Murder on the Moor - C. S. Challinor [3]
“Well, he-llo!” Mrs. Farquharson bleated. “We found you!”
Worst luck, Rex thought.
The next moment he was introducing Estelle and Cuthbert Farquharson to Helen.
“Ceud mile failte,” Helen welcomed them. “I’ve been practicing my Scottish Gaelic.”
Cuthbert babbled some incomprehensible Gaelic politeness in reply before turning to Rex. “I say, I thought we’d get in a bit of deer stalking.” He clapped Rex on the back. “Plenty of time before dinner, what?”
Cuthbert Farquharson sported a Sherlock Holmes deerstalker and matching camouflage trousers bagging over sage green rubber boots. Estelle also wore wellies, along with a sloppy sweater and frumpy tweed skirt, the attire of landed gentry. Though Scottish, they had both been educated in England, Estelle at some highfaluting London school and Cuthbert at Eton, which accounted for their horsy accents.
“How bloody marvelous this place is,” Estelle remarked prior to inhaling deeply of the pure, pine-scented air. “So wild and unspoilt.” She cast a determined look at the lodge, apparently undaunted by the idea of “slumming it” and prepared for any eventuality. “Doesn’t look like anything’s changed much over the centuries. It’s so authentic!”
“We do have indoor plumbing,” Rex countered mildly. “In fact, all modern conveniences.” Then, remembering the leaking radiator, he added, “Of sorts.”
“Your room is all ready for you,” Helen told the guests. “I was just about to bake a cake.”
“A cake! How fabulous!” Estelle enthused.
“With real eggs, fresh from the local farm,” Rex added with a straight face.
“Divine. Do let me help.”
“Good idea.” Cuthbert prodded his wife in Helen’s direction. “The ghillie should be here in a minute with the pony,” he told Rex.
“What ghillie?”
“The boy from the Loch Lochy Hotel. His parents and sister will be along later with that reporter chap.”
“We won’t be needing a ghillie or a pony,” Rex said firmly. “We won’t be shooting any deer.”
Ponies were still the transportation of choice for retrieving dead deer over hilly terrain.
“But I brought my new rifle. Thought I’d try it out.”
“The only thing we shoot here are photographs,” Rex explained.
A deer head replete with a pair of seven-pointed antlers had hung forlornly over the living room fireplace when he purchased the lodge. The first thing he had done was to give it a decent burial and replace it with a copy of Monarch of the Glen, the famous oil painting of a majestic stag by nineteenth-century artist Sir Edwin Landseer.
“Did you bring a camera?” he asked his guest.
“Estelle has a Nikon somewhere.” Cuthbert’s bottom lip, wet and red as a woman’s, trembled peevishly. “Not quite the same thing, is it?”
“I don’t believe in murdering God’s creatures for sport.”
“You can’t view them as defenseless bambies, you know. They wreak havoc with the forests. Without wolves to cull the population, it’s the best way to keep the numbers under control.”
Rex shook his head resolutely. “Not on my land. I like to think of Gleaneagle Lodge as a nature sanctuary.”
At that moment, a golden eagle swooped overhead and soared over the barren hill summits.
“Well, it’s your land, I suppose, and you’re free to do with it as you please,” Cuthbert conceded. “Here’s the boy now.”
An uneven clopping of hooves rang out as Donnie Allerdice, an agile lad of about seventeen in a plaid shirt and jeans, led a sturdy Shetland pony down the loose stone road.
“This here is Honey,” he told the men when he drew level with them. “On account of the colour of her coat, not her temperament.” He said this in a slow and deliberate way. The horse chewed irritably on its bit and twitched its long tail. “The midges are bothering her something fierce.”
“You can put her in the meadow over there for the time being,” Rex told the boy, who was slightly cross-eyed. “We won’t be needing her.”
“Mr. Graves is opposed to hunting,” Cuthbert explained testily.
“That’s a shame,” the boy said. “I saw a large hummel and his hinds down in the glen.” Rex noticed he carried