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Chapter 27

There was a moment when I thought that Ellie as going to take my head clean off at the shoulders, and that the Ninewells Accident and Emergency department was going to face its biggest ever challenge.

‘How the hell could you have let him do that, Oz?’ she shouted at me. I just stood there like I had when I was a kid, when she had me in a corner, knowing that a smart answer — or like now, any answer — was the short route to a smack in the mouth.

It’s at times like those that you find out who your real friends are. ‘But Mum,’ said Jonathan, without the slightest sign of flinching, ‘you did the same thing yourself the day that Colin got shut in the cellar.’

She glared at him, but he stood his ground. ‘God,’ she gasped, eventually, ‘you two! You’re like peas from the same pod, so you are.’ Then, to my great relief, she smiled. ‘And you’re right too, son. There’s no holding that wee so-and-so when he’s determined to do something.’

Thankfully Colin’s skull wasn’t fractured; nothing was broken other than his shoulder, which was reassembled under anaesthetic and immobilised. Partly because of his concussion, and partly to give the delicate bones a chance to knit, the casualty registrar decided to keep him in hospital in Dundee for a few days, and decreed that school was out for at least a fortnight. Ellie was worried about work at first, but that problem was solved by a single telephone call to our stepmother, who had retired from teaching a year earlier. She volunteered at once to look after the convalescent Colin, and to keep him up with his school work as well.

‘Can I stay off too, if Grandma Mary’s coming?’ Jonathan asked. ‘She could teach me as well.’

‘Don’t push your luck, wee man,’ I whispered to him.

Back in St Andrews I called in at the police office. The duty sergeant knew about the incident; he told me that the janitor had been interviewed and had insisted that after he had cleaned the Dungeon, he had put the grille back in place as usual. None of the bystanders were any help; not one of them had noticed the Dungeon or had seen Colin near it.

‘As far as we’re concerned, sir,’ the uniformed policeman told me, ‘the incident is closed. If your sister wants to sue Historic Scotland, that’s up to her, but we cannae help her. Are you sure your wee nephew didn’t move that cover himself?’

‘We’ll ask him when he’s well enough,’ I said. ‘But unless he’s been doing a lot of weight training for a six-year-old, there’s not a chance.’

That evening I really did insist that there was to be no cooking. Ellie put up not a moment’s argument, and Jonathan chose the takeaways, which inevitably meant pizzas, with chips on the side. We maintained a certain standard though, by eating at the table rather than from trays.

‘What do you think, Oz?’ Ellen asked me, at last. ‘Do you think the people at the Castle are lying?’

I shook my head. ‘Not for a minute. The sergeant told me that he knows the janitor well, and that he would vouch for him personally. There’s only one person who can tell us what happened. Maybe tomorrow we’ll be able to ask him.’