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

beast, and stopped before him.

      “I’ve gotten it,” he whispered hoarsely. “The stag’s in the cairt. The lassie and me histed him in, and she tell’t me to drive to the Castle. But when I was out o’ sicht o’ her, I took the auld road through the wud and here I am. We’ve gotten the stag off Glenraden ground and we can hide him up at Crask, and I’ll slip doun in the cairt afore mornin’ and leave him ootbye the Castle wi’ a letter from John Macnab. Fegs, it was a near thing!”

      Benjie’s voice rose into a shrill paean, his disreputable face shone with unholy joy. And then something in Palliser-Yeates’s eyes cut short his triumph.

      “Benjie, you little fool, right about turn at once. I’m much obliged to you, but it can’t be done. It isn’t the game, you know. I chucked up the sponge when Miss Raden challenged me, and I can’t go back on that. Back you go to Glenraden and hand over the stag. Quick, before you’re missed…And look here—you’re a first-class sportsman, and I’m enormously grateful to you. Here is something for your trouble.”

      Benjie’s face grew very red as he swung his equipage round. “I see,” he said. “If ye like to be beat by a lassie, dinna blame me. I’m no wantin’ your money.”

      The next moment the fish-cart was clattering in the other direction.

      To a mystified and anxious girl, pacing the gravel in front of the Castle, entered the fish-cart. The old horse seemed in the last stages of exhaustion, and the boy who drove it was a dejected and sparrow-like figure.

      “Where in the world have you been?” Janet demanded.

      “I was run awa’ wi’, lady,” Benjie whined. “The auld powny didna like the smell o’ the stag. He bolted in the wud, and I didna get him stoppit till verra near the Larrig Bridge.”

      “Poor little Benjie! Now you’re going to Mrs Fraser to have the best tea you ever had in your life, and you shall also have ten shillings.”

      “Thank you very kindly, lady, but I canna stop for tea. I maun awa down to Inverlarrig for my fish.” But his hand closed readily on the note, for he had no compunction in taking money from one who had made him to bear the bitterness of incomprehensible defeat.

      VI.

       THE RETURN OF HARALD BLACKTOOTH

       Table of Contents

      Miss Janet Raden had a taste for the dramatic, which that night was nobly gratified. The space in front of the great door of the Castle became a stage of which the sole furniture was a deceased stag, but on which event succeeded event with a speed which recalled the cinema rather than the legitimate drama.

      First, about six o’clock, entered Agatha and Junius Bandicott from their casual wardenship of Carnbeg. The effect upon the young man was surprising. Hitherto he had only half believed in John Macnab, and had regarded the defence of Glenraden as more or less of a joke. It seemed to him inconceivable that, even with the slender staffing of the forest, one man could enter and slay and recover a deer. But when he heard Janet’s tale he became visibly excited, and his careful and precise English, the bequest of his New England birth, broke down into college slang.

      “The man’s a crackerjack,” he murmured reverentially. “He has us all rocketing around the mountain tops, and then takes advantage of my dad’s blasting operations and raids the front yard. He can pull the slick stuff all right, and we at Strathlarrig had better get cold towels round our heads and do some thinking. Our time’s getting short, too, for he starts at midnight the day after to-morrow…What did you say the fellow was like, Miss Janet? Young, and big, and behaved like a gentleman? It’s a tougher proposition than I thought, and I’m going home right now to put old Angus through his paces.”

      With a deeply preoccupied face Junius, declining tea, fetched his car from the stableyard and took his leave.

      At seven-fifteen Colonel Raden, bestriding a deer pony, emerged from the beech avenue, and waved a cheerful hand to his daughters.

      “It’s all right, my dears. Not a sign of the blackguard. The men will remain on Carnmore till midnight to be perfectly safe, but I’m inclined to think that the whole thing is a fiasco. He has been frightened away by our precautions. But it’s been a jolly day on the high tops, and I have the thirst of all creation.”

      Then his eyes fell on the stag. “God bless my soul,” he cried, “what is that?”

      “That,” said Janet, “is the stag which John Macnab killed this afternoon.”

      The Colonel promptly fell off his pony.

      “Where—when?” he stammered.

      “On the Home beat,’ said Janet calmly. The situation was going to be quite as dramatic as she had hoped. “I saw it fall, and ran hard and got up to it just when he was starting the gralloch. He was really quite nice about it.”

      “What did he do?” her parent demanded.

      “He held up his hands and laughed and cried ‘Kamerad!’ Then he ran away.”

      “The scoundrel showed a proper sense of shame.”

      “I don’t think he was ashamed. Why should he be, for we accepted his challenge. You know, he’s a gentleman, papa, and quite young and good looking.”

      Colonel Raden’s mind was passing through swift stages from exasperation to unwilling respect. It was an infernal annoyance that John Macnab should have been suffered to intrude on the sacred soil of Glenraden, but the man had played the boldest kind of hand, and he had certainly not tailored his beast. Besides, he had been beaten—beaten by a girl, a daughter of the house. The honour of Glenraden might be considered sacrosanct after all.

      A long drink restored the Colonel’s equanimity, and the thought of their careful preparations expended in the void moved him to laughter.

      “‘Pon my word, Nettie, I should like to ask the fellow to dinner. I wonder where on earth he is living. He can’t be far off, for he is due at Strathlarrig very soon. What did young Bandicott say the day was?”

      “Midnight, the day after to-morrow. Mr Junius feels very solemn after to-day, and has hurried home to put his house in order.”

      “Nettie,” said the Colonel gravely, “I am prepared to make the modest bet that John Macnab gets his salmon. Hang it all, if he could outwit us— and he did it, confound him—he is bound to outwit the Bandicotts. I tell you what, John Macnab is a very remarkable man—a man in a million, and I’m very much inclined to wish him success.”

      “So am I,” said Janet; but Agatha announced indignantly that she had never met a case of grosser selfishness. She announced, too, that she was prepared to join in the guarding of Strathlarrig.

      “If you and Junius are no more use than you were on Carnbeg to-day, John Macnab needn’t worry,” said Janet sweetly.

      Agatha was about to retort when there was a sudden diversion. The elder Bandicott appeared at a pace which was almost a run, breathing hard, and with all the appearance of strong excitement. Fifty yards behind him could be seen the two Strathlarrig labourers, making the best speed they could under the burden of heavy sacks. Mr Bandicott had no breath left to speak, but he motioned to his audience to give him time and permit his henchmen to arrive. These henchmen he directed to the lawn, where they dropped their sacks on the grass. Then, with an air which was almost sacramental, he turned to Colonel Raden.

      “Sir,” he said, “you are privileged—WE are privileged—to assist in the greatest triumph of modern archaeology. I have found the coffin of Harald Blacktooth with the dust of Harald Blacktooth inside it.”

      “The devil you have!” said the Colonel. “I suppose I ought to congratulate you, but I’m bound to say I’m rather sorry. I feel as if I had violated the tomb of my ancestors.”