A Risk Worth Taking

by Robin Pilcher

  “Hu-llo?”

  Hearing his voice again after so long sent an involuntary shockwave of guilt through her body, but it was countered by the resentment that she felt at the cheeriness of his reply.

  “Dan?”

  “Jackie, is that you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Just hang on a minute, can you? I’m just going to pull over onto the side of the road.” In the background, she could hear the muffled sound of the engine dying as he brought the car to a halt. “Sorry, I didn’t look to see who was calling. How are you?”

  “I’m fine.”

  “It’s so good to hear your voice. I haven’t spoken to you for ages.”

  “I know. I’ve been really busy.”

  “How did Paris go?”

  Jackie wished that he wouldn’t be so bloody interested in everything that she did. “It went really well. The press reports were excellent.”

  “That’s terrific. Well done, you. That’s a real feather in your cap.”

  “Dan?”

  “How’s everything at home? Battersea Gran coping all right, is she?”

  “Yes, she’s being wonderful. Dan?”

  Once again he cut across her question. “And how are Millie and Nina?” She heard him laugh. “Still watching the soaps instead of doing their homework, are they?”

  Jackie grasped the opportunity. “That’s what I was calling you about, Dan.”

  That seemed to quieten him. “There’s nothing wrong, is there?” She could hear the concern in his voice.

  “No, nothing at all. It’s just that . . .” She glanced across to Stephen’s office. He was eyeing her intently. She spun her chair round to avoid his gaze. “It’s just that it’s the girls’ half term the week after next, and I have to go over to Milan so I won’t be here.”

  “Right. So, can’t Battersea Gran look after them?”

  Jackie suddenly saw her direction. “Well, I think your mother could do with a rest. She’s longing to go back to Battersea for a bit, and I’m afraid that I just haven’t been able to give her the chance.”

  “So what are you suggesting?”

  “Well, maybe that they could come up and stay with you and Josh for the week.” She paused to hear Dan’s reply, but none was forthcoming. “It would be an adventure for them.”

  Dan laughed. “You must be joking, Jackie. They’d hate it up here. They’d get more enjoyment going to the moon! Anyway, there’s hardly enough room for Josh and me to swing a cat in the cottage, let alone have the girls come to join us.”

  Jackie narrowed her mouth petulantly. “So you don’t want them, then?”

  “That’s not what I said. I would love to have them come to stay more than anything, but I don’t think it’s, well, very practical. Josh and I leave the house every morning at six-fifteen and we don’t get back until early evening. What would they do with themselves?”

  “They could look after the dogs.” She regretted saying it the moment that she opened her mouth. She knew as well as Dan that the last time the girls had shown any interest in the dogs was when the Porter family, en masse, had driven to the Battersea Dog Home to collect them and Nina had given Cruise his name. “And they both have a lot of work to do, especially Millie. It would be so much better for them to be up in Scotland where there are obviously no distractions. They could just get on with it.”

  “I don’t know, Jackie.”

  She could sense his resolve falter. “They really have missed both you and Josh, you know.” She thought that a little friendly laugh wouldn’t go amiss at that precise moment. “Not your cooking, I have to say.”

  “Jackie, you have to understand that we’re miles away from the nearest McDonald’s.”

  “Scotland’s famous for its fish-and-chip shops, isn’t it?”

  Jackie bit at the side of a fingernail when she heard him laugh.

  “That’s true. Maybe I could wean them slowly onto my cooking.”

  “It really would be an ideal environment for them to catch up on their work, Dan.”

  “Yeah, I can see that.”

  “So could they come?”

  “It would be a hell of a squash.”

  “They wouldn’t mind that.”

  “They’d have to bring sleeping bags.”

  “They’re used to kipping on the floor. You know as well as I do how many sleep-overs they go to.”

  Dan was silent, and Jackie sensed it as being the moment of decision.

  “Oh, all right, then, but you’ll have to clear it with Millie and Nina first. I don’t want them coming up here and just moping around the place.”

  “Of course I will!” Jackie replied, stifling the urge to jump to her feet and let out a whoop of triumph. “I’ll build Scotland up as the happening place.”

  Dan chuckled. “For goodness’ sakes, don’t do that.”

  “Leave it to me. I’ll say all the right things. Now, how do they get up there?”

  “Probably best putting them on the overnight train from Euston to Fort William. When are you thinking of sending them up?”

  Jackie turned her chair around and glanced at her diary, realizing immediately that she had no idea when Stephen was planning to go to Milan. “Just hang on a moment.” She caught Stephen’s eye and beckoned to him frantically. He raced over to her office.

  “How did you get on?” he asked as he entered, his voice reverberating around her room.

  She mouthed at him to shut up and gesticulated towards the mouthpiece of her telephone before clamping her hand over it.

  “Who was that?” Dan asked.

  Jackie took her hand away. “Just somebody coming into my office to find out how we got on in Paris.”

  “Ah, right. So when are they coming up?”

  “I’m still trying to find my diary.” She put her hand over the mouthpiece again and glared at Stephen. “You nearly blew it then,” she whispered angrily at him. “When are you wanting to go over to Milan?”

  “I’ve booked two seats on the Tuesday morning flight out of Heathrow.”

  “Oh, have you? Was that before or after our little conversation just then?”

  “Jackie?” Dan’s voice sounded down the telephone. “Are you still there?”

  Jackie took her hand away. “Yes, sorry, I’ve found it now. How about if I put them on the Monday night train? They’d be with you then on Tuesday morning.”

  “Okay. And when would they have to be back in London?”

  Jackie turned the page on her diary. “The following Monday morning would be fine. They are meant to be starting back at school that day, but I’m sure they could be a little late.”

  “Would you meet them at the station?”

  “Yes, or if not, they could always get the tube.”

  “No, I want you to meet them. If I’m going to have them for the week, I think you could take a bit of time off work just to do that.”

  “All right. Of course I’ll do that. Listen, Dan, I have to go. I’ve got a meeting about to start. I’ll text you their train times.”

  “You could always ring me during the day.”

  “I’ll see. And everything’s all right with you and Josh?”

  “Yes, all’s well. I’m just on my way back from Buckie at the minute. Hell, Jackie, you’d have laughed. I had this contretemps with a guy down in Oban—”

  “I have to go, Dan,” Jackie cut in. “They’re calling me into the meeting. Tell me another time.”

  “Oh, all right.” She could hear the tone of his voice dip with disappointment. “It’s been great talking to you, Jacks. You know, the other day, I was just thinking that in all the time that we’ve been married, I don’t think that—”

  “Your line’s breaking up, Dan. I can’t hear you very well.” She put her finger on the button to end the call, and slowly replaced the telephone on its cradle.

  Stephen had not bothered to return to his office, but had remained standing by her door until she finished the call. “Sorry about that,”
he said quietly. “I didn’t know that you were still speaking to him.”

  “I realized that.”

  “So are we on for Milan?”

  Jackie smiled at him and nodded.

  Stephen gave her the thumbs-up. “That’s wonderful. You just wait. I’ll give you the time of your life.”

  20

  The story about Dan’s little escapade in the loading yard in Oban was recounted to Patrick, with all the exaggeration of a game of Chinese Whispers, long before Dan arrived back at Auchnacerie that evening. Patrick did indeed laugh, but contrary to Ronnie Macaskill’s predictions, he never managed to shift himself from his bed that day, nor for a week after. Dan’s reputation, however, was given a healthy boost by his actions, and the true animosity felt against Maxwell Borthwick in the area was confirmed to Dan every time he went into a shop or a pub or a filling station. Everyone had heard the story, and everyone had heard it differently.

  Also, it had helped to create a real bond in his relationship with Ronnie Macaskill, a man renowned for keeping himself to himself and having a total inability to suffer fools. Thereafter, no matter where Dan was, Ronnie would call him on his mobile every morning at ten o’clock to find out what prices Dan had been paying and with which boats he had been dealing. Ronnie relinquished to Dan every shrewd bit of knowledge in his possession about buying prawns.

  Dan’s own opinion of the man, however, was slightly dented the following weekend when Ronnie inveigled both him and Josh into representing Seascape in a game of camanachd against a rival company from Elgin.

  “Played a bit of sport in your time, have you, Dan?” Ronnie had asked him during one of their morning telephone calls.

  “I used to play a bit of football, yes.”

  “That would set you up well, then.”

  “Set me up for what?”

  “I’m short of a few players to play camanachd for the company on Saturday, so I was hoping that maybe you and Josh would be good enough to take part.”

  “Cama-what? Ronnie, I can’t even pronounce it, let alone play the game.”

  “You’ll know it better as shinty, no doubt.”

  “Oh, right. I’ve got you now. That’s a hell of a rough game, isn’t it?”

  “No, no, not at all. It’s a wee bit of a mixture between hockey and lacrosse, not unlike the kind of games that you see played at girls’ schools. It should be nothing more than a doddle for you.”

  The tinge of sardonic humour in Ronnie’s voice as he imparted this information did nothing to convince Dan of its total truth.

  “How long does the game go on for?”

  “It would just be two halves of forty-five minutes each.”

  “Ninety minutes? Ronnie, I’d have a heart attack! I haven’t taken any exercise for about eighteen months.”

  “That’s not a worry. We’re short of a goalkeeper anyway, so you won’t be having to do too much running about.”

  “I don’t know about this, Ronnie. I have a feeling that I might just let everybody down.”

  “Not at all. We’re just a bunch of amateurs having a wee bit of a hit-around.”

  Having eventually agreed to play, Dan found out later from a knowledgeable, though clearly inebriated, aficionado of the sport over an evening drink in the Nevisview public bar that even those who played for the teams that made up the Marine Harvest National Premier League were of amateur status. He was also informed that, five years previously, Ronnie Macaskill, that unassuming and mild-mannered individual who had sweet-talked him into playing, had been the centre forward for Kingussie, and that during the time that he had worn their colours, the team had walked away with the prestigious Glemorangie Camanachd Cup no fewer than three times. What’s more, he had represented Scotland twice in the annual Shinty Hurling International against Ireland.

  It was therefore quite understandable that the following Saturday, Dan’s nerves were jangling to such an extent that he was forced to have a number of unscheduled stops at the side of the road on the way from the cottage to the playing field in Fort William. As he nonchalantly viewed the beauty of the surrounding countryside while being stared at by the occupants of passing cars, he wished that he could have had a fraction of the youthful enthusiasm for the forthcoming battle displayed by his bandana-headed son who sat sucking his teeth in the car, desperate to get to the field of conflict and to get stuck in to the opposition.

  Having given his team a pep talk that started with a secretive message on tactics and crescendoed into a motivational war cry, Ronnie broke free from the huddle of players and walked over to Dan, who was standing by the touchline, leaning on a caman, his designated weapon for the day, staring open-mouthed towards one end of the pitch.

  “What the hell is that?” he asked, pointing his caman at the gigantic goal.

  “That’s the tadhal—the goal.”

  “But it’s bigger than the bloody gates of Buckingham Palace!”

  “Not quite. It measures about twelve foot by ten foot.”

  “Ronnie, that’s one hundred and twenty square feet! How the hell am I meant to stop the ball from going in there?”

  “Well, there would be three ways, actually. You can either ‘cleek’ it with your caman, slap it away, or stop it with your open hand.”

  Dan shook his head in desperation at Ronnie’s calculated misunderstanding of his complaint. “Thanks, Ronnie.”

  “Oh, and you can stop the ball with your foot, if you like, but you’re not allowed to swing a boot at it”—he let out a chuckle of a laugh—“nor at any of your opponents, for that matter.”

  Dan let out a resigned sigh. “Right, I suppose I’d better get ready, then.”

  Ronnie gave him an encouraging pat on the back. “Aye, a good idea, lad. Take a couple of turns around the pitch to get warmed up.”

  Dan narrowed his eyes at the man. “I wasn’t meaning that. I meant that I should put on my protective gear.”

  Ronnie clicked his fingers. “Och, I was forgetting about that.” He ran off into the hut at the side of the pitch and returned far too quickly holding out Dan’s armour to him.

  Dan ran his tongue against the top row of his teeth, wondering if it would be the last time that he would ever be able to do such a thing. “What is that?” he asked quietly, looking at the wafer-thin pair of shin pads and the soft leather gloves that Ronnie held in his hand.

  Ronnie dropped the meagre collection on the ground in front of his goalkeeper. “That, Dan, is your gear.”

  “You have got to be joking.”

  Ronnie gave him a wink. “Don’t worry. Those laddies will never get near your goal.”

  The game ended after ninety minutes of play, plus a full ten minutes of injury time, in a resounding 5–1 victory for the Seascape Camanachd Club. For Dan, however, it ended after only twenty minutes of the first half. He had been standing quite happily minding his own business in the goalmouth a good seventy yards from where the action was taking place, when the ball suddenly came looping through the air in his direction. The centre forward of the opposing side, a deceptive little devil who looked as if he trained on four pints of lager before each game but who, in truth, had the same fleetness of foot as Pegasus, covered fifty yards of the pitch at such a speed that he arrived with at least two seconds in hand at the spot where the ball was destined to make contact once more with terra firma. This fractional moment in time gave him the opportunity to steady his feet and to swing his caman around his head like a hammer thrower, before hitting a first-time ball absolutely fair and square in the direction of Dan.

  Dan stood transfixed, like an earthling who was caught in the path of a mighty meteor from space, his eyes rooted on the cork and leather missile that flew towards him. In the last few seconds before his eternal demise, and as he found out later, much to the disgust of his fellow players, Dan took cowardly avoidance action, ducking unceremoniously and covering his head with his arms. He felt a whistling wind rush past him as the ball screamed over his quaking shoulders, i
mmediately followed by the zing as it concaved into the back of the net. Dan unfurled himself and stared at the ball on the ground, convinced that a few wisps of smoke still rose from its leather casing. The blood in his body, which had been hitherto pumping madly somewhere about his feet, began to boil up to his head and he turned, his eyes bulging in fury, as he glared at the perpetrator of this unsportsman-like deed.

  “You stupid bastard!” he yelled as he charged up the pitch, with caman raised, like Rob Roy leading the final charge against the Redcoats at the Battle of Killiecrankie. “You had at least a hundred square feet of fucking goal to shoot at, and you had to hit the fucking ball straight at me!”

  It was now the turn of Pegasus to stand immobile, and if it had not been for the intervention of Josh who, just before the moment of contact, yelled out, “Dad, for goodness’ sakes, what the hell’s got into you?” Dan would have cleaved the man from head to foot with one blow.

  Dan’s reputation was therefore further enhanced by being the first Seascape Camanachd Club player ever to be red-carded from the field of play. Not that he minded much. Josh took over the goalkeeping duties thereafter and, no doubt in part due to the presence of Maria José on the touchline, performed for the rest of the game with the alacrity of a scalded cat.

  21

  Dan’s heart sank the moment he woke up on the morning that the girls’ train was due to pull into Fort William Station. He had become quite accustomed to lying in bed for those few precious seconds after his alarm had gone off, listening to the wind lightly blowing on the start of yet another sun-filled day. However, on this occasion, it whistled through the gap in his open window and splattered rain off the tin roof like the incessant roll of a snare drum, thus heralding the end of the long-running Indian summer.

  He got out of bed and padded through to the main room, realizing as he went that the temperature in the house had dropped by about ten degrees. Having been lulled into a state of complacency by the continuance of the good weather, he had forgotten to bring in logs for the cooking stove the night before. He stuck his bare feet into a virgin pair of Wellington boots, chucked on a padded jacket, from which the price tag still hung, over his T-shirt and sports shorts, gave a short whistle to call the dogs from their bed, and ventured outside. He was back in the house no more than thirty seconds later. Having dumped the armful of logs into the wooden box by the stove, he began hopping from one foot to the other and beating his arms around his chest to get himself warm. The day was similar to the one when he had first arrived in Fort William five weeks ago, if not worse.