Death by the Mistletoe (7 page)

Further, in no fewer than seven cases, sprigs of a green plant — in only two instances not identified as mistletoe — were found on or near the bodies of the dead men. Neither the police nor the Press — with a single exception — considered the unusual plant to have any bearing on the tragedies. This, however, cannot be wondered at, as all the fatal occurrences at first appeared to be isolated instances of death by lightning; and the wearing of a green sprig by the deceased would not occasion a second thought. Only when the different tragedies are correlated does the fact become of the utmost importance.

The seven deaths with which the mistletoe is connected include those of the Right Rev. Kenneth Millar, the Rev. George Manderson, Father Magnus MacLean, Lochaber, the Rev. Augustus Wainwright, the Rev. Albert Tyson, Devonshire, and the Rev. Archibald Allan. Though red marks were found on the body of Father Melville Davidson, no mistletoe, it is stated, was found near the spot where it lay.

The Rev. William MacCallum was drowned in the River Irvine in Ayrshire, while Father Hope Mallinson was killed in a motor accident in London. The
Gazette
is prepared to believe that these two men met their deaths purely by accident. The evidence of the red marks and the green sprigs, however, puts the matter of the other seven tragedies beyond the bounds of mere coincidence.

What vast terrorist organisation is behind this series of callous murders? Is there an enemy of Britain striking at the most vulnerable part of her solid foundation — the religious life of the country?

The police would be well advised to seek diligently for the source of the supply of mistletoe, because, were it found, the identification of a number of the criminals might possibly follow. None can be bought in shops at this period of the year, and in only about half a dozen parts of Britain can it be found growing wild.

*

And there the article ended.

At two o'clock James was summoned to attend at the police station.

CHAPTER IV

James had a momentary qualm when he received the sudden invitation to visit the police station; tor he had no doubt but that his article was the cause of the consternation in the voice of the Procurator Fiscal who had addressed him over the telephone. But his conscience was not altogether a guilty one. On the previous night, when he had put before him the facts contained in the last part of the article, Mr. Archibald MacLean had given him no warning not to publish them.

James was shown into the inspector’s room. Seated round the table were five men — three of whom were personally known to the editor of the
Gazette
. Inspector McMillan was there, his large red face puffed and blotched after a sleepless night, and his hands uncertainly clasping and unclasping. On either side of him sat the Chief Constable, a small, thin, yellow-haired man with an eyeglass and a waxed moustache, and Mr. Archibald MacLean. The Fiscal was of medium height and sturdily built. He had a shock of greying brown hair, slightly thin at the top, but allowed to grow thick at the nape of the neck like a poet’s. He had a habit of keeping one shoulder raised higher than the other, and his head, which seemed too large even for his stout body, was generally held on one side like an alert sparrow’s. His astute mind, for which he was noted throughout the county, was reflected in his keen, if somewhat flabby, face.

James was of the opinion that the other two sharp-featured, motionless men were Detective-Inspector McKay and Detective-Sergeant Wilson. The former, tall, dark and middle-aged, had sombre brown eyes and a long chin, while his companion was a short, stout individual, grey-haired, with a hatchet face rather disfigured by warts. His blue eyes glittered strangely as they regarded James.

The Fiscal rose when the editor entered, and stumped round to his side, looking up at him with choleric eyes.

“What the hell do you mean by publishing that article?” he demanded. He had the quick Celtic temperament which makes a man give expression to his thoughts at once and be sorry for it afterwards if need be. “We’ve just read it. Every word of it is true, of course, as we learned last night. And to-day
post
mortems
in every part of the country have confirmed your theories. But, my God, MacPherson, could you not have kept quiet about things?”

“Why should I have kept quiet?” asked James, whose eyes were very gloomy, and into whose voice had crept a great dourness.

“Why!” roared the Fiscal, his face red with anger. “I’ll tell you why! Five clergymen and two priests have been murdered in different places throughout Britain. We have stirred up the police forces in these districts, and Scotland Yard is on the job to-day. But your damned article has probably ruined any chance the police had of tracing the murderers. Now that it has appeared, local representatives of what can only be a national gang of criminals will at once warn headquarters. The result will be that members of the group will lie low until the excitement has died down … Further, you have probably aroused a wholesale panic in the country.”

“Is that all?” asked James.

“No, MacPherson, it is not all!” returned the Fiscal. “I realise well enough that after our efforts last night the big newspapers would have got a grip of the story in a day or two, at any rate. But that might have given the police sufficient time to make the necessary round-up. As it is, here we are, all our cards placed on the table — by you — and we haven’t a single clue to go by, save the sprig of mistletoe.”

Inspector McMillan looked sheepishly at James: never before had the Fiscal and he quarrelled with the editor of the
Gazette
. Was it worth it now? The Chief Constable twirled his eyeglass somewhat uncomfortably, for he knew James well and had some respect for his ability. The two detectives watched the young man’s face interestedly. The expression there had become intensely forbidding.

“These are your opinions, Mr. MacLean,” said James, his cheeks white and his eyes glowering. “They are not mine. The murders were committed on Tuesday evening: my article was not published until to-day. During the interval the ‘national gang,’ as you call it, must have been lulled into a certain sense of security. Here at Campbeltown, in fact, did you not have O’Hare and Muldoon — who are without a doubt implicated in the crimes — actually in your clutches? And had your methods been worth a docken you might have been arresting Allan’s murderers this very afternoon instead of wasting your time with me, and sending out search-parties for escaped criminals. I am certain that in other parts of the country similarly suspicious persons have been apprehended by this time — and are still in jail! And by degrees they will probably volunteer all the information that is necessary.”

Inspector McMillan squirmed and looked appealingly at James, trying to make him understand that he was by no means responsible either for the escape of O’Hare and Muldoon or for the Fiscal’s tirade.

“Furthermore, Mr. MacLean,” continued James, “did it ever occur to you that these murders must have been arranged for long before the twenty-third of June? Did it ever occur to you that your ‘gang’ could not have counted upon an electric storm of such severity on Midsummer’s Eve? Did it ever occur to you that they would have killed these clergymen and priests no matter whether there had been a storm or not to cover their tracks? And had there been no storm, the fact of their crimes would have been apparent at once to men of even the dullest intellect, and would have been bruited abroad in every newspaper in the kingdom. Murders on such a scale could not have been planned all of a sudden when the great storm was predicted on the wireless on Tuesday morning. In my opinion, Mr. MacLean, your ‘gang’ will not be in the least perturbed by my article, or, for that matter, by subsequent articles in other newspapers. They will be slightly annoyed, perhaps, that an excellent chance of the murders remaining undetected has been lost, but the article cannot be a circumstance outside their original calculations. As to a panic being aroused in the country, it is up to the police to prevent it by arresting the murderers.

“And what is more, sir,” concluded James, “I can claim that had it not been for my inquiries the whole ghastly series of crimes would have passed unnoticed. Surely I am entitled to some small reward. Does it appeal to your sense of justice, Mr. MacLean, that I should give you my theories — freely and without reserve — to be relayed at once to all the great national newspapers, while the
Gazette
, my own paper, should remain in the backwash as usual?”

James, somewhat breathless, paused. Would his arguments, which, he realised, were woefully weak at certain points, be listened to by these older and more experienced men? And it suddenly struck him that he had been carried away by his sudden anger against the Fiscal to be a little more sarcastic than he had actually intended.

But his last question had apparently quietened the Fiscal, that upholder of the downtrodden. Mr. Archibald MacLean lifted a shoulder to James, swung round and stumped back to his seat by the inspector. He slumped down heavily, as he was in the habit of doing after a telling point had been raised by a defence lawyer.

“The young man,” remarked Detective-Inspector McKay in a deep, booming voice, “is probably correct in saying that the murders were planned for a considerable period before they actually occurred, and that the fact of the storm was merely incidental.” “Yes,” agreed Sergeant Wilson, his eyes flashing fiercely as he regarded James.

Inspector McMillan rubbed his thick hands together, while Major Dallas said:

“Well, MacLean, it cannot be helped now, at any rate. I am perfectly sure MacPherson is only too willing to give us all the help he can.”

“I am, sir, naturally,” said the editor of the
Gazette
. “But it seems my assistance is not appreciated.”

“Now, now, James!” interposed the Fiscal with a sudden change of front. “Don’t take up that attitude! We’ve always been friends. Maybe I spoke rather too hastily just now.”

There was a discreet knock at the door.

“Come in!” said Inspector McMillan, grateful for something which might relieve the tension. “Come in!”

Sergeant MacLeod, his thin-lipped mouth pursed with excitement, marched over to his immediate superior, holding a torn scrap of dirty paper in his hand.

“I found this ten minutes ago,” he explained, “wedged between the cushions in the back of the Daimler used by O’Hare and Muldoon. Must have dropped out of O’Hare’s pocket in his struggle with Mr. MacPherson.”

Sergeant MacLeod retired. The little group leaned over the table expectantly. On the scrap of paper was a queer scrawl such as a child might have drawn.

The mansion house of Dalbeg, which Professor Niven Campbell had occupied for some thirteen months previous to the murder of the Rev. Archibald Allan, was situated on the Blaan shore. Lord Kelvin had once remarked to his students at the University of Glasgow that the air in the vicinity of Dalbeg contained the second greatest percentage of ozone on the Scottish coast, a fact which James had often impressed upon prospective visitors to the parish of Blaan.

The many-gabled house stood, large and rambling, a legacy from the days of Queen Anne, at the foot of a precipitous, tree-covered hillside, which effectively sheltered it from the prevailing west wind. The ground upon which it had been built was a level stretch of land shaped like a half-moon, hemmed in at either extremity by rocky prominences, and extending in front of the main road, which had been laid almost on the sea-sand. The building was immediately surrounded by a small garden, gay in the summer with a multitude of flowers, while the remaining part of the half-circle of ground was laid with smooth, green turf.

On the evening of June the twenty-fifth a grey haze from the sea, caused by a cool breeze which had sprung up following the heat of the afternoon, lay over the mansion, lending it a strange atmosphere of romance and mystery such as is often suggested in the Celtic studies of Wallcousins, the artist.

James, whose mind was still much exercised over his sudden invitation to Dalbeg, admitted himself to be a little nervous as he parked his six-year-old Morris tourer — by name “Kate” — at the entrance to the avenue.

He had spoken with Professor Campbell more than once, of course, on the subject of the latter’s learned but popular works on the history of ancient Celtic religions, two of which had been published during his short stay in the district; and the editor of the
Gazette
, that keen student of human nature, had found the old fellow interesting and charming, indeed, in a distinctly pawky way. He was, moreover, somewhat of an enigma to James, for his coming to Blaan had been preceded by a sudden retiral from the Celtic Chair at Edinburgh University just as he was in the midst of building up an international reputation as an archaeologist. Why he should thereafter have buried himself in Dalbeg with only a housekeeper and two servants for companions was, as a matter of fact, a puzzle to more men than the editor of the
Gazette
.

During his year’s occupancy of the Dalbeg estate, however, he had, despite several long absences from home, made an altogether favourable impression upon his tenants and upon the Blaan folk generally. In many senses this latter fact savoured of the miraculous; for the people of Blaan did not allow themselves to be favourably impressed by anyone without putting up a stern struggle. But the Professor — a short, stout man, with ruddy cheeks and silken white hair — was by no means an aloof and unapproachable person, mixing, indeed, in the affairs of the parish with some zest; and this fact went a long way towards ensuring his popularity.

But though he had no qualms about spending an evening with Professor Campbell, James realised that on this occasion the Rev. Duncan Nicholson — and heaven knew how many other damned public schoolboys of the same kidney — would be among the company. And he was conscious of his own awkwardness and lack of subjects for polite and refined conversation. Miss Eileen Campbell would — he both hoped and feared — be there also, and would at once notice his
gaucherie
and indubitably unpolished manners.

And then James pulled himself up abruptly and cursed himself roundly for being a boyish fool. He strode up the long gravelled avenue whistling defiantly “A man’s a man for a’ that.”

He was met on the wide flight of steps leading up to the great main door of Dalbeg by Eileen herself. Employing a mighty effort of will he refrained from blushing on this occasion, even though his breath was somewhat taken away by her loveliness.

She was wearing a long, slim dinner-gown made of some filmy blue material which matched the colour of her eyes, and her hair was dressed in brown waves. There was a faint flush in her cheeks and her arms were rounded and delicately kissed by the sun.

“I saw your car,” she greeted him. “I’m so glad you could come. Daddy and the others are in the garden.”

James felt a sudden strange desire well up in his heart, which he crushed down on an instant, almost with horror. Good Lord, he thought! She was so small, so precious, so absolutely fresh and lovely. What a sacrilege for a large and uncouth individual like himself to be wanting to gather her up in his arms, and … oh, well! Besides, there was the Rev. Duncan Nicholson.

“Did you not hear my old bus as well as see it, Miss Campbell?” asked James, and Eileen told herself that she liked him much better when he smiled like that; for the gloom had vanished from his eyes, leaving them sparkling and rather boyish.