Diary of a Shopkeeper, 20th December

Delivering at midwinter is not as easy as midsummer.  We’re glad to have the orders folk have entrusted to us, and we’re happy to deliver them all over the county.  But it can be quite a challenge to find an address you’ve never been to before, especially out in the country, where roads are dark and houses not always well signposted.

So it was on Saturday night.  I’d headed out west and north, to inland Evie.  Or maybe it was Harray.  Somewhere in the badlands between those two fine parishes.  I’d memorised our customer’s directions to follow the Deilquoy Road to the end, and then branch off up a farm track.  The lights at the end would be Goodman’s Croft.

It was the last delivery of the evening, and I was happy.  I was singing along to Bob Marley as I turned off Deilquoy, the headlights poking ahead into the darkness.  No sign of any house up ahead, but this had to be the way: there was no other.

I drove on, bumping into the occasional pothole, the box of wine in the back rattling.  The road curved to the left, then swerved to the right, and – holy hell! – there was a closed gate right across the road.

I stamped on the brakes, twisted the wheel and…BANG!

The next thing I knew I was coming to, the van pitched over at an angle, me held upright only by my seatbelt. I took a deep breath, shook my head, and looked around.  The headlights weren’t working, but it was clear I’d ended up in the ditch. 

My first thought was, had I been knocked out for a moment?  My second thought was, what about the wine in the back?  Was it smashed to pieces?  I sniffed: no tell-tale aroma of Shiraz or Chardonnay – maybe I’d been lucky.  The engine had cut, and the only sound was a low whistling wind.  I reached for my phone on the passenger seat, but of course it had gone flying in the smash and was lost.

I won’t detail the ten minutes it took me to push open the door and struggle out and up and down, landing at last with a thump and a splash on the muddy track.  All I will say is, when I finally stood up, brushed the gutter off my knees, and looked around, there was nothing to see in any direction but inky, impenetrable darkness.

The van tilted above me.  No chance of getting it out of the ditch by myself.  I’d have to get some help – preferably help of the John Deere or Massey Ferguson variety.

After a few seconds my eyes began to adjust to the darkness.  The moon was hidden behind big black clouds, but even so there was just enough glimmer in the air for me to make out the shape of the metal gate that had caused the accident.  Beyond that must lie the track to Goodman’s Croft, and my only chance of rescue.

I heaved myself over the gate and headed on along the track – which was only visible when the faint gleam though the clouds reflected in puddles in front of me. 

 And then…  And then I started to hear something.   Shuffling, stumbling footsteps.  Heavy breathing.  The sound of something big coming towards me out of the darkness.  And a strange clanking sound, like heavy chains rattling and dragging…

The skin on the back of my neck prickled, and my heart started pounding.  I could see nothing, absolutely nothing, but the sounds of the enormous shambling something came closer and closer.  I stared around wildly, my fists clenched, ready for flight or fight.

‘Hi aye beuy,’ said a gruff cheery voice.

‘Who is that?  I can’t see a thing!’ 

‘I’m right in front of you.  It’s me.’

The darkness moved, and I realised it wasn’t just the night I was seeing, but the vast bulk of Willie Pickle, looming over me, breathing heavily, reeking of beer and pickled onions.

‘Jeez Willie, you gave me a scare!   What the Dickens are you doing wandering about in the middle of nowhere?’

‘I’m looking for the party, beuy.  Got my carry out, see, just a few tins.’

There was a rustling and clanking noise, and I realised he was holding up a black bin bag full of beer cans, half of them already empty by the sound of them and the smell of him.

‘I’m delivering to some old croft,’ I said.  ‘I never heard of a party.’

‘Och it’s going to be great.  The theme is Ghost of Christmas Past.  We’ll all go crazy with the drinking and the dancing, like we used to back in the good old days, before this damn Covid cancelled all the fun.’

‘Exactly, Willie!  How can you have this blast from the past party now that parties are banned?’

‘Well, we’ll just…eh…I’m not sure.  But whatever the rights of it are, that’s where I’m going. Back to the past, that’s my motto.  So much better than the here and now.’

And with that he pushed past me.  I still couldn’t see him, but just felt him shove by and heard him stumbling off into the darkness, carry-out clanking at his side

‘Happy Christmas past!’ he called as he vanished into the night.

I had to find Goodman’s Croft.  I had to deliver the wine.  I had to get a tow out of the ditch, and I had to get home.  These thoughts were swirling around my head as I staggered on up the track.  There were still no lights ahead.  Unless…what was that a hundred metres or so ahead?

I picked up my pace, as far as I could in the mirk, but then found the skin prickling across my scalp again as I realised that, as I walked towards it, the light was jerking towards me too.  And I started to hear something, a moaning, a wailing, a string of mumbled words in a language I couldn’t quite understand.

And then round the corner ahead of me came a strange and ghostly figure glistening in the watery starlight, floating a foot off the ground.  Its top half was a woman, its bottom half a seal, and its tail flippers flapped in the air, propelling it remorselessly towards me...

TO BE CONTINUED

This diary appeared in The Orcadian on 24th December. The second and final part will appear in the paper on Hogmanay, and on this site a few days later. Other diaries continue to appear weekly. I am posting them in this blog a few days after each newspaper appearance, with added illustrations., and occasional small corrections or additions.