Bog-Myrtle and Peat Part 24

"Weel, he's won awa'!"

"Ay, ay, he is that!"

The minister's funeral was winding slowly out of the little manse loaning. The window-blinds were all down, and their bald whiteness, like sightless eyes looking out of the white-washed walls and the trampled snow, made the Free Church manse of Deeside no cheerful picture that wild New Year's Day. The green gate which had so long hung on one hinge, periodically mended ever since the minister's son broke the other swinging on it the summer of the dry year before he went to college, now swayed forward with a miserably forlorn lurch, as though it too had tried to follow the funeral procession of the man who had shut it carefully the last thing before he went to bed every night for forty years.

Andrew Malcolm, the Glencairn joiner, who was conducting the funeral--if, indeed, Scots funerals can ever be said to be conducted--had given it a too successful push to let the rickety hea.r.s.e have plenty of sea-room between the granite pillars. It was a long and straggling funeral, silent save for the words that stand at the opening of this tale, which ran up and down the long black files like the irregular fire of skirmishers.

"Ay, man, he's won awa'!"

"Ay, ay, he is that!"

This is the Scottish Lowland "coronach," characteristic and expressive as the wailing of the pipes to the Gael or the keening of women among the wild Eirionach.

"We are layin' the last o' the auld Andersons o' Deeside amang the mools the day," said Saunders M'Quhirr, the farmer of Drumquhat, to his friend Rob Adair of the Mains of Deeside, as they walked sedately together, neither swinging his arms as he would have done on an ordinary day.

Saunders had come all the way over Dee Water to follow the far-noted man of G.o.d to his rest.

"There's no siccan men noo as the Andersons o' Deeside," said Rob Adair, with a kind of pride and pleasure in his voice. "I'm a dale aulder than you, Saunders, an' I mind weel o' the faither o' him that's gane." (Rob had in full measure the curious South-country disinclination to speak directly of the dead.)

"Ay, an angry man he was that day in the '43 when him that's a cauld corp the day, left the kirk an' manse that his faither had pitten him intil only the year afore. For, of coorse, the lairds o' Deeside were the pawtrons o' the pairish; an' when the auld laird's yae son took it intil his head to be a minister, it was in the nature o' things that he should get the pairish.

"Weel, the laird didna speak to his son for the better part o' twa year; though mony a time he drave by to the Pairish Kirk when his son was haudin' an ootdoor service at the Auld Wa's where the three roads meet.

For nae _sicht_ could they get on a' Deeside for kirk or manse, because frae the Dullarg to Craig Ronald a' belanged to the laird. The minister sent the wife an' bairns to a sma' hoose in Cairn Edward, an' lodged himsel' amang sic o' the farmers as werena feared for his faither's factor. Na, an' speak to his son the auld man wadna, for the very dourness o' him. Ay, even though the minister wad say to his faither, 'Faither, wull ye no' speak to yer ain son?' no' ae word wad he answer, but pa.s.s him as though he hadna seen him, as muckle as to say--'Nae son o' mine!'

"But a week or twa after the minister had lost yon twa nice bairns wi'

the scarlet fever, his faither an' him forgathered at the fishin'--whaur he had gane, thinkin' to jook the sair thochts that he carried aboot wi'

him, puir man. They were baith keen fishers an' graun' at it. The minister was for liftin' his hat to his faither an' gaun by, but the auld man stood still in the middle o' the fit-pad wi' a gey queer look in his face. 'Wattie!' he said, an' for ae blink the minister thocht that his faither was gaun to greet, a thing that he had never seen him do in a' his life. But the auld man didna greet. 'Wattie,' says he to his son, 'hae ye a huik?'

"Ay, Saunders, that was a' he said, an' the minister juist gied him the huik and some half-dizzen fine flees forbye, an' the twa o' them never said _Disruption_ mair as lang as they leeved.

"'Ye had better see the factor aboot pittin' up a meetin'-hoose and a decent dwallin', gin ye hae left kirk and manse!' That was a' that the auld laird ever said, as his son gaed up stream and he down.

"Ay, he's been a sair-tried man in his time, your minister, but he's a'

by wi't the day," continued Saunders M'Quhirr, as they trudged behind the hea.r.s.e.

"Did I ever tell ye, Rob, aboot seem' young Walter--his boy that gaed wrang, ye ken--when I was up in London the year afore last? Na? 'Deed, I telled naebody binna the mistress. It was nae guid story to tell on Deeside!

"Weel, I was up, as ye ken, at Barnet Fair wi' some winter beasts, so I bade a day or twa in London, doin' what sma' business I had, an' seein'

the sichts as weel, for it's no' ilka day that a Deeside body finds themsel's i' London.

"Ae nicht wha should come in but a Cairn Edward callant that served his time wi' Maxwell in the _Advertiser_ office. He had spoken to me at the show, pleased to see a Gallawa' face, nae doot. And he telled me he was married an' workin' on the _Times_. An' amang ither things back an'

forrit, he telled me that the minister o' Deeside's son was here. 'But,'

says he, 'I'm feared that he's comin' to nae guid.' I kenned that the laddie hadna been hame to his faither an' his mither for a maitter o'

maybe ten year, so I thocht that I wad like to see the lad for his faither's sake. So in a day or twa I got his address frae the reporter lad, an' fand him after a lang seek doon in a gey queer place no' far frae where Tammas Carlyle leeves, near the water-side. I thocht that there was nae ill bits i' London but i' the East-end; but I learned different.

"I gaed up the stair o' a wee brick hoose nearly tumlin' doon wi' its ain wecht--a perfect rickle o' brick--an' chappit. A la.s.s opened the door after a wee, no' that ill-lookin', but toosy aboot the heid an'

unco shilpit aboot the face.

"'What do you want?' says she, verra sharp an' clippit in her mainner o'

speech.

"'Does Walter Anderson o' Deeside bide here?' I asked, gey an' plain, as ye ken a body has to speak to thae Englishers that barely can understand their ain language.

"'What may you want with him?' says she.

"'I come frae Deeside,' says I--no' that I meaned to lichtly my ain pairish, but I thocht that the la.s.sie micht no' be acquant wi' the name o' Whunnyliggate. 'I come frae Deeside, an' I ken Walter Anderson's faither.'

"'That's no recommend,' says she. 'The mair's the peety,' says I, 'for he's a daicent man.'

"So she took ben my name, that I had nae cause to be ashamed o', an'

syne she brocht word that I was to step in. So ben I gaed, an' it wasna a far step, eyther, for it was juist ae bit garret room; an' there on a bed in the corner was the minister's laddie, lookin' nae aulder than when he used to swing on the yett an' chase the hens. At the verra first glint I gat o' him I saw that Death had come to him, and come to bide.

His countenance was barely o' this earth--sair disjaskit an' no' manlike ava'--mair like a la.s.sie far gane in a decline; but raised-like too, an'

wi' a kind o' defiance in it, as if he was darin' the Almichty to His face. O man, Rob, I hope I may never see the like again."

"Ay, man, Saunders, ay, ay!" said Rob Adair, who, being a more demonstrative man than his friend, had been groping in the tail of his "blacks" for the handkerchief that was in his hat. Then Rob forgot, in the pathos of the story, what he was searching for, and walked for a considerable distance with his hand deep in the pocket of his tail-coat.

The farmer of Drumquhat proceeded on his even way.

"The la.s.sie that I took to be his wife (but I asked nae questions) was awfu' different ben the room wi' him frae what she was wi' me at the door--fleechin' like wi' him to tak' a sup o' soup. An' when I gaed forrit to speak to him on the puir bit bed, she cam' by me like stour, wi' the water happin' off her cheeks, like hail in a simmer thunder-shoo'er."

"Puir bit la.s.sockie!" muttered Rob Adair, who had three daughters of his own at home, as he made another absent-minded and unsuccessful search for his handkerchief. "There's a smurr o' rain beginnin' to fa', I think," he said, apologetically.

"'An' ye're Sandy MacWhurr frae Drumquhat,' says the puir lad on the bed. 'Are your sugar-plums as guid as ever?'

"What a quastion to speer on a dying bed, Saunders!" said Rob.

"'Deed, ye may say it. Weel, frae that he gaed on talkin' aboot hoo Fred Robson an' him stole the hale o' the Drumquhat plooms ae back-end, an'

hoo they gat as far as the horse waterin'-place wi' them when the dogs gat after them. He threepit that it was me that set the dogs on, but I never did that, though I didna conter him. He said that Fred an' him made for the seven-fit march dike, but hadna time to mak' ower it. So there they had to sit on the tap o' a thorn-bush in the meadow on their hunkers, wi' the dogs fair loupin' an' yowlin' to get haud o' them. Then I cam' doon mysel' an' garred them turn every pooch inside oot. He minded, too, that I was for hingin' them baith up by the heels, till what they had etten followed what had been in their pooches. A' this he telled juist as he did when he used to come ower to hae a bar wi' the la.s.sies, in the forenichts after he cam' hame frae the college the first year. But the lad was laughin' a' the time in a way I didna like. It wasna natural--something hard an' frae the teeth oot, as ye micht say--maist peetifu' in a callant like him, wi' the deid-licht shinin'

already in the blue een o' him."

"D'ye no' mind, Saunders, o' him comin' hame frae the college wi' a hantle o' medals an' prizes?" said Rob Adair, breaking in as if he felt that he must contribute his share to the memories which shortened, if they did not cheer, their road. "His faither was rael prood o' him, though it wasna his way to say muckle. But his mither could talk aboot naething else, an' carriet his picture aboot wi' her a' ower the pairish in her wee black retical basket. Fegs, a gipsy wife gat a saxpence juist for speerin' for a sicht o' it, and cryin', 'Blessings on the laddie's bonny face!'"

"Weel," continued Saunders, imperturbably taking up the thread of his narrative amid the blattering of the snow, "I let the lad rin on i' this way for a while, an' then says I, 'Walter, ye dinna ask after yer faither!'

"'No, I don't,' says he, verra short. 'Nell, gie me the draught.' So wi'

that the la.s.sie gied her een a bit quick dab, syne cam' forrit, an'

pittin' her airm aneath his heid she gied him a drink. Whatever it was, it quaitened him, an' he lay back tired-like.

"'Weel,' said I, after a wee, 'Walter, gin ye'll no' speer for yer faither, maybe ye'll speer for yer ain mither?'

"Walter Anderson turned his heid to the wa'. 'Oh, my mither! my ain mither!' he said, but I could hardly hear him sayin' it. Then more fiercely than he had yet spoken he turned on me an' said, 'Wha sent ye here to torment me before my time?'

"I saw young Walter juist yince mair in life. I stepped doon to see him the next mornin' when the end was near. He was catchin' and twitchin' at the coverlet, liftin' up his hand an' lookin' at it as though it was somebody else's. It was a black fog outside, an' even in the garret it took him in his throat till he couldna get breath.

"He motioned for me to sit doon beside him. There was nae chair, so I e'en gat doon on my knees. The la.s.s stood white an' quaite at the far side o' the bed. He turned his een on me, blue an' bonnie as a bairn's; but wi' a licht in them that telled he had eaten o' the tree o'

knowledge, and that no' seldom.