“He didn’t do that,” said Macdonald. “It’s all a bit odd, Betty. It wasn’t one of Mr. Brough’s men, I’ve seen them and they were together all the afternoon, spreading muck. Not one of them would have had time to come up here. And it wasn’t one of the pipe-line men, either. They were doing a job of blasting this afternoon, I expect you heard the charges, and the overseers can answer for it that all the men were there, under their eyes.”
“That’s a right funny thing,” she said. “Must ha’ been someone from away, ’tisn’t often we get strangers up here. They’ll come at the back-end, when the heather’s out, and come picking blueberries and blackberries, too, along the fences, but now there’s nought to come for.”
“Did you ever know Sam Borwick, Betty?”
“No. I’ve never set eyes on him. ’Tis years since he went away, in the war that was, and I lived in Gimmerdale, as you know, and I was too busy to come all this way and nought to come for.” She laughed a little. “Jock and me, we’ve often named him: ‘When Sam Borwick comes back,’ we’d say—meaning never. You see, Jock and me, we’d have liked to farm High Garth, and if so be Sam Borwick wasn’t ever going to come back, that might have been a chance. Not that we bother now. We’re right well off here.”
“Well, I don’t suppose High Garth’s going to be empty for always,” replied Macdonald. “Perhaps we could farm it together. Go and ask Jock to come in here, and tell him to bring another cup.”
Jock came in slowly and sat down when he was bid. Macdonald told him of Tim Healey’s story about someone having “dossed down” in the hay loft.
“Did you ever notice anything of the kind yourself, Jock, when you first looked round the shippon?”
“Aye, I noticed. I went up to the hay loft, to see if any of the hay up there was fit for fodder, Mr. Brough having said I could have it. And when I saw someone had rolled in the hay, made a bed of it as ’twere, why I thought, ‘That’d be Healey, having a nice rest, or sheltering from the weather.’ He was up there at High Garth a long time, some days. I reckon Mr. Brough thought he took a mighty long time to fodder a few beasts and that’s why Mr. Brough said, ‘That don’t suit.’ All of three bob an hour he pays Healey and more for overtime and Mr. Brough wasn’t paying good money for Healey to have a nice lie in t’ hay. And then he’s courting, Healey is. I don’t want to throw dirt at no one, but I reckon that fat lass of Healey’s came up there when he was there—and that’s how it could ’a been.”
“It certainly could,” rejoined Macdonald. “What do you think of Healey, Jock?”
“Not all that,” said Jock. “He’s good with beasts, but I did think he didn’t play fair with Mr. Brough. Wasted no end of time up at High Garth, Healey did, and ’twas time he was paid for. Then I never did like Irishmen.”
“Did you ever see Healey walking round the house?”
“Not so’s to notice. He’d come round to the back and over the fell, looking for beasts that had strayed. He’d have done better to fettle up those fences,” added Jock; “but Healey was never one to do a job when he hadn’t got to, and ’twas Mr. Brough’s fault in a manner of speaking, a lot of new posts was wanted and he ought to have sent some up on the tractor. Healey wasn’t going to carry posts all that way.” He paused a moment and then added, very slowly and solemnly: “ ’Tis this way, gaffer. You’ve found a dead man in that house. It’s easy to say, ‘Healey might ha’ downed him and left him there. Plenty of time he had to break in and all that.’ And easy for Healey to say, ‘Shearling, he lives close by, likely he did it.’ ”
“Oh, I know,” rejoined Macdonald, “but I’d say this: in my opinion that dead man had lain where we found him much longer than six months. In my judgment, his body had never been moved, he lay where he died. Now you and Betty have only been at Fellcock for six months. Before that yon lived in Gimmerdale, ten miles away. Did you ever come over to High Garth or Fellcock before I brought you over here last September? ”
“No, we didn’t,” replied Jock and Betty put in:
“ ’Twas no use. We knew Fellcock was for sale, but we’d no money. We never came here. Jock and me, we was both working, and we didn’t waste time walking over the fell all that way to look at steadings they was asking £4000 for. If it’d been £400, likely we’d have come, though we hadn’t four hundred neither. But we never came within miles of High Garth nor Fellcock till that day you brought us. The fifth of September that was, and I shall never forget it.”
“Well, you’ve nothing to worry about,” replied Macdonald.
Chapter Ten
THE MAN WHOM Betty Shearling had seen from the back windows of Fellcock had realised that he was visible from those windows. The instinct of the fugitive urged him to run, to hurry away, to get clear before he was pursued. He had seen Jock running across to High Garth after bending to examine Mr. Brough
