SIR EDWARD LEITHEN'S MYSTERIES - Complete Series. Buchan John

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СКАЧАТЬ never tanned, he was now as red as a peony, and his grey beard made a startling contrast with his flamboyant face. Usually he was an embarrassed figure inside the Castle, having difficulties in disposing of his arms and legs, but now excitement made him bold.

      “I’ve seen him, Cornel,” he panted. “Seen him crawlin’ like an adder and runnin’ like a sta-ag!”

      “Seen who? Get your breath, Macpherson!”

      “Him—the man—Macnab. I beg your pardon for my pechin’, sir, but I came down the hill like I was a rollin’ stone…It was up on the backside of Craig Dhu near the old sheep-fauld. I seen a man hunkerin’ among the muckle stones, and I got my glass on him, and he was a sma’ man that I’ve never seen afore. I was wild to get a grip of him, and I started runnin’ to drive him to the Cailleach’s Well, where Miss Agatha and the gentleman was havin’ their lunch. He seen me, and he took the road I ettled, and I thought I had him, for, thinks I, the young gentleman is soople and lang in the leg. But he seen the danger and turned off down the burn, and I couldna come near him. It would have been all right if I could have made the young gentleman hear, but though I was roarin’ like a stot he was deafer than a tree. Och, it is the great peety.”

      “Agatha, what on earth were you doing?” Janet asked severely.

      Junius Bandicott blushed hotly. “I never heard a sound,” he said. “There must be something funny about the acoustics of that place.”

      Colonel Raden, who knew the power of his stalker’s lungs, looked in a mystified way from one to the other.

      “Didn’t you see Macpherson, Agatha?” he asked. “He must have been in view coming over the shoulder of Craig Dhu.”

      It was Agatha’s turn to blush, which she did with vigour, and, to Mr Bandicott’s eyes, with remarkable grace.

      “Ach’ I was in view well enough,” went on the tactless Macpherson, “and I was routin’ like a wild beast. But the twa of them was that busy talking they never lifted their eyes, and the man, as I tell you, slippit off down the burn. It is a gre-at peety, whatever.”

      “What did you do then?” the Colonel demanded.

      “I followed him till I lost him in that awful rough corrie…But I seen him again—aye, I seen him again, away over on the Maam above the big wud. Standin’, as impident as ye please, on the sky-line.”

      “How long after you lost him in the corrie?” Janet asked.

      “Maybe half an hour.”

      “Impossible,” she said sharply. “No living man could cover three miles of that ground in half an hour.”

      “I was thinkin’ the body was the Deevil.”

      “You saw a second man. John Macnab has an accomplice.”

      Macpherson scratched his shaggy head. “I wouldn’t say but ye’re right, Miss Janet. Now I think of it, it was a bigger man. He didn’t bide a moment after I caught sight of him, but I got my glass on him, and he was a bigger man. Aye, a bigger man, and, maybe, a younger man.”

      “This is very disturbing,” said Colonel Raden, walking to the window and twisting his moustache. “What do you make of it, Nettie?”

      “I think the affair is proceeding, as generals say about their battles, ‘according to plan.’ We didn’t know before that John Macnab had a confederate, but of course he was bound to have one. There was nothing against it in the terms of the wager.”

      “Of course not, of course not. But what the devil was he doing on Carnbeg? There was no shot, Macpherson?”

      “There was no shot, and there will be no shot. There wass no beasts the side they were on, and Alan is up there now with one of James’s laddies.”

      “It’s exactly what we expected,” said Janet. “It proves that we were right in guessing that John Macnab would take Carnmore. He came here to-day to frighten us about Carnbeg—make us think that he was going to try there, and get us to mass our forces. To-morrow he’ll be on Carnmore, and then he’ll mean business. I hoped this would happen, and I was getting nervous when Agatha and Mr Bandicott came home looking as blank as the Babes in the Wood. But I wish I knew which was really John Macnab—the little one or the tall one.”

      “What does it matter?” her parent asked.

      “Because I should be happier if he were tall. Little men are far more cunning.”

      Junius Bandicott, having recovered his composure, chose to be amused. “I take that as a personal compliment, Miss Janet. I’m pretty big, and I can’t say I want to be thought cunning.”

      “Then John Macnab will get his salmon,” said Janet with decision.

      Junius laughed. “You bet he won’t. I’ve gotten the place watched like the Rum Fleet at home. A bird can’t hardly cough without its being reported to me. My fellows are on to the game, and John Macnab will have to be a mighty clever citizen to come within a mile of the Strathlarrig water. Nobody is allowed to fish it but myself till the 3rd of September is past. I reckon angling just now is the forbidden fruit in this neighbourhood. I’ve seen but the one fellow fishing in the last three days—on the bit of slack water five hundred yards below the bridge. It belongs to Crask, I think.”

      Janet nodded. “No good except with a worm after a spate. Crask has no fishing worth the name.”

      “I saw him from the automobile early this morning,” Junius continued. “Strange sight he was, too—dressed in pyjamas and rubbers— flogging away at the most helpless stretch you can imagine—dead calm, not a ripple. He had out about fifty yards of line, and when I passed he made a cast which fell with a flop about his ears. Who do you suppose he was? Somebody from Crask?”

      Janet, who was the family’s authority on Crask, agreed. “Probably some English servant who came down before breakfast just to say he had fished for salmon.”

      After tea Janet went down into the haugh. She met old Mr Bandicott returning from the Piper’s Ring, a very grubby old gentleman, and a little dashed in spirits, for he had as yet seen no sign of Harald Blacktooth’s coffin. “Another day’s work,” he announced, “and then I win or lose. I thought I had struck it this afternoon, but it was the solid granite. If the follow is there he’s probably in a rift of the rock. That has been known to happen. The Vikings found a natural fissure, stuck their dead chief in it, and heaped earth above to make a barrow…”

      Down near the stream she met Benjie, who appeared to have worked late at his besoms, bumping over the moor to the road. He and his old pony made a more idyllic picture than ever in the mellow light of evening, almost too conventionally artistic to be real, she thought, till Benjie’s immobile figure woke to life at the sight of her and he pulled his lint-white forelock. “A grand nicht, lady,” he crooned, and jogged on into the beeches’ shade. She sat on the bridge and watched the Raden waters pass from gold to amethyst and from amethyst to purple, and then sauntered back through the sweet-smelling dusk. Visions of John Macnab filled her mind, now a tall bravo with a colonial accent, now a gnarled Caliban of infinite cunning and gnome-like agility. Where in this haunted land was he ensconced—in some hazel covert, or in some clachan but-and-ben, or miles distant in a populous hotel, ready to speed in a swift car to the scene of action?…Anyhow, in twenty-four hours she would know if she had defeated this insolent challenger. On the eve of СКАЧАТЬ