The Cone Gatherers (16 page)

‘I'm sorry I'm late, my lady,' he said. ‘Ever since the storm yesterday my wife's been badly upset; she's still a bit hysterical. Her hand shakes so much' – he held out his own, and could not still its shaking – ‘she has to be fed.'

She wondered if he had fed her.

‘I'm very sorry to hear that, Duror,' she murmured.

Tulloch prepared to leave. ‘If you will excuse me, my lady,' he said, ‘I'd better be going. My car's at the foot of the drive.'

‘No, no,' she said quickly. ‘Please wait another minute or two. What Duror and I have to discuss concerns you, or rather your two men.'

‘It surely does,' muttered Duror, and he took from his
pocket a doll that she immediately recognised, though she had not seen it for years. It had belonged to Sheila, and during its reign had been an especial favourite. Now when she saw it, naked, without its gay frilly clothes, squirming one-legged in Duror's huge lustful fist, it seemed to her that her daughter's innocence was somehow being publicly outraged. Faint swellings represented a bosom, and its buttocks seemed, in their saucy chubbiness, unutterable, shameful.

‘Where did you get that, Duror?' she asked, her voice faint.

‘In his hut, in his bed.'

‘Whose hut? For heaven's sake, don't make a filthy mystery out of it. Please give it to me.'

He was unwilling to hand it over.

‘Give it to me,' she repeated sternly.

When she had it she did not know what to do with it. She held it as if it was visibly soiling her hand.

‘May I have it?' asked the forester quietly. ‘My little girl would be delighted with it.'

She wondered that he could see it so innocently.

‘I'm afraid it's just rubbish now,' she said.

‘I don't think so.'

‘Well, you're welcome to it.' She handed it to him.

In his hand it was innocent again. She breathed in relief.

‘All it needs,' he murmured, ‘is a new leg; and that's what Calum took it for, to fashion a new leg for it.'

‘Did he tell you so?' she asked.

‘No. But I know him. He's fond of carving. He carves squirrels and rabbits out of wood. My wee girl has a squirrel carved by him that she has to have hanging over her cot before she'll go to sleep.'

She smiled at that picture of guarded innocence. It reminded her of her own children: a fluffy teddy called Bruin had been Sheila's guardian; a knight in gilded armour Roderick's.

Then, her smile blasted, she turned towards Duror. Leaning forward, as if sick, he had begun to utter quietly, hoarsely, and with an undercurrent of pleading, the most loathsome accusations against the little cone-gatherer.
During that half-minute as she listened against her will horror caused her right hand to jerk about on her lap like a dying rabbit's paw; she could not raise it high to order him to stop. Nor could she find strong speech, only an ineffectual drivel of no's. In Duror's repetitious incoherence the word seed kept recurring.

She sprang to her feet. ‘For heaven's sake, Duror,' she cried, ‘hold your tongue. Have you gone mad? Do you realise whom you're talking to?' She stamped her foot on the stone as he persisted. ‘I order you to be quiet,' she said imperiously.

He was at last silent, his head bowed, his eyes on the stone steps, his cap in his hand.

She was trembling. When she glanced at Tulloch, she found herself hating him because he was so self-possessed, so human, and so male; and because he still held the doll in his hand.

‘I think you should go home, Duror,' she said. ‘Don't argue. Go home.'

‘I have work to do, my lady,' he muttered.

‘Then for heaven's sake go and do it.'

Nodding all the time, he retreated backwards a few steps, and then slunk away along the side of the house towards the wood. He had to step aside to let Sheila whizz by on her bicycle. In the basket Monty yapped triumphantly.

Lady Runcie-Campbell shouted to her daughter. The latter, disconcerted by the urgency of the command, braked so abruptly she nearly fell.

‘Come here at once,' cried her mother.

Slowly the girl cycled towards the steps. Her face was pink with indignation.

‘What's the matter, mother?' she asked coolly.

‘Never you mind. I want you to go into the house.'

Sheila was astonished and aggrieved. ‘Why, mother? I wasn't doing any harm. Monty enjoys it. And if I did nearly run into Duror, it was his own fault; he wasn't looking where he was going.'

‘I want no impertinence. Please go into the house. Leave your bicycle here.'

Huffishly, Sheila obeyed. Then she decided that to be in a huff was to lose an opportunity. Smiling, and with her head held high, like one unjustly persecuted but not daunted, she ascended the steps and entered the house.

Tulloch, still self-possessed, and still holding the doll, remained leaning against the urn. Lady Runcie-Campbell did not sit down again on her chair; she stood with her hand resting on its carved top.

There was a short silence between them.

‘The man's ill,' he said at length.

‘Which one?' she asked hoarsely.

‘What he said about Calum were lies,' he said.

‘Can you prove that? Duror may be ill, as you say, but why in heaven's name should he manufacture such abominable lies?'

‘He seems always to have had a spite against Calum.'

‘In heaven's name, why?'

He wondered how many times she had used that phrase so querulously pious, so indicative of faith exhausted. Then he concentrated on her question: why had Duror taken a spite against Calum? This was not the first time he had considered the gamekeeper's animosity. It could be the whole man's disgust at the deformed man, unreasonable and instinctive: he had seen, for instance, crows mobbing one that had a broken wing. Or it could be that Duror resented their intrusion into the wood: again in nature animals had their own hunting grounds and chased off trespassers. Or it could be that the dislike was simply inexplicable: once he had known a horse that showed its teeth in anger every time it saw a certain man; and that man had certainly never treated it cruelly. Of course Duror and Calum were human; and at that very moment, in different parts of the earth, men were blowing one another to pieces without personal bias or hatred, in pursuance of their respective ideals. Why then seek an explanation of one childish grudge?

The forester shook his head.

‘Is he not an unhappy man?' he asked.

‘Duror? Yes, I suppose he is, but unhappiness is no excuse for vicious slander.'

‘No excuse, but perhaps an explanation.'

‘You will certainly have your men removed on Saturday,' she said.

He nodded. ‘I was thinking maybe I should do it earlier, but I don't think the lorry will be free before then.'

‘Saturday at the very latest. Good afternoon, Mr Tulloch.' She made to go into the house, but turned at the door. ‘It must have occurred to you that your man stole the doll,' she said.

‘I'm sure he meant to return it once he had mended it.'

She smiled cynically. ‘You know, I suppose, that Duror's wife has been a helpless cripple for years?'

‘Yes, my lady.'

‘Have you ever seen her, Mr Tulloch?'

‘No, my lady.'

She came back a step or two with a peculiar smile; it was as if she wished to confound him. But all she said was ‘Good afternoon,' and then she hurried into the house.

He lingered on the steps for another minute, wondering whether he should go down to the point and warn Neil and Calum he might be out tomorrow to take them home. He decided he had better not, as they might wait all day in hope, and he would not be able to come.

Yet, even when his decision was made, and he was walking down the avenue towards his car, he went slowly and twice paused, in doubt.

Sheila was seated nonchalantly on a sofa, looking at the photographs in a magazine. Monty lay at her feet, gazing up at her with his head nodding and his tongue protruding in agreement with her air of persecution bravely borne.

Lady Runcie-Campbell walked shyly over to her daughter.

‘I'm sorry, dear,' she said.

Sheila turned and smiled with a sweetness that indicated apology was acceptable, but hardly sufficient. Then she resumed her martyred inspection of the pictures.

It was not possible, of course, to tell her the truth: to say, standing in that lovely peaceful room within their home, that she had been brought in to save her from pollution; that danger of worse than mutilation from bombs had, outside on the sunny sparkling grass of the lawn, threatened her. But if the truth was not possible, to lie would be to cast the shadow of the foulness upon her; while to say nothing, to offer no explanation, would be to damage the trust between them.

‘Was that my doll the man had in his hand?' asked Sheila, casually.

Her mother was startled.

‘Why, yes, as a matter of fact it was,' she answered. ‘Did you recognise it?'

‘Yes.'

‘Yet it must have been years since you played with it.'

‘I remember it. I think I remember all my dolls.'

‘What did you call it?'

‘Clementine.'

‘Are you sure? I thought Clementine was a little fat-faced fair-haired creature.'

‘That was Evangeline.'

‘Oh. How did she lose her leg?'

Sheila smiled. ‘Perhaps Monty chewed it off.'

Hearing his name, Monty acknowledged it with a few conceited barks.

‘I think she was before Monty's time, dear.'

‘I suppose it just came off. Was Duror drunk, mother?'

The slyness as much as the impropriety of the question shocked Lady Runcie-Campbell. Here truly was involvement.

‘What a thing to ask!' she cried.

‘He looked queer.'

‘He isn't well.'

Sheila hummed a little.

‘Was he and the other man quarrelling?' she asked.

‘Sheila, I'm afraid you've got a vulgar mind.'

The girl smiled as if she took that as a compliment. She bent down to admire at closer range the photograph of six aeroplanes in flight.

‘May I go out now?' she asked.

It was not simply a request, it was a move in the game. She waited with ruthless politeness for an answer.

For the first time Lady Runcie-Campbell forced herself to consider whether or not she believed Duror's dreadful accusation. On the promontory, a place dear to her courting days, the mysterious little hunchback was climbing the pine trees to gather their seed. Inconsequentially then, causing her to turn away from Sheila, whose head she had been touching, she remembered how long ago, when she had been as young as Sheila, she had visited Edinburgh Zoo with some other girls a little older and more knowledgeable. They had gone into the monkey house, despite her objections: the very heat and smell at the entrance had nauseated her. From one cage she had hurried, horrified; and the horror had not been diminished by the subsequent conspiratorial giggles of her companions. She had been a member of the conspiracy, without the password; now she had it. Yet the hunchback might be innocent.

As she stood at the window, gazing out at the loveliness and amplitude of her land, she felt her whole being
contract in frustration and resentment, that she should thus be embroiled and degraded in such a predicament as this because of common men like Duror and the cone-gatherer and the forester. Her husband would justly have accused her of foolishness and disloyalty. She heard him say: ‘What d'you expect, Elizabeth? They're still brutes under the skin, y'know. It's taken centuries of breeding to produce our kind. For God's sake, don't get us mixed. After the war they'll be trying to drag us down to their level. It's up to us to see they don't manage it.'

She was interrupted by a loud knock on the door. Mrs Morton came in quickly, her hands still white with flour; her hair too was smeared with it, giving her a weird momentary resemblance to Duror. Like him, too, she was under some stress.

‘Young Harry's in the kitchen, my lady,' she said, ‘with a story that Master Roderick's climbed a tree and can't get down again.'

Sheila burst out laughing. ‘Just like him,' she scoffed. ‘He always gets dizzy.'

‘Keep quiet, Sheila,' said her mother, who imagined her son perched ignominiously a few feet from the ground. ‘Why didn't Harry assist him down instead of coming here to alarm us all?'

‘It's one of the very big trees at the end of the park: a silver fir.'

From Sheila came a pooh of incredulity.

Lady Runcie-Campbell glanced out of the window. From there she could not see the silver firs. Was this, she thought, the time of crisis? Had the events of the past few days been leading to this?

‘Tell Harry I want to see him,' she said.

Mrs Morton hurried away.

‘I'm sure he won't be as high as grandfather,' chuckled Sheila, pointing to the portrait of the Judge.

‘I hope so,' said her mother.

‘What was he climbing for anyway? There aren't any nests at this time of the year.'

‘There are cones.'

As Sheila was frowning over this mention of cones,
Harry entered, pushed by Mrs Morton. He was ill at ease before his mistress in the luxury of the house. Monty the dog, indeed, was offended by his shy presence, and scampered over the carpet to growl at him.

‘What's this nonsense you've been telling Mrs Morton?' asked Lady Runcie-Campbell.

His freckled face, already glum and anxious, now looked guilty. He was bringing the bad news, therefore he was to blame.

‘It's Master Roderick, my lady,' he stammered. ‘He's stuck up one of the big silver trees.'

‘How high up?'

‘Near the top, my lady.'

‘Near the top,' she said. ‘Don't be an idiot. How could he possibly be as high as that?'

‘I don't know, my lady.'

‘Were you involved in this? Was it some idiotic caper you and he were up to?'

‘Oh, no, my lady. I was working in the garden. Graham and me were wheeling some rubbish down to the dump in the wood when we heard a shout. For a while we couldn't tell where it was coming from. Then I saw him, high up in a tree.'

‘And where is Graham now?'

‘He's at the tree, my lady.'

‘Didn't he climb up and bring my son down?'

‘He said he was too old, my lady.'

‘Why didn't you, then?'

Harry blushed with shame and stared at the carpet. On it Monty snarled up at him.

‘I've never climbed as high as that before, my lady.'

‘You were afraid?'

Harry nodded. ‘Yes, my lady.'

His mistress, despite her anxiety, was elated: her own son had not been afraid.

‘Good heavens,' she cried, ‘am I surrounded by cowards, too?' She made for the door. ‘Mrs Morton, would you please telephone the farm and ask Mr Baird to come at once, and to bring with him anyone that's available; and ropes too. Harry, you run to the garden
and fetch Mr Hendry; bring with you the longest ladder you have. But first point out to me the tree.'

‘Will I telephone for Duror too?' asked Mrs Morton.

‘No, no. We don't want him here.'

Mrs Morton showed surprise and displeasure at this slighting of Duror's services. With tight lips she went to telephone.

Lady Runcie-Campbell, Sheila, Monty, and Harry hurried out, down the steps, and onto the lawn. Harry pointed. In that direction the trees were the tallest. Their tops seemed inaccessible.

‘I can't believe it,' said Sheila.

‘Suppose this ridiculous thing is true,' said her mother to Harry, ‘why in heaven's name if he got up can't he get down again?'

‘Maybe he's lost his nerve, my lady.'

It was a timid, earnest, sympathetic, respectful suggestion; its reward was a blow on the head.

‘How dare you tell me to my face my son's a coward!' whispered Lady Runcie-Campbell.

Harry dared not put up his hand to his head, nor move back a step.

Sheila was shocked. She gasped and glared indignantly at her mother. When Monty, encouraged, made to snap at Harry's legs, she bent and slapped the dog hard.

‘Don't stand there like a fool,' said Lady Runcie-Campbell. ‘Go and fetch Mr Hendry, and the ladder.'

‘Yes, my lady.' Instantly he raced away.

Monty pursued him.

‘Come back, Monty,' shouted Sheila. ‘Come back.'

Peeved, the dog trotted back; it looked up at Lady Runcie-Campbell as if asking her to take note that, if he had failed to nip Harry's ankles, the fault was not his.

He soon had reason to think he was pardoned. Not only Sheila, but her mother too, began to run across the lawn, as if for his diversion. He let himself be diverted; he frisked on ahead; he pretended he had caught a rat and worried it to death, with ferocious snarls; he rushed back to exhort the two humans to go faster; he let Sheila know he had forgiven those unmerited slaps; and all the
way to the tree he remained blissfully and pompously in the belief that the haste and excitement were for his benefit.

They saw Graham under the tree, but not Roderick in it. The latter was hidden by the foliage; the former, when he caught sight of his superiors, gave the trunk a few kicks. He had his cap off and his sleeves rolled up to show scratches caused by an abortive attempt to climb the tree. He would not tell them he had retreated after twenty feet.

‘Is this the tree?' panted his mistress. Her hair was tousled by exertion and on her cheek was a tiny scratch.

‘Yes, my lady, this is it.'

She gazed up its great perpendicular trunk. For about fifty or sixty feet there was little foliage, only the broken-off remnants of branches as close together as the rungs of a ladder. Where the foliage did begin it seemed impenetrable.

Gazing up, and imagining her son at the swaying top, turned her giddy.

‘I don't see him,' she said.

‘No, my lady, not from here. You can from there, though, if he's not shifted.'

Graham led the way to a little knoll. Monty, accepting this new recruit to the game of chasing, nipped his leg. He swore softly, and his next heel's lift cracked against the dog's chin. It yelped at such unfairness, while he pretended to have noticed nothing, so intent was he to point out where Roderick, ninety feet up, clung to the trunk.

‘How in heaven's name did he ever get up there?' murmured Lady Runcie-Campbell, proud and terrified.

‘Usually he's too frightened to go very high,' whispered Sheila. ‘I always beat him at climbing.'

‘I've not shouted to him, my lady,' said Graham. ‘I thought I'd better wait till you came. He'll be encouraged by you.'

‘I hope so, Graham.'

Before she could shout she had to silence Monty, who refused to agree that the game was suspended, and was
suggesting it be resumed at once. Reproved so fiercely, he slunk away in a pet.

Lady Runcie-Campbell tried to make her voice reassuring and confident.

‘Listen, Roderick,' she cried. ‘This is your mother. There's no need to be afraid. Just hold on for a few minutes more. Help is coming.'

She paused to give him a chance to reply. He did not take it.

‘I tried,' said Graham, ‘but I'm too old.'

‘What's that he's got round his shoulders?' she asked.

‘I've noticed it, my lady. It's a bag. I think he was meaning to collect the cones, like those men from Ardmore.'

‘Yes. I think so.' Then it occurred to her where salvation lay: at Scour Point, gathering cones, were men who better than anyone else could help her son down; and they were morally obliged to do it, as it was their example which had enticed him into this danger.

‘Graham,' she said urgently, ‘you know Scour Point, where the pines are?'

‘Surely, my lady.' In the summer he'd fished for saithe there off the rocks.

‘Go there as fast as you can, and fetch the men from Ardmore. Quickly, Graham.'

She had spoken with a sense of sacrifice: her son was to be saved by an obscene misshapen labourer; his virginal body was to be handled by hands, or paws rather, accustomed to bestial practices; his demoralisation was to be seen by eyes that had gloated over unimaginable vileness.

‘I hope to God,' she said, ‘we have him down by the time you come back; but go as fast as you can, and bring them.'

‘At the gallop, my lady,' he said solemnly, for, though he was willing to run all the way, he was not at all sure his heart, lungs, and legs could stand it. It was likely he would collapse somewhere, maybe in the middle of a burn, and would die, the subject not of lamentations but of revilements because he was taking too long. If his
mistress was willing to take the risk, he thought sardonically, why should he grumble?

He galloped off.

Monty watched, and saw insincerity in that exaggerated hurry: he refused, therefore, to follow.