CHAPTER XXXII
"THERE'S NAE LUCK ABOOT THE HOOSE"
There's a bit more to tell about this part, though you might not expectit. It always makes me shiver to think of. But I could not help it.Nobody could--and anyway, the thing has got to be told. It is aboutMad Jeremy, and what befell him when he fled upward through the smokeand flame, clambering by the balusters, my father says, more like amonkey than any human man.
And, by the way, I am not sure that he really was a man--except that awild beast would not have been so clever, and the devil ever so muchcleverer! Or, at least, he has the credit of being.
Did you ever see the burning of a great house--not in a city, I mean,but far in the country? Well, I have. There is not much to see tillone is close by. A few pale, shivering flames, like the fires thatboil the tea at a summer picnic--volumes of smoke rising over theparapet, mostly pale, and the sun serene above the scurry of helplessmen, running this way and that, like ants when you thrust your stickinto an ant hill to see what will happen. Hither and thither theygo--all busy, all doing nothing. For one thing, water is lacking. Thelocal fire brigade is always just about to arrive. If, by any chance,it does come, a boy with a garden squirt would do more good.
Well, it was like that on the morning of the eleventh of February.When the day did come at last, there was nothing mean aboutit--considered as an early spring morning in Scotland. It was of thecolour of pale straw, with a glint low down like newly thatched housesbefore the winter's storm has had a turn at them.
Meanwhile, underneath, and looking so petty and foolish, was thecrackling of the timbers, the falling in of the tiles, the smokepuffing and mounting like great strings of onions linked together, blueand stifling from the burning wood, white and steamy as the faggotsslid outward into the moat, or fell with a crash into the pond.
All about swarmed a crowd of eager and curious folk. My father, assoon as he was recognized, and before he could condescend to tell histale, had taken command, all soiled and bleeding as he was. I believenow that most there considered that he had rescued Elsie from the wildtribe after a desperate struggle, in which all the others had beenannihilated. And it is characteristic of Breckonside, of the positionmy father held there, and especially of public sentiment with regard tothe folk of the Moat, that no one for a moment dreamed that in so doinghe had exceeded his legal right.
There was not much attempt at saving the building. Elsie had come alittle to herself. At first she could say little, save that "hergrandfather was dead--Mad Jeremy had killed him," which information didnot greatly interest the people, save in so far as it detracted from myfather's glory in having made a "clean sweep!"
Mr. Ball, whom everybody respected--in spite of the service in which helived--caused a horse to be put between the shafts, and Elsie wasconveyed home to Nance Edgar's by Mr. Ball himself. My father wantedher to go on to "the Mount." But Elsie no sooner heard the wordmentioned, than, recovering from her swoon, she declared that "shewould never set foot there--so long as---- No, indeed, that she wouldnot!"
"So long as what, my girl?" my father asked, gently.
You really can't imagine how gentle my father was with her. It took meby surprise, as I did not, of course, yet know anything about theevents which had drawn them together in the deep places underground.
"Because--because--just because!" she answered. "Besides, it is notfitting at present!"
"I understand--perhaps you are right," sighed my father, somewhatdisappointed.
For all that, he did not understand a little bit. It was because ofHarriet and Constantia Caw--especially Harriet. It is an eternalwonder how women misunderstand each other--the best, the kindest, andespecially the prettiest of them.
I would gladly have gone with her, but, of course, that would have beentoo marked. Besides, I dared not face my mother without my father.There was a little fountain made of the mouths of lions on the terrace,which spouted out thin streams of water into a large oyster shell--thekind they call _pecten_, I think, only the round part as big as ahorseshoe. And once Elsie was away with Mr. Bailiff Ball, I got fatherto wash his face and hands there, which were black and terrible withmatted hair and hardened blood. So that my mother, for all heroutcries, did not really see him at his worst, or anything like it.
The fire mounted always, but somehow in the light of day it did notseem real. The faces of all the folk as we returned from the water,were directed to the tower which was called Hobby's Folly. The gabled,crow-stepped mansion of the Moat had nothing very ancient aboutit--that is, to the common view. You had to know the older secrets ofthe monks for that. But at the angle overlooking the pond, Mr. Stennishad caused to be built a square tower in the old Robert the Brucedonjon fashion, each chamber opening out of the other. Thesecommunicated by ladders, which could be drawn up and all accessprevented. At least that was the tale which the masons who were at thebuilding brought back to Breckonside. The tower was square on the topand had low battlements, save at one corner where there was a kind ofpepper-pot cupola in which--so they said--Hobby Stennis used to sit andcount his gold.
At first I could not make out what it was that the folk were craningtheir necks upward to look at. Evidently it was on the far side, thatnearest the small lake, and, of course, invisible from the court out ofwhich my father and I were coming.
But we followed the movement of the people, and there on the utmostpinnacle of the battlements, that outer corner which was higher thanthe rest and shaped like a miniature dome, his long legs twined aboutthe broken stalk of the weathercock, and his melodeon in his hands, satMad Jeremy! Of the gilt weathercock itself nothing remained save thebutt. With a single clutch of his great hairy hand, Jeremy had rootedthe uneasy fowl out of its socket and hurled it far before him into thepond.
Up till now the flames had hardly reached the tower, and it seemed atleast a possible thing that the maniac might be saved. But none of theBreckonsiders were keen about it. Only Mr. Ablethorpe and my fatherwere willing to make any attempt to save him. Indeed, I was absolutelywith the majority on this occasion, and could not, for my part, imaginea better solution than that which seemed to be imminent.
Nevertheless, the two tried to get into the tower from behind, butfound all a seething mass of flames, which had swept across the wholemain body of the building as if to swallow up Hobby's Folly for a last_bonne bouche_. There was no arguing with such a spate of fire. Thereremained, however, a little low door, reported to be of iron, butwhich, being near to the water and exposed to the fury of damp westerlywinds and the moist fogs off the pond, had probably rusted half away.
"The two tried to get into the Tower from behind, butfound all a seething mass of flames."]
"Come, let us do our duty," said Mr. Ablethorpe; "here is a human life!Let us save it!"
But nobody but Mr. Yarrow, senior, followed him. I was with themajority on this point, as I have said before, and so stayed where Iwas. Besides, Mad Jeremy was so curious to see and hear. He laughedand sang, his shrill voice carrying well through the crackle of therafters and the snap and spit of the smaller shredded fragments offlame. As soon as he caught sight of Mr. Ablethorpe and my father hebegan to hurl down the copings of the battlements upon their heads. Sothat in the end they had to desist from the attempt, though they hadnobly done their best.
And all the while he sang. It was the trampling measure of "There'snae luck" that the madman had chosen for his swan song. Never had beenseen or heard such a thing. As he finished each verse he would riseand dance, balancing himself on the utmost point of the cupola, hismelodeon swaying in his hand and his voice declaring ironically that--
"There's nae luck aboot the hoose, There's nae luck ava, There's little pleasure i' the hoose, When oor guidman's awa'!"
Then he would laugh, and call out to the people beneath that the luckhad come back.
"The guidman o' the Grange is safe!" he would cry. "He is at his loom,but never more will he weave, I ken. Jeremy
has seen to that. Andwhat for that, quo' ye? Juist to learn him that when Jeremy asks forhis ain, he is no to be denied as if he were a beggar wantin' alms!"
Then he took a new tack, and launched into "The Toom Pooch"--which isto say, the "empty pocket"--a very popular ditty in the Scots language,and especially about Breckonside:
"An empty purse is slichtit sair, Gang ye to market, kirk, or fair, Ye'll no be muckle thocht o' there, Gin ye gang wi' a toom pooch!"
He finished with a shout of derision.
"Ye puir feckless lot!" he shouted down to the crowd beneath. "I kenyou and Breckonside. Here's charity for ye! Catch a haud!" And heshowered the contents of a pocket-book down upon their heads.
"Here are notes o' ten pound, and notes o' twenty, and notes o' ahundred! What man o' ye ever saw the like? Only Jeremy, Jeremy andhis maister. They wan them a', playin' at a wee bit game wi' richlonely folk. Jeremy was fine company to them. And whiles it ended ina bit jab wi' the knife in the ribs, and whiles in a tug o' the hempaboot a lad's neck, if he wasna unco clever. But it was never Jeremy'sneck, nor was the knife ever in Hobby's back till Jeremy--but that'stellin'! Oh, Hobby's a'richt. I saw him sitting screedin' awa' at hiswindin' sheet, and thinkin' the time no lang."
He rose and danced, singing as he danced--
"There's nae luck aboot the hoose, There's nae luck ava----"
The flames shot up like the cracking of a mighty whip. The madman feltthe sting, and with a wild yell he launched himself over the parapetinto the muddy sludge at the bottom of Deep Moat pond. He must havegone in head foremost, for he never rose. Only the melodeon, with thewater trickling in drops off its bell chime in silver gilt, and theglittering tinsel of its keys, rose slowly to the surface among a fewair bubbles and floated there among a little brownish mud.
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