The Ashiel Mystery

He felt he could trust the discretion of this taciturn Highlander.

"I'll that, sir," was the reply.

And Gimblet could see, in spite of the man's unchanging countenance, that he was pleased at this mark of confidence in him.

"Could you take me to the head gardener's house?" he asked, abruptly changing the subject. "I should rather like a talk with him."

McGregor conducted him down the road to the lodge.

"It's in here whar Angus Malcolm lives," he remarked laconically. "Good evening, sir."

He turned and strode away over the hillside, and Gimblet knocked at the door. It was opened by the gardener, and he had a glimpse through the open doorway of a family at tea.

"I'm sorry I disturbed you," he said. "I will look in again another day. Lord Ashiel referred me to you for the name of a rose I asked about, but it will do to-morrow."

The gardener assured him that his tea could wait, but Gimblet would not detain him.

"I shall no doubt see you up in the garden to-morrow," he said. "The roses in that long bed outside the library are very fine, and I am interested in their culture. I wonder they do so well in this peaty soil."

"Na fie, man, they get on splendid here," said Malcolm. He liked nothing better than to talk about his flowers, but, being a Highlander, resented any suggestion that his native earth was not the best possible for no matter what purpose. "We just gie them a good dressin' doon wie manure ilka year."

"Do you use any patent fertilizer?" Gimblet asked.

"Oh, just a clean oot wie a grain o' basic slag noo and than," said the gardener. "And I just gie them some lime ilka time I think the ground is needin' it."

"Well, the result is very good," said the detective. "By the way, have you been working on that bed lately? I picked this up among the violas. Did you happen to drop it?"

He took from his pocket a small paper notebook, and held it out interrogatively.

"Na, I hinna dropped it," answered the gardener. "It micht have been some one fay the castel. I hinna been near that rose-bed for fower or five days. And it couldna hae been lying there afore the rain."

Indeed, the little book showed no trace of damp on its green cover.

"I asked in the castle, but no one claimed it," said Gimblet. "Perhaps it belongs to one of your men?"