Cousin Kate Read online

  ‘Not I!’ he said, his eyes gleaming, and a rather unpleasant smile curling his beautiful lips. ‘I’m going to keep it, and I know where, too! Disturbed by the bangs, indeed! That’s a loud one! Doing it rather too brown, my dear mama!’

  ‘Torquil, you should not speak so of your mother!’ Kate said earnestly. ‘It is most improper! Besides, how can you tell that she is not speaking the truth? Many people have the greatest dread of sudden noises, you know – and not hen-hearted people either!’

  She was interrupted by her unknown acquaintance, who once more bounded up to her, this time with the desiccated remains of a very dead mole, which he spat at her feet, plainly feeling that it must be acceptable to her. ‘Ugh!’ she exclaimed. ‘What a horrid animal you are! No, I don’t want it!’

  ‘Where did that dog come from?’ asked Torquil shrilly.

  ‘I haven’t the least idea. I suspect him of playing truant. He has been trying to induce me to play with him!’

  ‘I hate dogs! I’ll shoot him!’ said Torquil.

  ‘Shoot him?’ Kate cried. ‘You will do no such thing!’

  ‘Oh, yes, I will! He’s a savage dog, and a stray!’

  ‘Don’t be so absurd! He’s not at all savage!’ said Kate wrathfully. ‘Why, he –’ She stopped, becoming aware suddenly that the dog was growling at Torquil, bristling, and backing away from him.

  She moved forward to soothe him just as Torquil fired. The shot missed both her and the dog by several inches, and its only effects were to send the dog off in a panic, and to shock her into frozen immobility. Torquil sent the second charge after the flying animal. It failed to hit its target, but peppered the trunk of the tree. ‘Hell and damnation!’ swore Torquil furiously.

  ‘How dare you?’ demanded Kate, recovering her voice. ‘Do you realize that if you had shot wide to the left instead of to the right you might have killed me?’

  ‘You shouldn’t have moved,’ he said sulkily. ‘I wasn’t trying to shoot you !’

  ‘Oh, I am so much obliged to you!’ Kate flashed.

  He started to speak, but broke off as his valet came running up, out of breath, but managing to gasp: ‘No, no, sir! Now, Master Torquil, give over, do! Let me have that gun!’

  Torquil spun round, pointing the gun at him, and saying between his teeth: ‘Oh, no, you don’t, Badger! Keep off !’

  Badger halted abruptly. ‘Now, you know that’s foolishness, Master Torquil!’ he said, in fondly chiding accents. ‘Give it to me, like a good boy! Whatever must Miss be thinking of you? And whatever would her ladyship say, if she got to hear you’d stolen one of Sir Timothy’s guns? Now, you give it to me quiet-like, and I’ll put it back where it belongs, and no more said!’

  ‘Come and take it from me – if you dare!’ said Torquil tauntingly.

  ‘Please to go away, miss!’ begged Badger, keeping his eyes on the gun. ‘I won’t be answerable for it if you was to get hurt! Master Torquil, you’re scaring Miss, and that I’ll be bound you don’t want to do!’

  ‘He is not scaring me at all!’ declared Kate, in a cold rage. ‘He discharged both barrels, and the gun is unloaded!’ She walked up to Torquil, and held out her hand. ‘Give me that gun, if you please! Unless you mean to hit me over the head with it?’

  The wicked glitter died out of his eyes, and he began to giggle. ‘Oh, coz, what a jokesmith you are! Always full of gig! I wouldn’t beat your brains out on any account! You are too pretty!’

  She removed the gun from his slackened grip, and handed it to Badger, who received it wordlessly, but with obvious relief. Torquil watched the transfer, and sighed. ‘I was trying to shoot a dog,’ he explained. ‘I missed him, but not by so very much, Badger! Oh, Kate, dearest Kate, don’t be in a pelter! don’t go away! I swear to you I didn’t mean to shoot at you!’

  ‘No, I don’t suppose you did,’ she replied. ‘But until you have learnt to mend your temper you need not look to me to advance your cause! I am more likely to advise your mama to sweep the gunroom bare! You are not to be trusted with firearms, Torquil!’

  She left him glowering, just as Dr Delabole came hurrying up. He looked to be very much alarmed, but when he saw that Badger was in possession of the gun some of the anxiety left his face, and he heaved a sigh of relief. He came from the direction of the house, and met Kate before he was within tongue-shot of Torquil. He stood in her path, making it necessary for her to stop, and asked, in an urgent undervoice: ‘What has happened, Miss Kate? I heard a couple of shots!’

  ‘Torquil was firing at a dog,’ she replied reticently.

  ‘Oh, if that was all – !’

  ‘All?’ she repeated, as though she could not believe her ears. ‘Upon my word, sir, you take it very calmly! For my part, I think it iniquitous! How could he have done such a thing?’

  ‘Yes, yes, it was very bad – iniquitous indeed! But he doesn’t like dogs, you know. In fact he suffers from a positive antipathy!’

  ‘The antipathy was shared by the dog!’ snapped Kate. ‘Nothing could have been more friendly than the dog’s attitude to me, but he bristled and growled at Torquil! No doubt his instinct warned him to beware!’

  ‘Very true! The instinct that tells dogs that they stand in danger is most remarkable. The thing is that Torquil was once, when he was a child, severely bitten by a dog – a big retriever it was, belonging to Sir Timothy! The experience left an indelible impression on the poor boy’s mind.’

  ‘It doesn’t excuse his conduct in trying to shoot a dog that belongs to someone else!’ retorted Kate.

  ‘Of course not! Of course it does not! I daresay he felt that he had a right to shoot a stray dog that was, no doubt, hunting on his land – which, in point of fact, he had, you know. Not that I wish to say it was not very wrong of him! Very wrong indeed! But you must be aware, Miss Kate, how easily he flies up into the boughs! Quite loses control of himself ! He suffers from irritation of the nerves, and if he was frightened, you know, his impulse would be to protect himself. I haven’t the least doubt that he fired at the dog without pausing to think!’

  ‘I haven’t any doubt of that either,’ said Kate dryly. ‘He is not fit to be allowed to handle guns, and so I have told him!’

  ‘Indeed no! Most certainly not!’ he said. ‘But pray don’t be afraid, Miss Kate! I can promise you that it won’t happen again!’

  She inclined her head, making it plain that she wished to proceed on her way, and he immediately stood aside, bowing very politely, and again reassuring her that she need not be anxious.

  She went on towards the house, regaining the avenue, and walking slowly along it. She was not afraid, but she was a good deal disturbed, because it had seemed to her, for a few seconds, that the expression on Torquil’s face had been almost fiendish. She shivered, and was forced to remind herself that as soon as the dog had vanished from sight so too had the fiendish look from Torquil’s face, and so swiftly that she could not be sure that she had not imagined it. He had certainly levelled his gun at Badger, but Kate was much inclined to think that he had done so only to frighten the valet, and would not have fired it even if it had been loaded, which he must have known it was not. Remembering the wary look in Badger’s eyes, and his urgent entreaty to her to go away, it occurred to her that he really was frightened, standing stock-still for fear that Torquil would pull the trigger. But Kate knew that he was devoted to Torquil, and had looked after him almost since he was first breeched, and it seemed incredible to her that he could have supposed himself to be in danger. It was as though Sarah had been terrified of herself when, in one of her childhood’s rages, she had been crossed, and had threatened all sorts of revenges. A smile hovered at the corners of Kate’s mouth as she thought of Sarah’s responses to fits of temper in her nursling. ‘Throw that ink-pot at me, Miss Kate, and you’ll go supperless to bed!’ Sarah would have said, wholly unimpressed by de