment years ago instead of having to wait until a crisis developed. The man you're describing is a close personal friend of mine and I don't think he would be very pleased if he could hear you describing him in this way.'

  Christopher felt weak at the knees by the time he had finished this little speech.

  'Sorry, Mr Wilson, I couldn't hear all of that,' said Mrs Wingford. 'We get a lot of static in school from the overhead pylons.'

  'The man's a friend of mine!' shouted Christopher into the phone. 'There's no need to worry!'

  'Well, if you're sure,' said Mrs Wingford, still with that note of disapproval in her voice. 'It was just that nobody had seen him around the school gates before, and one of our mothers thought - '

  'No, it's fine,' said Christopher. 'But thank you for your vigilance.'

  'You can't be too careful, Mr Wilson,' said Mrs Wingford, and ended the call.

  Christopher was of the opinion that you could be too careful, but he didn't have the time or energy to develop an argument about it at this moment. He wondered about calling the police to ask about if they had started to search for Caroline, but he didn't know where he should ring. Big Dave had told him all calls went through a call centre in Stirling, but he didn't really believe that. Surely they must have someone closer by who answered the phone. In any case he didn't know what number to dial: it probably didn’t count as a 999 situation, as far as he knew anyway. They would have to contact him if they wanted him. He must force himself to concentrate on finding the right person to give the parcel to.

  He realised that his feet, as if they were propelled b
y his sub-conscious, which had obviously been working away underneath while his conscious mind dealt with Mrs Wingford, were taking him down the road that led to the harbour. It made a certain amount of sense to look for the mysterious strangers there, since it was one of Simon’s known haunts as well as quite near where the shooting incident had taken place.

  Christopher had just arrived at the harbour wall, though without sighting any mysterious strangers or their cars, when the phone rang again. Silently cursing the invention of mobile technology, which could interrupt and disrupt your life on a whim because people were nowadays too impatient to use the less intrusive methods which were still at their disposal, he answered it.

  'It's Sergeant McLuskey from Leven Road police station, Kirkcaldy,' said a male voice, less peremptory than that of the two women who had earlier rung him in rapid succession; instead there was a note of world-weariness, as if its owner had seen all the foibles and failings of people and, although despairing of making a difference, would keep on trying because it was his job to do so. Christopher marvelled himself for discerning so much from one sentence. Something of Mrs Wingford's psychological insight must have rubbed off on him.

  'Is there any news of Caroline - Mrs Hussein?' asked Christopher.

  'We've located your sister, Mr Wilson. But she's refusing to come down as yet. We've sent for an expert to try and talk her down safely, but it's going to take him a while to get here from North Berwick.'

  'Talk her down?'

  'I'm afraid your sister has managed to get up on the hospital roof and she's threatening to jump.'

  Christopher tried to picture how tall the hospital building was, and how far Caroline might fall, and failed. He couldn't remember much about it at all. But even if it wasn't any bigger than a house, she could still injure herself - or worse. This was dreadful. He must keep calm.

  'Isn't there any other way of getting her down? A turntable ladder? A helicopter?'

  'She could easily jump while we're putting something in place. We're trying our best, Mr Wilson. But we feel it might be useful for someone from her family to have a word with her.'

  'Me?'

  It came out as an affronted squeak.

  'I understand there are children....' said Sergeant McLuskey, doubtfully.

  'No - no - they're too young,' said Christopher. 'I couldn't possibly put them through that. No, I'd better come over. It'll take me a while - the buses.....'

  'We'll send a car round for you,' said Sergeant McLuskey. 'Where are you? Anywhere near home?'

  'Well, I'm in Pitkirtly, but down by the harbour.'

  'Stay where you are. They'll pick you up there.'

  'But - '

  Christopher wanted to tell the sergeant he was on an important errand, but as soon as he started to think about framing a sentence, it became impossible to explain. He sat on the harbour wall, clutching the parcel and shivering a little in the cold damp October air, and rang home. It was engaged. He tried again. Still engaged. He told himself to wait a bit, trying to curb the sense of panic that was threatening to engulf him. What was happening at home? Who was on the phone and why? Did they need him there, or were they wondering where he was and what was happening?

  A police car came hurtling down the road, sirens blaring, lights flashing, and screeched to a halt.

  'Mr Christopher Wilson?' said the driver.

  'Yes, that's me,' said Christopher, getting into the car.

  It was flashing lights and blaring sirens, and swinging round corners, and overtaking on the inside on the dual carriageway, and eyes tightly shut, all the way to Kirkcaldy, but suddenly everything went quiet and the car was creeping up the hospital drive, adhering closely to the 5 mph speed limit. An idiot in a 4 x 4 who had turned into the hospital grounds just behind the police car started beeping his horn at them.

  'Don't want to advertise ourselves,' said the driver. 'We might scare her into doing something silly.'

  Well, thought Christopher, how much sillier can she get? Jumping off the hospital roof wouldn't stand out in her life as a particularly silly thing to do but as the logical consequence of her actions to date.

  The 4 x 4 turned off into the car park, and the police car crept closer to the hospital building.

  Suddenly Christopher saw a little cluster of people standing looking up at the roof.

  'I've got to get out,' he said urgently.

  'We're taking you round to the back, sir,' said the police officer who had been sitting quietly next to the driver, as still as an Action Man, which he quite closely resembled, especially since he had apparently not even batted an eyelid at any of the corners they had come round on two wheels on the way here. 'There's a way up on to the roof.'

  'On to the roof? Me?'

  'That's the general idea, sir,' said the policeman with a sideways look at his colleague, the driver.

  'Isn't that a bit - '

  He stopped in mid-sentence. The missing word was 'dangerous'. He didn't really want to ask baldly what if Caroline decided to push him off the roof, but couldn't work out how to phrase it so that he didn't seem like a terrible wimp.

  'We won't be very far away.' The driver obviously meant to sound reassuring, but the effect of his words was to paint a picture in Christopher’s mind of himself and Caroline wrestling at the very edge of the roof, and the police arriving just too late to save him from falling. Or maybe they would fall together like a pair of lovers who had decided to jump together. And what would happen to Faisal and Marina then?

  He gasped for air. Somewhere in the distance he heard sirens – or maybe they were in his imagination. He hoped they heralded the arrival of a fire engine with a big ladder.

  Halfway up the back stairs he realised he was still clutching the parcel with which they had hoped to trap one of the mysterious strangers. Oh, well, too late to worry about that now. Simon Fairfax and Amaryllis Peebles would just have to work things out with the American and all the rest themselves, without trying to involve innocent bystanders in it. He hung on to the parcel anyway. There was nowhere else to put it.

  He tripped on the stairs just thinking about all of this; paused to say to himself, what chance have I got on the roof if I can't manage the stairs? He told himself sternly to lay off the negative self-talk; tripped again while pondering this.

  'Mind your step there, sir,' said one of the police officers. He hoped they weren't laughing at him, or at least not unduly.

  The stairs seemed endless and yet it was much too soon when they arrived at the door that led to the roof. It seemed ludicrously easy to get out there - surely they must have lost patients like this before?

  'I suppose this door's usually locked,' he commented. The nearest policeman just shrugged his shoulders and rolled his eyes at the same time. Christopher was impressed by his co-ordination.

  'So anybody can just get out on the roof any time?' he persisted.

  'I believe it's used routinely by staff who want to contravene the smoking regulations,' said the other policeman, the one who had been driving.

  Indeed, there was a smell of cigarettes as they came out into the open air. They were met by another police officer who introduced himself as Sergeant McLuskey.

  'You made good time,' he whispered. 'We weren't expecting you for another ten minutes yet.'

  'We just put the sirens on and went for it,' said the policeman who hadn't been driving, modestly.

  'So - are you ready for this?' said Sergeant McLuskey to Christopher.

  'I don't think so,' said Christopher. 'What should I say to her? How near should I get?'

  'Don't rush in too close, Mr Wilson. You could shock her into jumping. We'll give you a loud-hailer and you can stand well back... Just tell her who you are for starters.'

  Christopher sincerely hoped Caroline wouldn't jump as soon as she heard his voice. It would be a bit embarrassing. No, that was the wrong word for it.

  He didn't have time to think of the right word. Sergeant McLuskey took him by the arm and led
- or possibly dragged - him forward. The policeman himself picked up the loud-hailer and spoke into it first.

  'Mrs Hussein! Caroline!' he said.

  His magnified and distorted voice echoed round the roof. Christopher could now see the lonely little figure standing much too near the edge, at the front of the roof. She half-turned and looked at them.

  'Caroline, I've got your brother here. He wants to speak to you.'

  'Christopher?' said Caroline in mild surprise. Her voice was a bit indistinct. Christopher hoped there wouldn't be any silly misunderstandings, each not really catching what the other said, that would lead to disaster. It would be one thing to jump because you were in despair and your life was a mess - he could almost sympathise with that under the circumstances - but another altogether to jump because you thought someone had told you there were twenty firemen below ready to catch you when there weren't.

  'If you keep her talking long enough, we might be able to get the big ladder up,' murmured Sergeant McLuskey.

  There was just a spit of rain in the air. Christopher gingerly took the loud-hailer which the other man held out to him. He transferred the parcel of money to his spare hand.

  'Caroline!' he called.

  Sergeant McLuskey winced. 'You don't need to shout, sir. They'll probably have heard that in Dundee.’

  'Caroline, it's Christopher here. Can you come here and talk to me? Maybe we can just have a quiet word.... It's a bit more sheltered over here.'

  'What's the point?' she shouted. 'We've had plenty of time to talk over the last forty-three years. It's all been such a waste.'

  ‘Maybe I wasn’t listening before,’ said Christopher.

  ‘No use… nobody listening now?’

  She half-turned away from him; some of her words were caught on the wind and whisked away over the edge of the roof. He knew he must try to get her to look at him properly.

  ‘I’ve got plenty of time to listen,’ he said. ‘I want to know what – what you want.’

  ‘What I want – what you want – what I want.’ She took a step nearer the edge. Christopher started forward. Sergeant McLuskey muttered ‘No!... Say something about the family – your childhood.’

  Christopher trawled his memory for anything resembling lost treasure.

  ‘Remember when we found that dead fox in the garden?’ he shouted. ‘The one we hid in the compost heap?’

  She seemed to be hovering right on the edge.

  ‘Remember that Christmas when I hid your presents and you thought Santa had forgotten you?’

  ‘Christmas!’ she moaned, swaying a little.

  ‘There was the time Mr Browning ran over your bike…’

  Christopher realised the only memories he could dredge up were depressing ones.

  Sergeant McLuskey sighed heavily. ‘The children?’ he suggested.

  ‘What about Marina? And Faisal? They're not a waste. They just want you home. They’re really missing you.' Christopher wasn't sure if it was a good idea to mention the kids, let alone lie about how they felt. Maybe her despair was caused partly by her failure to look after them properly. He saw her shoulders slump. He felt panic tightening his chest and starting to choke him. Surely he wasn't going to have a heart attack, on top of everything else? That would be very annoying.

  She turned away from the edge and started to walk towards them.

  'I can't do it,' she was saying to herself. 'I can't leave them yet after all.'

  She stumbled as she came nearer, and Christopher went forward to help her up. She leaned against him heavily, so that he staggered back. Sergeant McLuskey, treading carefully as if on eggshells, came forward to help him. Caroline didn't even notice him. Christopher put his arms round her, not really wanting to but feeling he had to.

  'What's all this about, Caroline?' he said to her, while knowing he wouldn't understand even if she were capable of explaining it to him.

  'I can't do it any more,' she sobbed. 'The kids - the teachers looking at me - the social workers...'

  'The social workers?' he said. 'What do you mean, social workers?'

  'Try not to upset her,' whispered Sergeant McLuskey into his ear. 'We've got to get her downstairs.'

  'Social workers coming to the house....I can't do it.'

  There were people in white coats and others in hospital scrubs, some with flapping white hats, coming up the stairs to meet them. Christopher surrendered her to them, and they hurried her away, he hoped towards a sleep and a forgetting, or other appropriate quotation for drug-induced unconsciousness. There would be time later to work out what was behind it all. He wouldn't be altogether surprised to find she had conjured up the social workers from her imagination. But it seemed an odd kind of monster to think up - why not werewolves, or zombies, or evil fantasy creatures from some made-for-television movie? If you were going to use your imagination you might as well use it for something worthwhile.

  He, Sergeant McLuskey and the two other policemen walked back down the stairs. Christopher was just wondering if there was another way to get home that didn't involve closed eyes and white knuckles, when there was a commotion not far away.

  'Get your hands off me, you - you terrorists!' screeched Caroline's voice. 'I've got to go with my brother! He's in danger!'

  Running footsteps, shouting, wild random screeching from Caroline. Then she appeared on the stairs below them.

  'Christopher! I've got to come with you....I promised my mother on her death-bed.... Keep back, you - you vandals!'

  'It's all right, Caroline, they're just trying to help you,' said Christopher, although he was touched by her apparent need to protect him from imagined danger.

  She stared up at him, wide-eyed.

  'Come on, you can get rid of those policemen, and come with me!'

  Someone crept up behind her; she wavered, her eyelids flickered, she fell into the arms of one of the medical team, eyes closed, at peace - although Christopher was reminded of the 'to be or not to be' speech from 'Hamlet' - ' in that sleep of death what dreams may come?' None of them knew what sort of dreams they were forcing her into. Perhaps that was where the social workers had come from.

  'You OK, Mr Wilson?' said Sergeant McLuskey, looking at him with concern. 'That was quite an outburst, wasn't it?'

  'I'm used to Caroline,' said Christopher ruefully.

  'How about a cup of tea in the canteen before the boys drive you home,' suggested the Sergeant. 'Unless you want to go and see your sister settled down.'

  'No, not really,' said Christopher. 'I'd like a breath of fresh air, and some time on my own, if you don't mind.'

  'That's fine, Mr Wilson. I'll have the car standing by. Just give me a shout when you're ready.'

  Christopher barely managed to thank them for their help before stumbling helplessly down the rest of the staircase and out the door at the bottom, eyes blurred and watery, hands shaking so much he was afraid he was going to drop the parcel. He didn't really know why he was hanging on to it; it was only money, when all was said and done. It didn't live, and breathe, and drink and swear, and play Monopoly, and get stuck behind sinks in old village halls... Ever since that day when Amaryllis had first appeared in the Queen of Scots, his life and all his thoughts seemed to have been turned upside down and shaken about, almost as if he had been living inside a tornado for a week or so.

  'Hello, Mr Wilson,' said a familiar voice as he emerged into the open. 'I thought I might find you here.'

  The sleek black car was parked, audaciously, next to the police car Christopher had arrived in. Simon Fairfax was standing by the driver’s door and a dark-skinned heavy-set man was glowering from the front passenger seat. Christopher’s search for mysterious strangers was over.