He rubbed his chin. ‘Twa miles on the way forks, an’ the right-hand road gangs on tae Gateside; but if ye tak the left fork, an’ head south through Edensmuir to Leslie an’ join the true road again at Cowdenbeath, ye’ll knock ten miles or more off the distance, that way.’
‘Is the way plain to follow?’ I asked. ‘I canna risk getting lost.’
He thought for an instant, then nodded. “Tis your lucky day; old Hammerhead’s in the end stall. Leslie’s his home stable and he kens his way hame if ever a horse did. Just let him gang his ain gait, an’ ye’ll not get lost if ye sleep on his back every step o’ the way frae here tae Leslie.’
We got old Hammerhead out and saddled up between us; and never was a horse better named, for I never saw an uglier brute in all my days. And at long last, after I’d paid the score and left the same word as I’d left at Kilmany, I was on my way again, and trying to overtake the time I had lost.
Two – three miles on, I came, as the old hostler had said, to a place where the road forked, or rather where the high road, such as it was, ran on towards Gateside and round Loch Leven to Kinross, where we had spent the night when I rode that way with Claverhouse, while on the left a rough track that I had not even noticed that first time went snaking down info lower country, losing itself in scrubby moorland and darkly ragged thorn-woods. There I reined in and sat for a few moments, thinking. The high road was at least clear to follow, while the southward track looked awful untrustworthy. But ten miles was ten miles…
Hammerhead was fidgeting under me, eager to turn left into his way home. Finally I gave him his head. ‘It’s your road,’ I told him. ‘In God’s name keep to it!’
Maybe it was a fool thing to do, and more than once I was cursing myself as we plunged deeper and deeper into the wilds of Edensmuir Forest, following tracks that were mere traces among the heather and did not have the feel of leading to any place in this world at all; and no living creature to be seen save the distant flicker of a roe deer and the curlew and snipe that we startled from the bents as we went drumming by. I have a good sense of direction myself, and can find my way blind about a wolf’s belly as well as most, but I take my bonnet off to that old nag; he was as wise as he was ugly; and not so long past noon, when I had about lost hope of ever winning clear of that black and sodden wilderness, we came to another track that crossed ours running east and west, and a straggling village at the way-crossing, and drew rein before an inn with the Leslie Arms painted on its swinging sign; or rather, Hammerhead came to a halt there of his own accord.
I parted from him with a hurried pat and a word of praise, and having asked my road to Cowdenbeath and again left word for horses to be ready next morning, I took to the wilds again. This time the track was easier to follow; but when we came down into the Rother Glen, the rain in the hills, coming down in brown swirling spate, was over the banks of the burn and had washed the timber bridge away.
With a horse I knew and that knew me, I would have tried swimming him over, myself still in the saddle, but as it was, I dismounted, and keeping an arm through the bridle, took off my plaid – it could not be soaked much wetter by the spate than it was already by the rain, but the weight of it could well drown me if I went under still wearing it – and rolled it into a tight bundle with my pistol in the middle, and made it fast to the saddle with my belt strap.
‘Now,’ said I, ‘in wi’ ye, ma laddie!’
The horse laid back his ears and tried to wheel aside; but I had him fast, and somehow I got him snorting and trembling down the torn bank, and we took to the racing water together. My, but the cold of it bit to the bone, August or no, all the chill of the high hills was in it, and the swirling force of it seemed like a live thing trying to carry us away! But somehow, half swimming and half floundering, we got across and found ourselves up the further bank and out on firm ground once more, without, I’m thinking, either of us much idea of how we got there. I know I threw up a surprising amount of burn water, while the horse stood by shivering and watching me – I had the presence of mind not to let go of his bridle the while. When I’d done, I belted on my plaid and the pistol again and, remounting, heeled the poor brute into a gallop without giving him more time to think about it.
The wet and windy day was fading early into a sodden gloaming when we came into Cowdenbeath and pulled up in the inn courtyard. And the hostler asked had we swum Loch Leven.
‘We didna come that way; but the bridge is washed away up Rother Glen,’ I said. ‘Give him a dash of ale in his mash, he’s earned it.’
‘Ye look as if ye could do wi’ something o’ the same kind yersel’, my young callant,’ said the man, kind enough.
‘Aye,’ I said, and the teeth were chattering in my head. ‘But I’ve no time.’ And I was away down the last long stretch to Inverkeithing.
It was long after dark when I came down through the little town, and saw the wind-tossed lantern light among the wharves and jetties, and leaving my horse at the inn, found my way down to the ferry.
The boatman was no better pleased to be called out after dark on such a night than the Dundee man had been to be called out before dawn on such a morning; but he went off, grumbling, his great gawky lad with him and myself hard at their heels. And by and by I was crouched in the stern of the ferry-boat while the lights of Inverkeithing dwindled smaller behind me, and the lights of Queensferry grew out of the blustery darkness ahead. I got out the remains of the food Darklis had given me, and tried to eat, but without much success. I had covered seventy miles and more hard riding since dawn, and I was weary almost beyond eating, and the heart cold within me when I thought what might have happened at Dudhope in the past hours. But I managed to thrust some of it down, and took a swig out of the flask, which made my head swim – unless that was the swing and bounce of the little boat in the choppy waters – I was never much of a sailor. But it put back some of the heart into me; and before long, on the southern shore with a fresh horse under me and a good road to follow, I was off on the last long stage of my ride.
Eh, but I was weary!
There’s not much I am minding of that last stage, just the wind and the darkness, and the drumming hooves of the post-horse as the miles reeled out behind me. But it seemed to go on a long, long time, so that I felt it to be far into the darkmost belly of the night before I reached Edinburgh town; and I was vaguely surprised when at last I came clattering up Leith Wynd, to find the glimmer of candles still shining here and there through the cracks in window shutters.
I came out into the Cannongate and swung right-hand towards the Netherbow, and in a few moments more was dropping from the saddle before the tall old house on the third floor of which Claverhouse had his town lodging.
A lantern over the door-arch was swinging in the wind, casting its lights and shadows across the entrance. I hitched the weary post-horse to the ring beside the door, and beat on the timbers until an old woman in a grey wrapper and carrying a candle came and opened it to me. ‘Eh?’ she said, peering out. ‘Wha’s there, knocking fit to raise the deid?’
‘I must speak with Colonel Graham –’ I began, and then as she tried to shut the door again, ‘I’m from Dudhope – from his lady—’
‘The Colonel has company,’ she said, still trying to shut the door again.
But my foot was safe inside. ‘He’ll see me,’ I said, and thrust the door back on her, then banged it shut behind me.
‘Och well,’ she shrugged, and holding up the candle, peered at me more closely. ‘Dinna I ken ye?’
‘Mebbe. I’ve been here before. Let me up, Grannie.’
‘The Colonel will no’ be best pleased, I’m warning ye, but that’s your affair.’ And grumbling to herself still, she shuffled away back to some den of her own in the back regions, taking the candle with her, and leaving the narrow entrance-way in pitch darkness.
I fumbled my way across to the turnpike stair and began to climb, past the doors of the lower landings, feeling with my hands until a faint light began to reach dow
n to me from a wall lantern far overhead. I came to the door of the third landing, and wondered whether it would yet be locked for the night; but when I tirled at the pin, it opened easily under my hand.
The small entrance room was lit by a branch of candles streaming in the draught from a passage-way on the far side, and Claverhouse’s gloves lay on a carved chest against one wall, together with a couple of rain-wet riding cloaks. More candlelight and the smell of tobacco smoke spilled out from another door that stood half open, and with it the sound of voices, and Claverhouse’s quiet laugh. I turned towards the doorway, and checked in the opening a moment to pull my sodden plaid into more seemly folds.
The booming of the wind had seemingly swallowed the sounds of my coming, and a screen of gilded leather half-shielded the doorway, and so for a few moments I saw the men in the room before they were aware of me. Lord Ross standing with his shoulder against the mantel as he kicked at a log that had rolled forward out of the fire; and another, a fair-haired man sprawling long legs out from the chair that seemed to have swallowed him, and who I knew, having seen him once or twice before, to be Colin Lindsay, the young Earl of Balcarres; both of them puffing away at their long-stemmed pipes. And in the opposite chair, Claverhouse himself, leaning forward to gaze into the fire, turning his pipe forgotten in his fingers. Indeed he was not one who smoked much, save to keep other men company, and I think he found little pleasure in it.
‘Aye well, it’s as good as finished with at last,’ he was saying. ‘Tomorrow to go over matters with the Quartermaster as to supplies and quartering for our own troops, eh, Ross? And with luck I’ll be away home by the morn’s morn.’
I hesitated to break in on their talk.
It was Balcarres that answered. ‘Ye’ve done a good job for the Foot Guards, and ye’ve sorted Colonel Douglas, but I’m thinking ye may have done a bad job for yourself.’
‘Ye think Colonel Douglas may bear a grudge?’ Claverhouse said. ‘Man, even if he did, what ill has he the power to do me?’
‘The power of being Queensberry’s brother,’ said Lord Ross, watching the smoke curl upward. ‘Ye’ll not deny that Queensberry has power in plenty?’
Claverhouse laughed. ‘Don’t be such an old hen-wife. Queensberry’s by way of being a friend of mine.’
‘By way of being?’ Balcarres shook his head. ‘You’re too trusting, Johnnie. Queensberry on his way up would be the friend of any man who was friend to the King or York. But Queensberry is no longer on his way up, he’s there! He has his dukedom and he doesn’t need your good offices any more. Also General Dalyell is an old man and a sick one, and our new duke wants the Commander-in-Chief’s place when it falls vacant, for his brother. And I’m thinking he must know you’ll get it, unless he can discredit you.’
‘All we’re saying,’ Lord Ross put in, ‘is – have a care, Johnnie.’
‘And not go spoiling Douglas’s little games? Somebody had to see justice done for these poor devils.’
It came to me suddenly that I was eavesdropping, and I made a trampling at the door, and went in round the screen, pulling off my drowned bonnet.
They looked round abruptly, and Claverhouse said, ‘Why, Hugh! In God’s name what—’
‘’Tis my lady,’ I croaked, ‘she fell on the stairs yestere’en, and this morning—’
Claverhouse was on his feet. ‘Is she – how sore is she hurt?’
‘Awfu’ bad – inside. They sent me to fetch you.’
I heard him catch his breath in between his teeth. Then he spoke, quite calmly to the other two. ‘Colin – Ross, you’ll have to tidy up things here; I’ll be back to the regiment as soon as I can.’ He strode past me through the open doorway, shouting for his man-servant, and when the chiel came running, began giving him orders for his horse to be brought round, and for his riding-cloak for he must start back at once for Dudhope. Aye, and orders for me to be dried and fed and put somewhere to sleep.
I cut in on that. ‘Sir – my post-horse is still at the door, and hard ridden; I must get him to his own stable out of this wind.’
‘Someone else will see to that,’ Claverhouse said. He put his hand on my shoulder. ‘I’ll thank you as you deserve, Hugh, when there’s time. Now away with you and get a good night’s sleep.’
I must have shot up like a beanstalk in the past few months, for it was at that moment I noticed, as one notices things when it is no time to be noticing them, that I no longer had to look up at him, for my eyes were on a level with his, and I could look straight into them. ‘It’s another horse I’ll be needing, no’ the night’s sleep,’ I said. ‘I’ll be riding back with you, sir.’
‘That’s daft talk,’ Claverhouse said, ‘ye’ve ridden close on a hundred miles the day.’
‘Ye can knock ten or more off that if ye strike north-east from Cowdenbeath and up through Leslie, ’stead of round by Kinross.’ My voice sounded mulish in my own ears. ‘Do ye ken that way, sir?’
‘I’ve ridden it as a boy. I daresay I can find it again.’
‘It’s no’ that easy to find. I rode it the day.’
‘You’ll hold me back –’
‘No’ if I’ve a horse to match yours. I’m riding wi’ ye, sir.’
His eyes looked back into mine, hard and searching. Then he let go my shoulders and turned to the servant still hovering in the doorway. ‘Two horses, Murray, and no bed, but dry clothes and food. Hand him over to Effie.’
And he went clattering off up another turn of the stairs, as I suppose to his own chamber.
In something like a dream, I heard the quick concerned voices of his two friends gathering up their own cloaks to depart; the whole place seemed springing to sudden life; and I was in the kitchen, my head suddenly swimming, in the warmth of the fire stripping off my sodden clothes and dragging on dry ones much too wide for me, under the watchful eye (despite all my protests) of a meagre little woman in an enormous night-cap, who assured me, as she set bread and beer and a heel of braxy ham on the table, that she had had brothers of her own.
I had scarcely had time to start on the food when the clatter of hooves sounded outside, and Effie snatched it from me and thrust it into Darklis’s wallet which somebody must have rescued and brought in, bidding me drink up, flinging a dry plaid over my shoulder, thrusting me out to go racing down the stairs at Claverhouse’s heels.
And almost before I could draw another breath I was in the saddle again, and following Claverhouse up the Cannongate. Mercifully the rain had slacked off, and there was even a late lopsided moon breaking through the ragged clouds, as not much after midnight we left Edinburgh by Leith Wynd and took the road to Queensferry.
I had got a kind of second wind, and I kept going well enough; but truth to tell there’s little that I remember about that ride, for when I think of it now, it is like trying to remember a confused dream. It must have been something after two in the morning when we came to Queensferry, and it was in my mind we might have trouble getting across; but ferries that do not ply for the likes of Hugh Herriot ply for the likes of John Graham of Claverhouse, and we made the Forth crossing without trouble; aye, and found all ready for us at Inverkeithing where I had left word, so that we were on horseback again with the least possible delay. And Claverhouse said something to me about having a head on my shoulders that warmed the heart in me, though I have never been too clear what it was.
He made me rise beside him whenever the road was wide enough; I am thinking so that he could keep an eye on me and see that I did not roll out of the saddle in my sleep. I mind the hostler at Cowdenbeath saying that the bridge was down in Rother Glen, and my own voice pointing out that I had come that way yesternoon… And unless there had been a lot more rain in the hills…
So we took the Leslie road, and I have a dim memory of splashing our way across the still flooded burn, the shock of the cold hill-water waking me somewhat from my dream, and Claverhouse taking the upstream side to come between me and the force of the spate. I mind the Ochills rea
ring up ahead of us, the heather on their flanks that had been wine-black yesterday turned to hazy amethyst in the late sunlight. I mind the choking taste of spirits that burned my throat like fire being poured into me at the post-house at Ferny and then not much more, not even the Tay crossing, until we were riding into the courtyard at Dudhope in the first dusk.
They must have been keeping a look-out for us, for the lanterns had been lit early, and Dr Anstruther was coming down the steps from the great door even as we reined up. He looked very tired, but there was a half smile lurking somewhere about his face as he came to Claverhouse’s stirrup. ‘The worst is over,’ he said. ‘By God’s grace your lady will live to bear you many sons.’
Claverhouse dropped from the saddle as I took his bridle from him. ‘The sons can wait,’ he said. ‘I may go to her?’
‘Lady Jean is asleep; I have bled her, and now rest is what she needs above all things. But to find you beside her when she wakes will do more for her than any leechcraft of mine.’
Claverhouse took a long step towards the house, then checked and turned a haggard face to look up at me. ‘My thanks, Hugh,’ he said, and reached up for my hand and gripped and wrung it. Then he went on with the doctor.
I led his horse with my own through into the stable-yard, where other hands took both bridles from me, and there were kindly concerned voices all about me as I half slid, half fell from the saddle, and the cobbles came up to meet me, rocking and dipping under my feet.
I lurched away and somehow clawed my way up the loft ladder, and pitched down on to my straw pallet. Someone pulled the rug over me, but before they had done, I had fallen headlong into sleep with the drum of horses’ hooves still beating in my head.
10
Captain Faa
I SLEPT THE clock round, and woke aching from head to foot, stiff as a board and hungry as a wolf in a famine winter; but a bowl of steaming porridge and a thick col-lop of mutton soon set the one to rights, and the rest wore off as the day went by, until by noon I was within sight of being back to my usual self. Aye me, the powers of recovery one has when one is not yet turned sixteen!
Bonnie Dundee Page 9
