A pang of hunger seized her.
She had made a late start from Inverness, having spent most of the morning shopping and sending off postcards to her friends in London. It was now nearly two o’clock and she was glad that she had asked the hotel to pack her a picnic luncheon. This was the ideal spot for a picnic and she took the luncheon bag from her Volkswagen and spread herself on a grassy bank by the water.
It was really a beautiful spot and there was nothing so pleasant as eating out in the open air in spectacular surroundings. The sun was hot for a late April day, one of those peculiar days that, by rights, should belong to July or August.
She lay back, feeling a little drowsy after her meal and musing for the hundredth time on the incredible events of the past few months. As she had told Simpson Kyle, it was quite a step from a North London bedsitter to a Scottish castle.
The next thing Jeannie knew was that it was turning chilly and clouds were scudding low across the sky. With a cry of dismay she realised that she must have been sitting dreaming for nearly two hours for her wrist watch showed the hour to be nearly four o’clock. Hastily, she drank the last cup of tea in her thermos flask and tidied up the luncheon things, returning the bag to her Volkswagen, and drove on.
She had not gone many miles when there was a loud report and the wheel started to drag in her hand. She braked cautiously, brought the car to a halt and climbed out.
‘Damnation,’ she breathed, as she saw the flat offside front tyre.
She opened the front of the Volkswagen and brought out the jack and placed it in position under the ‘jacking-point’. She had raised the vehicle off its flat tyre, taken off the hub cap and was busy struggling with the nuts when a voice made her swing round.
‘Can I be of help to you?’
It was a tall, willowy looking man in his late forties. He was swarthy of skin with straight black hair, a lock of which rebelliously fell across his face, while the rest was pushed backwards, glistening under a coating of hair oil. The dark skin of his face was pitted with chicken-pox scars. His lips were thin and gave the impression of a tiny mouth beneath a hooked nose. His eyelids were heavy and half hooded his black eyes. The gauntness of his face and features made Jeannie immediately think of a vulture. Jeannie fought down her prejudiced feeling of initial dislike.
‘I am sorry if I startled you,’ the man was saying in a fairly slow but pronounced accent. Each word was carefully articulated in his soft accent which made the man sound like a stage Highlander.
Jeannie recovered her wits.
‘I didn’t see you coming along the road,’ she said.
‘Perhaps because I was not coming along the road,’ rejoined the man.
He looked down at the tools in her hand and the offending wheel.
‘You would seem to be having a problem with the nuts. Would you allow me … ?’
Somewhat reluctantly Jeannie handed him the tools, observing as she did so that the man’s hands were dirty and the fingernails blackened. If there was anything Jeannie Millbuie disliked in the personal appearance of a man, it was dirty fingernails. She also noted that the tweed suit he wore had obviously seen better days and in parts was now torn and filthy.
The man bent over the wheel and before long had removed it and replaced it with the spare.
‘I would be having this mended before you go much further, miss,’ he said as he lifted the flat into the front of the Volkswagen. ‘I would be thinking that the roads in these parts are not as good as those in London and there is no telling when you might get another flat.’
Jeannic started.
‘How do you know that I come from London?’
The man’s thin lips quirked in a parody of a smile.
‘Och, is it not your accent that is telling me?’
Jeannie relaxed and grinned.
‘Yes, I suppose you’re right. We Londoners tend to think everyone else has an accent except us.’
The man tidied away the tools.
‘Would you be on holiday then, miss?’
Jeannie felt a surge of resentment at his questioning but suddenly reminded herself that she was not in London. People in the country were genuinely curious and interested in who one was and where one was going; it was a friendly interest without ulterior motives. It was sometimes hard for a city-raised person to realise that fact.
‘I’m partly on holiday,’ she replied and, prompted by the man’s puzzled stare, went on: ‘I am on my way to Balmacaan. Perhaps you can give me some directions … ?’
Her voice trailed off as the man swung round, a deathly pallor seeming to drain his face of blood.
‘Balmacaan?’ he whispered. ‘Balmacaan, is it?’
‘Is there anything wrong?’ asked Jeannie, puzzled.
‘What do you know of Balmacaan? What business have you there?’
The man’s voice had turned harsh, demanding.
Jeannie felt herself go red in indignation.
‘Surely that is my affair?’ she snapped back, wondering at the man’s sudden change of attitude.
The man moved towards her, eyes blazing.
Jeannie took an involuntary step backwards. For one wild moment she thought the man was going to assault her physically.
But then the man’s shoulders suddenly slumped and his eyes dropped to the ground.
‘Aye, aye. I am thinking you are right. Perhaps it is no business of mine. Yet I shall tell you this … Balmacaan is not for the likes of you. There are plenty of other spots in which to enjoy a holiday. There are plenty of places which are not cursed.’
Jeannie looked at the man, startled.
‘What do you mean?’
‘As I say, miss. If you want a holiday then stay at Inverfarigaig or Foyers but avoid Balmacaan. It is an unlucky place, an evil place.’
The man turned abruptly and started walking away into the woods.
For a moment Jeannie stared at his retreating form.
‘Hey!’ she called. ‘Hey, just a moment. Let me give you something for fixing the car.’
But the man did not answer and had already vanished amongst the trees.
Perplexed, Jeannie climbed back into her Volkswagen and drove on. By the time she had cleared the woods, emerging high on a hillside overlooking the loch-side village of Foyers, she had dismissed the man as a local simpleton. Her mind was once more fascinated with the breathtaking beauty of the scenery that lay before her. She found herself gazing down to where a river ran into the loch, where the shore line formed a promontory and crescent bay around which the village was built. She could see, beyond a football field, shelving muddy beaches backing onto a rocky shoreline. The land looked flat in contrast with the mountainous scenery surrounding it. The village itself seemed quite tranquil and was dotted with steep gabled cottages.
She had barely time to gather in the splendid picture before she had sped through the village and the road climbed higher and slanted away across the hillside, with the great loch developing into a fantastic panoramic view. Soon she would have to turn off towards the loch side, to the hamlet of Balmacaan itself. The encounter with the strange man was already half forgotten in her excitement at seeing Balmacaan Castle.
After a few miles, Jeannie pulled into the side of the road and gazed about her in perplexity. She reached for the maps in the glove compartment and silently rebuked herself for not bothering to get a large-scale map of the district. Balmacaan certainly seemed to be off the beaten track. And now there was already a dullness to the sky which precedes the onset of evening. She did not want to be driving around the countryside trying to find her way in the blackness.
A sudden crunch of gravel made her look up.
A florid-faced police constable was dismounting from an ancient bicycle.
Jeannie wound down the window of her car and smiled up at the man as he leant his bicycle against a low stone wall and came over.
‘Would you be lost then, miss?’ he asked cheerfully, nodding towards her maps.
&
nbsp; ‘I’m afraid I am,’ confessed Jeannie. ‘Can you tell me how I get to Balmacaan from here?’
She was startled to see the constable’s friendly expression vanish as suddenly as the flame of a candle when it is blown out.
‘Balmacaan?’ The constable regarded her with a suspicious look.
Jeannie experienced a feeling of apprehension. The odd behaviour of the man who had helped her mend the flat tyre surged back into her mind. She frowned and then laughed to herself: perhaps they were all a trifle queer in these parts.
‘Yes,’ she replied, pretending that she had seen nothing amiss. ‘It does exist doesn’t it … I can’t see it marked on the map.’
‘Aye,’ the constable took off his hat and smoothed his hair. ‘It exists all right. But there is nothing there … nothing to interest a tourist, that is.’
‘What makes you think that I’m a tourist?’ demanded Jeannie, a trifle annoyed.
The constable shrugged.
‘Well, it’s precious few other people that we get in these parts. That is apart from the weirdies who come up to hunt Nessie … the monster that is.’
‘Well, I do not happen to be either. My name is Millbuie.’
The constable’s eyes went wide in astonishment.
‘Millbuie, is it?’
‘Yes, and I am trying to get to Balmacaan Castle.’
‘Aye, aye.’ The policeman studied her reflectively. ‘I did hear some talk of the old laird’s castle being inherited by someone from England.’
‘Well?’ asked Jeannie, now impatient. ‘Can you direct me to Balmacaan?’
The constable shifted his weight from one foot to the other in apparent awkwardness.
‘Aye.’
There was a long pause.
It seemed to Jeannie that the constable squared his shoulders as if about to undertake an unpleasant task.
‘Aye, Miss Millbuie … you go about a hundred yards down this road and then you’ll see a trackway to your right. You follow it around the shoulder of the first hill and go alongside the wee loch you’ll come upon. Then the track starts to go up and across the shoulder of Beinn a’ Bhacaidh, the big mountain you can just see from here. Just follow that trackway and it’ll lead you straight up to the gates of Balmacaan Castle. The village lies a mile or so further on but you’ll not be wanting to go there, I’m thinking.’
Jeannie smiled her thanks.
‘No, it is the castle that I want.’
She reached forward to start her car.
‘Miss Millbuie … ’
The constable paused, awkward again.
‘It is getting late and it may be a better plan to stay at Foyers for the night. There’s a good inn there.’
Again Jeannie felt a moment of apprehension.
But Jeannie Millbuie was nothing if not stubborn.
‘You seem to have something against Balmacaan,’ she observed with a directness which made the man look down uncomfortably.
‘Och, not a thing, not a thing, Miss Millbuie. I merely thought that you might not be expected at this hour … and … ’
His voice trailed off lamely.
‘I believe my solicitor in Inverness has informed the housekeeper, Mrs Murdo, that I am coming. Mrs Murdo is the housekeeper there, isn’t she?’
‘Oh, aye,’ nodded the constable. ‘Mrs Murdo is the housekeeper there, right enough.’
‘Then that’s all right. I’ll be on my way.’
‘Very well, Miss Millbuie … drive carefully now. Just follow the trackway but go carefully; it does not have all that many cars along it these days.’
He raised his hand in salute as she moved off.
As she turned from the main road onto the trackway which he indicated, Jeannie caught a last glimpse of the man in her driving mirror, standing in the roadway, hands on his hips, feet splayed apart, gazing after her.
She had a passing wish that Tim was with her.
CHAPTER FOUR
Twilight was beginning to shroud the loch when Jeannie brought her Volkswagen to a halt on the steep shoulder of Beinn a’ Bhacaidh. She pulled the car over to one side of the winding gravel trackway and climbed out.
Her breath caught in her throat as she gazed down towards the wooded shores of the loch, now lying with its peaty black waters sullen in the uncoming gloom. Yet in spite of the twilight she could make out, perhaps a mile or so away, the great house which must surely be Balmacaan Castle.
Most of the house was obliterated by tall pine and spruce fir, in whose giant shadows the occasional birch struggled for existence. The house seemed to be a large rambling building. She noted patches of red brick here and there but the main structure seemed to be of grey stone rising to three storeys in height. Dominating even the trees were two large stone towers, square and stubborn, set right at the water’s edge. With their slit windows and battlements, Jeannie realised that these must have been part of the original castle structure.
The place must surely be beautiful in daylight and particularly on a summer’s day, reflected Jeannie.
She climbed back into her car, pushed it into gear and began the descent down the gravel track towards a large stone wall in which two heavy wrought-iron gates were set. At first she thought she had come to the wrong gate because the iron work was rusty, even decayed, and tall grass grew in profusion around it as if the gateway had never been used in centuries. She left the motor of the Volkswagen running and went to the gate to peer through. No, the pathway did carry on past the gate and disappeared through the woods in the direction of the house.
On one side of the gateway was a rotting wooden board inscribed in black Gothic characters, which could only just be read — Balmacaan Castle. Below this was a heavy rusty iron handle on an equally rusty iron chain. It seemed obvious that this was a bell to the house.
Cautiously, Jeannie reached up, took the handle and yanked.
There was a snapping noise and Jeannie nearly went over backwards as the handle, chain and some wood splintered away in her hand.
She swore softly.
Returning to the gates she saw, after a careful inspection, that there did not seem to be a lock of any sort securing them. She reached forward and pushed. The gates did not move. The hinges were so rusty that the gates had simply welded themselves into the iron supports which had also come away from the rotting wood gate posts and fallen downwards so that the gates rested with their bottom parts on the ground.
With a deep breath, Jeannie bent and took a firm hold of the iron spokes of one gate and heaved. It took her several attempts before she tore the thing loose from the ensnaring grass and shrubs. She staggered a few feet, swinging the gate inwards with a protesting squeal from the rust-laden hinges and the snapping of rotten wood.
She regarded her reddened and rust-smeared hands ruefully and then turned to execute a similar action with the second gate.
She stood back and surveyed her work. She had moved the gates open to a distance whereby she could just squeeze her car through them. She drove the car forward at about five miles an hour, cautiously easing it over the weed strewn pathway and through the now darkened wood, which appeared to encircle the house on three sides, leaving the loch as a protective barrier on the fourth side.
Jeannie switched her headlights on and found the pathway stretching in a lazy arc between the trees before suddenly emerging on some wide lawns which crept up to the red brick walls of what was obviously the front of the house itself. She switched off her lights as they were now unnecessary, once she had left the darkness of the woods.
In the twilight the house seemed very imposing. Even the grotesque Victorian architecture lent a certain dignity to the building.
The pathway, which she had been following, swung to one side of the building, under an archway which led into a cobbled yard, enclosed on three sides by red brick outhouses which seemed to have been stables at one time, while the fourth side was delineated by the wall of the main house itself.
Jeannie halted th
e car and climbed out.
A stillness greeted her to which she was totally unused. In London one did not notice the continual background hum of traffic and other sounds, swirling in the Thames valley dustbowl, until one left the city and halted in some quiet country spot. To the city bred, the stillness of the country could be unnerving and Jeannie had not yet grown used to its totality.
What puzzled her was the fact that no one had come from the house to greet her. Surely they had heard or seen the arrival of her car? Nor could she see any lights in the gloomy building. Perhaps Mrs Murdo, the housekeeper, had left the house after all?
Jeannie stood for a moment, indecisively, and then walked across the cobbled yard to the narrow pathway which seemed to circumnavigate the house.
The night had descended with surprising abruptness. One moment it had been a gloomy, brooding sort of twilight. The next moment, even as she left her car, the blackness seemed to swirl over everything.
She could still see enough to follow the pathway alongside the flowerbeds that bordered the building; still see enough to find her way to the extravagant main door. The Victorians seemed to have rebuilt the square mediaeval brick porchway which stood like the porch of an ancient church, a structure of arched windows and doorways with a vaulted roof. The main door was large, made of some heavy wood and studded with iron.
Jeannie could see no bell or knocker at first and so she beat on the wooden panels with her fist. She realised how futile this was almost immediately as the sound of her knocking was muffled by the thickness of the wood. She peered around and her eyes, growing more accustomed to the blackness, caught sight of the shadow of an iron bell chain hanging to one side of the porch. Wary from her experience at the gate, she caught hold of it, braced herself and pulled. Somewhere, a long, long way away, came the muffled peal of a bell.
The Curse of Loch Ness Page 3