Festival of Murder by Ross Macfarlane KC, Chapter 2: Not My Circus

No - that’s the wrong question.

The real question is: why do retired people always seem to be so busy?

You’ll have seen it yourself. A friend/relative retires. You ask to see them. The invariable answer is ‘No’. Looking after the grandkids/meeting friends/looking after the grandkids/away in the caravan/joined the knitting club (whether it’s ‘Knit and Knatter’ or ‘Stitch ‘n’ Bitch’)/looking after the grandkids/joining the Children’s Panel/The Church/The Chapel/“Isn’t pottery so fulfilling…who would have thought?”/the Garden Committee/(did I mention: ‘looking after the grandkids’?).

Not one of these time-tested activities, however, was of interest to Wally Wood.

A useless English Degree (with Distinction - but no less useless). A dozen different jobs afterwards before finally going back to university in his thirties; two marriages - the first terminated by Death (‘O rose, thou art sick…’), the second by Edinburgh Sheriff Court; a brief interlude as a solicitor (NB: The practice of Conveyancing is not for everyone); then a final couple of decades at the Scottish Bar as a Criminal Law Advocate, latterly a High Court prosecutor (great fun - a wig, a gown and a great deal of swishing about).

No real pension to boast of, though, but enough dosh - during the years of Legal Aid plenty - to amass a bit of cash and buy a nice wee basement flat in the New Town of Edinburgh. But enough was enough. Time to stop work. Time to forget the cry of gulls, and the deep seas swell. Time to sit in the Cumberland Bar and decide between the menu’s Mac’n’Cheese or the Haggis Bon-Bons. Retired. Retired but restless. Wood frowned: Or should that be: used up and useless.

*****

‘What about golf?’

‘What about golf?’

‘Grampa Wally - you need a hobby!’

‘I need a drink…’

The conversation at the breakfast table of the Wood residence was not usually this combative. Abbie had both hands around her mug of coffee. She leaned forward: ‘Look at you…’

‘I’d rather not…’

‘You’re a relatively healthy man, not entirely clapped-out…’

‘Thank you. None taken…’

‘…and you should be out and about doing something.’

Wood leaned in: ‘Abbie - I’m retired. I’m meant to be sitting around gathering dust. I’ve had my day in the sun.’

Abbie tossed her head back: ‘Ha! I know you, Grampa Wally - you’re like a shark. The minute you stop moving, you’ll die.’

O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us

To see oursels as ithers see us!

Of course - Abbie was right.

It was only a matter of time before the dry rot of Old Age set in. But how to stave it off? Maybe take a night class? But in what? Literature? He loved books. The feel of them. The smell of them. Someone once said: ‘Books are the best furniture’ and Wally Wood had a lot of furniture. (He even liked books on Kindle - at his age, easier to read with the enlarged writing). But in a course like that, he was likely to be more of a pest in the class, given his voracious reading and his intolerance of carelessness.

Or what about studying Music? Not playing music. Listening to it. Was there a further education class entitled ‘Pop Music for Old Fogeys’? A Diploma in Steely Dan? A PhD in Procol Harum? What about singer-songwriters of the 1960s and 70s? Surely the lyrics alone were worth an Honours Degree: ‘Critically analyse the use of alliteration in Carole King’s ‘Tapestry’ – ‘Once, amid the soft silver sadness in the sky…’

Or how about a course on old comic books? A passion of Wood’s from childhood. Or was that interest – as his counsellor had suggested – maybe just a way of bringing back good memories of the past? They were studying that kind of thing at university now, weren’t they? Comics. How about a Bachelor’s degree in Batman? Comic books. In fact, Wood’s parents would remind him that they had decided on the Christian name ‘Wallace”/Wally” after spotting it in a science fiction magazine in the 1950s. Later, as Wood was growing up, he would give a satisfied grin when his comics would announce (in typical Stan Lee hyperbole) ‘Art by Wondrous Wally Wood’.

His thoughts were broken when Abbie reached across the breakfast table and snatched his mug from him.

‘I’m not finished with that.’

‘You are now. Look at the clock - we leave in fifteen minutes. And knowing you, you’ll have to pee first…’

As usual, Abbie was right. Infuriating, but right.

*****

It wouldn’t go away. The nagging, nagging feeling. Something wasn’t right. Sometimes, when Wood had been an active Criminal Court prosecutor, he had a feeling about certain cases. On paper, they would add up fine, but when Wood considered the facts as a whole, he would get that nagging feeling. Almost a physical sensation. A deep, dark undefinable sensation inside. A bit like grief. And Wood was grieving now. Was it grief? Or was it the memory of a bad dream? That poor lady. The fall.

*****

There’s an old Polish saying that helps keep the people of Krakow out of trouble: ‘This is not my circus. These are not my monkeys.’

Wood kept repeating this to himself - not my circus, not my monkeys - when, the next day, he found himself climbing up The News Steps. As he reached the David Hume statue at the entrance to the High Court, Wood smiled, noting that some solicitous passer-by had adorned the statue’s head with a traffic cone.

Was that someone waving? Someone in uniform. P C Gordy! The greybeard (but youthful) police officer who manned the security team of the High Court.

The courtroom atmosphere - to the casual onlooker - seems awfully formal. This is as it should be. But it must be remembered that the people one sees, the police officers, the court officers, the clerks, the prosecutors, the defence lawyers (even the judges!) - these can be people who see each other every day and a camaraderie - even an unlikely one - can blossom. So it was that Wally Wood KC, Advocate Depute (High Court prosecutor) and PC Gordon (‘Gordy’) Hamilton forged their unlikely alliance - over bad (or should that be ‘dad’) jokes. ‘Wally! Wally!’ PC Hamilton beckoned the retired prosecutor over: ‘Wally, Wally - did you see that there was a big explosion at that French cheese factory?’

‘No…’

The officer shook his head: ‘It was awful. Everywhere you looked - de brie…’

*****

Festival of Murder continues tomorrow in ‘Knock Knock!’