The Ashiel mystery: A Detective Story, Mrs. Charles Bryce [red queen free ebook .txt] 📗

pulling open the drawers and peeping in at the piles of documents.

"What an accumulation!" he remarked. "None of these cupboards are locked,
I see," he added.

"No, he never locked anything up," said Mark. "I've heard him boast he never used a key. Do you know, if one had time to read them, I believe some of these old letters might be rather amusing. It looked as if my grandfather and his fathers had kept every single one that ever was written to them. I've just come across one from Raeburn, the painter, and I saw another, a quarter of an hour ago, from Lord Clive."

"Really," said Gimblet eagerly, "which cupboard were they in? I should like to see them immensely some time."

"They were in this one," said Mark, pointing to the shelves opposite him.

Gimblet stood facing it, and looked hopefully round him in all directions for anything like a bull. There was nothing, however, to suggest such an animal, and he reflected that interesting though these old letters might be it would be going rather far to refer to them as curiosities. Suddenly an idea struck him.

"I suppose you haven't come across anything concerning a Papal Bull?" he inquired.

"No," said Mark, looking up in surprise. "It's not very likely I should, you know."

"No, I suppose not," said Gimblet. "Still, you old families did get hold of all sorts of odd things sometimes, and your uncle was a bit of a collector, wasn't he?"

"Uncle Douglas," said Mark, "not he! He didn't care a bit for that kind of thing. You can see in the drawing-room the sort of horrors he used to buy. He was thoroughly early Victorian in his tastes, and ought to have been born fifty years sooner than he was."

"Dear me," said Gimblet. "I don't know why I thought he was rather by way of being a connoisseur. Well, well, I mustn't waste any more time. I wanted to ask you if you would mind my going all over the house. I may see something suggestive. Who knows? At present I have only examined the library and your uncle's bedroom."

"By all means," said Mark. "Blanston will show you anything you want to see. Oh, by the by, you like to be alone, don't you? I was forgetting. Well, go anywhere you like; and good luck to your hunting!"

On a writing-table in one of the bedrooms, Gimblet found a paper-weight in the bronze shape of a Spanish toro, head down, tail brandishing, a fine emblem of goaded rage. But there was nothing promising about the round mahogany table on which it stood: no drawer, secret or otherwise could all his measurings and tappings discover; the animal, when lifted up by the horn and dangled before the detective's critical eye, proclaimed itself modern and of no artistic merit. It was like a hundred others to be had in any Spanish town, and by no expanding of terms could it be considered a curiosity.

Except for this one more than doubtful find, he drew the whole house absolutely blank. There were very few specimens of ancient work in the castle, which like so many other old houses had been stripped of everything interesting it contained in the middle of the nineteenth century, and entirely refurnished and redecorated in the worst possible taste. With the exception of some family portraits, the lacquered clock in the library was the one genuine survival of the Victorian holocaust, and though Gimblet passed nearly half an hour in contemplating it he could not see any way of connecting it with a bull, nor was he a whit the wiser when he finally turned his back on it than he had been at the beginning.

CHAPTER XV

Blanston, to whom he appealed, could give no useful information. Yes, some of the plate was old, but that was all at the bank in London. Mrs. Haviland, his lordship's sister, had liked it on the table when his lordship entertained in his London house, and it had not been carried backwards and forwards to Scotland since her ladyship's death.

He knew of nothing resembling a bull in his lordship's possession, unless it was the picture of cows that hung in the drawing-room opposite the one of the dead stag.

Gimblet had already exhausted the possibilities of that highly varnished oil-painting, and he went forth from the house in a state of deep dejection.

As he descended the drive he heard his name called, and looking back perceived the short, sturdy figure of Lady Ruth hurrying down the road behind him.

"If you are going back to the cottage, Mr. Gimblet," she panted, "let us walk together. I ran after you when I saw your hat go past the window, for I couldn't stand those frowsty old papers of Mark's any longer."

Gimblet waited till she came up, still talking, although considerably out of breath.

"We will go by the road, if you don't mind," she said, "the lochside is rather rough for me. I have been paying a visit of charity, and very hard work it is paying visits in the country when you don't keep a conveyance of any kind, and I really can't afford even a donkey. You see the Judge's income died with him, poor dear, in spite of those foolish sayings about not being able to take your money with you to the better land, where I am sure one would want it just as much as anywhere else, for the better life you lead, the more expensive it is. No one could be generous, or charitable, or unselfish, with nothing to give up or to give away. That's only common sense, and I always say that common sense is such a help when called upon to face problems of a religious kind.

"My uncle was a bishop and a very learned theologian, I assure you; but he always held that it was impious to apply plain common sense to matters so far above us, and that is why he and my poor husband were never on speaking terms; not from any fault of the Judge's, who had been trained to think about logic and all that kind of thing which is so useful to people at the Bar.

"But it takes all sorts to make a world, as he often used to say to himself, and if every one was exactly alike one would feel almost as solitary as if the whole earth was empty and void, while, as for virtues and good qualities, they would automatically cease to exist, so that a really good man would simply long to go to hell and have some opportunity to show his goodness. That always seemed very reasonable to me, but I am just telling you what my husband used to say, because I really don't know much about these things, and he was such a clever man, and what he said was always listened to with great interest and respect at the Old Bailey. If it hadn't been, of course he would have cleared the court.

"But as I was telling you, his money went with him, though I know he always meant to insure his life, which is such a boring thing to think of when a man has many calls on his purse. And so, I live, as you see, in a very quiet way up here, and sometimes get down to the South for a month or six weeks in the winter, where I have many kind friends. But I find the hills rather trying to my legs as time goes on, and I don't very often walk as far as I have to-day. Still charity, as they say, covers a multitude of miles, and I really thought it my duty to come and see how poor Mark was bearing up all alone at Inverashiel. I was afraid he would be terribly unhappy, poor boy, so soon after the funeral, and Juliet Byrne having refused him, and everything. Though of course he can't be pitied for inheriting Inverashiel, such a lovely place, is it not? And quantities of property in the coal district, you know, besides. He is really a very lucky young man."

"It is indeed a most beautiful country," Gimblet observed, as Lady Ruth's breath gave out completely, and she stopped by the roadside to regain it. He was deep in thought, and glad to escape the necessity of frequent speech.

"Yes," she said, as they moved slowly on, "I had a delightful walk here, and found him much more cheerful than I had feared. It is such a good thing he has all those papers to look over. It is everything, at a time like this, to have an occupation. It is so dreadful to think of dear David with absolutely nothing to do in that horrid cell. I wonder if they allow him to smoke, or to keep a tame mouse, which I remember reading is such a comfort to prisoners. I do hope, Mr. Gimblet, that you will soon be able to get him out of it."

Before Gimblet could reply, the silence was broken by the rumble of wheels; and a farmer's cart came up behind them, driven by a thin man in a black coat, who had evidently attended the funeral earlier in the day. The road, at the point they had reached, was beginning to ascend; and the stout pony between the shafts slowed resolutely to a walk as he leant against the collar. The man lifted his hat as Lady Ruth wished him good day.

"I saw you at the funeral, Angus McConachan," she said. "A sad business.
A terrible business." And she shook her head mournfully.

The farmer stopped the willing pony.

"That it is, my leddy," he assented. "It's a black day indeed, when the heed o' a clan is struck doon by are o' his ain bleed. It's a great peety that the lad would ha' forgot what he owed to his salt. But I'm thinkin' they'll be hangin' him afore the year's oot."

"Oh, Angus," cried Lady Ruth, in horrified tones, "don't talk in that dreadful way. I'm quite, quite sure Sir David never had any part in the thing. It's all a mistake, and this gentleman here is going to find out who really fired the shot."

"Well, I hope ye'll be richt, my leddy," was all the farmer would commit himself to, as he gathered up the reins. Then he hesitated, looking down on the hot, flushed countenance of the lady in the road beneath him. "If yer leddyship will be tackin' a seat in the machine," he hazarded, "it'll maybe save ye the trail up the brae."

Lady Ruth accepted the suggestion with great content. She was getting very tired, and was finding the walk more exhausting than she had bargained for. She lost no time in climbing up beside Angus, and the fat pony was induced to continue its reluctant progress.

Near the top of the hill the road forked into two branches, that which led to the right continuing parallel with the loch, whilst the other diverged over the hill towards Auchtermuchty, a town some fifteen miles distant. The stout pony unhesitatingly took the turning to the left.

The farmer looked at Lady Ruth inquiringly.

"Will ye get doon here, my leddy?" he asked; "or will ye drive on as far as the sheepfold? It will be shorter for ye tae walk doon fay there, by the burn and the Green Way."

"I should like to do that;" said Lady Ruth, "if you don't mind taking me so far. Perhaps you would give Mr. Gimblet a lift too, now that we're on top of the hill?"

The man readily consented, and Gimblet, who was following on foot, was called and informed of the proposed change of route. He scrambled into the back of the cart and they rattled along the upper road, the stout pony no doubt wearing a very aggrieved expression under its blinkers.

When another mile had been traversed, they were put down at a place where a rough track led down across the moor by the side of an old stone sheepfold.

The cart jogged off to the sound of a chorus of thanks, and Lady Ruth and Gimblet started down the heather-grown path. They rounded the corners of the deserted fold, and walked on into the golden mist of sunset which spread in front of them, enveloping and dazzling. The clouds of the morning had rolled silently away to the horizon, the wind had dropped to a mere capful; and the midges were abroad in their hosts, rejoicing in the improvement in the weather.

"I don't