Thrice upon a Time (13 page)

"It can't be helped," the girl said simply. "Obviously it was nobody's fault. Was that your kitten?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. He must have hitched a ride. We didn't know he was in the car."

"I do hope I didn't hurt him."

Her voice was as calm and controlled as her manner. It was a rich, melodious voice, carefully cultivated, and her accent was more English than Scottish, Murdoch thought. They straightened up, she holding the rest of the bags and he with his hands full of boxes and burst wrappings. He found himself looking at a face that was a classically oval composition of finely molded features built from lines that were clean and sharp but without any hint of harshness; it was framed by hair that fell in loose, dark waves to her shoulders. Her nose was straight, her mouth full, and her chin just pointed enough to be dainty without losing its softness. And the eyes—looking out from beneath long, dark lashes, which had to be real to suit the rest of the image—were dark, clear, and unwavering. They were infinitely deep, intelligent eyes—the kind that could take on expressions of their own to mirror the thoughts within or, with equal ease, remain aloof and inscrutable. She was dressed in a brown sheepskin coat whose hood was thrown back to reveal fleece inner lining, with matching knee-length boots of suede.

Murdoch realized that he had been staring for what was about to become an impertinently long time. "Oh, he'll be okay," he said. "He's young… Hasn't gotten around to using any of his nine lives yet." He motioned with his head at the items he was holding. "Look, ah… about this mess. Naturally I'll take care of the damage for you. Why don't we get off the street and find someplace where we can take stock."

"You don't have to," she replied. "If I had been looking where I was putting my feet, it would probably never have happened. I think the damage sounds worse than it is. There wasn't really a lot in there that could break."

"It sounded like you had a collection of chandeliers in there to me," Murdoch said dubiously. "Let's check it out anyhow. It'd sure make me feel a lot better."

Her mouth softened into a smile that seemed to come easily and naturally. "Very well. Thank you, that's very considerate." She turned her eyes away to gaze along the street. "What's happened to your friend? I hope he hasn't lost the kitten." As she said this, Lee came back into sight through the crowd, holding a squirming, protesting Maxwell clamped firmly inside the front of his jacket. At the same moment the door of the store opened, and a man came out bearing a worried expression. He was bald except for two patches of thin, gray hair smoothed down above his ears, and was carrying a pair of thick-rimmed spectacles in his hand. His dark suit worn without a topcoat said that he was not a customer; from his age, Murdoch guessed he was probably the store manager.

"That was a terrible piece of bad luck," the man said to them. "I saw the whole thing. Bring everything back inside now, and we'll have a look at what's broken. You weren't even off the premises, so there will be no problem in replacing it. We can always send the stuff back as damaged in transit."

"There's no reason why you should have to do that," Murdoch said. "Just replace whatever needs replacing and let me take care of it." The manager took some of the girl's packages and held the door open with his back as she turned to reenter the store. Lee bundled Maxwell onto the back seat of the car, slammed the door, and joined Murdoch a few steps behind her.

"I guess we're in trouble," Lee said.

"I don't think so," Murdoch told him as they walked over to the counter inside the door. "We seem to have picked a very understanding victim." He dumped the packages he had been holding down on the counter and turned toward the girl. "This is Lee, by the way. I'm Murdoch."

"Anne," she informed them. "I'm pleased to meet you both, even if the circumstances are a little unusual. I gather you're Americans."

"Both from California," Murdoch said.

"It's a strange time of year to visit your family," Anne remarked casually. "Most people would have done it the other way round—winter there and spend the summer in Scotland."

Murdoch's mouth fell open in surprise. "I didn't say anything about any family. How the hell… ?"

Anne gave a quick laugh, uncovering a row of perfect teeth. "Oh, just a lucky guess. With a name like Murdoch, you had to have some Scottish blood in you. And Lee is still wearing summery clothes, which says you haven't been here very long."

"Good grief!" Murdoch exclaimed, realizing as he said it that he had been adopting some of Cartland's expressions in the last few days. "What are you? Do you work for Scotland Yard or something?"

"Oh, nothing as exciting as that. I just notice things, I suppose."

Behind them the manager was examining the contents of the parcels, and every now and again pushing one of them aside with a sad shake of his head while he called out the design numbers to an assistant who began wrapping up the replacements.

"Are you from around here?" Murdoch inquired.

Anne shook her head. "I live at Nairn, north of here near Inverness. I'm just driving home from Edinburgh. Kingussie seemed a good place to stop for a snack and do some shopping."

"Have you had your snack yet?"

"Not yet."

"We were just about to go for a drink. How about joining us? I think we owe you one."

Anne's brow furrowed slightly. "I couldn't face a drink at this time of day," she said. Murdoch decided it just wasn't his day. Then she added, "But a cup of tea and a sandwich would be very welcome. Could you stand that?"

"We'll take the risk," Murdoch said and grinned.

The manager finished adding up prices on a scrap of paper and cleared his throat to attract their attention. "Ah, are you sure you still want to pay for this, sir? Really, I'd be quite happy to write it all off as I said."

"We'll pick up the tab," Murdoch insisted. "What's the damage?"

"As you wish. It comes to thirty-four pounds and seventy pence. Will it be cash, credit, or on account?"

"AmEx okay?"

"Certainly."

"Here." Murdoch produced his card. The manager inspected it briefly then inserted it into a slot in the front of a small, desktop terminal on one end of the counter. A few seconds went by while a communications satellite high over the Atlantic redirected downward and westward a stream of binary code prefixed with the number of Murdoch's New York bank account.

"Are you enjoying your visit to Scotland, Mr. Ross?" the manager asked as the terminal's miniature screen came to life to validate the transaction.

"A lot, thanks."

"A grand Scottish name, I see. Would you be related to any of the Rosses in these parts?"

"My family's from near here—a place called Glenmoroch, over toward Loch Ness," Murdoch said.

The manager snatched his spectacles from his ear and looked up abruptly. "Not Sir Charles Ross of Storbannon?"

"Yes. He's my grandfather. You know him?"

"I most certainly do." The manager's voice warmed suddenly in surprise and evident delight. "There aren't many around here who don't know Sir Charles. Then you must be his grandson from America. It's not your first visit here either; I've heard about you from time to time." He extended a hand and shook Murdoch's firmly. "It's a pleasure to meet you at last. How long will you be staying?"

"We don't really know for sure. We're helping Grandpa with some of his work for a while. Oh, this is Lee, who's over with me from the States. And this is Anne, who we've just bumped into… or rather our cat did."

"My pleasure," the manager said as they nodded in turn. "I've only known Sir Charles since he came back to Scotland, you understand. A grand man he is… a grand man. Remember me to him when you get back—Andrew McKenzie from Kingussie, tell him. He'll know who you mean."

"We sure will," Murdoch promised. He inclined his head in the direction of his AmEx card, still protruding from the slot in the terminal. "Are you finished with that?" McKenzie extracted the card, thrust it back into Murdoch's hand, and stabbed his finger at a button on the panel beside the screen. The word VOID appeared superposed in red across the details being displayed.

Murdoch started to protest, but McKenzie brushed the words aside with a brisk wave of his hand. "I'll not listen, and that's the end of it," he declared. His voice left no room for argument. "I'm Pamela McKenzie's uncle, you see. It's the least I can do for the Rosses of Glenmoroch."

Murdoch and Lee exchanged puzzled looks. "Sorry, I'm not with you," Murdoch said. "Who's Pamela McKenzie, apart from being your niece?"

"Oh, I see. They didn't tell you about that, eh." McKenzie nodded to himself. "Ask somebody to tell you about it when you get back to Storbannon. Ask them to tell you about Pamela McKenzie."

They all left the store together and stopped to deposit Anne's packages in her car, a fairly new-looking Audi lowline, silver-blue metallic with black trim, which turned out to be parked just a few spaces ahead of Murdoch's. Then they found a quaint olde-worlde tea house tucked away in one of the side-streets off the main thoroughfare, and were soon settled at a secluded corner table with a heaped plate of sandwiches and currant buns, while a subdued background of Strauss polkas played cheerfully from somewhere among plant pots and timber beams up near the ceiling.

Her name was Anne Patterson. She was originally from Dundee but had spent many of her earlier years at school in England, which accounted for her almost complete lack of a Scottish accent. As Murdoch listened to her speaking at greater length, however, he began to detect a slight lilt that added an undertone of texture to her voice that made her even more fascinating. She was single and lived alone. Nairn was a pleasant little town, she found, with plenty of variety to offer without being so large as to become overpowering. Furthermore it was conveniently close to where she worked—the fusion plant at a place called Burghead, about forty miles farther north, as a junior doctor and assistant to the Head of the Medical Department.

"Burghead!" Murdoch exclaimed when she told them this. "Can you beat that? The world gets smaller every day."

"Do you know it, then?" Anne asked, sounding slightly surprised.

"We know of it," Lee said.

Murdoch passed on. "Do you know somebody there called Muir—Dr. Elizabeth Muir?"

"Of course. She's very well known there. She's the Principal Physicist. I take it she's an acquaintance of yours."

"She's an old friend of my grandfather's. In fact she's staying with us for the weekend right now. Incredible, isn't it."

Lee shook his head disbelieving. "It seems like nobody can move in this country without bumping into somebody they know. That oughta keep a guy on the straight and narrow."

"They all seem to know Murdoch's grandfather anyway," Anne remarked. "Sir Charles, wasn't it?" She said it matter-of-factly, without any trace of deference or awe. This at once made Murdoch feel more at ease, and he was certain she had done it intentionally; he wanted to he just Murdoch Ross, not the grandson of somebody famous.

"Yes," Murdoch replied, in a way that he hoped was off-hand but not enough so to sound careless. Anne continued looking at him over the rim of her cup, her eyebrows half raised. In one expression she was able to convey that she was naturally interested but didn't want to appear inquisitive. "He's a scientist," Murdoch went on. "A theoretical physicist. He spent most of his life in the U.S.A. which is how I come to be an American. He retired about three years ago and moved back to Scotland."

"He sounds very interesting. What kind of work does he do now?"

"Oh… private research. Particle phenomena… connected with communications mainly."

"You must be physicists too then," Anne said, shifting her eyes from Murdoch to Lee then back again. "You told Mr. McKenzie that you were over here helping him with his work."

"I guess we are… sort of," Lee said with a shrug.

"Sort of?"

"By inclination anyhow," Murdoch said. "But the world only seems to have room for graybeards, bomb-freaks, and aspiring executives. So what can you do?"

"I see," Anne said simply. Murdoch had the feeling that she did see—exactly; there was no need to explain further. "So what do you do?" she asked. "Apart from kidnap kittens."

"For the last couple of years we've been on our own," Murdoch told her. "I suppose a theoretical consultancy would be the best way to describe it. We think about other people's problems for a price, and maybe solve them for a bigger price."

"That's one way of getting paid without being owned by anybody, I suppose," Anne remarked. Her radar was uncanny. Again there was no need to elaborate; she already understood all there was to be said. "Who's looking after the business while you two are over here?" she asked.

"Actually we pretty well wrapped it up about six months ago," Murdoch said. "We were looking at some other possibilities in New York when my grandpa asked us to come over." He shrugged and showed his empty palms. "So here we are."

"No plans for what happens next?"

"Guess not. It all depends on the winds and the tide." Murdoch refilled his cup from the pot of tea that had come with the sandwiches.

"How about you?" Lee asked her. "Where do you plan on going after Burghead? Anything in particular in mind?"

Anne emitted an almost inaudible sigh and shrugged, more with her eyebrows than her body. "I'm hoping to qualify as a specialist in nuclear medicine while I'm there. After that? I don't know. I might go abroad somewhere… America possibly."

"No ties here at all, huh?" Lee said.

"Not really."

"What about your folks in Dundee?" Murdoch asked.

"Oh, I left there a long time ago. We get along well enough, but"—she paused just long enough to avoid sounding indelicate—"we really don't have all that much in common. They're content enough in their own kind of world, if you know what I mean." She made it a plain statement of fact with no attempt at any implied apology; at the same time, her eyes asked why there should be any.

She was another odd-one-out of the family, Murdoch realized. They were all three of them the same: Three young people adrift on life with supplies for a voyage of eighty-odd years, but with no port singling itself out on the charts as an obvious destination. The major trade routes were well marked, but exactly what the trade was that took place at their ends was obscure. Eighty years of battling storms could be a long time to spend discovering that a cargo was valueless.