Complete Fictional Works of John Buchan (Illustrated)

by John Buchan

  “You’re better than your word, Andra,” said Francis, on his return.

  “Say nae mair about it,” said he. “And look ye here, Mr. Birkenshaw, ye may be a michty scoondrel, as I have nae doot ye are, ye may be fresh frae cuttin’ the throat o’ Maccallummore himsel’; but ye come frae my ain toun, and I have drunk mony glesses wi’ ye at the Harbour-walk, so I’ll see ye through wi’ this bit business, if it does na interfere wi’ mine.”

  “If you can put me in by the Renfrew shore you will do me a great obligement.”

  “And it so happens that that is my very road,” said the captain, “so the Lord has lookit after ye better than ye could guide yoursel’.”

  As Francis lay down in a ship’s berth he could hear the anchor lifting, and soon they were dropping down the loch with a fair breeze behind. When he awoke late in the morning, they had already left the loch and were making their course by the south end of an island in what seemed a broad sea, lined on one side with craggy hills and on the other by far-stretching lines of level country. For the whole of a long day they made slow progress up the Firth, tacking against a difficult wind, while Francis looked idly from the bows, busy with his own reflections. The skipper was always by his side, leaving him only to make short inroads below or to yell orders to his men. To his amazement Francis found that he was no more the godless Andra Gordiestoun of the old days, but an enthusiast in religion on the watch for a proselyte. True, his language was violent as ever, and he seemed little less drunken; but his talk was always of theological mysteries, and unctuous texts fell easily from his lips. He preached Francis a vehement sermon on the error of his ways, adjured him to flee from a wrath to come, painted this wrath in awful colours, and dwelt zealously on the joys of the redeemed. Francis heard him out with impatient grace. He himself had been the arena of so severe a struggle, good and evil had fought such a duel in his breast, that he was willing to lend an ear to anyone who could teach him the way of life. But these phrases, this fluent rhetoric, seemed paltry to one whose soul was scarred with the grim reality. He was in the actual throes of a vain endeavour; little to him these commonplaces of the throng. And yet this man, sent with such words out of his own tattered past, was a sting and a remembrance of years mis-spent.

  “I will pray for ye, Francie,” said the man, on parting, “that ye may yet be reclaimed. It’s a puir warld withoot hopes o’ a better.”

  “I say ‘Amen’ to that,” said Francis, and he stepped ashore on Lowland earth.

  BOOK THREE

  CHAPTER XV. The House of Broughton.

  By the afternoon of the next day Francis had put many broad Lanark and Renfrew cornfields between himself and the sea, and had come to the upmost streams of Clyde, where the land begins to fall away towards pleasant Tweeddale. He had bought a horse with some of his Highland gold, since his business demanded speed, and ridden through the quiet Whig clachans with none to gainsay him. Only at the change-house of Roberton did he stop to wet his dry lips with ale. The landlord was an honest, sunburnt countryman, so Francis ventured a question.

  “What like is Tweeddale now when the steer is over? Are there still Murrays to vex it?”

  The man looked suspicion for a second and quietly stroked his right cheek. By luck Francis knew the current Jacobite sign and responded.

  “I ken but ae thing o’ the state o’ affairs in Brochtoun,” said the man, “The Leddy was bidin’ there hersel’, but yestreen yin came bye on a blae horse and syne yin on a broun, and I think the last was awfu’ like the shape o’ the Laird. Hae ye ony word yoursel’?”

  “None save that soon there’s like to be a flittin’ from Brochtoun House.”

  “Across the water belike?” said the man.

  “Maybe scarcely so far,” said Francis.

  “But he’ll ne’er be ta’en. Brochtoun’s a dour bit, but the lave o’ Tweeddale is leal and no Whiggish ava’.”

  “I have nought to tell you,” said Francis, “but if you do not hear within a week that Mr. John Murray went up the Edinboro’ road wi’ a company o’ dragoons to keep him cheery, then thank God for saving a poor gentleman from himself.” And he rode on, leaving the man a prey of vague suspicions.

  The flush of early summer was on hill and wildwood as he rode from the green moor-road into the shadowy vale. To one sick of rock and heather and the sour unkindly odours of moss and torrent, the place seemed goodly beyond dreams. It was mid-afternoon, and in the mellow glow all was softened, touched with enchantment and old romance. The glen was asleep; scarcely a murmur of water reached his ears; the white stone cottages by the meadow-edge, the grey walls of the Place among the trees, the faint lines of far-away mountains, — all were part of an ancient primordial peace o’ the world. And the air of the place bewitched him till he lost all settled thoughts. Before he had been puzzling sore over the knots in his destiny and striving to form a clear plan of conduct. Now he was in a fairyland of sentiment, where a woman’s face shone ever from the still and golden skies.

  He came on the Edinburgh highway above the bridge of the burn, some hundreds of yards from the road to the Place. His heart began to beat painfully at the thought of the near meeting. The whirligig of time had been playing pranks since that morning a year before when he had ridden down Edinburgh streets to the North. And what had been the end of his mission? Dust and ashes! He had no news but the worst, news of treachery, of suffering and black fortune. Was she likely to find pleasure in his presence for all his high-flown dreams of service? And at the thought Francis brought his horse to a walk and braced himself for the inevitable.

  Suddenly, at a turn of the bridge, he came full before the eyes of a party of three who were riding leisurely up towards the great avenue. They turned round at the sound of steps, and his heart stood still, while he felt the blood palpitate about his forehead. For the meeting he longed for and dreaded had come. The lady rode between two tall, harsh-looking gentlemen, one a grey-headed man with a soldier’s bearing, the other younger, but with the same grim, narrow features. A far-away resemblance in the eyes made him hastily set them down as distant kinsmen.

  At the sight of him the lady’s eye grew wide with wonder, and she involuntarily drew rein. Then she nodded to her companions.

  “Wait for me, Henry,” she said, “I have a moment’s business with this gentleman,” and she turned and cantered to the bridge-end.

  “You have returned, Mr. Birkenshaw,” said she. “Have you any news for me?”

  For a little Francis could only look. Her face was so pale and thin, her eyes so impenetrably sad, that he was lost in pity. Then, “I took your message to the Lord Lovat,” he said lamely, “but was prevented from returning by a sore sickness. I saw the Prince on the eve of Culloden, and was by his side in the battle. I followed him to Gortuleg, and there, finding the Lord Lovat, I conceived it to be my duty to attach myself to his cause. Now I am come from him on a matter which closely concerns yourself.”

  “You have done well,” she said. “I heard that you had reached Lovat from other sources, and when no further news came of you, I had thought you were dead. I am glad to see you safe. But I cannot wait longer lest I make my friends impatient. You have done my errand loyally, and I thank you from my heart. I would offer you the hospitality of my house were it not old and half-dismantled; but the village-inn will receive you for the night. I will lay no more toilsome missions on you. Farewell, Mr. Birkenshaw.” And ere he could say a word she had ridden up to the others.

  Francis’ heart sank to the ground. This was the dismissal, the end of his long service. For this he had endured sickness and weariness, cold mosses and the cruel hills. She had used him only as a servant, when he had thought he was a friend. His humiliation was bitter, his disappointment so utter as to benumb his mind. In a state of dreary bemazement he turned his horse’s head to the village.

  But he had told her of private news, and she had not waited to listen. What woman, least of all what woman of her eager temper, could have acted t
hus? And then her talk of the inn — and with this, light broke in upon his brain. She had feared suspicion on the part of the two sour-looking cavaliers. She had to all intents bidden him go to the inn and await her further commands. Clearly she would find ways and means to visit him. The thought was so wholly comforting that he fell into a state of unreasoning joy. She seemed solitary and friendless; then he, and he alone, would right her wrongs. This pale-cheeked lady was not the glorious beauty he had left, but she was something finer, subtler, more enchanting, pure gold refined in the furnace of sorrow.

  The landlord of the inn was changed, the stout old Whig being dead, and a zealous Murray’s man reigning in his stead. He eyed Francis with undisguised annoyance, clearly suspecting the designs of a stranger so near a noted harbour of the outlawed. Nor did Francis improve matters by his cunning questions to find out the man’s leanings. The host adopted a robustious Whig tone, and professed a violent love for Hanover and all its appurtenances. This compelled the other to a like avowal of loyalty, and soon the two stood in a posture of mutual suspicion. Then the main purpose of his errand began to stir in Francis’s heart, and he asked cautiously about the Laird’s whereabouts, if haply he were yet lurking in the place. The man affected secrecy and drew him aside.

  “Ye ken the tap house in the clachan,” he said. “Weel, that’s John Bertram’s, and at its backside is a bit gairrden. There abune the tattie beds is a kind o’ hole in the solid rock, whaur Murray has been hiding thae twae days.”

  The news fired Francis to action. Could he but get speech of Murray all might yet be well, false faith might be prevented, and the honour of a great family saved. He learned his directions from the man, and made his way up the fields to the garden back. With some pains he pierced the thick thorn hedge and found himself in a lone strip of ground, half planted with greens and half the bare rock of the hill. By dint of much searching he found a hole of some dimensions, and bearing marks of recent use. But now it was empty, utterly. When he came out he saw through the dusk a face at an open window in the cottage watching him closely. He ran down to the garden foot, but ere he reached it the window was shut and closely barred; and though he knocked hard at the back door he could get no admittance.

  In some irritation he made his way back to the inn, where he found the landlord waiting with a clouded face.

  “Why the Devil did you send me on such a goose-chase, sir?” Francis asked fiercely. “Where is Murray?”

  “Let that be,” said the man, sullenly. “Look ye here, sir. This is a letter sent to you this moment from a certain lady. Now, before ye get a sicht o’ ‘t, ye will tell me plainly your way of thinking, for I will see ye damned afore I will have this lady come to any hurt.”

  The man stood so fully revealed by his words that Francis felt the need of caution no longer. “Why, man,” he cried, “I am honest to the backbone. I have just come from the North with news for my Lady. I was by the Prince’s side at Culloden, and am not a week from my Lord Lovat’s company.”

  The landlord looked relieved, and gave him the note without further scruple. It proved to be a mere line to arrange an hour of meeting. Nine of the evening was the time she fixed, when with her servant she would seek Mr. Birkenshaw’s presence. Francis read it and dropped it into the fire.

  “Perhaps you will tell me now where the Laird lies,” said he.

  “Till this morning he was in that hole I telled ye o’, and I kenna why he left it. He micht hae lain there canty for months. This countryside was ill-inclined to him, but there’s no a man wad cheep a word o’ where he was hidin’. But this morning he gaed off to Powmood to his guid-brither’s, and I sair misdoot if he’ll find it as quiet a biggin’. The mail gaed bye the day wi’ twae-three lads that hadna the look o’ Moffat dealers. I wis I kent if they gaed bye Powmood.”

  Francis groaned in spirit. This was the confirmation of his worst fears. Even now the man might be in the Government’s hands with all his weight of secret knowledge. His first thought was to fly to Polmood and strive by main force to arrest calamity. But the thought of his own frailty deterred him, and, moreover, it was near the hour appointed for the meeting with Mrs. Murray. Even as he waited the clock struck the half-hour; so he went upstairs to spend the thirty minutes in snatching supper.

  He had finished his meal and sat watching the firelight strive with the last fading glow of day on the wainscotted walls. He felt very melancholy, what with the ruin of a great cause and the futility of his little plans. Of what worth was he after all save to follow a greater’s lead? He had not it in him to originate or to command. Something of his boyish sickness for cutting a fine figure in life came back to him at the moment, and added a pang to his regrets. And bitterer than all was the thought of his mistress’s sorrows, of the long loneliness and shame which lay like a pall athwart her future.

  Then when he had lost all cognisance of the present and was deep in dismal fancies, the door opened and two women entered. One was a maid, a little, rosy-faced countrywoman, and the other was the lady of his dreams. She advanced to greet him with both hands held out after her impulsive fashion, and before he knew he had taken them and led her to a seat. She wore a heavy dark cloak, and when at length she laid it aside, there were no bright robes beneath, only a sombre gown which made her white face paler. Her manner, too, had changed utterly. Of old she had looked at him with the calm, sovereign air of a mistress, now there was hesitation, diffidence, the tremulousness of grief.

  “You understood me, Mr. Birkenshaw. I was vexed to turn from you so hastily, but my cousins of Romanno are ever suspicious. And now I can thank you for doing my work so well. In this lamentable confusion, when the best blood has been spilled like water, it is a pleasure to see a kenned face. And you will have heard, sir, I am desolate now, and have no one to look to save such honest gentlemen as serve me out of good will,” and she smiled a little ghost of a smile.

  Francis’ blood was painfully stirred. He could not bear to see her sitting there so changed from her high estate. A great tumult of compassion arose in his soul.

  “And now for your news,” she said, “for I believe you have something to tell me in private. My maid is a sharer of all my secrets.”

  Here was a quandary for the unhappy man. How could he tell this pale heroic woman of her husband’s perfidy? It seemed cruel beyond thought, and his heart failed him.

  “It had to do with your husband,” he stammered; “but if—”

  He got no further, for at the word “husband” he saw she knew all. She covered her face with her hands and her bosom heaved with her sobbing. “Oh, it is true,” she cried. “I am near crazy. I have fought — Oh my God! — I have fought to prevent it, but I could not. I knew his heart, but he denied it when I asked him, and put me off with smooth phrases till it was too late. And now he has gone to Polmood, and I am left to curse my woman’s weakness. And he was the King’s friend, the first man in Scotland to stand by the Prince, and the wisest head in his councils.” She rocked herself to and fro in an impotence of agony.

  Suddenly she rose to her feet and had flung herself beside him with her hands on his arm. “Oh, save me from myself,” she cried. “I shall go mad, I have been alone for so long and my mind is sick with care. Oh, help me, help, do not go away. The Saints sent you here to-day, and I have been alone so long, and I have no friends but you.” And she ended in stormy tears.

  Francis was at his wit’s end with sorrow and perplexity. To see his proud mistress humbled pierced him to the heart. He raised her and with the help of the maid reduced her to something like calm. All the while there was an undercurrent of crazy delight. Now at last she had summoned him to her aid, he need fear no rival in her service any more; and at the thought he felt the ragged ends of his life gather to a centre. Here lay his duty and task; his toil was but beginning.

  At that moment through the window came the noise of a carriage driving rapidly along the highway to the North. It had the sound of a great equipage, and Francis instincti
vely drew back to the shadow of the curtain. Then came the sound of a stopping at the inn-door. The three in the room looked at each other in fear; even Mrs. Murray’s eyes lost their vacancy. Francis peeped through the curtain’s edge, but all he could see was a splash of light in the mid-road from the carriage lamps and the open inn-door. There was the sound of a man alighting, then of some talking with the landlord, in which the remaining inmates seemed to join. Then the man re-entered, the door was closed, and the echo of wheels died in the village street.

  Francis rushed from the room with a foreboding of tragedy. He met the landlord at the stair-head with a face somewhat whiter than his own. There was no need of question; the man’s look was eloquent of all.

  “It’s twae captains frae the Castle,” he faltered, “and Murray o’ Brochtoun is sitting atween them.”

  CHAPTER XVI. A Council of Honour.

  When Francis came to the house on the next forenoon he found it silent as a mausoleum. The smokeless chimney, the wide avenue beginning to show traces of lack of gardening, the great mass of untrimmed blossom on wall and border, and the sealed, dusty windows seemed to tell of a masterless home. Curlews screamed over the flower-garden, and in one spot where the heather had encroached on a clipped lawn two melancholy peacocks strutted in the confusion.

  The solemn maid opened the door to him and took him to the self-same room where he had sat that night a year before and waited on the lady with the lamp. The same air of lost splendour which had afflicted him without, oppressed him within, — the deep rich wainscotting, the carved shelves of books, the emblazoned mantelpiece, all with a subtle atmosphere of neglect and disuse. The carpet still bore the mark of a man’s mud-stained boot: here doubtless the Secretary Murray had bidden farewell to his house and his honour.

  Then Mrs. Murray came to greet him, and led him to a summer-room looking out upon the hill and the western valley. She was no more the distracted woman of yesterday, but composed and pale, with heroism at her lips and eyes weary of life. Francis trembled at the sight of her, for this face argued some quixotic resolve and he anticipated troublous days. Night had worked changes in his temper. He had lost his first tumultuous anger and grief; the fervours of his spirit had abated and left his soul cold and exceeding bleak. He wavered nothing from his purpose, but he would have welcomed gladly yesterday’s high sentiment. What though it were but vain elation, it had at least made the world roseate for an hour. Now he was a wiser, stronger man, but one with teeth set and his back to the wall, fighting against inclination, prudence, and his own unregenerate heart.