Red Cap Tales Part 26

But on this occasion it was the Highlanders who were destined to win.

They fought altogether under cover, and, from the number of musket flashes they held also a great superiority in point of numbers. At all events Frank soon saw the English officer stripped of his hat and arms, and his men, with sullen and dejected countenances, delivering up their muskets to the victorious foe.

The Bailie was, however, rescued by "the Dougal cratur," as the magistrate called him, who cut off the tails of his coat and lowered him to the ground. Then, when at last he was somewhat appeased, on account of Frank's seeming desertion, he counselled that they should be in no hurry to approach Mac-Gregor's wife, who would certainly be most dangerous in the moment of victory.

Andrew Fairservice had already been espied on his airy perch, from which the Highlanders soon made him descend, by threatening him with their guns and even firing a stray shot or two over his head, so that presently he fell to the earth among them. The outlaws stood ready to receive him, and ere he could gain his legs, they had, with the most admirable celerity, stripped him of periwig, hat, coat, doublet, stockings, and shoes. In other circ.u.mstances this might have been amusing for Frank to watch. For though Andrew fell to the earth a well-clothed and decent burgher--he arose a forked, uncased, bald-pated, and beggarly-looking scarecrow.

And indeed Frank and the Bailie would soon have shared the same fate, had not Dougal appeared on the scene in the nick of time, and compelled the plunderers to restore their spoil. So to Helen Mac-Gregor they were taken, Dougal fighting and screaming all the way, evidently determined to keep his captives to himself, or at least to prevent others from claiming them.

With many but (considering the time and occasion) somewhat ill-chosen words of familiarity, the Bailie claimed kindred with Rob Roy's wife.

But in this he did himself more harm than good, for his ill-timed jocularity grated on Helen Mac-Gregor's ear, in her present mood of exaltation, and she promptly commanded that the Sa.s.senachs should one and all be bound and thrown into the deeps of the lake.

But here Dougal threw himself between the angry woman and her prisoners with such vehemence that he was able to stave off, at least for a time, the execution of the supreme sentence. These men were, he said, friends of the Chief and had come up on his a.s.surance to meet him at the Clachan of Aberfoil.

But at that very moment the wild strains of the pibroch were heard approaching, and a strong body of Highlanders in the prime of life arrived on the scene. It now appeared that those who had fought and beaten the troops were either beardless boys or old men scarcely able to hold a musket. But there was no joy of victory on the faces of the newcomers. The pipes breathed a heart-breaking lament.

_Rob Roy was taken!_

"Taken," repeated Helen Mac-Gregor, "taken!--And do you live to say so?

Did I nurse you for this, coward dogs--that you should see your father prisoner, and come back to tell it?"

The sons of Rob Roy, the elder James, tall and handsome, the younger Robin Oig, ruddy and dark, both hung their heads. And after the first burst of her indignation was over, the elder explained how Rob Roy had been summoned to bide tryst with--(here Frank Osbaldistone missed the name, but it sounded like his own). Having, however, some suspicion of treachery, Rob Roy had ordered the messenger to be detained, and had gone forth attended by only Angus Breck and little Rory. Within half an hour Angus Breck came back with the tidings that the Chief had been captured by a party of the Lennox militia under Galbraith of Garschattachin, who were in waiting for him.

Helen Mac-Gregor had now two purposes to carry out. First, she sent messengers in every direction to gather a.s.sistance for an immediate attack on the Lowlanders, in order to effect the rescue of her husband.

Second, she ordered the spy, whose false message had sent her husband to his doom, to be brought before her. For him there was no pity.

When he was haled, pale and trembling before the enraged wife of the Mac-Gregor, what was Frank's astonishment to discover that he was none other than Morris, the very same man who had accused him of the robbery of his portmanteau at Squire Inglewood's, and whom he had last seen in the Glasgow College Yards, walking and talking with Rashleigh Osbaldistone.

A brief command to her followers--and the wretched man was bound. A heavy stone was tied about his neck in a plaid, and he was hurled instantly into the depths of the lake, where he perished, amid the loud shouts of vindictive triumph which went up from the clan.

INTERLUDE OF EXPOSTULATION

"Oh, do go on," said Sweetheart, actually pushing the narrator's arm, as if to shake more of the tale out of him. "What a perfectly horrid place to stop at! Tell us what happened after."

"Nothing more happened to Morris, I can promise you that!" I replied.

"That's not nice of you," said Sweetheart. "I am quite sorry for the poor man--in spite of all he had done!"

"Well, I'm not," said Sir Toady Lion, truculently, "he deserved it all, and more. He has done nothing but tell lies and betray people all through the story--right from the very beginning."

"Besides, he was afraid!" said Hugh John, with whom this was the sin without forgiveness.

"Well," said Sweetheart, "so am I afraid often--of mice, and rats, and horrid creeping things."

"Huh," said Sir Toady, crinkling up his nose, "you are a girl--of course you are afraid!"

"And I know," retorted Sweetheart, "two n.o.ble, brave, gallant, fearless, undaunted BOYS, who daren't go up to the garret in the dark--_there!_"

"That's not fair," said Hugh John; "that was only once, after father had been telling us about the Hand-from-under-the-Bed that pulled the bedclothes off! Anybody would have been frightened at that.

You, yourself--"

"Oh, but I don't pretend," cried Sweetheart; "I don't need to. I am only a girl. But for all that, I went up and lit the candle in a bedroom belonging to two boys, who dared not even go up the stair holding each other by the hand!"

"If you say that, I'll hit you," said Sir Toady.

"Will you!" said Sweetheart, clearing for action; "we'll see about that. It's only mice _I_ am afraid of--not cowardly boys!"

I hastened to still the rising storm, and in order to bring the conversation back to the subject of Rob Roy, I asked Hugh John if this were not more to his taste in the matter of heroes.

"Oh, Rob Roy's all right," he said; "that is, when once you get to him. But Frank Osbaldistone is just like the rest--always being tied up, or taken round where he doesn't want to go. Besides, he ran away at the battle!"

"Well," said I, "he had no arms, and besides it was not his quarrel. He couldn't fight either for the soldiers or for the Highlanders. At any rate, you can't deny that he did fight with Rashleigh in the College Yards of Glasgow!"

"Yes, and he got wounded. And then Rob Roy threatened to lick them both--I don't count that much!" said the contemner of heroes. "But, at any rate, it was something. And he didn't go spooning about after girls--that's good, anyway."

"Don't be too sure," said Sweetheart; "there's Die Vernon in the background."

"Well, of course, a fellow _has_ to do some of it if he's a hero," said Hugh John, who has always high ideas of the proper thing; "it's in his part, you see, and he has to--else he wouldn't be respected. But I think if ever I had to be a hero, I would dress up Sir Toady for the girl's part.

Then if he monkeyed too much, why--I could welt him well after. But (he added with a sigh), with a girl, you can't, of course."

"Well, anyway," said Sweetheart, thinking that possibly the tale-teller might feel aggrieved at these uncomplimentary remarks, "_I_ think it is just a beautiful story, and I love the dear Bailie for being willing to go all that way with Frank, and get hung up in the tree by the coat-tails and all!"

"Rats!" said Hugh John, contemptuously, "think if he had known _that_, he would ever have left Glasgow--not much!"

"Well, it was beautiful, I think," said Sweetheart, "but I _am_ sorry that they drowned the poor man Morris, especially when he was so very frightened."

But the instant indignant outcry of the boys silenced her. Lochs twelve feet deep, it speedily appeared, ought to be provided by law everywhere over the kingdoms three, for the accommodation of such "sweeps" and "sneaks" and "cowards."

Then Mistress Margaret spoke up for the first time.

She had been sitting with her eyes fixed dreamily on the sparkle of the logs in the library fireplace.

"What a blessing it is," she said, "that this is a rainy Sat.u.r.day, and so we do not need to wait for more. Please go on with the story--JUST where you left off."

And Maid Margaret's form of government being absolute monarchy, I did so, and the result was

THE THIRD TALE FROM "ROB ROY"

I. IN THE HANDS OF THE PHILISTINES

AFTER the victory of the Highlanders and the drowning of Morris the spy, it was for some little while touch-and-go whether the Bailie and Frank should be made to follow him to the bottom of the loch. But at last Frank was ordered to go as an amba.s.sador to those who had captured Rob Roy, while the Bailie with Captain Thornton and all the other prisoners remained as hostages in the hands of the victorious Helen.

This was the message he was to carry to the Sa.s.senach.

The whole district of the Lennox would be ravished if the Mac-Gregor were not set free within twelve hours. Farmhouses would be burned, stack-yard and byre made desolate. In every house there would be a crying of the death wail--the coronach of sorrow. Furthermore, to begin with, Helen Mac-Gregor promised that if her request was not granted within the time specified, she would send them this Glasgow Bailie, with the Saxon Captain, and all the captive soldiers, bundled together in a plaid, and chopped into as many pieces as there were checks in the tartan!