Rachel's Coming Home (16 page)

‘Your daughter?' said the woman to Philip, smiling fondly at the child. He had to admit she was a pretty little thing.

‘Niece,' he said. ‘She's been staying for the school holidays. The weather's been mixed, it started off lovely but the last couple of weeks haven't been so good.'

A middle-aged couple nearby joined in the conversation. ‘It's been wet here, has it? We've just got back from the Canaries and we didn't see a drop of rain the whole fortnight.'

‘Very wet,' said the shop assistant. ‘I hear there were even floods over Boroughbie way.'

‘That's right,' said Philip, pleased for once to have some bit of local knowledge. ‘The Collington Boarding Kennels had a bad time of it, water from the burn behind them flooded right through the place.'

‘Collington Kennels?' asked the wife of the couple, looking horrified.

‘Yes, the ones on the road between here and Boroughbie. The family managed very well, considering.'

‘They said the water was up to here,' said Amelia, wide eyed, showing a height almost at her thigh.

‘Well, maybe not quite that deep,' said Philip quickly, wondering why the couple looked so concerned. ‘Anyway, young lady, have you made a decision yet? The cashmere scarf or the brooch, what's it to be?'

The couple hurried away and the shop assistant reluctantly turned from the fascinating topic of the weather to helping the child with her purchases.

When Philip and Amelia returned to the car park they found a crowd of people around one of the cars. As they neared, Philip realised with a sinking heart it was his Freelander. He was rather proud of this vehicle, the first he had every purchased new, and he hurried over.

‘What's happened?' he demanded. A solidly-built, dark-haired man, a couple of teenagers and what looked like half a coach-party turned as he approached.

‘This your car?' said the man.

‘Yes, it is. I …' Then Philip saw the damage. Someone had driven into the rear off side. Even with the hefty bumper of the Freelander, the damage was severe. All the lights were broken and the bodywork buckled. ‘Who did this? What on earth's happened?'

‘It wasnae us,' said one of the youths quickly.

‘It was a white pickup,' said the dark-haired man. ‘Luckily I was just getting out of my own car and saw the whole thing. I shouted at him to stop but he ignored me. He was reversing too fast out of that space there, see. He must have known he'd hit something but he just drove off.'

‘Terrible,' said one of the coach party. ‘Don't know what the world is coming to.'

Philip could feel himself shaking with anger. ‘This is going to cost a fortune, not to mention the inconvenience. And I suppose I'll have to claim against my own insurance if we don't know who did it.'

‘Ah, but we do,' said the dark-haired man. ‘I took a note of his number. I don't like to see people getting away with something like that.' He handed over a scrap of paper on which he had scribbled the registration.

‘Quick thinking, son,' said someone. ‘Well done.'

‘You'll probably need to get the police involved,' advised another of the coach party. ‘Report it to them, they can trace the van for you.'

‘We'll be witnesses,' said the youths, showing bravado now. ‘We saw it all, didn't we?'

The coach party began to drift away and Philip used his mobile to call the police. Then he took down the names of the two youths and the very helpful dark-haired man. He was an outdoor type who identified himself as, ‘Freddy Smith, Inshie Heights Farm.' The name rang a bell with Philip but he didn't have time to think about that now.

‘You've been really helpful,' he said, shaking the man's hand. ‘I can't thank you enough. If you hadn't taken down the number that driver would have got away with it.'

‘Don't like to see people breaking the law,' said the man in the same abrupt tones. ‘Too many people try it on, littering, building without permission, I don't know what. It's our responsibility to see these things don't happen.'

‘Absolutely,' said Philip, thinking guiltily that he was probably the sort of person who would have turned a blind eye. He wouldn't have wanted to waste his time. It was bad enough waiting for the police when his own vehicle was involved, he doubted he would have been prepared to make the effort for someone else. It was a sobering thought.

It was a good hour later when he and Amelia finally left the town. By this time Philip's patience had well and truly run out. He hated bureaucracy and was still smarting from the damage to his beautiful car. He supposed he should be relieved it was still driveable.

‘Are we going to go and see Rachel?' asked Amelia as they approached the Collington's white cottage.

‘Not today,' said Philip. He wasn't in the mood for being sociable. He had also just remembered where he had heard the name Freddy Smith before. He was the Collington's neighbour, whom Rachel claimed was thoroughly unpleasant. Philip hadn't found him unpleasant at all, which only increased his doubts about Rachel. He really didn't understand her.

Chapter Thirteen

To Anthony's surprise, life seemed to be going OK at the moment. The whole of the last year, which was supposed to have been his fun gap year, he had been dogged by doubts about his proposed university course. Now he had made the decision not to pursue IT studies, he felt free. Rachel was right, if he didn't want to follow that career, then there was absolutely no point in doing the course.

At first he had resented Rachel's presence at home, but he was starting to realise she wasn't all bad. And also, oddly, that she wasn't as capable as he had always assumed her to be. She had been really thrown by the flood, more so than their father, who had concentrated on working to solve the problem, or their mother, who had taken her lead from her husband and vowed not to worry. Rachel seemed to think there was something they could have done to avoid the catastrophe, and the water had frightened her more than he would have expected. Funny to think that tough old Rachel could be frightened.

The only down side to life was that Gemma would soon be going away to Glasgow. She had still refused to go out with him, but she
seemed
to enjoy his company. With both of them working at the hotel he saw almost as much of her as even he desired. Maybe once she was no longer living at home she would give him a chance? Or maybe she would meet a student as bright and hardworking as herself, with a good career in prospect, and forget all about him? The thought was horrifying.

He wished she wasn't quite so excited about the adventure ahead of her.

‘I'm going to miss you,' he said gloomily as she chatted away about her room in the halls of residence.

‘You can come and visit. And I'll come home to see Dad as much as I can; he'll be lonely without me.'

Secretly Anthony thought she would be mad to come and spend time with her father who made life so difficult for her now. ‘You'll make a new life up there, you'll forget all about us.'

‘Rubbish,' she said, laughing. ‘You see your friend James and others who are away at college, don't you? I thought you were out with them last night.'

‘I was. But that was only because you wouldn't go out with me.'

‘I had to cook Dad's meal, you know that. Anyway, time to go back in, that's our coffee break over.'

They had been sitting on a bench in the back garden of the hotel, glad of a few minutes' fresh air. Anthony had been delighted that Mrs Mackenzie seemed to be scheduling their breaks to coincide. At least someone was on his side.

And then, the very next day, he managed to upset Mrs Mackenzie.

He didn't mean to. That was the last thing he would have wanted, she had been really cool with him, first of all offering him the job and then not making a big fuss when he made the odd mistake.

The evening started well enough. It was a Friday and therefore rather busy with a mixture of locals and hotel residents. James and a couple of Anthony's other friends came in for their first drink of the evening. This wasn't their normal drinking haunt, but they said they wanted to see how he was getting on. It was a bit embarrassing, having to pull their pints, with them joking he wouldn't get the head right, but he managed OK. Then Stewart, the older barman, gave them a look, and they took their drinks off to a table and left him in peace.

‘You getting on all right?' asked Stewart.

‘Mmm.' Anthony nodded, unsure if the man was annoyed at the noise his friends had been making. Most of the clientele were middle-aged and frowned at the continuing hoots of laughter from the boys. Anthony wished James hadn't brought Russell Simpson with him, he was always far too loud.

‘You're doing fine. Can you get some more bottles of dry white from the cellar? We've nearly run out. I'll deal with this lot.'

Anthony did as he was bidden, pleased to have got off lightly. When he returned Stewart was serving a grey-haired man who looked vaguely familiar.

‘So I said to my wife, I said, if they can't look after wee Pixie the way we would do at home she's no' going back there.'

Anthony's ears perked up. He recognised the name of the little Yorkshire terrier immediately and recalled now that she was owned by an elderly couple from Boroughbie. What on earth was the man talking about?

‘They're aye in the papers one way or another, those kennels. Makes you think, doesn't it?' The man took a satisfied swallow of his pint and wiped the froth from his upper lip.

Anthony stepped forwards. ‘And which kennels would that be you're talking about?'

‘Now, now,' said Stewart, frowning at his tone.

‘Collington Kennels, they call them. Always seemed all right before but with all the troubles we had with our flight back and then coming home to find Pixie in a fair state by wife's up to high doe.'

‘What's wrong with Pixie?' demanded Anthony.

‘Nothing wrong, as such. But they had a massive flood out at the place. Know it, do you? Out on the Moffat road. Not that they told us about the flood, oh no. Pixie could have been washed away for all we'd have known about it if I hadn't heard it mentioned in the town.'

‘That's my parents' kennels you're talking about,' said Anthony, feeling the anger rising. ‘If you have anything to complain about you should speak to them directly.'

‘Anthony, there are customers waiting,' said Stewart.

‘If your parents can't be bothered to speak to me about what Pixie had to go through I don't see why I should go asking them anything. But you can tell them from me, my Yorkie won't be going back there, not after the way she was treated.'

Anthony couldn't believe anyone could be so unreasonable. And about his parents, who would never harm anyone. ‘Don't be so ridiculous! You don't know how she was treated. I do 'cos I was there and I can tell you she was safe and sound in the house the whole time. Not a single dog was harmed in any way but with Pixie being so small she was the first one we took inside. My mother had her on her lap and the dog loved every minute of it.' He glowered at the man. ‘Maybe that's why my parents didn't say anything, because there was nothing to say!'

‘Well now, young man …' began Pixie's owner, put out by the reaction he had provoked and going rather red in the face. ‘That's as maybe, but how was I to know? They were talking about a river running through the place and I don't know what.'

‘You shouldn't believe everything you hear,' continued Anthony, and then found himself being pulled sharply away by none other than Mrs Mackenzie herself.

‘I need a hand in the back kitchen,' she said loudly. ‘Come with me
at once
.'

It was only then Anthony looked around and realised every conversation in the bar had stopped. They were all staring at him. Not the sort of scene Mrs Mackenzie wanted played out in her lounge bar on a busy Friday night.

‘I can't believe you got into an argument like that,' said Rachel, not for the first time.

‘I was upset. The man was being so nasty and it wasn't fair.'

‘But there are ways of dealing with these things.' Rachel glanced through to the conservatory where her parents were watching television. Anthony had been right to tell them of the incident at the Boroughbie Arms Hotel, but she feared that it had upset her parents more than they were saying. Physical problems such as the flood did not seem to trouble them nearly as much as people speaking badly about the kennels. Her father had tried to phone Mr Donaldson, Pixie's owner, to put things straight, but all he had got was an answer phone. He had left a message but the Donaldsons hadn't phoned back.

‘It's so unfair,' said Anthony, his young face unusually grim. ‘I wonder who has been saying bad things about us?'

‘Who knows?' Rachel shook her head. It was horrible to think that someone had it in for them. ‘Anyway, shouldn't you be off to work?'

‘I'm not working tonight. I wasn't rostered to work before all this happened, but now I don't know if Mrs Mackenzie will want me back. She was pretty upset.'

‘Not surprising,' said Rachel, and then relented, seeing how troubled her brother looked. ‘Look, if she didn't tell you not to come back I'm sure she'll be OK. Probably a good thing you're not working today, give her time to get over it.'

‘I suppose,' said Anthony, still gloomy.

‘So are you going out with James? Or Gemma?'

‘Don't feel like it. I think I'll just have an early night. I'm taking Gemma's place serving breakfasts tomorrow so I'll have to be up first thing.'

‘Good for you,' said Rachel encouragingly. She was amazed at how conscientious he was about his hotel work. ‘And you've got Monday to look forward to, with Rupert Randall.'

‘If I don't mess that up too,' said Anthony, but his expression wasn't as gloomy as his words.