Читать книгу Where Have All the Boys Gone? - Jenny Colgan - Страница 9

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.’

‘That is not what PR is about,’ said Katie. ‘Except in, you know, the specifics.’

Louise kicked her heels. ‘What do you think people do around here for fun?’

‘Torture the foreigners,’ said Katie. She nodded her head towards the baker’s. Kelpie was heading over their way with two cronies. She had shaken off her ridiculous pie-crust hat to reveal a thick head of wavy hair with four or five rainbow-hued colours streaked through it, and taken out a packet of cigarettes. Even from fifty feet away, it was clear that she was doing an impression of Katie and Louise.

‘We’re big news around these here parts,’ said Katie. ‘I think we’d better make ourselves scarce, before we get bullied by a pile of twelve-year-olds. I’m going to find this Iain Kinross character. Sounds like some anal old baldie geezer who sits in his bedsit writing angry letters to the Daily Mail. He’ll be putty in my hands.’

The three girls had seen them now; Kelpie was pointing them out. They were screaming with laughter in an over-exaggerated way.

‘Oh no you don’t,’ said Louise. ‘Not without me. They’ll flay me alive.’

‘They’re harmless,’ said Katie as they both got up from the bench and started to back away.

‘I don’t care,’ said Louise. ‘Take me with you, please.’

‘I can’t!’

‘Of course you can! Just say I’m your…PA.’

‘I’m not paying you.’

‘Oh my God, you’re a true Scottish person already,’ said Louise.

‘I’d like a SSSCCCCOOOOOOOONNNNE,’ came from the other side of the park, carried on the wind.

‘OK,’ said Katie. ‘But you’d better keep your mouth shut.’

‘A SSSCCCCOOOOOOOONNNNE!’

It took them a while to find the offices of the West Highland Times, situated up a tiny alleyway off the main street of old grey stone buildings, which hosted a post office, a fishmongers, a kind of broom handle/vacuum cleaner bits and bobs type of place, a Woolworths and sixteen shops selling pet rocks and commemorative teaspoons. They looked very quiet at this time of year.

The small oak door was set into a peculiar turret on the edge of a house made of a particularly windworn granite. It was studded with large dark bolts, and only a tiny brass plaque set low on the left-hand side identified it. There didn’t appear to be a bell, so, taking the initiative, Katie bowed her head and crept up the spiral staircase. Louise, whispering crossly under her breath at the exercise involved, followed her.

A little old man with grey hair sat at the top in a small room with an open door leading into the main body of the building. Katie could glimpse computers, typewriters and masses of paper beyond, and hear the regular dins and telephone calls of a newsroom.

They were not greeted with a welcoming smile.

‘Did ye’s no knock?’

Louise screwed up her face. Was no one going to be friendly to them around here?

‘Sorry?’ said Katie politely. ‘Hello there. I’m from the Forestry Commission. I’d like to see Iain Kinross please.’

‘He’s busy.’

‘How do you know?’ said Louise.

‘Shut up Louise,’ said Katie, and motioned to her friend to sit in a chair, awkwardly positioned around the curve of the wall.

‘I’m sure he won’t be too busy to see me,’ said Katie. She’d dealt with tougher hacks than this. ‘Could you tell him I’ve come from Harry Barr’s office?’

‘In that case, he’s busy for ever,’ said the man.

Katie heard a snort come from Louise. ‘I’ve got for ever,’ she said. ‘I think I’ll just stand here and wait until he comes out. Or in.’

‘You cannae do that,’ said the man. ‘I’ll…I’ll call security.’

‘Unless your security’s name is Kelpie, you’re not going to scare me with that,’ said Katie. ‘My name is Katie Watson and I’ve come from the Forestry Commission. Please just tell him I’m here.’

The man looked at her, then turned back to his computer. ‘He’s busy,’ he muttered in the tone of somebody feeling they definitely weren’t being paid enough to take this kind of abuse.

‘Yes, busy slagging off my employer,’ said Katie. ‘Let me see him!’

‘No!’

The door to the newsroom finally banged open.

‘Archie, Archie, can ah no get a wee bit of peace and quiet in here?’ said an amused-sounding voice. ‘I’m never going to win my Pulitzer with this racket, am I?’

Katie looked up. The owner of the voice, with its gentle Highland burr, was tall with green eyes, untidy curly brown hair and a mouth that looked as though it was permanently teetering on the edge of a grin. He turned to face them.

‘What can I do for you? Let me tell you, if it’s for prize cattle, you’re swing out o’ luck.’

The man on the desk gave Katie a look which clearly read ‘I am now going to hate you for ever.’

‘I heifer feeling you’re not going to like it,’ said Katie, pushing past the now incandescently annoyed assistant.

The green-eyed man opened his arms in a gesture of surrender. ‘What about your friend?’ he said, looking over at Louise. Louise flashed him a beaming smile.

‘She’ll be fine,’ said Katie, storming into the room beyond. Then she stopped suddenly. What she’d imagined to be a full and busy newsroom was really quite small, about fifteen feet long. There were three desks, one empty, one containing another very old man talking quietly down the phone, and one clearly belonging to the man beside her. In the corner was an old-fashioned record player, playing, at full volume, a sound effects track of typing, telephoning, shouting…

‘You’re really not meant to be in here,’ said the young man with a sigh.

Katie stared at the record player and back to him.

‘It’s for advertising,’ he said apologetically. ‘That goes through Mr Beaumont there, but not everyone has a telephone and some people like to pop in on market day and

‘You want them to think there’s a million people working here.’

‘Working for the good of the town.’ The man’s green eyes danced mischievously. ‘Well, you’ve scooped us. Unfortunately, I’m not sure the local paper will run it.’

Katie smiled and put out her hand. ‘Well, I’d like to say your secret’s safe with me…’

He took it and bowed low. ‘Yes, bonny English maid?’

‘But I’m afraid I’ve been sent here by Harry Barr.’

He dropped her hand as if it were a live snake. ‘Och, you have not now.’ He looked around as if for assistance.

‘You have to be Iain Kinross.’

He rubbed the back of his neck. ‘Um, no. That was him out on the front desk. Bit of a dour type.’

He paced across the room and sat down on the comfortable green leather swivel chair in front of his desk. He had an antiquated computer in front of him, and a rather more used-looking typewriter; small Stanley knives and tubes of paper glue littered the tabletop and floor, and piles of paper filled the shelves around his desk. He squinted at her, and pushed back a rogue lock of hair. ‘You don’t look like a rottweiler.’

‘I’m the new forestry PR,’ said Katie.

‘Oh God,’ said Iain, and, suddenly, he disappeared below his desk.

‘Are you being sick?’ ventured Katie, when he didn’t reappear.

‘No, uh no.’ He emerged. ‘There’s a mouse in here somewhere. Thought I saw it in one of the coffee cups.’

‘One of the coffee cups?’ said Katie. ‘How many do you have under there?’

‘One,’ he said quickly. ‘You don’t want a coffee do you?’

‘I sooo don’t.’

‘Good. That’s good. So, I suppose Harry has told you lots of horrible things about me?’

‘No.’

His open face brightened. ‘Really? That’s good.’

‘Just that you were a “prickwobbling dicko”.’

It fell again. ‘Oh.’

‘And that he’s not killing all the trees.’

At this, Iain leaned forward. ‘Look. Are you a country girl?’

‘Yes,’ said Katie quickly. Well, she’d nearly gone camping on the Duke of Edinburgh’s Award scheme once. It wasn’t her fault that it had started raining and her mother had given in to her noisy and tremulous tantrum and let her stay at home and watch Dr Who and drink hot chocolate instead. Katie had picked up a thing or two from her canny younger sister.

‘OK well, you should understand then. If they’re going to cross-fertilise from the GM firs just because they’re gaining on their EU dispensation, it’s going to be no surprise to anyone when they start to lose the red and have yet another heron panic’ He snorted at the ludicrousness of Harry’s position.

‘Heroin? Really? Up here? Well, I suppose it is Scotland,’ said Katie.

Iain stared at her suspiciously. ‘OK, well, let’s pretend I was explaining to you as if, for one minute, you weren’t a country girl. Just for fun.’

Katie got her notebook out.

‘I mean, if you keep planting one type of tree instead of lots of different types, you’re going to have to understand why animals who like lots of mixed habitats might move on. Which then affects the environment and turns back on the plantations themselves.’

‘That sounds terrible,’ said Katie. It did sound terrible. Though she didn’t know why.

‘It is,’ said Iain, pounding his fist on the desk, which made lots of suspicious-sounding clinking china noises. ‘That’s why you…’

‘Katie,’ said Katie.

‘That’s why you, Katie, have to help me. That man is killing trees.’

‘Yes!’ said Katie, fired up with zeal. ‘Oh, hang on. No! I can’t! I work for him.’

‘This isnae about “me” or “him”,’ said Iain, gazing into her eyes. ‘This is for the trees, Katie.’

She looked at him for a second, then the moment was broken by the low trill of a mobile phone. A nice masculine ring, she couldn’t help thinking.

‘Kinross. Yeah? Oh, cock. Right, right, OK.’ He snapped it shut. ‘I’m so sorry. I have to go. Some stupid sheep’s just had octuplets and it’ll probably make the front page. Drink tonight?’

The invitation was so direct, Katie didn’t even see it coming and wasn’t sure what it meant. Was it a date or a continuation of their business conversation? She shouldn’t really be fraternising with the enemy, should she – even if he was hot? On the other hand, the alternative was huddling under two sheets in a hayloft with Louise, so she wasn’t in a position to be picky.

‘Um, OK. Where?’

Iain, who was now shrugging his way into a parka, laughed. ‘Well, take your pick. There’s the Rum and Thump or the Mermaid or…nope, that’s it.’

‘The Mermaid, please,’ said Katie fervently. The name sounded a bit more appealing.

‘Got a taste for the wild side have we? OK, see you at seven. Remember –’ he indicated the audio-challenged room sternly ‘– tell no one. Or Mr Beaumont will be on you like a cougar.’

The aged Mr Beaumont declined to look up from his whispered conversation on the telephone. Or maybe he couldn’t.

‘A cougar,’ warned Iain again. Then he was gone.

Katie trailed behind him weakly as he swept out of the turret. She could see Louise’s plaintive face follow him down the stairway as she emerged. Louise raised her eyes expectantly.

‘I have to go back to the office,’ said Katie, officiously. In fact, she needed five minutes by herself to think.

‘Well?’ asked Louise as they exited the small building, pausing only to give the receptionist evils.

Katie was feeling slightly more understanding. ‘Well what?’

‘Well what what? Did you just see that guy?!’

‘Iain?’

‘Ooh, yes, Iain, of course. You know him so well now. Yes, how was Iain, your husband. Iain. Everyone likes Iain. Iain and Katie.’

‘Shut up Louise,’ said Katie, trying to swallow down a blush.

‘Well spill then. Jeez, the first hot, non-psychotic male we’ve seen in months and now you’re trying to pretend you’re Joan of Arc’

‘Well, he seems all right,’ conceded Katie. ‘First person we’ve met so far that didn’t hate us on sight anyway.’

‘That’s good,’ said Louise. ‘Definitely, that’s a good sign.’ She futilely pulled the collar of her Karen Millen coat up against the stiff breeze coming in from the sea. ‘Christ. You’d have thought people would have realised it was cold up here.’

‘They did,’ said Katie as they looked out across the bay. ‘That’s why there’s so few of them. You have to admit, it’s pretty though.’

‘The South of France is pretty,’ mused Louise. ‘I’m amazed it’s never occurred to them to just go there.’

Katie turned back towards the car. ‘Well, there’s no parking problems.’

‘Can I sit in your car all afternoon?’

‘Yes. And by the way, Iain asked me out for a drink tonight.’

Louise squealed. ‘You bitch! You cast-iron bitch!’

By a tremulous stroke of bad luck, around the cobbled corner at that exact moment came Kelpie and her two cronies. They stared at each other for a moment. Then hurried away in barely concealed hysterics.

‘CAAARRRRSSSTTTTT AYRRRON BEEETCH!’ echoed up and down the high street.

‘I’m actually glad to know we’ve doubled the entertainment available in this town in such a short space of time,’ said Katie, unlocking the car. ‘We should sell tickets.’

‘Well?’ Harry barked, somewhat rudely. He seemed preoccupied, eating a large home-made sandwich. Derek was nowhere to be seen. Katie was starving and watched him munch away, salivating. Carelessly, he ripped off a piece of his sandwich and threw it on the floor. Before Katie had time to object, there was a lazy snapping sound. Leaning over the desk, Katie saw the most beautiful black Labrador stretched out at his feet.

‘Ooh, lovely doggie,’ said Katie, before she could help herself. Harry looked at her as if she’d just insulted his mother (which of course, she’d already managed earlier).

‘Francis isn’t a “doggie”,’ said Harry, spluttering crumbs. ‘He’s a working animal.’

Francis didn’t look anything like a working animal, unless he was a member of a particularly strong trade union. He batted his long eyelashes at her twice, then fell asleep.

‘Sorry,’ said Katie. ‘Does he bite?’

‘Yes, that’s the kind of work he does,’ said Harry scathingly. ‘He bites ditzy PR girls. Got his paws full around here.’

‘You’re a very hostile person,’ said Katie. ‘Is it the sandwich?’

For once, Harry looked nonplussed. He soon regained his sangfroid. ‘What did Kinross say?’

‘I think you may have something of an image problem,’ said Katie.

‘In English?’

‘Um, he says…’ she consulted her notebook urgently, ‘that there’s an issue with biodiversity, herons, food chain implications, blah blah blah…basically you’re killing all the trees.’

‘Typical!’ said Harry furiously. ‘I’m going to kill that little prick.’

‘And we come back to the image problem.’

‘OK,’ said Harry. ‘Now you see our problem. So, what are you going to do about that little shit?’

This was Katie’s moment. She was usually pretty good at the client pitch of how they were going to find the USP and work it to their point of view, then extend that point of view throughout the nation. Although usually facing her across the table were excited haircare product manufacturers and the implication was that she could get it about that Jennifer Aniston used their gunk. She wasn’t used to trying to convince a homicidal tree-hugger and his gently snoring dog.

‘Well, first, I think we need to have a meeting. Have a frank and fearless exchange of views. Really get to grips with what the underlying misunderstandings are. Maybe over a nice lunch somewhere. Then…’

‘Well, that’s absolutely out of the question,’ said Harry. ‘Next.’

‘There’s nowhere to get a nice lunch?’

‘Well, that too. But I hate that lying son of a bitch.’

‘Why?’

Katie was excitedly picking over the possibilities in her head. There must be a girl involved, surely? Hearts broken? Ooh, maybe they were long-lost brothers? TWINS, bitter rivals, born on the same day, to grow up to strive over the heart and soul of the town, nay, the very Highlands themselves…

‘That’s none of your business,’ said Harry, heading out of the door.

‘He’s such a grumpy bastard,’ moaned Katie later, back at their digs.

‘He really does sound like Gordon Brown. Are you sure he’s not a bit romantic and rugged?’

Louise was putting make-up on, thus intruding on Katie’s date by insinuation whilst pretending to be simply trying out new lipstick. She’d managed to find some candles with which to light their dank room, which, although flattering, was forcing them to apply lipstick in the style of Coco the Clown.

‘No, retarded. He’s clearly got some kind of big gay crush on Iain.’

‘Haven’t we all?’ Louise circled some rouge on her cheeks.

‘You’re not coming, you know.’

‘Just a quick drink. Please. I’ve seen the visitors’ lounge here.’

‘What’s it like?’

Louise shuddered. ‘There was an old man sitting in the corner watching University Challenge. He didn’t look up when I walked in. I think he was dead and ossifying. Oh, and they can’t get Channel Five.’

‘Big whoop.’

‘…or 4. And ITV is called Grampian and BBC2 is in foreign.’

‘What do you mean it’s in foreign?’

‘I don’t know, do I? It looks like Postman Pat and then they all go “Grbbrrtggtthh tht ht ht th thvvvvv”.’

‘Interesting. But still, no.’

‘Do you love this guy?’

‘No!’

‘Do you love me?’

‘That is Very Unfair.’

‘You dragged me up here.’

‘You forced yourself on me!’

‘I did not! And…’ Louise pouted her bottom lip in a way Katie recognised both from primary school (natural) and secondary (fake and put on for boys and suggestible male teachers alike). ‘…I’m going through a difficult time. I thought you of all people would understand, seeing as it’s your sister that…’

Katie put her hands over her ears. ‘La la la, not listening! OK. Well, maybe there’ll be another man there for you to talk to.’

‘Are you serious? Are you really considering trying to get off with someone you might have to work against for the next eight months? Wow, you’re very brave.’

Katie hadn’t looked at it this way at all. In fact, ever since Iain had grasped her hand in his, her insides had been on something of a repeater track, like a scrambled record, which went ‘green eyes green eyes snog snog yum yikes snog snog green’, repeated ad infinitum. It didn’t really give her brain much room to process any other information. The practical consequences of the matter – that they were in a very small village, that he may well be married and that whatever the outcome she was almost certainly going to have to see him every day – had faded into the background of the insistent beat of her groin reminding her she hadn’t had sex for five months.

She pretended to give it serious consideration. ‘There are plenty of people who’ve slept with people they’ve worked with and it’s turned out great,’ she said decisively. ‘Don’t you think?’

Louise looked at her as if she was holding a dangerous animal. ‘Umm…’

‘Come on. What about…’ Alas, all that flooded Katie’s mind at that moment was the memory that Louise had met Max when she’d been briefly working at his office. Suddenly, she had a mental picture of her and Louise in fifty years’ time, with her still treading on eggshells all the time. It was a sad fact that Clara’s act had changed not only Katie and her relationship but Katie and Louise’s too. ‘Ouf,’ she said.

‘Come on,’ said Louise, changing the subject. ‘I hope you’re not wearing your pulling knickers.’

‘I didn’t even bring my pulling knickers,’ said Katie as they braced themselves against the wind outside the front door of Water Lane. ‘I just brought my thermal knickers.’

‘Maybe they find that sexy up here,’ said Louise. ‘Brrr.’