The Secret Vanguard (16 page)

‘Perhaps.’

‘Or there’s Neaera’s hair. Tangled in the tresses of it. Girl who for some reason likes the very private life. Or other private foible.’

‘Perhaps.’

‘Or job of work. Even chemists, I believe, do their critical bits just navel-gazing. And there was that briefcase.’

‘Exactly. And our chance is in that. We have to hope that the briefcase was empty, and continues so. These people are ahead. The clock’s against us. But suppose they are in the position of having to
wait
. You can’t steal another man’s work until his imagination has conceived it, can you? Orchard goes off to incubate something in solitude – and they’re around him,
waiting
. Pray for that.’ Appleby was silent for a moment. ‘If only the girl could have–’ He stopped in his stride. ‘Fool that I am!’ he said quietly. ‘I looked everywhere but in the place I ought.’ He turned and ran back along the platform.

When Mackintosh overtook him he was down on the line, flashing his torch on the sides of the first truck. The circle of light moved across the open door, dropped, ran horizontally left and then right. ‘The point,’ Appleby was saying, ‘is that the girl is reported as having brains. But it’s a long chance, all the same. You’ve marked it a hundred times. It intrigued you as a boy… There.’ On the side of the truck the beam of light had picked out a little metal frame which enclosed a square of faded pasteboard. ‘A sort of case history of the truck, is it? Or its destination and loading? As often as not they don’t use it – just scribble on the side in chalk…’ His voice rose in sudden sharp excitement. ‘
PTO
. Did you ever see one that was pencilled with that?’ His hand went out and removed the card. There was a moment’s silence. And then Appleby’s voice came quietly out of the dusk.

Where the western spur of the furthermost mountain

Hovers falcon-like over the heart of the bay,

Past seven sad leagues and a last lonely fountain,

A mile towards tomorrow the dead garden lay.

Again there was a pause, and Appleby spoke more quietly still. ‘It’s initialled S G and has been scribbled at top speed. Brains, Mackintosh. She’s done her part. And I nearly muffed mine.’

‘We’ll find that girl.’

‘Quite so,’ Appleby climbed back to the platform and handed over the card. ‘Just what would you say we’ve got now?’

‘We’ve presumably got all that the girl had when they felt it necessary to nab her. On the other hand, by this time she probably knows more. She’s been in their hands and escaped again. From a counter-espionage point of view hers may be about the most important life in these islands. Not an enviable role, poor child.’ Mackintosh stared at the square of soiled pasteboard, frowned. ‘The clue’s here, if we can follow it – the thread that will take us to Orchard.’ His voice rose. ‘If we can get down to five miles – to ten – we’ll have a battalion out. We’ll have a flight up at dawn that not a rabbit shall escape from on all these moors.’

‘My dear boy’ – Appleby’s voice was gentle – ‘that’s capital. But can we read the clue? This verse: it means something definite to them. You’re the topographer of the expedition. Does it mean anything to you?’

Mackintosh nodded and read the verse through again. Then for a fraction of a second he looked up at the empty evening sky. It was, Appleby guessed, a moment in which thinking was no good: the thing had to come.

‘It means the Wind-cuffer,’ Mackintosh said.

The loch was darkening; behind the motorboat a gash of foam pointed towards Castle Troy. It was a long, keen gash like a brush stroke – for a craft with the speed of this Sheila had never boarded before, let alone attempted to navigate. She praised heaven for two crumpets and a dish of tea: spoil which made all the difference to her hand and head.

She had travelled a mile at least, but still she kept the throttle full out. It was scarcely an occasion to stand upon the order of her going, even if at this pace a touch from a floating log would mean the end of her. Better that than be beaten again by Belamy Mannering and the false Alaster. And there was exhilaration in swapping dangers; the motion was not in itself disconcerting – rather like a gargantuan canter – and she could concentrate on the difficult job. The difficult job was to look right and left; there was dizziness in turning one’s eyes anywhere but straight ahead.

Two things were supremely important: whether they had another craft capable of pursuit; and whether by the side of this loch as it stretched into distance there was any sort of motor road. Eliminate these dangers and her position was the strongest she had yet achieved. It was also almost alarmingly dramatic. For, whether she liked it or not, she was hurtling straight towards the heart of the mystery. The bogus Forsaken Garden and the genuine
Ode on the Natural Beauties of the Highlands of Scotland
between them told her that. At the head of the loch, invisible behind the mists of evening, was the Wind-cuffer. And the last lonely fountain lay on a straight line beyond.

If they had a boat with which to pursue her it would be on the water by now. So far so good. She glanced to her left – it must be almost due west – in search of a road. But the pines marched almost to the verge of the water, and they stood on broken ground that swept steeply upwards. Good again, she thought – and looked the other way. Again there was no road: but nevertheless she found something to give her pause. She was flashing past a boathouse – an oddly large boathouse, which must almost certainly be theirs. Danger perhaps in that, but only the merest track could lead to it. And, although it was securely barred, it had an appearance of neglect and decay. With luck she was safe on that count, too.

The day was done. Solemn and grey, great clouds of evening floated golden tipped in the west, and against this uncertain background the topmost pines showed at once menacing and unreal. From the waters before her a last luminousness was fading. Visibility would soon be bad.

For this pace, very bad indeed. And the thought had no sooner come to Sheila than danger was actual and upon her. She was steering now by the eastern bank, which a moment before had seemed to run northwards in an unbroken line. Suddenly it had leapt towards her and she saw, as she swung her helm to port, that the loch was here almost cut in two by a curving tongue of land so low as to be almost invisible in her present situation. And she was only just in time. A protruding root scraped and jarred her bow, there was a jerk and a choke as the screw fouled reeds or weed, and then she was free again and running at half speed towards the western bank. A swing to starboard through a narrow channel, and the glimmering loch was clear before her once more.

The heart of the bay. Stand by Castle Troy and bring an imaginary bisection of this curved promontory in line with the Wind-cuffer and one would be looking straight at the goal. She had passed another landmark.

As the enemy must long ago have done. Whatever mystery there was, the clock had surely beaten her to it by now. And from making contact with authority she seemed as far away as ever. Castle Troy appeared to lie in country as solitary as did the croft in which she had been first imprisoned and the sinister mansion which had swallowed Dick Evans. Between her and the dead garden – whatever the dead garden might be or mean – there was perhaps nobody at all. Seven sad leagues. Something over twenty miles from Castle Troy. She must be almost halfway there now. And she would go on. If she saw sign of human habitation she would reconnoitre it. But if this solitude continued unbroken she would go straight on and try to find where the enigma lay. Perhaps when she got there she would find the elusive county police. Perhaps they would have discovered and contrived to follow the clue she had managed to leave on the damaged truck.

There was a moon. It would be up shortly after nightfall, and in any case she would have made the head of the loch before that. Plenty of lochs in Scotland nearly twenty miles long – but few, Loch Ness and Loch Lomond apart, longer than that. In twenty minutes at most, if her petrol held and she made no mistake with the unfamiliar mechanisms she was controlling, the boat would have taken her as far as it could go. And then –

Sheila’s train of thought was abruptly broken. A little way ahead, and to the left, a single light had sprung up in the dusk. The boat drew nearer and it took on tone – golden and mellow; nearer still and it took shape – the oblong shape of an uncurtained window. She shut off the engine and silence, filling the void where a moment before had been shattering sound, pressed upon her like a physical thing. Then came the soft hiss and ripple of water still parting before her. And then a voice.

She swung the boat in towards the shore and saw a second and larger oblong of light. A door. And silhouetted against it was the figure of a man. He was talking. His voice came distinctly over the water and Sheila strained her ears. A foreign language.

The momentum of the boat had taken it within thirty yards of the solitary figure. Sheila’s hand was going out to start the engine hastily when she heard:

‘
Dainonioi, muthous men huperphialous aleasthe pantas homos
…’

A foreign language, but one which was more reassuring than any English could have been. Enemy agents do not stand in the dusk by highland lochs chanting ancient Greek. With the little way that was left to her Sheila let the boat glide to within a dozen yards of the shore. And then she called out: ‘Ahoy! Who are you?’

The man was standing before the open door of what appeared to be a small cottage on the water’s edge. At Sheila’s call he stopped chanting and there was a moment’s silence. Then a cultured voice said: ‘I beg your pardon. I hope I did not startle you.’

Coming in answer to an abrupt challenge which had followed hard upon the hideous racket of a powerful motorboat, this was exceedingly polite. Sheila felt foolish – and spoke foolishly as a result. ‘Are you,’ she demanded, ‘British?’

‘British?’ The voice appeared to weigh his question carefully. ‘In the modern sense of the word, madam – yes. I am an Englishman.’ There was a pause and the voice appeared to think some further apology civil. ‘Perhaps my language misled you. I was repeating Homer. I am apt to do it – and preferably in the open air – when disturbed, or upon hearing bad news.’

‘Bad news?’ There was a little landing stage and Sheila had glided up to it. ‘There’s bad news?’ War, thought Sheila. Perhaps they’ve got the Forth Bridge. Perhaps what I might have prevented is something like that.

‘Yes. It has just come over on the news bulletin. Rain at Dabdab. A perfect deluge. The dig will be ruined.’

‘Oh.’

There was another pause. And then the voice spoke again as if aware of a discourteous obscurity. ‘You see, I am an archaeologist and such a mischance is important to me. My name is Hetherton – Ambrose Hetherton.’ There was a further pause, ‘It promises,’ said Mr Hetherton, ‘a clement night.’

Sheila laughed a little shakily. ‘Would you mind,’ she asked, ‘if I came on land? And – and in?’

Mr Hetherton hastened forward. ‘Really, you must forgive my appearing so inhospitable. My mind
will
stray back, you know, to Dabdab. My quarters are somewhat primitive, but there is not a bad fire. Mind the log. Please notice the step.’ They entered a low, lamp-lit room, strewn with books and fishing tackle. ‘How deplorably untidy it all is! I have borrowed the cottage of a friend and I may not unfairly plead that some part of the guilt is his. This chair – allow me to remove the eggs – is not at all uncomfortable. Somewhere’ – he looked round vaguely – ‘there are cigarettes. Virginian, I fear. And perhaps you would take a glass of wine? Or a little whisky, even? And perhaps it might not be impertinent if I recorded my impression’ – and Mr Hetherton, who was cruising vaguely round the room, turned round and looked at Sheila with extreme penetration – ‘that you are in some distress?’

‘Yes, I am. My name is Sheila Grant. I–’

‘My dear Miss Grant, I am delighted you are safe. The broadcasting device’ – he pointed to a corner and Sheila saw that this was his way of describing a wireless set – ‘has told me that you have anxious friends. I wonder–’ Mr Hetherton paused, as if wondering whether he were at all entitled to wonder.

‘I was kidnapped and escaped. Have you a telephone? A car?’

‘Neither. There is the merest track, along which a cart will come for me in some days’ time.’ Mr Hetherton took another appraising glance at Sheila, moved to a cupboard, and began quite briskly setting out a meal. Then he spoke with decision. ‘Miss Grant, you had better tell me about it at once.’

‘Yes.’ Sheila felt her head swimming slightly: perhaps it was the peat smoke which hung about the room. ‘It began with overhearing somebody recite a poem on a train – a poem about a garden.’

The eye of Mr Hetherton, which had narrowed in the task of choosing between alternative bottles of sherry, rounded slightly. ‘Two poems about a garden,’ he said; ‘a missing Orchard, a dead man, and a kidnapped girl. I have a friend called Appleby who would be better at putting it all together than I am likely to be.’

‘I beg your pardon?’

‘Do you care for sardines? I fear my stores are extremely limited. But at least they come from the neighbourhood of Sardinia and not that of the North Cape.’ He hesitated. ‘Miss Grant, you appear to me to be a person of resolution. And so I will tell you that the last man who overheard a poem about a garden – and it may well have been on a train – was shot. Dead.’

‘They just kidnapped
me
. Yes, please, I do like sardines. But later on I was machine-gunned. That was when I was getting away in the motorboat from Castle Troy. It’s a nest of spies.’

Mr Hetherton, who had begun to open the sardines, looked up mildly from his task, listening. Then he laid down the tin opener, his hand went up to the low ceiling, and the room was suddenly in darkness. ‘What they call a black-out,’ he said. ‘I fear everybody will have experience of it soon. Behind you are two rugs: take them. I have the sherry and the sardines, and here is a loaf. One moment – a torch. And now out to your boat. There is no road round the loch – nor one to anywhere near the head of it. But there is a track, as I have said, to this cottage, and our enemies may be searching this way. Notice the step. If only I had some faculty for rapid decision! Please mind the log.’