by John Buchan
Francis flushed for the moment. “D’ ye ken what ye ask me to do, Mr. Craik?” said he. “It’s a job that some folk would call house-breaking and stouthrief.”
“Na,” said the other, “it’s no that. It’s the lawfu’ consequence o’ poleetical principles. Think ye, if the sodgers in Embro had word o’ siccan a thing they wadna be the first to tak it? If ye believe me, Mr. Birkenshaw, it’s a naational necessity.”
“But what do ye ken of my principles?” asked Francis. “Who telled ye I wasna as hot a Jacobite as Murray himself?”
The man looked shrewdly at his neighbour to detect his purpose. Then he laughed incredulously. “Gae awa wi’ ye and your havers. Ye were aye ower fond o’ a saft seat and a bieldy corner.”
For a little Francis stood in a sorry hesitation, in two minds whether to join forces with this house-breaker or there and then to give him the soundest of thrashings. His parting with Starkie still rankled in his mind. He called up the designs which he had formed for himself, his abhorrence of trivial virtue, his deification of the unscrupulous. This was a chance both to better his means and restore his confidence. This would be the rubicon over which there was no returning to the dreary paths of the respectable. His course was clear, and yet with a vanishing pride he could have beaten this little city blackguard who called him companion.
So he told Mr. Craik of his compliance, and was rewarded with a sigh of relief. “Man, I kenned ye wad dae ‘t, and noo we’re shure o’ success. Come down the road till I tell ye the ways o’ ‘t. I’ve been hereabouts for days till I ken ilka turn o’ the place. The Hoose looks north ower a dean o’ trees and a’ to the south is the whinny back o’ a hill. There’s naether windy nor door kept lockit the noo on that gairden side, for at a’ hoors there’s a steer o’ men comin’ and leavin’.” And with a crowd of such directions he led him into the shade.
It was clear that Murray’s folk had small liking for their laird. There in the inn sat Whiggery triumphant, smiled upon by a Calvinist landlord and a score of staunch Presbyterian followers. Further down the water the Cause found many adherents, but there, on the very confines of the West, there was something dour and covenanting in the air, and the fervours of the master and his lady awoke no spirit among the men of Broughton. Had two such characters as Mr. Craik and Francis been seen in an Athole or Badenoch inn they would have been jealously spied upon; but there they were suffered to go their ways, and in a corner of the inn over their glasses they brought the project to completion.
An hour later the two men were climbing the brae which rose from the green haughs of the burn to the upland valley where stood the house. Francis had the same free stride as ever, but Mr. Craik hastened over the brighter patches of moonlight and stole gladly to the shadows. To himself Francis seemed something less worthy than before. The mist of daring and escapade, with which he fancied his course to be shrouded, had begun to disappear under the cold north wind of Mr. Craik’s company. He had set out on the ploy for money and self-satisfaction; but soon he wished that he had come alone, for his disgust rose at the sight of the ferret-faced thing which led him.
Soon they were on the bare hill-face and looking down upon the back windows of the dwelling. To the left there was light in the lower windows, where probably dwelt the few domestics, but otherwise the whole of the great wall was black with darkness. Mr. Craik chuckled joyfully and led the way across the garden fence and down an alley of flowers. At the edge of the lawn he stopped and held a whispered consultation.
“That windy forenent us is never barred; the lock’s broke, for I was up last nicht to find oot. Now if ye gang in there ye come to a passage which takes ye to the maister’s ain room. It’s no the first door but the second on the left-hand side, and there he keeps his siller and valuables. It’s aye lockit, but I’ve trystit wi’ a servant lass to leave the key in the door. Aince ye won there, ye wad lock the thing on the inside and search the place at your leesure. Syne ye wad come back to me and I wad help ye oot. The reason why twae man’s needit is that the windy canna open frae within, and if there werena ane oot bye to lift it, there wad be nae mainner o’ escape. Now, whilk is to gang and whilk is to bide?” and he took a coin from his pocket to toss.
“Ye’d better let me try it,” said Francis. “I’m bigger and stronger, and maybe I’ve a better eye for a hidy-hole.” Already he was beginning to loathe the business, and chose this part of it as the less discreditable. It was better to have his hand at the work than to wait outside like a child.
“Man, ye’ve speerit,” said the other, admiringly and not without gratitude. Fear had already begun to wrestle with his avarice.
So Francis raised the window, which fitted like a portcullis into a socket above. His companion held it open till his long legs had struggled through. He found himself in a narrow corridor, pitchy dark, save for the glimmer from the window. A musty smell, as of an old and little-used house, hung all about it, and his groping feet detected an uneven floor. An utter silence prevailed, in which as from a great distance he heard the click of the shut window.
He felt out with his hand along the left wall. One door he passed, of stout ribbed oak securely fastened. Then the place widened, and he seemed to be in a hall with some kind of matting upon the floor. Here his feet went noiselessly, and some faint degree of light obtained from a window far in front. Then his hand came on the space of a second door, and he stopped to test it. This was clearly the place where the key was to be found, as Mr. Craik had directed.
But this was no less closely bolted than the last, and the key-hole was empty. He put his shoulders to the panel and shook it. He heard only the rasp of a great lock in its place, but the door did not give an inch. Again he tried, and this time the wood work cracked. But the noise warned him, echoing in that still place with double power, and he desisted.
Nothing remained but to try elsewhere, so he groped further down the hall. Again he touched a handle, and this time with better success; for to his amazement he found the door ajar, and pushing it open entered a wide room. He turned to look for a key, but found none; this, too, was not the place appointed; but since he had found an entrance he resolved to go further. The place was black with night. A dim haze of light seemed to hang at the end, which doubtless came from a shuttered window. As he groped his way he stumbled on furniture which felt rich and softly draped to the touch. A faint odour of food, too, lurked in the air, as if the room had been used for dining.
This was not the goal which he had sought, but even here something might be found. So Francis was in the act of beginning a hasty scrutiny when a sound brought him to a stop. A footstep was crossing the hall and making for the room. A pioneer ray of light gleamed below the door. He was in a quandary, uncertain whither to turn; he could not flee by the door, and no other way was apparent. To hide behind some curtain or cabinet was possible, and he was about to creep hastily to the back when a hand was laid on the latch. Some instinct prompted him to sink quietly into a chair and wait the issue.
The light of a lamp flooded the room, showing its noble size and costly furnishing. Francis sat silent in his chair, curious of the result, and busily searching his brains for some plausible tale. The light-bearer saw at the table-end a long man, his face dark with the sun, dressed decently yet with marks of travel, and bearing somewhere in his dress and demeanour the stamp of a townsman, who sat waiting on the newcomer’s question with eyes half apologetic and half bold.
As for Francis himself he saw a vision which left him dumb. He had expected the sight of a servant or at most some gentleman of the cause using the house as a lodging. But to his wonder, at the doorway stood a woman holding a lamp above her and looking full from its canopy of light into the half-darkness. In the dimness she seemed tall and full of grace, standing alert and stately with a great air of queenship. Her gown was of soft white satin, falling in shining folds to her feet, and showing the tender curves of arm and bosom. Above, at the throat and wrists, her skin was white as milk, and the
hair rose in dark masses on her head, framing her wonderful face, — pale with the delicate paleness so far above roses. Something in her eye, in the haughty carriage of the little head, in the life and grace which lay in every curve and motion, took suddenly from Francis the power of thought. He looked in silent amazement at this goddess from the void.
He had waited for surprise, anger, even fear; but to his wonder he found only recognition. She looked on him as if she had come there for no other purpose than to seek him. A kindly condescension, the large condescension of one born to rule and be obeyed, was in her demeanour.
“Ah, you are here,” she said. “I thought you had not come. You are my Lord Manorwater’s servant?”
For an instant Francis’ wits wandered at the suddenness of the question. Then his readiness returned, and with some shrewdness he grasped the state of matters. He rose hurriedly to his feet and bowed with skill. “I have that honour, my lady,” said he; and he reflected that his sober dress would suit the character.
As he stood a tumult of thoughts rushed through his brain. This was the famous lady whom he had so often heard of, she who was the Cause, the Prince, and the King to so many loyal gentlemen. His eyes gloried in her beauty, for somewhere in his hard nature there was an ecstatic joy in mere loveliness. But the bodily perfection was but a drop in the cup of his astonishment. She had clearly been receiving guests in this old house, and guests of quality, for the rich white gown was like a state dress, and jewels flashed at her neck and fingers. A swift and violent longing seized him to be one of her company, to see her before him, to be called her friend. In her delicate grace she seemed the type of all he had renounced for ever — nay, not renounced, for in his turbid boyhood he had had no glimpse of it. To this wandering and lawless man for one second the elegancies of life were filled with charm, and he sighed after the unattainable. Then his mood changed to one of fierce revulsion. This was a lady of rank and wealth, doubtless with a crazy pride of place and honour, condescending gravely to him as to one far beneath; and he, he was the careless, the indomitable, who would yet laugh in the face of the whole orderly world.
But such sentimental reflections were soon succeeded by thoughts more practical. He had run his head into a difficult place, and might yet escape by this lucky chance which called him a servant of Lord Manorwater’s. But there was little time to lose, lest the real lackey should come to confront him. His ready brain was already busy with plans when the lady spoke again.
“Your master will have told you your errand. This is the letter which I desire you to carry and put into the hands of Mr. Murray of Broughton at his lodging in the Northgate of Edinburgh. Your master told me you have travelled the same road before to the same place.”
Francis said “Ay.”
“Then I have but one word for you. Take the hills from here and keep off the high-road, above all near the inn of Leidburn. For I have heard to-night that a body of rebel soldiers is lying there. When you come to my husband, he will give you his directions, whether to go with him and the royal army or to return here. But in any case I can trust the diligence and loyalty of one of my Lord Manorwater’s men.” And she smiled on him graciously.
“And they brought you in here and left you in darkness,” she said, as if in self-reproach. “It is a hard thing to live in such troubled times. And perhaps you have not supped?”
Francis protested that he had already had food, in mortal fear lest she should delay him with refreshment.
“I will let you out myself,” she said, and lifting the lamp she led the way from the room, her soft skirts trailing and the light flickering in her dusky hair. Francis followed in a fervour of delight. The sudden vista of a great plan had driven all sentiment from his mind. Now at last he might get free of petty ill-doing, and exercise his wits on matters of greater import. He carried a letter which meant money from any officer of Government; he scented plot and intrigue all richly flavoured with peril. He felt himself no more the casual amateur, but the established adventurer, meddling with the great affairs of nations. The thought restored him to his perverted self-respect.
She opened the hall-door and let him pass into the front garden with a word of good-speed. As he departed he turned for a moment, and his sentiment flickered to life, for as she stood, a radiant figure of light in the arch of the door, his mind reverted to this great loveliness.
But a second later such thoughts had fled, and, with no care for the patient Mr. Craik waiting silently by the back window, Francis took his path for the highway and the Leidburn inn.
CHAPTER VI. On the Edinburgh Highway.
The moon was up, whitening the long highway to the north, as Francis sped gaily on. It was still early night; lengthy hours were to come before the dawn; and Leidburn inn was no more than a dozen miles. But the exhilaration of escape, of new hope, drove him with eager legs, and he watched the trees fall away and the barer hills draw together with pride in his fleet strength.
At the watershed the moors stretched dim and yellow on either hand in a melancholy desolation. A curlew piped on the bent, and then all was still as the grave but for the clack of his shoes on the hill-gravel. He fell out of his run and took to the stride with which he had been wont to stalk through the back-vennels of the city. The soft odours of moorland weather hung about the place as over a shrine. The luminous sky above had scarcely a hint of dark, but shone like an ocean starred with windy isles in some twilight of the gods.
His first resolution had grown and made itself clear in every part. He pictured gleefully the incidents of his course. The soldiers found, he called for their Captain and delivered his letter. The tide of war was turned, he was honoured with reward, and a life of bold intrigue awaited him. Exultantly he pictured his fate, — how the world would talk of him with fear, how his name would be on all men’s lips and his terror in every heart. Then haply Mr. Francis Birkenshaw would set his heel on the neck of his oppressors.
But his importunate common-sense drew him sharply back from his flights. It meant but a guinea for his pocket and a glass of wine for his thirst, for he could only pose as a lackey if he wished for credence. Yet even in this there was promise. It needed but his wits and his habitual bold presence to push his fortune far. Here, in his own land, lay his field. Far better to seize a spoke of Fate’s wheel as she twirled it here than hunt the jade in nations oversea.
The way led him through a bogland meadow and up again to the skirts of a hill. In a little he was among trees, whence came the chilly echo of running water and a gleam of light from some sequestered dwelling. Already a wider vale seemed to open and high, dark hill-shapes rose on the left. The road was wide and even, for by it men chiefly travelled to Carlisle and the South. Even as he sped a rumble of wheels came to his ear, and he was in the roadside heather watching a four-horse carriage go by. The horses seemed weary with forcing, and within the coach by the moonlight he had a glimpse of anxious faces. Lord Smitwood, or the great Lady Blaecastle, or the famous Mrs. Maxwell, he thought, on their way to put their sundry houses in order against an evil day. Clearly wars and rumours of war were thickening in the North, and he was soon to have a hand in the game.
And with this he fell back on thoughts of Broughton and the lady of the Jacotot lace and dusky hair. Something in her image as it flashed on his memory roused keen exaltation. He would trick this proud woman and all her kind, crush them, use them for his purpose. Each feature, as he reflected on it, roused his hatred. She was fair; well, beauty for the joy of the strong. Men said she was clever; well, he would match her with counter-wits and gain the victory. Three hours before, and he had never seen her; now she filled his whole fancy with her hateful beauty. He thought of her freely, grossly, as he had trained himself to think of women. But somewhere in the man there was a string of fine sentiment which jarred at the incongruous. The exquisite freshness of her beauty forbade her a place in a gallery of harlots, and to his disgust he found himself forced to regard her with decency.
The thing
stuck in his memory and began to vex him. Vigorously he questioned himself if he were not falling back to his boyish virtue. Re-assured by the hot and lustful spirit within him, he searched for some catchword or badge of his resolve. So all the latter part of the way he hummed rags of ill-reputed ditties, and now and then in the near neighbourhood of a cottage made the night hideous with a tune. For he was now at the verge of settled country, where King George held a tight rein, and no loyalist gentry would be at hand with a bullet from the wayside. So leisurely had been his course that the autumn dawn was already breaking ere he rounded the hill and came out on the level Leidburn moss. The place was desert, — acres of peat with the film of morn still raw on the heather, and the black reaches of a lazy stream. But through the midst ran the fresh-coloured highway, and there, half a mile distant, rose the white walls of the inn. Even as he walked the thin air of dawn brought him the noise of hens’ cackling and the first stir of life. Beyond all there stretched a great wide country of meadow and woodland to the horizon of the morning, the smoke of a city and the broad curve of the sea.
The scene was so airy and clear that Francis fell into a rich good-humour with himself, and drew near to the inn with pleasant confidence. He had expected to find some traces of military, some neighing from the stable or bustle of servants, but to his wonder the house was silent. The kitchen door stood open, and through it he passed with the appearance of a lackey’s haste.
