Kenneth McAlpine Part 10

"I've tied the hands and feet of a poacher before," he said, "a bigger man than you. And I mean to do my duty by you."

"Dugald," said Kenneth, "this gentleman may really be what he says."

"Let him come quietly, then," replied Dugald. "No stranger that ever walked will lead Dugald McCrane into trouble again. Is it going to surrender you are, sir? Consider while I count ten. One--two--three--"

"Enough, enough. I'm your prisoner, fellow. It is very ridiculous.

Perhaps you'll live to rue this day. Come on with me to the inn."

Dugald laughed.

"Not just yet," he answered; "it's the other way; you come with me."

The stranger bit his lip and frowned.

Then he put his hand in his pocket and produced a gold piece.

"This is yours," he said, "if you come at once."

Fire seemed to flash from Dugald's eyes. He clenched his fists convulsively, and looked for a moment as if he meant to spring at the stranger's neck.

"Put up your bawbees," he said at length. "If Highlanders are poor, they are also proud, and the gold isn't dug yet that would tempt Dugald McCrane to neglect his duty. And if the auld laird himsel' was standing there, he'd tell you it's the truth I'm speaking. Right about face, my man, and march with us to the glen-head, or it may be the worse for you."

The stranger gave a sigh and a sickly kind of smile, but he shouldered his gun and prepared to follow.

"One minute," said Dugald, for Kenneth had beckoned him aside.

Kenneth and he conversed for a moment; then Dugald returned.

"You look tired," he said, shortly; "we'll go your road. Archie," he continued, "pick the ice-b.a.l.l.s from the feet of those twa poor dogs.

Your dogs, sir, are but little used to our Hielan' hills."

"And indeed, my fine fellow," replied the stranger, "am but little used to your Highland manners, but grateful to you, young sir,"--he was addressing Kenneth--"for saving me a longer journey than needful."

In half an hour's time the future laird of Alva, for it was no other, found himself a prisoner at the little inn of the clachan. This for a night; next day he produced a letter from McGregor himself--he had despatched a messenger to C--for it--which quite satisfied Dugald McCrane.

Dugald was satisfied of something else as well, namely, that he had done his duty without exceeding it.

Kenneth and Dugald visited Nancy Dobbell's next day and told her the story.

"Och! och!" she said, "it will be a sore day for the folks of the clachan, when a stranger steps into the shoes of poor auld Laird McGregor.

"But a cloud is rising o'er the hills, my laddies; there will be little more peace in Glen Alva. A cloud is rising o'er the hills, and that cloud will burst, and wreck and ruin will fall on the poor people. My dreams have told me this many and many a day since. Heigho! but Nancy's time is wearin' through. She'll never live to see it."

Kenneth took the old thin hand that lay in her lap in both his, and looked into her face, while the tears gathered in his eyes.

He was going to say something. But he did not dare trust himself to speak. He simply petted the poor wrinkled hand.

Is Campbell the poet right, I wonder?

"_Does_ the sunset of life give us mystical lore?

_Do_ coming events cast their shadows before?"

CHAPTER SEVEN.

THE DEATH OF POOR NANCY.

"I'm wearin' awa', Jean, Like snaw-wreaths in thaw, Jean; I'm wearin' awa'

To the Land o' the Leal."

Old Song.

Scene: Kenneth at home in his mother's humble cot. A fire of peats and wood burning on the low hearth. Kenneth's mother reading the good Book with spectacles on her eyes. Kenneth leading also at the other side of the fire. Above the mantelpiece a black iron oil lamp is burning, with old-fashioned wicks made from peeled and dried rushes. Between the pair, his head on his paws, Kooran is lying. He is asleep, and probably dreaming of the sheep that he cannot get to enter the "fauld," for he is emitting little sharp cheeping barks, as dogs often do when they dream.

Kenneth gets up at last and reaches down his plaid and crook.

"Dear laddie," says his mother, "you're surely not going out to-night!"

Kooran jumps up and shakes himself.

"Yes, mother; I must," is the quiet reply. "I had a strange dream about poor Nancy last night. She has been ill, you know, and I haven't called for three days."

"But in such a night, laddie! Listen to the wind! Hear how the snow and the hail are beating on the window!"

Kenneth did listen.

It was indeed a fearful night.

The wind was sighing and crying through every cranny of the window, and shaking the sash; it was howling round the chimney, and wailing through the keyhole of the door.

Snow was sifting in underneath the door, too, and lying along the floor like a stripe of light.

Kenneth drew his plaid closer round him.

"I must go, mother," he said; "I could not sleep to-night if I didn't.

"Don't be uneasy about me even if I don't return till morning. I may stay all night at Dugald's."

When Kenneth opened the door he was almost driven back with the force of the wind, and almost suffocated with the soft, powdery, drifting snow.

But he closed the door quickly after him and marched boldly on down the glen, rolling the end of his plaid about his neck, and at times having even to breathe through a single fold of it to prevent suffocation.

It was now well on in January. There had been but little snow all the winter, but this storm came on sharp and sudden. All day gigantic ma.s.ses of cloud had been driving hurriedly over the sky on the wings of an easterly wind; the ground was as hard as adamant, and towards sunset the snow had begun to fall. But it took no time to settle on the bare ground; it was blown on and heaped wherever there was a bit of shelter from the fierce east wind. So it lay under the hedges and d.y.k.es, and on the lee-side of trees, and deep down in the ravines, and under banks and rocks, and across the road here and there in rifts like frozen waves of the ocean.

The wind howled terribly across the moorland. There was a moon, but it gave little light.

Kooran knew, however, where his master was going, and went feathering on in front, stopping now and then to turn round and give a little sharp encouraging bark to his st.u.r.dy young master.

Kenneth was all aglow when he reached Nancy's hut, and his face wet and hot. His hair and the fringes of the plaid and even his eyebrows were covered with ice.