Thomas Hanshew - The Riddle of the Spinning Wheel

"Be off with you, Dollops, and have a look at the river," said Cleek from the shelter of the open doorway, as Dollops wended his way slowly down the path to the wicket-gate which led out on to the road. "And see what fish be in those waters. And if you don't come home with a twenty-pounder, you're no angler, my lad!"

Dollops nodded and winked.

"Right you are, sir. As Mr. Asquith says, better 'wait and see.' And if I don't bring 'ome a twenty-pounder, I'll bring 'ome a twenty-yarder, at any rate. Fer I'm a fair dabster for eels every time."

"Sounds more like boa constrictors and the jungle than Highland rivers and modest eels," retorted Cleek, laughing heartily. "And I'm paying a call at the Castle and making my respects to Miss Duggan. So if I'm not back for lunch, Dollops, don't fancy dreadful things and imagine I've been consumed by the ghost-lady who haunts those lovely turrets and towers, but come home and wait for me."

Dollops stopped in his tracks and sucked in his breath hard, and the freckled brown of his Cockney countenance took on a queer drabbish shade. He came back again along the path and stopped in front of his master, mouth hanging open, eyes wide.

"Ghosts, sir! Did I 'ear you use the word ghosts ?" he ejaculated with a perceptible shiver. "Br-r-rh. I doesn't mind dealin' wiv any kind of 'uman – but wiv them in'uman species I'm a reg'lar goner! You ain't arskin' me ter meet the lidy, are yer, sir?"

"Not yet, my boy," returned Cleek, with a laugh and a shake of the head. "So you needn't worry yourself about that. And if I do ask, you may be sure I'll be asking nothing that I would not – and will not – partake of myself. Get along with you, and don't bother your head. When I want you to call, I'll come, too. You can count upon that."

"Well, so long as I don't 'ave to call alone I doesn't mind so much," retorted Dollops. Then, swinging round in his tracks, he went off down the pathway, whistling that very hackneyed but popular tune, "Pack Up Your Troubles in Your Ole Kit-Bag and Smile, Smile, Smile!" While Cleek, watching him for a moment, felt a sudden warmth of feeling toward the rough-mannered but warm-hearted youth who had followed him – willy-nilly – ever since they two had met upon that memorable far-off day when Cleek had made himself responsible for the boy's safety.

A leisurely cigarette smoked in company with the worthy host, and then Cleek took up his soft "squash" hat, seized hold of his blackthorn stick, and with a nod and a smile to Mr. Fairnish, swung out into the roadway, monocle screwed into left eye, well-cut tweeds setting off the splendid figure of him, and looking for all the world like the leisured, perfectly turned-out exquisite who journeys so far out of his beaten track only in pursuit of a sport which vastly amuses him, and to whom Bond Street and the very outer edge of the Western Highlands are all one and the same thing, so long as he can get a day's amusement out of them.

The walk to the Castle was not as long as he expected. It was, in fact, but a brief fifteen minutes over a rough, hilly road which in parts was little more than a track, and which swung up and down so unevenly over the moor that walking was at times difficult. Halfway there, as Cleek turned the corner of a little ravine and came out upon a full view of the valley, with the Inn of the Three Fishers to the left of him and the Castle to the right, he heard the thud-thud of a horse's hoofs, and in a moment more, drawing up against the bank to allow whoever was coming to pass, he saw a rider approach from the right and go through a gate which led apparently to the Castle grounds. As the rider passed, Cleek stepped out into the path with a sudden impulse and raised his hat.

"I say," said he in his London drawl, as the rider dismounted and, removing his hat, stood before him – a fine figure of a man in Scotch tweeds, measuring a good six-feet-two of staunch muscle and bone, with the shoulders of a giant and a big-featured, kindly face, and the blue eyes and high hooked nose of the typical Scotsman; the all-observing eye of Cleek noticed that one of the stranger's fingers was bandaged, as if it had recently been cut. Cleek instinctively liked him. "Can you tell me," he said – "awfully sorry to stop you and all that – but can you possibly tell me if this is Aygon Castle? Looks like it from the pictures, b' Jove, but photography's frightfully deceptive – what? Friend of mine – a Miss Duggan – Miss Maud Duggan, I think the name is – lives there, doesn't she? I happened to come up here yesterday for the fishin' – awfully fond of it and that sort of thing – and promised to call whenever I was out this way. I'm right, am I not?"

"Perfectly right." Cleek liked the deep, ringing voice which answered him, as he liked the shrewd blue eyes that travelled so rapidly over his tweeds. Liked, too, the hard, grim mouth which broke into such a charming smile, transfiguring the whole face as though a light had been set behind it. "And Miss Duggan does live here. You're keen on fishing, I take it. Well, so am I. It's a man's sport, and there's few Scotsmen who don't like it. My name's Tavish – James Tavish – and I'm agent for Sir Andrew Duggan's estates. We'll possibly meet each other up the river some time, for I spend most of my spare time there."

"Thanks. I'd like it immensely. Fishin's a lonesome game alone. And though I've brought my man with me, and he's a dab hand with the tackle, one gets a bit bored sometimes. I'll probably see you up at the Castle, Mr. Tavish, and we'll improve our acquaintance. Many thanks for your courtesy."

So saying, Cleek passed on up the rough road, while his new friend remounted the little chestnut mare he rode so magnificently, and went galloping off up the incline, making a fine picture against the rugged scenery of which he seemed such an inseparable part.

Cleek reached the Castle gates at last, rang the huge bell, and waited while the lodge-keeper unfastened them for him and inquired his name, went with him up the long sweep of gravelled driveway with its bordering of yews and young pine trees lending an air of picturesque gloom to the place even upon that bright morning. And having reached the great oaken front door – a monstrous affair scarred by the ruthless hand of Time as much as by the mailed fists which must have thudded upon it in far-off days, or by the spears and battle-axes of past Duggans who in this fashion had left something more definite than a memory for their ancestors to cherish – pulled the chain of the bell, and waited while the jangling echoes of its noise died away into silence before his summons was answered.

At length the door opened. He caught a glimpse of a dim interior, lofty as a church and dark with the panellings of old oak which flanked it upon all four sides, and then gave his name to the pompous old butler, and was taken into a little ante-room redolent of age – that mothy, curtained odour as of a room but rarely opened and still more rarely used – and within a moment or two Miss Duggan was standing there before him.

"Mr. Deland! How good of you to have come so soon – how very good!" she said warmly, extending a hand to him in greeting. "You must surely stay and lunch with us, now that you have come all this distance. And I want you to meet my father." Her voice dropped a tone or two. "Paula is with him now, going over the housekeeping accounts – it is a daily matter upon which he is very insistent. Ross is in the laboratory, tinkering over something to do with the lights, but he'll be out in a minute. I told him I had met you on the train, and that we had got into conversation and found we were congenial friends through Ailsa Lorne. You know her well, don't you, Mr. Deland?"

He smiled, and for a moment his eyes softened.

"Rather well, I fancy, as she has consented some day to throw in her lot with me and marry me," he returned in a happy, low-pitched voice. "And that is why any friend of hers, you know, must be a friend of mine as well. I'd like very much to have a look at the Castle, if I might be so permitted. Architecture interests me immensely. It's a hobby of mine. And this is surely one of the grandest old stately homes that Scotland possesses!"