4 Death at the Happiness Club Read online

  'It was the coastal path that made me feel better,' she said mysteriously.

  Christopher had never been convinced that arguments cleared the air - in his previous experience they often left a fog of resentment hanging in it - but in this case he found himself agreeing with her. Of course she would never be cured - but at least he had realised he could live with that, and maybe if she didn't feel weighed down by his disapproval she would live with it too.

  Worn out by thinking about this, he fell asleep in his chair in the front room and didn't wake up until Amaryllis broke into the house late in the evening and started clattering about in the kitchen.

  'You're not making haggis crumble, are you?' he said, standing in the kitchen doorway watching. She cooked like a whirling dervish and was just as dangerous and unpredictable.

  'Egg on toast,' she said. 'Do you want some?'

  'A bit of toast would be nice.'

  'They kept us there for hours on end,' she said. 'Jock McLean was lucky to get out so quickly - especially as it was all his fault. Well, mostly his fault.'

  'What? Did he blow something up with a spark from his pipe?'

  'Don't even joke about that,' said Amaryllis darkly. 'It's a lethal weapon… No, it wasn't all his fault. The boat filled up with gas. The police think it might have been a faulty water heater, but they've taken away the boat for forensic tests.'

  'Foul play?'

  She put some bread in the toaster and shrugged. 'Could be. It looks like an accident though. Charlie Smith thinks so.'

  'Charlie Smith?'

  'Chief Inspector Smith to you.'

  'So you're on first name terms now, are you? Thanks to the Happiness Club?'

  Amaryllis gave him a look.

  'No need to be like that.'

  'Oh, no?' he said, sitting down at the table and folding his arms.

  'No.' She turned back to the cooker and stared at the eggs that were poaching away. 'How long do eggs take?''

  'Depends,' he said. 'Have you heard any more about Jock? From the hospital?'

  'He's got a bit of concussion and a broken leg. They'll probably dump him on his own doorstep in a day or two and expect somebody to look after him.'

  'We'd better watch out for that, then.'

  The toast popped up. She got out the butter and marmalade and an extra plate for Christopher, then turned to deal with the eggs.

  'We didn't stop on the way home for anything to eat,' she explained a few moments later, attacking the plateful of food with a knife and fork. 'I thought you'd probably have some eggs.'

  ‘Did I tell you somebody shot at us? Near Aberdour.’

  ‘What?’ She stared at him across the table.

  ‘At least, it sounded like a shot. And Caroline hurt her leg – I wondered if had been hit by a bit of rock that splintered off. When the bullet hit something.’

  ‘Did you see anyone?’

  ‘No – yes, there was somebody up above us shouting and waving. But we just wanted to get the hell out of there… We saw a police car going up there later on.’

  ‘You should have phoned them yourselves,’ she said censoriously.

  ‘We were on holiday,’ he replied. 'So - tell me about the Happiness Club. What is it anyway?'

  'It's meant to be a singles club - like an old-fashioned marriage bureau. But with lots of different social events,' she explained.

  'A singles club - so Jemima and Dave have split up then?'

  'Not exactly.'

  'What's that supposed to mean?'

  She gave him another look. 'If being with your sister makes you this grumpy, you'd better wait another couple of years before you try it again.'

  ‘I’m going over to see her and the kids next weekend, actually.’

  ‘Well, fine.’

  ‘Yes, fine!’

  They sat in hostile silence for a while. Amaryllis made herself a cup of coffee. ‘Got any of Jemima’s tablet?’ she asked.

  He had to laugh: she was just so irrepressible. He couldn’t sulk like a teenager even though he wanted to.

  ‘So could I join the Happiness Club too?’ he asked. ‘Would it make me happy?’

  ‘Depends.’

  ‘On what?’

  ‘How you define being happy. If, contrary to the advice of every self-help book and most therapists, you define it as being in a relationship, then maybe it would make you happy.’

  ‘Where do you stand on that?’ he enquired. He thought he knew the answer already, but it was fun to wind her up by asking.

  ‘It doesn’t really matter, since I’m not bothered about being happy,’ she said, foiling him.

  ‘What are you bothered about, Amaryllis?’ he asked. He regretted saying the words almost as soon as they came out; spending a week with Caroline had definitely affected him. He wouldn’t have dreamed of asking Amaryllis any kind of personal question before that.

  She thought about it as she nibbled delicately at the edges of the tablet she had excavated from a tartan tin in his biscuit cupboard.

  ‘It’s just like eating some sort of rock formation made all of sugar,’ she mused. ‘I’m bothered about people doing bad things and getting away with them. That’s more or less all, I think.’

  ‘Bad things? Isn’t that a bit negative?’

  ‘We can’t all be chirpy positive Pollyannas,’ she said firmly. ‘Somebody’s got to behave rationally.’

  He turned his derisive laugh into a coughing fit. It was all right winding up Amaryllis a bit, but he didn’t want to turn her into a mortal enemy by questioning the rationality of her behaviour. That would be an extremely dangerous strategy.

  Chapter 13 Caroline gives her opinion

  Amaryllis, Dave and Jemima were on their way to a ten-pin bowling session organised by the Happiness Club. To make up for the boat trip fiasco, this was still classified as an introductory session so they hadn't yet had to sign up for the club itself. The nearest venue for this sport was a self-styled leisure complex on the outskirts near Rosyth. Dave had offered to drive them there in the pick-up truck. The drive was the most dangerous part of the whole operation, but fortunately Amaryllis had a Zen-like approach to the terrors of being driven by Dave, and no longer noticed his tendency to ignore speed-bumps, Fiat Pandas and policemen waving mobile speed cameras. Christopher wasn't quite as Zen-like; he was meeting Caroline at North Queensferry station and they were planning to travel from there to the leisure complex by bus.

  'I thought your sister said her therapist said you couldn't find happiness in other people?' Amaryllis had asked him when he booked them both a place at the event.

  'I just thought it would be good for her to be in a normal social situation,' he said.

  Amaryllis doubted if the situation would be normal, even if it was theoretically social. The last couple of Happiness Club events had taken unexpected turns. But then, that was why she had gone to them in the first place so she couldn't really complain.

  She had asked Christopher if Caroline would mind seeing people drinking, which seemed to her to be an essential aspect of a bowling evening, but he just muttered something. The topic was closed.

  They sped into the car park of the leisure complex and screeched to a halt about two centimeters from the toes of a large uniformed bouncer. He glared at them.

  'Don't worry, he's only there to stop teenagers having a good time,' said Dave airily. They all got out.

  'Hey! You can't park there!' said the bouncer.

  'Oh, no?' said Dave, looming over him.

  The bouncer looked at him more closely. 'Oh, sorry, Mr Douglas. I didn't recognise you with all the women in tow. I'll keep an eye on your truck for you.'

  'Thanks, Billy,' said Dave. As they walked away, he commented, 'My sister-in-law's nephew's cousin. He's been scared of me since I put him right about a few things.'

  'What sort of things?' enquired Amaryllis.

  'Don't ask,' said Dave. 'You and Jemima don't want to know.'

  They found the rest of the Happi
ness Club party at the bowling alley reception desk, where Maisie Sue seemed to have caused a stir by bringing her own bowling shoes. Once that was sorted out Sean declared the party to be ready to start bowling. Christopher and Caroline hadn't yet arrived - 'I told them they'd never get here on the bus,' commented Dave - but they divided into two groups and occupied adjoining alleys.

  'I've never done this before,' confessed Jemima. 'What if your fingers get stuck in those holes in the ball?'

  'If you don't let go you get dragged all the way down to the end,' said Dave with a big wink at Amaryllis.

  'Maybe I'll just watch,' said Jemima.

  In fact her fingers didn't get stuck, and she turned out to be by far the best bowler in their group.

  'I expect it's all the experience I've had chasing wasps out of the kitchen with a rolled-up newspaper,' she said.

  In the next lane, Sean was coaching one of his sisters. Amaryllis still wasn't completely sure which was Dilly and which was Dee, but she heard him say, 'For God's sake, Dilly, relax! You'll never be able to do it if your arm stiffens up like that.'

  Amaryllis thought Dilly said something like, 'Let me go then, you bully,' but in such a low, breathless tone that the words weren't all that clear. Dee then stepped forward and pushed Sean aside unceremoniously, grabbing Dilly by the arm herself and saying, 'Look, this is how you hold the ball. Then you need to loosen your grip just before you let go.'

  Amaryllis was struck by Sean's expression as he watched his sisters. If you saw them together they were alike, but not identical. Dee was taller and held herself straighter. Dilly was so slender that her fingers looked almost as if they would break if you forced them into the holes on the ball, as Dee seemed to be doing. Dee's hair was shorter and darker. Dilly's tended to go wispy and straggly if she got agitated, which she must be by now. Amaryllis was tempted to go over to the lane and sort them all out, but she sensed it wouldn't help. This family situation must have been building up for years. The claustrophobic way they lived and worked together was unnatural. They were just too close.

  Having said that, Sean, now standing aside with a sneer on his face, wasn't much like the other two in appearance. He was rounder, redder in the face, with little resemblance either to the ethereal Dilly or the more statuesque Dee. She wondered if they were really related at all. Maybe they all just lived together in a ménage a trois. It took more than that to shock Amaryllis, but she did wonder why they were running something like the Happiness Club, with its implicit approval of conventional relationships. She hadn't come across any gays, for instance, although they were rare around Pitkirtly in any case and would have caused a bit of a stir. The idea of investigating the club on the internet to see if it was a franchise, as they had all first imagined, or perhaps the recruitment arm of some sort of cult, a possibility her mind had only now invented, had just crossed her mind when she became aware of someone greeting her.

  'Amaryllis?' said Caroline, Christopher's sister, in a nervous tone.

  Amaryllis opened her eyes, which she hadn't realised were closed until that moment.

  'Caroline! Sorry, I was thinking.'

  'Just one of her annoying little ways,' Christopher explained to his sister.

  'We've already started, but you can join in our game, if you like,' she said. 'Is that all right, Jemima? Dave? Maisie Sue? Charlie?'

  Nobody objected, so she assumed it was all right. Christopher politely allowed Caroline to sit down, while he stood beside her like some sort of guardian angel. Amaryllis hadn't met Caroline very often before, since Christopher had been keeping her out of his life for some time, and she used a lull in the game while Charlie Smith helped Maisie Sue to choose the right weight of ball to observe the two of them together. They weren't very much alike, except that they both had hazel eyes set in round faces, and permanent expressions of mild anxiety. Apart from that, Caroline had curly golden-brown hair which Amaryllis suspected came out of a packet, and she was quite a bit thinner than her brother, perhaps because of her past lifestyle.

  'Do you want to have a go?' Charlie Smith was asking Caroline. He leaned towards her, and she shrank back in the seat.

  'Maybe in a while,' she said.

  'How about you?' said Mr Smith to Christopher. They glared at each other. It was a kind of default position for both of them.

  'OK,' said Christopher. He turned out to be a useless bowler, and sent both balls almost straight into the gutter, but then he was distracted at the moment by having to look after Caroline. If only they would both relax a bit… Amaryllis found herself getting tense on their behalf. She hoped nobody would upset Caroline.

  'Aaah!' came a cry. Jemima seemed to have got stuck as she leaned forward to release the ball. Dave rushed to help her up. She hobbled to the group of seats, clutching the small of her back.

  'Oh, dear, I suppose I got a bit carried away with myself,' she said sadly. 'Just when things were going so well too… Don't mind me, just carry on,' she added. After clustering round her for a few moments, they did just that. Dave fetched her a drink from the bar. Amaryllis noticed Caroline watching.

  'Do you want to join in and take Jemima's turn?'

  'All right,' said Caroline. 'But I won’t be any good.'

  'You can't be as useless as Christopher,' said Amaryllis.

  'Thanks very much,' said Christopher. But he didn't seem very upset.

  As Caroline stepped forward to pick up a ball, she glanced sideways into the next lane - and stopped in her tracks, staring at someone.

  'What's the matter?' Christopher asked her.

  'I thought I saw - no, it couldn't be. Never mind. I'll just get on now.'

  She launched the ball forwards energetically. It trickled a few yards and then went sideways just as Christopher's had.

  'Sorry,' she said. She turned away, once again casting a glance into the next lane. Amaryllis tried to work out who she had been staring at, but everyone was clustered around Sean, who had just scored a strike. He gave one of his sisters a big kiss to celebrate. It seemed to be Dee who was the favoured one. Dilly was watching with a face like thunder.

  'Tears before bedtime', said Amaryllis, half to herself.

  'Amaryllis? Can I have a quick word with you?' said Caroline, who was standing in front of her again. 'Not here - I don't want to be overheard.'

  They went to the Ladies together. It made Amaryllis feel like a teenager. 'We'll be dancing round our handbags soon at this rate,' she muttered.

  'Sorry, what did you say?'

  'Nothing. So what do you want to talk to me about?'

  Amaryllis tried to make her tone brisk, in the hope that the discussion wouldn't involve soul-baring on anyone's part, group hugs or any self-help mumbo-jumbo. But what Caroline had to say took her completely by surprise.

  'I've seen someone I recognise.'

  'Well, you know Jemima and Dave already, don't you? Was it Maisie Sue? American woman, sculpted hair, funny bowling shoes.'

  'No, somebody over in the next lane.'

  Amaryllis thought about it. Penelope or Zak Johnstone? The man from the fish shop? Two girls from the hairdressers'?

  'Man or woman?' she enquired.

  'Well - both, I suppose,' said Caroline.

  'Um, both. A drag artist?'

  'No, I mean one of each.'

  'Don't tell me - the Frasers.'

  'No, that wasn't it. I think they were McIlroys. From Belfast.'

  'Hmm. So where did you meet them?' asked Amaryllis.

  'That's the thing. I don't know where I met them - it just doesn't seem as if it would be a good memory. There was something I didn't like about it - I think. Sorry, I'm not making sense. I don't want to tell Christopher. He'll have me put back in hospital. He already thinks - well, never mind that.'

  'Take your time - maybe it'll come back to you.'

  'Is there anything you can do?'

  'What do you mean?' said Amaryllis cautiously. 'What do you think I might be able to do?'

  'I don'
t know - find out if they've got some sort of, well, history.'

  'Can you point them out to me somehow when we go back in? Without them seeing?' Amaryllis imagined Caroline must mean the Frasers. They had never seemed quite genuine to her either. 'Just to make sure we're talking about the same people.'

  'I think so,' said Caroline cautiously.

  When they returned to their lane, everyone was in the middle of congratulating Christopher on a strike. He smiled smugly.

  'Just a fluke,' he said several times, as if he didn't really believe that.

  'They're over there,' said Caroline quietly, nudging Amaryllis. 'Drinking Guinness.'

  She looked over. Sean Fraser and both his sisters were sitting together with the distinctive drinks in their hands.

  'Which of the women?' said Amaryllis just as quietly.

  'Oh, the one with the short hair, I think,' said Caroline.

  'Come on and have another go, Caroline,' said Mr Smith. 'Maybe bowling runs in the family after all.'

  It quickly became obvious that it didn't. The novelty wore off soon after that, and the party began to break up.

  'Where are you and Christopher heading now?' Amaryllis enquired casually as she and Caroline put their coats on.

  'Oh, I'm just going home,' said Caroline. 'Faisal and Marina are there. I need to get back.'

  'We're getting the bus to the station,' said Christopher, suddenly appearing next to his sister. He glared at Amaryllis as if she might pose some sort of threat to their family togetherness. Amaryllis felt a stab of indignation: she had only been trying to take a friendly interest, as any normal woman might.

  Dave interrupted this awkward moment, looming over all of them.

  'Jemima and me are going to get a bite to eat on the way home. We can stop in North Queensferry and do that. Do you two want to squeeze into the back of the truck - there's some fish in there, but it won't bother you, will it?'

  Amaryllis had already experienced the fish - which Dave and Jemima had picked up on the way from a special fishmonger in Limekilns - and tried to warn Christopher about it silently with eye movements. He kept staring at her blankly until he understood something was wrong, when he said to Dave, 'We'll be fine on the bus, thanks, Dave. But we can meet you for a meal. Where are you going?'