Bob, Son of Battle - Alfred Ollivant (ereader ebook TXT) 📗

belied his years.

Some score yards from the lower edge of the spinney, upon the farther side of the ridge, a tiny beck babbled through its bed of peat. The two men, as they topped the rise, noticed a flock of black-faced mountain-sheep clustered in the dip ‘twixt wood and stream. They stood martialled in close array, facing half toward the wood, half toward the newcomers, heads up, eyes glaring, handsome as sheep only look when scared.

On the crest of the ridge the two men halted beside Gyp. The postman stood with his head a little forward, listening intently. Then he dropped in the heather like a dead man, pulling the other with him.

“Doon, mon!” he whispered, clutching at Gyp with his spare hand.

“What is’t, Jim?” asked the Master, now thoroughly roused.

“Summat movin’ i’ th’ wood,” the other whispered, listening weasel-eared.

So they lay motionless for a while; but there came no sound from the copse.

“‘Appen ‘twas nowt,” the postman at length allowed, peering cautiously about. “And yet I thowt—I dunno reetly what I thowt.”

Then, starting to his knees with a hoarse cry of terror: “Save us! what’s yon theer?”

Then for the first time the Master raised his head and noticed, lying in the gloom between them and the array of sheep, a still, white heap.

James Moore was a man of deeds, not words. “It’s past waitin’!” he said, and sprang forward, his heart in his mouth.

The sheep stamped and shuffled as he came, and yet did not break.

“Ah, thanks be!” he cried, dropping beside the motionless body; “it’s nob’but a sheep.” As he spoke his hands wandered deftly over the carcase. “But what’s this?” he called. “Stout’ she was as me. Look at her fleece— crisp, close, strong; feel the flesh—finn as a rock. And ne’er a bone broke, ne’re a scrat on her body a pin could mak’. As healthy as a mon—and yet dead as mutton!”

Jim, still trembling from the horror of his fear, came up, and knelt beside his friend. “Ah, but there’s bin devilry in this!” he said; ‘I reck’ned they sheep had bin badly skeared, and not so long agone.”

“Sheepmurder, sure enough!” the other answered. “No fox’s doin’—a girt-grown twoshear as could ‘maist knock a h’ox.”

Jim’s hands travelled from the body to the dead creature’s throat. He screamed.

“By gob, Master! look ‘ee theer!” He held his hand up in the moonlight, and it dripped red. “And warm yet! warm!”

“Tear some bracken, Jim!” ordered the other, “and set a-light. We mun see to this.”

The postman did as bid. For a moment the fern smouldercd and smoked, then the flame ran crackling along and shot up in the darkness, weirdly lighting the scene: to the right the low wood, a block of solid blackness against the sky; in front the wall of sheep, staring out of the gloom with biight eyes; and as centrepiece that still, white body, with the kneeling men and lurcher sniffing tentatively round.

The victim was subjected to a critical examination. The throat, and that only, had been hideously mauled; from the raw wounds the flesh hung in horrid shreds; on the ground all about were little pitiful dabs of wool, wrenched off apparently in a struggle; and, crawling among the fern-roots, a snake-like track of red led down to the stream.

“A dog’s doin’, and no mistakin’ thot,” said Jim at length, after a minute inspection.

“Ay,” declared the Master with slow emphasis, “and a sheepdog’s too, and an old un’s, or I’m no shepherd.”

The postman looked up.

“Why thot?” he asked, puzzled.

“Becos,” the Master answered, “‘im as did this killed for blood—and for blood only. If had bin ony other dog—greyhound, bull, tarrier, or even a young sheepdog–d’yo’ think he’d ha’ stopped wi’ the one? Not he; he’d ha’ gone through ‘em, and be runnin’ ‘em as like as not yet, nippin’ ‘em, pullin’ ‘em down, till he’d maybe killed the half. But ‘im as did this killed for blood, I say. He got it—killed just the one, and nary touched the others, d’yo ‘see, Jim?”

The postman whistled, long and low.

“It’s just what owd Wrottesley’d tell on,” he said. “I never nob’but half believed him then—I do now though. D’yo’ mind what th’ owd lad’d tell, Master?”

James Moore nodded.

“Thot’s it. I’ve never seen the like afore myself, but I’ve heard ma grandad speak o’t mony’s the time. An owd dog’ll git the cray-in’ for sheep’s blood on him, just the same as a mon does for the drink; he creeps oot o’ nights, gallops afar, hunts his sheep, downs ‘er, and satisfies the cravin’. And he nary kills but the one, they say, for he knows the value o’ sheep same as you and me. He has his gallop, quenches the thirst, and then he’s for home, maybe a score mile away, and no one the wiser i’ th’ mornin’. And so on, till he cooms to a bloody death, the murderin’ traitor.”

“If he does!” said Jim.

“And he does, they say, nigh always. For he gets bolder and bolder wi’ not bein’ caught, until one fine night a bullet lets light into him. And some mon gets knocked nigh endways when they bring his best tyke home i’ th’ mornin’, dead, wi’ the sheep’s wool yet stickin’ in his mouth.”

The postman whistled again.

“It’s what owd Wrottesley’d tell on to a tick. And he’d say, if ye mind, Master, as hoo the dog’d niver kill his master’s sheep—kind o’ conscience-like.”

“Ay, I’ve heard that,” said the Master. “Queer too, and ‘im bein’ such a bad un!”

Jim Mason rose slowly from his knees.

“Ma word,” he said, “I wish Th’ Owd Un was here. He’d ‘appen show us sum-mat!”

“I nob’but wish he was, pore owd lad!” said the Master.

As he spoke there was a crash in the wood above them; a sound as of some big body bursting furiously through brusliwood.

The two men rushed to the top of the rise. In the darkness they could see nothing; only, standing still and holding. their breaths, they could hear the faint sound, ever growing fainter, of some creature splashing in a hasty gallop over the wet moors.

“Yon’s him! Yon’s no fox, I’ll tak’ oath. And a main big un, too, hark to him!” cried Jim. Then to Gyp, who had rushed off in hot pursuit: Coom back, chunk-‘ead. What’s usc o’ you agin a gallopin’ potamus?”

Gradually the sounds died away and away, and were no more.

“Thot’s ‘im, the devil!” said the Master at length.

“Nay; the devil has a tail, they do say,”

replied Jim thoughtfully. For already the light of suspicion was focusing its red glare.

“Noo I reck’n we’re in for bloody times amang the sheep for a while,” said the Master, as Jim picked up his bags.

“Better a sheep nor a mon,” answered the postman, still harping on the old theme.

Chapter XIX. LAD AND LASS

AN immense sensation this affair of the Scoop created in the Daleland. It spurred the Dalesmen into fresh endeavors. James Moore and M Adam were examined and re-examined. as to the minutest details of the matter. The whole countryside was placarded with huge bills, offering 100 pounds reward for the capture of the criminal dead or alive. While the vigilance of the watchers was such that in a single week they bagged a donkey, an old woman, and two amateur detectives.

In Wastreldale the near escape of the Killer, the collision between James Moore and Adam, and Owd Bob’s unsuccess, who was not wont to fail, aroused intense excitement, with which was mingled a certain anxiety as to their favorite.

For when the Master had reached home that night, he had found the old dog already there; and he must have wrenched his foot in the pursuit or run a thorn into it, for he was very lame. Whereat, when it was reported at the Sylvester Arms, M’Adam winked at Red Wull and muttered, “Ah, forty foot is an ugly tumble.”

A week later the little man called at Kenmuir. As he entered the yard, David was standing outside the kitchen window, looking very glum and miserable. On seeing his father, however, the boy started forward, all alert.

“What d’yo’ want here?” he cried roughly. “Same as you, dear lad,” the little man giggled, advancing. “I come on a visit.”

“Your visits to Kenmuir are usually paid by night, so I’ve heard,” David sneered.

The little man affected not to hear.

“So they dinna allow ye indoors wi’ the Cup,” he laughed. “They know yer little ways then, David,”

“Nay, I’m not wanted in there,” David answered bitterly, but not so loud that his father could hear. Maggie within the kitchen heard, however, but paid no heed; for her heart was hard against the boy, who of late, though he never addressed her, had made himself as unpleasant in a thousand little ways as only David M’Adam could.

At that moment the Master came stalking into the yard, Owd Bob preceding him; and as the old dog recognized his visitor he bristled involuntarily.

At the sight of the Master M’Adam hurried forward.

“I did but come to ask after the tyke,” he

~said. “Is he gettin’ over his lameness?”

James Moore looked surprised; then his stern face relaxed into a cordial smile. Such generous anxiety as to the welfare of Red Wull’s rival was a wholly new characteristic in the little man,

“I tak’ it kind in yo’, M’Adam,” he said, “to come and inquire.”

“Is the thorn oot?” asked the little man with eager interest, shooting his head forward. to stare closely at the other.

“It came oot last night wi’ the poulticin’,” the Master answered, returning the other’s gaze, calm and steady.

“I’m glad o’ that,” said the little man, still staring. But his yellow, grinning face said as plain words, “Wha1~ a liar ye are, James Moore.”

The days passed on. His father’s taunts and gibes, always becoming more bitter, drove David almost to distraction.

He longed to make it up with Maggie; he longed for that tender sympathy which the girl had always extended to him when his troubles with his father were heavy on him. The quarrel had lasted for months now, and. he was well weary of it, and utterly ashamed. For, at least, he had the good grace to acknowledge that no one was to blame but himself; and that it had been fostered solely by his ugly pride.

At length he could endure it no longer, and determined to go to the girl and ask forgiveness. It would be a bitter ordeal to him; always unwilling to acknowledge a fault, even to himself, how much harder would it be to confess it to this strip of a girl. For a time he thought it was almost more than he could do. Yet, like his father, once set upon a course, nothing could divert him. So, after a week of doubts and determinations, of cowardice and courage, he pulled himself together and off he set.

An hour it took him from the Grange to the bridge over the Wastrel—an hour which had wont to be a quarter. Now, as he walked on up the slope from the stream, very slowly, heartening himself for his penance, he was aware of a strange disturbance in the yard above him: the noisy cackling of hens, the snorting of pigs disturbed, and above the rest the cry of a little child ringing out in shrill distress.

He set to running, and sped up the slope as fast as his long legs would carry him. As he took the gate in his stride, he saw the white-clad figure of Wee Anne fleeing with unsteady, toddling steps, her fair hair streaming out behind, and one bare arm striking wildly back