WE STAYED AWAKE throughout the day on the Twelfth. Only our ears’ expectancy kept us from falling asleep. It was a warm drowsy day; the heat of the yellowing sun, the sound of bumble-bees, the smell of heather in flower, lulled us and drugged our senses half to sleep save our ears that harkened through the hours for sounds that did not come.
‘The first day of autumn,’ Terry breathed, interrupting a long silence.
‘The last day of summer,’ I returned.
‘Och, no,’ she said, ‘summer will have plenty of last days yet. We’ve had rare luck in the weather, Hugh.’
‘We couldn’t have managed if the year was wet,’ I agreed.
‘It’s too dry now. The hill’s like tinder. A spark would put it in a blaze. We must be careful with the ashes, Terry. This would be a hot corner if the rank heather round about caught fire.’
We looked involuntarily to the east where we had seen heavy smoke rising in the past few days, as if from a forest fire in the region of Rothiemurchus.
‘It couldn’t have been woods on fire,’ I said, reverting to an oft-discussed topic. ‘Or it would have been burning still.’
‘The smoke has vanished,’ Terry agreed. ‘There might have been rain there though we had none.’
I shook my head.
‘Not with these blue skies,’ I told her. ‘If it doesn’t rain soon I needn’t bother going out to stalk. Even as it is I can scarcely come near stags for the noise of the moss crackling under my feet.’
In the late afternoon Terry voiced our mutual thought.
‘I haven’t heard a single shot,’ she said.
‘Not one,’ I concurred.
‘I’ve been waiting all day ready to be angry,’ she confessed with a smile.
‘Angry?’ I asked.
‘If I heard shooting, I’d be angry to think men should go out for sport, at such a time.’
‘They went out to kill grouse in the last war,’ I informed her.
‘Did they? Hadn’t they plenty of killing?’
‘I’m not sure but that I’d prefer to hear the guns blattering to-day,’ I went on. ‘Things must be bad, Terry. I never heard a Twelfth like this before. Nor any one else. It’d be better to hear the guns—if we knew they were shooting grouse.’
‘We know things are bad,’ she told me. ‘Duncan said—’
‘He didn’t say much,’ I interrupted.
‘Not with his tongue, Hugh.’
‘It’s a wonder we haven’t seen any one,’ she continued. ‘If the country is full of deserters and stragglers—’
‘He warned us,’ I put in.
‘And soldiers rounding them up—’ she added.
I rose to my feet and stretched myself.
‘He could have told us much more than he did,’ she said. ‘He was saving us, hiding the worst from us—where are you going, Hugh?’
‘To kill a grouse, Terry,’ I answered. ‘We’ve always had a grouse on the Twelfth.’
She jumped up beside me and caught my arm.
‘Don’t go, Hugh,’ she begged earnestly. ‘Please don’t go! maybe it’s a bad sign for human folk, this quiet Twelfth, but men’s misfortune has this much good in it, that it makes a truce for the poor birds of the country. Hugh, there’ll be other times when we’re more needing food. We’ll let this Twelfth be a holiday from killing.’
‘We used to reckon that we could use the new potatoes from the field by the Twelfth of August,’ I said, sitting down again.
‘Don’t make my mouth water,’ she reproached me. ‘I’ve been longing for new potatoes—’
‘With milk and fresh butter,’ I suggested.
‘Why are you tempting me!’ she cried.
Next day, in the evening, I took Duncan’s rifle and slipped a handful of cartridges into my pocket.
‘Where are you going, Hugh?’ Terry demanded. ‘Why are you taking that rifle? Won’t it make a loud noise?’
‘I’m leaving the.22 with you,’ I answered, ‘in case a grouse comes near while I’m away. Don’t sit up for me, Terry, it may be morning before I come back.’
‘Can’t I come?’ she begged. ‘I’ll not be a nuisance. I won’t be tired or in the way—listen!’
She tiptoed through a brake of long heather.
‘You didn’t hear that, did you?’ she asked triumphantly. ‘The deer won’t take fright from my step, I’ll walk so lightly. I’ll tread as soft as a mouse.’
I could not help laughing at her sober face.
‘Another time,’ I put her off.
‘Why not this time?’ she demanded. ‘I know,’ she went on, ‘you’re not going after a deer at all, Hugh. You’re planning something and you don’t want to tell me.’
‘What would I be planning?’ I cried. ‘Now, where’s Duncan’s game-bag—have you a bite of food I can take in my pocket in case I’m hindered? Are you angry, Terry? Won’t you say good hunting?’
‘No,’ she answered flatly. ‘Take care of yourself and come safe home,’ she whispered a moment afterwards. ‘Don’t let any harm come to you. I’ll be waiting for you.’
I went down into the gully and spied the country to the south, making a great show of looking for beasts for Terry’s benefit. When I had assured myself that there were no deer to be seen from where she stood beside the cave I walked up the defile towards Ardverikie Forest. As soon as I was out of sight of the cave I slackened my pace. Darkness was still some hours off, and the evening was too bright for my project. I settled myself behind a stone and smoked a precious pipeful of tobacco that I had gleaned from the corners of my jacket’s pockets, and while I waited for night I amused myself by taking imaginary snapshots at boulders. I had often used Duncan’s rifle in the old days when he took me with him to kill a hind. It came naturally to my hands now. It was far superior to my own .303, and I had brought down a beast at three hundred yards with it, more than once.
At length when it seemed dark enough to proceed I loaded the rifle carefully, filling the magazine with seven shells and leaving the breach empty. In this way I could carry it in perfect security with the safety catch off and yet load and be ready in a twinkling. I swung from my first course, bending more westernly towards the shining goal of Loch Laggan.
It was very dark by the time I reached the woods along the River Pattock and I regretted that I had not taken the risk of going ahead while daylight lasted. I blundered through the thick scrubby outskirts of the wood. Tussocks and open drains tripped me up, I went to the knees in scummy pools. I have never recovered from the horror of that time when I was nearly drowned in a bog in the Durc, and I dragged myself trembling from these sloughs as if they harboured venomous reptiles. Branches struck my face or caught my clothes as I passed. I fell a hundred times, and the rifle, swinging over my shoulder, belaboured my head with its butt as I scrambled to my feet. I could not afford a hand to hold the rifle since both hands were needed to warn me of obstacles and ward off the trees I would have run against had I not kept my hands outstretched before me. I knew that I had a deer fence to cross before I arrived at the Pattock. I walked with groping hands outstretched for a good half-mile before I came to the fence, and when I did reach it I came unawares against it and hurt my arm.
I was exasperated and nervous. When an owl left its perch in the branches above my head with a soft Whoof of feathers I had the rifle in my hands and loaded and cocked and pointed forward in one frenzied movement. I could hear the river brawling ahead of me, my only guide through the mirk. I headed for the noise, fearing to miss the shallow upper part of the stream where it could be forded. I began to fancy that I had kept too low, and that each step forward was going to precipitate me over the edge of the cliffs which guard the lower course of the river.
The stream was very small. Its waters felt warm even to my hot touch. I bathed my wrists and my forehead before I crossed into the main forest. I found the path leading to Gallovie, between the river and the fir woods, and followed it as best I could. The Pattock, ending its broad shallow course, plunged into a chasm; on my left hand I had the dark windless wood, on my right a sheer descent from the verge of my path into the river’s pools and cascades. It was pitch dark and very hot. Sweat ran down my face, blinding me more effectually than the dark night. I began to start like a nervous animal. I fancied the trees were keeping step with me, or dangerous creatures hid in the depth of the forest walked abreast with me. The dark wood repelled me and I found myself walking on the brink of the cliff. I veered from that danger until I ran into the trees where the path curved, and I sprang away in fear.
I had gone about half a mile down the path when a sudden thrashing noise, accompanied by the sound of harsh choked breathing, brought me to a fearful standstill. The noise was directly in my way, I could not go ahead without approaching it. I forced my limbs to carry me off the path, into the wood. As soon as I left the path and halted in the shade of the wood, if shadow it could be called which was but more intensely dark, everything fell silent again; I could hear the river but no other sound. I brought the rifle from my shoulder to assure myself with shaking hands that it was ready. I waited what seemed a great length of time before I ventured to move, keeping within the wood, off the path. When I had travelled twenty steps the noise broke out once more with renewed force; I was near enough to the edge of the wood to see the narrow strip of sky between the trees on both sides of the river. I saw a monstrous form uprear itself against the lesser darkness of the sky; it rose to the height of the trees, a few yards from me, and fell, and rose again. The choking sound repeated itself more loudly. I was shaking so that I could scarcely keep my fingers on the safety catch and the trigger of my rifle. I levelled the rifle at the patch of blank darkness from which the shape had risen as I waited. I began to hear a low sobbing noise, like the drawing in of difficult breath, that the water’s voice had drowned until this moment. I trailed my feet closer to the thing, with infinite caution, ready to retreat. My eyes caught a glimpse of a tree-top which seemed to bend and shake, moving alone amongst its motionless fellows. As I stared at the bending plumes of that tree the Thing leapt up again, and I saw horns outlined against the vague sky. I turned back the safety catch of my rifle, and commenced to laugh. I could hear the hysterical note of my laughter. I scolded myself aloud saying, ‘Shut up! shut up! shut up!’ And then, ‘Frightened to death by a stag in a snare!’
I was near enough, now that I knew what I was looking for, to make out the shape of the stag that hung suspended by its head, or horns, from a young tree beside the path. I ventured closer. Immediately the brute began to plunge and rear. Flying hooves missed my face by an inch. I felt the wind of the fore-feet as they lashed out; the skin of my neck was prickling and my spine felt cold. Those sharp hooves would have cut my face to ribbons if I had been a step nearer. The horrible shuddering of the poor creature’s breath started again.
‘The damn fools!’ I raged aloud, ‘to hang their snare too low and leave the brute in agony.’
I was so angry that I forgot to be wary. The stag’s pain could scarcely be listened to. I took my handkerchief and bound my sheath-knife to the muzzle of the rifle like a bayonet. When the deer ceased to struggle and hung quietly I guessed for its heart and drove the weapon with all my strength at the vague bulk. I drew back as fast as I could recover from the thrust. The beast reared itself for the last time. It was a lucky stroke. The random blade had pierced a vital place. The sweeping horns loomed over me with the sky behind them; the deer uttered a sound between groan and cough. Frothy blood shaken from its nostrils in the final convulsion fell on my face. The stag fell, dragging the tree-top into a great bow as the dead weight came on it. When I was sure the beast was dead I loosened the wire from its neck and cut off its head and flung it in the river. I gralloched the carcass and rolled the forequarters after the head and hid the haunches on a bluff that I could not mistake, to await my return. I was glad to have venison so easily although the brute’s cruel death troubled my mind. I consoled myself with the thought that I had punished whoever set the snare. I could fancy the poacher’s anger, and I told myself, ‘Serve him right,’ yet the stag’s breath was still in my ears. I felt implicated in needless brutality. I went ahead towards Gallovie more rapidly than I had travelled heretofore. Anger ousted fear and made my previous caution seem cowardly. As I walked a new thought struck me. It was very strange that a poacher should dare to set a trap for deer on this path of all places. Stalkers used the path daily, fishers and sightseers frequented it. I recalled the silence of the Twelfth and what Duncan let slip about famished bands of stragglers roving the country. I thought of Terry with sudden panic. I began to run as fast as my legs would carry me, down the path, out of the wood, into the meadows of Inverpattock. The normal past is still the background to my thoughts. Perhaps there are no stalkers now, no fishers by the Pattock, no sightseers save the sightless wide-eyed dead.
The path, leaving the forest, brought me to a cooler lighter world where my panic abated as quickly as it rose. My own experience in the plantation beyond the river was enough to teach me that strangers, inexpert in the country, would never come on our cave by night. I was ready to reproach myself for a timorous imaginative fool by the time I came to the foot-bridges that span the Pattock’s divided streams. I sat down on the rail of one bridge to draw my breath. The country seemed lost in sleep. Every house was dark. I guessed it was past one in the morning. The blurred valley sloped upwards into woods, and the woods ended in a jet-black line against the hills, and the hills climbed against the sky. I felt a touch of frost in the air. The deep blue of the sky lightened towards the north, as I had often seen in frosty weather when the wild fires of frost that burn around the pole irradiate the Monadhliah scarp, warning us of winter. A sliver of white moon, hung like a sword in blue air, rested over Gallovie. I went into the fields to steal the new potatoes I had come for.
I came first on a field of corn. It was trampled down as if by a herd of cattle. When I kneeled to peer at the ground I could distinguish the mark of boots, and cattle’s hooves, in the soft earth. I crossed from that field into its neighbour. It was drilled as if for potatoes or turnips but nothing grew from the drills. I kneeled once more to assure myself that my eyes were not deceiving me. The night was too peaceful and normal for such discoveries as affronted my senses. Half-withered green shaws lay between the drills, with yellowed turnip tops and potatoes the size of a marble. I commenced to delve hurriedly in the tattered drills, groping in the earth with my fingers for potatoes overlooked by whoever had forestalled me. I found a few potatoes, but when I had scraped and scratched methodically for half an hour, gleaning no more than a few pounds of tiny potatoes, I tried a new plan. I walked up and down the drills in search of crops that had escaped the harvesters. I found a crop here and there hidden amongst shaws. At length I had a fair weight in my bag. I left the potato patch to hunt for turnips. They likewise had been uprooted by hasty inexpert hands. I gathered a dozen bulbs which had been overlooked. Then I stuffed the game-bag with green turnip-tops until it would hold no more and I was ready to go home.
I crossed the bridge. The climbing moon, and my accustomed eyes, made my path plain, but my eyes kept turning towards Gallovie. I was devoured with curiosity which would not be gainsaid. I walked a few steps on my homeward path, and halted.
‘It won’t be dawn for a good two hours,’ I told myself. I hid my game-bag under the bridge and, rifle in hand, went to spy round Gallovie. I had no idea what I wanted to find. A fever of curiosity spurred me.
There is often a wind before dawn after windless nights. Such a breath began to stir now amongst the trees, and in the summer-parched grass. I heard it over the woods long before it reached me. While it was still and calm where I stood I heard the sighing in the tree-tops which presaged a breeze; a door banged in the cluster of buildings. I tiptoed up the hill against the cooling breeze. The door banged again. There was no other sound or sign of life amongst the houses and farm buildings. I trod so warily that I could hear the beating of my heart louder by far than my cautious step. But it was dark underfoot and I trod twice on dead branches which snapped with a noise like a rifle, or so it seemed to my ears. I froze at the sound; I dared not turn the safety catch of my rifle in case it was heard; I kept my thumb on the catch and my forefinger on the trigger.
I could hear no noise of cattle or horses. If they were not in the steading they should be in the meadows. I gazed every way and saw no beast. I heard nothing but the wind and the river and my tumultuous blood. I reached a fence. Walking alongside it with one hand on the top wire to guide me, I came to a gateway. An iron gate was lying flat on the ground, torn from its hinges. I stepped across it, marking its place lest I required to retreat hastily. I entered the courtyard. The doors of the steading were open. The doorways yawned black in the wall. I went cautiously from one door to another. Some of the doors were gone, others had broken panels and their locks were torn out. The place had the aspect of desolation. I was afraid to strike a match or go inside the byres and stables. It occurred to me again that I had not heard a dog barking. I ventured as far as the kennels. Their iron doors were open, their occupants mute, or gone. I crept back until I came to a cottar house. Its door was shut, but I could see it was not properly closed. It leaned from inside against its frame, without hinges or lock. The window-panes were broken in every window, the garden like our own trampled with many feet; I found potato shaws scattered on the ground amongst a litter of broken glass and charred clothes and broken dishes. A fire had been lighted in a corner of the garden. I found hinges amongst its embers. Bits of painted wood lay half-burnt around. As I went out of that garden a breath of abominable air met me, a stench of decaying flesh such as I had often felt when I passed near the rotting maggot-infested carcass of a deer on the hill in midsummer. The smell came the more abominably upon the night’s sweet air; I felt my gorge rising, I ran with my hand to my mouth until I was near the river. A mouthful of bile spewed itself into my hand against the strength of my clenched jaws.
The sky was lightening in the east. I hurried to be gone before day surprised me in strange country. I carried the stag’s haunches out of the wood and as far as I was able to bring them into the hills. I hid them securely to await my return. The sun came up to lighten my way home obliterating the fears of night. Terry had a fire burning.
‘I thought you’d never come,’ she said. ‘What have you in the bag, Hugh? You didn’t get a stag after all. You’re all blood! Your face is all blood! Hugh! where were you?’
I spilled the bag’s contents on the floor.
‘New potatoes!’ she cried, ‘and turnips! Oh, Hugh! But where did you get them? Sit down and I’ll take off your boots. They’re soaking—’
I told her part of the night’s affairs while she gave me dry clothes and set out food for me.
‘I can’t eat them,’ she said, looking at the potatoes with distaste. ‘Think of the risk you ran—it wasn’t worth it—if anything happened to you—’
‘Risk?’ I returned. ‘I don’t think there was any. I don’t think there’s a soul save ourselves left alive in this country.’
I kept some things secret even from her. The smell of death, rank and hideous, was in my nostrils as I spoke, and ate, and tried to sleep. I shuddered when I let my thoughts go back and I smelled again that foul air I breathed. She brought me dry clothes, making pretence that she believed it was cold which made my blood congeal.