The barman's face turned a shade of scarlet, and the woman wept. The rest of the clientele murmured angrily to each other as the barman started at pace to work his way from the bar towards Dev.
‘What do you mean by that, you sick bastard? Do you know about my daughter? Have you done something to her? Do you know where she is?’
Dev realized his error, or had he been set up?
‘Listen I’m sorry I was told to come in and ask.’
‘By who?’ The man was closing in on him and Dev backed towards the swing doors of the bar, remembering the car outside.
‘Listen, I’m sorry, OK’, and with that Dev turned, bolted out the door and, scraping his back end off the car bonnet, found himself in his car again. Looking out to the left the barman tried the passenger door, but luckily this car was devoid of central locking and unlocking.
‘You bastard, you tell me what you know.’ The voice boomed as the bar owner made his way round the front of the car towards Dev's door. The others were coming out of the bar now, too. Dev forced the car into reverse, praying that tonight it would continue to perform. Praying he would get of this mess intact and praying he would not become the scapegoat of their misery.
‘I’m sorry OK. I don’t know anything’, and with a glance back, the Cro_k _nn disappeared, and Dev spun the car on the empty street to make his escape.
In the rear view mirror he saw the bar personnel pointing and racing towards their own vehicles, so Dev pushed on, down Naemoor road and hopefully to the safety of the darkness. He’d stop down the farm lane off Muckhart Golf course, and see if there was anymore activity. But then he’d progress slowly back to Dunfermline – and tell the story. Bloody hell, what a story.
Dev pulled up. The lack of activity on the roads was eerie, but understandable as the rain was still falling and the winds still gusted around the trees. Take a breath. These were the little girl’s parents, and he had just caused them no end of upset. Shit. Why would the guys send him there tonight. Maybe they hadn’t realized. Likely the clues had been written days before. Just a mistake, and all would end peacefully, happily ever after. What was the clue again.
‘
Ask what’s missing? That’s what started this mess. But maybe that isn’t what they meant. The Crook Inn had been missing the O and the I. O___ I____. That’s what was missing. So Olive Island, the woods that they had used for courting in their younger days, and not far from here, that was the next venue. Dev considered staying, but the road that he was on led away from the Crook and it would not be likely that anyone would follow him to Olive Island, deep in the Ochil hills, off the main track.
There were some cars on the Dollar road, but going east. Dev crossed over the track and found the obscure entrance, and the memories flooded back. Nights with various girls in this car. Good memories. A small farmhouse just off the track was in darkness, although a light flicked on to the rear, probably because the wind blew a branch across the motion sensor from the trees that surrounded the premises. A car in the drive, but no-one home. The track ended with the rusty old gate and the parking place that he’d spent past evenings with Monica, with others. Steamy windows being wiped down with white cotton knickers on the journey home to Dunfermline.
Dev opened the car door and walked up to the gate. So where was the clue? It was dark where there were no street lights, although to the south the cars still streamed past and the rain kept falling. Dev pulled his V- neck up and over his head, and started to climb the fence. Olive Island was a patch of trees, like a wee oasis in a field which was used as a grazing meadow. They always called it Olive Island – an island of trees often surrounded by flooded marshland, but in the summer it was lush green. Tonight it was sodden. Bastards making him trample across this muck. He felt like phoning in and telling them he wasn’t going through with the clue – again. But tonight he had to. He was not going to give up and take the flak again.
The mud seeped into his Nike trainers and over the bottoms of his designer jeans. Bastard. But there was no other way to Olive Island. So, squelching and leaving a trail of muddy tracks, Dev made his way over the meadow. The rain felt so cold. He’d left his jacket in the car. Stupid. The trees from Olives Island rose and fell like shadowy flames across the backdrop of the Ochil Hills and he hoped beyond hope that the clue would be here and he could get back. A very small light shone from the ground in the undergrowth. A torch. That must be the clue to return with. Dev scrambled through the twigs and branches and reached the torch. Lifting it up it felt sticky to the touch, and shining the torch onto his own hand he discovered the sticky substance was red. Blood red. This was sick.
He shone the torch shining down towards the ground at his feet where a small trail of blood led to the bottom of an old oak. A girl. Gagged and tied. Eyes staring. Deathly stare. Dev's heart raced in panic and thoughts of the girl’s parents and this situation began to haunt him. An envelope sat on the body. Dev started to weep. Who would do this? How could he explain? Maybe he could find out from the envelope. He wiped his hand and picked up the envelope using his jumper to prevent any fingerprints, but the blood was on his jumper already. He felt it harder to breathe. The letter was out of the envelope and he forced it open.
It was a clue.
‘
Someone had set him up. Dev at the start, Could – it begins, and end – ing. Dev Coulding. But now he had the clue, and he could discover who did this.
A crack of a branch and Dev's torch fell to the ground.
Dev Coulding was dead. A figure disappeared into the shadows, as a dad came looking for his daughter in Olive Island.
1
It’s 1955 and the 8 bodies sit around the recently furnished room. Wallace Squaregut, a policeman with an attitude puffs, on a pretend cigarette blowing fake smoke out of its plastic sheath. His blond walrus moustache is poised like a dead rat, ready to fall off his top lip if he is asked to speak. Pretence is the name of the game. His closest companion is Lady Ratzenberger, a harlot dressed in scarlet, cigarillo in its holder, pointed to the ceiling. She is now owner of Heighley Manor since her husband’s tragic death hours earlier in this fictitious place. Everyone an actor, but in this false reality the characters in this room indulge in good humoured discussion to find out who the murderer is, why they did it and with what. A reality Cluedo game.
‘Any of you cocks for anymore beverages?’ Bob laughed as his character slipped down from high class toff to housing scheme scum.
‘Bob!’ A shrill young maid shouted across the room,
‘Stay in character or you’ll spoil it’. The maid was Bob’s fiancee of 5 years, Marie, sounding as though the wait for a wedding date played constantly on her mind.
‘I can’t when Emm keeps asking for Bacardi Breezers – its hardly the drink of the 50’s’
Slight mirth and merriment erupted, but cautiously from the visitors to this apartment.
‘Lager?’ Bob stood holding his arms aloft, each hand containing a can.
