‘Next customer, please!’ Rhona said with urgency.
‘Whit?’ McIntyre had near about run straight into the bolted gate. It was shut? But it had never, ever been shut, not in the twenty-eight years they’d lived here.
He dropped the boxes and paced at the boundary, his phone to his ear. No answer. On tiptoe he could see a faint glow at their bedroom window. Testing the dry-stone wall with his hands – easily five foot tall, but surely something he could scale? – he made up his mind.
‘Roz!’ he yelled, dropping each box over the wall, wincing at the sound of them hitting the gravel on the other side. ‘I’m coming in!’
A crack showed between the bedroom blinds as he scrambled up and onto the pointed capstones. ‘Ohyah!’ It hurt, but he was determined.
When he fell hard onto the boxes on the dark side of the wall, however, he was less sure this was his best idea. A pain spread from his buttock down to his left knee, which had taken much of the impact, but still, he was going to get through her defences one way or another.
‘Rosalyn!’ he shouted again, dragging himself to standing, dusting off his good new overalls. As he gathered the dented boxes he realised his elbow hurt too, and it was wet under his new shirt. A bit of blood wouldn’t matter now, though.
A light came on at the stairs, then at the porch door. He limped towards it, the boxes threatening to topple with each drag of his aching leg. ‘Jeezo, Mac, you’ve really done it now!’ he told himself.
He’d been about to knock at his own front door with scraped knuckles when he heard the bolt being slipped and the chain jangling.
Roz’s face appeared at the crack. ‘What the hell are you playing at!’ Anger masked her concern.
She’d been crying. When had she turned so pale? Hadn’t he noticed how tired she was looking lately? Where had his head been at this spring?
‘Rosalyn, Roz,’ he gasped, still winded from his fall. ‘Will you let me in? I’ve something I need to tell you.’
Her looks turned sicker still, but she dolefully stepped aside and let him in, and for the first time in their marriage he learned what it felt like to show up scratched and scraped (granted, usually it was from a slip while repairing something in the shed, not throwing himself over his own wall) and his wife didn’t flinch at his cuts and run to get her first aid kit.
Only as her cool impassivity hit him did he realise how accustomed to her care and compassion he’d grown. He only truly felt its enormity now she’d withdrawn it. Quailing at how steely and distant she’d become, he told her, fearfully, ‘You had better sit down,’ drawing out a kitchen chair; though, in truth, it was McIntyre who was feeling faint.
22
Carenza worked her punch ladle. If she’d been the sort of woman to sigh contentedly, that’s what she’d have done now. Everything in her little fiefdom was perfectly under control.
Her daughter had recovered from the May madness of yesterday and was talking animatedly over by the bonfire with the charming young Felton, who’d so masterfully taken control of the bonfire lighting. She might, she mused, drop McIntyre from his traditional role and put Felton in charge of the ceremonial lighting every year. McIntyre was growing increasingly doddery and distracted of late, it was probably time. She couldn’t have any weak links in her organisational armour.
Sachin, she was delighted to see, had attracted a small band of kids who were dancing, if not exuberantly, to one of the jolly party tunes she’d pre-approved, songs from her childhood, nothing risqué or likely to result in a ruckus like last year before she’d taken charge of the whole event.
Cary Anderson was spiking litter in a gloomy posture all along the perimeter of the rec. The new doctor was flicking through her phone in an empty first aid tent, while the St John’s Ambulance volunteers drank tea from paper cups. Some of the older kids had formed a snaking queue for the bouncy castle which was bobbing and sagging from all the happy jumpers. The Giffords were doing a roaring trade in their wonderful rum truffles (Carenza had sampled one and it truly was delicious), and even though Ranger Finlay and Murray McIntyre had chosen to bring along their daft mutt, Nell, the dog was obediently glued to Finlay’s leg at the promise of some pork sausage from the grill. All was well.
The crowds were milling around, greeting one another in little groups, shelling out fivers for the hotdogs, and generally being orderly and dignified (apart from that band of lads from out of town, farmers, she guessed, who were three sheets to the wind, and it was only shortly before eight. At least there was no way for them to get more inebriated on site. She’d seen to that.
She’d watched the Mason brothers, two of the stupidest police officers one could ever meet, stopping a group of men she didn’t recognise at the entrance to the rec, each of them carrying what looked like musical instruments of the Scottish marching band variety. Those same officers had held her at their roadblock the day before, point-blank refusing to let her reach her daughter waiting in distress at the repair shop with her showcase collection. The dopey officers had risen a little in her estimation this evening, however, as they’d made the men with the drums and pipes surrender their gear to the lost property tent until closing time.
She was less pleased to see Officer Jamie Beaton neglecting his assigned spot and wandering around merrily chatting to anyone he pleased, but if the Masons were doing such a sterling job of catching trouble before it could start, he wasn’t really needed anyway.
They’d also been instructed to keep an eye open for that liability, Euan Sparks, and to make sure he wasn’t involving himself in any dangerous situations. Happily, she hadn’t seen hide nor hair of the boy. Perhaps he had a little more sense than she’d given him credit for and he’d known to stay well away from anywhere she and Peaches were for a good long while.
Carenza had spent much of the day chasing away thoughts of what the pair of them might have got up to last night in between riding off on that death-trap motorbike and her daughter traipsing home at first light this morning.
No, she wouldn’t think of it now. It was too successful an evening. Valerie Cromarty had practically begged for an early morning meeting with her tomorrow. The papers, very much in Carenza’s favour, were already drawn up and on the office desk for Valerie to sign. She would soon have the edge on every property developer in the Cairngorms. Luxury apartments, beautifully presented in Valerie’s high-end signature style, dressed to perfection, as well as being furnished with every new techy gadget her buyers and renters could wish for, and all at a special bargain price to Carenza.
Yes, despite the heavy lump in her throat that had been there since she heard Peaches had left her stranded at the roadblock last night, meaning she missed the pinnacle of her career so far – Peaches’ career, she ought to say – tonight was still a huge success. Even if her daughter had scared the life out of her with her wilfulness, and she’d been on the brink of saying some very harsh things to her child this morning. With any luck, that could all be forgotten about now. She and Felton were, after all, chatting away happily over by the bonfire. No, Carenza McDowell would not countenance failure. It was not in her vocabulary.
Perhaps the evening ambiance at the rec could be a little more… rustic? And maybe the romance of the evening was a tad stilted, and some of the wild Scottish poetry of May Day was possibly a little dampened, but that’s the price you pay for orderly behaviour and dignity.
The coronation of the king and queen and the jumping over the blessing bonfires ceremony would turn it all up a notch, she reassured herself, and then everyone would make their way quietly offsite and safely home to their beds by half nine, if she was any sort of organisational expert at all. Which, she smiled to herself as she poured half-cups of apple and pear juice for the little kiddies in her queue, she had proven time and again she truly was.
23
Shell and Jolyon had successfully, or so they thought, escaped the watchful eyes of their mums, as well as Jolly’s dad, Dan, and they’d spent their 50ps on sweeties and squash, and two goes on the bouncy castle, and now they were running out of things to do.
