The Moor - Laurie R. King [57]
It was Gould who reassured me, or tried to. "I shouldn't think they are practising this late in the season. They normally finish in September."
"Before we go, Gould," said Holmes, "just take a look at the map for us and tell Russell if there are any points a person could take a carriage onto the moor that aren't obvious from the markings."
"A ghostly carriage doesn't need a road, Holmes," Baring-Gould said in a stern whisper. Holmes did not deign to answer, merely took a folded smaller-scale map from his pocket and shook it out, holding it up by the corners directly in front of Baring-Gould. The old man had only to pull down his spectacles from his forehead to study the map, but instead he smiled and waved Holmes away.
"No need for that; I can see it better with my eyes closed." He did actually close his eyes, and Holmes laid the map over a table for those of us whose eyes were better than our knowledge of the moor. I took out a pencil.
"I think that, as the sightings have all been in the northern quarter, we need not bother with anything south of the Princetown Road. Is this reasonable?"
"For the present," Holmes said, adding, "We may have to expand the search later."
"Very well. From the south, we begin at the point where the Prince-town Road enters Tavistock." I dutifully made a small circle on the map. "From there up to Mary Tavy the gates are all on the east side of the Tavy, and will coincide with the lanes leading down to the river. Except," he said, sitting forward and replacing his glasses onto his nose so he could take the pencil from me and circle an invisible fold in the contour lines, "except for here, a lane that appears to skirt the field. Since the map was made, however, the farmer took down a section of the old wall, and now drives his cattle up onto the moor along here." The edge of his fingernail traced a dip in the contour lines. "Here is another place, but that should be obvious." His eyes shifted sideways to take in my reaction. I nodded, and pointed to half a dozen other access points I could see. We both ignored the actual lanes and the labelled Moor Gates, looking only for the hidden places. "Along here," he said, "there is an old miner's trail. And this here; it used to be a railway line for bringing peat off the moor. And of course this path here, marginally negotiable if the driver were very good and the horses strong."
It did not take long for Baring-Gould's intimate knowledge of the moor to lay open the map to my eyes. I should begin by crossing the moor to the other side of Princetown, and from there work my way back to Lydford, while Holmes cut across the moor up to the northeastern portion and worked his way counterclockwise. We should either meet in the middle or, failing that, return here Wednesday night.
I took my leave of Baring-Gould with considerably greater warmth than I would have thought possible even a day or two earlier. Holmes played for him again that night, and although the music ended early, he did not return to our rooms until a very late hour.
TEN
I had almost written God-forsaken, but checked my pen, for God forsakes no place, though He may tarry to bless.
—A Book of Dartmoor
In the morning I put together a bag—a simple enough procedure that amounted to pushing everything I had brought with me except my frock into the rucksack, borrowing a pair of sturdy riding boots, and adding the book of Baring-Gould's memoirs and a map—and walked down to the barn.
Here I was presented with a dilemma: Baring-Gould himself had sent down an order that I be given the household's ageing Dartmoor pony, a beast with a rough coat and a gloomy eye. However, being a pony (even though not apparently interbred with the Shetland) and I passing six feet in my boots and hat, the picture I had of me on its back had a distinctly ludicrous air. I wondered if perhaps Baring-Gould could be pulling