Murder at Midnight Read Online Free PDF Page A

bonnet, the emblem of the Jacobites.” Cleverly stopped his mime of digging and cupped a hand to his ear, as though listening out for the sound of voices echoing across the purple glen or horses trampling through the fallen leaves of the valley. The guests stared at him owlishly, captivated by his description of the furtive robber.
    “He digs under cover of darkness, afraid of the sound his spade makes sluicing and scraping into the ground, afraid of the whistling of mallard wings over the loch. To be caught means certain death, a traitor’s ignominious and terrible death. After hours of digging he hides the bags in his beer kegs, which he straps either side of a mule. Then, leaving the hiding place as though nothing ever was, he takes to the forests and hills, hiding from English soldiers and from his own kith and kin until, finally, he reaches his castle. He dares not rest until his clinking cache of gold is safely buried once more, this time deep under the flagstones of the keep.”
    The professor took a curt bow to indicate his story was concluded, and received a hearty applause. Jason tooted loudly with one of the paper blowouts he had brought to the party.
    “Everyone’s in high spirits,” Rex commented to Helen with the satisfaction of a successful host.
    “Spirits is right,” she said pointedly, her glance sweeping the empty bottles on the table.
    Cleverly resumed in his professorial tone, “The Highland clans- folk among whom the prince sought refuge never betrayed his whereabouts to the government troops, even though a fortune in bounty was offered on his pretty head.”
    He stroked his own pate, but whereas the Young Pretender had been famed for his fair curls, Cleverly could only feel scalp. “And no one knew what to do with all the gold once Charlie left, although many hoped he would return to attempt another armed action. Enough gold to sink a ship had been delivered to Loch nan Umah, seven or eight barrels of it aboard the Bellona , each containing five thousand glittering gold pieces, the total worth over ten million pounds today, an astounding sum back then. Much of it simply vanished into thin air.” He performed a conjuring motion with his hand. “Until now, that is.”
    “To excavate the gold, always assuming it’s buried in the keep, as the poem suggests, would cost an arm and a leg,” Alistair contended. “And there’s no real guarantee that it’s there.”
    “Perhaps Jason can assist you with that,” Drew Harper said, leveling a look at the student.
    “What do you mean?” Jason demanded.
    “Why don’t you tell all us curious people what you found there?” Drew’s somber blue eyes challenged him unflinchingly.
    Jason’s mouth formed an angry line as he glared back at the house agent. “Why don’t you mind your own business?” he blurted after a brief pause.
    “What’s going on here?” Alistair stepped between the two men, both of them athletic; but whereas Jason was stocky, Drew was tall and lean. “Stop being so obscure, Drew. If you know something relevant to the subject of the alleged buried gold, cough it up, why don’t you.”
    “I will, if Jason won’t. I just wanted to give him the opportunity to come clean.”
    “Jason?” Flora began questioningly behind her boyfriend.
    He held her back. “Come clean?” he returned, staring Drew down. “You make me sound like a criminal.”
    “I’m sorry, but stealing is a criminal activity.”
    Rex decided to intervene at this point. Tempers were rising, and he didn’t want the mood at his party to sour. “I’m sure there is a perfectly reasonable explanation for this. Jason, lad, why don’t you tell us in your own words what Drew is referring to and lay this possible misunderstanding to rest?”
    “Hear, hear,” said Ken, availing himself of more Scotch.
    With a contemptuous glance at the house agent, Jason told how, being a metal detector enthusiast, he had walked over the glen from the Loch Lochy Hotel, where