Tandem

by Alex Morgan

  “I arrived yesterday.”

  “Staying long?”

  “For the summer at least, maybe longer.” Paula managed a brief smile. “I’m not making any plans just now.”

  Nora climbed back down the steps and onto the beach. “Once you’ve stayed for the summer you won’t ever want to leave.”

  Paula shrugged. “I spent the summer here once before and managed it.”

  “But you’re back now,” Nora said over her shoulder. She gave a little wave and walked off along the sand.

  Paula turned her attention to Bovis. “What are we going to do with you?” She scratched behind the dog’s ears. “I should have asked Nora where that strange girl lives, so I could take you home and find out what she was up to.”

  She glanced over the wall. Nora had vanished, probably into one of the other gates.

  “Let’s untie you for now so you’ll be a bit more comfortable and I’ll go and see if Mrs McIntyre can help. I wonder what Nora meant when she said you were left as bait?”

  There was no answer when she knocked on her landlady’s door.

  Paula got a padlock and chain from a box of cycling stuff Andy had left in the corner of the bedroom, and secured the tandem to a drainpipe. Then she walked up onto Main Street. The first shop she came to was a newsagent. She chose a Scotland on Sunday and Sunday Herald from the display outside and went in.

  “That’ll be £3.40,” the man said.

  She handed over the money. “I don’t suppose you know where a blonde girl with a greyhound lives? I found her dog and I want to return it.”

  “A blonde girl?” the man repeated.

  “About eleven years old, with a pale fawnish greyhound.”

  He snapped his fingers. “I ken the dog you mean. That moth-eaten thing’s perfectly capable o’ findin’ its own way home.”

  “I’d like to return it anyway,” Paula said firmly.

  “In that case, you want to go up to they new houses at the top o’ the hill behind the harbour – Kirkcaldy Close. Let me just check ma book for the number – mum gets Ok! and Hello delivered.”

  He pulled a ledger from under the counter and thumbed through to the right page. “Aye, Carole McCormack: Ok! and Hello. Seven Kirkcaldy Close. Do you ken how to find it?”

  “It can’t be that difficult.”

  “No, this isnae exactly the metropolis.”

  Paula thanked him and headed back to the house. Out in the garden, the tandem was chained up under the study window where she had left it, but there was no sign of the dog. She checked the gate: still locked. She looked over it. The fish boxes were neatly piled on the top step.

  By the time Paula had eaten a couple of poached eggs on toast, watched Katharine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart in The African Queen on BBC2 and read all the papers, it was half-past nine. She stretched and got up from the sofa. Mrs McIntyre had passed the closed sitting room door a couple of hours before and she could hear her moving about upstairs.

  She pulled a fleece over her T-shirt and set off along the beach to the harbour. The granary must have been redeveloped into flats because there were lights on every floor. She followed the harbour wall to the furthest point then retraced her steps, turning down a ramp to stroll along the sand of the next bay. The sky was tinged with grey by the time she headed back towards the village. When she reached the harbour once more, she walked up a cobbled lane that led onto Main Street. It wasn’t until she saw the blue neon sign for Felice’s Fish Bar that she realised she was hungry.

  A man of about forty in a white nylon overall, his thick black curls held in check by a net cap, was shovelling chips into cardboard cartons for a couple of teenage girls.

  “Salt ‘n’ sauce?” His accent was a mixture of Scottish and Italian.

  They nodded and he sprinkled the chips with salt and topped them with gloopy brown liquid from an old lemonade bottle. Closing the boxes, he wrapped them in shiny white paper and passed them over the counter.

  “Anythin’ else?”

  “Big ginger an’ two heart attacks,” the thinner of the girls said.

  Paula watched with a mixture of fascination and horror as he took a pair of Mars Bars from the shelf behind him, tore off the wrappers, dipped the chocolate in a washing-up bowl filled with batter and dropped them into one of the fryers. While they sizzled, he retrieved a two-litre bottle of Irn-Bru from the bottom of a glassfronted fridge and rang up the girls’ purchases.

  “What can I do you for?” he asked Paula.

  “What do those taste like?” She nodded towards the parcel of fried Mars Bars the girls carried.

  He shrugged. “No idea, hen. They make a right mess of the fryer though. You wanna try one?”

  “Y’should. They’re pure brilliant,” the thin girl offered as she followed her friend out of the shop.

  “No thanks. I’ll stick to fish and chips. What kind do you have?”

  “Maris Piper.” The man lifted one of the hinged baskets of chips, gave it a shake and returned it to the bubbling fat. “They’re always Maris Piper, except when they’re King Edwards.”

  “I meant the fish.”

  He studied her for a moment. “You’re no’ Scottish are you?”

  “I’m English.”

  “London?”

  “Yes.”

  “You need to learn the lingo then. Up here battered fish is always haddock. Fish ‘n’ chips is a supper, Irn-Bru is ginger and a fried Mars Bar is a heart attack.” He grinned. “Got that?”

  “A fish supper,” Paula repeated. “I’d forgotten that.”

  “So you did know.”

  She smiled. “I lived in Edinburgh for four years when I was small.”

  “That’s virtually England, but we’ll no’ hold it against you.” The man grinned. “So what’ll it be?”

  “One supper, salt, no sauce and I’ll skip the ginger and the heart attack. Oh, and a small bottle of sparkling water.”

  He winced. “This is a chippy, no’ the Ritz. How about a fat Coke? You look like you could do wi’ the calories.”

  “Fat Coke’s fine.”

  “One supper, salt, no sauce, wi’ a fat Coke coming right up.” He dipped a huge white fillet into the washing-up bowl and tossed it in the fryer.

  As he wrapped her supper, she asked tentatively, “I don’t suppose you’ve got a plastic fork?”

  He snorted.

  “Okay, no fork.”

  “You’re gettin’ the hang o’ it now.”

  Paula walked back along the beach to the steps of her new home. She sat down and opened the sweaty parcel. By the time she had finished eating, it was completely dark. She put the empty box and can on the sand, and felt in the pockets of her fleece for a tissue. Her fingers closed around her mobile phone. Without thinking, she switched it on and checked for new messages. There were two.

  “Hi, darling.” It was Ollie. “Your bike’s ready. I think you’ll be really pleased with the gears. I’ve put on the Dura Ace ten-speed cassette, a new chain and replaced the broken lever. If I don’t hear from you by tomorrow morning, I’ll pop round with it in the afternoon. Hey, and if you change your mind about Dan’s party, give me a shout and I’ll pick you up on the way. I know how you’re feeling – I feel exactly the same – but I think it would be really good for us both to put in an appearance. No one’ll expect us to stay long.”

  The electronic voice said he had called the day before at half-past five. Paula pressed delete. The second message was Ollie too.

  “Paula, where are you?” He sounded frantic. “What’s going on? I’m outside your flat with the bike. I just looked in the sitting room window. Half your stuff’s gone. Please tell me you’ve been burgled, because if you haven’t, the only thing I can think is that you’ve done a runner. For God’s sake, call me as soon as you get this. I need to know you’re all right.”

  The message was left at four o’clock that afternoon. She pressed delete again and waited, knowing what came next.

  “Fi
rst saved message,” the electronic voice said.

  “Hiya, babe.” It wasn’t Ollie this time. “You all set for tomorrow morning? We’re gonna be great. They won’t see us for dust. Don’t forget you said you’d get more High5 for the bottles. I’m just going for a quick blast on the solo. Call me when you get this.”

  Paula’s finger moved to select delete but something stopped her. “You bastard,” she murmured into the phone, tears she had sworn not to shed muffling the words. “How could you abandon me? I would never have done that to you.”

  She hurled the handset into the blackness. There was a small splash.

  “There, the tide can have you and you can sail away to Norway for all I care.”

  She scrambled to her feet, grazing already battered knuckles on the wall as she fumbled for the right key. Kicking the gate closed, she strode up the path.

  Shopping with Sanders

  Bovis was stretched out in the sun at the bottom of the steps, snout resting on her paws, when Paula got back from her run the next morning. A boy with shaggy collar-length blond hair, wearing a faded orange T-shirt and denim cut-offs was sitting cross-legged on the sand beside the dog, poking at the toenails of one of his bare feet with a small stick.

  She stopped beside him, leaning forward slightly with hands on hips while she got her breath. The boy squinted up at her, revealing exactly the same snub nose and wide mouth as the girl Paula had seen on Saturday night.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  She paused her iPod. “Will be in a minute. Hot today, isn’t it? You looking after Bovis?”

  “That’s right. How’d you know her name?”

  “A woman called Nora from along the road told me.”

  “Why are you staring at me?”

  “Am I? Sorry.” Paula scanned the beach. There weren’t many people out yet. Just a couple of dog walkers and one young family setting up camp a little way along the sand. The father was using a stone to bang in the poles of their windbreak, while the mother unpacked rugs, towels and swimsuits. A pair of little boys hopped about impatiently.

  Without looking at him she said, “I saw her with a girl before. Are you brother and sister?”

  He sniffed. “What makes you think that?”

  “You’re so alike.” She smiled fleetingly. “You could be twins.”

  “Sandra said someone’d moved in.”

  “Your sister?”

  “Aye.”

  Paula took out her earphones and sat down on the steps. “I think she climbed over the gate into my garden and moved my bike.”

  “Why would she do that?” he asked without much interest.

  “I was hoping you could tell me.”

  He shook his head. “Nope.”

  “She also left Bovis tied to the gate.”

  Shielding his eyes with a stubby hand, he gazed out to sea. “Did she?”

  Paula stretched down and knocked some wet sand off her trainers. “Any idea why she would do that?”

  “Possibly.”

  “Nora said Bovis was bait.”

  The boy considered this. “Mibby.”

  “So your sister was testing me in some way?”

  He turned and looked at her. His blue eyes were so pale they were almost transparent. “If she wanted to know what kind of person you were, she could of left Bovis to find out. You know, see how you’d react.”

  “She’d have had to be spying from somewhere then. I wonder where she could have been.”

  He shrugged. “There’s plenty of rocks to hide behind and she’s got ears like a bat.”

  “Does she often do that kind of thing?”

  “You’d have to ask her.” He grinned, revealing a mouthful of small, perfectly even teeth. “But Bovis definitely likes you.”

  “How can you tell?”

  “She told me.”

  “Right.”

  “I don’t mean she can speak,” he said quickly. “I mean she tells me things by the way she behaves. See how she just shifted, so the tips of her paws are covering the end of her nose? She only does that when she’s dead relaxed. If she likes a new person she leans on them, or rests her head on them, but if she doesn’t, she’ll turn away and, if I let her, she’ll just walk off. When we’re at home if someone she doesn’t like comes into a room, she gets up and goes somewhere else.” He rubbed the top of Bovis’s head. “But you must be a nice person because she’s comfortable with you.”

  “I like her too.” Paula stood up. “But I’ve got to get on.”

  He looked disappointed. “Don’t go yet. I could tell you some jokes. I know hundreds. How do penguins drink their Coke?” Without waiting for a response he carried on. “On the rocks. What’s black and white and goes round and round? A penguin in a revolving door.”

  “That’s very funny, but I really have to go.”

  “Wait, wait.” He held up his hand. “Have you heard the one about the frog that went to McDonald’s? He ordered French flies and a diet croke. What does a spaceman keep his sandwiches in? A launch box. What d’you call a vampire who likes cooking? Count Spatula!”

  Paula couldn’t help smiling again. “They’re really good, but I’m off now. Will you tell your sister I’d like to speak to her?”

  The boy stood too. “Where are you going?”

  “To have a shower. I need to buy some food if I’m going to have any breakfast.”

  “So we’ll wait here for you.”

  “Why?”

  “You’re new. We can show you the shops.”

  “Are there that many?”

  “Of course not.” He rolled his eyes. “This is Cra’frae.”

  “Cra’frae?”

  “Only visitors call it Craskferry, and it’s not that big.”

  “I know, that’s what everyone keeps saying: this is not the Ritz, this is not London or Edinburgh, not the metropolis,” Paula recited. “Anyway, I’m going.”

  She turned to leave but he touched her arm. Paula spun round as if she had been struck.

  He pulled his hand away. “No need t’be so jumpy.”

  “Sorry. What do you want now?”

  “Someone left a fish ‘n’ chip box and an empty can beside your steps. I put them in the bin.” He pointed to a large black dustbin along the sand.

  “That was kind of you. They were mine. I forgot to get rid of them last night.”

  “Did you have a heart attack?”

  “Hilarious.”

  He held out his right hand. “Sanders McCormack.”

  Paula shook it. “I know. The McCormack bit at least. Sanders is unusual.”

  He wrinkled his nose. “My sister’s Sandra.”

  “You said.”

  “We are twins,” he said, excavating a lump of seaweed with his toe. “We were conceived in the toilet of a fried chicken restaurant.”

  “Of course you were.”

  “We were!” he said indignantly. “Anyway, what’s your name?”

  Paula opened her mouth to tell him but something strange happened. “PT,” she heard herself say.

  “Pete-y? That’s more like a bloke’s name.”

  “PT. It’s a nickname. It’s from my initials – P for Paula, T for Tyndall.”

  “Fair enough.” Sanders sat down again. “We’ll see you here in a bit then, PT.”

  “I’ll be a while. Don’t feel you have to wait.”

  “We’re in no hurry. Bovis and me have had our breakfast.”

  “Shouldn’t you be at school? It is Monday, isn’t it?”

  “Doh, it’s the holidays.”

  “But it’s only what, the fourth of July?”

  “You’re in Scotland now. We get our holidays earlier than English kids.”

  “So you do – I keep forgetting things these days.”

  “It’s probably your age.”

  “Thanks, Sanders. See you later.”

  Back in the kitchen, Paula found a key lying on the table. A note scribbled on the back of a used brown envelope said si
mply, “Shed key for bicycle.” It was signed “B McIntyre”.

  Sanders and Bovis were waiting when she went back out half-an-hour later.

  “Where’s your shopping bag?” he asked.

  “I don’t have one. Don’t tell me shops here won’t give you plastic bags?”

  “Everybody knows plastic’s bad for the environment. Mrs McIntyre sometimes uses a tartan trolley. You could borrow that.”

  “I wouldn’t be seen dead with a tartan shopping trolley.”

  “But it’s very nice tartan. It’s Henderson. Betty was a Henderson before she married into the McIntyres, so that trolley means a lot to her. It’s part of her heritage.”

  “You’re talking nonsense.”

  Sanders gave a snort of laughter. “Aye, but it sounded good, didn’t it?”

  “Come on, I want to get to the newsagent’s before all the papers are gone.”

  When she reached the front of the queue, the newsagent suggested, “If you’re going to be here for the summer, you could put in an order. Lots o’ visitors do. That way, the paper’s on the mat for breakfast just like at home.”

  “That’s a good idea,” Paula agreed. “I’ll have The Scotsman and The Guardian plus Scotland on Sunday and the Sunday Herald.”

  “I see you found them,” he observed as he wrote her address in his book.

  She glanced over her shoulder at Sanders, who was hovering in the doorway with Bovis. “Yes, but it was his sister I was after.”

  The newsagent handed Paula her papers. Looking at Sanders, he said, “You can tell yon sister o’ yours I watched her palm that packet o’ Maltesers the other day. If she tries anything like that again, I’ll call the cops.”

  As Paula turned away from the counter, she saw Sanders stick his tongue out at the newsagent. She frowned at him.

  “Old Renton fancies you,” he said as they walked down Main Street.

  “Who?”

  “Him in there, the newsagent.”

  “Don’t be daft. Anyway, he’s not old. He couldn’t be much more than thirty.”