Authors: Alanna Knight
The sky was still cloudless and I decided to clear my mind with a visit to Alnwick, where I was certain the leads in my investigation lay in wait. With luck I might find someone employed at the railway station who knew Lily and her husband and their present whereabouts.
Locating the library would be useful. In Edinburgh, the library had always proved an invaluable source of information, and back-copies of newspapers could be relied upon to provide more graphic accounts of local events, like those accidents on the level crossing.
I decided to leave my bicycle and have a brisk walk, which Thane would enjoy. We had accomplished most of the journey when I was hailed by Cedric.
He had been occupying my thoughts so much as prime suspect that I felt a blush riding up from my neck which, I hoped, would not be regarded as a quite different emotion.
Getting smartly into step alongside me, he looked down into my face and treated me to one of his atrocious leers. ‘Goin’ into the town, are we?’
I said yes a little coolly but he was not to be put off by my somewhat obvious lack of enthusiasm for his company. ‘Goin’ to the shops?’
In response to my non-committal shrug, he laughed.
‘Auntie’ll give ye a great list of things to bring back if she knows. She’s like that, never misses an opportunity for a body to fetch and carry for her, lazy old cow.’
If he expected some comment, there was none, except that I hastened my steps to increase the distance between us.
‘Thinks a lot of hersel’ does Auntie, being with the gentry all these years, shaken the hand of Royalty in her time. Visitors they aren’t allowed to talk about too.’
I felt mildly interested and he went on. ‘Guests of the lord and master.’ He put his finger to his lips and looked round with an elaborate air of secrecy. ‘Shh – not supposed to talk about that. Very proper is Auntie, knows her place and the side her bread’s buttered on, if ye get my meaning.’ And with a mock shudder, he added, ‘She’d skin me alive if I telt anyone—’
His skin was saved by a shrill whistle, his name hoarsely shouted as a lad about his own age emerged from a cottage and approached us. ‘Comin’ to the pub for a jar, Ceddy?’
‘Right by me, Jock.’ Cedric grinned and with a mock bow added, ‘If ye’ll excuse me, that is.’
I nodded coldly, and as he left me I heard his friend remark: ‘Is she not coming too?’
He sounded disappointed and Cedric’s answer was indistinct, but it was greeted with a roar of laughter, as his friend thumped him on the shoulder. ‘You don’t say. Thought ye’d got yersel’ a right classy fancy woman.’
I hurried on, cutting across a rough path where the towers of Alnwick Castle were visible above the trees, when Thane suddenly sat down.
‘Come along, Thane.’
He did not move. I looked at him. Such behaviour was odd, since he loved a walk and distance never bothered him.
‘Oh, for goodness sake,’ I said rather impatiently, ‘It’s not far now.’
He was staring straight ahead. Then he turned slowly, shivered, and regarded me with that imploring look, almost human in its intensity, that I knew so well.
Something was wrong. But there was nothing in sight, just that well-worn path across scrubland leading into the town. ‘What is it?’ I asked, touching his head.
He remained quite still. And then I saw it, what I took to be a milestone just yards away. I went for a closer look. The stone was to commemorate a battle if the crossed swords were any indication, but only a few letters of the inscription remained, the rest having been worn away long since by wind and weather.
‘Is that it, Thane?’ I asked softly.
He shivered, stood up, and shook himself.
‘I didn’t realise you could read.’ I walked on a few steps, expecting him to follow, but when I turned and said, ‘Come on, everything is all right,’ he remained stubbornly unmoving, as if rooted to the spot, a living statue.
What was I to do? I didn’t feel like continuing, nor could I do so and leave him here. Besides, I knew Thane well enough not to disregard his warnings, and as danger had seemed obvious, I turned back.
There was no sign of Cedric and his friend and the road was almost empty apart from an old gentleman, perched on a large stone and smoking a pipe.
He was reading, and at closer quarters he had the look of a scholar. Saluting me gravely, he gave me good-day and pointed at Thane, who had raced ahead.
‘A fine hound you have there, miss. Gave me quite a shock
when I saw him. Lovely old chap, aren’t you, let’s have a look at you,’ he said holding out his hand to Thane, who, always polite, with a swift look in my direction, allowed his head to be patted.
The old gentleman smiled. ‘You gave me quite a turn, old chap,’ he repeated and to me: ‘Don’t see many deerhounds these days, miss. Thought I was seeing a ghost.’
‘A ghost?’
‘Indeed, yes.’ Seeing my frown, he went on: ‘Stranger in these parts, are you?’ I nodded and he smiled. ‘Then you won’t have heard the old legend. Place hereabouts, all this area,’ he gestured with his pipe, ‘was where the English defeated the Scottish army long ago at the Battle of Alnwick. Year 1093 it was. The Scottish King Malcolm, the son of Duncan and the defeater of Macbeth, was slain and his devoted hound, who had followed him into battle, leapt upon the armoured English knight and tore out his throat. The soldiers tried to catch him but he was too quick for them, just disappeared, vanished.’
He paused and added, ‘Never seen again, but some say his ghost haunts this road, baying at the moon, mourning his lost master.’
‘Have you ever seen it?’
He shook his head, grinned. ‘Not I. Not until this evening, miss,’ he chuckled. ‘Thought I’d have a fine tale to tell my grandbairns when I got home. My daughter, of course, would scold me and say I’d been at the brandy again.’ He paused. ‘Where do you live, miss. Have you far to go?’
‘Just to Staines.’
He frowned, ‘Oh, that’s where the pit was. Knew it well once upon a time. Worked down there as a young lad, before my lungs gave out and I had to seek more congenial
employment. Never liked the pit – too many accidents.’ He grinned. ‘Teaching was vastly preferable – and safer.’
He stood up with a groan and an arthritic creak. ‘Good to talk to you and meet this old chap,’ he said giving Thane a final pat. ‘I’ll bid you both goodnight.’ And looking up at the sky he pointed in the direction of Alnwick. ‘See you get home before the rain, I fancy we’re in for a storm.’
I watched him go and quickened my steps, Thane trotting eagerly by my side. Now his reluctance had an eerie explanation. Did he see that other ghostly hound? Was that battle still taking place in some other segment of the circle of time to which Thane – and Wolf, I suspected – had access? Access that was denied to most other mortals, myself included?
Or, another uneasy thought struck me. Was Thane reliving his own past? This ‘creature of heaven’ – according to Sir Walter Scott’s description – where had he come from that day three years ago when I met him on Arthur’s Seat? His coat shiny, so groomed, well fed and clean, he was certainly no stray. That was one mystery still unsolved, especially as his behaviour each passing day clearly indicated that he was not Roswal, Hubert Staines’ missing deerhound.
When we reached the back door, Mrs Robson was taking the washing off the line outside the kitchen. As we exchanged greetings, I remembered Cedric’s remarks about a mysterious visitor no one was allowed to talk about.
Did I have another suspect to add to my list, this person or persons unknown, that not even Hubert had been prepared to discuss? Was that the vital piece of information, the missing piece of the puzzle? And if so, why he was reluctant to confide in me?
Wolf’s predicted storm blew up two hours later, out of that hitherto cloudless sky. The earth took on a strange stillness; the distant hills had a dazed look too, as if all life held its breath. In the garden, the trees stood starkly against a sky wiped clean of all colour, their burden of leaves shivering gently although there was as yet no wind, like spinsters whispering an improper story.
A blackbird asserting his territorial rights and sparrows going about their business of noisily pursuing domestic matters were suddenly watchful. In human terms they would have been described as peering apprehensively over their shoulders, alert to danger. Somewhere a solitary robin gave voice, an eerie sound piercing the silence.
Near at hand I heard Mrs Robson in the corridors busy checking shutters and closing the first rattling windows. A moment’s respite to batten down hatches and then the gales began, great swooping winds, so strong it seemed impossible that such noisy elements should remain invisible. In some ruthless pursuit, they gathered momentum and violence, penetrating every nook and cranny, howling down chimneys and along corridors, an army of trapped demons.
Rain followed, crashing waves of water, hurling themselves against wall and window. Mrs Robson looked into my room and said, ‘Just wanted to make sure you’re all right. We’re in for a right storm, so stay away from the window. There’ll be lightning as like as not. Not scared of thunder, are you?’
I said no, that I rather enjoyed storms, at which Mrs Robson looked worried. Obviously she regarded taking pleasure in storms as very odd indeed. She shook her head. ‘You wouldn’t if you lived in the country, lass.’
I did not add that I had witnessed tornados in Arizona that
would make an English storm look like a mountain mist as she went on: ‘In towns it’s different. High buildings to protect you, but here the elements can do so much damage. Like that earth tremor when the colliery workings collapsed.’ And she repeated the story of how there had been an outcry when the colliery was closed.
‘Sir’s father wouldn’t give permission to keep it open. He was right, too, and just in time. The seam ran right under us here and he’d have lost the house too.’
As she bustled off to check the other rooms, I was aware that darkness had come early, riding on the storm. Heavy black clouds were billowing across the horizon, like some monstrous fleet of ships in full sail. The trees and bushes in the garden below were no longer still; they were now swaying to a wild dance, their leaves shiny, bright emerald in the gloom.
Wind and rain increased, thunder rattled the windows and jagged flashes of lightning ripped across the garden, where everything that grew was suddenly united in a wild dervish dance.
Thane didn’t like storms. I knew that, like many other lesser canines, he hated the loud noise, so I had brought him back into the house with me rather than abandoning him to the stables. I thought of all the animals and birds out there that took storms as a matter of course and instinctively knew the tricks of survival.
I lit a candle against the growing darkness and, with Thane at my side, prepared to sit out the storm, watching its progress from the window and daring the lightning to do its worst.
I never heard the crash of the falling tree that caved in the roof of Wolf Rider’s bothy, one of several ancient elms that went down like matchsticks.
The commotion downstairs alerted Thane. I got out of bed and looked over the banister to see a bedraggled figure framed in the doorway. Thane’s exuberant tail-wagging identified this new arrival as Wolf Rider, of course.
Hubert was saying: ‘Come in, man. You’re soaking wet. Of course you cannot stay there. You must move in here until we can get the roof fixed. No arguments, please. We have plenty of spare rooms.’
A murmur, perhaps of protest, then Hubert’s voice: ‘Get them later. For heaven’s sake, come in and take off those wet clothes. Mrs Robson will fix you up with some of mine.’
Wolf Rider stepped inside. A wild figure indeed; his long black hair plastered against his skull, he looked strangely alien – a savage contrast to his surroundings, his dripping clothes making pools on the marble floor of the handsome and very civilised Georgian hall.
Thane was all for dashing down to greet him and I said firmly: ‘No, Thane. No.’
With a little moan Thane obeyed and we went back into my room, where we remained for half an hour until Mrs Robson
rang the bell for dinner. There we were joined by Wolf, Collins and Kate, who had been terrified by the storm. It had now faded away leaving behind a trail of destruction, which was the main topic of conversation.
Hubert went into a long explanation, presumably for my benefit, about the bothy and the trees and how dangerous these storms could be. I heard for the second time that where coal had been discovered, the land was very fragile – some sort of a geological fault which had caused an earth tremor that made the pit workings collapse.
Listening politely and hoping my expression was intelligent enough to indicate interest in the conversation, I wished that my knowledge of geography and, more important, geology was not so primitive.
When Hubert reached the end of his little lecture he looked at me, smiling, awaiting comment. I told him how, long past childhood, I had believed what our gardener in Sheridan Place, Edinburgh, had told me. When I asked about the hole he was digging, he had solemnly said that if he dug down deep enough he would come out in Australia.
Everyone laughed. During dinner Wolf said little. He was wearing, presumably from Hubert’s wardrobe, a cast-off smoking jacket. Ill-fitting, it was curiously at odds with his Aztec warrior image.
Seated next to Kate, he had an air of preoccupation. Detached from the rest of the company, he evaded all her attempts to engage him in whispered conversation. She darted him almost childlike looks of adoration, but he ignored her, staring anxiously towards the window.
Strangely, Kate’s behaviour and his reactions struck a chord, reminding me of childhood days and forlorn attempts
to get Danny McQuinn’s attention on the rare occasions when we met at Pappa’s dining-table in Sheridan Place. No doubt as Danny had once been absorbed by important police matters, Wolf was preoccupied by the damage to his bothy and wishing that he could escape and inspect the roof now that the storm had died away.
I was seated across the table from Hubert, who seemed to be directing his geology monologue mainly towards me. During the meal I was acutely conscious of his regard. Each time I looked up, his eyes were upon me. The first time I thought it was an attempt to start up a conversation, but he quickly averted his gaze to concentrate on Mrs Robson’s roast lamb. Later I looked up – same again – and, embarrassed, I avoided eye contact, aware that someone else was not paying full attention to the talk, which had swung to white cattle and the shooting party tomorrow.
And who was watching Hubert very carefully but Collins. When our eyes met, her look was venomous, clutching her fork fiercely as if she would like to use it on me as a weapon of destruction.
I had no wish to cause friction between the pair but I was beginning to realise that the sooner I found Hubert’s blackmailer and returned to Edinburgh the better for all concerned.
Hubert said, ‘I hope your cow doesn’t decide to drop her calf tonight, Rider.’
‘I was thinking the same, sir,’ said Wolf and, as if this was the moment he had waited for, he rose from the table.
‘If you will excuse me, I’ll take a walk round and do my evening inspection.’
‘Later. It’s still raining,’ said Hubert. ‘Have some more wine,’ he added, refilling his glass.
Wolf shook his head. ‘I’m used to rain, sir. I won’t melt away.’
Hubert looked at him doubtfully. ‘Take Roswal with you then,’ and to me, ‘Save you having to take him for a walk. Everything will be so wet and muddy.’
I knew that Thane, lying in the hall with the two Labradors, would be delighted at the prospect, as Hubert continued:
‘Timing couldn’t have been worse for the shooting party. Remember your gun, Rider. I’ll expect you to carry an extra one for me, just in case.’
Wolf looked at him. ‘I understood I was to be with the beaters, sir.’
Hubert grinned. ‘Not this time. Consider yourself upgraded. We’ll need picnic lunches,’ he said to Mrs Robson, who was removing the dessert plates. ‘Thank goodness, the weather should have settled down and dried up in time for the Duke’s garden party next week.’
‘Yes, sir, he is so proud of his lovely garden.’
Hubert looked at me. ‘We have been invited and, of course, you must come along, Rose.’
I heard the clatter of cutlery from Collins’ direction. Obviously this did not please her. She helped Kate to her feet as if she was made of Dresden china while Hubert bowed in my direction.
‘Allow me to escort you to your room, Rose.’
As we approached the stairs, he took my hand and tucked it into his arm in a proprietary manner. I didn’t like it. There was something intimate in the gesture, as if we were a couple, for so I have seen married people behave at the end of a party, happy to be retiring to their bedroom.
Outside my door, my hand still captive in his arm, he leant
forward and, putting his hand behind my head, he kissed my mouth firmly and deeply.
‘Goodnight, sweet Rose, sleep well.’
I was taken aback. I had not expected a goodnight kiss. It was a pleasant experience, I admit. He had what one of my school friends had often sighed over: Thick, well-shaped, warm lips, ‘a mouth made for kissing’.
He smiled, stroked my hair. ‘I think I am falling in love with you, Rose,’ he whispered.
I did not know what to say or even what to think. I realised that gratitude, flattery, should be expressed, but somehow this confession did not please me. It made me feel uncomfortable and a vague smile was my only response.
As I pushed him away I was conscious of a shadow along the corridor. Collins had emerged from Kate’s room and had witnessed that goodnight kiss.
And this was the night none of us were ever to forget. Someone – perhaps that same person or persons at present still unknown who had stolen Hubert’s photographs – tried to murder Kate.
The scream woke me from an amorous dream about Jack Macmerry, which had turned into a nightmare. I thought I had cried out but when I opened my eyes and sat up in bed, the room was filled with the dusky gleam of sluggish moonlight.
There were raised voices from the floor below. I threw on a robe, opened my door and looked over the banisters.
Hubert was there. He looked up at me and said in exasperation, ‘It’s only Kate. She’s been sleepwalking again – go back to bed, Rose.’
The scream had now turned into noisy sobs and regardless of Hubert’s instructions, I ran downstairs.
The door to the sitting room was open, admitting an icy blast from the open window from which Mary Staines had fallen to her death. Mrs Robson, hastily dressed, cradled Kate and threw a shawl over her nightdress. Wolf Rider, still wearing his borrowed clothes, was closing the window with some difficulty, as it creaked back and forth in the rising wind which was billowing heavy rain into the room and forming a pool on Mrs Robson’s nicely polished floor.
Collins was there in a nightrobe, shivering and wringing her hands in a fair imitation of Lady Macbeth, while Hubert, in a handsome brocade robe, surveyed the scene with remarkable aplomb.
It was a tableau etched on my mind, something I was to try to recall in detail later when it was important to remember exactly what I had seen and where everyone was stationed in the room.
Kate screamed again. ‘Can’t someone do something? He tried to kill me.’
‘For God’s sake, all of you, do sit down. Now, Kate, my dear,’ said Hubert, a flick of his fingers indicating the sofa. Seated, he drew her down beside him and put an arm around her shoulders, smoothing down her tangled hair.
‘There, there. You are quite safe. No one is going to harm you.’
‘He – he tried to kill me,’ Kate wailed.
‘Do try to be calm. Tell us exactly what happened and we will soon sort it all out,’ Hubert said gently.
Mrs Robson, always practical, came forward with a glass of water from the carafe on a side table. Collins thrust it into
Kate’s hand. Gulping it down, she sat up straight, stared round as if aware of us for the first time.
‘You were sleepwalking again, Miss Kate. It’s all those drugs you’ve been giving her,’ Collins said with a spiteful glance at Wolf, who was standing by, silent and watchful. He shook his head, gave a helpless shrug.
‘Now, Kate, what’s all this about?’ demanded Hubert patiently.
‘A man – he tried to kill me, that’s all I remember,’ said Kate.
Hubert gave an exasperated sigh. Humouring her, he said, ‘So that we can all get back to bed, tell us all about this person you think you saw—’
‘I don’t think, Hubert,’ Kate said defiantly. ‘I know. He was here. I awoke and he picked me up, carried me to the open window over there. He thought I was still asleep, tried to push me out. He didn’t expect me to struggle and start to yell.’
Taking a deep breath, she added in a whisper: ‘It was going to be another accident – like – like—’ A sob.
Mrs Robson and Hubert exchanged worried glances that finished the sentence for her: ‘Mamma!’
Hubert sighed deeply, patted her hand and insisted patiently: ‘All right, my dear. Perhaps you can at least tell us what he looked like.’
‘How can I do that? It was dark.’ She shook her head. ‘I think he was wearing a mask. But when I was struggling, he felt – velvety – like one of those fancy costumes, the ones we wore that last Christmas before – before Mamma—’
Hubert’s brow darkened momentarily, the pain of remembrance of happier days. He nodded briefly and said, ‘I
think you should go back to bed now, my dear, and forget all this.’
‘But—’
Hubert cut short the protest. ‘Mrs Robson will give you a warm drink. Something to calm her, Rider, if you please. We’ll soon have you back to sleep,’ he added, unduly hopeful in the circumstances, and Kate gave him a bewildered look.
‘I’m afraid this was one of your nasty nightmares again, my dear.’
‘But it seemed so real, Hubert, so awful. I can still feel what his arms were like. I was sure I could feel it and that I was awake.’
Hubert shook his head. ‘Just a horrible dream, and dreams can seem very real to us at the time,’ he added as if speaking to a small child. ‘Now, off to bed with you.’
Kate looked at us all as if we were owed an apology. Collins held out a hand and she took it obediently, gave a bewildered backward glance and left, not unwillingly, but obviously still shaken.
Hubert stood up. ‘Kate has suffered from nightmares and been walking in her sleep ever since – ever since—’ he shook his head and sighed, leaving us to fill in the details about their two tragedies.
I looked round the room. The lighted candle fluttering on the mantelpiece. Who had put it there, since Kate said it was too dark to recognise her attacker but there was enough light to see his masked face?
Something wrong about her appearance taunted me, but I was not to recall what it was until later. Meanwhile, Hubert was waiting for me at the door. He smiled and I wondered if he was about to escort me upstairs and kiss me again. I
considered how I should react. A dignified and firm rejection was called for. Let him know I did not encourage that sort of behaviour.
This time it was not needed. He merely bowed. ‘Sleep well, Rose,’ although how any of us would manage to fulfil that wish after the night’s events was utterly beyond me.
I must have looked surprised as he turned, came back and, taking my hand, said: ‘Don’t concern yourself, my dear, over the rather distressing scene you have just witnessed. There is an explanation. I had reason to believe that Kate had an assignation. I disapprove – she is much too young, you know. I was awake; she heard me approaching and invented the entire story in order to distract everyone’s attention so that – he – could make his escape.’
‘You know this fellow.’
He smiled wryly. ‘I do indeed, and I shall be keeping an eye on them both.’
Bowing, he again whispered goodnight, and I suddenly realised what had been troubling me about the scene. Despite the rain that had blown into the room from the open window where her attacker had supposedly attempted to throw her out, Kate was quite dry.
As for the candle, that was a necessity to guide her downstairs to her would-be lover.