by John Buchan
Those words made all the difference to Jaikie’s comfort. He was called a “little rat” — he was being threatened; and threats had always one effect on him. They roused his slow temper, and they caused him to turn very pale, just as six years earlier they would have made him weep. Allins saw his whitening face, and thought it was the consequence of Mastrovin’s glower and the formidable silence of the company. He saw only a rag of a journalist, who had been drunk in the afternoon, and was now feeling the effects. He did not see the little shiver which ran across Jaikie’s face, leaving it grey and pinched, and, even if he had, he would not have known how to interpret it.
“I think you will tell me,” said Mastrovin with a menacing smoothness. “We will make it worth your while. If you don’t, we can make it unpleasant for you.”
Jaikie’s acting was admirable. He let a wild eye rove among the faces and apparently find no comfort. Then he seemed to surrender.
“All right. Keep your hair on. . . . Well, first there’s a man they call the Count — that’s all I could get from the Knockraw beaters.”
He described in accurate detail the appearance and garb of Casimir, of the Professor, of Prince Odalchini. He in no way drew upon his imagination, for he was speaking to men to whom the three had for years been familiar.
“Is there not a fourth?” Mastrovin asked.
Jaikie appeared to consider. “Oh, yes. There’s a young one. He came the night before last, and was out shooting yesterday.” He described elaborately the appearance of Prince John. “He wears a white mackintosh,” he added.
Mastrovin nodded.
“Now, will you tell us why you think these people have some hold on Mr Craw?”
Jaikie appeared to hesitate. “Well — ye see — I don’t just quite like. Ye see, Craw’s my employer. . . . If he heard I had been mooching round his house and spying — well, I’d be in the soup, wouldn’t I?”
The alcoholic bravado of the afternoon had evaporated. Jaikie was now the treacherous journalist, nervous about his job.
“You are afraid of offending Mr Craw,” said Mastrovin. “Mr Galt, I assure you that you have much more reason to be afraid of offending us. . . . Also we will make it worth your while.”
Threats again. Jaikie’s face grew a shade paler, and his heart began to thump. He appeared to consider anew.
“Well, I’ll tell ye. . . . Craw never entertains anybody. His servants tell me that he never has any guests from the neighbourhood inside the door. But the people at Knockraw dined at Castle Gay last Saturday night, and the Castle Gay party dined at Knockraw on Monday night. That looks queer to begin with.”
The others exchanged glances. They apparently had had news of these incidents, and Jaikie confirmed it. Their previous knowledge also established Jaikie’s accuracy.
“Anything more?”
“Plenty. The people at Knockraw have brought their own servants with them. Everybody inside the house is a foreigner. That looks as if they had something they wanted to keep quiet. . . . It would have been far cheaper to get servants in the Canonry, like other tenants.”
Again Mastrovin nodded.
“Anything more?”
“This,” said Jaikie, allowing a smile to wrinkle his pallor. “These Knockraw foreign servants are never away from Castle Gay. They spend half their time crawling about the place. I’ve seen one of them right up at the edge of the terrace. I daresay they’re all poachers at home, for they’re grand hands at keeping cover. Now, what does that mean?” Jaikie seemed to be gaining confidence and warming to his task. “It means that they’re not friends of Craw. They’ve got something coming for him. They’re spying on him. . . . I believe they’re up to no good.”
Mastrovin bent his brows again.
“That is very interesting and very odd. Can you tell us more, Mr Galt?”
“I can’t give ye more facts,” said Jaikie briskly, “but I can give ye my guesses. . . . These Knockraw folk want something out of Craw. And they’re going to get it. And they’re going to get it soon. I’ll tell ye why I think that. The polling’s on Friday, and on that day there’s a holiday at Castle Gay. Craw’s very keen — so they tell me — on his people exercising what he calls their rights as citizens. All the outdoor servants and most of the indoor will be in Portaway, and, if I’m any judge, they’ll no be back till morning. Maybe you don’t know what a Scotch election is like, especially in the Canonry. There’ll be as many drunks in Portaway as on a Saturday night in the Cowcaddens. The Knockraw foreigners will have Craw to themselves, for yon man Barbon, the secretary, is no mortal use.”
Jaikie observed with delight that his views roused every member of the company to the keenest interest, and he could not but believe that he had somehow given his support to a plan which they had already matured. It was with an air of covering his satisfaction that Mastrovin asked, in a voice which he tried to make uninterested:
“Then you think that the Knockraw people will visit Castle Gay on Friday night?”
“They won’t need to visit it, for they’ll be there already,” said Jaikie.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that by this time they’ve all shifted their quarters, bag and baggage, to the Castle.”
“How the devil do you know that?” It was Allins who spoke, and his voice was as sharp as a dog’s bark.
“I found it out from one of the Castle maids. I can tell ye it’s all arranged. The servants have left, but the gentry are shifting over to the Castle. . . . I was at Knockraw this morning, and I saw them packing the guns in their cases. They’re done with shooting for the year, unless,” he added with a grin, “there’s some shooting of a different kind at Castle Gay.”
This news produced an impression as great as the most sensitive narrator could have desired. The seven men talked excitedly among themselves — not, to Jaikie’s regret, in French.
“It looks as if ye didn’t believe me,” he said, with irritation in his tone. “Well, all I can say is, send out somebody to Knockraw the morn’s morning, and if the place is not all shuttered up and not a chimney smoking, ye can call me the worst kind of liar.”
“We accept what you say, Mr Galt,” said Mastrovin, “and we will test it. . . . Now, on another matter. You say that you have explored the park of the Castle very thoroughly, and have seen the Knockraw servants engaged in the same work. . . . We have here a map. As a proof of your good faith, perhaps you will show us the route by which these servants approached the gardens unobserved.”
He produced a sheet of the largest-scale Ordnance Survey.
“Fine I can do that,” said Jaikie. “In my young days I was a Boy Scout. But I’m awful dry with so much talking. I’ll thank you for some more beer.”
His glass was filled, and he drained it at a draught, for he was indeed very thirsty. A space was cleared on the table, and with a pencil he showed how the park could be entered at the Callowa bridge and elsewhere, and what sheltered hollows led right up to the edge of the terrace. He even expounded the plan of the house itself. “There’s the front door. . . . A man could get in at any one of these lower windows. They’re never shuttered. . . . No, the gardeners’ houses are all down by the kitchen garden on the east bank of the Callowa. The chauffeurs and mechanics live on the other side just under the Castle Hill. . . . The keepers? Mackillop is miles away at the Blae Moss; one of the under-keepers lodges in Starr, and one lives at the South Lodge. Craw has a very poor notion of guarding his privacy, for all he’s so keen on it.”
Jaikie yawned heavily — partly in earnest, for he was very weary. He consulted the cheap watch at the end of his recently purchased chain. He was searching for the right note on which to leave, and presently he found it. It was no occasion for ceremony.
“I wasn’t much in my bed last night, and it’s time I was there now — or I’ll be dropping under this table.” He got to his feet and made an embarrassed survey of the company.
“I’m much obliged to you gentlemen for your hospita
lity. We’ve had a great crack, but for God’s sake keep it to yourselves. . . . I’ve maybe said more than I should have, but it’s your blame for leading me on. . . . I want ye to promise that ye’ll never mention my name. If it came out that I had been spending my time nosing into his private affairs, Craw would fire me like a shot. . . . And he doesn’t pay badly.”
“You need not worry, Mr Galt,” said Mastrovin. “We are not loquacious people. Let me recommend you to be equally silent — especially in your cups.”
“Never fear. I’ll take care of that.” Jaikie gave an imbecile giggle, bobbed his head to the company, and took his leave. Allins did not offer his hand or trouble to open the door. They had had all that they wanted from this bibulous, babbling, little reporter.
At the door of the Hydropathic Jaikie remembered suddenly that they had promised to remunerate him for his confidences. He wished he had collected his fee, for he believed in taking every opportunity of spoiling the Egyptians. But he could do nothing now. He was as one who had escaped from the cave of Polyphemus, and it would be folly to go back for his hat.
At the Green Tree he found a note which had been brought by a boy on a bicycle. “Dear Jaikie,” he read, “set your mind at ease. Mr Craw is here at the Mains, being lectured by Aunt Harriet. You have made him twice the man he was. Love from Alison.”
He read this missive at least eight times. Then he put it carefully into his pocket-book and laid the pocket-book under his pillow. Last night, though that pocket-book contained fifty pounds in Treasury notes, it had lain casually on his dressing-table.
CHAPTER XVII. JAIKIE OPENS HIS COMMUNICATIONS
Jaikie slept like a log and awoke next morning in high spirits. These were mainly attributable to Alison’s letter, which he re-read many times while he dressed. She had called him “Jaikie” on paper; she had sent him her love: the whole enterprise was a venture of his and Alison’s — the others were only lay figures. At breakfast he had some slight uneasiness as to whether he had not been a little too clever. Had he not given too much rein to his ingenuity? . . . He had prevented Prince John joining the others in their midnight flitting. No doubt it was in a general way desirable to scatter in a flight, but he could not conceal from himself that the Prince might now be safe in the English midlands, whereas he was still in the very heart of danger. Well, he had had a reason for that, which he thought Alison would appreciate. . . . And he had gone out of his way to invite an assault on Castle Gay. He had his reason for that, too, many reasons, but the chief, as he confessed to himself, was the desire for revenge. He had been threatened, and to Jaikie a threat was a challenge.
He spent half an hour in cleansing Woolworth, whose alcoholic flavour the passage of hours had not diminished. His bedroom had smelt like a public house. First he borrowed big scissors from Mrs Fairweather, and clipped the little dog’s shaggy fleece and his superabundant beard and whiskers. Then he washed him, protesting bitterly, with soap and hot water, and dried him before the kitchen fire. He made a few alterations in his own get-up. The stiff collar and flamboyant tie of yesterday were discarded, and for neckwear he used a very faded blue scarf, which he tied in the kind of knot affected by loafers who have no pride in their appearance. He might meet Allins or one of the Evallonians in the street, and he had no desire to be recognised. He looked now, he flattered himself, like a young artisan in his working clothes, and to complete the part he invested in an unfashionably shaped cap.
Attended by the shorn and purified Woolworth, he made for the railway station. Portaway, as has been explained, is an important main-line station, but it is also the junction for a tiny single-line railway which runs down the side of the Callowa estuary to the decayed burgh of Fallatown. Once Fallatown was a flourishing port, with a large trade to the Cumberland shore and the Isle of Man, a noted smuggling centre, and the spot from which great men had taken ship in great crises. Now the ancient royal burgh is little more than a hamlet, with a slender fishing industry, a little boat-building, and one small distillery. Jaikie did not propose to go as far as Fallatown, but to stop at the intermediate station of Rinks, where he had some business with a friend.
He crossed the bridge and reached the station without mischance. The rain of the preceding day had gone, and had left one of those tonic October mornings which are among the delicacies of Scottish weather. There was no frost, the air was bracing and yet mild, the sky was an even blue, the distances as sharp as April. From the bridge Jaikie saw the top of the great Muneraw twenty-five miles distant, with every wrinkle clear on its bald face. The weather gave an edge to his good spirits. He bought a third-class return ticket for Rinks, and walked to the far end of the station, to the small siding where the Fallatown train lay, as if he had not a care in the world.
There he got a bad fright. For among the few people on the little platform was Allins, smoking a cigar outside a first-class carriage.
Jaikie hastily retreated. Why on earth was Allins travelling to Fallatown? More important, how on earth was he to escape his notice at such close quarters? At all costs Allins must not know of his visit to Rinks.
He retreated to the booking-office, and at an adjoining bookstall bought a paper with the notion that he might open it to cover his face. In the booking-office was a large comely woman of about thirty, much encumbered with a family. She carried an infant in one arm, and a gigantic basket in the other, and four children of ages from four to ten clung to her skirts. Apparently she desired to buy a ticket and found it difficult to get at her purse because of the encumbrance in her arms. “I want three return tickets to Fallatown,” she was telling the clerk, while she summoned the oldest child to her aid. “Hector Alexander, see if you can get Mither’s purse oot o’ Mither’s pooch. Na, na, ye gomeril, that’s no whaur it bides. Peety me that I suld hae sic feckless weans . . . Mind the basket, then . . . Canny, it’s eggs . . . Gudesakes, ye’ll hae them a’ broke.”
Hector Alexander showed signs of tears, and one of the toddlers set up a wail. The mother cast an agonised look round and caught sight of Jaikie.
“Can I help ye, mistress?” he said in his friendly voice. “I’m for Rinks mysel’. It’s a sore job traivellin’ wi’ a family. Gie me the wean and the basket. Ye havena muckle time, for the train starts in three minutes.”
The flustered woman took one look at his face, and handed over the baby. “Thank ye kindly. Will ye tak the bairns to the train and I’ll get the tickets? Hector Alexander and Jean and Bessie and Tommy, you follow the gentleman. I’m sure I’m awfu’ obliged.”
So it fell out that Jaikie, with an infant beginning to squall held resolutely before his face, a basket in his right hand, and four children attached to different parts of his jacket, made his way to the Fallatown train, passing within ten feet of his enemy. The third-class coach was just behind the engine. Allins did not spare even a glance for the much-encumbered youth. Jaikie found a compartment with only one old woman in it, and carefully deposited the basket on the floor and the four children on the seats, the while he made strange noises to soothe the infant. The guard was banging the doors when the hustled mother arrived and sat down heavily in a corner. She cuffed Hector Alexander for blowing his nose in a primitive way, and then snatched the now obstreperous babe from Jaikie’s arms. “Wheesht, daurlin’! Mither’s got ye noo . . . Feel in my pooch, Bessie. There’s some jujubes for you and Jean and wee Tommy.”
The old woman surveyed the scene over the top of her spectacles. Then she looked at Jaikie.
“Ye’re a young chiel to be the faither o’ sae mony weans.”
The mother laughed hilariously. “He’s no their faither. He’s just a kind freend. . . . Their faither is in the Gledmouth hospital wi’ a broken leg. He works in the Quarries, ye ken, and a month yestreen he got a muckle stane on his leg that brak it like a pipe stapple. . . . Thank ye, he’s gettin’ on fine. He’ll be out next week. I’m takin’ the weans to see their grannie at the Port.”
The infant was quieted, and the two wom
en embarked on a technical discussion of human ailments, while the four children found an absorbing interest in Woolworth. The little dog was deeply offended with his master and showed it by frequent artificial sneezes, but he was not proof against the respectful blandishments of the children. Consequently when he left the carriage at Rinks, he had two of their jujubes sticking in his damp fleece.
Jaikie, with the dog in his arms, sheltered behind a shed till the train had left the platform. He had a glimpse of Allins’s unconscious profile as he was borne past. Then he went out to the roadside clachan which was Rinks, and turned his steps over the salty pastures to the riverside.
The machars, yellowing with autumn, stretched for miles before him till in the south they ended in a blue line of sea. The Callowa, forgetting its high mountain cradle, had become a sinuous trench with steep mud banks, at the bottom of which — for the tide was out — lay an almost stagnant stream. Above the grasses could be seen here and there the mast of a small vessel, waiting in the trough for the tide. The place was alive with birds — curlew and plover and redshank and sandpiper — and as he jumped the little brackish ditches Jaikie put up skeins of wild duck. It was a world in which it was good to be alive, for in the air there was both the freedom of the hills and the sting of the sea.
Presently he reached a little colony of huts beside the water. Down in the ditch which was the Callowa lay three small luggers; there was an antiquated slip and a yard full of timber. One of the huts was a dwelling-house, and before its door, sitting on a log, was a man in sea-boots and jersey, busy mending a sail. He looked up as Jaikie appeared, dropped his task, took the pipe from his mouth, and grinned broadly. “Whae would hae thocht to see you here?” was his greeting. “Is Mr McCunn wi’ ye?”
“Not this time,” said Jaikie, finding a place on the log. “But he’s in this countryside. How’s the world treating you, Mr Maclellan?”