Frozen in Crime

Chapter 14 Extreme knitting

Christopher was worried enough to call round at Amaryllis's apartment at eight on Boxing Day. It would have been still pitch dark at that time, except that the snow made seem it a bit lighter. He wasn't sure of the scientific explanation for this but the extra light helped if you were getting up and going out while the rest of the world slept.

He trudged through the snow. At least the gales had died down again. It had been annoying having to go to bed early because there was nothing to do once the electricity went off, and he was pleased to find the power supply suddenly working again today. It must have been some temporary blip, not the lines coming down as he had imagined. He remembered reading about people having to wait days or even weeks to have their power restored. What did they do without the ability to boil a kettle and make a cup of tea?

The blinds were up at Amaryllis's sitting-room windows, which led to the balcony, and when he rang the bell downstairs she answered almost at once, sounding bright and breezy. Whatever had been bothering her on Christmas Day, she must have got over it very fast. He even felt a tiny trace of resentment about having got up so early to rush round and see her.

'Good that we've got the power back,' he said as she took his coat. Then he glanced round the room, normally a white minimalist haven with little furniture and no clutter, and his eyes widened.

There were big sheets of paper all over the floor, the glass-topped table, the big white sofa. They were covered in diagrams and lists drawn with marker pens in various colours. On the sofa some multi-coloured knitting formed a second layer of chaos, flung down as if randomly.

He didn't intend to pry into whatever she had been writing, but he caught sight of his own name halfway down one of the sheets. He glanced up to the top and saw the word 'Weaknesses' written there in big letters. He wasn't sure what to make of this.

'It's a SWOT analysis,' she said.

'So I'm a weakness, am I'?'

'Not exactly. I've put you down as a strength too.' She held up another piece of paper. 'It's because sometimes when I bounce ideas off you, you come up with a really helpful point, like Dr Watson - and sometimes you use delaying tactics to try and stop me following up a clue.'

'No, I don't!'

'You do, if you think it might be dangerous.'

'Well, maybe. But that could be a strength as well,' he argued. In spite of the bickering and the fact that he hadn't needed to get up early after all, he was relieved to see her like this. She still seemed restless, but she had turned the energy from this restlessness into something that could be useful.

'Is the knitting part of it?' he said mildly.

She laughed. 'Believe it or not, I like to do a bit of knitting when I'm thinking about things. It helps me to focus.'

He stared at the tangle of wools. 'But you don't actually focus on the knitting.'

'Don't make fun of it - you might end up with a woolly hat next Christmas. Or a pair of socks. I haven't worked out which it is yet.'

'But isn't there a pattern?'

She laughed, as if patterns were for wimps. 'The shape develops organically from the wool. Like a sculpture emerging from a piece of stone.'

'So what's all this about anyway?'

She let the 'Strengths' list flop back to the ground, and picked up another piece of paper from the table. The diagrams on it crawled around all over the place, and the text straggled round them like ivy round an old window-frame.