Mince Pies and Murder Read online

  Carly Reid

  Mince Pies and Murder

  First published by Inkpot Books 2019

  Copyright © 2019 by Carly Reid

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise without written permission from the publisher. It is illegal to copy this book, post it to a website, or distribute it by any other means without permission.

  This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

  Carly Reid asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

  First edition

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  Contents

  Yule Night

  The Morning After The Night Before

  Mince Pies at the Museum

  The Lochside Hydro

  Sleuthing

  Shopping and Eavesdropping

  A Night at the Church...

  ...And the Pub

  A Way of Life

  Following Up

  Santa's Beard

  Where is Amy?

  Clues from the Elves

  Closing In

  Cheese, Wine and Confessions

  Christmas Eve

  Author's Note

  Join my mailing list

  About the Author

  Also by Carly Reid

  Yule Night

  Jessica Greer paused for a moment before she entered Lissa’s, the charming coffee shop that belonged to her friend Ealisaid Robertson. Not normally open in the evening, Ealisaid had made an exception for Dalkinchie’s annual Yule Night. There had been a hum of anticipation around the village for weeks, and Jessica was delighted to be reporting on the event for her job as a junior reporter for The Drummond and Dalkinchie Herald. It would help to take her mind off the intrusive memories she had been having lately.

  The cafe – Ealisaid’s pride and joy – was a cheerful, homey spot all year round, but looked especially so tonight in contrast to the dark, frosty night outside. Ealisaid had placed a small tree in the corner, and wound delicate strands of multicolored lights around the shelves behind the counter. She had added Christmassy flavors to her drinks menu, with spiced coffee syrups and flavored teas. Tonight, she wasn’t serving food apart from Christmas cake. This took pride of place on the polished counter at the front – with a whole, beautifully iced and decorated cake raised up on one of Ealisaid’s stands, and small slices temptingly arranged next to it, allowing customers to help themselves.

  “Hello, you! Glad you made it before I ran oot,” said Ealisaid, gesturing. “The cake has been popular already. Help yourself!”

  Jessica didn’t need to be asked twice. She took a moment to admire the beauty of the sugar craft on display, and was soon fully appreciating the warm, sweet flavors of her sample slice. She had already tried one from the same batch, and knew that her aunt Reenie had ordered another one from Ealisaid for their own Christmas. Ealisaid took only a limited number of orders, and as she finished off her small slice, Jessica felt all the more fortunate to be looking forward to more of the same.

  Ealisaid was selling teas and coffees from her usual spot behind the counter, and had set up a makeshift extra counter by arranging a couple of tables together perpendicular to it, in front of the long back wall. Behind this, seated between two crockpots and working on something behind the table, sat Murdo Smith, Ealisaid’s part-time assistant. The son of a local dairy farmer, Murdo was a friendly soul, and he greeted Jessica warmly when he noticed her.

  “Lovely to see you Jessica, Merry Christmas! Can I get you a hot chocolate? Wi’, or wi’out a wee added special something?” He gestured at the crockpots. Somebody – probably either Ealisaid or her younger sister Mairead, who often worked in the café, too – had written signs to sit beside each one, indicating the presence or absence of a dash of whisky. Jessica elected for the alcohol-free option – after all, she was technically working, even if she didn’t think her editor Grant Mack would mind. Murdo began to serve the drink, and as he did so, laid down a bundle of knitting.

  “What’s that you are working on, Murdo?”

  Jessica had seen some of the items Murdo had knitted before, in particular a hat for his brother Magnus, who sometimes worked alongside Jessica as a photographer for The Herald. She knew that Murdo had been very strongly influenced by the woman he called ‘his wee granny’, and that she had been the one who had taught him how to knit.

  Murdo handed Jessica her drink and she wrapped her cold hands around it gratefully. He held up his knitting needles and displayed the beginnings of his project – navy blue, with a Fair Isle pattern.

  “It’ll be a wee cardigan for one o’ DI Gordon’s twins. I’ve already done the other one. It wis a wee bitty complicated, but I’m fair chuffed wi’ how it’s turned oot. It’s their first Christmas, see, and I just wanted to give them something a bit special. I know the Detective Inspector is looking forward to a big family Christmas wi’ his partner and the babies, I think there’s other folk going to be traveling over and it’s the first time they’ll have met the twins. Loads o’ photies, probably.”

  In addition to his duties on the family farm and his job at Lissa’s, Murdo also volunteered as a Special Constable in the police force, making DI James Gordon his boss. Jessica, charmed with the notion, exclaimed in delight.

  “Oh, they will look so sweet! I’ve got twin sisters you know, and they were so cute wearing matching clothes when they were small. He’ll be really pleased, Murdo! What a kind gift.”

  Murdo looked abashed. “Aye, well, ‘tis the season…”

  But before he could continue, an altercation broke out at the front of the shop. A man, turning to leave after being served his takeaway drink by Ealisaid, had clearly walked straight into a small child’s flashing wand – and was not taking it well.

  “Watch oot!” The man stopped and looked round where he stood, his face twisted in disgust. He wore a heavy dark grey woolen coat over battered blue jeans, paired with scuffed hobnail boots. A worn-through patch on the arm of his coat had been mended, badly, using a clashing thread. His shoulders curved forwards, and a shock of graying hair stood up over his thick, beetling brows.

  The child, a tiny girl of about six, had turned pink and looked as if she was on the verge of tears. She lowered her wand slowly. Her father then leaned forward and intervened, gently ushering his daughter behind him as he spoke.

  “Aye, OK, Ian – no harm done. She’s just excited, all the weans are. It’s a special night.”

  “Well, she shouldnae be waving that thing around. You need to keep a better eye on her. And those wands are just trash anyway. It’ll be broken in no time. Waste of money if you ask me.”

  Before anyone could respond to that, the surly man sloped out of the café and turned right, heading up the hill towards The Ram’s Heid Inn, Dalkinchie’s local pub. Ealisaid successfully broke the shocked silence left behind by offering the child a striped peppermint candy cane, and smiling warmly at her family before returning to the counter to finish preparing their drinks.

  Jessica turned back to Murdo.

  “Ian Johnston,” he said with a nod in the direction of the door. “No’ the most pleasant of men usually, but you’d think at Christmas he’d find it in his heart to have a wee bit o’ cheer. Imagine upsetting a wean like that. Ach well. Some people.”

  “Is he a local, then?” Jessica asked.

  “Have ye no’ come across the John
stons before? Two brothers, both electricians. And both – I’ll say it, although I shouldnae – as grumpy as each other. Although while Ian Johnston is away up to the pub, by the looks of it, his brother is daein’ something quite different…”

  Murdo leaned in closer to continue, mindful that there were still children in the café and not wanting to be overheard. “…he’s Santa. On the float? Bill Johnston does Santa’s grotto every year on Yule Night. You’ll see him later, although you won’t recognize him. He’s actually awfy good at being Santa, although he’s a real bah humbug aw’ the rest of the year.”

  A pair of grumpy brothers. If what Murdo had said was true, how, Jessica wondered, could someone capable of being so unpleasant and surly have taken up the role of waving and smiling at the children from the float, in a Santa suit? Perhaps, she reasoned to herself, Bill Johnston was a little more pleasant than his brother – even if only a little. She glanced back towards the little girl with the sparkly wand again. For the sake of the children, she certainly hoped so.

  * * *

  The street crowd had thinned by the time Jessica left, probably because they were all already waiting for the official beginning of the evening – and Santa’s departure – at the courtyard outside The Ram’s Heid. Jessica decided to hurry up there too, but paused to look across the High Street towards The Bloom Room. The little flower shop – her Aunt Reenie’s fledgling business – looked beautiful, its painted sign reflecting a warm glow from the windows beneath, in which there were colorful floral displays, reds and greens predominating. Jessica knew that Reenie would be giving out sparkling wine or orange and cranberry juice, and hoping to get a few more Christmas orders before the holidays truly began.

  Walking over and peeking into the shop, she saw that the upturned wooden crates used as shelving – some with Christmas wreaths or floral decorations and others with the balms and sprays that Reenie had begun selling – were now decorated with star-shaped white fairy lights. A Christmas display with a tree-shaped decoration of holly and lights stood right in the centre of the shop floor. Feeling a glow of pride for how the shop had developed after its rocky start, Jessica waved at Reenie through the window, and Reenie, glancing up, waved back briefly, busy dealing with a customer.

  The frosty night couldn’t be more perfect. People, already muffled up in thick coats and cozy scarves, stamped their feet and wrapped their arms around themselves to get warmer. Children, many up past their usual bedtime and bundled into heavy brightly-colored coats, sang snatches of Christmas carols that they had learned at daycare and school. Some waved more of the light-up plastic wands which an enterprising person dressed as Santa Claus was selling further down the High Street.

  Jessica, keen to take in as much as she could of the mood as well as the sights, began to jot down her impressions in her notebook. The Dalkinchie Yule Night event happened every year in December, always on the third Friday, but this was Jessica’s first experience of it. She had lived in Dalkinchie for six months now, since joining her Aunt Reenie earlier in the year to help set up the flower shop. Her part-time role for the local newspaper had been an excellent way to get to know the village and its inhabitants – even if it had occasionally thrown her in the path of more extreme circumstances as well.

  Jessica flexed her fingers. She was wearing fingerless gloves so that she could still use a pen, but the cold was creeping in, numbing her hands and making writing increasingly difficult. She closed her notebook, and hooked her pen into its elastic closure.

  A crowd had gathered on the paved area outside The Ram´s Heid. It was a charming old black-and-white coaching inn, formed of a long, asymmetric stone building. It was largely painted white but the surrounds of its tall multi-paned windows were black, giving it a striking, almost medieval appearance. The entrance way was large and arched, and right outside it – unusually – stood a low wooden platform stage with a podium in its centre. It was flanked on either side by a burning log, which hissed and crackled in the cold air. Christmas lights ran all along the front of the building, and stretched over the top of the stage to the other side of the street – though none of them were yet lit up.

  This was where the evening kicked off every year, with the switching-on ceremony followed by a procession of a horse-drawn float through the High Street, transporting Santa Claus along with a couple of his elves to the Village Hall at the other end of the village, whereupon children could visit Santa in his grotto. Some residents of the village would always follow behind the float, eager to be first in the queue for the grotto – and for the tea and mince pies that were served up there. Other villagers would take advantage of the fact that every shop in Dalkinchie was participating by staying open late, offering special discounts on products and services, and usually serving refreshments of their own.

  Just as the crowd’s mood seemed about to turn from excitement to impatience, there was some movement at the stage in front of the pub. The MacNaughton, Dalkinchie’s local celebrity and clan chief, was due to initiate the proceedings, and he had come out of the pub with a young woman. The great bearded Scotsman was wearing his kilt as usual, along with a thick sweater, scarf and dark blue woolly hat pulled over his thick head of hair. The young woman was in overalls, hair tied back out of her face in a single plait that fell over one shoulder. The pair climbed onto the platform, the woman gesturing and speaking to Gillespie MacNaughton who did not yet address the crowd, instead nodding and replying to her quietly. Jessica watched as he appeared to ask a question, and, apparently unable to answer, the woman climbed back down off the platform and disappeared back into the pub. The MacNaughton beamed at the waiting crowd and bellowed:

  “No’ long now, folks! Just a wee technical hitch!”

  There were minor grumblings, but for the most part the crowd seemed content to wait. The foot stamping and jumping increased. A child’s small, clear voice rang above the crowd “I want to see Santa!” Jessica overheard someone next to her murmur “I wonder where he’s got tae – Santa’s usually here by noo.”

  The young woman reappeared, this time accompanied by another man, this one much shorter and thinner than the MacNaughton. The pair moved behind the platform together and briefly fiddled with the cables there, before the man traced the length of cable to behind the podium and pushed something there. Job seemingly done, he stepped down from the platform and went back towards the pub. All eyes then turned back to the MacNaughton, who began to address the crowd.

  All eyes, that is, apart from Jessica’s. She was still watching the thin man as he spoke abruptly to the young woman outside the pub, and stomped off back inside without a backwards glance towards her or the crowd. Jessica wasn’t close enough to hear what he had said, but the young woman’s reaction was clear enough. Bathed in the light from the pub window, her face had turned red. Her eyes were glittering, her lips pressed together. After a moment, she caught Jessica looking at her. Swiftly she broke eye contact, looked down and turned away. Head still bowed, she moved over closer to the podium, and then walked behind the platform.

  “Merry Christmas, Dalkinchie!”

  Perhaps mindful of the delay and the cold, the MacNaughton had kept his speech very short. He now deftly flicked the switch below the podium and the village was suddenly illuminated by hundreds of Christmas lights. Being from the U.S., Jessica was no stranger to holiday light displays, and in fact the village efforts had seemed a little low-key from her perspective when she had seen them being constructed. Now, however, the warm white lights gave the whole village a magical feel. From the Inn itself at the top of the street, the lights ran along to and wrapped around the great nearby Christmas tree, as well as lighting up the many smaller trees which were attached to each building frontage all along the High Street. In addition, there was a pretty canopy of lights slung between the buildings, from one side of the street to the other. Jessica immediately thought of The Bloom Room – it was already looking charmingly Christmassy, and she couldn’t wait to see what it looked like no
w, with the outside lighting as well.

  The horses attached to the float had been waiting patiently during the delay and the lighting up ceremony, with only the occasional harrumphs or whinnies. The elves, however, were clearly feeling the cold through their thin outfits and had been looking quite miserable – not that Mairead Robertson ever really looked cheerful exactly. Now, Santa Claus himself emerged from the pub in all his red-suited glory, and with a couple of muffled cries of “Ho, ho, ho!”, he hastily swung himself into the chair on the float, lounged back comfortably with one hand across his belly, and began waving at the children.

  The float slowly moved off, with the clicking of the horses’ hooves easily heard over the hubbub of voices. Soon the crowd fell in behind the float, and started to move along behind it. Jessica hung back slightly. As she started to walk slowly down the High Street, she took one last look back at the scene outside the Ram’s Heid. The MacNaughton had now climbed off the platform and was talking to an elderly man outside the pub. There was no sign of the young woman.

  * * *

  The procession moved slowly behind the cart all the way to the Village Hall. Jessica looked into the windows of all the shops as she passed by, enjoying the view of Dalkinchie at Christmas now that the lights had been switched on. Gillespies, the fine dining restaurant near the Hall, had outdone themselves with two columns of lights wrapped round the door jambs and a tableau of golden reindeer to one side of their tiled entryway. Jessica saw a party of women sitting at the table in the window. One of them, a woman with long shiny blonde hair, blew into a party whistle as Jessica went past.

  Santa’s Grotto had taken over one of the smaller rooms at the front of the Village Hall building, and Jessica edged past the waiting line to make her way through to the larger main hall at the back. There, teas and coffees and other refreshments were being sold, and a local community choir was performing a variety of Christmas music on stage. Around the edges of the hall, various stalls had been set up. The primary school fundraising committee was selling hot chocolate, gingerbread reindeer – each one individually decorated with swirls and splodges of multicolored icing – and bath bombs with enthusiastic dollops of glitter on the top of each one. There was a bottle tombola stall, at which people were already paying for the chance to win a fine bottle of Scotch whisky, although the only prize that had been secured so far was a small bottle of shampoo.