The Einstein Equation

10 Skullduggery in Oban

Nina had rented a car to drive back to Oban from Sam’s place. It was grand to be back home in her old house that overlooked the temperamental waters of the Bay of Oban. The only part she hated about coming home after a visit away was the house cleaning. Her home was not small by any means, and she was its only occupant.

Before, she used to hire cleaners to come once a week and help her with the upkeep of the historical heritage site she had purchased years ago. Eventually she grew tired of losing antiques to cleaners who needed some extra quid from any gullible antique collector. Other than sticky fingers, Nina lost more than enough of her beloved belongings to careless housekeepers, breaking precious relics she obtained by risking her life on Purdue’s expeditions, mostly. Being a historian was not a vocation to Dr. Nina Gould, but a very specific obsession that she felt closer to than the modern comforts of her era. It was her life. The past was her treasure trove of knowledge, her bottomless well of fascinating accounts and beautiful artifacts, fashioned by the quills and clay of braver, stronger civilizations.

Sam had not called yet, but she had come to know him as scatter brained and always occupied with some or other new trail. Like a bloodhound, he only needed a whiff of an adventure or chance of scrutiny to get him focused on something. She wondered what he thought of the news report she left for him to watch, but she was not that zealous for a review.

The day was moody, so there was no reason to stroll along the water or call in to the coffee shop for some sinful partaking of strawberry cheesecake — fridge, not baked. Even the tangy wonder of cheesecake could not get Nina to go out into the grey, drizzling day, which was a testament to the discomfort outside. Through one of her bay windows, Nina saw the harrowing journeys of those who did venture out today, and thanked herself again.

“Ooh, and what are you up to?” she whispered, pressing her face into the fold of the lace curtain, peeking out in a not so discreet way. Below her house, down the steep decline of her lawn, Nina noticed old Mr. Hemming from down the road inching his way up the road in the terrible weather, calling for his dog.

Mr. Hemming was one of the oldest residents on Dunuaran Road, a widower who had an illustrious past. She knew this, because after a few whiskeys nothing would stop him from telling stories from his youth. Whether at a party or a pub, the old master engineer never failed to ramble on until the daylight hours, for anyone sober enough to remember. As he started to cross the road, Nina noticed that a black car was speeding from a few houses off. With her window set so high above the street below, she was the only one who could see it coming.

“Oh, Jesus,” she gasped, and rapidly darted toward the door. Barefoot, with only a pair of jeans and a bra on, Nina dashed down the steps onto her cracked walkway. As she ran, she cried out his name, but the rain and thunder prevented him from hearing her warning.

“Mister Hemming! Look out for the car!” Nina shrieked, her feet hardly feeling the frigid sensation of the wet puddles and grass she traversed. The ice cold wind bit at her bare skin. Her head swung to the right to measure the distance of the fast approaching car that splashed along the brimming gutter. “Mister Hemming!”

By the time Nina reached the gate in her fence, Mr. Hemming was trudging along halfway across the road, calling his dog. As it is with haste, her wet fingers slid and fumbled at the catch of the lock, unable to lift the pin fast enough. As she tried the lock, she still called out his name. With no other pedestrians crazy enough to come out in this weather, she was his only hope, his sole harbinger.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” she shouted in frustration, just as the pin came free. It was her cussing, in fact, that finally drew Mr. Hemming’s attention. He frowned and slowly turned to see where the swearing was coming from, but he was turning anti-clockwise, preventing him from seeing the oncoming car. When he saw the beautiful historian, scantily dressed, the old man felt a strange twinge of nostalgia to his old days.

“Hey there, Dr. Gould,” he greeted. A little smirk crawled onto his face when he saw her in her bra, thinking her either drunk or crazy, what with the chilly weather and all.

“Mr. Hemming!” she still screamed as she ran toward him. His smile vanished as he began to doubt the mad woman’s intentions toward him. But he was too old to run from her, so he waited for the impact and hoped she would not hurt him. A deafening rush of water ensued from his left, and finally he turned his head to see the monstrous black Mercedes glide at him. On both its sides, white foamy wings sprang up from the road as the tires cut through the water.

“Holy Ch…!” he gasped, his eyes widening in terror, but Nina had him by the upper arm. She tugged him so hard that he stumbled onto the pavement, but the velocity of her action saved him from the fender of the Mercedes. Overcome by the wave of water scooped up by the car, Nina and old Mr. Hemming cowered in behind a parked car until the jerk in the Merc had passed.

Nina jumped up immediately.

“You are going down for this, you prick! I will track you down and kick your ass, you wanker!” she hailed her insults at the idiot in the posh car. Her dark hair hugged her face and neck, curling over the mounds of her bosom as she growled in the street. The Mercedes turned at the bend of the road and gradually disappeared behind the stone bridge. Nina was furious and cold. She reached out her hand to the flabbergasted senior citizen, shivering from the cold.

“Come, Mr. Hemming, let’s get you inside before you catch your death,” Nina suggested firmly. His crooked fingers latched over hers and she gently pulled the frail man to his feet.

“My dog, Betsie,” he stammered, still in shock from the fright of the close call, “she ran off when the thunder started.”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Hemming, we will find her for you, alright? Just get out of the rain. Oh my God, I am so tracking down that asshole,” she assured him, catching her breath in short gasps.

“You can do nothing to them, Dr. Gould,” he mumbled as she started leading him across the street. “They will sooner kill you than waste a minute on defending their actions, the scum.”

“Who?” she asked.

He motioned with his head toward the bridge where the car had vanished. “Them! The discarded afterbirth of what was once a good municipality, when Oban was run by a righteous council of dignified men.”

She frowned, looking bewildered. “Wh-what? You mean you know who that car belongs to?”

“Course!” he replied as she opened the garden gate for him. “Those bloody vultures in the town hall. McFadden! That swine! He is going to end this town but the young people don’t care about who is in charge anymore, as long as they can carry on whoring and partying. They are the ones who should have voted. Voted him away, they should have, but no. Money won the day. I voted against that skunk. I did. And he knows it. He knows everyone who voted against him.”

Nina recalled seeing McFadden on the news a while back, where he was attending a very important secret meeting, the nature of which, the news channels could not disclose. Most people in Oban loved Mr. Hemming, but most thought his political views was too old fashioned, that he was one of those veteran nay-sayers who refused to allow progress.

“How can he know who voted against him? And what could he do?” she defied the villain, but Mr. Hemming was adamant that she be careful. She patiently led him up the sharp incline of her walkway, aware that his heart could not handle a strenuous march uphill.

“Listen, Nina, he knows. I don’t know about technology these days, but word is that he is using devices to do surveillance on citizens and that he had hidden cameras installed above voting booths,” the old man jabbered on, as he always did. Only, this time, his babbling was not a tall tale or a fond memory of bygone days, no; it came in the form of serious accusations.

“How can he afford all those things, Mr. Hemming?” she asked. “You know that would cost a fortune.”

Big eyes leered at Nina from under the dripping, unkempt eyebrows. “Oh, he has friends, Dr. Gould. He has friends with lots of money who back his campaigns and pay for all his trips and meetings.”

She sat him down in front of her warm hearth, where the fire was licking at the mouth of the chimney. From her sofa, she grabbed a cashmere throw and wrapped it around him, rubbing his arms over the throw to warm him. He stared up at her in brute sincerity. “Why do you think they tried to run me over? I was the principal rival of their proposals during the rally. Me and Anton Leving, remember? We stood against McFadden’s campaign.”

Nina nodded. “Aye, I do remember. I was in Spain at the time, but I followed the whole thing on social media. You are correct. Everyone was convinced that Leving would win another stint in the town council chambers, but we were all devastated when McFadden won out of the blue. Is Leving going to object or propose another vote in the council?”

The old man scoffed bitterly, staring into the fire as his mouth cracked in a morose smile.

“He is dead.”

“Who? Leving?” she inquired in disbelief.

“Aye, Leving is dead. Last week he,” Mr. Hemming looked at her with a sarcastic expression, “had an accident, they said.”

“What?” she scowled. Nina was completely taken aback by the sinister goings on in her own town. “What happened?”

“Apparently, he fell down the stairs of his Victorian while intoxicated,” the old man reported, but his face played another card. “You know, I knew Leving for thirty-two years and he never had more than a tot of sherry in a blue moon. How could he intoxicated? How did he get so drunk that he could not walk the bloody stairs he walked for twenty-five years in the same house, Dr. Gould?” He laughed, reminiscing about his own near tragic experience. “And looks like, today was my turn at the gallows.”

“That’ll be the day,” she sneered, mulling around the information while she pulled on her robe and tied it.

“Now, you are involved, Dr. Gould,” he cautioned. “You spoiled their chance at killing me. You are in the middle of the shit storm now.”

“Good,” Nina said with a steely look. “That is where I am at my best.”