Death by the Mistletoe (17 page)

Eileen and the young minister were already on the ground, standing near the trim grey and red ’plane, when James, in the company of three other prospective passengers, arrived in the taxi. Eileen, James thought, looked much fresher and gayer that morning, and he stifled a vain regret at the participation of Nicholson in their adventure. She wore a smart grey costume and a little grey hat with a blue feather that matched her eyes. Nicholson had discarded his clerical collar and was dressed in an obviously new flannel suit and felt hat, strikingly in contrast with James’s aged blazer, baggy flannels and lack of any headgear whatsoever. But for all that Eileen had a very charming smile for the editor of the
Gazette
, who had discarded his sticking-plaster. The cut was healed, but a red line remained, angry and sore, below his left cheekbone.

Professor Campbell, James learned, was able to speak and to answer questions that morning, and his physical condition had greatly improved. His memory, however, was still a complete blank. Major Dallas, it transpired, had put in an appearance at Dalbeg before Eileen left, and had decided to remain with the Professor until her return.

An official of Midland and Scottish Air Ferries warned them that the ten-seater machine was about to start, and indeed, as they walked over to the short ladder, its engine broke into a staccato roar. Its propeller flung back the air behind it in tearing gusts. The Rev. Duncan Nicholson, who was not so used to the ways of aeroplanes as James, ignored the flighty nature of these gusts, and had his new felt hat whisked neatly off his head as he was about to climb into the cabin. It whirled away over the flat ground, curvetting and leaping like a nimble lamb.

The beatific expression on Nicholson’s handsome face changed to one of dismay, and James caught Eileen’s eye. He could not help it: he pulled a long face to resemble Nicholson’s. Eileen, after a desperate effort, broke into a peal of laughter. The faces of the other passengers softened into smiles, while the small, lean-jawed pilot, his head twisted round in the cockpit, watched the progress of the flying hat with amused interest.

Nicholson, red-faced, turned and confronted the girl, and James was shocked and amazed at the utter rage which distorted his features. In the suave and easy-going minister the diabolical change was almost incredible. A little pulse was hammering beneath his left ear. His hands were clenched until the knuckles showed white. The polish had completely disappeared.

“Thereʼs very little to laugh at,” he said slowly and deliberately.

Eileen flushed and then grew pale as death.

“I suppose there is, Duncan,” she replied quietly.

James stepped quickly to her side.

“I shouldn’t be crude, Nicholson,” he remarked, remembering a previous occasion, and the young minister suddenly regained his
sang
froid
. He laughed shortly.

“Sorry!” he exclaimed. “It was a good hat.”

The whole incident was over in less than thirty seconds, and to a casual observer it was unimportant and harmless enough. But as a matter of fact its effects were so far-reaching that none of the three protagonists ever forgot it.

*

James thoroughly enjoyed the trip to Renfrew, and was sorry that it lasted only a bare half-hour. There were four passengers in the ’plane — all men — besides Eileen, Nicholson and himself; but none of them were known to him. He had an idea that they were commercial travellers, to whose fraternity the air-service to Campbeltown and Islay had come as a veritable godsend.

It was a perfect June morning; but it quickly became apparent that air-pockets were  numerous, and the curious dropping sensation, like that experienced in a descending lift, which occurred every few seconds, seemed at first to startle Eileen. She sat opposite James, and watched his face intently when the first queer drop occurred.

James, who had been in the air before, grinned at her.

“Don’t you worry, Eileen,” he said softly, so that above the hum of the engine none of the others might hear.

She smiled back and looked down on the earth.

“You must tell me about all those places, James,” she said. “I don’t know this part of the country well at all.”

Nicholson, who sat behind her, leaned forward.

“By Jove!” he said. “Isn’t it a marvellous view!”

Steadily the aeroplane droned on through the morning sunshine. They passed over Campbeltown, nestling beneath Bengullion, and encircling the shores of the landlocked bay with a lover’s arms. The smoke of a thousand breakfast fires still hung over the buildings like a pall, stagnant in the still air. Out they soared over Davaar Island, dwarfed and squat in perspective, and as they crossed over Kilbrannan Sound, towards Arran, the quiet sea flashed up at them with blinding radiance. Eileen was delighted with the fairy scene and with James’s expert running commentary; and she answered the Rev. Duncan Nicholson’s questions with great kindliness. James was of the opinion that she was a little sorry for her laughter at the young minister’s expense, and had chosen to overlook the momentary fury in his eyes.

They did not mention the reason for their mission until, after passing round a shoulder of Goatfell in Arran, over a further stretch of glinting water to the south of the Cumbraes and above the white blur of Ardrossan, they came within sight of Glasgow. Eileen picked out the spire of the University at once, high on Gilmorehill.

“I wonder what we will find?” she said. “You are sure it was
The
Book
of
Dalraida
that my father mentioned?”

“Quite certain,” returned the Rev. Duncan Nicholson, and James nodded.

Gracefully they ’planed down for the Renfrew Aerodrome.

*

A taxi brought them swiftly into Glasgow. The bustle and roar of the traffic was rather pleasing to James. It soothed and reassured him, acting like a drug on nerves which, for the last three days, had been tautened to breaking-point.

As the car moved slowly over the George V Bridge and past the Central Station, the events of the past week began to appear unreal and nebulous. The evil power of the ‘well-meaning ones’ and the horror within the Piper’s Cave at Blaan seemed like the substance of a nightmare that had gone. Could such terrors exist in the same world as the kindly, noisy Glasgow traffic? Could the cheerful crowds boarding the clanging, whining trams and the roaring buses be of the same flesh and blood as O’Hare, who had the eyes of Balor?

And yet James knew that while they threaded their way up Hope Street, along Bothwell Street and Elmbank Street, and past Charing Cross, weary-faced men in many parts of the country, and in Glasgow, too, were studying the best means of eradicating a nameless menace to the peace and tranquillity of the nation. And a thousand eager, secret eyes were focused on events in Blaan …

The taxi brought them up the steep ascent of University Avenue, and they climbed out a short distance past the dingy Women’s Union. The Rev. Duncan Nicholson, who had spent six profitable sessions at Gilmorehill, led the way up the stairs and into the deserted Arts Quadrangle. Making inquiries of the languid female clerk in the office, they learned that the librarian might be interviewed immediately.

Ten minutes later, under the jealous eyes of an attendant in the Hunterian Museum, they were poring over the musty, ancient tome known as
The
Book
of
Dalraida
.

*

The volume is one of the most cherished possessions of the University, which can boast the ownership of Caxton’s greatest effort,
The
Golden
Legend
, a first folio Shakespeare, the unique Chaucerian
Roman
de
la
Rose
and several ancient Hebrew manuscripts. Its leaves are brown and tattered, but the bold lettering of the type used by Walter Chapman and Andro Myller, the first Scottish printers, from whose press the volume was published in modern Gaelic in 1508, is still almost as clean-cut as it must have appeared over four centuries ago. The original manuscript, Eileen told her escorts, was lost in a fire which occurred in Inverary thirty years after Chapman and Myller’s enterprise.

James, when his eyes fell for the first time upon the crinkly leather cover, stained and scored by the fingers of a thousand handlers, experienced the thrill of a prospector in new territory. He had the peculiar trait of the book-lover who, when confronted with a rare and valuable document, is quite unable to think reasonably and becomes like a child with an original toy. But as the minutes passed a fresh emotion mingled with his earlier excitement. Was this old book, he wondered, lovingly compiled by the Columban monks, the first Christian settlers in Scotland, to be partly the means of a final triumph over the last remnant of paganism in that country, almost two thousand years after its making? In one way James had no doubts on the question, and Longfellow’s line flashed in his mind:

*

“The mills of God grind slowly … ”

*

The wheels of one mill were coming full circle.

And Eileen’s face, too, was flushed, as she turned over the leaves with careful precision. But the Rev. Duncan Nicholson remained passive and calm. He had decided, it was clear, that no emotional breeze should again blow aside his mantle of suavity.

Eileen studied the pages with brow-puckering intentness, and James, leaning over her right shoulder, spared a long minute to love the whiteness of her neck below the grey hat and the tendril of dark brown hair which curved out in front of her ear. The first part of the book she skipped, as it is concerned mainly with place-names and legends relating to the Mid-Argyll district. But in the second part, which deals exclusively with Kintyre, she read industriously. A list of place-names both she and her escorts found to be of considerable interest. Blaan, Dunaverty, Kiel and Dalbeg, were all mentioned, while Lagnaha occurred first in one group of names.

“
Dal
-
bhraddan
,
Ach
-
a
-
ruadh
,
Gleann-eadar-da-chnoc
,
Machribeg
,” repeated Eileen in a monotone. Then the sound of her voice changed. “
Gleann
An
t
-
Schleuchadh
… Now, where is that, Duncan? Have you heard of it in Blaan?‘The Glen of Adoration.’”

Her eyes were bright. James saw her breast rising and falling with suppressed excitement.

“ʻThe Glen of Adoration,”’ mused the Rev. Duncan Nicholson, and there was a sudden tightening of his cheek muscles. “No … I’ve never heard of it, Eileen.”

“Nor have I.” James shook his head when Eileen turned to him. He hated to see that sparkle die down and the dark-lashed eyelids droop again. “Does it not give any explanation? It’s a mighty queer name.”

“There’s no explanation — ”
began
Eileen
.
She
stopped abruptly. “Oh, but there is!” she exclaimed. “Here is a footnote: ‘
For
the
ancient
legend
concerning
Gleann
An
t
-
Schleuchadh
the
student
may
seek
in
a
later
portion
.’ Oh, I say — ”

She had raised her voice in anticipation. The uniformed attendant, whose charge was the particular corner of the room set apart for valuable documents, approached them, frowning.

“We cannot have loud talk,” he announced, and James would gladly have slain him with one of the ancient maces on the walls.

Eileen, however, did not take any great heed of the interruption. With trembling hands she fluttered the dry pages, until she found the place she sought.

“Here are the Blaan legends … Here is the one we want. Listen!”

James bent down and followed the movement of her pink-tipped fingers, so fresh and alive against the musty brown background of the page, as she translated with patience and care. The Rev. Duncan Nicholson stood motionless at Eileen’s other side.

‘“
And
the
Glen
of
Adoration
in
Blaan
is
the
place
formerly
employed
by
Na
Daoine
Deadh
Ghinn
in
their
ceremonies
.
Here
used
to
be
a
high
idol
with
many
fights
which
was named
Cromm
Cruaich
.
It
was
a
sad
evil
:
Brave
Gaels
used
to
worship
it
.
From
it
they
would
not
ask
,
without
tribute
,
to
be
satisfied
as
to
their
portion
of
the
hard
world
.
He
was
their
god
,
the
withered
Cromm
with
many
mists
.
The
people
whom
he
shook
over
every
host
,
the
everlasting
kingdom
they
shall
not
have
.
To
him
without
glory
whey
would
kill
the
piteous
,
wretched
people
with
much
wailing
and
peril
,
and
the
manner
of
their
death
was
by
the
mistletoe
.
Great
was
the
horror
and
the
scare
of
him
.
They
did
evil
things
,
and
the
powers
of
darkness
were
in
them
.
They
beat
their
palms
,
wailing
to
the
demon
who
enslaved
them
.
They
shed
falling
showers
of
tears
… ’”