Thainstone Mart

‘Who’ll give me two hundred? One hundred? Fifty, then, to get started? Fifty, I’m bid!’ From his perch on the elevated metal dais, the white-coated auctioneer scanned the faces gathered around the ring. Behind him, an identically clad assistant kept a watchful eye. The two were flanked by a female clerk, her eyes glued to a computer screen.

With an annual turnover of over one hundred million, Thainstone Mart comprises a purpose-built complex of auction halls, stores and offices on the outskirts of Inverurie. With over five thousand members, the farmer-owned co-operative hosts a weekly Thursday sale of cast cows and bulls, prime cattle and sheep, and on Fridays, of young, store and breeding cattle and ewes. These are augmented by sales of fodder, plant and machinery, vehicles, furniture, and by farm displenish sales or roups.

Maggie had been to a fair few sales with her folks when they lived on the farm, though these had been at the old Kittybrewster Mart, a rather random collection of sheds on Aberdeen’s Great Northern Road. The site had been redeveloped, now: new flats and neighbouring superstores. But she could still hear the scrunch of her dad’s car tyres on gravel as they bumped over the unmade approach road, smell the two rank toilets that huddled in one corner, and taste the stovies that came, steaming, on a bendy paper plate from a makeshift kitchen.

Now, she sat in the tiered blue folding seats that rose behind the Thainstone auction ring. Following Wilma’s unfortunate episode at Kemnay, Maggie had decided to resume control of the case. Farming was second nature to her, and she was determined to achieve a satisfactory outcome. One in the eye for Wilma; she wasn’t the only one who could take on somebody bigger than herself and get a speedy result. Maggie allowed herself a quiet smile at the thought her business partner had been floored by a coo.

She’d decided the best way forward was to nail the subject on sale day. That way she was sure he’d be solvent. She scanned the rows of seats. Men of all ages, shapes and sizes, clad in quilted body-warmers, fleeces, Barbour jackets. A scattering of women. There was no sign of her man.

‘Sold!’ She was snapped out of her reverie by the crack of the auctioneer’s gavel. Above his head, the screen flashed red, live-streaming details of the lot under the hammer: number, sex and age of the beasts, country of birth, breed of sire. Then the medical history and whether farm assured – this last, she knew, essential to meet supermarket criteria.

‘Walk on!’ She heard the familiar command of the yardsman in his blue coat and welly boots, as he brandished his stick at the sold beast’s rump. On the other side of the dais, another beast snorted and nudged at the steel bars of the pen as it waited its turn to be led into the ring.

It was years since her dad had kept cattle, but it all came flooding back: the serene presence of the cows with their solid flanks and liquid brown eyes, the sweet smell of silage. With a pang, Maggie recalled the day her folks held their own roup: the household goods in the yard, the machinery laid out in rows in the field. The anticipation as the auctioneer sought a vantage point on a chair or tractor, the poignancy of dismantling a lifetime’s toil.

How Maggie wished, now, she’d offered her mum and dad more support. Decisively, she dismissed the thought. Wasn’t it always the same, the way a woman was pulled in two different directions – that constant tug-of-love between husband and child, parent and family, even one sibling and another?

Concentrate! Maggie turned her attention to the potential bidders. Perched on moulded blue plastic stools, the weather-reddened faces at the ringside were a study in fierce deliberation, broken only by the occasional quip out the side of a mouth. Bids were hard to spot: a raised eyebrow, a barely perceptible lift of the chin. Maggie indulged in a quiet chuckle. This lot could teach a poker school a thing or two.

She’d inveigled her way into the office, established her man’s consignment was Lot No. 137. Now all she had to do was wait. Lot 100 came and went. 110. 120. The auctioneer rattled through the lots. Maggie followed with her eyes the new arrivals in the hall. Lot 130. 135. 137. She sat forward in her seat.

The bidding was sluggish at first: one man wearing a lovat green jersey with shoulder and elbow patches leaned on the ringside opposite, one hand on the railing, his little finger flicking bids. Another sat in the seats high up. He raised a catalogue to show intent. And then she saw him. He was standing just inside the doorway, his face partly obscured by a checked scarf.

The bids crept upwards, so slowly Maggie feared they wouldn’t meet the reserve. And then what? She caught her breath. She’d have spent time and petrol for nothing.

A new bidder, this time on the seats below her, though Maggie could only see the back of his head and the auctioneer’s acknowledgement. Her eyes glued to the action, she observed another couple of bids. Then they stalled.

‘I’m sorry, that’s a pass.’ The auctioneer jotted a note.

Damn and blast! So much for the Mart’s guaranteed same-day payment. Half Maggie’s day had been wasted. In her head she totted up the cost to the agency. And that didn’t factor in Wilma’s wee adventure.

As the beasts were led out, Maggie caught a movement. Her man had turned and was pushing through the exit.

She leapt to her feet, skittered down the steps and followed. She was just in time to see him huddled in the near corner in conversation with another man.

There was a brief nod of the head, a shuffling of hands, a roll of banknotes. So her guy had done a deal on the side. Maggie cursed herself for being so slow on the uptake, for many a transaction was effected outside the sale hall to avoid paying the Mart’s commission. For just a moment she felt sorry for the man. High levels of indebtedness among farmers were widespread, she knew, farm suicides not uncommon. Her man had likely been driven by financial difficulty to perpetrate the fraud she was investigating. He’d just sold his beasts for less than they were worth. And he wouldn’t be alone.

Still, she reminded herself, fraud is fraud.

She watched as the two shook hands.

The target turned.

Made to walk away.

Maggie moved like a bullet.

‘Got a minute.’ She tugged at his sleeve. ‘There’s a wee something we have to discuss.’