"Absolutely rotten," agreed Mark. "I don"t know what"s happened to my shooting. I"ve hit every bird in the tail to-day, except when I"ve missed "em clean, and that"s what I"ve done most of the time. There"s something wrong with my eye altogether. If I don"t get better, I shall knock off shooting-for a few days, anyhow."
All his usual self-possession seemed to have been shaken out of him by the thought of the catastrophe he might have caused. Young, good-looking and popular, he was accustomed to take the pleasure shown in his society and the admiring approval of his a.s.sociates, which had always contributed so much to his comfortable feeling of satisfaction with himself, and which had invariably strengthened his reluctance to harbour unpleasant doubts as to his own perfections, as a matter of course; and the heartiness with which he now cursed himself for a careless and dangerous fool testified to the fright he had had.
Even when David, relenting a little, though still reluctant to show it, grunted surlily, "None of you cavalry soldiers are safe with a gun." Mark did not, as he would generally have done, deny the accusation resentfully, but displayed an astonishing meekness, which proved how clearly he saw himself to be in the wrong. Juliet, who had sometimes thought him rather selfish-a fault he shared with many others of his kind, and one perhaps almost unavoidable in attractive only sons-was touched by his unusual humility, and treated the matter lightly, doing all she could to cheer him up and restore to him his good opinion of himself.
But Mark, while he smiled back gratefully in reply, would not allow her to persuade him that he was less to blame than he a.s.serted, and he was still lamenting his carelessness when they came up with the rest of the party, who were already stationed in the b.u.t.ts.
Miss Tarver was beside Lord Ashiel, and Mark stopped a minute to relate how nearly he had been the cause of an accident, although both David and Juliet, by mutual consent, guessed what he was going to do, and tried to dissuade him.
"No need to say anything about it," David mumbled in his ear.
"No, no, don"t, please," Juliet murmured in the other.
Yet he would not be tempted, and they walked on together in silence, leaving him to tell the story.
"I as near as makes no difference peppered David and Miss Byrne just now," they heard him begin, and then Lord Ashiel"s voice broke in in an angry tone as they pa.s.sed out of earshot.
David"s loader reported afterwards that that young gentleman and Miss Byrne, when she waited with him in the b.u.t.t, seemed to find very little to talk about. And it was a long wait before any birds came up, on that beat.
CHAPTER VII
It was a few days after this that Gimblet, taking up an evening paper at the Club, was startled to see a sinister headline of "Murder," immediately followed by the name of Ashiel.
"MURDER OF A SCOTCH PEER." "LORD ASHIEL SHOT DEAD IN HIS OWN HOUSE." "ESCAPE OF MURDERER."
"They"ve got him," he muttered between his teeth as he hastily began to read the paragraph that followed:
"News reaches us, as we go to press, of a dastardly crime, involving the death of Lord Ashiel, which occurred late last night at his residence in the Highlands of Scotland. Lord Ashiel was sitting quietly in his library at Inverashiel Castle, when a shot was fired through the window by someone in the grounds, which wounded his Lordship so severely that death took place instantaneously. Although the household was immediately alarmed and a thorough search made through the garden and grounds surrounding the castle, the murderer contrived to escape. The police are continuing their search in the neighbourhood, and it is believed that a very strong clue to the scoundrel has been discovered. Douglas, Lord Ashiel, was the seventh Baron. He was born in 1869, educated at Eton and Oxford, and served for some years in the Diplomatic Service. He was a widower and childless, and is succeeded in the t.i.tle by his nephew, Mr. Mark McConachan."
There was nothing more.
Gimblet strode out of the Club and drove to New Scotland Yard. The Superintendent of the Criminal Investigation Department was in, and received him gladly. Gimblet held out the paper he had carried off from the Club and pointed to the news of the tragedy.
"Is all this correct?" he asked.
"Yes, yes, indeed," replied Mr. Beech, the superintendent. "We heard of it this morning. The Glasgow people have sent their men up, but it will take them all day to get to the place. Inverashiel is on the West Coast, and not what one would call easy to get at. They ought to be there about five o"clock."
"Who has gone?" asked Gimblet.
"Macross has gone himself with one or two others. He has taken a photographer and a finger-print man, and will get to work as soon as he possibly can. This is a big business. Lord Ashiel is an important person; apart from his being a Scotch landowner-he owns 90,000 acres of moorland there-he is connected with half the great families in England. He has a cousin in the Cabinet; cousins everywhere, in the Foreign Office, in Parliament, in trade; he has one who owns a newspaper. He is rich; he is a sleeping partner in some Newcastle iron works, he is part owner of a small colliery in Yorkshire. Oh, there"s going to be a fine to-do about this case, you bet your life!"
"I knew him," said Gimblet slowly. "He came to see me a fortnight ago. He told me he expected an attempt might be made to kill him."
"The deuce he did!" exclaimed Beech. "Did he say who it was he feared?"
"Not exactly; but I gathered he had mixed himself up with some secret society abroad. He refused to give me any explicit information, or to appeal to you for protection, as I advised him to do. He told me he had some doc.u.ment in his possession which his enemies were anxious to obtain from him, and that if they failed to do so by peaceful methods he thought it likely they might try to get him out of the way; though he added that he did not antic.i.p.ate any open a.s.sault, but thought it likely he might die some death that should have all the appearances of being accidental. He made me promise to take up the case if this should happen."
"We are always glad of your help, my dear fellow," said Beech.
"He gave me certain instructions, in the event of my being able to satisfy myself that his death is the work of his Nihilist friends," said Gimblet, who thought it unnecessary to mention his disconcerting experience with the veiled lady, "And contrariwise, if I can make sure that they have no hand in it, it was his wish that I should then leave the whole thing alone. So I had better see what I can make of it before I go into this any further with you."
"I can"t say I agree with that idea," protested the superintendent. "However, I know you insist on working on your own lines, and that I have really no influence with you, in spite of the show you make, humbug that you are! of consulting my opinion. Well, good luck go with you; and let me know if you hit on anything that escapes our men."
Gimblet walked back to his flat, his mind full of the tragedy which he had an uneasy feeling he might, in some way, have averted. How, he hardly knew. Lord Ashiel could not have lived all his life encircled by a cordon of police and detectives; and, without such precautions, a man condemned by Nihilist societies is practically sure to fall a victim to their excellent organization and disregard for the lives of their own members.
Still Gimblet had liked the dead peer, and could not get the pale aristocratic face and tired, feverish blue eyes out of his head. Surely he might have found some way of preventing this catastrophe.
He found a telegram at his flat. It was signed Byrne, and ran:
"Please come immediately to investigate death of Lord Ashiel certain some mistake."
It had been sent off at four o"clock that day.
"Higgs," called Gimblet to his servant, as he filled up the prepaid reply form, "I am going North to-night, by the eight o"clock from Euston. Pack me things for a week; country clothes; and put in plenty of chocolate."
He collected several things he wanted packed, and then retired to his sitting-room, where he buried himself in an enormous file of typewritten papers he had borrowed from Scotland Yard, and which related to the various Nihilists known to be living in England. He had to return them before he left London, and when he dropped them at the Yard about seven o"clock, on his way to the station, he learnt that no word had yet come from the Scotch authorities as to any further developments at Inverashiel.
A few minutes past eight he was travelling North as fast as the Scotch express could carry him.
It was midday on the following day when he got off the steamer that had brought him from Crianan, and landed with his luggage on the wooden pier which displayed, painted on a rough board, the name of Inverashiel.
One of the deck hands dumped his luggage out on to the side of the loch and the boat moved on again.
A track led across the moor, and down it Gimblet saw a farm cart advancing, driven by a man who shouted as he approached:
"The young leddy"s comin" doon tae meet ye, sir."
And behind him, on the near skyline, the detective beheld the hurrying figure of a girl.
Leaving the man with the cart to grapple with his luggage, which was not of large dimensions, Gimblet walked to meet Juliet. As they drew near, she stopped and held out her hand.
"Mr. Gimblet?" she asked.
"Yes," he said; "and you are Miss Byrne, are you not?"
He looked at her keenly as he spoke, noticing that her eyes were red and swollen, and that her whole bearing was eloquent of sorrow and want of sleep. She lifted a miserable face to him.
"Yes," she said. "I am so glad you have come, but it has seemed a long while. I suppose you couldn"t get here before. Do you know all that has happened?"
"I know that Lord Ashiel is dead," said the detective. "Hardly more than that. Will you tell me all there is to tell before we go up to the castle?"
"I have left the castle, and am staying with Lady Ruth Worsfold, whose house you can just see through the trees," she said. "Will you come there first, or shall we go straight to the castle. It is about a mile through the woods."
"Let us walk straight up," said Gimblet. "You can tell me as we go. I have, as you say, been a long while getting here, but it is fortunate that the day is fine. I hope it has not rained during the last thirty-six hours?"
"I don"t know," said the girl. "No; I believe it has been fine. But I haven"t taken much notice what the weather has been like." She was disappointed and indignant that he should talk in this trivial strain, when her own heart was nearly bursting, and her every nerve stretched and tingling. She had pinned all her hopes on the arrival of the famous detective.