The Stalking Party Read online

  Mary glanced out of the window. She knew very well where Nicky was, having watched him squeeze into the Land Rover behind Miss Ashy, bound for the Black Corrie.

  ‘Would he be on the river? He was out in the rod-room after dinner last night.’

  ‘Fishing? In this?’

  Mary smiled. ‘It’s the first rain we’ve had for a week, and needed sair. I’ve never known it so dry at the time of year. The salmon will be running, the morn, and there’s a good chance of a fish.’

  Beverley sighed impatiently. ‘Whereabouts on the river?’

  ‘That I couldna say. It could be anywhere on the Lower Beat – the Upper will be running too brown just now. If ye go tae the road bridge and walk on up the path, ye’re like tae find him.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Beverley took the coffee pot and went out.

  As the door swung shut, Elspeth looked round from the sink. ‘Mr Nicky’s away to the hill.’

  ‘Aye, so he is.’

  ‘Then why – ?’

  ‘Save your breath tae cool your porridge, lassie,’ advised Mary, cutting delicate pastry leaves. ‘If he didna tell that one, why would I?’

  Sipping coffee and orange juice, Beverley decided to walk up the river as soon as the rain stopped. She was worried about Nicky. There had been a subtle change in him since they arrived here: he was less willing to agree with her, less interested in her plans for the place. The influence of his family was stronger than she had realised. In particular, she resented Ashy Macleod’s casually proprietorial manner towards him. Ashy the insider, with the right voice, the right connections. Nicky would probably have married her, reflected Beverley, if his father had not made his approval of such a match so obvious.

  Nicky could be led but not driven, as she had discovered in the course of her own exploitation of his feelings of guilt towards the under-privileged.

  ‘You have no conception of what it is like to be poor,’ she often told him, and he usually agreed humbly.

  ‘I know, but I do what I can to help.’

  Then she would laugh, and rebuild his self-esteem. ‘If other poor little rich boys were like you, the world would be a better place.’

  But Nicky trying to right the world’s wrongs at her direction in the anonymity of London was a different being from this new persona as the laird’s son on forty thousand acres of the Western Highlands, which he would, in all probability, eventually inherit. Unless John Forbes got there first, or it was sold to that fat-cat Everard Cooper. There was many a slip...

  She frowned, drained her coffee, and left the dining-room.

  A packet of neatly-wrapped sandwiches lay ready in the boot-room, clear indication that she was not expected back for lunch. Breathing shallowly in the stifling atmosphere of the drying-room, she saw that the pegs and racks which last night had been festooned with wet jackets and sodden socks were now bare. Only her own boots, freshly dubbined, and her green padded jacket hung in their corner. She stuffed the sandwiches in her pocket, and set off resolutely into the drizzle.

  A screen of ramping ponticum separated the river Buie from the pot-holed, rock-ribbed track that led over the shoulder of Ben Culichan, and then continued through high, sedgy uplands, to the spawning-pools beyond the Glen Buie march. The map showed it as a dotted line thereafter, a thread of path fit only for walkers and mountain bikers where it crossed the steep, shaley slopes of Meall na Shallachan and eventually descended, through forestry plantations clothing the hills around Little Kintulloch, finally joining the main road at Westerbrae.

  Half an hour’s brisk walking along the river path brought her to the junction of tracks, where the left-hand branch veered away towards Strathtorran House. The stone bridge spanning the water marked the separation between Upper and Lower Beats of the Buie, but there was no sign of Nicky – no movement except that of a heron, which rose heavily and flapped upstream.

  Beverley perched on the parapet of the bridge, and studied the outline map with which every guest was provided. This must be the Greeting Pool, where the Auld Laird’s teenage daughter, Lady Helen McNeil, had drowned a quarter of a century ago. Against it on the map was written: Not Fished. Above the bridge was the pool labelled Falls, and beyond that were Alt na Chorain, Mill Race, and Miss Hazelrigg’s Catch.

  The rain had stopped, and looking back down the glen she took in the wide panorama of hills clad in russet and episcopal purple, sapphire water and emerald sward on the sheep-nibbled flats down by the estuary. The small cluster of whitewashed buildings – pub, post-office and general store combined – with the harbour and toy-size ferryboat, was as self-consciously scenic as a postcard.

  Here was her brochure cover, no doubt about that. The PR people would go mad for it: the view that said it all. Bonnie Prince Charlie, the Road to the Isles, Will Ye No’ Come Back Again? Every corny Highland fantasy the tourist heart desired.

  She half closed her eyes, visualising a Visitor Centre down by the ferry, craftshops and an audio-visual introduction to the Highlands; a colour-coded Nature Trail to suit every degree of mobility from superfit to zimmer-bound; railed-off viewpoints where tourists could pose with their arms round a stuffed stag; a piper in full regalia outside the Snack Bar...

  Daydreams for the future. There would be opposition, of course, and she would be foolish to under-estimate its strength. Backward people clung to the past, and feudal habits died hard. Park-Plans Inc. would have its work cut out to win hearts and minds here, even when legal possession of the peninsula was assured. Her own first task must be to sow seeds of discontent with the old regime, and prepare the ground for the new.

  Where to begin? A group of nearer buildings caught her attention, and abandoning the search for Nicky, she walked away from the river, heading for the squat, low-browed cottage standing isolated amid the remnants of ancient Caledonian forest, half a mile up the glen.

  A sagging wire fence enclosed an acre or so of coarse grass and rushes, where a shaggy white pony, its sweeping tail blown forward to wrap round its knees, was backed into the scanty shelter of a corrugated iron shed. As she approached, a pack of kennelled terriers set up a shrill yapping.

  What a dump! she thought, arranging her face in a smile of greeting. ‘Anyone at home?’ she called, pushing open the half-glassed door of the porch.

  On the hillside across the river, sunlight flashed against glass. Someone was watching her.

  *****

  I was a fool to come, thought Maya. She kept her eyes focused on the basket-weave tops of Sir Archie’s thick heather-mix stockings, and tried to match their steady advance. Follow my leader. Mark my footsteps, good my page.

  She felt light-headed, as if she had been walking for ever in this muffled, dripping, midge-infested purgatory. Her boots were full of water and beginning to press on her toes, ski-pants dragged at waist and knees, quilted jacket was sodden inside and out.

  Left, right, left. Slip, stumble, squelch over boggy ground, stony ground, coarse wet rushes and mossy rocks. Slowly they were gaining height, working across the broad bowl of Corrie na Shallachan, tormented by insects, longing for a breath of wind, with the shale slopes of the mist-shrouded Ben rising steeply above them.

  From time to time the men stopped, scanning through binoculars the high ground at the very edge of the mist. They muttered together, ignoring her. She caught garbled, meaningless phrases: ‘The carry, no’ the true wind...draw back to the Sanctuary.’ Maya swept her own binoculars across the slope, but they showed her nothing but rocks and bracken, grey and brown, a barren landscape.

  Shouldn’t have come, shouldn’t have come, repeated maddeningly in her mind. She didn’t belong here, among these chilly, disdainful people. The Romans, masters of the fairest places on earth, Gibbon had written, looked with wonder and horror at the wilderness of Caledonia and its savage inhabitants. The Romans had had more sense than to try to live here. They recognised the end of the civilised world, and built a wall to keep the barbarians outside it.

  She should have fol
lowed their example, but because she had loved Alec, she had clung to the hope of finding some lingering echo of him among his own beloved hills. Glen Buie had been his Land of Lost Content.

  ‘I want to take you to the cairn on top of Ben Shallachan, and show you my kingdom,’ he had said. ‘Highlands and islands spread out as far as the eye can see. That’s where we’ll ask them to scatter our ashes, my love, fifty years hence.’ And he had quoted softly,

  West of these, out to seas

  Colder than the Hebrides

  I must go,

  Where the fleet of stars is anchored,

  And the young star-captains glow.

  Tears stung her eyes. There had been no fifty years, no ashes even, when those seas colder than the Hebrides stole his life and her happiness. She would find no trace of him here.

  On the ferryboat from Tounie, she had had a premonition of what it might be like, and when she drove the hired car on to the jetty, instinct forced her to turn left, away from the sign to Glen Buie. She had gone ten miles in the wrong direction before conquering her nerves and deciding to go through with the visit.

  Now she knew that instinct had been right. America and Britain were indeed two countries divided by a common tongue. Understanding the words fooled you into believing you knew what they meant, but half the time you got it wrong. The British would tell you to look them up, but to take the words at face value was a big mistake.

  Gwennie’s invitation had been no more than a social gesture. On impulse, Maya had rung her when she reached London, but even over the phone, her mother-in-law’s surprise had been obvious. ‘Come up here? Of course. My dear, we’d be delighted. By car? Well, take the ferry from Tounie, and after you dock turn right and follow the coast road until you see the sign. About four miles from the harbour. We’ll look forward to seeing you, my dear.’

  But all the ‘my dears’ in the world could not hide the tiny giveaway signs that she was an embarrassment. At dinner last night she had felt like Banquo’s ghost, and today was the same.

  Only the young second stalker’s greeting as she followed Sir Archie into the gun-room gave an impression of genuine warmth. ‘Good morning, Mrs Alec. Ready for the hill?’

  Unlike the ginger-browed, ruddy-faced head stalker, Fergus was slim and olive-skinned, dark-eyed as any Spaniard. Even in his heavy hill boots and thick tweeds he moved with a dancer’s step.

  Mrs Alec. The form of address had surprised her initially, but now she felt pleased by the implication that she belonged here. She had smiled tentatively. ‘Ready as I’ll ever be, I guess.’

  Sir Archie had handed his rifle to Fergus, who slid it out of the sleeve and checked the bolt.

  ‘Ammo?’

  Fergus patted his pocket. ‘Aye, sir.’

  Sir Archie gave Maya a quick up-and-down glance in which she sensed disapproval of her clothes, but he said only, ‘Got a stick? Take one of these. You’ll need a third leg on the rough stuff. Sandwiches? Good. Come on, then.’

  The men had turned away, leaving her to follow, and so it had continued for the next three hours. She wondered if they had forgotten she was with them. This was what it must feel like to be a dog, she thought, unsure of what its master wanted or where he was going, following obediently, ready to sit or go forward at the word of command.

  ‘Antlers!’ whispered Sir Archie urgently, reaching forward to tap Fergus with his stick. Both men flung themselves flat.

  ‘Get down!’ they hissed at Maya as she hesitated, looking for a dry patch to lie, and dog-like she dropped into the wet peat, feeling water ooze through knees and elbows. She began to wriggle backwards, as the men were doing, although she could see no reason.

  In the shelter of a rock, they re-grouped, and the men began a low-voiced discussion. She grasped that there were some small stags in front of them, and they believed there might be more lying in the hollow below. The problem was first to find out if there was a shootable beast among them, and then to get past the staggies without disturbing them.

  ‘Up to the top and come down behind,’ murmured Sir Archie.

  Fergus plucked a tuft of cotton-grass and tossed it in the air, testing the wind. ‘I’m thinking we can get past below them if we keep in the burn.’

  Maya looked up at the misty heights and hoped they would adopt Fergus’s plan. Already she was more tired than she cared to admit, and feared she might not be able to keep up if they tackled the climb.

  ‘How many are there?’ she whispered.

  They looked at her in surprise. ‘Did ye no’ see them? Three wee staggies lying in the rocks,’ said Fergus softly.

  Useless to complain that she couldn’t see past them both. They resumed their whispering, heads close, and being unable to influence their plans she turned away, staring down the hill at the dark pattern of peat hags through which they had threaded their way to this vantage point. Moisture dripped from her hat and her body temperature dropped. Bored and uncomfortable, she began to shiver, but she knew there was no going back now. Sir Archie had made that clear. The stalking-party had to stick together.

  ‘People wandering about during the cull are a menace,’ he had said. ‘They shift the deer about, whether they mean to or not, and there’s always a degree of danger when using high-powered rifles. A bullet could go astray, hit a rock, ricochet. We ask walkers to stick to the paths – most of them are pretty sensible.’

  ‘And if they don’t?’

  ‘Our chaps have a friendly word with them. No question of intimidation, just pointing out the danger.’ He had smiled. ‘On some forests it’s not unknown for a stalker to put a shot over their heads, but I don’t approve of that, do I, Fergus?’

  ‘No, Sir Archibald,’ agreed Fergus, butter-wouldn’t-melt.

  ‘Don’t you forget it.’

  Fergus said nothing, but his grin suggested that he would put a shot over any interloper’s head if he thought he could get away with it.

  She had to stick it out. Maya wriggled her toes inside the sodden boots and tried to take an interest in the bleak, dripping landscape. To see it through Alec’s eyes. ‘Animal or vegetable, anything that survives in the Highlands is a miracle of adaptation,’ she remembered him saying once. Obviously this applied to the little white-winged ptarmigan she had glimpsed among the rocks, and the blue hare which would turn white in the snow.

  It was probably true of the scrubby sapling a few yards below them now, with its branches apparently growing directly out of the peat. Curiosity stirred: it sure was a strange place for a tree. As she put up her binoculars for a closer look, the branches moved and she drew a sharp breath. Not daring to speak, she tugged Sir Archie’s sleeve.

  ‘What?’ His gaze followed her pointing finger.

  Huge and black-bodied from rolling in peat, the stag came up the bank, and the three humans shrank back in the shelter of their rock, easing up collars and pulling down brims to hide the flash of skin. Unalarmed, the stag came on.

  Maya pressed herself into the rock, peering sideways, noting all she could. His shaggy throat and brisket dripped moisture, his head was carried high, and she saw that on one side his antler was not branched, but formed a long single point, like a scimitar. His thin, delicate legs trod lightly over the rough ground. She could smell the hot, throat-catching stink of the rut on him, and feel his power and passion as he passed within yards of them: angry, alert, looking for trouble.

  Would he wind them? See them?

  The stag paused, snuffing the air, then laid his antlers flat against his neck and uttered an ugly, challenging roar, almost a bellow, that held his mouth wide open seconds after the sound had gone bouncing round the corrie. At once a whole forest of heads appeared. The small stags were on their feet, plus a dozen others, all staring at the newcomer. They turned, without haste, and trotted away, the big beast following.

  Maya let out the breath she had been holding. They were gone.

  ‘Yon’s the muckle switch from Beinn a Heurig!’ Fergus said excitedly.
/>   ‘He’s a long way from home, then.’

  ‘It’s him, right enough.’

  ‘Good girl! Well spotted.’ Sir Archie patted Maya’s shoulder, and she experienced the baffled pleasure of a dog who has unwittingly done the right thing. ‘We’ve been trying to get that beggar for years.’

  ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘Didn’t you see his left antler? No tines on it. Just a single point. Makes him a dangerous fighter. Better off the hill.’

  ‘It sure looked kinda mean.’ She was puzzled that the men showed no inclination to pursue the stags, which were now mere dots in the distance, brown against grey-green. ‘Won’t you go after him?’

  ‘All in good time.’ He sat down and took out his sandwiches. ‘We’ll give them a while to settle.’

  ‘They may go for miles!’

  Both men laughed at her anxiety. ‘Och, they’ll no’ go far,’ said Fergus. ‘Ye’re doing well, Mrs Alec. Not too tired?’

  She shook her head, for both boredom and weariness had vanished as soon as she saw the big stag. The switch. She was in a fever to catch up with them before they vanished in this vast wilderness. How could the men sit munching quietly while their quarry moved ever farther out of range?

  Faintly across the wide bowl of corrie came the muffled groaning bellow.

  Fergus nodded towards the sound. ‘There he goes. Dinna fash, Mrs Alec, we’ll come up with him soon enough.’

  She tried to contain her impatience while they finished their food, and Fergus accepted a Turkish cigarette from his employer’s battered silver case. When he had smoked it to an inch, he pinched it out and rose, easing the haversack off his shoulders.

  ‘Best give Callum a call. We’ll be needing the pony.’

  ‘D.V,’ said Sir Archie, touching wood.

  Fergus withdrew to a small knoll, and the walkie-talkie crackled. ‘Wake up, mon. Wake up!’ he muttered, pressing buttons.

  At the third call, Callum answered. Far below them, a white blob with a black blob preceding it emerged from the stone building beside the jetty, where the launch bobbed at anchor, and began to move slowly up the path beside the burn.