It was strange, how you meet your friends in the presence of your enemies … or at least just before they arrive...
Captain Hamish MacMurray of the Big Loft police force was a true Scottish highlander, having heard constantly about Virginia from “the southernmost of the Scottish highlanders,” the MacMurrays of Lofton County, who had been in Virginia since the mid-1800s. He had finally decided to come over and visit and see what the fuss was after becoming a widower … a new start in America, like so many before him had the thought.
“Oh, Virginia is for lovers!” his cousins assured him, “and there are a lot of pretty girls with Scottish and Irish roots here!”
He had been a police captain in Inverness before coming across the Atlantic, and it so happened that his American cousins had long history in Lofton County law enforcement, so, he was swiftly offered a position with the Big Loft police force as a captain as well in early 2019.
At that time, the force had also offered a job to Colonel Henry Fitzhugh Lee, back home after 23 years in the Army, with a position as captain.
The two “outsiders” had not met right away, but they would … Captain MacMurray had missed the last “struggle meeting” of captains owing to being out sick, but he had heard about the carrying on and was especially disgusted about the meeting that had been added to everyone's morning on January 21.
Captain Lee had stayed well within departmental guidelines in his interview with the Lofton County Free Voice, but that taken with his shunning of the mainstream (read: White) press and his giving so much credit to Chief Inspector Jean-Paul Philippe Dubois from Interpol (who just happened to hail from French Louisiana and be Black), had caused all the resentment about the changes in the department to boil over … again.
Captain MacMurray thought it was all ridiculous, especially since he knew Chief Inspector Dubois from back in Inverness … he had great respect for and a good deal of liking for how the man from Interpol handled himself in complex international matters.
Yet he also had studied the history of race in the United States of America, and he knew what it was all about. Demographic change was sweeping the nation as well as being forced on Lofton County's police forces … Captain MacMurray had been warmly welcomed as a European immigrant to fill a position, but the very presence of Chief Inspector Dubois in his power and brilliance was a profound irritant – and then to have Captain Lee talking him up as if getting more officers of a darker hue might be a good thing – that was too much.
But still, when he arrived at the conference room early and saw Captain Lee already there, early, perfectly calm as he occupied his time reviewing a file he had brought with him, Captain MacMurray burst out – and made a life-long friend.
“Och, man! Why are we here? Just why are we here? We both have ten thousand things we need to be doing at our precincts, and we're here because somebody is mad at what somebody else did and actually got the credit he should because you gave it to him?”
“Captain MacMurray, I hear from every corner about your clear-minded thinking and leadership, and I see the stories are true.”
Captain MacMurray laughed heartily.
“These people do not bother me,” Captain Lee said. “I am a U.S. Army veteran; this does not even qualify as a hard day in basic training.”
“Not many of these would have made it in the Scottish Army where I served either!”
The man from the Scottish highland sat down by the man from the Blue Ridge, and since they had time, made friends at once.