Page 109 of Meet me at the Seaside Cottages

‘Let her talk,’ says Dwight, suddenly, pale white, his knuckles clenching the glass, as if she might have brought a tiny bit of hope.

Janey thinks of the bank loan, the mortgage, the deeds. Can this possibly work?

She takes out the piece of paper she managed to get printed.

‘There’s a small possibility . . . ’

Dwight squints. ‘What’s this?’

‘Essie has gone to Edinburgh and “reclaimed” the land deeds. You need to sign this to withdraw them from sale. And the deeds as well.’

He frowns.

‘There’s a cooling-off period,’ says Janey. ‘The problem is it expires today. And the office closes in just under three hours.’

‘We can’t get there,’ says Dwight.

‘Can you email it?’ demands Shelby.

‘I’m afraid not.’

Janey had already phoned Morag, the local pilot, to see if there was anything she could do. Morag is sympathetic but says it’s not even a question; there isn’t a slot for them at Edinburgh airport and even if there were, it would cost more than the price of the houses in the first place. That’s not the answer.

‘I could drive,’ says Dwight.

‘You’d die,’ says Shelby. ‘Stupid idea. It’s three hundred miles.’

Janey sighs. ‘We’ll think of something. Essie will have the deeds back here soon enough.’

Dwight’s phone rings. His face creases.

‘It’s the police,’ he says. ‘They want to interview me.’

*

The little plane bounces and hops to a stop in Carso on its afternoon run, the sun chasing their tail all the way north. It’s one of the most beautiful trips in the world on a good day, the Highlands in all their glory stretching out on all sides. Essie doesn’t notice a bit of it. She holds her bag with her fingers on the papers.

Essie gets down the steps just as the policeman is getting his bag. She doesn’t notice him.

Her mother is waiting in the draughty tin shed that functions as an airport and runs towards her. Essie discreetly shows her the envelope.

‘Oh, my God,’ says Janey. ‘You’re an international criminal.’

‘I’m a fricking idiot,’ says Essie, ruefully. ‘I’m . . . Mum, I’m . . . ’

Janey shakes her head and hugs her. ‘You’re everything.’

Dwight is waiting outside by his car. ‘The policeman’s here,’ he says. ‘I’m meant to meet him.’ He glances up in terror.

Then, from Dwight’s car, an absolute vision emerges.

It is Shelby. Her bright blonde hair is piled high on her head. Her face is made up perfectly and she is wearing a lacy white top that makes her enormous bosoms look even larger, on top of a denim skirt and pure white pointed cowboy boots. Her eye-watering perfume fills the air.

‘Can you get us a couple of minutes?’ says Janey urgently.

‘Can I?’ says Shelby.

And she walks – no, she sashays, in a way that cannot help reminding Essie of Bute – over to the policeman who is already slightly disorientated by the freshness of the air, the great long views out to sea, the sense that the mountains and bens are all behind you and that you have landed at the very tip of the world.

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