Death by the Mistletoe (25 page)

After a while they desisted. They had been tied with expert skill. In the inner cave they heard faintly the rustling and squealing of the rats. Latterly there was silence. The brown horde must have passed on towards the Mull.

“Major Dallas,” said James, “is there no chance of McMillan discovering ‘The Glen of Adoration’?” The Chief Constable bent his head.

“He may, MacPherson, but — ”

“‘The Glen of Adoration’! Lagnaha! … It’s coming back to me! It’s coming back to me!” Professor Campbell’s sudden cry startled them.

“What is it, Professor?” demanded Major Dallas quickly. “Where is ‘The Glen of Adoration’?”

“I remember everything now. I remember. What day is it? What time is it?”

“It is Wednesday,” said the Chief Constable. “It can’t be more than two hours from midnight.”

“And in three hours the ‘well-meaning ones’ will be holding their Festival.”

Professor Campbell spoke calmly, rationally now. The change in his expression, too, was remarkable. His face and eyes were alert and intelligent. Dr. Black, in a future discussion with James, was of the opinion that the shock of the coming of the rats had been to a large extent responsible for his sudden return to full mental vigour, hastening an inevitable process.

“You have not discovered ‘The Glen of Adoration’?’’

“No, Professor.” It was Nicholson who spoke. “We tried the
Book
of
Dalriada
, but the page was missing. We tried all the antiquarians, all the old people. We failed.”

“Then
Na
Daoine
Deadh
Ghinn
have beaten us,” said Professor Campbell. “‘The Glen of Adoration’ is about three miles south-west of Lagnaha in Breckrie, half a mile along the big watershed of Glenadale. They call it Glenalbin nowadays. It is filled with hazel trees.”

“I know it!” exclaimed James. “There is a flat stone at one end … It may be the altar.”

“Can no one help us?” asked Professor Campbell. “Did someone not mention Eileen a moment ago?”

In the distance, from the Lagnaha direction, they heard the sound of running, stumbling steps on the loose gravel. No one answered the old man. A police whistle shrilled far down the tunnel.

“Hullo! Hullo!” yelled McKay.

The sound of the steps grew louder until they were able to distinguish them as those of two persons. The dim glimmer of a torch appeared down the cave. The prisoners could hear deep, panting breaths.

“We are alone!” shouted McKay. “Come straight on!”

“Coming! Coming!”

“It’s Wallace!” cried James. He felt suddenly stronger. The blood began to course more powerfully through his veins. “Quick, you fellows! Oh, hurry!”

The glare of the torch grew in brilliance, and then it was snapped out altogether, as its bearer and his companion came into the radius of the light thrown by the electric bulb. James saw the blue uniforms and the pale, tired faces of Sergeant MacLeod and Constable Wallace. Their cheeks were streaming with perspiration.

“Thank God!” whispered Major Dallas … “Cut the ropes at our wrists, men!”

“We wondered if we would ever find you,” gasped Sergeant MacLeod. “The Inspector sent us in to explore. It was our last chance. Has Professor Campbell recovered?”

“Yes,” said Major Dallas.

James bit his lip until the blood came when the ropes were loosened from his arms; for the returning circulation was an almost unbearable agony. The others, who had not been confined for much longer than three hours, were less affected. They stood, chafing their wrists for a moment. Constable Wallace took a flask of brandy from his pocket.

“Doctor Black is with us,” he said. “He made me bring this for you.”

James, on Major Dallas’s orders, had the first mouthful. He felt the fiery spirit replace the lost vigour in his limbs, and his brain became clearer.

“What has been happening?” asked the Chief Constable.

“It was Merriman,” replied Sergeant MacLeod, who was still breathing heavily. “We were at the Station. We were useless. We didn’t know where you had gone. We were just waiting. McMillan was nearly crazy. Then, about eight o’clock, a scarecrow of a man staggered into the office. ‘They’ve got Dallas and the others in the cave!’ he was shouting. ‘Ellis is the spy and the High Priest of the cult besides. The secret entrance to the cave is in Lagnaha House somewhere.’ The Inspector yelled out that it was Merriman. He’s the Secret Service man, isn’t he?

… He had suspected Ellis from the start, it seems, and had got into Lagnaha by passing himself off as one of the ‘well-meaning ones’ with a message from an English branch. There he heard Ellis talking to his niece, and learned many things, waiting until the last possible minute. He wanted to hear where the secret shrine was, but they didn’t speak of it. He ran all the way from Lagnaha to Campbeltown. We could get no answer from Stewart and McFater — Wallace’s relief — at Dalbeg, but McMillan had all the rest of us roped in at once. The Fiscal, Dr. Black and Merriman are with us at Lagnaha. When we got there half an hour ago the place was empty — But we found the dummy bookcase pretty soon.” Sergeant MacLeod spoke fast, almost incoherently. His dark eyes glowed in his lined face.

“They have gone on foot to ‘The Glen of Adoration,ʼ” said Major Dallas. “But we know where that is now … Are you fit enough to walk, MacPherson?”

“Iʼm all right. Come on!”

Back along the cave they started, the two uniformed policemen helping Professor Campbell, and McKay carrying the unconscious electrician over his shoulder. There was no sound as yet of the returning rats.

“What’s the time now?” asked the Rev. Duncan. Nicholson.

“Eleven o’clock,” answered the Chief Constable, looking at his watch. “We still have two hours.”

“There are cars at Lagnaha,” said Sergeant MacLeod. “We can cover the fifteen miles by road in good time. Glenalbin is only about three-quarters-of a mile off the Breckrie Road.”

“And we can pick up Stewart and McFater at Dalbeg on our way,” suggested Nicholson. “O’Hare and the others left them bound in the kitchen. The maids were tied up too.”

It was difficult going over the loose gravel. They ran twenty steps and walked twenty, Scout-fashion. Professor Campbell began to stumble and lag behind with his supporters. But James felt now that his strength would never fail. He was strung up, a little light-headed, perhaps. He found Nicholson at his side, carrying a torch which Sergeant MacLeod had given him. They drew ahead; gained steadily.

The words of the prophecy came back to James.

He refused to think of Eileen and the sacrifice. He must keep going — he and Nicholson. It was inevitable. They were going to defeat
Na
Daoine
Deadh
Ghinn
. They were going on. They were going on to victory …

They ran up the damp steps leading into the perfumed room at Lagnaha, the others far behind. The bookcase door was lying open.

Inspector McMillan met them at the top, and the glare from the bulbs on the electric chandelier struck their eyes with blinding force after the comparative gloom of the cave.

“Glenalbin!” exclaimed Nicholson. “In Glenadale! The Professor remembers.”

James spoke not a word. He saw that the room was filled with policemen. He saw the Fiscal, Dr. Black, and a small, slim man in ragged clothes. That would be Merriman. The Inspector and those others fell back to give him a passage. Mr. Archibald MacLean said afterwards that they were all startled and even terrified by his ghastly appearance and the murderous intention in his eyes. His red hair stood up like a flame. Nicholson, following him, shouted: “The others are coming. We have decided to go first — across country. Follow us as fast as you can by road. What time is it?”

“Five to twelve!” Nicholson did not recognise the voice. Possibly it was Merriman’s.

“Haven’t they a stable at Lagnaha?” James spat the words over his shoulder as they rushed through the hall to the front door. “Hunters?”

“Round at the back.” Nicholson was keeping at his heels.

It was bright moonlight outside. The stars twinkled down, and the moon shone on the slated roof of the house, giving it a phosphorescent sheen. The ash trees were tall and stark and menacing. But James looked neither to right nor to left. He and Nicholson had no difficulty in finding their way to the rear.

The stable was unlocked. There were three well-fed hunters in the stalls.

“Can you ride, Nicholson?”

“I can. What about you?”

“Learned in America.”

They fitted halters, but wasted no time in saddling. James said:

“There’s a bridle-path across the hill to Breckrie, isn’t there?”

“Yes. We can follow it. It’s as clear as day.” The two hunters that they had chosen were greys, which reared and curvetted as they mounted. James put his at the gate leading out from the backyard. Nicholson followed.

“Can we do it in an hour?” shouted the minister. “It’s hard going uphill for the first part.”

“We can do it in forty minutes.”

The horses were in magnificent condition. James felt their powerful sides swelling out under his legs, and the thrust and gather of their bodies as they climbed the steep hill behind Lagnaha. It was rough ground that they traversed, covered for the most part with heather and bracken and an occasional clump of whin; but as they went higher the brackens and the whins disappeared and the ground bore only heather and dry, white grass. They struck the bridle-path unused for generations, when they rounded the first shoulder of the hill. It had been the track employed by crofters in the old days — before families had been scattered to make room for sheep and when carts and motor-cars were unheard-of things — in journeying from their holdings in the great Breckrie Valley to the port of Campbeltown. Narrow and stony it was, but James and the young minister galloped their horses over it. Thundering along the hillside they went, and sparks flew out beneath the steel-shod hooves.

Again they came to a stiff ascent, and Nicholson fumed and fretted as the horses settled to a walk.

But James’s face was set, and he showed no signs of impatience. His eyes, bright with an unwavering purpose, stared straight ahead. Up, up they went and at last they had crossed the summit of the long-backed hill. Beneath them, to their left, ran the wooded Breckrie Valley, dim and shadowy in the night. There were bright glints where the trees thinned and the moon shone on the river. And somewhere down there, somewhere in the black stillness, preparations for a pagan festival were growing ever nearer completion … The great hills which shielded Blaan from the Atlantic gales loomed gloomy in front, forming one side of the valley.

James kicked the sides of his horse, and it broke into a wild gallop down the narrow track. Nicholson followed.

The night was windless, but the rush of air created by the speed of his horse ruffled James’s hair. It was a reckless ride, and with every wild plunge of their beasts they courted death. But Mr. Anderson Ellis’s hunters were sure and powerful and seldom stumbled. They crossed the main road at the point to which the police cars would presently come.

“Only about half a mile now,” shouted James, as they set their horses through the Breckrie River just beneath the black mouth of Glenadale.

Nicholson yelled back:

“It’s twenty to one!”

“We’ll do it!”

Up Glenadale they swept, first across a level stretch of turf and then round the shoulder of a small hillock, tufted with short hazel.

“Keep high!” directed Nicholson. “It’s boggy by the burnside.”

They galloped at headlong speed, and often they had to stoop to avoid the long branches of the hazels and birches. The aromatic scent of the birch-sap was all around them. The backs of the horses were slippery with sweat.

“Glenalbin — round that corner,” said Nicholson, pointing.

They rode with a thunder of hooves into the little side glen. It is called Glenalbin, because of the profusion of old, silver-barked hazel trees which grow along its sides.

CHAPTER XV

As they swept round the side of a mossy mound James had a sudden view of the scene in the glen. Long afterwards when, sunk in a reverie, he would live again through the events of the night, this instantaneous vision would stand out clearly before his mind, like a magic-lantern slide shown in the midst of a swiftly moving film. For a moment horses, people, the whole world, seemed to stand still.

In the grassy hollow, sheltered on either side by the hazel trees, stood about two score men and women, wearing loose, white robes. James recognised many of them, and his heart was sick. They had arranged themselves, one behind the other, in three long lines which converged on a centre at the head of the glen. They were bare-headed, and some of the women — among them the deaf housekeeper — had dressed their hair in long plaits. At the apex of the triangle formed by the three ranks was the death-masked man who had visited Dalbeg, holding high above his head a flaming torch. Immediately behind him James saw Miss Dwyer. The naked arms of the worshippers were raised to the sky, and their eyes were directed eagerly towards a single object. Their low wailing filled the hollow.

Dominating the gathering was a tall, spare figure, his face towards the east. He was raised on a high boulder behind a long, flat stone and clad, unlike the others, in a green mantle, the folds of which fell thickly about him. On his bare head had been placed a chaplet of mistletoe. His arms were upraised, and he was speaking in a dreary monotone. In one hand he held an instrument like a sickle, which glinted dully yellow in the moonlight; in the other he grasped a trailing green plant. The face of Mr. Anderson Ellis was lined and drawn, but his eyes glowed with a fanatic fire. Behind him, on a knoll, there had been erected a small, squat stone, which James had not seen before in the glen, and of which the golden ornament he had noticed in the perfumed room at Lagnaha was an exact replica. The pitted, sun-marked Cromm Cruaich must have been carried to the glen that night, for the adoration of the cult. In front of the High Priest was a flat altar, at whose base lay two large boxes and, leading from the boxes, there ran a cluster of wires. O’Hare, Muldoon and Barlow, in ordinary clothes, stood beside one of the batteries. O’Hareʼs hand was on a lever. All about the glen, obliterating the clean, fresh smell of the birch-sap, lay the odour of the stuff that was being burned in the spluttering torch.

James saw that Eileen lay on the altar, her body covered only by a thin, white cloth. Steel rings, attached to the wires from the batteries, were bound to her forehead and to her left ankle. Her eyes were wide open and terrified, and her breasts rose and fell painfully beneath the shining coverlet.

The wailing of the worshippers ceased as James and Nicholson rode into the glen, and a wild shrieking took its place. Straight among the long ranks the riders sent their labouring beasts. The white-robed people scattered to let them through. James heard them shouting:

“
The
prophecy
:
The
wanderer
with
the
flaming
head
:
The
fair
churchman
!”

He heard Ellis, the High Priest, screaming:

“My curse rest on you, wanderer! The curse of Balor fall on you!
Kill
her
,
O’Hare
!”

He saw the gleaming eyes trying to hold his own; but he took no heed of the power playing about his brain. He rode on, leaped from his beast and grappled with O’Hare, pulling him from the lever before the giant could lean upon it.

“Loose Eileen!” he roared to Nicholson.

As he struggled with the executioner he saw the young minister cower away from the High Priest, then shield his eyes with his arm and advance to the altar. He saw Nicholson tear the steel rings from the forehead and ankle of the girl, wrap her round with the white covering and lift her in his arms from the flat stone.

He yelled in a frenzy; Eileen was alive and safe. And this was his last fight with O’Hare: he knew it in his heart. He was inured to the pain of the blows which were showered on his chest by the great fist of the giant. The whole assembly seemed to be stricken still as the battle waged before the altar. Even Ellis appeared to be nonplussed, taken by surprise. The worshippers, it was clear, began to await the result of the fight as they would await a sign from their heathen god. The two horses had disappeared into the hazel thickets.

The thud of fists on hard, trained bodies sounded through the glen, and the quick, panting breaths of the fighters rose and fell. Circling round on the narrow strip of short grass they went. O’Hare’s eyes were cruel, and his thick, red lips curled in the delight of inflicting pain. His gross face was flushed under the film of dark hair. James seemed slight beside him. But he was a better boxer than O’Hare: he would not allow those powerful hands to grip. His face was white in the moonlight, and his mouth was a straight, red gash. His flaming hair was like a halo. He felt no weariness, even after his ordeal in the cave. He could have fought on for ever. Eileen was alive behind him.

O’Hare had no knife on this occasion, and slowly his expression began to change. A foam-fleck gathered at one comer of his sensuous mouth. He was becoming afraid. He could not hurt this dancing, frenzied devil. His right fist lashed out. James side-stepped, let the blow glance lightly from his jaw, and used his left, straight for the stomach. O’Hare grunted, bent forward a little with the pain. James’s right arm streaked out from his shoulder, like a trip-hammer.
Crack
: O’Hare’s body curved backwards and he fell, writhing and moaning, on the turf. His jaw was broken.

James turned, and was about to leap across the altar to where the High Priest stood, sickle in hand. He saw Eileen, barefoot on the dewy grass, clinging to Nicholson. She was watching him with dilated eyes. But as he gathered himself for the spring he heard a quiet, clipped voice behind him:

“All right, MacPherson! We have them covered!” Major David Dallas strode alone, bare-headed and dishevelled, into the centre of the glen.

“I arrest you all,” he said distinctly, “in the name of God and the King. Your sins be upon you!”

On he walked through the silent assembly — a small slip of a man — towards the High Priest. Not one of the worshippers tried to stop him. Despite the raggedness of his clothes and the weariness in his face, there was a dignity and a power in his presence which could not be gainsaid. He stopped before the altar.

“Come down, Ellis!”  he commanded.

Mr. Anderson Ellis came down, stepping on the altar. They stood confronting each other. Major Dallas put out his right hand to grasp the arm of his prisoner …

James, panting, saw the whole thing happen; but though he stood less than three yards away it was all over so quickly that he could not lift a finger to prevent the tragedy. Eileen hid her face on the Rev. Duncan Nicholson’s breast, and a groan of anguish went up from the throats of the “well-meaning ones” .… With a darting, jerky movement Ellis brought down the golden sickle on the wrist of the Chief Constable. The blood spurted and the hand hung limp. Major Dallas’s expression hardly changed. He flung the High Priest from him against the altar, and in some way the electrodes, which had been strapped on Eileen’s body, must have found contact. As he stumbled forward the Chief Constable fell against the lever of the battery. There was a crackling and a blinding flash …
Na
Daoine
Deadh
Ghinn
had not failed to offer up a sacrifice.

*

Huddled like sheep in the comer of the glen farthest from the altar, the priests, the executioners and the worshippers turned to flee. They looked towards the bottom of the glen. Inspector McMillan, Sergeant Robertson, Constable Stewart and Dr. Black stood there, cocked rifles to their shoulders. They looked towards the north side of the glen. Sergeant MacLeod, Constable Wallace, Constable McFater and a small, slim man stood there, cocked rifles to their shoulders. They looked to the south side of the glen. Detective-Inspector McKay, Constable McArthur, Constable Allison and Mr. Archibald MacLean stood there, cocked rifles to their shoulders.

And at the head of the green hollow, grouped around the altar, were the Rev. Duncan Nicholson, Major Dallas and Detective-Sergeant Wilson, the latter holding a revolver in his sound right hand. On the altar lay the High Priest, and trailing across his still breast was the sprig of mistletoe which he had been grasping. A little to one side was James. Eileen had now gone over to his side.

Before they left “The Glen of Adoration” the Rev. Duncan Nicholson and James put their shoulders to the Cromm Cruaich, and it toppled over, crashing on to the altar and shattering the electric batteries.

*

Big Peter, the head printer in the offices of the
Campbeltown
Gazette
, stormed, raged, resigned and set up the headings to a remarkable and exclusive article, two columns in length, which appeared in that Thursday’s issue of the journal, and which was not completed until five minutes to twelve in the forenoon. The last paragraph of the article read as follows:

*

At an early hour this morning it was learned in Campbeltown that police activities in other parts of Britain had been entirely successful, and that captures similar to those which took place in Blaan were brought about at one o’clock. We understand that the plan proposed by the Society to which Professor Campbell and the late Moderator belonged was carried out to the letter in every case. It is officially believed that only a very few members of the Na Daoine Deadh Ghinn now remain at large; and these can no longer continue the rites of the cult — alone. The land has been rid of a great evil.

*

“As accessories to murder, imprisonment for life for each member of the cult,” McKay predicted. “Ellis, had he not died, would have been executed.”

Immediately the
Gazette
was published, James, who had slept for six solid hours at Dalbeg after their return from “The Glen of Adoration,” dashed for “Kate.” The car, which was garaged in Messrs. Hewitt’s establishment, had been taken from Lagnaha the previous night by the policemen and used in their wild race by road for Breckrie. He was tired and sore; he had a bad cold, and his arms ached from the wrists upwards; but his heart was singing.

He stopped at the Cottage Hospital on his way to Dalbeg, and found Major Dallas cheerful, though suffering some pain from his injured arm. The two C.I.D. men were with him, chatting, in a private ward. McKay’s forehead was covered with sticking-plaster, while Wilson’s left arm was in a sling.

“They’ll call me ‘One-handed Dallas’ in the Force now,” said the Chief Constable with a short laugh. “But I don’t grudge — anything. And at any rate, I always managed my moustache with my left!” They talked of the adventure, and presently, in reply to a question put by James, McKay said:

“The rats came to Lagnaha this morning after we left. They destroyed almost everything in the house.” Wilson’s queer eyes glittered triumphantly.

“But we had secured all our evidence yesterday,” he added.

“I suppose, MacPherson,” said Major Dallas, “you’ll be going on to Dalbeg now?”

James flushed.

“Absolutely right,” he answered, and the Chief Constable’s left hand shot out and gripped his arm.

“Good luck!” said the three policemen, almost in chorus.

*

There was quite a gathering at Dalbeg. When James arrived, the Professor, fully restored in health, was holding forth in the library on the subject of the “well-meaning ones.” His face was round and ruddy again. With him were the Rev. Duncan Nicholson, Dr. Black, Mr. Archibald MacLean and Inspector McMillan. Merriman, James learned later, had vanished early that morning, having some mysterious task in view in the North of Scotland.

“Another scoop!” greeted the Fiscal as he came in. “Well done!”

“He is like a hawk, indeed!” remarked Inspector McMillan.

James coughed.

“Professor Campbell, might I see you for a moment alone?”

Damn it!” Dr. Black slapped his knee. “I knew it! … Young ass!”

Leaving the room with the Professor, James saw the Rev. Duncan Nicholson’s eyes on his face. They were very blue and very wistful. But the young minister met James’s glance with a crooked smile.

“I just want to ask you, Professor Campbell, if I can marry Eileen — sometime soon?” James spoke very concisely when they reached the hallway. “We love each other. I received an offer from the
London
Echo
this morning … They think I did rather — er — well on the ‘Mistletoe Murders.’ It means a steady, decent income.”

He was breathing fast. He quailed — this man who had rode unarmed into “The Glen of Adoration” — before the sharp eyes of the little, stout Professor. But the latter smiled.

“Surely, MacPherson,” he said. “I think you will make her happy.”

“Oh … thank you!” James had grown hoarse. “Where is she?”

“Drawing-room,” pointed the Professor, who realised the need for brevity in the circumstances.

She was wearing the white tennis frock, and her brown hair glinted in the sunshine which came through the open windows. She was pale, and there were dark shadows beneath her eyes. But when she saw James her cheeks flushed. Her eyes sparkled as a clear pool does under a sudden shaft of light.