The Dark Mile (Historical Novel). D. K. Broster

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СКАЧАТЬ madam,” he protested with apparent sincerity. “I should be loth to bring such an accusation against a gentleman. But what laird in these parts knows precisely what his tenants will be about when his back is turned . . . and you say Ardroy is from home now. Yet, since the steers are branded——”

      “Aye,” broke in Miss Cameron with vivacity, “that alone proves, my good sir, that you are talking nonsense—and very offensive nonsense too! Had the cattle come here, by straying or even by reiving, you would have had them back by now, branded as you say they are.”

      “Yet I have not had them back.”

      “Then they never came here.”

      Glenshian looked at her loftily. “I have the best of reasons for knowing that they did . . . I should like to see Ardroy’s herdsman.”

      “I have no authority to allow that in his absence,” replied Miss Cameron. “I perceive,” she went on with warmth, “that you’re almost upon saying that I went and lifted your steers myself one dark night, and have them hidden—in my bedchamber belike! You may go and look, sir. But warrant you to interfere with Ardroy’s dependents I cannot.”

      “Then,” said the visitor still more loftily, “I regret, but I shall have to do it without your warrant, madam. I am not going back without my steers.”

      “You’ll go back without much reputation for civility, Mr. MacPhair!” retorted the lady. “But as you have brought some sort of an army with you, and we are only women in this house . . .” She made a gesture. “Forbye, are you sure you did not know all the while that Ardroy was from home?”

      To this suggestion Glenshian deigned no answer. He said, looking black, “There are men on Ardroy’s land, at any rate—the men who drove off my cattle.”

      “And do you think, sir, that they are going to help you find those phantom beasts?”

      “Someone is going to help me find them. I have come for that!”

      And like two duellists, the young man and the old woman faced each other. Miss Cameron made the first lunge.

      “Very good then,” she said after a moment. “Take your tail that’s out there, and go up the braeside, Glenshian, and look for your steers. But if you think that one of Ardroy’s gillies will lift a finger to help you without orders from him you are sore mistaken! In the latter end you and your gathering will likely all spend the night in a bog!” And she followed up this attack by a second. “Here’s another point for your consideration: God knows what sort of faces my nephew’s tenants, and particularly the MacMartins, will show you when you go marching over his land and driving his cattle!”

      “You will please to send word in advance, madam, upon what errand I am come.”

      “And have the look of countenancing it! I shall do nothing of the sort!”

      To the ears of the disputants, both now thoroughly roused—and the younger and stronger aware, too, that this damned old lady had him at something of a disadvantage by her refusal of support—there came in the momentary silence the rumble of carriage-wheels. Miss Cameron, if her older hearing did not perceive it quite as quickly, was, however, at once aware, from the way he turned his head, that the intruder had heard something or other.

      “That’s maybe Ardroy returning before he’s expected,” she remarked casually, though she did not think it was. “You will be able to make your request to him in person, which will no doubt be more agreeable to a gentleman like yourself than trying to bully an old woman.”

      “Request,” said Finlay MacPhair, throwing back his head. “I’d have you know, madam——”

      But, then, out of the corner of his eye, he perceived a chaise pass the window, and did not finish the sentence.

      “Losh, it is Ardroy and the bairns!” exclaimed Miss Cameron in genuine surprise. “What brings him back before his time?” She went to the parlour door (the vehicle having meanwhile passed out of sight, and being presumably by now in the act of discharging its occupants) and called out, “Ewen, come away ben at once; here’s a visitor to see you!”

      And so, a moment or two later, Ewen Cameron entered to find the enemy who, as he had declared only two nights ago, was not likely ever to trouble his house, standing in a very haughty manner almost upon its hearthstone. He had not seen Finlay MacPhair face to face—though he had seen his back—since the revelation of his treachery, two years ago, in the Chief’s London lodging, when he himself had interposed between his sword and Hector Grant’s. He stopped, speechless, in the doorway.

      * * * * *

      “You are surprised to see me, Ardroy?” said the visitor, showing no embarrassed consciousness at all of their last meeting. “But when you hear why I am come, I can’t but think that you will put fewer obstacles in my path than your good aunt here has seen fit to do.”

      “I wonder!” thought Aunt Margaret. Her nephew’s dour expression suggested that there was one path at least in which he would place no obstacles, and that was Mr. MacPhair’s homeward one. His lips were so firmly closed that, to her, it seemed as if he were only keeping back with difficulty the utterance of this sentiment; but the traditions of Highland hospitality were too strong for him to give way to his visible desire.

      “In what then can I serve you, Glenshian?” he asked in the most frigid tones, laying his hat and a riding whip upon the table as he spoke.

      And Finlay the Red answered him with much directness: “By restoring to me the cattle which your tenants have lifted from me.”

      A quick flush dyed Ewen’s fair skin. “I think I cannot have heard you aright, sir. My tenants do not lift cattle . . . from anyone!”

      The young Chief smiled a half pitying smile. “Not with your knowledge, perhaps; I do not suggest that. But, as I was just remarking to Miss Cameron, who knows what goes on behind the laird’s back?”

      “In the case of a man with so many dependents as yourself, that question may perhaps be asked,” retorted Ewen. “But I, with my mere handful”—there was no humility, rather the reverse, in his tone—“I flatter myself that I know their employments pretty well.”

      Glenshian sniggered. “I would not be too ready to claim that knowledge if I were in your place, Ardroy. In the end it might prove awkward for you.”

      But, before her nephew could reply to this innuendo, Aunt Margaret, already standing at the door, had slipped out of the room. Although by nature she relished a fight, it seemed to her that Ewen would prefer to have out this preposterous business unhampered by the presence of a woman. Moreover she must prepare Alison for the onslaught of her small sons. The sound of their excited voices and of racing feet was even now audible upstairs, and the hall door had just opened to admit a man in riding costume whom she recognised, without much surprise, as young Invernacree.

      “Is that Ian Stewart?” she asked, and, Ian coming forward to salute her, she went on, in a voice which, despite herself, showed signs of trouble, “MacPhair of Glenshian is here, making a great pother about a couple of steers which he swears Ewen’s people have lifted from him. Whether you’d best go in on them or not I don’t know. Ewen looks very angry, but I suppose they’ll not come to blows—at least I hope not.”

      Ian hesitated a moment; then he remembered something which Ewen had let fall about a dark night and a СКАЧАТЬ