John Splendid Part 17

A constraint fell on us; it may have been there before, but only now I felt it myself. I changed the conversation, thinking that perhaps the child's case was too delicate a subject, but unhappily made the plundering of our glens my dolorous text, and gloom fell like a mort-cloth on our little company. If my friend was easily uplifted, made buoyantly cheerful by the least accident of life, he was as p.r.o.ne to a h.e.l.lish melancholy when fate lay low. For the rest of the afternoon he was ever staving with a gloomy brow about the neighbourhood, keeping an eye, as he said, to the possible chance of the enemy.

Left thus for long s.p.a.ces in the company of Betty and the child, that daffed and croodled about her, and even became warmly friendly with me for the sake of my Paris watch and my glittering waistcoat b.u.t.tons, I made many gallant attempts to get on my old easy footing. That was the wonder of it: when my interest in her was at the lukewarm, I could face her repartee with as good as she gave; now that I loved her (to say the word and be done with it), my words must be picked and chosen and my tongue must stammer in a contemptible awkwardness. Nor was she, apparently, quite at her ease, for when our talk came at any point too close on her own person, she was at great pains adroitly to change it to other directions.

I never, in all my life, saw a child so muckle made use of. It seemed, by the most wonderful of chances, to be ever needing soothing or scolding or kissing or running after in the snow, when I had a word to say upon the human affections, or a compliment to pay upon some grace of its most a.s.siduous nurse.

"I'm afraid," said Betty at last, "you learned some courtiers'

flatteries and coquetries in your travels. You should have taken the lesson like your friend and fellow-cavalier M'Iver, and got the trick of keeping a calm heart."

"M'Iver!" I cried. "He's an old hand at the business."

She put her lips to the child's neck and kissed it tumultuously.

"Not--not at the trade of lovier?" she asked after a while, carelessly keeping up the crack.

"Oh no!" I said, laughing. "He's a most religious man."

"I would hardly say so much," she answered, coldly; "for there have been tales--some idle, some otherwise--about him, but I think his friend should be last to hint at any scandal."

Good heavens! here was a surprise for one who had no more notion of traducing his friend than of miscalling the Shorter Catechism. The charge stuck in my gizzard. I fumed and sweat, speechless at the injustice of it, while the girl held herself more aloof than ever, busy preparing for our evening meal.

But I had no time to put myself right in her estimate of me before M'Iver came back from his airing with an alarming story.

"It's time we were taking our feet from here," he cried, running up to us. "I've been up on Meall Ruadh there, and I see the whole countryside's in a confusion. Pipers are blowing away down the glen and guns are firing; if it's not a muster of the enemy preparatory to their quitting the country, it's a call to a more particular search in the hills and woods. Anyway we must be bundling."

He hurriedly stamped out the fire, that smoked a faint blue reek which might have advertised our whereabouts, and Betty clutched the child to her arms, her face again taking the hue of hunt and fear she wore when we first set eyes on her in the morning.

"Where is safety?" she asked, hopelessly. "Is there a sheep-fank or a sheiling-bothy in Argile that is not at the mercy of those blood-hounds?"

"If it wasn't for the snow on the ground," said M'Iver, "I could find a score of safe enough hidings between here and the Beannan." "Heavens!"

he added, "when I think on it, the Beannan itself is the place for us; it's the one safe spot we can reach by going through the woods without leaving any trace, if we keep under the trees and in the bed of the burn."

We took the bairn in turns, M'Iver and I, and the four of us set out for the opposite side of Glenaora for the _eas_ or gully called the Beannan, that lay out of any route likely to be followed by the enemy, whether their object was a retreat or a hunting. But we were never to reach this place of refuge, as it happened; for M'Iver, leading down the burn by a yard or two, had put his foot on the path running through the pa.s.s beside the three bridges, when he pulled back, blanching more in chagrin than apprehension.

"Here they are," he said "We're too late; there's a band of them on the march up this way."

At our back was the burned ruin of a house that had belonged to a shepherd who was the first to flee to the town when the invaders came.

Its byre was almost intact, and we ran to it up the burn as fast as we could, and concealed ourselves in the dark interior. Birds came chirping under the eaves of thatch and by the vent-holes, and made so much bickering to find us in their sanctuary that we feared the bye-pa.s.sers, who were within a whisper of our hiding, would be surely attracted Band after band of the enemy pa.s.sed, laden in the most extraordinary degree with the spoil of war. They had only a rough sort of discipline in their retirement: the captains or chieftains marched together, leaving the companies to straggle as they might, for was not the country deserted by every living body but themselves? In van of them they drove several hundreds of black and red cattle, and with the aid of some rough ponies, that pulled such sledges (called _carns_) as are used for the hauling home of peat on hilly land, they were conveying huge quant.i.ties of household plenishing and the merchandise of the burgh town.

Now we had more opportunity of seeing those coa.r.s.e savage forces than on any occasion since they came to Argile, for the whole of them had mustered at Inneraora after scouring the shire, and were on their march out of the country to the north, fatter men and better put-on than when they came. Among them were numerous tartans, either as kilt, trews, or plaid; the bonnet was universal, except that some of the officers wore steel helms, with a feather tip in them, and a clan badge of heather or whin or moss, and the dry oak-stalk whimsy of Montrose. They had come bare-footed and bare-b.u.t.tocked (many of the privates of them) to Campbell country; now, as I say, they were very snod, the scurviest of the knaves set up with his hosen and brogues. St.u.r.dy and black, or lank and white-haired like the old sea-rovers, were they, with few among them that ever felt the razor edge, so that the hair coated them to the very eyeholes, and they looked like wolves. The pipers, of whom there were three, were blasting l.u.s.tily at Clanra.n.a.ld's march when they came up the lower part of the Glen, according to M'Iver, who had heard them from Meall Ruadh; but now the music was stopped, and all were intent upon driving the cattle or watching their stolen gear', for doubtless among such thieves there was not as much honour as would prevent one from picking his neighbour's sporran.

We lay buried to the head in bracken that filled one side of the byre, and keeked through the plenteous holes in the dry-stone wall at the pa.s.sing army. Long gaps were between the several clans, and the Irish came last It seemed--they moved so slowly on account of the cattle--that the end of the cavalcade was never to come; but at length came the baggage and the staff of Montrose himself. Then I got my first look of the man whose name stinks in the boar's snout to this day. A fellow about thirty-three years of age, of mid height, hair of a very dark red, hanging in a thick fell on the shoulders of the tartan jacket (for he wore no armour), with a keen scrutinising eye, and his beard trimmed in the foreign vein. He sat his horse with considerable ease and grace, and was surrounded by half-a-dozen of the chiefs who had come under his banner. The most notable-looking of these was Alasdair MacDonald, the Major-General, an uncouth dog, but a better general, as I learned later, than ever G.o.d or practice made James Grahame of Montrose; with John of Moidart, the Captain of Clanra.n.a.ld, Donald Glas MacRa.n.a.ld of Keppoch, the laird of Glencoe, Stewart of Appin, and one of the Knoydart house, all of whilk we distinguished by their tartans and badges.

In the mien of these savage chiefs there was great elation that Montrose had little share in, to all appearance. He rode moodily, and when fair opposite our place of concealment he stopped his horse as if to quit the sell, but more likely to get, for a little, out of the immediate company of his lawless troops. None of those home-returning Gaels paid heed to his pause, for they were more Alasdair Macdonald's men than his; Mac-Donald brought them to the lair of the boar, MacDonald glutted their Highland thirst for Campbell blood, Mac-Donald had compelled this raid in spite of the protests of the n.o.bleman who held the King's Commission and seal.

For some minutes his lordship stood alone on the pathway. The house where we lay was but one, and the meanest, among a numerous cl.u.s.ter of such drear memorials of a black business, and it was easy to believe this generalissimo had some gloomy thoughts as he gazed on the work he had lent consent to. He looked at the ruins and he looked up the pa.s.s at his barbarians, and shrugged his shoulders with a contempt there was no mistaking.

"I could bring him down like a capercailzie," said M'Iver, coolly, running his eye along his pistol and c.o.c.king it through his keek-hole.

"For G.o.d's sake don't shoot!" I said, and he laughed quietly.

"Is there anything in my general deportment, Colin, that makes ye think me an a.s.sa.s.sin or an idiot? I never wantonly shot an unsuspecting enemy, and I'm little likely to shoot Montrose and have a woman and bairn suffer the worst for a stupid moment of glory."

As ill luck would have it, the bairn, that had been playing peacefully in the dusk, at this critical minute let up a cry Montrose plainly heard.

"We're lost, we're lost," said Betty, trembling till the crisp dry bracken rustled about her, and she was for instant flight.

"If we're lost, there's a marquis will go travelling with us," said M'Iver, covering his lordship's heart with his pistol.

Had Montrose given the slightest sign that he intended to call back his men to tread out this last flicker of life in Aora Glen he would never have died on the gibbet at the Gra.s.smarket of Dunedin, Years after, when Grahame met his doom (with much more courtliness and dignity than I could have given him credit for), M'Iver would speak of his narrow escape at the end of the raiding.

"I had his life in the crook of my finger," he would say; "had I acted on my first thought, Clan Campbell would never have lost Inverlochy; but _bha e air an dan_,--what will be will be,--and Grahame's fate was not in the crook of my finger, though so I might think it Aren't we the fools to fancy sometimes our human wills decide the course of fate, and the conclusions of circ.u.mstances? From the beginning of time, my Lord Marquis of Montrose was meant for the scaffold."

Montrose, when he heard the child's cry, only looked to either hand to see that none of his friends heard it, and finding there was no one near him, took off his Highland bonnet, lightly, to the house where he jaloused there was a woman with the wean, and pa.s.sed slowly on his way.

"It's so honest an act," said John, pulling in his pistol, "that I would be a knave to advantage myself of the occasion."

A generous act enough. I daresay there were few in the following of James Grahame would have borne such a humane part at the end of a b.l.o.o.d.y business, and I never heard our people cry down the name of Montrose (bitter foe to me and mine) but I minded to his credit that he had a compa.s.sionate ear for a child's cry in the ruined hut of Aora Glen.

Montrose gave no hint to his staff of what he had heard, for when he joined them, he nor they turned round to look behind. Before us now, free and open, lay the way to Inneraora. We got down before the dusk fell, and were the first of its returning inhabitants to behold what a scandal of charred houses and robbed chests the Athole and Antrim caterans had left us.

In the grey light the place lay tenantless and melancholy, the snow of the silent street and lane trodden to a slush, the evening star peeping between the black roof-timbers, the windows lozenless, the doors burned out or hanging off their hinges. Before the better houses were piles of goods and gear turned out on the causeway. They had been turned about by pike-handles and trodden upon with contemptuous heels, and the pick of the plenishing was gone. Though upon the rear of the kirk there were two great mounds, that showed us where friend and foe had been burled, that solemn memorial was not so poignant to the heart at the poor relics of the homes gutted and sacked. The Provost's tenement, of all the lesser houses in the burgh, was the only one that stood in its outer entirety, its arched ceils proof against the malevolent fire. Yet its windows gaped black and empty. The tide was in close on the breast-wall behind, and the sound of it came up and moaned in the close like the sough of a sea-sh.e.l.l held against the ear.

We stood in the close, the three of us (the bairn clinging in wonder to the girl's gown), with never a word for a s.p.a.ce, and that sough of the sea was almost a coronach.

CHAPTER XV.--CONFESSIONS OF A MARQUIS.

In a few hours, as it were, the news that the enemy had left the country was put about the shire, and people returned to pick up the loose ends of the threads of family and affairs. Next day my lord the Marquis came round Lochlong and Glencroe in a huge chariot with four wheels, the first we had ever seen in these parts, a manner of travel inc.u.mbent upon him because of a raxed shoulder he had met with at Dunbarton. He came back to a poor reception: the vestiges of his country's most bitter extremity were on every hand, and, what was bound to be embarra.s.sing to any n.o.bleman of spirit, there was that in the looks and comportment of his clansmen that must have given MacCailein some unpleasant thought.

Behind his lordship came eleven hundred Lowland levies that had been with Baillie in England, and to command them came his cousin, Sir Duncan Campbell of Auchinbreac, luckily new over from Ireland, and in the spirit for campaigning. A fiery cross was sent round the clan, that in better times should easily have mustered five thousand of the prettiest lads ever trod heather, but it brought only a remnant of a thousand, and the very best that would have been welcome under the galley flag were too far afield for the summons to reach them in time. But every well-affected branch of Clan Campbell sent its gentlemen to officer our brigade.

A parley of war held in the castle determined on immediate pursuit of Montrose to Lochaber, keeping within easy distance, but without attacking till he was checked in front by troops that had gone up to flank him by way of Stirling. I was at the council, but had little to do with its decision, though the word of M'Iver and myself (as was due to cavaliers of experience) was invited with respect.

We were to march in two days; and as I had neither house nor ha' to shelter me, seeing the old place up the glen was even more of a ruin than in Donald Gorm's troubles, when the very roof-tree was thrown in Dhuloch, I shared quarters with M'Iver in the castle, where every available corner was occupied by his lordship's guests.

When these other guests were bedded, and the house in all our wing of it was still, my comrade and I sat down to a ta.s.se of brandy in our chamber, almost blythe, as you would say, at the prospect of coming to blows with our country's spoilers. We were in the midst of a most genial crack when came a faint rap at the door, and in steps the goodman, as solemn as a thunder-cloud, in spite of the wan smile he fixed upon his countenance. He bore his arm out of his sleeve in a sling, and his hair was un-trim, and for once a most fastidious n.o.bleman was anything but perjink.

"I cry pardon, gentlemen!" he said in Gaelic, "for breaking in on my guests' privacy; but I'm in no humour for sleeping, and I thought you might have a spare gla.s.s for a friend."

"It's your welcome, Argile," said I, putting a wand chair to the front for him. He sat himself down in it with a sigh of utter weariness, and nervously poking the logs on the fire with a purring-iron, looked sadly about the chamber.

It was his wife's tiring-room, or closet, or something of that nature, fitted up hastily for our accommodation, and there were signs of a woman's dainty hand and occupation about it The floor was carpeted, the wall was hung with arras; a varnish 'scrutoire, some sweet-wood boxes, two little statues of marble, two raised silver candlesticks with snuffers conform, broidery-work unfinished, and my lord's picture, in a little gilded frame hanging over a dressing-table, were among its womanly plenishing.

"Well, coz," said his lordship, breaking an awkward silence, "we have an enormous and dastardly deed here to avenge."

"We have that!" said M'Iver. "It's a consolation that we are in the mood and in the position to set about paying the debt. Before the glad news came of your return, I was half afraid that our quarry would be too far gone ere we set loose the dogs on him. Luckily he can be little farther than Glenurchy now. Elrigmore and I had the honour to see the visitors make their departure. They carried so much stolen gear, and drove so big a prize of cattle, that I would not give them more than a twenty miles'

march to the day."