The Thirty-Nine Steps

-Fly Fi

ly discomfort. Those lentonite fumes had fairly poisoned me, and the baking hours on the dovecot hadn't helped matters. I had a crushing headache, and felt

to me that the sooner I got in touch with the Foreign Office man, Sir Walter Bullivant, the better. I didn't see how I could get more proof than I had got already. He mu

the places, but I believe this stream was no less than the upper waters of the river Tweed. I calculated I must be about eighteen miles distant, and that meant I could not get there before morning. So I must lie up a day somewhere, for I was too outrageous a figure to be seen in the sunlight

a decent old body, and a plucky one, for though she got a fright when she saw me, she had an axe handy, and would have used it on any evil-doer. I told her that I had had a fall-I didn't say how-and she saw by my looks that I was pretty sick.

'giving it to them that had a right to it'. At this I protested so strongly that I think she believed me honest, for she took the money and gave me a warm new plaid for it, and an old hat of her man's. She show

a burn, where a drift of dead brackens made a tolerable bed. There I managed to sleep till nightfall, waking very cramped and wretched, wi

had some nasty falls into peat-bogs. I had only about ten miles to go as the crow flies, but my mistakes made it nearer twenty. The last bit was completed with set teeth and a very

ancient but well-tended suit of black; he had been shaved not later than the night before; he wore

travaigin' here on the Sa

ays. So the Sabbath was the r

uld not frame a coherent answer. But he

t my specs

of my trouser pocke

e said. 'Come in-bye. Losh, man, ye're terrible d

out, while my shoulder and the effects of the fumes combined to make me feel pretty bad. Before I knew, Mr Turnbull

dman. His wife was dead years ago, and sin

the fever took its course, and when my skin was cool again I found that the bout had more or less cured my should

e. When I was getting better, he never bothered me with a question. Several times he fetched me a two days' old Scotsman, and I noticed that the interest in the Portland Place murde

r. 'There's a terrible heap o' siller in't,' he s

if anybody had been around making inquirie

daft. But he keepit on at me, and syne I said he maun be thinkin' o' my gude-brither frae the Cleuch that w

twelfth day of June, and as luck would have it a drover went past that morning taking some cattle to Moffat. He was

ively rude when I pressed him, and shy and red, and took the money at last without a thank you. When I told him how much I owed him, h

prices, and he made up his mind I was a 'pack-shepherd' from those parts-whatever that may be. My plaid and my old hat, as I have said, gav

own hills and far green meadows, and a continual sound of larks and curlews and falling streams. But I had no mind for the summer, and little

to fill up the time I went up on the hillside and fell asleep, for the walk had tired me. I all but slept too long, and had to run to the station and catch the train with two min

I was in a land of lush water-meadows and slow reedy streams. About eight o'clock in the evening, a weary and travel-stained being-a cross between a farm-labourer and a vet-with a checked black-and-white plaid over his a

e limes and chestnuts and lilac bushes were domes of blossom. Presently I came to a bridge, below which a clear slow stream flowed between snowy beds of water-buttercups. A little above it was a mill; and the las

a huge man in untidy old flannels and a wide-brimmed hat, with a canvas bag slung on his shoulder. He nodded to me, and I thought I had neve

y against the Test. Look at that big fellow. Four pounds if he's

see him

from the reeds just

You might swear he

whistled another ba

he said over his shoulder, his

o say, Yes.' I had forg

name,' he observed, grinning broadly at a mo

brow and the firm folds of cheek, and began to think that here at last w

ice. 'Disgraceful that an able-bodied man like you should dare to beg

an who raised his whip to salute the fisher

e a hundred yards on. 'Wait five minutes and then g

n to the stream, and a perfect jungle of guelder-rose and lilac flankin

with all the fixings, a brown flannel suit, shirts, collars, ties, shaving things and hair-brushes, even a pair of patent shoes. 'Sir Walter thought as how Mr Reggie's things would fit you, Sir,'

could not guess. I looked at myself in the mirror and saw a wild, haggard brown fellow, with a fortnight's ragged beard, and dust in ears and eyes, collarless, vulgarly shirted, with shapeless old tweed clothes and boots that

thed luxuriously, and got into the dress clothes and clean crackling shirt, which fitted me n

and established and secure, the embodiment of law and government and all the conventions-took me aback and made me feel an interloper

clear,' I said. 'I'm an innocent man, but I'm wanted by the police. I'

e proud, for we drank a good champagne and had some uncommon fine port afterwards. It made me almost hysterical to be sitting there, waited on by a footman and a sleek butler, and remember that I had been living for three weeks lik

r I got rid of this business and had a house of my own, I would create just such a room. Then when the coffee-cups were cleared aw

the bribe he offered me was that you would tell

art that he called

back to find Scudder gibbering on my doorstep. I told him all Scudder had told me abou

He heard all about the milkman and my time in Gall

ply, and drew a long breath when I wh

ed my meeting with Sir Harry, and the speeches

He's as good a chap as ever breathed, but his idiot of an

ows in the car very closely, and seemed to be raking back in his memo

e solemnized him. Again I had to des

ynamited his hermitage, after he had saved you from the police. Spirited piece of work, that!' Prese

our mind,' he said. 'You're in no

ried. 'Have they

ight they have dropped you

asked in

honest. The trouble about him was his partiality for playing a lone hand. That made him pretty well useless in any Secret Service-a pity, for he had uncommon gifts. I

been dead a

te decease. His communications usually took a week to reach me, for they were sent under c

he say?' I

I got it I went to Scotland Yard, went over the details of the inquest, and concluded that you were the friend. We made inquiries about you, Mr Hannay, and found you were respectable. I thought I knew the motives for your disappearance-not only the police, the other o

he little note-boo

picking it up. He emended my reading of it on several points, but I had been fairly correct

itself. But all this about war and the Black Stone-it reads like some wild melodrama. If only I had more confidence in Scudder's judgement. The trouble about him was that he was too romanti

ng up to Berlin and Vienna and giving my Chief some uneasy moments. No! Scudder has gone off the track there. Frankly, Hannay, I don't believe that part of his story. There's some nasty business afoot, and he found out too much and lost his life over it. But I am ready to take my oath that it is ordinary spy wo

e butler ent

Sir Walter. It's Mr 'Eath, and he

t off to th

logize to the shade of Scudder,' he said. 'Karolides wa