Bob, Son of Battle by Alfred Ollivant (crime books to read TXT) 📕

Chapter XVIII. HOW THE KILLER WAS SINGED

No further harm came of the incident; but it served as a healthy object-lesson for the Dalesmen.

A coincidence it may have been, but, as a fact, for the fortnight succeeding Kirby’s exploit there was a lull in the crimes. There followed, as though to make amends, the sevcn days still remembered in the Daleland as the Bloody Week.

On the Sunday the Squire lost a Cheviot ewe, killed not a hundred yards from the Manor wall. On the Monday a farm on the Black Water was marked with the red cross. On Tuesday—a black night—Tupper at Swinsthwaite came upon the murderer at his work; he fired into the darkness without effect; and the Killer escaped with a scaring. On the following night Viscount Birdsaye lost a shearling ram, for which he was reported to have paid a fabulous sum. Thursday was the one blank night of the week. On Friday Tupper was again visited and punished heavily, as though in revenge for that shot.

On the Saturday afternoon a big meeting was held at the Manor to discuss measures. The Squire presided; gentlemen and magistrates were there in numbers, and every farmer in the countryside.

To start the proceedings the Special Commissioner read a futile letter from the Board of Agriculture. After him Viscount Birdsaye rose and proposed that a reward more suitable to the seriousness of the case than the paltry �s of the Police should be offered, and backed his proposal with a 25 pounds cheque. Several others spoke, and, last of all, Parson Leggy rose.

He briefly summarized the history of the crimes; reiterated his belief that a sheepdog was the criminal; declared that nothing had occurred to shake his conviction; and concluded by offering a remedy for their consideration. Simple it was, so he said, to laughableness; yet, if their surmise was correct, it would serve as an effectual preventive if not cure, and would at least give them time to turn round. He paused.

“My suggestion is: That every man-jack of you who owns a sheepdog ties him up at night.”

The farmers were given half an hour to consider the proposal, and clustered in knots talking it over. Many an eye was directed on M’Adam; but that little man appeared all unconscious.

“Weel, Mr. Saunderson,” he was saying in, shrill accents, “and shall ye tie Shep?”

“What d’yo’ think?” asked Rob, eying the man at whom the measure was aimed.

“Why, it’s this way, I’m thinkin’,” the little man replied. “Gin ye haud Shep’s the guilty one I wad, by all manner o’ means—or shootin’d be ailbins better. If not, why “—he shrugged his shoulders significantly; and having shown his hand and driven the nail well home, the little man left the meeting.

James Moore stayed to see the Parson’s resolution negatived, by a large majority, and then he too quitted the hail. He had foreseen the result, and, previous to the meeting, had warned the Parson how it would be.

“Tie up!” he cried almost indignantly, as Owd Bob came galloping up to his whistle; “I think I see myself chainin’ yo’, owd lad, like ony murderer. Why, it’s yo’ has kept the Killer off Kenmuir so far, I’ll lay.”

At the lodge-gate was M’Adam, for once without his familiar spirit, playing with the lodge-keeper’s child; for the little man loved all children but his own, and was beloved of them. As the Master approached he looked up.

“Wed, Moore,” he called, “and are you gaein’ to tie yer dog?”

“I will if you will yours,” the Master answered grimly.

“Na,” the little man replied, “it’s Wullie as frichts the Killer aff the Grange. That’s why I’ve left him there noo.”

“It’s the same wi’ me,” the Master said. He’s not come to Kenmuir yet, nor he’ll not so long as Th’ Owd Un’s loose, I reck’n.”

“Loose or tied, for the matter o’ that,” the little man rejoined, “Kenmuir’ll escape.” He ‘made the statement dogmatically, snapping his lips.

The Master frowned.

“Why that?” he asked.

“Ha’ ye no heard what they’re sayin’?” the little man inquired with raised eyebrows.

“Nay; what?”

“Why, that the mere repitation o’ th’ best sheepdog in the North’ should keep him aff. An’ I guess they’re reet,” and he laughed shrilly as he spoke.

The Master passed on, puzzled.

“Which road are ye gaein’ hame?” M’Adam called after him. “Because,” with a polite smile, “I’ll tak’ t’ither.”

“I’m off by the Windy Brae,” the Master answered, striding on. “Squire asked me to ‘leave a note wi’ his shepherd t’other side o’ the Chair.” So he headed away to the left, making for home by the route along the Silver Mere.

ft is a long sweep of almost unbroken moorland, the well-called Windy Brae; sloping gently down in mile on mile of heather from the Mere Marches on the top to the fringe of the Silver Mere below. In all that waste of moor the only break is the quaint-shaped Giant’s Chair, puzzle of geologists, looking as though plumped down by accident in the heathery wild. The ground rises suddenly from the uniform grade of the Brae; up it goes, ever growing steeper, until at length it runs abruptly into a sheer curtain of rock—the Fall—which rises perpendicular some forty feet, on the top of which rests that tiny grassy bowl—not twenty yards across—they call the Scoop.

The Scoop forms the seat of the Chair and reposes on its collar of rock, cool and green and out of the world, like wine in a metal cup; in front is the forty-foot Fall; behind, rising sheer again, the wall of rock which makes the back of the Chair. Inaccessible from above, the only means of entrance to that little deli are two narrow sheep-tracks, which crawl dangerously up between the sheer wall on the one hand and the sheer Fall on the other, entering it at opposite sides.

It stands out clear-cut from the gradual incline, that peculiar eminence; yet as the Master and Owd Bob debouched on to the Brae it was already invisible in the darkening night.

Through the heather the two swung, the Master thinking now with a smile of David and Maggie; wondering what M’Adam had meant; musing with a frown on the Killer; pondering on his identity—for he was half of David’s opinion as to Red Wull’s innocence; and thanking his stars that so far Kenmuir had escaped, a piece of luck he attributed entirely to the vigilance of Th’ Owd Un, who, sleeping in the porch, slipped out at all hours and went his rounds, warding off danger. And at the thought he looked down for the dark head which should be travelling at his knee; yet could not see it, so thick hung the pall of night.

So he brushed his way along, and ever the night grew blacker; until, from the swell of the ground beneath his feet, he knew himself skirting the Giant’s Chair.

Now as he sped along the foot of the rise, of a sudden there burst on his ear the myriad patter of galloping feet. He turned, and at the second a swirl of sheep almost bore him down. It was velvet-black, and they fled furiously by, yet he dimly discovered, driving at their trails, a vague hound-like form.

“The Killer, by thunder!” he ejaculated, and, startled though he was, struck down at that last pursuing shape, to miss and almost fall.

“Bob, lad!” he cried, “follow on!” and swung round; but in the darkness could not see if the gray dog had obeyed.

The chase swept on into the night, and, far above him on the hillside, he could now hear the rattle of the flying feet. He started hotly in pursuit, and then, recognizing the futility of following where he could not see his hand, desisted. So he stood motionless, listening and peering into the blackness, hoping Th’ Owd Un was on the villain’s heels.

He prayed for the moon; and, as though in answer, the lantern of the night shone out and lit the dour face of the Chair above him. He shot a glance at his feet; and thanked heaven on finding the gray dog was not beside him.

Then he looked up. The sheep had broken, and were scattered over the steep hillside, still galloping madly. In the rout one pair of darting figures caught and held his gaze: the foremost dodging, twisting, speeding upward, the hinder hard on the leader’s heels, swift, remorseless, never changing. He looked for a third pursuing form; but none could he discern.

“He mun ha’ missed him in the dark,” the Master muttered, the sweat standing on his brow, as he strained his eyes upward.

Higher and higher sped those tWo dark specks, far out-topping the scattered remnant of the flock. Up and up, until of a sudden the sheer Fall dropped its relentless barrier in the path of the fugitive. Away, scudding along the foot of the rock-wall struck the familiar track leading to the Scoop, and up it, bleating pitifully, nigh spent, the Killer hard on her now.

“He’ll doon her in the Scoop!” cried the Master hoarsely, following with fascinated eyes. “Owd Un! Owd Un! wheer iver are yo’ gotten to?” he called in agony; but no Owd Un made reply.

As they reached the summit, just as he had prophesied, the two black dots were one; and down they rolled together into the hollow of the Scoop, out of the Master’s ken. At the same instant the moon, as though loth to watch the last act of the bloody play, veiled her face.

It was his chance. “Noo!”—and up the hillside he sped like a young man, girding his loins for the struggle. The slope grew steep and steeper; but on and on he held in the darkness, gasping painfully, yet running still, until the face of the Fall blocked his way too.

There he paused a moment, and whistled a low call. Could he but dispatch the old dog up the one path to the Scoop, while he took the other, the murderer’s one road to safety would be blocked.

He waited, all expectant; but no cold muzzle was shoved into his hand. Again he whistled. A pebble from above almost dropped on him, as if the criminal up there had moved to the brink of the Fall to listen; and he dared no more.

He waited till all was still again, then crept, cat-like, along the rock-foot, and hit, at length, the track up which a while before had fled Killer and victim. Up that ragged way he crawled on hands and knees. The perspiration rolled off his face; one elbow brushed the rock perpetually; one hand plunged ever and anon into that naked emptiness on the other side.

He prayed that the moon might keep in but a little longer; that his feet might be saved from falling, where a slip might well mean death, certain destruction to any chance of succ~s. He cursed his luck that Th’ Owcl Un had somehow missed him in the dark; for now he must trust to chance, his own great~ strength, and his good oak stick. And he a~ climbed, he laid his plan: to rush in on the Killer as he still gorged and grapple with him. If in the darkness he missed—and in that narrow arena the contingency was improbable—the murderer might still, in the panic of the moment, forget the one path to safety and leap over the Fall to his destruction.

At length he reached the summit and paused to draw breath. The black void before him was the Scoop, and in its bosom—not ten yards away—must be lying the Killer and the killed.

He crouched against the wet rock-face and listened. In that dark silence, poised