Page 72 - the-thirty-nine-steps

CHAPTER SIX

The Adventure of the

Bald Archaeologist

I spent the night on a shelf of the hillside, in the lee of a
boulder where the heather grew long and soft. It was a cold
business, for I had neither coat nor waistcoat. These were
in Mr Turnbull’s keeping, as was Scudder’s little book, my
watch and worst of all my pipe and tobacco pouch. Only my
money accompanied me in my belt, and about half a pound
of ginger biscuits in my trousers pocket.
I supped off half those biscuits, and by worming myself
deep into the heather got some kind of warmth. My spirits
had risen, and I was beginning to enjoy this crazy game of
hide-and-seek. So far I had been miraculously lucky. The
milkman, the literary innkeeper, Sir Harry, the roadman,
and the idiotic Marmie, were all pieces of undeserved good
fortune. Somehow the first success gave me a feeling that I
was going to pull the thing through.
My chief trouble was that I was desperately hungry.
When a Jew shoots himself in the City and there is an in-
quest, the newspapers usually report that the deceased was
‘well-nourished’. I remember thinking that they would not
call me well-nourished if I broke my neck in a bog-hole. I lay

72 The Thirty-Nine Steps