Destroying Angel Page 2

  But the carriage had hardly disappeared from view when Thane appeared – from the direction of the kitchen. I realised he had been staying out of sight and I did not doubt he had heard every word of our conversation.

  I told him that we were going to Alnwick.

  I stroked his head. Did he remember Hubert Staines and little Kate? Of course, he couldn’t reply. I would have to wait and see – and hope. Hope that he was not and never had been the missing deerhound, Roswal.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Two days later all was arranged. Hubert Staines had sent a telegraph, offering to meet me with his carriage at Alnwick Station. I declined. I wanted the independence my bicycle would allow and did not want to inflict on him the possible embarrassment of accommodating it too.

  Realising the anxious outcome of Thane’s future could only be prolonged by delay, we boarded the southbound train the next day. As there were several empty compartments, we were not sternly dismissed to spend the journey in the goods van, as had happened before, and we reached Alnwick with only a minor delay.

  The train braked abruptly, throwing us from our seats, doors were flung open and a rush of porters dealt with a cow that had found its way onto the level crossing between a cluster of houses and the decayed workings of an unsightly colliery pithead.

  Expecting a simple platform and tiny waiting room similar to others along the line, I was surprised when the train steamed into Alnwick’s ornate station, its splendid architecture equalling Edinburgh’s Waverley and in the same category, I learnt later, as Newcastle and York.

  Built in 1870 to replace the original modest railway halt, its mission was to accommodate the new fashion of travelling by train – set by members of the Royal Family – and the aristocracy’s constant flow to the Duke of Northumberland’s handsome Castle which dominates the landscape.

  As Thane and I left the train, I had to admit that our progress along the platform created quite a stir. I was aware of curious passengers staring out of compartment windows, unable to restrain their astonishment at the sight of a young woman wheeling a bicycle along the platform accompanied by a dog the size of a Shetland pony.

  Perhaps the bicycle aroused the most comment, and as we walked to the station exit, with its elegant canopy and painted seats, I was already beginning to regret opting for sturdy independence by declining Mr Staines’ handsome offer of a carriage to meet us. As well as wanting to save him the embarrassment of trying to load my bicycle into his carriage, I had rejected his offer because I had been told that Staines Manor was only two miles distant from Alnwick. ‘You cannot miss it’ (according to Vince) ‘on the Great North Road to Newcastle.’

  As the train steamed out of the station, I had a glimpse of an ancient wall, a medieval tower with an archway that led into the town. New places are my delight and I was well pleased at the prospect of exploring Alnwick and, considering that what awaited our arrival in Staines was melancholy indeed, I was glad of this opportunity for temporary respite. Was it remotely possible that instead of the tiny market town I had expected, there might even be a theatre, an assembly hall for concerts and like entertainment?

  I regarded my bicycle fondly. It offered freedom of movement without having to call upon the Staines’ carriage. A thoughtful contemplation of Bartholomew’s map had revealed several tempting landmarks of historical and archaeological interest that I hoped to visit. As well as Alnwick Castle there were others of note – Warkworth, Bamburgh, Dunstanburgh, some of which were ruinous – and I was glad indeed that I had packed my sketchbook.

  Such were my thoughts as we headed downhill. In fact I was so involved in the prospect of these fantasy adventures that I suddenly realised I was lost.

  That promised signpost to Staines had failed to appear!

  I was at a crossroads, but the only sign was to ‘Gibbet Hill’. A name that might arouse feelings of melancholy and caution in the criminally minded, the sign pointed sharply back along the road we had travelled instead of directing us to Staines. Closer inspection revealed that the signpost was leaning at a rather unhappy angle as if it had been the victim of a carriage accident, or had suffered in a high wind or from a bout of malice from person or persons unknown.

  Helplessly, I looked around and decided that Gibbet Hill had been well chosen for a criminal’s last sight of a bleak and barren moorland world, devoid of hope and stretching to infinity.

  All signs of the handsome castle or indeed of any visible habitation on the vast horizon had vanished. The cold, grey sky’s sole occupants were a few large unidentifiable birds hovering in the manner that such creatures do when seeking their prey on Arthur’s Seat, which seemed by comparison a friendly park.

  Homesickness swept over me. Why, oh why, had I started on this venture? Already I feared the worst, for this was no gentle Border village guarded by the undulating Eildon Hills. As far as I could see this was a wild and savage land; the feeling of sudden death, of treachery and ancient violence still lurked in the gaunt and stricken landscape.

  Here were boulders that under some lights might take on the look of moving phantoms, and heather moors whose bleached roots could, to one possessed of even a moderately lively imagination, reassemble into a chilling likeness of human bones.

  We were lost under a rapidly darkening and unforgiving sky, where isolation and despair stretched forth from every mute crag. Every now and then I imagined I caught the echoes of a twilight world, long vanished, where prehistoric monsters roamed this desolate land.

  The welfare of my bicycle necessitated cautious proceeding. A punctured wheel was the last thing I needed, and as what passed for a road turned into a boulder strewn path winding uphill I dismounted and prepared to walk, with an unperturbed Thane trotting alongside.

  Some distance further on, and wondering what on earth to do next, in desperation I said: ‘Where do we go from here? Come on, let’s see some of that much-vaunted canine instinct.’

  Thane regarded me reproachfully for a moment from under those magisterial brows and, using the pause to sniff delicately at a clump of bracken and attend to the needs of nature, he returned to my side, sat down and waited for me to tell him what to do next.

  I looked around despairingly. Soon it would be too dark to travel in safety. Nothing lay in sight by way of shelter built by human hands beyond a sheep pen in the middle of a field. Open to the four winds, it would have to suffice until daylight.

  I had no fears that anyone would steal my bicycle, so I climbed over the fence, which Thane took in one leap. As we neared the stone structure, I realised this was no sheep pen but something much more ancient. A fragment of the Roman wall built by Hadrian two thousand years ago to keep the Scots at bay. He had certainly succeeded, and I was a prime example.

  Suddenly at my side, Thane growled low in his throat, and across the field I saw moving towards us in the gloaming the pale ghosts of cattle. Then I realised what I was seeing: the legendary Chillingham white cattle, a few miles off their terrain perhaps. The original cattle, they were well-established long before the Romans invaded, and their survival from prehistoric times was said to be due to the fact that no one had ever been able to domesticate them. From what I had read and heard from Pappa, who had had a narrow escape from being gored to death on one of his Border cases, they were highly dangerous to humans.

  Such facts were hardly reassuring, since there was nothing between us but the length of a field, down which they were making a fairly rapid and steady progress.

  Thane looked at me and then at the wall, as if to say, ‘Take shelter.’

  I needed no second bidding, but clambered over fully realising that the remains of an ancient wall would not offer much defence.

  And what of Thane?

  Thane had not moved. He stood his ground. The cattle drew nearer. Now only a few yards separated us from them. Although smaller than our domestic cattle, their horns were long and sharp. Above the beating of my own heart, I heard their angry snorts, pawing the ground, heads lowere
d…

  Was this how it was to end?

  First Thane, gored and killed – and then – and then—

  Dear God, please…

  I looked at Thane. The cattle looked at Thane. And then as one, they bowed their heads and, turning slowly, retreated back the way they had come.

  I found myself breathing again. It was over. The incident closed before that prayer had time to reach heaven, Thane jumped the wall, wagged his tail and lay down beside me, a sigh indicating: Don’t worry, you’re safe now.

  And I realised this phenomenon was not something new and strange. It had happened before and I had observed Thane’s effect on all four-legged things. Cows, sheep and horses ignored him completely, dogs and cats merely walked on past him.

  As if he were invisible to them. Perhaps he was.

  Now, although we were out of danger, the cattle gone, the present indication was that we would be spending the night in the fragmentary remains of what had once been a bathhouse abandoned by the Roman legion.

  At least it wasn’t raining and the wall with its sunken floor was reasonably sheltered. I had often slept under the stars in the Arizona desert during my pioneering days with Danny McQuinn. And it was cold there, too, when the temperature dropped considerably during the night. I did not expect much in the way of a comfortable lodging, but wrapped in my woollen cape I must have slept, for when I opened my eyes the sky was flooded with moonlight.

  But where was Thane?

  Panic seized me. I stood up, called him, and then realised that I had the bleak and barren landscape all to myself. I was completely alone.

  Alone, that is, apart from a large bird of prey hovering close. Dangerously close, in fact. About six feet above my head.

  The moonlight touched its wings and left no doubt of what it had in mind. I was marked down for supper.

  ‘Shoo!’ I screamed, waving my arms.

  The bird continued to hover.

  Seizing my cape, waving it wildly, I screamed again.

  Suddenly, I saw a peep of light on the horizon and a bullseye lantern came swinging across the moorland. It was being carried in a hurry by a tall man with Thane dancing around him.

  As they approached, in the moment before I recognised my rescuer, I realised that I was witnessing something extraordinary.

  I had never imagined a deerhound dancing with joy. But that was exactly what Thane was doing.

  ‘Mrs McQuinn!’

  The lantern was anchored and the man came over the wall.

  CHAPTER THREE

  He was no stranger.

  We had met once before under terrifying and sinister circumstances during my first months in Edinburgh. This was Chief Wolf Rider, a Sioux Indian from the Wild West Circus, now transformed into a semblance of an English gamekeeper by a garb that suggested an Aztec high priest in fancy dress costume.

  Smiling, he helped me over the wall, looked down at Thane, and nodded solemnly. ‘So the deerhound has stayed with you, protecting you from danger.’

  I ignored that enigmatic introduction. ‘His name is Thane.’

  Three years ago no one believed he existed. Thane was then very good at keeping himself to himself and only deigning to appear to me.

  A deerhound! On Arthur’s Seat! A figment of my imagination, they said, all except Sergeant Jack Macmerry.

  Now everything was happening at once. The bird of prey swooped down, I threw up my hand to protect my head and yelled out, but the peregrine falcon settled happily on Wolf Rider’s gloved fist and shook out his feathers.

  ‘Kokopele is quite tame. He helped me find you. Pleasant change to tracking down his prey,’ he said.

  That touched another memory. Kokopele was the mythical flute-bearer of the Navajo Indians.

  I shuddered as Rider went on: ‘It is your deerhound you have to thank for keeping the white cattle at bay,’ and, looking over his shoulder, ‘but we would be wise to get out of this field immediately.’

  ‘Where are we?’

  ‘On Staines’ estate, but this part is the cattle’s territory and they are notoriously suspicious of strangers – and quite unpredictable. Follow me.’

  We made our way rapidly across the field to where my bicycle reclined gracefully against a fence. The sight of Chief Wolf Rider, without his Dakota Ghost Dancers from the Wild West Circus at Queen’s Park, was completely out of context in these surroundings and awakened bitter memories of my return to Edinburgh.

  Rider had come to Solomon’s Tower to identify the body of one of his troupe. Riding on the hill, Wild Elk’s horse had thrown him. Badly injured, he had crawled to the nearest habitation – my barn – and had died there.

  Wolf Rider was a shaman and came to carry out certain Sioux rites before the young man could be buried. He told me that Wild Elk believed he was being stalked on the hill by a large dog, and he presumed that this animal had spooked his horse.

  I looked at Wolf, walking ahead with Thane at his side. Meeting him again aroused painful memories that I shuddered to recall. I remembered his extraordinary and uncanny explanation that Wild Elk had killed an innocent white man who wore a Christian cross and, in accordance with Sioux beliefs, the dead man’s spirit had entered an animal to seek revenge.

  Danny wore a crucifix and Thane, a mysterious deerhound who lived on the hill, had chosen to befriend me. A coincidence, I told myself, refusing to be reconciled to such a terrifying idea, especially as I was clinging to the certainty that Danny still lived and that one day we would be blissfully reunited.

  Now as I watched the man and the deerhound, there was none of Thane’s usual shyness and caution with strangers. It was as if I was witnessing the reunion of old comrades, both possessors of that extra-sensory perception, well beyond my range, or indeed beyond the range of most humans.

  I guessed I was observing a phenomenon. Rider and Thane inhabited a world bordering on the supernatural. A world of instinctive intuition of which I had only touched the fringes. It was as though their bond had been forged many lifetimes ago, many ages past.

  Suddenly I was back in the present, surrounded by the menace of dark moorland, the feeling of danger in the air, despite the softening effect of the moonlight. Shivering, aware of being cold and hungry and that I had not yet slept properly, a blessed apparition appeared fifty yards away.

  A small estate cottage, known as a ‘bothy’ in Scotland.

  Wolf pointed to the smoke rising from the chimney. ‘This is where I live. There is food and a warm fire.’

  His hand on Thane’s shoulder, we covered the short distance rapidly. Opening the door he ushered me inside, set down the lantern and attended to the fire. Then, placing two bowls on the table, he said: ‘Hot soup, this will soon warm you. And I have meat for Thane.’

  The soup was delicious. It tasted of herbs and I decided I must have the recipe.

  Watching with satisfaction as I tackled a second helping, he leant back in his chair and smiled. ‘It has been a long time, Mrs McQuinn.’

  ‘Indeed it has. And please call me Rose.’

  ‘That will be my pleasure.’ He grinned, briefly. ‘There are moments in life, like my brief time in Edinburgh, that will always remain with me.’

  I was surprised that he hadn’t enquired what I was doing in the middle of nowhere. ‘You didn’t seem surprised to see me.’

  ‘No. I was expecting you again – sometime. I knew we should meet again.’ And before I could think of a suitable reply, he asked, ‘What brings you to Staines?’

  ‘A brief visit.’ I wasn’t prepared to give my reasons and added: ‘What on earth are you doing in Northumberland? As I recall, you said in Edinburgh that you were going in search of your roots – your Scottish grandmother.’

  ‘That is exactly what I did. And I found her – not in Scotland, but here in Staines.’

  ‘Really!’

  ‘She was the young wife of Hubert’s grandfather, made wealthy by the coal on his land. A difficult man by all accounts, and as Miranda had a spirit
of adventure, she became bored with rural life and went on a fashionable safari with rich friends to hunt buffalo in Arizona. However, they became the hunted instead. All were slain but the lovely Miranda, who was taken captive and kept alive by the chief. She had a child by him and never returned to Staines.’

  ‘So you are distant cousins. What an extraordinary coincidence.’

  And as I said the words, I recalled my practical father’s scorn of coincidences.

  ‘Always be suspicious of coincidences,’ was his maxim.

  For Pappa, everything had to have a purpose, and that was the philosophy in which I had been raised. There was another question looming:

  ‘How did you meet Mr Staines?’

  He shrugged. ‘By chance, in London. The circus was closing and I was desperately in need of funds. What little I had would not last very long if I wished to return to Scotland. Then, at the end of the last show, Hubert Staines had been taking photographs and said he was impressed by the way I handled animals – I had taken over the lion taming act.’

  With an apologetic grin, he added: ‘Leo the Man-eater and I were great friends. He was very old and lacked teeth. We understood each other. He was a good actor and when asked to do so he could look impressively fierce, with his tail lashing furiously. He had a roar that shook the rafters and had small children screaming in terror when it looked as if he might leap out of the cage.’

  And smiling at the memory, he shook his head. ‘But he was more akin to a good dog than a king of the jungle.’ Then, regarding my puzzled expression, he laughed. ‘I can see you are wondering why a rich man like Mr Staines wanted a lion tamer. Is that not so?’

  It was indeed, and he went on: ‘His family had acquired a collection of animals and birds from their days as big-game hunters. Most of their trophies are now stuffed in menacing attitudes, on exhibition in the gun room. Staines followed the family tradition and learnt that art, said it was useful for a photographer. But he longed to do something that had never been done before.’