CHAPTER VIII.
MISTS OF UNCERTAINTY.
When we got back to the house we found Myra and her father--notunnaturally--wondering what had become of us.
"What have you been doing, and where have you been, and what do youmean by it?" she asked, playfully. "I wish I could see you. I'm sureyou must be looking very guilty."
Garnesk and I exchanged hurried glances. It was obvious from herremark that the General had not told her of Sholto's disappearance. Idecided there and then that I would have to tell her the whole truthmyself, and I gave the others a pretty broad hint that we would liketo be left alone. I left the drawing-room and went with them to thelibrary, and answered the old man's feverish questions as to theresult of our search.
Then I returned to Myra. It was a difficult and unpleasant task that Ihad to perform, but I got through it somehow; and, as I expected, Myrawas very distressed about her dog, but not in the least frightened. Ihad thought it wiser not to acquaint her with the specialist'sdeductions as to the connection between her own affliction and thetheft of Sholto. When I had given her as many particulars as I thoughtadvisable, the other two rejoined us.
"Can you think of anyone at all, Miss McLeod," the specialist asked,"who would be likely to steal Sholto?"
"I can't," the girl replied helplessly. "I wish I could."
"The two classes of people we want to find," I suggested, "are thosewho like Sholto so much as to be prepared to steal him, and those whodislike him so much as to be anxious to destroy him."
"You don't think they'll hurt him," she cried, anxiously. "Poor oldfellow! It's bad enough his being blind; but I would rather know hewas dead than being ill-treated."
"It's much more likely to be the act of some very human person whocovets his neighbour's goods," said Garnesk, reassuringly. "But, atthe same time, we must not overlook the other possibility. Can youremember anyone who does dislike the dog?"
"Only one," said Myra, thoughtfully, "and I don't think he could havedone it. He has a small croft away up above Tor Beag, and Sholto andI were up there one day; but it's months ago. Sholto went nosing roundas usual, and the man came out and got very excited in Gaelic--and youknow how excited one can be in that language. He was very rude to meabout the dog, and it made me rather suspicious. I told daddy about itafter."
"Yes, and I hope you won't go wandering about so far from homewithout saying where you're going in future, my dear; because----"said the old man, and pulled himself up in pained confusion as herealised the tragic significance of his words.
"Some sort of poacher, perhaps," suggested Garnesk, coming quickly tothe rescue.
"An illicit whisky still somewhere about, more likely," Myra replied.And as she could think of no other likely person, and the crofterseemed out of the question, we had to confess ourselves puzzled. I hadhoped that Myra would have been able to give us some clue with whichwe could have satisfied her, while we kept our suspicions toourselves. Then we left Myra with the specialist, who made a temporaryexamination. In twenty minutes he assured us that he could makenothing of the case, but that he was willing to stake his reputationthat there was nothing organically wrong; and he gave us, so far as hedared, distinct reason to hope that she would eventually regain fullpossession of her lost faculty. So, after general rejoicings allround, in which I quite forgot the mystery of the man who stole thedog, I went to bed feeling ten years younger, and slept like a top.
When I awoke in the morning much of my elation of spirit hadevaporated, and I felt again the oppression of surrounding tragedy. Igot up immediately--it was just after six--dressed, and went downto bathe. I was strolling down the drive, with a towel round myneck, when Garnesk put his head out of his window and shouted thathe would join me. The tide being in, we saved ourselves a walk tothe diving-rock, as the point was called, and bathed from thelanding-stage. Refreshed by the swim, we determined to scour thecountry-side for any tracks of the thief.
"What beats me is how anybody in a place like this, where everybodyfor miles round knows more about you than you do yourself, couldget rid of an enormous beast like Sholto. He was big even for a Dane,and his weight must have been tremendous when he was drugged," saidGarnesk, as we walked up the beach path. "Have you ever tried to carrya man who's fainted?"
"I have," I answered with feeling, "and I quite agree with you. If thethief wanted to do away with the dog the beast's body is probablysomewhere near."
"What about the river?" my companion suggested.
"More likely the loch," I decided, "or the sea. But that would meana boat, because it would have to be buried in deep water, or thebody would be washed up again on the rocks, even with a heavy weightattached. There are many deep pools in the river, but they areconstantly fished, and that would lead to eventual detection. We aredealing with a man who knows his way about. It might be the loch orone of the burns, easily."
Accordingly we decided to try the loch first; but though we followedthe path from the house, carefully studying the ground every foot ofthe way, and examined the banks equally carefully, we were forced tothe conclusion that we were on the wrong scent. Then we came down oneof the burns that runs from the loch to the sea, and met with the sameresult.
"We'll walk along the beach and go up the next stream," Garnesksuggested. "Hullo," he exclaimed suddenly, as we clambered over thehuge rocks into a tiny cove, "there's been a boat in here!"
I looked at the shingly beach, and saw the keel-marks of a boat andthe footprints of its occupants in the middle of the cove. We went upgingerly, for fear of disturbing the ground of our investigations. Ilooked at the marks, and pondered them for a moment. By this time mysenses were wide awake.
"What do you make of it?" the oculist asked.
"Well," I replied, with an apologetic laugh, "I'm afraid you'llthink me more picturesque than businesslike if I tell you all theconclusions I've already come to; but the man who came ashore inthis boat didn't steal Sholto."
"Go on," he said. "Why, I told you I knew you weren't a fool."
"Thank you!" I laughed. "It seems to me that if a man arrived in aboat and went ashore to steal a dog, he would go away again in thesame boat."
"And didn't he?"
"I feel convinced he didn't," I replied, and pointed out to him whatmust have been obvious to both of us. "Compare the keel-marks withhigh-water mark. There is less than half a boat's length of keel-mark,and it is just up above high-water mark. This craft, which appears tohave been a small rowing-boat, was run ashore at high tide, or verynear it, and run out again very quickly. It might conceivably havecome in and been caught up by the sea. But Sholto was stolen between aquarter past eight and half-past nine, when the tide was well on theway out. If Sholto went out to sea it was not in this boat."
"Well," said Garnesk, thoughtfully, "your point is good enough for me.We must look somewhere else."
"I hope my attempts at detective work will not put us off the scent,"I said, doubtfully.
"I don't think they will, Ewart," said my companion, graciously. "Notin this case, anyway. I'm sure you're right, because this bay can beseen from the top windows of the house."
"You evidently reached my conclusions with half the effort in half thetime," I laughed.
"Oh, nonsense!" he exclaimed. "It was you who pointed out that theone man in this boat came in daylight."
"Why 'one man' so emphatically?" I asked.
"When two men come in a boat to commit a theft, and only one of themgoes ashore, the other would hardly be expected to sit in the boat andtwiddle his thumbs. It's a thousand pounds to a penny that he wouldget out and walk about the beach. Now, only one gentleman came ashorefrom this boat, and only one got on board again. One set of footprintsgoing and one coming decided me on that. Besides, if anyone came alongand saw a solitary man sitting in a boat, they might ask him how hiswife and children were, and he would have to reply; whereas an emptyboat, being unable to answer questions, would raise no suspicions."
"You seem to be arguing that this boat may
have been the one we arelooking for," I pointed out; "and yet we are agreed that the state ofthe tide made it impossible for Sholto to have been taken away in it."
"Yes," said Garnesk, "I agree to that. But I fancy the thief came bythat boat. It seems to me that our man jumps out of the boat, runsashore, and his friend pulls away and picks him up elsewhere--probablynearer the house. It would look perfectly natural for a man who hasapparently been giving a companion a pull across from Skye, say, toland him and then go back. The more I think of this the more itinterests me. You see, if the top windows of the house can be seenfrom the bay, it means that the lower windows can be seen from the topof the cliff. If we can find where our thief lay in wait on the cliffand watched the house, probably with his eyes glued on the dining-roomwindows to see when we commenced dinner, if we can also find where heleft his sea-boots while he went to the house, and then where herejoined his companion, we are getting on."
"What makes you say 'sea-boots'?" I asked. "You can't tell a top-bootby the footmarks."
"Indirectly you can," Garnesk replied, puffing thoughtfully at hispipe. "That boat was pulled in and pushed out by a man who exertedhardly any pressure, although the beach only slopes gently. Hiscompanion did not lend a hand by pushing her out with an oar; if hehad done so we should have seen the marks, and I couldn't find any.The only other way to account for it is that our friend, who exertedso little pressure, was wearing sea-boots and walked into the waterwith the boat. Had he been alone, the jerk of his final jump into theboat would have left a deeper impression on the beach. The tide wasjust going out; it would have no time to wash this mark away. I lookedfor the mark, and it wasn't there; so I came to the final conclusionthat two men arrived in the cove shortly after seven last night in asmall open boat. One of them--a tall, left-handed man insea-boots--pushed the boat out again and went ashore."
I am afraid I was rude enough to shout with laughter at this verydefinite statement; but it was mainly with excited admiration that Ilaughed--certainly not with ridicule. Garnesk turned to meapologetically.
"I know it sounds far-fetched, my dear chap," he said; "but we shallhave to think a lot over this business, and I am simply thinking aloudin order that you can give me your help in my own conclusions."
"My dear fellow," I cried, "don't, for heaven's sake, imagine that Iam laughing at you. It was the left-handed touch that made me guffawwith sheer excitement."
"Well, I think he was left-handed, because the footmarks were goingashore on the right-hand side of the keel-marks, and going seawards onthe left-hand side. Jump out of a boat and push it out to sea, andnotice which side of the boat you stand by instinct--provided you weredoing as he was, pushing on the point of the bows. The fact that hisfeet obliterate the keel-marks in one place proves that. So now wewant to find a left-handed man in sea-boots who knew Sholto wasblind"--and he laughed in a half-apology.
"What about these sea-boots," I asked, "and the place we are to findwhere he left them?"
"We'll look for that now; and if we find it we can be pretty sure ourmariner stole the dog."
"You seem to be taking it for granted already," I pointed out.
"The easiest way to prove he didn't is to satisfy ourselves thatthere's no evidence he did," said the oculist. "But I fancy he did."
"From the way you've sized it up so far I should be inclined to backyour fancy," I admitted frankly. "I take it, from your diagnosis, thatour nautical friend came ashore here, went up on to the cliff, andglued his eye to the dining-room window. When he saw we were atdinner, and it was getting dusk--in fact, almost dark--he took off hissea-boots and slipped up to the Lodge in his stocking-soles. So if weclimb the cliff, we expect to find the spot on which he deposited hisboots."
"If we expected that," Garnesk replied, "we should also expect to findhis boots; and he wouldn't be likely to leave such incriminatingevidence in our hands as that. No, my dear Ewart; when he left thecliff he was wearing his boots, and he left them at some point on thepath between the house and his embarking place. Come--let's look."
I was intensely interested in my friend's deductions, and I feltconvinced that he was right. So we climbed the cliff, he by one routeand I by another, in order to see if we could find any traces of lastnight's visitor. But that was impossible; the rocks were toostorm-swept to harbour any sort of lichen which would have shownevidence of footmarks. Still, we were not disappointed when we reachedthe top, and Garnesk looked at me with a charming expression of boyishtriumph when we came across a patch of ground where the heather hadobviously been trampled about and worn down by someone recently lyingthere.
"I don't think we'll worry about tracing him from here just now," saidthe specialist. "It would be a very difficult job, and we may as wellmake for the most likely spot to embark from."
"Right you are," I agreed. "I think there can only be one--that is asecluded little inlet, almost hidden by the rocks on the other side ofthe house."
"Come on, let's have a look at it," my companion urged; and weblundered down the side of the cliff and hurried along the shore. Butwhen we came to the small bay which I had in mind there was certainlysome sign of disturbance among the rough gravel with which the shorewas carpeted; and that was all the evidence we could find.
"It is such an ideal spot for the job that this almost knocks ourtheory on the head," murmured Garnesk ruefully. "There are noboat-marks, or anything."
"Which, in a way, bears out your diagnosis," I cried, suddenlyhitting on what I thought to be the solution of the difficulty.
"How, in heaven's name?"
"Our old friend the tide," I declared, with returning confidence.
"Of course," he almost shouted. "I've got you, Ewart. The boat came inhere while the tide was going out--when, in fact, it was some distanceout, possibly nearly an hour after it ran into the other cove. Sincethen the tide has come in again and obliterated any marks the men mayhave made. If we find any evidence on a line running between thisplace and the house, we can call it a certainty."
In feverish excitement we hurried towards the house, casting anxiousglances to right and left, but the stubborn heather showed no sign ofany recent passenger that way. At last Garnesk, who was some distanceto my right, hailed me with an exultant shout. There, sure enough, wasa broad patch bearing marks of recent occupation, much the same as theother at the top of the cliff. We were able easily to distinguish theexact spot where the thief had laid the unconscious dog while he puton his boots. The discovery of an unmistakable footprint in a moremarshy spot, which could only have been imprinted by a stockingedfoot, completed my friend's triumph.
"My dear fellow," I cried heartily, slapping my companion on the back,"I congratulate you. If you go on like this we shall have the dog andthe thief in no time."
"It will be some days, even at this rate," he warned me solemnly,"before we get as far as that. Now, back to the embarking-point, andsee if we can reconstruct the thing fully."
So we retraced our steps, and studied the shingle once more, butfailed to discover any marks of any value. Then we sat down, and theoculist drew a vivid picture of the journey the thief had made. Atlast, feeling more than satisfied with our work, we rose to go in tobreakfast.
"Ewart, I want you to wire for that friend of yours before you doanything else. You may want him soon. I will leave by the morningtrain to-morrow, but I shall continue on this case till the mystery issolved. In the meantime, you will need someone you can trust at yourside all the time."
"I'll go into Glenelg, and wire immediately after breakfast," Ipromised. "Hullo, more reflections," I laughed, and pointed to asmall, bright object some distance away on the rocks, which wascatching the glint of the sun.
"We seem to be surrounded by a spying army of glittering objects,"laughed my companion, as we strolled on. We had walked some fortyyards when some instinct--I know not what--prompted me to investigatethe affair. I turned back, and went to pick up the shining object,though for the life of me I could not have told you what I expectedto fin
d.
"Garnesk!" I bawled. "Garnesk! Come here!"
"What is it?" he shouted to me, as he came hurtling over the rocks.
"Look at it," I replied tersely, and placed it in his outstretchedpalm. He glanced at it, and then at me.
"That settles it," he said, and whistled softly, for I had found asmall piece of brass, and on it was engraved:--
"Sholto, The Douglas, Invermalluch Lodge, Inverness-shire."
It was the name-plate from Sholto's collar.