Where Have All the Boys Gone?
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‘You sent me on this stupid assignment!’ said Katie.
‘Yeah, but I didn’t want you both to go.’
‘I’ll be back in a couple of days!’ said Louise indignantly.
‘But you’re either a biscuit-strewn crumbling mess or under a waiter. You’re no use at all!’
‘Well, that’s nice.’
‘I’m just saying,’ replied Olivia gruffly, ‘good luck – I’ll miss you.’
‘Well, I’ll miss you too,’ said Katie. ‘Along with electric lighting, central heating, comprehensible English, Belgo, sushi, mojitos, movie theatres, wine bars, radio, fajitas…’
‘I’ll get the drinks in,’ interrupted Olivia.
Katie’s Fiat Punto fought a brave fight, but it still took them twelve full hours, much circling around and two full bouts of crying (one and a half Louise’s, one half Katie’s, who felt that red eyes and a crack in the voice wasn’t quite as bad as Louise’s full-on tantrum on the subject of unmarked B roads, leading to an extremely long diatribe on Max’s inability to find his way anywhere which meant he was probably lost in the foothills of the Himalayas, which, Katie had thought, was exactly where she’d like to be right now, a thought she committed the profound error of voicing) to finally limp into Fairlish late that evening.
To Katie’s horror, the Forestry Commission had politely turned down Olivia’s offer to organise their accommodation and said they’d sort something out. Which in practice meant that rather than automatically booking the nicest hotel in the area and billing it to the client, Katie was somewhat at the mercy of…well, the fax she was clasping in her hand. It didn’t say anything along the lines of ‘Gleneagles’. It didn’t say anything along the lines of ‘hotel’. It said, ‘4 Water Lane. Do not arrive after 8 p.m.’.
It was 11.30 p.m. The last time they’d got out of the car, near Killiemuir, it had been so cold, Louise’s sobs had frozen in her throat. It had hurt to breathe.
The darkness was almost complete. Louise was looking out of the window, failing to spot a single road sign, whining, ‘I can’t see a thing.’
Katie was trying her best to be patient, but it was like travelling all day with a six-year-old.
‘Well, look harder. I’m just concentrating on trying not to run over any more squirrels or rats or badgers or hedgehogs or deer, OK?’
‘No need to get snitty,’ said Louise. ‘It’s not my fault you forgot to pack the night-vision goggles.’
Without warning, the Fiat dropped into a huge puddle of freezing water. The girls both screamed. Katie somehow managed to push the car on through before it stalled, and they came to a shuddering halt. They looked at each other, neither wanting to get out in the cold.
‘Where’s the torch?’ asked Louise, finally.
Katie looked at her soaking wet feet. ‘Um, I didn’t bring one.’
‘What did your dad say about driving at night without a torch?’
‘I don’t have a dad.’
‘Oh, yes, bring that up now we’re trapped in a flood in the middle of nowhere.’
Gingerly, Katie opened the door. There was definitely water running under their feet. ‘Bollocks,’ she said.
Louise gasped sharply.
‘What?’
‘There’s a light…over there.’
Sure enough, a tiny light could be seen bobbing up and down towards them.
‘Do you think it’s a rescue boat?’
‘Uh, yeah,’ said Katie, whose first thought had, in actual fact, been that it was aliens.
‘Hellaooowww!’ screeched Louise. ‘Carn you come and help us, pleayse!’
‘Could you sound a little less like the Duke of Edinburgh?’ hissed Katie. ‘Haven’t you seen An American Werewolf in London?’
‘Cooeee!’ shouted Louise.
‘What the MANKIN HELL…’ a strident voice, closely followed by the beam of a torch and an equally visible bosom, strode out of the darkness ‘…do you think you’re doing?’
An imperious nose followed the bosom, along with an expression that looked far from the welcoming Scots of tradition, with two eyebrows that wouldn’t have been entirely out of place on an old Labour minister.
Katie and Louise immediately splashed to attention.
The woman sized them up and down. ‘And you are?’
‘We’re looking for number 4 Water Lane,’ said Katie, in her best well-brought-up voice.
‘D’you think this might be Water Lane?’ said the woman, staring pointedly at their shoes.
‘Is that a yes or a no?’ replied Katie. Playing humorous word games with Attila the Bun would be all well and good if they weren’t on the brink of hypothermia.
The woman sniffed in a manner that implied that yes, it obviously was, surely even to the educationally sub-rate specimens in front of her. ‘You’ll be the London girls then.’
Katie and Louise swapped glances.
‘I thought it was quite clear that you were expected before 8.30?’ she continued.
‘It took us a while to get here. From London,’ said Katie.
‘Really? Is it far? Maybe you had to stop for cocktails and to buy some shoes on the way.’
If she hadn’t been so very, very wet and very, very tired, Katie would simply have turned around and driven all the way back home.
Number 4 Water Lane was not, as the girls had fantasised for the last two hundred miles, a tartan-festooned haven of horseshoe antiques, a stag’s head or two and a blazing open fire. It was an enormous house, shrouded in almost complete darkness, with creaks and peculiar noises emanating from different corners. It was freezing – ‘heating and hot water 7–8. Breakfast 7–8’ read the sign on the wall that Attila, whose name was in fact Mrs McClockerty, had pointed out, leading them to ponder the invention of time travel as she led them through endless gloomy corridors, pointing out a terrifyingly pristine, antimacassared floral monstrosity called the ‘residents’ lounge’. They appeared to have been billeted in the old servants’ quarters, directly under the eaves. Fortunately the lighting was terrible: Katie was sure there were cobwebs and God knew what else in the corners. The beds were single, and both mattresses and blankets were painfully thin.
‘I need the toilet,’ whimpered Louise from her bed after they’d put the light out.
‘It’s down the hall,’ whispered back Katie.
‘I’m too frightened.’
‘Oh, for goodness’ sake.’
‘Katie?’
‘Yes?’
‘Are you sure we haven’t been kidnapped by white slavers and sold into service?’
‘Ssh!’
There was a short pause. ‘Have you seen that film The Others?’
‘NO!’
‘Gaslight?’
‘Goodnight Louise.’
‘Amityville?’
‘If you wet the bed, I’m telling Mrs McClockerty.’
There was a pause, then a rustle. Katie stiffened. Sure enough, the covers on her bed were being pulled back.
‘Louise!’
‘Please!’
‘Well, no funny stuff, OK?’
‘I would never fancy you even if I was gay,’ said Louise loftily. ‘I’d fancy that bird from Location Location Location.’ And, despite her avowed terrors and full bladder, she immediately fell fast asleep.
Katie wriggled a little to try to get comfortable, but it was no use. Grateful for the warm body beside her, she lay staring into the dark as the clock ticked away until morning.
Getting up the next morning proved near impossible – the room was icy and so huge that getting to their clothes seemed an epic journey, never mind the arduous trek to the bathroom. Only by holding hands, closing their eyes and shouting ‘bacon and eggs!’ could they inch their way forwards into the frigid air.
Sadly, bacon and eggs weren’t exactly forthcoming.
‘It’s continental breakfast,’ announced Mrs Mc-Clockerty, as if what is delicious-freshly-made-in-a-patisserie-under-a-heartwarming-early-Mediterranean-sun was in any way a comparable experience to the dried-out pieces of toast studded on the tray before them while the wind audibly howled around the house.
‘Two pieces only!’ she barked.
There were three other people in the dining room, all men, sitting on their own.
‘Perhaps it’s a lonely murderers’ convention,’ suggested Louise, trying in vain to warm her hands on the coffee pot.
‘It holds up Olivia’s male-female ratio theory,’ said Katie, inhaling her tea greedily. Before they’d left, Olivia had pointed out that seeing as the main industries in the region were farming, fishing, forestry and a large research centre down the road, they might be in with a bit of luck totty-wise. Although studying their fellow inmates, Katie wasn’t entirely heartened by what was on offer. One of the men was dropping crumbs all over his Aberdeen Evening Post, another was unselfconsciously exploring the inside of his nose. At the far end, Mrs McClockerty was surveying the room in silence, making sure nobody took more than the requisite number of condiments.
‘So, are we going home today?’ asked Louise brightly. ‘’Course we are!’
Katie grimaced. ‘I think I’m going to have to at least look at this job thing. Otherwise Livvy will have my farts for parts.’
‘Surely not,’ said Louise. ‘She won’t mind. This place is cruel and unusual.’
Outside, rain was throwing itself against the window as if it were trying to get their attention. Katie looked at her watch. Eight thirty.
‘I’m going to have to go,’ she said apologetically.
‘OK, I’ll get the car started,’ said Louise.
‘You’re not coming!’
Louise looked taken aback. ‘Of course I am.’
‘Of course you’re not. This is my job. I’m not walking in there like Jennifer Lopez with an entourage. They already hate me.’
‘Do they know it’s you?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Do they know it’s you? The person who already got turned down for the job?’
‘I did not get turned down for the job! I…declined.’
‘What? They offered it to you and you turned it down?’
‘In a manner of speaking.’
‘By default?’
‘That’s a manner of speaking.’
‘Well, what am I going to do all day?’
‘You should have thought of that,’ said Katie sternly, ‘before you started with the “Ooh, please can I come, boo hoo hoo, blah blah”.’
Louise gave her a look.
‘OK, everyone out!’ said Mrs McClockerty. The men started shifting around, collecting his papers untidily together, in one case, and wiping his finger surreptitiously under the table in another.
Mrs McClockerty came and stood so her bosom loomed over their heads, blocking out all light. ‘You must exit the premises until 6 o’clock. This isn’t a hotel, you know.’
‘It is a hotel!’ said Katie.
‘It’s a boarding house,’ said Mrs McClockerty, as if Katie had sworn at her. The girls waited for further elucidation as to what the difference was, but none was forthcoming. The bosom swayed towards the door and vanished into the endless bowels of the house.
‘Can I hide under the seat of the car while you’re at work?’ asked Louise desperately.
‘No! You have to go explore.’
There was a pause. ‘Can I have the umbrella?’ asked Louise.
‘I forgot it,’ said Katie in a very quiet voice.
‘You forgot an umbrella when coming to the Highlands of Scotland?’ said Louise in an even quieter voice.
‘Yes,’ said Katie.
Louise sat very still for a minute. Then she stood up, slowly. ‘I will see you,’ she announced, ‘at 6 p.m.’ Then she picked up her coat, still wet from the night before, and, with a great sense of purpose and wounded pride, walked out of the big old-fashioned door. Katie watched her go for a moment, feeling guilty, then feeling annoyed that she spent so much of her life feeling guilty.
Mrs McClockerty poked her head around the door and looked pointedly at the brass clock on the wall. It was 8.40. Katie jumped up, guiltily.
Chapter Five
Katie hadn’t known what to expect of the town – she hadn’t seen much of it from the tiny railway station. But on first impressions, Katie felt happier despite herself. The rain was easing off, and there was even a hint of sun in the air, trying hard to make itself felt behind a watery cloud. The town was tiny, built around a little harbour. The houses were brightly painted and picture-postcard cosy. The town looked like it should be hosting a perky children’s television series, and, although the streets were deserted, Katie could imagine it thronged in the summer. The roads were narrow and cobbled, and a tiny church was perched on one of the hills above. The directions to the Forestry Commission indicated it was out of town, though, and so Katie reluctantly set off in the opposite direction, following the badly-faxed map.
The rain did stop, but the Punto was still having some trouble navigating the muddy roads through the thick woods. It was the first time Katie had ever driven somewhere where she could see the point of those ridiculous Land-Rover thingies, other than to transport skinny blonde women and their single children to the lycée whilst squashing cyclists in the London rush hour. Olivia, who usually cycled to work of course, always suggested that they use the bull-bars on the front of their vehicles to tie little posies of flowers to commemorate all the cyclists and pedestrians they’d killed that week whilst being too far off the ground to notice anyone and too busy doing their make-up to care.
Katie wondered how things were going to go with this Harry character. The best thing, she supposed, would be if nobody mentioned their previous encounter. After all, he had said she could have had the job if she wanted, hadn’t he? Even if grudgingly so? Maybe he wouldn’t recognise her? Surely he’d think all London girls looked the same anyway? Nervously, she smoothed down her plain black sweater and burgundy skirt. It would be fine. She would do the job and get home. Breathe fresh air. Eat…well, kippers and things, she supposed. She quickly put to the back of her mind how unhappy he would be when he found out he was paying consultancy rates rather than £24k a year.
Suddenly, she reached a clearing. As if out of nowhere, a building appeared amongst the trees. It consisted of a wood frame in a peculiar rhombus shape. The walls were sheer glass, rising diagonally outwards from the grassy forest floor. It looked exactly like what it was: the office of the forest. It was beautiful.
Katie got out of the now mud-encrusted car and took a deep breath. She could see two shadowy figures inside – presumably they could see her a lot better from the inside out. She squinted at the glass, trying to work out where the door was. She had a vision of herself walking straight into a wall and breaking her nose. Maybe she’d get sick leave and have to go straight home. And they’d give her a nose job on the NHS.
She spied the door and walked through it.
‘Hello?’ she said tentatively. There was no answer. She could hear voices, and stepped through the wood-panelled foyer.
‘Hello?’
Inside the large clean open-plan room, with a picture perfect view, two men were poring over a single newspaper.
‘Hello?’
‘PRICKWOBBLING DICKO!’ shouted one of the men suddenly. Katie recognised Harry’s voice immediately.
The other man was heavier set and his voice much more accented. ‘God, if only we had someone to deal with the bloody papers, like.’
‘Ta dah!’ exclaimed Katie.
Both the men whirled around, startled.
‘Yes?’ said Harry, his dark eyes flashing at her in a cross ‘can I help you?’ kind of a way.
She walked towards him, smiling confidently. ‘Hello, I’m Katie Watson.’
Harry stopped and looked her up and down, clearly trying to place her from somewhere.
‘Olivia at LiWebber sent me,’ she said. ‘For a temporary assignment.’
‘Hello,’ said the older man. ‘I’m…’
‘I remember you!’ said Harry. ‘You’re the girl that came up on the train!’
‘I have no idea what you’re talking about.’
‘I think I asked them to send me somebody else. I’m sure I did. Didn’t I?’
Katie decided to ignore this, and shook hands with the other man.
‘Derek Cameron,’ he said. ‘I’m the…’ he coughed suddenly. ‘Executive assistant. Which isn’t like a secretary or anything. Nothing like it.’
‘Derek, make us both a coffee, while I sort this out,’ said Harry loftily.
‘Sure thing, boss,’ replied Derek, disappearing into the back.
‘Well,’ said Harry, sitting back in his armchair and eyeing her carefully. ‘Uh, welcome.’
‘Thank you,’ said Katie. He stared at her again, then blinked. With his dark eyes and thick curly hair, Katie suddenly realised who he reminded her of – Gordon Brown. When he was younger and thinner. Much younger and much thinner, she thought. But there was the same brooding, distracted air and lack of speaking terms with combs.
‘Find your way up all right from the big smoke?’
‘Yes,’ said Katie, ‘although we’re not staying in a very nice place.’
‘Really?’ he leaned over his desk, suddenly looking interested. ‘What’s wrong with it?’
Katie described at length the horrid food, scary demeanour and general grimness of the Water Lane guest-house. About halfway through, realising that Harry was still staring at her, she remembered suddenly that there were only about nine people living in the town and he must know all of them.
‘…so, but, actually, apart from that, it’s lovely, great and we’re very happy,’ she finished in a gush.
Harry was quiet.
‘She’s your mum, isn’t she?’
‘Not quite.’
‘Gran?’
‘Aunt, actually. Brought me up after my mum died.’
Uncharitably, Katie’s first thought was, ‘well, that explains a lot’. Her second was, ‘how annoying, having that to throw in every time you wanted to win a conversation’. Fortunately it was her third that actually came out of her mouth. ‘I’m really, really sorry.’
‘It was a long time ago,’ said Harry. ‘And she couldn’t cook then either, to the best of my recollection.’
Katie stared at the floor, her face burning.
‘Well, anyway,’ said Harry finally. ‘I find it’s probably best to…buy your own sheets, stuff like that. There’s a woman in town gives you a discount if you tell her where you’re staying.’
‘Thanks,’ said Katie, thinking it best not to mention that the plans she and Louise had discussed that morning included moving out as soon as humanly possible, burning the place to the ground, then salting the land.
‘So, what’s my first assignment?’
Derek returned, bearing three cracked mugs bearing pictures of trees on the side. They said ‘Don’t commit TREEson, come see us this SEASON’.
These people need help, thought Katie.
‘The prickwobbling dicko,’ prompted Derek.
‘Oh, yes,’ said Harry. ‘Iain Kinross. Iain Kinross of the West Highland Times. Yes, yes. Iain Kinross.’
‘Our evil arch-nemesis,’ added Derek helpfully.
Harry brandished the paper and threw it down on the desk. ‘You have to sort him out.’
Katie picked up the paper.
‘He’s pursuing a vendetta against us,’ said Harry gravely. The headline read ‘Further Deciduous Cuts’. It meant nothing to Katie.
‘He writes that we’re killing all the trees.’
‘Are you?’
‘Yes,’ said Harry. ‘We start by weeding out the gay and disabled trees.’
‘Don’t listen to him,’ said Derek.
‘No,’ said Katie, who’d come to this conclusion on her own.
‘Yes!’ said Harry indignantly. ‘Wages paid by me, both of you. Now, you –’ he pointed at Katie ‘– go into town. Introduce yourself to Kinross. Simper a bit, you know, do that girlie thing. Toss your hair a little.’
‘I will not,’ said Katie. ‘I’m not a horse.’
Harry rolled his eyes. ‘Just tell him you’re new here and that you were kind of hoping he’d go easy on you until you’ve settled in.’
‘That’s not the kind of thing I’ve usually found works on journalists,’ said Katie. ‘Especially not evil ones.’
‘Well, what’s your great plan then, Miss Whoever-you-are?’
Katie didn’t know, but given the atmosphere of outright hostility, she was on Iain Kinross’s side pretty much already. ‘Let me go and talk to him,’ she said, trying to sound professional.
‘Exactly. Bit of the old eyelash-fluttering. See, Derek, I told you a lassie would help things around here.’
‘Of course, boss.’
‘They’re like Mr Burns and Smithers.’
Katie had run into Louise with comparative ease, given that there were only three streets in Fairlish, and only one person on any of them.
‘Great,’ said Louise. ‘I’m starving. Let’s cut our losses and run. We could be in Glasgow in five hours, and it rocks.’
‘I don’t think it’s going to be that easy,’ said Katie, looking around her. ‘Do you know, Starbucks would clean up around here.’
‘Who from? Mrs Miggin’s pie shop?’ Louise pointed to a little bakers-cum-teashop. It still had the original round glass panes in its tiny windows, and was painted pink. It looked cosy and welcoming, with condensation fogging up the glass. ‘Why isn’t it that easy? They can take the high road, and we’ll take the low road, and we’ll be shopping at LK Bennett’s before them.’
The heavy bakery doors clanged as they walked in. The shop was hot, steamy and full of old men chattering away in a musical brogue. Everyone fell silent immediately. Katie and Louise were about the same height as most of them.
‘Do you sell coffee?’ Louise asked the friendly-looking red-haired chap behind the counter, which would have been fine if she hadn’t felt the need to over-enunciate in a very posh-sounding way while making the international signal for coffee by shaking imaginary beans in her hand, and looking a bit of a Gareth Hunt in the process.
Alongside the chap there was a tallish, angular young girl, with a sulky expression and a face that was quite possibly rather beautiful, if it were not crowned by a ridiculous pie-crust, olde-world elasticated bonnet and a murderous expression.
‘Aw, caawww-feee?’ she said, shaking her hand in the same stupid gesture Louise had used. ‘Ah dunno. Mr MacKenzie, dweez sell CAAWWW-FEEE?’
Mr MacKenzie looked at the two girls with some sympathy. ‘Don’t be stupid, Kelpie,’ he said. ‘Serve theys.’
Kelpie gave the all-purpose teenage tut and walked over to a silver pot in the corner, slopping out two measures of instant into polystyrene cups before adding half a pint of milk and two sugars to each without asking them.
‘Anything else for you girls?’ said Mr MacKenzie pleasantly. ‘Macaroni pie?’
‘Let me just check my Atkins list,’ said Louise. Katie kicked her.
‘Umm.’
Nothing in the case laid out in front of them looked in the least bit familiar. There were pale brown slabs of what might have been fudge, only harder, lots of circular pies with holes poked in the middle of them which seemed, on closer examination, to hold anything from rhubarb to mince. There were gigantic, mutant sausage rolls and what may or may not have been very flat Cornish pasties. But both girls were starving. Suddenly Katie’s eyes alighted on the scones.
‘Two…um, of those please.’ She couldn’t remember how to pronounce the word. Was it scawn or scoone?
‘The macaroons?’
‘No, um, the…’
‘French cake?’
What on earth was a French cake?
‘The scoones,’ said Louise. Katie winced. There was a pause, then everyone in the shop started laughing.
‘Of course,’ said the man serving, who had a kind face. ‘Would that be a roosin scoone or a choose scoone?’
Maybe not that kind.
Louise and Katie found a bench in a tiny sliver of public park overlooking the harbour. The boats were coming back in, even though it was only ten in the morning. They looked beautiful and timeless, their jaunty red and green painted hulls outlined against the dark blue water. Katie was throwing most of her (delicious) scone to the cawing seagulls.
‘Now I’ve got to find some complete stranger and try and intimidate them.’
‘Ah yes,’ said Louise. ‘A great change from your usual job. Of finding complete strangers and licking their arses until they buy something.’