The Moor - Laurie R. King [12]
"A common enough state of affairs for your cases," I commented.
"True, but regrettable nonetheless. Josiah Gorton was a tin miner—although that may be a deceptive description. Tin seeker might be more accurate, one of a breed who wanders the moor, putting their noses into every rivulet and valley, poring over every stone pile in hopes of discovering small nuggets of tin that the more energetic miners of the past left behind. He spent his days fossicking through the deep-cut streambeds and his nights in caves or shelters or the barns of farmers.
"I met Gorton once, in fact, many years ago, and thought him a harmless enough character even then. He affected the dress of a gipsy, with a red kerchief around his throat, although when I met him he looked more like a pirate, with dark, oiled locks and a heavy frock coat too large for him. He was a colourful figure, proud of his freedom, and he had a goodly store of traditional songs tucked into the back of his head, which he would happily bring forth for the cost of a pint or a meal. He was a last relic of the old moor 'songmen,' although his voice was giving way, and with more than three pints under his belt he tended to forget the words to some of the longer ballads. Still, he was tolerated with affection by the innkeepers and farmers, as a part of the scenery, and in particular by Gould, for whom Gorton had a special significance.
"You need to understand that with all the work he has done in a wide variety of fields, Gould regards his greatest achievement in life to have been the collecting of west country songs and melodies, a task begun more than thirty years ago and only reluctantly dropped when he became too old to take to the moor for days at a time. Josiah Gorton was one of his more important songmen. I suppose it could be said, by those of a psychologically analytical bent, that Gorton represents to Gould the fate of the moor, overcome by progress and forgotten in the shiny, shallow attractions of modernity." Holmes' fastidious expression served to make it clear that he was merely acknowledging the possible explanation given by another discipline. He continued, "Whatever the explanation, there is no doubt that Gould is deeply troubled not only by the fact of Gorton's death, but by the manner it came about.
"On the night of Saturday, the fifteenth of September, Gorton was seen walking north past Watern Tor. You did study those maps you brought down, I presume?"
"Not studied, no. I glanced at a couple of them."
"You didn't?" He sounded amazed and more than a bit disapproving. "What on earth were you doing all that time on the train?"
"Reading," I said evenly. I actually had deliberately buried myself in the most arcane piece of theological history I could lay my hands upon, as a protest and counterbalance to the forces pulling me to Devonshire. In retrospect, it seemed a bit childish, but I bristled when Holmes gave me that look of his.
"Reading," he repeated in a flat voice. "Wasting your time, Russell, with theological speculation and airy-fairy philosophising when there is work to be done."
"The work is yours, Holmes, not mine—I only agreed to bring you the maps. And the speculation of Jewish philosophers is as empirical as any of your conclusions."
His only reply was a scornful examination of his pipe-bowl.
"Admit it, Holmes," I pressed. "The only reason you so denigrate Talmudic studies is sheer envy over the fact that others perfected the art of deductive reasoning centuries before you were even born."
He did not deign to answer, which meant that the point was irrefutably mine, so I drove home my advantage: "And besides that, Holmes, what I was reading does actually have some bearing on this case—or at least on its setting. Were you aware that in the seventeenth century Moorish raiders came as far as the