The Silver Maple Part 6

The man still stood gazing down at the boy. Scotty's face was dark with anger. Store Thompson, who pretended to be his grandfather's friend, to publish his disgrace before these strangers! It was unbearable! "I'll not be English," he muttered. "I'll jist be Scotch, an' my name's MacDonald!" He clenched his fists and wagged his curly head threateningly. "He must be right," said the man eagerly. "He should certainly know."

Store Thompson shook his head smilingly. "He lives in the Oa, sir," he confided in a low tone, "an' he wants to be a MacDonald. But yon's his name, nevertheless!"

Captain Herbert turned away abruptly, as though he had not heard.

"Eleanor, I shall be ready almost immediately," he said to the lady in the silk gown, and, with a hasty good-bye, he stepped outside, Store Thompson following. Scotty slipped out behind them; the fight was over, the Murphys and their friends were evidently retreating. He could see his grandfather's tall, commanding form in the midst of a victorious crowd. He drew a great breath of relief. As he stood gazing proudly at them, he felt his hand touched gently by little, soft, gloved fingers. He wheeled round to find a pair of big, blue eyes looking at him from out of the coquettish rim of a fur-trimmed hood. The eyes were very sympathetic. "I'm Scotch, too," came in a whisper from inside the wrappings, "an' it's nice to be Scotch, isn't it?"

Scotty's heart opened immediately; here was someone who evidently believed in him.

"But--but, won't you be Captain Herbert's little girl?" he asked, wonderingly.

"Yes," she answered with a baby-lisp, that made him feel very big and superior. "He's my uncle Walter; but my mamma was Scotch, an' my name's Isabel Douglas Herbert, an' Uncle Walter says I'm his Scotch la.s.sie!"

"Oh!" Scotty looked at her with new interest. "An' you're Kirsty John's little girl, too, ain't you?"

"Yes," she cried delightedly. "Do you know Kirsty?"

"Yes."

"Oh, an' Gran'mamma MacDonald? An' Weaver Jimmie?"

"Oh, yes!"

"I love Jimmie; he tells lovely stories when I go to see Kirsty, 'bout fairies, an'--an' everything. Do you know any stories?"

A silken rustle in the doorway made Scotty draw back. "Come, Isabel,"

said the tall lady. She was a very pale lady, with a haughty, weary look in her eyes; and Scotty wondered how the little girl could catch hold of that silk dress so fearlessly.

"Goo-bye," she said, pausing a moment. "Goo-bye, little boy." She poked the fur-lined hood very close to his face, and Scotty drew back in alarm for fear she might be going to kiss him. The little girl looked disappointed, nevertheless she smiled radiantly.

"I like you," she whispered, "an' I'm comin' to visit you next time I go to Kirsty's; goo-bye!"

She danced off towards the sleigh, and was bundled in among the warm robes. She waved her hand to Scotty as they dashed away, and turned back to gaze at him standing on the step.

"Man," said Store Thompson, stamping the snow from his feet as he entered, "Ah niver saw the Captain act like yon before. He was jist,--aye, he was jist what Ah would call inimical; aye, jist inimical, like!"

Store Thompson was more perturbed over the hearty Captain's strange behaviour than he was over the commotion that had just taken place at his door. Such affairs were of too frequent occurrence to call for comment. But when Big Malcolm returned for Scotty, the fierce heat of the conflict still blazed in his eyes and his friend suddenly remembered what had happened.

"Eh, Malcolm, Malcolm, Ah'm sorry for this!" he cried. "These fichts are no work for a Chreestian man!"

"And would I be sitting here, James Thompson, an' see that piece o'

Popish iniquity kill my son?" demanded Big Malcolm fiercely.

Store Thompson held up his hands. "What, what?" he cried, "would it be the Murphys and the MacDonalds again?"

"It was a Fenian raid, James!" shouted Tom Caldwell, coming up to the sleigh, with a proud swagger, "an' Malcolm here was helpin' us Orangemen put it down, sure!"

Weaver Jimmie, his diffidence all vanished, threw his cap into the air and shouted his old shibboleth, "They may take Canady, but they'll not be taking Oro!"

"The Orangemen 'll kape Canada!" cried Tom Caldwell rea.s.suringly.

"Hoh, him an' his 'kape Canada,'" cried Callum Fiach in disgust, as he pitched himself into the sleigh. "Let's get out o' this!"

"Eh, eh!" cried Store Thompson, standing in the doorway to see them depart, "ye MacDonalds are aye too ready wi' the neeves!"

Big Malcolm took the reins and drove away without another word. The joy of battle was always succeeded by a season of depression. His old friend's reproof had already begun to work repentance in his breast.

The homeward drive was silent and gloomy. Even Callum forbore to talk; for he was uncomfortably conscious that he had had more to do with setting the Orangemen and the Catholics against each other than he would like Big Malcolm to know. He had not foreseen that all the MacDonalds would plunge into it, and his father with them, and was rather uneasy at the havoc he had caused. For this would bring sorrow upon the mother at home.

But Scotty could not be silent, he was alive with curiosity; and, taking advantage of his grandfather's gloomy absorption, he crept out from between the two on the front seat, and got close to the source of all knowledge, Hamish.

He overflowed with questions. Why should the MacDonalds be helping Orangemen? And hadn't Hash Tucker's father and a lot more from the Tenth been on their side, too? And how in the name of all nationalities did it happen that the Caldwells and the Tuckers came to be fighting together against the Murphys? And weren't Orangemen far worse than Fenians, anyway?

The confusion in Scotty's mind was like that which befell the builders of the Tower of Babel; and for once Hamish failed to satisfy him. He seemed rather ashamed of the fact that they had helped a Caldwell in battle, and was rather inclined to drop the subject.

That evening at home was something new to Scotty. A gloomy silence pervaded the place, and there was a look in Granny's eyes that made the boy want to put his head into her lap and cry. There were no prayers before they retired, either; there always came a stage in Big Malcolm's repentence which consisted almost entirely of religious exercises, but that was not yet.

Scotty felt vaguely that there was something terribly wrong, for the boys, even Hamish, went off after supper, and Old Farquhar did not sing his accustomed song before retiring. And when Scotty went up to bed in the loft he left Granny praying by the bed in the corner, and he could hear the steady tramp, tramp of his grandfather's feet up and down in the snow outside. He half woke late in the night and found that Hamish was beside him; the problems of the day were still troubling his dreams.

"Hamish," he whispered, "where's Cape Canady?"

"What?" growled Hamish sleepily.

"Where's Cape Canady? Tom Caldwell said somethin' about it, an' the Master learned the Fourth Cla.s.s all about capes yesterday, an' he wouldn't be saying anything about that one!"

But Hamish was snoring; and outside the steady tramp, tramp of feet went up and down in the snow.

V

THE REFORMATION

O strong hearts, guarding the birthright of our glory, Worth your best blood this heritage that ye guard!

These mighty streams resplendent with our story, These iron coasts by rage of seas unjarred-- What fields of peace these bulwarks will secure!

What vales of plenty these calm floods supply!

Shall not our love this rough, sweet land make sure, Her bounds preserve inviolate, though we die?

--C. G. D. ROBERTS.

The fathers of the Scottish settlement were gathered about the stove in Store Thompson's shop. This emporium was a respectable rival of Pete Nash's tavern across the way. Anyone, weary of the noise and wrangling which characterised that lively establishment, might step across to Store Thompson's haven and find rest and quiet, a never-failing hospitality and a much better social atmosphere. To-night the company represented the best the settlement could produce, several of the MacDonalds and a few of the inhabitants of the Glen.

Big Malcolm was among them. It was his first visit to the Glen since the day of his disgrace, and he had not yet quite recovered his old genial spirits.

One small lamp burned dimly on the counter and the forms of boxes and barrels loomed up fantastically in shadowy corners. In the circle about the stove the men's faces shone out spectrally from the cloud of smoke produced by some half-dozen pipes.

As usual, Store Thompson was taking the lead in the conversation. He stood leaning over the counter in the little ring of light, his spectacles pushed up on his benign-looking forehead, his finger-tips brought carefully together. In company with the schoolmaster, Store Thompson had begun his winter's course of reading and was more than usually oratorical.