Death by the Mistletoe

by Angus MacVicar

  “It’s twenty to one!”

  “We’ll do it!”

  Up Glenadale they swept, first across a level stretch of turf and then round the shoulder of a small hillock, tufted with short hazel.

  “Keep high!” directed Nicholson. “It’s boggy by the burnside.”

  They galloped at headlong speed, and often they had to stoop to avoid the long branches of the hazels and birches. The aromatic scent of the birch-sap was all around them. The backs of the horses were slippery with sweat.

  “Glenalbin — round that corner,” said Nicholson, pointing.

  They rode with a thunder of hooves into the little side glen. It is called Glenalbin, because of the profusion of old, silver-barked hazel trees which grow along its sides.

  CHAPTER XV

  As they swept round the side of a mossy mound James had a sudden view of the scene in the glen. Long afterwards when, sunk in a reverie, he would live again through the events of the night, this instantaneous vision would stand out clearly before his mind, like a magic-lantern slide shown in the midst of a swiftly moving film. For a moment horses, people, the whole world, seemed to stand still.

  In the grassy hollow, sheltered on either side by the hazel trees, stood about two score men and women, wearing loose, white robes. James recognised many of them, and his heart was sick. They had arranged themselves, one behind the other, in three long lines which converged on a centre at the head of the glen. They were bare-headed, and some of the women — among them the deaf housekeeper — had dressed their hair in long plaits. At the apex of the triangle formed by the three ranks was the death-masked man who had visited Dalbeg, holding high above his head a flaming torch. Immediately behind him James saw Miss Dwyer. The naked arms of the worshippers were raised to the sky, and their eyes were directed eagerly towards a single object. Their low wailing filled the hollow.

  Dominating the gathering was a tall, spare figure, his face towards the east. He was raised on a high boulder behind a long, flat stone and clad, unlike the others, in a green mantle, the folds of which fell thickly about him. On his bare head had been placed a chaplet of mistletoe. His arms were upraised, and he was speaking in a dreary monotone. In one hand he held an instrument like a sickle, which glinted dully yellow in the moonlight; in the other he grasped a trailing green plant. The face of Mr. Anderson Ellis was lined and drawn, but his eyes glowed with a fanatic fire. Behind him, on a knoll, there had been erected a small, squat stone, which James had not seen before in the glen, and of which the golden ornament he had noticed in the perfumed room at Lagnaha was an exact replica. The pitted, sun-marked Cromm Cruaich must have been carried to the glen that night, for the adoration of the cult. In front of the High Priest was a flat altar, at whose base lay two large boxes and, leading from the boxes, there ran a cluster of wires. O’Hare, Muldoon and Barlow, in ordinary clothes, stood beside one of the batteries. O’Hareʼs hand was on a lever. All about the glen, obliterating the clean, fresh smell of the birch-sap, lay the odour of the stuff that was being burned in the spluttering torch.

  James saw that Eileen lay on the altar, her body covered only by a thin, white cloth. Steel rings, attached to the wires from the batteries, were bound to her forehead and to her left ankle. Her eyes were wide open and terrified, and her breasts rose and fell painfully beneath the shining coverlet.

  The wailing of the worshippers ceased as James and Nicholson rode into the glen, and a wild shrieking took its place. Straight among the long ranks the riders sent their labouring beasts. The white-robed people scattered to let them through. James heard them shouting:

  “The prophecy: The wanderer with the flaming head: The fair churchman!”

  He heard Ellis, the High Priest, screaming:

  “My curse rest on you, wanderer! The curse of Balor fall on you! Kill her, O’Hare!”

  He saw the gleaming eyes trying to hold his own; but he took no heed of the power playing about his brain. He rode on, leaped from his beast and grappled with O’Hare, pulling him from the lever before the giant could lean upon it.

  “Loose Eileen!” he roared to Nicholson.

  As he struggled with the executioner he saw the young minister cower away from the High Priest, then shield his eyes with his arm and advance to the altar. He saw Nicholson tear the steel rings from the forehead and ankle of the girl, wrap her round with the white covering and lift her in his arms from the flat stone.

  He yelled in a frenzy; Eileen was alive and safe. And this was his last fight with O’Hare: he knew it in his heart. He was inured to the pain of the blows which were showered on his chest by the great fist of the giant. The whole assembly seemed to be stricken still as the battle waged before the altar. Even Ellis appeared to be nonplussed, taken by surprise. The worshippers, it was clear, began to await the result of the fight as they would await a sign from their heathen god. The two horses had disappeared into the hazel thickets.

  The thud of fists on hard, trained bodies sounded through the glen, and the quick, panting breaths of the fighters rose and fell. Circling round on the narrow strip of short grass they went. O’Hare’s eyes were cruel, and his thick, red lips curled in the delight of inflicting pain. His gross face was flushed under the film of dark hair. James seemed slight beside him. But he was a better boxer than O’Hare: he would not allow those powerful hands to grip. His face was white in the moonlight, and his mouth was a straight, red gash. His flaming hair was like a halo. He felt no weariness, even after his ordeal in the cave. He could have fought on for ever. Eileen was alive behind him.

  O’Hare had no knife on this occasion, and slowly his expression began to change. A foam-fleck gathered at one comer of his sensuous mouth. He was becoming afraid. He could not hurt this dancing, frenzied devil. His right fist lashed out. James side-stepped, let the blow glance lightly from his jaw, and used his left, straight for the stomach. O’Hare grunted, bent forward a little with the pain. James’s right arm streaked out from his shoulder, like a trip-hammer. Crack: O’Hare’s body curved backwards and he fell, writhing and moaning, on the turf. His jaw was broken.

  James turned, and was about to leap across the altar to where the High Priest stood, sickle in hand. He saw Eileen, barefoot on the dewy grass, clinging to Nicholson. She was watching him with dilated eyes. But as he gathered himself for the spring he heard a quiet, clipped voice behind him:

  “All right, MacPherson! We have them covered!” Major David Dallas strode alone, bare-headed and dishevelled, into the centre of the glen.

  “I arrest you all,” he said distinctly, “in the name of God and the King. Your sins be upon you!”

  On he walked through the silent assembly — a small slip of a man — towards the High Priest. Not one of the worshippers tried to stop him. Despite the raggedness of his clothes and the weariness in his face, there was a dignity and a power in his presence which could not be gainsaid. He stopped before the altar.

  “Come down, Ellis!” he commanded.

  Mr. Anderson Ellis came down, stepping on the altar. They stood confronting each other. Major Dallas put out his right hand to grasp the arm of his prisoner …

  James, panting, saw the whole thing happen; but though he stood less than three yards away it was all over so quickly that he could not lift a finger to prevent the tragedy. Eileen hid her face on the Rev. Duncan Nicholson’s breast, and a groan of anguish went up from the throats of the “well-meaning ones” .… With a darting, jerky movement Ellis brought down the golden sickle on the wrist of the Chief Constable. The blood spurted and the hand hung limp. Major Dallas’s expression hardly changed. He flung the High Priest from him against the altar, and in some way the electrodes, which had been strapped on Eileen’s body, must have found contact. As he stumbled forward the Chief Constable fell against the lever of the battery. There was a crackling and a blinding flash … Na Daoine Deadh Ghinn had not failed to offer up a sacrifice.

  *

  Huddled like sheep in the comer of the glen farthest from the al
tar, the priests, the executioners and the worshippers turned to flee. They looked towards the bottom of the glen. Inspector McMillan, Sergeant Robertson, Constable Stewart and Dr. Black stood there, cocked rifles to their shoulders. They looked towards the north side of the glen. Sergeant MacLeod, Constable Wallace, Constable McFater and a small, slim man stood there, cocked rifles to their shoulders. They looked to the south side of the glen. Detective-Inspector McKay, Constable McArthur, Constable Allison and Mr. Archibald MacLean stood there, cocked rifles to their shoulders.

  And at the head of the green hollow, grouped around the altar, were the Rev. Duncan Nicholson, Major Dallas and Detective-Sergeant Wilson, the latter holding a revolver in his sound right hand. On the altar lay the High Priest, and trailing across his still breast was the sprig of mistletoe which he had been grasping. A little to one side was James. Eileen had now gone over to his side.

  Before they left “The Glen of Adoration” the Rev. Duncan Nicholson and James put their shoulders to the Cromm Cruaich, and it toppled over, crashing on to the altar and shattering the electric batteries.

  *

  Big Peter, the head printer in the offices of the Campbeltown Gazette, stormed, raged, resigned and set up the headings to a remarkable and exclusive article, two columns in length, which appeared in that Thursday’s issue of the journal, and which was not completed until five minutes to twelve in the forenoon. The last paragraph of the article read as follows:

  *

  At an early hour this morning it was learned in Campbeltown that police activities in other parts of Britain had been entirely successful, and that captures similar to those which took place in Blaan were brought about at one o’clock. We understand that the plan proposed by the Society to which Professor Campbell and the late Moderator belonged was carried out to the letter in every case. It is officially believed that only a very few members of the Na Daoine Deadh Ghinn now remain at large; and these can no longer continue the rites of the cult — alone. The land has been rid of a great evil.

  *

  “As accessories to murder, imprisonment for life for each member of the cult,” McKay predicted. “Ellis, had he not died, would have been executed.”

  Immediately the Gazette was published, James, who had slept for six solid hours at Dalbeg after their return from “The Glen of Adoration,” dashed for “Kate.” The car, which was garaged in Messrs. Hewitt’s establishment, had been taken from Lagnaha the previous night by the policemen and used in their wild race by road for Breckrie. He was tired and sore; he had a bad cold, and his arms ached from the wrists upwards; but his heart was singing.

  He stopped at the Cottage Hospital on his way to Dalbeg, and found Major Dallas cheerful, though suffering some pain from his injured arm. The two C.I.D. men were with him, chatting, in a private ward. McKay’s forehead was covered with sticking-plaster, while Wilson’s left arm was in a sling.

  “They’ll call me ‘One-handed Dallas’ in the Force now,” said the Chief Constable with a short laugh. “But I don’t grudge — anything. And at any rate, I always managed my moustache with my left!” They talked of the adventure, and presently, in reply to a question put by James, McKay said:

  “The rats came to Lagnaha this morning after we left. They destroyed almost everything in the house.” Wilson’s queer eyes glittered triumphantly.

  “But we had secured all our evidence yesterday,” he added.

  “I suppose, MacPherson,” said Major Dallas, “you’ll be going on to Dalbeg now?”

  James flushed.

  “Absolutely right,” he answered, and the Chief Constable’s left hand shot out and gripped his arm.

  “Good luck!” said the three policemen, almost in chorus.

  *

  There was quite a gathering at Dalbeg. When James arrived, the Professor, fully restored in health, was holding forth in the library on the subject of the “well-meaning ones.” His face was round and ruddy again. With him were the Rev. Duncan Nicholson, Dr. Black, Mr. Archibald MacLean and Inspector McMillan. Merriman, James learned later, had vanished early that morning, having some mysterious task in view in the North of Scotland.

  “Another scoop!” greeted the Fiscal as he came in. “Well done!”

  “He is like a hawk, indeed!” remarked Inspector McMillan.

  James coughed.

  “Professor Campbell, might I see you for a moment alone?”

  Damn it!” Dr. Black slapped his knee. “I knew it! … Young ass!”

  Leaving the room with the Professor, James saw the Rev. Duncan Nicholson’s eyes on his face. They were very blue and very wistful. But the young minister met James’s glance with a crooked smile.

  “I just want to ask you, Professor Campbell, if I can marry Eileen — sometime soon?” James spoke very concisely when they reached the hallway. “We love each other. I received an offer from the London Echo this morning … They think I did rather — er — well on the ‘Mistletoe Murders.’ It means a steady, decent income.”

  He was breathing fast. He quailed — this man who had rode unarmed into “The Glen of Adoration” — before the sharp eyes of the little, stout Professor. But the latter smiled.

  “Surely, MacPherson,” he said. “I think you will make her happy.”

  “Oh … thank you!” James had grown hoarse. “Where is she?”

  “Drawing-room,” pointed the Professor, who realised the need for brevity in the circumstances.

  She was wearing the white tennis frock, and her brown hair glinted in the sunshine which came through the open windows. She was pale, and there were dark shadows beneath her eyes. But when she saw James her cheeks flushed. Her eyes sparkled as a clear pool does under a sudden shaft of light.

  “Oh, James!” she cried.

  He caught her to him, trying hard not to hurt her.

  “They didn’t” he was beginning.

  She shook her head.

  “They treated me well … Oh, don’t let us speak of it any more for ever and ever.”

  He did not fail to kiss her, this time.

  After a while he said:

  “Eileen, come on! We’ll go down to the shore. Remember that day? … Darling, I’ve got such a lot of things to tell you.”

  “All right, James.” A twinkle came into her eyes. “But before you come out with me you must comb that mop of hair. It’s terrible!”

  “Which,” remarked the editor of the Campbeltown Gazette, “is the third time you’ve said that!”

  “And I don’t suppose it will be the last,” whispered Eileen, and she kissed his cheek lightly.

  *

  On the following day, Friday, The Times again used a set of banner headlines.

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