The Leithen Stories. Buchan John

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СКАЧАТЬ off the ground. No thought of the stakes and her hunter occurred to her – only of Glenraden and its inviolate honour.

      Almost at once she lost sight of the place where the stag lay. She was now on the low ground of the haugh, in a wilderness of bogs and hollows and overgrown boulders, with half a mile of rough country between her and her goal. Soon she was panting hard: presently she had a stitch in her side; her eyes dimmed with fatigue, and her hat flew off and was left behind. It was abominable ground for speed, for there were heather-roots to trip the foot, and mires to engulf it, and noxious stones over which a runner must go warily or break an ankle. On with bursting heart went Janet, slipping, floundering, more than once taking wild tosses. Her light shoes grew leaden, her thin skirts a vast entangling quilt; her side ached and her legs were fast numbing … Then, from a slight rise, she had a glimpse of the Raden water, now very near, and the sight of a moving head. Her speed redoubled, and miraculously her aches ceased – the fire of battle filled her, as it had burned in her progenitors when they descended on their foes through the moonlit passes.

      Suddenly she was at the scene of the dark deed. There lay the dead stag, and beside it a tall man with his shirt-sleeves turned up and a knife in his hand. That the miscreant should be calmly proceeding to the gralloch was like a fiery stimulant to Janet’s spirit. Gone was every vestige of fatigue, and she descended the last slope like a maenad.

      ‘Stop!’ she sobbed. ‘Stop, you villain!’

      The man started at her voice, and drew himself up. He saw a slim dishevelled girl, hatless, her fair locks fast coming down, who, in the attitude of a tragedy queen, stood with uplifted and accusing hand. She saw a tall man, apparently young, with a very ruddy face, a thatch of sandy hair, and ancient, disreputable clothes.

      ‘You are beaten, John Macnab,’ cried the panting voice. ‘I forbid you to touch that stag. I …’

      The man seemed to have grasped the situation, for he shut the knife and slipped it back in his pocket. Also he smiled. Also he held both hands above his head.

      ‘Kamerad!’ he said. ‘I acknowledge defeat, Miss Raden.’

      Then he picked up his rifle and his discarded jacket, and turned and ran for it. She heard him splashing through the river, and in three minutes he was swallowed up in the farther woods.

      The victorious Janet sank gasping on the turf. She wanted to cry, but changed her mind and began to laugh hysterically. After that she wanted to sing. She and she alone had defeated the marauder, while every man about the place was roosting idly on Carnmore. Now at last she remembered that hunter which would carry her in the winter over the Midland pastures. That was good, but to have beaten John Macnab was better … And then just a shade of compunction tempered her triumph. She had greatly liked the look of John Macnab. He was a gentleman – his voice bore witness to the fact, and the way he had behaved. Kamerad! He must have fought in the war and had no doubt done well. Also, he was beyond question a sportsman. The stag was just the kind of beast that a sportsman would kill – a switch-horn, going back in condition – and he had picked him out of a herd of better beasts. The shot was a workmanlike one – through the neck … And the audacity of him! His wits had beaten them all, for he had chosen the Home beat which everyone had dismissed as inviolable. Truly a foeman worthy of her steel, whom like all good fighters after victory she was disposed to love.

      Crouched beside the dead stag, she slowly recovered her breath. What was the next move to be? If she left the beast might not John Macnab return and make off with it? No, he wouldn’t. He was a gentleman, and would not go back on his admission of defeat. But she was anxious to drain the last drops of her cup of triumph, to confront the idle garrison of Carnmore on its return with the tangible proof of her victory. The stag should be lying at the Castle door, and she herself waiting beside it to tell her tale. She might borrow Mr Bandicott’s men to move it.

      Hastily doing up her hair, she climbed out of the hollow to the little ridge which gave a prospect over the haugh. There before her, not a hundred yards distant, was the old cart and the white pony of Fish Benjie, looking as if it had been part of the landscape since the beginning of time.

      Benjie had wormed his way far into the moss, for he was more than half a mile from the road. It appeared that he had finished his day’s work on the besoms, for his pony was in the shafts, and he himself was busy loading the cart with the fruits of his toil. She called out to him, but got no reply, and it was not till she stood beside him that he looked up from his work.

      ‘Benjie,’ she said, ‘come at once. I want you to help me. Have you been here long?’

      ‘Since nine this mornin’, lady.’ Benjie’s face was as impassive as a stump of oak.

      ‘Didn’t you hear a shot?’

      ‘I heard a gude wheen shots. The auld man up at the Piper’s Ring has been blastin’ awa.’

      ‘But close to you? Didn’t you see a man – not five minutes ago?’

      ‘Aye, I seen a man. I seen him crossin’ the water. I thought he was a gentleman from the Castle. He had a gun wi’ him.’

      ‘It was a poacher, Benjie,’ said Janet dramatically. ‘The poacher I wanted you to look out for. He has killed a stag, too, but I drove him away. You must help me to get the beast home. Can you get your cart over that knowe?’

      ‘Fine, lady.’

      Without more words Benjie took the reins and started the old pony. The cart floundered a little in a wet patch, tittuped over the tussocks, and descended with many jolts to the neighbourhood of the stag – Janet dancing in front of it like an Israelitish priest before the Ark of the Covenant.

      The late afternoon was very hot, for down in the haugh the wind had died away. The stag weighed not less than fifteen stone, and before they finished Janet would have called them tons. Yet the great task of transhipment was accomplished. The pony was taken out of the shafts and the cart tilted, and, after some strenuous minutes, the carcase was heaved and pushed and levered on to its floor. Janet, hanging on to the shafts, with incredible exertions pulled them down, while Benjie – a tiny Atlas – prevented the beast from slipping back by bearing its weight on his shoulders. The backboard was put in its place, the mass of brooms and heather piled on the stag, the pony restored to the shafts, and the cortege was ready for the road. Benjie had his face adorned with a new scratch and a quantity of deer’s blood, Janet had nobly torn her jumper and one stocking; but these were trivial casulties for so great an action.

      ‘Drive straight to the Castle and tell them to leave the beast before the door. You understand, Benjie? Before the door – not in the larder. I’m going to strike home through the woods, for I’m an awful sight.’

      ‘Ye look very bonny, lady,’ said the gallant Benjie as he took up the reins.

      Janet watched the strange outfit lumber from the hollow and nearly upset over a hidden boulder. It had the appearance of a moving peat-stack, with a solitary horn jutting heavenwards like a withered branch. Once again the girl subsided on the heather and laughed till she ached.

      * * *

      The highway by the Larrrig side slept in the golden afternoon. Not a conveyance had disturbed its peace save the baker’s cart from Inverlarrig, which had passed about three o’clock. About half-past five a man crossed it – a man who had descended from the hill and used the stepping-stones where Sir Archibald Roylance had come to grief. He was a tall man with a rifle, hatless, untidy and very warm, and he seemed to desire to be unobserved, for he made certain СКАЧАТЬ