There was quite a lot of snow, but for the moment it did not seriously impede his progress and he made good speed. A few rifle shots rang out from below, whip cracks in the silence. They were shooting blind, he realised, but the thought gave him little confidence.
Murdo climbed with the accustomed stride of one well used to shepherding, and soon found himself high on the steep ridge that rose from the house to the rolling summits of the moor. Pausing for a moment to regain his breath, he looked back down his tracks, so clearly visible in the bright moonlight. A light was on in Hector’s car, and as he listened intently, faint voices drifted up on the wind. Tiny figures, impossible to distinguish, moved in the circle of light. He turned again and pressed on up the slope.
Minutes later the roar of an engine caused him to halt a second time. They had managed to start Hector’s car, and as he watched the lights went on, stabbing their golden-white beams through the dusky shadows. A door slammed. Slowly the car drew away in a circle, then gathering speed, headed off down the track towards the ford.
Briefly he watched its progress, angry with himself for not removing the distributor cap, then turned his gaze back to Loch Strathy cottage, scanning the slopes. He blinked and screwed up his eyes to see more clearly, for the icy wind was making them water. Two dark specks stood out on the near side of the bothy, moving slowly up the hillside after him. He imagined Carl Voss with the powerful rifle tucked beneath his arm, scouring the snowfields ahead for a sign of himself. He bit his lip, suppressing a shiver of fear, and looked around at the moors. Ten, twenty miles, they spread away on every side, to the very rim of the glittering sky. They were very empty, very big. Out there, you could die. But surrender was unthinkable: among those rolling hills lay Murdo’s only hope of safety. He shrugged the jacket easy on his shoulders and headed out into the wilderness.
Full Moon
THREE HOURS LATER the spread-eagled figure of Orion had swung far around the sky and the moon was at its zenith in the south, when Murdo stopped for the hundredth time and scanned the slopes behind him. For half an hour he had been climbing across the side of a mountain and its great flank stretched far down below. There was no sign of any movement upon the bright snow. Surely, he thought, he must be drawing clear, yet fear was so much stronger than hope that he could hardly believe it. He breathed deeply but easily as the wind blew cold on his damp forehead. He had plenty of strength left yet. He glanced up at the Plough and found the Pole Star, then set off again eastwards towards Strath Halladale. For more than an hour he had been heading in that direction. In the glen there were houses, and the little village of Kinbrace.
A snowy owl winging its way silently above hooted softly with surprise at the minute figure far below, toiling across the great slope like an ant on a sand dune. Far away, well beyond the foot of the mountain, the round wide-awake eyes spotted two more, even tinier figures, imperceptibly moving in the same direction. The white wings fluttered and it sailed back to the summit rocks to land without even a rustle, blinking in astonishment. The great head swivelled to look behind. Nothing moved, the shadowy moonlit hills rolled on until they vanished into the dimness of the horizon. The very mountain itself was lost in the landscape.
As Murdo climbed over the ridge the land fell away before him into a flat valley, the floor a gleaming level of frozen lochs, all pewter and silver, dappled with snow. Beyond, barring his path to the east, reared two imposing summits, even from that height outlined against the stars. It would take a while to climb through the steep pass between them. Still, that was the way he must go, and relieved that for the moment at least his path led downwards, he ploughed off, taking long, loose-kneed strides towards the valley bottom.
He thrust a hand deeply into the pocket of his blue serge trousers for warmth and encountered the comfortable haft of his father’s knife. The contact gave him strength, and as he proceeded he thought of his father – and Lachlan and Maggie, but most of all his father – and the times they had all had together. Repeatedly, however, his mind returned to Hector and that roaring ‘No!’ on the beach, followed by a brief scuffle and then a long silence before the first of the shots. He tried to picture what had happened, and a hundred times in his mind’s eye relived the nightmarish climb up the cliff.
As he descended, the hills rose ahead, and by the time he was skirting the first of the lochs, the nearer summit did indeed look formidable. It soon became apparent, however, that his track through the lochs would naturally take him between them, and that the slope to the pass was by no means as arduous as it had appeared earlier.
A few hundred yards brought him to a broad stream, half a mile in length, which linked two substantial lochs in the long valley chain. It must be crossed. Murdo looked at the ice, dusted and drifted with snow. It was impossible in the moonlight to judge how thick it was. Tentatively he slid one foot from the edge and leaned his weight upon it. The ice seemed firm enough. Then he thought of the black water swirling below. If he went through it might carry him beneath the surface – he would never get out. He withdrew and retraced his footsteps to the end of the loch. The water there would be stiller, the ice thicker. If he did break through, he should be able to clamber out again.
Cautiously he inched out from the shore. The ice was strong and apparently sound. Nevertheless he was careful, for there were sometimes springs in the bed of the loch that left weak patches, invisible beneath the snow. But he encountered none, and in a couple of minutes was on the further shore. The mountains lay ahead.
Murdo gazed up the slope he must travel, fingering the stiff patch on his trousers and testing the sharp, numb sensation of the wound beneath it. The pass was split by a deep rocky gully. On either side the ascent was rough, with steep slopes and tussocky grass. He decided to take the right hand rim, where there was more stone but less snow, and drawing a deep breath, trudged on.
Soon he had left the valley floor and was climbing. But in his choice of route he had made an error. As he went higher the gully deepened and pressed close into the side of the mountain, so that he was forced to watch how he went on the treacherous grass and strewn boulders. It was hard going and his legs began to tremble with the effort. Up and up he toiled, until at length he found himself on a steep slope beneath the summit crags. It was a landscape of snow and rock. A long run of scree swept from the foot of the cliffs into the stream below. The whole slope shifted beneath his feet as he started to cross, and little avalanches slid away into the shadows.
Beyond the scree the way was more difficult, winding along a broad ledge between boulders, with the snow-clad cliffs hanging above, and a rough rock-fall dropping into the gully below. His nailed boots struck occasional sparks, and skidded on the hidden stones. Then his right foot went from beneath him and he fell heavily, raking his damaged thigh against a corner of rock as he twisted to save the bottle in his jacket. The pain was acute, and it was long moments before he could grit himself to rising. A hot blade twisted in the wound. He felt the wetness on his leg as blood trickled past his knee and down into his sock. For some minutes, as he limped on, it seemed as though the ledge was merging into the crag, and he feared he would have to climb again or retrace his steps. Then he rounded a steep buttress, and suddenly the rocks were behind him. A gentle snow slope rose ahead to the crest of the pass. Relieved, but more slowly than before, he pressed his weary legs forward, and equally slowly the huge vista unfolded before him.
Featureless, shadowy, pale, mile upon mile, the moors rolled on ahead. No gleam of light, no sparkle from a lonely window, relieved the cold austerity of the scene. The thin, perishing wind blew through the funnel of the pass into his face.
A hundred times Murdo had pictured Hector’s map, and travelled over the land in his mind’s eye, for he knew the region well. Strath Halladale must be there – but there was no sign of it.
He was lost. A feeling of hopelessness and emptiness welled up within him. He had counted on the strath lying spread before him, or at least being in sight and no
t too far distant when he reached the top of the pass. Instead he was rewarded with an awe-inspiring revelation of the sheer immensity of the land.
For a minute he gave in. Anything was better than being lost and alone out there. Already the heat of the climb was leaving him and he shivered. He was tired, he wanted a rest, and thought longingly of the glowing fire and his warm bed in Hector’s cottage… Suddenly he was angry with himself. He would not give in – he would never give in! There was only one end to that kind of thinking. Strath Halladale lay to the east, there was no doubt about it. He glanced up at the North Star and took an easterly bearing, noting a long escarpment that must remain ahead. The full moon, dominating the night, would be slightly behind his right shoulder. He flexed the injured thigh. Then, denying the thoughts of despair and fortifying himself with images of the warmth and help that were waiting in Strath Halladale, only a few miles ahead, he pushed forward down the long slope.
Murdo was not the only person to be doubting himself on the moors at that moment. Even as he trudged down the hillside from the pass, Carl Voss and Peter arrived at the end of the loch below and crossed over the ice. Murdo’s tracks led on ahead of them. Voss was sweating and he paused, pressing a hand to his knee, wrenched in the sea and bruised when Murdo struck him with the car. His face was twisted but determined as he gazed up the steep slope ahead. Surely the boy must be somewhere on that face, or in the gully, but he could not see him. He looked across at Peter, the young Luftwaffe pilot, who slowly shook his head in reply, never taking his eyes from the mountainside.
‘He is some walker!’
Carl Voss pressed his lips together and snorted angrily in reply.
‘If it wasn’t for this damned leg!’ He massaged his knee gently and winced as the pain shot through it. ‘We’ll never catch up with him like this. I’m only keeping you back.’ He slung the rifle from his shoulder and pulled a roughly folded map from inside his jacket. Shading a little torch with his hand he studied it carefully, comparing it with the land around them. ‘We are – here.’ His broad finger indicated the narrow space between a chain of blue lochs and the packed brown contours of a hillside. ‘And he has gone up here. Now…’ Thoughtfully he studied Murdo’s course and the lie of the land beyond the mountain. ‘If he has gone over the pass, and it looks as if he has, there are two possibilities. He will either keep straight on east, and in that case he has got a long way to go to – Strath Halladale, or whatever you call it, the God-forsaken place; or else he will see the road below him and drop down to this valley here, in which case he will see –’ he peered closely at the map ‘– the Ben Crocach Hotel. It is only about two miles from the top of the hill there.’ He shifted a little to ease the weight on his aching leg and looked up the steep pass. ‘If I tried to climb that it would take an hour – more. I’d keep you back and that brat would get a bigger lead than ever. He’s far enough ahead already.’ He thought for a moment. ‘The best plan is for you to go after him by yourself. I’m sure you can go faster than he can. I’ll head round the side of the hill and cut him off if he tries to turn back to the hotel.’
The young pilot nodded. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘I’ll be following the tracks, so if you catch him I’ll meet up with you. And if I catch him I’ll fire two shots in the air.’ He lifted a foot and tried to squeeze some life into his frozen toes. In the cave on Strathy beach he had just exchanged his sodden boots for a pair of sandshoes when Murdo escaped. In the hurry and confusion there had been no time to change back.
‘Never mind two shots in the air – two shots in the head. When you catch him, kill him,’ Carl Voss said. ‘No messing about. Just make sure he’s dead, and leave him where he is. No- one will find him out here. If Heinrich hadn’t been so squeamish we’d be back in the cave now.’
‘Mm.’ With some distaste, Peter regarded his dark companion. ‘It must be nice to have everything so simple in your mind, Voss,’ he said. ‘No indecision. Just ‘kill him’, and that’s the problem solved. ‘No messing about’.’
Carl Voss pushed the map into his pocket and slung the rifle over his shoulder. ‘It’s clean,’ he said simply.
‘It’s certainly final,’ Peter observed. ‘I’m afraid it’s not my way, though.’ He looked up at the moon and ran a hand through his fair hair. ‘Well, I’ll be off.’
‘Good luck,’ said Voss, with a dry smile.
Peter did not reply, and moving more swiftly than before, despite his frozen feet, settled down to following the footprints that led straight across the valley floor and up the side of the sweeping mountain ravine.
Carl Voss grunted, alone now, and gritted his teeth to make a further effort. Then, denying himself any respite for the sickening pain that lurched at every footfall, he strode off to the right, heading around the western flank of the mountain.
He kept high, and an hour later the hotel and scattering of outbuildings appeared ahead of him, far below. From what he could distinguish it was a good-sized place, an old lodge, probably used for shooting and fishing in the summer. But no lights were visible now, and there was no sign of the boy on the broad snow slopes above it.
He walked on, drawing closer. Suddenly he stopped. A line of footprints crossed the slope fifty yards ahead – but they were only the tracks of a deer. Then he saw the deer themselves, a herd of about fifty, moving quietly out of a hidden hollow not two hundred yards from the hotel. Clearly the boy was not there, the deer would have run off. There was no point in going down.
He pulled out his torch and studied the map again. Since the boy had not turned back to the hotel, then almost certainly he was heading for Strath Halladale. With his eye he drew a line east from the high pass and saw that it reached the strath near a loch, where there was a lodge. Four miles further south lay the little village of Kinbrace. Certainly he must prevent the boy from reaching there. He projected his own path south-east along the side of the hill, above the road, and saw that it led to a deserted stretch of strath between the village and the loch. If he continued he should be able to cut the boy off. It was a gamble, but there was not much else he could do except go back, and he had not trained for six months with the Alpenkorps to turn back now.
He looked up and ran his eyes carefully along the white crest high above him. Even yet the boy might cross the ridge and try to reach the hotel, or see the black splinters of telephone poles far below, marking the road. But the hillside remained empty, nothing moved. He returned the torch and map to his pockets and walked on, trying to ignore the pain, but gradually going slower despite himself. The weight of the gleaming rifle was a pleasure on his shoulder, the empty mountains were his own terrain. Like a wolf, he limped along the snowy slopes.
A third group of men were on the moors that night.
Leaving Peter and Carl Voss at the bothy, Henry Smith had driven Hector’s rattling car down the track, back through the ford and snow wreaths, towards the village. He had not been going for fifteen minutes when car lights appeared more than a mile ahead, and the two met with dipped headlights, nose to nose on the narrow track. In the car were the last of his men, Arne, Gunner and Knut. Henry Smith was annoyed that Bjorn Larvik, the best countryman of them all, had elected to stay behind to care for the old man, who was still unconscious, and keep watch at the cave. They had all equipped themselves with rifles and ammunition, and set off in a ‘borrowed’ car just in case there should be any trouble. It was the work of a moment to push Hector’s car off the road. Down the steep slope it went, bucking and tumbling over and over, finally crashing into the frozen channel of the stream. Then, with some satisfaction, they all climbed into the borrowed car and drove back to the bothy above Loch Strathy.
They set off immediately in pursuit of Carl Voss and Peter. Knut, with his tiny snub nose and beard, still in uniform and duffle coat, was returning the car. He leaned on top of the door smoking a cigarette, and watched Henry Smith lead Arne and Gunner at a fast pace up the long hillside. Soon they were dots cresting a far rise, and then they
were gone. He turned the car in a heavy circle and set off for the village.
The three were only half an hour behind Carl Voss and Peter when they left the bothy, and by the time they arrived at the frozen loch they had cut this to fifteen minutes.
Breathing scarcely more deeply than normal, Henry Smith suddenly came to a halt and stood gazing in surprise at the three sets of footprints. Two led straight ahead towards the high pass, the other turned right around the side of the mountain. Slowly a rising fury took the place of astonishment.
‘The fools! The incompetent fools!’ He pointed. ‘What do they think are doing? Do they think that by going over mountains they will cut him off?’ Trembling, he gnawed at one knuckle. But it was only for a moment that he hesitated. ‘Right! Leave them. We will follow him ourselves. Come. We must hurry!’ He pushed his way past Gunner and strode off to the right. Angrily he crushed his map in a clenched fist, and beat it against his thigh as he walked.
The track led high around the mountain slope. Walking was treacherous, for the snow hid peaty hollows and tussocks of grass, and from time to time they fell. Unused to such haste on rough terrain their ankles ached, but Henry Smith would permit no rest, no respite, and kept pressing on, pressing on. They crossed the line of deer tracks and saw the herd far below, scouring the sheep fields for remnants of hay and oil cake. They saw the hotel, set back on the dappled plain. Left of the hotel, low down in the east, the stars had vanished, blotted out by a slowly advancing bank of cloud.
Suddenly Gunner exclaimed, and touching Henry Smith’s arm, pointed to a tiny dot, slightly below them and half a mile further on. Short-sighted without his glasses, Henry Smith screwed up his eyes and peered across the slope, barely making it out. Even as they watched, it dropped from sight behind a shallow ridge.
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