Читать книгу Trouble in the Glen - Maurice Walsh - Страница 8

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Dave threw his head back, and laughed, and his artificial leg twitched spasmodically.

“It is no’ that laughin’ matter, Major,” said Lukey weightily.

“Nothing is spoiled by a taste of laughter,” said the Major. “It is so easy to loose anger.” Forthwith he loosed a little himself. “Blast all lawabidingness! and blast wooden legs! If the damnonsensical thing that happened happened in a place I know, no road would be closed—or the man that closed it would know all about it.”

“We move cannier this side,” Lukey said. “But, mind you, I’m no’ that sure of lawabidingness any more. Some of the lads up at Ardaneigh, hame from war, will stand just so much and no more, and it takes me all my time to moderate them. Do you know: the river is poached a’ to hell—”

“The dom’ scoundrels!” mimicked Gawain solemnly. “Was that fresh salmon we had for supper?”

“A gift horse in the mouth, my man!” upbraided Lukey. “What’s a bit fish out of the sea anyway? But the grouse is another matter, and I’m feart they’ll be picked off, and they no more than cheepers. Ay! and, come September, the darin’ ones will be sweepin’ the hills for the laird’s stags. An’ then, some wild lads, ower bold, will be caught by the new head-stalker, an’ that’ll be a jailin’ matter—unless they sink the deevil in a moss-hag. That’s the sort o’ trouble we do not want. That’s the sort o’ trouble our lassie doesna want—and you are her knight-at-arms—my canty man!” Lukey finished his drink at a gulp, laid his glass down, and went through the exasperating motion of washing his hands.

But Gawain would not show exasperation. He sipped his whisky, lit a fresh cigarette, and spoke slowly.

“I was only asking for a leetle information, you know?”

Dave Keegan resettled his shoulders comfortably, and lifted a finger.

“You knew this estate of Glen Easan pretty thoroughly, Mick?”

“As well as yourself.”

“There have been a few changes, and we’ll take another look over the lie of the land.”

“Off you go!”

Keegan moved a hand. “You know! Half-a-mile up the slope from here the main road comes through the township of Ardaneigh, and slants down to the Loch, three miles below. That’s where the old jetty is, now silted over. And from down there another road comes back by the loch-side to the new pier below the Tigh Mhor, and that’s only half-a-mile from where you’re sitting—”

“But there’s Alsuin’s road out there?”

“Precisely! The connecting link, running direct from the township to the new pier—just one curving mile. It was made by an old laird of Glen Easan.”

“No—it wasna!” Lukey said quickly. “It was dug and soled by the clan under the old system.”

“Yes, but once it entered the demesne of the Tigh Mhor, it became a private road, and was gated and gate-lodged accordingly.”

“But everyone used it, and the South Gate was never shut,” Gawain said.

“It was shut just one day in the year,” Keegan corrected him. “That is the legal requirement to counter a right of way.”

Gawain nodded. “Yes, that is quite customary in Scotland where a road runs through private policies.”

“Exactly. And do you know of any reason why such a road cannot be shut all the year round?”

“Several—”

“But none in law. That road out there has been closed for three months now.”

“And, again, I am asking you why?”

“Just a moment! You know what the closed road means to Ardaneigh—to the whole hinterland of crofters?”

“I can guess.”

“Faith, you can! For the sea-road is the only road to market, and the only market: Greyport, eighty miles away. Cattle, sheep, pigs, poultry, corn, spuds, eggs and homespuns, all must go by sea to Greyport, and all consumer goods must come back the same way. That road out there was a busy and a friendly mile, and, now that it is closed, the crofters, to get to the pier, have to go three miles down and three miles back again. Two sides of a triangle longer than the third—and the cause of many a bloody war!”

“And we are back where we started,” Gawain said. “Why was the road closed?”

Dave sighted his pipe-stem at Lukey.

“The culprit in the first instance—Mr Luke Carnoch!”

“Not forgetting that Foreign Prince—” began Lukey.

“No!” snapped Keegan firmly. “You’ll not blame any Foreign Prince. If I were he I’d ha’ cut your bloody gizzard out.”

“He dom’ near did,” said Lukey.

“Supposing you tell me,” suggested Gawain patiently.

“We are coming at it, and the night is young,” said the Irishman. “I like to hear myself talkin’, but I would need another small lubricant out of the bottle.”

“It has to last us three nights,” protested Lukey, rising to his feet with alacrity.

They had their drinks, and, again, Lukey sat on his hassock, built fresh peats round the fire, and sighed deeply and resignedly.

“Ayeh me! I’ll have to listen to this once more, over and over again. But ’tis no harm to ask a friend hame from war to take off a coupla hunder’ per cent. for ex-aggeration.”