Dark Mountain

Chapter One-2

'Well, here we are,' Charlie packed away her notebook and pencil. 'Let the great adventure begin.'

I had never been to the Strathnasealg Inn before so studied the building and its surroundings before I left the car. The Inn sat within a group of small fields, most of which had been recently harvested to leave stubble on bare brown earth. The Strathnasealg appeared to be a typical Highland hotel, a one-time shooting lodge built in late Victorian times in the Scottish Baronial style with dormer windows overlooking the views on all sides. More like a castle than an Inn, it shrugged off the mist that the westerly wind encouraged to drift across its splendid towers. Lights glowed inside, revealing a vast bar decorated with stags' heads and a gaudy tartan carpet.

'We're here!' Kate announced her arrival by hooting her car horn. 'Porters! We have luggage!'

'That will make us popular,' Mary murmured. 'For God's sake, shut up, Katie!'

A young freckle-faced man acted as porter, grinning as he lifted the first two bags of Katy's luggage and promising to return for the rest.

'I'll carry my own,' Charlie growled.

'Follow me, girls,' Kate commanded, and we trooped into the Inn.

A group of tweed-clad men in the bar turned to watch us enter. One muttered 'Good God' and turned away, while another gave us a friendly smile. His eyes were shrewd and shaded. I immediately knew that he had endured much.

Our rooms were small, decorated in the height of fashion perhaps twenty years previously and without plumbing, none of which mattered when we looked out of the window to see the most glorious vista of hills, sea and moors. I shared my room with Mary, while Lorna and Charlie were next door and Kate and Christine in the best room in the hotel.

'The bed's not bad,' Mary bounced experimentally. 'A bit creaky perhaps.'

'I've slept in worse, and it's only for one night.' I changed my travelling clothes into something less comfortable. 'Let's see what the food is like.'

'Probably vile,' Mary said. 'These Highland inns usually are.'

Mary was wrong. The Strathnasealg was noted for the quality of its seafood and had added venison and an excellent Aberdeen Angus beef to the locally caught salmon and haddock. I opted for the Cullen skink soup to go with my saddle of mutton and finished with a glass of what was meant to be a fine French wine. I was somewhat doubtful about both the adjective and the geographical origin but dutifully swallowed it down. I was not too happy about the quality of the bread either, although as nobody else complained, I kept my tongue still.

'Shall we repair to the lounge, ladies?' Kate invited. We all knew that ladies would not frequent such a place yet we liked to shock and followed Kate into that sacred domain of men.

The smell of expensive pipe tobacco and whisky wrapped around us the second we pushed open the double multi-paned doors. The carpet underfoot was faded Black Watch tartan, while glassy-eyed deer-heads stared at us from their position on the walls. As the Strathnasealg was a climbing inn, the company was mixed and exclusively masculine. As well as the hirsute locals with their ubiquitous black-and-white collie dogs and silent gazes there was a plethora of mountaineers and hill walkers all intent on maps and routes and serious discussions of past glories and future conquests. The advent of half a dozen of the fairer s*x certainly unsettled their private little kingdom.

While Kate requisitioned a table and its attendant chairs, Charlie strolled to the bar. The eyes of every man in the room followed her, most disapproving, either of her very short hair or her presence in their world. The man who had smiled at us when we entered the Inn watched musingly, stroking his military moustache. His companions did not mute their comments.

'Good God, they've let women in here.'

'Don't they know this is a climbing inn?'

'They must be in the wrong place, surely.'

'It's bad enough granting them the vote without having to share the bar with them.'

Sudden blindness seemed to strike the barman when Charlie pinged the little brass bell for his attention.

'I say! Custom!' Charlie shouted until the barman shambled up as if reluctant to take her money. He stared at Charlie as she ordered a bottle of the house wine.

'We don't have wine,' he said.

'What do you stock?' Charlie kept her tone reasonable.

'Whisky.'

'Excuse me, ladies.' Kate pushed herself up from her seat at our table and sauntered to Charlie's side. 'The inn serves wine for meals,' she said. 'I am sure you could pop through and find some for your customers.' She presented the barman with her best smile. 'We'll wait here until you return.' Her voice hardened a fraction. 'Off you go now, Alan.'

The barman's face darkened as the noise in the bar quietened into a tense hush. 'I did not tell you my name.'

'You are Alan Finlay; you are 26 years old. You were a steward in the Royal Navy in the late war and took this position in June 1920.' Kate pointed to the back of the bar. 'The door there leads to the kitchen and the stairs down to the storeroom are on the left. I presume that's where the hotel holds the wine.'

Alan looked shaken. 'How do you know that?'

'My family owns this hotel,' Kate said. 'Off you go.' She turned away to talk to Charlie. The voice of authority had spoken.

I saw Mary's face darken. 'What's the matter, Mary?'

'Oh, nothing.' Mary's smile was forced. 'Nothing at all.'

The taller, saturnine man who came in Alan's place was apparently the manager. 'I did not know you had honoured us with your presence, your Ladyship.'

'That title belongs to my mother,' Kate said. 'I use the title The Honourable Miss Gordon.'

'Of course.' The manager gave a little bow and held out a hand. 'I am Maurice Nott. I do so apologise for my barman's inefficiency. Of course, we have wine, and it will be on the house.' His accent was southern English.

'Thank you, Mr Nott.' Kate accepted the complimentary wine with the ease of long habit.

'Of course, if I had realised that it was you, I would have served you in person.' Nott gave an obsequious smile that immediately repulsed me. 'Would you permit me to offer my apologies and honour the hotel by accepting my offer of providing free lunches tomorrow?'

Kate remained polite and aloof. 'Thank you, but we are going off to the hills tomorrow.'

'Then I shall arrange for a full packed lunch for all your party, Miss Gordon.'

'That will be acceptable,' Kate said. 'There are six of us, and we intend to be at least three days.'

Nott bowed again. 'I assure you will enjoy our packed lunches. We grow our own vegetables and grain here and have, I believe, the only rye bread made in Scotland.'

'Thank you.' Kate remained cool. 'One of my party has a fondness for marmalade.'

I smiled over at Kate, surprised that she knew my particular tastes.

'I shall ensure that one packed lunch contains marmalade sandwiches.'

'Thank you. Dundee marmalade if you have it, and if you could send over a couple of bottles of the house red, that would suit,' Kate said, 'and a couple of bottles of claret.' She returned to our table without a smile. Kate was used to having people jump to obey her.

'Are you ladies sightseeing?' The man who had smiled limped across to talk to us. About forty years old, with weather-battered features and a strong chin, he seated himself beside us and waved a dismissive hand toward the men in the lounge. 'Don't concern yourselves with them; they are just not used to seeing women in here.'

'We're the Edinburgh Ladies Mountaineer Club,' Kate told him. 'I am Kathleen Gordon.'

'Ah,' the man nodded. 'I am Graham Mackenzie. How do you do?' He shook hands with us one-by-one.

'Christine Brown.' Quiet Christine did not raise her eyes.

'Mary Ablach.' Direct and to the point, Mary held Mackenzie's gaze.

'Brenda Smith.' I found his handshake pleasantly firm.

'Brenda Smith.' Mackenzie gave me a level look. 'You're no stranger here.'

'I am,' I said. 'I've never been here in my life before.'

'No?' Mackenzie frowned. 'I'm certain I've seen you before.' He shrugged. 'You must have a twin sister.' His smile was apologetic as I wished that I did have a twin sister.

'Lorna Menzies.' Lorna opened her mouth as if to speak further and then closed it again.

'I am Charlie Gunn, Graham.' Charlie gripped Mackenzie's hand.

'Are you Major Graham Mackenzie who won the Military Cross at Passchendaele?' Lorna asked.

When Major Mackenzie nodded agreement without any further elaboration, my respect for him increased.

'You lost your left leg rescuing two of your wounded men,' Lorna said.

Mackenzie still did not pursue his heroism. 'Edinburgh Ladies Mountaineering Club?' He said, 'it must be the season for active ladies. Catriona, my wife, is sailing around the British Isles even as we speak.' His blue eyes twinkled. 'She should be hereabouts in a week.' I understood that he was informing us of his marital state to reassure us his intentions were innocent. 'We don't get many lady climbers in here. In fact, I think you are the only ladies we have ever had. Are you after a Munro?'

Sir Hugh Munro had died only two years previously. He was the most famous of Scottish mountaineers, having catalogued and climbed all the Scottish hills over 3000 feet. In respect, all Scottish hills over that height were known as Munros.

'Not this time,' Kate said. 'We're off on an expedition to conquer the most interesting hill in north-west Scotland.'

Mackenzie looked immediately interested. 'Tip top! Whither bound? Suilven? Canisp? Stac Polly?' He rattled off a list of the most famous local peaks.

'Each of these is well worth climbing,' Kate answered for us all. 'But we have a different hill in mind.'

'Ah, Ben More Assynt then,' Mackenzie nodded. 'A tremendous hill.'

'No,' Kate said. 'Not Ben More either.'

'Oh?' Mackenzie raised his bushy eyebrows. He sipped at his whisky, looking eager. 'Where then, if I am not too nosey?'

'An Cailleach,' Kate told him.

'An Cailleach? The hill known as the dark mountain?' Mackenzie's smile quickly faded. 'You understand that nobody has ever climbed that hill. It's not even a Munro.'

'We know,' Charlie said. 'It's only 2,995 feet high, and we don't know for sure that nobody has ever climbed it. There have been attempts.'

Mackenzie sipped at his whisky. 'As far as I know, Miss Gunn, every attempt failed, either through bad weather or some other reason. The last attempt was in '14.'

'The Mahoney expedition,' Charlie had her notebook and pencil ready.

'Exactly. Three men set off to conquer An Cailleach, and nothing was ever heard from them again. With the Great War starting, the news of their disappearance faded from the newspapers, and now they are forgotten.'

'They are not quite forgotten,' Charlie said. 'We remember them.' She glanced at Kate before she continued. 'Perhaps you could tell us what you know of the Mahoney expedition, Major Mackenzie?'

'I don't know much,' Mackenzie admitted. 'I was with the Cameron Highlanders at the time, waiting for the balloon to go up. Most of the local men were. I was one of the lucky ones; I came back.'

'What could you tell us, Major Mackenzie?' Charlie leaned forward in her chair. 'Any little snippet of information could be helpful.'

Mackenzie signalled for another whisky. 'There were three men in the party,' he said, 'Mike Mahoney was an experienced Irish climber. He learned his trade in Ireland and climbed all over the Alps so a wee Scottish ben should have been nothing more than an afternoon jaunt for him. Maybe he was too casual.'