‘Grandad’s looked after it for forty years now,’ Euan said as they crunched over the gravel drive.
‘He’s done a braw job,’ McIntyre exclaimed, inspecting the gleaming machine. ‘An auld Triumph, eh?’
‘It is. He’s repaired it over the years with whatever parts he could scavenge. But now he’s a bit less mobile, since the stroke, and he’s letting me use the bike for work. I’ve needed transport since I moved back to town…’
‘You’re an electrician on a motorbike?’
Euan confirmed this was correct, trying to hide his embarrassment with a straight face.
A bike wouldn’t have been his first choice, but it was all he had. Since setting himself up in business a few weeks ago he’d done nothing but count the pennies, wishing for a van of his own and knowing that being able to afford one was years away. He’d calculated that at his current rate of success he’d be able to afford a Transit like a real electrician by the time he was forty.
‘Anyway, there’s a sidecar in Grandad’s garage,’ Euan told him, making McIntyre’s eyebrow arch. ‘And I thought if I could work on getting it attached again, I could take Grandad on runs out and about.’
‘Good thinking. So… why’s it no’ mounted to it now?’
‘That’s the problem. When Granny Rosie passed, Grandad let the sidecar lie unused in his garage. It’s in a right state. Mounting point’s rusted through.’
In spite of the sad note in Euan’s voice, McIntyre had the look of a man presented with a longed-for birthday present. ‘And you want me to help you fix it up?’
‘It was Grandad’s idea. He told me you can fix anything.’
This made McIntyre stand all the straighter, his freckled cheeks flushing. ‘I won’t let any machine defeat me, that’s true. I do have a lot on at the moment though.’ He scratched his head, considering then dismissing this. ‘So, Saturday morning?’
‘Huh?’
‘If you can get it here for Saturday, we can start working on it together?’
‘Oh! Right. Thanks. Grandad’s probably not up to helping, but I’m keen enough.’ Euan considered what spending next Saturday here might mean.
Everyone in town knew the shed’s main repairing day was Saturday and, according to his grandad, the place was always overrun with customers. The rest of the week, the shed was open for special events or social groups or the gardening project in the mill house grounds.
‘Are, um, are all that lot here every Saturday?’ Euan asked, tipping his head towards the shed.
McIntyre, who no one considered particularly romantically inclined, not in the traditional sense anyway, hadn’t a notion that Euan was chiefly thinking of young Peaches McDowell.
‘Aye, cannae seem to get rid of them,’ McIntyre joked, his eyes still on the bike.
McIntyre’s idea of romance was the hands-on magic of restoration, and the only sparks he sent flying these days were of the kind that required a welder’s mask, so he thought no more about the lad’s question.
‘We open at ten on Saturday, but if you can get here for half-eight, we’ll set to uninterrupted. I can pick up the sidecar from Clyde’s garage through the week, if that helps?’
It was all agreed with a handshake, after McIntyre had confirmed all repairs were free of charge but ‘a wee donation is always appreciated’, and it was expected that on big jobs like this, the customer would stick around and learn about the repair, even taking part in it themselves.
McIntyre was about to lead Euan back inside to fill in a repair docket and get the job officially logged when he said, ‘Listen, son? Dinnae let the chatterers, like our Senga, worry you. They’re just hard up for gossip. They’re no’ out to spoil your reputation; and they couldn’t anyway. OK?’
So, thought Euan, the repair shed boss was more clued up about goings-on in the town than it first appeared. He’d heard the whispers and wanted to comfort him.
Unfortunately for McIntyre, Euan had heard similar whispers about the repair shop. In fact, those whispers had become a national news item last summer. There’d been a scandal over some stolen jewellery and a crime gang operating in the area. It had been before Euan’s return to Cairn Dhu, but everyone in town knew how the repair shop had got inveigled in it at the expense of its reputation.
‘Grandad told me the same gossips managed to take away all of your repair shop customers at one point?’
‘Aye… well.’ McIntyre coughed. ‘That’s as may be, but look at us now. Heavin’ with customers every Saturday. Folk always see sense in the end. And a town needs its repairers, just the same as it needs its electricians. You’ll see.’
Euan dropped the subject because he didn’t like to tell the older man he was surely wrong about his fledgling business recovering from his mistake, and so they made their way indoors to fill out the paperwork.
Once inside it was immediately obvious something was wrong.
The pink-hair girl was frantically tapping a message into her phone. ‘He’s not coming!’ she was saying on a loop, panic in her voice.
