Brothers & Sisters - John & Anna Buchan Edition (Collection of Their Greatest Works). Buchan John

itself. After all he had the vital role. If a man-hunt was on foot, he had charge of the quarry. It was going to be a difficult business, and it might be exciting. He remembered the glow in Alison’s eyes, and the way she had twined and untwined her fingers. They were playing in the same game, and if he succeeded it was her approval he would win. Craw was of no more interest to him than the ball in a Rugby match, but he was determined to score a try with him between the posts.

      In this more cheerful mood he arrived at the Back House about the hour of seven, when the dark had fallen. Mrs Catterick met him with an anxious face and the high lilt of the voice which in her type is the consequence of anxiety.

      “Ye’re back? Blithe I am to see ye. And ye’re your lane? Dougal’s awa on anither job, says you? Eh, man, ye’ve been sair looked for. The puir body ben the hoose has been neither to haud nor to bind. He was a mile doun the road this mornin’ in his pappymashy buits. He didna tak a bite o’ denner, and sin’ syne he’s been sittin’ glunchin’ or lookin’ out o’ the windy.” Then, in a lowered voice, “For guid sake, Jaikie, do something, or he’ll loss his reason.”

      “It’s all right, Mrs Catterick. I’ve come back to look after him. Can you put up with us for another night? We’ll be off to-morrow morning.”

      “Fine that. John’ll no be hame or Monday. Ye’ll hae your supper thegither? It’s an ill job a jyler’s. Erchie will whistle lang ere he sees me at it again.”

      Jaikie did not at once seek Mr Craw’s presence. He spread his map of the Canonry on the kitchen table and brooded over it. It was only when he knew from the clatter of dishes that the meal was ready in the best room that he sought that chamber.

      He found the great man regarding distastefully a large dish of bacon and eggs and a monstrous brown teapot enveloped in a knitted cosy of purple and green. He had found John Catterick’s razor too much for him, for he had not shaved that morning, his suit had acquired further whitewash from the walls of his bedroom, and his scanty hair was innocent of the brush. He had the air of one who had not slept well and had much on his mind.

      The eyes which he turned on Jaikie had the petulance of a sulky child.

      “So you’ve come at last,” he grumbled. “Where is Mr Crombie? Have you brought a car?”

      “I came on a bicycle. Dougal—Mr Crombie—is staying at Castle Gay.”

      “What on earth do you mean? Did you deliver my letter to Mr Barbon?”

      Jaikie nodded. He felt suddenly rather dashed in spirits. Mr Craw, untidy and unshaven and as cross as a bear, was not an attractive figure, least of all as a companion for an indefinite future.

      “I had better tell you exactly what happened,” he said, and he recounted the incidents of the previous evening up to the meeting with Tibbets. “So we decided that it would be wiser not to try to deliver the letter last night.”

      Mr Craw’s face showed extreme irritation, not unmingled with alarm.

      “The insolence of it!” he declared. “You say the Wire man has got the story of my disappearance, and has published it in to-day’s issue? He knows nothing of the cause which brought me here?”

      “Nothing. And he need never know, unless he tracks you to this place. The Wire stands a good chance of making a public goat of itself. Dougal telephoned to your Glasgow office and your own papers published to-day the announcement that you had gone abroad.”

      Mr Craw looked relieved. “That was well done. As a matter of fact I had planned to go abroad to-day, though I did not intend to announce it. It has never been my habit to placard my movements like a court circular… So far good, Mr Galt. I shall travel south to-morrow night. But what possessed Barbon not to send the car at once? I must go back to Castle Gay before I leave, and the sooner the better. My reappearance will spike the guns of my journalistic enemies.”

      “It would,” Jaikie assented. “But there’s another difficulty, Mr Craw. The announcement of your going abroad to-day was not sent to your papers first by Dougal. It was sent by very different people. The day before yesterday, when you were in Glasgow, these same people sent you a letter. Yesterday they telephoned to Mr Barbon, wanting to see you, and then he opened the letter. Here it is.” He presented the missive, whose heavy seals Mr Barbon had already broken.

      Mr Craw looked at the first page, and then subsided heavily into a chair. He fumbled feverishly for his glasses, and his shaking hand had much ado to fix them on his nose. As he read, his naturally ruddy complexion changed to a clayey white. He finished his reading, and sat staring before him with unseeing eyes, his fingers picking nervously at the sheets of notepaper. Jaikie, convinced that he was about to have a fit, and very much alarmed, poured him out a scalding cup of tea. He drank a mouthful, and spilled some over his waistcoat.

      It was a full minute before he recovered a degree of self-possession, but self-possession only made him look more ghastly, for it revealed the perturbation of his mind.

      “You have read this?” he stammered.

      “No. But Mr Barbon told us the contents of it.”

      “Us?” he almost screamed.

      “Yes. We had a kind of conference on the situation this afternoon. At the Mains. There was Mr Barbon, and Miss Westwater, and her aunt, and Dougal and myself. We made a sort of plan, and that’s why I’m here.”

      Mr Craw clutched at his dignity, but he could not grasp it. The voice which came from his lips was small, and plaintive, and childish, and, as Jaikie noted, it had lost its precise intonation and had returned to the broad vowels of Kilmaclavers.

      “This is a dreadful business… You can’t realise how dreadful… I can’t meet these people. I can’t be implicated in this affair. It would mean absolute ruin to my reputation… Even the fact of their being in this countryside is terribly compromising. Supposing my enemies got word of it! They would put the worst construction on it, and they would make the public believe it… As you are aware, I have taken a strong line about Evallonian politics—an honest line. I cannot recant my views without looking a fool. But if I do not recant my views, the presence of those infernal fools will make the world believe that I am actually dabbling in their conspiracies. I, who have kept myself aloof from the remotest semblance of political intrigue! Oh, it is too monstrous!”

      “I don’t think the Wire people will get hold of it very easily,” was Jaikie’s attempt at comfort.

      “Why not?” he snapped.

      “Because the Evallonians will prevent it. They seem determined people, determined to have you to themselves. Otherwise they wouldn’t have got your papers to announce that you had gone abroad.”

      This was poor comfort for Mr Craw. He ejaculated “Good God!” and fell into a painful meditation. It was not only his repute he was thinking of, but his personal safety. These men had come to coerce him, and their coercion would not stop at trifles. I do not know what picture presented itself to his vision, but it was probably something highly melodramatic (for he knew nothing at first hand of foreign peoples)—dark sinister men, incredibly cunning, with merciless faces and lethal weapons in every pocket. He groaned aloud. Then a thought struck him.

      “You say they telephoned to Castle Gay,” he asked wildly. “Where are they?”

      “They are at Knockraw. They have taken the place for the autumn. Mr Barbon, as I told you, refused to let them in. They seemed to know about your absence from the Castle, but they believe that he can put his hand on you if he wants. So they are going there at eleven o’clock to-morrow morning, and they say they will take no denial.”

      “At Knockraw!” It was the cry of a fugitive who learns that the avenger of blood is in the next room.

      “Yes,” said Jaikie. “We’ve got the Recording Angel established in our back garden on a strictly legal tenure. We must face that fact.”

      Mr Craw seemed disinclined to face it. He sunk his face in his hands and miserably