The Complete McAuslan (71 page)

‘My God, and they talk about Sarah Bernhardt! If I’d had to be ladylike a minute longer I’d have burst!’ She inhaled deeply, raising a hand to still my clamour. ‘Not now, Dand. I know you’re full of desperate news, but it can wait. Now . . . stiffen your drink, because I have a wee surprise for you, and I want you to sit there, keep calm, and hold your peace till it’s over.’

She rose, and opened the door to the little box-room off the study. ‘Come out of that,’ she said, and before my disbelieving eyes Lance-Corporal Macrae sidled warily into the room, and behind him, like an anxious tomb-robber emerging from a pyramid, shambled Private McAuslan.

I don’t know what I’d have said if I hadn’t been bidden to silence; nothing, probably. Unexpectedness apart, they were a sight to numb the senses: Macrae was wild and dishevelled, but McAuslan looked as though he had been in the ground for centuries. Filthy I had seen him, but never like this; he had broken all previous records. Mud and slime of every shade and texture seemed to cover him, his hair was matted with it, through the beauty-pack on his face he was regarding me in terror, and then he quivered to attention as my aunt addressed them.

‘You two men,’ and she looked and sounded like a Valkyrie at the end of her tether, ‘will haud your wheesht, now and hereafter. Do you see? Mr MacNeill will have something to say to you later, but just now you’ll go out by the back way, like mice, and up to the house without being seen. Is that clear?’ She raised a finger. ‘And Macrae – if ever you put your neb into West Perthshire again I’ll have you hung by the heels.
Aighe-va
.′

I counted five when they had gone and, restraining myself with difficulty, asked for an explanation. Aunt Alison gave me a look.

‘Are you sure you want to know?’

I pointed out that since
they
obviously knew, I ought to, if only for discipline’s sake, and she sat, resting her brow on her fingertips, and finally said: ‘I could greet. Dand, next time you come to see me, just bring a couple of nice wee city criminals, will you? Not reivers like Macrae. Mind you . . . if he’s looking for a job when he leaves the Army . . . ach, never mind. Well, bide and listen, if your nerves can stand it.’

It seemed that on the first evening Macrae and McAuslan, refreshing themselves in the public bar, had made friends with the lads of the village, including the notorious McLarens, the Dipper’s crew. They and Macrae had discovered mutual interests, and in no time he was abreast of local affairs, such as the pressing danger to the Dipper’s illicit still from the Admiral and the gadgers. A raid was imminent, and what was needed, said the Dipper, was some diversion to keep the Admiral busy while the still was moved to a new hideaway – shooting a stag, for example. A task for a skilled night hunter . . . aye, but it would be worth his while. Oh, Macrae was a bit of a stalker, was he? And then they would be needing transport for the carcase the next night . . . what, Macrae knew where a truck was to be had? Here, Erchie, come you and listen to this . . .

I could contain myself no longer. ‘Aunt Alison, are you telling me Macrae was bribed to poach a stag before he’d been here five minutes? I can’t believe it! How do you know this, anyway?’ I regarded her in sudden terror. ‘Have you known all along?’

‘Will you hold your peace? And don’t jump to unflattering conclusions,’ she said with some asperity. ‘I’ve been telling you that since you could toddle. I knew nothing at all until this evening. But I’m not a gommeril, and like everyone else I knew the McLarens would try
some
ploy to set Jacky running in circles. And when he came yelping to me this morning that a stag had been shot, I thought, aye, that’s their red herring. There was no point saying anything to Jacky, with the steam rising from him; besides, it was no business of mine. But when you came to the hotel in the evening, and said your truck was missing, and two of your lads nowhere to be found – then, it was my business.’

‘When the Admiral was here, planning his raid? You never said anything. You went to arrange a snack for his men.’

She gave me a pitying look. ‘Aye, didn’t I just? I also went to get Rab, my grieve, because he’s one that knows every mortal thing that goes on hereabouts. I don’t pry as a rule, but I knew this was an emergency, and I grilled the whole black tale out of him, with the promise that if he held back he’d be on the dole tomorrow. Now, may I continue?’

Rab, under pressure, had described what my aunt had just told me – how Macrae had conspired with the McLarens, contributing some refinements of his own to their diversionary plan. The upshot was that he had gone out that first night with Erchie McLaren’s rifle and a flask of rabbit’s blood which he had smeared artistically on a rock on Ben Vornach; he had faked signs that a stag had been carried off through the heather, fired a shot, and so home to bed. (And I’d thought he was out wenching.)

‘You mean there wasn’t any dead stag? But then . . . why did they take the truck tonight, if there was no carcase to shift?’

‘I guessed that before Rab got the length of telling me,’ said Aunt Alison complacently. ‘They needed it to shift the Dipper’s still. That was the whole point – to make Jacky think the truck was being used to carry off a carcase that didn’t exist, when in fact they were getting the still away from Lochnabee.’

‘But they
didn’t
get it away! The Dipper had to jettison it! I saw him!’

Aunt Alison shrugged. ‘Aye, well, the best-laid schemes . . . Jacky took their bait – but he went to Lochnabee as well, and no doubt got there ahead of them, and spoiled their plan. But that’s by the way. All I knew, and cared about, when Rab had told his tale, was that
your
truck was about to be used for bootlegging or moonshining or whatever you call it. With one of your men, Macrae, red-hand in the mischief – and yon other poor bedraggled idiot as well, probably. What’s his name? McAuslan? He hasnae the look of a gangster.’

‘He’s not. I shouldn’t think he knew what the hell was happening. I don’t think I do.’

‘Well, thank your stars I did. It was plain that with Jacky bound for Lochnabee they were in great danger of getting caught, and I had to prevent that, for your sake – I don’t ken what the Army does to officers whose men are lifted for moving illicit stills (or for trying to) but I’m sure it’s something embarrassing. So,’ she continued serenely, ‘I phoned Robin Elphinstone and told him to take his car and scour the road about Lochnabee, and find those clowns of yours before the police did, and get them safe away. And to give him time to do that, I kept Jacky and his minions busy here with grouse pate and Glenlivet. I thought it went down rather well,’ said this amazing woman complacently, ‘and I wasn’t bad myself.’

It’s remarkable, about family. You think you know them, but you don’t. Here was this good, respected widow lady of advancing years, who had guided my infant steps, heard my prayers at night, and read to me from the
Billy and Bunny Book
, sitting there looking like the matriarch of some soap-opera family of Texas tycoons, and apparently concealing the combined talents of the Scarlet Pimpernel and a Mafia godmother. I didn’t know where to begin.

‘You could try saying thank you, and bring me a glass of sherry,’ she reproved me. ‘Well, Robin didn’t like it, much, but he’s biddable. He took his car and waited in a quarry near the Lochnabee turn-off until your truck came by, going like fury. He saw the police car head them off, and your two boys and the McLarens taking to the heather, and being a good man on the hill himself he waited until the police had given up, and then went after your lads, leaving the McLarens to take care of themselves.’ She took a wistful sip of sherry. ‘It’s a fact, men have all the fun. Well, he found them: the poor McAuslan cratur was up to his neck in a myrtle bog, bawling like a bull, but he got them to his car and brought them here – which wasn’t so clever, but Robin has his limitations. He sneaked them in by the back, and they had barely been in here long enough to foul the carpet when we heard Jacky waking the echoes at the front door. I whipped them straight into the box-room and told Robin to make himself scarce.’

‘No wonder he looked panic-stricken! Aunt Alison, he could have got the jail! So could you, I dare say . . . don’t ask me for what – obstructing justice or something ―’

‘Ach, stop blethering, boy. What did I do but telephone a friend asking him to give two soldiers a lift?’

Legally, she may have been right: I doubt if there are laws against obtaining information from an employee with threats of dismissal, dragooning a neighbour into rescuing stray soldiers from bogs, playing Lady Bountiful to keep Excisemen from their duty, or beguiling choleric naval men with fair words and malt whisky while their mud-spattered quarry lies hidden in the next room. But they do call for an unusual ability to think on your feet, to say nothing of imperturbability, man management, and sheer cold nerve. And as I watched her now, taking a vanity mirror from her bag, turning her head critically, and adjusting a silver curl, I said as much. She was amused.

‘Dear me,’ she said, ‘have you forgotten, when you were wee, I told you about the woman of Achruach and the Gregora? Well,’ she gave a last glance at her mirror, smoothing an eyebrow, ‘I may use reading glasses and gasp a bit on the stairs, but the day I cannot keep my countenance, and work my will on the likes of Robin Elphinstone and Admiral Jacky – that, nephew, is a day you will never see.’

They were feigning sleep when I got back to Wade’s House, Macrae in silence, McAuslan with irregular staccato grunts which he probably imagined sounded like rhythmic breathing. I didn’t rouse them, partly because I was too tired to listen to the lies of one and the pathetic excuses of the other, but chiefly because my sadistic streak was showing and I was only too pleased to let them stew in their guilty fear until morning. Even then I ignored them, telling Brooks that we would do without breakfast and get on the road at once; I had no wish to linger in a locality whose inhabitants had proved themselves about as safe as damp gun-cotton.

When we were safely south of Balquhidder I told Brooks to pull over on a quiet stretch, and went round to order the criminal element out of the back for a man-to-man chat by the roadside. Macrae, haggard but presentable, stared stolidly to his front; McAuslan was in his normal parade order, filthy, abject, crouched to attention with animal fear in every ragged line of him, and sneezing fit to rattle the windows in Crieff. Forcing myself to look more closely, I saw that he had shed most of the muck he had been wearing last night, and that he was wringing wet; a small pool was forming around his sodden boots.

‘What the devil have you been doing?’ I demanded.

‘Please, sur,’ he croaked, and sneezed again, thunderously. ‘Oh, name o’ Goad! Please, sur,’ he repeated, through hideous snuffles, ‘Corporal Macrae threw me inna burn, sur. Las’ night, sur, when we wis comin’ hame.’

I fought down an impulse to deal leniently with Macrae. ‘Why did you do that, Corporal?’

‘Tae get him clean, sir. He was manky. Ye saw him at the hotel, sir, covered wi’ glaur. I wisnae lettin’ him in your auntie’s hoose in that state.’

‘Well, that was very thoughtful of you. And by the looks of you, McAuslan, you slept in your wet uniform. Why?’

‘Becos . . . aarraashaw! Aw, jeez, beg pard’n, sur! Jist a wee tickle in ma nose. Aye, weel, ye see, Ah kept ma claes on fur tae keep me warm.’

‘Ah, of course. Well, we don’t want them to get creased, do we, so why don’t you get back in the truck – and strip the disgusting things off, you blithering clot, you! Dry your horrible self, if you know how, and wrap your useless carcase in a blanket before you get pneumonia, although why I should worry about that I’m shot if I know! Move!’

A normal enough preliminary to a meeting of minds with McAuslan. When he had vanished, sneezing and hawking, over the tailboard, I turned back to Macrae.

‘Right, Corporal. Tell me about last night.’

He licked his lips, looking past me. ‘Did your auntie . . . Mrs Gordon, I mean . . . not tell you?’

‘She told me. Now you tell me.’

It was like getting blood from a stone. After some evasion, he admitted faking the stag-shooting. Why had he done it? Och, well, the McLarens were good lads, and it was a bit o’ sport. No, he’d had no money from them. (I believed this.) Yes, he had let them take the truck in my absence, and gone with them; aye, he knew it was a grave offence, but he was deep in the business by then, and couldnae let them down; they were good lads. Forbye, he didnae think I would ever know. Yes, he knew that conspiring with illicit distillers was a criminal matter, and that he and McAuslan might have landed in jail. Didn’t he realise what a dirty trick it was to involve a meat-brain like McAuslan in the first place? At this he looked uncomfortable, and shrugged, with a sheepish little laugh – and that was when I caught the smell on his breath.

‘Half a sec,’ I said. ‘Where did you get a drink at this time of day?’

‘Drink, sir? Me, sir?’

I went straight to the truck and climbed in, ignoring the debutante squeal of McAuslan caught
en déshabillé.
Sure enough, in the well of the truck beneath the floor, safe from the prying eyes of policemen, were a dozen bottles – no labels, of course, but all filled with the water of life, clear as glass. I wetted my palm and tasted, and it was the good material, smooth and strong and full of wonder. Not more than a hundred proof, probably. I knew old soldiers who would have killed for it.

’Well, well . . . so the Dipper paid you in advance, did he?’ I said. ‘Generously, too – twelve bottles for nothing.’

Macrae, at the tailboard, was silent, presumably resigned to confiscation, but McAuslan, clutching his blanket about him like the oldest squaw on the reservation, was startled into contradiction.

‘Wisnae fur nuthin’, sure’n it wisnae.’ He sounded quite indignant. ‘Sure’n we shiftit his bluidy still for him.’

Like my aunt, I too can sometimes keep my countenance.

‘Och, sure,’ I said, ‘but that’s no great work.’

‘Wis it no’, but?’ said McAuslan, and emitted another crashing sneeze. When he had finished towelling his nose with his blanket he resumed: ‘See that still, sur? It wis bluidy heavy, Ah’m tellin’ ye. We’d a helluva job gettin’ it oot o’ the boat an’ into ra truck, an’ –