Dougal whistled. “The writer of this knows all about the journalists. And he knows that Mr Craw is not at the Castle, but believes that you are hiding him somewhere. They’ve a pretty useful intelligence department.”
Mrs Brisbane-Brown, who had listened to Mr Barbon’s recital with composure, now entered the conversation.
“You mustn’t let your nerves get the upper hand of you, Freddy. Try to take things more calmly. I’m afraid that poor Mr Craw has himself to thank for his predicament. Why will newspaper owners meddle with things they don’t understand? Politics should be left to those who make a profession of them. But we must do our best to help him. Mr Crombie,” she turned to Dougal, whose grim face was heavy with thought, “you look capable. What do you propose?”
The fire of battle had kindled in Dougal’s eyes, and Jaikie saw in them something which he remembered from old days.
“I think,” he said, “that we’re in for a stiff campaign, and that it must be conducted on two fronts. We must find some way of heading off those Evallonians, and it won’t be easy. When a foreigner gets a notion into his head he’s apt to turn into a demented crusader. They’re all the same— Socialists, Communists, Fascists, Republicans, Monarchists—I daresay Monarchists are the worst, for they’ve less inside their heads to begin with … And we must do it without giving the journalists a hint of what is happening. We must suppress Tibbets by force, if necessary.”
“Perhaps the Evallonians will do that for you,” suggested Alison.
“Very likely they will… The second front is wherever Mr Craw may be. At all costs he must be kept away from here. Now, he can’t stay at the Back House of the Garroch. The journalists will very soon be on to the Glasgow students, and they’ll hear about the kidnapping, and they’ll track him to the Back House. I needn’t tell you that it’s all up with us if any reporter gets sight of Mr Craw. I think he had better be smuggled out of the country as quickly as possible.”
Mr Barbon shook his head.
“Impossible!” he murmured. “I’ve already thought of that plan and rejected it. The Evallonians will discover it and follow him, and they will find him in a foreign land without friends. I wonder if you understand that Mr Craw will be terrified at the thought of meeting them. Terrified! That is his nature. I think he would prefer to risk everything and come back here rather than fall into their hands in another country than his own. He has always been a little suspicious of foreigners.”
“Very well. He can’t come back here, but he needn’t go abroad. He must disappear. Now, how is that to be managed?”
“Jaikie,” he said, after a moment’s reflection, “this is your job. You’ll have to take charge of the Craw front.”
Jaikie opened his eyes. He had not been attending very carefully, for the preoccupations of the others had allowed him to stare at Alison, and he had been wondering whether her hair should be called red or golden. For certain it had no connection with Dougal’s… Also, why a jumper and a short tweed skirt made a girl look so much more feminine than flowing draperies…
“I don’t quite understand,” he said.
“It’s simple enough. We’re going to have some difficult work on the home front, and the problem is hopeless if it’s complicated by the presence of Mr Craw. One of us has to be in constant attendance on him, and keep him buried… “
“But where?”
“Anywhere you like, as long as you get him away from the Back House of the Garroch. He’ll not object. He’s not looking for any Evallonians. You’ve the whole of Scotland, and England too, to choose from. Pick your own hidy-hole. He’ll not be difficult to hide, for few people know him by sight and he looks a commonplace little body. It’s you or me—and better you than me, for you’re easy tempered, and I doubt Mr Craw and I would quarrel the first day.”
Jaikie caught Alison’s eyes and saw in them so keen a zest for a new, exciting adventure that his own interest kindled. He would have immensely preferred to be engaged on the home front, but he saw the force of Dougal’s argument. He had a sudden vision of himself, tramping muddy roads in October rain, putting up at third-rate inns, eating bread and cheese in the heather—and by his side, a badly scared millionaire, a fugitive leader of the people. Jaikie rarely laughed aloud, but at the vision his face broke into a slow smile.
“I’ll need a pair of boots,” he said, “not for myself—for Mr Craw. The things he is wearing would be knocked to pieces in half a day.”
Mr Barbon, whose dejection had brightened at the sound of Dougal’s crisp mandates, declared that the boots could be furnished. He suggested other necessaries, which Jaikie ultimately reduced to a toothbrush, a razor, spare shirts, and pyjamas. A servant from the Castle would deliver them a mile up the road.
“You’d better be off,” Dougal advised. “He’ll have been ranging round the Back House these last four hours like a hyena, and if you don’t hurry we’ll have him arriving here on his two legs… You’ll have to give us an address for letters, for we must have some means of communication.”
“Let it be Post Office, Portaway,” said Jaikie; and added, in reply to the astonished stare of the other, “Unless there’s a reflector above, the best hiding place is under the light.”
CHAPTER 7
BEGINNING OF A GREAT MAN’S EXILE
Jaikie had not a pleasant journey that autumn afternoon over the ridge that separates Callowa from Garroch and up the latter stream to the dark hills of its source. To begin with, he was wheeling the bicycle which Dougal had ridden, for that compromising object must be restored as soon as possible to its owner; and, since this was no easy business on indifferent roads, he had to walk most of the way. Also, in addition to the pack on his back, he had Dougal’s, which contained the parcel duly handed over to him a mile up the road by a Castle Gay servant… But his chief discomfort was spiritual.
From his tenderest years he had been something of a philosopher. It was his quaint and placid reasonableness which had induced Dickson McCunn, when he took in hand the destinies of the Gorbals Diehards, to receive him into his own household. He had virtually adopted Jaikie, because he seemed more broken to domesticity than any of the others. The boy had speedily become at home in his new environment, and with effortless ease had accepted and adapted himself to the successive new worlds which opened to him. He had the gift of living for the moment where troubles were concerned and not anticipating them, but in pleasant things of letting his fancy fly happily ahead. So he accepted docilely his present task, since he was convinced of the reason for it; Dougal was right—he was the better person of the two to deal with Craw… But the other, the imaginative side of him, was in revolt. That morning he had received an illumination. He had met the most delightful human being he had ever encountered. And now he was banished from her presence.
He was not greatly interested in Craw. Dougal was different; to Dougal Craw was a figure of mystery and power; there was romance in the midge controlling the fate of the elephant. To Jaikie he was only a dull, sententious, elderly gentleman, probably with a bad temper, and he was chained to him for an indefinite number of days. It sounded a bleak kind of holiday… But at Castle Gay there were the Evallonians, and Mrs Brisbane-Brown, and an immense old house now in a state of siege, and Alison’s bright eyes, and a stage set for preposterous adventures. The lucky Dougal was there in the front of it, while he was condemned to wander lonely in the wings.
But, as the increasing badness of the road made riding impossible, and walking gave him a better chance for reflection, the prospect slowly brightened. It had been a fortunate inspiration of his, the decision to keep Craw hidden in the near neighbourhood. It had been good sense,