Gardner, John Read Online Free PDF

given up trying to fathom her employer's working hours long ago, and merely asked if he fancied anything special to eat when he did get in. Bond said he would not be averse to a nice pair of Arbroath Smokies - should she have some tucked away. May, being a strict conservative in matters of kitchen equipment, would never in a thousand years have allowed a freezer in her domain. Bond agreed with her, though it was sometimes nice to be able to have delicacies within reach, so they had compromised. With tact, Bond had talked her round to allowing him to buy a large Bosch refrigerator with a spacious freezing compartment, which May christened the ice box. She thought, now, that there might be a pair of Smokies in 'the ice box', adding, 'So I'll see what I can do, Mr James; but mind you don't get back too late.' May had a habit of treating Bond, when the mood was on her, as a nanny will treat her small charges.
    The fact that Bond was only out of his office for a few minutes mollified M, who had refilled his pipe and was poring over the dossiers. Caustically he asked if 007 had managed to arrange matters so that they were not interrupted again.
    'Yes, sir,' Bond replied calmly. 'I'm quite ready for the Laird of Murcaldy, Rob Roy and even Bonnie Prince Charlie, if you wish.'
    'It's not a matter for levity, 007,' M spoke sharply. 'The Murik family is a noble line. There was a Laird of Murcaldy at Dunbar, and another at Culloden Moor. However, it is possible that the true line died out with the present Laird's grandfather. It has yet to be proven, or even properly tested, but it is a matter which disturbs the Lord Lyon King of Arms greatly.' He shuffled through some of the first dossier. 'Anton Murik's grandfather was well-known as an adventurer —a traveller. In the year 1890 he was missing for more than three months in central Europe - searching, it is said, for his brother who had been disinherited for some offence. Their parents were dead, and the village folk believed that Angus Murik - that was his name - planned to return with his brother, shepherding the black sheep back into the fold. When he did return it was with a wife: a foreign woman, the records say. She was with child, and there are also written documents suggesting that the prodigal Laird was not Angus at all, but the brother, Hamish. It is also suggested that the child, who became Anton's father, was born out of wedlock, for there are no records of a marriage having actually taken place.'
    Bond grunted, 'But surely that would only weaken the line, not destroy it altogether.'
    'Normally, yes,' M continued. 'But Anton was also born in strange circumstances. His father was a wild lad who, at the age of eighteen, also began to travel. He did not return at all. There is a letter, extant, saying that he had married an English woman of good family in Palermo. But shortly after that a young woman arrived at Murik Castle, in an advanced state of pregnancy, with the news that her husband, the heir to the title, had been killed by bandits during an expedition in Sicily.' 'When was this?' It sounded a confused and odd story to Bond.
    'Nineteen-twenty,' M nodded, as though reading Bond's thoughts. 'Yes, and there are newspaper reports of some "English" gentleman having been killed in Sicily. The newspapers, however, claim that this gentleman's wife also perished at the hands of the bandits; though the young woman insisted it was her maid who died. The graves, at Caltanissetta, are so marked; but diaries, and some memories, say that the girl who presented herself as wife of the Laird-presumptive was far from being an English lady of good breeding. It's difficult to sort out fact from fiction, or even bigotry. What is certain is the fact that some of the older people on the Murik estate maintain Anton is not the true Laird — though, knowing which side their bread is buttered, they only whisper it privately, and will not commit themselves to either strangers or authority.'
    'But