Tales of Mysteries & Espionage - John Buchan Edition. Buchan John

trouble is that I’m no sober. Last nicht my dochter Merran was waddit, and they danced till fower in the byre. Me and some ither chiels sat down to the drinkin’, and here I am. Peety that I ever lookit on the wine when it was red!’

      I agreed with him about bed. ‘It’s easy speakin’,’ he moaned. ‘But I got a postcard yestreen sayin’ that the new Road Surveyor would be round the day. He’ll come and he’ll no find me, or else he’ll find me fou, and either way I’m a done man. I’ll awa’ back to my bed and say I’m no weel, but I doot that’ll no help me, for they ken my kind o’ no-weelness.’

      Then I had an inspiration. ‘Does the new Surveyor know you?’ I asked.

      ‘No him. He’s just been a week at the job. He rins about in a wee motor-cawr, and wad speir the inside oot o’ a whelk.’

      ‘Where’s your house?’ I asked, and was directed by a wavering finger to the cottage by the stream.

      ‘Well, back to your bed,’ I said, ‘and sleep in peace. I’ll take on your job for a bit and see the Surveyor.’

      He stared at me blankly; then, as the notion dawned on his fuddled brain, his face broke into the vacant drunkard’s smile.

      ‘You’re the billy,’ he cried. ‘It’ll be easy eneuch managed. I’ve finished that bing o’ stanes, so you needna chap ony mair this forenoon. just take the barry, and wheel eneuch metal frae yon quarry doon the road to mak anither bing the morn. My name’s Alexander Turnbull, and I’ve been seeven year at the trade, and twenty afore that herdin’ on Leithen Water. My freens ca’ me Ecky, and whiles Specky, for I wear glesses, being waik i’ the sicht. just you speak the Surveyor fair, and ca’ him Sir, and he’ll be fell pleased. I’ll be back or mid-day.’ I borrowed his spectacles and filthy old hat; stripped off coat, waistcoat, and collar, and gave him them to carry home; borrowed, too, the foul stump of a clay pipe as an extra property. He indicated my simple tasks, and without more ado set off at an amble bedwards. Bed may have been his chief object, but I think there was also something left in the foot of a bottle. I prayed that he might be safe under cover before my friends arrived on the scene.

      Then I set to work to dress for the part. I opened the collar of my shirt—it was a vulgar blue-and-white check such as ploughmen wear—and revealed a neck as brown as any tinker’s. I rolled up my sleeves, and there was a forearm which might have been a blacksmith’s, sunburnt and rough with old scars. I got my boots and trouser-legs all white from the dust of the road, and hitched up my trousers, tying them with string below the knee. Then I set to work on my face. With a handful of dust I made a water-mark round my neck, the place where Mr Turnbull’s Sunday ablutions might be expected to stop. I rubbed a good deal of dirt also into the sunburn of my cheeks. A roadman’s eyes would no doubt be a little inflamed, so I contrived to get some dust in both of mine, and by dint of vigorous rubbing produced a bleary effect.

      The sandwiches Sir Harry had given me had gone off with my coat, but the roadman’s lunch, tied up in a red handkerchief, was at my disposal. I ate with great relish several of the thick slabs of scone and cheese and drank a little of the cold tea. In the handkerchief was a local paper tied with string and addressed to Mr Turnbull—obviously meant to solace his mid-day leisure. I did up the bundle again, and put the paper conspicuously beside it.

      My boots did not satisfy me, but by dint of kicking among the stones I reduced them to the granite-like surface which marks a roadman’s foot-gear. Then I bit and scraped my finger-nails till the edges were all cracked and uneven. The men I was matched against would miss no detail. I broke one of the bootlaces and retied it in a clumsy knot, and loosed the other so that my thick grey socks bulged over the uppers. Still no sign of anything on the road. The motor I had observed half an hour ago must have gone home.

      My toilet complete, I took up the barrow and began my journeys to and from the quarry a hundred yards off.

      I remember an old scout in Rhodesia, who had done many queer things in his day, once telling me that the secret of playing a part was to think yourself into it. You could never keep it up, he said, unless you could manage to convince yourself that you were it. So I shut off all other thoughts and switched them on to the road-mending. I thought of the little white cottage as my home, I recalled the years I had spent herding on Leithen Water, I made my mind dwell lovingly on sleep in a box-bed and a bottle of cheap whisky. Still nothing appeared on that long white road.

      Now and then a sheep wandered off the heather to stare at me. A heron flopped down to a pool in the stream and started to fish, taking no more notice of me than if I had been a milestone. On I went, trundling my loads of stone, with the heavy step of the professional. Soon I grew warm, and the dust on my face changed into solid and abiding grit. I was already counting the hours till evening should put a limit to Mr Turnbull’s monotonous toil. Suddenly a crisp voice spoke from the road, and looking up I saw a little Ford two-seater, and a round-faced young man in a bowler hat.

      ‘Are you Alexander Turnbull?’ he asked. ‘I am the new County Road Surveyor. You live at Blackhopefoot, and have charge of the section from Laidlawbyres to the Riggs? Good! A fair bit of road, Turnbull, and not badly engineered. A little soft about a mile off, and the edges want cleaning. See you look after that. Good morning. You’ll know me the next time you see me.’

      Clearly my get-up was good enough for the dreaded Surveyor. I went on with my work, and as the morning grew towards noon I was cheered by a little traffic. A baker’s van breasted the hill, and sold me a bag of ginger biscuits which I stowed in my trouser-pockets against emergencies. Then a herd passed with sheep, and disturbed me somewhat by asking loudly, ‘What had become o’ Specky?’

      ‘In bed wi’ the colic,’ I replied, and the herd passed on… just about mid-day a big car stole down the hill, glided past and drew up a hundred yards beyond. Its three occupants descended as if to stretch their legs, and sauntered towards me.

      Two of the men I had seen before from the window of the Galloway inn—one lean, sharp, and dark, the other comfortable and smiling. The third had the look of a countryman—a vet, perhaps, or a small farmer. He was dressed in ill-cut knickerbockers, and the eye in his head was as bright and wary as a hen’s.

      Morning,’ said the last. ‘That’s a fine easy job o’ yours.’

      I had not looked up on their approach, and now, when accosted, I slowly and painfully straightened my back, after the manner of roadmen; spat vigorously, after the manner of the low Scot; and regarded them steadily before replying. I confronted three pairs of eyes that missed nothing.

      ‘There’s waur jobs and there’s better,’ I said sententiously. ‘I wad rather hae yours, sittin’ a’ day on your hinderlands on thae cushions. It’s you and your muckle cawrs that wreck my roads! If we a’ had oor richts, ye sud be made to mend what ye break.’

      The bright-eyed man was looking at the newspaper lying beside Turnbull’s bundle.

      ‘I see you get your papers in good time,’ he said.

      I glanced at it casually. ‘Aye, in gude time. Seein’ that that paper cam’ out last Setterday I’m just sax days late.’

      He picked it up, glanced at the superscription, and laid it down again. One of the others had been looking at my boots, and a word in German called the speaker’s attention to them. ‘You’ve a fine taste in boots,’ he said. ‘These were never made by a country shoemaker.’

      ‘They were not,’ I said readily. ‘They were made in London. I got them frae the gentleman that was here last year for the shootin’. What was his name now?’ And I scratched a forgetful head. Again the sleek one spoke in German. ‘Let us get on,’ he said. ‘This fellow is all right.’

      They asked one last question.

      ‘Did you see anyone pass early this morning? He might be on a bicycle or he might be on foot.’

      I very nearly fell into the trap and told a story of a bicyclist hurrying past in the grey dawn. But I had the sense to see my danger. I pretended to consider very deeply.