Midnight Never Comes

5

It was very peaceful in the small station by the lochside and Chavasse peered out of the window of the rear compartment keeping out of sight. On the other side of the glen, the mountain reared its bald head more than three thousand feet into a clear blue sky, sunlight glinting on a waterfall high on the slope that spilled in a white apron across granite to disappear into the birch trees that fringed the base.

A door opened in the front coach and Asta Svensson stepped down on to the platform. She wore a soft leather jacket, a pleated tweed skirt, nylon stockings and handmade leather brogues.

With the pale blonde hair glinting in the sunlight, she made an attractive, vibrant figure in the quiet setting of the little railway station. She moved across to the ticket collector who stood at the barrier beside the small waiting room. There was some conversation, a burst of laughter and she went out through the barrier.

Chavasse waited, wondering what she was up to. Following her from Glasgow to Fort William had been easy, for the train had been quite busy, but the branch line to Arisaig and Mallaig was little used now that the holiday season was over and he'd had difficulty keeping out of sight.

The ticket collector moved to join the guard as he emerged from the waiting room. 'You've lost a passenger, Tam,' he said in a soft highland blas.

'Is that a fact now?' the guard observed calmly.

'Aye, a bonny lass with hair of corn and a face to thank God for. A Miss Svennson. Her step-father's yon fella Donner that bought Glenmore last year. She's away over the mountain. You're to put down her baggage at Lochailort.'

'I hope it keeps fine for her.' The guard took out his watch. 'The long short cut she'll find it if the weather breaks.'

Chavasse reached for his raincoat, opened the door and got out. 'Did I hear you say there was a short cut over the mountain?'

'Well now, sir, and that would depend on where you want to be.'

'Ardmurchan Lodge.'

The guard nodded. 'Over the top of Ben Breac and a twelve mile walk on the other side. You'll be staying with Colonel Craig, the new tenant?'

'My uncle. He'll be waiting for me at Lochailort. Perhaps you'd be good enough to tell him where I am?'

The five shillings he slipped into the guard's hand was pocketed without inspection. 'Leave it to me, sir.'

He blew his whistle and boarded the train. As it moved away from the platform, Chavasse turned to the ticket collector. 'And where do I go from here?'

'Through the village and over the bridge, sir. You'll find a path through the birches on your left. It's hard going, but you can't miss the cairns that mark the way. Once over the top, the track is plain to the glen below.'

'Do you think the weather will hold?'

The ticket collector squinted up at the mountain. 'A touch of mist perhaps and rain in the evening. I shouldn't waste time on top.' He smiled suddenly. 'I'd tell the young lady that if I were you, sir. It's no place for a lassie to be on her own.'

Chavasse grinned. 'I'll do that. A pity to see her get wet.'

'A thousand pities, sir.'

At a small general store he purchased an extra packet of cigarettes and two half-pound bars of milk chocolate. Twelve miles on the other side of the mountain, the ticket collector had said and that wasn't counting the miles that stood up on end. A long walk and something told him he might be hungry before the end of it.

He marched down the quiet village street, his raincoat slung over one shoulder and crossed the bridge over a clear flowing stream. It was still and quiet in the hot afternoon sun and the road stretched before him, lifting upwards and away from the waters of the loch shining through the trees below.

There was no sign of the girl which suited him for the moment. Sooner or later a meeting was inevitable, in fact necessary, but he preferred that it should be at a time and place of his own choosing.

The track snaked up through the birch trees, lifting steeply, bracken pressing in on either side. It was cool and dark and somehow remote from the world, the path dappled with light where shafts of sunlight pierced the roof of green branches.

The trees grew sparser until he moved out on to a slope where the track disappeared into bracken that in places was waist high. Occasionally grouse or plover lifted out of the heather, disturbed by his passing. He moved up over a steep ridge and found himself on the edge of a boulder-strewn plain that lifted to meet the lower slopes of Ben Breac.

In the same moment he saw the girl, up on the shoulder of the mountain to his right, six or seven hundred feet above him.

She paused, turning to look out over the loch and he dropped back into cover. When he peered cautiously over the edge of the ridge a moment later, she had disappeared round the shoulder of the mountain.

She was certainly moving fast. Faster than he would have thought possible, but hardly surprising, remembering her litheness and the healthy glow of her golden skin and he took out an ordnance survey map of Moidart and unfolded it. The track she was following was plainly marked, skirting the shoulder of the mountain, climbing gradually to the final plateau and the summit. There was a quicker way, of course-straight up. But only a fool would try that.

Chavasse raised his eyes to the swelling breast of the mountain above, the great wall of granite beyond. A steady eye and strong nerves were all that was needed and he could be sitting on the summit cairn waiting to greet her when she arrived. He folded the map, put it away and started to climb.

It was easy enough on the lower slopes with the heather springy to the feet, but within half an hour, he came out onto a great cascading bank of scree and loose stones that moved alarmingly beneath him with each step he took, bringing the heart into his mouth.

He worked his way to the left, making for the waterfall he had observed from the train, and when he reached it, followed the channel upwards, jumping from one great boulder to the other. Finally, he moved out on to a small plateau and faced the granite cliffs.

From the station, they had looked impossible, but now he was close enough to see that instead of being perpendicular, they leaned backwards gently in a series of great tilted slabs, cracked and fissured by the years.

He paused for as long as it took him to eat half a bar of chocolate, then slung his raincoat over his back, fastening it securely with its own belt and started to climb.

He wondered how the girl was doing, but there was no means of knowing, for the shoulder of the mountain was between them, and he climbed on, testing each hold securely before moving. He turned once to look down into the glen and saw the ticket collector moving from the station to his small cottage adjoining. When he looked down again half an hour later, he could see nothing, and suddenly a cold wind seemed to move across his face.

He climbed on doggedly and as he scrambled over the edge of a great up-tilted slab of granite a few minutes later, grey mist spilled across the face of the mountain with incredible speed, wrapping itself around him like some living thing.

He had spent enough time in hill country in various parts of the world to have learned that in such circumstances it was fatal to make any kind of move at all unless there was a well defined track to follow. Remembering what lay beneath him, he sat down between a couple of boulders and lit a cigarette.

He had a long wait and it was just over an hour later when a sudden current of air snatched the grey curtain away and beyond, the valleys lay dark and quiet in the evening sunlight, the mountains touched with a golden glow.

He started to climb again and an hour later came over the final edge and found himself on a gently sloping plateau that lifted to meet the sky a quarter of a mile away, a great cairn of stones marking the ultimate peak.

There was no sign of Asta Svensson and when he cut across the track, he turned and hurried back along it until he reached a point where he had a clear view of its zigzag course for two thousand feet up the great northern slope of the mountain.

So she had beaten him to the summit-so much was obvious. But that was hardly surprising, for with the track to follow, the mist must have proved no problem at all. He turned and trudged along the track towards the cairn, feeling suddenly tired for the first time. Tired and annoyed. He'd tried to be clever and he'd made a mess of it, it was as simple as that. Far better to have struck up a conversation with her in the train while he'd had the chance.

He moved towards the cairn, head bowed as he took the final slope and then he paused, the breath hissing sharply between his teeth at the vision of splendour unfolded before him.

The sea was still in the calm evening, the islands so close that it was as if he had only to reach out to be able to touch the Rum and Eigg and Skye beyond, on the dark horizon, the final barrier against the Atlantic, the Outer Hebrides.

Below, a small loch cut deep into the heart of the hills, black with depth in the centre, purple and grey where granite edges lifted to the surface, and on Skye the peaks of the mountains were streaked with orange.

The beauty of it was too much for a man and with an inexplicable dryness in his throat, he turned and hurried along the track down into Glenmore.

Asta Svensson was tired and her right ankle was beginning to ache rather badly, legacy of an old skiing injury. It had taken her much longer to cross the mountain than she had imagined. Now she was faced with a twelve mile walk before reaching her destination, and what had originally seemed a rather amusing idea was fast turning into something of an ordeal.

The track which followed the lochside was dry and dusty and hard to the feet. After a while, she turned a bend and found her way barred by a five-barred gate, a wire fence running into the bracken on either side.

The notice said, Keep Out-Glenmore Estate-Private, and the gate was padlocked. She hoisted herself over, surprised at the effort it took, slipped and fell on the other side and a sudden stab of pain in her right ankle told her that she had turned it.

She got to her feet and started to walk again, limping heavily, and as she turned a curve in the glen she saw a small hunting lodge in a green loop of grass beside the loch. The door was locked, but when she went round to the rear, a window stood an inch or two ajar. She opened it without difficulty, pulled up her skirt and climbed over the sill.

When she struck a match she found herself standing in a small, well-fitted kitchen which, from the look of it, had been added to the main building only recently. There was a calor gas stove in one corner, an oil lamp on a bench beside it. She lit the lamp expertly, remembering with a strange nostalgia, holidays on her grandmother's farm on Lake Siljah as a little girl and went into the other room.

It was adequately furnished and quite comfortable in spite of the whitewashed walls and polished wood floor. A fire was laid on the stone hearth. She put a match to it, then sat in one of the wing-backed chairs and rested her right leg on a stool.

The dry wood flared up quickly. She added pine logs from the stack at the side of the hearth and suddenly she was warm again and her ankle seemed to have eased. She took off her leather jacket, hung it over the back of her chair and lit a cigarette, pausing at the alien sound in the distance.

Within a moment or two she knew what it was-a vehicle of some sort being driven surprisingly fast considering the conditions. She sat there waiting and then the noise of it seemed to fill the night and it braked to a halt outside. There was a quick step, the rattle of a key in the lock and the door was flung open.

The man who stood there was of medium height with a weak, sullen face and badly needed a shave. He wore a shabby tweed suit that was a size too large for him and yellow hair poked untidily from beneath the tweed cap.

He held a double-barrelled shotgun in both hands, and lowered it slowly, astonishment on his face. 'Would ye look at that now?'

Asta returned his gaze calmly. 'What do you want?'

'What do I want?' He laughed harshly. 'Now that's a good one. You're trespassing, did you know that? And how the hell did you get in here anyway?'

'Through the kitchen window.'

He shook his head and ran his tongue over his lips quickly, his eyes on her legs, on the skirt that was rucked up above her knees.

'I don't think my boss would like that at all. He's very particular about things like that. I mean, if he knew, he might even consider calling in the police.'

His eyes carried their own message and she took her foot off the stool and pulled down her skirt. 'I turned my ankle back there on the track somewhere. I've just come over Ben Breac.'

'Oh, a hiker? That's nice.'

Asta took a deep breath and stood up, not in the least afraid. 'It's lucky you came. You'll be able to give me a lift, won't you?'

He reached out, clutching at her arm. 'That depends now, doesn't it?'

She was tired and the blotched whisky face was suddenly completely repulsive. 'What's your name?'

He grinned. 'That's more friendly. It's Fergus-Fergus Munro.'

She pulled her arm free and sent him staggering with a vigorous shove of both hands.

'Then don't be stupid, Fergus Munro.'

For a moment he gaped in astonishment and then anger twisted his mouth. He dropped the shotgun and grabbed at her as she turned away, fingers hooking into the neck of her blouse, the thin material ripping along the seam of one shoulder.

She gave a cry of anger, striking out at him, aware of his hands on her, the staleness of his breath, the blotched, drink-sodden face and then beyond him, she saw a man materialise from the darkness to stand in the doorway.

It was the face which held her, the handsome, devil's face, eyes like black holes above high cheekbones, full of cold fury, flaring into a ruthless action that was almost frightening in its efficiency.

One hand fastened on her assailant's collar, another in his belt, tearing him away from her, sending him across the room with a tremendous heave.

Munro crashed against the opposite wall and slid to his knees. For a moment he stayed there, staring up at Chavasse, bewilderment on his face and then he flung himself forward, reaching for the shotgun.

Chavasse kicked it away from him, grabbed for the man's right wrist with both hands, twisting it round and up in an akaido shoulder lock, and sent him head first across the room to crash into the wall for the second time.

When Munro picked himself up, blood trickled down his cheek from a cut above the right eye and his face was contorted with fear. He plunged for the open door in complete panic and Chavasse went after him.

'Let him go!' Asta cried sharply.

Chavasse paused, a hand on each side of the door frame and when he turned, the killing mask was still firmly in place. And then he smiled, becoming in that moment almost a different person.

'Are you all right, Miss Svensson?'

She nodded slowly. 'Who are you?'

'My name is Chavasse-Paul Chavasse.'

Outside, the engine of Fergus Munro's Land Rover roared into life and he drove rapidly away down the glen. Chavasse closed the door and when he turned she was sitting in the wing-backed chair again, her right leg back on the footstool.

She chuckled suddenly. 'You know, I was really beginning to despair, Mr. Chavasse. I thought you were never going to catch up with me.'