There’s a son, I believe.’

Lamancha closed the atlas.

‘Do you know any of these people, Archie?’ he asked.

‘Only the Claybodys – very slightly. I stayed with them in Suffolk for a covert shoot two years ago. The Radens have been to call on me, but I was out. The Bandicotts – that’s the Americans – are new this year.’

‘Is the sport good?’

‘The very best. Haripol is about the steepest and most sportin’ forest in the Highlands, and Glenraden is nearly as good. There’s no forest at Strathlarrig, but, as I’ve told you, amazin’ good salmon fishin’. For a west coast river, I should put the Larrig only second to the Laxford.’

Lamancha consulted the atlas again and appeared to ponder. Then he lifted his head, and his long face, which had a certain heaviness and sullenness in repose, was now lit by a smile which made it handsomer and younger.

‘Could you have me at Crask this autumn?’ he asked. ‘My wife has to go to Aix for a cure and I have no plans after the House rises.’

‘I should jolly well think so,’ cried Archie. ‘There’s heaps of room in the old house, and I promise you I’ll make you comfortable. Look here, you fellows! Why shouldn’t all three of you come? I can get in a couple of extra maids from Inverlarrig.’

‘Excellent idea,’ said Lamancha. ‘But you mustn’t bother about the maids. I’ll bring my own man, and we’ll have a male establishment, except for Mrs Lithgow ... By the way, I suppose you can count on Mrs Lithgow?’

‘How do you mean, “count”?’ asked Archie, rather puzzled. Then a difficulty struck him. ‘But wouldn’t you be bored? I can’t show you much in the way of sport, and you’re not naturalists like me. It’s a quiet life, you know.’

‘I shouldn’t be bored,’ said Lamancha, ‘I should take steps to prevent it.’

Leithen and Palliser-Yeates seemed to divine his intention, for they simultaneously exclaimed. – ‘It isn’t fair to excite Archie, Charles,’ the latter said. ‘You know that you’ll never do it.’

‘I intend to have a try. Hang it, John, it’s the specific we were talking about – devilish difficult, devilish unpleasant, and calculated to make a man long for a dull life. Of course you two fellows will join me.’

‘What on earth are you talkin’ about?’ said the mystified Archie. ‘Join what?’

‘We’re proposing to quarter ourselves on you, my lad, and take a leaf out of Jim Tarras’s book.’

Sir Archie first stared, then he laughed nervously, then he called upon his gods, then he laughed freely and long. ‘Do you really mean it? What an almighty rag! ... But hold on a moment. It will be rather awkward for me to take a hand. You see I’ve just been adopted as prospective candidate for that part of the country.’

‘So much the better. If you’re found out – which you won’t be – you’ll get the poaching vote solid, and a good deal more. Most men at heart are poachers.’

Archie shook a doubting head. ‘I don’t know about that. They’re an awfully respectable lot up there, and all those dashed stalkers and keepers and gillies are a sort of trade-union.