No Place Like Home

one”,’ Bram had objected, and Kirsty had countered: ‘But you never used it for Max, did you?’ Fair point.
Scott moved closer to Kirsty and leant in for a half-hug. ‘You okay?’
Bram could feel his caveman instincts kicking in again. Scott and Kirsty had ‘gone out together’ when they were fourteen and thirteen, respectively. Scott was happily – as far as Bram knew – married with a kid, but still.
Kirsty nodded. ‘What’s happening? No sign of them?’
‘Not a dickie-bird,’ said David.
‘Dad, you need to go in to Mum right now!’ Kirsty snapped. ‘She’s fucking furious with you and no wonder!’
Whoa.
Kirsty never swore.
‘Okay, okay,’ said David, backing off with his hands raised, as if placating a wild animal. ‘I’m going, I’m going.’
‘We know about the conviction,’ Kirsty said to Scott and Fraser as they all stood watching David plod off across the grass towards the house.
Scott grimaced.
‘Yeah,’ said Fraser. ‘I told Mum and Dad they should come clean – I mean, it was only a matter of time before you found out. But it was no big deal, Kirst. A road rage incident.’
‘He broke the man’s nose and jaw,’ said Kirsty. ‘He could have killed him!’
Fraser shrugged, looking as sheepish now as David had.
Tense silence, which Bram felt he should break. ‘So, what’s the story with this airgun enthusiast?’ Enthusiast? That made it sound like the person responsible was enjoying a nice hobby, out in the fresh air shooting guide dogs. That was another thing about being around Scott – Bram often found himself coming out with a load of nonsense. ‘Or psychopath, as Phoebe is calling him.’ Oh yeah, that was so much better.
Scott raised his Paul Newman eyebrows. ‘We’ve searched your wood, and a couple of PCs are giving the Taylors’ land the once-over now – and I’ve been over there to alert the Taylors to what’s happened. There’s no sign of anyone hanging around, but there’s evidence of a camp fire in the westernmost quadrant of your wood, the one furthest from the house. And some rubbish, cans of lager and crisp packets.’ He shrugged. ‘Kids.’
‘This is a bit below your pay grade, Scott, isn’t it?’ You ungrateful bastard, Bram. ‘Thanks for coming out,’ he added weakly. And that made it sound like he was talking to a tradesman.
More eyebrow action. ‘Fraser called me.’
‘Oh, ah, yes, right.’
It was a bit of a mystery why this ultra-sophisticated, successful guy was friends with Fraser, but apparently they’d been best mates since the first day of primary school, when the two five-year-olds had bonded over a shared obsession with football.
Bram became aware of the sound of a chugging engine, and a massive four-by-four appeared over the bridge.
‘The Taylors,’ said Kirsty.
Whenever the Taylors came over they drove, although it was just a five-minute walk up the track from their house. The lazy bastards.
Bram shook himself mentally. The Taylors were lovely people. Where was this vitriol coming from?
Scott raised a hand and strode across the grass towards the Taylors as they disembarked, twinkly Paul Newman smile in place, as if he, and not Bram and Kirsty, owned Woodside. Kirsty and Bram followed in his wake.
The Taylors had brought their kids along for the ride, Finn and Cara, nineteen and sixteen, respectively. Andrew and Sylvia would probably be in their early fifties, another generation, almost, from Kirsty and Bram. Andrew was your archetypal middle-class, middle-aged male, pink shirt and designer jeans, polished brown shoes, living high on the hog and beginning to show it around the midriff and in the fleshy ruddiness of his face. Sylvia was the archetypal mum, plump and smiley and chatty, with a tip-tilted nose and cat-like eyes that made her look like one of those 1950s actresses.
‘What an awful, awful thing!’ she exclaimed, bypassing Scott, Bram was pleased to note, and coming straight over to him and Kirsty. ‘How’s Bertie?’
‘Oh, he’s going to be fine,’ Kirsty reassured her, smiling, almost visibly relaxing a little. Sylvia had that effect on you, somehow – she oozed empathetic sympathy.
Scott had engaged Andrew in conversation, and was now gesturing at the wood. The two kids were kicking their heels, in Finn’s case literally. He was heeling a clump of grass and, as Bram watched, switched to kicking it with his toe. He was a tall, sporty boy who always seemed to be on the move, never sitting still for long, always fidgeting and jiggling about. His large brown eyes and strong jaw in combination with his mum’s little tipped-up nose gave him a cartoonish look, like a teenage superhero in a comic, always on the look-out for action. His sister Cara, in contrast, looked half asleep and utterly, utterly bored. Her skinny frame was slumped against the four-by-four as if she couldn’t wait for this to be over so she could get home and shut herself back in her room. Her hair was pink with green tips.
‘Max is inside,’ Bram called over to them.
‘Why don’t we all go in?’ Kirsty suggested.
They found Linda in the armchair by the ‘wireless’ in the Walton Room, Bertie in his bed at her feet. David was slumped at the kitchen table. Bram got the impression that their arrival had interrupted a frosty silence.
Cara, touchingly, was transformed when she saw Bertie in his Perspex collar.
‘Oh no, Bertie!’ she crooned, dropping to her knees on the rug by his bed and gently stroking his head. ‘Poor Bertie.’
‘He’s okay,’ Phoebe assured her. ‘It’s just a flesh wound.’
Finn shook his head at Max, as if to say Girls.
The group separated into adults round the kitchen table and kids in the sitting area, and Bram bustled about getting everyone coffee and tea and biscuits.
‘Probably just some idiot child,’ said Andrew, stirring milk into his coffee. ‘After rabbits.’ He indicated Bertie with his teaspoon. ‘Similar colouring.’
‘Have you had any trouble before, with kids with airguns?’ Bram asked.
‘No, never.’
But Sylvia was looking at her husband. ‘Local kids do hang out around here a bit. It seems the woods have been used by youngsters in the