The narrow road from Catfirth out to the Moul of Eswick did not actually extend as far as the property. They would have to walk the last quarter mile on foot, then another half mile to the bluff where the land dropped off to the sea. Nothing about the site as it appeared on the map would indicate singular value, except that the shoreline curved in a semicircle and thus formed a protected bay within the larger South Nesting coastline. The only other feature of interest was that an oil-production platform lay in the sea three miles straight off the Moul of Eswick.
As they drove close, the cars slowed. Andrew, in the lead automobile with Inspector Shepley, saw three vehicles parked beside the road ahead, including the maroon BMW Andrew had seen pulling into the Houses of Parliament just two days before.
“That’s Ramsey’s car, all right,” said Shepley to Andrew. “So far it looks like your information was on the mark. He must have left immediately after you saw the car the other day.”
Andrew glanced about anxiously but saw no sign of Ginny, her father, or anyone else.
As quietly as possible, they parked the cars and got out. Not a tree was in sight, only an endless expanse of rolling peat moor. It was as quiet and isolated a spot as Andrew could imagine. He couldn’t understand how the property brought in the meager income it did, unless there were sheep about someplace.
Shepley conferred briefly with his men. One was already making for a rise in the rocky landscape with a pair of binoculars. After a minute, he hurried back down and joined the others again.
“They’re over there all right, Inspector,” he said, “out at the coast—a thousand, maybe twelve hundred, yards away.”
“How many?” asked Shepley.
“Looks to be five or six . . . couldn’t tell for certain.”
Andrew crowded in a little closer to listen.
“Is there a young woman with them?” he asked.
“Yeah, I think I saw what could be a female . . . rather short—red hair.”
“Do they know we’re here?” asked the inspector before Andrew could get in another question.
“Didn’t look like it. They were standing close together talking. Didn’t look my way.”
“All right, then, let’s go,” said Shepley. “We’ll have to split up, make for the coast on either side of them, keeping out of sight—”
As he spoke, he pointed to indicate a two-pronged approach.
“—Blenkinsop, you stay behind and temporarily disable their cars, then head straight over the ground between us. Give us a ten-minute lead. We’ll work our way to the shore, then approach from opposite directions under cover of the bluff. Everyone got it?”
Nods followed around, and they struck out.
“Trentham, you come with me,” said Shepley. “Everyone keep low. Stay in the hollows of the moor.”
They reached the rocky coastline without much difficulty after some twelve or fifteen minutes. Thankfully the bluff overlooking the sea was not a sheer one. They were able to crouch low enough among its uneven rocks and protrusions to begin making their way gradually westward, along a line parallel to the water, toward the small party. As they drew near, Andrew caught occasional glimpses of the backs and heads of the individuals involved. By and by voices drifted faintly toward them, though now, at the edge of the sea, a brisk wind and pounding waves made it difficult to hear.
At length Shepley paused, crouched lower yet, and turned to Andrew and the three agents with them.
“We’re close enough now,” he whispered. “We’ll give it another few minutes to make sure the others are in place. Then we’ll get up over the ledge as quickly as we can and hope the element of surprise does the trick. What’s your read of the thing, Burford?”
“Won’t know until we get them in plain sight, Inspector,” said Shepley’s assistant softly. “If Blenkinsop’s in place, as well as the boys on the other side, we ought to have them surrounded. They won’t have anyplace to go.”
As they waited, Andrew strained to listen, though they could only make out fragments of the conversation through the wind.
“ . . . if you don’t, you’ll be staying here . . .”
“ . . . treacherous coastline . . . anything can happen . . . food for the gulls . . .”
“Tell them, Strang . . . have to sign . . .”
“ . . . no good refusing . . .”
“ . . . offering five times what it’s worth . . .”
“ . . . dinna ken what ye—”
Andrew realized this last was the laird’s voice. His Highland temper was obviously up.
“—no goin’ t’ sell t’ the muckle likes o’ a pack o’ thieves . . .”
“All right,” said Shepley glancing at his watch. “Sounds like it’s getting heated . . . let’s bust up this little party.”
“Just make sure no one gets hurt,” said Andrew.
“Relax, Trentham. We know our business.”
“But—”
Already they were on the move. Andrew scrambled up the jagged slope to follow.
They burst quickly onto the flat of the bluff. Even as Andrew scurried to follow, Shepley was running forward, gun in hand.
“All right, everyone,” he shouted, “stay exactly where you are! No one move—we have you surrounded.”
From the other side, another three agents ran toward them. Within seconds a half-circle was stretched around the conspirators, pinning them against the sea bluff.
Exclamations and a few imprecations sounded in surprise. As he ran forward behind Shepley, Burford, and the others, Andrew recognized four of his parliamentary colleagues, including one party leader and two deputy leaders, one of whom was his own. Ginny and her father were there as well, along with a man he did not know holding a small sheaf of papers.
“What in the world, Inspector!” began Tory leader Miles Ramsey, arguably the second most powerful man in the country. “What in blazes is the meaning of this?”
“I think you know well enough, Mr. Ramsey,” answered Shepley, slowing and walking calmly toward him, gun still in hand.
“We are merely conducting a business arrangement with these good people. This gentleman is Dobson Strang, solicitor from Aberdeen. He will tell you—”
“We know all about what you are doing, Ramsey,” interrupted Shepley. “We are here on other business than a real estate transaction, namely the theft of the Stone of Scone and the murder of Eagon Hamilton.”
Andrew glanced toward Ginny but could not catch her eye. If she recognized him under the circumstances and without his beard, she did not show it.
“Don’t be ridiculous. I haven’t the slightest idea what you’re talking about,” said Ramsey. “This gentleman here, Mr. Finlaggan Gordon, controls this land on behalf of his clan, and we are simply engaged in negotiations to purchase—”
“’Tis a lie!” now interrupted Ginny’s father, emboldened to speak his mind even more by the arrival of reinforcements. “’Tis more like thievin’ than negotiations, ye foul blackguard!”
“We happen to know that Mr. Reardon—” Shepley began, still addressing Miles Ramsey, but now turning in Reardon’s direction, “was involved with the theft of the Stone. Mr. Trentham here is an eyewitness. We have had a bulletin out for Mr. Reardon’s arrest since June.”
At the word “Trentham,” both Ginny’s and her father’s faces lit in sudden recognition, though neither said a word. Shepley motioned to two of his men, who now walked to either side of the LibDem deputy leader and grasped his two arms.
“I had nothing to do with Hamilton’s murder,” said Reardon nervously. “You can’t pin that part of it on me. I didn’t even know he and—”
“Shut up, you fool!” shouted Ramsey, losing grip on his calm political persona. “They’ve got nothing on us.”
“I don’t know what part you have in all this, Mr. Burslem,” said Shepley, addressing Ramsey’s vice-chairman, “but I’m sure we’ll find out.—What about you, Ferguson?” he went on, turning toward the SNP deputy leader. “We
know you were involved in the Stone theft.”
“I know nothing about the murder,” sputtered Ferguson. “The Stone, maybe, but I wasn’t alone. There was Dwyer and Reardon and all the rest. But Hamilton—”
Suddenly a gun was in Ramsey’s hand. In a single motion, he ran several steps to his right before anyone could stop him and grabbed Ginny with his left hand. A surprised scream escaped her lips.
“Let go o’ me, ye rascal!” she cried, squirming and trying to resist.
“Shut up, you little minx!” spat Ramsey, clutching her small frame all the more tightly. “—Now stand back, Inspector. Clear your men away or the girl—”
But he did not finish.
Almost without thinking, Andrew broke into a run and sprinted straight toward them.
“Let her go, Ramsey!” he shouted.
Taken by surprise, Ramsey’s grip on Ginny loosened momentarily. She wriggled free, turned and kicked him as hard as she could in the shin, then ran to her father just as Andrew crashed into the Tory leader as if it had been a rugby match.
Both men tumbled to the ground. An explosion of gunfire sounded as the pistol flew from Ramsey’s hand and landed several feet away.
Even Shepley’s men were taken by surprise with Andrew’s sudden attack, but now they hurried to help. While one secured Ferguson, two more now ran forward and pulled Andrew from the top of Ramsey.
“You all right, Trentham?” said Shepley.
“Yeah, I think so,” replied Andrew, brushing himself off.
“You were lucky that bullet didn’t find you. That was the most foolhardy move I’ve ever seen. You’d never last at the Yard.”
Andrew laughed. “That’s good. This kind of business is far too dangerous for me.”
Two of Shepley’s men dragged Ramsey to his feet. Before he knew it, his wrists were handcuffed behind his back.
“I tell you, you can’t pin the murder on us!” cried Ferguson as he, too, felt the steel cuffs clamp over his wrists. “Talk to Ramsey. He’ll tell you all about it—”
“I said to shut up, you idiot,” growled Ramsey.
“We’ll sort it all out later.—All right, Mr. Strang,” said Shepley, turning to the solicitor, “what do you know about all this?”
As they spoke, suddenly Ginny ran toward Andrew almost as vigorously as he had toward Ramsey. Before she realized what she was doing, she found herself in his arms.
“That was so brave o’ ye,” she said.
Andrew did not reply, but simply enjoyed the moment by giving her an extra reassuring squeeze.
Behind them, the laird now approached, patting Andrew on the shoulder and greeting him warmly.
“Ye’re a right braw lad, Mr. Trentham,” he said, “gien ye dinna mind me callin’ ye by yer real name.”
“Of course not,” laughed Andrew. “I just wish I had told it to you when we first met.”
“’Tis all behind us noo. Dinna ye worry yersel’ aboot it again.”
“What about the woman you told us about before?” Shepley asked Andrew.
“Oh, right, Blair—they call her Fiona.”
“Where’s the woman called Fiona?” said the inspector, turning back toward his prisoners.
“He stashed her in a cottage not far from here,” said Ferguson, nodding his head in Ramsey’s direction.
“What for?” asked Shepley.
“He said she’d watch the girl if he had to put her on ice for a while to convince her father to cooperate.”
“I see . . . so we have a planned kidnapping to add to everything else. What about it, Ramsey?”
As the inspector continued to grill the conspirators, Ginny gradually came to herself, embarrassed for her impulsive actions. She stiffened and pulled away from Andrew’s arms.
“Why did ye du this?” she said to Andrew, backing away.
“What do you mean?” asked Andrew, still smiling and unaware of what she was thinking.
“Why did ye come here?” she said.
“Because you were in trouble,” replied Andrew, “not to mention that we learned that man there may be a killer. I was worried about you.”
“But hoo did ye ken whaur we were?” she added insistently.
“Alastair Farquharson telephoned me. He saw the maroon car and was worried. He thought maybe I could help.”
“Why the muckle lunk!” exclaimed Ginny, her temper rising—toward Alastair, toward Andrew, toward everyone. “He had no right t’ du it.”
“Even if he was trying to help you?”
“We Gordons can tak care o’ oursel’s, thank ye verra much,” she huffed. “Besides, wha kens whether we can believe ye or no?”
“What are you talking about?” laughed Andrew, bewildered by the turn the conversation had taken.
“Ye’re an Englishman!”
“And that makes me a liar?” said Andrew incredulously. What in the world could have aroused this sudden change within her?
“I dinna ken aboot that, but I ken ye’re no friend o’ Scotland.”
“Why would you say that?”
“’Tis what the papers say.”
“And you believe everything you read?”
Ginny was silent a moment.
“How do you know any of that?” asked Andrew. “Maybe I am trying to be a friend, and you won’t let me.”
“Noo ye’re jist tryin’ t’ confuse me wi’ yer smooth Englishman’s tongue!”
“Ginny, ye’re bein’ a perfect nincompoop,” scolded the laird. “Ye can at least give the lad a chance t’ explain himsel.’ He’s proven himsel’ oor friend today. He could hae been shot, as weel as yersel.’ ’Twas a brave thing he did. Seems ye’re bein’ a mite hard on him whether or no, like ye say, he’s a friend t’ Scotland.”
“Well, he’ll have t’ prove it t’ me!”
She turned and stormed off, hiding the hot tears that were already clouding both her vision and her good sense. The laird turned to Andrew, now embarrassed himself.
“Ye’ll have t’ forgive the lass. She’s a mite hotheaded by nature, an’ more’n a wee bit confused at the minute.”
“Confused,” repeated Andrew. “Confused about what?”
“Why aboot ye yersel,’ lad—dinna ye see it wi’ yer ain twa eyes? She doesna ken whether t’ love ye or hate ye. So all she can du is blow off steam through that fiery red head o’ hers, an’ say foolish things she’ll regret one day.”
Before the conversation could go further, Inspector Shepley again walked toward them.
“Everyone all right here?” he said.
“We’re fine, Inspector,” replied Andrew. He introduced him to the laird. The agent and the Scotsman shook hands.
“Right,” said Shepley. “Well, we’ve about got it wrapped up here, so let’s be off. I’ll want to talk to you further, of course, Mr. Gordon.”
They turned and followed Shepley’s men back across the moor toward the cars. Ginny kept her distance, and she and Andrew did not speak again.
Eight
The King’s speech at the state opening of Parliament in late November did not offer a great many surprises. Labour’s program for the following twelve months was not unlike what everyone had expected and what Prime Minister Richard Barraclough had predicted. In keeping with the centuries-old formality of the occasion, no mention was made of the parliamentary scandal that had so recently rocked the world.
There was, however, one item in the King’s address which took the entire United Kingdom by surprise: Home rule for Scotland would be put on the agenda for debate in the House of Commons. The SNP had lobbied strenuously and successfully, and the Right Honorable Richard Barraclough had at last consented.
“My government,” stated the King, “will introduce a bill to provide increased independence for Scotland, to be phased in over a period of several years, with an end in view of complete autonomy.”
As His Majesty King Charles III read out the simple statement, buried two-thirds of the way through a speech whose mono
tone was only slightly less uninspiring than his mother’s, he seemed completely unfazed by the historic implications of his words.
But Dugald MacKinnon and his colleagues were exultant. After years of trying, they had finally succeeded in bringing the issue of Scots independence before Parliament.
What the prime minister’s actual plans in the matter were, he had divulged to no one. Did he really intend to proceed with debate and a vote on the matter? Or did he think the Scottish Nationalists could be bought off by simply inserting the item in the speech and then proceeding to ignore it?
Only time would tell.
As Andrew sat listening, his thoughts drifted to Malcolm and Margaret. Things had certainly shifted for Scotland during their reign too. Was another such era of dramatic change coming for Caledonia?
So much he read about Margaret and Malcolm reminded him of himself and Ginny—except in reverse.
He was the sedate Englishman who came north and found himself face-to-face with a tempestuous Highland Celt. He might not exactly be a saint, but he could probably be forgiven that. And on the other side of it, he supposed that to draw a parallel between the diminutive Leigh Ginevra Gordon and huge old ruthless Malcolm Canmore—
What am I thinking? Andrew asked himself.
Even if the comparison were apt, he had thus far been no more successful at subduing her Celtic temperament than Margaret had Malcolm’s. What did it matter anyway? He might never see Ginny again. Her Highland temper was directed in the opposite direction from Malcolm’s. Whereas Malcolm loved Margaret, she seemed to hate the very sight of him. He had begun at least ten letters to her since they had seen each other in the Shetlands, but they had all ended up in the bin.
Andrew glanced up. The King was still speaking. He tried to force himself to pay attention.
The Labour prime minister and the leader of the Scottish Nationalist Party listened too, with very different responses. But neither Richard Barraclough nor Dugald MacKinnon realized what deep and dramatic changes were taking place within the heart of their longtime colleague and new party leader Andrew Trentham—changes that could ultimately make him either an ally or a foe in the approaching debate on the matter of Scottish home rule. Nor did they realize that he rather than either of them would become the focal figure in the Commons when the division came to a head.
An Ancient Strife Page 39
